Historical Parallels, vol. 1 (of 3)

by Arthur Thomas Malkin

“The Parthian king
In Ctesiphon[203] hath gathered all his host
Against the Scythian, whose incursions wild
Have wasted Sogdiana; to her aid
He marches now in haste: see though from far
His thousands, in what martial equipage
They issue forth; steel bows and shafts their arm
Of equal dread in flight, or in pursuit;
All horsemen, in which fight they most excel;
See how in warlike muster they appear,
In rhombs and wedges, and half–moons and wings.

“He looked, and saw what numbers numberless
The city gates out–poured, light–armed troops
In coats of mail and military pride;
In mail their horses clad, yet fleet and strong,
Prancing their riders bore, the flower and choice
Of many provinces from bound to bound
From Arachosia,[204] from Candaor east,
And Margiana to the Hyrcanian cliffs
Of Caucasus, and dark Iberian dales,
From Atropatia, and the neighbouring plains
Of Adiabene, Media, and the south
Of Susiana, to Balsara’s haven.
He saw them in their forms of battle ranged,
How quick they wheeled, and flying, behind them shot
Sharp sleet of arrowy showers against the face
Of their pursuers, and overcame by flight;
The fields, all iron, cast a gleaming brown:
Nor wanted clouds of foot, nor on each horn
Cuirassiers all in steel for standing fight,
Chariots or elephants indorsed with towers
Of archers, nor of labouring pioneers
A multitude, with spades and axes armed
To lay hills plain, fell woods, or valleys fill
Or where plain was raise hill, or overlay
With bridges rivers proud, as with a yoke;
Mules after these, camels, and dromedaries,
And waggons fraught with utensils of war.
Such forces met not, nor so wide a camp
When Agrican with all his northern powers
Besieged Albracca, as romances tell,
The city of Gallaphrone, from thence to win
The fairest of her sex, Angelica
His daughter, sought by many prowest knights
Both Paynim and the peers of Charlemain.
Such and so numerous was their chivalry.”[205]

“After the battle,” Ammianus continues, “three days being passed in repose, that each might cure his own or his neighbour’s wounds, intolerable want of victuals began to afflict us; and the burning both of corn and green crops having reduced men and horses to the extremity of distress, a large part of the provisions brought by the chief officers of the army for their own use was distributed to the indigent soldiery. And the emperor, who, in place of delicacies prepared with regal luxury, satisfied his hunger under a small tent, with a scanty portion of meal and water, which even the labouring common soldier would have disdained; careless of his own safety, performed whatever services were required in the tents of his poor comrades. Then having withdrawn awhile to an anxious and uncertain repose, devoted not to sleep, but to some literary work, written in the camp, and under the tent–skins, in emulation of Julius Caesar, in the dead of night, while deeply meditating upon some philosopher, he beheld, as he acknowledged to his friends, that vision of the genius of the empire which he had seen in Gaul, when about to reach the dignity of Augustus,[206] pass sorrowfully from the tent in mourning habit, his head and horn of abundance covered with a veil. For a moment he was fixed in amazement; yet, superior to all fear, he commended futurity to the gods. As he rose from his lowly couch, to supplicate the powers of heaven with the rites deprecatory of misfortune, a blazing torch appeared to flash across the sky, and vanished, leaving him filled with horror lest it were the star of Mars which thus openly menaced him.”[207]

Before daybreak he consulted the Etruscan soothsayers, who still retained the monopoly of this profitable art, concerning the meaning of this portent. They replied that on no account should anything be commenced, in obedience to the rules of their science, which forbade the giving battle, or undertaking military operations, subsequent to the appearance of such a meteor: but the emperor neglected their predictions, and gave order to march. Taught by experience not rashly to close with the firm ranks of the legions, the Persians hovered all around, and while Julian, unarmed by reason of the heat, advanced to reconnoitre in front, he was alarmed by tidings of an attack upon the rear. Forgetful or careless of his want of armour, he hurried to the spot, which was scarcely reached when a fresh alarm came that the van, which he had quitted, was similarly menaced, and at the same moment the iron–clothed Parthian cavalry, supported by elephants, dashed in upon the flank. The light–armed troops, encouraged by their sovereign’s presence, rushed forwards, and put to flight these formidable assailants; and while Julian, forgetting the prudence of a general in his ardour, cheered them on, a dart grazed his uplifted arm, and penetrated deep into his unprotected side. He tried to draw it out, but the sharp edges cut the tendons of his fingers; and falling in a swoon from his horse, he was borne back by his attendants to the camp. The prince being withdrawn, it is scarce credible with what ardour the soldiery, heated by rage and anger, flew to their revenge, and though the dust blinded them, and the heat relaxed their sinews, yet, as if released from discipline by the fall of their leader, they rushed prodigal of life upon the enemies’ steel. The Persians, on the other hand, shot still more eagerly, till they were almost hidden by the constant arrow flight; while the bulk and nodding plumes of the elephants stationed in their front struck terror into horse and man. Night put an end to a bloody and indecisive contest, in which fifty of the chief Persian nobility fell, including the two generals, Merenes and Nohodares.

This success, however, was dearly purchased by the death of Julian, which occurred soon after he reached the camp. He made a short address to those officers who surrounded his bed, expressing his willingness to die, and a hope that the empire would devolve on a worthy successor, declining to interfere, or in any way direct their choice; and breathed his last while arguing upon the nature of the soul. Among the tumult and intrigues consequent upon the election of a new emperor, Jovian, a household officer of the highest rank, was chosen, rather as a means of reconciling the disputes of others of higher pretensions, than for his personal merits, which rose not above mediocrity. The news of Julian’s death was carried to Sapor the Persian king by deserters, and he, inspirited by the death of his most formidable enemy, pursued the retreating army with increased vigour. On one occasion the heavy–armed horse and elephants broke the Jovian and Herculean legions which had been trained to war in the able school of Diocletian; on another the Persian cavalry broke into the camp, and penetrated almost to the emperor’s tent. At length, after five days of constant harass and alarm, they reached the town of Dura on the Tigris. Four days were here consumed in repelling the unceasing attacks of the Persians, until the army, impatient of this daily annoyance, hopeless of bringing the enemy to battle, and stimulated by a notion that the Roman frontier was at no great distance, impatiently demanded permission to recross the Tigris. The emperor and his officers in vain pointed out to them the river swollen by the summer floods, and entreated them not to trust its dangerous whirlpools: they represented that most of the troops were unable to swim, and showed the enemy, who lined the opposite bank of the overflowed river. But when these arguments proved vain, and dissatisfaction seemed ready to end in mutiny, a reluctant order was given that the Gauls and Germans, trained to the passage of rapid rivers from their youth, should first risk the attempt; in expectation that the others’ obstinacy would be overcome by the spectacle of their fate, or else that their success would embolden and encourage the less able. Accordingly, as soon as the fall of night concealed their purpose, they passed the river, swimming or supported by skins, occupied the opposite bank, and made slaughter of the Persians, who had been lulled to sleep by the fancied security of their position. Their comrades, informed of their success by signal, were only restrained from emulating their courage and success by the engineers undertaking to construct a bridge upon inflated hides. But these attempts were baffled by the strength of the stream, and at the end of two days, all sorts of food being consumed, the soldiery, reduced to want and desperation, were loud in complaint of the ignoble death for which they were reserved.

This would have been the time for a vigorous and decisive blow; but the Persian king was staggered in his confidence by the Romans’ obstinate and successful resistance. The destruction among his troops had been severe; the loss of elephants unequalled in any former war: while his foes were seasoned and encouraged by a continuance of successful resistance, and, instead of being intimidated by the death of their noble general, seemed rather to consult revenge than safety, careless whether they were extricated from their difficulty by a brilliant victory or a memorable death. These considerations, and the yet unbroken power of the empire, induced him to send ambassadors to treat of peace. But the conditions proposed were hard and humiliating, and four days were spent amid the agonies of famine in fruitlessly discussing what was best to be done, which if diligently employed would have brought the army into the fruitful district of Corduene, distant but a hundred and fifty miles from the scene of their sufferings. Five provinces situated east of the Tigris were to be given up, together with three important fortresses in Mesopotamia, Castra Maurorum, Singara, and Nisibis, the latter uncaptured since the Mithridatic wars, and regarded as the especial key of the East. The strong expression of Ammianus is, that it would have been better to have fought ten battles, than to have surrendered one of these things. But a crowd of flatterers surrounded the timid prince; they urged the necessity of a speedy return, lest other pretenders to the empire should start up, and his weak and easy temper was readily persuaded to acquiesce.

The delay occasioned by these negotiations, in which, in return for such important concessions, even the safe passage of the Tigris was not provided for, proved fatal to numbers, who, impatient of the sufferings which they endured, plunged secretly into the stream, and were swallowed up by its eddies, or, if they reached the shore, were slain or sold into a distant captivity by the Saracens and Persians. And when at last the trumpet gave the signal of passage, it was wonderful to see how every one hurried to escape the danger which they still feared upon the eastern bank. Wicker vessels hastily constructed, to which their beasts of burthen were attached, or the hides of sheep and oxen, were the precarious means of transport to which most were reduced: the emperor and his suite crossed in a few small boats which had laboriously accompanied the march, and continued to ply backwards and forwards, as long as any remained upon the farther shore. News came meanwhile that the Persians were constructing a bridge, with intent of falling suddenly and secretly upon the exhausted enemy; but either the intelligence was false, or the betrayal of their intention caused the Persians to desist from the meditated treachery, and Jovian, released from this apprehension, arrived by long and fatiguing marches at the town of Hatra, of ancient fame in the wars of Trajan and Severus. From hence, for seventy miles, an arid plain extended, offering only salt, fetid water, and the bitter, nauseous herbs of the desert: and such provision as opportunity afforded was made for the further march by filling the water vessels, and slaughtering camels and other beasts of burthen. But a six days’ march, through a country where not even grass was to be found, reduced them to extremity; and it was with no small joy that they hailed a convoy of provisions, doubly welcome as providing for the relief of present distress, and assuring the fidelity of Procopius and Sebastian, the powerful officers whom Julian had sent to co–operate with him in Armenia. Passing Thilsaphata the army at length reached Nisibis, and found an end of its distresses under the walls of the city, which the emperor was unwilling, perhaps ashamed, to enter.

In all these cases the thirst of conquest worked its own punishment by subjecting its votaries to the guidance of will instead of reason, and like all other passions, when indulged, misleading them both as to the character and the probable consequence of their actions. The expedition of Darius is said, indeed, to have been prompted by policy; but we look in vain for prudence and sound judgment in his unavailing pursuit of the Scythians, in his protracted stay, in the treacherous abandonment of a part of his army, or in his hurried retreat; while his resolution (if Herodotus be credited) of destroying the bridge, and thus, in case of reverses, cutting off all hope of escape, could only have been suggested by a frantic presumption in his own power and fortune. In the other cases an eager desire and hope of terminating the war by one decisive blow, and a well–grounded confidence that in fair field no troops would stand the shock of the Roman legions, stifled the voice of common sense, of wisdom and of experience, which concurred in teaching that the desired opportunity was attainable only by the enemy’s misconduct, and that the failure of success necessarily involved severe misfortune. We may draw from hence a lesson touching the pernicious influence of power and prosperity upon the mind. The warning of Amasis to Polycrates[208] contains valuable instruction, though we reject the superstitious and unworthy notion of the Deity upon which it is founded, and the equally superstitious remedy proposed. It is true that a life of unbroken prosperity is frequently terminated by some memorable reverse, but the effect of such prosperity upon ourselves is the greatest of evils, and the parent of all the others which may befall us: and this chapter may be considered as a supplement to the one which has been devoted to the effects of absolute power upon the morals and intellect; for the judicial blindness produced by an inferior degree of grandeur and good fortune resembles that species of insanity which we have noticed, and differs from it rather in degree than in nature. History abounds in examples of such infatuation; the most striking and perhaps the most important of them, it has been reserved for our own age to witness.

If ever there was an instance of a powerful mind delivered over for its ruin to a strong delusion, it is to be found in Napoleon’s campaign in Russia. An unparalleled series of victories appears to have confirmed the turn of his mind to fatalism, and to have inspired a belief that no difficulties were insuperable by his genius and fortune. It is in such a belief, and in his natural resoluteness of purpose, aggravated into inflexibility by the habit of dictating to all who came within his widely extended sphere, that we must look for the explanation of conduct into which no man would have been betrayed while in the full and sane possession of his judgment, however just and unbounded his confidence in himself and his troops. That he was fully aware of the difficulties which he was about to meet (it is impossible that they should have escaped his penetration) is evident from his own declarations. “For masses like those we are about to move, if precautions be not taken, the grain of no country can suffice. The result of my movements will be to assemble four hundred thousand men on a single point. There will be nothing to expect from the country, and it will be necessary to have everything within ourselves.”[209] Immense preparations were accordingly made, but made in vain, for a very small portion of them ever reached the borders of Russia, and those too late to supply the needs of the army. It is here that the obstinacy and infatuation of which we have spoken first appear. Too impatient to wait for the supplies which he had declared indispensable, and unable to resist the temptation of endeavouring to gain his object by one decisive stroke, Napoleon plunged headlong into a savage country, without a commissariat, and with a most insufficient hospital department, and suffered grievous loss before an enemy was even seen. Without anything approaching to a general action, the effective force under his immediate command was reduced in six weeks, between the passage of the Niemen and his departure from Witepsk, from two hundred and ninety–seven thousand to one hundred and eighty–five thousand; and was besides in so shattered and unsoldier–like a condition, that a fortnight later, at Smolensk, Napoleon himself declared halt or retreat to be impracticable. “This army cannot stop: with its composition, and in its disorganized state, movement alone supports it. We may advance at its head, but not stop or retreat. It is an army of attack, not of defence; of operation, not of position.”[210] The desperate enterprise was therefore pursued, and the nominal victory of Borodino, which cost in killed and wounded thirty thousand men, gave Moscow into his hands—the specious prize which he hazarded so much to gain. But the advantages hoped from its possession vanished when in his grasp, and this seeming success proved but a snare to disguise his failure, and ensure destruction by delaying retreat.

We probably shall never be satisfied as to the real origin of the conflagration of Moscow. If the voluntary act of the Russian people, it deserves to be classed, with the abandonment of Athens, among the noblest acts of patriotism recorded; but with this difference, that the Athenians trusted their property to the victor’s mercy, the Russians inflicted on themselves the utmost losses of war, rather than allow an invader to profit by the shelter of their homes. That a rugged but deep love of their country did animate even those among them who had least to love, is certain. Palaces and hamlets were alike committed to the flames; the serf and the prince were equally indignant at their national injuries. “It is an admitted fact, that when the French, in order to induce their refractory prisoners to labour in their service, branded some of them in the hand with the letter N. as a sign that they were the serfs of Napoleon, one peasant laid his hand upon a block of wood, and struck it off with the axe which he held in the other, in order to free himself from the supposed thraldom.”[211]