The Emperor was carried into his tent, and laid on his camp-bed. Still in a swoon, he groaned from time to time. Oribazius, the physician, drew out the iron lance-head, and washed and bound up the deep wound. By a look Victor asked if any hope remained, and Oribazius sadly shook his head. After the dressing of the wound Julian sighed and opened his eyes.
"Where am I?" he asked in surprise with a glance round. Then hearing the distant noise of battle he remembered all, and with an effort rose upon his bed.
"Why have they brought me here? Where is my horse? Quick, Victor!"
Suddenly his face writhed with pain, friends hastened to support him, but he thrust back Victor and Oribazius.
"Permit me! I must be with them to the end."
His soul was struggling against death. Slowly, with infinite difficulty, he tottered to his feet, a faint smile playing on his lips, and the old fire in his eyes.
"You see, I am able-bodied still ... quick! give me my sword, buckler, horse!"
Victor gave him the shield and sword. Julian took them and made a few unsteady steps, like a child learning to walk. The wound re-opened; he let fall his arms, sank into the arms of Oribazius and Victor and looking up cried contemptuously—
"All is over! Thou hast conquered, Galilean!"
And making no further resistance, he gave himself up to his friends, and was laid on the bed.
"Yes, yes," he repeated softly, "I am dying."
Oribazius leaned towards him, consoling him, assuring him that the wound would heal.
"Why deceive me?" answered Julian; "I am not afraid...." Then he added gravely, "I hope I shall die the death of the righteous."
In the evening he lost consciousness. Hour after hour went by. The sun went down. Fighting ceased. A lamp was lighted in the tent, and night slowly descended.
Julian did not recover consciousness. His breathing grew weaker; he was thought to be breathing his last. But later his eyes opened, little by little; his look was fixed steadily on a corner of the tent. A rapid whisper broke from his lips: he was in delirium.
"Thou, here, why?... what matters it? All is over. Canst Thou not see that?... Go. Thou hatedst laughter.... And so we can never forgive Thee...."
Then, regaining his faculties, he asked of Oribazius—
"What hour is it? Shall I see the sun?"
And he added dreamily—
"Oribazius, can it be possible that reason should be really so powerless? I believe it is a weakness of the body ... blood fills the brain, creating phantoms.... One must conquer ... reason must...."
His ideas anew became confused, and his gaze resumed its fixity—
"I will not! Do you hear?... Go, Tempter! I do not believe! Socrates died like a god. Reason ... Victor, ah, Victor!... what do you want fromme? Thou, the unappeasable, the implacable? Thy love is more terrible than death.... Thy burden is the heaviest of all.... Why dost thou look at me so? How much I have loved thee, Good Shepherd! ... Only Thou? No, no! The pierced feet, blood? ... The death of Hellas ... darkness?... I want sunlight, the golden sun ... on the Parthenon marble!... Wouldst thou veil the sun?..."
It was one o'clock in the morning. The legions had returned to camp, with no exultation over their victory. In spite of fatigue, scarcely any slept, all waiting for news from the Imperial tent. Many stood sleeping, leaning on their lances round the half-extinguished camp-fires; and the breathing of picketed horses could be heard, munching captured forage of corn.
Between the dark rows of tents, faint white lines showed on the horizon. Stars became yet more chilly and pale. The mists kept spreading, and the steel of lances and shields was clouded with dew. Here and there crew a cock, belonging to the Tuscan soothsayers. A calm sadness hovered over heaven and earth. The scene was illusive as a mirror; the near seemed far off and the distant came near.
At the entrance to Julian's tent stood a throng of generals, friends, and familiar companions, all looking like phantoms in the misty twilight. Still deeper silence reigned within the tent. Oribazius, the physician, was pounding simples in a mortar to make a refreshing drink. The sick man lay calm, and the delirium had left him. At dawn, collecting himself, he asked impatiently—
"When will the sun rise?"
"In an hour," answered Oribazius glancing at the clepsydra.
"Call the generals," ordered Julian. "I must speak...."
"Well-beloved Cæsar, it may be hurtful...."
"What matter! I shall not die before the sun rises. Victor, raise my head."
He was told about the victory over the Persians, the flight of the enemy's cavalry, and of the two sons of Sapor the king; of the death of fifty satraps. Julian showed neither astonishment nor gladness. He remained indifferent.
Dagalaïf, Hormizdas, Ariphas, Lucilian, and Sallustius came in, headed by the general Jovian. Many, with an eye to the future, had wished to see on the throne this weak and timid man, who could be dangerous to none. It was their hope under his rule to recover from the anxieties of the tumultuous reign of Julian. Jovian possessed the art of pleasing all. Tall and handsome in person, he in no way differed from the crowd, aiming at all-round benevolence. Among the intimate friends stood also a young centurion of the Imperial horse, the future famous historian, Ammianus Marcellinus. Everyone was aware that he was writing an account of the campaign, and amassing documents for a great historical work. Stooping under the tent-door Ammianus drew out tablets and stylus. A keen and impartial curiosity animated his stern face; and with the coolness of an artist or a man of science he prepared to take notes of the speech of the dying Emperor.
"Lift the curtain!" Julian ordered.
It was raised, and everyone stood aside so that the fresh air of the morning might blow on the face of the dying. The door faced east, and the view to the horizon was unbroken.
"Now put the lamp out."
The order was executed, and the tent filled with twilight. Everybody stood waiting in silence.
"Listen, friends," Julian began; his voice was low but clear, his whole presence breathed a triumph of mind over body, and invincible will still gleamed from those eyes. The hand of Ammianus trembled, but he wrote down the words uttered. He knew that he was writing on the tables of history, and transmitting to men unborn the last words of a great man.
"Listen, friends; my hour is come, perhaps too soon. But you see, like an honest debtor, I am not sorry to give back my life to Nature, and in my soul is neither pain nor fear; nothing but cheerfulness, and a fore-feeling of the long repose. I have simply done my duty, and have nothing to repent of. From the days when I daily expected death, like a hunted beast, in the palace of Macellum, in Cappadocia, up to the day of greatness when I took on the purple of the Roman Cæsar, I have tried to keep my soul stainless, I have aspired to ends not ignoble. If I have failed—and I have failed—to do all that I desired, you will not forget that most of our earthly affairs are in the hands of Destiny. And now I thank the Eternal for having allowed me to die neither after long sickness nor at the hands of the executioner, but on the battlefield—in mid-youth—in mid-endeavour, half-way to achievement.... And dear, dear friends...."
His voice ceased; everyone present knelt down; many were weeping.
"No, no, my dear friends," said Julian smiling; "why weep for those who are going back to their own country? Take heart, Victor!"
The old man tried to answer, but in vain; then hiding his face in his hands, he sobbed aloud.
"Soft! Soft!" cried Julian; and then turning toward the sky: "Ah, there He is!"
The morning clouds were growing rosy, and the twilight in the tent had become warm and mellow; the first beam of the sun washed over the rim of the horizon. The dying man held his face towards the light, with closed eyes.
Then Sallustius Secundus went up to Julian and kissing his hand said—
"Well-beloved Augustus! whom do you name as your successor?"
"What matters it? Let Destiny decide! We must not resist her. Let the Galileans triumph. We shall conquer later on. And then shall begin on earth the reign of the equals of the gods, souls laughing for ever like the sun.... Look, behold him!"
A faint shiver ran through his body, and with a last effort Julian stretched out his arms, as if he would have rushed to meet the rising orb. Blood gushed from his wound, and the veins swelled on neck and temples.
"Water! water!" he whispered, choking.
Victor lifted a golden cup of spring-water to his mouth. Julian, looking forth from the tent drank thirstily of the ice-cold draught. Then his head fell back, and the last murmur came from his half-open lips—
"Helios! receive me into thyself...."
The eyes went out. Victor closed their lids. The face of the Emperor, lying in the sun-rays, took on a look of one of the Olympians sleeping.