The Huns declared that they had delivered all, and Honoria was not there--Honoria, without whom all was nothing. Ten of the principal barbarian chiefs were detained as hostages for the safety of her who had not returned; while the envoys of Attila were sent back to learn the savage monarch's will. The reply soon came, that if any of the chiefs of Azimantium dared to trust himself in the dominions of Attila, he should have free means and aid in making every search for the captive said to be detained. Maximin and Priscus, the messengers added, were then on their journey as ambassadors from the imperial court to the king of the Huns, and if the Azimantine chief would join them at Sardica, he would be conducted to the presence of Attila, who loved the brave, even when his enemies. Menenius sprang upon his horse, and followed by a scanty train, took the way to Sardica, his heart torn with the eternal struggle of those two indefatigable athletes, Hope and Fear. Still, as he went, his eye roamed over the landscape--for even the absorbing sorrow of his own breast had not obliterated his love for his country--and how painful was the sight upon which the eye rested! Desolation--the vacant cottage, the extinguished hearth, the threshold stained with blood, the raven and the vulture gorged and gorging, the mangled and unburied slain, the overthrown cities, the deserted streets through which the speedy grass was already growing up where multitudes had trod--the grass--the verdant and the speedy grass, which, like the fresh joys of this idle world, soon covers over the place that we have held when once we are passed away--ruin, destruction, death--such was the aspect of the land. And as he gazed and saw--the thought of all the broken ties and torn fellowships, the sweet associations and dear thrilling sympathies dissolved, the wreck of every noble art, the scattering of every finer feeling, which the blasting, withering, consuming lightning of war had there accomplished, found an answering voice deep in the recesses of his own wrung and agonized heart. At the ruins of Naissus--for one stone of the city scarcely remained upon the other--he joined the legates of the emperor, and with them pursued his way. His mind was not attuned to much commune with his fellows; and though Priscus, with learned lore, tempted him to speak of science, and arts, and philosophy; and Maximin, with courtly urbanity, which softened and ornamented the sterner firmness of his character, and Vigilius, the interpreter, with subtle and persuasive art, strove to win the Azimantine chief to unbend from his deep gloom, Menenius could neither forget nor forgive, and sadness was at once in his heart and upon his brow.