"Thou knowest I am guiltless, Hun!" replied Menenius, "and bonds such as these have pressed upon my arms too long." "Of thy guilt or innocence I know nought," replied the King; "but this I know, that I will guard thee safely till thine Emperor send me the head of Chrysaphius, the murdering slave who first sought to tempt my subjects into treachery. Away with Vigilius, till he pay the purchase of his base life; and away with this Azimantine, till Orestes and Eslaw, my envoys, bring me the head of the eunuch from my slave the Emperor." * * * * * * * * * * * * In the solitude of a dark unlighted hut, stretched upon a bear's hide, which had been cast down for his bed, lay the young Chief of Azimantium, pondering his hard fate, while the sounds of many a gay and happy, voice without, struck with painful discord upon his unattuned ear. Dark and melancholy, the fancies flitted across his brain like the visions of dead friends seen in the dim atmosphere of troubled sleep, and he revolved in his mind that bold cowardice of his ancestors, which taught them to fly from the sorrows and dangers of their fate, by the sure but gloomy passage of the tomb. Was it virtue, he asked himself, or vice? wisdom, or insanity, that allied the last despair to the last hope, and made self-murder the cure of other ills? And, as he thought, sorrow took arms against his better mind, and whispered like a friend, "Die! Die, Menenius! Peace is in the grave!" A new and painful struggle was added to the evils of his state, and still he thought of death as hours and days went by. Nor was this all; for, as the Dacians tame the lions for the imperial shows, the Hum strove to break his spirit, and subdue his high heart, by reiterated anxieties and cares. Now, he was told of wars with the Empire, and the fall of Greece: now, strange whispers were poured into his ear, of some direful fate reserved for himself: now, he heard of the great annual sacrifice offered at the altar of Mars, where a hundred captive maidens washed the platform with their blood. But still, like the great hero of the mighty founder of the Epic song, he rose above the waves that poured upon his head, and still answered, "Never! never!" when the name of Azimantium was connected with the dominion of the Huns.