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But after Cyrus had been killed, and all the people of Asia had joined forces, even under these favorable conditions they made such a disgraceful failure of the war as to leave for those who are in the habit of vaunting Persian valor not a word to say. For they had to deal with only six thousand Hellenes1—not picked troops, but men who, owing to stress of circumstances, were unable to live in their own cities.2 These were, moreover, unfamiliar with the country; they had been deserted by their allies; they had been betrayed by those who made the expedition with them; they had been deprived of the general whom they had followed;
1 Xen. Anab. 5.3.3 gives the survivors of the battle of Cunaxa as 8600.
2 Cf. Isoc. 4.168; Isoc. 5.96, 120, 121; Isoc. Letter 9.9.