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When the boy was in his tenth year, an accident which I will now
relate, caused it to be discovered who he was. He was at play one day
in the village where the folds of the cattle were, along with the boys
of his own age, in the street. The other boys who were playing with
him chose the cowherd's son, as he was called, to be their king. He
then proceeded to order them about some he set to build him houses,
others he made his guards, one of them was to be the king's eye,
another had the office of carrying his messages; all had some task or
other. Among the boys there was one, the son of Artembares, a Mede
of distinction, who refused to do what Cyrus had set him. Cyrus told
the other boys to take him into custody, and when his orders were
obeyed, he chastised him most severely with the whip. The son of
Artembares, as soon as he was let go, full of rage at treatment so
little befitting his rank, hastened to the city and complained bitterly
to his father of what had been done to him by Cyrus. He did not, of
course, say "Cyrus," by which name the boy was not yet known, but
called him the son of the king's cowherd. Artembares, in the heat of
his passion, went to Astyages, accompanied by his son, and made
complaint of the gross injury which had been done him. Pointing to the
boy's shoulders, he exclaimed, "Thus, oh! king, has thy slave,
the son of a cowherd, heaped insult upon us."
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