for me here,” he proceeded, “and recruit yourselves.  I will take a look round and rejoin you.”  So saying he took a certain path over hill and rode off.  As soon as he had reached deep snow, he looked to see whether there were footprints of human beings leading forward or in the opposite direction; and having satisfied himself that the road was untrodden, back he came, exclaiming:  “God willing, sirs, it will be all right; we shall fall on the fellows, before they know where they are.  I will lead on with the cavalry; so that if we catch sight of any one, he shall not escape and give warning to the enemy.  Do you follow, and if you are left behind, keep to the trail of the horses.  Once on the other side of the mountains, we shall find ourselves in numerous thriving villages.”

By the middle of the day he had already gained the top of the pass and looked down upon the villages below.  Back he came riding to the heavy infantry and said:  “I will at once send off the cavalry into the plain below, and the peltasts too, to attack the villages.  Do you follow with what speed you may, so that in case of resistance you may lend us your aid.”  Hearing this, Xenophon dismounted, and the other asked:  “Why do you dismount just when speed is the thing we want?” The other answered:  “But you do not want me alone, I am sure.  The hoplites will run all the quicker and more cheerily if I lead them on foot.”

Thereupon Seuthes went off, and Timasion with him, taking the Hellene squadron of something like forty troopers.  Then Xenophon passed the order:  the active young fellows up to thirty years of age from the different companies to the front; and off with these he went himself, bowling along[7]; while Cleanor led the other Hellenes.  When they had 46 reached the villages, Seuthes, with about thirty troopers, rode up, exclaiming:  “Well, Xenophon, this is just what you said! the fellows are caught, but now look here.  My cavalry have gone off unsupported; they are scattered in pursuit, one here, one there, and upon my word, I am more than half afraid the enemy will collect somewhere and do them a mischief.  Some of us must remain in the villages, for they are swarming with human beings.”  “Well then,” said Xenophon, “I will seize the heights with the men I have with me, and do you bid Cleanor extend his line along the level beside the villages.”  When they had done so, there were enclosed—­of captives for the slave market, one thousand; of cattle, two thousand; and of other small cattle, ten thousand.  For the time being they took up quarters there.

[7] {etropkhaze}, a favourite word with our author.  Herodotus uses it;
    so does Aristot.; so also Polybius; but the Atticists condemn it,
    except of course in poetry.

IV

But the next day Seuthes burnt the villages to the ground; he left not 1 a single house, being minded to inspire terror in the rest of his enemies, and to show them what they also were to expect, if they refused obedience; and so he went back again.  As to the booty, he sent off Heracliedes to Perinthus to dispose of it, with a view to future pay for the soldiers.  But for himself he encamped with the Hellenes in the lowland country of the Thynians, the natives leaving the flats and betaking themselves in flight to the uplands.