y be comprised under the names of, I. Persia;
II. Syria; III. Egypt; IV. Africa; and, V. Spain. Under this general
division, I shall proceed to unfold these memorable transactions;
despatching with brevity the remote and less interesting conquests of
the East, and reserving a fuller narrative for those domestic countries
which had been included within the pale of the Roman empire. Yet I
must excuse my own defects by a just complaint of the blindness and
insufficiency of my guides. The Greeks, so loquacious in controversy,
have not been anxious to celebrate the triumphs of their enemies.
After a century of ignorance, the first annals of the Mussulmans were
collected in a great measure from the voice of tradition. Among the
numerous productions of Arabic and Persian literature, our interpreters
have selected the imperfect sketches of a more recent age. The art
and genius of history have ever been unknown to the Asiatics; they are
ignorant of the laws of criticism; and our monkish chronicle of the
same period may be compared to their most popular works, which are never
vivified by the spirit of philosophy and freedom. The _Oriental library_
of a Frenchman would instruct the most learned mufti of the East; and
perhaps the Arabs might not find in a single historian so clear and
comprehensive a narrative of their own exploits as that which will be
deduced in the ensuing sheets.

I. In the first year of the first caliph, his lieutenant Caled, the
Sword of God, and the scourge of the infidels, advanced to the banks of
the Euphrates, and reduced the cities of Anbar and Hira. Westward of the
ruins of Babylon, a tribe of sedentary Arabs had fixed themselves on the
verge of the desert; and Hira was the seat of a race of kings who had
embraced the Christian religion, and reigned above six hundred years
under the shadow of the throne of Persia. The last of the Mondars was
defeated and slain by Caled; his son was sent a captive to Medina; his
nobles bowed before the successor of the prophet; the people was tempted
by the example and success of their countrymen; and the caliph accepted
as the first-fruits of foreign conquest an annual tribute of seventy
thousand pieces of gold. The conquerors, and even their historians, were
astonished by the dawn of their future greatness: "In the same year,"
says Elmacin, "Caled fought many signal battles: an immense multitude of
the infidels was slaughtered; and spoils infinite and innumerable were