very many deep, the enemy will stretch beyond us on both sides,
and will employ the parts that outreach us in any way they may think
proper; and if we advance only a few deep, it would not be at all
surprising if our line be broken through by showers of missiles and men
falling upon us in large bodies. If this happen in any part, it will be
ill for the whole extent of the line. I think, then, that having formed
our companies in columns, we should keep them so far apart from each
other as that the last companies on each side may be beyond the enemy's
wings. Thus our extreme companies will both outflank the line of the
enemy, and, as we march in file, the bravest of our men will close with
the enemy first, and wherever the ascent is easiest, there each division
will direct its course. Nor will it be easy for the enemy to penetrate
into the intervening spaces when there are companies on each side, nor
will it be easy to break through a column as it advances; while, if any
one of the companies be hard pressed, the neighboring one will support
it; and if but one of the companies can by any path attain the summit,
the enemy will no longer stand their ground."

This plan was approved, and they threw the companies into columns.
Xenophon, riding along from the right wing to the left, said: "Soldiers,
the enemy whom you see before you is now the only obstacle to hinder us
from being where we have long been eager to be. These, if we can, we
must eat up alive."

When the men were all in their places, and they had formed the companies
into columns, there were about eighty companies of heavy-armed men, and
each company consisted of about eighty men. The peltasts and archers
they divided into three bodies, each about six hundred men, one of which
they placed beyond the left wing, another beyond the right, and the
third in the centre. The generals then desired the soldiers to make
their vows to the gods; and having made them, and sung the paean, they
moved forward. Chirisophus and Xenophon, and the peltasts that they had
with them, who were beyond the enemy's flanks, pushed on; and the enemy,
observing their motions, and hurrying forward to receive them, was drawn
off, some to the right and others to the left, and left a great void in
the centre of the line; when the peltasts in the Arcadian division, whom
Aeschines the Acarnanian commanded, seeing the Colchians separate, ran
forward in all haste, thinking that they were taking to fli