ll! Should you ever stand in need of
ought, remember Cyrus' widow, and how she wished to teach you, that the
virtues the Persians desire most in their children are magnanimity and
liberality."
After saying this she left the apartment.
On the same day Rhodopis heard that Phanes was dead. He had retired to
Crotona in the neighborhood of Pythagoras and there passed his time in
reflection, dying with the tranquillity of a philosopher.
She was deeply affected at this news and said to Croesus: "Greece has
lost one of her ablest men, but there are many, who will grow up to be
his equals. The increasing power of Persia causes me no fear; indeed, I
believe that when the barbarous lust of conquest stretches out its hand
towards us, our many-headed Greece will rise as a giant with one head of
divine power, before which mere barbaric strength must bow as surely as
body before spirit."
Three days after this, Sappho said farewell for the last time to her
grandmother, and followed the queens to Persia. Notwithstanding the
events which afterwards took place, she continued to believe that Bartja
would return, and full of love, fidelity and tender remembrance, devoted
herself entirely to the education of her child and the care of her aged
mother-in-law, Kassandane.
Little Parmys became very beautiful, and learnt to love the memory of her
vanished father next to the gods of her native land, for her mother's
tales had brought him as vividly before her as if he had been still alive
and present with them.
Atossa's subsequent good fortune and happiness did not cool her
friendship. She always called Sappho her sister. The hanging-gardens were
the latter's residence in summer, and in her conversations there with
Kassandane and Atossa one name was often mentioned--the name of her, who
had been the innocent cause of events which had decided the destinies of
great kingdoms and noble lives--the Egyptian Princess.
CHAPTER XVI.
Here we might end this tale, but that we feel bound to give our readers
some account of the last days of Cambyses. We have already described the
ruin of his mind, but his physical end remains still to be told, and also
the subsequent fate of some of the other characters in our history.
A short time after the departure of the queens, news reached Naukratis
that Oroetes, the satrap of Lydia, had, by a stratagem, allured his old
enemy, Polykrates, to Sardis and crucified him there, thus fulfilling
what A
|