pass slowly
before him in their ignominy and misery.

After the destruction of Babylon there is a pause in the history of
the conqueror, and with him in that of Assyria itself. It seems as
if Nineveh had been exhausted by the greatness of her effort, and
was stopping to take breath before setting out on a fresh career of
conquest: the other nations also, as if overwhelmed by the magnitude
of the catastrophe, appear to have henceforth despaired of their own
security, and sought only how to avoid whatever might rouse against them
the enmity of the master of the hour. His empire formed a compact and
solid block in their midst, on which no human force seemed capable of
making any impression. They had attacked it each in turn, or all at
once, Elam in the east, Urartu in the north, Egypt in the south-west,
and their efforts had not only miserably failed, but had for the most
part drawn down upon them disastrous reprisals. The people of Urartu
remained in gloomy inaction amidst their mountains, the Elamites had
lost their supremacy over half the Aramaean tribes, and if Egypt was as
yet inaccessible beyond the intervening deserts, she owed it less to the
strength of her armies than to the mysterious fatality at Libnah. In one
half-century the Assyrians had effectually and permanently disabled
the first of these kingdoms, and inflicted on the others such serious
injuries that they were slow in recovering from them. The fate of these
proud nations had intimidated the inferior states--Arabs, Medes, tribes
of Asia Minor, barbarous Cimmerians or Scythians,--all alike were
careful to repress their natural inclinations to rapine and plunder. If
occasionally their love of booty overpowered their prudence, and they
hazarded a raid on some defenceless village in the neighbouring border
territory, troops were hastily despatched from the nearest Assyrian
garrison, who speedily drove them back across the frontier, and pursuing
them into their own country, inflicted on them so severe a punishment
that they remained for some considerable time paralysed by awe and
terror. Assyria was the foremost kingdom of the East, and indeed of the
whole world, and the hegemony which she exercised over all the countries
within her reach cannot be accounted for solely by her military
superiority. Not only did she excel in the art of conquest, as many
before her had done--Babylonians, Elamites, Hittites, and Egyptians--but
she did what none of them had been a