that Babylonia and Assyria paid one-third of it.  The payment seems to have been very considerable in amount.  Egypt had to supply grain sufficient for the nutriment of 120,000 Persian troops quartered in the country.  Media had to contribute 100,000 sheep, 4000 mules, and 3000 horses; Cappadocia, half the above number of each kind of animal; Armenia furnished 20,000 colts; Cilicia gave 360 white horses and a sum of 140 talents (L35,000.) in lieu of further tribute in kind.  Babylonia, besides corn, was required to furnish 500 boy eunuchs.  These charges, however, were all fixed by the crown, and may have been taken into consideration in assessing the money payment, the main object of the whole arrangement evidently being to make the taxation of each province proportionate to its wealth and resources.

The assessment of the taxation upon the different portions of his province was left to the satrap.  We do not know on what principles he ordinarily proceeded, or whether any uniform principles at all were observed throughout the Empire.  But we find some evidence that, in places at least, the mode of exaction and collection was by a land-tax.  The assessment upon individuals, and the actual collection from them, devolved, in all probability, on the local authorities, who distributed the burthen imposed upon their town, village, or district as they thought proper.  Thus the foreign oppressor did not come into direct contact with the mass of the conquered people, who no doubt paid the calls made upon them with less reluctance through the medium of their own proper magistrates.

If the taxation of the subject had stopped here, he would have had no just ground of complaint against his rulers.  The population of the Empire cannot be estimated at less than forty millions of souls.  The highest estimate of the value of the entire tribute, both in money and kind, will scarcely place it at more than ten millions sterling.  Thus far, then, the burthen of taxation would certainly not have exceeded five shillings a head per annum.  Perhaps it would not have reached half that amount.  But, unhappily, neither was the tribute the sole tax which the crown exacted from its subjects, nor had the crown the sole right of exacting taxation.  Persian subjects in many parts of the Empire paid, besides their tribute, a water-rate, which is expressly said to have been very productive.  The rivers of the Empire were the king’s; and when water was required for irrigation, a state officer superintended the opening of the sluices, and regulated the amount of the precious fluid which might be drawn off by each tribe or township.  For the opening of the sluices a large sum was paid to the officer, which found its way into the coffers of the state.  Further, it appears that such things as fisheries—­and if so, probably salt-works, mines, quarries, and forests—­were regarded as crown property, and yielded large sums to the revenue.  They appear to have been farmed to responsible persons, who undertook to pay at a certain fixed rate, and made what profit they could by the transaction.  The price of commodities thus farmed would be greatly enhanced to the consumer.