Anabasis

On the other hand, wherever we come, whether it be to a barbarian or to a Greek land, and have no market at which to buy, we take provisions, not out of wantonness, but from necessity.

The Carduchians, for example, and the Taochians and Chaldaeans were not subjects of the King and were exceedingly formidable, yet, even so, we made enemies of them because of this necessity of taking provisions, inasmuch as they would not provide a market.

The Macronians, however, provided us as good a market as they could, and we therefore regarded them as friends, barbarians though they were, and took by force not a thing that belonged to them.

As for the Cotyorites, whom you claim as yours, if we have taken anything that belonged to them, they are themselves to blame; for they did not behave toward us as friends, but shut their gates and would neither admit us within nor send a market without; and they alleged that the governor set over them by you was responsible for this conduct.

In regard to your statement about people making their way into the city by force and being quartered there, we asked them to receive our sick into their houses; but when they refused to open their gates, we went in at a point where the place of itself received us; and we have done no deed of force save only that our sick are quartered in the houses, paying their own expenses, and that we are guarding the gates, in order that our sick may not be in the power of your governor, but that it may be in our power to get them back when we so wish.