Complete Works of Xenophon (Illustrated) (Delphi Ancient Classics)

by Xenophon

  The time for action now approaching, Cyrus took care to animate his Grecian troops by renewed and splendid promises, and to warn them of the immense superiority of numbers with which they would have to contend, encouraging them at the same time with assurances that they would find the Persian soldiers less than women.

  Cyrus assigned the Greeks a position on the right of his army, flanked by the Euphrates, and directed Clearchus to command their right wing, and Menon the left. And here for the first time Xenophon makes mention of himself. Cyrus rode along at a moderate distance surveying both armies, looking now at the enemy, now at his friends. Xenophon seeing him from the Grecian line, rode out to meet him, and inquired if he had any commands for him. Stopping his horse, Cyrus desired him to tell them all, that the sacrifices and victims were favorable. While he was saying this, he heard a clamor through the ranks, and asked hat it was. Xenophon told him that they were exchanging a fresh watch-word. He wondered who could have given it out, and asked what it might be. Xenophon replied, that it was ‘Jupiter the Preserver, and Victory.’ Cyrus having heard it, said, ‘I agree to it; let it be so and having said this, rode off to his station.

  The minuteness with which a circumstance, in itself so little important, is related, is highly characteristic of a young man ambitious of notice and gratified by the honor conferred on him. At the same time it seems to imply that Xenophon had hitherto taken no part in the conduct of the army, and had not been invited to the councils of the prince; for had he been accustomed to converse familiarly with Cyrus, he would scarcely have recorded the present interview.

  The battle of Cunaxa, which followed immediately after the anecdote that has just been related, in which Cyrus was slain and his army completely defeated by Artaxerxes, belongs to the history of Persia rather than to the life of Xenophon. The native troops in the army of Cyrus were totally routed; but in that part of the field in which the Greeks fought, the forces of Artaxerxes were put to flight in every direction, and almost without resistance. These last were pursued until the Grecians, wearied with slaughter and fatigue, returned to their camp.

  In the mean time, Clearchus was too good a general to neglect provisions for the immediate wants of his army. After dinner, when they were, according to the manner of the Greeks, assembled together to spend the heat of the day in conversation, some heralds arrived from the king and from Tissaphernes, demanding, in the name of the king, that they should ground their arms and surrender at discretion. Clearchus replied; and, among the rest, Xenophon thus addressed the messenger:

  ‘With us, Phalesius, as you may perceive, nothing is of value but our arms and our honor. As long as we preserve our arms, we can rely on our own valor; but in parting with them, we should be conscious of betraying ourselves. Think not therefore that we will resign our only remaining property, but rather we will use them in fighting for yours.’ Phalesius laughed heartily at this set speech, and replied, ‘You appear to be a scholar, young man, and what you say is pleasant enough; but I would not have your inexperience so much deceive you, as to set your boasted valor against the power of the king.’

  After the battle of Cunaxa, and the fall of young Cyrus, the prudence and vigor of his mind were called into action. The Ten Thousand Greeks, who had followed the standard of an ambitious prince, were now above six hundred leagues from their native home, in a country surrounded on every side by a victorious enemy, without money, or provisions, or a leader. All gave themselves up to despair. They felt that they were still two thousand miles from the nearest part of Greece, close to the vast armies of the king, and surrounded on all sides by tribes of hostile barbarians, who would supply them with nothing but at the expense of blows and blood: they had no guide acquainted with the country, no knowledge of the deep and rapid rivers which intersected it, and no cavalry to explore the road, or cover their rear on the march. As if discipline and hope had ended together, the roll-call was scarcely attended to, the watch-fires were scantily, or not at all, supplied, and even their principal meal was neglected; where chance led, they threw themselves down to rest, but not to sleep — for sleep was banished by thoughts of that country and those friends, whom they now no longer expected, and scarcely dared hope to behold again.

  But the army had among them a man, little known indeed, but of far greater talents and bolder energies than any general under whom they had served; and probably the only man who could have extricated them from their present situation of unparalleled danger. Xenophon had hitherto held no rank; had been attached to no division of the army; and had appeared only as the friend of Proxenus. He, like the rest, lay awake, suffering from grief and alarm; but his mind was not of a temperament to suffer without a remedy, and he represents himself as having been encouraged by a dream during a momentary doze, which he has so related and interpreted, as to leave it doubtful whether his remarkable attention to omens and sacrifices was the result of sound policy or of sincere belief. Rousing himself from slumber, he began to reflect on the folly and rashness in which all participated. The night was far spent; the enemy would probably be on them with the dawn; submission could only conduct through suffering to an ignominious death: no one provided for the emergency; despair produced the effect of security; and from what people among them, thought he, can I expect a general, fit for this business? or why should I hesitate to act on account of my youth? If I thus give myself up without an effort to the enemy, I shall never reach a more mature age.

  Full of these thoughts he rose, and calling together the officers belonging to the division of Proxenus, he set before them in an animated speech, the certain ruin and destruction which must ensue from their submission; the grounds on which he trusted for success, from strenuous exertion and prudent counsel; and concluded with assuring them that he was at their service in any capacity; and that if they thought fit to invest him with the command, his youth should only pledge him to more vigorous exertion. On this, the officers unanimously declared their readiness to serve under him, with the exception of one Apollonides, who, speaking in the Boeotian dialect, recommended that they should seek safety by submitting to the orders of the king. To this proposal Xenophon replied with well-timed warmth, declaring that sentiments so base ought to be punished by degradation to servile duties; an expression which led to the discovery that the officer in question had actually been a Lydian slave, and retained the marks of slavery on his person. He was accordingly cashiered, and the example proved of the greatest advantage; for it infused a new spirit into the rest, who, on the suggestion of Xenophon, immediately proceeded to summon a general council of all the surviving generals and officers, to the number of nearly a hundred. By this time it was midnight, and the Bœotian officers, to save time, requested that Xenophon would open the business, by repeating what he had stated to them.

  He accordingly made another judicious and encouraging speech, in which he strongly reprobated the idea of placing the smallest dependence on any thing but their own prudence, courage, and unanimity; and recommended, as the first step towards providing for the expected attack, that they, should instantly proceed to supply by election the places of the commanders whom they had lost.

  As soon as it was day, the new commanders, placing pickets in advance, again assembled the army, and exhorted them to take courage, to maintain discipline, and to rely on the favor of the gods, who would not fail to avenge themselves on the perfidious Persians. Xenophon in particular, having armed himself with a splendor becoming his present rank, endeavored to inspire sentiments of honor; and fortunately the favorable omen of sternutation occurred in the midst of his speech; on which the soldiers, all with one accord, worshipped Jupiter the Preserver, from whom the omen was reputed to proceed; and Xenophon breaking off his harangue, proposed a sacrifice to the god, desiring those who approved of the motion to hold up their hands: the show of hands being unanimous, the sacrifice was formally vowed, and a hymn sung; after which he resumed his discourse, and at great length set before the army, now full of hope and cheerfulne
ss, the system which they must adopt to insure a safe and honorable return to their native country, and especially enforcing the necessity of a strict adherence to discipline, always the great deficiency of Grecian troops, and of all troops in a retreat, when it becomes doubly necessary. His proposals were unanimously carried, as before, by a show of hands. Thus, without assuming any superior authority, he in fact acted as commander-in-chief, and was cheerfully obeyed; the whole army feeling that they were indebted to his genius for their present safety, and depending on him for their future hopes.

  On one occasion Xenophon, during the Retreat, encouraged the almost broken spirits of the army by relating a dream, the interpretation of which was evidently that he should extricate them from their perilous situation; and soon afterwards he announced information which he had received of a shallower passage lower down, with a landing-place, where the Persian horse would be unable to act against them. The usual sacrifices and libations to the gods having been performed, the whole army sung the pæan, and prepared to cross the river. The Persians, astonished probably at their apparently undiminished numbers and resolution, offered no effectual resistance; and the mountaineers being held in check by the judicious dispositions of Xenophon, made little impression on the rear. So complete indeed was the success, that the first division of the Greeks actually captured some booty from the Persian troops.

  In their subsequent march they suffered so dreadfully from snow and frost, that the men fell down benumbed with cold, and the cattle perished. The sufferings of the army became extreme, and it required all the art and authority of Xenophon and the other generals to preserve the men from yielding to the severity of the climate and fatigue.

  He superintended the retreat of his country men successfully; and though often opposed by malevolence and envy, yet his eloquence and his activity convinced the Greeks that no general could extricate them from every difficulty better than the disciple of Socrates. He rose superior to danger, and though under continual alarms from the sudden attacks of the Persians, he was enabled to cross rapid rivers, penetrate through vast deserts, gain the tops of mountains, till he could rest secure for a while, and refresh his tired companions. This celebrated retreat was at last happily effected, and the Greeks returned home after a march of one thousand one hundred and fifty-five parasangs, or leagues, which was performed in two hundred and fifteen days, after an absence of fifteen months.*

  * The army of Cyrus marched from Sardis, through Lydia, Phrygia, Lycaonia, and Cappadocia, crossed the mountains of Cilicia, passed through Cilicia and Syria to the Euphrates, forded this river, passed through a part of Arabia and Babylonia, until they reached the plain of Cunaxa. In retreating, the object of the Greeks was to strike the Euxine; but the error they committed was in making that so extend too far to the east. From Cunaxa they turned their course to the Tigris, crossed that river, marched through Media, northwards, still following the course of the Tigris. They then crossed the mountains of the Carduchi, and, after great exertions, reached the sources of the river just mentioned. After this they traversed Armenia, crossed the Euphrates not far from its source, lost many of their number in the marshes through the cold and snow, and at last reached the Phasis. Leaving this stream, they passed through the countries Trochi, Chalybes, Macrones, Colchians, and at last reached the Greek colony of Trapezus on the coast of the Euxine sea. As there were not ships enough there to receive them all, they determined to return home by land, and marching along the coast of the last to Chalcedon.

  The whole, perhaps, might now be forgotten, or at least but obscurely known, if the great philosopher who planned it had not employed his pen in describing the dangers which he escaped, and the difficulties which he surmounted; the particulars of which memorable adventure are so well related by himself in his ‘Retreat of the Ten Thousand.’ He was no sooner returned from Cunaxa than he sought new honors in following the fortune of Agesilaus in Asia. He enjoyed his confidence; he fought under his standard, and conquered with him in the Asiatic provinces, as well as at the battle of Coronaea. His fame, however, did not escape the aspersions of jealousy: he was publicly banished from Athens for accompanying Cyrus against his brother; and being now without a home, he retired to Scillus, a small town of the Lacedaemonians, in the neighborhood of Olympia.

  He was accompanied in his retreat by his wife, and by his twin sons Gryllus and Diodorus; but whether this lady was the mother of the young men is not recorded.

  It is probable, that in the course of his Asiatic campaigns Xenophon, though by nature expensive and generous, had amassed considerable wealth; and it will be recollected that he was one of the generals who were intrusted with the tenth dedicated to Apollo and the Ephesian Diana, on the division of the spoil among the Cyreian Greeks at Cerasus; a trust not only honorable, but the source also of an ample revenue. Xenophon remitted the portion designed for Apollo to the temple at Delphi; and, on leaving Asia to return with Agesilaus into Greece, he deposited the other portion with Megabyzus, the treasurer of the Ephesian temple, desiring that if he should fall in the approaching contest with the Thebans, Megabyzus himself should perform the solemn act of dedication in such manner as should be most pleasing to the goddess; but if he should survive, the money should be returned to him; for in the insecurity of all property in Greece, the safest depository for money and the precious metals was the treasury of a temple, where superstition generally effected what better principles failed to do elsewhere; and hence the Grecian temples, especially that at Delphi, were generally used both as public and private banks.

  When Xenophon was securely settled at Scillus, Megabyzus took the opportunity afforded by the Olympian games to restore the deposited to him, with which he purchased an estate for the goddess, and built on it a temple and an altar; reserving a tenth of the produce of the sacred land as the rent due to her as proprietor, and leaving the residue to be enjoyed by the occupier of the soil, on condition of discharging his duties as manager of the festivals and guardian of the temple; thus securing to himself and to his family a splendid demesne and handsome income, under the protection of reputed sanctity.

  The situation of the estate was dictated by the oracle of Apollo, at the suggestion doubtless of Xenophon himself, and appears to have been studiously selected with a view to make it a counterpart of the sacred territory of Ephesus.

  The yearly festival was celebrated with an entertainment to all the inhabitants of the town and neighbourhood.

  In this delightful retreat, under the protection of the temporal sovereignty of Lacedaemon, and the spiritual tutelage of Diana, Xenophon forgot the toils of war, in a state of as much enjoyment as can fall to the lot of a man whose happiness must depend on sublunary circumstances. He seems to have been precisely what we should now call a literary country gentleman, diversifying the more refined pleasures of his studious hours with the active amusements of the field; breaking his dogs, training his horses, and attending to the breed of stock; and so much interest did the philosopher, historian, and commander take in these healthful pursuits, that they became the subject of more than one treatise from his immortal pen; an example to scholars in all ages that they should not disdain to refresh their vigour and renew their animation by allowing the unharnessed faculties to recreate themselves freely in country sports, and exercise themselves agreeably in country business.

  From the period of his settlement at Scillus till after the destruction of the Lacedaemonian sovereignty, by the event of the battle at Leuctra, Xenophon appears to have enjoyed uninterrupted quiet, and to have employed himself in composing those works which exalted him to be the rival of Plato in politics and biography, as well as of Thucydides in history.

  It is said that the emulation between the two disciples of Socrates occasioned a pitiable jealousy and alienation from each other; but Diogenes relates to the praise of Xenophon, that he gave to the world the history of Thucydides in the name of the author, when he might easily have made it his own. The list of his other works, given us by
the same biographer, proves that we have been singularly fortunate in their preservation.

  From this literary and rural enjoyment of peace and security, he was not to be tempted by the reversal of the decree against him, which passed on the change of Athenian politics some time after the battle of Leuctra. Athens was of all places the most dangerous for men in any way eminent, but especially for those who possessed property and talents; and in the continual changes of system which characterised the republics of Greece, the fickleness of the despotic mob, who had banished and recalled him, might at any moment confiscate his property and take away his life. When therefore the protection of Lacedæmon could no longer avail him, and the dissensions which agitated the surrounding states rendered even the sacred territory insecure, he sent his family to Lepreum, and is related to have gone in person to Elis, to plead with the Eleians (now once more masters of Scillus) for immunity, on account of having accepted the fief from an hostile power. It appears that the prayer was readily granted, and that he returned in peace to the possession of his property; but whether the commotions of the times rendered a country residence less desirable, or the decline of life brought with it a disinclination for bodily exertion, he appears, in his latter years, to have lived principally at Corinth, in which place he died about the second year of the hundred and fifth Olympiad, 359 years B.C.

  The simplicity and the elegance of Xenophon’s diction have procured him the name of Athenian Muse, and the Bee of Greece; and they have induced Quintilian to say that the Graces dictated his language, and that the goddess of Persuasion dwelt on his lips. His sentiments, as to the Divinity and religion, were the same as those of the venerable Socrates. He supported the immortality of the soul, and exhorted his friends to cultivate those virtues which insure the happiness of mankind, with all the zeal and fervor of a Christian.