roperty
from the sacrilegious hands of the followers of Zoroaster. But the ruin
of Tarsus, and of many other cities, furnishes a melancholy proof that,
except in this singular instance, the conquest of Syria and Cilicia
scarcely interrupted the progress of the Persian arms. The advantages of
the narrow passes of Mount Taurus were abandoned, in which an invader,
whose principal force consisted in his cavalry, would have been engaged
in a very unequal combat: and Sapor was permitted to form the siege of
Caesarea, the capital of Cappadocia; a city, though of the second
rank, which was supposed to contain four hundred thousand inhabitants.
Demosthenes commanded in the place, not so much by the commission of the
emperor, as in the voluntary defence of his country. For a long time he
deferred its fate; and when at last Caesarea was betrayed by the perfidy
of a physician, he cut his way through the Persians, who had been
ordered to exert their utmost diligence to take him alive. This heroic
chief escaped the power of a foe who might either have honored or
punished his obstinate valor; but many thousands of his fellow-citizens
were involved in a general massacre, and Sapor is accused of treating
his prisoners with wanton and unrelenting cruelty. Much should
undoubtedly be allowed for national animosity, much for humbled pride
and impotent revenge; yet, upon the whole, it is certain, that the same
prince, who, in Armenia, had displayed the mild aspect of a legislator,
showed himself to the Romans under the stern features of a conqueror.
He despaired of making any permanent establishment in the empire, and
sought only to leave behind him a wasted desert, whilst he transported
into Persia the people and the treasures of the provinces.

At the time when the East trembled at the name of Sapor, he received
a present not unworthy of the greatest kings; a long train of camels,
laden with the most rare and valuable merchandises. The rich offering
was accompanied with an epistle, respectful, but not servile, from
Odenathus, one of the noblest and most opulent senators of Palmyra. "Who
is this Odenathus," (said the haughty victor, and he commanded that the
present should be cast into the Euphrates,) "that he thus insolently
presumes to write to his lord? If he entertains a hope of mitigating his
punishment, let him fall prostrate before the foot of our throne, with
his hands bound behind his back. Should he hesitate, swift destruction
sha