associate of beauty. It is more likely, that Amasis, who had submitted to Cyrus, refused, upon the death of that conqueror, to pay his successor the same homage and tribute. But whatever may have been the real motive of this war, it is certain that Cambyses was greatly enraged against Amasis; and that the Egyptians, when the country was invaded by the Persian monarch, were treated with unwonted cruelty. The death of Amasis, however, which happened six months before the arrival of the Persians, prevented Cambyses from satiating his meditated revenge on the Egyptian monarch: and judging from the savage rage which the Persian conqueror vented upon his lifeless body, it was fortunate for Amasis that he had not fallen alive into his hands.

Herodotus mentions the situation of the tomb of Amasis. Like all those of the Saite monarchs, it stood within the precincts of the temple of Minerva, in the chief city of that nome, which, during the reign of the princes of the twenty-sixth dynasty, had become the royal residence of the monarchs, and the nominal metropolis of Egypt; Thebes and Memphis still retaining the titles of the capitals of Upper and Lower Egypt.

CHAPTER VI.

THE KINGDOM OF EGYPT.

PERSIAN DOMINATION.

CAMBYSES entered the country of Egypt, B. c. 525, when he found that Amasis was just dead, and that he was succeeded in his kingdom by his son

PSAMMENITUS.

The first operations of Cambyses were against Pelusium, which Ezekiel styled, "the strength of Egypt," and Suidas, "the key of Egypt," or its strong barrier on the side of Syria and Arabia. This place he took by a singular stratagem. Finding it was garrisoned entirely by the Egyptian troops, he placed a great number of the sacred animals, cats, dogs, cows, sheep, etc., in front of the Persians when advancing to the walls; and the Egyptians, not daring to throw a dart, or shoot an arrow, for fear of killing some of their gods, the walls were scaled, and the city taken without difficulty.

Conscious of the great danger to which Egypt was exposed by the invasion of the Persians, Psammenitus made great preparations for the defence of the frontier, and advancing with his Egyptian troops, and the Ionian and Carian auxiliaries, to Pelusium, he encamped in a plain near the mouth of the Nile. The Persians having passed the desert, took up a position opposite the Egyptian army, and both sides prepared for battle. The conflict soon commenced, and the battle was for a long time obstinately disputed; till at length, after a great slaughter had been made on both sides, the Egyptians gave way and fled.

The way from Pelusium to Memphis was now open to the invader, and with rapid marches he hastened towards the

ancient capital of Lower Egypt. Hoping, however, to obtain advantageous terms without another contest, Cambyses sent a Persian up the river in a Mitylenian vessel, to treat with the Egyptians: but as soon as they saw the vessel enter Memphis, they rushed in a crowd from the citadel, destroyed it, and tore the crew to pieces. At the news of this outrage, the indignation of Cambyses knew no bounds; he immediately laid seige to Memphis, and having succeeded in reducing that city, he indulged his resentment by putting many of the inhabitants to the sword: the king was taken prisoner, and 2,000 Egyptians of the same age as the son of Psammenitus were compelled first to march in procession before the conqueror, and were then put to death, as a retaliation for the murder of the Persian and Mitylenian herald. There were 200 Mitylenians destroyed in the vessel, so that ten of the first rank among the Egyptians suffered for every one who was destroyed on that occasion. Psammenitus himself was pardoned; and such was the respect entertained by the Persians for the persons of kings, that he would probably have been restored to a tributary throne; but being detected in fomenting a rebellion, he was put to death by Cambyses, after a brief reign of six months.

From this date, B. c. 525, to B. c. 413, Egypt was governed by the Persian kings.

Great havoc followed the reduction of Egypt by Cambyses. Temples and public buildings were destroyed; tombs were violated, and the bodies burned;* religion was insulted, private property pillaged or destroyed, and every thing which could tempt the avarice or reward the labour of the spoiler was seized and appropriated either by the chief or his troops. Gold and silver statues, and other objects of value, were sent to Persia; and it would appear that numerous Egyptian captives were also sent thither by the conqueror.

be

The name of Cambyses, says Mr. Wilkinson, as may easily imagined, is never met with on Egyptian monuments; but a visitor to the slate and breccia quarries, on the road from Coptos to the Red Sea, has, at a later period, recorded the name of this monarch in hieroglyphics, adding to it the

*The officers of the French frigate, Luxor, it is said, who removed the obelisk, found the sarcophagus of the queen of Amasis in a pit at El Qnooreeh, the body entirely burned, though placed in its original repository. The tomb had been violated, probably, by the Persians, and the body thus treated, and was afterwards reclosed by the Egyptians in the sarcophagus. The body had been gilded.

date of his sixth year. On the same rock two other ovals also occur: one of Darius, with the number 36; the other of Xerxes, with the year twelve; showing the inscription to have been written in the twelfth of Xerxes; and the date 36, intended as the full extent of the reign of Darius. On another rock, at the same place, are the sixteenth year of Xerxes, and the fifth of Artaxerxes Longimanus; and in the principal temple of El Khargeh, in the great Oasis, that of Darius again occurs, a considerable portion of the building having been erected by him: and it is remarkable, that he is the only Persian king whose Phonetic name is accompanied by a prenomen like those of the ancient Pharaohs; à circumstance which confirms the remark of Diodorus, namely, that he, and he alone, of all the Persian monarchs, obtained while living the appellation of Divus, or "Good God," which was a title given by the Egyptians to all the ancient Pharaohs.

Upon the death of Cambyses, whose history will be recorded in future pages, B. c. 487, the Persian empire fell into the hands of

SMERDIS, THE MAGIAN,

who usurped the Persian throne, by pretending to be Smerdis, a son of Cyrus, who had been slain by order of his brother Cambyses. This pretext was soon discovered, and the pseudo-Smerdis, after a brief reign of seven months, was slain as an usurper by

DARIUS HYSTASPES,

who, by means of a stratagem, established himself upon the throne.

The rule of Darius was mild and equitable; he was not only careful to avoid every thing that might offend the religious prejudices or hurt the feelings of his foreign subjects, but having made diligent inquiry respecting the jurisprudence and constitution of the Egyptians, he corrected some abuses, and introduced many salutary laws, which continued to form part of their code, until, in common with many of those enacted by the Pharaohs, they were altered or abrogated by the Ptolemies, after the Macedonian conquest.

The Egyptians, however, impatient of foreign rule, and anxious to free their country from the presence of a people whose cruelties, at the time of the invasion of Cambyses, they could never pardon or forget, and thinking the reverse

of Persia, during the Greek war, offered a favorable opportunity for throwing off the yoke, revolted towards the end of this monarch's reign, and succeeded in expelling the Persians from the valley of the Nile. Darius made great preparations, during three successive years, in order to restore it to the empire. At the end of that time, B. c. 484, he resolved to make war in person against Egypt as well as Greece; but death frustrated his designs. He was succeeded in his empire by

XERXES,

who, in the second year of his reign, B. c. 482, invaded Egypt in person at the head of a powerful army. He quickly defeated the Egyptians, and having subdued the whole country, he made the yoke of their subjection more heavy than before. He then gave the government of that province to Achæmenes, his brother, after which he returned to Susa, the seat of the Persian government.

Affairs remained in this state until the death of Xerxes, B. c. 460, when

ARTAXERXES LONGIMANUS

succeeded to the empire. At this period, considerable confusion occurred in Persia, which being augmented by the intrigues of Artabanus and the rebellion of Bactria, afforded the Egyptians another opportunity for asserting their independence. They prevailed on the Athenians to assist them with a fleet of forty sail; and they attacked and overwhelmed the Persian garrisons. Upon intelligence of this, an army of 400,000 foot, and a fleet of 200, or, according to Diodorus, eighty sail were equipped by Artaxerxes, and placed under the command of Achæmenes. Inarus, the son of Psammiticus, a native of Libya, and Amyrtæus, of Sais, who had been invested with sovereign power, and were charged with the defence of the country, made every effort to resist him; and the two armies having met, the Persians were defeated with great slaughter, and Achæmenes received a wound from the hand of Inarus, of which he died.

Artaxerxes, enraged at this defeat, resolved on sending an overwhelming force under the combined command of Megabyzus and Artabazus, consisting, according to ancient authors, of 500,000 men. Both armies fought valiantly, and many were slain on both sides; at length, Megabyzus hav