rn of Belisarius (in 559), his
services were claimed by Justinian in order to repel a horde of savage
Huns who had penetrated within eighteen miles of Constantinople. The
work was brilliantly done, with much of the old ingenuity and fertility
of resource which had marked his first campaign in Italy, and then
Belisarius relapsed into inactivity. He was again accused (562),
probably without justice, of abetting a conspiracy against the Emperor,
was disgraced and imprisoned in his own palace. After seven months he
was restored to the Imperial favour, the falsity of the accusation
against him having probably become apparent. He died in 565, in about
the sixtieth year of his age, and only a few months before his jealous
master. He had more than once had to endure the withdrawal of that
master's confidence, and some portions of his vast wealth were on two
occasions taken from him. But this is all that can be truly said as to
the reverses of fortune undergone by the conqueror of the Vandals and
the Goths. The stories of his blindness and of his beggary, of his
holding forth a wooden bowl and whining out "_Date obolum Belisario_",
rest on no good foundation, and either arise from a confusion between
Belisarius and another disgraced minister of Justinian, or else are
simply due to the myth-making industry of the Middle Ages.

[Illustration: COIN OF BADUILA. (TOTILA.)]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XVIII.

NARSES.

Totila again takes Rome--High-water mark of the success of the Gothic
arms--Narses, the Emperor's Chamberlain, appointed to command another
expedition for the recovery of Italy--His character--His semi-barbarous
army--Enters Italy--Battle of the Apennines--Totila slam--End of the
Gothic dominion in Italy.

[Illustration]

Soon after the return of Belisarius to Constantinople
came the Fourth Siege of Rome. Totila, who had sought the hand of a
Frankish princess in marriage, received for answer from her father,
"that the man who had not been able to keep Rome when he had taken it,
but had destroyed part and abandoned the rest to the enemy, was no King
of Italy".[156]

[Footnote 156: Procopius, "De Bello Gotthico", iii., 37. This is one of
the passages which make me somewhat doubtful whether we are not too
confident in our denial of the title "King of Italy" to Odovacar and
Theodoric. The words are clear.]

The taunt stung Totila to the quick. We know