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Pelopidas, when leaving his house, as his wife wept at parting with him and begged him to be careful of his life, answered, "My dear, this is very good advice for private soldiers, but we who are commanders must think about saving the lives of others."
But their real teacher was not Agesilaus, but those who, seizing fit opportunities, and with due management, skilfully used to let them loose upon their enemies, as men train young mastiffs, and then when they had tasted victory and self-confidence brought them safely back. Of these leaders Pelopidas received the chief credit.
XXI. So now Pelopidas, when asleep in the camp, seemed to see the maidens weeping over their tombs and invoking curses on the Spartans, and Skedasus, who bade him sacrifice a red virgin to the maidens, if he wished to conquer his enemies. And as this command seemed to him shocking and impious, he started up and consulted the prophets and the generals.
The Mantineans sallied out, and there was a battle, in which they were defeated; but in the course of it a Theban youth of a rich and noble family, named Pelopidas, was surrounded by enemies.
To him Pelopidas and his colleagues privately sent a merchant, one of their friends, with money, and, what proved more efficient, advice, that it more became a man of his worth to set upon some great enterprise, and that he should, making a sudden incursion on the unprotected Athenians, surprise the Piraeus; since nothing could be so grateful to Sparta, as to take Athens; and the Thebans, of course, would not stir to the assistance of men whom they now hated and looked upon as traitors.
The Spartans, coming into Thebes, as we have seen, exiled the rich and important Pelopidas, but allowed his friend Epaminondas to remain. They little suspected that this quiet and seemingly stupid man would in time become their greatest enemy, and that the mere sound of his name would fill their hearts with dread.
But Pelopidas and Gorgidas, holding the office of captains of Boeotia, designing to breed a quarrel between the Lacedaemonians and Athenians, made this contrivance. One Sphodrias, a Spartan, a man famous indeed for courage in battle, but of no sound judgment, full of ungrounded hopes and foolish ambition, was left with an army at Thespiae, to receive and succor the Theban renegades.
Pelopidas, thus forced to leave home, withdrew to Athens, where he was very kindly received. He was not happy, however, and was always longing to return home, and see his friend Epaminondas, whose society he missed very much.
Now Pelopidas, being asleep in the camp, thought he saw the maidens weeping about their tombs, and cursing the Spartans, and Scedasus commanding, if they desired the victory, to sacrifice a virgin with chestnut hair to his daughters.
But Pelopidas, having sufficiently tried their bravery at Tegyrae, where they had fought alone, and around his own person, never afterward divided them, but keeping them entire, and as one man, gave them the first duty in the greatest battles.
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