The scroll is made up thus: when the Ephors send an admiral or general
on his way, they take two round pieces of wood, both exactly of a length
and thickness, and cut even to one another; they keep one themselves,
and the other the give to the person they send forth; and these pieces
of wood they call Scytales. When, therefore, they have occasion to
communicate any secret or important matter, making a scroll of parchment
long and narrow like a leathern thong, they roll it about their own
staff of wood, leaving no space void between, but covering the surface
of the staff with the scroll all over. When they have done this, they
write what they please on the scroll, as it is wrapped about the staff;
and when they have written, they take off the scroll, and send it to the
general without the wood. He, when he has received it, can read nothing
of the writing, because the words and letters are not connected, but
all broken up; but taking his own staff, he winds the slip of the scroll
about it, so that this folding, restoring all the parts into the same
order that they were in before, and putting what comes first into
connection with what follows, brings the whole consecutive contents to
view round the outside. And this scroll is called a _staff_, after the
name of the wood, as a thing measured is by the name of the measure.