The position of Miletus was too strong to permit of its being carried by a _coup de main_; besides which, the Lydians were unwilling to destroy at one blow a town whose colonies, skilfully planted at the seaports from the coasts of the Black Sea to those of Egypt, would one day furnish them with so many outlets for their industrial products. Their method of attacking it resolved itself into a series of exhausting raids. "Every year, as soon as the fruit crops and the harvests began to ripen, Alyattes set out at the head of his troops, whom he caused to march and encamp to the sound of instruments. Having arrived in the Milesian territory, he completely destroyed the crops and the orchards, and then again withdrew." In these expeditions he was careful to avoid any excesses which would have made the injury inflicted appear irretrievable; his troops were forbidden to destroy dwelling-houses or buildings dedicated to the gods; indeed, on one occasion, when the conflagration which consumed the lands accidentally spread to the temple of Athena near Assesos, he rebuilt two temples for the goddess at his own expense. The Milesians sustained the struggle courageously, until two reverses at Limeneion and in the plain of the Maeander at length induced them to make terms. Their tyrant, Thrasybulus, acting on the advice of the Delphic Apollo and by the mediation of Periander of Corinth, concluded a treaty with Alyattes in which the two princes, declaring themselves the guest and the ally one of the other, very probably conceded extensive commercial privileges to one another both by land and sea (604).* * Thrasybulus' stratagem is said to have taken place at Priene by Diogenes Laertes and by Polysenus. The war begins under Ardys, lasts for five years under Sadyattes, instead of the six years which Herodotus attributes to it, and five years under Alyattes.