Part 12

Saladin sent for him to his army, and promised the brave Conrad to restore his father to him, and give him rich possessions in Syria, if he would open the gates of Tyre. He at the same time threatened to place the old marquis de Montferrat in the front of the ranks of the Saracens, and expose him to the arrows of the besieged. Conrad replied with haughtiness, that he despised the presents of infidels, and that the life of his father was less dear to him than the cause of the Christians. He added that nothing should impede his endeavours, and that if the Saracens were barbarous enough to put to death an old man who had surrendered on his parole of honour, he should think it a glory to be descended from a martyr. After this reply the Saracens recommenced their assaults, and the Tyrians defended themselves with firmness and courage. The Hospitallers, the Templars, and most of the bravest warriors left in Palestine, hastened within the walls of Tyre, to share in the honour of so great a defence. Among the Franks who distinguished themselves by their valour, was a Spanish gentleman, known in history by the name of “_The Green Knight_,” from the colour of his armour. He alone, say the old chroniclers, repulsed and dispersed whole battalions; he fought several single combats, overthrowing the most intrepid of the Mussulmans, and made the Saracens wonder at and admire his bravery and skill in arms.

There was not a citizen in the place who would not fight; the children, even, were so many soldiers; the women animated the men by their presence and by their words. Upon the waters, at the foot of the ramparts, fresh combats were continually taking place. In all parts the Saracens met with the same Christian heroes who had so often made them tremble.

Despairing of taking the city of Tyre, Saladin resolved to raise the siege, in order to attack Tripoli, and was not more fortunate in that expedition. William, king of Sicily, being informed of the misfortunes of Palestine, had sent succours to the Christians. The great Admiral Margarit, whose talents and victories had obtained for him the name of the King of the Sea and the New Neptune, arrived on the coast of Syria with sixty galleys, three hundred horse and five hundred foot-soldiers. The Sicilian warriors flew to the defence of Tripoli, and, led on by the Green Knight, who had so distinguished himself at Tyre, forced Saladin to abandon his enterprise.

Thus was Saladin foiled; but the fate of Tyre was only deferred: towards the end of the Crusades, which European passions and interests had made abortive, the Sultan Chalil, after taking and destroying Ptolemaïs, sent one of his emirs with a body of troops to take possession of Tyre; and that city, seized with terror, opened its gates without resistance. The conquerors likewise possessed themselves of Berytus, Sidon, and all the other Christian cities along the coast. These cities, which had not afforded the least succour to Ptolemaïs in the last great struggle, and which believed themselves protected by a truce, beheld their population massacred, dispersed, or led into slavery; the fury of the Mussulmans extended even to the stones; they seemed to wish to destroy the very earth which the Christians had trod upon; their houses, their temples, the monuments of their piety, their valour, their industry,--everything was condemned to perish with them by the sword or by fire.

Such was the character of the wars miscalled Holy; and the impartial student of history is forced to confess, that in all that degrades humanity, such as cruelty, cupidity, ambition, and false glory, the Crusaders at least kept pace with the Mahometans; in bad faith, with regard to treaties, truces, and pledged honour, the Christians by far exceeded the Mussulmans.

SARDIS.

A.C. 502.

After the battle of Thymbra between Cyrus and Crœsus, which was one of the most considerable events in antiquity, as it passed the empire of Asia from the Assyrians of Babylon to the Persians, Cyrus, the conqueror, marched directly upon Sardis, the capital of Lydia. According to Herodotus, Crœsus did not believe that Cyrus meant to shut him up in the city, and therefore marched out to give him battle. He says the Lydians were the bravest people in Asia. Their principal strength consisted in their cavalry; and Cyrus, in order to render this force ineffective, caused his camels to advance against the horse; and the latter animals, having an instinctive dread or dislike for the former, would not face them. The horsemen dismounted and fought on foot; after an obstinate contest, the Lydians were forced to retreat into their capital city, Sardis, which Cyrus immediately besieged, causing his engines to be brought up and his scaling-ladders to be prepared, as if he meant to take it by assault. But this was a feint; he had been made acquainted with a private way into the city by a Persian slave, who had formerly been in the service of the governor, and at night he quietly made himself master of the citadel. At break of day, he entered the city without resistance. Perceiving that the Chaldeans quitted their ranks and began to disperse themselves, his first care was to prevent the city from being plundered. To effect this required nothing less than the perfect ascendancy which Cyrus had obtained over his troops. He informed the citizens that the lives of themselves and their children, with the honour of their women, were perfectly safe, provided they brought him all their gold and silver. This condition they readily complied with, and Crœsus, the proverbially richest man in the world, was one of the first to lay his wealth at the foot of the conqueror.

The siege of Sardis has nothing remarkable in it, except the change of empires which followed it; but there are several anecdotes connected with it, which our young readers would not forgive us for omitting.

When Cyrus had given all proper directions concerning the city, he had a private conversation with the king, of whom he asked what he now thought of the oracle of Delphi, and of the god who presided over it, whom Crœsus held in great veneration. Crœsus acknowledged that he had justly incurred the indignation of that god, by having shown a distrust of the truth of his answers, and by having put him to the trial by an absurd and ridiculous question; and he then added, that he had still no reason to complain of him, for that, having consulted him that he might know what to do in order to lead a happy life, the oracle had given him as answer, that he should enjoy a perfect and lasting happiness when he had come to the knowledge of himself. “For want of this knowledge,” said he, “and believing myself, through the excessive praises bestowed upon me, to be something very different from what I am, I accepted the title of generalissimo of the whole army, and unadvisedly engaged in war against a prince infinitely my superior in all respects. But now that I am instructed by my defeat, and begin to know myself, I believe that I am going to be happy; and if you prove favourable to me,--and my fate is in your hands,--I shall certainly be so.” Cyrus, touched with compassion at the misfortunes of the king, who was fallen in a moment from so great an elevation, and admiring his equanimity under such a reverse of fortune, treated him with a great deal of clemency and kindness, suffering him to enjoy both the title and authority of king, under the restriction of not having the power to make war; which was, as Crœsus said, relieving him of the great burden of royalty, and leaving him the power of leading a happy life. Thenceforward Cyrus took him with him upon all his expeditions, either out of esteem for him, and to have the benefit of his counsels, or out of policy, and to be more secure of his person. We consider this to have been a sad realization of poor Crœsus’s dream of happiness.

There are other wonders connected with this event, about which we can only say that great historians have related them. For our own parts, we are not so sceptical regarding the remote events of history as some readers and authors are. We see, constantly, matters that must some day belong to history, put in as false a light by the passions and interests of contemporaries, as if they were viewed through the mist of past ages. Again, that which is wonderful is not necessarily untrue. When Marco Paolo returned from his long pilgrimage, his accounts were all received as fables; now, almost all of them prove to be bare truth. We shall never reject a story told by a respectable historian, on account of its being a little miraculous, provided it be amusing, instructive, and elevating, and at the same time a thing with which well-educated youth ought to be acquainted.

The only son Crœsus had living was dumb. This young prince, seeing a soldier about to cut down the king, whom he did not know, with his scimitar, made such a violent effort to save his father’s life, that he broke the string which had confined his tongue, and cried out,--“Soldier! spare the life of Crœsus!”

The account of Cyrus’s conversation, given above, is from Xenophon’s Cyropædia; the following, which greatly differs from the circumstances attending it, is from Herodotus.--How are we to choose? The Cyropædia is by some writers looked upon as little more than a romance; and Herodotus abounds in apocryphal stories.

Crœsus being a prisoner, was condemned by the conqueror to be burnt alive. Accordingly, the funeral pile was prepared, and the unhappy prince, having been laid thereon, and on the point of execution, recollecting the conversation he had formerly had with Solon, was wofully convinced of the truth of that philosopher’s admonition, and in remembrance thereof, cried out three times,--“Solon! Solon! Solon!” Cyrus, who with his court was present, was curious to know why Crœsus pronounced the name of that philosopher with so much vehemence in his extremity. “Mighty king,” replied Crœsus, “when Solon in search of wisdom visited my court, I tried every means to dazzle him, and impress upon him the immense extent of my wealth. When I had displayed it all before him, I asked which man in all his travels he had found the most truly happy, expecting, after what he had seen, he would name me. But he replied, ‘One Tellus, a citizen of Athens, a very honest and good man, who, after having lived all his days without indigence, having always seen his country in a flourishing condition, has left children who are universally esteemed, has had the satisfaction of seeing those children’s children, and at last died gloriously in fighting for his country.’ I was surprised to find that my gold and silver had so little weight; but, supposing I at least might claim the next rank, I asked him, ‘Who of all he had seen was most happy after Tellus?’ Solon replied,--‘Cleobis and Biton, two brothers, of Argos, who had left behind them a perfect pattern of fraternal affection, and of the respect due from children to parents. Upon a solemn festival, when their mother, a priestess of Juno, was to go to the temple, the oxen that were to have drawn her not being ready, the two sons put themselves into the yoke and drew their mother’s chariot thither, a distance of five miles. The mothers of the place, ravished with admiration, congratulated the priestess upon having such sons. She, in the transports of her joy and thankfulness, earnestly entreated the goddess to reward her children with the best thing Heaven can bestow. Her prayers were heard. When the sacrifice was over, her two sons fell asleep in the temple, and there died in a soft and sweet slumber. In honour of their piety, the people of Argos consecrated statues to them in the temple of Delphi.’ ‘What then,’ said I, in a tone of discontent, ‘you do not reckon me amongst the happy at all?’ Solon replied, calmly: ‘King of Lydia, the gods have given us Grecians a spirit of moderation and reserve, which has produced amongst us a plain, popular kind of philosophy, accompanied with a certain generous freedom, void of pride or ostentation, and therefore not well suited to the courts of kings. This philosophy, considering what an infinite number of vicissitudes and accidents the life of man is liable to, does not allow us to glory either in any prosperity we enjoy ourselves, or to admire happiness in others, which perhaps may prove only transient or superficial. The life of man seldom exceeds seventy years, which make up in all six thousand two hundred and fifty days, of which no two are exactly alike; so that the time to come is nothing but a series of various accidents which cannot be foreseen. Therefore, in our opinion, no man can be esteemed happy but he whose happiness the gods continue to the end of his life; as for others, who are perpetually exposed to a thousand dangers, we account their happiness as uncertain as the crown is to a person engaged in battle who has not yet won the victory.’”

Upon hearing this, Cyrus reflected upon the uncertainty of sublunary things, and was touched with compassion for the prince’s misfortunes. He caused him to be taken from the pile, and treated him as long as he lived with kindness and respect. Thus had Solon the honour of saving the life of one king, and of giving a wholesome lesson of instruction to another.

SECOND SIEGE, A.C. 502.

Under the reign of Darius Ochus, the Athenians, seduced by the persuasions of Aristagoras, embarked in an ill-fated expedition against the city of Sardis. We say ill-fated, although they burnt the city, with the exception of the citadel, because this unprovoked attack was the source of all the subsequent wars between Greece and Persia, which produced so many calamities to both countries. The city being principally built of reeds, was soon fired, and as quickly destroyed; but the citadel proved impregnable. The Lydians and Persians, highly exasperated, drove the Athenians and Ionians back to Ephesus, and destroyed many of their ships. Darius being informed of the burning of Sardis, and of the part the Athenians had taken in the affair, resolved from that time to make war upon Greece; and, that he might never forget this resolution, he commanded one of his officers to cry out to him with a loud voice, every night, when he was at supper: “Sire, remember the Athenians!” In the burning of Sardis, a temple of Cybele, the peculiar goddess of that country, was consumed, which was the reason the Persians, in their invasions of Greece, destroyed every sacred edifice that fell in their power.

BABYLON.

A.C. 538.

Cyrus stayed in Asia Minor till he had entirely subdued all the nations that inhabited it, from the Ægean sea to the river Euphrates. Thence he proceeded to Syria and Arabia, which he also subjected. After which he entered Assyria, and advanced towards Babylon, the only city of the East that stood out against him.

The siege of this important place was no easy enterprise. The walls of it were of a prodigious height, and appeared to be inaccessible, without mentioning the immense number of people within them for its defence. The city was said to be stored with sufficient provisions for twenty years. But Cyrus was not a leader to be discouraged by difficulties. Despairing of taking the city by assault, he made the Babylonians believe that he meant to reduce it by famine. To this end, he caused a line of circumvallation to be drawn quite round the city, with a wide and deep ditch, and, that his troops might not be over-fatigued, he divided his army into twelve bodies, and assigned each of them its month for guarding the trenches. The besieged, thinking themselves free from all danger on account of their fortifications and magazines, insulted Cyrus from the top of their walls, and laughed at all his attempts, and all the trouble he gave himself, as so much unprofitable labour.

As soon as the ditch was completed, he began to think seriously of his vast design, which he had communicated to nobody. Providence soon furnished him with as fit an opportunity for this purpose as he could desire. He was informed that a great festival was to be celebrated in the city, and that the Babylonians, on account of that solemnity, would pass the whole night in drinking and debauchery.

Belshazzar, the king, took more interest in this public rejoicing than any other person, and gave a magnificent entertainment to the chief officers of the kingdom and the ladies of the court. When flushed with wine, he ordered the gold and silver vessels which had been taken from the temple of Jerusalem to be brought out; and as an insult to the God of Israel, he, his whole court, and all his concubines, drank out of these sacred vessels. God, who was displeased at such insolence and impiety, at the instant made him sensible whom it was he offended, by a sudden apparition of a hand, writing certain characters upon the wall. The king, terribly surprised and frightened at this vision, immediately sent for all the wise men, diviners and astrologers, that they might read the writing to him, and explain the meaning of it. But they all came in vain, not one of them being able to expound the characters. The obvious reason of this was that the characters were in the Hebrew or Samaritan language, which the Babylonians did not understand. The queen-mother Nitocris, a princess of great merit, coming, upon hearing of this prodigy, into the banqueting-room, endeavoured to compose the mind of the king her son, advising him to send for Daniel, with whose abilities in such matters she was well acquainted, and whom she had employed in the government of the state.

Daniel was therefore immediately sent for, and spoke to the king with the freedom and liberty becoming a prophet. He put him in mind of the dreadful manner in which God had punished the pride of his grandfather Nebuchadnezzar, and the flagrant abuse he made of his power, when he acknowledged no law but his own will, and thought himself empowered to exalt and to abase, to inflict destruction and death, wheresoever he would, only because such was his will and pleasure. “And thou his son,” said he to the king, “hast not humbled thine heart, though thou knewest all this, but hast lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of his house before thee, and thou and thy lords, thy wives and thy concubines, have drunk wine in them; and thou hast praised the gods of silver and of gold, of brass, iron, wood, and stone, which see not, nor hear, nor know; and the God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified. Then was the part of the hand sent from him, and this writing was written. And this is the writing that was written: MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE, God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it; TEKEL, thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting; PERES, thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.” This interpretation might be expected to increase the consternation of the company; but they found means to dispel their fears, probably from a persuasion that the calamity was not denounced as present or immediate, and that time might furnish them with expedients to avert it. This, however, is certain, that for fear of disturbing the general joy of the present festival, they put off the discussion of serious matters to another time, and sat down again to their banquet, and continued their revellings to a very late hour.

Cyrus, however, well informed of the confusion that was generally occasioned by this festival, both in the palace and the city, had posted a part of his troops on that side where the river entered into the city, and another part on that side where it went out; and had commanded them to enter the city that very night, by marching along the channel of the river as soon as ever they found it fordable. Having given all necessary orders, and exhorted his officers to follow him, by representing to them that he marched under the guidance of the gods, in the evening he made them open the great receptacles or ditches, on both sides of the city, above and below, that the water of the river might run into them. By this means, that part of the Euphrates was, for a time, emptied; and its channel became nearly dry. Then the two bodies of troops, according to their orders, went into the channel, the one commanded by Gobryas, and the other by Gudatas, and advanced without meeting any obstacle. The invisible guide, who had promised to open all the gates to Cyrus, made the general negligence and disorder of that riotous night subservient to his design, by leaving open the gates of brass which were made to shut up the descents from the quays to the river, and which alone, if they had not been left open, were sufficient to defeat the whole enterprise. Thus did these two bodies of troops penetrate into the very heart of the city without any opposition, and meeting together at the royal palace, according to their agreement, surprised the guards, and cut them to pieces. Some of the company that were within the palace opening the doors to ascertain the cause of the noise they heard without, the soldiers rushed in, and quickly made themselves masters of it. Meeting the king, who came towards them sword in hand, at the head of those that were in the way to succour him, they killed him, and put all that attended him to death. The first thing the conqueror did was to thank the gods for having at last punished that impious king. These words are Xenophon’s, and are very worthy of attention, as they so perfectly agree with what the Scriptures have recorded of the impious Belshazzar.

The taking of Babylon put an end to the Babylonian empire, after a duration of two hundred and ten years, from the beginning of the reign of Nabonassur. Thus was the power of that proud city brought low just fifty years after she had destroyed the city of Jerusalem and her temple. And herein were accomplished those predictions which the prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel had denounced against her. There is still one more, the most important and the most incredible of them all, and yet the Scripture has set it down in the strongest terms, and marked it out with the greatest exactness; a prediction literally fulfilled in all its points: the proof still actually subsists, is the most easy to be verified, and indeed of a nature not to be contested. What[4] I mean is the prediction of so total and absolute a ruin of Babylon, that not the least remains or traces should be left of it.

In the first place, Babylon ceased to be a royal city, the kings of Persia choosing to reside elsewhere. They delighted more in Susa, Ecbatana, Persepolis, or any other place, and did themselves destroy a great part of Babylon. We are informed by Strabo and Pliny, that the Macedonians, who succeeded the Persians, did not only neglect it, and forbear to embellish it, or even repair it, but that, moreover, they built Seleucia in the neighbourhood, on purpose to draw away its inhabitants, and cause it to be deserted. Nothing can better explain what the prophet had foretold: “It shall not be inhabited.” Its own masters endeavour to make it desolate. The new kings of Persia, who afterwards became masters of Babylon, completed the ruin of it by building Ctesiphon, which carried away all the remainder of the inhabitants; so that from the time the curse was pronounced against that city, it seems as if those very persons who ought to have protected it had become its enemies.

SECOND SIEGE, A.C. 510.