CHAPTER V.
Plistarchus the son of Leonidas died soon after succeeding to the kingdom, and Plistoanax the son of Pausanias, the hero of Platæa, succeeded him. And Plistoanax was succeeded by his son Pausanias. This is that Pausanias who led an army into Attica, ostensibly against Thrasybulus and the Athenians, but really to establish the dominion of the Thirty Tyrants who had been set over Athens by Lysander. And he conquered in an engagement the Athenians who guarded the Piræus, but directly after the battle he took his army off home again, not to bring upon Sparta the most shameful disgrace of establishing the power of unholy men. And when he returned from Athens with nothing to show for his battle, his enemies brought him to trial. Now a king of the Lacedæmonians is tried by a court composed of twenty-eight Seniors, and the Ephors, and the King of the other family. Fourteen of the Seniors and Agis, the King of the other family, condemned Pausanias, the rest of the Court acquitted him. And no long time after the Lacedæmonians gathering together an army against Thebes, the reason for which war we shall relate in our account about Agesilaus, Lysander marched into Phocis, and, having mustered the Phocians in full force, lost no time in advancing into Bœotia, and making an attack upon the fortified town Haliartus, which would not revolt from Thebes. Some Thebans however and Athenians had secretly entered the town, and they making a sally and drawing up in battle array, Lysander and several of the Lacedæmonians fell. And Pausanias, who had been collecting forces from Tegea and the rest of Arcadia, came too late to take part in the fight, and when he got to Bœotia and heard of the death of Lysander and the defeat of his army, he nevertheless marched his army to Thebes, intending to renew the fight there. But when he got there he found the Thebans drawn up in battle array against him, and it was also reported that Thrasybulus was coming up with an Athenian force; accordingly, fearing to be taken between two fires, he made a treaty with the Thebans, and buried those who had fallen in the sally from Haliartus. This conduct of his did not please the Lacedæmonians, but I praise his determination for the following reason. Well knowing that reverses always found the Lacedæmonians surrounded by a swarm of enemies, what happened after Thermopylæ and in the island of Sphacteria made him afraid of causing a third disaster. But as the citizens accused him of slowness in getting to Bœotia he did not care to stand a second trial, but the people of Tegea received him as a suppliant at the temple of Alean Athene. This temple was from time immemorial venerated throughout the Peloponnese, and afforded safety to all suppliants, as was shewn by the Lacedæmonians to Pausanias, and earlier still to Leotychides, and by the Argives to Chrysis, who all took sanctuary here, and were not demanded up. And after the voluntary exile of Pausanias, his sons Agesipolis and Cleombrotus being quite young, Aristodemus the next of kin was appointed Regent: and the success of the Lacedæmonians at Corinth was owing to his generalship. And when Agesipolis came of age and took over the kingdom, his first war was against the Argives. And as he was leading his army from Tegea into Argolis, the Argives sent an envoy to negotiate peace with him on the old conditions established among all Dorians. But he not only declined these proposals, but advanced with his army and ravaged Argolis. And there was an earthquake, but not even then would Agesipolis draw off his forces, though these tokens of Poseidon’s displeasure frightened the Lacedæmonians especially, [and also the Athenians.] And Agesipolis was now encamped under the walls of Argos, and the earthquakes ceased not, and some of the soldiers died struck by lightning, and others were dismayed by the thunder. So at last he returned from Argolis sorely against his will, and led an expedition against the Olynthians, and having been successful in battle, and taken most of the other cities in Chalcidice, and hoping to take Olynthus also, he was carried off by a sudden disease and died.