OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

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power of flight or of resistance, in the hands of chap.their implacable enemies. Their fate was sus-pended till the arrival of Constantius , the se-cond, h and perhaps the most favoured, of thesons of Constantine .

The voice of the dying emperor had recom- Mauacr*mended the care of his funeral to the piety of princes.Constantius ; and that prince, by the vicinity ofhis eastern station, could easily prevent the di-ligence of his brothers, who resided in their dis-tant government of Italy and Gaul. As soonas he had taken possession of the palace of Con-stantinople , his first care was to remove the ap-prehensions of his kinsmen by a solemn oath,which he pledged for their security. His nextemployment was to find some specious pretencewhich might release his conscience from the ob-ligation of an imprudent promise. The arts offraud were made subservient to the designs ofcruelty ; and a manifest forgery was attested bya person of the most sacred character. Fromthe hands of the bishop of Nicomedia, Constan-tius received a fatal scroll, affirmed to be thegenuine testament of his father; in which theemperor expressed his suspicions that he hadbeen poisoned by his brothers; and conjuredhis sons to revenge his death, and to consult

" The character of Dalmatius is advantageously, though conciselydrawn by Entropius (x, 9). Dalmatius Caesar prosperrimi indole,neque patruo absimilis, haud multo post oppressus est factione militariAs both Jerom and the Alexandrian Chronicle mention the third yearof the Caesar, which did not commence till the 18th or 24!h of Septem-ber, a. d. 337, it it certain that these military factions continued abovefour months.