The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [135]
17. So he cut off his own nose and ears, and then, clipping his hair close and flogging himself with a scourge, he came in this plight before Darius.
18. The king was stirred to wrath at the sight of a man of Zopyrus’ lofty rank in such a condition;
19. Leaping down from his throne, he exclaimed aloud, and asked Zopyrus who it was that had disfigured him, and what he had done to be so treated.
20. Zopyrus answered, ‘There is not a man in the world but you, O king, that could reduce me to such a plight;
21. ‘No stranger’s hands have wrought this work on me, but my own only. I maimed myself in order to help us defeat the Assyrians.’
22. Replied Darius, ‘Surely you have gone out of your mind! How will your disfigurement induce the enemy to yield one day the sooner?’
23. Zopyrus answered, ‘If I had told you what I planned on doing, you would not have allowed me; as it is, I kept my own counsel.
24. ‘Now, therefore, we shall take Babylon. I will desert to the enemy as I am, and when I get into their city I will tell them that it is by you I have been thus treated.
25. ‘I think they will believe my words, and entrust me with a command of troops.
26. ‘You, for your part, must wait till the tenth day after I have entered the town,
27. ‘And then place near to the gates of Semiramis a detachment of the army, troops for whose loss you will care little, a thousand men.
28. ‘Wait, after that, seven days, and post another detachment, two thousand strong, at the Nineveh gates;
29. ‘Then let twenty days pass, and at the end of that time station near the Chaldaean gates a body of four thousand.
30. ‘Let neither these nor the former troops be armed with any weapons but their swords.
31. ‘After the twenty days are over, bid the whole army attack the city on every side,
32. ‘And put two bodies of Persians, one at the Belian, the other at the Cissian gates;
33. ‘For I expect, that, on account of my successes, the Babylonians will entrust everything, even the keys of their gates, to me.
34. ‘Then it will be for me and our Persians to do the rest.’
Chapter 39
1. When this plan was agreed Zopyrus fled towards the gates of the town, often looking back, to give himself the air of a deserter.
2. The lookouts on the towers, observing him, hastened down, and setting one of the gates slightly ajar,
3. Questioned him who he was, and on what errand he had come. He replied that he was Zopyrus, and had deserted to them from the Persians.
4. When the doorkeepers heard this they took him at once to the magistrates. Introduced into the assembly, he began to bewail his misfortunes,
5. Telling them that Darius had maltreated him in the way they could see, only because he had given advice that the siege should be raised, since there seemed no hope of taking the city.
6. ‘And now,’ he said, ‘my coming to you, Babylonians, will prove the greatest gain that you could possibly receive, while to Darius and the Persians it will be the severest loss.
7. ‘Truly, he by whom I have been so mutilated shall not escape unpunished. And all the paths of his counsels are known to me.’
8. The Babylonians, seeing a Persian of such exalted rank in so grievous a plight, his nose and ears cut off, his body red with marks of scourging and with blood,
9. Had no suspicion but that he spoke the truth, and was really come to help them. They were ready, therefore, to grant him anything he asked;
10. And on his requesting a command, entrusted to him a body of troops, with whose help he proceeded to do as he had arranged with Darius.
11. On the tenth day after his flight he led out his detachment, and surrounding the thousand men, whom Darius according to agreement had sent, he slew them all.
12. Then the Babylonians, seeing that his deeds were as brave as his words, were beyond measure pleased, and set no bounds to their trust.
13. He waited, however, and when the next period agreed on had elapsed, again with a band of picked men he went out and defeated the two