The following year the Spartans, under King Agis, again invaded the territory of Elis, enriched by the offerings made to the temple of Olympeia. Immense booty in slaves, cattle, and provisions was the result of this invasion, provoked by the refusal of the Elians to furnish aid in the war against Athens. The Elians were obliged to submit to hard terms of peace, and all the enemies of Sparta were rooted out of the Peloponnesus. (M608) Such was the triumphant position of Sparta at the close of the Peloponnesian war. And a great change had also taken place in her internal affairs. The people had become enriched by successful war, and gold and silver were admitted against the old institution of Lycurgus, which recognized only iron money. The public men were enriched by bribes. The strictness of the old rule of Spartan discipline was gradually relaxed. (M609) It was then, shortly after the accession of Agesilaus to the throne, on the death of Agis, that a dangerous conspiracy broke out in Sparta itself, headed by Cinadon, a man of strength and courage, who saw that men of his class were excluded from the honors and distinctions of the State by the oligarchy—the ephors and the senate. But the rebellion, though put down by the energy of Agesilaus, still produced a dangerous discontent which weakened the power of the State. (M610) The Lacedæmonian naval power, at this crisis, was seriously threatened by the union of the Persian and Athenian fleet under Conon. That remarkable man had escaped from the disaster of Ægospotami with eight triremes, and sought the shelter of Cyprus, governed by his friend Evagoras, where he remained until the war between Sparta and the Persians gave a new direction to his enterprising genius. He joined Pharnabazus, enraged with the Spartans on account of the invasion of his satrapy by Lysander and Agesilaus, and by him was intrusted with the command of the Persian fleet. He succeeded in detaching Rhodes from the Spartan alliance, and gained, some time after, a decisive victory over Pisander—the Spartan admiral, off Cnidus, which weakened the power of Sparta on the sea, B.C. 394. More than half of the Spartan ships were captured and destroyed. (M611) This great success emboldened Thebes and other States to throw off the Spartan yoke. Lysander was detached from his command at the Hellespont to act against Bœotia, while Pausanias conducted an army from the Peloponnesus. The Thebans, threatened by the whole power of Sparta, applied to Athens, and Athens responded, no longer under the control of the Thirty Tyrants. Lysander was killed before Haliartus, an irreparable blow to Sparta, since he was her ablest general. Pausanias was compelled to evacuate Bœotia, and the enemies of Sparta took courage. An alliance between Athens, Corinth, Thebes, and Argos was now made to carry on war against Sparta.