did armour. The
sea-breeze played with his crimson crest.

It was Cethegus; and the way he was going led to the gates of death. He
was followed at a short distance by the Moor. He soon reached a little
promontory which stretched out into the bay, and going to its outer
point, he turned and looked towards the northwest. There lay Rome--his
Rome.

"Farewell!" he cried with deep emotion; "farewell, ye seven immortal
hills! Farewell, old Tiber stream! thou that hast laved the venerable
ruins through many centuries. Twice hast thou tasted my blood; twice
hast thou saved my life. Now, kindly River-god, thou canst save me no
more! I have striven and fought for thee, my Rome, as none of thy
children, not even Caesar, has ever done before.--The struggle is over;
the general without an army is vanquished. I now acknowledge that a
mighty intellect may possibly supply the place of a single man, but not
the want of a whole nation's patriotism. Intellect can preserve its own
youth, but it cannot renew that of others, I have tried to do what is
impossible; for to do only what is possible is common; and it is better
to fall striving for the superhuman than to be lost in dull resignation
among the common herd. But"--and he kneeled down and wet his hot
forehead with the salt water--"be thou blessed, Ansonia's sacred flood;
be thou blessed, Italians sacred soil!"--and he put his hand deep into
the sea sand--"thy most faithful son parts from thee with a thankful
heart--moved, not by the terrors of approaching death, but only by thy
beauty. I forebode for thee, Italia, an oppressive foreign rule; I have
not been able to turn it aside, but I have offered up my heart's blood;
and if the laurels of thy Empire are for ever withered--may the olive
of thy people's love of freedom still bloom amid the ruins of thy
cities, and may the day quickly come when no foreign master rules in
all the length and breadth of the land, and when thou art mistress of
thyself from the sacred Alps to the sacred sea!"

He rose quietly, and now walked more rapidly through the centre camp to
the tent of the commander-in-chief. When he entered it, he found all
the generals and officers assembled. Narses called to him in a friendly
voice, saying:

"You come at the right moment, Cethegus. Twelve of my officers, whom I
have discovered in a foolish league, such as barbarians, but not the
scholars oL Narses, might make, have appealed to you in excuse. They
say that what