tion Ochus had sent thither for auxiliaries. The Athenians and the Lacedemonians excused themselves, telling the Persian ambassadors that were sent to them for this purpose, that they should be glad to maintain peace and friendship with the king, but could not send him any succours at that time. But the Thebans sent him one thousand men under the command of Lachares, and the Argives three thousand under the command of Nicostratus. The rest came from the Grecian cities of Asia, and all these joined him immediately after his taking of Sidon.

The Jews seem to have been engaged in this war of the Phoenicians against Ochus: for, after he had taken Sidon, he marched into Judea, and besieged and took Jericho, and, making many of the Jews captives, he led part of them with him into Egypt, and sent a great number of others into Hyrcania, and there planted them on those parts of that country which lay on the Caspian sea.

Ochus at the same time also got rid of the Cyprian war; for having his mind wholly bent on the reducing of Egypt, that he might not be diverted from it by any other embarrassment, he was content to come to a composition with the nine Cyprian kings; and therefore, having removed their grievances, they all again submitted to him, and were confirmed by him in the government of their respective territories. The greatest difficulty in the bringing of this matter to a composure, was to content Euagoras, who claimed to be restored to his kingdom of Salamine; but he being convicted before Ochus of great crimes there committed, for which he was justly ejected, Protagoras was continued at Salamine, and amends was made Euagoras, by conferring on him the government of another place. But, having there run into the same misdemeanours which he had been guilty of at Salamine, he was ejected thence also; whereon being forced to fly into Cyprus, he was there taken, and put to death for them.

e Solinus, c. 35. Syncellus ex Africano, p. 256 Orosius, lib. 31, e. 7. Josephus ex Hecateo, lib 1, contra Apionem. Euseb. in Chron.

d Diod. Siculus, lib. 16, p. 584.

An. 350.

Ochus 9.

Cyprus, as well as Phoenicia, being thus wholly reduced, and settled again in peace,e Ochus set forward for this Egyptian expedition. In his way he lost many of his men at the lake of Serbonis. This lake lay in the entrance into Egypt from Phoenicia, of the extent of about thirty miles in length. The south wind blowing the sand of the desert upon it, made a crust upon the surface of the water, that in appearance looked like firm land; but if any went upon it, they were soon swallowed up and lost. And thus it happened to as many of Ochus' men as for want of good guides marched on upon it. And there are instances of whole armies which had been thus lost in that place. On his arrival in Egypt, he planted his camp near Pelusium, and from thence sent out three detachments to invade the country, setting a Grecian and a Persian in joint commission over each of them. Over the first he put Lachares the Theban, and Rosaces governour of Lydia and Ionia ; over the second Nicostratus the Argive, and Aristazanes; and over the third Mentor the Rhodian, and Bagoas one of his eunuchs: to each of which having given his orders, he retained the main of the army about himself, in the place where he had first encamped, there to watch the events of the war, and to be ready from thence to relieve all the distresses and prosecute all the advantages of it. In the interim, Nectanebus having sufficient notice, from these rations against him, to provide for his defence, had gotten together an army of one hundred thousand men, of which twenty thousand were mercenaries out of Greece, and twenty thousand out of Lybia, and the rest Egyptians. With some of these he garrisoned his towns on the borders, and with the rest guarded those passes through which the enemy was to enter into the country. The first of Ochus' detachments, under the command of Lachares, sat down before Pelusium, which was garrisoned with five thousand Greeks. While this siege was carrying on, Nicostratus, having put his detachment on board a squadron of the Per

e Diodor. Sic. lib. 16, p. 534, 535.

prepa

sian fleet of eighty ships that attended him, sailed up, through one of the channels of the Nile, into the heart of the country, and, having there landed his forces, strongly encamped them in a place convenient for it. Whereon all the soldiers of the neighbouring garrisons taking the alarm, gathered together under the command of Clinius, a Grecian of the island of Cos, to drive him thence. This produced a fierce battle between them, in which Clinius, with above 5000 of his men, being slain, and all the rest dissipated and broken, this in a manner determined the whole fate of the war. For hereon Nectanebus fearing lest Nicostratus should sail up the river with his victorious forces, and take Memphis the metropolis of his kingdom, he hastened thither for its defence, leaving those passes into his country open which it was his chief interest to have defended. When the Grecians who garrisoned Pelusium heard of this retreat, they gave all for lost, and therefore, coming to a parley with Lachares, agreed upon terms of being safely conveyed into Greece, with all that belonged to them, to yield the town to him. And Mentor, with the third detachment, finding the passes deserted and left open, marched through them, and, without any opposition, took in all that part of the country. For having given it out through all his camp, that Ochus had given orders graciously to receive such as should yield unto him, but utterly to destroy all those that should stand out, in the same manner as he had destroyed the Sidonians, he permitted all his captives to escape, that they might carry the report of it all over the country; who accordingly returned to their respective cities, and dispersing every where what they had heard was ordered by Ochus, (and the brutal cruelty of the man making it believed) this so frighted the garrisons through all the country, that, in every city, both Greeks and Egyptians were at strife which of them should first yield to the invader; which Nectanebus perceiving, despaired of any longer being able to defend himself; and therefore, gathering together all the treasure he could get into his hands, fled with it into Ethiopia, and never again returned. And this was the last Egyptian that ever reigned in this country, it having been ever

since enslaved to strangers, according to the prophecy of Ezekiel, which hath been already taken notice of. Ochus having thus made an absolute conquest of Egypt, he dismantled their chief cities, and plundered their temples, and then returned in triumph to Babylon, loaded with vast treasures of gold and silver, and other spoils gotten in this war, leaving Pherendates, one of his nobles, governour of the country. And heres Manetho ended his commentaries which he wrote of the Egyptian affairs. He was a priest of Heliopolis in Egypt, and wrote, in the Greek language, an history of all the several dynasties of Egypt, from the beginning of that kingdom to this time, which is often quoted by Josephus, Eusebius, Plutarch, Porphyry, and others, an epitome whereof is preserved in Syncellus. He lived in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus king of Egypt; for to him he dedicates his book.

The chief cause of Nectanebus' losing of his kingdomi was his over-confidence in himself. He had gained his kingdom by the assistance of Agesilaus, and had preserved himself in it by the prudence and valour of Diaphantus an Athenian, and Lamius a Spartan, who managing his wars, and commanding his armies for him, made him victorious against the Persians in all the attempts which they had hitherto made upon him; with which being elevated, he thought himself now sufficient to conduct his own affairs, and therefore, dismissing those by whose help he had hitherto subsisted, he was now ruined for want of it.

An. 349.

Ochus 10.

Ochus having thus mastered this war, and recovered Phoenicia and Egypt again to his crown, hek nobly rewarded the service of Mentor, the Rhodian. The other Greeks he had sent back into their country, with ample rewards, before he left Egypt: but the success of the whole expedition being chiefly owing to Mentor, he not only gave him one hundred talents, with many other valuable gifts, but also made him governour of all the Asiatic coasts, and committed to his charge the management of the

f Ezekiel xxix, 14, 15.

g Syncellus, p. 256. h Vide Vossium de Historicis Græcis, c. 14. ? Dioder. Sic. lib. 16, p. 535.

k Diodor. Sic. lib. 16, p. 537.

war which he still had with some of the provinces that had there revolted from him in the beginning of his reign, and made him generalissimo of all his forces in those parts. Mentor having thus gained so great a share in the favour of Ochus, he made use of it to reconcile unto him Memnon his brother, and Artabazus who had married their sister; for they had both been in war against him. Of the revolt of Artabazus, and the several victories which he had gained over the king's forces, I have already spoken; but he being at length overpowered, took refuge with Philip king of Macedon; and Memnon, who had joined with him in those wars, was forced to bear with him the same banishment. After this reconciliation, they both became very serviceable to Ochus, and his successors of that race, especially Memnon, who was a person of the greatest valour and military skill of any of his time. And Mentor was not wanting in answering that confidence which the king had placed in him for, when settled in his province, he soon restored the king's authority in those parts, and made all that had revolted again submit to him. Some he circumvented by stratagem and military skill, and others he subdued by open force, and so wisely managed all his advantages, that at length he reduced all again under their former yoke, and thoroughly re-established the king's affairs in all those provinces.

An. 348.

Ochus 11.

In the first year of the 108th Olympiad died Plato, the famous Athenian philosopher. The eminentest of his scholars was Aristotle, the founder of the Peripatetic philosophy. He wash by birth of Stagira, a small city on the river Strymon, in the northern confines of Macedonia. He was born in the first year of the 99th Olympiad (which was the year before Christ 384.) At the age of seventeen he came to Athens, and became one of the scholars of Plato, and heard him till his death. Speusippus succeeding Plato in his school, Aristotle went into Asia,

1 Diodor. Sic. lib. 16, p. 538.

m Diogenes Lærtius in Platone. Dionysius Halicarnesseus in Epistola að Ammaeum de Demosthene. Athenæus, lib. 5, c. 13.

n Diog. Laert. in Aristotele. See also Mr. Stanley's account of the Life of Aristotle, in his History of Philosophy.