Pari felicitate in ea re usus, elatius se gerere coepit maioresque appetere res. Nam cum Byzantio expugnato cepisset complures Persarum nobiles atque in his nonnullos regis propinquos, hos clam Xerxi remisit, simulans ex vinclis publicis effugisse, et cum his Gongylum Eretriensem, qui litteras regi redderet, in quibus haec fuisse scripta Thucydides memoriae prodidit:
Having enjoyed equal good fortune in that expedition, he began to act still more arrogantly and to entertain still loftier ambitions. In fact, having at the taking of Byzantium captured several Persian nobles, including some relatives of the king, he secretly sent them back to Xerxes, pretending that they had escaped from the state prison; and with them he dispatched Gongylus the Eretrian, who was to deliver to the king a letter, which, as Thucydides has told us, contained the following message:
final_alignments\Cornelius_Nepos_Pausanias.json