ius was attacked, Babylon taken, and the
Chaldaean monarchy, which had lasted nearly two thousand years, brought
to an end. The contest had been prolonged, and in the course of it some
disintegration of the empire had taken place. Phoenicia had asserted her
independence; and Cyprus, which was to a large extent Phoenician, had
followed the example of the mother-country. Under these circumstances,
Amasis thought he saw an opportunity of gaining some cheap laurels, and
accordingly made a naval expedition against the unfortunate islanders,
who were taken unawares and forced to become his tributaries. It was
unwise of the Egyptian monarch to remind Cyrus that he had still an open
enemy unchastised, one who had entered into a league against him ten
years previously, and was now anxious to prevent him from reaping the
full benefit of his conquests. We may be sure that the Persian monarch
noted and resented the interference with territories which he had some
right to consider his own; whether he took any steps to revenge himself
is doubtful. According to some, he required Amasis to send him one of
his daughters as a concubine, an insult which the Egyptian king escaped
by _finesse_ while he appeared to submit to it.

It can only have been on account of the other wars which pressed upon
him and occupied him during his remaining years, that Cyrus did not
march in person against Amasis. First, the conquest of the nations
between the Caspian and the Indian Ocean detained him; and after this, a
danger showed itself on his north-eastern frontier which required all
his attention, and in meeting which he lost his life. The independent
tribes beyond the Oxus and the Jaxartes have through all history been an
annoyance and a peril to the power which rules over the Iranian plateau,
and it was in repelling an attack in this quarter that Cyrus fell.
Amasis, perhaps, congratulated himself on the defeat and death of the
great warrior king; but Egypt would, perhaps, have suffered less had the
invasion, which was sure to come, been conducted by the noble,
magnanimous, and merciful Cyrus, than she actually endured at the hands
of the impulsive tyrannical, and half-mad Cambyses.

The first step taken by Cambyses, who succeeded his father Cyrus in B.C.
529, was to reduce Phoenicia under his power. The support of a fleet was
of immense importance to an army about to attack Egypt, both for the
purpose of conveying water and stores, and of giving comma