ans the
military, and even the civil, honors of Spain. The nine bands of
_Honorians_, which may be easily traced on the establishment of the
Western empire, could not exceed the number of five thousand men: yet
this inconsiderable force was sufficient to terminate a war, which had
threatened the power and safety of Constantine. The rustic army of the
Theodosian family was surrounded and destroyed in the Pyrenees: two
of the brothers had the good fortune to escape by sea to Italy, or the
East; the other two, after an interval of suspense, were executed at
Arles; and if Honorius could remain insensible of the public disgrace,
he might perhaps be affected by the personal misfortunes of his generous
kinsmen. Such were the feeble arms which decided the possession of the
Western provinces of Europe, from the wall of Antoninus to the
columns of Hercules. The events of peace and war have undoubtedly been
diminished by the narrow and imperfect view of the historians of the
times, who were equally ignorant of the causes, and of the effects,
of the most important revolutions. But the total decay of the
national strength had annihilated even the last resource of a despotic
government; and the revenue of exhausted provinces could no longer
purchase the military service of a discontented and pusillanimous
people.

The poet, whose flattery has ascribed to the Roman eagle the victories
of Pollentia and Verona, pursues the hasty retreat of Alaric, from the
confines of Italy, with a horrid train of imaginary spectres, such as
might hover over an army of Barbarians, which was almost exterminated by
war, famine, and disease. In the course of this unfortunate expedition,
the king of the Goths must indeed have sustained a considerable loss;
and his harassed forces required an interval of repose, to recruit
their numbers and revive their confidence. Adversity had exercised and
displayed the genius of Alaric; and the fame of his valor invited to
the Gothic standard the bravest of the Barbarian warriors; who, from the
Euxine to the Rhine, were agitated by the desire of rapine and conquest.
He had deserved the esteem, and he soon accepted the friendship, of
Stilicho himself. Renouncing the service of the emperor of the East,
Alaric concluded, with the court of Ravenna, a treaty of peace and
alliance, by which he was declared master-general of the Roman armies
throughout the praefecture of Illyricum; as it was claimed, according to
the true and