f the information which he was able to
communicate with respect to the disposition of the Roman forces and the
condition of their magazines. This individual, ennobled by the royal
authority, and given a place at the royal table, gained great influence
over his new master, whom he stimulated by alternately reproaching him
with his backwardness in the past, and putting before him the prospect
of easy triumphs over Rome in the future. He pointed out that the
emperor, with the bulk of his troops and treasures, was detained in
the regions adjoining the Danube, and that the East was left almost
undefended; he magnified the services which he was himself competent to
render; he exhorted Sapor to bestir himself, and to put confidence
in his good fortune. He recommended that the old plan of sitting down
before walled towns should be given up, and that the Persian monarch,
leaving the strongholds of Mesopotamia in his rear, should press forward
to the Euphrates, pour his troops across it, and overrun the rich
province of Syria, which he would find unguarded, and which had not been
invaded by an enemy for nearly a century. The views of Antoninus were
adopted; but, in practice, they were overruled by the exigencies of the
situation. A Roman army occupied Mesopotamia, and advanced to the
banks of the Tigris. When the Persians in full force crossed the river,
accompanied by Chionite and Albanian allies, they found a considerable
body of troops prepared to resist them. Their opponents did not, indeed
offer battle, but they laid waste the country as the Persians took
possession of it; they destroyed the forage, evacuated the indefensible
towns (which fell, of course, into the enemy's hands), and fortified
the line of the Euphrates with castles, military engines, and palisades.
Still the programme of Antoninus would probably have been carried out,
had not the swell of the Euphrates exceeded the average, and rendered it
impossible for the Persian troops to ford the river at the usual point
of passage into Syria. On discovering this obstacle, Antoninus suggested
that, by a march to the north-east through a fertile country, the "Upper
Euphrates" might be reached, and easily crossed, before its waters had
attained any considerable volume. Sapor agreed to adopt this suggestion.
He marched from Zeugma across the Mons Masius towards the Upper
Euphrates, defeated the Romans in an important battle near Arnida,
took, by a sudden assault, two castles