Not long after the news of this disaster, it was reported
in Rome that Neapolis, hopeless of relief, had opened her gates, and
presently the report had strange confirmation. There arrived by the
Appian Way officers of the garrison which had surrendered; not as
harassed fugitives, but travelling with all convenience and
security, the Gothic king himself having expedited their journey and
sent guides with them lest they should miss the road. Nor was this
the most wonderful of the things they had to relate. For they told
of humanity on the part of the barbarian conqueror such as had no
parallel in any story of warfare known to Greek or Roman; how the
Neapolitans being so famine-stricken that they could scarce stand on
their legs, King Totila would not at once send plentiful stores into
the town, lest the sufferers should die of surfeit, but ministered
to their needs even as a friendly physician would have done, giving
them at first little food, and more as their strength revived. To be
sure, there were partisans of the Empire in Rome who scoffed at
those who narrated, and those who believed, a story so incredible.
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