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Ten days after the fort had fallen, Cambyses resolved to try the
spirit of Psammenitus, the Egyptian king, whose whole reign had been
but six months. He therefore had him set in one of the suburbs, and
many other Egyptians with him, and there subjected him to insult.
First of all he sent his daughter out from the city, clothed in the
garb of a slave, with a pitcher to draw water. Many virgins, the
daughters of the chief nobles, accompanied her, wearing the same
dress. When the damsels came opposite the place where their fathers
sate, shedding tears and uttering cries of woe, the fathers, all but
Psammenitus, wept and wailed in return, grieving to see their
children in so sad a plight; but he, when he had looked and seen,
bent his head towards the ground. In this way passed by the
water-carriers. Next to them came Psammenitus' son, and two
thousand Egyptians of the same age with him - all of them having ropes
round their necks and bridles in their mouths - and they too passed by
on their way to suffer death for the murder of the Mytilenaeans who
were destroyed, with their vessel, in Memphis. For so had the royal
judges given their sentence for each Mytilenaean ten of the noblest
Egyptians must forfeit life." King Psammenitus saw the train pass
on, and knew his son was being led to death, but while the other
Egyptians who sate around him wept and were sorely troubled, he showed
no further sign than when he saw his daughter. And now, when they too
were gone, it chanced that one of his former boon-companions, a man
advanced in years, who had been stripped of all that he had and was a
beggar, came where Psammenitus, son of Amasis, and the rest of the
Egyptians were, asking alms from the soldiers. At this sight the
king burst into tears, and weeping out aloud, called his friend by his
name, and smote himself on the head. Now there were some who had been
set to watch Psammenitus and see what he would do as each train went
by; so these persons went and told Cambyses of his behaviour. Then
he, astonished at what was done, sent a messenger to Psammenitus,
and questioned him, saying, "Psammenitus, thy lord Cambyses asketh
thee why, when thou sawest thy daughter brought to shame, and thy son
on his way to death, thou didst neither utter cry nor shed tear, while
to a beggar, who is, he hears, a stranger to thy race, thou gavest
those marks of honour." To this question Psammenitus made answer,
"O son of Cyrus, my own misfortunes were too great for tears; but
the woe of my friend deserved them. When a man falls from splendour
and plenty into beggary at the threshold of old age, one may well weep
for him." When the messenger brought back this answer, Cambyses
owned it was just; Croesus, likewise, the Egyptians say, burst
into tears - for he too had come into Egypt with Cambyses - and the
Persians who were present wept. Even Cambyses himself was touched
with pity, and he forthwith gave an order that the son of Psammenitus
should be spared from the number of those appointed to die, and
Psammenitus himself brought from the suburb into his presence.
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