The three hundred Spartans under Leonidas were found fully equal to this act of generous and devoted self-sacrifice. Perhaps he would have wished to inspire the same sentiment to the whole detachment: but when he found them indisposed, he at once ordered them to retire, thus avoiding all unseemly reluctance and dissension:[172] the same order was also given to the prophet Megistias, who however refused to obey it and stayed, though he sent away his only son.[173] None of the contingents remained with Leonidas except the Thespian and the Theban. The former, under their general Demophilus, volunteered to share the fate of the Spartans, and displayed even more than Spartan heroism, since they were not under that species of moral constraint which arises from the necessity of acting up to a preëstablished fame and superiority. But retreat with them presented no prospect better than the mere preservation of life, either in slavery or in exile and misery; since Thespiæ was in Bœotia, sure to be overrun by the invaders;[174] while the Peloponnesian contingents had behind them the isthmus of Corinth, which they doubtless hoped still to be able to defend. With respect to the Theban contingent, we are much perplexed; for Herodotus tells us that they were detained by Leonidas against their will as hostages, that they took as little part as possible in the subsequent battle, and surrendered themselves prisoners to Xerxes as soon as they could. Diodorus says that the Thespians alone remained with the Spartans; and Pausanias, though he mentions the eighty Mykenæans as having stayed along with the Thespians (which is probably incorrect), says nothing about the Thebans.[175] All things considered, it seems probable that the Thebans remained, but remained by their own offer,—being citizens of the anti-Persian party, as Diodorus represents them to have been, or perhaps because it may have been hardly less dangerous for them to retire with the Peloponnesians, than to remain, suspected as they were of _medism_: but when the moment of actual crisis arrived, their courage not standing so firm as that of the Spartans and Thespians, they endeavored to save their lives by taking credit for _medism_, and pretending to have been forcibly detained by Leonidas. [172] Herodot. vii, 220. Ταύτῃ καὶ μᾶλλον τῇ γνώμῃ πλεῖστός εἰμι, Λεωνίδην, ἐπεί τε ἤσθετο τοὺς συμμάχους ἐόντας ἀπροθύμους, καὶ οὐκ ἐθέλοντας συνδιακινδυνεύειν, κελεῦσαί σφεας ἀπαλλάσσεσθαι· αὐτῷ δὲ ἀπιέναι οὐ καλῶς ἔχειν· μένοντι δὲ αὐτοῦ κλέος μέγα ἐλείπετο, καὶ ἡ Σπάρτης εὐδαιμονίη οὐκ ἐξηλείφετο.