mplished it, he crept into the centre of the city by the dry bed of
the river. If the Babylonians had kept proper guard, the Persians would
probably have been surrounded and caught like fish in a net; but on that
particular day they were keeping one of their festivals, and continued
their dancing and singing till they suddenly found the streets alive
with the enemy.

Babylon suffered in no way by her servitude, and far from its being a
source of unhappiness to her, she actually rejoiced in it; she was rid
of Nabonidus, whose sacrilegious innovations had scandalised her piety,
and she possessed in Cyrus a legitimate sovereign since he had "taken
the hands of Bel." It pleased her to believe that she had conquered her
victor rather than been conquered by him, and she accommodated herself
to her Persian dynasty after the same fashion that she had in turn
accustomed herself to Cossaean or Elamite, Ninevite or Chaldaean dynasties
in days gone by. Nothing in or around the city was changed, and she
remained what she had been since the fall of Assyria, the real capital
of the regions situated between the Mediterranean and the Zagros. It
seems that none of her subjects--whether Syrians, Tyrians, Arabs, or
Idumaeans--attempted to revolt against their new master, but passively
accepted him, and the Persian dominion extended uncontested as far as
the isthmus of Suez; Cyprus even, and such of the Phoenicians as
were still dependencies of Egypt, did homage to her without further
hesitation. The Jews alone appeared only half satisfied, for the
clemency shown by Cyrus to their oppressors disappointed their hopes
and the predictions of their prophets. They had sung in anticipation of
children killed before their fathers' eyes, of houses pillaged, of
women violated, and Babylon, the glory of the empire and the beauty
of Chaldaean pride, utterly destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrha when
overthrown by Jahveh. "It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be
dwelt in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch
tent there; neither shall shepherds make their flocks to lie down there.
But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be
full of doleful creatures; and ostriches shall dwell there, and satyrs
shall dance there. And wolves shall cry in their castles, and jackals in
the pleasant palaces."*

* The table of the last kings of Ptolemy and the monuments,
is given below:--

[Illustration: