subtle mysticism which philosophers pretended to discover lurking below, when mixed up with the pure and simple but startling tenets of the new faith, formed a confused mass which few intellects could reduce to order and harmony." The vices of our author's style, and his ambitious affectation of ornament, are condemned by most critics; but some of the points which strike a modern reader as defects evidently arise from the alteration which the Latin language had already undergone since the days of Livy. His great value, however, consists in the facts he has made known to us, and is quite independent of the style or language in which he has conveyed that knowledge, of which without him we should have been nearly destitute. The present translation has been made from Wagner and Erfurdt's edition, published at Leipzig in 1808, and their division of chapters into short paragraphs has been followed. _Feb._ 1862. THE HISTORY OF AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS. THE FIRST THIRTEEN BOOKS ARE LOST. BOOK XIV. ARGUMENT. I. The cruelty of the Cæsar Gallus.--II. The incursions of the Isaurians.--III. The unsuccessful plans of the Persians.--IV. The invasion of the Saracens, and the manners of that people.--V. The punishment of the adherents of Magnentius.--VI. The vices of the senate and people of Rome.--VII. The ferocity and inhumanity of the Cæsar Gallus.--VIII. A description of the provinces of the East.--IX. About the Cæsar Constantius Gallus.--X. The Emperor Constantius grants the Allemanni peace at their request.--XI. The Cæsar Constantius Gallus is sent for by the Emperor Constantius, and beheaded. I. A.D. 353. § 1. After the events of an expedition full of almost insuperable difficulties, while the spirits of all parties in the state, broken by the variety of their dangers and toils, were still enfeebled; while the clang of trumpets was ringing in men's ears, and the troops were still distributed in their winter quarters, the storms of angry fortune surrounded the commonwealth with fresh dangers through the manifold and terrible atrocities of Cæsar Gallus:[1] who, when just entering into the prime of life, having been raised with unexpected honour from the lowest depth of misery to the highest rank, exceeded all the legitimate bounds of the power conferred on him, and with preposterous violence threw everything into confusion. For by his near relationship to the royal family, and his connection with the name of Constantine, he was so inflated with pride, that if he had had more power, he would, as it seemed, have ventured to attack even the author of his prosperity.