peak; indeed it is not thought right for us even to raise
our eyes. How different it is with you! By Mithras! mother, I should
like to be an Egyptian, for we poor creatures are in reality nothing but
miserable slaves; and yet I feel that the great Cyrus was my father too,
and that I am worth quite as much as most men. Do I not speak the
truth? can I not obey as well as command? have I not the same thirst and
longing for glory? could not I learn to ride, to string a bow, to fight
and swim, if I were taught and inured to such exercises?"

The girl had sprung from her seat while speaking, her eyes flashed and
she swung her spindle in the air, quite unconscious that in so doing she
was breaking the thread and entangling the flax.

"Remember what is fitting," reminded Kassandane. "A woman must submit
with humility to her quiet destiny, and not aspire to imitate the deeds
of men."

"But there are women who lead the same lives as men," cried Atossa.
"There are the Amazons who live on the shores of the Thermodon in
Themiscyra, and at Comana on the Iris; they have waged great wars, and
even to this day wear men's armor."

"Who told you this?"

"My old nurse, Stephanion, whom my father brought a captive from Sinope
to Pasargadae."

"But I can teach you better," said Nitetis. "It is true that in
Themiscyra and Comana there are a number of women who wear soldier's
armor; but they are only priestesses, and clothe themselves like the
warlike goddess they serve, in order to present to the worshippers a
manifestation of the divinity in human form. Croesus says that an army
of Amazons has never existed, but that the Greeks, (always ready
and able to turn anything into a beautiful myth), having seen these
priestesses, at once transformed the armed virgins dedicated to the
goddess into a nation of fighting women."

"Then they are liars!" exclaimed the disappointed girl.

"It is true, that the Greeks have not the same reverence for truth as
you have," answered Nitetis, "but they do not call the men who invent
these beautiful stories liars; they are called poets."

"Just as it is with ourselves," said Kassandane. "The poets, who sing
the praises of my husband, have altered and adorned his early life in
a marvellous manner; yet no one calls them liars. But tell me, my
daughter, is it true that these Greeks are more beautiful than other
men, and understand art better even than the Egyptians?"

"On that subject I should not venture