e mind of the young warrior, when,
having secured Egypt on the south, he turned his attention to the north,
and asked himself the question how he should next employ the power that
he had inherited, and the talents with which nature had endowed him.

It is uncertain what amount of knowledge the Egyptians of the time
possessed concerning the internal condition, population, and resources,
of the continent which adjoined them on the north-east. We cannot say
whether Thothmes and his counsellors could, or could not, bring before
their mind's eye a fairly correct view of the general position of
Asiatic affairs, and form a reasonable estimate of the probabilities of
success or discomfiture, if a great expedition were led into the heart
of Asia. Whatever may have been their knowledge or ignorance, it will be
necessary for the historical student of the present day to have some
general ideas on the subject, if he is to form an adequate conception
either of the dangers which Thothmes affronted, or of the amount of
credit due to him for his victories. We propose, therefore, in the
present place, to glance our eye over the previous history of Western
Asia, and to describe, so far as is possible, its condition at the time
when Thothmes began to contemplate the invasion which it is his great
glory to have accomplished.

Western Asia is generally allowed to have been the cradle of the human
race. Its more fertile portions were thickly peopled at a very early
date. Monarchy, it is probable, first grew up in Babylonia, towards the
mouths of the Tigris and Euphrates. But it was not long ere a sister
kingdom established itself in Susiana, or Elam, the fertile tract
between the Lower Tigris and the Zagros mountains. The ambition of
conquest first showed itself in this latter country, whence
Kudur-Nakhunta, about B.C. 2300, made an attack on Erech, and
Chedor-laomer (about B.C. 2000) established an empire which extended
from the Zagros mountains on the one hand to the shores of the
Mediterranean on the other (Gen. xiv. 1-4) Shortly after this, a third
power, that of the Hittites, grew up towards the north, chiefly perhaps
in Asia Minor, but with a tendency to project itself southward into the
Mesopotamian region. Upper Mesopotamia, Syria, and Palestine, were at
this time inhabited by weak tribes, each under its own chief, with no
coherence, and no great military spirit. The chief of these tribes, at
the time when Thothmes I. ascended the Eg