Part 10 (1/2)
The Sacian went in pursuit of him. He found Pheraulas with his face covered with blood and dirt, and asked him if he had received a blow.
”I have,” said Pheraulas, ”as you see.” ”Then,” said the Sacian, ”I make you a present of my horse.” Pheraulas asked an explanation. The Sacian accordingly gave him an account of what had taken place between himself and Cyrus, and said, in the end, that he gladly gave him his horse, as he, Pheraulas, had so decisively proved himself to be a most worthy man.
Pheraulas accepted the present, with many thanks, and he and the Sacian became thereafter very strong friends.
Some time after this, Pheraulas invited the Sacian to an entertainment, and when the hour arrived, he set before his friend and the other guests a most sumptuous feast, which was served in vessels of gold and silver, and in an apartment furnished with carpets, and canopies, and couches of the most gorgeous and splendid description.
The Sacian was much impressed with this magnificence, and he asked Pheraulas whether he had been a rich man at home, that is, before he had joined Cyrus's army. Pheraulas replied that he was not then rich.
His father, he said, was a farmer, and he himself had been accustomed in early life to till the ground with the other laborers on his father's farm. All the wealth and luxury which he now enjoyed had been bestowed upon him, he said, by Cyrus.
”How fortunate you are!” said the Sacian; ”and it must be that you enjoy your present riches all the more highly on account of having experienced in early life the inconveniences and ills of poverty. The pleasure must be more intense in having desires which have long been felt gratified at last than if the objects which they rested upon had been always in one's possession.”
”You imagine, I suppose,” replied Pheraulas, ”that I am a great deal happier in consequence of all this wealth and splendor; but it is not so. As to the real enjoyments of which our natures are capable, I can not receive more now than I could before. I can not eat any more, drink any more, or sleep any more, or do any of these things with any more pleasure than when I was poor. All that I gain by this abundance is, that I have more to watch, more to guard, more to take care of. I have many servants, for whose wants I have to provide, and who are a constant source of solicitude to me. One calls for food, another for clothes, and a third is sick, and I must see that he has a physician.
My other possessions, too, are a constant care. A man comes in, one day, and brings me sheep that have been torn by the wolves; and, on another day, tells me of oxen that have fallen from a precipice, or of a distemper which has broken out among the flocks or herds. My wealth, therefore, brings me only an increase of anxiety and trouble, without any addition to my joys.”
”But those things,” said the Sacian, ”which you name, must be unusual and extraordinary occurrences. When all things are going on prosperously and well with you, and you can look around on all your possessions and feel that they are yours, then certainly you must be happier than I am.”
”It is true,” said Pheraulas, ”that there is a pleasure in the possession of wealth, but that pleasure is not great enough to balance the suffering which the calamities and losses inevitably connected with it occasion. That the suffering occasioned by losing our possessions is greater than the pleasure of retaining them, is proved by the fact that the pain of a loss is so exciting to the mind that it often deprives men of sleep, while they enjoy the most calm and quiet repose so long as their possessions are retained, which proves that the pleasure does not move them so deeply. They are kept awake by the vexation and chagrin on the one hand, but they are never kept awake by the satisfaction on the other.”
”That is true,” replied the Sacian. ”Men are not kept awake by the mere continuing to possess their wealth, but they very often are by the original acquisition of it.”
”Yes, indeed,” replied Pheraulas; ”and if the enjoyment of _being_ rich could always continue as great as that of first becoming so, the rich would, I admit, be very happy men; but it is not, and can not be so. They who possess much, must lose, and expend, and give much; and this necessity brings more of pain than the possessions themselves can give of pleasure.”
The Sacian was not convinced. The giving and expending, he maintained, would be to him, in itself, a source of pleasure. He should like to have much, for the very purpose of being able to expend much. Finally, Pheraulas proposed to the Sacian, since he seemed to think that riches would afford him so much pleasure, and as he himself, Pheraulas, found the possession of them only a source of trouble and care, that he would convey all his wealth to the Sacian, he himself to receive only an ordinary maintenance from it.
”You are in jest,” said the Sacian.
”No,” said Pheraulas, ”I am in earnest.” And he renewed his proposition, and pressed the Sacian urgently to accept of it.
The Sacian then said that nothing could give him greater pleasure than such an arrangement. He expressed great grat.i.tude for so generous an offer, and promised that, if he received the property, he would furnish Pheraulas with most ample and abundant supplies for all his wants, and would relieve him entirely of all responsibility and care.
He promised, moreover, to obtain from Cyrus permission that Pheraulas should thereafter be excused from the duties of military service, and from all the toils, privations, and hards.h.i.+ps of war, so that he might thenceforth lead a life of quiet, luxury, and ease, and thus live in the enjoyment of all the benefits which wealth could procure, without its anxieties and cares.
The plan, thus arranged, was carried into effect. Pheraulas divested himself of his possessions, conveying them all to the Sacian. Both parties were extremely pleased with the operation of the scheme, and they lived thus together for a long time. Whatever Pheraulas acquired in any way, he always brought to the Sacian, and the Sacian, by accepting it, relieved Pheraulas of all responsibility and care. The Sacian loved Pheraulas, as Xenophon says, in closing this narrative, because he was thus continually bringing him gifts; and Pheraulas loved the Sacian, because he was always willing to take the gifts which were thus brought to him.
Among the other conversations, whether real or imaginary, which Xenophon records, he gives some specimens of those which took place at festive entertainments in Cyrus's tent, on occasions when he invited his officers to dine with him. He commenced the conversation, on one of these occasions, by inquiring of some of the officers present whether they did not think that the common soldiers were equal to the officers themselves in intelligence, courage, and military skill, and in all the other substantial qualities of a good soldier.
”I know not how that may be,” replied one of the officers. ”How they will prove when they come into action with the enemy, I can not tell; but a more perverse and churlish set of fellows in camp, than these I have got in my regiment, I never knew. The other day, for example, when there had been a sacrifice, the meat of the victims was sent around to be distributed to the soldiers. In our regiment, when the steward came in with the first distribution, he began by me, and so went round, as far as what he had brought would go. The next time he came, he began at the other end. The supply failed before he had got to the place where he had left off before, so that there was a man in the middle that did not get any thing. This man immediately broke out in loud and angry complaints, and declared that there was no equality or fairness whatever in such a mode of division, unless they began sometimes in the center of the line.
”Upon this,” continued the officer, ”I called to the discontented man, and invited him to come and sit by me, where he would have a better chance for a good share. He did so. It happened that, at the next distribution that was made, we were the last, and he fancied that only the smallest pieces were left, so he began to complain more than before. 'Oh, misery!' said he, 'that I should have to sit here!' 'Be patient,' said I; 'pretty soon they will begin the distribution with us, and then you will have the best chance of all.' And so it proved for, at the next distribution, they began at us, and the man took his share first; but when the second and third men took theirs, he fancied that their pieces looked larger than his, and he reached forward and put his piece back into the basket, intending to change it; but the steward moved rapidly on, and he did not get another, so that he lost his distribution altogether. He was then quite furious with rage and vexation.”
Cyrus and all the company laughed very heartily at these mischances of greediness and discontent; and then other stories, of a somewhat similar character, were told by other guests. One officer said that a few days previous he was drilling a part of his troops, and he had before him on the plain what is called, in military language, a _squad_ of men, whom he was teaching to march. When he gave the order to advance, one, who was at the head of the file, marched forward with great alacrity, but all the rest stood still. ”I asked him,” continued the officer, ”what he was doing. 'Marching,' said he, 'as you ordered me to do.' 'It was not you alone that I ordered to march,' said I, 'but all.' So I sent him back to his place, and then gave the command again. Upon this they all advanced promiscuously and in disorder toward me, each one acting for himself, without regard to the others, and leaving the file-leader, who ought to have been at the head, altogether behind. The file-leader said, 'Keep back! keep back!' Upon this the men were offended, and asked what they were to do about such contradictory orders. 'One commands us to advance, and another to keep back!' said they; 'how are we to know which to obey?'”
Cyrus and his guests were so much amused at the awkwardness of these recruits, and the ridiculous predicament in which the officer was placed by it, that the narrative of the speaker was here interrupted by universal and long-continued laughter.
”Finally,” continued the officer, ”I sent the men all back to their places, and explained to them that, when a command was given, they were not to obey it in confusion and unseemly haste, but regularly and in order, each one following the man who stood before him. 'You must regulate your proceeding,' said I, 'by the action of the file-leader; when he advances, you must advance, following him in a line, and governing your movements in all respects by his.'
”Just at this moment,” continued the officer, ”a man came to me for a letter which was to go to Persia, and which I had left in my tent. I directed the file-leader to run to my tent and bring the letter to me.
He immediately set off, and the rest, obeying literally the directions which I had just been giving them, all followed, running behind him in a line like a troop of savages, so that I had the whole squad of twenty men running in a body off the field to fetch a letter!”