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The prospect excited Antony, who at once divided his troops, and having given orders to Oppius Statianus to follow him leisurely with the more unwieldy part of the army, the baggage-train, and the siege batteries, proceeded himself by forced marches to Praaspa with all the calvary and the infantry of the better class.
Artavasdes pointed out that the Median monarch was absent from his own country, having joined his troops to those which Phraates had collected for the defence of Parthia. His territory therefore would be open to ravage, and even Praaspa, his capital, might prove an easy prey.
A proof of this is that in the one war which he has waged in all this long time and the one campaign that he has made he lost great numbers of citizens in the battles, returned in thorough disgrace from Praaspa, and parted with very many additional men in the flight.
The Roman general now found himself in great difficulties. He had exhausted the immediate neighborhood of Praaspa, and was obliged to send his foraging-parties on distant expeditions, where, being beyond the reach of his protection, they were attacked and cut to pieces by the enemy. He had lost his siege-train, and found it impossible to construct another.
So he proceeded again against Praaspa and besieged it, though he did no great damage to the enemy; for the men inside the walls repulsed him vigorously, and those outside could not easily be entrapped into a combat. Thus he lost many of his own men in searching for and bringing provisions, and many by his own discipline.
Having lost some valuable time in negotiations, at which the Parthians laughed, at length, when the equinox was passed, he broke up from before Praaspa, and commenced the work of retreat.
Just as he was he at once advanced toward Armenia, and learning there that the Mede had gone a considerable distance from his own land in the discharge of his duties as an ally of the Parthian king, he left behind the beasts of burden and a portion of the army with Oppius Statianus, giving orders for them to follow, and himself taking the cavalry and the strongest of the infantry hurried on in the confidence of seizing all his opponent's strongholds at one blow; he assailed Praaspa, the royal residence, heaped up mounds and made constant attacks.
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