respected the resolute attitude of their antagonist. Neither were any measures taken to blockade him in his camp, and so to extort by famine that submission, which it was too plainly perilous to enforce with the sword. Attila was allowed to march back the remnants of his army without molestation, and even with the semblance of success.
It is probable that the crafty Aetius was unwilling to be too victorious. He dreaded the glory which his allies the Visigoths had acquired; and feared that Rome might find a second Alaric in Prince Thorismund, who had signalised himself in the battle, and had been chosen on the field to succeed his father Theodoric. He persuaded the young king to return at once to his capital; and thus relieved himself at the same time of the presence of a dangerous friend, as well as of a formidable though beaten foe.
Attila's attacks on the Western Empire were soon renewed; but never with such peril to the civilized world as had menaced it before his defeat at Châlons. And on his death two years after that battle, the vast empire which his genius had founded, was soon dissevered by the successful revolts of the subject nations. The name of the Huns ceased for some centuries to inspire terror in Western Europe, and their ascendancy passed
