3
THE DECLINE AND FALL
chap, gloomy hills assailed by the winter tempest, from
_lakes concealed in a blue mist, and from cold and
lonely heaths, over which the deer of the forestwere chased by a troop of naked barbarians. 1 ”Conquest Such was the state of the Roman frontiers,theseconci and such the maxims of imperial policy from theexception. c } ea th of Augustus to the accession of Trajan .That virtuous and active prince had received theeducation of a soldier, and possessed the talentsof a general. n The peaceful system of his pre-decessors was interrupted by scenes of war andconquest; and the legions, after a long interval,beheld a military emperor at their head. Thefirst exploits of Trajan were against the Dacians ,the most warlike of men, who dwelt beyond theDanube, and who, during the reign of Domitian ,had insulted with impunity the majesty ofRome .” To the strength and fierceness of bar-barians, they added a contempt for life, whichwas derived from a warm persuasion of the im-mortality and transmigration of the soul. p De-cebalus, the Dacian king, approved himself arival not unworthy of Trajan ; nor did he de-spair of his own and the public fortune, till, bythe confession of his enemies, he had exhaustedevery resource both of valour and policy.» This
m See Appian (in Prorern), and the uniform imagery of Ossian’sPoems, which, according to every hypothesis, were composed by anative Caledonian.
” See Pliny’s Panegyric , which seems founded on facts.
p Herodotus , 1. iv. c. 94. Julian in the Caesars, with Spanheim’sobservations.
' Plin. Epist. viii, 9.,