infiltration; he then turned into it the waters of the Euphrates, so that the town appeared to be floating on a lake, without either bridges or quays by means of which the besiegers might have brought their machines within range and their troops been able to approach for an assault. Merodach-baladan had been careful not to shut himself within the town, but had taken up a position in the marshes, and there awaited the arrival of the Assyrians. Sargon, having left Babylon in the month of Iyyar, encountered him within sight of Dur-Yakin. The Aramaean infantry were crushed by repeated charges from the Mnevito chariotry and cavalry, who pursued the fugitives to the outer side of the moat, and seized the camp with all its baggage and the royal train, including the king's tent, a canopy of solid silver which protected the throne, his sceptre, weapons, and stores of all kinds. The peasants, to the number of 90,580, crowded within the lines, also fell into their hands, together with their flocks and herds--2500 horses, 610 mules, and 854 camels, as well as sheep, oxen, and asses; the remainder of the fugitives rushed within the outworks for refuge "like a pack of wild boars," and finally were driven into the interior of the place, or scattered among the beds of reeds along the coast. Sargon cut down the groves of palm trees which adorned the suburbs, and piled up their trunks in the moat, thus quickly forming a causeway right up to the walls. Merodach-baladan had been wounded in the arm during the engagement, but, nevertheless, fought stubbornly in defence of his city; when he saw that its fall was inevitable, he fled to the other side of the gulf, and took refuge among the mud flats of the Lower Ulai. Sargon set fire to Dur-Yakin, levelled its towers and walls with the ground, and demolished its houses, temples, and palaces. It had been a sort of penal settlement, to which the Kalda rulers used to consign those of their subjects belonging to the old aboriginal race, who had rendered themselves obnoxious by their wealth or independence of character; the number of these prisoners was considerable, Babylon, Borsippa, Nipur, and Sippar, not to speak of Uni, Uruk, Eridu, Larsam, and Kishik, having all of them furnished their share. Sargon released them all, and restored their gods to the temples; he expelled the nomads from the estates which, contrary to all justice, had been distributed among them in preceding years, and reinstated the former owners. Karduniash, which had been oppressed for twelve long years by a semi-barbarian despot, now breathed again, and hailed Sargon as its deliverer, while he on his part was actively engaged in organising his conquest. The voluntary submission of Upiri, King of Dilmun, who lived isolated in the open sea, "as though in a bird's nest," secured to Sargon possession of the watercourses which flowed beyond the Chaldaean lake into the Persian Gulf: no sooner had he obtained it than he quitted the neighbourhood of