He then was being sent as envoy to Miletos; and Thrasybulos in the
meantime being informed beforehand of the whole matter and knowing
what Alyattes was meaning to do, contrived this device:--he gathered
together in the market-place all the store of provisions which was
found in the city, both his own and that which belonged to private
persons; and he proclaimed to the Milesians that on a signal given by
him they should all begin to drink and make merry with one another.
22. This Thrasybulos did and thus proclaimed to the end that the
herald from Sardis, seeing a vast quantity of provisions carelessly
piled up, and the people feasting, might report this to Alyattes: and
so on fact it happened; for when the herald returned to Sardis after
seeing this and delivering to Thrasybulos the charge which was given
to him by the king of Lydia, the peace which was made, came about, as
I am informed, merely because of this. For Alyattes, who thought that
there was a great famine in Miletos and that the people had been worn
down to the extreme of misery, heard from the herald, when he returned
from Miletos, the opposite to that which he himself supposed. And
after this the peace was made between them on condition of being
guest-friends and allies to one another, and Alyattes built two
temples to Athene at Assessos in place of one, and himself recovered
from his sickness. With regard then to the war waged by Alyattes with
the Milesians and Thrasybulos things went thus.

23. As for Periander, the man who gave information about the oracle to
Thrasybulos, he was the son of Kypselos, and despot of Corinth. In his
life, say the Corinthians, (and with them agree the Lesbians), there
happened to him a very great marvel, namely that Arion of Methymna was
carried ashore at Tainaron upon a dolphin's back. This man was a
harper second to none of those who then lived, and the first, so far
as we know, who composed a dithyramb, naming it so and teaching it to