army of
inspectors and spies, who reported to him from all quarters the
sufferings or complaints of the oppressed, and the neglects or misdoings
of those in authority. On the occurrence of any specially suspicious
circumstance, he appointed extraordinary commissions of inquiry,
which, armed with all the power of the crown, proceeded to the suspected
quarter, took evidence, and made a careful report of whatever wrongs or
malpractices they discovered.

When guilt was brought home to incriminated persons or parties, the
punishment with which they were visited was swift and signal. We have
seen how harsh were the sentences passed by Chosroes upon those whose
offences attacked his own person or dignity. An equal severity appears
in his judgments, where there was no question of his own wrongs, but
only of the interests of his subjects. On one occasion he is said to
have executed no fewer than eighty collectors of taxes on the report of
a commission charging them with extortion. Among the principal reforms
which Chosroes is said to have introduced was his fresh arrangement
of the taxation. Hitherto all lands had paid to the State a certain
proportion of their produce, a proportion which varied, according to the
estimated richness of the soil, from a tenth to one-half. The effect was
to discourage all improved cultivation, since it was quite possible that
the whole profit of any increased outlay might be absorbed by the State,
and also to cramp and check the liberty of the cultivators in various
ways, since the produce could not be touched until the revenue official
made his appearance and carried off the share of the crop which he had
a right to take. Chosroes resolved to substitute a land-tax for the
proportionate payments in kind, and thus at once to set the cultivator
at liberty with respect to harvesting his crops and to allow him the
entire advantage of any augumented production which might be secured by
better methods of farming his land. His tax consisted in part of a money
payment, in part of a payment in kind; but both payments were fixed and
invariable, each measure of ground being rated in the king's books at
one dirhem and one measure of the produce. Uncultivated land, and land
lying fallow at the time, were exempt; and thus the scheme involved,
not one survey alone, but a recurring (annual) survey, and an annual
registration of all cultivators, with the quantity of land under
cultivation held by each, and the natu