their mud cottages within the spacious court of a
magnificent temple.

[Footnote 75: Hist. August. p. 219.]

Another and a last labor still awaited the indefatigable Aurelian; to
suppress a dangerous though obscure rebel, who, during the revolt of
Palmyra, had arisen on the banks of the Nile. Firmus, the friend and
ally, as he proudly styled himself, of Odenathus and Zenobia, was no
more than a wealthy merchant of Egypt. In the course of his trade to
India, he had formed very intimate connections with the Saracens and the
Blemmyes, whose situation on either coast of the Red Sea gave them an
easy introduction into the Upper Egypt. The Egyptians he inflamed with
the hope of freedom, and, at the head of their furious multitude, broke
into the city of Alexandria, where he assumed the Imperial purple,
coined money, published edicts, and raised an army, which, as he vainly
boasted, he was capable of maintaining from the sole profits of his
paper trade. Such troops were a feeble defence against the approach of
Aurelian; and it seems almost unnecessary to relate, that Firmus was
routed, taken, tortured, and put to death. [76] Aurelian might now
congratulate the senate, the people, and himself, that in little more
than three years, he had restored universal peace and order to the Roman
world.

[Footnote 76: See Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 220, 242. As an
instance of luxury, it is observed, that he had glass windows. He was
remarkable for his strength and appetite, his courage and dexterity.
From the letter of Aurelian, we may justly infer, that Firmus was
the last of the rebels, and consequently that Tetricus was already
suppressed.]

Since the foundation of Rome, no general had more nobly deserved a
triumph than Aurelian; nor was a triumph ever celebrated with superior
pride and magnificence. [77] The pomp was opened by twenty elephants,
four royal tigers, and above two hundred of the most curious animals
from every climate of the North, the East, and the South. They were
followed by sixteen hundred gladiators, devoted to the cruel amusement
of the amphitheatre. The wealth of Asia, the arms and ensigns of so many
conquered nations, and the magnificent plate and wardrobe of the
Syrian queen, were disposed in exact symmetry or artful disorder. The
ambassadors of the most remote parts of the earth, of Aethiopia, Arabia,
Persia, Bactriana, India, and China, all remarkable by their rich or
singular dresses, displayed the fame