d making sudden inroads into the districts belonging to others.

3. Afterwards by a system of artful cajolery fortified by perjury, he
got their king Arsaces into his hands, having invited him to a banquet,
when he ordered him to be seized and conducted to a secret chamber
behind, where his eyes were put out, and he was loaded with silver
chains, which in that country is looked upon as a solace under
punishment for men of rank, trifling though it be; then he removed him
from his country to a fortress called Agabana, where he applied to him
the torture, and finally put him to death.

4. After this, in order that his perfidy might leave nothing unpolluted,
having expelled Sauromaces, whom the authority of the Romans had made
governor of Hiberia, he conferred the government of that district on a
man of the name of Aspacuras, even giving him a diadem, to mark the
insult offered to the decision of our emperors.

5. And after these infamous actions he committed the charge of Armenia
to an eunuch named Cylaces, and to Artabannes, a couple of deserters
whom he had received some time before (one of them having been prefect
of that nation, and the other commander in-chief); and he enjoined them
to use every exertion to destroy the town of Artogerassa, a place
defended by strong walls and a sufficient garrison, in which were the
treasures, and the wife and son of Arsaces.

6. These generals commenced the siege as they were ordered. And as it is
a fortress placed on a very rugged mountain height, it was inaccessible
at that time, while the ground was covered with snow and frost: and so
Cylaces being an eunuch, and, as such, suited to feminine manoeuvres,
taking Artabannes with him, approached the walls; after having received
a promise of safety, and he and his companion had been admitted into the
city, he sought by a mixture of advice and threats to persuade the
garrison and the queen to pacify the wrath of the implacable Sapor by a
speedy surrender.

7. And after many arguments had been urged on both sides, the woman
bewailing the sad fortune of her husband, these men, who had been most
active in wishing to compel her to surrender, pitying her distress,
changed their views; and conceiving a hope of higher preferment, they in
secret conferences arranged that at an appointed hour of the night the
gates should be suddenly thrown open, and a strong detachment should
sally forth and fall upon the ramparts of the enemy's camp, surpr