If the system really be so bad as it is often represented, it seems strange that it should have been adopted with all its imperfections in British India. But the truth is this; the mercenaries of the Roman armies were more faithful to their contract than the emperors. It is by sovereigns and ministers of state, not by generals of mercenaries, that empires are prepared for destruction. Our Indian empire is always in greater danger from a conceited Foreign secretary or a foolish Governor-general than from a rebellion of the native troops. If our administration be only as wise as that of Imperial Rome, somewhat more just, and a great deal less avaricious, there seems no reason why a British government should rule at Calcutta for a shorter period than a Roman one at Constantinople. The laws of Rome still survive in the courts of justice of the greater part of Europe; the spirit of the Roman Republic breathes, at the present hour, in full energy in the Papal councils; and are we to suppose that the institutions of a more Catholic philanthropy, in the progress of development under the British constitution, are less capable of acquiring an inherent vitality? The age of Belisarius was deeply imbued with the military spirit of the middle ages; and Belisarius was himself as proud of his accomplishments as a daring horseman, a good lance, and a stout bowman, as of his military science. Cavalry was the favourite portion of the army in his day, and he shared in the general contempt felt for infantry. The horsemen were sheathed in complete steel; and their helmets, breast-plates and shields, were impenetrable even to the shafts of the Persians, who drew their bow-strings to the right ear, and threw discredit on the prowess of the Homeric archers.[13] The Roman officers, as must always be the case where cavalry is the principal arm, were remarkable for personal courage and impetuous daring; and perhaps in the whole annals of Rome there cannot be found another period in which headlong rashness was so universally the characteristic of the generals of the Roman armies. The favourite position of Belisarius on the field of battle was to figure like Richard Coeur-de-Lion as a colonel of cuirassiers, not like Marlborough, to perform the duties of a commander-in-chief. Procopius prefaces an account of one of his rashest combats by declaring that he was not in the habit of exposing himself unnecessarily, but on the occasion in question, he owns that Belisarius fought too much like a mere soldier in the front rank.