with
greater ease than the others.

The conquest of all Syria as far as Euphrates and the subjection of even a
part of Mesopotamia aided the diffusion of the Semitic religions in still
another manner. From these regions, which were partly inhabited by fighting
races, the Caesars drew recruits for the imperial army. They levied a great
number of {112} legionaries, but especially auxiliary troops, who were
transferred to the frontiers. Troopers and foot-soldiers from those
provinces furnished important contingents to the garrisons of Europe and
Africa. For instance, a cohort of one thousand archers from Emesa was
established in Pannonia, another of archers from Damascus in upper Germany;
Mauretania received irregulars from Palmyra, and bodies of troops levied in
Ituraea, on the outskirts of the Arabian desert, were encamped in Dacia,
Germany, Egypt and Cappadocia at the same time. Commagene alone furnished
no less than six cohorts of five hundred men each that were sent to the
Danube and into Numidia.[20]

The number of inscriptions consecrated by soldiers proves both the ardor of
their faith and the diversity of their beliefs. Like the sailors of to-day
who are transferred to strange climes and exposed to incessant danger, they
were constantly inclined to invoke the protection of heaven, and remained
attached to the gods who seemed to remind them in their exile of the
distant home country. Therefore it is not surprising that the Syrians who
served in the army should have practised the religion of their Baals in the
neighborhood of their camps. In the north of England, near the wall of
Hadrian, an inscription in verse in honor of the goddess of Hierapolis has
been found; its author was a prefect, probably of a cohort of Hamites
stationed at this distant post.[21]

Not all the soldiers, however, went to swell the ranks of believers
worshiping divinities that had long been adopted by the Latin world, as did
that officer. They also brought along new ones that had come from a still
greater distance than their predecessors, in fact {113} from the outskirts
of the barbarian world, because from those regions in particular trained
men could be obtained. There were, for instance, _Baltis_, an "Our Lady"
from Osroene beyond the Euphrates;[22] _Aziz_, the "strong god" of Edessa,
who was identified with the star Lucifer;[23] _Malakbel_, the "Lord's
messenger," patron of the soldiers from Palmyra, who appeared with several
companio