l other attempts to take it failed,
he set about digging a tank or reservoir, and in connection with the
tank an underground channel, by means of which he proposed to draw off
the water supply of the inhabitants. In this he was baffled by frequent
sallies of the besieged, and a continual discharge of timber and stones
into the cutting. He retaliated by the construction of a wooden tortoise
which he erected over the tank; but once more the tortoise was burnt to
a cinder in a successful night attack on the part of the men of Larisa.
These ineffectual efforts induced the ephors to send a despatch bidding
Thibron give up Larisa and march upon Caria.

(9) See "Anab." VI. vi. 12.

(10) March B.C. 399. See the final sentence of the "Anabasis."

(11) See "Anab." VII. viii. 8-16.

(12) Seventy stades S.E. of Cyme in the Aeolid. See Strabo, xiii. 621.
For the origin of the name cf. "Cyrop." VII. i. 45.

He had already reached Ephesus, and was on the point of marching into
Caria, when Dercylidas arrived to take command of his army. The new
general was a man whose genius for invention had won him the nickname of
Sisyphus. Thus it was that Thibron returned home, where on his arrival
he was fined and banished, the allies accusing him of allowing his
troops to plunder their friends.

Dercylidas was not slow to perceive and turn to account the jealousy
which subsisted between Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus. Coming to
terms with the former, he marched into the territory of the latter,
preferring, as he said, to be at war with one of the pair at a time,
rather than the two together. His hostility, indeed, to Pharnabazus was
an old story, dating back to a period during the naval command (13)
of Lysander, when he was himself governor in Abydos; where, thanks to
Pharnabazus, he had got into trouble with his superior officer, and had
been made to stand "with his shield on his arm"--a stigma on his honour
which no true Lacedaemonian would forgive, since this is the punishment
of insubordination. (14) For this reason, doubtless, Dercylidas had the
greater satisfaction in marching against Pharnabazus. From the moment he
assumed command there was a marked difference for the better between his
methods and those of his predecessor. Thus he contrived to conduct his
troops into that portion of the Aeolid which belonged to Pharnabazus,
through the heart of friendly territory without injury to the allies.

(13) Technically "navarchy," in