enous I will say 'Wait a little: HE
is with the ladies of the court,' until I have plagued and tormented him
as he torments me, keeping me away from you, grandfather, when I want to
come." [12] Thus the boy delighted his elders in the evening, and by
day if he saw that his grandfather or his uncle wanted anything, no one
could forestall him in getting it; indeed nothing seemed to give him
greater pleasure than to please them.

[13] Now when Mandane began to think of going back to her husband,
Astyages begged her to leave the boy behind. She answered that though
she wished to please her father in everything, it would be hard to leave
the boy against his will. [14] Then the old man turned to Cyrus: "My
boy, if you will stay with us, Sacas shall never stop you from coming to
me: you shall be free to come whenever you choose, and the oftener you
come the better it will please me. You shall have horses to ride, my
own and as many others as you like, and when you leave us you shall take
them with you. And at dinner you shall go your own away and follow your
own path to your own goal of temperance just as you think right. And I
will make you a present of all the game in my parks and paradises, and
collect more for you, and as soon as you have learnt to ride you shall
hunt and shoot and hurl the javelin exactly like a man. And you shall
have boys to play with and anything else you wish for: you have only to
ask me and it shall be yours." [15] Then his mother questioned the
boy and asked him whether he would rather stay with his grandfather
in Media, or go back home with her: and he said at once that he would
rather stay. And when she went on to ask him the reason, he answered, so
the story says, "Because at home I am thought to be the best of the lads
at shooting and hurling the javelin, and so I think I am: but here I
know I am the worst at riding, and that you may be sure, mother, annoys
me exceedingly. Now if you leave me here and I learn to ride, when I am
back in Persia you shall see, I promise you, that I will outdo all our
gallant fellows on foot, and when I come to Media again I will try and
show my grandfather that, for all his splendid cavalry, he will not have
a stouter horseman than his grandson to fight his battles for him." [16]
Then said his mother, "But justice and righteousness, my son, how can
you learn them here when your teachers are at home?" "Oh," said Cyrus,
"I know all about them already." "How do you kno