ngerous in this last century of Egyptian
independence; it caused the fall of the Mendesian dynasty in the very
face of the enemy, and the prince of Sebennytos, Nakht-har-habit,
Nectanebo I., was raised to the throne by the military faction.
According to a tradition current in Ptolemaic times, this sovereign was
a son of Nephorites I., who had been kept out of his heritage by the
jealousy of the gods; whatever his origin, the people had no cause
to repent of having accepted him as their king. He began his reign
by suppressing the slender subsidies which Evagoras had continued to
receive from his predecessors, and this measure, if not generous, was
at least politic. For Cyprus was now virtually in the power of the
Persians, and the blockade of a few thousand men in Salamis did not
draught away a sufficiently large proportion of their effective force to
be of any service to Egypt: the money which had hitherto been devoted to
the Cypriots was henceforth reserved for the direct defence of the Nile
valley. Evagoras obtained unexpectedly favourable conditions: Artaxerxes
conceded to him his title of king and the possession of his city (383
B.C.), and turned his whole attention to Nectanebo, the last of his
enemies who still held out.

Nectanebo had spared no pains in preparing effectively to receive his
foe. He chose as his coadjutor the Athenian Chabrias, whose capacity as
a general had been manifested by recent events, and the latter accepted
this office although he had received no instructions from his government
to do so, and had transformed the Delta into an entrenched camp. He had
fortified the most vulnerable points along the coast, had built towers
at each of the mouths of the river to guard the entrance, and had
selected the sites for his garrison fortresses so judiciously that they
were kept up long after his time to protect the country. Two of them are
mentioned by name: one, situated below Pelusium, called the Castle of
Chabrias; the other, not far from Lake Mareotis, which was known as his
township.*

* Both are mentioned by Strabo; the exact sites of these two
places are not yet identified. Diodorus Siculus, describing
the defensive preparations of Egypt, does not state
expressly that they were the work of Chabrias, but this fact
seems to result from a general consideration of the context.

[Illustration: 291.jpg PHARNABAZUS]

Drawn by faucher-Gudin, from a coin in the _Cabinet d