Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/447

 ARTAXERXES. 439 humanity, sacrificing to the memory of Cyrus the king's faithful friends and eunuchs. Now after that Tisaphernes had circumvented and by a false oath had betrayed Clearchus and the other com- manders, and, taking them, had sent them bound in chains to the king, Ctesias says that he was asked by Clearchus to supply him with a comb ; and that when he had it, and had combed his head with it, he was much pleased with this good office, and gave him a ring, which mi«?ht be a token of the obligation to his relatives and friends in Sparta; and that the engraving upon this signet was a set of Caryatides dancing/-^ He tells us that the soldiers, his fellow captives, used to purloin a part of the allowance of food sent to Clearchus, giving him but little of it ; which thing Ctesias says he rectified, causing a better allowance to be conveyed to him, and that a separate share should be distributed to the soldiers by themselves; adding that he ministered to and supplied him thus by the interest and at the instance of Parysatis. And there being a portion of ham sent daily with his other food to Cleai'chus, she, he says, advised and in- structed him, that he ought to bury a small knife in the meat, and thus send it to his friend, and not leave his fate to be determined by the king's cruelty; which he, how- ever, he says, was afraid to do. However, Artaxerxes consented to the entreaties of his mother, and promised her with an oath that he would spare Clearchus; but afterwards, at the instigation of Statira, he put every one of them to death except Menon. And thencefor- ward, he says, Parysatis watched her advantage against Statira, arid made up poison for her ; not a very probable in Laconia sacred to Artemis and monian maidens hold yearly dances, the nymphs, where there was an and perform a particular dance of image of Artemis Caryatid. Here, the country. Pausanias, III., 10.
 * Carya, or Caryse, was a spot continues Pausanias, the Laceda?-