Key to Easy Latin Stories for beginners/Part IV/XVIII
XVIII.EXPEDITION OF CLEOMENES AGAINST ARGOS.
A subterranean stream.
209.Answer had been made to Cleomenes, the Spartan king, when consulting the Oracle of Delphi, ‘that he would take Argos.’ So he set out with his army to the territory of the Argives. But after coming to the river Erasinus, which they affirm flows from the Stymphalian lake (for they say that this lake, after discharging itself into a hidden whirlpool, appears again in Argolis, and that thence this water is called Erasinus by the Argives), he sacrificed victims to the river. But on its being shown by the entrails that the crossing would be unlucky, he said that he praised the river for not betraying its citizens; but that not even so would the Argives get off safe.
The invasion of Argolis.
210.After this, having returned and having offered a bull to the sea, he took his army on shipboard to the territory of the Argives. On ascertaining this, the Argives hasten to the sea intending to bring help to their friends. Then they opposed their camp to that of the Lacedaemonians, leaving no great interval in the middle between them. They then did not fear an open fight, but lest they should be conquered by craft; for the priestess of Apollo had uttered an oracle in these words: ‘When a victorious female shall rout a male, and shall gloriously bring honour among the Argives; then shall she make many of the Argive women to lament, and the serpent, with its winding folds shall perish.’
Turning the tables.
211.Accordingly they formed the plan of using the enemy’s herald; and this (plan) they so carried out, that, as often as the Spartan herald had given out any signal, the Aigives also did that very thing. And when Cleomenes ascertained that they were in the habit of doing the same thing as his own herald had proclaimed, he gave orders to his men that whenever the herald should have given the signal for breakfast, they should take their arms and attack the Argives. And the Lacedaemonians did this. For while the Argives, according to the command of the herald, were taking their breakfast, having suddenly attacked them, they slew a great number, and besieging many others who had fled to the grove of Argos, they kept them there.
Broken faith.
212.Then Cleomenes did as follows. When he had ascertained from certain deserters which of the Argives they were who were shut up in the sacred grove, he sent a herald and called them one by one by name, asserting that he would receive a price for their ransom. Now among the Peloponnesians there is a fixed price for ransom, (namely) two minae to be paid for each captive. So Cleomenes called out about fifty of the Argives and put them to death; (a thing) which was unknown to the rest who were in the grove; for since the grove was a large one, those who were inside could not see what he was doing. But at last, one of them climbed a tree and saw what was being done; and thereupon they no longer came out when called.
Sacrilege.
213.Then indeed Cleomenes ordered all the helots to pile timber round the grove: and when this was done, he set fire to the grove. And now, while the grove was burning, he asked a deserter to what god was the grove sacred. And when he replied that it was the grove of Argos, on hearing this Cleomenes uttering a deep groan said, ‘O prophetic Apollo, thou didst greatly deceive me, when thou saidst that I should take Argos, for I suspect that that prophecy has been accomplished for me.’ After this, having sent away the greater part of the army to Sparta, he himself, with a thousand of the bravest troops, betook himself to the temple of Juno,’ intending to offer a sacrifice, but when he desired to sacrifice, the priest forbade him, saying that it was not right for a stranger to sacrifice there. But Cleomenes, having ordered the helots to take away the priest from the altar and beat him, offered a sacrifice himself; and after doing this returned to Sparta.
Trial and defence of Cleomenes.
214.But at Sparta his enemies brought him before the ephors as a criminal: for they affirmed that having been bribed with money he had not taken Argos, when he could have taken it very easily. But he replied that after he had taken the grove sacred to Aigos, the prophecy of the god seemed to him to have been fulfilled. Wherefore he had thought that the city should not be attempted before he had ascertained after sacrificing whether the god was likely to give it over to him, or to be a hindrance. Moreover, that a flame shone out to him from the breast of the image while sacrificing in the temple of Juno; and so that he had understood that Argos could not be taken, for he would have taken the city if the flame had shone from the head of the image; but since it had shone from its breast, everything had been done which the god had desired to be done. So he was freed from the charge.
Madness and suicide of Cleomenes.
215.Madness afterwards attacked him; for as often as a Spartan met him, he used to dash his sceptre in his face. Since he kept doing this and was mad, his relations bound him and fastened him to a log. But he, being thus bound, on observing that only one guard was left, the others having gone out, asked for a knife, and when the guard was unwilling to give it to him at once, he threatened the man with what he intended to do to him afterwards; till terrified by the threats, he gave him the knife. Then indeed Cleomenes, having taken the steel, lacerated himself with his own hand (lit. himself) miserably, beginning from his legs. At last, on reaching his stomach, he also cut it open, until he breathed his last (lit. breathed out his life).
Explanations of the act.
216.The Argives used to affirm that he had done this since he had murdered the Argives who had betaken themselves from the fight to the grove of Argos, after tearing them away from thence, and had burnt the grove itself, despising religion. But the Spartans think that Cleomenes was not driven to madness by any god, but that he had got into the habit of drinking wine unmixed with water, and that from that cause he had fallen into madness. This is the report about Cleomenes among the Spartans.