PART I. When the Persian forces came within sight, the Grecian mercenaries, in order to shew their detestation of the treachery of Phanes, slaughtered his children before his eyes, and drank their blood54. That barbarity, however, availed them nothing. It served only to rouse the courage of the Persians, The two armies joined battle, and fought with obstinate valour. But the Egyptians and their allies, after numbers had fallen on both sides, were finally broken, and totally routed 55. The surrender of the city of Pelusium, esteemed the key of Egypt, to the arms of the Persian monarch, seems to have been the immediate consequence of this victory. The king of Egypt took refuge in Memphis, his capital, with the remains of his army. And thi ther he was followed by Cambyses 56, Memphis was taken after a short siege, and Psammenitus made prisoner, The unfortunate monarch, who had reigned only about six months, was at first treated with lenity, and furnished with a maintenance suited to his former dignity. But not being able to brook his degraded condition, he attempted to raise a rebellion against the conqueror, and was ordered to drink poison58. Before this fatal event, Cambyses had received the submissions of the neighbouring Africans, and of the Greeks of Cyrenaica 59. Now undisputed master of Egypt, and of the neighbouring parts of Africa to the west, he projected three grand expeditions; one against the Ethiopians, another against the Ammonians, and a third against the Carthagenians. But the latter he was obliged to lay aside, as the Phenicians, 54. Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xi. 56. Herodot. Historiar. lib. iii. cap. xiii. xiv. 59. Id. Historiar. lib. iii. cap. xiii. 60. Herodotus, lib. iii. cap. xviii. 55. Id. ibid. 57. Id. ibid. who X. who formed the chief strength of his navy, refused LETTER to act against the Carthagenians, whom they called And he did not think it prudent their children": to compel their obedience 62. The Persian monarch, therefore, found it necessary to confine his ambition to the conquest of Ethiopia and Ammonia, or the higher part of Lybia. Nor did he, rash and impetuous as he was, and elated with conquest, advance against those unknown regions, without exercising some degree of caution. Before he left Memphis, he sent ambassadors into Ethiopia, in order to discover the state of the country-63. But although these ambassadors carried rich presents along with them, according to the custom of the east, and were ordered to make professions of friendship, they were considered as spies by the king of Ethiopia; who, after reproaching Cambyses with an unjust design upon the liberties of a people that had never injured him, dismissed them contemptuously with the present of a bow, which he drew, and unbended in their presence, and desired them to deliver to their master4. "And tell the "king of Persia," added he, "that the king of "Ethiopia gives him this advice:-When the Per"sians can as easily draw so strong a bow, Camby"ses may make war upon the Ethiopians with his "victorious forces. In the meantime, let him thank "the gods, that have not given the sons of Ethiopia a wish to possess any other country but their ❝ own 65." 61. Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xix. Carthage, as I have had occasion to observe (Lett. ix.), was founded by a colony from Tyre. 62. Id. ibid. 63. Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xx. 64. Ibid. cap. xxi, xxii. 65. Herodotus, lib. iii. cap. xxi. I have formerly had occasion to remark, that the Ethiopians, notwithstanding their claims to high antiquity, seem always to have remained in a rude or barbarous state PART I. Irritated almost to madness by this insulting message, Cambyses acted, from the moment it was delivered to him, as if he had been deprived of the use of his understanding.66; already shaken by a convulsive malady, to which he had been subject from his infancy, and occasionally disordered by intemperance; which inflamed the natural violence of his (Lett. i. note 251). And this insulting message, and their king's treatment of the Persian present, "a purple robe, a chain for the "neck, and bracelets of gold, an alabaster box of ointment, and a "vessel of palm-wine," prove them to have been little polished in the reign of Cambyses. The barbarian monarch laughed, when the curious workmanship of the necklace and bracelets was explained to him; and said, "that chains of greater strength were to be found "in Ethiopia” (Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xxii.). He tasted the wine, however, with pleasure; and owned that the Ethiopians had no liquor equal to it. But he set no value on the purple garment; con. sidering the beautiful dye, in changing the native colour of the fleece, as a mark of deceit characteristic of the friendly professions of the Persians (Id. ibid.). Yet do we find in this barbarian pride and haughty contempt of alliance, a degree of dignity that courtly manners cannot bestow; and which had induced men of weak understandings, and narrow minds, to exalt barbarism above refinement; not reflecting, that to the softenings of the human character we are indebted for the most pleasing enjoyments of social life; that barbarian stateliness is less allied to such enjoyments, and consequently less friendly to the happiness of mankind, though it apparently con→ tains less deceit. It may seem extraordinary, that I should dwell so much on the advantages of refinement, after having given so favourable a picture of the condition of human nature in its first removes from the savage state (Lett. i. passim). But this I do from a feeling of the pleasures of polished life, and from a conviction that the delicate disguises of the passions are essential to the good order of society; as such habitual restraint only can enable us to subdue them. For, although uncorrupted men associated in small bodies may be safely left to the guidance of their instincts and natural affections, a sense of honour and propriety is no less necessary than the prohibitions of the magistrate to the well-being of a large community; from which it is impossible to exclude the vices that spring from luxury and avarice. Over these it is requisite, that public decency should throw a veil; and manners correct, what laws cannot cure. 66. Herodot. Historiar. lib. iii. cap. xxv. temper, 68 X. 524. temper, and henceforth often gave to his conduct, LETTER both in public and private, the appearance of lunacy Leaving only the Grecian auxiliaries in Lower Egypt, Ant. Chr. he put his army instantly in motion, and began his march toward the frontiers of Ethiopia"; without having collected a sufficient supply of provisions, or taken other steps necessary to the success of so distant an expedition70. When the enraged monarch arrived at Thebes, he detached fifty thousand men to lay waste the country of the Ammonians, and burn the temple of Jupiter, there so famous for its oracular responses". The troops that composed this detachment, by the help of guides, reached the city of Oasis in Upper Egypt". But what afterward became of them is not certainly known; as none of them reached the place of their destination, or returned to relate the cause of their failure73. They are said to have been overwhelmed by waves of sand in the deserts of Lybia; in consequence of a violent south wind, while they were seated at dinner, and all to have perished'. Meantime Cambyses had prosecuted his march, and entered Lower Ethiopia. No enemy appeared to obstruct his progress; but famine, the most terrible of all enemies, compelled him to set limits to his ambition. His soldiers having consumed all their provisions, and even the beasts of burden, were driven to the dreadful necessity of feeding upon wild herbs, and even upon each other?5, casting lots for the wretched victims, to be devoured by hunger. Olymp. lxiv. 1. 68. Id. ibid. 69. Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xxv. 71. Herodot. ubi sup. 73. Id. ibid. 70. Id. ibid. 72. Id. lib. iii. cap. xxvi. 75. This is the first time (as far as I remember) that the eating of human flesh is mentioned by any ancient author; and we find, it was by no means from choice. 76. Herodotus, lib. iii. cap. xxv. The PART I. Ant. Chr. The haughty and obstinate spirit of the Persian monarch, had made him persist in his purpose, to this extremity. But seeing no prospect of attaining the object of his enterprise, the conquest of the kingdom of Ethiopia, and his army in danger of being utterly ruined, he returned to Thebes, and thence to Memphis". After his return to Memphis, Cambyses was guilty of many extravagances, in his fits of intoxication and phrenzy78. But the actions of a madman not being fit subjects of reasoning, as no consequences can be fairly deduced from them, I shall take no notice of any anecdotes of that kind except such as concern the Egyptian superstition. I have formerly had occasion to speak of the religion of the Egyptians, and to allude to the enormity of the superstition. Yet they, like all other nations, in the first stage of their civil progress, appear to have worshipped one true God, under the wide expanse of heaven; for we are told, that they boasted of being the first people, who built temples, reared. altars, and erected statues to the gods:-a boast which would not have been made, without reference to some period, when they themselves had none. Superstition had now attained its height in Egypt. The Egyptians not only worshipped the host of heaven, or the constellations, under symbolical representations, like the Arabians, Syrians, and Chaldeans, but deified in appearance every thing around them. Having given many examples of this in 77. Id. ibid. 78. Herodot. lib. iii. cap. xxvii-xxxix. 79. Lett. i. p. 90--112. 80. See Lett. i. of this work, p. 95, 96. 81. Herodot. lib. ii. cap. iv. §2. Diod. Sicul. lib. i. et Herodot. lib. ii. passim. treating |