C Z A 



541 



C Z A 



Cyrus 



II 



C'zar.-ko- 



selo. 



be related hereafter, in the article Persia. But, accord- 

 ing to Xenophon's account, Cyrus, instead of falling 

 in battle, died quietly in his bed, after a long and pros- 

 perous reign, full of years and of glory. Plutarch re- 

 lates, in the life of Alexander the Great, that the Ma- 

 cedonian conqueror, when in Persia, having found the 

 tomb of Cyrus broken open, discovered the following 

 epitaph, in the Persian language. man ! whosoever 

 thou art, and whencesoever thou earnest {for come I know 

 thou will), I am Cyrus, the founder of the Persian em- 

 pire. Envy me not the little earth that covers my body. 



It is not an easy task, at this extreme distance of 

 time, to reconcile these contradictory statements of the 

 ancient historians, or to separate what is true from what 

 is false or fabulous in their various narratives. But to 

 us, Cyrus appears to have been one of those able and 

 enterprising men, who have frequently appeared on the 

 theatre of Asiatic history ; who, possessing talents far 

 superior to those of any other man of his age and na- 

 tion, had the address to unite the whole of the different 

 Persian tribes under his own dominion ; as, in a later 

 age, Gengis-Khan contrived to get himself placed at 

 the head of the Mogul hordes. The time of his ap- 

 pearance was fortunate ; the empire of the Medes and 

 Babylonians was already upon the decline ; and that of 

 the Lydians, under Croesus, had not yet acquired a so- 

 lid foundation. That Cyrus, as a prince and a states- 

 man, possessed great and good qualities sufficient to 

 entitle him to much of the praise which has been la- 

 vished upon him, there seems little reason to doubt ; 

 that he was deeply infected with the common vice of 

 all great conquerors, an insatiable ambition, is evident 

 enough from the history of his eventful career. That 

 Xenophon purposely magnified the virtues, and em- 

 bellished the exploits of this powerful conqueror, ap- 

 pears to be generally admitted ; and his object in do- 

 ing so has been already explained. But, at the present 

 day, it were difficult to point out what portion of the 

 traditionary character of Cyrus is with justice ascribed 

 to him, and what portion is to be imputed to the lively 

 fancy and inventive genius of his biographer. See 

 Rollin, B. iv. ch. 1 . ; Millot, Hist. Ancienne, torn. i. ; 

 Memoires de I' Acad, des Inscript. torn. vi. & vii. ; 

 and Bayle, Diet. Hist, et Crit. v. Cyrus, (z) 

 CYTHERA. See Cerigo. 



CYSTANTHE, a genus of plants of the class Pen- 



tandria, and order Monogynia. See Brown's Prodro- 



mus Plant. Nov. Holl. &c. p. 555 ; and Botany, p. 177. 



CYTINUS, a genus of plants of the class Monee- 



cia, and order Monadelphia. See Botany, p. 327. 



CYTISUS, a genus of plants of the class Diadel- 

 phia, and order Decandria. See Botany, p. 284. 

 CZAR, or Tsar. See Russia. 

 CZARSKOSELO, or Tsarskoselo, the summer re- 

 sidence of the Russian sovereigns, is about 22 versts 

 from St Petersburg, between that city and Novogorod. 



The palace is built of brick, and has a front which ex- 

 tends nearly eight hundred feet. It is all plastered 

 over, and is covered with columns, pilasters, and ca- 

 riatides, all of which are gilt. The rooms are gaudy 

 and spacious, and the walls of one of them are entirely 

 covered with pictures, by the best of the Flemish and 

 other masters. They are all fitted together, without 

 frames, and without any arrangement ; and it is said, 

 that the vacant spaces were filled up with pictures cut 

 down to suit the spaces that Avere left. The most in- 

 teresting apartment in this palace is a room about ?>0 

 feet square, which is covered on all sides with amber, 

 which was a present from the King of Prussia. In the 

 apartment fitted up for Prince Potemkin, the floor was 

 covered with different kinds of exotic wood, interlaid; 

 and it is said to have cost an hundred roubles for every 

 square archon. 



The ball-room is an hundred and forty feet long, and 

 fifty-two feet wide ; and is two stories high. In an- 

 other apartment, the walls, pilasters, and tables, were 

 adorned with lapis lazuli. The cabinet of mirrors is 

 a small room, lined with large pier glasses, and looks 

 into a terrace, where there is a covered gallery, above 

 two hundred and sixty feet long. The chapel is made 

 wholly of gilt Avood, and is richly decorated. 



The gardens are laid out in the English style, and 

 contain many statues in marble and bronze. A small 

 flower garden conducts to the bath, which is adorned 

 with agates, jasper, and marble statues and columns. 

 The grotto is likewise ornamented with various mine- 

 rals, formed into columns, vases, busts, and bas-reliefs, 

 the most interesting of which is a vase, composed of 

 precious stones, from Siberia. The rostral column, 

 erected to Orlof, in memory of the naval victory gain- 

 ed at Tchesme, over the Turks, is seen from this grotto, 

 upon a lake. Among several bridges, Mr Coxe was 

 particularly struck with one, built after the model of 

 the Palladian bridge at Wilton, the seat of Lord Pem- 

 broke. It is of the same size, but of superior magni- 

 ficence, the colonnade being of marble, and the lower 

 part of granite. The marble was wrought in Siberia, 

 by an Italian artist, who took nine years to finish it. 

 There is a large court before the palace, encircled with 

 low buildings, for the kitchens and out-houses. 



On the road from St Petersburg, the versts or dis- 

 tances are marked by columns of mai - ble, jasper, and 

 granite ; and when the court is at Czarskoselo, there 

 are 1100 globular lamps lighted. This palace was 

 built by Catherine I. but received its principal embel- 

 lishments from the Empress Elizabeth. It was the 

 principal residence of Catherine the Great, during the 

 latter part of her life. See Storch's Picture of St Pe- 

 tersburg ; Reinbeck's Travels from St Petersburg in 

 1 805, Letter xi. ; Coxe's Travels in Holland, Russia, 

 Sfc. vol. ii. p. 199, 200; but principally Clarke's Tra~ 

 vels, vol. i. p. 16 — 21. (j) 



