BABYLON AND PERSIA

262 MEDIA, BABYLON, AND PERSIA.Kroisos (Crccsus), went on consolidating and enlar¬ging the dominion of Lydia, and settling old-standingaccounts with the Greek cities of the sea-shore.2. Nor was the change that had come over the na¬tion less great. The Medes were no longer therough warriors, inured to hardships, careless ofwealth, of which they hadnot learned the value,who " did not regard silver, and as for gold, took nodelight in it " (Isaiah xiii., 17).The booty of Nine¬veh and the other Assyrian cities had taught themthe uses of luxury, and the court of Agbatana wasnot outdone in splendor by either Babylon or Sar¬dis.The palace of Median royalty, too, was fullyequal in magnificence to those of the older capitals ;it is even possible that it outshone them in mere barba'ricgorgeousness, such as the lavish use of gold andsilver, though there is great reason to believe that itremained far behind in point of artistic decoration.For the Aryan conquerors had no art of their own,and had not yet had time to learn that of their neigh¬bors, nor, perhaps, to find out that art was in itselfdesirable and worth learning a notion originallyforeign to the rather stern and practical Eranianmind.But, as national dignity demands that roy¬alty should be housed in seemly splendor, an effect ofgreat magnificence and imposing majesty was pro¬duced by other means.3. For, if they had not made a study of art, espe¬cially that of decoration, the Medes had brought withthem a manner of building which was to be fruitfulof artistic results, and inaugurate a style of architec¬ture entirely different from that with which we have