many gainsayers who argued that it was not seemly for the king to let those who had marched against him depart in peace.  And at last he said:  “You may now, if you like, take pledges from us, that we will make the countries through which you pass friendly to you, and will lead you back without treachery into Hellas, and will furnish you with a market; and wherever you cannot purchase, we will permit you to take provisions from the district.  You, on your side, must swear that you will march as through a friendly country, without damage—­merely taking food and drink wherever we fail to supply a market—­or, if we afford a market, you shall only obtain provisions by paying for them.”  This was agreed to, and oaths and pledges exchanged between them—­Tissaphernes and the king’s brother-in-law upon the one side, and the generals and officers of the Hellenes on the other.  After this Tissaphernes said:  “And now I go back to the king; as soon as I have transacted what I have a mind to, I will come back, ready equipped, to lead you away to Hellas, and to return myself to my own dominion.”

IV

After these things the Hellenes and Ariaeus waited for Tissaphernes, 1 being encamped close to one another:  for more than twenty days they waited, during which time there came visitors to Ariaeus, his brother and other kinsfolk.  To those under him came certain other Persians, encouraging them and bearing pledges to some of them from the king himself—­that he would bear no grudge against them on account of the part they bore in the expedition against him with Cyrus, or for aught else of the things which were past.  Whilst these overtures were being made, Ariaeus and his friends gave manifest signs of paying less attention to the Hellenes, so much so that, if for no other reason, the majority of the latter were not well pleased, and they came to Clearchus and the other generals, asking what they were waiting for.  “Do we not know full well,” they said, “that the king would give a great deal to destroy us, so that other Hellenes may take warning and think twice before they march against the king.  To-day it suits his purpose to induce us to stop here, because his army is scattered; but as soon as he has got together another armament, attack us most certainly he will.  How do we know he is not at this moment digging away at trenches, or running up walls, to make our path impassable.  It is not to be supposed that he will desire us to return to Hellas with a tale how a handful of men like ourselves beat the king at his own gates, laughed him to scorn, and then came home again.”  Clearchus replied:  “I too am keenly aware of all this; but I reason thus:  if we turn our backs now, they will say, we mean war and are acting contrary to the truce, and then what follows?  First of all, no one will furnish us with a market or means of providing ourselves with food.  Next, we shall have no one to guide us;