Roman History Roman History - Book XVI. IV. He is besieged in the city of Sens by the Allemanni.
by Ammianus Marcellinus
While he was anxiously
revolving these things in his mind, he was attacked by a numerous force of the
enemy, who had conceived a hope of being able to take the town. And they were
the more confident of success because, from the information of deserters, they
had learnt that he neither had with him his Scutarii nor his Gentiles, both of
which bodies of troops had been distributed among the different municipal towns
in order that they might be the more easily supplied with provisions.
Therefore after the
gates of the city had been barricaded, and the weakest portions of the walls
carefully strengthened, Julian was seen night and day on the battlements and
ramparts, attended by a band of armed men, boiling over with anger and gnashing
his teeth, because, often as he wished to sally forth, he was prevented from taking such a step by the scantiness of the force which he had
with him.
At last,
after thirty days, the barbarians retired disappointed, murmuring that they had
been so vain and weak as to attempt the siege of such a city. It deserves
however to be remarked, as a most unworthy circumstance, that when Julian was in
great personal danger, Marcellus, the master of the horse, who was posted in the
immediate neighbourhood, omitted to bring him any assistance, though the danger
of the city itself, even if the prince had not been there, ought to have excited
his endeavours to relieve it from the peril of a siege by so formidable an
enemy.
Being now
delivered from this fear, Julian, ever prudent and active, directed his anxious
thoughts incessantly to the care of providing that, after their long labours,
his soldiers should have rest, which, however brief, might be sufficient to
recruit their strength. In addition to the exhaustion consequent on their toils,
they were distressed by the deficiency of crops on the land, which through the
frequent devastations to which they had been exposed afforded but little
suitable for human food.
But these
difficulties he likewise surmounted by his ever wakeful diligence, and a more
confident hope of future success opening itself to his mind, he rose with higher
spirits to accomplish his other designs.