banks of a stream, while some of the men were bathing and others were
taking their breakfast, and was completely cut to pieces by Kobad,
scarcely any but the generals escaping.

Thus far success had been wholly on the side of the Persians; and if
circumstances had permitted Kobad to remain at the seat of war and
continue to direct the operations of his troops in person, there is
every to reason to believe that he would have gained still greater
advantages. The Roman generals were incompetent; they were at variance
among themselves; and they were unable to control the troops under their
command. The soldiers were insubordinate, without confidence in their
officers, and inclined to grumble at such an unwonted hardship as a
campaign prolonged into the winter. Thus all the conditions of the war
were in favor of Persia. But unfortunately for Kobad, it happened that,
at the moment when his prospects were the fairest, a danger in another
quarter demanded his presence, and required him to leave the conduct
of the Roman war to others. An Ephthalite invasion called him to the
defence of his north-eastern frontier before the year A.D. 503 was over,
and from this time the operations in Mesopotamia were directed, not by
the king in person, but by his generals. A change is at once apparent.
In A.D. 504 Celer invaded Arzanene, destroyed a number of forts,
and ravaged the whole province with fire and sword. Thence marching
southward, he threated Nisibis, which is said, to have been within a
little of yielding itself. Towards winter Patricius and Hypatius took
heart, and, collecting an army, commenced the siege of Amida, which they
attempted to storm on several occasions, but without success. After a
while they turned the siege into a blockade, entrapped the commander of
the, Persian garrison, Glones, by a stratagem, and reduced the defenders
of the place to such distress that it would have been impossible to hold
put much longer. It seems to have been when matters were at this
point that an ambassador of high rank arrived from Kobad, empowered to
conclude a peace, and instructed to declare his master's willingness
to surrender all his conquests, including Amida, on the payment of
a considerable sum of money. The Roman generals, regarding Amida as
impregnable, and not aware of the exhaustion of its stores, gladly
consented. They handed over to the Persians a thousand pounds' weight of
gold, and received in exchange the captured city and