ian exerted the superior ascendant of authority and reason
to calm the passions, which the son of Theodoric considered as a duty;
represented, with seeming affection and real truth, the dangers of
absence and delay and persuaded Torismond to disappoint, by his speedy
return, the ambitious designs of his brothers, who might occupy the
throne and treasures of Thoulouse. [46] After the departure of the
Goths, and the separation of the allied army, Attila was surprised at
the vast silence that reigned over the plains of Chalons: the suspicion
of some hostile stratagem detained him several days within the circle of
his wagons, and his retreat beyond the Rhine confessed the last victory
which was achieved in the name of the Western empire. Meroveus and his
Franks, observing a prudent distance, and magnifying the opinion of
their strength by the numerous fires which they kindled every night,
continued to follow the rear of the Huns till they reached the confines
of Thuringia. The Thuringians served in the army of Attila: they
traversed, both in their march and in their return, the territories
of the Franks; and it was perhaps in this war that they exercised the
cruelties which, about fourscore years afterwards, were revenged by the
son of Clovis. They massacred their hostages, as well as their captives:
two hundred young maidens were tortured with exquisite and unrelenting
rage; their bodies were torn asunder by wild horses, or their bones were
crushed under the weight of rolling wagons; and their unburied limbs
were abandoned on the public roads, as a prey to dogs and vultures.
Such were those savage ancestors, whose imaginary virtues have sometimes
excited the praise and envy of civilized ages. [47]

[Footnote 46: Jornandes de Rebus Geticis, c. 41, p. 671. The policy of
Aetius, and the behavior of Torismond, are extremely natural; and
the patrician, according to Gregory of Tours, (l. ii. c. 7, p. 163,)
dismissed the prince of the Franks, by suggesting to him a similar
apprehension. The false Idatius ridiculously pretends, that Aetius
paid a clandestine nocturnal visit to the kings of the Huns and of the
Visigoths; from each of whom he obtained a bribe of ten thousand pieces
of gold, as the price of an undisturbed retreat.]

[Footnote 47: These cruelties, which are passionately deplored by
Theodoric, the son of Clovis, (Gregory of Tours, l. iii. c. 10, p. 190,)
suit the time and circumstances of the invasion of Attila. His re