f
Hani's arrival. Unfortunately it was too late. The cunning Amorite brought
forward one excuse after another. "Even if thy actions be just, yet if
thou dissemble in thy letters at thy pleasure, the king must at length
come to think that thou liest in every case," is a passage in the letter
brought by Hani. Aziru replies in a tone of injured innocence:

"To the great king, my lord, my god, my sun; Aziru, thy servant.
Seven times and again seven times, &c. Oh, lord, I am indeed thy
servant; and only when prostrate on the ground before the king, my
lord, can I speak what I have to say. But hearken not, O lord, to
the foes who slander me before thee. I remain thy servant for
ever."

This trusty vassal added to his other known faults the peculiarity of
conspiring readily with the Hittite foes of the Court. His insolence
helped him successfully out of these awkward difficulties also whenever
the matter came under discussion. When preparing fresh raids he did not
hesitate to invent news of Hittite invasions which he was bound to resist,
and all territory which he then took from his co-vassals would, according
to his own account, otherwise certainly have fallen into the hands of the
enemy. But as the result was always the same--_i.e._, to the advantage of
Aziru alone--the opinion began to prevail in Egyptian councils that this
restless vassal should be summoned to Court and tried. For many years
Aziru succeeded in evading these fatal and dangerous, or at best very
costly orders. But finally he was forced to obey, and with heavy heart and
well-filled treasure chests set off for Egypt. Apparently he relied on his
principal ally Dudu, whom in his letters he always addresses as "father";
but this pleasant alliance did not avail to protect the disturber of the
peace from provisional arrest. The last letter in the Aziru series, which
had obviously been confiscated and subsequently found its way back into
the archives, is a letter of condolence from the adherents or sons of
Aziru to their imprisoned chief. Nevertheless, the political activity of
the Amorite chief seemed to many Syrian, and especially to Phoenician
princes as on the whole for the good of the land, and, therefore, to be
supported. His appearance put the longed-for end to a far less endurable
condition of things. Two communications from Akizzi, the headman of the
city of Katna, near Damascus, exhibit the difference clearly. When Akizzi
sent