Thus the East was again tranquillized, the peace with the Persians being secured until the times of Carus, as it seems, by treaties. Aurelian now returned to Europe to reunite the West with the empire; whereupon he was met by Tetricus, who felt that his own life was not safe among the mutinous soldiers, and wished to get himself out of this position: but the soldiers of Tetricus fought with such spirit in the neighbourhood of Chalons, that one may see how national was their cause, and how determined was the wish for separation. It is remarkable that the French historians have never understood nor discerned the national development of France, which always renewed itself from the time of Julius Cæsar; just as they also have ever overlooked the distinctly marked difference between the literature of Northern and Southern France. It cannot be accurately made out, whether it was now, or somewhat sooner or later, that the German tribes broke through the frontier. The Alemanni, Lombards (Juthungi), and Vandals—the first two at least—passed the Po and threatened Rome: they were defeated near Fano (_Fanum Fortunæ_), very nearly in the same neighbourhood where Hasdrubal fell in the second Punic War. Aurelian, who could not live without war, was on the eve of renewing that against the Persians: but he was murdered while on his march, at the crafty instigation, it is said, of an infamous secretary whose fraud he had found out. This story, however, is perhaps one of the many tales which were devised to screen the guilt of the real perpetrators: another conspiracy had already been discovered once before. The army bewailed him, and determined that none of the leading men who had had a share in his murder should reap any advantage from it. This accounts for the strange demand which the army made to the senate, to appoint the successor of Aurelian. The senate mistrusted this, or it was afraid that the soldiers might repent; but the latter are said to have so steadfastly stood by their declaration, that the empire remained for eight months without an emperor, nor did any one arise in the provinces.