Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/238

 120 HISTORY OF GREECE. retain his regal dignity as a dependent of Persia. But being soon detected, or at least believed to be concerned, in raising re- volt against the conquerors, he was put to death, and Egypt was placed under a satrap. 1 There yet lay beyond Egypt territories for Kambyses to conquer, though Kyreue and Barka, the Greek colonies near the coast of Libya, placed themselves at once out of the reach of danger by sending to him tribute and submission at Memphis. He projected three new enterprises : one against Carthage, by sea ; the other two, by land, against the Ethiopians, far to the southward up the course of the Nile, and against the oracle and oasis of Zeus Ammon, amidst the deserts of Libya. Towards Ethiopia he himself conducted his troops, but was com- pelled to bring them back vithout reaching it, since they were on the point of perishing with famine ; while the division which he sent against the temple of Ammon is said to have been over- whelmed by a sand-storm in the desert. The expedition against Carthage was given up, for a reason which well deserves to be commemorated. The Phenicians, who formed the most efficient part of his navy, refused to serve against their kinsmen and col- onists, pleading the sanctity of mutual oaths as well as the ties both of relationship and traffic. 2 Even the frantic Kambyses was compelled to accept, and perhaps to respect, this honorable re- fusal, which was not imitated by the Ionic Greeks when Darius and Xerxes demanded the aid of their ships against Athens, we must add, however, that they were then in a situation much more exposed and helpless than that in which the Phenicians stood before Kambyses. Among the sacred animals so numerous and so different throughout the various nomes of Egypt, the most venerated of all was the bull Apis. Yet such peculiar conditions were re- quired by the Egyptian religion as to the birth, the age, and the marks of this animal, that, when he died, it was difficult to find a new calf properly qualified to succeed him. Much time was sometimes spent in the search, and when an unexceptionable suc- 1 Herodot. iii, 10-16. Ab:>ut the Arabians, between Judaea and Egypt ee iii, c. 5, 88-91. 1 Hcrtklot. iii, 13.