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454 THE DECLINE AND FALL [Chap, xliii and Narses might second his wishes by the restoration of cities and more especially of churches. But the power of kings is most effectual to destroy ; and the twenty years of the Gothic war had consummated the distress and depopulation of Italy. As early as the fourth campaign, under the discipline of Belisarius himself, fifty thousand labourers died of hunger 94 in the narrow region of Picenum ; 95 and a strict interpretation of the evidence of Procopius would swell the loss of Italy above the total sum of her present inhabitants. 96 invasion of I desire to believe, but I dare not affirm, that Belisarius vians[cot- sincerely rejoiced in the triumph of Narses. Yet the con- 559 [558-9] ' sciousness of his own exploits might teach him to esteem with- out jealousy the merit of a rival; and the repose of the aged 97 warrior was crowned by a last victory which saved the emperor and the capital. The Barbarians who annually visited the provinces of Europe were less discouraged by some accidental defeats than they were excited by the double hope of spoil and of subsidy. In the thirty-second winter of Justinian's reign, the Danube was deeply frozen : Zabergan led the cavalry of the Bulgarians, 98 and his standard was followed by a promiscuous multitude of Sclavonians. The savage chief passed, without opposition, the river and the mountains, spread his troops over Macedonia and Thrace, and advanced with no more than seven thousand horse to the long walls which should have defended the territory of Constantinople. But the works of man are impotent against the assaults of nature : a recent earthquake had shaken the foundations of the wall; and the forces of the empire were employed on the distant frontiers of Italy, Africa, Prffitorio Italise ; and has been preserved by Julian Antecessor, and in the Corpus Juris CiviliB, after the novels and edicts of Justinian, Justin, and Tiberius. [Novel 164, ed. Zacharia.] 94 A still greater number was consumed by famine in the southern provinces ixrhs the Ionian gulf. Acorns were used in the place of bread. Procopius had seen a deserted orphan suckled by a she-goat. Seventeen passengers were lodged, murdered, and eaten by two women, who were detected and slain by the eighteenth, &c. 93 Quinta regio Piceni est ; quondam uberrimae multitudinis, ccclx. millia, Picentium in fidem P. R. venere (Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 18). In the time of Vespasian, this ancient population was already diminished. 98 Perhaps fifteen or sixteen millions. Procopius (Anecdot. c. 18) computes that Africa lost five millions, that Italy was thrice as extensive, and that the depopu- lation was in a larger proportion. But his reckoning is inflamed by passion, and clouded with uncertainty. 97 [His age can hardly have exceeded 55 years in a.d. 559 ; for he was irni]v{]TT)s in a.d. 526.] 98 [The Cotrigurs, see Appendix 16.]