of government, and on the discipline and management of
armies. The principles and the sentiments which the work inculcates
and explains are now of little value, being no longer applicable to
the affairs of mankind in the altered circumstances of the present
day. The book, however, retains its rank among men on account of a
certain beautiful and simple magnificence characterizing the style and
language in which it is written, which, however, can not be
appreciated except by those who read the narrative in the original
tongue.

CHAPTER XII.

THE DEATH OF CYRUS.

B.C. 530

Progress of Cyrus's conquests.--The northern countries.--The
Scythians.--Their warlike character.--Cyrus's sons.--His queen.--Selfish
views of Cyrus.--Customs of the savages.--Cyrus arrives at the
Araxes.--Difficulties of crossing the river.--Embassage from
Tomyris.--Warning of Tomyris.--Cyrus calls a council of war.--Opinion
of the officers.--Dissent of Croesus.--Speech of Croesus.--His
advice to Cyrus.--Cyrus adopts the plan of Croesus.--His reply
to Tomyris.--Forebodings of Cyrus.--He appoints Cambyses
regent.--Hystaspes.--His son Darius.--Cyrus's dream.--Hystaspes's
commission.--Cyrus marches into the queen's country.--Success of the
stratagem.--Spargapizes taken prisoner.--Tomyris's concern for her
son's safety.--Her conciliatory message.--Mortification of
Spargapizes.--Cyrus gives him liberty within the camp.--Death of
Spargapizes.--Grief and rage of Tomyris.--The great battle.--Cyrus
is defeated and slain.--Tomyris's treatment of Cyrus's
body.--Reflections.--Hard-heartedness, selfishness, and cruelty
characterize the ambitious.

After having made the conquest of the Babylonian empire, Cyrus found
himself the sovereign of nearly all of Asia, so far as it was then
known. Beyond his dominions there lay, on every side, according to the
opinions which then prevailed, vast tracts of uninhabitable territory,
desolate and impassable. These wildernesses were rendered unfit for
man, sometimes by excessive heat, sometimes by excessive cold,
sometimes from being parched by perpetual drought, which produced bare
and desolate deserts, and sometimes by incessant rains, which drenched
the country and filled it with morasses and fens. On the north was the
great Caspian Sea, then almost wholly unexplored, and extending, as
the ancients believed, to the Polar Ocean.

On the west side of the Caspian Sea were the Caucasian Mountains,
which were supp