READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

GEORGE GROTE'S HISTORY OF GREECE

CHAPTER LXX.

RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND GREEKS.

The first triumphant feeling of the Greek troops at Cunaxa was exchanged, as soon as they learnt the death of Cyrus, for dismay and sorrow, accompanied by unavailing repentance for the venture into which he and Clearchus had seduced them. Probably Clearchus himself too repented, and with good reason, of having displayed, in his manner of fighting the battle, so little foresight, and so little regard either to the injunctions or to the safety of Cyrus. Nevertheless he still maintained the tone of a victor in the field, and, after expressions of grief for the fate of the young prince, desired Proclus and Glus to return to Ariaeus, with the reply, that the Greeks on their side were conquerors, without any enemy remaining ; that they were about to march onward against Artaxerxes ; and that if Ariaeus would join them, they would place him on the throne which had been intended for Cyrus. While this reply was conveyed to Ariaeus by his particular friend Menon along with the messengers, the Greeks procured a meal as well as they could, having no bread, by killing some of the baggage animals; and by kindling fire, to cook their meat, from the arrows, the wooden Egyptian shields which had been thrown away on the field, and the baggage carts.

Before any answer could be received from Ariaeus, heralds appeared coming from Artaxerxes; among them being Phalinus, a Greek from Zakynthos, and the Greek surgeon Ktesias of Cnidus, who was in the service of the Persian king. Phalinus, an officer of some military experience and in the confidence of Tissaphernes, addressed himself to the Greek commanders; requiring them on the part of the King, since he was now victor and had slain Cyrus, to the Greeks surrender their arms and appeal to his mercy. To this summons, painful in the extreme to a Grecian ear, Clearchus replied that it was not the practice for victorious men to lay down their arms. Being then called away to examine the sacrifice which was going on, he left the interview to the other officers, who met the summons of Phalinus by an emphatic negative. “If the King thinks himself strong enough to ask for our arms unconditionally, let him come and try to seize them.” “The King (rejoined Phalinus) thinks that you are in his power, being in the midst of his territory, hemmed in by impassable rivers, and encompassed by his innumerable subjects.”—“Our arms and our valour are all that remain to us (replied a young Athenian); we shall not be fools enough to hand over to you our only remaining treasure, but shall employ them still to have a fight for your treasure.” But though several spoke in this resolute tone, there were not wanting others disposed to encourage a negotiation ; saying that they had been faithful to Cyrus as long as he lived, and would now be faithful to Artaxerxes, if he wanted their services in Egypt or anywhere else. In the midst of this parley, Clearchus returned, and was requested by Phalinus to return a final answer on behalf of all. He at first asked the advice of Phalinus himself; appealing to the common feeling of Hellenic patriotism, and anticipating, with very little judgment, that the latter would encourage the Greeks in holding out. “If (replied Phalinus) I saw one chance out of ten thousand in your favour, in the event of a contest with the King, I should advise you to refuse the surrender of your arms. But as there is no chance of safety for you against the King’s consent, I recommend you to look out for safety in the only quarter where it presents itself.” Sensible of the mistake which he had made in asking the question, Clearchus rejoined— “That is your opinion: now report our answer. We think we shall be better friends to the King, if we are to be his friends—or more effective enemies, if we are to be his enemies—with our arms, than without them.” Phalinus, in retiring, said that the King proclaimed a truce so long as they remained in their present position, but war if they moved either onward or backward. And to this Clearchus acceded, without declaring which he intended to do.

Shortly after the departure of Phalinus, the envoys despatched to Ariaeus returned; communicating his reply that the Persians grandees would never tolerate any pretensions on his part to the crown, and that he intended to depart early the next morning on his return; if the Greeks wished to accompany him, they must join him during the night. In the evening, Clearchus, convening the generals and the lochages (or captains of lochi), acquainted them that the morning sacrifice had been of a nature to forbid their marching against the King—a prohibition of which he now understood the reason, from having since learnt that the King was on the other side of the Tigris, and therefore out of their reach—but that it was favourable for rejoining Ariaeus. He gave directions accordingly for a night-march back along the Euphrates, to the station where they had passed the last night but one prior to the battle. The other Grecian generals, without any formal choice of Clearchus as chief, tacitly acquiesced in his orders, from a sense of his superior decision and experience, in an emergency when no one knew what to propose. The night­march was successfully accomplished, so that they joined Ariaeus at the preceding station about midnight, not without the alarming symptom, however, that Miltokythes the Thracian deserted to the King at the head of 340 of his countrymen, partly horse, partly foot.

The first proceeding of the Grecian generals was to exchange solemn oaths of reciprocal fidelity and fraternity with Ariaeus. According to an ancient and impressive practice, a bull, a wolf, a boar, and a ram were all slain, and their blood allowed to run into the hollow of a shield; in which the Greek generals dipped a sword, and Ariaeus, with his chief companions, a spear. The latter, besides the promise of alliance, engaged also to guide the Greeks in good faith down to the Asiatic coast. Clearchus immediately began to ask what route he proposed to take; whether to return by that along which they had come up, or by any other. To this Ariaeus replied, that the road along which they had marched was impracticable for retreat, from the utter want of provisions through seventeen days of desert; but that he intended to choose another road, which, though longer, would be sufficiently productive to furnish them with provisions. There was, however, a necessity (he added) that the first two or three days’ marches should be of extreme length, in order that they might get out of the reach of the King’s forces, who would hardly be able to overtake them afterwards with any considerable numbers.

They had now come 93 days’ march from Ephesus, or 90 from Sardis. The distance from Sardis to Cunaxa is, according to Colonel Chesney, about 1265 geographical miles, or 1464 English miles. There had been at least 96 days of rest, enjoyed at various places, so that the total of time elapsed must have at least been 189 days, or a little

How to retrace their steps aos new the problem, apparently insoluble. As to the military force of Persia in the fields, indeed, not merely the easy victory at Cunaxa, but still more the undisputed march throughout so long a space left them no serious apprehensions. In spite of this great extent, population, and riches, they had been allowed to pass through the most difficult and defensible country, and to ford the broad Euphrates, without a blow; nay, the King had shrunk from defending the long trench which he had specially caused to be dug for the protection of Babylonia. But the difficulties which stood between them and their homes were of a very different character. How were they to find their way back or obtain provisions, in defiance of a numerous hostile cavalry, which, not without efficiency even in a pitched battle, would be most formidable in opposing their retreat? The line of their upward march had all been planned, with supplies furnished, by Cyrus; yet even under such advantages, supplies had been on the point of failing in one part of the march. They were now, for the first time, called upon to think and provide for themselves; without knowledge of either roads or distances —without trustworthy guides—without any one to furnish or even to indicate supplies—and with a territory all hostile, traversed by rivers which they had no means of crossing. Clearchus himself knew nothing of the country, nor of any other river except the Euphrates; nor does he indeed in his heart seem to have conceived retreat as practicable without the consent of the King. The reader who casts his eye on a map of Asia, and imagines the situation of this Greek division on the left bank of the Euphrates, near the parallel of latitude 33° 30', will hardly be surprised at any measure of despair, on the part either of general or soldiers. And we may add that Klaus had not even the advantage of such a map, or probably of any map at all, to enable him to shape his course.

In this dilemma, the first and most natural impulse was to consult Ariaeus, who (as has been already stated) pronounced, with good reason, that return by the same road was impracticable, and promised to conduct them home by another road— longer, indeed, yet better supplied. At daybreak on the ensuing morning they began their march in an easterly direction, anticipating that before night they should reach some villages of the Babylonian territory, as in fact they did; yet not before they had been alarmed in the afternoon by the supposed approach of some of the enemy’s horse, and by evidences that the enemy were not far off, which induced them to slacken their march for the purpose of more cautious array. Hence they did not reach the first villages before dark; these, too, had been pillaged by the enemy while retreating before them, so that only the first-comers under Clearchus could obtain accommodation, while the succeeding troops, coming up in the dark, pitched as they could, without any order. The whole camp was a scene of clamour, dispute, and even alarm, throughout the night. No provisions could be obtained. Early the next morning Clearchus ordered them under arms; and, desiring to expose the groundless nature of the alarm, caused the herald to proclaim that whoever would denounce the person who had let the ass into the camp on the preceding night should be rewarded with a talent of silver.

What was the project of route entertained by Ariaeus, we cannot ascertain since it was not further pursued. For the effect of the unexpected arrival of the Greeks as if to attack the enemy—and even the clamour and shouting of the camp during the night—so intimidated the Persian commanders, that they sent heralds the next morning to treat about a truce. The contrast between this message and the haughty summons of the preceding day to lay down their arms was sensibly felt by the Grecian officers, and taught them that the proper way of dealing with the Persians was by a bold and aggressive demeanour. When Clearchus was apprised of the arrival of the heralds, he desired them at first to wait at the outposts until he was at leisure; then, having put his troops into the best possible order, with a phalanx compact on every side to the eye, and the unarmed persons out of sight, he desired the heralds to be admitted. He marched out to meet them with the most showy and best-armed soldiers immediately around him; and when they informed him that they had come from the King with instructions to propose a truce, and to report on what conditions the Greeks would agree to it, Clearchus replied abruptly, “Well then, go and tell the King that our first business must be to fight; for we have nothing to eat, nor will any man presume to talk to Greeks about a truce, without first providing dinner for them”. With this reply the heralds rode off, but returned very speedily; thus making it plain that the King, or the commanding officer, was near at hand. They brought word that the King thought their answer reasonable, and had sent guides to conduct them to a place where they would obtain provisions, if the truce should be concluded.

After an affected delay and hesitation, in order to impose upon the Persians, Clearchus concluded the truce, and desired that the guides would conduct the army to those quarters where provisions could be had. He was most circumspect in maintaining exact order during the march, himself taking charge of the rear guard. The guides led them over many ditches and channels, full of water, and cut for the purpose of irrigation; some so broad and deep that they could not be crossed without bridges. The army had to put together bridges for the occasion, from palm- trees either already fallen or expressly cut down. This was a troublesome business, which Clearchus himself superintended with peculiar strictness. He carried his spear in the left hand, his stick in the right, employing the latter to chastise any soldier who seemed remiss, and even plunging into the mud and lending his own hands in aid wherever it was necessary. As it was not the usual season of irrigation for crops, he suspected that the canals had been filled on this occasion expressly to intimidate the Greeks, by impressing them with the difficulties of their prospective march; and he was anxious to demonstrate to the Persians that these difficulties were no more than Grecian energy could easily surmount.

At length they reached certain villages indicated by their guides for quarters and provision; and here for the first time they had a sample of that unparalleled abundance of the Babylonian territory, which Herodotus is afraid to describe with numerical precision. Large quantities of corn—dates not only in great numbers, but of such beauty, freshness, size, and flavour, as no Greek had ever seen or tasted, insomuch that fruit like what was imported into Greece was disregarded and left for the slaves—wine and vinegar, both also made from the date palm: these are the luxuries which Xenophon is eloquent in describing, after his recent period of scanty fare and anxious apprehension, not without also noticing the headaches which such new and luscious food, in unlimited quantity, brought upon himself and others.

After three days passed in these restorative quarters, they were visited by Tissaphernes, accompanied by four Persian grandees and a suite of slaves. The satrap began to open a negotiation with Clearchus and the other generals. Speaking through an interpreter, he stated to them that the vicinity of his satrapy to Greece impressed him with a strong interest in favour of the Cyreian Greeks, and made him anxious to rescue them out of their present desperate situation; that he had solicited the King’s permission to save them, as a personal recompense to himself for having been the first to forewarn him of the schemes of Cyrus, and for having been the only Persian who had not fled before the Greeks at Cunaxa; that the King had promised to consider this point, and had sent him in the meantime to ask the Greeks what their purpose was in coming up to attack him: and that he trusted the Greeks would give him a conciliatory answer to carry back, in order thar he might have less difficulty in realizing what he desired for their benefit. To this Clearchus, after first deliberating apart with the other officers, replied, that the army had come together, and had even commenced their march, without any purpose of hostility to the King; that Cyrus had brought them up the country under false pretences, but that they had been ashamed to desert him in the midst of danger, since he had always treated them generously; that since Cyrus was now dead, they had no purpose of hostility against the King, but were only anxious to return home; that they were prepared to repel hostility from all quarters, but would be not less prompt in requiting favour or assistance. With this answer Tissaphernes departed, and returned on the next day but one, informing them that he had obtained the King’s permission to save the Grecian army—though not without great opposition, since many Persian counsellors contended that it was unworthy of the King’s dignity, to suffer those who had assailed him to escape. “I am now ready (said he) to conclude a covenant and exchange oaths with you; engaging to conduct you safely back Greece, with the country friendly, and with ca regular market for you to purchase provisions. You must stipulate on your part always to pay for your Pro visions, and to do no damage to the country : if I do not furnish you with provisions to buy, you are then at liberty to take them where you can find them.” Well were the Greeks content to enter into such a covenant, which was sworn, with hands given upon it, by Clearchus, the other generals, and the lochages on their side, and by Tissaphernes with the King’s brother-in-law on the other. Tissaphernes then left them, saying that he would go hack to the King, make preparations, and return to reconduct the Greeks home, going himself to his own satrapy.

The statements of Ktesias, though known to us only indirectly, and not to be received without caution, afford ground for believing that Queen Parysatis decidedly wished the success to her son Cyrus in his contest for the throne—that the first report conveyed to her of the battle of Cunaxa, announcing the victory of towards Cyrus, filled her with joy, which was exchanged for bitter sorrow when she was informed of his death,—that she caused to be slain with horrible tortures all those, who, though acting in the Persian army and for the defence of Artaxerxes, had any participation in the death of Cyrus, and that she showed favourable dispositions towards the Cyreian Greeks. It may seem probable, further, that her influence may have been exerted to procure for them an unimpeded retreat, without anticipating the use afterwards made by Tissaphernes (as will soon appear) of the present convention. And in one point of view, the Persian king had an interest in facilitating their retreat. For the very circumstance which rendered retreat difficult also rendered the Greeks dangerous to him in their actual position. They were in the heart of the Persian empire, within seventy miles of Babylon, in a country not only teeming with fertility, but also extremely defensible, especially against cavalry, from the multiplicity of canals, as Herodotus observed respecting Lower Egypt. And Clearchus might say to his Grecian soldiers — what Xenophon was afterwards preparing to say to them at Kalpe on the Euxine Sea, and what Nicias also affirmed to the unhappy Athenian army whom he afterwards conducted away from Syracuse—that wherever they sat down, they were sufficiently numerous and well-organized to become at once a city. A body of such troops might effectually assist, and would perhaps encourage, the Babylonian population to throw off the Persian yoke, and to exonerate themselves from the prodigious tribute which they now paid to the satrap. For these reasons, the advisers of Artaxerxes thought it advantageous to convey the Greeks across the Tigris out of Babylonia, beyond all possibility of returning thither. This was at any rate the primary object of the convention. And it was the more necessary to conciliate the good­will of the Greeks, because there seems to have been but one bridge over the Tigris; which bridge could only be reached by inviting them to advance considerably farther into the interior of Babylonia.

Such was the state of fears and hopes on both sides, at the time when Tissaphernes left the Greeks, after concluding his convention. For twenty days did they await hid return, without receiving from him any communication, the Cyreian Persians under Ariaeus being encamped near them. Such prolonged and unexplained delay became, after a few days, the source of much uneasiness to the Greeks; the more so as Ariaeus received during this interval several visits from his Persian kinsmen, and friendly messages from the King, promising amnesty for his recent services under Cyrus. Of these messages the effects were painfully felt, in manifest coldness of demeanour on the part of his Persian troops towards the Greeks. Impatient and suspicious, the Greek soldiers impressed upon Clearchus their fears that the King had concluded the recent convention only to arrest their movements, until he should have assembled a larger army and blocked up more effectually the roads against their return. To this Clearchus replied, “ I am aware of all that you say. Yet if we now strike our tents, it will be a breach of the convention and a declaration of war. No one will furnish us with provisions; we shall have no guides; Ariaeus will desert us forthwith, so that we shall have his troops as enemies instead of friends. Whether there be any other river for us to cross I know not; but we know that the Euphrates itself can never be crossed if there be an enemy to resist us. Nor have we any cavalry, while cavalry is the best and most numerous force of our enemies. If the King, having all these advantages, really wishes to destroy us, I do not know why he should falsely exchange all these oaths and solemnities, and thus make his own word worthless in the eyes both of Greeks and barbarians.”

Such words from Clearchus are remarkable, as they testify his own complete despair of the situation—certainly a very natural despair—except by amicable dealing with the Persians, and also his ignorance of geography and the country to be traversed. This feeling helps to explain his imprudent confidence afterwards in Tissaphernes.

That satrap, however, after twenty days, at last came back, with his army prepared to return to Ionia, with the King’s daughter, whom he had just received in marriage, and with another grandee named Orontas. Tissaphernes took the conduct of the march, providing supplies for the Greek troops to purchase; while Ariaeus and his division now separated themselves altogether from the Greeks, and became intermingled with the other Persians. Clearchus and the Greeks followed them at the distance of about three miles in the rear, with a separate guide for themselves; not without jealousy and mistrust, sometimes shown in individual conflicts, while collecting wood or forage, between them and the Persians of Ariaeus. After three days’ march (that is, apparently, three days, calculated from the moment when they began their retreat with Ariaeus) they came to the Wall of Media, and passed through it, prosecuting their march onward through the country on its other or interior side. It was of bricks cemented with bitumen, 100 feet high, and 20 feet broad; it was said to extend a length of 20 parasangs (or about 70 miles, if we reckon, the parasang at 30 stadia), and to be not far distant from Babylon. Two days of farther march, computed at eight parasangs, brought them to the Tigris. During these two days they crossed two great ship­canals, one of them over a permanent bridge, the other over a temporary bridge laid on seven boats. Canals of such magnitude must probably have been two among the four stated by Xenophon to be drawn from the river Tigris, each of them a parasang distant from the other. They were 100 feet broad, and deep enough even for heavy vessels ; they were distributed by means of numerous smaller channels and ditches for the irrigation of the soil; and they were said to fall into the Euphrates, or rather, perhaps, they terminated in one main larger canal cut directly from the Euphrates to the Tigris, each of them joining this larger canal at a different point of its course. Within less than two miles of the Tigris was a large and populous city named Sittake, near which the Greeks pitched their camp, on the verge of a beautiful park or thick grove full of all kinds of trees ; while the Persians all crossed the Tigris, at the neighbouring bridge.

As Proxenus and Xenophon were here walking in front of the camp after supper, a man was brought up who had asked for the former at the advanced posts. This man said that he came with instructions from Anrieus. He advised the Greeks to be on their guard, as there were troops concealed in the adjoining grove for the purpose of attacking them during the night, and also to send and occupy the bridge over the Tigris, since Tissaphernes intended to break it down, in order that the Greeks might be caught without possibility of escape between the river and the canal. On dis­cussing this information with Clearchus, who was much alarmed by it, a young Greek present remarked that the two matters stated by the informant contradicted each other; for that if Tissaphernes intended to attack the Greeks during the night, he would not break down the bridge, so as both to prevent his own troops on the other side from crossing to aid, and to deprive those on this side of all retreat if they were beaten; while, if the Greeks were beaten, there was no escape open to them, whether the bridge continued or not. This remark induced Clearchus to ask the messenger what was the extent of ground between the Tigris and the canal. The messenger replied that it was a great extent of country, comprising many large cities and villages. Reflecting on this communication, the Greek officers came to the conclusion that the message was a stratagem on the part of Tissaphernes to frighten them and accelerate their passage across the Tigris, under the apprehension that they might conceive the plan of seizing or breaking the bridge and occupying a permanent position in the spot where they were, which was an island, fortified on one side by the Tigris, on the other sides by intersecting canals between the Euphrates and the Tigris. Such an island was a defensible position, having a most productive terri­tory with, numerous cultivators, so as to furnish shelter and means of hostility for all the King’s enemies. Tissaphernes calculated that the message now delivered would induce the Greeks to become alarmed with their actual position, and to cross the Tigris with as little delay as possible. At least this was the interpretation which the Greek officers put upon his proceeding—an interpretation highly plausible, since, in order to reach the bridge over the Tigris, he had been obliged to conduct the Greek troops into a position sufficiently tempting for them to hold, and since he knew that his own purposes were purely treacherous. But the Greeks, officers as well as soldiers, were animated only by the wish of reaching home. They trusted, though not without misgivings, in the promise of Tissaphernes to conduct them, and never for a moment thought of taking permanent post in this fertile island. They did not, however, neglect the precaution of sending a guard during the night to the bridge over the Tigris, which no enemy came to assail. On the next morning they passed over it in a body, in cautious and mistrustful array, and found themselves on the eastern bank of the Tigris, not only without attack, but even without sight of a single Persian, except Girls the interpreter and a few others watching their motions.

After having crossed by a bridge laid upon thirty-seven pontoons, the Greeks continued their march to the northward upon the eastern side of the Tigris, for four days to the river Physkus, said to be twenty parasangs. The Physkus was 100 feet wide, with a bridge, and the large city of Opis near it. Here, at the frontier of Assyria and Media, the road from the eastern regions to Babylon joined the road northerly on which the Greeks were marching. An illegitimate brother of Artaxerxes was seen at the head of a numerous force, which he was conducting from Susa and Ecbatana as a reinforcement to the royal army. This great host halt ed to see the Greeks pass by; and Clearchus ordered the march in column of two abreast, employing himself actively to maintain an excellent array, and halting more than once. The army thus occupied so long a time in passing by the Persian host that their numbers appeared greater than the reality, even to themselves ; while the effect upon the Persian spectators was very imposing. Here Assyria ended and Media began. They marched, still in a northerly direction, for six days through a portion of Media almost unpeopled, until they came to some flourishing villages which formed a portion of the domain of Queen Parysatis; probably these villages, forming so marked an exception to the desert character of the remaining march, were situated on the Lesser Zab, which flows into the Tigris, and which Xenophon must have crossed, though he makes no mention of it. According to the order of march stipulated between the Greeks and Tissaphernes, the latter only provided a supply of provisions for the former to purchase; but on the present halt he allowed the Greeks to plunder the villages, which were rich and full of all sorts of subsistence—yet without carrying off the slaves. The wish of the satrap to put an insult on Cyrus, as his personal enemy, through Parysatis, thus proved a sentence of ruin to these unhappy villagers. Five more days’ march, called twenty parasangs, brought them to the banks of the river Zabatus, or the Greater Zab, which flows into the Tigris near a town now called Senn. During the first of these five days, they saw on the opposite side of the Tigris a large town called Kaenae, from whence they received supplies of provisions, brought across by the inhabitants upon rafts supported by inflated skins.

On the banks of the Great Zab they halted three days—days of serious and tragical moment. Having been under feelings of mistrust, ever since the convention with Tissaphernes, they had followed throughout the whole march, with separate guides of their own, in the rear of his army, always maintaining their encampment apart. During their halt on the Zab, so many various manifestations occurred to aggravate the mistrust, that hostilities seemed on the point of breaking out between the two camps. To obviate this danger Clearchus demanded an interview with Tissaphernes, represented to him the threatening attitude of affairs, and insisted on the necessity of coming to a clear understanding. He impressed upon the satrap that, over and above the solemn oaths which had been interchanged, the Greeks on their side could have no conceivable motive to quarrel with him; that they had everything to hope from his friendship, and everything to fear, even to the loss of all chance of safe return, from his hostility; that Tissaphernes also could gain nothing by destroying them, but would find them, if he chose, the best and most faithful instruments for his own aggrandizement and for conquering the Mysians and Pisidians—as Cyrus had experienced while he was alive. Clearchus concluded his protest by requesting to be informed what malicious reporter had been filling the mind of Tissaphernes with causeless suspicions against the Greeks.

“Klearchus (replied the satrap), I rejoice to hear such excellent sense from your lips. You remark truly, that if you were to meditate evil against me, it would recoil upon yourselves. I shall prove to you, in my turn, that you have no cause to mistrust either the King or me. If we had wished to destroy you, nothing would be easier. We have superabundant forces for the purpose: there are wide plains in which you would be starved—besides mountains and rivers which you would be unable to pass, without our help. Having thus the means of destroying you in our hands, and having nevertheless bound ourselves by solemn oaths to save you, we shall not be fools and knaves enough to attempt it now, when we should draw upon ourselves the just indignation of the gods. It is my peculiar affection for my neighbours the Greeks, and my wish to attach to my own person, by ties of gratitude, the Greek soldiers of Cyrus, which have made me eager to conduct you to Ionia in safety. For I know that when you are in my service, though the King is the only man who can wear his tiara erect upon his head, I shall be able to wear mine erect upon my heart, in full pride and confidence.”

So powerful was the impression made upon Clearchus by these assurances, that he exclaimed—“ Surely those informers deserve the severest punishment, who try to put us at enmity, when we are such good friends to each other, and have so much reason to be so”. “Yes (replied Tissaphernes), they deserve nothing less : and if you, with the other generals and lochages, will come into my tent tomorrow, I will tell you who the calumniators are.” “To be sure I will (rejoined Clearchus), and bring the other generals with me. I shall tell you at the same time who are the parties that seek to prejudice us against you.” The conversation then ended, the satrap detaining Clearchus to dinner, and treating him in the most hospitable and confidential manner.

On the next morning, Clearchus communicated what had passed to the Greeks, insisting on the necessity that all the generals should go to Tissaphernes pursuant to his invitation, in order to re-establish that confidence which unworthy calumniators had shaken, and to punish such of the calumniators as might be Greeks. So emphatically did he pledge himself for the good faith and Phil-hellenic dispositions of the satrap, that he overruled the opposition of many among the soldiers, who, still continuing to entertain their former suspicions, remonstrated especially against the extreme imprudence of putting all the generals at once into the power of Tissaphernes. The urgency of Clearchus prevailed. Himself with four other generals—Proxenus, Menon, Agias, and Socrates—and twenty lochages or captains—went to visit the satrap in his tent; about 200 of the soldiers going along with them, to make purchases for their own account in the Persian camp-market.

On reaching the quarters of Tissaphernes—distant nearly three miles from the Grecian camp, according to habit—the five generals were admitted into the interior, while the lochages remained at the entrance. A purple flag, hoisted from the top of the tent, betrayed too late the purpose for which they had been invited to come. The lochages, with the Grecian soldiers who had accompanied them, were surprised and cut down, while the generals in the interior were detained, put in chains, and carried up as prisoners to the Persian court. Here Clearchus, Proxenus, Agias, and Sokrates were beheaded, after a short imprisonment. Queen Parysatis, indeed, from affection to Cyrus, not only furnished many comforts to Clearchus in the prison (by the bands of her surgeon Ktesias), but used all her influence with her son Artaxerxes to save his life; though her efforts were counteracted, on this occasion, by the superior influence of Queen Stateira his wife. The rivalry between these two royal women, doubtless arising out of many other circumstances besides the death of Clearchus, became soon afterwards so furious, that Parysatis caused Stateira to be poisoned.

Menon was not put to death along with the other generals. He appears to have taken credit at the Persian court for the treason of entrapping his colleagues into the hands of Tissaphernes. But his life was only prolonged to perish a year afterwards in disgrace and torture—probably by the requisition of Parysatis, who thus avenged the death of Clearchus. The queen-mother had always power enough to perpetrate cruelties, though not always to avert them. She had already brought to a miserable end every one, even faithful defenders of Artaxerxes, concerned in the death of her son Cyrus.

Though Menon thought it convenient, when brought up to Babylon, to boast of having been the instrument through whom the generals were entrapped into the fatal tent, this boast is not to be treated as matter of fact. For not only does Xenophon explain the catastrophe differently, but in the delineation which he gives of Menon, dark and odious as it is in the extreme, he does not advance any such imputation; indirectly, indeed, he sets it aside.

Unfortunately for the reputation of Clearchus, no such reasonable excuse can be offered for his credulity, which brought himself as well as his colleagues to so melancholy an end, and his whole army to the brink of ruin. It appears that the general sentiment of the Grecian army, taking just measure of the character of Tissaphernes, was disposed to greater circumspection in dealing with him. Upon that system Clearchus himself had hitherto acted; and the necessity of it might have been especially present to his mind, since he had served with the Lacedaemonian fleet at Miletus in 411 B.C., and had therefore had fuller experience than other men in the army of the satrap’s real character. On a sudden he now turns round, and on the faith of a few verbal declarations, puts all the military chiefs into the most defenceless posture and the most obvious peril, such as hardly the strongest grounds for confidence could have justified. Though the remark of Machiavel is justified by large experience—that from the short­sightedness of men and their obedience to present impulse, the most notorious deceiver will always find new persons to trust him—still such misjudgement on the part of an officer of age and experience is difficult to explain. Polyaenus intimates that beautiful women, exhibited by the satrap at his first banquet to Clearchus alone, served as a lure to attract him with all his colleagues to the second; while Xenophon imputes the error to continuance of a jealous rivalry with Menon. The latter, it appears, having always been intimate with Ariaeus, had been thus brought into previous communication with Tissaphernes, by whom he had been well received, and by whom he was also encouraged to lay plans for detaching the whole Grecian army from Clearchus, so as to bring it all under his (Menon’s) command into the service of the satrap. Such at least was the suspicion of Clearchus, who, jealous in the extreme of his own military authority, tried to defeat the scheme by bidding still higher himself for the favour of Tissaphernes. Imagining that Menon was the unknown calumniator who prejudiced the satrap against him, he hoped to prevail on the satrap to disclose his name and dismiss him. Such jealousy seems to have robbed Clearchus of his customary prudence. We must also allow for another impression deeply fixed in his mind—that the salvation of the army was hopeless without the consent of Tissaphernes, and therefore, since the latter had conducted them thus far in safety, when he might have destroyed them before, that his designs at the bottom could not be hostile.

Notwithstanding these two great mistakes—one on the present occasion, one previously, at the battle of Cunaxa, in keeping the Greeks on the right contrary to the order of Cyrus—both committed by Clearchus, the loss of that officer was doubtless a great misfortune to the army ; while, on the contrary, the removal of Menon was a signal benefit—perhaps a condition of ultimate safety. A man so treacherous and unprincipled as Xenophon depicts Menon would probably have ended by really committing towards the army that treason for which he falsely took credit at the Persian court in reference to the seizure of the generals.

The impression entertained by Clearchus, respecting the hopeless position of the Greeks in the heart of the Persian territory after the death of Cyrus, was perfectly natural in a military man who could appreciate all the means of attack and obstruction which the enemy had it in their power to employ. Nothing is so unaccountable in this expedition as the manner in which such means were thrown away—the spectacle of Persian impotence. First, the whole line of upward march, including the passage of the Euphrates, left undefended; next, the long trench dug across the frontier of Babylonia, with only a passage of twenty feet wide left near the Euphrates, abandoned without a guard; lastly, the line of the Wall of Media and the canals which offered such favourable positions for keeping the Greeks out of the cultivated territory of Babylonia, neglected in like manner, and a convention concluded, whereby the Persians engaged to escort the invaders safe to the Ionian coast, beginning by conducting them through the heart of Babylonia, amidst canals affording inexpugnable defences if the Greeks had chosen to take up a position among them. The plan of Tissaphernes, as far as we can understand it, seems to have been to draw the Greeks to some considerable distance from the heart of the Persian empire, and then to open his schemes of treasonable hostility, which the imprudence of Clearchus enabled him to do, on the banks of the Great Zab, with chances of success such as he could hardly have contemplated. We have here a fresh example of the wonderful impotence of the Persians. We should have expected that, after having committed so flagrant an act of perfidy, Tissaphernes would at least have tried to turn it to account; that he would have poured with all his forces and all his vigour on the Grecian camp, at the moment when it was unprepared, disorganized, and without commanders. Instead of which, when the generals (with those who accompanied them to the Persian camp) had been seized or slain, no attack whatever was made except by small detachments of Persian cavalry upon individual Greek stragglers in the plain. One of the companions of the generals, an Arcadian named Nikarchus, ran wounded into the Grecian camp, where the soldiers were looking from afar at the horsemen scouring the plain without knowing what they were about,—exclaiming that the Persians were massacring all the Greeks, officers as well as soldiers. Immediately the Greek soldiers hastened to put themselves in defence, expecting a general attack to be made upon their camp; but no more Persians came near than a body of about 300 horse, under Ariaeus and Mithridates (the confidential companions of the deceased Cyrus), accompanied by the brother of Tissaphernes. These men, approaching the Greek lines as friends, called for the Greek officers to come forth, as they had a message to deliver from the King. Accordingly, Kleanor and Sophaenetus with an adequate guard came to the front, accompanied by Xenophon, who was anxious to hear news about Proxenus. Ariaeus then acquainted them that Clearchus, having been detected in a breach of the convention to which he had sworn, had been put to death; that Proxenus and Menon, who had divulged his treason, were in high honour at the Persian quarters. He concluded by saying—“The King calls upon you to surrender your aims, which now (he says) belong to him, since they formerly belonged to his slave Cyrus’’.

The step here taken seems to testify a belief on the part of these Persians, that the generals being now in their power, the Grecian soldiers had become defenceless, and might be required to surrender their arms, even to men who had just been guilty of the most deadly fraud and injury towards them. If Ariaeus entertained such an expectation, he was at once undeceived by the language of Kleanor and Xenophon, which breathed nothing but indignant reproach; so that he soon retired and left the Greeks to their own reflections.

While their camp thus remained unmolested, every man within it was a prey to the most agonizing apprehensions. Ruin appeared impending and inevitable, though no one could tell in what precise form it would come. The Greeks were in the midst of a hostile country, ten thousand stadia from home, surrounded by enemies, blocked up by impassable mountains and rivers, without guides, without provisions, without cavalry, to aid their retreat, without generals to give orders. A stupor of sorrow and conscious helplessness seized upon all. Few came to the evening muster ; few lighted fires to cook their suppers ; every man lay down to rest where he was ; yet no man could sleep, for fear, anguish, and yearning after relatives whom he was never again to behold.

Amidst the many causes of despondency which weighed down this forlorn army, there was none more serious than the fact that not a single man among them had now either authority to command or obligation to take the initiative. Nor was any ambitious candidate likely to volunteer his pretensions, at a moment when the post promised nothing but the maximum of difficulty as well as of hazard. A new, self-kindled light—and self-originated stimulus—was required, to vivify the embers of suspended hope and action, in a mass paralyzed for the moment, but every way capable of effort. And the inspiration now fell, happily for the army, upon one in whom a full measure of soldierly strength and courage was combined with the education of an Athenian, a democrat, and a philosopher.

It is in true Homeric vein, and in something like Homeric language, that Xenophon (to whom we owe the whole narrative of the expedition) describes his dream, or intervention of Oneirus, sent by Zeus, from which this renovating impulse took its rise. Lying mournful and restless like his comrades, he caught a short repose ; when he dreamt that he heard thunder, and saw the burning thunderbolt fall upon his paternal house, which became forthwith encircled by flames. Awaking, full of terror, he instantly sprang up upon which the dream began to fit on and blend itself with his waking thoughts, and with the cruel realities of his position. His pious and excited fancy generated a series of shadowy analogies. The dream was sent by Zeus the King, since it was from him that thunder and lightning proceeded. In one respect the sign was auspicious—that a great light had appeared to him from Zeus in the midst of peril and suffering. But on the other hand it was alarming, that the house had appeared to be completely encircled by flames, preventing all egress, because this seemed to indicate that he would remain confined where he was in the Persian dominions, without being able to overcome the difficulties which hedged him in. Yet doubtful as the promise was, it was still the message of Zeus addressed to himself, serving as a stimulus to him to break through the common stupor and take the initiative movement. “Why am I lying here? Night is advancing ; at daybreak the enemy will be on us, and we shall be put to death with tortures. Not a man is stirring to take measures of defence. Why do I wait for any man older than myself, or for any man of a different city, to begin?”

With these reflections, interesting in themselves and given with Homeric vivacity, he instantly went to convene the lochagi or captains who had served under his late friend Proxenus. He impressed upon them emphatically the necessity of standing forward to put the army in a posture of defence. “I cannot sleep, gentlemen; neither, I presume, can you, under our present perils. The enemy will be upon us at daybreak—prepared to kill us all with tortures, as his worst enemies. For my part, I rejoice that his flagitious perjury has put an end to a truce by which we were the great losers—a truce under which we, mindful of our oaths, have passed through all the rich possessions of the King, without touching anything except what we could purchase with our own scanty means. Now, we have our hands free; all these rich spoils stand between us and him, as prizes for the better man. The gods, who preside over the match, will assuredly be on the side of us, who have kept our oaths in spite of strong temptations, against these perjurers. Moreover, our bodies are more enduring and our spirit more gallant than theirs. They are easier to wound and easier to kill than we are, under the same favour of the gods as we experienced at Cunaxa”.

“Probably others also are feeling just as we feel. But let us not wait for any one else to come as monitors to us : let us take the lead, and communicate the stimulus of honour to others. Do you show yourselves now the best among the lochages—more worthy of being generals than the generals themselves. Begin at once, and I desire only to follow you. But if you order me into the front rank, I shall obey without pleading my youth as an excuse—accounting myself to be of complete maturity, when the purpose is to save myself from ruin.”

All the captains who heard Xenophon cordially concurred in his suggestion, and desired him to take the lead in executing it. One captain alone (Apollonides), speaking in the Boeotian dialect, protested against it as insane; enlarging upon their desperate position, and insisting upon submission to the King as the only chance of safety. “How? (replied Xenophon). Have you forgotten the courteous treatment which we received from the Persians in Babylonia when we replied to the demand for the surrender of our arms by showing a bold front? Do not you see the miserable fate which has befallen Clearchus when he trusted himself unarmed in their hands, in reliance on their oaths? And yet you scout our exhortations to resistance, again advising us to go and plead for indulgence! My friends, such a Greek as this man disgraces not only his own city, but all Greece besides. Let us banish him from our counsels, cashier him, and make a slave of him to carry baggage.” “Nay (observed Agasias of Stymphalus), the man has nothing to do with Greece : I myself have seen his ears bored like a true Lydian.” Apollonides was degraded accordingly.

Xenophon with the rest then distributed themselves, in order to bring together the chief remaining officers in the army, who were presently convened, to the number of about one hundred. The senior captain of the earlier body next desired Xenophon to repeat to this larger body the topics upon which he had just before been insisting. Xenophon obeyed, enlarging yet more emphatically on the situation, perilous, yet not without hope—on the proper measures to be taken—and especially on the necessity that they, the chief officers remaining, should put themselves forward prominently, first fix upon effective commanders, then afterwards submit the names to be confirmed by the army, accompanied with suitable exhortations and encouragement. His speech was applauded and welcomed, especially by the Lacedaemonian general Cheirisophus, who had joined Cyrus with a body of 700 hoplites at Issus in Cilicia. Cheirisophus urged the captains to retire forthwith, and agree upon their commanders instead of the four who had been seized; after which the herald must be summoned, and the entire body of soldiers convened without delay. Accordingly, Timasion of Dardanus was chosen instead of Clearchus ; Xanthikles in place of Socrates; Eleanor in place of Agias; Philesius in place of Menon; and Xenophon instead of Proxenus. The captains, who had served under each of the departed generals, separately chose a successor to the captain thus promoted. It is to be recollected that the five now chosen were not the only generals in the camp ; thus, for example, Cheirisophus had the command of his own separate division, and there may have been one or two others similarly placed. But it was now necessary for all the generals to form a Board and act in concert.

At daybreak the newly-constituted Board of generals placed proper outposts in advance, and then convened the army in general assembly, in order that the new appointments might be submitted and confirmed. As soon as this had been done, probably on the proposition of Cheirisophus (who had been in command before), that general addressed a few words of exhortation and encouragement to the soldiers. He was followed by Eleanor, who delivered, with the like brevity, an earnest protest against  the perfidy of Tissaphernes and Ariaeus. Both of them left to Xenophon the task, alike important and arduous at this moment of despondency, of setting forth the case at length,—working up the feelings of the soldiers to that pitch of resolution which the emergency required,—and above all extinguishing all those inclinations to acquiesce in new treacherous proposals from the enemy, which the perils of the situation would be likely to suggest.

Xenophon had equipped himself in his finest military costume e at this his first official appearance before the army, when the scales seemed to tremble between life and death. Taking up the protest of Kleanor against the treachery of the Persians, he insisted that any attempt to enter into convention or trust with such liars would be utter ruin; but that if energetic resolution were taken to deal with them only at the point of the sword, and punish their misdeeds, there was good hope of the favour of the gods and of ultimate preservation. As he pronounced this last word, one of the soldiers near him happened to sneeze. Immediately the whole army around shouted with one accord the accustomed invocation to Zeus the Preserver; and Xenophon, taking up the accident, continued—“Since, gentlemen, this omen from Zeus the Preserver has appeared at the instant when we were talking about preservation, let us here vow to offer the preserving sacrifice to that god, and at the same time to sacrifice to the remaining gods, as well as we can, in the first friendly country which we may reach. Let every man who agrees with me hold up his hand.” All held up their hands; all then joined in the vow and shouted the paean.

This accident, so dexterously turned to profit by the rhetorical skill of Xenophon, was eminently beneficial in raising the army out of the depression which weighed them down, and in disposing them to listen to his animating appeal. Repeating his assurances that the gods were on their side and hostile to their perjured enemy, he recalled to their memory the great invasions of Greece by Darius and Xerxes,—how the vast hosts of Persia had been disgracefully repelled. The army had shown themselves on the field of Cunaxa worthy of such forefathers; and they would for the future be yet bolder, knowing by that battle of what stuff the Persians were made. As for Ariaeus and his troops, alike traitors and cowards, their desertion was rather a gain than a loss. The enemy were superior in horsemen; but men on horseback were after all only men, half occupied in the fear of losing their seats—incapable of prevailing against infantry firm on the ground—and only better able to run away. Now that the satrap refused to furnish them with provisions to buy, they on their side were released from their covenant, and would take provisions without buying. Then as to the rivers: those were indeed difficult to be crossed in the middle of their course; but the army would march up to their sources, and could then pass them without wetting the knee. Or, indeed, the Greeks might renounce the idea of retreat, and establish themselves permanently in the King’s own country, defying all his force, like the Myaians and Pisidians. “If (said Xenophon) we plant ourselves here at our ease in a rich country, with these tall, stately, and beautiful Median and Persian women for our companions, we shall be only too ready, like the Lotophagi, to forget our way home. We ought first to go back to Greece, and tell our countrymen that if they remain poor it is their own fault, when there are rich settlements in this country awaiting all who choose to come, and who have courage to seize them. Let us burn our baggage waggons and tents, and carry with us nothing but what is of the strictest necessity. Above all things, let us maintain order, discipline, and obedience to the commanders, upon which our entire hope of safety depends. Let every man promise to lend his hand to the commanders in punishing any disobedient individuals; and let us thus show the enemy that we have ten thousand persons like Clearchus, instead of that one whom they have so perfidiously seized. Now is the time for action. If any man, however obscure, has anything better to suggest, let him come forward and state it; for we have all but one object — the common safety.”

It appears that no one else desired to say a word, and that the speech of Xenophon gave unqualified satisfaction ; for when Cheirisophus put the question, that the meeting should sanction his recommendations, and finally elect the new generals proposed, every man held up his hand. Xenophon then moved that the army should break up immediately, and march to some well-stored villages, rather more than two miles distant; that the march should be in a hollow oblong, with the baggage in the centre; that Cheirisophus, as a Lacedaemonian, should lead the van, while Kleanor and the other senior officers would command on each flank, and himself with Timasion, as the two youngest of the generals, would lead the rear guard.

This proposition was at once adopted, and the assembly broke up; proceeding forthwith to destroy, or distribute among one another, every man’s superfluous baggage, and then to take their morning meal previous to the march.

The scene just described is interesting and illustrative in more than one point of view. It exhibits that susceptibility to the influence of persuasive discourse which formed so marked a feature in the Grecian character—a resurrection of the collective body out of the depth of despair, under the exhortation of one who had no established ascendency, nor anything to recommend him, except his intelligence, his oratorical power, and his community of interest with themselves. Next, it manifests, still more strikingly, the superiority of Athenian training as compared with that of other parts of Greece. Cheirisophus had not only been before in office as one of the generals, but was also a native of Sparta, whose supremacy and name was at that moment all-powerful: Eleanor had been before, not indeed a general, but a lochage, or one in the second rank of officers:—he was an elderly man, and he was an Arcadian, while more than the numerical half of the army consisted of Arcadians and Achaeans. Either of these two, therefore, and various others besides, enjoyed a sort of prerogative, or established starting-point, for taking the initiative in reference to the dispirited army. But Xenophon was comparatively a young man, with little military experience:—he was not an officer at all, either in the first or second grade, but simply a volunteer, companion of Proxenus; he was moreover a native of Athens, a city at that time unpopular among the great body of Greeks, and especially of Peloponnesians, with whom her recent long war had been carried on. Not only therefore he had no advantages compared with others, but he was under positive disadvantages. He had nothing to start with except his personal qualities and previous training; in spite of which we find him not merely the prime mover, but also the ascendant person for whom the others make way. In him are exemplified those peculiarities of Athens, attested not less by the denunciation of her enemies than by the panegyric of her own citizens: spontaneous and forward impulse, as well in conception as in execution—confidence under circumstances which made others despair—persuasive discourse and publicity of discussion, made subservient to practical business, so as at once to appeal to the intelligence and stimulate the active zeal of the multitude. Such peculiarities stood out more remarkably from being contrasted with the opposite qualities in Spartans—mistrust in conception, slackness in execution, secrecy in counsel, silent and passive obedience. Though Spartans and Athenians formed the two extremities of the scale, other Greeks stood nearer on this point to the former than to the latter.

If, even in that encouraging autumn which followed immediately upon the great Athenian catastrophe before Syracuse, the inertia of Sparta could not be stirred into vigorous action without the vehemence of the Athenian Alcibiades, much more was it necessary, under the depressing circumstances which now over­clouded the unofficered Grecian army, that an Athenian bosom should be found as the source of new life and impulse. Nor would any one, probably, except an Athenian, either have felt or obeyed the promptings to stand forward as a volunteer at that moment, when there was every motive to decline responsibility, and no special duty to impel him. But if by chance a Spartan or an Arcadian had been found thus forward, he would have been destitute of such talents as would enable him to work on the minds of others—of that flexibility, resource, familiarity with the temper and movements of an assembled crowd, power of enforcing the essential views and touching the opportune chords, which Athenian democratical training imparted. Even Brasidas and Gylippus, individual Spartans of splendid merit, and equal or superior to Xenophon in military resource, would not have combined with it that political and rhetorical accomplishment which the position of the latter demanded. Obvious as the wisdom of his propositions appears, each of them is left to him not only to initiate, but to enforce : Cheirisophus and Eleanor, after a few words of introduction, consign to him the duty of working up the minds of the army to the proper pitch.

How well he performed this may be seen by his speech to the army, which bears in its general tenor a remarkable resemblance to that of Pericles addressed to the Athenian public in the second year of the war, at the moment when the miseries of the epidemic, combined with those of invasion, had driven them almost to despair. It breathes a strain of exaggerated confidence and an undervaluing of real dangers highly suitable for the occasion, but which neither Pericles nor Xenophon would have employed at any other moment. Throughout the whole of his speech, and especially in regard to the accidental sneeze near at hand which interrupted the beginning of it, Xenophon displayed that skill and practice in dealing with a numerous audience and a given situation which characterized more or less every educated Athenian. Other Greeks, Lacedaemonians or Arcadians, could act with bravery and in concert; but the Athenian Xenophon was among the few who could think, speak, and act with equal efficiency. It was this tripartite accomplishment which an aspiring youth was compelled to set before himself as an aim in the democracy of Athens, and which the Sophists as well as the democratical institutions—both of them so hardly depreciated by most critics—helped and encouraged him to acquire. It was this tripartite accomplishment, the exclusive possession, of which, in spite of constant jealousy on the part of Boeotian officers and comrades of Proxenus, elevated Xenophon into the most ascendant person of the Cyreian army, from the present moment until the time when it broke up, as will be seen in the subsequent history.

I think it the more necessary to notice this fact, that the accomplishments whereby Xenophon leaped on a sudden into such extraordinary ascendency, and rendered such eminent service to his army, were accomplishments belonging in an especial manner to the Athenian democracy and education, because Xenophon himself has throughout his writings treated Athens not merely without the attachment of a citizen, but with feelings more like the positive antipathy of an exile. His sympathies are all in favour of the perpetual drill, the mechanical obedience, the secret government proceedings, the narrow and prescribed range of ideas, the silent and deferential demeanour, the methodical, though tardy, action of Sparta. Whatever may be the justice of his preference, certain it is that the qualities whereby he was himself enabled to contribute so much, both to the rescue of the Cyreian army and to his own reputation, were Athenian far more than Spartan.

While the Grecian army, after sanctioning the propositions of Xenophon, were taking their morning meal before they commenced their march, Mithridates, one of the Persians previously attached to Cyrus, appeared with a few horsemen on a mission of pretended friendship. But it was soon found out that his purposes were treacherous, and that he came merely to seduce individual soldiers to desertion, with a few of whom he succeeded. Accordingly, the resolution was taken to admit no more heralds or envoys.

Disembarrassed of superfluous baggage and refreshed, the army now crossed the Great Zab River, and pursued their march on other side, having their baggage and attendants in the centre, and Cheirisophus leading the van with a select body of 300 hoplites. As no mention is made of a bridge, we are to presume that they borded the river, which furnishes a ford (according to Mr. Ainsworth) stall commonly used, at a place between thirty and forty miles from its junction with the Tigris. When they had got a little way forward, Mithridates again appeared with a few hundred cavalry and bowmen. He approached them like a friend, but, as soon as he was near enough, suddenly began to harass the rear with a shower of missiles. What surprises us most is that the Persians, with their very numerous force, made 10 attempt to hinder them from crossing so very considerable a river, for Xenophon estimates the Zab at 400 feet broad, and this seems below the statement of modern travellers, who inform us hat it contains not much less water than the Tigris, and though usually deeper and narrower, cannot be much narrower at any affordable place. It is to be recollected that the Persians, habitually marching in advance of the Greeks, must have reached the river first, and were therefore in possession of the crossing, whether bridge or ford. Though on the watch for every opportunity of perfidy, Tissaphernes did not dare to resist the Greeks, even in he most advantageous position, and ventured only upon sending Mithridates to harass the rear, which he executed with considerable effect. The bowmen and darters of the Greeks, few in number, were at the same time inferior to those of the Persians, and when Xenophon employed his rear-guard, hoplites and pelstasts, to charge and repel them, he not only could never overtake any one, but suffered much in getting back to rejoin his own main body. Even when retiring, the Persian horseman could discharge his arrow or cast his javelin behind him with effect—dexterity which the Parthians exhibited afterwards still more signally, and which the Persian horsemen of the present day parallel with their carbines. This was the first experience which the Greeks had of marching under the harassing attack of cavalry. Even the small detachment of Mithridates greatly delayed their progress, so that they accomplished little more than two miles, reaching the villages in the evening, with many wounded and much discouragement.

“Thank heaven (said Xenophon in the evening, when Cheirisophus reproached him for imprudence in quitting the main body to charge cavalry whom yet he could not reach)—thank heaven that our enemies attacked us with a small detachment only, and not with their great numbers. They have given us a valuable lesson without doing us any serious harm.” Profiting by the lesson, the Greek leaders organized during the night and during the halt of the next day a small body of fifty cavalry, with 200 Rhodian slingers, whose slings, furnished with leaden bullets, both carried farther and struck harder than those of the Persians hurling large stones. On the ensuing morning they started before daybreak, since there lay in their way a ravine difficult to pass. They found the ravine undefended (according to the usual stupidity of Persian proceedings), but when they had got nearly a mile beyond it, Mithridates reappeared in pursuit with a body of 4000 horsemen and darters. Confident from his achievement of the preceding day, he had promised, with a body of that force, to deliver the Greeks into the hands of the satrap. But the latter were now better prepared. As soon as he began to attack them, the trumpet sounded, and forthwith the horsemen, slingers, and darters issued forth to charge the Persians, sustained by the hoplites in the rear. So effective was the charge that the Persians fled in dismay, notwithstanding their superiority in number; while the ravine so impeded their flight that many of them were slain and eighteen prisoners made. The Greek soldiers of their own accord mutilated the dead bodies, in order to strike terror into the enemy. At the end of the day’s march they reached the Tigris, near the deserted city of Larissa, the vast, massive, and lofty brick walls of which (25 feet in thickness, 100 feet high, seven miles in circumference) attested its former grandeur. Near this place was a stone pyramid, 100 feet in breadth and 200 feet high, the summit of which was crowded with fugitives out of the neighbouring villages. Another day’s march up the course of the Tigris brought the army to a second deserted city called Mespila, nearly opposite to the modern city of Mosul. Although these two cities, which seem to have formed the continuation of (or the substitute for) the once colossal Nineveh or Ninus, were completely deserted, yet the country around them was so well furnished with villages and population, that the Greeks not only obtained provisions, but also strings for the making of new bows, and lead for bullets to be used by the slingers.

During the next day’s march, in a course generally parallel with the Tigris and ascending the stream, Tissaphernes, coming up along with some other grandees and with a numerous army, enveloped the Greeks both in flanks and rear. In spite of his advantage of numbers, he did not venture upon any actual charge, but kept up a fire of arrows, darts, and stones. He was however so well answered by the newly-trained archers and slingers of the Greeks, that on the whole they had the advantage, in spite of the superior size of the Persian bows, many of which were taken and effectively employed on the Grecian side. Having passed the night in a well-stocked village, they halted there the next day in order to stock themselves with provisions, and then pursued their march for four successive days along a level country, until on the fifth day they reached hilly ground with the prospect of still higher hills beyond. All this march was made under unremitting annoyance from the enemy, insomuch that though the order of the Greeks was never broken, a considerable number of their men were wounded. Experience taught them that it was inconvenient for the whole army to march in one inflexible, undivided, hollow square, and they accordingly constituted six lochi or regiments of 100 men each, subdivided into companies of 50, and enomoties or smaller companies of 25, each with a special officer (conformably to the Spartan practice) to move separately on each flank, and either to fall back or fall in as might suit the fluctuations of the central mass, arising from impediments in the road or menaces of the enemy. On reaching the hills, in sight of an elevated citadel or palace with several villages around it, the Greeks anticipated some remission of the Persian attack. But after having passed over one hill, they were proceeding to ascend the second, when they found themselves assailed with unwonted vigour by the Persian cavalry from the summit of it, whose leaders were seen flogging on the men to the attack. This charge was so efficacious, that the Greek light troops were driven in with loss and forced to take shelter within the ranks of the hoplites. After a march both slow and full of suffering, they could only reach their night-quarters by sending a detachment to get possession of some ground above the Persians, who thus became afraid of a double attack.

The villages which they now reached (supposed by Mr. Comfortable Ainsworth to have been in the fertile country under the Greeks modern town called Zakhu) were unusually rich in provisions; magazines of flour, barley, and wine having been collected there for the Persian satrap. They reposed here three days, chiefly in order to tend the numerous wounded, for whose necessities eight of the most competent persons were singled out to act as surgeons. On the fourth day they resumed their march, descending into the plain. But experience had now satisfied them that it was imprudent to continue in march under the attack of cavalry ; so that when Tissaphernes appeared and began to harass them, they halted at the first village, and, when thus in station, easily repelled him. As the afternoon advanced, the Persian assailants began to retire; for they were always in the habit of taking up their night-post at a distance of near seven miles from the Grecian position, being very apprehensive of nocturnal attack in their camp, when their horses were tied by the leg, and without either saddle or bridle. As soon as they had departed, the Greeks resumed their march, and made so much advance during the night, that the Persians did not overtake them either on the next day or the day after.

On the ensuing day, however, the Persians, having made a forced march by night, were seen not only in advance of the Greeks, but in occupation of a spur of high and precipitous ground overhanging immediately the road whereby the Greeks were to descend into the plain. When Cheirisophus approached he at once saw that descent was impracticable in the face of an enemy thus posted. He therefore halted, sent for Xenophon from the rear, and desired him to bring forward the peltasts to the van. But Xenophon, though he obeyed the summons in person and galloped his horse to the front, did not think it prudent to move the peltasts from the rear, because he saw Tissaphernes, with another portion of the army, just coming up ; so that the Grecian army was at once impeded in front and threatened by the enemy closing upon them behind. The Persians on the high ground in front could not be directly assailed. But Xenophon observed that, on the right of the Grecian army, there was an accessible mountain summit yet higher, from whence a descent might be made for a flank attack upon the Persian position. Pointing out this summit to Cheirisophus, as affording the only means of dislodging the troops in front, he urged that one of them should immediately hasten with a detachment to take possession of it, and offered to Cheirisophus the choice either of going or staying with the army. “Choose for yourself,” said Cheirisophus. “Well, then (said Xenophon), I will go, since I am the younger of the two.” Accordingly, at the head of a select detachment from the van and centre of the army, he immediately commenced his flank march up the steep ascent to this highest summit. So soon as the enemy saw their purpose, they also detached troops on their side, hoping to get to the summit first; and the two detachments were seen mounting at the same time, each struggling with the utmost efforts to get before the other—each being encouraged by shouts and clamour from the two armies respectively.

As Xenophon was riding by the side of his soldiers, cheering them on, and reminding them that their chance of seeing their country and their families all depended upon success in the effort before them, a Sicyonian hoplite in the ranks, named Soteridas, said to him— “ You and I are not on an equal footing, Xenophon. You are on horseback : I am painfully struggling up on foot, with my shield to carry.” Stung with this taunt, Xenophon sprang from his horse, pushed Soteridas out of his place in the ranks, took his shield as well as his place, and began to march forward afoot along with the rest. Though thus weighed down at once by the shield belonging to an hoplite and by the heavy cuirass of a horseman (who carried no shield), he nevertheless put forth all his strength to advance under such double incumbrance, and to continue his incitement to the rest. But the soldiers around him were so indignant at the proceeding of Soteridas, that they reproached and even struck him, until they compelled him to resume his shield as well as his place in the ranks. Xenophon then remounted, and ascended the hill on horseback as far as the ground permitted, but was obliged again to dismount presently, in consequence of the steepness of the uppermost portion. Such energetic efforts enabled him and his detachment to reach the summit first. As soon as the enemy saw this, they desisted from their ascent, and dispersed in all directions, leaving the forward march open to the main Grecian army, which Cheirisophus accordingly conducted safely down into the plain. Here he was rejoined by Xenophon on descending from the summit. All found themselves in comfortable quarters amidst several well-stocked villages on the banks of the Tigris. They acquired, moreover, an additional booty of large droves of cattle, intercepted when on the point of being transported across the river, where a considerable body of horse were seen assembled on the opposite bank.

Though here disturbed only by some desultory attacks on the part of the Persians, who burnt several of the villages which lay in their forward line of march, the Greeks became seriously embarrassed whither to direct their steps; for on their left flank was the Tigris, so deep that their spears found no bottom, and on their right mountains of exceeding height. As the generals and the lochages were taking counsel, a Rhodian soldier came to them with a proposition for transporting the whole army across to the other bank of the river by means of inflated skins, which could be furnished in abundance by the animals in their possession. But this ingenious scheme, in itself feasible, was put out of the question by the view of the Persian cavalry on the opposite bank ; and as the villages in their front had been burnt, the army had no choice except to return back one day’s march to those in which they had before halted. Here the generals again deliberated, questioning all their prisoners as to the different bearings of the country. The road from the south was that in which they had already inarched from Babylon and Media ; that to the westward, going to Lydia and Ionia, was barred to them by the interposing Tigris ; eastward (they were informed) was the way to Ecbatana and Susa ; northward lay the rugged and inhospitable mountains of the Karduchians— fierce freemen who despised the Great King, and defied all his efforts to conquer them, having once destroyed a Persian invading army of 120,000 men. On the other side of Karduchia, however, lay the rich Persian satrapy of Armenia, wherein both the Euphrates and the Tigris could be crossed near their sources, and from whence they could choose their farther course easily towards Greece. Like Mysia, Pisidia, and other mountainous regions, Karduchia was a free territory, surrounded on all sides by the dominions of the Great King, who reigned only in the cities and on the plains.

Determining to fight their way across these difficult mountains into Armenia, but refraining from any public e announcement, for fear that the passes should be occupied beforehand, the generals sacrificed forthwith, in order that they might be ready for breaking up at a moment’s notice. They then began their march a little after midnight, so that soon after daybreak they reached the first of the Karduchian mountain-passes, which they found undefended. Cheirisophus, with his front division and all the light troops, made haste to ascend the pass, and having got over the first mountain, descended on the other side to some villages in the valley or nooks beneath; while Xenophon, with the heavy-armed and the baggage, followed at a slower pace, not reaching the villages until dark, as the road was both steep and narrow. The Karduchians, taken completely by surprise, abandoned the villages as the Greeks approached, and took refuge on the mountains, leaving to the intruders plenty of provisions, comfortable houses, and especially abundance of copper vessels. At first the Greeks were careful to do no damage, trying to invite the natives to amicable colloquy. But none of the latter would come near, and at length necessity drove the Greeks to take what was necessary for refreshment. It was just when Xenophon and the rear-guard were coming in at night that some few Karduchians first set upon them, by surprise and with considerable success, so that if their numbers had been greater, serious mischief might have ensued

Many fires were discovered burning on the mountains—an earnest of resistance during the next day—which satisfied the Greek generals that they must lighten the army, in order to ensure greater expedition as well as a fuller complement of available hands during the coming march. They therefore gave orders to bum all the baggage except what was indispensable, and dismiss all the prisoners, planting themselves in a narrow strait, through which the army had to pass, in order to see that their directions were executed. The women, however, of whom there were many with the army, could not be abandoned ; and it seems further that a considerable stock of baggage was still retained ; nor could the army make more than slow advance, from the narrowness of the road and the harassing attack of the Karduchians, who were now assembled in considerable numbers. Their attack was renewed with double vigour on the ensuing day, when the Greeks were forced, from want of provisions, to hasten forward their march, though in the midst of a terrible snowstorm. Both Cheirisophus in the front and Xenophon in the rear were hard pressed by the Karduchian slingers and bowmen; the latter, men of consummate skill, having bows three cubits in length, and arrows of more than two cubits, so Strong that the Greeks when they took them could dart them as javelins. These archers, amidst the rugged ground and narrow paths, approached so near and drew the bow with such surprising force, resting one extremity of it on the ground, that several Greek warriors were mortally wounded even through both shield and corslet into the reins, and through the brazen helmet into their heads; among them especially two distinguished men, a Lacedaemonian named Cleonymus and an Arcadian named Basias. The rear division, more roughly handled than the rest, was obliged continually to halt to repel the enemy, under all the difficulties of the ground, which made it scarcely possible to act against nimble mountaineers. On one occasion, however, a body of these latter was entrapped into an ambush, driven back with loss, and (what was still more fortunate) two of their number were made prisoners.

Thus impeded, Xenophon sent frequent messages entreating Cheirisophus to slacken the march of the van division; but instead of obeying, Cheirisophus only hastened the faster, urging Xenophon to follow him. The march of the army became little better than a rout, so that the rear division reached the halting-place in extreme confusion; upon which Xenophon proceeded to remonstrate with Cheirisophus for prematurely hurrying forward and neglecting his comrades behind. But the other, pointing out to his attention the hill before them, and the steep path ascending it, forming their future line of march, which was beset with numerous Karduchians, defended himself by saying that he had hastened forward in hopes of being able to reach this pass before the enemy, in which attempt, however, he had not succeeded.

To advance farther on this road appeared hopeless, yet the guides declared that no other could be taken. Xenophon then bethought him of the two prisoners whom he had just captured, and proposed that these two should be questioned also. They were accordingly interrogated apart; and the first of them, having persisted in denying, notwithstanding all menaces, that there was any road except that before them, was put to death under the eyes of the second prisoner. This latter, on being then questioned, gave more comfortable intelligence ; saying that he knew of a different road, more circuitous, but easier and practicable even for beasts of burden, whereby the pass before them and the occupying enemy might be turned, but that there was one particular high position commanding the road, which it was necessary to master beforehand by surprise, as the Karduchians were already on guard there. Two thousand Greeks, having the guide bound along with them, were accordingly despatched late in the afternoon, to surprise this post by a night­march ; while Xenophon, in order to distract the attention of the Karduchians in front, made a feint of advancing as if about to force the direct pass. As soon as he was seen crossing the ravine which led to this mountain, the Karduchians on the top immediately began to roll down vast masses of rock, which bounded and dashed down the roadway in such a manner as to render it unapproachable. They continued to do this all night, and the Greeks heard the noise of the descending masses long after they had returned to their camp for supper and rest.

Meanwhile the detachment of 2000, marching by the circuitous road, and reaching in the night the elevated position (though there was another above yet more commanding) held by the Karduchians, surprised and dispersed them, passing the night by their fires. At daybreak, and under favour of a mist, they stole silently towards the position occupied by the other Karduchians in front of the main Grecian army. On coming near they suddenly sounded their trumpets, shouted aloud, and commenced the attack, which proved completely successful. The defenders, taken unprepared, fled with little resistance, and scarcely any loss, from their activity and knowledge of the country; while Cheirisophus and the main Grecian force, on hearing the trumpet, which had been previously concerted as the signal, rushed forward and stormed the height in front—some along the regular path, others climbing up as they could and pulling each other up by means of their spears. The two bodies of Greeks thus joined each other on the summit, so that the road became open for farther advance.

Xenophon, however, with the rear-guard, marched on the circuitous road taken by the 2000, as the most practicable for the baggage animals, whom he placed in the centre of his division, the whole array covering a great length of ground, since the road was very narrow. During this interval the dispersed Karduchians had rallied, and re-occupied two or three high peaks commanding the road, from whence it was necessary to drive them. Xenophon’s troops stormed successively these three positions, the Karduchians not daring to affront close combat, yet making destructive use of their missiles. A Grecian guard was left on the hindermost of the three peaks, until all the baggage tram should have passed by. But the Karduchians, by a sudden and well-timed movement, contrived to surprise this guard, slew two out of the three leaders with several soldiers, and forced the rest to jump down the crags as they could, in order to join their comrades in the road. Encouraged by such success, the assailants pressed nearer to the marching army, occupying a crag over against that lofty summit on which Xenophon was posted. As it was within speaking distance, he endeavoured to open a negotiation with them in order to get back the dead bodies of the slain. To this demand the Karduchians at first acceded, on condition that their villages should not be burned; but finding their numbers every moment increasing, they resumed the offensive. When Xenophon with the army had begun his descent from the last summit, they hurried onwards in crowds to occupy it, beginning again to roll down masses of rock, and renew their fire of missiles upon the Greeks. Xenophon himself was here in some danger, having been deserted by his shield-bearer; but he was rescued by an Arcadian hoplite named Eurylochus, who ran to give him the benefit of his own shield as a protection for both in the retreat.

After a march thus painful and perilous, the rear division at length found themselves in safety among their comrades, in villages with well-stocked houses and abundance of corn and wine. So eager however were Xenophon and Cheirisophus to obtain the bodies of the slain for burial, that they consented to purchase them by surrendering the guide, and to march onward without any guide: a heavy sacrifice in this unknown country, attesting their great anxiety about the burial.

For three more days did they struggle and fight their way through the narrow and rugged paths of the Karduchian mountains, beset throughout by these formidable bowmen and slingers, whom they had to dislodge at every difficult turn, and against whom their own Cretan bowmen were found inferior indeed, but still highly usefuL Their seven days’ march through this country, with its free and warlike inhabitants, were days of the utmost fatigue, suffering, and peril; far more intolerable than anything which they had experienced from Tissaphernes and the Persians. Right glad were they once more to see a plain, and to find themselves near the banks of the river Kentrites, which divided these mountains from the hillocks and plains of Armenia—enjoying comfortable quarters in villages, with the satisfaction of talking over past miseries.

Such were the apprehensions of Karduchian invasion, that the Armenian side of the Kentrites, for a breadth of 15 miles, was unpeopled and destitute of villages. But the approach of the Greeks having become known to Tiribazus, satrap of Armenia, the banks of the river were lined with his cavalry and infantry to oppose their passage—a precaution which if Tissaphernes had taken at the Great Zab at the moment when he perfidiously seized Clearchus and his colleagues, the Greeks would hardly have reached the northern bank of that river. In the face of such obstacles, the Greeks nevertheless attempted the passage of the Kentrites, seeing a regular road on the other side. But the river was 200 feet in breadth (only half the breadth of the Zab), above their breasts in depth, extremely rapid, and with a bottom full of slippery stones ; insomuch that they could not hold their shields in the proper position, from the force of the stream; while if they lifted the shields above their heads, they were exposed defenceless to the arrows of the satrap’s troops. After various trials, the passage was found impracticable, and they were obliged to resume their encampment on the left hank. To their great alarm, they saw the Karduchians assembling on the hills in their rear, so that their situation, during this day and night, appeared nearly desperate. In the night Xenophon had a dream —the first which he has told us since his dream on the terrific night after the seizure of the generals—but on this occasion of augury more unequivocally good. He dreamt that he was bound in chains, but that his chains on a sudden dropt off spontaneously; on the faith of which he told Cheirisophus at daybreak that he had good hopes of preservation; and when the generals offered sacrifice, the victims were at once favourable. As the army were taking their morning meal, two young Greeks ran to Xenophon with the auspicious news that they had accidentally found another ford near half-a-mile up the river, where the water was not even up to their middle, and where the rocks came so close on the right bank that the enemy’s horse could offer no opposition. Xenophon, starting from his meal in delight, immediately offered libations to those gods who had revealed both the dream to himself in the night, and the unexpected ford afterwards to these youths—two revelations which he ascribed to the same gods.

Presently they marched in their usual order, Cheirisophus commanding the van and Xenophon the rear, along the river to the newly-discovered ford, the enemy marching parallel with them on the opposite bank. Having reached the ford, halted, and grounded arms, Cheirisophus placed a wreath on his head, took off his clothes, and then resumed his arms, ordering all the rest to resume their arms also. Each lochus (company of 100 men) was then arranged in column or single file, with Cheirisophus himself in the centre. Meanwhile the prophets were offering sacrifice to the river. So soon as the signs were pronounced to be favourable, all the soldiers shouted the paean, and all the women joined in chorus with their feminine yell. Cheirisophus then, at the head of the army, entered the river and began to ford it; while Xenophon, with a large portion of the rear division, made a feint of hastening back to the original ford, as if he were about to attempt the passage there. This distracted the attention of the enemy’s horse, who became afraid of being attacked on both sides, galloped off to guard the passage at the other point, and opposed no serious resistance to Cheirisophus. As soon as the latter had reached the other side, and put his division into order, he marched up to attack the Armenian infantry, who were on the high banks a little way above ; but this infantry, deserted by its cavalry, dispersed without awaiting his approach. The handful of Grecian cavalry, attached to the division of Cheirisophus, pursued and took some valuable spoils.

As soon as Xenophon saw his colleague successfully established on the opposite bank, he brought back his detachment to the ford over which the baggage and attendants were still passing, and proceeded to take precautions against the Karduchians on his own side who were assembling in the rear. He found some difficulty in keeping his rear division together, for many of them, in spite of orders, quitted their ranks, and went to look after their mistresses or their baggage in the crossing of the water. The peltasts and bowmen, who had gone over with Cheirisophus, but whom that general now no longer needed, were directed to hold themselves prepared on both flanks of the army crossing, and to advance a little way into the water, in the attitude of men just about to recross. When Xenophon was left with only the diminished rear-guard, the rest having got over, the Karduchians rushed upon him, and began to shoot and sling. But on a sudden the Grecian hoplites charged with their accustomed paean, upon which the Karduchians took to flight—having no arms for close combat on the plain. The trumpet now being heard to sound, they ran away so much the faster ; while this was the signal, according to orders before given by Xenophon, for the Greeks to suspend their charge, to turn back, and to cross the river as speedily as possible. By favour of this able manoeuvre, the passage was accomplished by the whole army with little or no loss, about midday.

They now found themselves in Armenia, a country of even, undulating surface, but very high above the level of the sea, and extremely cold at the season, when they entered it—December. Though the strip of land bordering on Karduchia furnished no supplies, one long march brought them through to a village, containing abundance of provisions, together with a residence of the satrap Tiribazus; after which, in two farther marches, they reached the river Teleboas, with many villages on its banks. Here Tiribazus himself, appearing with a division of cavalry, sent forward his interpreter to request a conference with the leaders; which being held, it was agreed that the Greeks should proceed unmolested through his territory, taking such supplies as they required, but should neither burn nor damage the villages. They accordingly advanced onward for three days, computed at fifteen parasangs, or three pretty full days’ march; without any hostility from the satrap, though he was hovering within less than two miles of them. They then found themselves amidst several villages, wherein were regal or satrapical residences, with a plentiful stock of bread, meat, wine, and all sorts of vegetables. Here, during their nightly bivouac, they were overtaken by so heavy a fall of snow, that the generals on the next day distributed the troops into separate quarters among the villages. No enemy appeared near, while the snow seemed to forbid any rapid surprise. Yet at night the scouts reported that many fires were discernible, together with traces of military movements around ; insomuch that the generals thought it prudent to put themselves on their guard, and again collected the army into one bivouac. Here in the night they were overwhelmed by a second fall of snow, still heavier than the preceding, sufficient to cover over the sleeping men and their arms, and to benumb the cattle. The men however lay warm under the snow and were unwilling to rise, until Xenophon himself set the example of rising, and employing himself without his arms in cutting wood and kindling a fire. Others followed his example, and great comfort was found in rubbing themselves with pork-fat, oil of almonds or of sesame, or turpentine. Having sent out a clever scout named Democrates, who captured a native prisoner, they learned that Tiribazus was laying plans to intercept them in a lofty mountain pass lying farther on in their route; upon which they immediately set forth, and by two days of forced march, surprising in their way the camp of Tiribazus, got over the difficult pass in safety. Three days of additional march brought them to the Euphrates river—that is, to its eastern branch, now called Murad. They found a ford and crossed it, without having the water higher than the navel; and they were informed that its sources were not far off.

Their four days of march, next on the other side of the Euphrates, were toilsome and distressing in the extreme; through a plain covered with deep snow (in some places six feet deep), and at times in the face of a north wind so intolerably chilling and piercing, that at length one of the prophets urged the necessity of offering sacrifices to Boreas; upon which (says Xenophon), the severity of the wind abated conspicuously, to the evident consciousness of all. Many of the slaves and beasts of burthen, and a few even of the soldiers, perished : some had their feet frost-bitten, others became blinded by the snow, others again were exhausted by hunger. Several of these unhappy men were unavoidably left behind; others lay down to perish, near a warm spring which had melted the snow around, from extremity of fatigue and sheer wretched­ness, though the enemy were close upon the rear. It was in vain that Xenophon, who commanded the rear-guard, employed his earnest exhortations, prayers, and threats to induce them to move forward. The sufferers, miserable and motionless, answered only by entreating him to kill them at once. So greatly was the army disorganized by wretchedness, that we hear of one case in which a soldier, ordered to carry a disabled comrade, disobeyed the order, and was about to bury him alive. Xenophon made a sally, with loud shouts and clatter of spear with shield, in which even the exhausted men joined, against the pursuing enemy. He was fortunate enough to frighten them away, and drive them to take shelter in a neighbouring wood. He then left the sufferers lying down, with assurance that relief should be sent to them on the next day, and went forward, seeing all along the line of march the exhausted soldiers lying on the snow, without even the protection of a watch. He and his rear-guard as well as the rest were obliged thus to pass the night without either food or fire, distributing scouts m the best way that the case admitted. Meanwhile Cheirisophus with the van division had got into a village, which they reached so unexpectedly, that they found the women fetching water from a fountain outside the wall, and the head-man of the village in his house within. This division here obtained rest and refreshment, and at daybreak some of their soldiers were sent to look after the rear. It was with delight that Xenophon saw them approach, and sent them back to bring up in their arms, into the neighbouring village, those exhausted soldiers who had been left behind.

Repose was now indispensable after the recent sufferings. There were several villages near at hand, and the generals, thinking it no longer dangerous to divide the army, quartered the different divisions among them according to lot. Polycrates, an Athenian, one of the captains in the division of Xenophon, requested his permission to go at once and take possession of the village assigned to him, before any of the inhabitants could escape. Accordingly, running at speed with a few of the swiftest soldiers, he came upon the village so suddenly as to seize the head-man with his newly-married daughter, and several young horses intended as a tribute for the King. This village, as well as the rest, was found to consist of houses excavated in the ground (as the Armenian villages are at the present day), spacious within, but with a narrow mouth like a well, entered by a descending ladder. A separate entrance was dug for conveniently admitting the cattle. All of them were found amply stocked with live cattle of every kind, wintered upon hay; as well as with wheat, barley, vegetables, and a sort of barley-wine or beer in tubs, with the grains of barley on the surface. Reeds or straws without any joint in them were lying near, through which they sucked the liquid; Xenonphon did his utmost to conciliate the head-man (who spoke Persian, and with whom he communicated through the Perso-Grecian interpreter of the army), promising him that not one of his relations should he maltreated, and that he should be fully remunerated if he would conduct the army safely out of the country into that of the Chalybes, which he described as being adjacent. By such treatment the head-man was won over, promised his aid, and even revealed to the Greeks the subterranean cellars wherein the wine was deposited ; while Xenophon, though he kept him constantly under watch, and placed his youthful son as a hostage under the care of Episthenes, yet continued to treat him with studied attention and kindness. For seven days did the fatigued soldiers remain in these comfortable quarters, refreshing themselves and regaining strength. They were waited upon by the native youths, with whom they communicated by means of signs. The uncommon happiness which all of them enjoyed after their recent sufferings stands depicted in the lively details given by Xenophon, who left here his own exhausted horse, and took young horses in exchange, for himself and the other officers.

After this week of repose, the army resumed its march through the snow. The head-man, whose house they had replenished as well as they could, accompanied Cheirisophus in the van as guide, but was not put in chains runs or under guard; his son remained as an hostage with Episthenes, but his other relations were left unmolested at home. As they marched for three days, without reaching a village, Cheirisophus began to suspect his fidelity, and even became so out of humour, though the man affirmed that there were no villages in the track, as to beat him—yet without the precaution of putting him afterwards in fetters. The next night, accordingly, this head-man made his escape, much to the displeasure of Xenophon, who severely reproached Cheirisophus first for his harshness, and next for his neglect. This was the only point of difference between the two (says Xenophon) during the whole march—a fact very honourable to both, considering the numberless difficulties against which they had to contend. Episthenes retained the head-man’s youthful son, carried him home in safety, and became much attached to him.

Condemned thus to march without a guide, they could do no better than march up the course of the river ; and thus, from the villages which had proved so cheering and restorative, they pro­ceeded seven days’ march all through snow, up the river Phasis—a river not verifiable, but certainly not the same as is commonly known under that name by Grecian geographers: it was 100 feet in breadth. Two more days’ march brought them from this river to the foot of a range of mountains, near a pass occupied by an armed body of Chalybes, Taochi, and Phasiani.

Observing the enemy in possession of this lofty ground, Cheirisophus halted until all the army came up, in order that the generals might take counsel. Here Kleanor began by advising that they should storm the pass with no greater delay than was necessary to refresh the soldiers. But Xenophon suggested that it was far better to avoid the loss of life which must thus be incurred, and to amuse the enemy by feigned attack, while a detachment should be sent by stealth at night about to ascend the mountain at another point and turn the position.  However (continued he, turning to Cheirisophus), stealing a march upon the enemy is more your trade than mine. For I understand that you, the full citizens and peers at Sparta, practise stealing from your boyhood upward; and that it is held noway base, but even honourable, to steal such things as the law does not distinctly forbid. And to the end that you may steal with the greatest effect, and take pains to do it in secret, the custom is to flog you if you are found out. Here, then, you have an excellent opportunity of displaying your training. Take good care that we be not found out in stealing an occupation of the mountain now before us; for if we are found out, we shall be well beaten.”

“Why, as for that (replied Cheirisophus), you Athenians also, as I learn, are capital hands at stealing the public money—and that too in spite of prodigious peril to the thief; nay, your most powerful men steal most of all—at least if it be the most powerful men among you who are raised to official command. So that this is a time for you to exhibit your training, as well as for me to exhibit mine.”

We have here an interchange of raillery between the two Grecian officers, which is not an uninteresting feature in the history of the expedition. The remark of Cheirisophus, especially, illustrates that which I noted in a former chapter as true both of Sparta and Athens—the readiness to take bribes, so general in individuals clothed with official power; and the readiness, in official Athenians, to commit such peculation, in spite of serious risk of punishment Now this chance of punishment proceeded altogether from those accusing orators commonly called demagogues, and from the popular judicature whom they addressed. The joint working of both greatly abated the evil, yet was incompetent to suppress it. But according to the pictures commonly drawn of Athens, we are instructed to believe that the crying public evil was—too great a licence of accusation and too much judicial trial. Assuredly such was not the conception of Cheirisophus; nor shall we find it borne out by any fair appreciation of the general evidence. When the peculation of official persons was thus notorious in spite of serious risks, what would it have become if the door had been barred to accusing demagogues, and if the numerous popular Dikasts had been exchanged for a select few judges of the same stamp and class as the official men themselves?

Enforcing his proposition, Xenophon now informed his colleagues that he had just captured a few guides, by laying an ambush for certain native plunderers who beset the rear, and that these guides acquainted him that the mountain was not inaccessible, but pastured by goats and oxen. He further offered himself to take command of the marching detachment. But this being overruled by Cheirisophus, some of the best among the captains, Aristonymus, Aristeas, and Nikomachus, volunteered their services and were accepted. After refreshing the soldiers, the generals marched with the main army near to the foot of the pass, and there took up their night-station, making demonstrations of a purpose to storm it the next morning. But as soon as it was dark, Aristonymus and his detachment started, and, ascending the mountain at another point obtained without resistance a high position on the flank of the enemy, who soon however saw them and despatched a force to keep guard on that side. At daybreak those two detachments came to a conflict on the heights, in which the Greeks were completely victorious; while Cheirisophus was marching up the pass to attack the main body. His light troops, encouraged by seeing this victory of their comrades, hastened on to the charge faster than their hoplites could follow. But the enemy were so dispirited by seeing them­selves turned, that they fled with little or no resistance. Though only a few were slain, many threw away their light shields of wicker or wood-work, which became the prey of the conquerors.

Thus masters of the pass, the Greeks descended to the level ground on the other side, where they found themselves in some villages well-stocked with provisions and comforts—the first in the country of the Taochi. Probably they halted here some days; for they had seen no villages, either for rest or for refreshment, during the last nine days’ march, since leaving those Armenian villages in which they had passed a week so eminently restorative, and which apparently had furnished them with a stock of provisions for the onward journey. Such halt gave time to the Taochi to carry up their families and provisions into inaccessible strongholds, so that the Greeks found no supplies, during five days’ march through the territory. Their provisions were completely exhausted, when they arrived before one of these strongholds, a rock on which were seen the families and the cattle of the Taochi; without houses or fortification, but nearly surrounded by a river, so as to leave only one narrow ascent, rendered unapproachable by vast rocks which the defenders hurled or rolled from the summit. By an ingenious combination of bravery and stratagem, in which some of the captains much distinguished themselves, the Greeks overcame this difficulty, and took the heights. The scene which then ensued was awful. The Taochian women seized their children, flung them over the precipice, and then cast themselves headlong also, followed by the men. Almost every soul thus perished, very few surviving to become prisoners. An Arcadian captain named Aeneas, seeing one of them in a fine dress about to precipitate himself with the rest, seized him with a view to prevent it. But the man in return grasped him firmly, dragged him to the edge of the rock, and leaped down to the destruction of both. Though scarcely any prisoners were taken, however, the Greeks obtained abundance of oxen, asses, and sheep, which fully supplied their wants.

They now entered into the territory of the Chalybes, which they were seven days in passing through. These were the bravest warriors whom they had seen in Asia. Their equipment was a spear of fifteen cubits long, with only one end pointed—a helmet, greaves, stuffed corslet, with a kilt or dependent flaps—a short sword which they employed to cut off the head of a slain enemy, displaying the head in sight of their surviving enemies with triumphant dance and song. They carried no shield—perhaps because the excessive length of the spear required the constant employment of both hands—yet they did not shrink from meeting the Greeks occasionally in regular, stand-up fight. As they had carried off all their provisions into hill-forts, the Greeks could obtain no supplies, but lived all the time upon the cattle which they had acquired from the Taochi. After seven days of march and combat—the Chalybes perpetually attacking their rear—they reached the river Harpasus (400 feet broad), where they passed into the territory of the Skythini. It rather seems that the territory of the Chalybes was mountainous; that of the Skythini was level, and contained villages, wherein they remained three days, refresh­ing themselves, and stocking themselves with provisions.

Four days of additional march brought them to a sight, the like of which they had not seen since Opis and Sittake on the Tigris in Babylonia—a large and flourishing city called Gymnias, an earnest of the neighbourhood of the sea, of commerce, and of civilization. The chief of this city received them in a friendly manner, and furnished them with a guide, who engaged to conduct them, after five days’ march, to a hill from whence they would have a view of the sea. This was by no means their nearest way to the sea, for the chief of Gymnias wished to send them through the territory of some neighbours to whom he was hostile; which territory, as soon as they reached it, the guide desired them to burn and destroy. However, the promise was kept, and on the fifth day, marching still apparently through the territory of the Skythini, they reached the summit of a mountain called Theches, from whence the Euxine Sea was visible.

An animated shout from the soldiers who formed the vanguard testified the impressive effect of this long-deferred spectacle, assuring, as it seemed to do, their safety and their return home. To Xenophon and to the rear­guard—engaged in repelling the attack of natives who had come forward to revenge the plunder of their territory—the shout was unintelligible. They at first imagined that the natives had commenced attack in front as well as in the rear, and that the vanguard was engaged in battle. But every moment the shout became louder, as fresh men came to the summit and gave vent to their feelings; so that Xenophon grew anxious, and galloped up to the van with his handful of cavalry to see what had happened. As he approached, the voice of the overjoyed crowd was heard distinctly crying out Thalatta, Thalatta (The sea, the sea), and congratulating each other in ecstasy. The main body, the rear-guard, the baggage-soldiers driving up their horses and cattle before them, became all excited by the sound, and hurried, up breathless to the summit. The whole army, officers and soldiers, were thus assembled, manifesting their joyous emotions by tears, embraces, and outpourings of enthusiastic sympathy. With spontaneous impulse they heaped up stones to decorate the spot by a monument and commemorative trophy; putting on the stones such homely offerings as their means afforded —sticks, hides, and a few of the wicker shields just taken from the natives. To the guide, who had performed his engagement of bringing them in five days within sight of the sea, their gratitude was unbounded. They presented him with a horse, a silver bowl, a Persian costume, and ten darics in money, besides several of the soldiers’ rings, which he especially asked for. Thus loaded with presents, he left them, having first shown them a village wherein they could find quarters, as well as the road which they were to take through the territory of the Makrones.

When they reached the river which divided the land of the Passes Makrones from that of the Skythini, they perceived the former assembled in arms on the opposite side to resist their passage. The river not being fordable, they cut down some neighbouring trees to provide the means of crossing. While these Makrones were shouting and encouraging each other aloud, a peltast in the Grecian army came to Xenophon, saying that he knew their language, and that he believed this to be his country. He had been a slave at Athens, exported from home during his boyhood; he had then made his escape (probably during the Peloponnesian War, to the garrison of Dekeleia), and afterwards taken military service. By this fortunate accident the generals were enabled to open negotiations with the Makrones, and to assure them that the army would do them no harm, desiring noth­ing more than a free passage and a market to buy provisions. The Makrones, on receiving such assurances in their own language from a countryman, exchanged pledges of friendship with the Greeks, assisted them to pass the river, and furnished the best market in their power during the three days’ march across their territory.

The army now reached the borders of the Kolchians, found in hostile array, occupying the summit of a considerable mountain which formed their frontier. Here Xenophon, having marshalled the soldiers for attack, with each lochus (company of 100 men) in single file, instead of marching up the hill in phalanx or continuous front with only a scanty depth, addressed to them the following pithy encouragement: “Now, gentlemen, these enemies before us are the only impediment that keeps us away from reaching the point at which we have been so long aiming. We must even eat them raw, if in any way we can do so.”

Eighty of these formidable companies of hoplites, each in single file, now began to ascend the hill; the peltasts and bowmen being partly distributed among them, partly placed on the flanks. Cheirisophus and Xenophon, each commanding on one wing, spread their peltasts  in such a way as to outflank the Kolchians, who accordingly weakened their centre in order to strengthen their wings. Hence the Arcadian peltasts and hoplites in the Greek centre were enabled to attack and disperse the centre with little resistance; and all the Kolchians presently fled, leaving the Greeks in possession of their camp, as well as of several well-stocked villages in their rear. Amidst these villages the army remained to refresh themselves for several days. It was here that they tasted the grateful but unwholesome honey, which this region still continues to produce, unaware of its peculiar properties. Those soldiers who ate little of it were like men greatly intoxicated with wine; those who ate much were seized with the most violent vomiting and diarrhoea, lying down like madmen in a state of delirium. From this terrible distemper some recovered on the ensuing day, others two or three days afterwards. It does not appear that any one actually died.

Two more days’ march brought them to the sea, at the Greek maritime city of Trapezus or Trebizond, founded by the inhabitants of Sinope on the coast of the Kolchian territory. Here the Trapezuntines received them twith kindness and hospitality, sending them presents of bullocks, barley-meal, and wine. Taking up their quarters in some Kolchian villages near the town, they now enjoyed, for the first time since leaving Tarsus, a safe and undisturbed repose during thirty days, and were enabled to recover in some degree from the severe hardships which they had undergone. While the Trapezuntines brought produce for sale into the camp, the Greeks provided the means of purchasing it by predatory incursions against the Kolchians on the hills. Those Kolchians who dwelt under the hills and on the plain were in a state of semi­dependence upon Trapezus; so that the Trapezuntines mediated on their behalf, and prevailed on the Greeks to leave them unmolested, on condition of a contribution of bullocks.

These bullocks enabled the Greeks to discharge the vow which they had made, on the proposition of Xenophon, to Zeus the Preserver, during that moment of dismay and despair which succeeded immediately on the massacre of their generals by Tissaphernes. To Zeus the Preserver, to Herakles the Conductor, and to various other gods, they offered an abundant sacrifice on their mountain camp overhanging the sea; and after the festival ensuing the skins of the victims were given as prizes to competitors in running, wrestling, boxing, and the pankration. The superintendence of such festival games, so fully accordant with Grecian usage and highly interesting to the army, was committed to a Spartan named Drakontius—a man whose destiny recalls that of Patroklus and other Homeric heroes, for he had been exiled as a boy, having unintentionally killed another boy with a short sword. Various departures from Grecian custom however were admitted. The matches took place on the steep and stony hill-side overhanging the sea, instead of on a smooth plain; and the numerous hard falls of the competitors afforded increased interest to the by-standers. The captive non-Hellenic boys were admitted to run for the prize, since otherwise a boy-race could not have been obtained. Lastly, the animation of the scene, as well as the ardour of the competitors, was much enhanced by the number of their mistresses present.