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into the air, which we know to have been immemorially used in 

 the campaigns of Asia, were the directing flames that lighted the 

 Persian cavalry from the woody ambuscades in which they lay hid 

 to vengeance and to glory, if, indeed, true glory can ever really be 

 united with sentiments of vengeance. At that luminous signal, 

 the impetuous phalanx of Persia burst forth from their retreat, 

 and, while one part surrounded the field, and all the avenues that 

 Jed to the city and fortress, the other part acted the bloody office 

 of executioners to the assembled nobles and terrified citizens. 

 Asfendiar himself, at the head of his seven heroic comrades, and 

 now arrayed in a different attire from that of merchants, having 

 first secured his sisters, and sent them back under a strong guard 

 to Persia, along the road by which the cavalry had arrived, with 

 his own hand slew the unhappy sovereign of Turan ; while those in 

 his train devoted to promiscuous slaughter the principal grandees 

 of his court. The chief booty obtained, says our historian, on this 

 memorable occasion, was a throne of gold, set with precious stones, 

 of exquisite workmanship, and a white elephant. These he sent 

 into Persia as presents to his father, and followed them himself 

 as far as the mountains of Caucasus, whither we shall presently 

 return to him, after detailing another important event of this reign 

 materially connected with the subject of our history, and prominently 

 conspicuous in the ancient annals of Asia*; 



In the introductory work-f, when speaking of the ancient com- 

 merce carried on between India and Persia, I had occasion to ob- 

 serve, that the latter nation, from the earliest periods, were equally 

 restrained, by the precepts of religion and the dictates of policy, 

 from engaging in maritime expeditions. The element of water, not 

 less than that of fire, was the object of their superstitious veneration ; 



* Mirkhond Hist, sect. Iti. f Sec Indian Antiquities, vol. vi. r p. 40>. 



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