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78. During this summer, and about the same time, Brasidas set out on his way to Chalcidicè with1 seventeen hundred hoplites. When he arrived at Heraclea in Trachis he despatched a messenger to Pharsalus, where he had friends, with a request that they would conduct him and his army through the country. Accordingly there came to meet him at Melitia, in Achaea Phthiotis, Panaerus, Dorus, Hippolochidas, Torylaus, and Strophacus who was the proxenus of the Chalcidians. Under their guidance he started. Other Thessalians also conducted him; [2] in particular, Niconidas a friend of Perdiccas from Larissa. Under any circumstances it would not have been easy to cross Thessaly without an escort, and certainly for an armed force to go through a neighbour's country without his consent was a proceeding which excited jealousy among all Hellenes. Besides, the common people of Thessaly were always well disposed towards the Athenians. And if the traditions of the country had not been in favour of a close oligarchy, Brasidas could never have gone on; [3] even as it was, some of the opposite party met him on his march at the river Enipeus and would have stopped him, saying that he had no business to proceed without the consent of the whole nation. [4] His escort replied that they would not conduct him if the others objected, but that he had suddenly presented himself and they were doing the duty of hosts in accompaying him. Brasidas himself added that he came as a friend to the Thessalian land and people, and that he was making war upon his enemies the Athenians, and not upon them. He had never heard that there was any illfeeling between the Thessalians and Lacedaemonians which prevented either of them from passing through the territory of the other; however, if they refused their consent, he would not and indeed could not go on; [5] but such was not the treatment which he had a right to expect from them. Upon this they departed, and he by the advice of his escort, fearing that a large force might collect and stop him, marched on at full speed and without a halt. On the same day on which he started from Melitia he arrived at Pharsalus, and encamped by the river Apidanus. [6] Thence he went on to Phacium, and thence to Perrhaebia. Here his Thessalian escort returned; and the Perrhaebians, who are subjects of the Thessalians, brought him safe to Dium in the territory of Perdiccas, a city of Macedonia which is situated under Mount Olympus on the Thessalian side.

1 Brasidas, escorted by the leading men of the country, makes his way through Thessaly. His politic language.

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