But the power of these wandering tribes was always liable to be paralysed by the jealousies of rival chiefs. Their notions of government were crude; hereditary succession was held of little account among them. The Huns were only formidable to their neighbours when they were under the leadership of chiefs who possessed sufficient vigour to rise pre-eminent over all others, and the talent or the craft to secure to themselves absolute power. Attila was one of these. The Huns were already in the ascendant when he came to the throne; but his genius, energy, and insatiable ambition soon rendered them the terror of all Europe, and himself the greatest barbarian that ever wielded the sceptre. Attila had a body-guard of subject kings. His effective force has been variously estimated at half-a-million and at seven hundred thousand men. He enriched himself with the spoils of all nations; yet in the height of his barbaric pride he retained in camp the simple habits of his ancestors. Having subdued every hostile tribe within his reach, and incorporated their armies with his own, he threw the whole weight of his forces on the corrupt and degenerate Roman Empire, which was brought to the feet of the conqueror and compelled to accept conditions of peace the most degrading that the insolence of the invader could dictate. Desolation everywhere followed the march of Attila, for destruction was ever the glory of the barbarians. As the old Huns lived by predatory warfare, so the hosts of Attila were actuated, only in a higher degree, by the savage instincts of wild beasts. But their power only held together while there was food for pillage, and a master mind to direct their enterprise. And thus their reign of terror in Europe was of brief duration. A heavy debauch cut short the career of Attila, and he died an inglorious death in his own bed from the bursting of an artery. The empire of his creation collapsed after his death amid contending factions; and in A.D. 468, just fifteen years after the death of Attila, the empire of the Huns was utterly destroyed, and their name disappeared from history.