The rest of his conduct during his rule was similar and on a level with this.
For he participated in the acts of piracy of the Cretans, and through the whole of the <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Peloponnese&groupId=861&placeId=1552">Peloponnese</a> he had plunderers of temples, highwaymen, and assassins, the profits of whose misdeeds he shared and allowed them to make <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Sparta&groupId=660&placeId=1208">Sparta</a> their base of operations and their refuge.
But in one case some foreign soldiers from Boeotia who were paying a visit to <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Sparta&groupId=660&placeId=1208">Sparta</a> tried to induce one of Nabis\'s grooms to leave with them, bringing away a white horse supposed to be the best bred animal in the tyrant\'s stables.
Upon the groom consenting and doing as they wished, Nabis\'s men pursued them as far as <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Megalopolis&groupId=745&placeId=1360">Megalopolis</a> and catching them there at once took away the horse and the groom, no one offering any objection. When, in the next place, they tried to lay hands on the foreigners, the Boeotians at first demanded to be brought before the magistrates, and when no one paid any attention to their request, one of them called out "Help."
Upon this the populace collected and protested that the men should be brought before the magistrates, and now Nabis's men were compelled to release their prisoners and take their departure.
Nabis had been long on the look-out for some pretended grievance and a specious pretext for a rupture, and taking hold of this at once raided the cattle of Protagoras and some others. This was the origin of the war.
Walbank Commentary