The man perceived it, and motioning him to be silent, again addressed him.
'Listen!' cried he.

'I have that to reveal to the leader of your forces which will stir the heart of every man in your encampment, if you are trusted with the secret after your king has heard it from my lips! Do you still refuse to guide me to his tent ?' Hermanric laughed scornfully.
'Look on me,' pursued the man, bending forward, and fixing his eyes with savage earnestness upon his listener's face.

'I am alone, old, wounded, weak,--a stranger to your nation,--a famished and a helpless man! Should I venture into your camp--should I risk being slain for a Roman by your comrades--should I dare the wrath of your imperious ruler without a cause ?' He paused; and then, still keeping his eyes on the Goth, continued in lower and more agitated tones-- 'Deny me your help, I will wander through your camp till I find your king! Imprison me, your violence will not open my lips! Slay me, you will gain nothing by my death! But aid me, and to the latest moment of your life you will rejoice in the deed! I have words of terrible import for Alaric's ear,--a secret in the gaining of which I have paid the penalty thus!' He pointed to his wounded arm.

The solemnity of his voice, the rough energy of his words, the stern determination of his aspect, the darkness of the night that was round them, the rolling thunder that seemed to join itself to their discourse, the impressive mystery of their meeting under the city walls, all began to exert their powerful and different influences over the mind of the Goth, changing insensibly the sentiments at first inspired in him by the man's communications.
He hesitated, and looked round doubtfully towards the lines of the camp.
There was a long silence, which was again interrupted by the stranger.
'Guard me, chain me, mock at me if you will,' he cried, with raised voice and flashing eyes, 'but lead me to Alaric's tent! I swear to you by the thunder pealing over our heads, that the words I would speak to him will be more precious in his eyes than the brightest jewel he could ravish from the coffers of Rome.' Though visibly troubled and impressed, Hermanric still hesitated.
'Do you yet delay ?' exclaimed the man, with contemptuous impatience.
'Stand back! I will pass on by myself into the very heart of your camp! I entered on my project alone--I will work its fulfilment without help! Stand back!' And he moved past Hermanric in the direction of the suburbs, with the same look of fierce energy on his withered features which had marked them so strikingly at the outset of his extraordinary interview with the young chieftain.
The daring devotion to his purpose, the reckless toiling after a dangerous and doubtful success, manifested in the words and actions of one so feeble and unaided as the stranger, aroused in the Goth that sentiment of irrepressible admiration which the union of moral and physical courage inevitably awakens.

In addition to the incentive to aid the man thus created, an ardent curiosity to discover his secret filled the mind of Hermanric, and further powerfully inclined him to conduct his determined companion into Alaric's presence--for by such proceeding only could he hope, after the man's firm declaration that he would communicate in the first instance to no one but the king, to penetrate ultimately the object of his mysterious errand.