The Two Great Retreats of History Part 1

The Two Great Retreats of History.

by George Grote and Count Philippe-Paul de Segur.

PREFATORY NOTE.

The two following selections contain, first, Grote's account of the Retreat of the Ten Thousand Greeks, taken from his "History of Greece,"

and, secondly, an abridgment of Count Segur's narrative of Napoleon's retreat from Russia.

Grote's History, based on Xenophon's, is given entire, with the exception that, in a very few instances, some slight verbal change has been made in order to better adapt the work to school use.

Two maps are furnished, an introduction is prefixed to each selection, and all needed notes subjoined.

D. H. M.

SKETCH OF CYRUS THE YOUNGER.

(INTRODUCTORY TO THE RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND GREEKS.)

In the year 423 B.C. Darius Nothus ascended the throne of Persia. That country was then the greatest empire in the world, and had an area nearly equal to that of the United States. The capital of this seemingly powerful realm was the ancient city of Babylon on the lower Euphrates.

Here the Great King, as he was styled, had his princ.i.p.al palace, from which he issued orders to his twenty or more satraps or governors whose provinces extended in name at least from the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean to the banks of the Indus, and from the Persian Gulf to the Black Sea.

Darius had married his half-sister Parysatis, a high-spirited but unscrupulous woman, by whom he had two sons, destined to be known in history. The eldest was Artaxerxes, a youth of but little character; and the second, Cyrus, who inherited the decided qualities of his mother. In order to distinguish him from Cyrus the Great, the founder of the Persian Empire, who died more than a hundred years earlier, he is commonly called Cyrus the Younger.

He was his mother's favorite, and as he was born after Darius a.s.sumed the crown, while Artaxerxes was born before that date, Parysatis seems to have encouraged Cyrus to consider himself the true heir to the throne, since he was in fact the _king's_ eldest son. Through her influence he was appointed satrap of Lydia and the adjacent provinces of western Asia Minor when he was but sixteen. This position, since it made him the military ruler of that populous and wealthy section of country, was one of great importance, and doubtless had no small influence in shaping the young man's future career.

In 404 Cyrus was summoned from Sardis, the capital of Lydia, to Babylon, and shortly after, his father died, leaving his crown to Artaxerxes, who, from his remarkable memory which appears to have been his chief characteristic, got the t.i.tle of Artaxerxes Mnemon. But Cyrus certainly was not deficient in this mental quality, for he seems to have remembered his mother's suggestions about his being the rightful heir to the throne so well, that at the coronation of Artaxerxes he plotted his a.s.sa.s.sination; or at least, Tissaphernes, a neighboring satrap,[1]

accused him of it. Cyrus, who appears to have had no adequate defence to make, was forthwith arrested and would probably have been summarily put to death--for in Persia the law's delays were unknown--had not Parysatis interfered. Realizing her son's imminent peril, she rushed forward and, clasping him in her arms, wound her long flowing hair about him, and pressed his neck to hers in such a way that the executioner must have beheaded her with the same stroke with which he decapitated Cyrus.

The prayers and entreaties of Parysatis saved the young man's life, and he was even permitted to return to Sardis and resume his power. He went; but with no intention of remaining in that subordinate position. Not only was he resolved to be revenged on Tissaphernes, but he was equally determined to overthrow the mild Artaxerxes and convince him of the mistake of yielding to a woman's tears.

Cyrus had learned from his residence on the Mediterranean coast, how far superior Greek soldiers were to the troops of Persia. The former would not only fight from patriotic motives, but what was more, they would readily fight outside of Greece, if they were paid well for it; the latter would only fight when they were flogged to it, and officers had to carry whips to drive them into battle by the sting of the lash.

Under the pretext that he was about to engage in a local and private war with his enemy Tissaphernes, Cyrus managed to gradually collect an army of about ten thousand Greeks whom Klearchus, an ex-governor of Byzantium, hired for him. These ten thousand were the real core of the expedition, though in addition a hundred thousand Asiatics were to form the bulk of it. With this force the young satrap believed that he could take Babylon and with it that t.i.tle of Great King which he coveted. It was true that Artaxerxes would meet him with an army of ten men to his one; but, as Cyrus said, mere "numbers and noise" did not tell on the battle-field, and "numbers and noise" were all that the Persian sovereign had to rely on.

When all was ready, Cyrus set out from Sardis on his memorable march in the spring of 401. Among the Greeks was a volunteer named Xenophon, who had been persuaded to go by his friend Proxenus, a general in the army of Cyrus. Xenophon, as we shall see, eventually saved his countrymen from destruction, and became not only the leader, but the historian of the expedition.

With the exception of Klearchus, none of the army seem to have known the real object of the campaign, but supposed that Cyrus was going to attack the Pisidians, robber tribes that inhabited the mountainous country southeast of Sardis. Artaxerxes appears to have been equally in the dark, and though he knew Cyrus was advancing in the direction of Babylon, he thought that his ultimate purpose was to make war on Tissaphernes, and so gave himself no more trouble about the matter.

All went well with Cyrus and his Greek mercenaries until they reached that city of Tarsus in Cilicia, which was later to become famous as the birthplace of the apostle Paul. When they reached that place, Xenophon's countrymen saw that they had been deceived, and that Cyrus evidently had some greater foe in view than the rough banditti of the Pisidian highlands. At first they were on the point of mutinying, and of stoning Klearchus to give proper emphasis to their feelings; but sober second thought showed them that it was doubtful whether they would gain anything by such a course. Klearchus, who was quite equal to the emergency, bade them reflect that they were now a long distance from home, and that Cyrus had it in his power to make it difficult for them to get back without his permission. Next, they were promised a decided increase of pay if they would keep on. These considerations so influenced the Greeks that they finally resolved to continue their march and take the chances of war. Cyrus still refused to divulge his real purpose; and though there cannot be much doubt that the Ten Thousand felt pretty reasonably certain what it was, yet they probably believed he had chances enough of success to make it worth their while to run the risk with him.

Accordingly the army resumed their forward movement, following the trend of the coast round the Gulf of Issus, and then striking southeasterly again, until some time in the summer they reached and crossed the Euphrates at Thapsacus. From that point they marched down the left bank of the river, through the hilly desert of Arabia, toward the great city of Babylon. Early in September they reached a point on the Tigris, nearly opposite Bagdad, and about two days' march from Kunaxa, a place not very far northwest of the Persian capital.

Up to this time Cyrus had met with no opposition, though he was daily expecting to see the advance-guard of his brother's army. Before going further he thought it prudent to hold a grand review of his troops, which he did at midnight, as it was now reported that Artaxerxes, with an army of over a million, was coming to give him battle.

But the million did not make their appearance, and so Cyrus decided to keep on until he should encounter them. The next day the invading army reached a trench which had evidently been recently dug to obstruct their advance. It stretched across the plain between the Euphrates and the Tigris, in connection with the ruins of the old Median Wall, built probably in the days of Nebuchadnezzar as one of the defences of Babylon. This trench was eighteen feet deep, thirty feet wide, and upwards of forty miles in length; it stopped short of the Euphrates by only twenty feet. Over that narrow strip of ground, which the Persian king might easily have held with a small number of resolute men, the Cyreian forces pa.s.sed, with no one to hinder them. The great trench, on which so much labor had been expended, was, therefore, not only useless as a defence to Artaxerxes, but it was a positive encouragement to Cyrus and his men, for it revealed the inefficiency and the cowardice of the Persians. The whole army now moved rapidly forward, confident of an easy victory, many even supposing that Artaxerxes would make no stand at all, but abandon his capital to them. The Great King, however, was not so hopelessly pusillanimous as that; for, when Cyrus reached Kunaxa, scouts brought word that the enemy's hosts were not far behind. This time the intelligence was correct. That very afternoon a great cloud of white dust rolled up from the plain, and as it kept advancing the invaders caught sight of the flash of brazen armor and a forest of spears.

When all was ready for the battle to begin, the Greeks, not waiting to be attacked, charged on the run against the Persian left wing. The Persians, who seem to have thought that on such an occasion absence of body was a good deal better than presence of mind, waited just long enough to hear the Greeks give a fierce shout to Mars, accompanied by a significant clatter of spears and s.h.i.+elds. That satisfied them, and, turning like a flock of frightened sheep, they ran for their lives.

Cyrus, who had refused to put on a helmet, now dashed into the fight with uncovered head, making straight for King Artaxerxes, who occupied the centre of his army. "I see the man!" he cried, and, hurling his lance, he struck and slightly wounded the Great King; but that fratricidal blow was the last, for just then a javelin pierced Cyrus under the eye, and he fell from his horse and was slain. His head and right hand were then cut off to serve as a warning to traitors. The native or Asiatic troops, seeing the disaster, fled, and did not stop till they had reached a former camp eight miles away.

Meanwhile the victorious Ten Thousand, knowing nothing of what had happened to Cyrus, pursued the Persians as long as light lasted; then when the sun had set they returned to find that their camp had been plundered by the enemy, and that they must go to bed supperless. It was not until sunrise of the next day that they learned that Cyrus was dead; that their companions in arms had fled; and that they were left a mere handful of men without a leader, and without provisions, in the heart of the enemy's country.

How to retreat from such a position was the supreme question. They could not return the way they came, for that road led them through the desert, where it would be impossible to get food. If they were to get back alive they must take the northern route to the sh.o.r.es of the Black Sea. This would lead them through a fertile but rough country, in which they would have to find their way as best they could across rivers and over mountains, hara.s.sed by the Persians in the rear, and encountering savage tribes who would dispute their progress. At the shortest such a march would be about six hundred miles even in an air line, with prospect of something like six hundred more before they reached the Mediterranean.

After many delays, this latter course was the one they finally resolved to take, and owing to Xenophon's courage and resolution it turned out successfully.

After eight months of wandering, hards.h.i.+ps, and peril, they all came in sight of the Euxine, and perhaps no s.h.i.+pwrecked sailors clinging to a raft ever cried "Land!" "Land!" with more joy than those Greeks who had climbed a hill-top shouted "The Sea!" "The Sea!"

Thanks to their own bravery, to their able leader, and finally to Persian vacillation and cowardice, this little army had now reached a place of safety. It was long, however, before they got back to their native country, and when they did, they were not to arrive at its sh.o.r.es asleep, on s.h.i.+pboard, as the much wandering and storm-tossed Ulysses came to his beloved Ithaca.

It is doubtful, indeed, how many of them ever got back to their Spartan or Athenian homes, for we know that most of them could not make up their minds to live quiet lives of peace again; but preferred fighting in behalf of the independence of the Ionian cities which Greece had planted on the coast of Asia Minor.

Such was the Retreat of the Ten Thousand. If we may accept the judgment of Rollin, a once noted historian, it has never had a parallel in history. If we consider its results, it certainly merits all that Rollin claims for it, for it convinced the Greek people that the apparent power of the Persian empire was utterly unreal. They saw that, as Cyrus had said, its only strength was in "numbers and noise." This conviction grew, and two generations after Xenophon's return, it led to that grand invasion of Persia by Alexander the Great which was to revolutionize the ancient world.

What, then, had the retreat of the Greeks accomplished? First, it proved that ten thousand men not afraid to die are worth more than a million who lack that courage; and next, though it was a retreat, yet it suggested that advance which eventually spread the Greek language, Greek culture and Greek civilization in countries where they were before unknown.

D. H. M.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Tissaphernes was a satrap of Caria, a province of Asia Minor south of Lydia.

RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND GREEKS.

- 1. Effect of the death of Cyrus on the Greeks; they resolve to retreat.

The first triumphant feeling of the Greek troops at Kunaxa[2] was exchanged, as soon as they learnt the death of Cyrus, for dismay and sorrow; accompanied by unavailing repentance for the venture into which he and Klearchus had seduced them. Probably Klearchus himself too repented, and with good reason, of having displayed, in his manner of fighting the battle, so little foresight, and so little regard either to the injunctions or to the safety of Cyrus. Nevertheless he still maintained the tone of a victor in the field, and after expressions of grief for the fate of the young prince, desired Prokles and Glus to return to Ariaeus, with the reply, that the Greeks on their side were conquerors without any enemy remaining; that they were about to march onward against Artaxerxes; and that if Ariaeus would join them, they would place him on the throne which had been intended for Cyrus. While this reply was conveyed to Ariaeus by his particular friend Menon along with the messengers, the Greeks procured a meal as well as they could, having no bread, by killing some of the baggage animals; and by kindling fire to cook their meat, from the arrows, the wooden Egyptian s.h.i.+elds which had been thrown away on the field, and the baggage carts.

Before any answer could be received from Ariaeus, heralds[3] appeared coming from Artaxerxes; among them being Phalinus, a Greek from Zakynthus, and the Greek surgeon Ktesias of Knidus, who was in the service of the Persian king. Phalinus, an officer of some military experience and in the confidence of Tissaphernes, addressed himself to the Greek commanders; requiring them on the part of the King, since he was now victor and had slain Cyrus, to surrender their arms and appeal to his mercy. To this summons, painful in the extreme to a Grecian ear, Klearchus replied that it was not the practice for victorious men to lay down their arms. Being then called away to examine the sacrifice[4]

which was going on, he left the interview to the other officers, who met the summons of Phalinus by an emphatic negative. "If the King thinks himself strong enough to ask for our arms unconditionally, let him come and try to seize them."--"The King (rejoined Phalinus) thinks that you are in his power, being in the midst of his territory, hemmed in by impa.s.sable rivers, and encompa.s.sed by his innumerable subjects."--"Our arms and our valor are all that remain to us (replied a young Athenian); we shall not be fools enough to hand over to you our only remaining treasures, but shall employ them still to have a fight for _your_ treasure." But though several spoke in this resolute tone, there were not wanting others disposed to encourage a negotiation; saying that they had been faithful to Cyrus as long as he lived, and would now be faithful to Artaxerxes, if he wanted their services in Egypt or anywhere else. In the midst of this parley Klearchus returned, and was requested by Phalinus to return a final answer on behalf of all. He at first asked the advice of Phalinus himself; appealing to the common feeling of h.e.l.lenic[5] patriotism, and antic.i.p.ating, with very little judgment, that the latter would encourage the Greeks in holding out. "If (replied Phalinus) I saw one chance out of ten thousand in your favor, in the event of a contest with the King, I should advise you to refuse the surrender of your arms. But as there is no chance of safety for you against the King's consent, I recommend you to look out for safety in the only quarter where it presents itself." Sensible of the mistake which he had made in asking the question, Klearchus rejoined--"That is _your_ opinion: now report our answer. We think we shall be better friends to the King, if we are to be his friends,--or more effective enemies, if we are to be his enemies,--with our arms, than without them." Phalinus, in retiring, said that the King proclaimed a truce so long as they remained in their present position--but war, if they moved, either onward or backward. And to this Klearchus acceded, without declaring which he intended to do.

Shortly after the departure of Phalinus, the envoys despatched to Ariaeus returned; communicating his reply that the Persian grandees would never tolerate any pretensions on his part to the crown, and that he intended to depart early the next morning on his return; if the Greeks wished to accompany him, they must join him during the night. In the evening, Klearchus, convening the generals and the captains, acquainted them that the morning sacrifice had been of a nature to forbid their marching against the King--a prohibition, of which he now understood the reason, from having since learnt that the King was on the other side of the Tigris, and therefore out of their reach--but that it was favorable for rejoining Ariaeus. He gave directions accordingly for a night-march back along the Euphrates, to the station where they had pa.s.sed the last night but one prior to the battle. The other Grecian generals, without any formal choice of Klearchus as chief, tacitly acquiesced in his orders, from a sense of his superior decision and experience, in an emergency when no one knew what to propose. The night-march was successfully accomplished, so that they joined Ariaeus at the preceding station about midnight; not without the alarming symptom, however, that Miltokythes the Thracian deserted to the King at the head of 340 of his countrymen, partly horse, partly foot.

The first proceeding of the Grecian generals was to exchange solemn oaths of reciprocal fidelity and fraternity with Ariaeus. According to an ancient and impressive practice, a bull, a wolf, a boar, and a ram, were all slain, and their blood allowed to run into the hollow of a s.h.i.+eld; in which the Greek generals dipped a sword, and Ariaeus, with his chief companions, a spear. The latter, besides the promise of alliance, engaged also to guide the Greeks in good faith down to the Asiatic coast. Klearchus immediately began to ask what route he proposed to take; whether to return by that along which they had come up, or by any other. To this Ariaeus replied, that the road along which they had marched was impracticable for retreat, from the utter want of provisions through seventeen days of desert; but that he intended to choose another road, which, though longer, would be sufficiently productive to furnish them with provisions. There was, however, a necessity (he added), that the first two or three days' marches should be of extreme length, in order that they might get out of the reach of the king's forces, who would hardly be able to overtake them afterwards with any considerable numbers.

They had now come 93 days' march from Ephesus, or 90 from Sardis. The distance from Sardis to Kunaxa is 1464 miles. There had been at least 96 days of rest, enjoyed at various places, so that the total of time elapsed must have at least been 189 days, or a little more than half a year: but it was probably greater, since some intervals of rest are not specified in number of days.

How to retrace their steps was now the problem, apparently insoluble. As to the military force of Persia in the field, indeed, not merely the easy victory at Kunaxa, but still more the undisputed march throughout so long a s.p.a.ce, left them no serious apprehension. In spite of this great extent, population, and riches, they had been allowed to pa.s.s through the most difficult and defensible country, and to ford the broad Euphrates, without a blow: nay, the King had shrunk from defending the long trench which he had specially caused to be dug for the protection of Babylonia. But the difficulties which stood between them and their homes were of a very different character. How were they to find their way back, or obtain provisions, in defiance of a numerous hostile cavalry, which, not without efficiency even in a pitched battle, would be most formidable in opposing their retreat? The line of their upward march had all been planned, with supplies furnished, by Cyrus:--yet even under such advantages, supplies had been on the point of failing, in one part of the march. They were now, for the first time, called upon to think and provide for themselves; without knowledge of either roads or distances--without trustworthy guides--without any one to furnish or even to indicate supplies--and with a territory all hostile, traversed by rivers which they had no means of crossing. Klearchus himself knew nothing of the country, nor of any other river except the Euphrates; nor does he indeed in his heart seem to have conceived retreat as practicable without the consent of the King. The reader who casts his eye on a map of Asia, and imagines the situation of this Greek division on the left bank of the Euphrates, near the parallel of lat.i.tude 33 30'--will hardly be surprised at any measure of despair, on the part either of general or soldiers. And we may add that Klearchus had not even the advantage of such a map, or probably of any map at all, to enable him to shape his course.

In this dilemma, the first and most natural impulse was to consult Ariaeus; who (as has been already stated) p.r.o.nounced, with good reason, that return by the same road was impracticable; and promised to conduct them home by another road--longer indeed, yet better supplied.