In the earlier times, before riches and luxury had eaten out the strength of the race, their valor and military prowess must have been even more conspicuous.

It was then especially that Media deserved to be called, as she is in Scripture, "the mighty one of the heathen"-- "the terrible of the nations." Her valor, undoubtedly, was of the merciless kind.

There was no tenderness, no hesitancy about it.

Not only did her armies "dash to pieces" the fighting men of the nations opposed to her, allowing apparently no quarter, but the women and the children suffered indignities and cruelties at the hands of her savage warriors, which the pen unwillingly records.

The Median conquests were accompanied by the worst atrocities which lust and hate combined are wont to commit when they obtain their full swing.