s destruction, he would retire, falling back probably upon the coast,
where he could obtain supplies from his fleet. It is beyond dispute that
he returned with the bulk of his army, having suffered no loss but
that of a few invalid troops whom he sacrificed. Attempts had been made
during his absence to induce the Greeks, who guarded the bridge over
the Danube, to break it, and so hinder his return; but they were
unsuccessful. Darius recrossed the river after an interval of somewhat
more than two months, victorious according to his own notions, and
regarded himself as entitled thenceforth to enumerate among the subject
races of his empire "the Scyths beyond the sea." On his return march
through Thrace, he met, apparently, with no opposition. Before passing
the Bosphorus, he gave a commission to one of his generals, a certain
Megabazus, to complete the reduction of Thrace, and assigned him for the
purpose a body of 80,000 men, who remained in Europe while Darius and
the rest of his army crossed into Asia.

Megabazus appears to have been fully worthy of the trust reposed in him.
In a single campaign (B.C. 506) he overran and subjugated the entire
tract between the Propontis and the Strymon, thus pushing forward the
Persian dominion to the borders of Macedonia. Among the tribes which he
conquered were the Perinthians, Greeks; the Pseti, Cicones, Bistones,
Sapaei, Dersaei and Edoni, Thracians; and the Paeoplae and Siripasones,
Pseonians. These last, to gratify a whim of Darius, were transported
into Asia. The Thracians who submitted were especially those of the
coast, no attempt, apparently, being made to penetrate the mountain
fastnesses and bring under subjection the tribes of the interior.

The first contact between Persia and Macedonia possesses peculiar
interest from the circumstances of the later history. An ancestor of
Alexander the Great sat upon the throne of Macedon when the general of
Darius was brought in his career of conquest to the outskirts of the
Macedonian power. The kingdom was at this time comparatively small, not
extending much beyond Mount Bermius on the one hand, and not reaching
very far to the east of the Axius on the other. Megabazus saw in it,
we may be sure, not the fated destroyer of the Empire which he was
extending, but a petty state which the mere sound of the Persian
name would awe into subjection. He therefore, instead of invading the
country, contented himself with sending an embassy, with