nd gems, the spoils of Asiatic churches, were
made a grateful offering to the piety or avarice of the emperor; and he
transported the gates of Mopsuestia and Tarsus, which were fixed in the
walls of Constantinople, an eternal monument of his victory. After they
had forced and secured the narrow passes of Mount Amanus, the two Roman
princes repeatedly carried their arms into the heart of Syria. Yet,
instead of assaulting the walls of Antioch, the humanity or superstition
of Nicephorus appeared to respect the ancient metropolis of the East: he
contented himself with drawing round the city a line of circumvallation;
left a stationary army; and instructed his lieutenant to expect, without
impatience, the return of spring. But in the depth of winter, in a dark
and rainy night, an adventurous subaltern, with three hundred soldiers,
approached the rampart, applied his scaling-ladders, occupied two
adjacent towers, stood firm against the pressure of multitudes, and
bravely maintained his post till he was relieved by the tardy, though
effectual, support of his reluctant chief. The first tumult of slaughter
and rapine subsided; the reign of Caesar and of Christ was restored; and
the efforts of a hundred thousand Saracens, of the armies of Syria and
the fleets of Africa, were consumed without effect before the walls of
Antioch. The royal city of Aleppo was subject to Seifeddowlat, of
the dynasty of Hamadan, who clouded his past glory by the precipitate
retreat which abandoned his kingdom and capital to the Roman invaders.
In his stately palace, that stood without the walls of Aleppo, they
joyfully seized a well-furnished magazine of arms, a stable of fourteen
hundred mules, and three hundred bags of silver and gold. But the walls
of the city withstood the strokes of their battering-rams: and the
besiegers pitched their tents on the neighboring mountain of Jaushan.
Their retreat exasperated the quarrel of the townsmen and mercenaries;
the guard of the gates and ramparts was deserted; and while they
furiously charged each other in the market-place, they were surprised
and destroyed by the sword of a common enemy. The male sex was
exterminated by the sword; ten thousand youths were led into captivity;
the weight of the precious spoil exceeded the strength and number of
the beasts of burden; the superfluous remainder was burnt; and, after
a licentious possession of ten days, the Romans marched away from the
naked and bleeding city. In t