There was no time to be lost in talking. Cleanor scrambled with little difficulty to the entrance of the passage. But the passage itself was an awful experience. As the chief had said, it was pitch dark, and the Greek had to feel his way as he crept along on hands and knees. Twice he found the path come to what seemed an abrupt end in what he supposed to be a chasm, for he heard far below him the sound of falling water. But exploring the wall on the left hand he found a ledge just broad enough to allow him to creep along. At last, after what seemed hours of anxious toil--he found afterwards that the time was much less than it seemed--he saw a faint speck of light in the distance. Before long he reached the open air on the hillside, at the height of some four hundred feet above the plain.
It was not long before Cleanor fell in with a peasant. The man was aware of what had happened. He had seen the Thessalian troops on their march, and seeing the smoke rising from the hillside had guessed the tactics which they had employed. It was plain from the man's talk that the robbers were not unpopular in the district. As a rule they had paid, and paid liberally, for supplies. In short, they had been regarded, as such people often have been before and since, as friends of the poor. The man took Cleanor by a short cut into the highroad, and so enabled him to overtake his party, which reached Pella without further adventure. The banditti, as he heard during his stay in Macedonia, had fallen to a man in a desperate sally which they had made against the attacking party.
"Go tell to Sparta, thou that passest by, That here obedient to her laws we lie".
22: "Bravest of beasts am I, who watch the grave Of him that, living, was of men most brave. Lion he was alike in name and heart, Else had I ne'er endured the watcher's part."
23: Thermopylæ--the Hot Gates; so called from the hot springs found in the neighbourhood.
24: The same Greek word stands for "purse" and "girdle". The old-fashioned long silk purse is an interesting survival of this ancient custom. Those who lead lives of adventure still carry their money in a belt fastened round the waist.
25: The legendary hero, son of Hæmon, from whom Thessalia was supposed to have received its name.