ts and the chamber _Badaverd_ denoted the accidental gift of the
winds which had wafted the spoils of Heraclius into one of the Syrian
harbors of his rival. The vice of flattery, and perhaps of fiction, is
not ashamed to compute the thirty thousand rich hangings that adorned
the walls; the forty thousand columns of silver, or more probably of
marble, and plated wood, that supported the roof; and the thousand
globes of gold suspended in the dome, to imitate the motions of the
planets and the constellations of the zodiac. While the Persian monarch
contemplated the wonders of his art and power, he received an epistle
from an obscure citizen of Mecca, inviting him to acknowledge Mahomet
as the apostle of God. He rejected the invitation, and tore the epistle.
"It is thus," exclaimed the Arabian prophet, "that God will tear the
kingdom, and reject the supplications of Chosroes." Placed on the verge
of the two great empires of the East, Mahomet observed with secret
joy the progress of their mutual destruction; and in the midst of the
Persian triumphs, he ventured to foretell, that before many years should
elapse, victory should again return to the banners of the Romans.

At the time when this prediction is said to have been delivered, no
prophecy could be more distant from its accomplishment, since the first
twelve years of Heraclius announced the approaching dissolution of the
empire. If the motives of Chosroes had been pure and honorable, he
must have ended the quarrel with the death of Phocas, and he would have
embraced, as his best ally, the fortunate African who had so generously
avenged the injuries of his benefactor Maurice. The prosecution of the
war revealed the true character of the Barbarian; and the suppliant
embassies of Heraclius to beseech his clemency, that he would spare the
innocent, accept a tribute, and give peace to the world, were rejected
with contemptuous silence or insolent menace. Syria, Egypt, and the
provinces of Asia, were subdued by the Persian arms, while Europe, from
the confines of Istria to the long wall of Thrace, was oppressed by the
Avars, unsatiated with the blood and rapine of the Italian war. They had
coolly massacred their male captives in the sacred field of Pannonia;
the women and children were reduced to servitude, and the noblest
virgins were abandoned to the promiscuous lust of the Barbarians. The
amorous matron who opened the gates of Friuli passed a short night in
the arms of her