Histories

Having given these instructions, he went to the gates, turning and looking back as though he were in fact a deserter. When the watch posted on the towers saw him, they ran down, and opening half the gate a little asked him who he was and why he came; he told them that he was Zopyrus and was deserting to them.

When they heard this, the gatekeepers brought him before the general assembly of the Babylonians, where he made a pitiful sight, saying that he had suffered at the hands of Darius what he had suffered at his own because he had advised the king to lead his army away, since they could find no way to take the city.