Page:Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus.djvu/432

420 all the men had declared their adherence to his party, he received from them a promise of safety, and was gladly admitted to their assembly; where, however, though treated with all honour by the throng of mercenary soldiers, he found himself detained almost as a hostage; for they, like the prætorians who after the death of Pertinax had accepted Julian as their emperor because he bid highest, now undertook the cause of Procopius in the hope of great gain to themselves from the unlucky reign he was planning.

15. Procopius therefore stood among them, looking pale and ghost-like; and as a proper royal robe could not be found, he wore a tunic spangled with gold, like that of an officer of the palace, and the lower part of his dress like that of a boy at school; and purple shoes; he also bore a spear, and carried a small piece of purple cloth in his right hand, so that one might fancy that some theatrical figure or dramatic personification had suddenly come upon the stage.

16. Being thus ridiculously put forward as if in mockery of all honours, he addressed the authors of his elevation with servile flattery, promising them vast riches and high rank as the first-fruits of his promotion; and then he advanced into the streets, escorted by a multitude of armed men; and with raised standards he prepared to proceed, surrounded by a horrid din of shields clashing with a mournful clang, as the soldiers, fearing lest they might be injured by stones or tiles from the housetops, joined them together above their heads in close order.

17. As he thus advanced boldly the people showed him neither aversion nor favour; but he was encouraged by the love of sudden novelty, which is implanted in the minds of most of the common people, and was further excited by the knowledge that all men unanimously detested Petronius, who, as I have said before, was accumulating riches by all kinds of violence, reviving actions that had long been buried, and oppressing all ranks with the exaction of forgotten debts.

18. Therefore when Procopius ascended the tribunal, and when, as all seemed thunderstruck and bewildered, even the gloomy silence was terrible, thinking (or, indeed, expecting) that he had only found a shorter way to death,