antinople, was propagated in the female line as far as the
eighth generation.

Chapter XXXVI: Total Extinction Of The Western Empire.--Part V.

Whilst the vacant throne of Italy was abandoned to lawless Barbarians,
the election of a new colleague was seriously agitated in the council
of Leo. The empress Verina, studious to promote the greatness of her own
family, had married one of her nieces to Julius Nepos, who succeeded
his uncle Marcellinus in the sovereignty of Dalmatia, a more solid
possession than the title which he was persuaded to accept, of Emperor
of the West. But the measures of the Byzantine court were so languid and
irresolute, that many months elapsed after the death of Anthemius, and
even of Olybrius, before their destined successor could show himself,
with a respectable force, to his Italian subjects. During that interval,
Glycerius, an obscure soldier, was invested with the purple by his
patron Gundobald; but the Burgundian prince was unable, or unwilling, to
support his nomination by a civil war: the pursuits of domestic ambition
recalled him beyond the Alps, and his client was permitted to exchange
the Roman sceptre for the bishopric of Salona. After extinguishing such
a competitor, the emperor Nepos was acknowledged by the senate, by
the Italians, and by the provincials of Gaul; his moral virtues, and
military talents, were loudly celebrated; and those who derived any
private benefit from his government, announced, in prophetic strains,
the restoration of the public felicity. Their hopes (if such hopes had
been entertained) were confounded within the term of a single year, and
the treaty of peace, which ceded Auvergne to the Visigoths, is the only
event of his short and inglorious reign. The most faithful subjects of
Gaul were sacrificed, by the Italian emperor, to the hope of domestic
security; but his repose was soon invaded by a furious sedition of
the Barbarian confederates, who, under the command of Orestes, their
general, were in full march from Rome to Ravenna. Nepos trembled
at their approach; and, instead of placing a just confidence in the
strength of Ravenna, he hastily escaped to his ships, and retired to his
Dalmatian principality, on the opposite coast of the Adriatic. By this
shameful abdication, he protracted his life about five years, in a
very ambiguous state, between an emperor and an exile, till he was
assassinated at Salona by the ungrateful Glycerius, who was translated,