They proclaimed Probus emperor, who is the most excellent of the Cæsars of that age. Quite as great a general as Aurelian, he still at the same time turned his mind to the protection of the empire against foreign foes, and to raising it at home from the wretched condition into which it had fallen. He had many rebellions to put down, but he had especially to wage war against the Alans, the Franks, the Alemanni, and the Sarmatians. The Franks he drove back into the marshes of the Netherlands; and he not only defeated the Alemanni, but he also crossed the Rhine, and regained the Suabian empire: he is likewise said to have repaired the _limes_. We are told that he wanted to form Germany into a province, which at that time was much more feasible than it had been before: for the southern Germans had already become much nearer to the Romans in their manners. Had Diocletian given himself the same trouble, and established a Roman power in the south of Germany, he might perhaps have succeeded.—It would have been possible to collect the Germans into towns, and to accustom them to a regular city life, for in the reign of Valentinian, we find them afterwards on the banks of the Neckar already settled in larger villages and in fortified towns, and no longer in scattered cottages. Probus achieved an incredible number of great undertakings in every quarter, crossing the empire from one frontier to the other with the power and speed of lightning: rest, during the five years of his reign, he never once enjoyed; but, on the other hand, he was unspeakably beloved by his people. Once also he triumphed in Rome, as Aurelian had likewise done: yet his coins not only bear the legend, _Invicto Imperatori Probo_, but also _Bono Imperatori Probo_. The soldiers only became estranged from him, because he made their work too hard, as he exacted from them, besides all their military duty, task-service for the restoration of the provinces. Like Aurelian and Decius, he came from the neighbourhood of the _Limes Illyricus_, being perhaps descended from military settlers; and therefore he wished to revive tillage in the neighbourhood of Sermium, and to drain the fens. To this unwholesome labour he kept the soldiers, employing them in digging the drains. As he did not yield to any representations made to him, the soldiers can scarcely be blamed when in their despair they would bear the heavy yoke no longer. He was murdered in the year 282; yet they still wept over his loss.