EASTERN EMPIRE.

INVASION OF ALARIC.-Arcadius, the eldest son of the great Theodosius, seemed to impress his own feebleness on that empire whose history begins with his reign, A. D. 395. He ruled over Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, Dacia, and Macedonia. The obscure but clever Gascon Rufinus, who owed his elevation to the father, preserved his influence over the son; but his fall and death were brought on by his cruelties in the East, and by the marriage of the sovereign. He was succeeded by Eutropius, who shortly after incurred a similar fate. Gainas, the leader of the barbarian auxiliaries, dissatisfied at the frequent changes in the state, and probably moved by ambition, meditated the destruction of the Greek monarchy, by delivering up its capital into the hands of his fellow-countrymen; but the plot being discovered, he was compelled to withdraw beyond the Danube, where he perished in battle against the Huns. The empire escaped from these dangers only to encounter still greater. The Visigoths, on the refusal of Arcadius to pay the annual tribute, poured their wild bands into Thrace and Pannonia, following the guidance of Alaric, a chief of the ancient Balti. From the Adriatic to the Bosphorus, everything was devastated; and the Goths penetrated as far as Athens, the walls of which were vainly defended by the shade of Achilles and the powerful ægis of Minerva. They escaped from Stilicho, the minister of Honorius, who was sent against them, when the feeble counsels of Arcadius promoted the invader to the title of Prefect of Illyricum, 398.

PULCHERIA. The intrigues and conspiracies of the Eastern court are too numerons and too similar to deserve particular notice; but they contributed to the distress of the country by the consequent impossibility of employing the resources of the empire against the Barbarians. Pulcheria, scarcely fifteen years of age, was put at the head of affairs, and intrusted with the education of her young brother, THEODOSIus II., 408. During this minority the empire enjoyed internal as well as foreign peace; and its frontiers were extended by the addition of part of Armenia in 441. Theodosius, celebrated for the oldest collection of the Roman law which has come down to our time, was succeeded by MARCIAN, a soldier of great merit, who was invested with the purple when he received the hand of Pulcheria, 450. He braved the menaces of Attila, and by his firmness restored the peace of the church. With the death of his wife, in the year 453, the family of Theodosius became extinct.

The successor of Marcian was LEO the Great, A. D. 457. Proclaimed by the people, the army, and the senate, and crowned for the first time by the patriarch, this simple Thracian soldier appeared to revive the long-disused military elections of the empire. The Isaurian guard had for some time displaced the prætorians, whose privileges they now seemed desirous of assuming. On the death of Leo, they invested his son-in-law, their general ZENO, with the imperial dignity. A revolution placed BASILISCUS on the throne, who quitted his pleasures only to terminate by an edict of union the quarrels of the Orthodox and the Eutychians.

On the death of Zeno, Ariadne, the mother of Leo II., married a heretic, ANASTASIUS the Silentiary, who attained the sceptre in 491.

His character may be learnt from the flattering shout which greeted his accession-Reign as you have lived! His excessive intolerance towards the orthodox was atoned for by the removal of many oppressive taxes, the abolition of the sale of offices, the prohibition of combats between men and animals, the banishment of the seditious Isaurians, and other beneficial measures. He built Dara in Armenia to cover the frontiers on the side of Persia, and erected a wall fifty-four miles in length from the Euxine to the Propontis, for the defence of Constantinople. His long reign was agitated by religious quarrels, which in one instance cost the lives of 100,000 inhabitants of the capital. He was succeeded by JUSTIN I., a Thracian peasant, 518, whose throne, nine years afterwards, was occupied by his celebrated nephew JUSTINIAN.

WESTERN EMPIRE.

BATTLE OF POLLENTIA.-Honorius was eleven years of age when he succeeded to the government of Italy, Africa, Gaul, Spain, Britain, Noricum, Pannonia, and Dalmatia, in 395. His minister, the intrepid and sagacious Stilicho, himself of Vandal origin, supported the dignity of the Roman name in the West. After the revolt in Africa was quelled, 398, he was sent against Alaric, at that time ravaging Greece; but he was soon called to defend the sacred soil of Italy itself against that daring barbarian, 402. The Visigoths, after insulting Milan, and being almost shut up in their camp at Pollentia, were defeated in two battles, and compelled to leave in the hands of their conquerors a great part of the booty which they had collected in Greece. Honorius enjoyed, in Rome, the triumphal honours due to his successful general; and afterwards transferred the imperial residence to Ravenna, trusting for safety rather to the waters of the Adriatic than to the arms of his soldiers. Alaric retired into Pannonia, but the season of calm, which the Western Empire enjoyed, was of brief duration. Italy was again overrun by Radagaisus, who had served under that adventurer, and Rome threatened; but the manceuvres of Stilicho shut him up in the mountains, near Fæsulæ, where the united forces of the Goths and Huns were starved into surrender, and the leader himself beheaded, 406. Meantime Gaul was desolated by the Vandals from modern Lusatia, by the Suevi from between the Maine and the Neckar, and by the Alani from the banks of the Danube. It was defended by Constantine, who had usurped the imperial power, and whose lieutenant Constans administered the affairs of Spain.

CAPTURE OF ROME. Stilicho fell a victim to the intrigues of Olympius, an officer of the palace, who inspired the feeble Honorius with the determination of getting rid of a powerful minister, who was said to meditate the placing of his own son on the imperial throne. Thus the only general who was capable of defending Italy was put to death in 408. Alaric immediately resumed his projects against it, ostensibly to revenge the wrongs of his principal adversary; but neglecting Ravenna, he marched to Rome, which, since the time of Hannibal, more than six hundred years, had seen no enemy before its gates. A close blockade soon forced it to capitulate, on condition of paying 5000 pounds of gold, 30,000 of silver, 4000 silk dresses, 3000 pieces of fine scarlet cloth, and 3000 pounds of pepper, the last an

article held in the greatest esteem. The obstinacy and treachery of Honorius compelled Alaric to march a third time against the capital. At midnight a band of slaves in his interest opened the Salarian gate, and the inhabitants were roused from their slumbers by the sound of the Gothic trumpet in their streets. Eleven hundred and sixty-three years after its foundation, Rome, which had subdued the greatest part of the earth, was given up for six days to the fury of Scythians and Germans, 410. The piety of these recently converted barbarians respected the basilics of St. Peter and St. Paul. Marching to the south, devastating every thing upon which he set his foot, Alaric was surprised by death in the course of a few months at Consentia (Cosenza), while meditating an expedition to Africa.-He was succeeded by Ataulphus, with whom the emperor made peace by giving to him his sister Placidia in marriage. In return, he led his followers against the usurpers Constantine, Gerontius, Jovinus, and Sebastian, who were disputing the sovereignty of Gaul. The first was made prisoner at Arles and capitally punished; the second put himself to death; the other two were conquered by the Visigoths, and perished on the scaffold at Narbonne. Before the demise of Honorius in 424, several barbarian kingdoms had been established: the Burgundian in 413; the Suevian in Galicia, and the Visigoths in the south of France, 419. The main object of his government was the extirpation of heresy and paganism; he declared all noncomformers inadmissible to public offices, destroyed the temples with their idols, and endeavoured to abolish all gladiatorial shows.

KINGDOM OF Carthage, a. d. 439.-Honorius leaving no children, the inheritance reverted to Theodosius II., his nephew; but the union of the crowns of the East and West was no longer possible, and the emperor wisely transferred his rights to Valentinian III., the son of Placidia, 424. This princess defeated John the Secretary, who had usurped the Italian throne, and took the reins of state, while Pulcheria, sister of Theodosius, ruled in the east in the name of her brother. Under the new reign the dismemberment of the empire proceeded rapidly. Boniface, the governor of Africa, when on the point of falling a victim to the intrigues of the powerful minister, Ætius, proposed to Genseric the Vandal, in return for his assistance, a partition of the wealthy province of Africa, and that Mauritania should be his share. The court of Ravenna exerted itself in support of the governor, but he was unable to defend his province, and in 435, Valentinian, that he might save Carthage, ceded all Roman Africa. Genseric, four years later, became master of this great and populous city, plundered the treasures of the Catholic churches, and being installed in his new capital, assumed the title of King of the Earth, of the Sea, and of the Islands. His formidable navy had reduced Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily, the Balearic Isles, ravaged the northern coast of the Mediterranean, and threatened Constantinople.

ATTILA. The tribes of Huns established in the countries from whence they had expelled the Goths, between the Don, the Theiss, and the Volga, were united under this single chief, denominated the Scourge of God. The Byzantine court having refused the payment of the stipulated subsidy to his people, these barbarians crossed the frontiers, ravaged Thrace and Illyria, and forced Theodosius not only to pay the arrears, but to abandon the right bank of the Danube, 446. The emperor did

not long survive this humiliation. His successor Marcian opposed the pretensions of Attila with a firmness not unbecoming the Romans of an earlier age, and the barbarian was compelled to turn his views towards the West. In 451, he marched up the left bank of the Danube, and arrived at Basle, on the Rhine, with an army of 500,000 men. At the news of this irruption, Ætius endeavoured to preserve Gaul for his empire but in vain did the Burgundians dispute the passage of the river. Attila descending its left bank as far as Mentz, plundered Treves and Metz; after which leading his troops into the heart of Gaul, he pitched his camp before Orleans. At the very moment that he was entering that city by one gate, through another was advancing the army of Etius, with Theodoric and his Visigoths, and Meroveus with the Franks. The Huns were driven out and in the plains of Croisette, near Chalons on the Marne, a sanguinary battle was fought, in which 160,000 men were left dead upon the field, and the invader compelled to return to Germany. The next year he marched on Italy, destroyed Aquileia, took Pavia and Milan, and ravaged the north-eastern parts of the peninsula. He entered Ravenna through a breach in the walls, which the people had beeen obliged to make in token of their submission to his will, and hither the venerable pontiff Leo brought presents to conciliate the ferocious conqueror. The wrath of the latter was assuaged, and he retired from Italy loaded with the plunder of an hundred unfortunate cities. His death, in 453, was not less extraordinary than his life. Having espoused, in addition to a multitude of wives, the beautiful Hildichunde, he perished in the night of his marriage-intoxicated, and slain in a drunken fray, according to one account; a sacrifice to female craft, according to Agnellus; but most probably of apoplexy. The custom of primogeniture being unknown, the estates of the conqueror were divided by lot among all his sons.*

TAKING OF ROME BY GENSERIC, A. D. 455.-MAXIMUS having procured the murder of Valentinian III. and married his widow Eudoxia, had reigned three months, when the fleet of Genseric entered the port of Ostia to take vengeance on the guilty emperor, who was torn in pieces by the exasperated populace, while the injuries of ancient Carthage were avenged by its new citizens. Rome, which in forty-five years had recovered its magnificence and forgotten the depredations of Alaric, was given up during fourteen days to the license of the invaders. On the abolition of paganism, the capitol had been abandoned, but the statues of the gods and heroes which adorned it were respected; all of which, with the celebrated roof of gilded bronze, fell into the hands of Genseric. The golden table and candlestick, brought from Jerusalem several centuries before, were transported to Carthage by a barbarian who drew his first breath on the shores of the Baltic. The Christian churches and the treasures of the imperial palace offered a rich booty; but the vessel loaded with the spoils of the capitol, the most precious objects of art, foundered

* Attila was buried in a wide plain in a coffin enclosed in one of gold, another of silver, and a third of iron. With his body was interred an immense amount of booty, and that the spot might be for ever unknown, all those who had assisted at the burial were deprived of life. The Goths acted nearly in a similar manner on the death of Alaric in 410. They turned aside a small river in Calabria, and buried him in a grave formed in the midst of the channel. After restoring the stream to its course, they put to death all those who had been concerned in the formation of so singular place of se pulture.

on its passage. Thousands of Romans of both sexes whose charms or talents might contribute to the pleasures of their masters, were removed to Africa, where they furnished Deogratias, bishop of Carthage, with the opportunity of exercising his boundless charity. Eudoxia herself, who was plundered of her jewels while hastening to meet her liberator and ally, also followed the Vandal into a captivity which was shared by her daughters.

Genseric during twenty years was the terror of the East and West. With his numerous fleet, which he always commanded in person, he desolated all the coasts of the Mediterranean. After his death, 477, the Vandal kingdom was incessantly agitated by religious persecutions or harassed by the Moors, until Belisarius reduced Africa once more under the Byzantine dominion, 534.

END OF THE WESTERN EMPIRE. - During the twenty years which elapsed from the death of Valentinian in 455, Italy had acknowledged the rule of nine successive emperors. Most of them were mere puppets, managed by Ricimer, the commander of the barbarian mercenaries in the pay of Rome, and who was too prudent to assume in his own person the title of Augustus. Of all these, MAJORIAN was the only one who merited title and station. He enacted many wise laws, reformed the imposition and collection of taxes, and endeavoured to preserve the monuments of the city from destruction at the hands of its own inhabitants. Nor while thus peacefully occupied, did he neglect the external relations of the state. The Vandals and Moors were defeated at the mouth of the Liris, and Genseric's brother-in-law was amongst the slain. With a brave and disciplined army, the active monarch crossed the Alps in the middle of winter, marching on foot at the head of his legions, sounding the depth of the snow and encouraging by his example, the barbarians, who complained of the severity of the cold. His intention was to pass through Gaul and Spain into Numidia, and to overthrow the Vandal domination. Gaul submitted to his arms, Spain again recognised the authority of the empire, and a fleet of three hundred galleys was constructed to menace the African shores. But Majorian saw all his prospects blighted; his ships were surprised and burnt in the port of Carthagena, and he himself perished by the hands of his own soldiers, 460. The murderers conferred the supreme dignity successively on three senators-SEVERUS III., ANTHEMIUS and OLYBRIUS, all equally undeserving of the throne. These were followed by GLYCERIUS and JULIUS NEPOS, who were deposed in their turn, and ended their career, he one in the honours of a bishopric, the other in the retirement of Salona. The patrician Orestes, master-general of the army of Italy, after having been the minister of Attila, invested his son ROMULUS AUGUSTULUS with the purple which he had stripped from Nepos. But the barbarians in the service of the empire, under the name of fede• rates, not succeeding in their demand for one-third of the lands of Italy, revolted under the Herulean Odoacer. Orestes was defeated and killed at Pavia, and the youthful emperor was banished to Lucullanum in Campania, where he soon after died.

ODOACER, A. D. 476, received from his troops the title of King of Italy; but fearful of exciting jealousy, he never assumed either the purple or diadem. His office was without power; for in case of attack he could not rely on the zeal of the population whom he had despoiled;