would in turn be destroyed, and she would find herself face to face with their destroyer, and would enjoy the poor satisfaction of being devoured last.  But did she fear to be reproached with breaking the treaty and forfeiting her pledged word?  Rome had already broken it by her intrigues with the Huns, the Ethiopians, and the Saracens; and Persia would therefore be free from reproach if she treated the peace as no longer existing.  The treaty-breaker is not he who first draws the sword, but he who sets the example of seeking the other’s hurt.  Or did Persia fear the result of declaring war?  Such fear was unreasonable, for Rome had neither troops, nor generals to oppose to a sudden Persian attack.  Sittas was dead; Belisarius and the best of the Roman forces were in Italy.  If Justinian recalled Belisarius, it was not certain that he would obey; and, in the worst case, it would be in favor of Persia that the Goths of Italy, and the Armenians who for centuries had been subjects of Rome, were now ready to make common cause with her.”  Thus urged, the Persian king determined on openly declaring war and making an attack in force on the eastern provinces of the empire.

The scene of contest in the wars between Rome and Persia had been usually either Mesopotamia or Armenia.  On rare occasions only had the traditional policy been departed from, and attempts made to penetrate into the richer parts of the Roman East, and to inflict serious injury on the empire by carrying fire and sword into peaceful and settled provinces.  Kobad, however, had in his later years ventured to introduce a new system, and had sent troops across the Euphrates into Syria in the hope of ravaging that fertile region and capturing its wealthy metropolis, Antioch.  This example Chosroes now determined to follow.  Crossing the great stream in the lower portion of its course, he led his troops up its right bank, past Circesium, Zenobia, and Callinicus, to Suron, a Roman town on the west side of the river.  As this small place ventured to resist him, Chosroes, bent upon terrifying the other towns into submission, resolved to take a signal revenge.  Though the garrison, after losing their commandant, made overtures for a surrender, he insisted on entering forcibly at one of the gates, and then, upon the strength of this violent entrance, proceeded to treat the city as one taken by storm, pillaged the houses, massacred a large portion of the inhabitants, enslaved the others, and in conclusion set the place on fire and burned it to the ground.  It was perhaps in a fit of remorse, though possibly only under the influence of greed, that shortly afterwards he allowed the neighboring bishop of Sergiopolis to ransom these unfortunate captives, twelve thousand, in number, for the modest sum of two hundred pounds of gold.