"Yes, friend, we have drunk enough of the 'Livius.' You must know that I name my wines according to their historical character. For example, to return to what I was saying, this piece of history which we are about just now, this Gothic war, is quite against my taste. Narses is right, we ought first to repel the Persians before we attack the Goths."
"Narses! What is my wise friend doing?"
"He envies Belisarius, and will not confess it even to himself. Besides that, he makes plans of wars and battles. I will bet that he had already conquered Italy before we had even landed."
"You are not his friend. Yet he is a man of genius. Why do you prefer Belisarius?"
"I will tell you," said Procopius, pouring out the "Tacitus," "It is my misfortune that I was not the historian of Alexander or Scipio. Since I recovered from philosophy and theology, my whole nature has longed for men, for real men of flesh and blood. So these spindle-shanked emperors and bishops and generals, who subtilise everything with their reason, disgust me. We have become a crippled generation; the hero time lies far behind us! Only honest Belisarius is a hero like those of the olden time. He might have encamped with Agamemnon before Troy! He is not stupid; he has good sense; but only the natural sense of a noble wild animal for its prey, for his vocation. Belisarius's vocation is heroism! And I delight in his broad chest and his flashing eyes and mighty thighs with which he masters the strongest stallion. And I am glad when, sometimes, his blind delight in blows upsets all his fine plans. I love to see him rush amongst the enemy and fight like an infuriated boar. But I dare not tell him so; for then all would be over; in three days he would be cut to pieces. On the contrary, I keep him back. I am his 'reason,' as he calls me. And he puts up with my prudence because he knows that it is not cowardice. More than once I have been obliged to save him from a difficulty into which the frowardness of his heroism had brought him! The most amusing of these stories is that of the horn and tuba."
"Which of the two do you blow, O my Procopius?"
"Neither; only the trumpet of fame and the pipe of mockery!"
"But what about the horn and trumpet?"
"Oh, we were lying before a rocky nest in Persia, which we were obliged to take, because it commanded the high-road. But we had already, many times, damaged our heroic heads against its hard walls; and my master, becoming angry, swore 'by the slumber of Justinian'--that is his biggest oath--that he would never blow the signal of retreat before this Castle of Anglon. Now our outposts were very often surprised by sallies from the fortress; we, in the highly-situated camp, could see the assaulters as they issued from the fortress, but our outposts, lying at the foot of the hill, could not. I now advised that we should give our people the signal of retreat from the camp whenever we saw the danger approaching. But I met with a fine reception! The slumber of Justinian was such a sacred thing that no one dare meddle with an oath sworn by it. And so our poor fellows were obliged to let themselves be taken unawares by the Persians, until I hit upon the ingenious expedient of proposing to my master that we should give the signal of retreat to our men not with the trumpet but with the horn. The idea pleased my honest Belisarius. And so when we merrily blew the horn to the attack, our men ran away like frightened hares. It was enough to make one die with laughing to see those belligerent sounds produce such a despicable effect! But it availed. Justinian's slumber and Belisarius's oath remained intact, our outposts were no more butchered, and at last the rocky fortress fell. Thus I always scold and laugh at Belisarius for his heroic acts, but in reality my heart is warmed and gladdened: he is the last hero."
"Well," observed Cethegus, "amongst the Goths you will find many such sturdy fellows."