Cyrus the Younger

“ The pleasure of riding and of hunting in the park was very captivating to Cyrus's mind, and he consented to stay. He represented to his mother that it would be of great advantage to him, on his final return to Persia, to be a skillful and powerful horseman, as that would at once give him the superiority over all the Persian youths, for they were very little accustomed to ride. His mother had some fears lest, by too long a residence in the Median court, her son should acquire the luxurious habits, and proud and haughty manners, which would be constantly before him in his grandfather's example ”

“ Cyrus was the son of a Persian king and Median princess, and had been so well brought up at home, that when as a little boy he visited his grandfather at Echatana, in Media, he was very much shocked to see the court drinking to intoxication, and said wine must be poison, since it made people lose their senses; and he was much puzzled by the hosts of slaves who would not let people do anything for themselves. He thought only those who were old and helpless could like being waited on, and he kept these hardy, simple ways, even after he was a great king over both nations. ”

“ When the first childish feelings of excitement and curiosity had subsided, Cyrus seemed to attach very little value to the fine clothes and gay trappings with which his grandfather was disposed to adorn him, and to all the other external marks of parade and display, which were generally so much prized among the Medes. He was much more inclined to continue in his former habits of plain dress and frugal means than to imitate Median ostentation and luxury. There was one pleasure, however, to be found in Media, which in Persia he had never enjoyed, that he prized very highly. ”

“ Favors of such a sort can awaken no permanent gratitude in any heart, and thus it is quite possible that Cyrus might have evinced, during the simple and guileless days of his childhood, a deep veneration and affection for his grandfather, and yet, in subsequent years, when he had arrived at full maturity, have learned to regard him simply in the light of a great political potentate, as likely as any other potentate around him to become his rival or his enemy. ”

“ I wish, grandfather, you would let me have the rule over him just for three days."
"Why, what would you do to him?" asked Astyages.
"I would treat him as he treats me now," replied Cyrus. "I would stand at the door, as he does when I want to come in, and when he was coming for his dinner, I would stop him [Pg 82] and say, 'You can not come in now; he is busy with some men.'"
In saying this, Cyrus imitated, in a very ludicrous manner, the gravity and dignity of the Sacian's air and manner. ”

“ In a short time he, the petty prince of an almost unknown tribe, had founded a mighty empire, which extended from the Indus and Jaxartes to the Aegaean and the borders of Egypt. This result shows that Cyrus must have been a great warrior and statesman. Nor is his character without nobility. He excels in the humanity with which he treated the vanquished. ”

“ But what was the most popular thing of all among the Persians was the sight of his wife Statira's chariot, which always appeared with its curtains down, allowing her countrywomen to salute and approach her, which made the queen a great favorite with the people.
Yet busy, factious men, that delighted in change, professed it to be their opinion that the times needed Cyrus, a man of a great spirit, an excellent warrior, and a lover of his friends, and that the largeness of their empire absolutely required a bold and enterprising prince. ”

“ Cyrus goes blindly to his destruction. But the queen of the barbarians has no enjoyment of this success; her sorrow for the loss of her son, who puts an end to his own life in noble shame that he has brought his army to destruction, and become a captive by excess in wine, is greater than her joy at the victory. Hardly less strange is the conduct of Cyrus. The general who has conquered Media, Lydia, and Babylonia, and the nations of Asia, is uncertain how to carry on the campaign against the Massagetæ ”

“ It swelled up among the populations of Asia, between the Persian Gulf and the Caspian Sea, about five hundred years before Christ, and rolled on in undiminished magnitude and glory for many centuries. It bore upon its crest the royal line of Astyages and his successors. Cyrus was, however, the first of the princes whom it held up conspicuously to the admiration of the world and he rode so gracefully and gallantly on the lofty crest that mankind have given him the credit of raising and sustaining the magnificent billow on which he was borne. ”

“ As Cyrus had been sent to Persia as soon as his true rank had been discovered, he had had no opportunities of seeing the splendor of royal life in Media, and the manners and habits of the Persians were very plain and simple. Cyrus was accordingly very much impressed with the magnificence of the scenes to which he was introduced when he arrived in Media, and with the gayeties and luxuries, the pomp and display, and the spectacles and parades in which the Median court abounded. Astyages himself took great pleasure in witnessing and increasing his little grandson's admiration for these wonders. ”

“ Yet the assault of Cyrus was a mad one, and it met the end of madness. He was struck below the eye by a javelin, hurled from his horse and instantly slain; his few followers quickly sharing his fate.
The head and right hand of the slain prince were immediately cut off and held up to the view of all within sight, and the contest was proclaimed at an end. The Asiatic army of Cyrus, on learning of the fatal disaster, turned and fled. The Greeks held their own and repulsed all that came against them, in ignorance of the death of Cyrus, of which they did not hear till the next morning. ”

“ A brave and adventurous prince, at the head of a population at once poor, warlike, and greedy, acquires dominion; while his successors, abandoning themselves to sensuality and sloth, probably also to oppressive and irascible dispositions, become in process of time victims to those same qualities in a stranger which had enabled their own father to seize the throne. Cyrus, the great founder of the Persian empire, first the subject and afterward the dethroner of the Median Astyages, corresponds to their general description, as far, at least, as we can pretend to know his history. ”

“ Cyrus ordered him with all his family to be brought to the midst of the army. At that very instant arrived Tigranes, the king's eldest son, who was just returned from a journey. At so moving a scene he could not forbear weeping. Cyrus, addressing himself to him, said: "Prince, you are come very seasonably to be present at the trial of your father." And immediately he assembled the captains of the Persians and Medes, and called in also the great men of Armenia. ”

“ The father of Cyrus, so runs the story, was Cambyses, a king of the Persians, and one of the Perseidae, who look to Perseus as the founder of their race. His mother, it is agreed, was Mandane, the daughter of Astyages, king of the Medes. Of Cyrus himself, even now in the songs and stories of the East the record lives that nature made him most fair to look upon, and set in his heart the threefold love of man, of knowledge, and of honour. He would endure all labours, he would undergo all dangers, for the sake of glory. ”

“ In fact, by this time Cyrus had grown up to be [Pg 87] a tall and handsome young man, with strength and vigor sufficient, under favorable circumstances, to endure the fatigues and exposures of real hunting. As his person had become developed, his mind and manners, too, had undergone a change. The gayety, the thoughtfulness, the self-confidence, and talkative vivacity of his childhood had disappeared, and he was fast becoming reserved, sedate, deliberate, and cautious. He no longer entertained his grandfather's company by his mimicry, his repartees, and his childish wit. ”

“ See at the foot of his image, incense burning and nations lying prostrate; and admire how far the pride and abjection of mortals extend [6] .
The next picture represents the infancy of Cyrus, and the particular moment wherein he gave signs of that intolerable haughtiness, considered by the 106historians as the first sallies of a greatness of soul, which to display itself wants only great occasions. Cyrus, both by right of birth and right of conquest, united Assyria and Media to Persia, and was the founder of the largest empire that ever existed. ”

“ Cyrus, a man of great ambition and self-control, came to Asia Minor with a fixed purpose of putting down the Athenian power, which for sixty years had humbled the pride of the Persian kings. He formed a hearty and cordial alliance with Lysander, the Spartan admiral, and the most eminent man, after Brasidas, whom the Lacedæmonians had produced during the war. He was a man of severe Spartan discipline and virtue, but ambitious and cruel. He visited Cyrus at Sardis, was welcomed with every mark of favor, and induced Cyrus to grant additional pay to every Spartan seaman. ”

“ He ate only the plainest food. He slept on a hard bed. He learned to endure hunger and cold.
When Cyrus was twelve years old he went with his mother to Media to visit his grandfather. His grandfather, whose name was Astyages, [Footnote: Astyages (pro. as ti'a jeez) .] was king of Media, and very rich and powerful.
Cyrus was so tall and strong and handsome that his grandfather was very proud of him. He wished the lad to stay with him in Media. He therefore gave him many beautiful gifts and everything that could please a prince. One day King Astyages planned to make a great feast for the lad. ”

“ When all was ready and Cyrus had commanded silence, he began with requiring of the king, that in all the questions he was about to propose to him, he would answer sincerely, because nothing could be more unworthy a person of his rank than to use dissimulation or [Pg 86] falsehood. The king promised he would. Then Cyrus asked him, but at different times, proposing each article separately, and in order, whether it was not true, that he had made war upon Astyages, King of the Medes, his grandfather ”

“ The first plan which Cyrus formed for the annexation of the realm of the Massagetæ to his own dominions was by a matrimonial alliance. He accordingly raised an army and commenced a movement toward the north, sending, at the same time, embassadors before him into the country of the Massagetæ, with offers of marriage to the queen. The queen knew very well that it was her dominions, and not herself, that constituted the great attraction for Cyrus, and, besides, she was of an age when ambition is a stronger passion than love. ”

“ Astyages seemed to be convinced that Artembaris had just cause to complain, and he sent for Mitridates and his son to come to him in the city. When they arrived, Cyrus advanced into the presence of the king with that courageous and manly bearing which romance writers are so fond of ascribing to boys of noble birth, whatever may have been the circumstances of their early training. ”

“ And among many other high praises of himself, he said he had the stronger soul; was more a philosopher and a better Magian; and could drink and bear more wine than his brother, who, as he averred, was such a coward and so little like a man, that he could neither sit his horse in hunting nor his throne in time of danger. The Lacedaemonians, his letter being read, sent a staff to Clearchus, commanding him to obey Cyrus in all things. So Cyrus marched towards the king, having under his conduct a numerous host of barbarians, and but little less than thirteen thousand stipendiary Grecians ”

“ And right beautiful it was, and right well it fitted the lad, the armour that his grandsire had had made for him. So he put on the whole accoutrement, mounted his charger, and galloped to the front. And Astyages, though he wondered who had sent the boy, bade him stay beside him, now that he had come. Cyrus, as he looked at the horsemen facing them, turned to his grandfather with the question, "Can those men yonder be our enemies, grandfather, those who are standing so quietly beside their horses?" "Enemies they are too for all that," said the king. "And are those enemies too?" ”

“ Cyrus, like Alexander, Cæsar, William the Conqueror, Napoleon, and other commanding minds, who obtained a great ascendancy over masses of men in their maturer years, evinced his dawning superiority at a very early period of his boyhood. He took the lead of his playmates in their sports, and made them submit to his regulations and decisions. ”

“ This expedition was headed by a Grecian general named Clearchus. The soldiers and the subordinate officers of the expedition did not know for what special service it was designed, as Cyrus had a treasonable and guilty object in view, and he kept it accordingly concealed, even from the agents who were to aid him in the execution of it. His plan was to make war upon and dethrone his brother Artaxerxes, then king of Persia, and consequently his sovereign. Cyrus was a very young man, [Pg 29] but he was a man of a very energetic and accomplished character, and of unbounded ambition. ”

“ Cyrus, as he rode forward, mounted upon a spirited, but hard-mouthed and unmanageable horse, which, we learn from Ktesias was named Pasakas, was met by Artagerses, the leader of the Kadousians, who shouted loudly, saying, “Most wicked and foolish of men, who hast disgraced the name of Cyrus, erst the noblest in Persia, and bringest thy base Greeks on a base errand, to plunder the good things of the Persians, and to slay thy brother and thy lord, who hath ten thousand times ten thousand slaves, each one better than thou art. ”