ror and the empire was warmly maintained by their ministers;
the Huns, with equal ardor, asserted the superiority of their victorious
monarch: the dispute was inflamed by the rash and unseasonable flattery
of Vigilius, who passionately rejected the comparison of a mere mortal
with the divine Theodosius; and it was with extreme difficulty that
Maximin and Priscus were able to divert the conversation, or to soothe
the angry minds, of the Barbarians. When they rose from the table, the
Imperial ambassador presented Edecon and Orestes with rich gifts of silk
robes and Indian pearls, which they thankfully accepted.

Yet Orestes could not forbear insinuating that _he_ had not always been
treated with such respect and liberality; and the offensive distinction
which was implied, between his civil office and the hereditary rank of
his colleague seems to have made Edecon a doubtful friend and Orestes an
irreconcilable enemy. After this entertainment they travelled about one
hundred miles from Sardica to Naissus. That flourishing city, which had
given birth to the great Constantine, was levelled with the ground; the
inhabitants were destroyed or dispersed; and the appearance of some sick
persons, who were still permitted to exist among the ruins of the
churches, served only to increase the horror of the prospect. The
surface of the country was covered with the bones of the slain; and the
ambassadors, who directed their course to the northwest, were obliged to
pass the hills of modern Servia before they descended into the flat and
marshy grounds which are terminated by the Danube.

The Huns were masters of the great river: their navigation was performed
in large canoes, hollowed out of the trunk of a single tree; the
ministers of Theodosius were safely landed on the opposite bank; and
their Barbarian associates immediately hastened to the camp of Attila,
which was equally prepared for the amusements of hunting or of war. No
sooner had Maximin advanced about two miles from the Danube than he
began to experience the fastidious insolence of the conqueror. He was
sternly forbidden to pitch his tents in a pleasant valley, lest he
should infringe the distant awe that was due to the royal mansion. The
ministers of Attila pressed him to communicate the business, and the
instructions, which he reserved for the ear of their sovereign. When
Maximin temperately urged the contrary practice of nations, he was still
more confounded to find that th