262 DION. Sicily ; but if Plato did come, Dion should be assured of whatever he desired. Dion also received letters full of solicitations from his sister and his wife, urging him to beg Plato to gratify Dionysius in this request, and not give him an excuse for further ill-doing. So that, as Plato says of himself, the third time he set sail for the Strait of Scylla,* " Venturing again Charybdis's dangerous gulf." This arrival brought great joy to Dionysius, and no less hopes to the Sicilians, who were earnest in their prayers and good wishes that Plato might get the better of Philis- lus, and philosophy triumph over .tyranny . Neither was he unbefriended by the women, who studied to oblige him; and he had with Dionysius that peculiar credit "which no man else ever obtained, namely, liberty to come into his presence without being examined or searched. When he would have given him a consider- able sum of money, and, on several re^Deated occasions, made fresh offers, which Plato as often declined, Aristip- pus the Cyrensean, then present, said that Dionysius was very safe in his munificence, he gave little to those who were ready to take all they could get, and a great deal to Plato, who would accept of nothing. After the first compliments of kindness were over, when Plato began to discourse of Dion, he was at first diverted by excuses for delay, followed soon after by complaints and disgusts, though not as yet observable to others, Dionysius endeavoring to conceal them, and, by other civilities and honorable usage, to draw him off from
- It is Sicily in the manuscripts, itself, and is found with the verse
and in the old text, but there can following from tiie Odyssey (xii., be no doubt about altering it to 428), in Plato's own letters (Ep. ScijUa, which is more apposite iu 7).
