losses, his fatigues, and the progress of an epidemical disease, prevented a solid establishment; and the Saracens, after a campaign of fifteen months, retreated to the confines of Egypt, with the captives and the wealth of their African expedition. The caliph’s fifth was granted to a favorite, on the nominal payment of five hundred thousand pieces of gold; 144 but the state was doubly injured by this fallacious transaction, if each foot-soldier had shared one thousand, and each horseman three thousand, pieces, in the real division of the plunder. The author of the death of Gregory was expected to have claimed the most precious reward of the victory: from his silence it might be presumed that he had fallen in the battle, till the tears and exclamations of the praefect’s daughter at the sight of Zobeir revealed the valor and modesty of that gallant soldier. The unfortunate virgin was offered, and almost rejected as a slave, by her father’s murderer, who coolly declared that his sword was consecrated to the service of religion; and that he labored for a recompense far above the charms of mortal beauty, or the riches of this transitory life. A reward congenial to his temper was the honorable commission of announcing to the caliph Othman the success of his arms. The companions the chiefs, and the people, were assembled in the mosch of Medina, to hear the interesting narrative of Zobeir; and as the orator forgot nothing except the merit of his own counsels and actions, the name of Abdallah was joined by the Arabians with the heroic names of Caled and Amrou. 145 142 (return) [ See in Ockley (Hist. of the Saracens, vol. ii. p. 45) the death of Zobeir, which was honored with the tears of Ali, against whom he had rebelled. His valor at the siege of Babylon, if indeed it be the same person, is mentioned by Eutychius, (Annal. tom. ii. p. 308)] 143 (return) [ Shaw’s Travels, p. 118, 119.] 144 (return) [ Mimica emptio, says Abulfeda, erat haec, et mira donatio; quandoquidem Othman, ejus nomine nummos ex aerario prius ablatos aerario praestabat, (Annal. Moslem. p. 78.) Elmacin (in his cloudy version, p. 39) seems to report the same job. When the Arabs be sieged the palace of Othman, it stood high in their catalogue of grievances.`] 145 (return) [ Theophan. Chronograph. p. 235 edit. Paris. His chronology is loose and inaccurate.]