barians,. It is our own fault
if this detection does not inspire us with proper distrust on similar
occasions.]

[Footnote 78: Ammian. xvi. 12. Libanius, Orat. x. p. 276.]

After Julian had repulsed the Alemanni from the provinces of the Upper
Rhine, he turned his arms against the Franks, who were seated nearer
to the ocean, on the confines of Gaul and Germany; and who, from
their numbers, and still more from their intrepid valor, had ever been
esteemed the most formidable of the Barbarians. [79] Although they
were strongly actuated by the allurements of rapine, they professed a
disinterested love of war; which they considered as the supreme honor
and felicity of human nature; and their minds and bodies were so
completely hardened by perpetual action, that, according to the lively
expression of an orator, the snows of winter were as pleasant to them
as the flowers of spring. In the month of December, which followed the
battle of Strasburgh, Julian attacked a body of six hundred Franks, who
had thrown themselves into two castles on the Meuse. [80] In the midst
of that severe season they sustained, with inflexible constancy, a siege
of fifty-four days; till at length, exhausted by hunger, and satisfied
that the vigilance of the enemy, in breaking the ice of the river, left
them no hopes of escape, the Franks consented, for the first time, to
dispense with the ancient law which commanded them to conquer or to die.
The Caesar immediately sent his captives to the court of Constantius,
who, accepting them as a valuable present, [81] rejoiced in the
opportunity of adding so many heroes to the choicest troops of his
domestic guards. The obstinate resistance of this handful of Franks
apprised Julian of the difficulties of the expedition which he meditated
for the ensuing spring, against the whole body of the nation. His rapid
diligence surprised and astonished the active Barbarians. Ordering his
soldiers to provide themselves with biscuit for twenty days, he suddenly
pitched his camp near Tongres, while the enemy still supposed him in his
winter quarters of Paris, expecting the slow arrival of his convoys
from Aquitain. Without allowing the Franks to unite or deliberate,
he skilfully spread his legions from Cologne to the ocean; and by
the terror, as well as by the success, of his arms, soon reduced the
suppliant tribes to implore the clemency, and to obey the commands, of
their conqueror. The Chamavians submissively retired to