It was no small enterprise upon which the mind of Cyrus was now bent, and at first sight it might well have been pronounced altogether hopeless. How could a mere governor of a province hope to unseat from his throne the Great King with all the resources of the empire at his command? At the most, Cyrus could only reckon upon some 100,000 soldiers, whereas Artaxerxes was able to bring more than a million of men into the field. On the other hand however, it might be urged that the Great King could not at once assemble his whole force. So immense were the distances in this huge empire, that a whole year of preparation would be required, in order to bring up the army to its full strength. And Cyrus intended, if possible, to take his brother by surprise. He believed moreover that his disadvantage in point of numbers would be more than counterbalanced by the infinitely superior quality of at least a part of his army. It was from among the Hellenes that he hoped to enlist such troops as could not fail to ensure his success. Some years before this, he had visited Hellas as his father’s ambassador at the time of the Peloponnesian war, and had observed the unusual talent displayed by the Hellenes for military enterprise. He had made many friends among them, whose friendship he still retained, and he was anxious to induce as many Hellene soldiers as possible to enter his service. The Hellenes had always been fond of adventure, and just at this time there were numbers of them willing and eager to engage themselves to a foreign master who promised good wages, especially when this master was a prince well known to be generous and open-handed, and above all, a lover of Hellas and the Hellenes. During the long Peloponnesian war they had become accustomed to an unsettled, adventurous camp-life, and now that the war was over, they did not care to return to peaceful pursuits. But Cyrus could not, without betraying his plans, begin openly to enlist foreign troops. It was necessary to find a pretext for employing them, and in this he was helped by fortune. For several hundred years there had been established along the west coast of Asia, numerous flourishing colonies of Ionian Hellenes. At first, and for a long time, they were free states, but they had been conquered at last by the Persians, and now they formed part of the Persian empire, and were included in the satrapy of Tissaphernes.