ges in
the course of centuries, and since the Gothic kings, with all their
Germanic courtiers, had taken the place of the emperors, it had
assumed a very inharmonious aspect, for many chambers, intended
for the peculiar customs of Roman life, stood, still retaining
the old magnificence of their arrangements, unused and neglected.
Cobwebs covered the mosaic of the rich baths of Honorius, and in the
toilet-chamber of Placidia the lizards climbed over the marble frames
of the silver mirrors on the walls. On the one side, the necessities of
a more warlike court had obliged the removal of many walls, in order to
change the small rooms of the ancient building into wider halls for
arsenals, banqueting and guard-rooms, and, on the other, neighbouring
houses had been joined to the palace by new walls, so as to create a
stronghold in the middle of the city.

In the dried-up _piscina maxima_ (large fish-pond) fair-haired boys now
romped, and in the marble halls of the _palaestra_[1] neighed the horses
of the Gothic guards. So the extensive edifice had the dismal
appearance partly of a scarcely-preserved ruin, and partly of a
half-finished new erection; and thus the palace of the present ruler
seemed a symbol of his Roman-Gothic kingdom, and of his whole
half-finished, half-decayed political creation.

On the day, however, on which Cethegus, after years of absence, once
again entered the house, there lay heavy upon it a cloud of anxiety,
sorrow and gloom, for its royal soul was departing from it.

The great man, who here had guided, for the space of a man's life, the
fate of Europe; who was wondered at, with love or with hate, by West
and by East; the hero of his age; the powerful Theodoric of Verona, of
whose name--even during his lifetime--Legend had possessed herself; the
great Amelung, King Theodoric, was about to die.

So said the physicians--if not to himself, yet to his nearest
relations--and the report soon spread in the great and populous city.

Although such an end to the secret sufferings of the aged King had been
long held possible, the news that the blow was at hand now filled all
hearts with the greatest excitement.

The faithful Goths were anxious and grieved, and a dull fear was the
predominating feeling even of the Roman population, for here in
Ravenna, in the immediate vicinity of the King, the Italians had had
frequent opportunities of admiring his mildness and generosity, and of
experiencing his beneficen