Page:Xenophon by Alexander Grant.djvu/29

Rh come more hostile than even the army of the Great King."

As it was, the natives who were with Cyrus continued remarkably faithful to him, even now that it was getting rather nervous work; for they were evidently close to the King's army, and the country around them had been cut up by cavalry and the forage burnt. One noble Persian, however, by name Orontes, endeavoured at this moment to go over to Artaxerxes. This man was a born traitor and sycophant. On two previous occasions he had alternately plotted against Cyrus and whined to him for forgiveness. He now volunteered to go out on reconnaissance, and at the same time sent off a letter to the King, saying that he was going to come over to him with a thousand of the Cyreian horse. But the messenger to whom he intrusted this document took it to Cyrus. Orontes was arrested and taken into Cyrus's tent, where he was tried by a council of seven Persians and Clearchus. According to the report of Xenophon, Cyrus gravely and temperately stated the case against him, and the council unanimously condemned him to death. Orontes was led away to the tent of a confidential eunuch, and "no man afterwards saw him either alive or dead."

Cyrus now advanced cautiously for three days through the Babylonian territory. At the end of the third day's march he held a midnight review of his army, expecting that the King would give him battle next day. He found that he had a force of 12,900 Greeks and 100,000 natives. Reports of the royal