END OF THE MARCH
[401-399 B.C.]
At length, four months after the battle of Cunaxa, they entered Trapezus, the first Greek city they came to, and celebrated their safe arrival among their kindred with sacrifices and games. From this point they continued their retreat, some by sea and some by land. But when the air of Greece breathed upon them once more and the fear of the barbarians was overpast, discord and greed crept in amongst them, and they proved such troublesome guests that even the inhabitants of the Greek colonies along the southern shore of the Black Sea tried to get rid of them as speedily as possible. Making many raids in search of booty and suffering no small loss on the way, they came through Bithynia to Byzantium, and thence proceeded to the interior of Thrace, where Seuthes, who then ruled the country, engaged the rude and bellicose adventurers into whom the remnant of the Ten Thousand had degenerated. For some months they assisted him to extend his sovereignty over various Thracian tribes. Finally they were enlisted by the Spartans, who were then at war with the Persian empire, and so went back to Asia.
The remnant of the whole force amounted to six thousand men, the distance they had traversed from the battle-field of Cunaxa to about the middle of the south coast of the Black Sea to not less than two thousand miles. This they had done in eight months. But the whole march, from Ephesus to Cunaxa and thence to this region on the Black Sea, occupied fifteen months (from February, 401, to the beginning of June, 400 B.C.), and the march from the latter place to the spot where they joined the Spartan army in Asia Minor (March, 399 B.C.) took nine months.
Xenophon, who had rendered the most conspicuous service on this memorable march, returned to Greece after he had led the remnant of the Ten Thousand to the Spartan army in Asia Minor. Some years later he took part in the expedition against the Persians conducted by his friend the Spartan king, Agesilaus, and after the return of the latter fought at the battle of Coronea. While he was in Asia with Agesilaus he was banished from his native city by a vote of the people, because he had taken part in a war against the Persian king, who was at that time an ally of Athens, and because his aristocratic opinions and his preference for the political system of Sparta had earned him the hatred of the demagogues and the jealousy of the populace. After the battle of Coronea he accompanied Agesilaus to Sparta and remained there for a while, and then settled on a country estate in the neighbourhood of Olympia, which he had either received as a gift from the Spartans or bought with the great wealth he had amassed in Asia. Here and in Corinth he wrote some part of his works. The sentence of banishment from Athens was soon repealed, but it does not seem probable that he ever returned to his native city, though at a later time he induced his son Gryllus to take part in one of the military expeditions of the Athenians. Gryllus fell at the battle of Mantinea, and the story goes that the news of his death was brought to his aged father as he was standing by an altar, sacrificing to the gods. Xenophon was crowned with a garland, in accordance with the Greek custom of wearing wreaths upon festal occasions. He immediately took it from his head, but received the news of his son’s death with the utmost composure, saying that he knew he had only begotten a mortal. When he was told that Gryllus had fought with great valour, he put the garland on again, finished his sacrifice, and added to it a prayer in which he gave thanks to the gods for his son’s worthiness. Xenophon died at Corinth in (355 B.C.) the ninetieth year of his age.[e]