that they no longer defended the cause of Julian. That
assembly, convoked by the consul, unanimously acknowledged Severus as
lawful emperor, decreed divine honors to Pertinax, and pronounced a
sentence of deposition and death against his unfortunate successor.
Julian was conducted into a private apartment of the baths of the
palace, and beheaded as a common criminal, after having purchased, with
an immense treasure, an anxious and precarious reign of only sixty-six
days. [36] The almost incredible expedition of Severus, who, in so short
a space of time, conducted a numerous army from the banks of the Danube
to those of the Tyber, proves at once the plenty of provisions produced
by agriculture and commerce, the goodness of the roads, the discipline
of the legions, and the indolent, subdued temper of the provinces. [37]

[Footnote 35: Victor and Eutropius, viii. 17, mention a combat near the
Milvian bridge, the Ponte Molle, unknown to the better and more ancient
writers.]

[Footnote 36: Dion, l. lxxiii. p. 1240. Herodian, l. ii. p. 83. Hist.
August. p. 63.]

[Footnote 37: From these sixty-six days, we must first deduct sixteen,
as Pertinax was murdered on the 28th of March, and Severus most probably
elected on the 13th of April, (see Hist. August. p. 65, and Tillemont,
Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iii. p. 393, note 7.) We cannot allow less
than ten days after his election, to put a numerous army in motion.
Forty days remain for this rapid march; and as we may compute about
eight hundred miles from Rome to the neighborhood of Vienna, the army of
Severus marched twenty miles every day, without halt or intermission.]

The first cares of Severus were bestowed on two measures the one
dictated by policy, the other by decency; the revenge, and the honors,
due to the memory of Pertinax. Before the new emperor entered Rome, he
issued his commands to the Praetorian guards, directing them to wait his
arrival on a large plain near the city, without arms, but in the habits
of ceremony, in which they were accustomed to attend their sovereign. He
was obeyed by those haughty troops, whose contrition was the effect of
their just terrors. A chosen part of the Illyrian army encompassed them
with levelled spears. Incapable of flight or resistance, they expected
their fate in silent consternation. Severus mounted the tribunal,
sternly reproached them with perfidy and cowardice, dismissed them with
ignominy from the trust which they had bet