chap. XL] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 241 the loss of dignity and dominion. I implore heaven that I may never be seen, not a day, without my diadem and purple ; that I may no longer behold the light, when I cease to be saluted with the name of queen. If you resolve, Caesar ! to fly, you have treasures ; behold the sea, you have ships ; but tremble lest the desire of life should expose you to wretched exile and ignominious death. For my own part, I adhere to the maxim of antiquity, that the throne is a glorious sepulchre." The firmness of a woman restored the courage to deliberate and act, and courage soon discovers the resources of the most desperate situation. It was an easy and a decisive measure to revive the animosity of the factions ; the blue were astonished at their own guilt and folly, that a trifling injury should provoke them to conspire with their implacable enemies against a gracious and liberal benefactor ; they again proclaimed the majesty of Justin- ian, and the greens, with their upstart emperor, were left alone in the hippodrome. The fidelity of the guards was doubtful ; The but the military force of Justinian consisted in three thousand suppressed veterans, who had been trained to valour and discipline in the Persian and Illyrian wars. Under the command of Belisarius and Mundus, they silently marched in two divisions from the palace, forced their obscure way through narrow passages, expir- ing flames, and falling edifices, and burst open at the same mo- ment the two opposite gates of the hippodrome. In this narrow space, the disorderly and affrighted crowd was incapable of resist- ing on either side a firm and regular attack ; the blues signalized the fury of their repentance ; and it is computed that above thirty thousand persons were slain in the merciless and promiscuous carnage of the day. Hypatius was dragged from his throne, and conducted with his brother Pompey to the feet of the emperor ; they implored his clemency ; but their crime was manifest, their innocence uncertain, and Justinian had been too much terrified to forgive. The next morning the two nephews of Anastasius, with eighteen illustrious accomplices of patrician or consular rank, were privately executed by the soldiers ; their bodies were thrown into the sea, their palaces razed, and their fortunes confiscated. The hippodrome itself was condemned during several years to a mournful silence ; with the restoration of the games, the same disorders revived ; and the blue and vol. iv. — 16
