tain extent by
three centuries of subjection to the Persians and the Greco-Macedonians
before they rose to power; they affected Persian manners; they
patronized Greek art, they appreciated the advantages of having in their
midst a number of Greek states. Had the Massagetse and their kindred
tribes of Sakas, Tochari, Dahse, Yue-chi, and Su, which now menaced the
Parthian power, succeeded in sweeping it away, the general declension of
all which is lovely or excellent in human life would have been marked.
Scythicism would have overspread Western Asia. No doubt the conquerors
would have learned something from those whom they subjected; but it
cannot be supposed that they would have learned much. The change would
have been like that which passed over the Empire of the West, when
Goths, Vandals, Burgundians, Alans, Heruli, depopulated its fairest
provinces and laid its civilization in the dust. The East would have
been barbarized; the gains of centuries would have been lost; the work
of Cyrus, Darius, Alexander, and other great benefactors of Asiatic
humanity, have been undone; Western Asia would have sunk back into a
condition not very much above that from which it was raised two thousand
years earlier by the primitive Chaldaeans and the Assyrians.

Artabanus II., the Parthian monarch who succeeded Phraates II., appears
to have appreciated aright the perils of his position. He was not
content, when the particular body of barbarians which had defeated and
slain his predecessor, having ravaged Parthia Proper, returned home,
to fold his arms and wait until he was again attacked. According to the
brief, but expressive words of Justin, he assumed the aggressive, and
invaded the country of the Tochari, one of the most powerful of the
Scythic tribes, which was now settled in a portion of the region that
had, till lately, belonged to the Bactrian kingdom. Artabanus evidently
felt that what was needed was to roll back the flood of invasion
which had advanced so near to the sacred home of his nation; that the
barbarians required to be taught a lesson; that they must at least be
made to understand that Parthia was to be respected; or that, if this
could not be done, the fate of the Empire was sealed. He therefore, with
a gallantry and boldness that we cannot sufficiently admire--a boldness
that seemed like rashness, but was in reality prudence--without
calculating too closely the immediate chances of battle, led his troops
against one