family no longer holds together, when suspicion and jealousy have replaced the trust and affection of a happier time, the empire has passed into the declining stage, and has already begun the descent which conducts, by quick or slow degrees, to destruction.  The murder of Sennacherib, if it was, as perhaps it was, a judgment on the individual, was, at least equally, a judgment on the nation.  When, in an absolute monarchy, the palace becomes the scene of the worst crimes, the doom of the kingdom is sealed—­it totters to its fall—­and requires but a touch from without to collapse into a heap of ruins.

Esar-haddon, the son and successor of Sennacherib, is proved by the Assyrian Canon, to have ascended the throne of Assyria in B.C. 681—­the year immediately previous to that which the Canon of Ptolemy makes his first year in Babylon, viz., B.C. 680.  He was succeeded by his son Asshur-bani-pal, or Sardanapalus, in B.C. 668, and thus held the crown no more than thirteen years.  Esar-haddon’s inscriptions show that he was engaged for some time after his accession in a war with his half-brothers, who, at the head of a large body of troops, disputed his right to the crown.  Esar-haddon marched from the Armenian frontier, where (as already observed) he was stationed at the time of his father’s death, against this army, defeated it in the country of Khanirabbat (north-west of Nineveh), and proceeding to the capital, was universally acknowledged king.  According to Abydenus, Adrammelech fell in the battle; but better authorities state that both he and his brother, Sharezer, escaped into Armenia, where they were kindly treated by the reigning monarch, who gave them lands, which long continued in the possession of their posterity.

The chief record which we possess of Esar-haddon is a cylinder inscription, existing in duplicate, which describes about nine campaigns, and may probably have been composed in or about his tenth year.  A memorial which he set up at the mouth of the Nahr-el-Kolb, and a cylinder of his son’s, add some important information with respect to the latter part of his reign.  One or two notices in the Old Testament connect him with the history of the Jews.  And Abydenus, besides the passage already quoted, has an allusion to some of his foreign conquests.  Such are the chief materials from which the modern inquirer has to reconstruct the history of this great king.

It appears that the first expedition of Esar-haddon was into Phoenicia.  Abdi-Milkut king of Sidon, and Sandu-arra king of the adjoining part of Lebanon, had formed an alliance and revolted from the Assyrians, probably during the troubles which ensued on Sennacherib’s death.  Esar-haddon attacked Sidon first, and soon took the city; but Aladi-Milkut made his escape to an island—­Aradus or Cyprus—­where, perhaps, he thought himself secure.  Esar-haddon, however, determined on pursuit.  He traversed the sea “like a fish,” and made Abdi-Milkut