Above the narrow pass on Vesuvius, which we will call the Ravine of the Goths, a small but deep chasm had been formed by the black blocks of lava. Within it King Teja had concealed the most sacred possession of the nation--the corpse of King Theodoric and the royal treasure. Theodoric's banner was fixed before the mouth of this chasm.
A purple mantle, stretched upon four spears, formed the dark curtain to the rocky chamber which the last King of the Goths had chosen for his royal hall. A block of lava, covered with the skin of the black tiger, formed his last throne.
Here King Teja rested, when not called away by his jealously-held post at the southern entrance of the Ravine of the Goths; upon which, now from a distance with arrows, slings, and hurling--spears, now close at hand in a bold and sudden attack, the outposts of Narses commenced their assaults. None of the brave guardians returned home without bringing tokens of such attacks upon shield and armour, or leaving signs at the entrance of the ravine, in the form of slain enemies.
This happened so frequently, that the stench arising from the decay of the bodies threatened to render any further sojourn in the ravine impossible. Narses seemed to have counted upon this circumstance, for, when Basiliskos lamented the useless sacrifice, he said, "Perhaps our slain soldiers will be more useful after death than during their life." But King Teja ordered that the bodies should be thrown by night over the lava cliffs; so that, horribly mutilated, they seemed a warning to all who should attempt to follow their example. Seeing this, Narses begged to be allowed to send unarmed men to fetch away the bodies, a favour which King Teja immediately granted.
Since retiring into this ravine, the Goths had not lost a single man in fight; for only the foremost man in the pass was exposed to the enemy, and, supported by the comrades who stood behind him, this guardian had never yet been killed.
One night, after sunset--it was now the month of September, and all traces of the battle at Taginæ were already obliterated; the flowers planted by Cassiodorus and the nuns of the cloister round the sarcophagi of King Totila, his bride, and his friend, had put forth new shoots--King Teja, who had just been relieved from his post by Wisand, approached his lava hall, his spear upon his shoulder. Before the curtain which closed the entrance to his rocky chamber, Adalgoth received Teja with a sad smile, and, kneeling, offered to him a golden goblet.
"Let me still fulfil my office of cup-bearer," he said; "who knows how long it may last?"
"Not much longer!" said Teja gravely, as he seated himself. "We will remain here, outside the curtain. Look! how magnificently the bay and the coast of Surrentum shine in the glowing light left by the setting sun--the blue sea is changed to crimson blood! Truly, the Southland could afford no more beauteous frame with which to enclose the last battle of the Goths. Well, may the picture be worthy of its setting! The end is coming. How wonderfully everything that I foreboded--dreamed, and sang--has been fulfilled!"
And the King supported his head upon both his hands. Only when the silver tones of a harp was heard, did he again look up. Adalgoth had, unseen, fetched the King's small harp from behind the curtain.
"Thou shalt hear," he said, "how I have completed thy song of the Ravine; or I might have said, how it has completed itself. Dost thou remember that night in the wilderness of ivy, marble, and laurel in Rome? It was not a battle already fought, a battle of ancient days, of which thou didst sing. No! in a spirit of prophecy, thou hast sung our last heroic battle here." And he played and sang: