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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: the horses of his troops to the trees, and relieving the Sicyonians of
their heavy infantry shields, advanced with his volunteers against the
Argives. The latter, seeing the Sigmas on the shields and taking them
to be "Sicyonians," had not the slightest fear. Whereupon, as the
story goes, Pasimachus, exclaiming in his broad Doric, "By the twin
gods! these Sigmas will cheat you, you Argives," came to close
quarters, and in that battle of a handful against a host, was slain
himself with all his followers. In another quarter of the field,
however, the Corinthian exiles had got the better of their opponents
and worked their way up, so that they were now touching the city
circumvallation walls.
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