He was always with the army, seldom in Rome, and then only when the young emperor’s anxious love summoned him thither. Scarce had he greeted the gods of his home, scarce seen his wife when, still stained with the blood of his enemies, he hastened back to the battle. He did not stay to catch at least a kiss from Eucherius through his vizor; the anxieties of a general o’ercame a father’s yearning and a husband’s love. How often has he bivouacked through the Thracian winter and endured beneath the open sky the blasts that slow Boötes sends from mount Riphaeus. When others, huddled over the fire, could scarce brook the cold, he would ride his horse across the frozen Danube and climb Athos deep in snow, his helmet on his head, thrusting aside the frozen branches of the ice-laden trees with his far gleaming targe. Now he pitched his tent by the shores of Cimmerian Pontus, now
nunc dabat hibernum Rhodope nimbosa cubile. 130 vos Haemi gelidae valles, quas saepe cruentis stragibus aequavit Stilicho, vos Thracia testor flumina, quae largo mutastis sanguine fluctus; dicite, Bisaltae vel qui Pangaea iuvencis scinditis, offenso quantae sub vomere putres 135 dissiliant glaebis galeae vel qualia rastris ossa peremptorum resonent inmania regum. Singula complecti cuperem; sed densior instat gestorum series laudumque sequentibus undis obruimur. genitor caesi post bella tyranni 140 iam tibi commissis conscenderat aethera terris. ancipites rerum ruituro culmine lapsus aequali cervice subis: sic Hercule quondam sustentante polum melius librata pependit machina nec dubiis titubavit Signifer astris 145 perpetuaque senex subductus mole parumper obstupuit proprii spectator ponderis Atlas. Nulli barbariae motus; nil turbida rupto ordine temptavit novitas, tantoque remoto principe mutatas orbis non sensit habenas. 150 nil inter geminas acies, ceu libera frenis, ausa manus. certe nec tantis dissona linguis turba nec armorum cultu diversior umquam confluxit populus: totam pater undique secum moverat Auroram; mixtis hic Colchus Hiberis, 155 hic mitra velatus Arabs, hic crine decorus Armenius; hic picta Saces fucataque Medus,
misty Rhodope afforded him a winter’s bed. I call you to witness, cold valleys of Haemus, that Stilicho has often filled with bloody slaughter; and you, rivers of Thrace, your waters turned to blood; say, ye Bisaltae, or you whose oxen plough Pangaeus’ slopes, how many a rotting helm has not your share shattered neath the soil, how oft have not your mattocks rung against the giant bones of slaughtered kings.