Anabasis

And Xenophon said, Well, really, with weather of the sort you describe and provisions used up and no chance even to get a smell of wine, when many of us were becoming exhausted with hardships and the enemy were at our heels, if at such a time as that I wantonly abused you, I admit that I am more wanton even than the ass, which, because of its wantonness, so the saying runs, is not subject to fatigue. Nevertheless, do tell us, he said, for what reason you were struck.

Did I ask you for something, and then strike you because you would not give it to me? Did I demand something back? Was it in a fight over a favourite? Was it an act of drunken violence?

When the man replied that it was none of these things, Xenophon asked him if he was a hoplite. He said no. Was he a peltast, then? No, not that either, he said, but he had been detailed by his messmates, although he was a free man, to drive a mule.

At that Xenophon recognized him, and asked: Are you the fellow who carried the sick man? Yes, by Zeus, he replied, for you forced me to do so; and you scattered my messmates’ baggage all about.

Why, the scattering, said Xenophon, was after this fashion: I distributed it among others to carry and directed them to bring it back to me, and when I got it back, I returned the whole of it to you intact when you, for your part, had shown me the sick man. But listen, all of you, he continued, and hear how the affair happened; for the story is worth hearing.

A man was being left behind because he was unable to keep going any longer. I was acquainted with the man only so far as to know that he was one of our number, and I forced you, sir, to carry him in order that he might not perish; for, as I remember, the enemy were following after us. To that the fellow agreed.