The Exploits of Xenophon Read online

  The next day we crossed the pass where Tiribazus was to have attacked us, and three days later we came to the river Euphrates—not far, so it was said, from its source—which we forded in water up to the waist.

  Now a blizzard began to howl down from the north, and there was no possible shelter from it, as the country was flat. For forty-five miles we ploughed through deep snow into the teeth of the wind, and on the last march the men were numbed and exhausted. One of the chaplains then sacrificed to the spirit of the gale, and it was generally agreed that this made a considerable difference.

  The snow, however, remained—six feet of it, in which we had to camp. Fortunately there was plenty of wood about, and our great fires ate down to the bare earth. So each party was sitting in a deep hole surrounded by walls of snow.

  During the next day’s march my rear guard was continually coming up with men who had fallen out of the column and collapsed in the snow. I thought at first that they had been knocked out by disease. But someone who had had experience of extreme cold explained that it was exhaustion, and that if the men got something to eat they would recover. At once I unpacked whatever rations there were on the backs of the transport animals and distributed them. That put the men on their legs again.

  It was dangerous to sit down for any length of time. I realized how dangerous on one occasion when I was sitting and waiting for some men to pack their equipment. I stiffened all over so quickly that I could not stand. After that I used to force the men to keep moving by curses and even blows. We suffered from snow blindness and frostbite. I found that the blindness was helped by holding something black in front of the eyes during the march. Nothing could be done for frostbite, however, and many of the men lost their toes. Their feet, of course, were in shocking condition, for their sandals had worn out and they were wearing rough shoes made of untanned ox-hide. If they slept without taking them off, the shoes froze to their feet and the strap cut into the flesh.

  “That Night Was Terrible”

  That night was terrible. We made little progress through the deep snow, and the column could never get up into whatever camp there was. Many of our men were dead in the morning. All the time a pack of the enemy was on our heels, fighting one another for the carcasses of the transport animals which had dropped dead, and slaughtering any of our soldiers who were staggering along behind, numbed or blinded by cold.

  I remember coming upon one party of our men who had fallen out on a patch of bare ground where a hot spring had melted the snow. They could not and would not move, whatever I did, and begged me to cut their throats and let them die. We could hear the enemy yapping in the darkness behind us, arguing and quarrelling over the loot they had picked up.

  It was too much. The rear guard turned as if we were still full of our old spirit, and the men whose strength was finished shouted as loud as their poor throats could, and clashed their shields and spears together. The enemy panicked, and those of them who escaped into the snow-covered undergrowth were as silent thereafter as those we killed.

  The rear guard marched on, assuring the sick men that a detachment would come out later to bring them in. Then we began to come upon more and more parties lying down in the snow with their cloaks wrapped round them. I sent forward the fittest of my light infantry to find out what was holding up the march. On their return they reported that the whole column was lying down in the snow. We did so, too, without fires and without rations.

  At daybreak I ordered back the youngest of the rear guard to bring in the sick and the stragglers. Meanwhile, Cheirisophus was doing the same. He and the vanguard had managed to reach a village where they passed the night, so he had plenty of men fit to march back and carry the helpless into camp. At last we got in all who were alive and billeted them in the nearby villages.

  We commanders tossed up for the villages that each contingent should take over. As soon as mine was decided, one of my company commanders, an Athenian named Polycrates, got together a detachment of men who were still active, and surprised the village before the headman and the inhabitants could escape with their property.

  That place was just what we needed after such a night. The houses were underground and entered by ladders which led down holes no bigger than the mouth of a well. But inside the dwellings were broad and roomy. Goats, sheep, cattle and poultry all lived underground, too—going in and out by a ramp—and were fed from stacks of green fodder. For us there were wheat, barley, vegetables and barley wine. The natives had an odd way of drinking the wine. It was in big vats filled up to the brim, with the malted grains floating on top. Hollow reeds of all sizes lay on the edge of the vat, and anyone who wanted a drink put in his reed and sucked. It was uncommonly strong, but we found it delicious once we had got used to the taste.

  Thanks to Polycrates, who had kept the villagers from running away, we took over the place intact. In it we found, besides all the inhabitants, seventeen colts which were being reared as the tribe’s tribute to the Great King. The headman was also there with his daughter, who had been married just eight days before. Her husband was away hunting hare.

  I didn’t want them to be frightened of us, so I asked the headman to supper, assuring him that his children would be perfectly safe with us, and that when we went away we would fill his house with presents. He was most co-operative and showed us the village cellar where the barley wine was.

  The next day he and I made a round of the villages. It was one long party. None of them would let us go until they had served us breakfast—and a breakfast of half a dozen dishes: lamb, kid, pork, veal, fowls and several kinds of bread made of wheat and barley. Their custom of drinking to someone’s health was to drag him to the vat and make him lean over it and suck up the barley wine as though he were an ox.

  At last we came to Cheirisophus’ village. His men were certainly doing well for themselves. They had crowned their heads with garlands of hay and collected a lot of boys in fancy costume. These they were teaching in pantomime how to do the job of civilised waiters. Cheirisophus and I greeted each other with somewhat exaggerated affection and then sat down with my tame headman and an interpreter to get a bit of information about the country. We were still in Armenia, he said, and the next tribe we should come to would be the Chalybes.

  When I got back to my own village, I took my pick of the colts—since they were the King’s property—and gave one each to my fellow-generals and to the officers of my contingent. They were smaller than the Persian horses but much more lively. The headman told me how to get them—and all the transport animals—through the snow. We ought, he said, to wrap sacks around their hoofs and then they would not sink.

  We took a week to recover and resumed our march. I gave the headman whatever useful gifts we could get together and also a horse of mine which could stand no more campaigning. The animal would do, however, for fattening up underground, and the headman, who was a priest of the Sun, could make a sacrifice with it which would honour both him and my horse.

  Cheirisophus took my headman with him to guide the army through the snow; and to ensure that he didn’t play any tricks, we also took his son. On the third day the headman still had not brought us to any villages—there weren’t any to bring us to. But Cheirisophus flew into one of his Spartan tempers and beat him up; and my kindly headman ran away in the night, leaving his son with us. That was the only time in the whole march that I ever quarrelled with Cheirisophus. We could not turn the poor boy loose in the snow, but I am glad to say that Episthenes of Amphipolis, who was in charge of him, had become absolutely devoted to the young fellow. So he took the boy all the way back to Greece and found in him a most faithful friend.

  A week’s marching at fifteen miles a day brought us to the river Phasis. Soon afterwards we came to another range of mountains, and as usual, the valley we had to follow was barred by a strong force of tribesmen. When Cheirisophus saw them holding the mouth of the pass, he halted three or four miles away and passed the word down the column to deploy for action.


  As soon as the rear guard had come up into line, he held a headquarters conference.

  ‘My opinion,’ he said, showing us the enemy position, ‘is that we should not tackle that in a hurry. Suppose we let the troops have a meal, and meanwhile discuss whether we ought to attack now or tomorrow?’

  Cleanor, the oldest of the commanders, was for immediate action, pointing out that if we waited a day the enemy would grow bolder and probably increase their numbers.

  I myself did not like either proposal. Expensive frontal attacks might be all right in their proper place, but our job was to get the army over the range with as few casualties as possible.

  ‘The whole enemy force seems to be concentrated in the pass,’ I said, ‘leaving us seven miles of the range to play with. Why not try to find our own way over at night when we won’t be seen? Even the stiffest climb is easier than marching on the level and fighting at the same time, and I’m all for a rough road in peace rather than an easy slope with stones and arrows whistling past my ears. What we ought to do is to steal our own bit of mountain and use it.

  ‘That’s just the job for you, Cheirisophus,’ I added. ‘You’re an authority on stealing. I’ve often heard that you Spartans who belong to the upper class are taught to steal in the military school and whipped if you get caught. Well, there’s the mountain! Show us what you can do!’

  ‘Me?’ Cheirisophus retorted. ‘Doesn’t everyone know that your politicians in Athens are the biggest thieves in all Greece in spite of what you do to them when you catch them? And as you’re always talking about electing the best men to govern you, I suppose you were brought up to imitate them. So let’s see if you can steal as well as your politicians, Athenian!’

  ‘All right,’ I answered, ‘I’ll try. We have some prisoners from the scum that has been raiding the rear guard, and according to them there are cattle grazing on the mountain tops in spite of the steepness and the snow. So if we can take and hold a route, there should be no difficulty in getting the transport animals over.’

  ‘No, but seriously, Xenophon,’ Cheirisophus said, ‘we can’t spare you from the rear guard. Let’s call for volunteers to carry out your plan.’

  We took it easy during the day and at nightfall sent out two detachments of light infantry, with some infantry of the line in support. They occupied a ridge without any trouble and lit fires as a signal to us. We could see that the enemy were alarmed, for they, too, lit a whole lot of fires which they kept blazing all night.

  In the morning it was all over very quickly. Our mountain party came down on the flank of the enemy, and we had only to threaten a frontal attack. The tribesmen fled, leaving the pass wide open and throwing away their wicker shields. We picked up a large number of the shields and hacked them to bits with our swords so that they could not be used again. Then we set up a memorial at the top of the pass and marched down the other side into a plain where the army could feed well and rest.

  6. The Sea

  It was now about January I, 400 B.C., and the Greeks were in the foothills of the Caucasus, not far from the present frontier between Turkey and Russia. They had passed right out of the provinces effectively governed by the Persian Empire, and were near the end of the known world.

  Still, they were close now to the Black Sea; and where there was sea, there were little, isolated Greek cities. These colonies were independent, but each was bound by close ties of affection to the mother state which had first sent out her adventurers to found it. They were tiny trading towns, with a few square miles of farm land outside the walls, set down in the midst of savages. Generally they were welcome because of the unheard-of, civilized luxuries which the tribes and their chieftains could buy in the Greek markets.

  The next tribe were the Taochians, and in their country we ran out of food. We never could get any on the march, for the Taochians took refuge, with all their stores and livestock, in mountain fortresses. These were primitive places without any houses in them, but they were very strong.

  Cheirisophus tried to storm one of the forts which was protected on all sides by a ravine. He could not bring his superior numbers to bear, so he attacked in three waves on a narrow front, and all three were beaten back. He was very glad to see the rear guard when I came up with it.

  ‘We have to take this infernal place or starve,’ he said.

  At first sight I couldn’t spot the difficulty, for there seemed to be only a handful of men against us, and poorly armed at that. I asked him what stopped us from just marching in.

  ‘That crag up there!’ he replied. ‘Every time we go under it, they roll down a load of rocks, and that’s what happens.’ He pointed to some poor fellows with their ribs or legs crushed to bits.

  I have always got on very well with Spartans and I admire their discipline enormously, but I must say they do have slow minds.

  ‘Then wait till they have used up all their stones,’ I said. ‘Look here! We only have to charge about a hundred and fifty feet, and for the first hundred there is cover behind the trunks of those big pines, at any rate for a few of us. If we can dodge in and out of the trees and draw their fire, they’ll soon run out of ammunition.’

  Cheirisophus and I, with Callimachus, who was officer of the day for the rear guard, went up to the front to control the operation. We managed to get about seventy men, making a dash for it one by one, into the cover of the trees.

  Callimachus then hit on a fine trick. He ran forward a few yards from his tree, and when the stones came whizzing down he popped back again. Each of his dashes must have used up ten cartloads of stones. Callimachus’ jack-in-the-box act was amusing the whole army, and Agasias, another of my officers, did not see why he shouldn’t have some of the fun. So Agasias made a wild rush for the open, and Callimachus—who wanted to be first into the fort himself—caught him by the shield as he passed. While they were tangled up, two officers who were friends of theirs passed them both. All four got into the fort and captured it.

  But there was a horrible end to the comedy. The Taochian women threw their children over the cliff and then themselves. The men followed, and were so anxious to commit suicide that one of them dragged with him a Greek officer who had tried to stop him, and both crashed on to the rocks far below. We took scarcely any prisoners but plenty of cattle, donkeys and sheep.

  After the Taochians came the Chalybes. We managed to march 150 miles through their country in a week, but they were the bravest of all the enemies we had met, never hesitating to come to close quarters with our infantry. Their warriors wore helmets, leg armour, and padded tunics to protect the body, and carried spears twenty feet long. They also had short swords, about as long as the Spartan dagger, with which they cut the throat of an opponent when they had him down. Then they would chop off his head and dance with it and sing whenever they knew we were watching.

  This tribe, too, had the custom of taking refuge in hill forts. Fortunately we did not have to tackle one. We had enough to eat from the flocks and herds we had captured from the Taochians.

  We crossed the river Harpasus and after another 120 miles came to Gymnias—a real city such as we had not seen since we left Babylonia. The ruler of this place gave us a guide—not that he cared what happened to us, but he wanted to let us loose among his enemies. He certainly did; and we had to fight our way, with the guide all the time encouraging us to more fire and slaughter. However, this guide swore on his life that in five days he would take us to a mountain called Thekes, from which we could catch a glimpse of the sea.

  On the fifth day we began to march up this mountain. While the rear guard were on the slopes, we heard wild shouting ahead of us, and I thought that the head of the column had walked into trouble. It was likely enough, for the whole country was aflame behind us, and several times the rear guard had had to turn and punish the tribesmen who hung on our tail.

  The shouting grew louder and nearer, and detachments began to run up to the front. And the more men who went up, the more noise there was. I
still did not guess what had happened and mounted my horse and galloped up to the rescue with the cavalry. Soon I could hear what the soldiers were shouting:

  ‘The sea! The sea!’

  Then the rear guard began to run and so did the horses and even the transport animals. When we had all reached the top and set eyes on the distant sea, we embraced one another, generals, officers and men, and the tears ran down our cheeks for joy. Someone or other had the idea of building a monument to mark the spot. So the soldiers brought stones and made a huge mound of them, with skins and posts and captured shields on the top.

  “The Sea! The Sea”

  After this we sent our guide back to Gymnias with gifts from the common property of the army—a horse, a silver bowl, a Persian dress and ten gold coins. And, since he particularly admired the rings on our fingers, he got a lot of those, too. In the last light of the evening he pointed out to us a village where we could camp and the road on into the territory of the Macrones. Then he turned his back on us and vanished into the night.

  We had seen the sea but still had many a hard march before we could reach it. On the third day we found ourselves in a really nasty position and got out of it by a stroke of luck. We were marching down a valley with impossible country to our right and a river on our left. Ahead of us was a tributary river which had to be crossed in spite of a fierce reception committee of Macrones waiting for us on the other side.

  While we were cutting down trees to make a causeway, one of my light infantrymen came up to me. He said it was odd, but he seemed to know the language in which the Macrones were chattering.

  ‘I was long a slave in Athens,’ he explained, ‘and I think this must be my native country. If you don’t mind, sir, I’ll try and talk to them.’