Tissaphernes had no sooner received such an addition to his forces, as appeared to him sufficient to overpower Agesilaus, than he threw aside the mask, and sent a message to the Spartan king, bidding him immediately quit Asia, or prepare for war. The council and the allies were somewhat daunted by his arrogant tone, and apparent strength; but Agesilaus, who had expected this result, and desired no other, told the envoys to carry back his thanks to their master, for the advantage he had given the Greeks by his perjury. He then ordered his troops to put themselves in readiness for a long march; sent word to the towns which lay on the road to Caria to lay in provisions for the use of his army; and called on the cities of Ionia, Æolis, and the Hellespont, for their contingents. Agesilaus had reckoned upon this effect of the satrap’s selfish fears, and, instead of seeking him in Caria, marched in the opposite direction toward the residence of Pharnabazus. As this invasion was quite unexpected, he found the towns on his road unprepared for resistance, and collected an immense booty. He penetrated nearly to Dascylium without encountering an enemy. But in that neighbourhood he fell in with a body of Persian horse, and, by the issue of a skirmish which ensued, was made to feel its superiority in equipments and training over his own. The next day when he sacrificed, observes Xenophon--as if he was relating a providential warning, not a human contrivance--the victims were found imperfect; and Agesilaus advanced no farther, but retreated towards Ephesus. [Sidenote: [396-395 B.C.]] There he spent the winter in preparations for the next campaign, and more particularly applied himself to the raising of a body of cavalry, which he perceived would be indispensable to the success and the safety of his future operations. For this purpose he made a list of the most opulent men in the Greek cities, and compelled each of them, as the condition of his exemption from personal service, to furnish a trooper. In the spring he collected his forces at Ephesus, and put them into an active course of training, rousing their emulation by the prizes which he proposed for the most gallant show, and the highest degree of expertness, in every department of the service. Xenophon, as an old soldier, is delighted with the recollection of the military bustle which prevailed during this season at Ephesus; where the wrestling schools and the hippodrome were constantly enlivened by the exercises of the men, the market was abundantly supplied with horses, and arms of every kind, and all the trades subservient to war were kept in full employment. Among other devices for raising the spirits of his troops, Agesilaus borrowed a hint, it would seem, from one of Cimon’s stratagems, and ordered his Persian prisoners to be exposed to sale naked, that the Greeks might contrast the delicacy of their persons with the robustness of frames hardened by the exercises of the palæstra.