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Lysander
By Plutarch

(legendary, died 395 B.C.E.)


Translated by John Dryden

The treasure-chamber of the Acanthians at Delphi has this inscription:
"The spoils which Brasidas and the Acanthians took from the Athenians."
And, accordingly, many take the marble statue, which stands within
the building by the gates, to be Brasidas's; but, indeed, it is Lysander's,
representing him with his hair at full length, after the old fashion,
and with an ample beard. Neither is it true, as some give out, that
because the Argives, after their great defeat, shaved themselves for
sorrow, that the Spartans contrariwise triumphing in their achievements,
suffered their hair to grow; neither did the Spartans come to be ambitious
of wearing long hair, because the Bacchiadae, who fled from Corinth
to Lacedaemon, looked mean and unsightly, having their heads all close
cut. But this, also, is indeed one of the ordinances of Lycurgus,
who, as it is reported, was used to say, that long hair made good-looking
men more beautiful, and ill-looking men more terrible. 

Lysander's father is said to have been Aristoclitus, who was not indeed
of the royal family but yet of the stock of the Heraclidae. He was
brought up in poverty, and showed himself obedient and conformable,
as ever any one did, to the customs of his country; of a manly spirit,
also, and superior to all pleasures, excepting only that which their
good actions bring to those who are honoured and successful; and it
is accounted no base thing in Sparta for their young men to be overcome
with this kind of pleasure. For they are desirous, from the very first,
to have their youth susceptible to good and bad repute, to feel pain
at disgrace, and exultation at being commended; and any one who is
insensible and unaffected in these respects is thought poor-spirited
and of no capacity for virtue. Ambition and the passion for distinction
were thus implanted in his character by his Laconian education, nor,
if they continued there, must we blame his natural disposition much
for this. But he was submissive to great men, beyond what seems agreeable
to the Spartan temper, and could easily bear the haughtiness of those
who were in power, when it was any way for his advantage, which some
are of opinion is no small part of political discretion. Aristotle,
who says all great characters are more or less atrabilious, as Socrates
and Plato and Hercules were, writes that Lysander, not indeed early
in life, but when he was old, became thus affected. What is singular
in his character is that he endured poverty very well and that he
was not at all enslaved or corrupted by wealth, and yet he filled
his country with riches and the love of them, and took away from them
the glory of not admiring money; importing amongst them an abundance
of gold and silver after the Athenian war, though keeping not one
drachma for himself. When Dionysius, the tyrant, sent his daughters
some costly gowns of Sicilian manufacture, he would not receive them,
saying he was afraid they would make them look more unhandsome. But
a while after, being sent ambassador from the same city to the same
tyrant, when he had sent him a couple of robes, and bade him choose
which of them he would, and carry to his daughter: "She," said he,
"will be able to choose best for herself," and taking both of them,
went his way. 

The Peloponnesian war having now been carried on a long time, and
it being expected, after the disaster of the Athenians in Sicily,
that they would at once lose the mastery of the sea, and ere long
be routed everywhere, Alcibiades, returning from banishment, and taking
the command, produced a great change, and made the Athenians again
a match for their opponents by sea; and the Lacedaemonians, in great
alarm at this, and calling up fresh courage and zeal for the conflict,
feeling the want of an able commander and of a powerful armament,
sent out Lysander to be admiral of the seas. Being at Ephesus, and
finding the city well affected towards him, and favourable to the
Lacedaemonian party, but in ill condition, and in danger to become
barbarized by adopting the manners of the Persians, who were much
mingled among them, the country of Lydia bordering upon them, and
the king's generals being quartered there for a long time, he pitched
his camp there, and commanded the merchant ships all about to put
in thither, and proceeded to build ships of war there; and thus restored
their ports by the traffic he created, and their market by the employment
he gave, and filled their private houses and their workshops with
wealth, so that from that time the city began, first of all, by Lysander's
means, to have some hopes of growing to that stateliness and grandeur
which now it is at. 

Understanding that Cyrus, the king's son, was come to Sardis, he went
up to talk with him, and to accuse Tisaphernes, who, receiving a command
to help the Lacedaemonians, and to drive the Athenians from the sea,
was thought, on account of Alcibiades, to have become remiss and unwilling,
and by paying the seamen slenderly to be ruining the fleet. Now Cyrus
was willing that Tisaphernes might be found in blame, and be ill reported
of, as being, indeed, a dishonest man, and privately at feud with
himself. By these means, and by their daily intercourse together,
Lysander, especially by the submissiveness of his conversation, won
the affection of the young prince, and greatly roused him to carry
on and when he would depart, Cyrus gave him a banquet, and desired
him not to refuse his goodwill, but to speak and ask whatever he had
a mind to, and that he should not be refused anything whatsoever:
"Since you are so very kind," replied Lysander, "I earnestly request
you to add one penny to the seamen's pay, that instead of three pence,
they may now receive four pence." Cyrus, delighted with his public
spirit, gave him ten thousand darics, out of which he added the penny
to the seamen's pay, and by the renown of this in a short time emptied
the ships of the enemies, as many would come over to that side which
gave the most pay, and those who remained, being disheartened and
mutinous, daily created trouble to the captains. Yet for all Lysander
had so distracted and weakened his enemies, he was afraid to engage
by sea, Alcibiades being an energetic commander, and having the superior
number of ships, and having been hitherto, in all battles, unconquered
both by sea and land. 

But afterwards, when Alcibiades sailed from Samos to Phocaea, leaving
Antiochus, the pilot, in command of all his forces, this Antiochus,
to insult Lysander, sailed with two galleys into the port of the Ephesians,
and with mocking and laughter proudly rowed along before the place
where the ships lay drawn up. Lysander, in indignation, launched at
first a few ships only and pursued him, but as soon as he saw the
Athenians come to his help, he added some other ships, and, at last,
they fell to a set battle together; and Lysander won the victory,
and taking fifteen of their ships, erected a trophy. For this, the
people in the city being angry, put Alcibiades out of command, and
finding himself despised by the soldiers in Samos, and ill spoken
of, he sailed from the army into the Chersonese. And this battle,
although not important in itself, was made remarkable by its consequences
to Alcibiades. 

Lysander, meanwhile, invited to Ephesus such persons in the various
cities as he saw to be bolder and haughtier-spirited than the rest,
proceeded to lay the foundations of that government by bodies of ten,
and those revolutions which afterwards came to pass, stirring up and
urging them to unite in clubs and apply themselves to public affairs,
since as soon as ever the Athenians should be put down, the popular
government, he said, should be suppressed and they should become supreme
in their several countries. And he made them believe these things
by present deeds, promoting those who were his friends already to
great employments, honours, and offices, and, to gratify their covetousness,
making himself a partner in injustice and wickedness. So much so,
that all flocked to him, and courted and desired him, hoping, if be
remained in power, that the highest wishes they could form would all
be gratified. And therefore, from the very beginning, they could not
look pleasantly upon Callicratidas, when he came to succeed Lysander
as admiral; nor, afterwards, when he had given them experience that
he was a most noble and just person, were they pleased with the manner
of his government, and its straightforward, Dorian, honest character.
They did, indeed, admire his virtue, as they might the beauty of some
hero's image; but their wishes were for Lysander's zealous and profitable
support of the interests of his friends and partisans, and they shed
tears, and were much disheartened when he sailed from them. He himself
made them yet more disaffected to Callicratidas; for what remained
of the money which had been given him to pay the navy, he sent back
again to Sardis, bidding them, if they would, apply to Callicratidas
himself, and see how he was able to maintain the soldiers. And, at
the last, sailing away, he declared to him that he delivered up the
fleet in possession and command of the sea. But Callicratidas, to
expose the emptiness of these high pretensions, said, "In that case,
leave Samos on the left hand, and sailing to Miletus, there deliver
up the ships to me; for if we are masters of the sea, we need not
fear sailing by our enemies in Samos." To which Lysander answering,
that not himself but he commanded the ships, sailed to Peloponnesus,
leaving Callicratidas in great perplexity. For neither had he brought
any money from home with him, nor could he endure to tax the towns
or force them, being in hardship enough. Therefore, the only course
that was to be taken was to go and beg at the doors of the king's
commanders, as Lysander had done; for which he was most unfit of any
man, being of a generous and great spirit, and one who thought it
more becoming for the Greeks to suffer any damage from one another
than to flatter and wait at the gates of barbarians, who, indeed,
had gold enough, but nothing else that was commendable. But being
compelled by necessity, he proceeded to Lydia, and went at once to
Cyrus's house, and sent in word that Callicratidas, the admiral, was
there to speak with him; one of those who kept the gates replied,
"Cyrus, O stranger, is not now at leisure, for he is drinking." To
which Callicratidas answered, most innocently, "Very well, I will
wait till he has done his draught." This time, therefore, they took
him for some clownish fellow, and he withdrew, merely laughed at by
the barbarians; but when, afterwards, he came a second time to the
gate, and was not admitted, he took it hardly and set off for Ephesus,
wishing a great many evils to those who first let themselves be insulted
over by these barbarians, and taught them to be insolent because of
their riches; and added vows to those who were present, that as soon
as ever he came back to Sparta, he would do all he could to reconcile
the Greeks, that they might be formidable to barbarians, and that
they should cease henceforth to need their aid against one another.
But Callicratidas, who entertained purposes worthy a Lacedaemonian,
and showed himself worthy to compete with the very best of Greece,
for his justice, his greatness of mind and courage, not long after,
having been beaten in a sea fight at Arginusae, died. 

And now, affairs going backwards, the associates in the war sent an
embassy to Sparta, requiring Lysander to be their admiral, professing
themselves ready to undertake the business much more zealously if
he was commander; and Cyrus also sent to request the same thing. But
because they had a law which would not suffer any one to be admiral
twice, and wished, nevertheless, to gratify their allies, they gave
the title of admiral to one Aracus, and sent Lysander nominally as
vice-admiral, but, indeed, with full powers. So he came out, long
wished for by the greatest part of the chief persons and leaders in
the towns, who hoped to grow to greater power still by his means,
when the popular governments should be everywhere destroyed.

But to those who loved honest and noble behaviour in their commanders,
Lysander, compared with Callicratidas, seemed cunning and subtle,
managing most things in the war by deceit, extolling what was just
when it was profitable, and when it was not, using that which was
convenient, instead of that which, was good; and not judging truth
to be in nature better than falsehood, but setting a value upon both
according to interest. He would laugh at those who thought Hercules's
posterity ought not to use deceit in war: "For where the lion's skin
will not reach, you must patch it out with the fox's." Such is the
conduct recorded of him in the business about Miletus when his friends
and connections, whom he had promised, raised to assist in suppressing
popular government, and expelling their political opponents, had altered
their minds, and were reconciled to their enemies, he pretended openly
as if he was pleased with it, and was desirous to further the reconciliation,
but privately he railed at and abused them, and provoked them to set
upon the multitude. And as soon as ever he perceived a new attempt
to be commencing, he at once came up, and entered into the city, and
the first of the conspirators he lit upon, he pretended to rebuke,
and spoke roughly, as if he would punish them; but the others, meantime,
he bade be courageous, and to fear nothing, now he was with them.
And all this acting and dissembling was with the object that the most
considerable men of the popular party might not fly away, but might
stay in the city and be killed; which so fell out, for all who believed
him were put to death. 

There is a saying also, recorded by Androclides, which makes him guilty
of great indifference to the obligations of an oath. His recommendation,
according to this account, was to "cheat boys with dice, and men with
oaths," an imitation of Polycrates of Samos, not very honourable to
a lawful commander, to take example, namely, from a tyrant; nor in
character with Laconian usages, to treat gods as ill as enemies, or,
indeed, even more injuriously since he who overreaches by an oath
admits that he fears his enemy, while he despises his God.

Cyrus now sent for Lysander to Sardis, and gave him some money, and
promised him some more, youthfully protesting in favour to him, that
if his father gave him nothing, he would supply him of his own; and
if he himself should be destitute of all, he would cut up, he said,
to make money, the very throne upon which he sat to do justice, it
being made of gold and silver; and, at last on going up into Media
to his father, he ordered that he should receive the tribute of the
towns, and committed his government to him, and so taking his leave,
and desiring him not to fight by sea before he returned, for he would
come back with a great many ships out of Phoenicia and Cilicia, departed
to visit the king. 

Lysander's ships were too few for him to venture to fight, and yet
too many to allow of his remaining idle; he set out, therefore, and
reduced some of the islands, and wasted Aegina and Salamis; and from
thence landing in Attica, and saluting Agis, who came from Decelea
to meet him, he made a display to the land-forces of the strength
of the fleet as though he could sail where he pleased, and were absolute
master by sea. But hearing the Athenians pursued him, he fled another
way through the island into Asia. And finding the Hellespont without
any defence, he attacked Lampsacus with his ships by sea; while Thorax,
acting in concert with him with the land army, made an assault on
the walls; and so having taken the city by storm, he gave it up to
his soldiers to plunder. The fleet of the Athenians, a hundred and
eighty ships, had just arrived at Elaeus in the Chersonese; and hearing
the news, that Lampsacus was destroyed, they presently sailed to Sestos;
where, taking in victuals, they advanced to Aegos Potami, over against
their enemies, who were still stationed about Lampsacus. Amongst other
Athenian captains who were now in command was Philocles, he who persuaded
the people to pass a decree to cut off the right thumb of the captives
in the war, that they should not be able to hold the spear, though
they might the oar. 

Then they all rested themselves, hoping they should have battle the
next morning. But Lysander had other things in his head; he commanded
the mariners and pilots to go on board at dawn, as if there should
be a battle as soon as it was day, and to sit there in order, and
without any noise, excepting what should be commanded, and in like
manner that the land army should remain quietly in their ranks by
the sea. But the sun rising, and the Athenians sailing up with their
whole fleet in line, and challenging them to battle, though he had
had his ships all drawn up and manned before daybreak, nevertheless
did not stir. He merely sent some boats to those who lay foremost,
and bade them keep still and stay in their order; not to be disturbed,
and none of them to sail out and offer battle. So about evening, the
Athenians sailing back, he would not let the seamen go out of the
ships before two or three, which he had sent to espy, were returned,
after seeing the enemies disembark. And thus they did the next day,
and the third, and so to the fourth. So that the Athenians grew extremely
confident, and disdained their enemies as if they had been afraid
and daunted. At this time, Alcibiades, who was in his castle in the
Chersonese, came on horseback to the Athenian army, and found fault
with their captains, first of all that they had pitched their camp
neither well nor safely on an exposed and open beach, a very bad landing
for the ships, and secondly, that where they were they had to fetch
all they wanted from Sestos, some considerable way off; whereas if
they sailed round a little way to the town and harbour of Sestos,
they would be at a safer distance from an enemy, who lay watching
their movements, at the command of a single general, terror of whom
made every order rapidly executed. This advice, however, they would
not listen to; and Tydeus answered disdainfully, that not he, but
others, were in office now. So Alcibiades, who even suspected there
must be treachery, departed. 

But on the fifth day, the Athenians having sailed towards them, and
gone back again as they were used to do, very proudly and full of
contempt, Lysander sending some ships, as usual, to look out, commanded
the masters of them that when they saw the Athenians go to land, they
should row back again with all their speed, and that when they were
about half-way across, they should lift up a brazen shield from the
fore-deck, as the sign of battle. And he himself sailing round, encouraged
the pilots and masters of the ships, and exhorted them to keep all
their men to their places, seamen and soldiers alike, and as soon
as ever the sign should be given, to row boldly to their enemies.
Accordingly, when the shield had been lifted up from the ships, and
the trumpet from the admiral's vessel had sounded for the battle,
the ships rowed up, and the foot soldiers strove to get along by the
shore to the promontory. The distance there between the two continents
is fifteen furlongs, which, by zeal and eagerness of the rowers, was
quickly traversed. Conon, one of the Athenian commanders, was the
first who saw from the land the fleet advancing, and shouted out to
embark, and in the greatest distress bade some and entreated others,
and some he forced to man the ships. But all his diligence signified
nothing, because the men were scattered about; for as soon as they
came out of the ships, expecting no such matter, some went to market,
others walked about the country, or went to sleep in their tents,
or got their dinners ready, being, through their commanders' want
of skill, as far as possible from any thought of what was to happen;
and the enemy now coming up with shouts and noise, Conon, with eight
ships, sailed out, and making his escape, passed from thence to Cyprus,
to Evagoras. The Peloponnesians falling upon the rest, some they took
quite empty, and some they destroyed while they were filling; the
men, meantime coming unarmed and scattered to help, died at their
ships, or, flying by land, were slain, their enemies disembarking
and pursuing them. Lysander took three thousand prisoners, with the
generals, and the whole fleet, excepting the sacred ship Paralus,
and those which fled with Conon. So taking their ships in tow, and
having plundered their tents, with pipe and songs of victory, he sailed
back to Lampsacus, having accomplished a great work with small pains,
and having finished in one hour a war which had been protracted in
its continuance, and diversified in its incidents and in its fortunes,
to a degree exceeding belief, compared with all before it. After altering
its shape and character a thousand times, and after having been the
destruction of more commanders than all the previous wars of Greece
put together, it was now put an end to by the good counsel and ready
conduct of one man. 

Some, therefore, looked upon the result as a divine intervention,
and there were certain who affirmed that the stars of Castor and Pollux
were seen on each side of Lysander's ship, when he first set sail
from the haven toward his enemies, shining about the helm; and some
say the stone which fell down was a sign of this slaughter. For a
stone of a great size did fall, according to the common belief, from
heaven, at Aegos Potami, which is shown to this day, and held in great
esteem by the Chersonites. And it is said that Anaxagoras foretold
that the occurrence of a slip or shake among the bodies fixed in the
heavens, dislodging any one of them, would be followed by the fall
of the whole of them. For no one of the stars is now in the same place
in which it was at first; for they, being, according to him, like
stones and heavy, shine by the refraction of the upper air round about
them, and are carried along forcibly by the violence of the circular
motion by which they were originally withheld from falling, when cold
and heavy bodies were first separated from the general universe. But
there is a more probable opinion than this maintained by some, who
say that falling stars are no effluxes, nor discharges of ethereal
fire, extinguished almost at the instant of its igniting by the lower
air; neither are they the sudden combustion and blazing up of a quantity
of the lower air let loose in great abundance into the upper region;
but the heavenly bodies, by a relaxation of the force of their circular
movement, are carried by an irregular course, not in general into
the inhabited part of the earth, but for the most part into the wide
sea; which is the cause of their not being observed. Daimachus, in
his treatise on Religion, supports the view of Anaxagoras. He says,
that before this stone fell, for seventy-five days continually, there
was seen in the heavens a vast fiery body, as if it had been a flaming
cloud, not resting, but carried about with several intricate and broken
movements, so that the flaming pieces, which were broken off by this
commotion and running about, were carried in all directions, shining
as falling stars do. But when it afterwards came down to the ground
in this district, and the people of the place recovering from their
fear and astonishment came together, there was no fire to be seen,
neither any sign of it; there was only a stone lying, big indeed,
but which bore no proportion, to speak of, to that fiery compass.
It is manifest that Daimachus needs to have indulgent hearers; but
if what he says be true, he altogether proves those to be wrong who
say that a rock broken off from the top of some mountain, by winds
and tempests, and caught and whirled about like a top, as soon as
this impetus began to slacken and cease, was precipitated and fell
to the ground. Unless, indeed, we choose to say that the phenomenon
which was observed for so many days was really fire, and that the
change in the atmosphere ensuing on its extinction was attended with
violent winds and agitations, which might be the cause of this stone
being carried off. The exacter treatment of this subject belongs,
however, to a different kind of writing. 

Lysander, after the three thousand Athenians whom he had taken prisoners
were condemned by the commissioners to die, called Philocles the general,
and asked him what punishment he considered himself to deserve, for
having advised the citizens, as he had done, against the Greeks; but
he, being nothing cast down at his calamity, bade him not to accuse
him of matters of which nobody was a judge, but to do to him, now
he was a conqueror, as he would have suffered, had he been overcome.
Then washing himself, and putting on a fine cloak, he led the citizens
the way to the slaughter, as Theophrastus writes in his history. After
this Lysander, sailing about to the various cities, bade all the Athenians
he met go into Athens, declaring that he would spare none, but kill
every man whom he found out of the city, intending thus to cause immediate
famine and scarcity there, that they might not make the siege laborious
to him, having provisions sufficient to endure it. And suppressing
the popular governments and all other constitutions, he left one Lacedaemonian
chief officer in every city, with ten rulers to act with him, selected
out of the societies which he had previously formed in the different
towns. And doing thus as well in the cities of his enemies as of his
associates, he sailed leisurely on, establishing, in a manner, for
himself supremacy over the whole of Greece. Neither did he make choice
of rulers by birth or by wealth, but bestowed the offices on his own
friends and partisans, doing everything to please them, and putting
absolute power of reward and punishment into their hands. And thus,
personally appearing on many occasions of blood-shed and massacre,
and aiding his friends to expel their opponents, he did not give the
Greeks a favourable specimen of the Lacedaemonian government; and
the expression of Theopompus, the comic poet, seemed but poor, when
he compared the Lacedaemonians to tavern women, because when the Greeks
had first tasted the sweet wine of liberty, they then poured vinegar
into the cup; for from the very first it had a rough and bitter taste,
all government by the people being suppressed by Lysander, and the
boldest and least scrupulous of the oligarchical party selected to
rule the cities. 

Having spent some little time about these things, and sent some before
to Lacedaemon to tell them he was arriving with two hundred ships,
he united his forces in Attica with those of the two kings Agis and
Pausanias, hoping to take the city without delay. But when the Athenians
defended themselves, he with his fleet passed again to Asia, and in
like manner destroyed the forms of government in all the other cities,
and placed them under the rule of ten chief persons, many in every
one being killed, and many driven into exile; and in Samos he expelled
the whole people, and gave their cities to the exiles whom he brought
back. And the Athenians still possessing Sestos, he took it from them,
and suffered not the Sestians themselves to dwell in it, but gave
the city and country to be divided out among the pilots and masters
of the ships under him; which was his first act that was disallowed
by the Lacedaemonians, who brought the Sestians, back again into their
country. All Greece, however, rejoiced to see the Aeginetans, by Lysander's
aid, now again, after a long time, receiving back their cities, and
the Melians and Scionaeans restored, while the Athenians were driven
out, and delivered up the cities. 

But when he now understood they were in bad case in the city because
of the famine, he sailed to Piraeus, and reduced the city, which was
compelled to surrender on what conditions he demanded. One hears it
said by Lacedaemonians that Lysander wrote to the Ephors thus: "Athens
is taken;" and that these magistrates wrote back to Lysander, "Taken
is enough." But this saying was invented for its neatness' sake; for
the true decree of the magistrates was on this manner: "The government
of the Lacedaemonians has made these orders; pull down the Piraeus
and the long walls; quit all the towns, and keep to your own land;
if you do these things, you shall have peace, if you wish it, restoring
also your exiles. As concerning the number of the ships, whatsoever
there be judged necessary to appoint, that do." This scroll of conditions
the Athenians accepted, Theramenes, son of Hagnon, supporting it.
At which time, too, they say that when Cleomenes, one of the young
orators, asked him how he durst act and speak contrary to Themistocles,
delivering up the walls to the Lacedaemonians, which he had built
against the will of the Lacedaemonians, he said, "O young man, I do
nothing contrary to Themistocles; for he raised these walls for the
safety of the citizens, and we pull them down for their safety; and
if walls make a city happy, then Sparta must be the most wretched
of all, as it has none." 

Lysander, as soon as he had taken all the ships except twelve, and
the walls of the Athenians, on the sixteenth day of the month Munychion,
the same on which they had overcome the barbarians at Salamis, then
proceeded to take measures for altering the government. But the Athenians
taking that very unwillingly, and resisting, he sent to the people
and informed them that he found that the city had broken the terms,
for the walls were standing when the days were past within which they
should have been pulled down. He should, therefore, consider their
case anew, they having broken their first articles. And some state,
in fact, the proposal was made in the congress of the allies, that
the Athenians should all be sold as slaves; on which occasion, Erianthus,
the Theban, gave his vote to pull down the city, and turn the country
into sheep-pasture; yet afterwards, when there was a meeting of the
captains together, a man of Phocis, singing the first chorus in Euripides's
Electra, which begins- 

"Electra, Agamemnon's child, I come 
Unto thy desert home," they were all melted with compassion, and it
seemed to be a cruel deed to destroy and pull down a city which had
been so famous, and produced such men. 

Accordingly Lysander, the Athenians yielding up everything, sent for
a number of flute-women out of the city, and collected together all
that were in the camp, and pulled down the walls, and burnt the ships
to the sound of the flute, the allies being crowned with garlands,
and making merry together, as counting that day the beginning of their
liberty. He proceeded also at once to alter the government, placing
thirty rulers in the city and ten in the Piraeus: he put, also, a
garrison into the Acropolis, and made Callibius, a Spartan, the governor
of it; who afterwards taking up his staff to strike Autolycus, the
athlete, about whom Xenophon wrote his "Banquet," on his tripping
up his heels and throwing him to the ground, Lysander was not vexed
at it, but chid Callibius, telling him he did not know how to govern
freemen. The thirty rulers, however, to gain Callibius's favour, a
little after killed Autolycus. 

Lysander, after this, sails out to Thrace, and what remained of the
public money, and the gifts and crowns which he had himself received,
numbers of people, as might be expected, being anxious to make presents
to a man of such great power, who was, in a manner, the lord of Greece,
he sends to Lacedaemon by Gylippus, who had commanded formerly in
Sicily. But he, it is reported, unsewed the sacks at the bottom, took
a considerable amount of silver out of every one of them, and sewed
them up again, not knowing there was a writing in every one stating
how much there was. And coming into Sparta, what he had thus stolen
away he hid under the tiles of his house, and delivered up the sacks
to the magistrates, and showed the seals were upon them. But afterwards,
on their opening the sacks and counting it, the quantity of the silver
differed from what the writing expressed; and the matter causing some
perplexity to the magistrates, Gylippus's servant tells them in a
riddle, that under the tiles lay many owls; for, as it seems, the
greatest part of the money then current bore the Athenian stamp of
the owl. Gylippus having committed so foul and base a deed, after
such great and distinguished exploits before, removed himself from
Lacedaemon. 

But the wisest of the Spartans, very much on account of this occurrence,
dreading the influence of money, as being what had corrupted the greatest
citizens, exclaimed against Lysander's conduct, and declared to the
Ephors that all the silver and gold should be sent away, as mere "alien
mischiefs." These consulted about it; and Theopompus says it was Sciraphidas,
but Ephorus that it was Phlogidas, who declared they ought not to
receive any gold or silver into the city; but to use their own country
coin, which was iron, and was first of all dipped in vinegar when
it was red-hot, that it might not be worked up anew, but because of
the dipping might be hard and unpliable. It was also, of course, very
heavy and troublesome to carry, and a great deal of it in quantity
and weight was but a little in value. And perhaps all the old money
was so, coin consisting of iron, or, in some countries, copper skewers,
whence it comes that we still find a great number of small pieces
of money retain the name of obolus, and the drachma is six of these,
because so much may be grasped in one's hand. But Lysander's friends
being against it, and endeavouring to keep the money in the city,
it was resolved to bring in this sort of money to be used publicly,
enacting, at the same time, that if any one was found in possession
of any privately, he should be put to death, as if Lycurgus had feared
the coin, and not the covetousness resulting from it, which they did
not repress by letting no private man keep any, so much as they encouraged
it, by allowing the state to possess it; attaching thereby a sort
of dignity to it, over and above its ordinary utility. Neither was
it possible, that what they saw so much esteemed publicly they should
privately despise as unprofitable; and that every one should think
that thing could be nothing worth for his own personal use, which
was so extremely valued and desired for the use of the state. And
moral habits, induced by public practices, are far quicker in making
their way into men's private lives, than the failings and faults of
individuals are in infecting the city at large. For it is probable
that the parts will be rather corrupted by the whole if that grows
bad; while the vices which flow from a part into the whole find many
correctives and remedies from that which remains sound. Terror and
the law were now to keep guard over the citizens' houses, to prevent
any money entering into them: but their minds could no longer be expected
to remain superior to the desire of it when wealth in general was
thus set up to be striven after, as a high and noble object. On this
point, however, we have given our censure of the Lacedaemonians in
one of our other writings. 

Lysander erected out of the spoils brazen statues at Delphi of himself,
and of every one of the masters of the ships, as also figures of the
golden stars of Castor and Pollux, which vanished before the battle
at Leuctra. In the treasury of Brasidas and the Acanthians there was
a trireme made of gold and ivory, of two cubits, which Cyrus sent
Lysander in honour of his victory. But Alexandrides of Delphi write's,
in his history, that there was also a deposit of Lysander's, a talent
of silver, and fifty-two minas, besides eleven staters; a statement
not consistent with the generally received account of his poverty.
And at that time, Lysander, being in fact of greater power than any
Greek before, was yet thought to show a pride, and to affect a superiority
greater even than his power warranted. He was the first, as Duris
says in his history, among the Greeks to whom the cities reared altars
as to a god, and sacrificed; to him were songs of triumph first sung,
the beginning of one of which still remains recorded:- 

"Great Greece's general from spacious Sparta we 
Will celebrate with songs of victory." And the Samians decreed that
their solemnities of Juno should be called the Lysandria; and out
of the poets he had Choerilus always with him, to extol his achievements
in verse; and to Antilochus, who had made some verses in his commendation,
being pleased with them, he gave a hat full of silver; and when Antimachus
of Colophon, and one Niceratus of Heraclea competed with each other
in a poem on the deeds of Lysander, he gave the garland to Niceratus;
at which Antimachus, in vexation, suppressed his poem; but Plato,
being then a young man and admiring Antimachus for his poetry, consoled
him for his defeat by telling him that it is the ignorant who are
the sufferers by ignorance, as truly as the blind by want of sight.
Afterwards, when Aristonus, the musician, who had been a conqueror
six times at the Pythian games, told him as a piece of flattery, that
if he were successful again, he would proclaim himself in the name
of Lysander, "that is," he answered," as his slave?" 

This ambitious temper was indeed only burdensome to the highest personages
and to his equals, but through having so many people devoted to serve
him, an extreme haughtiness and contemptuousness grew up, together
with ambition, in his character. He observed no sort of moderation,
such as befitted a private man, either in rewarding or in punishing;
the recompense of his friends and guests was absolute power over cities,
and irresponsible authority and the only satisfaction of his wrath
was the destruction of his enemy; banishment would not suffice. As
for example, at a later period, fearing lest the popular leaders of
the Milesians should fly, and desiring also to discover those who
lay hid, he swore he would do them no harm, and on their believing
him coming forth, he delivered them up to the oligarchical leaders
to be slain, being in all no less than eight hundred. And, indeed,
the slaughter in general of those of the popular party in the towns
exceeded all computation as he did not kill only for offences against
himself, but granted these favours without sparing, and joined in
the execution of them, to gratify the many hatreds and the much cupidity
of his friends everywhere round about him. From whence the saying
of Eteocles, the Lacedaemonian, came to be famous, that "Greece could
not have borne two Lysanders." Theophrastus says, that Archestratus
said the same thing concerning Alcibiades. But in his case what had
given most offence was a certain licentious and wanton self-will;
Lysander's power was, feared and hated because of his unmerciful disposition.
The Lacedaemonians did not at all concern themselves for any other
accusers; but afterwards, when Pharnabazus, having been injured by
him, he having pillaged and wasted his country, sent some to Sparta
to inform against him, the Ephors taking it very ill, put one of his
friends and fellow-captains, Thorax, to death, taking him with some
silver privately in his possession; and they sent him a scroll, commanding
him to return home. This scroll is made up thus: When the Ephors send
an admiral or general on his way, they take two round pieces of wood,
both exactly of a length and thickness, and cut even to one another;
they keep one themselves, and the other they give to the person they
send forth; and these pieces of wood they call Scytales. When, therefore,
they have occasion to communicate any secret or important matter,
making a scroll of parchment long and narrow like a leathern thong,
they roll it about their own staff of wood, leaving no space void
between, but covering the surface of the staff with the scroll all
over. When they have done this, they write what they please on the
scroll, as it is wrapped about the staff; and when they have written,
they take off the scroll, and send it to the general without the wood.
He, when he has received it, can read nothing of the writing, because
the words and letters are not connected, but all broken up; but taking
his own staff, he winds the slip of the scroll about it, so that this
folding, restoring all the parts into the same order that they were
in before, and putting what comes first into connection with what
follows, brings the whole consecutive contents to view round the outside.
And this scroll is called a staff, after the name of the wood, as
a thing measured is by the name of the measure. 

But Lysander, when the staff came to him to the Hellespont, was troubled,
and fearing Pharnabazus's accusations most, made haste to confer with
him, hoping to end the difference by a meeting together. When they
met, he desired him to write another letter to the magistrates, stating
that he had not been wronged, and had no complaint to prefer. But
he was ignorant that Pharnabazus, as it is in the proverb, played
Cretan against Cretan; for pretending to do all that was desired,
openly he wrote such a letter as Lysander wanted, but kept by him
another, written privately; and when they came to put on the seals,
changed the tablets, which differed not at all to look upon, and gave
him the letter which had been written privately. Lysander, accordingly,
coming to Lacedaemon, and going, as the custom is, to the magistrates'
office, gave Pharnabazus's letter to the Ephors, being persuaded that
the greatest accusation against him was now withdrawn; for Pharnabazus
was beloved by the Lacedaemonians, having been the most zealous on
their side in the war of all the king's captains. But after the magistrates
had read the letter they showed it him, and he understanding now that-

"Others beside Ulysses deep can be, 
Not the one wise man of the world is he," in extreme confusion, left
them at the time. But a few days after, meeting the Ephors, he said
he must go to the temple of Ammon, and offer the god the sacrifices
which he had vowed in war. For some state it as a truth, that when
he was besieging the city of Aphytae in Thrace, Ammon stood by him
in his sleep; whereupon raising the siege, supposing the god had commanded
it, he bade the Aphytaeans sacrifice to Ammon, and resolved to make
a journey into Libya to propitiate the god. But most were of opinion
that the god was but the pretence, and that in reality he was afraid
of the Ephors, and that impatience of the yoke at home, and dislike
of living under authority, made him long for some travel and wandering,
like a horse just brought in from open feeding and pasture to the
stable, and put again to his ordinary work. For that which Ephorus
states to have been the cause of this travelling about, I shall relate
by and by. 

And having hardly and with difficulty obtained leave of the magistrates
to depart, he set sail. But the kings, while he was on his voyage,
considering that keeping, as he did, the cities in possession by his
own friends and partisans, he was in fact their sovereign and the
lord of Greece, took measures for restoring the power to the people,
and for throwing his friends out. Disturbances commencing again about
these things, and, first of all, the Athenians from Phyle setting
upon their thirty rulers and overpowering them, Lysander, coming home
in haste, persuaded the Lacedaemonians to support the oligarchies
and to put down the popular governments, and to the thirty in Athens,
first of all, they sent a hundred talents for the war, and Lysander
himself, as general, to assist them. But the kings envying him, and
fearing lest he should take Athens again, resolved that one of themselves
should take the command. Accordingly Pausanias went, and in words,
indeed, professed as if he had been for the tyrant against the people,
but in reality exerted himself for peace, that Lysander might not
by the means of his friends become lord of Athens again. This he brought
easily to pass; for, reconciling the Athenians, and quieting the tumults,
he defeated the ambitious hope of Lysander, though shortly after,
on the Athenians rebelling again, he was censured for having thus
taken, as it were, the bit out of the mouth of the people, which,
being freed from the oligarchy, would now break out again into affronts
and insolence; and Lysander regained the reputation of a person who
employed his command not in gratification of others, not for applause,
but strictly for the good of Sparta. 

His speech, also, was bold and daunting to such as opposed him. The
Argives, for example, contended about the bounds of their land, and
thought they brought juster pleas than the Lacedaemonians; holding
out his sword, "He," said Lysander, "that is master of this, brings
the best argument about the bounds of territory." A man of Megara,
at some conference, taking freedom with him, "This language, my friend,"
said he, "should come from a city." To the Boeotians, who were acting
a doubtful part, he put the question, whether he should pass through
their country with spears upright or levelled. After the revolt of
the Corinthians, when, on coming to their walls, he perceived the
Lacedaemonians hesitating to make the assault, and a hare was seen
to leap through the ditch: "Are you not ashamed," he said, "to fear
an enemy, for whose laziness the very hares sleep upon their walls?"

When King Agis died, leaving a brother Agesilaus, and Leontychides,
who was supposed his son, Lysander, being attached to Agesilaus, persuaded
him to lay claim to the kingdom, as being a true descendant of Hercules;
Leontychides lying under the suspicion of being the soil of Alcibiades,
who lived privately in familiarity with Timaea, the wife of Agis,
at the time he was a fugitive in Sparta. Agis, they say, computing
the time, satisfied himself that she could not have conceived by him,
and had hitherto always neglected and manifestly disowned Leontychides;
but now when he was carried sick to Heraea, being ready to die, what
by importunities of the young man himself, and of his friends, in
the presence of many he declared Leontychides to be his; and desiring
those who were present to bear witness to this to the Lacedaemonians,
died. They accordingly did so testify in favour of Leontychides. And
Agesilaus, being otherwise highly reputed of and strong in the support
of Lysander, was, on the other hand, prejudiced by Diopithes, a man
famous for his knowledge of oracles, who adduced this prophecy in
reference to Agesilaus's lameness:- 

"Beware, great Sparta, lest there come of thee, 
Though sound thyself, an halting sovereignty; 
Troubles, both long and unexpected too, 
And storms of deadly warfare shall ensue." When many, therefore, yielded
to the oracle, and inclined to Leontychides, Lysander said that Diopithes
did not take the prophecy rightly; for it was not that the god would
be offended if any lame person ruled over the Lacedaemonians, but
that the kingdom would be a lame one if bastards and false-born should
govern with the posterity of Hercules. By this argument, and by his
great influence among them, he prevailed, and Agesilaus was made king.

Immediately, therefore, Lysander spurred him on to make an expedition
into Asia, putting him in hopes that he might destroy the Persians,
and attain the height of greatness. And he wrote to his friends in
Asia, bidding them request to have Agesilaus appointed to command
them in the war against the barbarians; which they were persuaded
to, and sent ambassadors to Lacedaemon to entreat it. And this would
seem to be a second favour done Agesilaus by Lysander, not inferior
to his first in obtaining him the kingdom. But with ambitious natures,
otherwise not ill qualified for command, the feeling of jealousy of
those near them in reputation continually stands in the way of the
performance of noble actions; they make those their rivals in virtue,
whom they ought to use as their helpers to it. Agesilaus took Lysander,
among the thirty counsellors that accompanied him, with intentions
of using him as his especial friend; but when they were come into
Asia, the inhabitants there, to whom he was but little known, addressed
themselves to him but little and seldom; whereas Lysander, because
of their frequent previous intercourse, was visited and attended by
large numbers, by his friends out of observance, and by others out
of fear; and just as in tragedies it not uncommonly is the case with
the actors, the person who represents a messenger or servant is much
taken notice of, and plays the chief part, while he who wears the
crown and scepter is hardly heard to speak, even so was it about the
counsellor, he had all the real honours of the government, and to
the king was left the empty name of power. This disproportionate ambition
ought very likely to have been in some way softened down, and Lysander
should have been reduced to his proper second place, but wholly to
cast off and to insult and affront for glory's sake one who was his
benefactor and friend was not worthy Agesilaus to allow in himself.
For, first of all, he gave him no opportunity for any action, and
never set him in any place of command; then, for whomsoever he perceived
him exerting his interest, these persons he always sent away with
a refusal, and with less attention than any ordinary suitors, thus
silently undoing and weakening his influence. 

Lysander, miscarrying in everything, and perceiving that his diligence
for his friends was but a hindrance to them, forbore to help them,
entreating them that they would not address themselves to, nor observe
him, but that they would speak to the king, and to those who could
be of more service to friends than at present he could; most, on hearing
this forbore to trouble him about their concerns, but continued their
observances to him, waiting upon him in the walks and places of exercise;
at which Agesilaus was more annoyed than ever, envying him the honour;
and, finally, when he gave many of the officers places of command
and the governments of cities, he appointed Lysander carver at his
table, adding, by way of insult to the Ionians, "Let them go now,
and pay their court to my carver." Upon this, Lysander thought fit
to come and speak with him; and a brief laconic dialogue passed between
them as follows: "Truly, you know very well, O Agesilaus, how to depress
your friends;" "Those friends," replied he, "who would be greater
than myself; but those who increase my power, it is just should share
in it." "Possibly, O Agesilaus," answered Lysander, "in all this there
may be more said on your part than done on mine, but I request you,
for the sake of observers from without, to place me in any command
under you where you may judge I shall be the least offensive, and
most useful." 

Upon this he was sent ambassador to the Hellespont; and though angry
with Agesilaus, yet did not neglect to perform his duty, and having
induced Spithridates the Persian, being offended with Pharnabazus,
a gallant man, and in command of some forces, to revolt, he brought
him to Agesilaus. He was not, however, employed in any other service,
but having completed his time returned to Sparta, without honour,
angry with Agesilaus, and hating more than ever the whole Spartan
government, and resolved to delay no longer, but while there was yet
time, to put into execution the plans which he appears some time before
to have concerted for a revolution and change in the constitution.
These were as follows. The Heraclidae who joined with the Dorians,
and came into Peloponnesus, became a numerous and glorious race in
Sparta, but not every family belonging to it had the right of succession
in the kingdom, but the kings were chosen out of two only, called
the Eurypontidae and the Agiadae; the rest had no privilege in the
government by their nobility of birth, and the honours which followed
from merit lay open to all who could obtain them. Lysander who was
born of one of these families, when he had risen into great renown
for his exploits, and had gained great friends and power, was vexed
to see the city, which had increased to what it was by him, ruled
by others not at all better descended than himself, and formed a design
to remove the government from the two families, and to give it in
common to all the Heraclidae; or, as some say, not to the Heraclidae
only, but to all Spartans; that the reward might not belong to the
posterity of Hercules, but to those who were like Hercules, judging
by that personal merit which raised even him to the honour of the
Godhead; and he hoped that when the kingdom was thus to be competed
for, no Spartan would be chosen before himself. 

Accordingly he first attempted and prepared to persuade the citizens
privately, and studied an oration composed for this purpose by Cleon,
the Halicarnassian. Afterwards perceiving so unexpected and great
an innovation required bolder means of support, he proceeded, as it
might be on the stage, to avail himself of machinery, and to try the
effects of divine agency upon his countrymen. He collected and arranged
for his purpose answers and oracles from Apollo, not expecting to
get any benefit from Cleon's rhetoric, unless he should first alarm
and overpower the minds of his fellow-citizens by religious and superstitious
terrors, before bringing them to the consideration of his arguments.
Ephorus relates, after he had endeavoured to corrupt the oracle of
Apollo, and had again failed to persuade the priestess of Dodona by
means of Pherecles, that he went to Ammon, and discoursed with the
guardians of the oracle there, proffering them a great deal of gold,
and that they, taking this ill, sent some to Sparta to accuse Lysander;
and on his acquittal the Libyans, going away, said, "You will find
us, O Spartans, better judges, when you come to dwell with us in Libya,"
there being a certain ancient oracle that the Lacedaemonians should
dwell in Libya. But as the whole intrigue and the course of the contrivance
was no ordinary one, nor lightly undertaken, but depended as it went
on, like some mathematical proposition, on a variety of important
admissions, and proceeded through a series of intricate and difficult
steps to its conclusion, we will go into it at length, following the
account of one who was at once an historian and a philosopher.

There was a woman in Pontus who professed to be pregnant by Apollo,
which many, as was natural, disbelieved, and many also gave credit
to, and when she had brought forth a man-child, several, not unimportant
persons, took an interest in its rearing and bringing up. The name
given the boy was Silenus, for some reason or other. Lysander, taking
this for the groundwork, frames and devises the rest himself, making
use of not a few, nor these insignificant champions of his story,
who brought the report of the child's birth into credit without any
suspicion. Another report, also, was procured from Delphi and circulated
in Sparta, that there were some very old oracles which were kept by
the priests in private writings; and they were not to be meddled with,
neither was it lawful to read them, till one in aftertimes should
come, descended from Apollo, and, on giving some known token to the
keepers, should take the books in which the oracles were. Things being
thus ordered beforehand, Silenus, it was intended, should come and
ask for the oracles, as being the child of Apollo, and those priests
who were privy to the design were to profess to search narrowly into
all particulars, and to question him concerning his birth; and finally,
were to be convinced, and, as to Apollo's son, to deliver up to him
the writings. Then he, in the presence of many witnesses, should read,
amongst other prophecies, that which was the object of the whole contrivance,
relating to the office of the kings, that it would be better and more
desirable to the Spartans to choose their kings out of the best citizens.
And now, Silenus being grown up to a youth, and being ready for the
action, Lysander miscarried in his drama through the timidity of one
of his actors, or assistants, who just as he came to the point lost
heart and drew back. Yet nothing was found out while Lysander lived,
but only after his death. 

He died before Agesilaus came back from Asia, being involved, or perhaps
more truly having himself involved Greece, in the Boeotian war. For
it is stated both ways; and the cause of it some make to be himself,
others the Thebans, and some both together; the Thebans, on the one
hand, being charged with casting away the sacrifices at Aulis, and
that being bribed with the king's money brought by Androclides and
Amphitheus, they had, with the object of entangling the Lacedaemonians
in a Grecian war, set upon the Phocians, and wasted their country;
it being said, on the other hand, that Lysander was angry that the
Thebans had preferred a claim to the tenth part of the spoils of the
war, while the rest of the confederates submitted without complaint;
and because they expressed indignation about the money which Lysander
sent to Sparta, but more especially, because from them the Athenians
had obtained the first opportunity of freeing themselves from the
thirty tyrants, whom Lysander had made, and to support whom the Lacedaemonians
issued a decree that political refugees from Athens might be arrested
in whatever country they were found, and that those who impeded their
arrest should be excluded from the confederacy. In reply to this the
Thebans issued counter decrees of their own, truly in the spirit and
temper of the actions of Hercules and Bacchus, that every house and
city in Boeotia should be opened to the Athenians who required it,
and that he who did not help a fugitive who was seized should be fined
a talent for damages, and if any one should bear arms through Boeotia
to Attica against the tyrants, that none of the Thebans should either
see or hear of it. Nor did they pass these humane and truly Greek
decrees without at the same time making their acts conformable to
their words. For Thrasybulus, and those who with him occupied Phyle,
set out upon that enterprise from Thebes, with arms and money, and
secrecy and a point to start from, provided for them by the Thebans.
Such were the causes of complaint Lysander had against Thebes. And
being now grown violent in his temper through the atrabilious tendency
which increased upon him in his old age, he urged the Ephors and persuaded
them to place a garrison in Thebes, and taking the commander's place,
he marched forth with a body of troops. Pausanias, also, the king,
was sent shortly after with an army. Now Pausanias, going round by
Cithaeron, was to invade Boeotia; Lysander, meantime, advanced through
Phocis to meet him, with a numerous body of soldiers. He took the
city of the Orchomenians, who came over to him of their own accord,
and plundered Lebadea. He despatched also letters to Pausanias, ordering
him to move from Plataea to meet him at Haliartus, and that himself
would be at the walls of Haliartus by break of day. These letters
were brought to the Thebans, the carrier of them falling into the
hands of some Theban scouts. They, having received aid from Athens,
committed their city to the charge of the Athenian troops, and sallying
out about the first sleep, succeeded in reaching Haliartus a little
before Lysander, and part of them entered into the city. He upon this
first of all resolved, posting his army upon a hill, to stay for Pausanias;
then as the day advanced, not being able to rest, he bade his men
take up their arms, and encouraging the allies, led them in a column
along the road to the walls. But those Thebans who had remained outside,
taking the city on the left hand, advanced against the rear of their
enemies, by the fountain which is called Cissusa; here they tell the
story that the nurses washed the infant Bacchus after birth; the water
of it is of a bright wine-colour, clear, and most pleasant to drink;
and not far off the Cretan storax grows all about which the Haliartians
adduce in token of Rhadamanthus having dwelt there, and they show
his sepulchre, calling it Alea. And the monument also of Alcmena is
hard by; for there, as they say, she was buried, having married Rhadamanthus
after Amphitryon's death. But the Thebans inside the city, forming
in order of battle with the Haliartians, stood still for some time,
but on seeing Lysander with a party of those who were foremost approaching,
on a sudden opening the gates and falling on, they killed him with
the soothsayer at his side, and a few others; for the greater part
immediately fled back to the main force. But the Thebans not slackening,
but closely pursuing them, the whole body turned to fly towards the
hills. There were one thousand of them slain; there died, also, of
the Thebans three hundred, who were killed with their enemies, while
chasing them into craggy and difficult places. These had been under
suspicion of favouring the Lacedaemonians, and in their eagerness
to clear themselves in the eyes of their fellow-citizens, exposed
themselves in the pursuit, and so met their death. News of the disaster
reached Pausanias as he was on the way from Plataea to Thespiae, and
having set his army in order he came to Haliartus; Thrasybulus, also,
came from Thebes, leading the Athenians. 

Pausanias proposing to request the bodies of the dead under truce,
the elders of the Spartans took it ill, and were angry among themselves,
and coming to the king, declared that Lysander should not be taken
away upon any conditions; if they fought it out by arms about his
body, and conquered, then they might bury him; if they were overcome,
it was glorious to die upon the spot with their commander. When the
elders had spoken these things, Pausanias saw it would be a difficult
business to vanquish the Thebans, who had but just been conquerors;
that Lysander's body also lay near the walls, so that it would be
hard for them, though they overcame, to take it away without a truce;
he therefore sent a herald, obtained a truce, and withdrew his forces,
and carrying away the body of Lysander, they buried it in the first
friendly soil they reached on crossing the Boeotian frontier, in the
country the Panopaeans; where the monument still stands as you go
on the road from Delphi to Chaeronea. Now the army quartering there,
it is said that a person of Phocis, relating the battle to one who
was not in it, said, the enemies fell upon them just after Lysander
had passed over the Hoplites; surprised at which a Spartan, a friend
of Lysander, asked what Hoplites he meant, for he did not know the
name. "It was there," answered the Phocian, "that the enemy killed
the first of us; the rivulet by the city is called Hoplites." On hearing
which the Spartan shed tears and observed how impossible it is for
any man to avoid his appointed lot; Lysander, it appears, having received
an oracle as follows:- 

"Sounding Hoplites see thou bear in mind, 
And the earthborn dragon following behind." Some, however, say that
Hoplites does not run by Haliartus, but is a watercourse near Coronea,
falling into the river Philarus, not far from the town in former times
called Hoplias, and now Isomantus. 

The man of Haliartus who killed Lysander, by name Neochorus, bore
on his shield the device of a dragon; and this, it was supposed, the
oracle signified. It is said also that at the time of the Peloponnesian
war, the Thebans received an oracle from the sanctuary of Ismenus,
referring at once to the battle at Delium, and to this which thirty
years after took solace at Haliartus. It ran thus:- 

"Hunting the wolf, observe the utmost bound, 
And the hill Orchalides where foxes most are found." By the words,
"the utmost bound," Delium being intended, where Boeotia touches Attica,
and by Orchalides, the hill now called Alopecus, which lies in the
parts of Haliartus towards Helicon. 

But such a death befalling Lysander, the Spartans took it so grievously
at the time, that they put the king to a trial for his life, which
he not daring to await, fled to Tegea, and there lived out his life
in the sanctuary of Minerva. The poverty also of Lysander being discovered
by his death made his merit more manifest, since from so much wealth
and power, from all the homage of the cities, and of the Persian kingdom,
he had not in the least degree, so far as money goes, sought any private
aggrandizement, as Theopompus in his history relates, whom any one
may rather give credit to when he commends than when he finds fault,
as it is more agreeable to him to blame than to praise. But subsequently,
Ephorus says, some controversy arising among the allies at Sparta,
which made it necessary to consult the writings which Lysander had
kept by him, Agesilaus came to his house, and finding the book in
which the oration on the Spartan constitution was written at length,
to the effect that the kingdom ought to be taken from the Eurypontidae
and Agiadae, and to be offered in common, and a choice made out of
the best citizens, at first he was eager to make it public, and to
show his countrymen the real character of Lysander. But Lacratidas,
a wise man, and at that time chief of the Ephors, hindered Agesilaus,
and said they ought not to dig up Lysander again, but rather to bury
with him a discourse, composed so plausibly and subtilely. Other honours,
also, were paid him, after his death; and amongst these they imposed
a fine upon those who had engaged themselves to marry his daughters,
and then when Lysander was found to be poor, after his decease, refused
them; because when they thought him rich they had been observant of
him, but now his poverty had proved him just and good, they forsook
him. For there was, it seems, in Sparta, a punishment for not marrying,
for a late, and for a bad marriage; and to the last penalty those
were most especially liable who sought alliances with the rich instead
of with the good and with their friends. Such is the account we have
found given of Lysander. 

THE END

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