31.3
But when Egypt revolted with Athenian aid, 459 B.C. and Hellenic triremes sailed up as far as Cyprus and Cilicia, and Cimon’s mastery of the sea forced the King to resist the efforts of the Hellenes and to hinder their hostile growth; and when at last forces began to be moved, and generals were despatched hither and thither, and messages came down to Themistocles saying that the King commanded him to make good his promises by applying himself to the Hellenic problem,
31.4
then, neither embittered by anything like anger against his former fellow-citizens, nor lifted up by the great honor and power he was to have in the war, but possibly thinking his task not even approachable, both because Hellas had other great generals at the time, and especially because Cimon was so marvelously successful in his campaigns; yet most of all out of regard for the reputation of his own achievements and the trophies of those early days; having decided that his best course was to put a fitting end to his life,
31.5
he made a sacrifice to the gods, then called his friends together, gave them a farewell clasp of his hand, and, as the current story goes, drank bull’s blood, or as some say, took a quick poison, and so died in Magnesia, in the sixty-fifth year of his life, Thuc. 1.138 most of which had been spent in political leadership. They say that the King, on learning the cause and the manner of his death, admired the man yet more, and continued to treat his friends and kindred with kindness.
