Explore "The Retreat of the Ten Thousand" by C. Witt on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
But now the Hellenes were brought face to face with a new difficulty. The winter had by this time set in, and the whole country was buried in snow. All around in every direction, as far as the eye could reach, was one vast stretch of snow, many feet in depth, and through this the Hellenes had to make their way. Any one who has tried to walk for even a quarter of an hour through snow into which he cannot help sinking above the knee at every step he takes, may imagine how tiring and painful it must have been to march thus for a whole day. Many of the slaves and horses perished, and also thirty of the soldiers.
On the third day after crossing the Euphrates, their sufferings were still further increased by a north-wind, whose bitter blast was torture, even to the stalwart Hellenes. One of the soothsayers suggested that a sacrifice should be offered to Boreas, the god of the north-wind, and when this had been accomplished, it seemed to them all that his fury abated to some extent.