military officers, with the troops, the revenue, and the
sovereignty of the provinces beyond the Alps. He admonishes the Emperor
to consult the dictates of justice; to distrust the arts of those venal
flatterers, who subsist only by the discord of princes, and to embrace
the offer of a fair and honorable treaty, equally advantageous to the
republic and to the house of Constantine.

In this negotiation Julian claimed no more than he already possessed.
The delegated authority which he had long exercised over the provinces
of Gaul, Spain, and Britain was still obeyed under a name more
independent and august. The soldiers and the people rejoiced in a
revolution which was not stained even with the blood of the guilty.
Florentius was a fugitive; Lupicinus a prisoner. The persons who were
disaffected to the new government were disarmed and secured; and the
vacant offices were distributed, according to the recommendation of
merit, by a prince who despised the intrigues of the palace and the
clamors of the soldiers.

The negotiations of peace were accompanied and supported by the most
vigorous preparations for war. The army, which Julian held in readiness
for immediate action, was recruited and augmented by the disorders of
the times. The cruel persecution of the faction of Magnentius had filled
Gaul with numerous bands of outlaws and robbers. They cheerfully
accepted the offer of a general pardon from a prince whom they could
trust, submitted to the restraints of military discipline, and retained
only their implacable hatred to the person and government of
Constantius.

As soon as the season of the year permitted Julian to take the field, he
appeared at the head of his legions; threw a bridge over the Rhine in
the neighborhood of Cleves; and prepared to chastise the perfidy of the
Attuarii, a tribe of Franks, who presumed that they might ravage, with
impunity, the frontiers of a divided empire. The difficulty, as well as
glory, of this enterprise consisted in a laborious march; and Julian had
conquered, as soon as he could penetrate into a country which former
princes had considered as inaccessible. After he had given peace to the
barbarians, the emperor carefully visited the fortifications along the
Rhine from Cleves to Basel; surveyed, with peculiar attention, the
territories which he had recovered from the hands of the Alemanni,
passed through Besancon, which had severely suffered from their fury,
and fixed his head-quar