CAUCASIAN HISTORY.

While the Negro race seems to have retrograded from its original

position on the earth, while the Mongolian has afforded the spectacle

of a single permanent and pedantic civilization retaining millions

within its grasp for ages in the extreme east of Asia, the Caucasian,

as if the seeds of the world’s progress had been implanted in it, has

worked out for itself a splendid career on an ever-shifting theatre.

First attaining its maturity in Asia, the Caucasian civilization has

shot itself westward, if we may so speak, in several successive

throes; long confined to Asia; then entering northern Africa, where,

commingling with the Ethiopian, it originated a new culture; again,

about the year B. C. 1000, adding Europe to the stage of history; and

lastly, 2500 years later, crossing the Atlantic, and meeting in

America with a diffused and degenerate Mongolism. To understand this

beautiful career thoroughly, it is necessary to observe the manner in

which the Caucasians disseminated themselves from their central

home――to count, as it were, and note separately, the various flights

by which they emigrated from the central hive. So far as appears,

then, from investigations into language, etc., the Caucasian stock

sent forth at different times in the remote past five great branches

from its original seat, somewhere to the south of that long chain of

mountains which commences at the Black Sea, and, bordering the

southern coast of the Caspian, terminates in the Himalehs. In what

precise way, or at what precise time, these branches separated

themselves from the parent stock and from each other, must remain a

mystery; a sufficiently clear general notion of the fact is all that

we can pretend to. 1_st._ The Armenian branch, remaining apparently

nearest the original seat, filled the countries between the Caspian

and Black Seas, extending also round the Caspian into the territories

afterwards known as those of the Parthians. 2_d_, The Indo-Persian

branch, which extended itself in a southern and eastern direction from

the Caspian Sea, through Persia and Cabool, into Hindoostan, also

penetrating Bokhara. From this great branch philologists and

ethnographers derive those two races, the distinction between which,

although subordinate to the grand fivefold division of the Caucasian

stock, is of immense consequence in modern history――the Celtic and the

Germanic. Pouring through Asia Minor, it is supposed that the

Indo-Persian family entered Europe through Thrace, and ultimately,

through the operation of those innumerable causes which reäct upon the

human constitution from the circumstances in which it is placed,

assumed the character of Celts and Germans――the Celts being the

earlier product, and eventually occupying the western portion of

Europe――namely, northern Italy, France, Spain and Great Britain――still

undergoing subdivision, however, during their dispersion, into

Iberians, Gaels, Cymri, &c.; the Germans being a later off-shoot, and

settling rather in the centre and north of Europe in two great

moieties――the Scandinavians and the Germans Proper. This seems the

most plausible pedigree of the Celtic and Germanic races, although

some object to it. 3_d_, The Semitic or Aramaic branch, which,

diffusing itself southward and westward from the original Caucasian

seat, filled Syria, Mesopotamia, Arabia, etc., and founded the early

kingdoms of Assyria, Babylonia, Phœnicia, Palestine, etc. It was this

branch of the Caucasian variety which, entering Africa by the Isthmus

of Suez and the Straits of Babelmandel, constituted itself an element

at least in the ancient population of Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia; and

there are ethnographers who believe that the early civilization which

lined the northern coasts of Africa arose from some extremely early

blending of the Ethiopic with the Semitic, the latter acting as a

dominant caste. Diffusing itself westward along the African coast as

far as Mauritania, the Semitic race seems eventually, though at a

comparatively late period, to have met the Celtic, which had crossed

into Africa from Spain; and thus, by the infusion of Arameans and

Celts, that white or tawny population which we find in northern Africa

in ancient times, distinct from the Ethiopians of the interior, seems

to have been formed. 4_th_, The Pelasgic branch, that noble family

which, carrying the Greeks and Romans in its bosom, poured itself from

western Asia into the south-east of Europe, mingling doubtless with

Celts and Germans. 5_th_, The Scythian, or Slavonic branch, which

diffused itself over Russia, Siberia, and the central plains of Asia,

shading off in these last into the Mongolian Such is a convenient

division of the Caucasian stock; a more profound investigation,

however, might reduce the five races to these two――the Semitic and the

Indo-Germanic; all civilized languages being capable, it is said, of

being classified under these three families――the Chinese, which has

monosyllabic roots; the Indo-Germanic (Sanscrit, Hindoostanee, Greek,

Latin, German, and all modern European languages), which has

dissyllabic roots; and the Semitic (Hebrew, Arabic, &c.), whose roots

are trisyllabic. Retaining, however, the fivefold distribution which

we have adopted, we shall find that the history of the world, from the

earliest to the remotest times, has been nothing else than the common

Caucasian vitality presenting itself in a succession of phases or

civilizations, each differing from the last in the proportions in

which it contains the various separate elements.

It is advisable to sketch first the most eastern Caucasian

civilization――that is, that of India; and then to proceed to a

consideration of the state of that medley of nations, some of them

Semitic, some of them Indo-Persian, and some of them Armenian, out of

which the great Persian empire arose, destined to continue the

historic pedigree of the world into Europe, by transmitting its

vitality to the Pelasgians.

ANCIENT INDIA. One of the great branches, we have said, of the

Caucasian family of mankind was the Indo-Persian, which, spreading out

in the primeval times from the original seat of the Caucasian part of

the human species, extended itself from the Caspian to the Bay of

Bengal, where, coming into contact with the southern Mongolians, it

gave rise, according to the most probable accounts, to those new mixed

Caucasian-Mongolian races, the Malays of the Eastern Peninsula; and,

by a still farther degeneracy, to the Papuas, or natives of the South

Sea Islands. While thus shading off into the Mongolism of the Pacific,

the Indo-Persian mass of our species was at the same time attaining

maturity within itself; and as the first ripened fragment of the

Mongolians had been the Chinese nation, so one of the first ripened

fragments of the Indo-Persian branch of the Caucasians seems to have

been the Indians. At what time the vast peninsula of Hindoostan could

first boast a civilized population, it is impossible to say; all

testimony, however, agrees in assigning to Indian civilization a most

remote antiquity. Another fact seems also to be tolerably well

authenticated regarding ancient India; namely, that the northern

portions of it, and especially the north-western portions, which would

be nearest the original Caucasian seat, were the first civilized; and

that the civilizing influence spread thence southwards to Cape

Comorin.

Notwithstanding this general conviction, that India was one of the

first portions of the earth’s surface that contained a civilized

population, few facts in the ancient history of India are certainly

known. We are told, indeed (to omit the myths of the Indian Bacchus

and Hercules), of two great kingdom――those of Ayodha (Oude) and

Prathisthana (Vitera)――as having existed in northern India upwards of

a thousand years before Christ; of conquests in southern India,

effected by the monarchs of these kingdoms; and of wars carried on

between these monarchs and their western neighbors the Persians, after

the latter had begun to be powerful. All these accounts, however,

merely resolve themselves into the general information, that India,

many centuries before Christ, was an important member in the family of

Asiatic nations; supplying articles to their commerce, and involved in

their agitations. Accordingly, if we wish to form an idea of the

condition of India prior to that great epoch in its history――its

invasion by Alexander the Great, B. C. 326――we can only do so by

reasoning back from that we know of its present condition, allowing

for the modifying effects of the two thousand years which have

intervened; and especially for the effects produced by the Mohammedan

invasion, A. D. 1000. This, however, is the less difficult in the case

of such a country as India, where the permanence of native

institutions is so remarkable, and though we cannot hope to acquire a

distinct notion of the territorial divisions, etc., of India in very

ancient times, yet, by a study of the Hindoos as they are at present,

we may furnish ourselves with a tolerably accurate idea of the nature

of that ancient civilization which overspread Hindoostan many

centuries before the birth of Christ, and this all the more probably

that the notices which remain of the state of India at the time of the

invasion of Alexander, correspond in many points with what is to be

seen in India at the present day.

The population of Hindoostan, the area of which is estimated at about

a million square miles, amounts to about 120,000,000; of whom about

100,000,000 are Hindoos or aborigines, the remainder being foreigners,

either Asiatic or European. The most remarkable feature in Hindoo

society is its division into castes. The Hindoos are divided into four

great castes――the _Brahmins_, whose proper business is religion and

philosophy; the _Kshatriyas_, who attend to war and government; the

_Vaisyas_, whose duties are connected with commerce and agriculture;

and the _Sudras_, or artisans and laborers. Of these four castes the

Brahmins are the highest; but a broad line of distinction is drawn

between the Sudras and the other three castes. The Brahmins may

intermarry with the three inferior castes――the kshatriyas with the

vaisyas and the Sudras; and the vaisyas with the Sudras; but no Sudra

can choose a wife from either of the three superior castes. As a

general rule, every person is required to follow the profession of the

caste to which he belongs: thus the Brahmin is to lead a life of

contemplation and study, subsisting on the contributions of the rich;

the Kshatriya is to occupy himself in civil matters, or to pursue the

profession of a soldier; and the Vaisya is to be a merchant or a

farmer. In fact, however, the barriers of caste have in innumerable

instances been broken down. The ramifications, too, of the caste

system are infinite. Besides the four pure, there are numerous mixed

castes, all with their prescribed ranks and occupations.

A class far below even the pure Sudras is the _Pariahs_ or outcasts;

consisting of the refuse of all the other castes, and which, in

process of time, has grown so large as to include, it is said,

one-fifth of the population of Hindoostan. The Pariahs perform the

meanest kinds of manual labor. This system of castes――of which the

Brahmins themselves, whom some suppose to have been originally a

conquering race, are the architects, if not the founders――is bound up

with the religion of the Hindoos. Indeed of the Hindoos, more truly

than of any other people, it may be said that a knowledge of their

religious system is a knowledge of the people themselves.

[Illustration: AGA.]

[Illustration: JAPANESE AGRICULTURE]

The Vedas, or ancient sacred books of the Hindoos, distinctly set

forth the doctrine of the infinite and Eternal Supreme Being.

According to the Vedas, there is ‘one unknown, true Being, all

present, all powerful, the creator, preserver, and destroyer of the

universe.’ This Supreme Being ‘is not comprehensible by vision, or by

any other of the organs of sense, nor can he be conceived by means of

devotion or virtuous practices.’ He is not space, nor air, nor light,

nor atoms, nor soul, nor nature: he is above all these and the cause

of them all. He ‘has no feet, but extends everywhere; has no hands,

but holds everything; has no eyes, yet sees all that is; has no ears,

yet hears all that passes. His existence had no cause. He is the

smallest of the small and the greatest of the great; and yet is, in

fact neither small nor great.’ Such is the doctrine of the Vedas in

its purest and most abstract form; but the prevailing theology which

runs through them is what is called _Pantheism_, or that system which

speaks of God as the soul of the universe, or as the universe itself.

Accordingly, the whole tone and language of the highest Hindoo

philosophy is Pantheistic. As a rope, lying on the ground, and

mistaken at first view for a snake, is the cause of the idea or

conception of the snake which exists in the mind of the person looking

at it, so, say the Vedas, is the Deity the cause of what we call the

universe. ‘In him the whole world is absorbed; from him it issues; he

is entwined and interwoven with all creation.’ ‘All that exists is

God: whatever we smell, or taste, or see, or hear, or feel, is the

Supreme Being.’

This one incomprehensible Being, whom the Hindoos designate by the

mystical names _Om_, _Tut_, and _Jut_, and sometimes also by the word

_Brahm_, is declared by the Vedas to be the only proper object of

worship. Only a very few persons of extraordinary gifts and virtues,

however, are able, it is said, to adore the Supreme Being――the great

OM――directly. The great majority of mankind are neither so wise nor so

holy as to be able to approach the Divine Being himself, and worship

him. It being alleged that persons thus unfortunately disqualified for

adoring the invisible Deity should employ their minds upon some

visible thing, rather than to suffer them to remain idle, the Vedas

direct them to worship a number of inferior deities, representing

particular acts or qualities of the Supreme Being; as, for instances,

Crishnu or Vishnu, the god of preservation; Muhadev, the god of

destruction; or the sun, or the air, or the sea, or the human

understanding; or, in fact any object or thing which they may choose

to represent as God. Seeing, say the Hindoos, that God pervades and

animates the whole universe, everything, living or dead, may be

considered a portion of God, and as such, it may be selected as an

object of worship, provided always it be worshiped only as

constituting a portion of the Divine Substance. In this way, whatever

the eye looks on, or the mind can conceive, whether it be the sun in

the heavens or the great river Ganges, or the crocodile on its banks,

or the cow, or the fire kindled to cook food, or the Vedas, or a

Brahmin, or a tree, or a serpent――all may be legitimately worshiped as

a fragment, so to speak, of the Divine Spirit. Thus there may be many

millions of gods to which Hindoos think themselves entitled to pay

divine honours. The number of Hindoo gods is calculated at

330,000,000, or about three times the number of their worshipers.

Of these, the three principal deities of the Hindoos are Brahma the

creator, Vishnu the preserver, and Seeb or Siva the destroyer. These

three of course, were originally intended to represent the three great

attributes of the Om or Invisible Supreme Being――namely, his creating,

his preserving, and his destroying attributes. Indeed the name OM

itself is a compound word, expressing the three ideas of creation,

preservation, and destruction, all combined. The three together are

called _Trimurti_, and there are certain occasions when the three are

worshiped conjointly. There are also sculptured representations of the

Trimurti, in which the busts of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva are cut out

of the same mass of stone. One of these images of the Trimurti is

found in the celebrated cavern temple of Elephanta, in the

neighborhood of Bombay, perhaps the most wonderful remnant of ancient

Indian architecture. Vishnu and Siva are more worshipped separately

than Brahma――each having his body of devotees specially attached to

him in particular.

Hindooism, like other Pantheistic systems, teaches the doctrine of the

transmigration of souls: all creation, animate and inanimate, being,

according to the Hindoo system, nothing else but the deity Brahm

himself parceled out, as it were, into innumerable portions and forms

(when these are reunited, the world will be at an end), just as a

quantity of quicksilver may be broken up into innumerable little balls

or globules, which all have a tendency to go together again. At long

intervals of time, each extending over some thousand millions of

years, Brahm does bring the world to an end, by reäbsorbing it into

his spirit. When, therefore, a man dies, his soul, according to the

Hindoos, must either be absorbed immediately into the soul of Brahm,

or it must pass through a series of transmigrations, waiting for the

final absorption, which happens at the end of every universe, or at

least until such time as it shall be prepared for being reunited with

the Infinite Spirit. The former of the two is, according to the

Hindoos, the highest possible reward: to be absorbed into Brahm

immediately upon death, and without having to undergo any farther

purification, is the lot only of the greatest devotees. To attain this

end, or at least to avoid degradation after death, the Hindoos, and

especially the Brahmins, who are naturally the most intent upon their

spiritual interests, practice a ritual of the most intricate and

ascetic description, carrying religious ceremonies and antipathies

with them into all the duties of life. So overburdened is the daily

life of the Hindoos with superstitious observances with regard to

food, sleep, etc., that, but for the speculative doctrines which the

more elevated minds among the Brahmins may see recognised in their

religion, the whole system of Hindooism might seem a wretched and

grotesque polytheism.

A hundred millions of people professing this system, divided into

castes as now, and carrying the Brahminical ritual into all the

occupations of lazy life under the hot sun, and amid the exuberant

vegetation of Hindoostan――such was the people into which Alexander the

Great carried his conquering arms; such, doubtless, they had been for

ages before that period; and such did they remain, shut out from the

view of the rest of the civilized world, and only communicating with

it by means of spices, ivory, etc., which found their way through

Arabia or the Red Sea to the Mediterranean, till Vasco de Gama rounded

the Cape of Good Hope, and brought Europe and India into closer

connection. Meanwhile a Mohammedan invasion had taken place (A. D.

1000); Mohammedans from Persia had mingled themselves with the

Hindoos; and it was with this mixed population that British enterprise

eventually came into collision.

Ere quitting the Indians, it is well to glance back at the Chinese, so

as to see wherein these two primeval and contemporaneous

consolidations of our species――the Mongolian consolidation of eastern

Asia, and the Caucasian consolidation of the central peninsula of

southern Asia――differ. ‘Whoever would perceive the full physical and

moral difference,’ says Klaproth, ‘between the Chinese and Indian

nations, must contrast the peculiar culture of the Chinese with that

of the Hindoo, fashioned almost like a European, even to his

complexion. He will study the boundless religious system of the

Brahmins, and oppose it to the bald belief of the original Chinese,

which can hardly be named religion. He will remark the rigorous

division of the Hindoos into castes, sects, and denominations, for

which the inhabitants of the central kingdom have even no expression.

He will compare the dry prosaic spirit of the Chinese with the high

poetic souls of the dwellers on the Ganges and the Dsumnah. He will

hear the rich and blooming Sanscrit, and contrast it with the

unharmonious speech of the Chinese. He will mark, finally, the

literature of the latter, full of matters of fact and things worth

knowing, as contrasted with the limitless philosophic-ascetic writing

of the Indians, who have made even the highest poetry wearisome by

perpetual length.’

HISTORY OF THE EASTERN NATIONS TILL THEIR INCORPORATION IN THE PERSIAN

EMPIRE. Leaving India――that great fragment of the original Caucasian

civilization――and proceeding westward, we find two large masses of the

human species filling in the earliest times the countries lying

between the Indus and the Mediterranean――namely, an Indo-Persian mass

filling the whole tract of country between the Indus and the Tigris;

and a Semitic-Aramaic mass filling the greater part of lesser Asia and

the whole peninsula of Arabia, and extending itself into the parts of

Africa adjoining the Red Sea. That in the most remote ages these lands

were the theatres of a civilized activity is certain, although no

records have been transmitted from them to us, except a few fragments

relative to the Semitic nations. The general facts, however, with

regard to these ante-historic times, seem to be: 1_st_, That the

former of the two masses mentioned――namely, the population between the

Indus and the Caspian――was essentially a prolongation of the great

Indian nucleus, possessing a culture similar to the Indian in its main

aspects, although varied, as was inevitable, by the operation of those

physical causes which distinguish the climate of Persia and Cabool

from that of Hindoostan; 2_d_, That the Semitic or Aramaic mass

divided itself at a very early period into a number of separate

peoples or nations, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Phœnicians,

the Jews, the Arabians, etc., and that each of these acquired a

separate development, and worked out for itself a separate career;

3_d_, That upwards of a thousand years before Christ the spirit of

conquest appeared among the Semitic nations, dashing them violently

against each other; and that at length one Semitic fragment――that is,

the Assyrians――attained the supremacy over the rest, and founded a

great dominion, called the Assyrian empire, which stretched from Egypt

to the borders of India (B. C. 800); and 4_th_, That the pressure of

this Semitic power against the Indo-Persic mass was followed by a

reäction――one great section of the Indo-Persians rising into strength,

supplanting the Assyrian empire, and founding one of their own, called

the Persian empire (B. C. 536), which was destined in its turn to be

supplanted by the confederacy of Grecian states in B. C. 326.

Beginning with Egypt, let us trace separately the career of each of

the Eastern nations till that point of time at which we find them all

embodied in the great Persian empire:――

THE EGYPTIANS. Egypt, whose position on the map of Africa is well

known, is about 500 miles long from its most northern to its most

southern point. Through its whole length flows the Nile, a fine large

stream rising in the inland kingdom of Abyssinia, and, from certain

periodic floods to which it is subject, of great use in irrigating and

fertilizing the country. A large portion of Egypt consists of an

alluvial plain, similar to our meadow grounds, formed by the deposits

of the river, and bounded by ranges of mountains on either side. The

greatest breadth of the valley is 150 miles, but generally it is much

less, the mountain ranges on either side often being not more than a

few miles from the river.

A country so favorably situated, and possessing so many advantages,

could not but be among the earliest peopled; and accordingly, as far

back as the human memory can reach, we find a dense population of a

very peculiar character inhabiting the whole valley of the Nile. These

ancient Egyptians seem, as we have already said, to have been a

mixture of the Semitic with the Ethiopic element, speaking a peculiar

language, still surviving in a modified form in the Coptic of modern

Egypt. In the ancient authors, however, the Egyptians are always

distinguished from the Ethiopians, with whom they kept up so close an

intercourse, that it has been made a question whether the Egyptian

institutions came from the Ethiopian Meroe, or whether, as is more

probable, civilization was transmitted to Ethiopia from Egypt.

The whole country is naturally divided into three parts――Upper Egypt,

bordering on what was anciently Ethiopia; Middle Egypt; and Lower

Egypt, including the Delta of the Nile. In each there were numerous

cities in which the population was amassed: originally Thebes, a city

of Upper Egypt, of the size of which surprising accounts are

transmitted to us, and whose ruins still astonish the traveler, was

the capital of the country; but latterly, as commerce increased,

Memphis in Middle Egypt became the seat of power. After Thebes and

Memphis, Ombi, Edfou, Esneh, Elephantina, and Philoe seem to have been

the most important of the Egyptian cities.

Our accounts of the Egyptian civilization are derived chiefly from the

Greek historian Herodotus (B. C. 408), who visited Egypt and digested

the information which he received from the priests as to its ancient

history; and Manetho, a native Egyptian of later times, who wrote in

Greek. From their accounts it is inferred that the country was

anciently divided into thirty-six sections or provinces called

_nomes_――ten in Upper, sixteen in Middle, and ten in Lower Egypt.

‘Many of the separate nomes were of considerable substantive

importance, and had a marked local character each to itself, religious

as well as political; though the whole of Egypt, from Elephantine to

Pelusium and Kanopus, is said to have always constituted one kingdom.’

Of this kingdom, the population, according to a rough estimate, may

have been about seven millions. The government was a monarchy based on

an all-powerful priesthood, similar to the Brahminical system of

India; and, as in India, the most striking feature in the Egyptian

society was the division of the people into hereditary castes. ‘The

population of Egypt,’ says Mr Grote in his History of Greece, ‘was

classified into certain castes or hereditary professions, of which the

number is represented differently by different authors. The priests

stand clearly marked out as the order richest, most powerful, and most

venerated, distributed all over the country, and possessing

exclusively the means of reading and writing, besides a vast amount of

narrative matter treasured up in the memory, the whole stock of

medical and physical knowledge then attainable, and those rudiments of

geometry (or rather land-measuring) which were so often called into

use in a country annually inundated. To each god and to each temple

throughout Egypt, lands and other properties belonged, whereby the

numerous band of priests attached to him were maintained. Their

ascendancy, both direct and indirect, over the minds of the people was

immense; they prescribed that minute ritual under which the life of

every Egyptian, not excepting the king himself, was passed, and which

was for themselves more full of harassing particularities than for any

one else. Every day in the year belonged to some particular god, and

the priests alone knew to which. There were different gods in every

nome, though Isis and Osiris were common to all; and the priests of

each god constituted a society apart, more or less important,

according to the comparative celebrity of the temple. The property of

each temple included troops of dependents and slaves, who were stamped

with “holy marks,” and who must have been numerous, in order to

suffice for the service of the large buildings and their constant

visitors.

Next in importance to the sacerdotal caste were the military caste or

order, whose native name indicated that they stood on the left hand of

the king, while the priests occupied the right. They were classified

in Kalasires and Hermotybii, who occupied lands in eighteen particular

nomes or provinces, principally in Lower Egypt. The Kalasiries had

once amounted to 160,000 men, the Hermotybii to 250,000, when at the

maximum of their population; but that highest point had long been past

in the time of Herodotus. To each man of this soldier-caste was

assigned a portion of land, equal to about 6½ English acres, free from

any tax. The lands of the priests and the soldiers were regarded as

privileged property, and exempt from all burdens; while the remaining

soil was considered as the property of the king, who however, received

from it a fixed proportion――one-fifth of the total produce――leaving

the rest in the hands of the cultivators. The soldiers were

interdicted from every description of art and trade.’

The other castes are differently given in different authors; the most

probable account, however, is that which assigns them as three――the

caste of the husbandmen, that of the artificers, and that of the

herdsmen, which last caste included a variety of occupations held in

contempt, the lowest and most degraded of all being that of swineherd.

The separation between the husbandmen and the herdsmen seems to have

arisen from the circumstance that different parts of the country, not

suitable for agriculture, were entirely laid out in pasture. The

artificers, constituting the vast town population of Egypt, were

subdivided into a great variety of occupations, weavers, masons,

sculptors, etc., who were compelled to these professions by hereditary

obligation. It was by the labor of this vast town population, assisted

by that of herds of slaves, that those huge works were accomplished,

the remains of which attest the greatness of ancient Egypt. Part of

the artisan population were exclusively occupied in skilled labor; and

in a country where there was such a taste for works of masonry,

sculpture was necessarily one of the most largely-stocked of the

skilled occupations. ‘Perfect exactness of execution,’ it is said,

‘mastery of the hardest stone, and undeviating obedience to certain

rules of proportion, are general characteristics of Egyptian

sculpture. There are yet seen in their quarries obelisks not severed

from the rock, but having three of their sides already adorned with

hieroglyphics, so certain were they of cutting off the fourth side

with precision.’ These skilled artificers may be supposed to have

acted as foremen and overseers of the great numbers of laborers who

were employed in public works such as the Pyramids. In the

construction of these works no degree of labor for any length of time

seems to have intimidated the Egyptians. The huge blocks of stone,

sometimes weighing 1000 tons each, were dragged for hundreds of miles

on sledges, and their transport, perhaps, did not occupy less time

than a year; in one case which is known, 2000 men were employed three

years in bringing a single stone from a quarry to the building in

which it was to be placed. Usually, the sledges were drawn by men

yoked in rows to separate ropes, all pulling at a ring fixed to the

block. Where it was possible, the blocks were brought from the

quarries on flat-bottomed boats on the Nile. But the transport of

these masses was much more easily accomplished than the placing of

them in elevated situations in the buildings. They were raised by the

power of levers and inclined planes at immense trouble and cost. The

waste of human life in these gigantic works must have been enormous.

About 120,000 men are said to have perished in the digging of a canal,

which was left unfinished, between the Red Sea and an arm of the Nile;

and according to Herodotus, the Egyptian priests of his day described

the building of the Pyramids as a time of extreme exhaustion and

hardship to the whole country.

The religion of the Egyptians seems to have been, in its popular form

at least, a mere gross Fetishism, whose principal characteristic was a

worship of teeming animal life――the bull, the cat, the ibis, the

crocodile, etc.; different animals in different nomes. Whatever

profounder meaning lay hid under this gross ceremonial the

priest-caste reserved to themselves, as one of the mysteries, the

possession of which severed them from the rest of the population.

Among these mysteries was the art of writing, which was practised both

in the alphabetical and the hieroglyphic form; the latter being used

for special purposes. Some vague notion of the immortality of the

soul, resembling the Hindoo tenet of transmigration, seems to have

pervaded the Egyptian religion; and this belief appears to have lain

at the foundation of the Egyptian practice of embalming the dead. The

business of embalming was a very dignified one, and was aided by a

host of inferior functionaries, who made and painted coffins and other

articles which were required. The bodies of the poorer classes were

merely dried with salt or natron, and wrapt up in coarse cloths, and

deposited in the catacombs. The bodies of the rich and great underwent

the most complicated operations, wrapt in bandages dipped in balsam,

and laboriously adorned with all kinds of ornaments. Thus prepared

they were placed in highly-decorated cases or coffins, and then

consigned to sarcophagi in the catacombs or pyramids. Bodies so

prepared have been called mummies, either from the Arabian word

_momia_, or the Coptic _mum_, signifying bitumen or gum-resin.

Although the Egyptians carried on from early times a caravan-commerce

with the adjacent countries of Phœnicia, Palestine, and Arabia,

importing such articles as wine, oil, and spices for embalming, yet

exclusiveness and self-sufficiency were characteristics of their

civilization. There, on the banks of the Nile, these millions lived,

changeless in their methods through centuries, each individual

mechanically pursuing the occupation to which he was born――millions

cultivating the soil, and producing wheat, etc., for the subsistence

of the whole: others tending the cattle necessary for food or

sacrifice; millions, again, crowded into the numerous towns, occupied

in the various handicrafts necessary to provide articles of clothing,

luxury, etc.――a large proportion of this class being available for

stupendous architectural works; and lastly, diffused through these

country and town populations, two other proprietor-castes――the one a

militia, occupied in gymnastic exercises alone; the other a sacerdotal

or intellectual order, within whose body was accumulated all the

speculative or scientific wisdom of the country. Relations existed

between Egypt and the adjacent countries; and rumours of the nature of

its peculiar civilization may have spread through the nations of the

Mediterranean; but for a long while it was shut, like the present

China, against foreign intrusion; and it was not till about the year

650 B. C. that it was thrown open to general inspection. In the sixth

and fifth centuries B. C., the philosophers of other countries, and

especially of Greece, used to visit Egypt in order to acquire, by

intercourse with the Egyptian intellectual caste, some of that

precious knowledge of which they were believed to be the depositaries.

Although the Egyptian civilization is known to have existed pretty

much as we have described it from immemorial antiquity, yet, with the

exception of what we learn from Scripture, we know little of Egyptian

history, properly so called, anterior to the time when the country was

thrown open to the Greeks. Herodotus and Manetho, indeed, have given

us retrospective lists of the Egyptian kings, extending back into the

primitive gloom of the world; but portions of these lists are

evidently constructed backwards on mythical principles. Thus Manetho,

preserving doubtless the traditions of the sacerdotal Egyptian caste,

to which he is supposed to have belonged, carries back the imagination

as far as 30,000 years before the birth of Christ. From this date till

B. C. 5702, great divine personages ruled in Egypt; then (B. C. 5702)

it came into the possession of human kings, the first of which was

Menes. From the accession of Menes down to the incorporation of Egypt

with the Persian empire (B. C. 525), Herodotus assigns 330 kings, or,

as they are called in Scripture, Pharaohs, whose names he informs us,

were read to him out of a papyrus manuscript by the Egyptian priests,

who pledged themselves to its accuracy; and Manetho reckons up

twenty-six dynasties, some of them native and others foreign, which

divided the long period into portions of different lengths.

ARABIA. The great peninsula of Arabia was in the earliest times

inhabited by a population of the Semitic stock, in all essential

respects similar to that which inhabits it now, partly concentrated in

cities, partly wandering in tribes through the extensive deserts which

mark the surface of the country. The inhabitants of the towns subsist

by agriculture and commerce; the wandering tribes by cattle rearing

and pillage. In ancient times, as now, the Arabs were celebrated for

their expert horsemanship, their hospitality, their eloquence, and

their free indomitable spirit. In religion, however, the modern Arabs,

who are Mohammedans, differ from the ancient Arabs, who were

idolaters, chiefly worshippers of the celestial luminaries, nowhere so

beautiful as in the sky of an Arabian desert. The Arabs themselves

trace their history back, the older tribes to Kahtan (the Joktan of

the 10th chapter of Genesis), the latter to Adnan, a descendant of

Ishmael, the offspring of Abraham. It is unnecessary, however, to

enter into this history, as Arabia was not incorporated with the

Persian empire, and only assumed historical importance in later times,

when it sent forth the religion of Mohammed over the East.

SYRIA. The Semitic or Aramaic population overspreading Syria――which

name is generally applied to the country lying between the Euphrates

and Arabian desert on the east, and the Mediterranean on the west――had

early divided itself into various independent states or kingdoms,

which ultimately resolved themselves, it would appear, into three.

These were _Phœnicia_, a narrow strip of coast-land, extending from

Mount Carmel to the river Eleutheros; _Palestine_, or the _Holy Land_,

including the country south of Phœnicia, between the Arabian desert

and the Mediterranean, as well as the inland district lying between

Mount Carmel and Mount Herman; and _Syria Proper_, whose capital was

Damascus, and which, when the power of the Damascan kings was at its

highest, included all the country except Palestine and Phœnicia.

Syrian history possesses no independent importance; we pass,

therefore, to the history of the Phœnician and Jewish nations.

THE PHŒNICIANS. Phœnicia was an exceedingly small country, its length

being only about 120 miles, and its breadth nowhere greater than 20

miles. Indeed it may be described as a mere slip of coast-land,

sufficiently large to accommodate a range of port towns, such as a

merchant people required. The most northern of these Phœnician cities

was Aradus, situated on a small island; the most southern was the

famous Tyre; and between the two were situated many others, of which

the chief were Sidon, Berytus, Tripolis, and Byblus. The greater part

of the population was contained in these cities, the rural population

being small in proportion.

Originally, Phœnicia was divided into a number of little states or

communities, each having a town for its metropolis, with a hereditary

king of its own; and ere the country was restricted by the formation

of the Jewish nation, the number of these Phœnician or Canaanitish

principalities must have been considerable. The Phœnicians were a

fragment of the Canaanites of Scripture; and doubtless in the annals

of the separate Phœnician towns, such as Tyre, Sidon, and Aradus, were

preserved record from the Phœnician point of view, of many of those

ancient transactions which are related in the Scriptural account of

the settlement of the Jews in Canaan. Without going back, however,

into the remoter period of Phœnician history, one of the questions

connected with which is, whether Tyre (founded, it was said, B. C.

2700) or Sidon was the more ancient town, let us give a summary view

of the nature of the Phœnician civilization at the period of its

highest celebrity――namely, from B. C. 1200 to B. C. 700, at which time

we find Tyre exercising a presiding influence over the other Phœnician

communities.

The Phœnicians were the great trading nation of antiquity. Situated at

so convenient a point on the Mediterranean, it devolved on them to

transport to the sea-shore the commodities of the East, brought to

them overland by Arabian and Egyptian caravans, and from the sea-shore

to distribute them among the expecting nations of the west. Nor were

they without valuable products of their own. The sand of their coasts

was particularly suitable for the manufacture of glass; their bays

abounded in species of fish which produced a fine purple dye――the

celebrated Tyrian purple of antiquity; and in various parts of the

country there were excellent mines of iron and copper. It was, in

fact, essential for the general interests of the race that the people

inhabiting that portion of the Mediterranean coasts should devote

themselves to commerce. In anticipation of this, as it might seem, the

mountains of Libanus, which separated the narrow Phœnician territory

from Syria, were stocked with the best timber, which, transported over

the short distance which intervened between these mountains and the

sea, abundantly supplied the demands of the Phœnician dockyards. There

was something in the Phœnician character, also, which suited the

requirements of their geographical position. Skillful, enterprising,

griping in their desire for wealth, and in other respects resembling

much their neighbors the Jews, to whom they were allied in race, and

whose language was radically identical with their own――theirs was

essentially the merchant type of character.

Standing as the Phœnicians did as the people by whom the exchange

between the East and the West was managed, a complete view of their

life and manner of activity should embrace _first_, their relations

with the East――that is, their overland trade with Assyria, Arabia,

Egypt, Persia, and India; _secondly_, their relations with the

West――that is, their maritime trade with the various nations of the

Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts; and _thirdly_, the peculiar

character of mind which either accompanied or resulted from the

consciousness of such a position in the great family of mankind.

With regard to the overland trade of the Phœnicians with the Eastern

countries, little requires to be said except that it was one attended

with great risks――the journey of a caravan across the deserts, and

through the roaming tribes which separated Phœnicia from interior

Asia, being a more serious enterprise than a long sea voyage. It is

probable that the Phœnicians managed this commerce not in their own

persons, but as wealthy speculative merchants, dealing in a

skillful manner with the native Egyptian, Assyrian, or Arabian

caravan-proprietors, with whom they maintained an understood

connection. At the same time it is likely that they stimulated and

regulated the Eastern commerce, by means of Phœnician agents or

emissaries despatched into the interior with general instructions,

just as in later times European agents were often despatched into the

interior of Africa to direct the movements of native merchants. It was

in their maritime trade with the West, however, that the Phœnicians

chiefly exhibited the resources of their own character. Shipping the

Oriental commodities, as well as their native products, at Tyre or

Sidon, they carried them to all the coasts of the Mediterranean as far

as Spain, selling them there at immense profit, and returning with

freights of Western goods. With some of the nations of the

Mediterranean their intercourse would be that of one civilized nation

with another; with others, and especially with those of the West, it

must have been an intercourse similar to that of a British ship with

those rude islanders who exchange their valuable products for nails,

bits of looking-glass, and other trifles. Whether their customers were

civilized or savage, however, the Phœnicians reaped profits from them.

Their aim was to monopolise the commerce of the Mediterranean. ‘If at

any time,’ it is said, ‘their ships bound on a voyage observed that a

stranger kept them company, or followed them in their track, they were

sure to get rid of him, or deceive him if they could; and in this they

went so far as to venture the loss of their ships, and even of their

lives, so that they could but destroy or disappoint him; so jealous

were they of foreigners, and so bent on keeping all to themselves. And

to add to the dangers of the sea, and discourage other nations from

trading, they practiced piracy, or pretended to be at war with such as

they met when they thought themselves strongest.’ This policy

succeeded so far, that hardly a merchant ship was to be seen in the

Mediterranean not manned by Phœnicians. From this extension of the

Phœnician commerce throughout the Mediterranean resulted, by

necessity, an extensive system of colonization. The distance, for

instance, of Spain from Phœnicia, rendered all the greater by the

ancient custom of always sailing close by the coast, made it necessary

for the Phœnician traders to have intermediate ports, settlement, or

factories, to which their vessels might resort, not to say that such

settlements were required for the collection of the produce which was

to be taken back to Phœnicia. Accordingly, in process of time,

Phœnician colonies were established at all available points of the

Mediterranean――on the coasts of Africa, Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain,

and in the Balearic Islands; the rising maritime spirit of the Greeks

excluding the Phœnicians from the Ægean and the coasts of Asia Minor.

Among the most ancient of the colonies from Tyre were Carthage and

Utica on the African coast, and Gades (Cadiz) in Spain; all of which

were founded before the first of the Greek Olympiads (B. C. 884). From

these afterwards arose smaller settlements, which diffused the

Phœnician agency still more extensively among the uncivilized nations

of Africa and western Europe. Gades in Spain, situated, according to

the ancient mode of navigation, at a distance of seventy-five days’

sail from Tyre and Sidon――a distance larger than that which now

divides Liverpool from Bombay――was a colony of special importance;

first, as commanding the inland Spanish trade, particularly valuable

at that time, inasmuch as the gold and silver mines of Spain caused it

to be regarded as the Mexico or Peru of the ancient world; and

secondly, as forming a point from which the Phœnician commerce could

be still farther extended along the extra-Mediterranean shores. From

this point, we are told, the Phœnician ships extended their voyages

southward for thirty days’ sail along the coast of Africa, and

northwards as far as Britain, where they took in tin from Cornwall,

and even as far as the Baltic, where they collected amber. Upon what a

scale of profit must these expeditions have been conducted, when, from

Tyre to Cornwall, not a merchant ship besides those of the Phœnicians

was to be seen! And who can tell what influence these Phœnician visits

may have had on the then rude nations bordering the Atlantic?――or how

far these ante-historic Phœnician impulses may have stimulated the

subsequent career of these nations? Like the visit of an English

merchantman now to a South Sea Island, so must have been the visit of

a Phœnician trading vessel 3000 years ago to the Britons of Cornwall.

As might be expected, this great merchant people were among the most

cultured of antiquity, and especially skilled in all the arts of

luxurious living. The 27th chapter of the book of Ezekiel presents a

most striking picture of the pride and magnificence of the Tyrians,

and embodies many minute particulars relative to Phœnician customs and

mode of life. Indeed it has been pronounced the most early and most

authentic record extant relative to the commerce of the ancients.

Among the contributions made by the Phœnicians to the west, were

alphabetical writing, the Greek alphabet being a derivative from the

Phœnician; the scale of weight; and that of coined money. Having made

these and other contributions to the west, Phœnicia began about (700

B. C.) to decline in importance; the Ionian Greeks, and latterly the

Egyptians, becoming its commercial rivals on the Mediterranean: and

the invasions of the Assyrians from the east depriving it of

independence. Subdued by the Assyrians and Babylonians, Phœnicia was

transferred by them to the Persians. Among the last of the Phœnician

achievements was the circumnavigation of Africa B. C. 600――a feat

undertaken by Phœnician sailors at the command of the Egyptian king

Nekos, one of the immediate successors of Psammetik: and, as is now

believed, really performed――the course pursued being from the Red Sea

round Africa to Spain――the reverse, therefore, of that followed by

Vasco de Gama 2000 years later. About the time that Phœnicia began to

wane, her colony, Carthage, assumed her place in the affairs of the

world. Carthaginian civilization was essentially a mere repetition of

the Phœnician, although under a different form of government;

Carthaginian history interweaves itself with that of the Romans.

PALESTINE――THE JEWS. Palestine extends from north to south a length of

about 200 miles, and 50 in breadth; and is therefore, in point of

size, of nearly the same extent as Scotland. The general character of

the country is that of a hilly region, interspersed with moderately

fertile vales; and being thus irregular in surface, it possesses a

number of brooks or streams, which for the most part are swollen

considerably after rains, but are almost dry in the hot seasons of the

year. The present condition of Palestine scarcely corresponds with its

ancient fertility. This is chiefly attributable to the devastating

effects of perpetual wars; and some physical changes have also

contributed to the destruction of agricultural industry. Yet, after

all, so excellent would the soil appear to be, and so ample its

resources, that Canaan may still be characterized as a land flowing

with milk and honey.

The history of the extraordinary nation which once inhabited this

land, must be so much more familiar to our readers than that of any

other ancient nation, that all that is necessary here is a brief

sketch, such as will assist the imagination in tracing with due

completeness the general career of the East till the establishment of

the Persian empire. According to the accounts given of the Jews in

Scripture, and in their history by Josephus, they were descended from

Abraham, who was born in the 292d year (according to other

authorities, in the 352d year) after the Deluge, ‘left the land of

Chaldea when he was seventy-five years old, and, at the command of

God, went into Canaan, and therein he dwelt himself, and left it to

his posterity. He was a person of great sagacity, both for

understanding of all things and persuading his hearers, and not

mistaken in his opinions; for which reason he began to have higher

notions of virtue than others had, and he determined to renew and to

change the opinion all men happened then to have concerning God; for

he was the first that ventured to publish this notion, that there was

but ONE God, the Creator of the universe; and that as to other gods,

if they contributed anything to the happiness of men, that each of

them afforded it only according to His appointment, and not by their

own power. For which doctrines, when the Chaldæans and other people of

Mesopotamia raised a tumult against him, he thought fit to leave that

country, and at the command of God he came and lived in the land of

Canaan. And when he was there settled, he built an altar, and

performed a sacrifice to God.’ After the death of Abraham’s son Isaac,

_his_ younger son Jacob remained for a number of years in Canaan,

surrounded by a family of twelve sons, one of whom, Joseph, as related

in Scripture, became the cause of the removal of his father and

brethren, and all belonging to them, into Egypt. The Hebrew emigrants

were seventy in number, and formed at the first a respectable colony

among the Egyptians. Jacob died after having been seventeen years in

Egypt, and his body was carried by Joseph to Hebron, and buried in the

sepulchre of his father and grandfather. Joseph also died in Egypt at

the age of 110, and at length his brethren died likewise. Each of the

twelve sons of Jacob became the progenitor of a family or tribe, and

the twelve tribes, personified by the term ISRAEL, continued to reside

in Egypt, where they increased both in number and in wealth. Their

rapid increase and prosperity soon excited the jealousy of the masters

of the country; and from being in high favor, the different tribes

gradually fell under the lash of power, and came to be treated as

public slaves.

The entire body of Israelites, guided by Moses, fled from Egypt in the

year 1490 before Christ, at a time when Thebes, Memphis, and the other

magnificent cities of that country, were in all their glory.

Proceeding in a north-easterly direction from Rameses (near the site

of modern Cairo), they went through the level region of the land of

Goshen (now a barren sandy plain) to the head of the Gulf of Suez, the

western branch of the Red Sea. Here they crossed in a miraculous

manner to the opposite shore, to a spot now called the Wells of Moses,

where, according to the Scripture narrative, they sang their song of

thanksgiving for their deliverance. The country in which they had now

arrived was a portion of Arabia Petræa, consisting of a dismal barren

wilderness, now called the Desert of Sinai, from the principal

mountain which rises within it. From the point at which the Israelites

had crossed the Red Sea from Egypt, they were conducted by a most

circuitous and tedious route towards the Promised Land of Canaan.

The country on the shore of the Mediterranean which was allotted as a

settlement to this people, was at that time occupied by many warlike

tribes, who had grown strong in its fertile plains and valleys; and

the generation of the Hebrews who were conducted into it were

compelled to fight for its possession. The struggle was not of long

continuance. The whole land was conquered in the year B. C. 1450.

According to the account given in the 26th chapter of the book of

Numbers, the Hebrew nation thus brought out of the land of Egypt and

settled in Canaan amounted to 601,730 souls, unto whom the land was

divided for an inheritance, according to the number of individuals in

the respective tribes.

Moses dying before the inheritance was entered upon, was succeeded by

Joshua as a leader, and by him the Israelites were conducted across

the Jordan. The political government of the various tribes, after

their conquest and settlement of Canaan, appears to have been

republican, with military leaders called Judges; but these acted by

the direction of the Priesthood, who were immediately counseled by the

Deity within the sanctuary. This period of separate government in

tribes, called the Period of the Judges, lasted 300 years (B. C.

1427-1112), and was one of daring actions and great deliverances――the

heroic age of the Jews.

The epoch of kings succeeded that of judges. The reign of Saul, their

first monarch, though the people were stronger by being united, was

gloomy and troubled. David, who succeeded, was a soldier and a

conqueror. He rendered the Hebrews formidable to the whole of their

enemies, and gave them a regular and defensible position, expelling

their old antagonists from every part of the country. He left an

empire peaceful, respected, and strong; and, what was of as much

importance, he selected from among his sons a successor who was able

to improve all these advantages, and to add to the progress which his

countrymen had already made in prosperity. Under Solomon, the name of

the Hebrew government being able to protect its subjects in other

countries, the people and their king began to employ themselves in

commerce. Their trade was at first engrafted on that of the Phœnicians

of Tyre. A greater contrast cannot be imagined than between the

troubles of the time of the Judges (only 100 years before), and the

peace, security, and enjoyment of this reign. ‘And the king made

silver to be in Jerusalem as stones, and cedars made he to be as

sycamore trees that are in the vale for abundance; and Judah and

Israel were many; as the sand which is by the sea-shore for multitude,

eating, and drinking, and making merry.’ (1 Kings, x. 27.)

After the death of Solomon, the country fell into the same divisions

which had weakened it in the time of the Judges. Each of the districts

of North and South Israel was under a separate king, and the people

were exposed both to the attacks of their enemies and to quarrels with

each other. Their history is a succession of agitating conflicts for

independence, and of unexpected and remarkable deliverances, of a

similar nature to those of the earlier period, and they continued for

about the same length of time (380 years); but they are marked by

fewer of those traits of heroic devotion which distinguished the epoch

of the Judges. The backslidings, errors, and misgovernment of their

kings, is the chief and painful subject which is presented to us; and

though these are relieved at times by the appearance of such monarchs

as Josiah, Jehoshaphat, and Hezekiah, yet the whole history of this

period is overcast with the gloominess of progressive decline.

By far the most delightful parts of it are those which relate to the

lives of the prophets, who were raised up at intervals to warn the

nation and its rulers of the fate which they incurred by forsaking the

religion of their fathers. These inspired men sometimes sprang up from

among the humblest classes of the community: one from the ‘herdsmen of

Tekoa,’ another from ‘ploughing with twelve yoke of oxen;’ several

were of the priestly order, and one (Isaiah) is said to have been of

royal lineage; but the works of all are marked with the same

sacredness, force, and authority. They reprehend their countrymen, in

the most eloquent strains, at one time for idolatry, and at another

for hypocrisy; and their indignation is expressed with the same

freedom and dignity against the vices of the highest and the lowest.

Of the two kingdoms into which Palestine divided itself after the

death of Solomon (B. C. 975), the northern, called the Kingdom of

Israel, was conquered by the Assyrians of Nineveh (B. C. 722), who

carried off many thousand of the people into captivity. Little is

known of their fate. By some they are supposed to have been carried to

India, by others to Tartary: ‘what became of all the Israelites of the

ten tribes,’ is still a question with historians. The southern

kingdom, called the kingdom of Judah, retained its independence till

B. C. 588, when it was invaded and subdued by Nebuchadnezzar, king of

Babylon, who destroyed Jerusalem, and carried away a great number of

the principal Jews into captivity at Babylon. On the subversion of the

Babylonian dominion by Cyrus, seventy years afterwards, the captives,

to the number of 42,360, were permitted to return to their own land,

and rebuild Jerusalem. At this period, the whole of Palestine merged

in the growing Persian empire.

THE ASSYRIANS AND BABYLONIANS. That large extent of level country

situated between and on the banks of the two great rivers, the

Euphrates and the Tigris, was in the earliest antiquity, the seat of a

Semitic population living under an organized government. Of the

cities, the most important ultimately were Babylon, built, by Nimrod,

(B. C. 2217); and Nineveh (called Ninos by the Greeks), built either

by Asshur or Nimrod about the same time, but afterwards rebuilt and

enlarged, according to ancient tradition, by a great king, Ninus, (B.

C. 1230). With these two cities as capitals, the country divided

itself into two corresponding parts or kingdoms――the kingdom of

Assyria proper, including, besides part of Mesopotamia, the country to

the right of the Tigris as far as Mount Zagros; and the kingdom of

Babylonia, including the western part of Mesopotamia, together with

the country to the left of the Euphrates as far as Syria proper. The

two kingdoms, however, are often included under the joint name of

Assyria; a word which, as well as the shorter form Syria, was often

employed by the ancient Greek writers to designate the whole region

lying along the courses of the two great rivers from the Black Sea to

the northern angle of the Persian Gulf.

Although Babylon was according to Scripture, the earlier of the two

powers, yet the Assyrians of Nineveh attained such strength under

their hero Ninus, as to reduce the Babylonians to a species of

dependence. Under Ninus, and his wife and successor the great

conqueress Semiramis, says ancient mythical history, the city of the

Tigris extended its dominions far and wide, from Egypt to the border

of India. This empire, known in the common chronologies by the name of

‘The Assyrian Empire,’ lasted, according to the usual accounts, five

or six centuries, during which it was governed, in the absolute

Oriental manner, by the successors of Ninus and Semiramis. Of these

several are mentioned in Scripture――Phul, the contemporary of Menahem,

king of Israel (B. C. 761), Tiglath Pileser (B. C. 730), both of whom

were mixed up with the affairs of Israel and Judah; Salmanassar,

cotemporary with Hezekiah, king of Judah, and Hoseah, king of Israel,

by whom it was that Samaria was taken (B. C. 722), and the Israelites

led into captivity (B. C. 722); and Sennacherib, or Sanherib (B. C.

714), who attacked Egypt, and whose fruitless invasion of Judah forms

the subject of the striking narrative in the 18th and 19th chapters of

the second book of Kings. The last of the great line of the Assyrian

kings of Nineveh was the luxurious Sardanapalus, in whose reign the

empire was dissolved, through the instrumentality of its revolted

subjects the Medes (B. C. 626).

After Nineveh, the greatest city in the Assyrian dominion was Babylon.

Even while under the dominion of the kings of Nineveh, Babylon appears

to have possessed a special organization under its own chiefs, several

of whose names――such as Beldesis (B. C. 888), and Nabonassar (B. C.

747)――have been preserved; and, together with the whole province of

which it was the capital, to have pursued a special career. The

peculiar element in the Babylonian society which distinguished it from

that of Assyria proper, was its Chaldæan priesthood. ‘The Chaldæan

order of priests,’ says Mr. Grote, ‘appear to have been peculiar to

Babylon and other towns in its territory, especially between that city

and the Persian Gulf; the vast, rich, and lofty temple of Belus in

that city served them at once as a place of worship and an

astronomical observatory; and it was the paramount ascendancy of this

order which seems to have caused the Babylonian people generally to be

spoken of as Chaldæans, though some writers have supposed, without any

good proof, a conquest of Assyrian Babylon by barbarians called

Chaldæans from the mountains near the Euxine. There were exaggerated

statements respecting the antiquity of their astronomical

observations,[2] which cannot be traced, as of definite and recorded

date, higher than the era of Nabonassar (B. C. 747), as well as

respecting the extent of their acquired knowledge, so largely blended

with astrological fancies and occult influences of the heavenly bodies

on human affairs. But however incomplete their knowledge may appear

when judged by the standard of after-times, there can be no doubt

that, compared with any of their cotemporaries of the sixth century B.

C.――either Egyptians, Greeks, or Asiatics――they stood preëminent, and

had much to teach, not only to Thales and Pythagoras, but even to

later inquirers, such as Eudoxus and Aristotle. The conception of the

revolving celestial sphere, the gnomon, and the division of the day

into twelve parts, are affirmed by Herodotus to have been first taught

to the Greeks by the Babylonians.’ This learned Chaldæan class seems

to have pervaded the general mass of Babylonian society, as the

corresponding priest-caste in Egypt pervaded Egyptian society, with

this difference, that Babylonian society does not appear to have been

parceled out like the Egyptian into a rigorous system of castes.

On the dissolution of the Assyrian empire of Nineveh by the Medes (B.

C. 626), the Chaldæan fragment of it rose to eminence on its ruins,

chiefly by the efforts of Nabopolassar, a viceroy of the last Assyrian

king. Establishing Babylonia as an independent power in the east,

Nabopolassar came into collision with Nekos, king of Egypt, who was at

that time extending his empire into Asia. It was in opposing Nekos

(Pharaoh-Necho) on his march to Babylon, that Josiah, king of Judah,

was slain. At length (B. C. 608) Nebuchadnezzar, or Nebuchodonosor,

the son of Nabopolassar, defeated Nekos, and annexed all his conquests

in Asia to his father’s kingdom. Two years afterwards the same prince

took Jerusalem, and carried away a number of captives to Babylon,

among whom were Daniel and his companions. Succeeding his father, B.

C. 605, Nebuchadnezzar reigned over Babylon forty-three years (B. C.

605-561); and during his reign extended the empire to the

Mediterranean and the borders of Egypt, adding to it Palestine,

Phœnicia, etc. With his countenance the Medes and Lydians destroyed

Nineveh (B. C. 601). The great abduction of Jewish captives by his

orders took place B. C. 588. He was succeeded (B. C. 561) by his son,

Evil-Merodach, who was dethroned (B. C. 559) by his brother-in-law

Neriglissar, whose son and successor, Laboroso-archod, was dethroned,

after a brief reign, by Nabonnedus, the Belshazzar of Scripture (B. C.

555); in the eighteenth year of whose reign (B. C. 538) Babylon was

taken by Cyrus, and passed into the hands of the Persians.

It was during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar that the city of Babylon

attained that glory which has rendered it a known word to all who are

at all acquainted with history. Herodotus, who saw the city in its

decline, gives a description of it which has seemed incredible to

many, although now fully verified. ‘The city, divided in the middle by

the Euphrates, was surrounded with walls in thickness 75 feet, in

height 300 feet and in compass 480 stadia, or about 60 of our miles.’

Within this circuit there was included, besides the houses, a space of

vacant ground, gardens, pasture, etc., sufficient to accommodate the

country population in case of invasion: the height and strength of the

walls rendered the city itself to all appearance impregnable. ‘These

walls formed an exact square, each side of which was 120 stadia, or 15

miles in length; and were built of large bricks cemented together with

bitumen, a glutinous slime which issues out of the earth in that

country, and in a short time becomes harder than the very brick or

stone which it cements. The city was encompassed without the walls of

a vast ditch filled with water, and lined with bricks on both sides;

and as the earth that was dug out of it served to make the bricks, we

may judge of the depth and largeness of the ditch from the height and

thickness of the walls. In the whole compass of the walls there were a

hundred gates――that is, twenty-five on each side, all made of solid

brass. At intervals round the walls were 250 towers. From each of the

twenty-five gates there was a straight street extending to the

corresponding gate, in the opposite wall; the whole number of streets

was therefore fifty, crossing each other at right angles, and each

fifteen miles long. The breadth of the streets was about 150 feet. By

their intersection the city was divided into 676 squares, each about

two miles and a quarter in compass, round which were the houses, three

or four stories in height; the vacant spaces within being laid out in

gardens,’ etc. Within the city the two greatest edifices were the

royal palace with its hanging gardens, and the temple of Belus,

composed of eight towers built one above another, to the enormous

height, it is said, of a furlong.

Without the city were numerous canals, embankments, etc., for the

purpose of irrigating the country, which, as little or no rain fell,

depended on the river for moisture. ‘The execution of such colossal

works as those of Babylon and Egypt,’ it has been remarked,

‘demonstrates habits of regular industry, a concentrated population

under one government, and above all, an implicit submission to the

regal and kingly sway――contrasted forcibly with the small

self-governing communities of Greece and western Europe, where the

will of the individual citizen was so much more energetic.’ In the

latter countries only such public works were attempted as were within

the limits of moderate taste. Nineveh is said to have been larger even

than Babylon, and is described as an oblong, three days’ journey

round――that is, upwards of 60 miles.

THE MEDES AND PERSIANS. Extending, as we have said, from the

Mediterranean to the Indus, the Assyrian empire had included not only

the chief Semitic nations of western Asia, but also that portion of

the Indo-Germanic family which was contained between Mount Zagros and

the river Indus. Essentially a prolongation of the great race which

inhabited Hindoostan, the nature of their country――a vast table-land,

here and there rising into hills, or presenting spots of great

fertility――had made them quite different in character and habits from

the settled and stereotyped Hindoos. All parts of this plateau of

Iran, as it was called, including the present countries of Persia,

Cabool, and Belochistan, were not alike; in some portions, where the

soil was fertile, there existed a dense agricultural population; in

others, the inhabitants were nomadic horse-breeders, cattle-rearers,

and shepherds. All the tribes, however, were bound together by the

ties of a common Indo-Persic language, quite distinct from that spoken

by their Semitic neighbors and masters, and by a common religion. This

religion, called the Religion of Zend, a modification probably of some

more ancient form, from which Hindooism may also have sprung, was

taught by Zerdusht or Zoroaster, a great native reformer and spiritual

teacher, who lived six or seven centuries before Christ. The principal

doctrine of his religion was that of the existence of two great

emanations from the Supreme and perfect Deity――the one a good spirit

(Ormuzd), who created man, and fitted him for happiness; the other an

evil spirit, named Ahriman, who has marred the beauty of creation by

introducing evil into it. Between these two spirits and their

adherents there is an incessant struggle for the mastery; but

ultimately Ormuzd will conquer, and Ahriman and evil will be banished

from the bosom of creation into eternal darkness. The worship annexed

to this doctrine was very simple, dispensing with temples or images,

and consisting merely of certain solemn rites performed on mountain

tops, etc. Fire, and light, and the sun, were worshiped either as

symbols or as inferior deities. A caste of priests, called the Magi,

answering in some respects to the Brahmins of India or the Chaldæans

of Babylon, superintended these ceremonies, and commented on the

religion of Zoroaster.

Various of the tribes of Iran, associating themselves together,

constituted little nations. Thus adjacent to Assyria, and separated

from it by Mount Zagros, was an agglomeration of seven tribes or

villages, under the special name of the Medes, the country which they

inhabited being thence called Media. South from Media, and nearer the

sea, was another district of Iran, called Persis or Persia, inhabited

also by an association of tribes calling themselves the Persians.

Other nations of Iran were the Parthians, the Bactrians, etc.――all

originally subject to the Assyrian empire.

Median history begins with a hero king called Deiokes (B. C. 710-657),

who effected some important changes in the constitution of the nation,

and founded the Median capital Ekbatana in one of the most pleasant

sites in the world. His son, Phraortes (B. C. 657-635), pursued a

career of conquest, subjugated Persia and other districts of Iran, and

perished in an invasion of Assyria. He was succeeded by his son

Cyaxares, who continued his designs of conquest, and extended the

Median dominion as far westward into Asia Minor as the river Halys. He

was engaged in a repetition of his father’s attempt against Nineveh,

when he was called away to defend his kingdom against a great roving

population, belonging, as is most likely, to the Scythian branch of

the Caucasian race (although some reckon them Mongols), who, bursting

with their herds of horses and mares from their native seat in Central

Asia, had driven the Cimmerians, a kindred race, before them into Asia

Minor, and then had poured themselves over the plateau of Iran.

Defeating Cyaxares, they kept him from his throne for a period of

twenty-eight years, during which they ruled in savage fashion over

Media, Persia, etc. At length, having assassinated their chiefs by a

stratagem, Cyaxares regained his dominions, and drove the invaders

back into the north. He then renewed his attempt against Nineveh; took

it; and reduced the Assyrian empire, with the exception of Babylonia,

under his dominion. The Median empire, thus formed, he bequeathed (B.

C. 595) to his son Astyages.

Astyages having given his daughter Mandane in marriage to a Persian

chieftain named Cambyses, the issue of this marriage was the famous

Cyrus, the founder of the Persian monarchy. The circumstances which

led to the revolt of the Persians under Cyrus against the Medes, and

the dethronement by him of his grand-father Astyages (B. C. 560), had

been woven into a romance resembling the story of Romulus, even so

early as the age of Herodotus (B. C. 408), so that that accurate

historian could not ascertain the particulars. ‘The native Persians,’

says Mr. Grote, ‘whom Cyrus conducted, were an aggregate of seven

agricultural and four nomadic tribes, all of them rude, hardy, and

brave, dwelling in a mountainous region, clothed in skins, ignorant of

wine or fruit, of any of the commonest luxuries of life, and despising

the very idea of purchase or sale. Their tribes were very unequal in

point of dignity; first in estimation among them stood the Pasargadæ;

and the first clan among the Pasargadæ were the Achæmenidæ, to whom

Cyrus belonged. Whether his relationship to the Median king whom he

dethroned was a fact or a politic fiction we cannot well determine,

but Xenophon gives us to understand that the conquest of Media by the

Persians was reported to him as having been an obstinate and

protracted struggle.’

Master of Media, the Persian chief in his turn became a great Oriental

conqueror; indeed all the Oriental conquests bear the same character.

A nomadic race, led by a chief of great abilities, invades the more

organized states, and conquers them; the chief assumes the government,

and founds a dynasty, which after a rule of several generations,

becomes enervated, and gives way before some new nomadic incursion.

The first power against which Cyrus turned his arms, after having

subdued the Medes, was the famous Lydian kingdom, which then subsisted

in Asia Minor under the great Crœsus. And here, therefore, we must

give some account of the ancient condition of Asia Minor and its

principalities.

STATES OF ASIA MINOR――THE LYDIANS. The river Halys divided Asia Minor

into two parts. East of the Halys, or near its source, were various

nations of the Semitic stock――Cappadocians, Cilicians, Pamphylians

etc.――each organized apart, but all included under the Assyrian, and

latterly, as we have seen, under the Median empire. West of the Halys,

the inhabitants were apparently of the Indo-Germanic race, although

separated by many removes from the Indo-Germans of Persia.

Overspreading this part of Asia Minor, as well as Thrace and other

parts of south-eastern Europe, this great race had been broken up into

fragments distinguished by characteristic differences. To enumerate

these various nations, assigning to each its exact geographical

limits, is impossible; the chief, however, were the Bithynians, a sort

of Asiatic Thracians on the southern coast of the Euxine; the Lydians

and Carians in the south-west; and, intermediate between the two,

geographically as well as in respect of race and language, the Mysians

and Phrygians. These were the native states; but along the whole Ægean

shore was diffused a large Greek population, emigrants, it is

believed, from European Greece, chiefly gathered into cities. These

Greeks of Asia Minor were of three races――the Æolic Greeks in the

north, and the Ionian and Dorian Greeks in the south; and perhaps the

earliest manifestations of Greek genius, political or literary, were

among these Greeks of Asia. The intercourse of these Greeks with the

native Lydians, Phrygians, etc., gave rise to mixture of population as

well as to interchange of habits; the native music especially of the

Lydians and Phrygians became incorporated with that of the Greeks.

When Lydia, with its capital Sardis, first began to be a powerful

state, is not known; it is remarkable, however, that the Lydians are

not mentioned in Homer. According to Herodotus, the Lydians traced

their history back through three dynasties. 1_st_, The Atyadæ, from

the earliest times to B. C. 1221; 2_d_, The Heracleidæ, from B. C. 122

to B. C. 716; and 3_d_, The Mermnadæ. Only the last dynasty is

historic; the manner in which it succeeded to that of the Heracleidæ

forms the subject of a curious Lydian legend.

The first king of the Mermoad dynasty was Gyges (B. C. 716-678), the

second Ardys (B. C. 678-629), in whose reign the Cimmerians invaded

Asia Minor, the third Sadyattes (B. C. 629-617), the fourth Alyattes

(B. C. 617-560). Each of these Lydian kings was engaged in wars both

with the Asiatic Greeks of the coast and the native states of the

interior. The growth of the Lydian power was impeded by the Cimmerian

invasion; but those savage nomades were at length expelled by

Alyattes; and Crœsus, the son of Alyattes by an Ionian wife, having

succeeded his father B. C. 560, soon raised himself to the position of

a great potentate, ruling over nearly the whole country westward of

the Halys, comprehending Æolian, Ionian, and Dorian Greeks; Phrygians;

Mysians, Paphlagonians, Bithynians, Carians, Pamphylians, etc. At

Sardis, the capital of this extensive dominion, was accumulated an

immense treasure, composed of the tribute which the Lydian monarch

derived from the subject states; hence the proverb, ‘as rich as

Crœsus.’

Separated from the Median kingdom only by the river Halys, the Lydian

dominion naturally became an object of desire to Cyrus after he had

acquired the sovereignty of Media. Accordingly (B. C. 546), provoked

by an invasion of Crœsus, who had received from the Delphic oracle the

equivocal assurance, that ‘if he attacked the Persians he would

subvert a mighty monarchy,’ Cyrus crossed the Halys, advanced into

Lydia, took Sardis, and made Crœsus prisoner. It was intended by the

conqueror that the Lydian king should be burnt alive――it is even said

that the fire was kindled for the purpose; Cyrus, however, spared his

life, and Crœsus became his friend and confidential adviser. On the

subversion of the Lydian monarchy, its subjects, the Greeks of Asia

Minor, were obliged to submit to the conqueror, after having in

vain solicited the aid of their brethren the European Greeks. The

Lacedæmonians indeed sent an embassy into Asia Minor; and one of their

ambassadors had a conference with Cyrus at Sardis, where he warned him

‘not to lay hands on any of the Greek towns, for the Lacedæmonians

would not permit it.’ ‘Who are the Lacedæmonians?’ said the astonished

warrior. Having been informed that the Lacedæmonians were a Greek

people, who had a capital called Sparta, where there was a regular

market, ‘I have never yet,’ said he, ‘been afraid of this kind of men,

who have a set place in the middle of their city where they meet to

cheat one another and tell lies. If I live, they shall have troubles

of their own to talk about.’ To save themselves from the Persians, the

Ionian portion of the Asiatic Greeks proposed a universal emigration

to the island of Sardinia――a striking design, which, however, was not

carried into execution. All Asia Minor ultimately yielded to Cyrus.

THE PERSIAN EMPIRE. Having subdued Asia Minor, Cyrus next turned his

arms against the Assyrians of Babylon. His siege and capture of

Babylon (B. C. 538), when he effected his entrance by diverting the

course of the Euphrates, form one of the most romantic incidents in

history; an incident connected with Scriptural narrative through its

result――the emancipation of the Jews from their captivity. Along with

Babylon, its dependencies, Phœnicia and Palestine, came under the

Persians.

Cyrus, one of the most remarkable men of the ancient world, having

perished in an invasion of Scythia (B. C. 529), was succeeded by his

son Cambyses, who annexed Egypt to the Persian empire (B. C. 525),

having defeated Psammanitus, the son of the Pharaoh Amasis. Foiled in

his intention of penetrating Libya and Ethiopia, Cambyses was

dethroned by a Magian impostor, who called himself Smerdis, pretending

that he was the younger brother of Cambyses, although this brother had

been put to death by the order of Cambyses during a fit of madness. A

conspiracy of seven great nobles having been formed against the false

Smerdis, he was put to death. He was succeeded by one of the

conspiring chiefs called Darius Hystaspes, who reigned――over the

immense Persian empire, extending from the Nile to the Indus, and

beyond it――from B. C. 531 to B. C. 485. ‘The reign of Darius,’ says

Mr. Grote, ‘was one of organization, different from that of his

predecessor――a difference which the Persians well understood and

noted, calling Cyrus “the father,” Cambyses “the master,” and Darius

“the retail trader or huckster.” In the mouth of the Persians this

last epithet must be construed as no insignificant compliment, since

it intimates that he was the first to introduce some methodical order

into the imperial administration and finances. Under the two former

kings there was no definite amount of tribute levied upon the subject

provinces. But Darius probably felt it expedient to relieve the

provinces from the burden of undefined exactions. He distributed the

whole empire into twenty departments (called Satrapies), imposing upon

each a fixed annual tax. This, however, did not prevent each satrap

(the Persian governor appointed by the king) in his own province from

indefinite requisitions. The satrap was a little king, who acted

nearly as he pleased in the internal administration of his province,

subject only to the necessity of sending up the imperial tribute to

the king at Susa, the capital of the Persian empire; of keeping off

foreign enemies; and of furnishing an adequate military contingent for

the foreign enterprises of the great king. To every satrap was

attached a royal secretary or comptroller of the revenue, who probably

managed the imperial finances in the province, and to whom the court

of Susa might perhaps look as a watch upon the satrap himself. The

satrap or the secretary apportioned the sum payable by the satrapy in

the aggregate among the various component districts, towns, or

provinces, leaving to the local authorities in each of these latter

the task of assessing it upon individual inhabitants. From necessity,

therefore, as well as from indolence of temper and political

incompetence, the Persians were compelled to respect the authorities

which they found standing both in town and country, and to leave in

their hands a large measure of genuine influence. Often even the petty

kings who had governed separate districts during their state of

independence, prior to the Persian conquest, retained their title and

dignity as tributaries to the court of Susa. The empire of the great

king was thus an aggregate of heterogeneous elements, connected

together by no tie except that of common fear and subjection――noway

coherent nor self-supporting, nor pervaded by any common system or

spirit of nationality.’

CONTINUATION THROUGH GREEK AND ROMAN HISTORY. How Darius, in

consequence of the assistance rendered by the Athenians to the Ionian

Greeks of Asia Minor, who had revolted against him (B. C. 502), sent a

vast Persian army into European Greece; how this army was defeated by

the Athenian general, Miltiades, with only 11,000 men, in the glorious

battle of Marathon (B. C. 490); how, ten years later, Xerxes, the son

and successor of Darius, undertook an expedition against Greece with a

host of several millions, and was defeated by Themistocles in a naval

battle at Salamis (B. C. 480), which was followed by two

contemporaneous defeats of his lieutenants at Platæa and Mycale (B. C.

479); how the Persians were thus finally driven back into Asia; how

for a century and a-half relations, sometimes hostile and sometimes

friendly, were maintained between the Greek states and the Persian

monarchs, the degenerate successors of Darius and Xerxes, under whom

the empire had begun to crumble; how at length, in the reign of Darius

Codomannus (B. C. 324), Alexander the Great retaliated on the Persians

the wrongs they had done the Greeks by invading and destroying their

decrepit empire, and organizing all the countries between the Adriatic

and the Indus under, not a Semitic, as in the case of the Assyrian

empire, nor an Indo-Germanic, as in the case of the Persic empire, but

a Greek or Pelasgic system; how, on Alexander’s death (B. C. 323),

this vast agglomeration of the human species fell asunder into three

Greek monarchies――the Macedonian monarchy, including the states of

European Greece; the Egyptian monarchy of the Ptolemies, including,

besides Egypt, Phœnicia, Palestine, and Arabia; and the Syrian

monarchy of the Seleucidæ, comprehending, although with a weak grasp,

Asia Minor (or at least parts of it which had belonged to the Lydian

and Assyrian empires), Syria, Assyria, and Babylonia――with the loss,

however, of the countries between the Tigris and the Indus, where a

germ of independence arose (B. C. 236) in a native nomad dynasty,

which ultimately united all the tribes of Iran in one empire, called

_the Parthian_ _Empire_; and how these three fragments dragged on a

separate existence, full of wars and revolts; all this belongs to

Grecian history.

How, about two centuries and a half before Christ, another, but more

mixed portion of this Pelasgic family, which had arisen in Italy, and

in the course of several centuries rendered itself coëxtensive with

that peninsula――began to assume consequence in the wider area of the

Mediterranean world: how it first grappled with the power of the

Carthaginians (B. C. 264-201), who for several centuries had been

pursuing the career of world-merchants, formerly pursued by their

fathers the Phœnicians; how it then assailed and subdued the crumbling

Macedonian monarchy, incorporating all Greece with itself (B. C. 134);

how retrograding, so to speak, into Asia, it gradually absorbed the

Syrian and Egyptian monarchies, till it came into collision with the

Parthian empire at the Euphrates (B. C. 134-B. C. 60); how, advancing

into the new regions of northern and western Europe, it compelled the

yet uncultured races there――the Celts or Gauls, the Iberians, etc.――to

enter the pale of civilization (B. C. 80-50); how thus, from the

Atlantic to the Euphrates, was founded a new empire, called ‘The

Roman,’ retaining, with vast additions, all that portion of humanity

which the former empires had embraced, with the exception of what had

lapsed back to the Parthians; how this empire subsisted for several

centuries, a great mass of matured humanity girt by comparative

barbarism――that is, surrounded on the east by the Parthians, on the

south by the Ethiopians, on the north by the Germans and Scythians,

and on the west by the roar of the Atlantic; and how at last (A. D.

400-475) this great mass, having lost its vitality, fell asunder

before the irruption of the barbaric element――that is, the Germans,

the Scythians, and the Arabs――giving rise to the infant condition of

the modern world; all this belongs to Roman history, which forms the

subject of a separate treatise.

With one general remark we shall conclude; namely: that the progress

of history――that is, of Caucasian development――has evidently been,

upon the whole, from the east westward. First, as we have seen, the

Assyrian or Semitic fermentation affected western Asia as far as the

Mediterranean; then the Persian movement extended the historic stage

to the Ægean; after that the Macedonian conquest extended it to the

Adriatic; and finally, the Romans extended it to the Atlantic. For

fifteen centuries humanity kept dashing itself against this barrier;

till, at length, like a great missionary sent in search, the spirit of

Columbus shot across the Atlantic. And now, in the form of a dominant

Anglic race, though with large inter-mixture, Caucasian vitality is

working in its newest method, with Ethiopian help, on the broad and

fertile field of America.