Anabasis Part 16

VII

After this, Seuthes removed his camp to some considerable distance; 1 and the h.e.l.lenes took up their quarters in some villages, selecting those in which they could best supply their commissariat, on the road to the sea. Now these particular villages had been given by Seuthes to Medosades. Accordingly, when the latter saw his property in the villages being expended by the h.e.l.lenes, he was not over well pleased; and taking with him an Odrysian, a powerful person amongst those who had come down from the interior, and about thirty mounted troopers, he came and challenged Xenophon to come forth from the h.e.l.lenic host. He, taking some of the officers and others of a character to be relied upon, came forward. Then Medosades, addressing Xenophon, said: "You are doing wrong to pillage our villages; we give you fair warning--I, in behalf of Seuthes, and this man by my side, who comes from Medocus, the king up country--to begone out of the land. If you refuse, understand, we have no notion of handing it over to you; but if you injure our country we will retaliate upon you as foes."

Xenophon, hearing what they had to say, replied: "Such language addressed to us by you, of all people, is hard to answer. Yet for the sake of the young man with you, I will attempt to do so, that at least he may learn how different your nature is from ours. We," he continued, "before we were your friends, had the free run of this country, moving this way or that, as it took our fancy, pillaging and 5 burning just as we chose; and you yourself, Medosades, whenever you came to us on an emba.s.sy, camped with us, without apprehension of any foe. As a tribe collectively you scarcely approached the country at all, or if you found yourselves in it, you bivouacked with your horses bitted and bridled, as being in the territory of your superiors.

Presently you made friends with us, and, thanks to us, by G.o.d's help you have won this country, out of which to-day you seek to drive us; a country which we held by our own strength and gave to you. No hostile force, as you well know, was capable of expelling us. It might have been expected of you personally to speed us on our way with some gift, in return for the good we did you. Not so; even though our backs are turned to go, we are too slow in our movements for you. You will not suffer us to take up quarters even, if you can help it, and these words arouse no shame in you, either before the G.o.ds, or this Odrysian, in whose eyes to-day you are man of means, though until you cultivated our friendship you lived a robber's life, as you have told us. However, why do you address yourself to me? I am no longer in command. Our generals are the Lacedaemonians, to whom you and yours delivered the army for withdrawal; and that, without even inviting me to attend, you most marvellous of men, so that if I lost their favour when I brought you the troops, I might now win their grat.i.tude by restoring them."

As soon as the Odrysian had heard this statement, he exclaimed: "For my part, Medosades, I sink under the earth for very shame at what I hear. If I had known the truth before, I would never have accompanied you. As it is, I return at once. Never would King Medocus applaud me, if I drove forth his benefactors." With these words, he mounted his horse and rode away, and with him the rest of his hors.e.m.e.n, except four or five. But Medosades, still vexed by the pillaging of the country, urged Xenophon to summon the two Lacedaemonians; and he, taking the pick of his men, came to Charminus and Polynicus and informed them that they were summoned by Medosades; probably they, like himself, would be warned to leave the country; "if so," he added, 14 "you will be able to recover the pay which is owing to the army. You can say to them, that the army has requested you to a.s.sist in exacting their pay from Seuthes, whether he like it or not; that they have promised, as soon as they get this, cheerfully to follow you; that the demand seems to you to be only just, and that you have accordingly promised not to leave, until the soldiers have got their dues." The Lacedaemonians accepted the suggestion: they would apply these arguments and others the most forcible they could hit upon; and with the proper representatives of the army, they immediately set off.

On their arrival Charminus spoke: "If you have anything to say to us, Medosades, say it; but if not, we have something to say to you." And Medosades submissively made answer: "I say," said he, "and Seuthes says the same: we think we have a right to ask that those who have become our friends should not be ill-treated by you; whatever ill you do to them you really do to us, for they are a part of us." "Good!"

replied the Lacedaemonians, "and we intend to go away as soon as those who won for you the people and the territory in question have got their pay. Failing that, we are coming without further delay to a.s.sist them and to punish certain others who have broken their oaths and done them wrong. If it should turn out that you come under this head, when we come to exact justice, we shall begin with you." Xenophon added: "Would you prefer, Medosades, to leave it to these people themselves, in whose country we are (your friends, since this is the designation you prefer), to decide by ballot, which of the two should leave the country, you or we?" To that proposal he shook his head, but he trusted the two Laconians might be induced to go to Seuthes about the pay, adding, "Seuthes, I am sure, will lend a willing ear;" or if they could not go, then he prayed them to send Xenophon with himself, promising to lend the latter all the aid in his power, and finally he begged them not to burn the villages. Accordingly they sent Xenophon, and with him a serviceable staff. Being arrived, he addressed Seuthes thus:--

"Seuthes, I am here to advance no claims, but to show you, if I can, 21 how unjust it was on your part to be angered with me because I zealously demanded of you on behalf of the soldiers what you promised them. According to my belief, it was no less to your interest to deliver it up, than it was to theirs to receive it. I cannot forget that, next to the G.o.ds, it was they who raised you up to a conspicuous eminence, when they made you king of large territory and many men, a position in which you cannot escape notice, whether you do good or do evil. For a man so circ.u.mstanced, I regarded it as a great thing that he should avoid the suspicion even of ungrateful parting with his benefactors. It was a great thing, I thought, that you should be well spoken of by six thousand human beings; but the greatest thing of all, that you should in no wise discredit the sincerity of your own word.

For what of the man who cannot be trusted? I see that the words of his mouth are but vain words, powerless, and unhonoured; but with him who is seen to regard truth, the case is otherwise. He can achieve by his words what another achieves by force. If he seeks to bring the foolish to their senses--his very frown, I perceive, has a more sobering effect than the chastis.e.m.e.nt inflicted by another. Or in negotiations the very promises of such an one are of equal weight with the gifts of another.

"Try and recall to mind in your own case, what advance of money you made to us to purchase our alliance. You know you did not advance one penny. It was simply confidence in the sincerity of your word which incited all these men to a.s.sist you in your campaign, and so to acquire for you an empire, worth many times more than thirty talents, which is all they now claim to receive. Here then, first of all, goes the credit which won for you your kingdom, sold for so mean a sum. Let me remind you of the great importance which you then attached to the acquisition of your present conquests. I am certain that to achieve what stands achieved to-day, you would willingly have foregone the gain of fifty times that paltry sum. To me it seems that to lose your present fortune were a more serious loss than never to have won it; since surely it is harder to be poor after being rich than never to 28 have tasted wealth at all, and more painful to sink to the level of a subject, being a king, then never to have worn a crown.

"You cannot forget that your present va.s.sals were not persuaded to become your subjects out of love for you, but by sheer force; and but for some restraining dread they would endeavour to be free again to-morrow. And how do you propose to stimulate their sense of awe, and keep them in good behaviour towards you? Shall they see our soldiers so disposed towards you that a word on your part would suffice to keep them now, or if necessary would bring them back again to-morrow? while others hearing from us a hundred stories in your praise, hasten to present themselves at your desire? Or will you drive them to conclude adversely, that through mistrust of what has happened now, no second set of soldiers will come to help you, for even these troops of ours are more their friends than yours? And indeed it was not because they fell short of us in numbers that they became your subjects, but from lack of proper leaders. There is a danger, therefore, now lest they should choose as their protectors some of us who regard ourselves as wronged by you, or even better men than us--the Lacedaemonians themselves; supposing our soldiers undertake to serve with more enthusiasm, if the debt you owe to them be first exacted; and the Lacedaemonians, who need their services, consent to this request. It is plain, at any rate, that the Thracians, now prostrate at your feet, would display far more enthusiasm in attacking, than in a.s.sisting you; for your mastery means their slavery, and your defeat their liberty.

"Again, the country is now yours, and from this time forward you have to make provision for what is yours; and how will you best secure it an immunity from ill? Either these soldiers receive their dues and go, leaving a legacy of peace behind, or they stay and occupy an enemy's country, whilst you endeavour, by aid of a still larger army, to open a new campaign and turn them out; and your new troops will also need provisions. Or again, which will be the greater drain on your purse?

to pay off your present debt, or, with that still owing, to bid for more troops, and of a better quality?

"Heracleides, as he used to prove to me, finds the sum excessive. But 35 surely it is a far less serious thing for you to take and pay it back to-day than it would have been to pay the t.i.the of it, before we came to you; since the limit between less and more is no fixed number, but depends on the relative capacity of payer and recipient, and your yearly income now is larger than the whole property which you possessed in earlier days.

"Well, Seuthes, for myself these remarks are the expression of friendly forethought for a friend. They are expressed in the double hope that you may show yourself worthy of the good things which the G.o.ds have given you, and that my reputation may not be ruined with the army. For I must a.s.sure you that to-day, if I wished to injure a foe, I could not do so with this army. Nor again, if I wished to come and help you, should I be competent to the task; such is the disposition of the troops towards me. And yet I call you to witness, along with the G.o.ds who know, that never have I received anything from you on account of the soldiers. Never to this day have I, to my private gain, asked for what was theirs, nor even claimed the promises which were made to myself; and I swear to you, not even had you proposed to pay me my dues, would I have accepted them, unless the soldiers also had been going to receive theirs too; how could I? How shameful it would have been in me, so to have secured my own interests, whilst I disregarded the disastrous state of theirs, I being so honoured by them. Of course to the mind of Heracleides this is all silly talk; since the one great object is to keep money by whatever means. That is not my tenet, Seuthes. I believe that no fairer or brighter jewel can be given to a man, and most of all a prince, than the threefold grace of valour, justice, and generosity. He that possesses these is rich in the mult.i.tude of friends which surround him; rich also in the desire of others to be included in their number. While he prospers, he is surrounded by those who will rejoice with him in his joy; or if misfortune overtake him, he has no lack of sympathisers to give him help. However, if you have failed to learn from my deeds that I was, heart and soul, your friend; if my words are powerless to reveal the fact to-day, I would at least direct your attention to what the 43 soldiers said; you were standing by and heard what those who sought to blame me said. They accused me to the Lacedaemonians, and the point of their indictment was that I set greater store by yourself than by the Lacedaemonians; but, as regards themselves, the charge was that I took more pains to secure the success of your interests than their own.

They suggested that I had actually taken gifts from you. Was it, do you suppose, because they detected some ill-will in me towards you that they made the allegation? Was it not rather, that they had noticed my abundant zeal on your behalf?

"All men believe, I think, that a fund of kindly feeling is due to him from whom we accept gifts. But what is your behaviour? Before I had ministered to you in any way, or done you a single service, you welcomed me kindly with your eyes, your voice, your hospitality, and you could not sate yourself with promises of all the fine things that were to follow. But having once achieved your object, and become the great man you now are, as great indeed as I could make you, you can stand by and see me degraded among my own soldiers! Well, time will teach you--that I fully believe--to pay whatever seems to you right, and even without the lessons of that teacher you will hardly care to see whose who have spent themselves in benefiting you, become your accusers. Only, when you do pay your debt, I beg of you to use your best endeavour to right me with the soldiers. Leave me at least where you found me; that is all I ask."

After listening to this appeal, Seuthes called down curses on him, whose fault it was, that the debt had not long ago been paid, and, if the general suspicion was correct, this was Heracleides. "For myself,"

said Seuthes, "I never had any idea of robbing you of your just dues.

I will repay." Then Xenophon rejoined: "Since you are minded to pay, I only ask that you will do so through me, and will not suffer me on your account to hold a different position in the army from what I held when we joined you." He replied: "As far as that goes, so far from holding a less honoured position among your own men on my account, if you will stay with me, keeping only a thousand heavy infantry, I will deliver to you the fortified places and everything I promised." The other answered: "On these terms I may not accept them, only let us go 51 free." "Nay, but I know," said Seuthes, "that it is safer for you to bide with me than to go away." Then Xenophon again: "For your forethought I thank you, but I may not stay. Somewhere I may rise to honour, and that, be sure, shall redound to your gain also." Thereupon Seuthes spoke: "Of silver I have but little; that little, however, I give to you, one talent; but of beeves I can give you six hundred head, and of sheep four thousand, and of slaves six score. These take, and the hostages besides, who wronged you, and begone." Xenophon laughed and said: "But supposing these all together do not amount to the pay; for whom is the talent, shall I say? It is a little dangerous for myself, is it not? I think I had better be on the look-out for stones when I return. You heard the threats?"

So for the moment he stayed there, but the next day Seuthes gave up to them what he had promised, and sent an escort to drive the cattle. The soldiers at first maintained that Xenophon had gone to take up his abode with Seuthes, and to receive what he had been promised; so when they saw him they were pleased, and ran to meet him. And Xenophon, seeing Charminus and Polynicus, said: "Thanks to your intervention, this much has been saved for the army. My duty is to deliver this fraction over to your keeping; do you divide and distribute it to the soldiers." Accordingly they took the property and appointed official vendors of the booty, and in the end incurred considerable blame.

Xenophon held aloof. In fact it was no secret that he was making his preparations to return home, for as yet the vote of banishment had not been pa.s.sed at Athens (1). But the authorities in the camp came to him and begged him not to go away until he had conducted the army to its destination, and handed it over to Thibron.

(1) I.e. "at this moment the vote of banishment had not been pa.s.sed which would prevent his return to Athens." The natural inference from these words is, I think, that the vote of banishment was presently pa.s.sed, at any rate considerably earlier than the battle of Coronea in B.C. 394, five years and a half afterwards.

VIII

From this place they sailed across to Lampsacus, and here Xenophon was 1 met by Eucleides the soothsayer, a Phliasian, the son of Cleagoras, who painted "the dreams (1)" in the Lycium. Eucleides congratulated Xenophon upon his safe return, and asked him how much gold he had got?

and Xenophon had to confess: "Upon my word, I shall have barely enough to get home, unless I sell my horse, and what I have about my person."

The other could not credit the statement. Now when the Lampsacenes sent gifts of hospitality to Xenophon, and he was sacrificing to Apollo, he requested the presence of Eucleides; and the latter, seeing the victims, said: "Now I believe what you said about having no money.

But I am certain," he continued, "if it were ever to come, there is an obstacle in the way. If nothing else, you are that obstacle yourself."

Xenophon admitted the force of that remark. Then the other: "Zeus Meilichios (2) is an obstacle to you, I am sure," adding in another tone of voice, "have you tried sacrificing to that G.o.d, as I was wont to sacrifice and offer whole burnt offerings for you at home?"

Xenophon replied that since he had been abroad, he had not sacrificed to that G.o.d. Accordingly Eucleides counselled him to sacrifice in the old customary way: he was sure that his fortune would improve. The next day Xenophon went on to Ophrynium and sacrificed, offering a holocaust of swine, after the custom of his family, and the signs which he obtained were favourable. That very day Bion and Nausicleides arrived laden with gifts for the army. These two were hospitably entertained by Xenophon, and were kind enough to repurchase the horse he had sold in Lampsacus for fifty darics; suspecting that he had parted with it out of need, and hearing that he was fond of the beast they restored it to him, refusing to be remunerated.

(1) Reading {ta enupnia}, or if {ta entoikhia} with Hug and others, translate "the wall-paintings" or the "frescoes." Others think that a writing, not a painting, is referred to.

(2) Zeus Meilichios, or the gentle one. See Thuc. i. 126. The festival of the Diasia at Athens was in honour of that G.o.d, or rather of Zeus under that aspect. Cf. Arist. "Clouds," 408.

From that place they marched through the Troad, and, crossing Mount Ida, arrived at Antandrus, and then pushed along the seaboard of Mysia to the plain of Thebe (3). Thence they made their way through 8 Adramytium and Certonus (4) by Atarneus, coming into the plain of the Caicus, and so reached Pergamus in Mysia.

(3) Thebe, a famous ancient town in Mysia, at the southern foot of Mt.

Placius, which is often mentioned in Homer ("Il." i. 366, vi. 397, xxii. 479, ii. 691). See "Dict. Geog." s.v. The name {Thebes pedion} preserves the site. Cf. above {Kaustrou pedion}, and such modern names as "the Campagna" or "Piano di Sorrento."

(4) The site of Certonus is not ascertained. Some critics have conjectured that the name should be Cytonium, a place between Mysia and Lydia; and Hug, who reads {Kutoniou}, omits {odeusantes par 'Atanea}, "they made their way by Atarneus," as a gloss.

Here Xenophon was hospitably entertained at the house of h.e.l.las, the wife of Gongylus the Eretrian (5), the mother of Gorgion and Gongylus.

From her he learnt that Asidates, a Persian notable, was in the plain.

"If you take thirty men and go by night, you will take him prisoner,"

she said, "wife, children, money, and all; of money he has a store;"

and to show them the way to these treasures, she sent her own cousin and Daphnagoras, whom she set great store by. So then Xenophon, with these two to a.s.sist, did sacrifice; and Basias, an Eleian, the soothsayer in attendance, said that the victims were as promising as could be, and the great man would be an easy prey. Accordingly, after dinner he set off, taking with him the officers who had been his staunchest friends and confidants throughout; as he wished to do them a good turn. A number of others came thrusting themselves on their company, to the number of six hundred, but the officers repelled them: "They had no notion of sharing their portion of the spoil," they said, "just as though the property lay already at their feet."

(5) Cf. Thuc. i. 128; also "h.e.l.l." III. i. 6.

About midnight they arrived. The slaves occupying the precincts of the tower, with the ma.s.s of goods and chattles, slipped through their fingers, their sole anxiety being to capture Asidates and his belongings. So they brought their batteries to bear, but failing to take the tower by a.s.sault (since it was high and solid, and well supplied with ramparts, besides having a large body of warlike defenders), they endeavoured to undermine it. The wall was eight clay bricks thick, but by daybreak the pa.s.sage was effected and the wall undermined. At the first gleam of light through the aperture, one of 14 the defendants inside, with a large ox-spit, smote right through the thigh of the man nearest the hole, and the rest discharged their arrows so hotly that it was dangerous to come anywhere near the pa.s.sage; and what with their shouting and kindling of beacon fires, a relief party at length arrived, consisting of Itabelius at the head of his force, and a body of a.s.syrian heavy infantry from Comania, and some Hyrcanian cavalry (6), the latter also being mercenaries of the king. There were eighty of them, and another detachment of light troops, about eight hundred, and more from Parthenium, and more again from Apollonia and the neighbouring places, also cavalry.

(6) The Hyrcanian cavalry play an important part in the "Cyropaedeia."

They are the Scirites of the a.s.syrian army who came over to Cyrus after the first battle. Their country is the fertile land touching the south-eastern corner of the Caspian. Cf. "Cyrop." IV. ii. 8, where the author (or an editor) appends a note on the present status of the Hyrcanians.

It was now high time to consider how they were to beat a retreat. So seizing all the cattle and sheep to be had, with the slaves, they put them within a hollow square and proceed to drive them off. Not that they had a thought to give to the spoils now, but for precaution's sake and for fear lest if they left the goods and chattels behind and made off, the retreat would rapidly degenerate into a stampede, the enemy growing bolder as the troops lost heart. For the present then they retired as if they meant to do battle for the spoils. As soon as Gongylus espied how few the h.e.l.lenes were and how large the attacking party, out he came himself, in spite of his mother, with his private force, wishing to share in the action. Another too joined in the rescue--Procles, from Halisarna and Teuthrania, a descendant of Damaratus. By this time Xenophon and his men were being sore pressed by the arrows and slingstones, though they marched in a curve so as to keep their shields facing the missiles, and even so, barely crossed the river Carcasus, nearly half of them wounded. Here it was that Agasias the Stymphalian, the captain, received his wound, while keeping up a steady unflagging fight against the enemy from beginning to end. And so they reached home in safety with about two hundred captives, and sheep enough for sacrifices.

The next day Xenophon sacrificed and led out the whole army under the 20 cover of night, intending to pierce far into the heart of Lydia with a view to lulling to sleep the enemy's alarm at his proxmity, and so in fact to put him off his guard. But Asidates, hearing that Xenophon had again sacrificed with the intention of another attack, and was approaching with his whole army, left his tower and took up quarters in some villages lying under the town of Parthenium. Here Xenophon's party fell in with him, and took him prisoner, with his wife, his children, his horses, and all that he had; and so the promise of the earlier victims was literally fulfilled. After that they returned again to Pergamus, and here Xenophon might well thank G.o.d with a warm heart, for the Laconians, the officers, the other generals, and the soldiers as a body united to give him the pick of horses and cattle teams, and the rest; so that he was now in a position himself to do another a good turn.

Meanwhile Thibron arrived and received the troops which he incorporated with the rest of his h.e.l.lenic forces, and so proceeded to prosecute a war against Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus (7).

(7) The MSS. add: "The following is a list of the governors of the several territories of the king which were traversed by us during the expedition: Artimas, governor of Lydia; Artacamas, of Phrygia; Mithridates, of Lycaonia and Cappadocia; Syennesis, of Cilicia; Dernes, of Phoenicia and Arabia; Belesys, of Syria and a.s.syria; Rhoparas, of Babylon; Arbacus, of Media; Tiribazus, of the Phasians and Hesperites. Then some independent tribes--the Carduchians or Kurds, and Chalybes, and Chaldaeans, and Macrones, and Colchians, and Mossynoecians, and Coetians, and Tibarenians.

Then Corylas, the governor of Paphlagonia; Pharnabazus, of the Bithynians; Seuthes, of the European Thracians. The entire journey, ascent and descent, consisted of two hundred and fifteen stages = one thousand one hundred and fifty-five parasangs = thirty-four thousand six hundred and fifty stades. Computed in time, the length of ascent and descent together amounted to one year and three months." The annotator apparently computes the distance from Ephesus to Cotyora.