fortunate in his attack on Persia. If it was the object of the priesthood to give a dubious answer to this question, they could not possibly have answered the further question—whether he should take allies to help him,—with the command that he must take the "most powerful of the Hellenes." At that time the Spartans were beyond all question the most powerful of the Hellenes. How could the priests of Delphi, who owing to the close connection in which they stood to Sparta were well aware that the oracle would be a law to that state, send the Spartans to defeat and destruction, if they foresaw such a thing?[20] That at Delphi, owing to the impression made on the Greeks by the power, greatness, and splendour of the Lydian empire, the remote and unknown Persians were underrated is quite probable, and indeed sufficiently proved by the subsequent embassy of the Spartans to Cyrus. The first response did not entirely remove the doubts of Crœsus, so he asked a second time—"whether his dominion would continue long," and this question received a thoroughly satisfactory answer, i. e. an answer which, in the obscure form purposely adopted by oracles, deferred the defeat of the Lydians to distant times, and impossible conditions.

Crœsus had not waited for the oracle to provide himself with sufficient support in his undertaking. Yet it suited him to enter into negotiations with the Spartans, who after a series of successful contests against the Pisatae, Argos, and some cantons of Arcadia, had obtained the foremost place in the Peloponnesus. At an earlier time Crœsus had sent the Spartans a considerable present for the erection of a statue of Apollo, and their grateful feeling towards him would certainly be strengthened by the authority of the Delphian oracle, whose response was known to the Spartans, as Herodotus expressly states (p. 9). Even in Xenophon's account they declared themselves ready to send auxiliary troops to Sardis.[21] Crœsus did not stop here: he sent Eurybatus to obtain yet more troops in Hellas. Herodotus told us that Crœsus was in league with Egypt and Babylonia against Persia before he made the treaty with Sparta. Amasis, king of Egypt, had determined to support Crœsus, perhaps in return for the service which Gyges had once rendered to Psammetichus, when he sent soldiers to aid him against his fellow-princes, the vassals of Assyria (III. 301). The attitude of Babylonia must be decisive. If Lydia and Babylonia, who were both equally threatened by the new power, united in a firm military alliance, they might hope to contend successfully with the prince of the Persians. At Babylon, after the accession of Nabonetus in the year 555 B.C., the royal power was again in strong hands. According to Herodotus, there was a league between Crœsus and Nabonetus against Persia. Xenophon represents Crœsus as coming to the aid of the king of Babylon. Justin states that Cyrus was at war with Babylon when Crœsus attacked him; Cyrus drove him back, came to terms with Babylonia, and carried the war to Lydia. From all this we may assume that Lydia and Babylonia were united, and that they undertook the war against Persia in common.

Crœsus then might consider that careful preparations had been made for his enterprise, when in the year 549 B.C., and as we may pre-suppose with certainty, in the spring of the year, he took the field.[22] He crossed the Halys, and directed his course to the commanding plateau of Pteria, which Herodotus rightly regards as the strongest position in those regions. He took Pteria, and the neighbouring cities, and laid waste the land, with the view no doubt of making it impossible for the Persian army to support itself. There he remained, either because he shrank from going further, and seeking a decisive conflict at a distance from his own borders, or because he expected a diversion on the part of the Babylonians.

The attack of Crœsus was unexpected by Cyrus. He was also engaged with another enemy. These conclusions we may draw from the fact that it was autumn according to Herodotus before the armies stood opposite each other. Herodotus further remarks that Babylon, the Bactrians, and the Sacæ caused Cyrus to return out of Asia Minor.[23] By lingering in Cappadocia Crœsus had given Cyrus time to collect his army and add to it the troops of the countries through which he passed on his march to the West. With his usual circumspection he sought to avail himself of the weak points in his enemy. He sent ambassadors to the Greek cities subject to Crœsus, on the West coast, to urge them to revolt that he might raise up enemies in the rear of the Lydians. Crœsus awaited the attack of the Persians in the neighbourhood of the conquered Pteria. Herodotus tells that the contest was severe. In spite of the considerable superiority of numbers on the Persian side, the Lydians did not give way. The battle was not decided, when night came on. In truth the victory was with the Lydians, whose bravery made such an impression on Cyrus that he would not renew the battle. But the timidity of Crœsus put in his hands all the advantages of a victory. After the bloody day it seemed better to Crœsus, as is the case with men of weaker mould, not to risk everything, but to put off the final decision; he thought it safer to retire, in order to strengthen his army and so fight with equal numbers. Under the supposition that Cyrus would not venture to advance "as the winter was at the gate," he retired to Lydia. He intended to use the winter for collecting the forces of his confederates at Sardis. He requested Nabonetus of Babylon, the Lacedæmonians and the Pharaoh, to embark their forces on the Syrian coast, the Laconian Gulf, and at the mouths of the Nile, in time for them to reach Sardis in the fifth month, i. e. in the early spring. To the want of resolution which had suggested the thought of retreat, Crœsus, when returning, added another great act of folly. He disbanded "the mercenaries" of his army (Alyattes had made use of hired soldiers), bidding them come again to Sardis in the spring, and returned home with the Lydians alone. Such a series of blunders could not go unpunished in the presence of a general like Cyrus. In no case could he remain in the devastated country of the Cappadocians. He must go either forwards or backwards. To choose the latter was voluntarily to abandon the advantages which the retreat of Crœsus offered. Yet he did not content himself with slowly following the unexpected retreat of the Lydians. He appears to have been informed of the plans of Crœsus by Eurybatus of Ephesus, whose treason is not only mentioned by Diodorus after Ephorus, but alluded to by Plato, Demosthenes, and Aeschines.[24] By a rapid march upon the enemy's metropolis Cyrus intended to cripple the Lydian forces, hit Crœsus in the very centre of his