Agis and Cleomenes

Aratus burst out laughing at the jest, and inquired what manner of youth this was. Whereupon Damocrates, the Lacedaemonian exile, replied: If thou hast designs upon the Lacedaemonians, see that thou hastenest, before this young cock grows his spurs. After this, when Cleomenes with a few horsemen and three hundred foot-soldiers was making an expedition in Arcadia, the ephors, fearing the issue of the war, ordered him to come back home.

After he had returned, however, Aratus seized Caphyae, and the ephors sent Cleomenes forth again. He seized Methydrium and overran the territory of Argolis, whereupon the Achaeans marched out with twenty thousand foot-soldiers and a thousand horsemen under Aristomachus as general. Cleomenes met them at Pallantium and offered battle,