Page:History of Greece Vol IX.djvu/197

 XENOPHON IN THE SPARTAN SERVICE. 175 eilaus. Such military service would doubtless be very much to his taste ; while a residence at Athens, then subject and quies- cent, would probably be distasteful to him ; both from the habit? of command which he had contracted during the previous two years, and from feelings arising out of the death of Sokrates. After a certain interval of repose, he would be disposed to enter again upon the war against his old enemy Tissaphernes ; and his service went on when Agesilaus arrived to take the command. 1 But during the two years after this latter event, Athens be- came a party to the war against Sparta, and entered into con- junction with the king of Persia as well as with the Thebans and others ; while Xenophon, continuing his service as commander of the Cyreians, and accompanying Agesilaus from Asia back into Greece, became engaged against the Athenian troops and their Boeotian allies at the bloody battle of Koroneia. Under these circumstances, we cannot wonder that the Athenians passed sen- tence of banishment against him ; not because he had originally taken part in aid of Cyrus against Artaxerxes, nor because his political sentiments were unfriendly to democracy, as has been sometimes erroneously affirmed, but because he was now open- ly in arms, and in conspicuous command, against his own country. 3 1 See Xenoph. Ilellen. iii. 2, 7 a passage which Moras refers, I think with much probability, to Xenophon himself. The very circumstantial details, which Xenophon gives (iii, 1, 11-28) about the proceedings of Derkyllidas against Meidias in the Troad, seem also to indicate that he was serving there in person. 3 That the sentence of banishment on Xenophon was not passed by the Athenians until after the battle of Koroneia, appears plainly from Anaba- sis, v. 3, 7. This battle took place in August 394 B. c. Pausanias also will be found in harmony with this statement, as to the irne of the banishment. 'E $7/ d 6 SevoQuv VTTO 'A.^vaiuv, uj- iirl /3aa- tkea TWV Tlepauv, aty'iGiv evvovv ovra, arpareiag /usTaa%(JV Kvpy TroAe/ztoTarw rov STI/J.OV (iv, 6,4). Now it was not until 396 or 395 B. c., that the Persian king began to manifest the least symptoms of good-will towards Athens ; and not until the battle of Knidus (a little before the oattle of Koroneia in the same year), that he testified his good-will by con- spicuous and effective service. If, therefore, the motive of the Athenians to banish Xenophon arose out of the good feeling on the part of the king of Persia toward them, the banishment could not have taken place before 895 B. c., and is not likely to have taken place until after 394 B. c. ; which is the intimation of Xenophon himself as above.