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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 in all the various cities. From whence the saying of Eteocles the Lacedæmonian came to be famous, that Greece could not have borne two Lysanders. Theophrastus says, that Archestratus said the same of Alcibiades. But in his case what had given most offence was a certain licentious and wanton self-will; Lysander was made an object of fear and terror by his unmerciful disposition. The Lacedæmonians did not much concern themselves for any other accusers; but when Pharnabazus, whose country he had pillaged and wasted, sent some to Sparta to inform against him, the Ephors took the matter up, and put one of his friends and fellowcaptains, Thorax, to death, finding some silver privately in his possession; and sent Lysander a scroll, commanding him to return home. The scroll is made up thus: when the Ephors sent out an admiral or general on his command, 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 of wood they call scytalas. 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 wind it about their own wooden roller, 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.

20 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. 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 the proverb says, 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 Lacedæmon, 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 Pharna

* Or "cheat against cheat," the Cretans being famous for their mendacity; the Cretans are always liars."

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bazus was beloved by the Lacedæmonians, having been in the war the most zealous on their side of all the king's generals. 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,

But a few

left them at the time in extreme confusion. 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 the war. For some state it as a truth, that when he was besieging the town of Aphytæ in Thrace, Ammon stood by him in his sleep; whereupon raising the siege, supposing the god had commanded it, he bade the Aphytæans 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 what 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 21 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.* A new movement now commencing in this direction, and, first of all, the Athenians from Phyle setting upon their Thirty rulers and overpowering them, Lysander, coming

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sion of

Thirty

Expul home in haste, persuaded the Lacedæmonians to support the the oligarchies and to put down the popular governTyrants ments; 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, re

B.C. 403.

*This, however, was pretty certainly before the recall of Lysander by the scytala. The kings may have taken measures of the same kind also afterwards when he was away on his voyage. But the movement at Athens took place very early; the Thirty were only in power for a few months, and were ex

solved that one of themselves should take the command. Accordingly Pausanias went, and in words indeed professed as if he had been for the tyrants against the people, but in reality exerted himself for peace, that Lysander might not, by means of his friends, become lord of Athens again. This he brought easily to pass; and reconciling the Athenians and quieting the tumults, he defeated the ambitious hopes of Lysander. Though shortly after, on the Athenians renouncing the Spartan supremacy, he was censured for having thus taken, as were, the bit out of the mouth of the people, which, being freed from the oligarchy, could 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, nor for vain show, but strictly for the good of Sparta.

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His speech also was high and daunting to such as 22 opposed him. The Argives, for example, contended about the bounds of their land, and thought they brought juster pleas than the Lacedæmonians; 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, "is that of a city."* To the Boeotians, who were acting

pelled before midsummer, 403 B.C., the beginning of the archonship of Euclides. Lysander, after failing in his endeavours to maintain them, appears to have gone to Asia again; was recalled; and then went to Ammon; returning some time before the death of Agis, B.C. 399.

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* Literally, "Your words require a city," are those of a man representing a place of political importance; You speak as if any one cared about Megara's opinion."

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