tions: the royal gallery
was drawn close to an artificial and well-fortified platform; and the
majesty of the purple was emulated by the pomp of the Bulgarian. "Are
you a Christian?" said the humble Romanus: "it is your duty to abstain
from the blood of your fellow-Christians. Has the thirst of riches
seduced you from the blessings of peace? Sheathe your sword, open
your hand, and I will satiate the utmost measure of your desires." The
reconciliation was sealed by a domestic alliance; the freedom of trade
was granted or restored; the first honors of the court were secured to
the friends of Bulgaria, above the ambassadors of enemies or strangers;
and her princes were dignified with the high and invidious title of
_Basileus_, or emperor. But this friendship was soon disturbed:
after the death of Simeon, the nations were again in arms; his feeble
successors were divided and extinguished; and, in the beginning of the
eleventh century, the second Basil, who was born in the purple, deserved
the appellation of conqueror of the Bulgarians. His avarice was in
some measure gratified by a treasure of four hundred thousand pounds
sterling, (ten thousand pounds' weight of gold,) which he found in
the palace of Lychnidus. His cruelty inflicted a cool and exquisite
vengeance on fifteen thousand captives who had been guilty of the
defence of their country. They were deprived of sight; but to one of
each hundred a single eye was left, that he might conduct his blind
century to the presence of their king. Their king is said to have
expired of grief and horror; the nation was awed by this terrible
example; the Bulgarians were swept away from their settlements, and
circumscribed within a narrow province; the surviving chiefs bequeathed
to their children the advice of patience and the duty of revenge.

II. When the black swarm of Hungarians first hung over Europe, above
nine hundred years after the Christian aera, they were mistaken by fear
and superstition for the Gog and Magog of the Scriptures, the signs and
forerunners of the end of the world. Since the introduction of letters,
they have explored their own antiquities with a strong and laudable
impulse of patriotic curiosity. Their rational criticism can no longer
be amused with a vain pedigree of Attila and the Huns; but they complain
that their primitive records have perished in the Tartar war; that the
truth or fiction of their rustic songs is long since forgotten; and that
the fragm