At midnight they reached the gates of the Roman camp. Everything was still. The drawbridge had long been raised. The friends had to sleep in the wood near the hinder gate, usually called the Decumanal.
At dawn the trumpet sounded. The nightingale had been singing in the misty wood; he ceased, frightened by the warlike notes. Aragaris snuffed the smell of soup and woke Strombix. They made their way into the camp and sat down near the cauldrons. In the principal tent near the Pretorian gate the Cæsar Julian was keeping watch.
From the day on which he had been nominated Cæsar at Milan thanks to the protection of the Empress Eusebia, Julian had applied himself with zeal to soldierly exercises. He not only used to study the art of war under the direction of Severus, but desired moreover to master every detail of the work of the rank and file. Within sound of the trumpet, in barracks, on the Campus Martius in company with new recruits, during whole days he would learn to march, to use the bow and sling, to leap ditches, and to run under the heavy weight of full marching order. He became also an adept in swordsmanship.
The blood of the race of Constantine, a race of austere and obstinate warriors, woke in the young man and overcame his monkish hypocrisy.
"Alack! divine Iamblicus and Plato! if you could only see what your pupil is becoming!" he would sometimes exclaim, wiping the sweat from his brow.
And pointing to his armour he would add--
"Don't you think, Severus, that this steel sits as badly on a pupil of philosophers as a war-saddle on an ox?"
Severus would only reply by a mischievous smile; he knew that these sighings and complaints were not sincere, and that in reality Julian was delighted with his military progress.
In a few months he had been so transformed and hardened into manhood that it was not easy to recognise in him the "little Greek" of the Court of Constantius. His eyes alone had not changed, still shining with a strange and unforgettable keenness which had in it something of fever. Julian felt himself growing stronger every day, not only physically, but morally also. For the first time in his existence he felt the happiness that comes from the love of simple and common folk.