ho had been sent as hostages
beyond the Po, were inhumanly slain by the successor of Totila. The
fate of the senate suggests an awful lesson of the vicissitude of human
affairs. Of the senators whom Totila had banished from their country,
some were rescued by an officer of Belisarius, and transported from
Campania to Sicily; while others were too guilty to confide in the
clemency of Justinian, or too poor to provide horses for their escape
to the sea-shore. Their brethren languished five years in a state of
indigence and exile: the victory of Narses revived their hopes; but
their premature return to the metropolis was prevented by the furious
Goths; and all the fortresses of Campania were stained with patrician
[40] blood. After a period of thirteen centuries, the institution of
Romulus expired; and if the nobles of Rome still assumed the title of
senators, few subsequent traces can be discovered of a public council,
or constitutional order. Ascend six hundred years, and contemplate the
kings of the earth soliciting an audience, as the slaves or freedmen of
the Roman senate! [41]

[Footnote 38: Evagrius, l. iv. c. 24. The inspiration of the Virgin
revealed to Narses the day, and the word, of battle, (Paul Diacon. l.
ii. c. 3, p. 776)]

[Footnote 39: (Procop. Goth. lib. iv. p. 33.)
In the year 536 by Belisarius, in 546 by Totila, in 547 by Belisarius,
in 549 by Totila, and in 552 by Narses. Maltretus had inadvertently
translated sextum; a mistake which he afterwards retracts; out the
mischief was done; and Cousin, with a train of French and Latin readers,
have fallen into the snare.]

[Footnote 40: Compare two passages of Procopius, (l. iii. c. 26, l.
iv. c. 24,) which, with some collateral hints from Marcellinus and
Jornandes, illustrate the state of the expiring senate.]

[Footnote 41: See, in the example of Prusias, as it is delivered in the
fragments of Polybius, (Excerpt. Legat. xcvii. p. 927, 928,) a curious
picture of a royal slave.]

The Gothic war was yet alive. The bravest of the nation retired beyond
the Po; and Teias was unanimously chosen to succeed and revenge their
departed hero. The new king immediately sent ambassadors to implore, or
rather to purchase, the aid of the Franks, and nobly lavished, for the
public safety, the riches which had been deposited in the palace of
Pavia. The residue of the royal treasure was guarded by his brother
Aligern, at Cumaea, in Campania; but the strong castle which T