g that the
Blemmyes had risen in arms, and that Upper Egypt was again independent
of the Roman power. Not only Koptos, which had for centuries been an
Arab city, but even Ptolemais, the Greek capital of the Thebaid, was now
peopled by those barbarians, and they had to be reconquered by Probus
as foreign cities, and kept in obedience by Roman garrisons; and on his
return to Rome he thought his victories over the Blemmyes of Upper Egypt
not unworthy of a triumph.

By these unceasing wars, the Egyptian legions had lately been brought
into a high state of discipline, and, confident in their strength, and
in the success with which they had made their late general emperor of
the Roman world, they now attempted to raise up a rival to him in the
person of their present general Saturninus. Saturninus had been made
general of the Eastern frontier by Aurelian, who had given him strict
orders never to enter Egypt. "The Egyptians," says the historian,
meaning, however, the Alexandrians, "are boastful, vain, spiteful,
licentious, fond of change, clever in making songs and epigrams against
their rulers, and much given to soothsaying and augury." Aurelian well
knew that the loyalty of a successful general was not to be trusted in
Egypt, and during his lifetime Saturninus never entered that province.
But after his death, when Probus was called away to the other parts of
the empire, the government of Egypt was added to the other duties of
Saturninus; and no sooner was he seen there, at the head of an army that
seemed strong enough to enforce his wishes, than the fickle Alexandrians
saluted him with the title of emperor and Augustus. But Saturninus was
a wise man, and shunned the dangerous honour; he had hitherto fought
always for his country; he had saved the provinces of Spain, Gaul, and
Africa from the enemy or from rebellion; and he knew the value of his
rank and character too well to fling it away for a bauble. To escape
from further difficulties he withdrew from Egypt, and moved his
headquarters into Palestine. But the treasonable cheers of the
Alexandrians could neither be forgotten by himself nor by his troops;
he had withstood the calls of ambition, but he yielded at last to his
fears; he became a rebel for fear of being thought one, and he declared
himself emperor as the safest mode of escaping punishment. But he
was soon afterwards defeated and strangled, against the will of the
forgiving Probus.

On the death of Probus, in A