Page:The Children's Plutarch, Greeks.djvu/92

 the games to stop. Each race was run; each exercise was finished, as if there was nothing to do but make merry. Next day, after the names of the men slain in the battle had been learned, all who had lost any sons, brothers, or friends went about the streets looking gay and cheerful; and those who had lost no friends shut themselves in their houses as if in mourning. You see, the Spartans were proud to give their sons to the service of their fatherland, and thought it quite an honor for a man to be killed in the wars. But so many "tremblers" had fled from the battle I have spoken of that the magistrates did not dare to dress them in the patchwork coats. Erelong the enemy appeared before the walls of Sparta, and set fire to houses outside the city. It is said that no foe had trodden the soil of Sparta for six hundred years. The women looked from the walls, and saw with terror the smoke that rose from the burning villages outside. Agesilaus was most cautious. He kept his men inside the walls, and would not be tempted into sallying forth; and at last the Thebans withdrew. At one moment the king was threatened with a danger in his own fortress. A party of two hundred of his own followers gathered at a temple, as if to begin a rebellion. What was to be done? Was Agesilaus to fight his own citizens? He used his wits, and thought of a plan. Advancing with only one