THALIA. 13

adopting literally the spirit of the Persian laws; and
to secure their persons, they took care to discover
what would justify him, who wished to marry hid
eister. Cainbyses, therefore, instantly married the
sister whom he loved, and not long afterwards a
second. The younger of these, who accompanied
him to Egypt, he put to death.

XXXII. The manner of her death, like that of
Smerdis, is differently related. The Greeks say that
Cambyses made the cub of a lioness and a young
whelp engage each other, and that this princess was
present at the combat ; when this latter was vanquish'
ed, another whelp of the same litter broke what con­
fined it, and flew to assist the other, and that both
together were too much for the young lion. Cambyses
seeing this, expressed great satisfaction; but the prin­
cess burst into tears. Cambyses observed her weep,
and inquired the reason; she answered, that seeing
One whelp assist another of the same brood, she could
not but remember Smerdis, whose death she feared
nobody would revenge. For which saying, the Greeks
affirm, that Cambyses put her to death. On the con­
trary, if we may believe the Egyptians, this princess
was sitting at table with her husband, and took a let­
tuce in her hand, dividing it leaf by leaf: "Which,"
said she, "seems in your eyes most agreeable, this
" lettuce whole, or divided into leaves ?" He replied,
"When whole." "You," says she, "resemble this
" lettuce, as I have divided it, for you have thus torn
* in sunder the house of Cyrus." Cambyses was so
greatly incensed, that he threw her down, and leaped
upon her; and being pregnant, she was delivered be­
fore her time, and lost her life.

XXXIII. To such excesses in his own family was
Cambyses impelled, either on account of his impious
treatment of Apis, or from some other of those nu­
merous calamities which afflict mankind. From the
first hour of his birth, he laboured under what by some
is termed the sacred disease. It is, therefore, by no
means astonishing that so great a, bodily infirmity
should at length injure the mind.

XXXIV. His phrensy, however, extended to the