THALIA. U

XVT. From Sais, Canibyses proceeded to Memphis,
to execute a purpose he had in view. As soon as he
entered the palace of Amasis, he ordered the body of
that prince to be removed from his tomb. When this
was done, he commanded it to be beaten with rods,
the hair to be plucked out, and the flesh to be goaded
-with sharp instruments, to which he added other
marks of ignominy. As the body was embalmed, their
efforts made but-little impression; when therefore
they were fatigued with these outrages, he ordered it
to be burned. In this last act, Cambyses paid no
regard to the religion of his country, for the Persians
venerate fire as a divinity. The custom of burning
the dead does not prevail in either of the two nations;
for the reason above mentioned, the Persians do not
use it, thinking it profane to feed a divinity with
human carcasses; and the Egyptians abhor it, being
fully pursuaded that fire is a voracious animal, which
devours whatever it can seize, and when saturated,
finally expires with what it has consumed. They
hold it unlawful to expose the bodies of the dead to
any animals, for which reason they embalm them,
fearing lest, after interment, they might become the
prey of worms. The Egyptians assert, that the above
indignities were not inflicted upon the body of Ami-
sis, but that the Persians were deceived, and perpe­
trated these insults on some other Egyptian of the-
same age with that prince. Amasis, they say, was
informed by an oracle of the injuries intended against
his body, to prevent which he ordered the person who
really sustained them, to be buried at the entrance of
his tomb, whilst he himself, by his own directions
given to his son, was placed in some secret and inte­
rior recess of the sepulchre. These assertions I can­
not altogether believe, and am rather inclined to ,
impute them to the vanity of the Egyptians.

XVII. Cambyses afterwards determined to com­
mence hostilities against three nations at once, the
Carthaginians, the Ammonians, and the Macrobian
Ethiopians, who inhabit that part of Libya which
lies towards the southern ocean. He accordingly re­
solved to send against the Carthaginians a naval