[129] Xen. Anab. ii, 6, 1. Ktesiæ Frag. Persica, c. 60, ed. Bähr; Plutarch, Artaxerx. c. 19, 20; Diodor. xiv, 27. Menon was not put to death along with the other generals. He appears to have taken credit at the Persian court for the treason of entrapping his colleagues into the hands of Tissaphernes. But his life was only prolonged to perish a year afterwards in disgrace and torture,—probably by the requisition of Parysatis, who thus avenged the death of Klearchus. The queen-mother had always power enough to perpetrate cruelties, though not always to avert them.[130] She had already brought to a miserable end every one, even faithful defenders of Artaxerxes, concerned in the death of her son Cyrus. [130] Tacit. Histor. i, 45. “Othoni nondum auctoritas inerat ad _prohibendum_ scelus; _jubere_ jam poterat. Ita, simulatione iræ, vinciri jussum (Marium Celsum) et majores pœnas daturum, affirmans, præsenti exitio subtraxit.” Ktesias (Persica, c. 60; compare Plutarch and Diodorus as referred to in the preceding note) attests the treason of Menon, which he probably derived from the story of Menon himself. Xenophon mentions the ignominious death of Menon, and he probably derived his information from Ktesias (see Anabasis, ii, 6, 29). The supposition that it was Parysatis who procured the death of Menon, in itself highly probable, renders all the different statements consistent and harmonious. Though Menon thought it convenient, when brought up to Babylon, to boast of having been the instrument through whom the generals were entrapped into the fatal tent, this boast is not to be treated as matter of fact. For not only does Xenophon explain the catastrophe differently, but in the delineation which he gives of Menon, dark and odious as it is in the extreme, he does not advance any such imputation; indirectly, indeed, he sets it aside.[131] Unfortunately for the reputation of Klearchus, no such reasonable excuse can be offered for his credulity, which brought himself as well as his colleagues to so melancholy an end, and his whole army to the brink of ruin. It appears that the general sentiment of the Grecian army, taking just measure of the character of Tissaphernes, was disposed to greater circumspection in dealing with him. Upon that system Klearchus himself had hitherto acted; and the necessity of it might have been especially present to _his_ mind, since he had served with the Lacedæmonian fleet at Miletus in 411 B.C., and had, therefore, had fuller experience than other men in the army, of the satrap’s real character.[132] On a sudden he now turns round, and on the faith of a few verbal declarations, puts all the military chiefs into the most defenceless posture and the most obvious peril, such as hardly the strongest grounds for confidence could have justified. Though the remark of Machiavel is justified by large experience,—that from the short-sightedness of men and their obedience to present