Page:Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians Volume 1.djvu/144

96 bian Gulf in a fleet of long vessels, reduced under his authority the inhabitants of the coasts bordering on the Mare Erythœum ; and proceeding still farther, he came to a sea which, from the great number of its shoals, was not navigable. On his return to Egypt, according to the authority of the priests, he levied a mighty army, and made an expedition by land, subduing all the nations he met with on his march. Whenever he was opposed by a people who proved themselves brave, and who discovered an ardour for liberty, he erected tablets (stelæ) in their country, on which he inscribed his name, and that of his nation, and how he had conquered them by the force of his arms: but where he met with little or no opposition, upon similar tablets, which he erected, was added a symbol emblematic of their pusillanimity. Continuing his progress, he passed from Asia to Europe, and subdued the countries of Scythia and Thrace; there, however, I believe his army to have been stopped, since monuments of his victories only appear thus far, and none beyond that country. On his return he came to the river Phasis; but I am by no means certain whether he left a detachment of his force as a colony in that district, or whether some of his men, fatigued with their