sum of two thousand one hundred; and he stipulated
the immediate payment of six thousand pounds of gold, to defray the
expenses, or to expiate the guilt, of the war. One might imagine, that
such a demand, which scarcely equalled the measure of private wealth,
would have been readily discharged by the opulent empire of the East;
and the public distress affords a remarkable proof of the impoverished,
or at least of the disorderly, state of the finances. A large proportion
of the taxes extorted from the people was detained and intercepted
in their passage, though the foulest channels, to the treasury of
Constantinople. The revenue was dissipated by Theodosius and his
favorites in wasteful and profuse luxury; which was disguised by the
names of Imperial magnificence, or Christian charity. The immediate
supplies had been exhausted by the unforeseen necessity of military
preparations. A personal contribution, rigorously, but capriciously,
imposed on the members of the senatorian order, was the only expedient
that could disarm, without loss of time, the impatient avarice of
Attila; and the poverty of the nobles compelled them to adopt the
scandalous resource of exposing to public auction the jewels of their
wives, and the hereditary ornaments of their palaces. III. The king
of the Huns appears to have established, as a principle of national
jurisprudence, that he could never lose the property, which he had
once acquired, in the persons who had yielded either a voluntary,
or reluctant, submission to his authority. From this principle he
concluded, and the conclusions of Attila were irrevocable laws, that
the Huns, who had been taken prisoner in war, should be released without
delay, and without ransom; that every Roman captive, who had presumed
to escape, should purchase his right to freedom at the price of twelve
pieces of gold; and that all the Barbarians, who had deserted the
standard of Attila, should be restored, without any promise or
stipulation of pardon. In the execution of this cruel and ignominious
treaty, the Imperial officers were forced to massacre several loyal and
noble deserters, who refused to devote themselves to certain death;
and the Romans forfeited all reasonable claims to the friendship of any
Scythian people, by this public confession, that they were destitute
either of faith, or power, to protect the suppliant, who had embraced
the throne of Theodosius.

The firmness of a single town, so obscure, that,