“They say Attila in leading on his hosts bade them despise our Roman forces with the ancient defensive array of the shields locked into the testudo, and make their onset on the young nations who could not only defend themselves but assail. ‘Cut the sinew and the limbs will relax,’ he cried. ‘Him who is fated to conquer no dart will touch; him who is doomed to die Fate will find amidst the sloth of peace.’ He might have spared his taunts to us Romans. Romans or barbarians, who could say who fought best when all fought with the hope of beating back the flood of destruction for ever, and with the certainty that if it were not beaten back, it would overwhelm them all? It was no conflict between machines and battering-rams and Roman walls, but between flesh and blood, fierce and desperate men fighting hand to hand for life or death. They say three hundred thousand lives were lost upon this fatal field; three hundred thousand souls there passed away—whence or whither, who can say? Every kind of weapon was there—javelin, spear, huge Tartar bow, Roman shield and sword; amidst the din of every kind of language. Never, I should think, could confusion have been greater; and to confusion of tongues, before the battle ended, was added the bewilderment of darkness. We began at three o’clock, and the conflict raged on through the night. Aetius himself strayed in the dark amongst the Huns, whose language, fortunately for him, he knew. And yet, in spite of the confusion of tribes and tongues, the issue is clear, clearer I think than the issue of battles can often be. For it is, at bottom, the conflict of civilization with barbarism, of hope with despair, of building with destroying, of order with anarchy, of heathenism with Christianity, of life with death; and in the main, civilization, order, hope, Christianity, life, have won the day. “At this moment I hear the death-wail of the Goths around the body of their king. They think they have rescued the royal corpse from the heap of slain beneath which it lay. “Still the Huns keep behind their wagons. Attila their king is among them; but around him there is no shout as for a king. “The field is won; the host of the Huns, the great flood of devastation, is ebbing back to its deserts. God grant it be for ever. “It seems decided that we make no pursuit, but let the flood ebb away beyond the Rhone. To-morrow I go southward with a detachment to Troyes. Farewell.” * * * * * All the day of the great battle tidings kept flowing in to Troyes. None ventured beyond the city, for the battle was said to be raging not more than five miles away. There was indeed no roll of the thunder of guns; but the echo of distant tumult came faintly now and then through the hush of the July afternoon. Troyes knew that her Bishop was there. Who could say that if the battle were lost, vengeance might not fall on his head? But if Attila won, _all_ was lost.