flight, even though it bring safety.  For while it is impossible for a man who has seen the light not also to die, for one who has been an emperor it is unendurable to be a fugitive.  May I never be separated from this purple, and may I not live that day on which those who meet me shall not address me as mistress.  If, now, it is your wish to save yourself, O Emperor, there is no difficulty.  For we have much money, and there is the sea, here the boats.  However consider whether it will not come about after you have been saved that you would gladly exchange that safety for death.  For as for myself, I approve a certain ancient saying that royalty is a good burial-shroud.”  When the queen had spoken thus, all were filled with boldness, and, turning their thoughts towards resistance, they began to consider how they might be able to defend themselves if any hostile force should come against them.  Now the soldiers as a body, including those who were stationed about the emperor’s court, were neither well disposed to the emperor nor willing openly to take an active part in fighting, but were waiting for what the future would bring forth.  All the hopes of the emperor were centred upon Belisarius and Mundus, of whom the former, Belisarius, had recently returned from the Persian war bringing with him a following which was both powerful and imposing, and in particular he had a great number of spearmen and guards who had received their training in battles and the perils of warfare.  Mundus had been appointed general of the Illyrians, and by mere chance had happened to come under summons to Byzantium on some necessary errand, bringing with him Erulian barbarians.

When Hypatius reached the hippodrome, he went up immediately to where the emperor is accustomed to take his place and seated himself on the royal throne from which the emperor was always accustomed to view the equestrian and athletic contests.  And from the palace Mundus went out through the gate which, from the circling descent, has been given the name of the Snail.  Belisarius meanwhile began at first to go straight up toward Hypatius himself and the royal throne, and when he came to the adjoining structure where there has been a guard of soldiers from of old, he cried out to the soldiers commanding them to open the door for him as quickly as possible, in order that he might go against the tyrant.  But since the soldiers had decided to support neither side, until one of them should be manifestly victorious, they pretended not to hear at all and thus put him off.  So Belisarius returned to the emperor and declared that the day was lost for them, for the soldiers who guarded the palace were rebelling against him.  The emperor therefore commanded him to go to the so-called Bronze Gate and the propylaea there.  So Belisarius, with difficulty and not without danger and great exertion, made his way over ground covered by ruins and half-burned buildings, and ascended to the stadium.  And when