of Ctesiphon brought with it the submission of the whole
region on the lower courses of the great rivers, and gave the conqueror
access to the waters of a new sea. Trajan may be excused if he overrated
his successes, regarded himself as another Alexander, and deemed that
the great monarchy, so long the rival of Rome, was now at last swept
away, and that the entire East was on the point of being absorbed into
the Roman Empire. The capture by his lieutenants of the golden throne
of the Parthian kings may well have seemed to him emblematic of this
change; and the flight of Chosroes into the remote and barbarous regions
of the far East may have helped to lull his adversary into a feeling of
complete security. Such a feeling is implied in the pleasure voyage of
the conqueror down the Tigris to the Persian Gulf, in his embarkation
on the waters of the Southern Sea, in the inquiries which he instituted
with respect to Indian affairs, and in the regret to which he gave
utterance, that his advanced years prevented him from making India
the term of his labors. No shadow of his coming troubles seems to have
flitted before the eyes of the Emperor during the weeks that he was thus
occupied--weeks which he passed in self-complacent contemplation of the
past and dreams of an impossible future.

Suddenly, tidings of a most alarming kind dispelled his pleasing
visions, and roused him to renewed exertions. Revolt, he found, had
broken out everywhere in his rear. At Seleucia, at Hatra, at Nisibis,
at Edessa, the natives had flown to arms; his entire line of retreat was
beset by foes, and he ran a risk of having his return cut off, and
of perishing in the land which he had invaded. Trajan had hastily to
retrace his stops, and to send his generals in all directions to check
the spread of insurrection. Seleucia was recovered by Erucius Clarus
and Julius Alexander, who punished its rebellion by delivering it to the
flames. Lucius Quietus retook Nisibis, and plundered and burnt Edessa.
Maximus, on the contrary, was defeated and slain by the rebels, who
completely destroyed the Roman army under his orders. Trajan, perceiving
how slight his hold was upon the conquered populations, felt compelled
to change his policy, and, as the only mode of pacifying, even
temporarily, the growing discontent, instead of making Lower Mesopotamia
into a Roman province, as he had made Armenia, Upper Mesopotamia, and
Adiabene (or Assyria), he proceeded with much pom