ed the name of an army. But on his arrival at Aries, or Lyons, he
was confounded by the intelligence that the Visigoths, refusing to
embrace the defence of Gaul, had determined to expect, within their own
territories, the formidable invader, whom they professed to despise.

The senator Avitus, who, after the honorable exercise of the praetorian
prefecture, had retired to his estate in Auvergne, was persuaded to
accept the important embassy, which he executed with ability and
success. He represented to Theodoric that an ambitious conqueror, who
aspired to the dominion of the earth, could be resisted only by the firm
and unanimous alliance of the powers whom he labored to oppress. The
lively eloquence of Avitus inflamed the Gothic warriors by the
description of the injuries which their ancestors had suffered from the
Huns, whose implacable fury still pursued them from the Danube to the
foot of the Pyrenees. He strenuously urged that it was the duty of every
Christian to save from sacrilegious violation the churches of God and
the relics of the saints; that it was the interest of every barbarian
who had acquired a settlement in Gaul, to defend the fields and
vineyards, which were cultivated for his use, against the desolation of
the Scythian shepherds. Theodoric yielded to the evidence of truth,
adopted the measure at once the most prudent and the most honorable, and
declared that, as the faithful ally of Aetius and the Romans, he was
ready to expose his life and kingdom for the common safety of Gaul. The
Visigoths, who at that time were in the mature vigor of their fame and
power, obeyed with alacrity the signal of war, prepared their arms and
horses, and assembled under the standard of their aged King, who was
resolved, with his two eldest sons, Torismond and Theodoric, to command
in person his numerous and valiant people.

The example of the Goths determined several tribes or nations that
seemed to fluctuate between the Huns and the Romans. The indefatigable
diligence of the patrician gradually collected the troops of Gaul and
Germany, who had formerly acknowledged themselves the subjects or
soldiers of the republic, but who now claimed the rewards of voluntary
service and the rank of independent allies; the Laeti, the Armoricans,
the Breones, the Saxons, the Burgundians, the Sarmatians or Alani, the
Ripuarians, and the Franks who followed Meroveus as their lawful prince.
Such was the various army which, under the condu