well as of being served by them, he entered into the service of Cyrus with the view of advancing himself. He did not want ambition, but would take no other path to glory than that of virtue. He would have been a perfect captain, if he had had to act with none but brave and disciplined men, and it had been only necessary to be beloved. He was more apprehensive of being in the displeasure of his soldiers, than his soldiers in his. He thought it sufficient for a commander to praise good actions, without punishing bad ones; for which reason, he was beloved by the worthy; but those of a different charac ter abused his gentleness. He died at thirty years of age.

Could the two great persons we have here drawn, after Xenophon, have been moulded into one, something perfect might have been made of them; retrenching their several defects, and retaining only their virtues ;* but it rarely happens, that the same man, as Tacitus says of Agricola, behaves, according to the exigency of times and circumstances, sometimes with gentleness, and sometimes with severity, without lessening his authority by the former, or the affection of the people by the latter.f

Menon was a Thessalian, avaricious and ambitious, but ambitious only from the motive of avarice, pursuing honour and estimation for the mere lucre of money. He courted the friendship of the great, and persons in authority, that he might have it in his power to commit injustice and oppression with impunity. To obtain his ends, all means with him were virtue; falsehood, fraud, perjury; while sincerity and integrity of heart were by him esteemed weakness and stupidity. He loved nobody; and if he professed friendship, it was only to deceive. As others made their glory consist in religion, probity, and honour, he valued himself upon injustice, deceit, and treachery. He gained the favour of the great by false reports, whispering with calumny; and that of the soidiery by licence and impunity. In fine, he endeavoured to render himself terrible by the mischief it was in his power to do, and imagined he favoured those to whom he did none.

I had thought to have retrenched these characters, which interrupt the thread of the history, but as they are a lively image of the manners of men, which in all times are the same, I thought retaining them would neither be useless nor disagreeable to the reader.

SECTION V.-RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND GREEKS FROM THE PROVINCE OF BABYLON TO TREBISOND.

THE generals of the Greeks having been seized, and the officers who attended them massacred, the troops were in the highest consternation. They were five or six hundred leagues from Greece, surrounded with great rivers and hostile nations, without any supplies of provisions. In this state of general dejection, they could not think of taking either nourishment or repose. In the middle of the night, Xenophon, a young Athenian, but of prudence and capacity superior to his years, went to some of the officers, and represented to them, that they had no time to lose; that it was of the last importance to prevent the bad designs of the enemy; that however small their number, they would render themselves formidable, if they behaved with boldness and resolution; that valour and not multitude determines the success of arms; and that it was necessary above all things to nominate generals immediately; because an army without commanders is like a body without a soul. A council was immediately held, at which a hundred officers were present, and Xenophon being desired to speak, deduced the reasons at large which he had first but lightly touched upon; and by his advice commanders were appointed. They were, Timasion for Clearchus, Zanthicles for Socrates, Cleanor for Agias, Philesius for Menon, and Xenophon for Proxenes.‡

Egregium principatus temperamentura, si, demptis utrinsque vitiis, solæ virtutes miscerentur.— Tacit. Hist. I. ii. c. 5. Pro variis temporibus ac negotiis severus et comis nec illi, quod est rarissimum, aut facilitas auctorita tem, aut severitas amorem, diminuit.Tacit. in Agric. c. ix. Xenoph. in Exped. Cvr. 1. iii. et iv.

Before the break of day, they assembled the army. The generals made speeches to animate the troops, and Xenophon among the rest. "Fellow soldiers," said he," the loss of so many brave men by vile treachery, and he being abandoned by our friends, is very deplorable: but we must not sink under our misfortunes; and if we cannot conquer, let us choose rather to perish gloriously, than to fall into the hands of barbarians, who would inflict upon us the greatest miseries. Let us call to mind the glorious battles of Platææ, Thermopylæ, Salamin, and the many others wherein our ancestors, though with a small number, have fought and defeated the innumerable armies of the Persians, and thereby rendered the name alone of Greek for ever formidable. It is to their invincible valour we owe the honour we possess, of acknowledging no masters upon earth but the gods, nor any happiness but what consists with liberty. Those gods, the avengers of perjury, and witnesses of the enemy's treason, will be favourable to us; and as they are attacked in the violation of treaties, and take pleasure in humbling the proud and exalting the low, they will also follow us to battle, and combat for us. For the rest, fellow-soldiers, as we have no refuge but in victory, which must be our hope, and will make us ample amends for whatever it costs to attain it; I should believe, if it were your opinion, that for making a more ready and less difficult retreat, it would be very proper to rid ourselves of all the useless baggage, and to keep only what is absolutely necessary in our march." All the soldiers that moment lifted up their hands, to signify their approbation and consent to all that had been said, and without loss of time set fire to their tents and carriages; such of them as had too much equipage giving it to others who had too little, and destroying the rest.

It was resolved to march the army without tumult or violence, if their return was not opposed; but otherwise to force themselves a passage through the enemy. They began their march in the form of a great hollow square, with the baggage in the centre. Chirisophus the Lacedæmonian had the vanguard: two of the oldest captains the right and left; and Timasion with Xenophon were posted in the rear, as the youngest officers. The first day was difficult; because, having neither horse nor slingers, they were extremely harassed by a detachment sent against them but they provided against that inconvenience by following Xenophon's advice. They chose two hundred men out of the Rhodians in the army, whom they armed with slings, and augmented their pay for their encouragement. They could throw as far again as the Persians, because they discharged balls of lead, and the others made use of large flints. They mounted also a squadron of fifty men upon the horses intended for the baggage, and supplied their places with other beasts of burden. By the means of this supply, a second detachment of the enemy were very severely handied.

After some days march, Tissaphernes appeared with all his forces. He contented himself with harassing the Greeks, who moved on continually. The latter observing the difficulty of retreating in a hollow square in the face of the enemy, from the unevenness of ground, hedges, and other obstacles, which might oblige them to break it, changed their order of battle, and marched in two columns, with the little baggage they had in the space between them They formed a body of reserve of six hundred chosen men, whom they di vided into six companies, and sub-divided by fifties and tens to facilitate their motions according to occasion. When the columns came close to each other, they either remained in the rear, or filed off upon the flanks on both sides, to avoid disorder; and when they opened, they fell into the void space in the rear between the columns. Upon any occasion of attack, they immediately ran where it was necessary. The Greeks stood several charges; but they were neither considerable, nor attended with much loss.

They arrived at the river Tigris. As its depth would not admit them to pass it without boats, they were obliged to cross the Carducian mountains; because there was no other way, and the prisoners reported, that from thence

they would enter Armenia, where they might pass the Tigris at its source, and afterwards the Euphrates, not very distant from it. To gain these defiles before the enemy could seize them, it was thought proper to set forwards in the night, in order to arrive at the foot of the mountains by the break of day; which was done accordingly. Chirisophus continued at the head of the advanced guard, with the troops armed with missive weapons, besides his ordinary corps, and Xenophon in the rear, with only the heavy-armed soldiers, because at that time there was nothing to fear on that side. The inhabitants of the country had taken possession of several of the heights, from whence it was necessary to drive them, which could not be done without great danger and difficulty.

The officers having held a council of war, were of opinion, that it was proper to leave behind them all the beasts of burden not absolutely necessary, with all the slaves lately taken; because they would retard their march too much in the great defiles they had to pass; besides which, it required a greater quantity of provisions to support them, and those who had the care of the beasts were useless in flight. That regulation was executed without delay; and they continued their march, sometimes fighting, and sometimes halting. The passing of the mountains, which took up seven days, fatigued the troops exceedingly, and occasioned some loss; but at length they arrived at villages where they found provisions in abundance, and rested some days to recover the severe fatigues the army had suffered; in comparison with which,all they had undergone in Persia was trivial.

They found themselves soon after exposed to new danger. Almost at the foot of the mountains, they came to a river, two hundred feet in breadth, called Centrites, which stopped their march. They had to defend themselves against the enemy, who pursued them in the rear, and the Armenians, the soldiers of the country, who defended the opposite side of the river. They attempted in vain to pass it in a place where the water came up to their arm-pits, and were carried away by the rapidity of the current, which the weight of their arms inade them unable to resist. By good fortune they discovered another place not so deep, where some soldiers had seen the people of the country pass. It required abundance of address, diligence, and valour, to keep off the enemy on both sides of them. The army, however, passed the river at length without much loss.

They marched afterwards with less interruption; passed the source of the Tigris, and arrived at the little river Teleboa, which is very beautiful, and has many villages on its banks. Here began the western Arinenia, which was governed by Tiribasus, a satrap much beloved by the king, and who had the honour to help him to mount on horseback when at the court:* he offered to let the army pass, and to suffer the soldiers to take all they wanted, upon condition that they should commit no ravages in their march; which proposal was accepted, and ratified on each side. Tiribasus kept always a flying camp at a small distance from the army. There fell a great quantity of snow which gave the troops some inconvenience; and they learned from a prisoner, that Tiribasus had a design to attack the Greeks at a pass of the mountains, in a defile through which they must necessarily march. They prevented him by seizing that post, after having put the enemy to flight. After some day's march through deserts, they passed the Euphrates near its source, not having the water above their middles.

They suffered exceedingly afterwards from a north wind, which blew in their faces, and prevented respiration; so that it was thought necessary to sacrifice to the wind, upon which it seemed to abate. They marched on in snow five or six feet deep, which killed several servants and beasts of burden, besides thirty soldiers. They made fires during the night, for they found plenty of

The French translator of Xenophon says, "he held the king's stirrup when he got on horseback," without considering that the ancients used none.

wood. All the next day, they continued their march through the snow; when many of them, from the excess of hunger, followed with languor or fainting, continued lying upon the ground, through weakness and want of spirits. When something had been given them to eat, they found themselves relieved, and continued their march.

The enemy still pursued them; many of whom, overtaken by the night, remained on the way without fire or provisions, so that several died of their hardships, and the enemy who followed them took some baggage. Some soldiers were also left behind, who had lost their sight, and others their toes, by the snow. Against the first evil it was good to wear something black before the eyes and against the other, to keep the legs always in motion, and to bare the feet at night. Arriving in a more commodious place, they dispersed themselves into the neighbouring villages, to recover and repose after their fatigues. The houses were built under ground, with an opening at top, like a well, through which the descent was by a ladder; but there was another entrance for cattle. They found there, sheep, cows, goats, poultry; with wheat, barley, and pulse; and for drink, there was beer, which was very strong, when not mingled with water, but was agreeable to those who were used to it. They drank this with a reed out of the vessels that held the beer, upon which they saw the barley swim. The master of the house where Xenophon lay, received him very kindly, and even showed him where he had concealed some wine; besides which, he made him a present of several horses. He taught him also to fasten a kind of hurdles to their feet, and to do the same to the other beasts of burden, to prevent their sinking in the snow; without which, they would have been up to the girth in it at every step. The army, afte. having rested seven days in these villages, resumed their route.

After a march of seven days, they arrived at the river Araxes, called also the Phasus, which is about one hundred feet in breadth. Two days after, they discovered the Phasians, the Chalybes, and the Taochians, who kept the pass of the mountains, to prevent their descending into the plain. They saw it was impossible to avoid coming to a battle with them, and resolved to give it the same day. Xenophon, who had observed that the enemy defended only the ordinary passage, and that the mountain was three leagues in extent, proposed sending a detachment to take possession of the heights that commanded the enemy; which would not be difficult, as they might prevent all suspicion of their design by a march in the night, and by making a false attack by the main road, to amuse the barbarians. This was accordingly executed, the enemy put to flight, and the pass cleared.

They crossed the country of the Chalybes, who were the most valiant of all the barbarians in those parts. When they killed an enemy, they cut off his head, and carried it about in triumph, singing and dancing. They kept themselves close shut up in their cities; and when the army marched, fell suddenly upon the rear, after having carried every thing of value in the country into places of safety. After twelve or fifteen days march, they arrived at a very high mountain, called Tecqua, from whence they descried the sea. The first who perceived it, raised great shouts of joy for a considerable time; which caused Xenophon to imagine that the vanguard was attacked, and go up with all haste to support it. As he approached nearer, the cry of "the sea! the sea!" was heard distinctly, and the alarm changed into joy and gayety; and when they came to the top, nothing was heard but a confused noise of the whole army crying out together, "the sea! the sea!" while they could not refrain from tears, nor from embracing their generals and officers. And then, without waiting for orders, they heaped up a pile of stones, and erected a trophy with broken bucklers and other arms.

From thence they advanced to the mountains of Colchis, one of which was higher than the rest; and of that the people of the country had possessed them selves. The Greeks drew up in order of battle at the bottom of it to ascend, for the access was not impracticable. Xenophon did not judge it proper to

26.1

march in line of battle, but by files; because the soldiers could not keep their ranks from the inequality of the ground, being in some places easy, and in others difficult to climb, which might discourage them. That advice was approved, and the army formed according to it. The heavy armed troops amounted to eighty files, each consisting of about one hundred men, with eighteen hundred light-armed soldiers, divided into three bodies, one of which was posted on the right, another on the left, and a third in the centre. After having encouraged his troops, by representing to them that this was the last obstacle they had to surmount, and implored the assistance of the gods, the army began to ascend the hill. The enemy were not able to support their charge, and dis persed. They passed the mountain and encamped in villages, where they found provisions in abundance.

A very strange accident happened there to the army, which threw them into great consternation. For the soldiers finding abundance of bee hives in that place, and eating the honey, they were taken with violent vomitings and fluxes, attended with raving fits: so that those who were least ill, seemed like drunken men, and the rest either furiously mad or dying. The earth was strewed with their bodies as after a defeat; however, none of them died, and the distemper ceased the next day about the same hour it had taken them. The third or fourth day the soldiers got up, but in the condition people are in after having taken a violent medicine.

Two days after, the army arrived near Trebisond, a Greek colony of Sinopians, situated upon the Euxine or Black Sea, in the province of Colchis. Here they lay encamped for thirty days, and acquitted themselves of the vows they had made to Jupiter, Hercules, and the other deities, to obtain a happy return into their own country. They also celebrated the games of the horse and foot races, wrestling, boxing, and the pancratium; the whole attended with the greatest joy and solemnity.

SECTION VI.-THE GREEKS ARRIVE UPON THE SEA COAST OPPOSITE TO BYZANTIUM. XENOPHON JOINS THIMBRON.

AFTER having offered sacrifices to the several divinities, and celebrated the games, they deliberated upon the proper measures for their return into Greece.* They concluded on going thither by sea; and for that purpose Chirisophus offered to go to Anaxibius, the admiral of Sparta, who was his friend, to obtain ships from him. He set out directly; and Xenophon regulated the order it was necessary to observe, and the precautions to be taken for the security of the camp, provisions, and forage. He believed it also proper to make sure of some vessels besides those that were expected, and made some expeditions against the neighbouring people.

As Chirisophus did not return so soon as was expected, and provisions began to be wanting, it was resolved to proceed by land; because there was not a sufficient number of ships to transport the whole army, and those which the precaution of Xenophon had procured, were allotted to carry the women, the old and sick men, with all the unnecessary baggage. The army continued its march, and lay ten days at Cerasus, where there was a general review of the troops, who were found to amount to eight thousand six hundred men, out of about ten thousand; the rest having died in the retreat, of their wounds, fatigues, or diseases.

During the short time the Greeks remained in these parts, several disputes arose with the inhabitants of the country as well as with some of the offcers, who were jealous of Xenophon's authority, and endeavoured to render him odious to the army. But his wisdom and moderation put a stop to these disorders; having made the soldiers sensible that their safety depended upon

* Xenoph. 1. iii.

The city of Cerasus became famous on account of the cherry-trees, which Lucullus first brought inte Italy, and which from thence have been dispersed all over the western world.