e gain?"

"Glory to Sparta."

Then in the red morning half-light, folding his big hands across his
mailed chest, Leonidas looked from one to another of the little circle.
His voice was still in unemotional gutturals when he delivered the longest
speech of his life.

"We of Sparta were ordered to defend this pass. The order shall be obeyed.
The rest of you must go away--all save the Thebans, whose loyalty I
distrust. Tell Leotychides, my colleague at Sparta, to care for Gorgo my
wife and Pleistarchus my young son, and to remember that Themistocles the
Athenian loves Hellas and gives sage counsel. Pay Strophius of Epidaurus
the three hundred drachmae I owe him for my horse. Likewise--"

A second breathless scout interrupted with the tidings that Hydarnes was
on the last stretches of his road. The chief arose, drew the helmet down
across his face, and motioned with his spear.

"Go!" he ordered.

The Corinthian would have seized his hand. He shook him off. At Leonidas's
elbow was standing the trumpeter for his three hundred from Lacedaemon.

"Blow!" commanded the chief.

The keen blast cut the air. The chief deliberately wrapped the purple
mantle around himself and adjusted the gold circlet over his helmet, for
on the day of battle a Lacedaemonian was wont to wear his best. And even as
he waited there came to him out of the midst of the panic-stricken,
dissolving camp, one by one, tall men in armour, who took station beside
him--the men of Sparta who had abided steadfast while all others prepared
to flee, waiting for the word of the chief.

Presently they stood, a long black line, motionless, silent, whilst the
other divisions filed in swift fear past. Only the Thespians--let their
names not be forgotten--chose to share the Laconians' glory and their doom
and took their stand behind the line of Leonidas. With them stood also the
Thebans, but compulsion held them, and they tarried merely to desert and
pawn their honour for their lives.

More couriers. Hydarnes's van was in sight of Alpeni now. The retreat of
the Corinthians, Tegeans, and other Hellenes became a run; only once
Euboulus and his fellow-captains turned to the silent warrior that stood
leaning on his spear.

"Are you resolved on madness, Leonidas?"

"_Chaire!_ Farewell!" was the only answer he gave them. Euboulus sought no
more, but faced another figure, hitherto almost forgotten in the confusion
of the retreat.

"Haste, Master Deserter, the Barba