Theodore pressed the letter to his lips, to his heart. Her hand had touched it, her spirit had dictated it: and the very sight of those beloved characters was balm to his bosom. The news she told, however, was painful; the danger that she apprehended great, if the rumours on which her fears were raised had themselves any foundation in truth.
Without hesitation, Theodore took his way at once to the dwelling of Attila, and was admitted to the presence of the king.
The monarch's brow was gloomy, but he received the Roman youth with tenderness. "What wouldst thou, my son?" he said. "Thou hast had letters, I find, from the land of the Alani. Do they bear thee good tidings? Thy face is sad."
"They say that the chiefs of the Alani fear the wrath of Attila," replied Theodore, boldly.
"They have cause!" answered the monarch, sternly--"they have cause! but, if thou wouldst send any letters back, prepare them quickly, for by to-morrow's noon the messengers return, and some of mine own accompany them."
"I would fain ask a boon," replied Theodore, anxiously. "In the land of the Alani, as thou well knowest, oh mighty monarch, I have those whom I love better than life itself. If thine arms, victorious as they ever have been, are now destined to be turned against the Alani, I would fain visit those dear friends, and provide for their safety. They are but women and children, and cannot protect themselves."
"Thou canst not go, my son," replied Attila. "Thou goest with me wherever my steps are directed. Thus have I resolved for thy sake, as well as for mine own. When last thou wert absent, dangers, and wellnigh death, befell thee! The same may occur again. Bleda is dead; but even for thy sake Attila could not slay a son. Thou understandest well that which I mean. While thou art with me, thou art safe; but among distant tribes, such is not the case. There, thy death might be accomplished without leaving a trace to tell me how. I know not yet whether the Alani are to be crushed as a swarm of wasps, or hived as bees. It depends upon themselves. Let them obey Attila, and they are safe; but, at all events, I go towards the western seas; and though Italy will not be visited, some of my hosts may sweep the mountains as they advance. It were better that they were not encountered by women--women such as these, who, I have heard from those who went with thee thither, are exceeding beautiful. Bid them remove to some other land. They dare not, I think you tell me, return to Illyria on account of the base, weak Theodosius; but, if thou wilt, I will issue my commands to that throned slave to receive them with friendship and favour. He dare not disobey!"
"Thanks, oh great king!" replied Theodore; "but willingly we will not tread that land again so long as he is emperor. Valentinian, however, in the West, offers them peace and protection. Thither will I send them, if, indeed, I may not see them ere they go. I fear not any danger to myself."
"It must not be," said Attila, in a tone that left no reply. "Thou must go with me; but I promise thee that, this expedition over, thou shalt have permission to visit them in that great pile of stones which you Romans call the capital of the world, and shall abide with them longer than thou didst before. In Rome thou wilt be safe; but I could not trust thy life in barren mountains and passes which would defy our search. The word of Attila is given: thou shalt visit them in Rome! and my promise, like thine, my son, can never be violated."
"I thank thee, oh Attila," replied Theodore--"I thank thee, and feel that thou art generous. So they be safe and free from harm, I am content to abide with thee."
"They shall be safe," replied Attila; "for my messengers to Valentinian shall command him to respect them as the children of his master; and the Alani shall have orders to guard them on their journey into the Roman state. Now hie thee hence and write thy letter--a weary task, I should think it! What need have men with letters? Was not speech enough? But they must still add to what the gods give them; and all their additions do but spoil Heaven's gifts."
Theodore took his leave and withdrew; and going back to his dwelling, he called one of his attendants, saying, "Haste thee to Constantius, the Roman secretary of the king; ask him to send me parchment, and reeds, and ink, or, if he have no vellum, let him send papyrus."
The materials for writing were soon brought to him; and sitting down by the fresh-trimmed lamp, Theodore spent the next four hours of the night in pouring forth to Ildica all the feelings of his heart.
"I have not come, oh dearest, and most beautiful, I have not sent, because to do either was impossible; and even now, my prayer has been refused, when I petitioned Attila to let me go, in order to guard thee from difficulty and danger. He gives me the means, however, of sending thee this letter; and although it will soon cause the distance between us to be increased, yet gladly and eagerly do I seize the opportunity of bidding thee fly from the land of the Alani ere it become dangerous for thee to tarry. Fly, my Ildica; bid our mother fly as speedily as may be; for although the anger of Attila towards the nation with whom thou dwellest may be appeased, yet the myriads of the Huns are arming for some distant expedition, and he himself has said that a part of the host take their way by the Norican Alps. On their course is danger and destruction; and even where they come as friends, perils not small, to all whom they approach, precede and accompany their march.
"Oh that I could be with thee, to guide and guard thy footsteps! Oh that I could be with thee, to shelter thee in my arms from every danger and from every injury! But it must not be: and I must bid thee go farther from me, leave the calm retreat where, even in exile, we have known together some of our brightest hours of uninterrupted joy, and plunge into the crowd of a wide, vicious, luxurious city, where thousands will strive to efface the memory of the absent from thy heart; where thousands will strive to win the hand that has been promised unto me; where thousands will deem thy beauty and thy love prizes to be won by any means, conquests to be made by any falsehood.
"Yes, my Ildica, thou must fly to Rome; and yet I bid thee do so without one fear that any thought or any feeling of her I love will be estranged from me by absence, that her affection will be diminished by any art of others to win it for themselves, or that her heart will not be as wholly mine when next we meet as when last we parted. If I know my Ildica aright, and judge not Rome too harshly, the capital of the empire will be but a wide desert to her, who has no feelings in common with its degenerate and voluptuous inhabitants. Ravenna itself would be worse; and I grieve that it is so, for my Ildica's sake, knowing well that, even were the best and the brightest of other days assembled round her, they could not steal one feeling of her heart from the first grateful object of her young but steadfast love.
"Go, then, to Rome, my Ildica! and, amid the best of those who still remain, thou mayst, perhaps, find some who will cheer thine hours during our separation, some whose example and advice may be necessary and salutary, both to Eudochia and to Ammian. Long, I fear, alas! too long, will be that separation; for although Attila has fixed a time at which I may once more fly to see thee, yet that time is named as the end of the expedition on which he is now about to set out; and it is only in the knowledge of one all-seeing Being how long that expedition may continue, or whither it may lead.
"Still, however, it is a bright hope, a hope that will cheer me and console me, though it may make the day seem long and the hours fly heavily, till they dwindle down to the moment of my glad departure. Of what may intervene, I will think the best: dangers may happen, sorrows may befall; but I will not anticipate either the one or the other, and will only think that every hour which passes only serves to bring nearer the time of our reunion.
"What I most fear is, that the arms of Attila are about to be turned against some part of our native land; for where, indeed, could he lead his hosts, without meeting some portion of the Roman empire? He demands, too, that I should accompany him; but be assured, sweetest Ildica, that the hand of Theodore will never be armed against the land of his fathers; and though, as a Roman, I feel that I should be justified in striking to the earth the head of a tyrant, or of a tyrant's favourite, by whom my father was unjustly doomed to die, there is a difference between the country and its oppressor. I might be a Brutus, but I would never be a Coriolanus. If I go with Attila, and if his arms are turned against the empire, I may go as a spectator to the war; but let it be remembered--and oh, Ildica, make it known, wherever a Roman ear will listen--that I go against my will, and as a captive; that I leave my sword behind me in these wars; that my shield is hung up by the hearth I leave in this barbarian land; and that, if I fall amid the events which may now ensue, I fall without dishonor.
"Let me turn, now, to sweeter thoughts; let me think of some dearer theme. I have dreamed, I have fancied, that after this expedition is over, perchance Attila may abridge the period of my captivity, and permit me to return, and at the altar of our God claim my Ildica as my own for ever. Oh, beloved! how my heart beats even when I think of that hour, when I think of the moment that shall make thee mine--mine beyond the power of fate itself--mine through life and through eternity--united unto me by bonds that nothing can sever--wife of my bosom--mother of my children--one, one with me in every thought, in every feeling--in hopes, in fears, in joys and sorrows, one! Oh, Ildica! what were heaven itself, could we but think that dear bond, that tie which binds the soul itself, could be burst even by the hand of death. Oh, no! I will not believe it, that even in another life I shall not know, and see, and love thee still; that purified, perhaps, and elevated, calmed down and tranquillized from the agitating fire that thrills through every vein when I but think of thee, the same intense affection which I now feel shall not survive the tomb, and become one of the brightest parts of a brighter state of being. Yes, Ildica, yes, it shall be so! Those who doubt it know not what love is; for oh, surely, if there be feelings in this life at all that deserve to be immortal, it is those which would make us sacrifice life itself, and all that life can give, for another.
"Thou thinkest of me, Ildica; yes, I know thou thinkest of me. My heart is a witness for thine, that not an hour of the dull day passes without some thought of those we love; and it is strange, oh, how strange! that out of objects which have no apparent connexion with such images, the idea of her I love is brought before my mind, and my heart, like the bee, draws the honey of those sweet associations from everything it finds. If, when hunting in the neighbouring woods, the sweet breath of the wild cherry blossom is wafted past me by the wind, the image of Ildica, I know not why, rises up instantly before my imagination; and every sweet perfume of the odorous flowers seems to gain an additional fragrance from the associations that they call up. If the singing of the spring birds strike mine ear, do not the tones of that dear voice come back upon memory, and thrill through my inmost heart? Everything is lost in thee; nothing that I admired, or loved, or delighted in before, seems now to have any separate existence in my eyes, but is all beheld with some reference to her I love.
"Oh, Ildica! do we not love each other better for all the anxieties and cares which have surrounded the first days of our affection? If so, let us not regret them, for they have been stern but kind-hearted friends, who may have chastised our youth, but have left us an inestimable treasure ere they departed: yes, inestimable, indeed, for there are gems to adorn existence as well as to ornament the body; and the brightest of all the diamonds of the heart's treasury is love such as I feel for thee.
"Tell Flavia that I love her as her son; and tell her all I feel for thee. It will be more pleasant unto her ear than aught I could say unto herself. Bid her not mourn more than needs must be to return to Rome--the city which she knew in days of happiness--now that so much of that happiness has passed away. Bid her cheer herself with hope, for the clouds are beginning to break away; and the sun may soon shine once more, if not for her as bright as ever, yet with a tranquil splendour that will refresh her heart.
"Cast thine arms round Eudochia, and kiss her with love for her brother's sake, telling her how deeply and bitterly he regrets that he is not permitted to guard her youth, and foster her beauty and her virtues, till a husband's hand took from his own the task. Greet Ammian, too, with love, telling him that he must curb his wild spirit, and keep all his courage and all his energies to protect those whom God has placed under his charge, and left without other safeguard.
"One word more, my beloved, to end this long epistle. Doubt not that at Rome you will find protection; for you have it from one whom you have seen, but hardly know--from one so mighty, however, that, alas! experience shows, even Rome herself must tremble at his frown. Attila protects you; and unto Valentinian he has sent a message to respect you and yours as if you were his children. The weak and corrupt monarch that Rome must obey dare as soon neglect this warning as fall upon his sword. The Alani, too, have orders to conduct you safely to the Roman territory. Oh that every step should thus bear you farther from me!
"As I cannot see thee, as I cannot embrace thee, I would willingly write to thee for ever. But it must come to an end. Farewell, sweet Ildica! farewell, my beloved! Remember me still, as heretofore! Love me ever! Love me as well as I love thee! I ask--I can have--no better love. Farewell, again and again farewell!"
We must pass over the events of some months, and change the scene to the heart of France.
In the vast plains between the Seine and the Marne, where the eye can roam unobstructed over many a mile of open country, runs a brook of the clearest water, which, wandering on through vineyard and cornfield, joins the latter river not far from Soulanges.
At the time I speak of, however, no corn spread over that wide plain, no vines obstructed the progress of the eye, and nothing but thin low grass, which had sprung up where wheat and oats had been cut down or burnt, covered the brown surface of the earth with a robe of autumnal green. A wanderer, who stooped down to bathe his weary brow in that rivulet, had gazed, before he bent his head, upon the wide scene before his eyes, and over the whole plain not a living creature was seen to move. A raven winged its slow flight across the sky, but that was the only sign of life which the keenest eye could discover. When the wayfarer raised his head, however, and gazed again, a brown shadow seemed to lie upon the land near the horizon, and, mounting upon the base of a ruined landmark, he saw that dull shade creeping onward towards him. He looked up to the sky to see if it were a cloud, which, borne by the wind, might interrupt the light of the sun; but over the whole heaven was spread a thin, filmy vapour, which intercepted all the stronger rays.
He gazed again, and the shadow seemed to assume the form of a wide range of heathy bushes blown about by the air. Still the cloud advanced, and gradually spreading, like a high wave, seen rushing in a long bending line over the shore, it came forward across the plains, stretching out as far as the eye could reach. Distinct and more distinct at length the brown masses raised themselves above the earth, and in the end innumerable horsemen might be seen advancing with a slow pace from the westward. A cry of terror burst from the weary wanderer, and he fled as fast as his limbs would bear him. Ere half an hour had passed, the war-horse of Attila pawed the ground beside the fallen landmark, and the myriads of the Huns spread out over all the plain.
"Let the ground before me be cleared," cried the king; and then, poising his javelin above his head, he cast it forward with prodigious force. A hundred cubits farther than any other arm could throw, it still sang on through the air, then touched the earth, and quivered in the ploughed-up ground.
"There pitch my tent," continued Attila; "there fix our camp. Turn all faces back towards the west, for Attila has retreated far enough, and here we have space to wheel our horses on the foe. Oh Theodoric! Theodoric! thou hast deceived and betrayed thy friend. I offered to make thee a king indeed, instead of a puppet in the hands of Rome; but Ætius with his loud promises, and Avitus with his fair flattery, have seduced thee to the side of Attila's enemies, and, ere two days are over, either he or thou must die. Had it not been for thee and thy Goths, the Romans of Gaul, like the Romans of the East, had been now crouching in trembling terror at the feet of Attila. But they shall still tremble! Shall it not be so, oh Valamir? Will not thy subjects die their hands in the blood of their degenerate kinsmen? Shall it not be so, Ardaric? Will not thy Gepidæ smite the heads of the vain loquacious Franks? Attila will beard the Roman, and even here shall be the spot. Make the camp strong, and let no one sit apart from the rest. Let the wagons be placed around, and the spaces beneath them filled up, and leave no entrance but one; for if we destroy not this Roman army in the field, we will wait it in our camp, and by the head of my father I will not leave the land till it is dispersed. Bid the wise men and the diviners sacrifice, and consult the bones of the slain, that I may know what will be the event of to-morrow. Tell them that we fight, even if we die. Let them speak the truth, therefore, boldly. Ha! Theodore, my son, ride hither with me."
The young Roman spurred on his horse at the monarch's command, and rode on beside him while he surveyed the field. Theodore, however, was not armed, and he only feared that Attila might be about to ask him some question in regard either to the Roman discipline or the arrangements of his own troops for battle, to answer which he might feel incompatible with his duty to his country. But Attila, as he proceeded, gave directions to the various leaders who followed him, interrupting, from time to time, for that purpose, his conversation with the young Roman, which turned to a very different theme.
"Those diviners," he said, "I have no trust in them. Would that we had here that holy man from the mountains beyond the Teïssa! Then should we have some certainty in regard to the result of to-morrow's battle. Dost thou know, my son, what are the means which the Christian augurs use to learn the future as they do? Valamir, my friend," he continued, turning to the King of the Ostrogoths, "seest thou yon mound, the only one which interrupts the eye as it wanders towards the east. Though that mound be scarcely bigger than a great ant-hill, much may depend upon it--even the fate of the battle," he added, in a low voice. "We will range our host along this brook, at the distance of two hundred cubits; the hill will be before us, but let it be seized ere the strife commences. Say, Theodore, knowest thou how the Christian augurs are accustomed to divine?"
"The Christians have no augurs, oh Attila!" replied Theodore. "There have been, and there are, prophets among them to whom is revealed by God himself some of the events that are to come."
"That is but a pretence," answered Attila. "We judge by the bones of the victims, other nations by their entrails. Some divine by the sand, some by the lightning, some by the flight of birds; but all who have any knowledge of the future gain it from some manifest sign. So must it be with the Christian augurs; but they conceal their knowledge, lest others should learn it and be as wise as they are. Ardaric, my friend and wise counsellor, place thyself early upon the right. Thou wilt never fly nor bend, I know, but let us all be calm in the hour of battle. Let not rage and rashness make us forget that victories are as often won by calm and temperate skill as by impetuous daring. Lo! yonder come the Romans! I would fain that they should not live another night on the same earth with Attila; but it is too late to destroy them to-day. I will not look upon them, lest I be tempted overmuch. What say the diviners?" he continued, turning to an attendant who came running up from a spot where a large fire had been hastily lighted.
"I know not, mighty king!" replied the slave; "but the sacrifice is over, and they come to seek thee."
Attila paused, and waited, while a crowd of Huns and slaves, all eager to hear the announcement, came forward, accompanying the diviners. They, unlike the Roman augurs of a former time, were dressed in no graceful robes; but, covered simply with the rude garments of the Scythians, they were only distinguished from the rest of the Huns by a wilder and fiercer appearance. As they came near, however, Attila dismounted from his horse; and the diviners approaching with less reverence than the rest of his people displayed towards him, the elder of the party addressed him boldly.
"Hear, oh Attila!" he said--"hear what the gods pronounce by the bones of the victims! Of the result of the battle we know nothing, and therefore we cannot promise you the victory; but we know that the leader of your enemies shall die in the strife. To-morrow's sun shall rise upon him living, and set upon him dead. We have spoken what we know."
"Ætius shall die, then!" said Attila. "So let it be! But can ye say nothing farther! Can ye not tell which will be successful in to-morrow's strife!"
"We had no answer," replied the diviner, with a gloomy look; "the gods left it doubtful."
"They left it to our own valour, then!" cried Attila, in a voice of triumphant confidence. "Our hearts and our arms shall make it no longer doubtful. Lo! yon Romans still advance over the plain. They must not come too near us. Ardaric, let thy Gepidæ recross the stream, and ensure that the enemy do not approach within a hundred bowshots. Theodore, wouldst thou leave me, my son?" he added, seeing the young Roman's eyes turned with a look of natural interest upon the advancing legions of Ætius--"wouldst thou leave me, my son? If so, Attila gives thee leave to go. I fear not that there should be one brave man added to yon mighty host of cowards. I have saved thy life, I have loved thee well, I have treated thee as my child; but if thou wouldst leave Attila at such a moment as this, thou shalt go in peace."
Theodore sprang to the ground and kissed the hand of the monarch. "I will not leave thee, oh Attila!" he said--"I seek not to leave thee, and of all times I would not leave thee now. Fight against my native land I cannot; but through to-morrow's field I will ride unarmed by the side of Attila, and defend him, as far as may be, from every danger in the strife. I am grateful, oh mighty king! for all your favours: I love you for all your kindness and all your noble qualities; and doubt me not, I beseech you, for though I fight not on your part, none will be more faithful to you than I will. Oh, doubt me not!"
"I do not doubt you," answered Attila; "but let us to our camp."
Difficult were it to describe, impossible to convey any adequate idea of the scene of tumult, din, and confusion which the camp of the Huns presented during that night. The circle of wagons placed in a double row, and forming in reality a strong fortification, was nearly completed, when Attila led the way thither, and turned his steps towards his own tent. Fastened to strong stakes driven into the ground between the inner wheels, the wagons were immoveable from without, but easily turned or withdrawn from within; and embracing an immense extent of ground, they afforded space for the mighty host which Attila had led into the plains of Gaul.
During that night, and comprised in a space of a few miles, more than a million of human beings, either in the Hunnish or the Roman army, prepared for battle and panted for carnage. No still quiet followed in the train of night: the blows of the hammer and the mallet, the ringing of armour, the voices of guards and commanders, the tramp of thousands passing to and fro, the murmur of innumerable voices, the loud and ringing laugh, the war-song shouted high and strong, the sounding of trumpets and of wild martial music, the neighing of several millions of horses,[1]raised a roar through the whole air, in the midst of which the sounds of an accidental conflict that took place between the troops of Ardaric and those of Theodoric, the Gothic ally of Ætius were scarcely heard; though so fierce was the struggle for the bank of the rivulet, that fifteen thousand men were left dead within a stone's throw of the Hunnish camp.
Thus passed the night; and early on the following morning Attila appeared at the door of his tent, and was soon surrounded by the different leaders of the nations under his command. His countenance was serene and bright; and the attendants who had passed the night in his tent declared that he had slept as calmly as an infant, from the moment that he lay down his head to rest to the moment that he woke to battle. Calmly and tranquilly he asked the tidings of the night; and, in a brief conversation with the leaders, assigned to every one his proper post, and pointed out the great objects to be striven for in the coming conflict. Towards the third hour after daybreak, one of the watchers before the camp of the Huns announced that they saw movements in the Roman camp; and Attila, instantly springing on his horse, led forth his troops himself through the single aperture which had been left for that purpose. Two hours more elapsed ere the whole of that mighty host were in array; but then to any eye looking along over the wide plain, strange and fearful must have been the sight, yet grand and magnificent.
On one side of that little brook, running pure and clear between those hostile armies--like the bright stream of divine love, pouring on its refreshing waters of peace amid the strife and turbulence of human passions--stretched forth the host of Attila, nearly seven hundred thousand horsemen from every land and every nation of the North. There, in the centre, under his own immediate command, appeared the dark line of dusky Huns, little embarrassed with defensive armour, but bearing the strong and pliant bow upon their shoulders, and at their side the quiver, loaded with unerring arrows; the large heavy sword, too, was in the hand of each, and at many a stirrup of the wilder tribes hung, as an ornament, a gory human head. Far on the right appeared the Gepidæ, fairer in complexion, more bulky in limb, and more splendid in arms and apparel, but generally reputed less active, less fierce, and less persevering than the Huns. On the left, again, were seen the Ostrogoths, tall, fair, and powerful; and the intervening spaces were filled up with a thousand barbarous tribes--the Rugi, the Geloni, the Heruli, the Scyrri, Burgundians, Turingians, and those called the Bellonoti. A thousand tongues were spoken in that host, a thousand varieties of face and garb were seen, but all were actuated by the same feelings--hatred to the Romans, and reverence for the mighty Hun.
On the other side of the brook, again, appeared, not less in number, and not less various in appearance, the vast army which Ætius had collected from the different nations that inhabited Gaul; the long-haired Frank, the blue-eyed Goth, the sturdy Armorican, the powerful but doubtful Alan; and there, upon his right, appeared Theodoric, the wise and valiant monarch of the Visigoths, with his white hair, speaking the passing of many a careful year, and his three gallant sons, ready to obey, with the activity of youth, those directions which the wisdom of his age might dictate. In the centre were placed all the more doubtful allies of the Roman empire, mingled with such as might act as a check upon their wavering faith. On the left of the line appeared the Roman eagles, under the command of Ætius in person. There, too, might he be seen, in the eyes of the whole army, riding from rank to rank, and with bold and cheerful words encouraging his soldiers, and exciting them to great exertion. Small in person, but graceful, well proportioned, and active, with the lion heart of the hero and the eagle glance of the great general, the whole aspect of Ætius breathed courage and inspired energy. Wherever he rode, wherever he appeared, a cheerful murmur greeted him; and when at length he galloped his splendid battle-horse along the line, and, riding up to Theodoric, embraced the old chieftain without dismounting from his charger, a loud and universal shout burst from the army, and seemed to the ears of the Romans a presage of victory.
Calm, grave, and immoveable sat Attila upon his black charger, a stone's throw before the line of the Huns. On him every eye in his own host was turned; and in that moment of awful suspense which precedes the closing of two mighty powers in the first shock of battle, the barbarian myriads seemed to forget the presence of their Roman adversaries in the intense interest with which they regarded their terrible leader. Armed, like themselves, with a bow upon his shoulder and a sword in his hand, Attila sat and gazed upon his forces, turning from time to time a casual glance upon the Romans, and then looking back along the far extending line of Huns, while a scarcely perceptible smile of triumphant anticipation hung upon his lip.
He sat almost alone, for his nearest followers and most faithful friends remained a few paces behind; while, with that stern, proud glance, he ran over his often victorious bands, and seemed waiting with tranquil confidence for the approaching strife. At length, all seemed prepared on every side, and the stillness of expectation fell upon the field. It continued till it seemed as if all were afraid to break it, so deep, so profound grew that boding silence.
Slowly turning his horse, Attila rode back towards the centre of the Hunnish cavalry, and then, with a voice so clear, so distinct, so powerful, that its deep rolling tones are said to have reached even the Roman lines, he exclaimed, "Unconquerable race, behold your enemies! I strive not to give you confidence in me or in yourselves. Here is no new leader, no inexperienced army. Well do you know how light and empty are the arms of the Romans. They fly not with the first wound, but with the first dust of the battle! Fearing to meet you unsupported, and remembering that where Romans have encountered Huns the Romans have fallen like corn before the reaper, they have called to their aid degenerate tribes, who have taken shelter in the vicious provinces of Rome, after having been expelled from among the native Goths, from the Gepidæ, the Heruli, the Alani. These, whom we have driven from among us--these, weak, corrupted, degraded as they are--form the bulk, supply the strength, afford the courage of the army before you. Behold them as they stand! are they not as one of their own fields of corn, which we have a thousand times trodden down beneath our horses' feet? We are no weak husbandmen, that we should fail to reap such a harvest as that. On, warriors, on! Pour on upon the Alani! Break through the degenerate Goths! At the sound of our horses' feet, the Roman eagles, as is their custom, will take wing and fly; and yon dark multitude shall disappear like the mist of the morning! Why should fortune have given unto the Huns innumerable victories, if not to crown them all with this successful day? On, warriors, on! Drink the blood of your enemies! Let the wounded, in dying, strike his javelin through his foe, and no one dare to die ere he have brought a Roman head to the ground. I tread before you the way to victory; and if any one follow not Attila, he is already dead!"
A loud acclamation burst from the nearer ranks, and ran along all the line of the Huns, while even those who had not heard poured forth their own clamorous applause of the words which they fancied had been spoken; and the clang of arms dashed violently together, mingled with the deafening shout that rose up from the barbarian host.
"Seize on yon hill, Valamir!" cried Attila, while the roar continued: "it should have been done before."
The monarch of the Ostrogoths hastened to obey; but scarcely had his troops been put in motion, when a corresponding movement was seen upon the part of the Romans; and the terrible strife of that day--the most fierce, the most sanguinary that Europe ever has seen--was commenced by the struggle for that low hill, between the two rival tribes of Goths.
For a time the rest of both armies remained unmoved, as if spectators of the combat; but rage and emulation increased in their bosoms every moment as they gazed, and at length it became impossible for the leaders on either part to restrain in their troops the burning thirst for battle. On poured the Huns upon the Romans: on rushed the Romans on the Huns. The whirling masses of the Scythian horsemen, enveloped in a cloud of dust, from which shot forth a hail of arrows, passed through and through the ranks of the enemy, casting themselves in vain upon the firm legions of Ætius, scattering the Franks and the Sicambres, sweeping down whole ranks of the Alani and the Goths. On, in heavy line, with their long spears lowered, poured the multitude of the Gepidæ, bearing slaughter and confusion wherever they came.
But still Theodoric and his Goths maintained the hill; still Ætius and his legions fought unconquered on the plain; still the Franks and the Alani, knowing that valour could alone save them, continued the combat against the Huns. Hour after hour passed by; rank after rank was mowed down; the rivulet, late so pure and clear, flowed onward one unmingled stream of blood; and the feet of the Hunnish horses, as they charged again and again the confused but unsubdued masses of the Romans, splashed up a gory dew from the pools that lay unabsorbed upon the loamy soil. So great, so terrible was the slaughter, that the horses could scarcely keep their feet among the bodies of the dead and dying. Each waving sword dismissed some erring spirit to its last account; each footfall trampled on the writhing limbs of some mangled fellow-creature.
In the foremost ranks of battle, wherever danger was pre-eminent, wherever the foes remained unbroken, wherever the carnage was most intense, there was seen Attila; and wherever he appeared, there for the time was victory obtained. Through the whole of that day, too, Theodore was by his side; and for the second time he saw upon him what his followers not unaptly called "the spirit of the battle." Though prompt and clear in every command, keen and ready to seize every advantage, the calm and moderate sternness of his demeanour was gone; and, fierce as the lion of the wilderness, rapid as the leven bolt of heaven, remorseless and unsparing as the hurricane, he swept on. No one stood before him for an instant; no one was struck a second time; but, wherever an adversary crossed his path, there was left, at a single blow, a disfigured corpse upon the ground, or else his horse's feet trampled out the faint sparks that his sword had left.
Death seemed to march before him against his enemies, nor ever turned to approach himself; and only twice, when surrounded almost on every side by the foe, could Theodore interpose to parry with an iron truncheon, which was the only weapon that he bore throughout the day, the blows of a spear and a javelin, which were aimed at the monarch's throat. The young Roman knew not that he had seen the service rendered; but at length, when the day was far spent, Ellac, his eldest son, crossed the path of the monarch, saying, "Ride not in the battle with the Roman, oh my father! He is of the country of our enemies, and may kill thee when thy back is turned. Let me slay him even now, lest the traitor destroy thee!"
"He has saved my life twice this day!" cried Attila, urging forward his horse. "Out of my way!" he continued, seeing that his son still stood before him. "Out of my way! or, by the god of battles, I will send thee to the land of spirits! Out of my way!" and he raised his sword over his son's head as if about to cleave him to the jaws.
Ellac saw that the moment was not his; and, reining back his horse, he sought another part of the field, while Attila pursued his career, and strove, but strove long in vain, to obtain possession of the hill. At length, as the closing day waxed faint and dim, and the gray shade of evening falling over the whole bloody scene, announced that the battle must soon close or be prolonged into the night, Attila for a moment gained the summit of that long-contested eminence, and slew with his own hand the last of the Gothic warriors, whose especial charge had been to defend that post. Up to that instant he had rushed on like a devouring flame, leaving nothing but ashes behind him; but there he suddenly paused, gazed forth upon the confused and mingled masses of the Huns and Romans, that, with equal success, and very nearly equal numbers, were seen spread over the plain for many miles around. He then lifted his eyes towards the sky, marked the dim gray that mingled with the blue, and the bright star of evening betokening that the brighter sun was gone; and with a sudden calmness said, in a low, tranquil voice, "It is too late for victory to-night! It is too late! Let the trumpets be sounded!" he continued, to some of those who followed--"let the trumpets be sounded, to recall all men to the camp! Gather together the ten nearest squadrons upon this slope! The Romans, I think, have had enough of strife to-day, and will not seek it further; but they have fought well for once, and Attila must defend his own, while they seek a place of repose for the night."
He added some further orders; and in a few minutes was heard, from the Hunnish camp, the sound of trumpets, giving forth the peculiar notes of recall with which the Huns and other barbarous nations were acquainted; and, separating themselves gradually but securely from the masses of the Romans, the various tribes which had followed Attila to that bloody battle were seen moving, in firm and regular order, towards their camp.
What would have been the result of this movement under other circumstances, it is difficult to say, had the eye of Ætius marked the proceedings of the Huns, or the mind of Theodoric directed the movements of the enemy; but trampled under the horses' feet, not far from the spot where Attila then sat, lay the disfigured body of the Gothic king, and the Roman general was far away, embarrassed with a party of the Gepidæ, by whom he had nearly been taken.
The inferior commanders of the Roman host gladly perceived that a battle, of which they were beginning to despair, was not entirely lost; and seeing the dark cloud of Huns, with which Attila on the hill covered the man[oe]uvres of his troops, they dared not act any very vigorous part, with thinned and exhausted troops, against so bold and well-prepared an enemy. The trumpets of Attila continued to sound for two hours after nightfall: his forces entered the camp unmolested, and the last of the host who left the battle-plain was the monarch of the Huns himself.[2]
"Let the dead be numbered!" said Attila, as he entered his tent--"let the dead be numbered! I have lost many of my children! Let every chieftain of every tribe count up their numbers, and tell me how many are wanting. We are brave men, and can look our loss in the face. Theodore, my son, I thank thee; and I give thee leave, as a Roman, to rejoice that, for the first time, Attila has fought without winning a victory."
Thus saying, he passed on, and Theodore turned to where his own tents were placed. It had been a day of terrible excitement; and no man, probably, in either army, had felt such strange and contending emotions as the young Roman, who, riding by the side of Attila through that terrible conflict, exerted every energy to defend the monarch's life, and yet from his heart wished success unto his enemies. Though every moment his own person had been in danger--the more, perhaps, because he sought to take the life of none himself--yet, during the day, he had not felt even that slight exciting shade of apprehension which is rather pleasing than otherwise. His whole thoughts had been divided between Attila and the Romans. He had sought most eagerly, and he had found completely, an opportunity of proving his gratitude to the monarch of the Huns for all the great and singular favour which he had displayed towards him.
That gratitude had indeed been great. It is true, he had discovered that Attila had a personal object in the first signs of forbearance which he had shown towards him; but Theodore was not one to scan narrowly the causes of gratitude, or to weigh it out in very fine and accurate scales; and yet, though he would willingly have given his life to save that of the mighty king who had protected and befriended him, he could not find in his heart to wish his fellow-countrymen defeated. Thus he had watched the wavering progress of the fight with an anxious and a beating heart, longing every moment to spring forward and rally the legions when he saw them shaken, or to form again the cohorts broken by the Hunnish cavalry.
The same feelings continued, and agitated him still after he had re-entered the camp. Throughout the night a low and moaning murmur went up from the plain between the two armies; and when Theodore, raised upon one of the wagons, gazed over that bloody field, as it lay in the tranquil moonlight, he could see among the piles of dead, which now broke the flat line of the land, a number of objects moving slowly, and darkening, here and there, those spots where the beams of the calm, bright planet were reflected from heaps of corslets and shining arms. The whole camp around him, except a few solitary warriors keeping guard, seemed now to have fallen sound asleep, wearied out with exertion, and none of the noises of the preceding night broke the stillness of the air. Horses and men, equally tired, uttered no sound; and that low moan, not unlike the sighing of a melancholy wind, was all that interrupted the silence. As Theodore gazed, a step near him made him turn; and the next moment, mounting upon the same part of the rampart on which he had raised himself, Ardaric stood by his side, and gazed out in the same direction for some time without speaking.
"What can that faint moan proceed from?" said Theodore, at length. "You hear it, do you not, noble Ardaric? The stream is too small to be heard here!"
"I hear it well," answered Ardaric. "It is the groaning of the many wounded, I suppose, though I never listened to such a sound before."
"Nor ever, probably," said Theodore, "saw such a field?"
"The world never has seen such till this day!" replied the King of the Gepidæ. "The number of the dead is fearful. I alone have lost seventy thousand men: so say the leaders of the tribes. Did you not think the enemy seemed to have suffered as much as we had at the close of the day?"
"Fully!" answered Theodore. "But is it possible that the sound we hear can proceed from the wounded and dying? It is horrible to think upon!"
"It may be the spirits of the unburied dead mourning over their fate," replied Ardaric. "But what are yon moving objects? They must be either the Romans come to seek for their friends, or the wounded crawling about among the slain. Hark, that cawing! and see, they fly up for a moment into the air! It is the ravens already at their repast. The carrion-eaters in all lands, the vulture, the worm, and the crow, have cause to be grateful to Attila. On yonder field, I should guess, must lie, either dead or wounded, some half million of men. What a banquet! See, they settle again! and now some wise crow, perched upon a Roman corslet, shall peck, unreproved, the throat of one of those who used to call themselves the masters of the world."
"Cannot we go forth and aid the wounded?" demanded Theodore. "It is dreadful to think of leaving them to die."
"Why so?" demanded Ardaric. "They will be at rest all the sooner. Those who had any strength left have crept into the camp long ago; those who had none are as well where they are, for neither can they serve us nor we them. It is only a pity that those ravens are not vultures, such as we have in the East: they speedily make the dead and dying, one. But, doubtless, there are wolves here too, out of the great forest behind us. They will soon clear away the carrion. I should not wonder if that moaning, which I took for the groans of the wounded, were the well-pleased murmur of the wolves over their unexpected feast."
"Nevertheless," said Theodore, "I should much like to take a small body of men with me, and pick out those we can aid among the wounded."
"What! and have the Romans or the Visigoths upon you, declaring that you were pillaging the dead!" replied Ardaric; "and then I should be obliged to go out to defend you. More Goths, more Huns would come up, and a night-battle would finish what a day-battle has so well begun. No, no, my young friend; by my counsel and good-will, not a man shall stir forth from this camp either to-night, or to-morrow, or the day after, so long as yon army lies before us. Our loss is nearly equal now. We are in an enemy's country, where we cannot hope to increase our numbers by a man: they are at home, and probably, ere to-morrow, may receive re-enforcements. Could we have crushed them in the battle of yesterday, the whole country would have been ours at once; but, as we failed to do that, we must no longer leave them the advantages they possess. Here, in our camp, we must await them, where our defences are as much as half a million more warriors. They cannot starve us, for we have food enough for months, what with our horses and our cattle; and if they attack us boldly, they must be utterly defeated. No, no, Theodore, my friend, no one must leave the camp. Attila, I know, will seek to go forth and destroy them in the open plain; but all voices will be with me if he asks counsel of any one; and, having asked it, he will take it if we all agree. Now let us to our tents, my friend. After all, these tents are convenient things, though when we first entered the Roman territory as enemies we had none, and despised them as idle luxuries, unworthy of a warrior. Now, not a leader among us but has many."
"So would it be, Ardaric, with every other Roman luxury," replied Theodore. "What you contemn now, you will learn to tolerate, and at length to like."
"The gods forbid!" answered Ardaric. "Then will we cut our beards, and call ourselves women."
"The Romans have not fought like women this day, my friend," replied Theodore.
"True! true!" replied the other. "A fair reproof, Theodore! They have fought well, and I did them injustice. Now, good-night, and sleep you well. I was heated, and, to say the truth, somewhat anxious; and I came forth for the cool air, and for something else to think of thanto-morrow. I have found both, and have also made up my mind, even while gazing upon that plain. Sleep you well!"
Sleep, however, was not known to the eyes of Theodore during that night. He was not yet sufficiently habituated to the mighty trade of war to see thousands perish, and know that thousands more were lying around in agony, with a calm and unconcerned bosom. He lay down to rest his limbs, but sleep visited not his eyelids. Shortly after dawn, he rose and went out before his tent; but the host of the Huns was already up and stirring, and multitudes covered the tops of all the wagons, gazing out over the plain and towards the Roman encampment. Attila was still within his tent, though his battle-horse stood caparisoned by the side of the standard which was planted at the entrance. But Theodore was told that six or seven of the chief leaders were in council within the tent; and, joining himself to a party of Hunnish chiefs who stood in the open space hard by, he remained waiting, with no slight anxiety, the result of the conference.
At length the curtain of the tent was raised, and Attila, followed by his chief leaders, came forth. But little alteration was visible in his countenance, and yet that alteration had rendered the expression more harsh and severe. He was speaking when he came out, and the deep tones of his powerful voice reached to where Theodore stood.
"If it must be so," he said, "why, let it be so. Nor do I say that your counsel is not wise and prudent, though I feel within me the power to crush yon swarm of insects as I would emmets beneath my feet. Still I would spare the people, if it may be so. But let it be remembered that Attila must never be defeated! It is sufficient not to have been victorious; we must die here or conquer! Let my Huns, with their unerring bows, mount upon the ramparts of the camp. Let the other nations, my friends and allies, stand by to support them; then raise me up a funeral pile before the entrance of this tent. There shall be the bed of Attila, if fortune and the god of battle should desert him! To the ramparts, my friends, to the ramparts! Let no man say that Attila does not yield to wise counsels, even when they are opposed to the most burning desire of his heart."
With extraordinary celerity and perfect order, the Huns immediately spread themselves over the long line of chariots which formed the rampart of their camp; and, intermingled with the Gepidæ, and with the spearmen of Valamir, stood prepared, with their bows in their hands, and the arrow resting on the string, to send the winged death among the Roman legions as soon as they should advance to the attack.
Several times during the course of the day bodies of the Roman and Gothic troops were seen whirling about over the plain, and twice a large division advanced very near the Hunnish camp, as if to feel their way towards a general attack. But a hail of arrows, darkening the sky, and carrying death and confusion into their ranks, caused them to retreat even faster than they came; and day closed without the expected attack.
Early the next morning a rumour became prevalent in the Hunnish camp that the army was dispersing; and, on examining more accurately, it was found that an immense body of Goths, and another of Franks, had left the camp of Ætius before daylight that very morning. Infinite were now the conjectures throughout the barbarian host as to what would be the conduct of Attila under the present circumstances. It was not soon decided, however. Scouts returning to the camp after having been sent forth to ascertain the movements of the enemy, and reporting that the Goths and the Franks had halted at the distance of a few leagues after leaving the Roman army, the ramparts of the Huns remained guarded during the whole of that day; and no one was suffered to leave the camp, except some small parties sent forth to reconnoitre.
Attila only once left his tent during the whole day, when the unexpected appearance of a large body of cavalry, supposed to be Goths, on the eastern side of the plain, led to the belief that a general attack was about to take place upon the camp of the Huns. They passed away, however, without approaching; and Attila, returning to his tent, remained in solitude during the rest of the day.
By dawn of the next morning the Romans themselves removed to a greater distance, and towards noon an order was given for the Hunnish army to prepare to march. None knew the direction that they were about to take, none knew what purpose was in the bosom of the king; and when he himself rode forth among the troops, not even Ardaric, his most familiar friend, was aware of the course they were about to pursue.
A few words announced the intentions of the monarch. "To the south," he said; "I will not be further bearded by these Romans, though they be leagued with all the runaways from the hardy North. On to the south, I say! Let them attack me, if they dare!"
The tone in which he spoke was such as showed no inclination to receive counsel or follow advice, and his orders were instantly obeyed. No obstruction was offered to his march: the Roman army, as a whole, had disappeared; and though from time to time a few small bodies of cavalry was seen upon the right of the Huns, showing that Ætius either followed or accompanied the march of the invaders, yet no attempt was made to bring on a general battle; and when, at the end of a four days' march, the Roman cohorts approached somewhat too near, they were speedily driven back by the Hunnish cavalry.
On the fifth day, towards noon, the towers of a large and important city appeared, crowning the summit of some high hills, round the basis of which the barbarian army had been winding since the morning. Massy walls, close and elevated flanking towers, built from the bowels of the rock on which they stood, announced a well defended fortress, which, in the time of Rome's greatest glory, might well have been looked upon as impregnable. Nevertheless, no sooner did the eyes of Attila rest upon it, after gazing over the country round, as if to ascertain its capabilities for military man[oe]uvres, than, stretching forth his hand towards Langres, he exclaimed, "It must fall! Valamir, my friend, lead the troops to the attack. I, with one fourth part of the army, wait upon this gentle slope for the coming of the Roman, if he dare to show himself. Let not the sun set, and see this city in the hands of the enemy."
Langres fell, and Ætius struck no stroke to relieve it. Some of its inhabitants found means to escape into the recesses of the mountains, and some even hid themselves in various parts of the town, where they were not discovered, but all the rest perished by the sword; and the streets of Langres flowed with human blood. As was very customary with the Huns, it was fired in several places ere they left it as night fell; but the solidity of the buildings, and the incombustible nature of the materials, saved it from anything but partial destruction, and Attila passed on without waiting to see that it was utterly consumed.
Besançon shared the same fate as Langres; and on the morning after its destruction, Attila gazed from the heights in the neighbourhood, and exclaimed with a glance of triumph, as he beheld no force on any side either to watch his progress or oppose his will, "We are not defeated! Let them write it in their histories, that after a pitched battle, in which five hundred thousand men were slain, Attila rode unrestrained through Gaul, and sacked two of her finest cities before the eyes of Ætius. But they will not write the truth--they will not, they dare not, lest in after ages every boy should spit at their memory. Now we may safely turn our steps towards our native land, lest the winter again set in, as it did when we were coming hither, and bind us with icy chains amid the fastnesses of the mountains."
The direction taken by the army was now towards the east; and leaving Gaul, Attila plunged into the passes of the Jura, pausing from time to time amid the sweet Helvetian valleys, as if he even hoped that the Romans might follow him thither, and once more try the fortune of battle. He who through his life had gone from victory to victory, whose steps had been upon the necks of conquered nations, and whose daily food had been success, had met with a check, had encountered disappointment, had been unsuccessful, if not defeated; and he seemed to thirst for an opportunity of wiping away the only stain, slight as it was, which a thousand battles had left upon his sword. None of his confidence had abandoned him; his reliance on his own mighty genius and daring courage was unshaken; but yet the check received in that undecided battle had wrought a change in Attila, and that change unfavourable. Ever stern and unyielding, he had now become fierce and irascible; nor was that all: many of the vices of the barbarian character, which had been kept down, and, as it were, overawed in his nature by the greater and more splendid qualities, so long as success had attended him, now seemed, like slaves on the first reverse of their master, to rise up turbulently in his bosom, and threaten to usurp the supreme control.
It was remarked, also, that Attila--fearing, perhaps, that his first want of success might have deprived him of some portion of his vast influence over the minds and hearts of his followers--had become suspicious, wily, exacting in regard to outward reverence, occasionally violent, and often intemperate. He assumed, too, a greater degree of pomp and external magnificence; as if the simple splendour of his powerful mind was sufficiently tarnished by the one slight reverse he had met with, to require the substitution of a meaner sort of majesty, to dazzle the eyes where the heart was unsatisfied.
The change, indeed, was not very great in any one particular, but still enough so in each to attract the attention of a person who remarked so closely as Theodore, and, in the aggregate, sufficient to strike the eyes of others. This mood, too, increased in him daily; and, as he marched onward, it drew the attention of Ardaric himself.
Through those wide beautiful valleys, clad in the everlasting green with which a temperate climate and a happy soil has robed them, the Hunnish cavalry wound on, feeding their horses by the banks of the streams and lakes, which, scattered in bright confusion throughout the free Helvetian land, have rendered it, in all ages, a country of enchanted sights. Through those deep passes, too, clad with the fir and pine, whose evergreen garmenture bore no token of the approaching autumn, the long and dusky troops of barbarian horsemen poured on, lifting, with wild enthusiastic delight, to the mountain, the rock, the rugged precipice, the variegated foliage, and all the beauties of uncultivated nature, those eyes which looked with scorn or abhorrence upon all the productions of civilized art, and on the mighty master works of the human mind.
Every now and then, however, where the beech, or the ash, or the elm, or the oak was mingled with the unchanging trees of the mountain, the sear aspect of the withering leaves, the tints of yellow and of brown, told Theodore but too surely that the autumn was far advanced. The expedition of Attila had now lasted a year and nearly nine months. It was more than that since he had heard the slightest news of Ildica. It was two years since he had seen her he loved: but time could do nothing to diminish feelings such as his; and the longing once more to clasp her to his heart grew daily stronger and stronger instead of decreasing. He thought the rapid marches of the army slow and tedious--the way seemed long and interminable.
At length began to appear the wide plains, the dark woods, the broad rivers, which announced once more their approach to the land of the Huns. Their last three days' march, however, was through fallen and falling snow: but Theodore was not to be disheartened; and on the very day that followed their arrival on the banks of the Tibiscus, he claimed audience of Attila, and, reminding him of his promise, demanded permission to set out on his visit to Italy.
The answer was stern and decisive. "It is impossible!"
The monarch said no more, and Theodore, grieved and disappointed, waited on through a long, dark, tedious winter. With the first blossoms of the spring, however, as the young Roman sat within his dwelling, leaning his head upon his hand, and thinking of the past, the boy Ernac, now growing up in splendid beauty, ran gladly in, exclaiming, "My father calls for you! Come, Theodore, come! Attila demands your presence; and he is in a milder mood than he has been since his return from Gaul."
A glad hope passed through the bosom of Theodore, and, rising from his seat, he followed to the presence of the king.