Lege Manilia, c. 8.]

[Footnote 115: Strabo, l. xii. p. 573.]

[Footnote 116: Pocock's Description of the East, l. ii. c. 23, 24.]

[Footnote 117: Zosimus, l. i. p. 33.]

[Footnote 118: Syncellus tells an unintelligible story of Prince
Odenathus, who defeated the Goths, and who was killed by Prince
Odenathus.]

[Footnote 119: Voyages de Chardin, tom. i. p. 45. He sailed with the
Turks from Constantinople to Caffa.]

When we are informed that the third fleet, equipped by the Goths in the
ports of Bosphorus, consisted of five hundred sails of ships, [120]
our ready imagination instantly computes and multiplies the formidable
armament; but, as we are assured by the judicious Strabo, [121] that
the piratical vessels used by the barbarians of Pontus and the Lesser
Scythia, were not capable of containing more than twenty-five or thirty
men we may safely affirm, that fifteen thousand warriors, at the most,
embarked in this great expedition. Impatient of the limits of the
Euxine, they steered their destructive course from the Cimmerian to
the Thracian Bosphorus. When they had almost gained the middle of the
Straits, they were suddenly driven back to the entrance of them; till a
favorable wind, springing up the next day, carried them in a few hours
into the placid sea, or rather lake, of the Propontis. Their landing on
the little island of Cyzicus was attended with the ruin of that ancient
and noble city. From thence issuing again through the narrow passage
of the Hellespont, they pursued their winding navigation amidst the
numerous islands scattered over the Archipelago, or the Aegean Sea. The
assistance of captives and deserters must have been very necessary to
pilot their vessels, and to direct their various incursions, as well
on the coast of Greece as on that of Asia. At length the Gothic fleet
anchored in the port of Piraeus, five miles distant from Athens, [122]
which had attempted to make some preparations for a vigorous defence.
Cleodamus, one of the engineers employed by the emperor's orders to
fortify the maritime cities against the Goths, had already begun to
repair the ancient walls, fallen to decay since the time of Scylla. The
efforts of his skill were ineffectual, and the barbarians became masters
of the native seat of the muses and the arts. But while the conquerors
abandoned themselves to the license of plunder and intemperance, their
fleet, that lay with a slender guard in the harbor of Piraeus, was
un