re of his safety to the
Immortal Gods; and thus publicly renounced the religion as well as the
friendship of Constantius.

The situation of Julian required a vigorous and immediate resolution.
He had discovered, from intercepted letters, that his adversary,
sacrificing the interest of the state to that of the monarch, had again
excited the Barbarians to invade the provinces of the West. The position
of two magazines, one of them collected on the banks of the Lake of
Constance, the other formed at the foot of the Cottian Alps, seemed to
indicate the march of two armies; and the size of those magazines, each
of which consisted of six hundred thousand quarters of wheat, or rather
flour, was a threatening evidence of the strength and numbers of the
enemy who prepared to surround him. But the Imperial legions were still
in their distant quarters of Asia; the Danube was feebly guarded; and if
Julian could occupy, by a sudden incursion, the important provinces of
Illyricum, he might expect that a people of soldiers would resort to his
standard, and that the rich mines of gold and silver would contribute to
the expenses of the civil war. He proposed this bold enterprise to the
assembly of the soldiers; inspired them with a just confidence in
their general, and in themselves; and exhorted them to maintain
their reputation of being terrible to the enemy, moderate to their
fellow-citizens, and obedient to their officers. His spirited discourse
was received with the loudest acclamations, and the same troops which
had taken up arms against Constantius, when he summoned them to leave
Gaul, now declared with alacrity, that they would follow Julian to
the farthest extremities of Europe or Asia. The oath of fidelity was
administered; and the soldiers, clashing their shields, and pointing
their drawn swords to their throats, devoted themselves, with horrid
imprecations, to the service of a leader whom they celebrated as
the deliverer of Gaul and the conqueror of the Germans. This solemn
engagement, which seemed to be dictated by affection rather than by
duty, was singly opposed by Nebridius, who had been admitted to
the office of Praetorian praefect. That faithful minister, alone and
unassisted, asserted the rights of Constantius, in the midst of an armed
and angry multitude, to whose fury he had almost fallen an honorable,
but useless sacrifice. After losing one of his hands by the stroke of a
sword, he embraced the knees of the prince