ir numbers--generally fell by
means of the Italian population, who now overpowered the Gothic
garrison, as, after Totila's election, they had done the imperial. Thus
fell, during the progress of the war, Namia, Spoletium and Perusia; the
few towns which resisted were invested.

So Narses resembled a strong man who walks with outstretched arms
through a narrow passage, pursuing all who try to hide themselves
before him. Or a fisher, who wades up a stream with a sack-net; behind
him all is empty. The few Goths who could yet save themselves fled
before the "iron roller" to the army of the King, which soon consisted
of a greater number of the defenceless than of warriors.

The Visigoths were again engaged in migration, just as they had been a
hundred years before, but this time the iron net of Narses was behind
them; and before them, as they advanced farther and farther into the
constantly narrowing peninsula, the sea. And not a ship did they
possess in which to fly.

CHAPTER II.

Added to this, an inevitable necessity reduced the number of Goths in
the King's army capable of bearing arms in the most frightful manner.

From the very commencement of the pursuit, Cethegus, with his
mercenaries, and Alboin with his Longobardians, had stuck to the
heels of the fugitives, and consequently, if the retreat of the Gothic
army--already delayed by the number of women, children, and aged people
who had joined it--was not to be brought to a complete standstill, it
was necessary to sacrifice each night a small number of heroes, who
halted at some spot suitable for their design, and held the pursuers at
bay by an obstinate, fearless, and hopeless resistance, until the main
army had again gained a considerable advance.

This cruel, but only possible expedient, always entailed the loss of at
least fifty men, and often, where the place to be defended had a wider
front, a much greater number.

Before King Teja marched from Spes Bonorum, he had explained this plan
to the assembled army; his faithful troops silently assented to it. And
every morning the "death-doomed" volunteered so eagerly to join this
forlorn hope, that King Teja--with humid eyes--made them draw lots, not
wishing to offend any one by the preference of others. For the Goths,
who saw nothing before them but the certain destruction of the nation,
and many of whom knew that their wives and children had fallen into the
enemy's hands,