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When the Macedonian heard this, he could not wait for daylight, but went straight to the place under the guidance of Timocleia, and, after ordering the garden to be shut close, so that nobody should find out what was going on, he climbed down into the well in his shirt only. An odious Fate led him on,The poetic expression probably comes from some lyric or dramatic poet. It can hardly have been made up by Plutarch from Hesiod’s Shield of Heracles, 258. destined to work vengeance upon him at the hands of Timocleia standing over him at the top of the well. When she could tell by his voice that he had reached the bottom, she herself brought many of the stones, while her maid-servants rolled in many big ones on top until they had beaten him down and completely buried him. When the Macedonians came to know of this and recovered the corpse, inasmuch as proclamation had been made before this to kill none of the Thebans, they arrested Timocleia and brought her to the king, and told of her daring deed. But he, seeing in the composure of her countenance and her unhurried step an indication of high rank and noble blood, first questioned her as to who she was among the women. She quite undauntedly and courageously said, I had the good fortune to have a brother Theagenes, who was a general at Chaeroneia and fell there, fighting against you Macedonians for the freedom of Greece, that we might not have any such experience as we have had. But since we have had an experience undeserved by our family, we have no wish to escape death; for it were better, perhaps, not to live to experience another such night, unless you put a stop to this thing.
