d conduct of Julian had secured an interval of
peace, he applied himself to a work more congenial to his humane and
philosophic temper. The cities of Gaul, which had suffered from the
inroads of the Barbarians, he diligently repaired; and seven important
posts, between Mentz and the mouth of the Rhine, are particularly
mentioned, as having been rebuilt and fortified by the order of Julian.
[86] The vanquished Germans had submitted to the just but humiliating
condition of preparing and conveying the necessary materials. The active
zeal of Julian urged the prosecution of the work; and such was the
spirit which he had diffused among the troops, that the auxiliaries
themselves, waiving their exemption from any duties of fatigue,
contended in the most servile labors with the diligence of the Roman
soldiers. It was incumbent on the Caesar to provide for the subsistence,
as well as for the safety, of the inhabitants and of the garrisons. The
desertion of the former, and the mutiny of the latter, must have been
the fatal and inevitable consequences of famine. The tillage of the
provinces of Gaul had been interrupted by the calamities of war; but the
scanty harvests of the continent were supplied, by his paternal care,
from the plenty of the adjacent island. Six hundred large barks, framed
in the forest of the Ardennes, made several voyages to the coast of
Britain; and returning from thence, laden with corn, sailed up the
Rhine, and distributed their cargoes to the several towns and fortresses
along the banks of the river. [87] The arms of Julian had restored a
free and secure navigation, which Constantinius had offered to purchase
at the expense of his dignity, and of a tributary present of two
thousand pounds of silver. The emperor parsimoniously refused to his
soldiers the sums which he granted with a lavish and trembling hand to
the Barbarians. The dexterity, as well as the firmness, of Julian was
put to a severe trial, when he took the field with a discontented army,
which had already served two campaigns, without receiving any regular
pay or any extraordinary donative. [88]

[Footnote 86: Ammian. xviii. 2. Libanius, Orat. x. p. 279, 280. Of these
seven posts, four are at present towns of some consequence; Bingen,
Andernach, Bonn, and Nuyss. The other three, Tricesimae, Quadriburgium,
and Castra Herculis, or Heraclea, no longer subsist; but there is
room to believe, that on the ground of Quadriburgium the Dutch have
constru