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The Seven against Thebes.
challenged the Cadmeians to combat, and, through Athena's aid, came off victorious. Whereupon the Cadmeians sought to compass his returning steps, and planted an ambush of fifty warriors; these Tydeus slew, one only being left to bear the tidings homeward.
This treachery on the part of the Cadmeians furnishes a motive for the impetuous eagerness manifested by Tydeus to advance to the attack: it may also throw light upon the iron-hearted purpose of the infuriated chiefs, which found expression in their terrible oath—
"the town to raze,
And ravage the Cadmeian's citadel,
Or, dying, to imbrue this earth with blood."
