Amasis sighed, and answered:  “I would I could prove thee in the wrong; but in looking back on my past life I am fain to confess that its cares began with that very hour which brought me what men call my good fortune.”—­“And I,” interrupted Croesus, “can assure thee that I am thankful thou delayedst to come to my help, inasmuch as the hour of my overthrow was the beginning of true, unsullied happiness.  When I beheld the first Persians scale the walls of Sardis, I execrated myself and the gods, life appeared odious to me, existence a curse.  Fighting on, but in heart despairing, I and my people were forced to yield.  A Persian raised his sword to cleave my skull—­in an instant my poor dumb son had thrown himself between his father and the murderer, and for the first time after long years of silence, I heard him speak.  Terror had loosened his tongue; in that dreadful hour Gyges learnt once more to speak, and I, who but the moment before had been cursing the gods, bowed down before their power.  I had commanded a slave to kill me the moment I should be taken prisoner by the Persians, but now I deprived him of his sword.  I was a changed man, and by degrees learnt ever more and more to subdue the rage and indignation which yet from time to time would boil up again within my soul, rebellious against my fate and my noble enemies.  Thou knowest that at last I became the friend of Cyrus, and that my son grew up at his court, a free man at my side, having entirely regained the use of his speech.  Everything beautiful and good that I had heard, seen or thought during my long life I treasured up now for him; he was my kingdom, my crown, my treasure.  Cyrus’s days of care, his nights so reft of sleep, reminded me with horror of my own former greatness, and from day to day it became more evident to me that happiness has nothing to do with our outward circumstances.  Each man possesses the hidden germ in his own heart.  A contented, patient mind, rejoicing much in all that is great and beautiful and yet despising not the day of small things; bearing sorrow without a murmur and sweetening it by calling to remembrance former joy; moderation in all things; a firm trust in the favor of the gods and a conviction that, all things being subject to change, so with us too the worst must pass in due season; all this helps to mature the germ of happiness, and gives us power to smile, where the man undisciplined by fate might yield to despair and fear.”

Amasis listened attentively, drawing figures the while in the sand with the golden flower on his staff.  At last he spoke: 

“Verily, Croesus, I the great god, the ‘sun of righteousness,’ ’the son of Neith,’ ‘the lord of warlike glory,’ as the Egyptians call me, am tempted to envy thee, dethroned and plundered as thou art.  I have been as happy as thou art now.  Once I was known through all Egypt, though only the poor son of a captain, for my light heart, happy temper, fun and high spirits.  The common