r neighbors. Robber bands in many places infested the mountains,
owing no allegiance to any one, and defied alike the satrap and the
standing army.

The condition of Persia Proper was also purely exceptional. Persia paid
no tribute, and was not counted as a satrapy. Its inhabitants were,
however, bound, when the king passed through their country, to bring him
gifts according to their means. This burthen may have been felt sensibly
by the rich, but it pressed very lightly on the poor, who, if they could
not afford an ox or a sheep, might bring a little milk or cheese, a
few dates, or a handful of wild fruit. On the other hand, the king was
bound, whenever he visited Pasargadae, to present to each Persian woman
who appeared before him a sum equal to twenty Attic drachmas, or about
sixteen shillings of our money. This custom commemorated the service
rendered by the sex in the battle wherein Cyrus first repulsed the
forces of Astyages.

The substitution of definite burthens on the subject in lieu of variable
and uncertain charges was aimed at, rather than effected, by the new
arrangement of the revenue which is associated with the name of Darius.
This arrangement consisted in fixing everywhere the amount of tribute
in money and in kind which each satrapy was to furnish to the crown. A
definite money payment, varying, in ordinary satrapies, from 170 to
1000 Babylonian silver talents,330 or from L42,000. to L250,000. of our
money, and amounting, in the exceptional case of the Indian satrapy, to
above a million sterling, was required annually by the sovereign,
and had to be remitted by the satrap to the capital. Besides this, a
payment, the nature and amount of which was also fixed, had to be made
in kind, each province being required to furnish that commodity, or
those commodities, for which it was most celebrated. This latter burthen
must have pressed very unequally on different portions of the Empire,
if the statement of Herodotus be true that Babylonia and Assyria paid
one-third of it. The payment seems to have been very considerable
in amount. Egypt had to supply grain sufficient for the nutriment of
120,000 Persian troops quartered in the country. Media had to contribute
100,000 sheep, 4000 mules, and 3000 horses; Cappadocia, half the above
number of each kind of animal; Armenia furnished 20,000 colts; Cilicia
gave 360 white horses and a sum of 140 talents (L35,000.) in lieu
of further tribute in kind. Babylonia, beside