Our story must now go back a little, and take up the course of events at the camp, where the look of affairs was not promising. The donative promised by Constantine on the day of his election had been paid, but this had been done only after the greatest exertions in wringing money out of unlucky traders, farmers, and even peasants, who had been already squeezed almost dry. All that had any coin left were beginning to bury it,(24) and though the collectors of taxes, or loans, or gifts, or whatever else the frequent requisition of money might be called, had ingenious ways of discovering or making their owners give up these hoards, it was quite evident that very little more could be got out of Britain. The military chest meanwhile was becoming alarmingly empty, and though money was still found somehow for the larger camps, some of the less important garrisons had been left for months with almost nothing in the way of pay. What was to be done was a pressing question, which had to be answered in some way within a few days. If it was not so answered, it was tolerably plain that Constantine would meet the fate of Marcus and Gratianus. The Emperor himself (if we are to give him this title) seemed to be very little troubled by the prospect, and remained stolidly calm. His elevation indeed had made the least possible difference to him. He drank a better kind of wine, and perhaps a little more—for his cups had been limited by his means—but he did not run into excess. He was still the same simple, contented, good-natured man that he had always been. But his sons were of another temper, though curiously differing from each other. Constans the elder was an enthusiast, almost a fanatic, a man of strong religious feeling, who would have followed the religious life if it had been possible, and who now, finding himself possessed of power, had schemes of using it to promote his favourite schemes. Julian the younger had ambitions of a more commonplace kind. But both the brothers were agreed in holding on to the power that had been so strangely put into their father’s hands, hands which, as he had very little will of his own, were practically theirs. A council was held at which Constantine, his two sons, and three of the officers of highest rank were present, and the urgent question of the day was anxiously debated. Julian began the discussion. “The army,” he said, “must be employed, or it will find mischief to do at home which all of us will be sorry for.” “I have some one to introduce to your Majesty,” said one of the officers present, “who may have something to say which will influence your decision. He is from Ierne,(25) and brings me a letter from the commander at Uriconium. He came last night.” “Let him enter,” said Constantine, with his usual dull phlegmatic voice.