History of the Peloponnesian War

and being pursued by the men thereto appointed asking continually which way he went, he was compelled at a strait to turn in to Admetus, king of the Molossians, his enemy.

The king himself being then from home, he became a suppliant to his wife, and by her was instructed to take their son with him and sit down at the altar of the house.

When Admetus not long after returned, he made himself known to him and desired him that though he had opposed him in some suit in Athens, not to revenge it on him now in the time of his flight, saying that being now the weaker, he must needs suffer under the stronger, whereas noble revenge is of equals upon equal terms; and that he had been his adversary but in matter of profit, not of life, whereas, if he delivered him up (telling him withal for what and by whom he was followed), he deprived him of all means of saving his life. Admetus having heard him bade him arise together with his son whom he held as he sat, which is the most submissive supplication that is.

Not long after came the Lacedaemonians and the Athenians; and though they alleged much to have him, yet he delivered him not but sent him away by land to Pydna upon the other sea (a city belonging to Alexander) because his purpose was to go to the king, where finding a ship bound for Ionia, he embarked and was carried by foul weather upon the fleet of the Athenians that besieged Naxos.