He ended and Stilicho thus made answer: “Wilt thou, an emperor, deign to challenge a Moor to fight? Is that coward to have the consolation of death in battle at thy hand? Shall Honorius fight on our side and Gildo on the other? Ere that, chaos shall plunge the stars into Hell. ’Tis enough to command his punishment. Thy name shall strike greater terror into him than thy sword. Presence will minish awe; he who stands in the lists admits equality, and struggling hosts regard not majesty. Listen and I will tell thee something at once more profitable for thyself and of more effect against the enemy. Gildo has a brother of like descent but unlike in character, Mascezel, who, avoiding the evil courses of his brother, has entrusted his hopes and his life to thy keeping. When Gildo, after many vain attempts, found no means to kill Mascezel, he turned his anger from the father to the children and slew those whom himself had nursed as infants in his arms; then cast aside their unburied bodies and refused sepulchre to the shades of those that had been his kin. The bloody tyrant stifled all natural feelings, forgot he was a brother, forgot he was a man, and begrudged the slain a handful of dust. ’Twas a like deed brought its ill repute upon Mycenae, that put the sun to rout and turned back the day. But while Atreus paid back crime for crime and had excuse * * * * * Page 128 crimen et infandas excusat coniuge mensas. hic odium, non poena fuit. te perdita iura, te pater ultorem, te nudi pulvere manes, te pietas polluta rogat; si flentibus aram et proprium miseris numen statuistis, Athenae, 405 si Pandionias planctu traxere phalanges Inachides belloque rogos meruere maritis, si maesto squalore comae lacrimisque senatum in Numidas pulsus solio commovit Adherbal: hunc quoque nunc Gildo, tanto quem funere mersit, hunc doleat venisse ducem seseque minorem 411 supplicibus sciat esse tuis. quem sede fugavit, hunc praeceps fugiat, fregit quem clade, tremiscat agnoscatque suum, trahitur dum victima, fratrem.” Haec ubi sederunt genero, notissima Marti 415 robora, praecipuos electa pube maniplos disponit portuque rates instaurat Etrusco. Herculeam suus Alcides Ioviamque cohortem rex ducit superum, premitur nec signifer ullo pondere: festinant adeo vexilla moveri. 420 Nervius insequitur meritusque vocabula Felix dictaque ab Augusto legio nomenque probantes invicti clipeoque animosi teste Leones. Dictis ante tamen princeps confirmat ituros * * * * * Page 129