replied: "Who then are these Paionians, and where upon the earth do
they dwell?" and he asked them also what they desired, that they had
come to Sardis. They declared to him that they had come to give
themselves up to him, and that Paionia was a country situated upon the
river Strymon, and that the Strymon was not far from the Hellespont,
and finally that they were colonists from the Teucrians of Troy. All
these things severally they told him; and he asked whether all the
women of that land were as industrious as their sister; and they very
readily replied to this also, saying that it was so, for it was with a
view to that very thing that they had been doing this. 14. Then
Dareios wrote a letter to Megabazos, whom he had left to command his
army in Thrace, bidding him remove the Paionians from their place of
habitation and bring them to the king, both themselves and their
children and their wives. Then forthwith a horseman set forth to ride
in haste bearing the message to the Hellespont, and having passed over
to the other side he gave the paper to Megabazos. So he having read it
and having obtained guides from Thrace, set forth to march upon
Paionia: 15, and the Paionians, being informed that the Persians were
coming against them, gathered all their powers together and marched
out in the direction of the sea, supposing that the Persians when they
invaded them would make their attack on that side. The Paionians then
were prepared, as I say, to drive off the army of Megabazos when it
came against them; but the Persians hearing that the Paionians had
gathered their powers and were guarding the entrance which lay towards
the sea, directed their course with guides along the upper road; and
passing unperceived by the Paionians they fell upon their cities,
which were left without men, and finding them without defenders they
easily took possession of them. The Paionians when they heard that
their cities were in the hands of the enemy, at once dispersed, each
tribe to its own place of abode, and proceeded to deliver themselves