ians 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 shores 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, harassed 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, hardships, and peril, they all came in
sight of the Euxine, and perhaps no shipwrecked 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 shores
asleep, on shipboard, 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
claim