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Along the high tract thus created lay the bulk of the ancient Persia, consisting of alternate mountain, plain, and narrow valley, curiously intermixed, and as yet very incompletely mapped. This region is of varied character.
The capture of this city concludes the narration of Herodotus, which ended virtually the Persian war, although hostilities were continued in Asia. The battle of Marathon had given the first effective resistance to Persian conquests, and created confidence among the Greeks. The battle of Salamis had destroyed the power of Persia on the sea, and prevented any co-operation of land and naval forces.
There once was a king of Persia, who at the beginning of his reign had distinguished himself by many glorious and successful conquests, and had afterwards enjoyed such profound peace and tranquillity as rendered him the happiest of monarchs. His only occasion for regret was that he had no heir to succeed him in the kingdom after his death.
In my opinion, the Tartars have small store of armour, except bows and arrows, and leather jackets; some have iron plates, and skull cups from Persia, and I saw two at the court of Mangu armed with clumsy and unwieldy coats of rough hog-skin.
In three campaigns he chastised the rising power of Persia, drove the armies of Chosroes from Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, rescued Constantinople from the joint siege of the Avars and Persians , and finally reduced the Persian monarch to the defence of his hereditary kingdom. The deposition and murder of Chosroes by his son Siroes concluded the successes of the emperor.
He afterwards subjugated the five northern provinces of China, which were long imperfectly known under the name of Kathay; and successively reduced Carisme or Transoxiana, now great Bucharia, Chorassan, and Persia: and he died in 1227, after having exhorted and instructed his sons to persevere in the career of conquest, and more particularly to complete the conquest of China.
The Russian Mohammedan populations such as the Tartars of South Russia and the Turkomans of Central Asia furnished many recruits. Even more valuable were the exiles who flocked to Russia from Turkey, Persia, India, and elsewhere at the close of the Great War.
In the typical Oriental nation, such as Assyria or Persia, we see a conquering tribe holding down a number of vanquished peoples, and treating them like slaves: here the nation is very imperfectly made, and its government is subject to sudden and violent changes.
Amongst the many races whom dimly we decry in those shadowy hosts, tilting for ages in the vast plains of Angora, are seen latterly pressing on to the van, two mighty powers, the children of Persia and the Ottoman family of the Turks.
"From Persia," said the poet, "I travelled through Syria, and for three years resided in Palestine, where I conversed with great numbers of the northern and western nations of Europe, the nations which are now in possession of all power and all knowledge, whose armies are irresistible, and whose fleets command the remotest parts of the globe.
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