the tributes, the mention of the foraging arrangements which
the chiefs were compelled to make for the army on its
passage. We find among the tablets letters from Aziru
denouncing the intrigues of the Khati; letters also of
Ribaddu pointing out the misdeeds of Abdashirti, and other
communications of the same nature, which demonstrate the
supervision exercised by the petty Syrian princes over each
other.

** Under Thutmosis III. we have among others "Mir," or "Nasi
situ mihatitu," "governors of the northern countries," the
Thutii who became afterwards a hero of romance. The
individuals who bore this title held a middle rank in the
Egyptian hierarchy.

*** The archers--_pidatid, pidati, pidate_--and the
chariotry quartered in Syria are often mentioned in the Tel
el-Amarna correspondence. Steindorff has recognised the term
-ddu auitu, meaning infantry, in the word ueu, uiu, of the
Tel el-Amarna tablets.

The officers in command had orders to interfere as little as possible
in local affairs, and to leave the natives to dispute or even to fight
among themselves unhindered, so long as their quarrels did not threaten
the security of the Pharaoh.* It was never part of the policy of Egypt
to insist on her foreign subjects keeping an unbroken peace among
themselves. If, theoretically, she did not recognise the right of
private warfare, she at all events tolerated its practice. It mattered
little to her whether some particular province passed out of the
possession of a certain Eibaddu into that of a certain Aziru, or _vice
versa_, so long as both Eibaddu and Aziru remained her faithful slaves.
She never sought to repress their incessant quarrelling until such time
as it threatened to take the form of an insurrection against her own
power. Then alone did she throw off her neutrality; taking the side of
one or other of the dissentients, she would grant him, as a pledge of
help, ten, twenty, thirty, or even more archers.**

* A half at least of the Tel el-Amarna correspondence treats
of provincial wars between the kings of towns and countries
subject to Egypt--wars of Abdashirti and his son Aziru
against the cities of the Phoenician coast, wars of
Abdikhiba, or Abdi-Tabba, King of Jerusalem, against the
chiefs of the neighbouring cities.

** Abimilki (Abisharri) demands on one occasion from the
K