against me and my army.' 26. 'I will bring them all,' said Clearchus, 'and, on my part, will let you know the quarter whence I hear reports respecting you.' 27. After this conversation, Tissaphernes, behaving to Clearchus with much courtesy, desired him to stay with him, and made him his guest at supper.
On the following day, when Clearchus returned to the camp, he plainly showed that he considered himself to be on the most friendly footing with Tissaphernes, and stated what he had proposed; and he said that those must go to Tissaphernes, whose presence he required, and that whoever of the Greeks should be proved guilty of uttering the alleged calumnies, must be punished as traitors, and persons ill-affected to the Greeks. 28. It was Menon that he suspected of making the charges, as he knew that he had had an interview with Tissaphernes in company with Ariæus, and was forming a party and intriguing against himself, in order that, having gained the whole army over to his own interests, he might secure the friendship of Tissaphernes. 29. Clearchus likewise wished the whole army to have their affections fixed on himself, and troublesome rivals to be removed out of his way.
Some of the soldiers urged, in opposition to his advice, that all the captains and generals should not go, and that they ought to place no confidence in Tissaphernes. 30. But Clearchus pressed his proposal with great vehemence, till he at length succeeded in getting five generals and twenty captains to go; and some of the other soldiers followed them, to the number of about two hundred, as if for the purpose of marketing.[113]
31. When they had arrived at the entrance of Tissaphernes' tent, the generals, who were Proxenus the Boeotian, Menon the Thessalian, Agias the Arcadian, Clearchus the Lacedæmonian, and Socrates the Achæan, were invited to enter; but the captains waited at the door. 32. Not long after, at one and the same signal, those within were seized, and those without massacred; and immediately afterwards a body of Barbarian cavalry, riding through the plain, killed every Greek, slave or freeman, that they met.
33. The Greeks, observing the motions of these cavalry from the camp, were filled with astonishment, and wondered what they could be doing, till Nicarchus an Arcadian came fleeing thither, wounded in the belly and holding his intestines in his hands, and related all that had occurred. 34. The Greeks, in consequence, ran to their arms in a state of general consternation, expecting that the enemy would immediately march upon the camp. 35. They however did not all come, but only Ariæus and Artaozus and Mithridates, who had been Cyrus's most confidential friends; and the interpreter of the Greeks said, that he saw with them, and recognised, the brother of Tissaphernes. Other Persians, equipped with corslets, to the number of three hundred, were in attendance on them. 36. As they approached the camp, they called for whatever general or captain of the Greeks might be there, to come out to them, that they might deliver a message from the king. 37. There accordingly went forth to them, with much caution, Cleanor the Orchomenian, and Sophænetus the Stymphalian, generals of the Greeks, and with them Xenophon the Athenian, that he might learn news of Proxenus. As for Cheirisophus, he happened to be absent at some village looking for provisions.
38. When they had stopped just within hearing, Ariæus said to them: 'Clearchus, O Greeks, having been found guilty of perjury, and of violating the truce, has received his just punishment, and is dead; Proxenus and Menon, as having denounced his treachery, are in great honour; but the king demands of you your arms; for he says that they are his, as they belonged to Cyrus his subject.' 39. To this the Greeks answered, (Cleanor the Orchomenian spoke for them,) 'O Ariæus, most wicked of men, and the rest of you, as many as were the friends of Cyrus, have you no regard either for gods or men, that, after having sworn that you would consider our friends and enemies to be likewise yours, you have thus,[114] after treacherously deserting us in concert with Tissaphernes, the most godless and most unprincipled of human beings, murdered the very men to whom you swore alliance, and, abandoning us who are left, have come against us in conjunction with our enemies?' 40. Ariæus replied, 'Clearchus had been previously detected in treacherous designs against Tissaphernes and Orontes, and all of us who accompany them.' 41. To this Xenophon rejoined, 'Clearchus, then, if he infringed the truce in violation of his oath, is deservedly punished; for it is just that those who violate their oaths should suffer death; but as for Proxenus and Menon, as they are your benefactors and our generals, send them hither; for it is clear that, being friends to both parties, they will endeavour to advise what is best both for you and for us.' 42. The Barbarians, after conversing among themselves for some time, departed without making any answer to this proposal.
[Footnote 106: [Greek: Out' apo poiou an tachous pheugôn tis apophygoi].] This is Dindorf's reading. Bornemann and Kühner have [Greek: out' apo poiou an tachous oute hopoi an tis pheugôn apophygoi], on the authority, as they say, of the best copies. Dindorf thought with Schæfer, ad Greg. Cor. p. 492, that the words [Greek: oute hopoi an] were superfluous, and consequently omitted them. Bornemann and Kühner see no reason why they should not be retained.]
[Footnote 107: [Greek: Ton megiston ephedron].] [Greek: Ephedros] properly meant a gladiator or wrestler, who, when two combatants were engaged, stood ready to attack the one that should prove victorious. See Sturz. Lex. Xen.; Schol. in Soph. Aj. 610; Hesychius; D'Orvill. ad Charit. p. 338.]
[Footnote 108: [Greek: Anastrephoio].] 'Ut dominus versere, vivias, domini partes sustineas:' [Greek: An] must be repeated from the preceding clause; unless that particle, as Dindorf thinks, has dropped out from before [Greek: anastrephoio].
[Footnote 109: There is in the text, as Krüger observes, a confusion of the two constructions, [Greek: akousaimi to onoma toutou, hostis], and [Greek: akousaimi, tis].]
[Footnote 110: [Greek: Ha hêmin philia onta].] I have here departed from Dindorf's text, which has [Greek: ha hymeis philia onta, k. t. l.]; a reading much less satisfactory than the other, to which Schneider, Bornemann, and Kühner adhere.]
[Footnote 111: [Greek: Tamieuesthai].] This word is used in the same sense, 3. 47; iv. 1. 18; Thucyd. vi. 18; Plutarch, Timol. c. 27.]
[Footnote 112: [Greek: Tên d' epi tê kardia --echoi].] Sc. [Greek: orthên]. The sense is, 'but to wear a tiara erect on the heart, that is, to have a kingly spirit and to aspire to dominion, is what another, by your aid, might be able to do.' Tissaphernes, by this expression, wished to make it understood that he might possibly, with the support of the Greeks, aspire to the throne of Persia himself. A similar metaphor is noticed by Schæfer, (ad Greg. Corinth. p. 491.) in Philostratus v. a. iii. p. 131: [Greek: dokei moi kai ton prognôsomenon anor hygiôs heautou echein --' katharôs de auton prophêteuein, heautou kai tou peri tô sternô tripodos synientos].
[Footnote 113: [Greek: Hôs eis agoran].] 'Consequently unarmed.'
[Footnote 114: [Greek: Hôs apolôlekate].] Jacobs interprets [Greek: hôs] by quàm, as equivalent to quàm turpiter! quàm impiè! But such exclamations belong rather to modern writers than to the ancients. * * * Others have conjectured [Greek: atheôs, anosiôs, ômôs, hisôs, holôs, houtôs]. In one manuscript [Greek: hôs] is omitted; an omission approved by Larcher, Porson and some others. Some, too, think that the sentence is [Greek: anakolouthos], and that the author, forgetful how he commenced it, goes on with [Greek: hôs] for [Greek: hoti]. Dindorf supposes that Cleanor must be regarded as too much provoked and agitated to mind the exact arrangement of his words. For my own part, I consider that those have the most reason on their side who think that we should read [Greek: houtôs], interpreting it, with Bornemann,
CHAPTER VI.
The characters of the five generals that were put to death.
1. The generals, who were thus made prisoners, were taken up to the king, and put to death by being beheaded.
One of them, Clearchus, by the general consent of all who were acquainted with him, appears to have been a man well qualified for war, and extremely fond of military enterprise. 2. For as long as the Lacedæmonians were at war with the Athenians, he remained in the service of his country; but when the peace took place, having induced his government to believe that the Thracians were committing ravages on the Greeks, and having gained
