hat the two roads were filled with armed soldiers, and
accordingly quitted this road in order to avoid them, and made his way
by an almost invisible path, which lay between them, overgrown with
bushes and brambles, and fell in with the Armenians, who were by this
time greatly fatigued. He was brought before the king, and, being
admitted by him to a private conference, related to him secretly what he
had seen, and was detained in safety.

14. And presently, without anything being done to give an idea that they
were alarmed, a horseman was sent secretly to the road on the right side
to prepare a resting-place and some food. And when he had been gone a
little time, another was sent to the left with directions to move with
great rapidity, and do the same thing; neither horseman being aware that
the other had been sent in a different direction.

15. And after this arrangement had been thus cleverly made, the king
himself, with his escort, retraced his steps through the jungle by which
the traveller had come, taking him for his guide, and passing through
this overgrown path, which was almost too narrow for a loaded horse, he
left the Roman soldiers behind him and so escaped. Meanwhile our
troops, who had made prisoners of the soldiers who had been thus sent
out to impose upon them, waited a long time, while watching for the
king, and stretching out their hands, as one may say, to seize the game
which they expected would rush into them. And while they were thus
waiting for the arrival of Para, he reached his kingdom in safety, where
he was received with great joy by his countrymen, and still remained
unshaken in his fidelity to us, burying in silence the injuries which he
had received.

16. After this, Daniel and Barzimeres, having been thus balked of their
prey, returned to Tarsus, and were loaded with bitter reproaches as
inactive and blundering officers. But like venomous serpents whose first
spring has failed, they only whetted their deadly fangs, in order at the
first opportunity to inflict all the injury in their power on the king
who had thus escaped them.

17. And, with a view to palliate the effect of their own mistake, or
rather of the defeat their hopes, which the deeper sagacity of the king
had contrived, they began to fill the emperor's ears, which were at all
times most ready to receive all kinds of reports with false accusations
against Para; pretending that he was skilled in Circean incantations, so
as to b