Panegyricus (142-145)

Again, in the Rhodian War,[*] the King had the good will of the allies of Lacedaemon because of the harshness with which they were governed, he availed himself of the help of our seamen; and at the head of his forces was Conon, who was the most competent of our generals, who possessed more than any other the confidence of the Hellenes, and who was the most experienced in the hazards of war; yet, although the King had such a champion to help him in the war, he suffered the fleet which bore the brunt of the defense of Asia to be bottled up for three years by only an hundred ships, and for fifteen months he deprived the soldiers of their pay; and the result would have been, had it depended upon the King alone, that they would have been disbanded more than once; but, thanks to their commander[*] and to the alliance which was formed at Corinth,[*] they barely succeeded in winning a naval victory.

And these were the most royal and the most imposing of his achievements, and these are the deeds about which people are never weary of speaking who are fain to exalt the power of the barbarians! So no one can say that I am not fair in my use of instances, nor that I dwell upon the minor undertakings of the King and pass over the most important;

for I have striven to forestall just such a complaint, and have recounted the most glorious of his exploits. I do not, however, forget his minor campaigns; I do not forget that Dercylidas,[*] with a thousand heavy-armed troops, extended his power over Aeolis; that Draco[*] took possession of Atarneus, and afterwards collected an army of three thousand light-armed men, and devastated the plains of Mysia; that Thimbron,[*] with a force only a little larger, crossed over into Lydia and plundered the whole country; and that Agesilaus, with the help of the army of Cyrus, conquered almost all the territory this side of the Halys river.[*]

And assuredly we have no greater reason to fear the army which wanders about[*] with the King nor the valor of the Persians themselves; for they were clearly shown by the troops who marched inland[*] with Cyrus to be no better than the King’s soldiers who live on the coast. I refrain from speaking of all the other battles in which the Persians were worsted, and I am willing to grant that they were split with factions, and so where not inclined to throw themselves wholeheartedly into the struggle against the King’s brother.