d a dangerous
discontent which weakened the power of the State.

(M610) The Lacedaemonian naval power, at this crisis, was seriously
threatened by the union of the Persian and Athenian fleet under Conon.
That remarkable man had escaped from the disaster of AEgospotami with eight
triremes, and sought the shelter of Cyprus, governed by his friend
Evagoras, where he remained until the war between Sparta and the Persians
gave a new direction to his enterprising genius. He joined Pharnabazus,
enraged with the Spartans on account of the invasion of his satrapy by
Lysander and Agesilaus, and by him was intrusted with the command of the
Persian fleet. He succeeded in detaching Rhodes from the Spartan alliance,
and gained, some time after, a decisive victory over Pisander--the Spartan
admiral, off Cnidus, which weakened the power of Sparta on the sea, B.C.
394. More than half of the Spartan ships were captured and destroyed.

(M611) This great success emboldened Thebes and other States to throw off
the Spartan yoke. Lysander was detached from his command at the Hellespont
to act against Boeotia, while Pausanias conducted an army from the
Peloponnesus. The Thebans, threatened by the whole power of Sparta,
applied to Athens, and Athens responded, no longer under the control of
the Thirty Tyrants. Lysander was killed before Haliartus, an irreparable
blow to Sparta, since he was her ablest general. Pausanias was compelled
to evacuate Boeotia, and the enemies of Sparta took courage. An alliance
between Athens, Corinth, Thebes, and Argos was now made to carry on war
against Sparta.

(M612) Thebes at this time steps from the rank of a secondary power, and
gradually rises to the rank of an ascendant city. Her leading citizen was
Ismenias, one of the great organizers of the anti-Spartan movement--the
precursor of Pelopidas and Epaminondas. He conducted successful operations
in the northern part of Boeotia, and captured Heracleia.

(M613) Such successes induced the Lacedaemonians to recall Agesilaus from
Asia, and to concentrate all their forces against this new alliance, of
which Thebes and Corinth were then the most powerful cities. The allied
forces were also considerable--some twenty-four thousand hoplites, besides
light troops and cavalry, and these were mustered at Corinth, where they
took up a defensive position. The Lacedaemonians advanced to attack them,
and gained an indecisive victory, B.C. 394, which secured their ascendency