The Cavalry General

From the opening

Your first duty is to offer sacrifice, petitioning the gods to grant you such good gifts (2) as shall enable you in thought, word, and deed to discharge your office in the manner most acceptable to Heaven, and with fullest increase to yourself, and friends, and to the state at large of affection, glory, and wide usefulness. The goodwill of Heaven (3) so obtained, you shall proceed to mount your troopers, taking care that the full complement which the law demands is reached, and that the normal force of cavalry is not diminished. There will need to be a reserve of remounts, or else a deficiency may occur at any moment, (4) looking to the fact that some will certainly succumb to old age, and others, from one reason or another, prove unserviceable.

(1) For the title, etc., see Schneid. "Praemon. de Xeno." {Ipp}. Boeckh, "P. E. A." 251.

(2) Or, "with sacrifice to ask of Heaven those gifts of thought and speech and conduct whereby you will exercise your office most acceptably to the gods themselves, and with..." Cf. Plat. "Phaedr." 273 E; "Euthr." 14 B.

(3) The Greek phrase is warmer, {theon d' ileon onton}, "the gods being kindly and propitious." Cf. Plat. "Laws," 712 B.

(4) Lit. "at any moment there will be too few." See "Les Cavaliers Atheniens," par Albert Martin, p. 308.

But now suppose the complement of cavalry is levied, (5) the duty will devolve on you of seeing, in the first place, that your horses are well fed and in condition to stand their work, since a horse which cannot endure fatigue will clearly be unable to overhaul the foeman or effect escape; (6) and in the second place, you will have to see to it the animals are tractable, since, clearly again, a horse that will not obey is only fighting for the enemy and not his friends.

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