HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE:

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of their enterprise, and the possession of the latter raised them into the conse-quence of a maritime power, capable of being extended by any people power-ful and ambitious as themselves. So eager was Genseric, their leader, to profitby the advantage, that he was scarcely established in his new conquest, ere hisviews began to expand themselves. His preparations surmounted by his applica-tion of them, unequivocally pointed out to Valentinian, who was the emperorof the west, that he had little quietude to expect, unless it were in his powerto subdue, or at least to humble, his ambitious and restless neighbour. In thehope of effecting this, the Roman formed the immediate resolution worthy ofhis rank and character. He caused an immense fleet, consisting, according toreport, of eleven hundred large vessels, to be collected and equipped with theutmost expedition. Having embarked a very considerable army selected fromthe best troops in the whole empire, he ordered them to Africa, under thecommand of three generals whose bravery and experience had been proved.However equal, in respect to military talents, the Roman commanders mightbe as to the task of contending with the vandal chief by mere force of arms,they proved infinitely inferior to him on the score of policy and political pru-dence. Soon as he was informed of their approach, he dispatched ambassadorswith overtures of peace, a measure which proved completely productive of theend he wished to accomplish ; delay and procrastination. The season for offen-sive measures passed over without a conflict ; and notwithstanding the mightyfleet he had equipped, in the hopes of restoring Africa once more to the domi-nion of Rome, Valentinian found himself compelled, in the ensuing year, moreparticularly on being attacked by the Huns who invaded T hrace, to concludea treaty with Genseric, by which he ceded to him full and undisturbedpossession of all those various countries and territories which he had over-ran.

Thirteen years*' after Genseric had seated himself on the African throne,the murder of Valentinian the Third bv order of Pctronius Maximus, whosewife the emperor had ravished, and the rage of Eudoxia, the empress, onbeing compelled to marry Maximus, the author of her husband’s murder,whom, notwithstanding his infidelity, she most tenderly loved, caused an invi-tation from her to the Vandal, that he should repair to Italy with his fleet andarmies, for the purpose of revenging the death cf Valentinian, her husband, and

* Corresponding to tire year of the.world 455.

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