Tiglath-pileser presented some of them in chains to the god Shamash; he extorted an oath of vassalage from them, forced them to give up their children as hostages, and laid a tax upon them _en masse_ of 1200 stallions and 2000 bulls, after which he permitted them to return to their respective towns. He had, however, singled out from among them to grace his own triumph, Sini of Dayana, the only chief among them who had offered him an obstinate resistance; but even he was granted his liberty after he had been carried captive to Assur, and made to kneel before the gods of Assyria.* * Dayani, which is mentioned in the Annals of Shalmaneser II., has been placed on the banks of the Murad-su by Schrader, and more particularly in the neighbourhood of Melasgerd by Sayce; Delattre has shown that it was the last and most westerly of twenty-three kingdoms conquered by Tiglath-pileser I., and that it was consequently enclosed between the Murad-su and the Euphrates proper. Before returning to the capital, Tiglath-pileser attacked Khanigalbat, and appeared before Milidia: as the town attempted no defence, he spared it, and contented himself with levying a small contribution upon its inhabitants. This expedition was rather of the nature of a reconnaissance than a conquest, but it helped to convince the king of the difficulty of establishing any permanent suzerainty over the country. The Asiatic peoples were quick to bow before a sudden attack; but no sooner had the conqueror departed, than those who had sworn him eternal fealty sought only how best to break their oaths. The tribes in immediate proximity to those provinces which had been long subject to the Assyrian rule, were intimidated into showing some respect for a power which existed so close to their own borders. But those further removed from the seat of government felt a certain security in their distance from it, and were tempted to revert to the state of independence they had enjoyed before the conquest; so that unless the sovereign, by a fresh campaign, promptly made them realise that their disaffection would not remain unpunished, they soon forgot their feudatory condition and the duties which it entailed.