The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [190]
16. Not from any enmity towards the Thebans, but on account of his own urgent need,
17. For he required a rampart to protect his army, and a refuge in case the battle should go against him.
18. His army at this time lay on the Asopus, and stretched from Erythrae, along by Hysiae, to the territory of the Plataeans.
19. The rampart, however, was not made to extend so far, but formed a square of about ten furlongs each way.
20. While the barbarians were employed in this work, a certain citizen of Thebes, Attaginus, the son of Phrynon, gave a banquet, and invited Mardonius, together with fifty of the noblest Persians.
21. Fifty noble Thebans also were asked; and the two nations were not arranged separately, but a Persian and a Theban were set side by side upon each couch.
22. After the feast was ended, and the drinking had begun, the Persian who shared Thersander’s couch addressed him in the Greek tongue,
23. And enquired of him from what city he came.
24. He answered, that he was of Orchomenus; whereupon the other said,
25. ‘Since we have eaten at one table, and drunk from one cup, I will tell you what I think, and perhaps this will be a useful warning for you:
26. ‘Of these Persians you see here feasting, and the army in the camp nearby, in a little while, hardly any of these men will still be alive.’
27. As he spoke, the Persian wept; at which the Theban said, ‘Surely you should tell your fear of this to Mardonius, and the Persians who are next him in honour?’
28. But the other replied, ‘Dear friend, no one believes warnings, however true.
29. ‘Many of us Persians know our danger, but we are constrained by necessity to do as our leader bids us.
30. ‘In truth it is the worst of human ills, to abound in knowledge and yet have no power over action.’
Chapter 96
1. When Mardonius had held his camp in Boeotia during the first invasion of Greece a year beforehand,
2. All the Greeks of those parts who were friendly to the Persians sent troops to join his army, and these troops accompanied him in his attack upon Athens.
3. The Phocians alone abstained, and took no part in the invasion;
4. For, though they had espoused the Persian cause, it was much against their will, and only because they were compelled to do so.
5. However, a few days after the arrival of the Persian army at Thebes on this second occasion,
6. A thousand of their heavy-armed soldiers came up, under the command of Harmocydes, one of their most distinguished citizens.
7. No sooner had these troops reached Thebes, than some horsemen came to them from Mardonius, with orders that they should take up a position upon the plain, away from the rest of the army.
8. The Phocians did so, and forthwith the entire Persian cavalry drew near them: whereupon there went a rumour through the Greek force encamped with the Persian that Mardonius was about to destroy the Phocians.
9. The same conviction ran through the Phocian troops themselves; and Harmocydes, their leader, addressed them with words of encouragement:
10. ‘Phocians,’ said he, ‘it is plain that the Persians have resolved to take our lives,
11. ‘Perhaps because of the accusations of the Thessalians, or for some other treachery.
12. ‘Now, then, is the time for you to show yourselves brave men. It is better to die fighting and defending ourselves, than tamely to allow them to slay us in this shameful fashion.
13. ‘Let them learn that they are barbarians, and that the men whose death they have plotted are Greeks!’
14. So spoke Harmocydes; and the Persian horse, having encircled the Phocians, charged them, as if about to deal out death, with bows bent, and arrows ready to fly;
15. Here and there some did indeed discharge their weapons.
16. But the Phocians stood firm, keeping close to one another, and serrying their ranks as much as possible:
17. Whereupon the horse suddenly wheeled round and rode off. It is not known with certainty whether the Persians came, at the behest of the Thessalians, to destroy the Phocians,