CALIPHS OF BAGDAD* 23 



Like a host of locusts they swept the surface of Asia 

 Minor far beyond Tayana and Ancyra, and invested 

 the Pontic Heraclea, now a paltry town, but then a 

 flourishing- place, whose ships had conveyed home 

 the intrepid Xenophon and his ten thousand ; and 

 whose walls, 1200 years afterward, were capable of 

 sustaining a month's siege agcfinst the combined 

 forces of the Arabs. The ruin was complete ; the 

 city was reduced to ashes ; and, besides immense 

 spoil, 16,000 captives enhanced the triumph of the 

 conqueror. 



Several other towns met a similar fate. Cyprus 

 was attacked, and the inhabitants pillaged without 

 mercy ; after which, the " Roman dog" was com- 

 pelled to retract his haughty defiance, and submit 

 to an annual assessment. As a further mark of hi& 

 degradation, the coin of the tribute-money was 

 stamped with the image and superscription of Ha- 

 roun and his three sons. It v/as perhaps for- 

 tunate for Nicephorus, as the terms might have 

 been still more humiliating, that his adversary was 

 hastily called away to check the progress of revolt 

 at Samarcand, where the usurper, Ibn al Leith, had 

 assumed the title of cahph. The insurrection spread 

 over the Transoxian provinces, and extended also 

 to Khorasan and Kerman. Haroun had left his 

 favourite palace at Racca to march against the 

 rebels, when death put an end to his triumphant 

 career. His general Harethmah, laid siege to Sa- 

 marcand, and conveyed the refractory chief in chains 

 to the presence of Almamoun. 



The Emperor Theophilus, one of the most aetive 

 and high-spirited princes that reigned at Constan- 

 tinople during the middle ages, had led an army five 

 times in person against the Saracens. In the last 

 of these expeditions (A. D. 838) he invaded Syria at 

 the head of a hundred thousand men, and besieged 

 the obscure town of Sozometra, the birth-place of 

 Motassem, which he took and levelled with JJje 



