 Section 12 of the Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Mike Botez. The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2. Edited by Charles F. Horn, Rossiter Johnson and John Rudd. Brenus Burns-Rome, B.C. 398, Bartold Giorg Nibur. Part 1 Julius Caesar is the first writer, who gives us an authentic and enlightening account on the goals, whom he divided in three groups. The goals were the chief branch of the great original stock of Celts. They were nomadic people, and from their home in Western Europe, they spread to Britain, invaded Spain, and swarmed over the Alps into Italy. And it is from the latter event that this tall, fair and fighting nation first came into the region of history. Before the goals had come within the borders of Italy, Camulus, the dictator, had dealt the death blow to the Etruscan League through his capture and destruction of his stronghold, Veyi. But at the very summit of his triumph, he lost the grace of his countrymen by demanding a tenth of their spoil taken at Veyi, and which he claimed to have vowed to Apollo. It was popularly considered a ruse to increase his private fortune. Furthermore, a counterclaim was brought against him for appropriating bronze gates, which in Rome at that time were nothing less than actual money, bronze being the medium of currency. Camulus went into exile in consequence of the accusation. His parting prayer was that his country might fill his need and call him back. His desire was fulfilled for soon after the goal was of the gates, under the leadership of the Hottie Brennos, who had come upon the Romans at a most opportune moment. This event of the overthrow of the Romans on the Aelia has been the occasion for the well-known tale of the cuckling of the geese in the Temple of Juno, which alarmed the garrison. The episode also gave rise to the saying of the conqueror, Brennos, who, when reproached by his antagonists with using false weights, cast his sword into the scale crying, woe to the conquered. At that time, no Roman foresaw the calamity which was threatening the empire. Rome had become great because the country which she had conquered was weak through its oligarchical institutions. The subjects of the other states gladly joined the Romans, because under them their lot was more favourable, and probably because they were kindred nations. What matters went to the Romans as they did with Basilius, who subdued the Armenians when they were threatened by the Turks, and who soon after attacked the whole Greek empire and took away far more than had been gained before. The expedition of the Gauls into Italy must be regarded as a migration, and not as an invasion for the purpose of conquest. As for the historical account of it, we must adhere to Polybius and Iodorus, who placed it shortly before the taking of Rome by the Gauls. We can attach no importance to the statement of Livy, that they had come into Italy as early as the time of Tarquinius Priscus, having been driven from their country by a famine. It undoubtedly arose from the fact that some Greek writer, perhaps Timaeus, connected this migration with the settlement of the Phoecians at Massilia. It is possible that Livy even here made use of Dionysius, and that the latter followed Timaeus. For as Livy made use of Dionysius in the 8th book, why not also in the 5th? He himself knew very little of Greek history, but Justin's account is here evidently opposed to Livy. Trogus Pompeius was born in the neighborhood of Massilia, and in writing his 43rd book he obviously made use of native chronicles, for from no other source could he derive the account of the Decretta Honorifica, of the Romans to Massilians for the friendship which the latter has shown to the Romans during the Gaelic War, and from the same source must he have obtained his information about the maritime wars of Massilia against Carthage. Trogus knows nothing of the story that the Gauls assisted the Phoecians on their arrival, but according to him they met with a kind of reception among the Ligurians, who continued to inhabit those parts for a long time after. Even the story of the Lukumo, who is said to have invited the Gauls, is opposed to him, and if it were referred to Clusium alone it would be absurd. Polybius places the passage of the Gauls across the Alps about 10 or 20 years before the taking of Rome, and Diodorus describes them as advancing toward Rome by an uninterrupted march. It is further stated that Melpom, in the country of the Insubrians, was destroyed on the same day as Vei. Without admitting this coincidence we have no reason to doubt that the statement is substantially true, and it is made by Cornelius Nepos, who, as a native of Galia Transpadana, might possess accurate information and whose chronological accounts were highly esteemed by the Romans. There was no other passage for the Gauls, except either across the Little Saint Bernard or across the Simplan. It is not probable that they took the former road, because their country extended only as far as the Teachinus, and if they had come across the Little Saint Bernard they would naturally have occupied also all the country between that mountain and the Teachinus. The Salasi may indeed have been a Gaelic people, but it is by no means certain. Moreover, between them and the Gauls who had come across the Alps, the Levy also lived, and there can be no doubt that at that time Ligurians still continued to dwell on the Teachinus. Melpum must have been situated in the district of Milan. The latter place has an uncommonly happy situation. Often, as it has been destroyed, it has always been restored, so that it is not impossible that Melpum may have been situated on the very spot afterward occupied by Milan. The Gaelic migration undoubtedly passed by like a torrent with irresistible rapidity. How, then, is it possible to suppose that Melpum resisted them for two centuries, or that they conquered it and yet did not disturb the Etruscans for 200 years? It would be absurd to believe it merely to save an uncritical expression of Levy. According to the common chronology, the Tribali, who in the time of Herodotus inhabited the plains and were afterward expelled by the Gauls, appeared in Thrace 12 years after the taking of Rome. According to a more correct chronology, it was only nine years after that event. It was the same movement, assuredly, which led the Gauls to the countries through which the middle course of the Danube extends, and to the Pol. And could the people who came in a few days from Clusium to Rome, and afterward appeared in Apulia, have been sitting quiet in a corner of Italy for 200 years? If they had remained there because they had not the power to advance, they would have been cut to pieces by the Etruscans. We must, therefore, look upon it as an established fact that the migration took place of the late period mentioned by Polybius and Diodorus. These Gauls were partly Celts and partly, indeed principally, Belge or Camry, as may be perceived from the circumstance that their king, as well as the one who appeared before Delphi, is called Brennos. Brennin, according to Adelang in his Mithridates, signifies in the language of Wales and lower Brittany a king. But what caused the whole emigration? The statement of Livy that the Gauls were compelled by famine to leave their country is quite in keeping with the nature of all traditions about migrations, such as we find them in Saxo Grammaticus, in Paul Wernafred from the Sagas of the Swedes, in the Tyranian traditions of Lydia and others. However, in the case of a people like the Celts, every specific statement of this kind, in which even the names of their leaders are mentioned, is of no more value than the traditions of other barbarous nations which were unacquainted with the art of writing. It is indeed well known that the Celts in writing used the Greek alphabet, but they probably employed it only in the transactions of daily life, for we know that they were not allowed to commit their ancient songs to writing. During the Gaelic migration, we are again made aware how little we know of the history of Italy generally. Our knowledge is limited to Rome, so that we are in the same predicament there, as if of all the historical authorities of the whole German Empire, we had nothing but the annals of a single imperial city. According to Livy's account, it would seem as if the only object of the Gauls had been to march to Rome, and yet this immigration changed the whole aspect of Italy. After the Gauls had once crossed the Apennines, there was no further obstacle to prevent their marching to the south of Italy by any road they pleased, and it is in fact mentioned that they did proceed farther south. The Umbrians still inhabited the country on the lower Poe, in the modern Romania and Urbino, parts of which were occupied by Liburnians. Polybius says that many people there became tributary to the Gauls, and that this was the case with the Umbrians is quite certain. The first historical appearance of the Gauls is at Clusium, whether a noble Clusine is said to have invited them for the purpose of taking vengeance on his native city. Whether this account is true, however, must remain undecided, and if there is any truth in it, it is more probable that the offended Clusine went to cross the Apennines and fetched his Avengers. Clusium has not been mentioned since the time of Porcena. The fact of the Clusines soliciting the aid of Rome is a proof how little that northern city of Etruria was concerned about the fate of the southern towns, and makes us even suspect that it was allied with Rome. However, the danger was so great that all jealousy must have been suppressed. The natural road for the Gauls would have been along the Adriatic, then through the country of Umbrians who were tributary to them, and already quite broken down, and thence through the Romania across the Apennines. But the Apennines which separate Tuscany from the Romania are very difficult to cross, especially for Sumptor Horses, as therefore the Gauls could not enter Etruria on that side, which the Etruscans had intentionally allowed to grow wild. And as they had been convinced of this in an unsuccessful attempt, they crossed the Apennines in the neighborhood of Clusium, and appeared before that city. Clusium was the great bulwark of the valley of the Tiber, and if it were taken, the roads along the Tiber and the Arno would be open, and the Gauls might reach Arezzo from the rear. The Romans, therefore, looked upon the fate of Clusium as decisive of their own. The Clusines sued for a treaty with the mighty city of Rome, and the Romans were wise enough readily to accept the offer. They sent ambassadors to the Gauls ordering them to withdraw. According to a very probable account, the Gauls had demanded of the Clusines a division of their territory as the condition of peace, and not as was customary with the Romans as attacks upon a people already subdued. If this is correct, the Romans sent the embassy, confinding in their own strength. But the Gauls scorned the ambassadors, and the latter allowing themselves to be carried away by their warlike disposition, joined the Etruscans in a fight against the Gauls. This was probably only an insignificant and isolated engagement. Such is the account of Livy, who goes on to say that the Gauls, as soon as they perceived this violation in the law of nations, gave the signal for a retreat, and, having called upon the gods to avenge the wrong, marched against Rome. This is evidently a mere fiction, for a barbarous nation like the Gauls cannot possibly have had such ideas, nor was there in reality any violation of the law of nations, as the Romans stood in no kind of connection with the Gauls. But it was a natural feeling with the Romans to look upon the fall of their city as the consequence of an efface which no human power could resist. Roman vanity also is at work here, in as much as the Roman ambassadors are said to have so distinguished themselves that they were recognized by the barbarians among the hosts of Etruscans. Now, according to another tradition directly opposed to these statements, the Gauls sent to Rome to demand the surrender of those ambassadors. As the senate was hesitating and left the decision to the people, the latter not only rejected the demand but appointed the same ambassadors to the office of military tribunes, whereupon the Gauls with all their forces at once marched towards Rome. Livy here again speaks of the populace as the people to whom the senate left the decision. This must have been the patricians only, for they alone had the right to decide upon the fate of the members of their own order. It is not fair to accuse the Romans on that occasion of dishonesty, but this account assuredly originated with later writers, who transferred to barbarians the right belonging to a nation, standing in a legal relation to another. The statement that the three ambassadors, all of whom were Fabi, who were appointed military tribunes, is not even the usual one, for there is another in Diodorus, who must here have used Roman authorities written in Greek, that is, Fabius, since he calls the carites Greek, Cary, and not Greek, Agulei. He speaks of a single ambassador, who, being a son of a military tribune, fought against the Gauls. This is at least a sign how uncertain history yet is. The battle on the Alia was fought on the 16th of July. The military tribunes entered upon their office on the first of that month, and the distance between Clusium and Rome is only three good days' marches. It is impossible to restore the true history, but we can discern what is fabulous from what is really historical. An innumerable host of Gauls now marched from Clusium toward Rome. For a long time, the Gauls were most formidable to the Romans, as well as to all other nations with whom they came in contact, even as far east as the Ukraine. As to Rome, we see this as late as the Cisalpine War of the Year, A.U. 527. Polybius and Diodorus are our best guides in seeking for information about the manners of the Gauls, for in the time of Caesar they had already become changed. In the description of their persons, we partly recognize the modern Gaul, or the inhabitants of the Highlands of Scotland, huge bodies, blue eyes, bristly hair. Even their dress and armour are those of the Highlanders, for they wore the checked and variegated tartans. Their arms consisted of the broad unappointed battle-sword, the same weapon as the claymore among the Highlanders. They had a vast number of horns, which were used in the Highlands for many centuries after, and threw themselves upon the enemy in immense irregular masses with terrible fury, though standing behind, impelling those stationed in front, whereby they became irresistible by the tactics of those times. The Romans ought to have used against them their phalanx and doubled it, until they were accustomed to this enemy, and were enabled by their greater skill to repel them. If the Romans had been able to withstand their first shock, the Gauls would have easily been thrown into disorder and put to flight. The Gauls who were subsequently conquered by the Romans were the descendants of such as were born in Italy, and had lost much of their courage and strength. The Gauls under Vitigas, not 50 years after the immigration of Theodoric in Italy, were cowards and unable to resist the 20,000 men of Belisarius, showing how easily barbarians degenerate in such climates. The Gauls, moreover, were terrible on account of their inhuman cruelty, for wherever they settled, the original towns and their inhabitants completely disappeared from the face of the earth. In their own country, they had the feudal system and a priestly government. The Druids were their only rulers who avenged the oppressed people on the lords, but in their turn became tyrants. All the people were in the condition of serfs, a proof that the Gauls in their own country too were the conquerors who had subdued an earlier population. We always find mention of the wealth of the Gauls in gold, and yet France has no rivers that carry gold sand, and the Pyrenees were then no longer in their possession. The gold must therefore have been obtained by barter. Much may be exaggeration, and the fact of some noble individuals wearing gold chains was probably transferred by ancient poets to the whole nation, since popular poetry takes great liberty, especially in such embellishments. Section 13 of the Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Mike Botez The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2 Edited by Charles F. Horne, Rosseter Johnson, and John Rudd Brenus Burns-Rome, B.C. 388, by Bartold Georg Niebuhr, Part 2 Pliny States that previous to the Gaelic Calamity, the census amounted to 150,000 persons, which probably refers only to many entitled to vote in the assemblies, and does not comprise women, children, slaves, and strangers. If this be correct, the number of citizens was enormous, but it must not be supposed to include the inhabitants of the city only, the population of which was doubtless much smaller. The statement of Diodorus, that all men were called to arms to resist the goals, and that the number amounted to 40,000, is by no means improbable, according to the testimony of Polybius, Latins, and Hurnicans also were enlisted. Another account makes the Romans take the field against the Gauls with 24,000 men, that is, with four field legions, and four civic legions. The field legions were formed only of plebeians, and served according to the order of the classes, probably in manifolds. The civic legions contained all those who belonged neither to the patricians, nor to the plebeians, that is, all the Ierari, Proletari, Freedmen, and artisans who had never before faced an enemy. They were certainly not armed with a pillum, nor drawn up in manifolds, but used pikes and were employed in phalanxes. Now, as for the field legions, each consisted half of Latins and half of Romans, there being in each maniple one century of Roman and one of Latins. There were at that time four legions, and as a legion, including the reserve troops, contained 3,000 men, the total is 12,000. Now, the account which mentions 24,000 men must have presumed that there were four field legions, and four irregular civic ones. There would accordingly have been no more than 6,000 plebeians, and even if the legions were all made up of Romans, only 12,000. If in addition to these, we take 12,000 irregular troops and 16,000 allies, the number of 40,000 would be completed. In this case, the population of Rome would not have been as large as that of Athens in the Peloponnesian War, and this is indeed very probable. The cavalry is not included in this calculation, but 40,000 must be taken as the maximum of the whole army. There seems to be no exaggeration in this statement, and the battle on the Alia, speaking generally, is an historical event. It is surprising that the Romans did not appoint a dictator to command in the battle. It cannot be said indeed that they regarded this war as an ordinary one, for in that case, they would not have raised so great a force, but they cannot have comprehended the danger in all its greatness. New swarms continue to come across the Alps. The Sennons also now appear to seek habitations for themselves. They, like the Germans in aftertimes, demanded land, as they found the Insubrians, Boyans and others already settled. The latter had taken up their abode in Umbria, but only until they should find a more extensive, unsuitable territory. The Romans committed the great mistake of fighting with their hurriedly collected troops a battle against an enemy who had hitherto been invincible. The hills along which the right wing is said to have been drawn up are no longer discernible, and they were probably nothing but little mounds of earth. At any rate, it was senseless to draw up a long line against the immense mass of enemies. The Gauls, on the other hand, were enabled, without any difficulty, to turn off to the left. They proceeded to a higher part of the river, where it was more easily fordable, and with great prudence threw themselves with all their force upon the right wing, consisting of the civic legions. The latter at first resisted, but not long, and when they fled the whole remaining line, which until then seems to have been useless and inactive, was seized with a panic. Terror preceded the Gauls as they laid waste everything on their way, and this paralyzed the courage of the Romans, instead of rousing them to a desperate resistance. The Romans, therefore, were defeated on the Alia in the most inglorious manner. The Gauls had taken them in their rear and cut off their return to Rome. A portion fled toward the Tiber, where some affected the retreat across the river, and others were drowned. Another part escaped into the forest. The loss of life must have been prodigious, and it is inconceivable how levy could have attached so much importance to the nearedest grace. If the Roman army had not been almost annihilated, it would not have been necessary to give up the defense of the city, as was done, for the city was left undefeated and deserted by all. Many fled to Vey instead of returning to Rome. Only a few who had escaped along the high road entered the city by the Colleen Gate. Rome was exhausted, her power shattered, her legions defenseless, and her warlike allies had partly been beaten in the same battle, and were partly awaiting the fearful enemy in their own countries. At Rome, it was believed that the whole army was destroyed, for nothing was known of those who had reached Vey. In the city itself, there were only old men, women, and children, so that there was no possibility of defending it. It is, however, inconceivable that the gates should have been left open, and that the goals, from the fear of a stratagem, should have encamped for several days outside the gates. A more probable account is that the gates were shut and barricaded. We may form a vivid conception of the condition of Rome after this battle, by comparing it with that of Moscow, before the conflagration. The people were convinced that a long defense was impossible, since there was probably a want of provisions. Levy gives a false notion of the evacuation of the city, as if the defenseless citizens had remained immovable in their consternation, and only a few had been received into the capital. The determination, in fact, was to defend the capital, and the Tribune Salpitius had taken refuge there, with about 1000 men. There was on the capital an ancient well which still exists, and without which the garrison would soon have perished. This well remained unknown to all antiquaries, till I discovered it by means of information gathered from the people who live there. Its depth in the rock descends to the level of the Tiber, but the water is now not fit to drink. The capital was a rock which had been hewn steep, and thereby made inaccessible, but a cleavus, closed by gates both below and above, led up from the forum in the sacred way. The rock indeed was not so steep as in later times, as is clear from the account of the attempt to storm it, but the capital was nevertheless very strong, whether some few remained in the city as at Moscow, who in their steep affection did not consider what kind of enemy they had before them, cannot be decided. The narrative is very beautiful, and reminds us of the taking of the Acropolis of Athens by the Persians, where likewise the old men allowed themselves to be cut down by the Persians. Notwithstanding the improbability of the matter, I am inclined to believe that a number of aged patricians, their number may not be exactly historical, sat down in the forum, in their official robes, on their curial chairs, and that the chief pontiff devoted them to death. Such devotions are a well-known Roman custom. It is certainly not improbable that the Gauls were amazed when they found the city deserted, and only those old men sitting immovable, that they took them for statues or supernatural visions, and did nothing to them, until one of them struck a goal who touched him, whereupon all were slaughtered. To commit suicide was repugnant to the customs of the Romans, who were guided in many things by feelings more correct and more resembling our own, than many other ancient nations. The old men indeed had given up the hope of their country being saved, but the capital might be maintained, and the survivors preferred dying in the attempt of self-defense to take a refuge at Veyi, where after all, they could not have maintained themselves in the end. The sacred treasures were removed to Kere, and the hope of the Romans now was that the barbarians would be tired of the long siege. Provisions for a time had been conveyed to the capital, where a couple of thousand men may have been assembled, and where all buildings, temples, as well as public and private houses, were used as habitations. The Gauls made fearful havoc at Rome, even more fearful than the Spaniards and Germans did in the year 1527. Soldiers plunder, and when they find no human beings, they engage in the work of destruction, and fires break out, as at Moscow, without the existence of any intention to cause a conflagration. The whole city was changed into a heap of ashes with the exception of a few houses on the Palatine, which were occupied by the leaders of the Gauls. It is astonishing to find, nevertheless, that a few monuments of the preceding period, such as statues, situated at some distance from the capital, are mentioned as having been preserved, but we must remember that Travertino is tolerably fireproof, that Rome was burned down is certain, and when it was rebuilt, not even the ancient streets were restored. The Gauls were now encamped in the city. At first, they attempted to storm the Cleavus, but were repelled with great loss, which is surprising, since we know that at an earlier time the Romans succeeded in storming it against Apius Herdonius. Afterward, they discovered the footsteps of a messenger who had been sent from Veyi, in order that the state might be taken care of in due form, for the Romans in the capital were patricians and represented the Curies and the government, whereas those assembled at Veyi represented the tribes but had no leaders. The latter had resolved to recall Camulus and raise him to the dictatorship. For this reason Pontius Cominius had been sent to Rome to obtain the sanction of the Senate and the Curies. This was quite in the spirit of the ancient times. If the Curies had interdicted him aqua at Igne, they alone could recall him, if they previously obtained the resolution of the Senate, authorizing them to do so, but if he had gone into voluntary exile and had given up his Roman franchise by becoming a citizen of Ardea, before a sentence had been passed upon him by the centuries, it was again in the power of the Curies alone. He being a patrician to recall him as a citizen and otherwise he could not have become a dictator nor could he have regarded himself as such. It was the time of the dog days when the Gauls came to Rome and as the summer at Rome is always pestilential, especially during the two months and a half before the first of September, the unavoidable consequence must have been, as Levy relates that the barbarians, bewacking on the ruins of the city in the open air, were attacked by disease and carried off like the army of Frederick Barbarossa, when encamped before the castle of Saint Angelo. The whole army of the Gauls, however, was not in the city, but only as many as were necessary to blockade the garrison of the capital. The rest were scattered far and wide over the face of the country and were ravaging all the unprotected places and isolated farms in Latium. Many an ancient town which is no longer mentioned after this time may have been destroyed by the Gauls. None but fortified places like Ostia, which could obtain supplies by sea, made a successful resistance, for the Gauls were unacquainted with the art of besieging. The Ardiatans, whose territory was likewise invaded by the Gauls, opposed them under the command of Camulus. The Etruscans would seem to have endeavored to avail themselves of the opportunity of recovering Veyi, for we are told that the Romans at Veyi, commanded by Cadetius, gained a battle against them, and that, encouraged by this success, they began to entertain a hope of regaining Rome, since by this victory they got possession of arms. A Roman of the name of Fabius d'Orso is said to have offered up in broad daylight a gentile sacrifice on the Quirinal, and the astonished Gauls are said to have done him no harm, a tradition which is not improbable. The provisions in the capsule were exhausted, but the Gauls themselves, being seized with epidemic diseases, became tired of their conquests, and were not inclined to settle in a country so far away from their own home. They once more attempted to take the capital by storm, having observed that the messenger from Veyi had ascended the rock, and came down again near the Porta Carmentalis, below Aracelli. The ancient rock is now covered with rubbish and no longer discernable. The besieged did not think of a storm on that side. It may be that, formerly, there had in that part been a wall, which had become decayed, and in southern countries an abundant vegetation always springs up between the stones, and if this had actually been neglected, it cannot have been very difficult to climb up. The Gauls had already gained a firm footing, as there was no wall at the top. The rock which they stormed was not the Tarpeyan, but the Arcs. When Manlyus, who lived there, was aroused by the screaming of the geese, he came to the spot and thrust down those who were climbing up. This rendered the Gauls still more inclined to commence negotiations. They were, moreover, called back by an inroad of some Alpine tribes into Lombardy, where they left their wives and children. They offered to depart if the Romans would pay them a ransom of a thousand pounds of gold, to be taken no doubt from the capital line treasury. Considering the value of Manly at that time, the sum was enormous. In the time of Theodosius, indeed, there were people at Rome who possessed several hundred weight of gold. Nay, one is said to have had an annual revenue of 200 weight. There can be no doubt that the Gauls received the sum they demanded and quitted Rome. That in weighing it, they scornfully imposed upon the Romans is very possible, and the Vae Victis too may be true. We ourselves have seen similar things before the year 1813. But there can be no truth in the story told by Livy that while they were disputing, Camulus appeared with an army and stopped the proceedings, because the military tribunes had had no right to conclude the treaty. He is there said to have driven the Gauls from the city, and afterward in a two-fold battle, to have so completely defeated them that not even a messenger escaped. Buford, inspired by Gaelic patriotism, has most excellently shown what a complete fable this story is. To attempt to disguise the misfortunes of our forefathers by substituting fables in their place is mere childishness. This charge does not affect Livy, indeed, for he copied only what others had written before him, but he did not allow his own conviction to appear as he generally does, for he treats the whole of the early history with a sort of irony, half believing, half disbelieving it. According to another account in Diodorus, the Gauls besiege the town allied with Rome. Its name seems to be miswritten, but is probably intended for Vulsini, and the Romans relieved it and took back from the Gauls the gold which they had paid them. But this siege of Vulsini is quite unknown to Livy. A third account in Strabo, and also mentioned by Diodorus, does not allow this honor to the Romans, but states that the Kerites pursued the Gauls, attacked them in the country of the Sabins, and completely annihilated them. In like manner, the Greeks endeavored to disguise the fact that the Gauls took the money from the Delphic treasury, and that in a quite historical period, Olymp 120. The true explanation is undoubtedly the one found in Polybius, that the Gauls were induced to quit Rome by an insurrection of the Alpine tribes, after it had experienced the extremity of humiliation. Whatever the enemy had taken as booty was consumed. They had not made any conquests, but only indulged in plunder and devastation. They had been staying at Rome for seven or eight months, and could have gained nothing further than the capital, and the very money which they received without taking that fortress. The account of Polybius throws light upon many discrepant statements, and all of them, not even accepting Livy's fairytale-like embellishment, may be explained by means of it. The Romans attempted to prove that the Gauls had actually been defeated, by relating that the gold afterward taken from the Gauls, and buried in the capital, was double the sum paid to them as ransom. But it is much more probable that the Romans pay their ransom out of the treasury of the temple of the Capitoline Jupiter, and of other temples, and that afterward double this sum was made up by Attax, which agrees with a statement in the history of Manlius, that Attax was imposed for the purpose of raising the Gaelic ransom. Surely, this could not have been done at the time of the siege, when the Romans were scattered in all parts of the country, but must have taken place afterward for the purpose of restoring the money that had been taken. Now, if at a later time there actually existed in the capital such a quantity of gold, it is clear that it was believed to be a proof that the Gauls had not kept the gold, which was paid to them. Even as late as the time of Cicero and Caesar, the spot was shown at Rome in the Carine, where the Gauls had heaped up and burned their dead. It was called Busta Gallica, which was corrupted in the Middle Ages into Protogallo, when the church which was built there was in reality called St. Andreas in Bustis Gallicis, or according to the later Latinity in Busta Gallica, Busta Gallica not being declined. The Gauls departed with their gold, which the Romans had been compelled to pay on account of the famine that prevailed in the capital, which was so great that they pulled the leather from their shields and cooked it, just as was done during the siege of Jerusalem. The Gauls were certainly not destroyed. Justin has preserved the remarkable statement that the same Gauls who sacked Rome went to Apulia, and there offered for money their assistance to the elder Dionysius of Syracuse. From this important statement, it is at any rate clear that they traversed all Italy, and then probably returned along the shore of the Adriatic. Their devastations extended over many parts of Italy, and there is no doubt that the Aquians received their death blow at that time, for henceforth we hear no more of the hostilities of the Aquians against Rome. Preneste, on the other hand, which must formerly have been subject to the Aquians, now appears as an independent town. The Aquians, who inhabited small and easily destructible towns, must have been annihilated during the progress of the Gauls. There is nothing so strange in the history of Livy, as his view of the consequences of the gaily calamity. He must have conceived it as a transitory storm by which Rome was humbled but not broken. The army, according to him, was only scattered, and the Romans appear afterward, just as they had been before, as if the preceding period had only been an evil dream, and as if there had been nothing to do but to rebuild the city. But assuredly the devastation must have been tremendous throughout the Roman territory. For eight months the barbarians had been ravaging the country, every trace of cultivation, every farmer's house, all the temples and public buildings were destroyed. The walls of the city had been purposely pulled down. A large number of its inhabitants were led into slavery. The rest were living in great misery at Veii, and what they had saved scarcely sufficed to buy their bread. In this condition they returned to Rome. Camulus, as dictator, is called a second Romulus, and to him is due the glory of not having despaired in those distressing circumstances. End of section 13. Section 14 of the Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Mike Botez. The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2. Edited by Charles F. Horn, Rossiter Johnson, and John Rudd. Tartar Invasion of China by Meha, B.C. 341, by Demetrius Charles Bulger. The first Chinese are supposed to have been Anomad Tribe, in the provinces of Shanxi, which lies in the northwest of China, and among them, at last appeared the ruler, Fohi, whose name at least has been preserved. His deeds and his person are mythical, but he is credited with giving his country its first regular institutions. The analysts of the Chinese Chronicles placed the date of the creation at a point of time two millions of years before Confucius. This interval, they filled up with lines of dynasties. Preceding the Chao dynasty, the chronicles give 10 epochs. Prior to the eighth of these, there is no authentic history. Yu Chao Xie, the nest-having, taught the people to build huts of the boughs of trees. Fire was discovered by Sai Jin Xie, the fire producer. Fuhi, B.C. 2862, was the discoverer of iron. With Yaowu, B.C. 2356, is the period when Confucius begins his history. He says of that epoch, the house door could safely be left open. Yaowu greatly extended and strengthened the empire and established fairs and marts over the land. One of China's most notable rulers was Tsing Chi Huang Ti, who was studious in providing for the security of his empire, and with this object began the construction of a fortified wall across the northern frontier to serve as a defense against the troublesome Yongnu tribes, who are identified with the hunts of Atilla. This wall, which he begun in the first years of his reign, about the close of the third century B.C., was finished before his death. It still exists, known as the Great Wall of China, and has long been considered one of the wonders of the world. Every third man of the whole empire was employed on this work. It is said that 500,000 of them died of starvation. The contents of the Great Wall would be enough to build two walls six feet high and two feet thick around the equator. It is the largest artificial structure in the world, carried for 1400 miles over height and hollow, reaching in one place the level of 5,000 feet, nearly one mile above the sea. Earth, gravel, brick, and stone were used in its construction. The weak successors of Huang Ti finally gave way to the usurper, Cao Tzu, who had been originally the ruler of a small town and had borne the name of Li Yu Pang. The reign of Cao Tzu was distinguished by the consolidation of the empire, the connection of western and eastern China by high walls and bridges, some of which are still in perfect condition, and the institution of an elaborate code of court etiquette. His attention to these things was, however, rudely interrupted by an eruption of the Hyeong Nu Tatars. The death of Tsing Chi Huang Ti proved the signal for the outbreak of disturbances throughout the realm. Within a few months, five princes had founded as many kingdoms, each hoping, if not to become supreme, at least to remain independent. Meng Tian, beloved by the army and at the head, as he tells us in his own words, of 300,000 soldiers, might have been the arbiter of the empire. But a weak feeling of respect for the imperial authority induced him to obey an order, sent by Yu Qi, Huang Ti's son and successor, commanding him to drink the waters of eternal life. Yu Qi's brief reign of three years was a succession of misfortunes. The reigns of office were held by the Yu Nuk, Cao Cao, who first murdered the minister, Li Sep and then Yu Qi himself. Ying Wang, a grandson of Huang Ti, was the next and last of the Tsing emperors. On coming to power, he at once caused Cao Cao, whose crimes had been discovered, to be arrested and executed. This vigorous commencement proved very transitory, for when he had enjoined nominal authority during six weeks, Ying Wang's troops, after a reverse in the field, went over in a body to Li Yu Pang, the leader of the rebel force. Ying Wang put an end to his existence, thus terminating in a manner not less ignominious than any of its predecessors. The dynasty of the Tsins, which Huang Ti had hoped to place permanently on the throne of China, and to which his genius gave a luster, far surpassing that of many other families who had enjoyed the same privilege during a much longer period. The crisis in the history of the country had afforded one of those great men, who rise periodically from the ranks of the people, to give law to nations the opportunity for advancing his personal interests, at the same time that he made them appear to be identical with the public will. Of such genesis, if the test applied be the work accomplished, there have been few with higher claims to respectful and admiring consideration than Li Yu Pang, who after the fall of the Tsins became the founder of the Han dynasty, under the style of Cao Tzu. Originally the governor of a small town, he had, soon after the death of Huang Ti, gathered around him the nucleus of a formidable army, and while nominally serving under one of the greater princes, he scarcely affected to conceal that he was fighting for his own interests. On the other hand, he was no mere soldier of fortune, and the moderation which he showed after victory enhanced his reputation as a general. The path to the throne being thus cleared, the successful general became emperor. His first act was to proclaim an amnesty to all those who had born arms against him. In a public proclamation, he expressed his regret at the suffering of the people from the evils which follow in the train of war. During the earlier years of his reign, he chose the city of Luoyang as his capital, now the flourishing and populous town of Hunan. But at a later period, he removed it to Senganfu, in the western province of Xianxi. His dynasty became known by the name of the small state where he was born, and which had fallen early in his career into his hands. Cao Tzu sanctioned or personally undertook various important public works, which in many places still exist to testify to the greatness of his character. Prominent among those must be placed the bridges constructed along the great roads of western China. Some of them are still believed to be in perfect condition. No act of Cao Tzu's reign places him higher in the scale of sovereigns than the improvement of the roads and the construction of those remarkable bridges. Cao Tzu loved splendor and sought to make his receptions and banquets imposing by their brilliance. He drew up a special ceremonial, which must have proved a trinoid deal for his courtiers, and dire was the offense if it were infringed in the smallest particular. He kept up festivities at Senganfu for several weeks, and on one of these occasions he exclaimed, Today I feel I am emperor, and perceive all the difference between a subject and his master. Cao Tzu's attention was rudely summoned away from these trivialities, by the outbreak of revolt against his authority, and by inroads on the part of the tartars. The latter were the more serious. The disturbances that followed Huang Tzu's death were a fresh inducement to these clans. To again gather round a common head and pray upon the weakness of China. For Cao Tzu's authority was not yet recognized in many of the tributary states, which had been feigned to admit the supremacy of the great Qin emperor. About this time, the Yongnu tartars were governed by two chiefs in particular, one named Tongu, the other Meha or Mehe. Of these, the former appears to have been instigated by a reckless ambition or an over-winning arrogance, and at first it seemed that the forbearance of Mehe would allow his pretensions to pass unchallenged. Mehe's successes followed rapidly upon each other. Issuing from the desert and marching in the direction of China, he arrested many fertile districts from the feeble hands of those who held them, and while establishing his personal authority on the banks of the Huang Ho, his lieutenants returned laden with plunder from expeditions into the rich provinces of Shanxi and Shenzhuan. He won back all the territory lost by his ancestors to Huang Ti and Meng Tian, and he paved the way to greater success by the siege and capture of the city of Mehe. Thus obtaining possession of the key of the road to Qin Yang, several of the border chiefs and of the emperor's lieutenants, dreading the punishment allotted China to want of success, went over to the tartars and took service under Mehe. The emperor, fully aroused to the gravity of the danger, assembled his army, and placing himself at its head marched against the tartars. Encouraged by the result of several preliminary encounters, the emperor was eager to engage Mehe's main army, and after some weeks searching and maneuvering, the two forces halted in front of each other. Cao Tzu, imagining that victory was within his grasp and believing the stories brought to him by spies of the weakness of the tartar army, resolved on an immediate attack. He turned a deaf ear to the cautious advice of one of his generals, who warned him that in war we should never despise an enemy, and marched in person at the head of his advance guard to find the tartars. Mehe, who had been at all these pains to throw dust in the emperor's eyes and to conceal his true strength, no sooner saw how well his stratagem had succeeded, and that Cao Tzu was rushing into the trap so elaborately laid for him. Then, by a skillful movement, he cut off his communications with the main body of his army, and, surrounding him with an overwhelming force, compelled him to take refuge in the city of Pingqing in Shanxi. With a very short supply of provisions and hopelessly outnumbered, it looked as if the Chinese emperor could not possibly escape the grasp of the desert chief. In this trait, one of his officers suggested as a last chance that the most beautiful virgin in the town should be discovered, and sent as a present to mollify the conqueror. Cao Tzu seized a dissuggestion as the drowning man will catch at a straw, and the story is preserved, though her name has passed into oblivion of how the young Chinese girl entered into the plan and devoted all her wits to charming the tartar conqueror. She succeeded as much as their fondest hopes could have led them to believe, and Mehe permitted Cao Tzu, after signing an ignominious treaty, to leave his place of confinement and rejoin his army. Glad to welcome the return of the emperor, yet without him helpless to stir a hand to effect his release, Mehe retired to his own territory, well satisfied with the material results of the war and the rich booty, which he had obtained in the sack of Chinese cities, while Cao Tzu, like the ordinary type of an oriental ruler, vented his discoffiture on his subordinates. The closing acts of war were the lavishing of rewards on the head of the general to whose warnings he had paid no heed, and the execution of the scouts who had been misled by the wiles of Mehe. The success which had attended this incursion and the spoil of war were potent inducements to the tartars to repeat the invasion, while Cao Tzu was meditating over the possibility of revenge and considering schemes for the better protection of his frontier. The tartars, disregarding the truths that had been concluded, retraced their steps and pillaged the border districts with impunity. In this year, BC 199, they were carrying everything before them, and the emperor, either unnerved by recent disaster or appalled by the apparently irresistible energy of the followers of Mehe, remained apathetic in his palace. The representations of his ministers and generals failed to rouse him from his stupor, and the weapon to which he resorted was the abuse of his opponent and not his prompt chastisement. Mehe was a wicked and faithless man who had risen to power by the murder of his father, and one of whom oaths and treaties carried no weight. In the meanwhile, the tartars were continuing their victorious career. The capital itself could not be pronounced safe from their assaults or from the insult of their presence. In this crisis, councils of craft and dissimulation alone found favor in the emperor's cabinet. No voice was raised in support of the bold and only true course of going forth to meet the national enemy. The capitulation of Ping Qing had for the time destroyed the manhood of the race, and Kao Tzu held in esteem the advice of men widely different to those who had placed him on the throne. Kao Tzu opened fresh negotiations with Mehe, who concluded a treaty on the condition of the emperor's daughter being given to him in marriage, and on the assumption that he was an independent ruler. With these terms, Kao Tzu fell to bludge to comply, and thus for the first time this never-seizing collision between the tribes of the desert and the agriculturists of the plains of China closed with the admitted triumph of the former. The contest was soon to be renewed with different results, but the triumph of Mehe was beyond question. The weakness thus shown against a forum foe brought its own punishment in domestic troubles. The palace became the scene of broils, plots and counterplots, and so badly did Kao Tzu manage his affairs at this epoch, that one of his favorite generals raised the standard of revolt against him through apparently a mere misunderstanding. In this instance Kao Tzu easily put down the rising, but others followed, which, if not pregnant with danger, were at the least extremely troublesome. The murder of Han Xin, to whose aid Kao Tzu owed his elevation to the throne as much as to any other by order of the empress, during a reception at the palace, shook confidence still more in the ruler, and many of his followers were forced into open rebellion through dread of personal danger. What wonder that, as he had said, the very name of revolt inspired Kao Tzu with apprehension. In BC 195 we find Kao Tzu going out of his way to visit the tomb of Confucius. Shortly after this event it became evident that he was approaching his end. His elder son, Hiaohui, was proclaimed heir apparent. Kao Tzu died in the 53rd year of his age, having reigned as emperor during eight years. The close of his reign did not bear out all the promise of its commencement, and the extent of his authority was greatly curtailed by the disastrous effects of the war with the Tatars, and the subsequent revolts among his generals. Despite these reverses, there remains much in favor of his character. He had performed his part in the consolidations of the Han's. It remained for those who came after him to complete what he left half finished. Under Hiaohui T, the Tartar king Meha sent an envoy to the capital, but either the form or the substance of his message enraged the empress mother who ordered his execution. The two peoples were thus again brought to the brink of war, but eventually the difference was sunk for the time, and the Chinese chroniclers have represented that the satisfactory turn in the question was due to Meha saying the error of his ways. Not long afterward the Tartar king died and was succeeded by his son Laochang. Meha's letter of excuse is thus given. In the barbarous country which I govern, both virtue and the distances of life are unknown. I have been unable to free myself from them, and therefore I blush. China has her wise man. That is a happiness which I envy. They would have prevented my being wanting in the respect due to your rank. The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 2, edited by Charles F. Horn, Roseter Johnson and John Rudd. Alexander reduces tire, later founds Alexandria, BC 332 by Oliver Goldsmith. The master spirit who could sigh for more worlds to conquer was at this time high in his dazzling flight. Alexander has always been considered one of the most striking and picturesque characters of history. His personality was pleasing, his endurance remarkable, and courage tauntless. Educated by Aristotle, his skin mind was well trained. He was skilled in horsemanship, and his control over the fiery, Biosophilus, untameable by others, has become a household tale in all lands. There never was a more kingly prince. A king at 20, his career has been an object of wonder to succeeding generations. He shot like a meteor across the sky of ancient civilizations. His military achievements were remarkable for quickness of conception and rapidity of execution. His life was a progress from conquest to conquest. Alexander's army, with its solid phalanx, its darting cavalry, and light troops had become irresistible. He possessed Napoleon's ability to select good generals and to make the most of his talents. In battle, Alexander was entirely devoid of fear. After a victory, his chief thoughts were for the wanted. Like Napoleon, he also possessed that personal equation of absolute popularity with his soldiers. Their devotion to him was simply complete. After Thebes came the invasion of Asia. The invincible Macedonian had fought and won the Battle of Granicus. In this battle, nearly all of the Persian leaders were slain, and its result spread terror throughout Persia. Halicarnassus was next reduced. The march of Alexander was ever onward. In the citadel of Gordium, he cut the Gordian knot and prophecy marked him for the Lord of Asia. And now Darius marched to meet him, making a fatally bad choice of battleground. Darius was totally defeated at the celebrated battle of Issus, although he anticipated a victory. After the Persian route and the flight of Darius, whose numbers counted for nothing before the Macedonian skill, Linden welcomed the invaders, and Alexander determined to take Tire. This was accomplished after a siege, which was attended with much cruelty. The siege of Gaza followed, in which nearly all of the citizens perished. In BC 332, Alexander began his expedition to Egypt. He conciliated the natives by paying honors to their gods. In his progress, he was struck by the advantages of a certain site for a city, and founded there the town which is now called Alexandria. All Phoenicia was subdued, except Tire, the capital city. The city was justly entitled the Queen of the Sea. That element bring into it the tribute of all nations. She boasted of having first invented navigation, and taught mankind the art of braving the winds and waves by the assistance of a frail bark. The happy situation of Tire at the upper end of the Mediterranean, the convenience of its ports, which are both safe and capacious, and the character of its inhabitants, who were industrious, laborious, patient, and extremely courteous to strangers, invited either merchants from all parts of the globe, so that it might be considered not so much a city belonging to any particular nation, as the common city of all nations and the center of their commerce. Alexander thought it necessary, both for his glory and his interest, to take this city. The spring was now coming on. Tire was at that time seated on an island of the sea, about a quarter of a league from the continent. It was surrounded by a strong wall, 150 feet high, which the waves of the sea washed. And the Carthaginians, a colony from Tire, a mighty people, and sovereigns of the ocean, promised to come to the assistance of their parent state. Encouraged, therefore, by these favorable circumstances, the Tyrians determined not to surrender, but to hold out the place to the last extremity. This resolution, however imprudent, was certainly magnanimous, but it was soon after, followed by an act which was as blamable as the other was praiseworthy. Alexander was desirous of getting the place rather by treaty than by force of arms, and with this in view sent heralds into the town with offers of peace. But the inhabitants were so far from listening to his proposals, or endeavoring to avert his resentment by any kind of concession, that they actually killed his ambassadors and threw their bodies from the top of the walls into the sea. It is easy to imagine what effect, so shocking an outrage must produce in a mind like Alexander's. He instantly resolved to besiege the place, and not to desist until he had made himself master of it, and raised it to the ground. As Tyre was divided from the continent by an arm of the sea, there was necessity for filling up the intermediate space with a bank or pier, before the place could be closely invested. This work, accordingly, was immediately undertaken, and in a great measure completed, when all the wood of which it was principally composed was unexpectedly burned by means of a fire ship sent in by the enemy. The damage, however, was very soon repaired, and the maul rendered more perfect than formerly, and carried nearer to the town, when all of a sudden a furious tempest arose, which, undermining the stonework that supported the wood, laid the hole at once in the bottom of the sea. Two such disasters, following so closely on the heels of each other, would have cooled the ardor of any man except Alexander, but nothing could daunt his invincible spirit, or make him relinquish an enterprise he had once undertaken. He, therefore, resolved to prosecute the siege, and in order to encourage his men to second his views, he took care to inspire them with the belief that heaven was on their side, and would soon crown their labor with a wished for success. At one time, he gave out that Apollo was about to abandon the Tyrians to their doom, and that, to prevent his flight, they had bound him to his pedestal with a golden chain. At another, he pretended that Hercules, the tutelor deity of Macedon, had appeared to him, and, having opened prospects of the most glorious kind, had invited him to proceed to take possession of Tyre. These favorable circumstances were announced by the augurs as intimations from above, and every heart was in consequence cheered. The soldiers, as if that moment arrived before the city, forgetting all the toils they had undergone, and the disappointments they had suffered, began to raise a new mole, at which they worked incessantly. To protect them from being annoyed by the ships of the enemy, Alexander fitted out a fleet, with which he not only secured his own men, but offered the Tyrians battle, which, however, they thought proper to decline, and withdrew all their galleys into the harbor. The besiegers, now allowed to proceed unmolested, went on with the work, with the utmost vigor, and, in a little time, completed it and brought it close to the walls. A general attack was, therefore, resolved on, both by sea and land, and, with this in view, the king, having manned his galleys and joined them together with strong cables, ordered them to approach the walls about midnight and attack the city with resolution. But just as the assault was going to begin, a dreadful storm arose, which not only shook the ships asunder, but even shattered them in a terrible manner, so that they were all obliged to be towed toward the shore, without having made the least impression on the city. The Tyrians were elated with this gleam of good fortune, but that joy was of short duration, for, in a little time, they have received intelligence from Carthage that they must expect no assistance from that quarter, as the Carthaginians themselves were then overawed by a powerful army of Syracusans who had invaded their country, reduced, therefore, to the hard necessity of depending entirely upon their own strength and their own resources. The Tyrians sent all their women and children to Carthage, and prepared to encounter the very last extremities. For now, the enemy was attacking the place with greater spirit and activity than ever, and to do the Tyrians justice, it must be acknowledged that they employed a number of methods of defense, which, considering the rude state of the art of war at that early period, were really astonishing. They worded off the darts discharged from the balusters against them by the assistance of turning whales, which either broke them to pieces or carried them another way. They deadened the violence of the stones that were hurled at them, by setting up sails and curtains, made of a soft substance which easily gave way. To annoy the ships which advanced against their walls, they fixed grappling irons and scythes to joists or beams, then straining their catapultas, an enormous kind of crossbow, they laid those great pieces of timber upon them instead of arrows, and shot them off on a sudden at the enemy. These crushed some of their ships by their great weight, and by the means of the hooks or hanging scythes tore others to pieces. They also had brazen shields which they drew red hot out of the fire, and filling these with burning sand hurled them in an instant from the top of the wall upon the enemy. There was nothing the Macedonians dreaded so much as this fatal instrument. For the moment the burning sand got to the flesh through the crevices of the armor, it penetrated to the very bone, and stuck so close that there was no pulling it off, so that the soldiers throwing down their arms and tearing their clothes to pieces were in this manner exposed, naked and defenseless to the shot of the enemy. Alexander finding the resources and even the courage of the Tyrians increased in proportion as the siege continued, resolved to make a last effort, and attack them at once, both by sea and land, in order if possible to overwhelm them with the multiplicity of dangers to which they would be thus exposed. With this view, having managed his gullies with some of the bravest of his troops, he commanded them to advance against the enemy's fleet, while he himself took his post at the head of his men on the mole, and now the attack began on all sides with irresistible and unremitting fury. Wherever the battering rams had beat down any part of the wall, and the bridges were thrown out, instantly the Argyraspides mounted the bridge with the utmost valor. Being led by Admetus, one of the bravest officers in the army, who was killed by the thrust of a spear as he was encouraging his soldiers. The presence of the king and the example he set fired his troops with unusual bravery. He himself ascended one of the towers on the mole, which was of a prodigious height, and there was exposed to the greatest dangers he had ever yet encountered, for being immediately known by his insignia and the richness of his armor, he served as a mark for all the arrows of the enemy. On this occasion he performed wonders, killing with javelins several of those who defended the wall. Then advancing nearer to them, he forced some with his sword, and others with his shield, either into the city or the sea. The tower on which he fought almost touching the wall. He soon ascended the wall, followed by his principal officers, and possessed himself of two towers and the space between them. The battering rams had already made several bridges. The fleet had forced its way into the harbor, and some of the Macedonians had possessed themselves of the towers which were abandoned. The Tyrians, seeing the enemy, masters of their rampart, retired toward an open place called Agenor, and there stood their ground. But Alexander, marching up with his regiment of bodyguards, killed part of them and obliged the rest to fly. At the same time, Tyre being taken on that side, which lay toward the harbor, a general carnage of the citizens ensued, and none was spared, except a few that fell into the hands of the Cyclonians in Alexander's army, who, considering the Tyrians as countrymen, granted them protection and carried them privately on board their ships. The number that was slaughtered on this occasion is almost incredible. Even after conquest, the victor's resentment did not subside. He ordered no less than 5,000 men who were taken in the storming to be nailed to crosses along the shore. The number of prisoners amounted to 30,000 and were all sold as slaves in different parts of the world. Thus fell Tyre, that had been for many ages the most flourishing city in the world, and had spread the arts and commerce into the remotest regions. While Alexander was employed in the Siege of Tyre, he received a second letter from Darius, in which that monarch treated him with greater respect than before. He now gave him the title of king, he offered him 10,000 talents as ransom for his captive mother and queen, and he promised him his daughter Statera in marriage. With all the country he had conquered, as far as the river Euphrates provided he would agree to a peace. These terms were so advantageous that when the king debated upon them in council, Parmenio, one of his generals, could not help observing, that he would certainly accept of them were he Alexander. And so would I, replied the king, were I Parmenio. But deeming it inconsistent with his dignity to listen to any proposal from a man whom he had so lately overcome, he hotly rejected them, and scorned to accept of that as a favor, which he already considered his own by conquest. From Tyre Alexander marched to Jerusalem, fully determined to punish the city for having refused to supply his army with provisions during the siege. But his resentment was mollified by deputation of the citizens, coming out to meet him with their high priest Tadua, before them, dressed in white and having a mitre on his head, on the front of which the name of God was written. The moment the king perceived the high priest, he advanced toward him with an air of the most profound respect, bowed his body, adored the august name upon his front, and saluted him, who wore it with religious veneration. And when some of his courtiers expressed their surprise that he, who was adored by everyone, should adore the high priest of the Jews, I do not, said he, adore the high priest, but the God whose minister he is. For, while I was a deum in Macedonia, my mind wholly fixed on the great design of the Persian war. As I was revolving the methods how to conquer Asia, this very man, dressed in the same robes, appeared to me in a dream, exhorted me to banish my fear, bade me cross the hellospond boldly, and assured me that God would march at the head of my army, and give me the victory over the Persians. This speech delivered with an air of sincerity, no doubt, had its effect in encouraging the army, and establishing an opinion that his mission was from heaven. From Jerusalem he went to Gaza, where, having met with a more obstinate resistance than he expected, he cut to pieces the whole garrison, consisting of ten thousand men. Not satisfied with this act of cruelty, he caused holes to be bored through the hills of Boetes, the governor, and tying him with cords to the back of his chariot, drugged him in this manner around the walls of the city. This he did in imitation of Achilles, whom Homer describes of having drugged Hector around the walls of Troy in the same manner. It was ridding the past to very little, or rather indeed to very bad purpose, to imitate this hero in the most unworthy part of his character. Alexander, having left the garrison in Gaza, turned his arms toward Egypt, of which he made himself master without opposition. Here he formed the design of visiting the Temple of Jupiter, which was situated in the sandy deserts of Libya, at the distance of 12 days journey from Memphis, the capital of Egypt. His chief object in going dither was to get himself acknowledged, the son of Jupiter, an honor he had long aspired to. In this journey he founded the city of Alexandria, which soon became one of the greatest towns in the world for commerce. Nothing could be more dreary than the desert through which he passed, nor anything more charming, according to the fabulous accounts of the poets. Then the particular spot where the temple was situated. It was a perfect paradise in the midst of an immeasurable wilderness. At last having reached the place and appeared before the altar of the deity, the priest, who was no stranger to Alexander's wishes, declared him to be the son of Jupiter. The conqueror, elated with this high compliment, asked whether he should have success in his expedition. The priest answered that he should be the monarch of the world. The conqueror inquired if his father's murderers were punished. The priest replied that his father, Jupiter, was immortal, but that the murderers of Philip had all been extirpated. End of section 15