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After the battle Demetrius fled to Cyprus, and yielded to the terms of peace which were imposed on him by the four allied sovereigns. He sent his friend Pyrrhus as a hostage to Alexandria; and there this young King of Epirus soon gained the friendship of Ptolemy and afterwards his stepdaughter in marriage.
A fellow-passenger and countryman from Cyprus explained that the vessels belonged to Simonides, the master-merchant of Antioch; he told us, also, who the merchant was; his marvellous success in commerce; of his fleets and caravans, and their coming and going; and, not knowing I had interest in the theme beyond my associate listeners, he said Simonides was a Jew, once the servant of the Prince Hur; nor did he conceal the cruelties of Gratus, or the purpose of their infliction."
As soon as he had made himself master of Palestine, Syria, and Phoenicia, he turned his thoughts to the conquest of Cyprus: this island abounded in wood, of which Egypt was almost destitute; and on this account, as well as on account of its situation, in the bosom, as it were, of the Levant, it was of the utmost importance to a maritime power.
With him likewise, on the greatest of the galleys, were there sundry great gentlemen of the most famous families of Venice, and chief of them all, Marino Cavallo, Procurator of Saint Mark; inasmuch as that the Council desired to ransom the King of Cyprus with Venice gold, and to that end had sent Angelo Michieli with the embassy, he being the Senior of one of the most powerful and wealthy merchants' houses in the East.
The latter had gone from the Pharsalian battlefield to Lesbos, whence he brought away his wife and his second son Sextus, and had sailed onward round Asia Minor to Cilicia and thence to Cyprus.
The Mussulmans were alarmed, and Saphadin gladly concluded a truce for six years. But the country was doomed to be soon deprived of the tranquillity afforded by a cessation of arms. Almeric and his wife being dead, Mary, the daughter of Isabella by Conrade of Tyre, was acknowledged Queen of Jerusalem; while Hugh de Lusignan, son of Almeric by his first wife, was proclaimed King of Cyprus.
These, with some other minor disasters, and the state of bitter feeling that existed between the two parties at Athens, induced Pericles to recall Cimon from exile and put him in command of an expedition against Cyprus and Egypt. In 449, however, Cimon was taken ill, and he died in the harbor of Ci'tium, to which place he was laying siege.
So clear a declaration shewed me that if I persevered in this intrigue I might go on for ever without success. I also bethought me that I ran a risk of neglecting my chief business, which would not allow me to stay long in Ancona. I said nothing more to Leah just then, and when the dessert came in I gave her some Cyprus wine, which she declared was the most delicious nectar she had ever tasted.
Croesus, however, pleaded for me with his conqueror Cyrus; my life and liberty were granted me, but I was declared a dishonored man. Life in Persia became impossible with disgrace lying heavily on my soul; I took ship from Smyrna to Cyprus, entered the army there, fought against Amasis, and was brought hither by Phanes as a prisoner-of-war.
In Africa there practically subsisted a perpetual border-war between Carthage and Numidia. In Egypt Roman arbitration had settled the dispute as to the succession between the two brothers Ptolemy Philometor and Ptolemy the Fat; nevertheless the new rulers of Egypt and Cyrene waged war for the possession of Cyprus.
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