ing themselves, was defeated and
dispersed, and that Cyrus himself was slain, and to summon them to
surrender at once and unconditionally to the conquerors.

The Greeks refused to surrender. They formed themselves immediately
into a compact and solid body, fortified themselves as well as they
could in their position, and prepared for a desperate defense. There
were about ten thousand of them left, and the Persians seem to have
considered them too formidable to be attacked. The Persians entered
into negotiations with them, offering them certain terms on which they
would be allowed to return peaceably into Greece. These negotiations
were protracted from day to day for two or three weeks, the Persians
treacherously using toward them a friendly tone, and evincing a
disposition to treat them in a liberal and generous manner. This threw
the Greeks off their guard, and finally the Persians contrived to get
Clearchus and the leading Greek generals into their power at a feast,
and then they seized and murdered them, or, as they would perhaps term
it, _executed_ them as rebels and traitors. When this was reported in
the Grecian camp, the whole army was thrown at first into the utmost
consternation. They found themselves two thousand miles from home, in
the heart of a hostile country, with an enemy nearly a hundred times
their own number close upon them, while they themselves were without
provisions, without horses, without money; and there were deep rivers,
and rugged mountains, and every other possible physical obstacle to be
surmounted, before they could reach their own frontiers. If they
surrendered to their enemies, a hopeless and most miserable slavery
was their inevitable doom.

Under these circumstances, Xenophon, according to his own story,
called together the surviving officers in the camp, urged them not to
despair, and recommended that immediate measures should be taken for
commencing a march toward Greece. He proposed that they should elect
commanders to take the places of those who had been killed, and that,
under their new organization, they should immediately set out on
their return. These plans were adopted. He himself was chosen as
the commanding general, and under his guidance the whole force was
conducted safely through the countless difficulties and dangers which
beset their way, though they had to defend themselves, at every step
of their progress, from an enemy so vastly more numerous than they,
and which