MERGE TO GYRENE. 
561 
Libyans, either fearing to meet him in the field, or wishing to draw 
the Cyreneans from their heights to attack them with more advan- 
tage in the plains, retreated to the eastward, and joined the native 
tribes which occupied the country between Gyrene and Egypt. 
Here they were imprudently followed by the king, and an engage- 
ment took place, in which the Cyreneans were defeated, and seven 
thousand of their heavy-armed troops were left dead upon the field 
of battle. The consequences of this defeat were fatal to Arcesilaus ; 
for soon after his return to Gyrene he was strangled by his brother 
Learchus, when disabled by weakness resulting from indisposition ; 
the murderer, however, did not long survive him, for he was himself 
put to death by means of a stratagem, concerted, we are told, by 
Eryxo, the wife of Arcesilaus, who revenged in this manner tlie 
loss of her husband. To Arcesilaus succeeded another Battus, who 
is said by Herodotus to have been lame ; and in his reign ambas- 
sadors were sent to Mantinea (according to the advice of the Oracle), 
to entreat the mediation of the Arcadians, in the disputes which had 
already been the cause of so much bloodshed. Demonax was in 
consequence selected by the IMantineans, a person highly respected 
for his probity ; who, on arriving at Gyrene, divided the Greeks into 
three separate classes, according to the countries from which they 
originally came, and gave them a new form of government, which 
continued in force during Battus’ reign. The son of this Battus, 
however, Arcesilaus, refused to acknowledge the new constitution, 
by which many privileges of the former kings of Gyrene had been 
transferred to the body of the people. Insurrections of the populace 
