130 Dr. Kennedy Bailie's Researches amongst the inscribed Monuments 



position between the Melas and the Eurymedon. By this, however, Leo failed 

 to profit, and the result of the conflict was as might have been anticipated : he 

 was defeated by Tribigild, and his army slaughtered or dispersed.* 



The feature of the struggle which has, in my opinion, been drawn by the 

 author of the inscription, is that where Leo terminates his career in a morass 

 into which he is pursued, and where the poet has represented him as expiring 

 from the mere influence of terror. This closing scene of the drama is described 



as follows :f 



" Ast alios vicina palus sine more ruentes 

 Excipit, et cumulis immanibus aggerat undas. 

 Ipse Leo dama cervoque fugacior ibat, 

 Sudanti tremebundus equo ; qui pondere postquam 

 Decidit implicitus limo, cunctantia pronus 

 Per vada reptabat, coeno subnixa tenaci. 

 Mergitur, et pingui suspirat corpore moles, 

 More suis, dapibus quae jam devota futuris 

 Turpe gemit, quoties Hosius mucrone corusco 

 Armatur, cingitque sinus; 



Ecce levis frondes a tergo concutit aura ; 



Credit tela Leo : valuit pro vulnere terror, 



Implevitque vicem jaculi, vitamque nocentem •, • , 



Integer, et sola formidine saucius efflat." 



« The rest, in rude disorder hurrying, wild, 

 A marsh receives, full soon with corses pil'd. 

 Leo himself, more fleet than timid deer. 

 Flies on his panting steed, half dead with fear : 

 Anon his weight o'erpowers his courser's strength, 

 ' Who, 'tangled in the mud, with tottering length 



Falls prone, and struggling in the slimy shoals 

 Wriggles in reptile effort, snorts and rolls, 

 Whilst the unwieldy bulk he bore, the pride 

 Of chieftains ! wallows in the slimy tide, 

 Panting, expiring, as a well-gorg'd swine 

 Its gutturall screams when Hosius means to dine. 



»»•»•»»«♦ , 



• Vid. Suid. in Xitn, ii. p. 428. Ed. Kust. Gibbon, Hist. c. xxxii. p. 181. 

 j- Lib. in Eutrop. ii. 438, ss. 



