coolly
declared that his sword was consecrated to the service of religion; and
that he labored for a recompense far above the charms of mortal beauty,
or the riches of this transitory life. A reward congenial to his temper
was the honorable commission of announcing to the caliph Othman the
success of his arms. The companions the chiefs, and the people, were
assembled in the mosch of Medina, to hear the interesting narrative of
Zobeir; and as the orator forgot nothing except the merit of his own
counsels and actions, the name of Abdallah was joined by the Arabians
with the heroic names of Caled and Amrou. [145]

[Footnote 142: See in Ockley (Hist. of the Saracens, vol. ii. p. 45) the
death of Zobeir, which was honored with the tears of Ali, against whom
he had rebelled. His valor at the siege of Babylon, if indeed it be the
same person, is mentioned by Eutychius, (Annal. tom. ii. p. 308)]

[Footnote 143: Shaw's Travels, p. 118, 119.]

[Footnote 144: Mimica emptio, says Abulfeda, erat haec, et mira donatio;
quandoquidem Othman, ejus nomine nummos ex aerario prius ablatos aerario
praestabat, (Annal. Moslem. p. 78.) Elmacin (in his cloudy version, p.
39) seems to report the same job. When the Arabs be sieged the palace of
Othman, it stood high in their catalogue of grievances.`]

[Footnote 145: Theophan. Chronograph. p. 235 edit. Paris. His chronology
is loose and inaccurate.]

[A. D. 665-689.] The western conquests of the Saracens were suspended
near twenty years, till their dissensions were composed by the
establishment of the house of Ommiyah; and the caliph Moawiyah was
invited by the cries of the Africans themselves. The successors of
Heraclius had been informed of the tribute which they had been compelled
to stipulate with the Arabs; but instead of being moved to pity and
relieve their distress, they imposed, as an equivalent or a fine, a
second tribute of a similar amount. The ears of the zantine ministers
were shut against the complaints of their poverty and ruin their
despair was reduced to prefer the dominion of a single master; and the
extortions of the patriarch of Carthage, who was invested with civil and
military power, provoked the sectaries, and even the Catholics, of the
Roman province to abjure the religion as well as the authority of
their tyrants. The first lieutenant of Moawiyah acquired a just renown,
subdued an important city, defeated an army of thirty thousand Greeks,
swept away fourscore thou