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The Thasians, as he was marching through their country with his army, sent to him flour, geese, sweetmeats, honey-cakes, and other costly foods and drinks of all kinds. The flour alone he accepted, but the rest of the things he bade those who had brought them to carry back because these were of no use to the Spartans. But when the Thasians importuned him and begged him by all means to take all, he gave orders to distribute them among the Helots. And when the Thasians inquired the reason, he said, ‘It is not in keeping that those who practise manly virtues should indulge in such gormandizing, for things that allure the servile crowd are alien to free men.’ 1 [p. 257]

1 Cf. Plutarch's Life of Agesilaus, chap. xxxvi. (616 F), where the scene is laid in Egypt, as also in Cornelius Nepos, xvii., Agesilaus, 8. 3-4. The story is found also in Athenaeus, 657 B and in Aelian, Varia Historia, iii. 20, where it is told of Lysander.

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