ted by the furious Goths; and all the fortresses of Campania
were stained with patrician blood. After a period of thirteen centuries,
the institution of Romulus expired; and if the nobles of Rome still
assumed the title of senators, few subsequent traces can be discovered
of a public council, or constitutional order. Ascend six hundred years,
and contemplate the kings of the earth soliciting an audience, as the
slaves or freedmen of the Roman senate!

The Gothic war was yet alive. The bravest of the nation retired beyond
the Po; and Teias was unanimously chosen to succeed and revenge their
departed hero. The new king immediately sent ambassadors to implore, or
rather to purchase, the aid of the Franks, and nobly lavished, for the
public safety, the riches which had been deposited in the palace of
Pavia. The residue of the royal treasure was guarded by his brother
Aligern, at Cumaea, in Campania; but the strong castle which Totila had
fortified was closely besieged by the arms of Narses. From the Alps
to the foot of Mount Vesuvius, the Gothic king, by rapid and secret
marches, advanced to the relief of his brother, eluded the vigilance
of the Roman chiefs, and pitched his camp on the banks of the Sarnus
or _Draco_, which flows from Nuceria into the Bay of Naples. The river
separated the two armies: sixty days were consumed in distant and
fruitless combats, and Teias maintained this important post till he was
deserted by his fleet and the hope of subsistence. With reluctant steps
he ascended the _Lactarian_ mount, where the physicians of Rome, since
the time of Galen, had sent their patients for the benefit of the air
and the milk. But the Goths soon embraced a more generous resolution:
to descend the hill, to dismiss their horses, and to die in arms, and
in the possession of freedom. The king marched at their head, bearing in
his right hand a lance, and an ample buckler in his left: with the
one he struck dead the foremost of the assailants; with the other he
received the weapons which every hand was ambitious to aim against his
life. After a combat of many hours, his left arm was fatigued by the
weight of twelve javelins which hung from his shield. Without moving
from his ground, or suspending his blows, the hero called aloud on his
attendants for a fresh buckler; but in the moment while his side was
uncovered, it was pierced by a mortal dart. He fell; and his head,
exalted on a spear, proclaimed to the nations that the