"The Sun only is my crown, the Sun alone!" Then he stamped on the acanthus, and lifting his arms skyward repeated a third time-- "Now, until death, my crown is the Sun!" The mystery was over. Maximus kissed the initiate. On the face of the old man as he did so hovered a gleam of strange significance. While they were retracing their steps through the beech-forest the Emperor spoke to the enchanter-- "Maximus, I think you are hiding from me some secret deeper yet." He turned towards the old man his pale face, on which, as was the custom, the traces of the sacred blood were not yet wiped away. "What do you wish to know, Julian?" "What lot shall fall to me?" "You will conquer." "And Constantius?" "Constantius is no more." "What mean you?" "Wait! the Sun shall reveal your glory!" Julian dared not question further. Both men regained the camp in silence. In Julian's tent a courier from Asia Minor, the tribune Cintula, stood waiting. He knelt and kissed the edge of the Imperial paludamentum-- "Glory to the divine Augustus Julian!" "Do you come with a message from Constantius?" "Constantius is no more!" "What say you?" Julian trembled and threw a glance at Maximus, whose face remained inscrutable. "By the will of God," continued Cintula, "your enemy departed this life in the town of Mopsucrenam, not far from Macellum." That evening the army assembled on a hill. The death of Constantius was already made known to them. Augustus Claudius Flavius Julian took his station on a hillock so that all the soldiers could see him; crownless, weaponless, unarmoured, and enswathed head to foot in purple. To conceal the traces of the blood, which might not be washed off, he had enveloped his head and veiled his face in the purple silk. In this attire he bore the appearance rather of a sacrificial priest than of an emperor. Behind him rose the ruddy forest wrapping the base of Mount Hæmus. Above his head hung, like a golden banner, the yellow branches of a maple. Far as the eye could see, the plain of Thrace lay below, crossed by the white marble pavement of the Roman road stretching victoriously away to the Propontic Sea. Julian gazed at his army. When the legions moved their stations, red flashes from the sunset were reflected upon burnished helmets, breastplates, and eagles; the lances above the cohorts seemed like lighted tapers. By Julian's side was Maximus, who spoke in Cæsar's ear-- "Look forth upon this sight of glory! your hour is come! Act now!" The magician pointed to the Christian banner, the Labarum, with its crest of the monogram of Christ, the flag made on the pattern of that fiery standard bearing the inscription, "Through this shalt thou conquer," which Constantine the Great had seen miraculous in the heavens. The troops made no stir. Julian in a clear and solemn voice addressed them-- "Comrades, our work is finished. Now we will go to Constantinople! Give thanks to the Olympians, who have given us the victory!"