Res Gestae

He was matched by Prosper, who was at that time still representing the cavalry commander[*](Ursicinus (see xiv. 11, 5).) in Gaul and held military authority there, an abject coward and, as the comic poet says,[*](Plautus, Epidicus, 12, minus iam furtificus sum quam antehac. Quid ita? Rapio propalam.) scorning artifice in thieving and plundering openly.

While these men were in league and enriching themselves by bringing mutual gain one to the other, the Persian generals stationed by the rivers, while their king was busied in the farthest bounds of his empire, kept raiding our territories with predatory bands, now fearlessly invading Armenia and sometimes Mesopotamia, while the Roman officers were occupied in gathering the spoils of those who paid them obedience.

While the linked course of the fates was bringing this to pass in the Roman world, Julian Caesar at Vienne was admitted by Augustus,[*](That is, Constantius Augustus.) then consul for the eighth time, into the fellowship of the consular fasti. Urged on by his native energy, he dreamed of the din of battle and the slaughter of savages, already preparing to gather up the broken fragments of the province, if only fortune should at last aid him with her favouring breeze.