called to Constantinople, made full submission, obtained leave to return to Rome, but died on the voyage, and his companion Pelagius, having shown himself very pliant to the Imperial doctrines, was, by the order of Justinian, raised to the bishopric of Rome. He and his successors in the Roman See, to the time of the famous Gregory I., were all appointed by the order, or influence, of the Eastern Emperor. Hence their obscurity and obedience amidst the awful desolation inflicted on unhappy Italy by Justinian's twenty-years' war with the Goths, and his reconquest of Rome. The contemporary historian Procopius, and eyewitness, for he was the secretary of Belisarius, computes the depopulation of Italy as above the total sum of her present inhabitants. He tells us that acorns were used in place of bread; that he had seen a deserted orphan suckled by a she-goat, and makes our blood run cold by describing a way-side inn, where seventeen travellers were lodged, murdered, and eaten by two women, who were detected and slain by the eighteenth! This was the period in which the terrible Alboin king of the Lombards achieved the conquest of a great part of Italy. Fierce, beyond the example of the surrounding German tribes, the Lombards delighted to propagate the belief that their heads were formed like the heads of dogs, and that they drank the blood of the enemies whom they vanquished in battle! At the solicitation of Justinian, they left their own homes on the banks of the Elbe, to reduce the cities on the coast of the Adriatic. But the spirit of rapine soon tempted Alboin to cross the Julian Alps, and to seize on the fruitful but then desolate plains to which his victory communicated the perpetual name of Lombardy. Terror preceded his march, he found everywhere, or he left, a dreary solitude. The portraits of Alboin and his chiefs may still 578-590.] THE LOMBARDS. 433 be seen in the palace of Monza, near Milan; and our curiosity almost yields to horror as we gaze on their savage aspect and strange apparel. Their heads were shaven behind, but the shaggy locks hung over their eyes and mouth, and a long beard represented the name and character of the Langobard nation. Their dress consisted of loose linen garments, after the fashion of the Anglo-Saxons, which were decorated, in their opinion, with broad stripes of variegated colours. The legs and feet were clothed in long hose and open sandals; and even in the security of peace a trusty sword was constantly girt at their sides. It was a coarse allusion to the white bands which enveloped their legs, that drew forth the insulting remark of a barbarian chief to Alboin, "The Lombards resemble, in figure and in smell, the horses of our Sarmatian plains.' This is a very favourite sarcasm of the popes against the Lombards, towards whom they have ever felt an instinctive aversion as their natural foes. The Lombard kings have often retorted with Alboin, 'Add another resemblance, you have felt how strongly they kick.' And yet after the rage of battle had subsided, the Lombards sometimes surprised their vanquished foes by a gentleness and generosity truly characteristic of Father-land.' Pavia, which had been strongly fortified by the Goths, resisted the new invader for three years, whilst the rest of Northern and Central Italy submitted almost without a blow. Alboin bound himself by a tremendous oath that age, and sex, and dignity should be confounded in a general massacre. Famine at length enabled him to execute his bloody vow, but as he was entering the city-gate his horse stumbled, fell, and could not be raised from the ground. One of his attendants, from compassion or piety, boldly exclaimed-"This is the hand of God! This betokens the wrath of heaven.. U against shedding innocent blood.' The conqueror paused; relented; sheathed his sword; and, peacefully reposing himself in the palace of Theodoric, proclaimed to the trembling multitude that they should live and obey. (See Gibbon, v. 77, 251, 296-322; vi. 34-45, 125-165, 221-246283, 338. Milman, L. C. i. 248-252, 293, 350. Neander, iii. 316, 320, 340-348; iv. 262. Gieseler, ii. 128-130. Mosheim, i. 456-462. Elliott, Horæ Apol. iii. 142. Mahon, Life of Belisarius, passim. Ammianus, 1. xiv., xxviii. Anster, Introd. Lec. Roman Civil Law, pp. 11, 12, 30.) 590-604.] CHAPTER XI. 'Some voice thrills in mine ear like breath 'My heart is like a temple dim, Down whose long aisles the moonlight floats, And sad celestial organ notes, Hover, like wings of Cherubim, 'Touch'd by some unseen hand, around The marble figures of the Dead; But at this hour no living tread -TENNYSON. GREGORY I., THE LAST BISHOP OF ROME. MONACHISM Owes much of its marvellous power and perpetuity to the certainty with which, as soon as ever the evil nature of the system becomes visible and intolerable, either new sects, or Orders, arise, or the old are remodelled and regulated by some able or ardent monk, under a different name, dress, or rule. Such was the reform wrought out in Monachism by the celebrated BENEDICT, just as the ferocious fanaticism of the monks was disgusting the few scholars and men of sense, still lingering on the borders of the Dark Ages, and captivated them for a thousand years. We trace the story of his life from the hand of the last Roman bishop, and, though it will read like a fairy tale, I must sketch it off, so intensely is it characteristic of Gregory himself, and so faithfully does it reflect the spirit of the age. Benedict was born at Nursia, near Spoleto, at the close of the Fifth Century, of respectable parents, who, rejoicing at the bright promise of his genius, took him to Rome for his education. But preferring,' says Gregory, a holy ignorance to the perilous study of letters,' he ran away from his parents, and, accompanied by his faithful nurse Cyrilla, he secreted himself in a hermit's cell two miles from the town of Subiaco. Here his fame was at once established by the astounding miracle of making span-new an old stone sieve, commonly used by peasants of that part of the country for making oread, when he found Cyrilla weeping over it one day, in vexation at having broken it by her negligence. The wondering rustics came from far to see the sight, and hung the sieve over their Church door. Benedict shrunk from their praises; by the aid of a monk named Romanus he let himself down across the face of a precipice into a deep cavern, which is still shown to pilgrims as a hallowed place, overhanging the Anio, that roars beneath in a deep ravine, clothed with the densest forest, and looking on another wild precipitous rock. In this cold and dismal dwelling the softly and delicately nurtured boy lay sheltered from the pursuit of his sorrowing parents and the equally dangerous praises of the peasants, for three long years. His scanty food was supplied by Romanus, who stole it from the monastic stock, and let it down by a rope, to which a small bell was attached to give notice of its coming. To an imagination thus prepared, what scene could be more suited to nurture a disposition to see visions and wonders, than this wild and romantic scene? So the Evil One,' says Gregory very solemnly, often |