even tears could move him. Thereupon my "brother" conceived the design
of freeing us from our chains, and, antagonized by the stubbornness of
Lycurgus, he positively refused to sleep with him, and through this he
was in a better position to carry out the plan which he had thought out.
When the entire household was buried in its first sleep, Ascyltos loaded
our little packs upon his back and slipped out through a breach in the
wall, which he had previously noted, arriving at the villa with the dawn.
He gained entrance without opposition and found his way to our room,
which the guards had taken the precaution to bar. It was easy to force
an entrance, as the fastening was made of wood, which same he pried off
with a piece of iron. The fall of the lock roused us, for we were
snoring away, in spite of our unfortunate situation. On account of the
long vigil, the guard was in such a deep sleep that we alone were wakened
by the crashing fall of the lock, and Ascyltos, coming in, told us in a
few words what he had done for us; but as far as that goes, not many were
necessary. We were hurriedly dressing, when I was seized with the notion
of killing the guard and stripping the place. This plan I confided to
Ascyltos, who approved of the looting, but pointed out a more desirable
solution without bloodshed: knowing all the crooks and turns, as he did,
he led us to a store-room which he opened. We gathered up all that was
of value and sallied forth while it was yet early in the morning.
Shunning the public roads; we could not rest until we believed ourselves
safe from pursuit. Ascyltos, when he had caught his breath, gloatingly
exulted of the pleasure which the looting of a villa belonging to
Lycurgus, a superlatively avaricious man, afforded him: he complained,
with justice of his parsimony, affirming that he himself had received no
reward for his k-nightly services, that he had been kept at a dry table
and on a skimpy ration of food. This Lycurgus was so stingy that he
denied himself even the necessities of life, his immense wealth to the
contrary notwithstanding.)