See the conversation with Megillos in the First Book of the Laws throughout. Opp. t. vii. p. 201, sqq. And, again, in Book vi. p. 460. Σχεδὸν γὰρ πάντων τῶν Ἑλλήνων ἡ Λακεδαιμονίων εἱλωτεία πλείστην ἀπορίαν παράσχοιτ᾽ ἂν καὶ ἔριν τοῖς μὲν ὡς εὖ, τοῖς δ᾽ ὡς οὐκ εὖ γεγονυῖα ἐστιν. ἐλάττω δὲ ἥ τε Ἡρακλεωτῶν δουλεία τῆς τῶν Μαριανδυνῶν καταδουλώσεως ἔριν ἂν ἔχοι, τὸ Θετταλῶν τ᾽ αὖ πενεστικὸν ἔθνος. ----- Having enumerated the regulations affecting the free citizens, “In these,” he says, “there is no trace of that injustice and griping ambition which some object to the institutions of Lycurgus, considering them well adapted to beget bravery though not honest principles. It was probably the institution of the Crypteia (if as Aristotle contends, it proceeded from Lycurgus) that inspired Plato with such an opinion of the legislator and his laws. According to this ordinance the rulers, selecting from among the youths those most distinguished for ability, sent them forth armed with daggers and furnished with the necessary provisions, to scour the country, separating and concealing themselves in unfrequented places by day, but issuing out at night and slaughtering all such of the Helots as they found abroad. Sometimes, indeed, they fell upon them while engaged in their rural labours in the fields, and there cut off the best and bravest of the race.”[203] Plutarch felt that connected with this system, as flowing from the same principle of policy and designed to effect the same purpose, were those extensive massacres recorded in history, by one of which more than two thousand of those unhappy men, having been insidiously deluded into the assertion of sentiments conformable to the gallant actions they had performed in the service of the state,[204] were removed in a day. Lulled by the gift of freedom, crowned, smiled upon, they were conducted to the temples, as if to implicate the very gods in the treachery:—and then suddenly they disappeared; nor to this hour has the fate which overtook them been revealed.[205] Compared with this the slaughter of the Janisaries appears less culpable. ----- Footnote 203: Plut. Vit. Lycur. § 28. Vid. Ubb. Emmium, iii. 127, seq. et Crag. de Rep. Laced. b. i. c. xi. p. 68. Footnote 204: Among other nations where servitude was rendered less offensive, both by law and manners, men were enabled to place a more generous confidence in their slaves. Sarmatæ Limigantes Gotthorum vicinorum suorum armis oppressi, cum justas ad resistendum liberorum hominum copias non haberent, tanquam in extremo periculo servos suos armarunt, atque eos contra Gotthos duxerunt. Mox autem, cum à servis deficientibus appetiti, ac sedibus ejecti patriis essent auxilii ac consilii inopes ad Constantinum subsidium imploratum, et sedes tutas petitum se contulerunt. Carol. Sigon. De Occident. Imper. l. iv. p. 67. Footnote 205: Thucyd. iv. 80. -----