uld voluntarily come to terms in order to avoid being forcibly captured
and enslaved. When, after letting one day elapse, no one made any formal
proposition to him, he commanded the soldiers again to assault the wall,
though it had been built up in the night. The Europeans who had the power
to accomplish something were so angry that not one of them would any
longer obey him, and some others, Syrians, compelled to go to the assault
in their stead, were miserably destroyed. Thus Heaven, that rescued the
city, caused Severus to recall the soldiers that could have entered it,
and in turn when he later wished to take it caused the soldiers to prevent
him from doing so. The situation placed Severus in such a dilemma that
when some one of his followers promised him that, if he would give him
only five hundred and fifty of the Europeans, he would get possession of
the city without any risk to the rest, the emperor said within hearing of
all: "And where can I get so many soldiers?" (referring to the
disobedience of the soldiers).

[Sidenote: A.D. 200 (a.u. 953)] [Sidenote:--13--] Having prosecuted the
siege for twenty days he next came to Palestine and sacrificed to the
spirit of Pompey: and into [upper] Egypt [he sailed along the Nile and
viewed the whole country, with some small exceptions. For instance, he was
unable to pass the frontier of Ethiopia on account of pestilence.] And he
made a search of everything, including what was very carefully hidden, for
he was the sort of man to leave nothing, human or divine, uninvestigated.
Following this tendency he drew from practically all their hiding places
all the books that he could find containing anything secret, and he closed
the monument of Alexander, to the end that no one should either behold his
body any more or read what was written in these books.

This was what he did. For myself, there is no need that I should write in
general about Egypt, but what I know about the Nile through verifying
statements from many sources I am bound to mention. It clearly rises in
Mount Atlas. This lies in Macennitis, close to the Western ocean itself,
and towers far above all mountains, wherefore the poets have called it
"Pillar of the Sky." No one ever ascended its summits nor saw its topmost
peaks. Hence it is always covered with snow, which in summer time sends
down great quantities of water. The whole country about its base is in
general marshy, but at this season becomes even more so, wi