Am I really, O Cethegus, to be permitted speedily to seek you in your Italy and help to free Rome by the aid of Huns and Herulians? Your tyrants, the Ostrogoths, have made the bridge for us into this country; it was their Sicily. Justinian's gratitude is swift-winged. By the Emperor's command--Belisarius received it sealed, directly after our departure from Constantinople, with the direction not to open the papyrus until after the destruction of the Vandal kingdom--our General has already demanded from the court of Ravenna the cession of a considerable portion of Sicily,--Lilybæum, the important promontory and castle, and all that the Vandals had ever possessed in that island. For the Vandal kingdom had now lapsed to Constantinople, so everything that had ever belonged to that domain also fell to it. A man is not Emperor of the Pandects for nothing. True, it seems to me somewhat brutal to set their limitless stupidity before the eyes of the deluded people quite so speedily. Though of course it is the acme of statecraft to defeat the first with the help of the second, and then, in token of gratitude, overthrow the second. Yet it is long since it was done so openly. Belisarius is obliged to threaten war at once, not only upon Sicily, but all Italy, Ravenna, and Rome. The letter to the Regent Amalaswintha concludes,--I had to compose it for Belisarius in his tent, according to the Emperor's secret order directly after the battle of Trikameron: "If you refuse, you must know that you will not incur merely the _danger_ of war, but war itself, in which we shall take from you not only Lilybæum, but everything you possess contrary to justice; that is, all!" To-day came the news that there had been a revolution in Ravenna. Very wicked men, who had already wished to support the Vandals against us, do not love Justinian (but also unfortunately do not fear him), barbaric names,--you will be more familiar with them than I, O Cethegus! Hildebrand, Vitigis, Teja, have seized the helm there and flatly refuse our demand. It seems to me that there is the blast of the tuba in the air. But first of all we must subdue this Vandal King without a kingdom up above there. The siege is lasting too long for the patience of Belisarius. Hitherto all proposals for surrender have been refused, even those on the most absurdly favorable conditions, made because Belisarius desires to bring the war here swiftly to an end, as it seems to me that he may be able speedily to celebrate a triumph in Constantinople such as has not been witnessed there for centuries, and then continue in Italy what he had begun here. And since this singular King, who sometimes seems to be soft wax, sometimes the hardest granite, is not to be influenced by fair words, we will address him to-morrow with spears.