But these commissioners would not allow the names of those who had died or fallen in battle to be struck out, or the vacancies to be filled, until a long interval had elapsed.

The result was, that the army was short of men, and the survivors, after the death of the veterans, were kept in a position far inferior to their merits, and received less pay than they ought to have done, while in the meantime the commissioners handed over to Justinian the money they thus purloined from the soldiers.

In addition, they harassed the soldiers with several other kinds of injustices, by way of recompense for the dangers they had undergone in the field; they were taunted with the name of Greeks, as if Greece could never produce a brave soldier; others were cashiered, as not having been ordered by the Emperor to serve, although they showed their commissions, the genuineness of which the Logothetae did not hesitate to call in question; others, again, were disbanded for having absented themselves a short time from their quarters.

Afterwards, some of the Palace Guards were sent into every part of the Empire to take an exact inventory of the soldiers who were or were not fit for service.

Some were deprived of their belts, as being useless and too old, and for the future were obliged to solicit alms from the charitable in the open market-place--a sad and melancholy spectacle to all beholders.
The rest were reduced to such a state of terror that, in order to avoid similar treatment, they offered large sums of money to buy themselves out, so that the soldiers, being thus rendered destitute and in many ways enfeebled, conceived an utter aversion to the service.
This endangered the authority of the Romans, especially in Italy.
Alexander, who was sent thither as commissioner, unhesitatingly reproached the soldiers for this.