THE PERILS OF RAPID CIVILIZATION. 227 



with Roman civilization, it occurring more suddenly and lasting 

 longer. Joined in fortunes with the Huns, they shared in the terrific 

 defeat of Attila at Chalons in 451. At just about this time Theodo- 

 ric, destined to become their great leader, was born. Brought up 

 at Constantinople, as a hostage, he was imbued with the best culture 

 of the Eastern Empire. In 489 he led his people into Italy, and, over- 

 coming the resistance of a usurping king, speedily made himself mas- 

 ter of that country. Two hundred thousand men, with their wives 

 and children, were settled in Italy. For thirty-three years they min- 

 gled as conquerors in the current of a new and untried civilization. 

 They conformed themselves to the Roman administration and policy. 

 So far from destroying the monuments of art, they took measures for 

 their restoration and preservation. Agriculture and the arts of peace 

 revived, and Italy almost regained the prosperity of her palmiest days. 

 The " barbarian " set himself and his soldiers to do police diity for 

 the Roman officers of law and government, who were retained in their 

 titles and functions. An Arian himself, he respected and tolerated the 

 Catholic faith.* In fact, we have here a most marked instance of a 

 people in the position of conquerors adopting, in a generation, the civ- 

 ilization of their vanquished foes. And what is the result ? Their 

 wise and beneficent king died in 526. In the next twenty-five years 

 the prosperous and strong nation rapidly declines in power and num- 

 bers. Belisarius and his successor Narses overcome them, now by 

 strategy, now by force, until, in 553, their last king is slain, and the 

 nation of the Ostrogoths becomes extinct.f 



We can only allude, in passing, to the Huns, who never fairly 

 reached the seat of the Roman power in Italy, though they were 

 sought in alliance by the timorous emperors — and it is remarkable, 

 in view of their vast numbers, how completely they disappear from 

 history, within twenty years of their first aggressions on Roman terri- 

 tory, in the defeat and death of their one great chief. 



The Yandals demand a word of attention. Though they appear 

 in history as early as the second century, they are peaceably disposed 

 of and remain quiet in Pannonia till the beginning of the fifth cent- 

 ury, when 'they attack Gaul ; thence they overrun Spain, to be dis- 

 placed by the western Goths, and cross to Africa. Each of the bar- 

 barian races seems to have had its one great man, and the Vandals 

 had their Genseric. In Africa they numbered from fifty thousand to 

 eighty thousand men, and took their turn at sacking the Imperial City. 

 For fourteen days they ravaged it. But it was only a foray, not a 

 conquest. They did not stay among the Italians, as the Ostrogoths 

 had done. Early in the following century Belisarius had slain their 

 last king. A few of their soldiers were enlisted to fight in the Persian 

 wars, but the sacrifice of these is, in the words of Gibbon, " insufficient 

 to explain the fate of a nation whose numbers, before a short and 

 * Vide Gibbon, chapter xxxix. t Ibid., chapter xliii. 



