height[6]. There were also plenty of bowstrings found in the
villages--and lead, which they turned to account for their slings. As
a result of this day, then, the Hellenes chancing upon some villages
had no sooner encamped than the barbarians fell back, having had
distinctly the worst of it in the skirmishing.

[5] The best MSS read {Skuthai}, Scythians; if this is correct, it is
only the technical name for "archers." Cf. Arrian, "Tact." ii. 13.
The police at Athens were technically so called, as being composed
of Scythian slaves. Cf. Aristoph. "Thesm." 1017.

[6] I.e., in practising, in order to get the maximum range they let
fly the arrows, not horizontally, but up into the air. Sir W.
Raleigh (Hist. of the World, III. x. 8) says that Xenophon
"trained his archers to short compass, who had been accustomed to
the point blank," but this is surely not Xenophon's meaning.

The next day was a day of inaction: they halted and took in supplies,
as there was much corn in the villages; but on the day following, the
march was continued through the plain (of the Tigris), and
Tissaphernes still hung on their skirts with his skirmishers. And now
it was that the Hellenes discovered the defect of marching in a square
with an enemy following. As a matter of necessity, whenever the wings
of an army so disposed draw together, either where a road narrows, or
hills close in, or a bridge has to be crossed, the heavy infantry
cannot help being squeezed out of their ranks, and march with
difficulty, partly from actual pressure, and partly from the general
confusion that ensues. Or, supposing the wings are again extended, the
troops have hardly recovered from their former distress before they
are pulled asunder, and there is a wide space between the wings, and