rmy, wrested from them by the Goths,
retaken by the Imperialists. The Imperial general, a brave old barbarian
named Mundus, fell dead by the side of his slaughtered son; but another
general took his place, and being well supported by a naval expedition,
succeeded, as has been said, in reconquering Salona, drove out the
Gothic generals, and reincorporated Dalmatia with the Empire. This
province, which had for many generations been treated almost as a part
of Italy, was now for four centuries to be for the most part a
dependency of Constantinople. The Dalmatian war was ended by the middle
of 536.

But it was of course to the Italian expedition that the eyes of the
spectators of the great drama were most eagerly turned. Here Belisarius
commanded, peerless among the generals of his own age, and not surpassed
by many of preceding or following ages. The force under his command
consisted of only 7,500 men, the greater part of whom were of barbarian
origin--Huns, Moors, Isaurians, Gepidse, Heruli, but they were welded
together by that instinct of military discipline and that unbounded
admiration for their great commander and confidence in his success which
is the surest herald of victory. Not only in nationality but in mode of
fighting they were utterly unlike the armies with which republican Rome
had won the sovereignty of the world. In those days it might have been
truly said to the inhabitant of the seven-hilled city as Macaulay has
imagined Capys saying to Romulus:

"Thine, Roman | is the pilum:
Roman | the sword is thine.
The even trench, the bristling mound,
The legion's ordered line"--

but now, centuries of fighting with barbarian foes, especially with the
nimble squadrons of Persia, had completely changed the character of the
Imperial tactics. It was to the deadly aim of his _Hippo-toxotai_
(mounted bowmen) that Belisarius, in pondering over his victories,
ascribed his antonishing success. "He said that at the beginning of his
first great battle he had carefully studied the characteristic
differences of each army, in order that he might prevent his little band
from being overborne by sheer force of numbers. The chief difference
which he noted was that almost all the Roman (Imperialist) soldiers and
their Hunnish allies were good _Hippo-toxotai_, while the Goths had none
of them practised the art of shooting on horseback. Their cavalry fought
only with javelins and swords, and their archers fought