idea of the nation in arms was more thoroughly carried out than in any
other state in the history of civilization. In other states the
individual citizen often lived the life of a soldier, here the nation
lived the life of a regiment. Private homes resembled the "married
quarters" of a modern army; the unmarried men lived entirely in
barracks. Military exercises were only interrupted by actual service in
the field, and the whole life of a man of military age was devoted to
them. Under these circumstances, the Spartans maintained a practically
unchallenged supremacy over the armies of other Greek states; sometimes
their superiority was so great that, like the Spanish regulars in the
early part of the Dutch War of Independence, they destroyed their
enemies with insignificant loss to themselves. The surrender of a
Spartan detachment, hopelessly cut off from all assistance, and the
victory of a body of well-trained and handy light infantry over a closed
battalion of Spartiates were events so unusual as seriously to affect
the course of Greek history.