at Abidus by the fugitives
and exiles who thirsted for revenge; the ships of Heraclius, whose lofty
masts were adorned with the holy symbols of religion, [53] steered their
triumphant course through the Propontis; and Phocas beheld from the
windows of the palace his approaching and inevitable fate. The green
faction was tempted, by gifts and promises, to oppose a feeble and
fruitless resistance to the landing of the Africans: but the people, and
even the guards, were determined by the well-timed defection of Crispus;
and they tyrant was seized by a private enemy, who boldly invaded the
solitude of the palace. Stripped of the diadem and purple, clothed in a
vile habit, and loaded with chains, he was transported in a small boat
to the Imperial galley of Heraclius, who reproached him with the crimes
of his abominable reign. "Wilt thou govern better?" were the last words
of the despair of Phocas. After suffering each variety of insult and
torture, his head was severed from his body, the mangled trunk was cast
into the flames, and the same treatment was inflicted on the statues
of the vain usurper, and the seditious banner of the green faction. The
voice of the clergy, the senate, and the people, invited Heraclius to
ascend the throne which he had purified from guilt and ignominy; after
some graceful hesitation, he yielded to their entreaties. His coronation
was accompanied by that of his wife Eudoxia; and their posterity, till
the fourth generation, continued to reign over the empire of the East.
The voyage of Heraclius had been easy and prosperous; the tedious march
of Nicetas was not accomplished before the decision of the contest:
but he submitted without a murmur to the fortune of his friend, and
his laudable intentions were rewarded with an equestrian statue, and a
daughter of the emperor. It was more difficult to trust the fidelity of
Crispus, whose recent services were recompensed by the command of the
Cappadocian army. His arrogance soon provoked, and seemed to excuse,
the ingratitude of his new sovereign. In the presence of the senate, the
son-in-law of Phocas was condemned to embrace the monastic life; and the
sentence was justified by the weighty observation of Heraclius, that the
man who had betrayed his father could never be faithful to his friend.
[54]

[Footnote 52: In the writers, and in the copies of those writers, there
is such hesitation between the names of Priscus and Crispus, (Ducange,
Fam Byzant. p.