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+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #54936 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54936)
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-Project Gutenberg's History of Greece, v. 6 (of 12), by George Grote
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: History of Greece, v. 6 (of 12)
-
-Author: George Grote
-
-Release Date: June 19, 2017 [EBook #54936]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF GREECE, V. 6 (OF 12) ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Henry Flower, Adrian Mastronardi, Ramon Pajares
-Box, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
-http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
-generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
-Libraries.)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
-
-  * Italics are denoted by underscores as in _italics_.
-  * Small caps are represented in upper case as in SMALL CAPS.
-  * Letter spaced Greek text is enclosed in tildes as in ~καὶ τὰ λοιπά~.
-  * Obvious printer errors have been silently corrected, after
-    comparison with a later edition of this work. Greek text has
-    also been corrected after checking with this later edition and
-    with Perseus, when the reference was found.
-  * Original spelling, hyphenation and punctuation have been kept,
-    but variant spellings were made consistent when a predominant
-    usage was found.
-
-
-
-
-  HISTORY OF GREECE.
-
-  BY
-  GEORGE GROTE, ESQ.
-
-  VOL. VI.
-
-  REPRINTED FROM THE LONDON EDITION
-
-  NEW YORK:
-  HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
-  329 AND 331 PEARL STREET.
-
-  1879.
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS.
-
-VOL. VI.
-
-
-PART II.
-
-CONTINUATION OF HISTORICAL GREECE.
-
-
-  CHAPTER XLVII.
-
-  FROM THE THIRTY YEARS’ TRUCE, FOURTEEN YEARS BEFORE THE
-  PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA, IN THE YEAR
-  BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-  Personal activity now prevalent among the Athenian
-  citizens—empire of Athens again exclusively maritime, after
-  the Thirty years’ truce.—Chios, Samos, and Lesbos, were now
-  the only free allies of Athens, on the same footing as the
-  original confederates of Delos—the rest were subject and
-  tributary.—Athens took no pains to inspire her allies with the
-  idea of a common interest—nevertheless, the allies were gainers
-  by the continuance of her empire.—Conception of Periklês—Athens,
-  an imperial city, owing protection to the subject-allies;
-  who, on their part, owed obedience and tribute.—Large amount
-  of revenue laid by and accumulated by Athens, during the
-  years preceding the Peloponnesian war.—Pride felt by Athenian
-  citizens in the imperial power of their city.—Numerous Athenian
-  citizens planted out as kleruchs by Periklês.—Chersonesus
-  of Thrace. Sinôpê.—Active personal and commercial relations
-  between Athens and all parts of the Ægean.—Amphipolis in Thrace
-  founded by Athens.—Agnon is sent out as Œkist.—Situation
-  and importance of Amphipolis.—Foundation, by the Athenians,
-  of Thurii, on the southern coast of Italy.—Conduct of the
-  refugee inhabitants of the ruined Sybaris—their encroachments
-  in the foundation of Thurii: they are expelled, and Thurii
-  reconstituted.—Herodotus and Lysias—both domiciliated as
-  citizens at Thurii. Few Athenian citizens settled there as
-  colonists.—Period from 445-431 B.C. Athens at peace. Her
-  political condition. Rivalry of Periklês with Thucydidês son
-  of Melêsias.—Points of contention between the two parties: 1.
-  Peace with Persia. 2. Expenditure of money for the decoration of
-  Athens.—Defence of Periklês perfectly good against his political
-  rivals.—Pan-Hellenic schemes and sentiment of Periklês.—Bitter
-  contention of parties at Athens—vote of ostracism—Thucydidês
-  is ostracized about 443 B.C.—New works undertaken at Athens.
-  Third Long Wall. Docks in Peiræus—which is newly laid out
-  as a town, by the architect Hippodamus.—Odeon, Parthenon,
-  Propylæa. Other temples. Statues of Athênê.—Illustrious
-  artists and architects—Pheidias, Iktînus, Kallikratês.—Effect
-  of these creations of art and architecture upon the minds of
-  contemporaries.—Attempt of Periklês to convene a general congress
-  at Athens, of deputies from all the Grecian states.—Revolt of
-  Samos from the Athenians.—Athenian armament against Samos,
-  under Periklês, Sophoklês the tragedian, etc.—Doubtful and
-  prolonged contest—great power of Samos—it is at last reconquered,
-  disarmed, and dismantled.—None of the other allies of Athens,
-  except Byzantium, revolted at the same time.—Application of
-  the Samians to Sparta for aid against Athens—it is refused,
-  chiefly through the Corinthians.—Government of Samos after the
-  reconquest—doubtful whether the Athenians renewed the democracy
-  which they had recently established.—Funeral oration pronounced
-  by Periklês upon the Athenian citizens slain in the Samian
-  war.—Position of the Athenian empire—relation of Athens to her
-  subject allies—their feelings towards her generally were those
-  of indifference and acquiescence, not of hatred.—Particular
-  grievances complained of in the dealing of Athens with her
-  allies.—Annual tribute—changes made in its amount. Athenian
-  officers and inspectors throughout the empire.—Disputes and
-  offences in and among the subject-allies, were brought for
-  trial before the dikasteries at Athens. Productive of some
-  disadvantages, but of preponderance of advantage to the
-  subject-allies themselves.—Imperial Athens compared with imperial
-  Sparta.—Numerous Athenian citizens spread over the Ægean—the
-  allies had no redress against them, except through the Athenian
-  dikasteries.—The dikasteries afforded protection against
-  misconduct both of Athenian citizens and Athenian officers.—The
-  dikasteries, defective or not, were the same tribunals under
-  which every Athenian held his own security.—Athenian empire was
-  affected for the worse by the circumstances of the Peloponnesian
-  war: more violence was introduced into it by that war than had
-  prevailed before.—The subject-allies of Athens had few practical
-  grievances to complain of.—The Grecian world was now divided into
-  two great systems; with a right supposed to be vested in each,
-  of punishing its own refractory members.—Policy of Corinth, from
-  being pacific, becomes warlike.—Disputes arise between Corinth
-  and Korkyra—case of Epidamnus.—The Epidamnians apply for aid
-  in their distress to Korkyra; they are refused—the Corinthians
-  send aid to the place.—The Korkyræans attack Epidamnus—armament
-  sent thither by Corinth.—Remonstrance of the Korkyræans with
-  Corinth and the Peloponnesians.—Hostilities between Corinth and
-  Korkyra—naval victory of the latter.—Large preparations made
-  by Corinth for renewing the war.—Application of the Korkyræans
-  to be received among the allies of Athens.—Address of the
-  Korkyræan envoys to the Athenian public assembly. Principal
-  topics upon which it insists, as given in Thucydidês.—Envoys
-  from Corinth address the Athenian assembly in reply.—Decision
-  of the Athenians—a qualified compliance with the request of
-  Korkyra. The Athenian triremes sent to Korkyra.—Naval combat
-  between the Corinthians and Korkyræans: rude tactics on both
-  sides.—The Korkyræans are defeated.—Arrival of a reinforcement
-  from Athens—the Corinthian fleet retires, carrying off numerous
-  Korkyræan prisoners.—Hostilities not yet professedly begun
-  between Athens and Corinth.—Hatred conceived by the Corinthians
-  towards Athens.—They begin to stir up revolt among the Athenian
-  allies—Potidæa, colony of Corinth, but ally of Athens.—Relations
-  of Athens with Perdikkas king of Macedonia, his intrigues along
-  with Corinth against her—he induces the Chalkidians to revolt
-  from her—increase of Olynthus.—Revolt of Potidæa—armament
-  sent thither from Athens.—Combat near Potidæa, between the
-  Athenian force and the allied Corinthians. Potidæans, and
-  Chalkidians.—Victory of the Athenians.—Potidæa placed in blockade
-  by the Athenians.                                                 1-75
-
-
-  CHAPTER XLVIII.
-
-  FROM THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA DOWN TO THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR OF
-  THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-  State of feeling in Greece between the Thirty years’ truce and
-  the Peloponnesian war—recognized probability of war—Athens
-  at that time not encroaching—decree interdicting trade with
-  the Megarians.—Zealous importunity of the Corinthians in
-  bringing about a general war, for the purpose of preserving
-  Potidæa.—Relations of Sparta with her allies—they had a
-  determining vote, whether they would or would not approve of a
-  course of policy which had been previously revived by Sparta
-  separately.—Assembly of the Spartans separately addressed
-  by envoys of the allied powers, complaining that Athens had
-  violated the truce.—The Corinthian envoys address the assembly
-  last, after the envoys of the other allies have inflamed it
-  against Athens.—International customs of the time, as bearing
-  upon the points in dispute between Athens and Corinth.—Athens
-  in the right.—Tenor of the Corinthian address—little allusion
-  to recent wrong—strong efforts to raise hatred and alarm
-  against Athens.—Remarkable picture drawn of Athens by her
-  enemies.—Reply made by an Athenian envoy, accidentally present
-  in Sparta.—His account of the empire of Athens—how it had been
-  acquired, and how it was maintained.—He adjures them not to
-  break the truce, but to adjust all differences by that pacific
-  appeal which the truce provided.—The Spartans exclude strangers,
-  and discuss the point among themselves in the assembly.—Most
-  Spartan speakers are in favor of war. King Archidamus opposes
-  war. His speech.—The speech of Archidamus is ineffectual.
-  Short, but warlike appeal of the Ephor Stheneläidas.—Vote of
-  the Spartan assembly in favor of war.—The Spartans send to
-  Delphi—obtain an encouraging reply.—General congress of allies
-  at Sparta. Second speech of the Corinthian envoys, enforcing
-  the necessity and propriety of war.—Vote of the majority of
-  the allies in favor of war, B.C. 432.—Views and motives of
-  the opposing powers.—The hopes and confidence, on the side of
-  Sparta; the fears, on the side of Athens. Heralds sent from
-  Sparta to Athens with complaints and requisitions meanwhile
-  the preparations for war go on.—Requisitions addressed by
-  Sparta to Athens—demand for the expulsion of the Alkmæonidæ
-  as impious—aimed at Periklês.—Position of Periklês at
-  Athens: bitter hostility of his political opponents: attacks
-  made upon him.—Prosecution of Aspasia. Her character and
-  accomplishments.—Family relations of Periklês—his connection
-  with Aspasia. License of the comic writers in their attacks upon
-  both.—Prosecution of Anaxagoras the philosopher as well as of
-  Aspasia—Anaxagoras retires from Athens—Periklês defends Aspasia
-  before the dikastery, and obtains her acquittal.—Prosecution
-  of the sculptor Pheidias for embezzlement—instituted by the
-  political opponents of Periklês.—Charge of peculation against
-  Periklês himself.—Probability that Periklês was never even tried
-  for peculation, certainly that he was never found guilty of
-  it.—Requisition from the Lacedæmonians, for the banishment of
-  Periklês—arrived when Periklês was thus pressed by his political
-  enemies—rejected.—Counter-requisition sent by the Athenians to
-  Sparta, for expiation of sacrilege.—Fresh requisitions sent from
-  Sparta to Athens—to withdraw the troops from Potidæa—to leave
-  Ægina free—to readmit the Megarians to Athenian harbors.—Final
-  and peremptory requisition of Sparta—public assembly held at
-  Athens on the whole subject of war and peace.—Great difference of
-  opinion in the assembly—important speech of Periklês.—Periklês
-  strenuously urges the Athenians not to yield.—His review of
-  the comparative forces, and probable chances of success or
-  defeat, in the war.—The assembly adopts the recommendation of
-  Periklês—firm and determined reply sent to Sparta.—Views of
-  Thucydidês respecting the grounds, feelings, and projects of the
-  two parties now about to embark in war.—Equivocal period—war
-  not yet proclaimed—first blow struck, not by Athens, but by
-  her enemies.—Open violation of the truce by the Thebans—they
-  surprise Platæa in the night.—The gates of Platæa are opened by
-  an oligarchical party within—a Theban detachment are admitted
-  into the agora at night—at first apparently successful,
-  afterwards overpowered and captured.—Large force intended to
-  arrive from Thebes to support the assailants early in the
-  morning—they are delayed by the rain and the swelling of the
-  Asôpus—they commence hostilities against the Platæan persons
-  and property without the walls.—Parley between the Platæans and
-  the Theban force without—the latter evacuate the territory—the
-  Theban prisoners in Platæa are slain.—Messages from Platæa to
-  Athens—answer.—Grecian feeling, already predisposed to the war,
-  was wound up to the highest pitch by the striking incident at
-  Platæa.—Preparations for war on the part of Athens—intimations
-  sent round to her allies—Akarnanians recently acquired by
-  Athens as allies—recent capture of the Amphilochian Argos by
-  the Athenian Phormio.—Strength and resources of Athens and her
-  allies—military and naval means—treasure.—Ample grounds for the
-  confidence expressed by Periklês in the result.—Position and
-  power of Sparta and the Peloponnesian allies—they are full of
-  hope and confidence of putting down Athens speedily.—Efforts
-  of Sparta to get up a naval force.—Muster of the combined
-  Peloponnesian force at the isthmus of Corinth, under Archidamus,
-  to invade Attica.—Last envoy sent to Athens—he is dismissed
-  without being allowed to enter the town.—March of Archidamus into
-  Attica—his fruitless siege of Œnoê.—Expectation of Archidamus
-  that Athens would yield at the last moment.—Difficulty of
-  Periklês in persuading the Athenians to abandon their territory
-  and see it all ravaged.—Attica deserted—the population flock
-  within the walls of Athens. Hardships, privations, and distress
-  endured.—March of Archidamus into Attica.—Archidamus advances
-  to Acharnæ, within seven miles of Athens.—Intense clamor within
-  the walls of Athens—eagerness to go forth and fight.—Trying
-  position, firmness, and sustained ascendency, of Periklês, in
-  dissuading them from going forth.—The Athenians remain within
-  their walls: partial skirmishes only, no general action.—Athenian
-  fleet is despatched to ravage the coasts of Peloponnesus—first
-  notice of the Spartan Brasidas—operations of the Athenians in
-  Akarnania, Kephallênia, etc.—The Athenians expel the Æginetans
-  from Ægina, and people the island with Athenian kleruchs. The
-  Æginetans settle at Thyrea in Peloponnesus.—The Athenians invade
-  and ravage the Megarid: sufferings of the Megarians.—Measures
-  taken by Athens for permanent defence.—Sum put by in the
-  acropolis, against urgent need, not to be touched unless under
-  certain defined dangers.—Capital punishment against any who
-  should propose otherwise.—Remarks on this decree.—Blockade
-  of Potidæa—Sitalkês king of the Odrysian Thracians—alliance
-  made between him and Athens.—Periklês is chosen orator to
-  deliver the funeral discourse over the citizens slain during
-  the year.—Funeral oration of Periklês.—Sketch of Athenian
-  political constitution, and social life, as conceived by
-  Periklês.—Eulogy upon Athens and the Athenian character.—Mutual
-  tolerance of diversity of tastes and pursuits in Athens.—It
-  is only true partially and in some memorable instances that
-  the state interfered to an exorbitant degree with individual
-  liberty in Greece.—Free play of individual taste and impulse in
-  Athens—importance of this phenomenon in society.—Extraordinary
-  and many-sided activity of Athens.—Peculiar and interesting
-  moment at which the discourse of Periklês was delivered. Athens
-  now at the maximum of her power—declining tendency commences soon
-  afterwards.                                                     75-153
-
-
-  CHAPTER XLIX.
-
-  FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE SECOND YEAR DOWN TO THE END OF THE
-  THIRD YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-  Barren results of the operations during the first year of
-  war.—Second invasion of Attica by the Peloponnesians—more
-  spreading and ruinous than the first.—Commencement of the
-  pestilence or epidemic at Athens.—Description of the epidemic by
-  Thucydidês—his conception of the duty of exactly observing and
-  recording.—Extensive and terrible suffering of Athens.—Inefficacy
-  of remedies—despair and demoralization of the Athenians.—Lawless
-  recklessness of conduct engendered.—Great loss of life among
-  the citizens—blow to the power of Athens.—Athenian armament
-  sent first against Peloponnesus, next, against Potidæa—it is
-  attacked and ruined by the epidemic.—Irritation of the Athenians
-  under their sufferings and losses—they become incensed against
-  Periklês—his unshaken firmness in defending himself.—Athenian
-  public assembly—last speech of Periklês—his high tone of
-  self-esteem against the public discontent. Powerful effect of his
-  address—new resolution shown for continuing the war—nevertheless,
-  the discontent against Periklês still continues. He is accused
-  and condemned in a fine.—Old age of Periklês—his family
-  misfortunes and suffering. He is reëlected stratêgus—restored
-  to power and to the confidence of the people.—Last moments
-  and death of Periklês. His life and character.—Judgment of
-  Thucydidês respecting Periklês.—Earlier and later political life
-  of Periklês—how far the one differed from the other.—Accusation
-  against Periklês of having corrupted the Athenian people—untrue,
-  and not believed by Thucydidês.—Great progress and improvement
-  of the Athenians under Periklês.—Periklês is not to blame
-  for the Peloponnesian war.—Operations of war languid, under
-  the pressure of the epidemic.—Attack of the Ambrakiots on
-  the Amphilochian Argos: the Athenian Phormio is sent with a
-  squadron to Naupaktus.—Injury done to Athenian commerce by
-  Peloponnesian privateers—The Lacedæmonians put to death all
-  their prisoners taken at sea, even neutrals.—Lacedæmonian
-  envoys seized in their way to Persia and put to death by
-  the Athenians.—Surrender of Potidæa—indulgent capitulation
-  granted by the Athenian generals.—Third year of the war—king
-  Archidamus marches to Platæa—no invasion of Attica.—Remonstrance
-  of the Platæans to Archidamus—his reply—he summons Platæa
-  in vain.—The Platæans resolve to stand out and defy the
-  Lacedæmonian force.—Invocation and excuse of Archidamus on
-  hearing the refusal of the Platæans.—Commencement of the siege
-  of Platæa.—Operations of attack and defence—the besiegers
-  make no progress, and are obliged to resort to blockade.—Wall
-  of circumvallation built round Platæa—the place completely
-  beleaguered and a force left to maintain the blockade.—Athenian
-  armament sent to Potidæa and Chalkidic Thrace—it is defeated and
-  returns.—Operations on the coast of Akarnania.—Joint attack upon
-  Akarnania, by land and sea, concerted between the Ambrakiots and
-  Peloponnesians.—Assemblage of the Ambrakiots, Peloponnesians,
-  and Epirotic allies—divisions of Epirots.—They march to attack
-  the Akarnanian town of Stratus.—Rashness of the Epirots—defeat
-  and repulse of the army.—The Peloponnesian fleet comes from
-  Corinth to Akarnania—movements of the Athenian Phormio to oppose
-  it.—Naval battle between Phormio and the Peloponnesian fleet—his
-  complete victory.—Reflections upon these two defeats of the
-  Peloponnesians.—Indignation of the Lacedæmonians at the late
-  naval defeat: they collect a larger fleet under Knêmus to act
-  against Phormio.—Inferior numbers of Phormio—his manœuvring.—The
-  Peloponnesian fleet forces Phormio to a battle on the line
-  of coast near Naupaktus. Dispositions and harangues on both
-  sides.—Battle near Naupaktus. The Peloponnesian fleet at first
-  successful, but afterwards defeated.—Retirement of the defeated
-  Peloponnesian fleet.—Phormio is reinforced—his operations in
-  Akarnania—he returns to Athens.—Attempt of Knêmus and Brasidas
-  to surprise Peiræus, starting from Corinth.—Alliance of the
-  Athenians with the Odrysian king Sitalkês.—Power of the Odrysians
-  in Thrace—their extensive dominion over the other Thracian
-  tribes.—Sitalkês, at the instigation of Athens, undertakes to
-  attack Perdikkas and the Chalkidians of Thrace.—His vast and
-  multifarious host of Thracians and other barbarians.—He invades
-  and ravages Macedonia and Chalkidikê.—He is forced to retire
-  by the severity of the season and want of Athenian coöperation.
-                                                                 153-221
-
-
-  CHAPTER L.
-
-  FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE FOURTH YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR
-  DOWN TO THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMOTIONS AT KORKYRA.
-
-  Fourth year of the war—internal suffering at Athens.—Renewed
-  invasion of Attica.—Revolt of Mitylênê and most part of Lesbos
-  from Athens.—Proceedings of Athens—powerful condition of
-  Mitylênê—Athenian fleet sent thither under Kleïppidês.—Kleïppidês
-  fails in surprising Mitylênê—carries on an imperfect blockade.—He
-  receives reinforcements, and presses the siege with greater
-  vigor—want of resolution on the part of the Mitylenæans.—The
-  Mitylenæan envoys address themselves to the Spartans at the
-  Olympic festival, entreating aid.—Tone and topics of their
-  address.—Practical grounds of complaint on the part of the
-  Mitylenæans against Athens few or none.—The Peloponnesians
-  promise assistance to Mitylênê—energetic demonstrations of the
-  Athenians.—Asôpius son of Phormio in Akarnania.—The accumulated
-  treasure of Athens exhausted by her efforts—necessity for her
-  to raise a direct contribution.—Outbreak of the Platæans from
-  their blockaded town.—Their plan of escape—its extraordinary
-  difficulty and danger. Half of the garrison of Platæa escapes to
-  Athens.—Blockade of Mitylênê closely carried on by the Athenian
-  general Pachês—the Mitylenæans are encouraged to hold out by
-  the Lacedæmonians, who send thither Salæthus.—Mitylênê holds
-  out till provisions are exhausted—Salæthus arms all the people
-  of Mitylênê for a general sally—the people refuse to join—the
-  city is surrendered to Athens, at discretion.—The Peloponnesian
-  fleet under Alkidas arrives off the coast of Ionia—astonishment
-  and alarm which its presence creates.—Pachês, after the
-  capture of Mitylênê, pursues the fleet of Alkidas, which
-  returns to Peloponnesus without having done anything.—Pachês
-  at Notium—he captures the place—his perfidy towards Hippias,
-  the leader of the garrison.—Notium recolonized from Athens
-  as a separate town.—Pachês sends to Athens about a thousand
-  Mitylenæan prisoners, the persons chiefly concerned in the
-  late revolt, together with Salæthus.—Important debate in the
-  Athenian assembly upon the treatment of the prisoners.—First
-  mention of Kleon by Thucydidês—new class of politicians to
-  which he belonged.—Eukratês, Kleon, Lysiklês, Hyperbolus,
-  etc.—Character of Kleon.—Indignation of the Athenians against
-  Mitylênê—proposition of Kleon to put to death the whole male
-  population of military age is carried and passed.—Repentance
-  of the Athenians after the decree is passed. A fresh assembly
-  is convened to reconsider the decree.—Account of the second
-  assembly given by Thucydidês—speech of Kleon in support of the
-  resolution already passed.—Remarks on the speech of Kleon.—Speech
-  of Diodotus in opposition to Kleon—second decree mitigating
-  the former. Rapid voyage of the trireme which carries the
-  second decree to Mitylênê—it arrives just in time to prevent
-  the execution of the first.—Those Mitylenæans whom Pachês had
-  sent to Athens are put to death—treatment of Mitylênê by the
-  Athenians.—Enormities committed by Pachês at Mitylênê—his
-  death before the Athenian dikastery.—Surrender of Platæa to
-  the Lacedæmonians.—The Platæan captive garrison are put upon
-  their trial before Lacedæmonian judges.—Speech of the Platæan
-  deputies to these judges on behalf of themselves and their
-  comrades.—Reply of the Thebans.—The Platæans are sentenced to
-  death by the Lacedæmonian judges, and all slain.—Reason of the
-  severity of the Lacedæmonians—cases of Platæa and Mitylênê
-  compared.—Circumstances of Korkyra—the Korkyræan captives are
-  sent back from Corinth, under agreement to effect a revolution in
-  the government and foreign politics of the island.—Their attempts
-  to bring about a revolution—they prosecute the democratical
-  leader Peithias—he prosecutes five of them in revenge—they
-  are found guilty.—They assassinate Peithias and several other
-  senators, and make themselves masters of the government—they
-  decree neutrality—their unavailing mission to Athens.—The
-  oligarchical party at Korkyra attack the people—obstinate battle
-  in the city—victory of the people—arrival of the Athenian admiral
-  Nikostratus.—Moderation of Nikostratus—proceedings of the people
-  towards the vanquished oligarchs.—Arrival of the Lacedæmonian
-  admiral Alkidas, with a fleet of fifty-three triremes. Renewed
-  terror and struggle in the island.—Naval battle off Korkyra
-  between Nikostratus and Alkidas.—Confusion and defenceless
-  state of Korkyra—Alkidas declines to attack it—arrival of the
-  Athenian fleet under Eurymedon—flight of Alkidas.—Vengeance
-  of the victorious Demos in Korkyra against the prostrate
-  oligarchs—fearful bloodshed.—Lawless and ferocious murders—base
-  connivance of Eurymedon.—Band of oligarchical fugitives escape to
-  the mainland—afterwards land again on the island and establish
-  themselves on Mount Istônê.—Political reflections introduced by
-  Thucydidês on occasion of the Korkyræan massacre.—The political
-  enormities of Korkyra were the worst that occurred in the whole
-  war.—How these enormities began and became exaggerated. Conduct
-  of the opposing parties.—Contrast between the bloody character
-  of revolutions at Korkyra and the mild character of analogous
-  phenomena at Athens.—Bad morality of the rich and great men
-  throughout the Grecian cities.                                 221-285
-
-
-  CHAPTER LI.
-
-  FROM THE TROUBLES IN KORKYRA, IN THE FIFTH YEAR OF THE
-  PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE END OF THE SIXTH YEAR.
-
-  Capture of Minôa, opposite Megara, by the Athenians under
-  Nikias.—Nikias—his first introduction, position, and
-  character.—Varying circumstances and condition of the
-  oligarchical party at Athens.—Points of analogy between Nikias
-  and Periklês—material differences.—Care of Nikias in maintaining
-  his popularity and not giving offence; his very religious
-  character.—His diligence in increasing his fortune—speculations
-  in the mines of Laurium—letting out of slaves for hire.—Nikias
-  first opposed to Kleon—next to Alkibiadês.—Oligarchical
-  clubs, or Hetæries, at Athens, for political and judicial
-  purposes.—Kleon—his real function that of opposition—real
-  power inferior to Nikias.—Revival of the epidemic distemper
-  at Athens for another year—atmospheric and terrestrial
-  disturbances in Greece. Lacedæmonian invasion of Attica
-  suspended for this year.—Foundation of the colony of Herakleia
-  by the Lacedæmonians, near Thermopylæ—its numerous settlers,
-  great promise, and unprosperous career.—Athenian expedition
-  against Melos, under Nikias.—Proceedings of the Athenians under
-  Demosthenês in Akarnania.—Expedition of Demosthenês against
-  Ætolia—his large plans.—March of Demosthenês—impracticability
-  of the territory of Ætolia.—rudeness and bravery of the
-  inhabitants.—He is completely beaten and obliged to retire with
-  loss.—Attack of Ætolians and Peloponnesians under Eurylochus
-  upon Naupaktus.—Naupaktus is saved by Demosthenês and the
-  Akarnanians.—Eurylochus, repulsed from Naupaktus, concerts
-  with the Ambrakiots an attack on Argos.—Demosthenês and the
-  Athenians, as well as the Akarnanians, come to the protection
-  of Argos.—March of Eurylochus across Akarnania to join the
-  Ambrakiots.—Their united army is defeated by Demosthenês at
-  Olpæ—Eurylochus slain.—The surviving Spartan commander makes
-  a separate capitulation for himself and the Peloponnesians,
-  deserting the Ambrakiots.—The Ambrakiots sustain much loss in
-  their retreat.—Another large body of Ambrakiots, coming from the
-  city as a reinforcement, is intercepted by Demosthenês at Idomenê
-  and cut to pieces.—Despair of the Ambrakiot herald on seeing
-  the great number of slain.—Defenceless and feeble condition of
-  Ambrakia after this ruinous loss.—Attempt to calculate the loss
-  of the Ambrakiots.—Convention concluded between Ambrakia on one
-  side, and the Akarnanians and Amphilochians on the other.—Return
-  of Demosthenês in triumph to Athens.—Purification of Delos by the
-  Athenians. Revival of the Delian festival with peculiar splendor.
-                                                                 285-313
-
-
-  CHAPTER LII.
-
-  SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR.—CAPTURE OF SPHAKTERIA.
-
-  Seventh year of the war—invasion of Attica.—Distress in Korkyra
-  from the attack of the oligarchical exiles. A Peloponnesian fleet
-  and an Athenian fleet are both sent thither.—Demosthenês goes
-  on board the Athenian fleet with a separate command.—He fixes
-  upon Pylus in Laconia for the erection of a fort. Locality of
-  Pylus and Sphakteria.—Eurymedon the admiral of the fleet insists
-  upon going on to Korkyra, without stopping at Pylus. The fleet
-  are driven into Pylus by a storm.—Demosthenês fortifies the
-  place, through the voluntary zeal of the soldiers. He is left
-  there with a garrison while the fleet goes on to Korkyra.—Slow
-  march of the Lacedæmonians to recover Pylus.—Preparations of
-  Demosthenês to defend Pylus against them.—Proceedings of the
-  Lacedæmonian army—they send a detachment to occupy the island
-  of Sphakteria, opposite Pylus.—They attack the place by sea
-  and land—gallant conduct of Brasidas in the attack on the
-  sea-side.—Return of Eurymedon and the Athenian fleet to Pylus.—He
-  defeats the Lacedæmonian fleet in the harbor of Pylus.—The
-  Lacedæmonian detachment is blocked up by the Athenian fleet in
-  the island of Sphakteria—armistice concluded at Pylus.—Mission
-  of Lacedæmonian envoys to Athens, to propose peace and solicit
-  the release of their soldiers in Sphakteria.—The Athenians,
-  at the instance of Kleon, require the restoration of Nisæa,
-  Pegæ, Trœzen, and Achaia, as conditions of giving up the men
-  in Sphakteria and making peace.—The envoys will not consent to
-  these demands—Kleon prevents negotiation—they are sent back
-  to Pylus without any result.—Remarks on this assembly and on
-  the conduct of Athens.—The armistice is terminated, and war
-  resumed at Pylus. Eurymedon keeps possession of the Lacedæmonian
-  fleet.—Blockade of Sphakteria by the Athenian fleet—difficulty
-  and hardships to the sea men of the fleet.—Protracted duration
-  and seeming uncertainty of the blockade—Demosthenês sends to
-  Athens for reinforcements to attack the island.—Proceedings in
-  the Athenian assembly on receiving this news—proposition of
-  Kleon—manœuvre of his political enemies to send him against his
-  will as general to Pylus.—Reflections upon this proceeding and
-  upon the conduct of parties at Athens.—Kleon goes to Pylus with
-  a reinforcement—condition of the island of Sphakteria—numbers
-  and positions of the Lacedæmonians in it.—Kleon and Demosthenês
-  land their forces in the island, and attack it.—Numerous light
-  troops of Demosthenês employed against the Lacedæmonians in
-  Sphakteria.—Distress of the Lacedæmonians—their bravery and
-  long resistance. They retreat to their last redoubt at the
-  extremity of the island. They are surrounded and forced to
-  surrender.—Astonishment caused throughout Greece by the
-  surrender of Lacedæmonian hoplites—diminished lustre of Spartan
-  arms.—Judgment pronounced by Thucydidês himself—reflections
-  upon it.—Prejudice of Thucydidês in regard to Kleon. Kleon
-  displayed sound judgment and decision, and was one of the
-  essential causes of the success.—Effect produced at Athens
-  by the arrival of the Lacedæmonian prisoners.—The Athenians
-  prosecute the war with increased hopefulness and vigor.
-  The Lacedæmonians make new advances for peace without
-  effect.—Remarks upon the policy of Athens—her chance was now
-  universally believed to be most favorable in prosecuting the
-  war.—Fluctuations in Athenian feeling for or against the war:
-  there were two occasions on which Kleon contributed to influence
-  them towards it.—Expedition of Nikias against the Corinthian
-  territory.—He reëmbarks—ravages Epidaurus—establishes a post
-  on the peninsula of Methana.—Eurymedon with the Athenian fleet
-  goes to Korkyra. Defeat and captivity of the Korkyræan exiles in
-  the island.—The captives are put to death—cruelty and horrors
-  in the proceeding.—Capture of Anaktorium by the Athenians
-  and Akarnanians.—Proceedings of the Athenians at Chios and
-  Lesbos.—The Athenians capture Artaphernes, a Persian envoy, on
-  his way to Sparta.—Succession of Persian kings—Xerxes, Artaxerxes
-  Longimanus, etc., Darius Nothus.                               313-363
-
-
-  CHAPTER LIII.
-
-  EIGHTH YEAR OF THE WAR.
-
-  Important operations of the eighth year of the war.—Capture
-  of Kythêra by the Athenians. Nikias ravages the Laconian
-  coast.—Capture of Thyrea—all the Æginetans resident there
-  are either slain in the attack or put to death afterwards as
-  prisoners.—Alarm and depression among the Lacedæmonians—their
-  insecurity in regard to the Helots.—They entrap, and cause to
-  be assassinated, two thousand of the bravest Helots.—Request
-  from the Chalkidians and Perdikkas that Spartan aid may be sent
-  to them under Brasidas.—Brasidas is ordered to go thither,
-  with Helot and Peloponnesian hoplites.—Elate and enterprising
-  dispositions prevalent at Athens. Plan formed against Megara.
-  Condition of Megara.—The Athenians, under Hippokratês and
-  Demosthenês, attempt to surprise Nisæa and Megara.—Conspirators
-  within open the gate, and admit them into the Megarian Long
-  Walls. They master the whole line of the Long Walls.—The
-  Athenians march to the gates of Megara—failure of the scheme
-  of the party within to open them.—The Athenians attack
-  Nisæa—the place surrenders to them.—Dissension of parties in
-  Megara—intervention of Brasidas.—Brasidas gets together an
-  army, and relieves Megara—no battle takes place—the Athenians
-  retire.—Revolution at Megara—return of the exiles from Pegæ,
-  under pledge of amnesty—they violate their oaths, and effect a
-  forcible oligarchical revolution.—Combined plan by Hippokratês
-  and Demosthenês for the invasion of Bœotia on three sides at
-  once.—Demosthenês, with an Akarnanian force, makes a descent
-  on Bœotia at Siphæ in the Corinthian gulf—his scheme fails and
-  he retires.—Disappointment of the Athenian plans—no internal
-  movements take place in Bœotia. Hippokratês marches with the
-  army from Athens to Delium in Bœotia.—Hippokratês fortifies
-  Delium, after which the army retires homeward.—Gathering
-  of the Bœotian military force at Tanagra. Pagondas, the
-  Theban bœotarch, determines them to fight.—Marshalling of
-  the Bœotian army—great depth of the Theban hoplites—special
-  Theban band of Three Hundred.—Order of battle of the Athenian
-  army.—Battle of Delium—vigorously contested—advantage derived
-  from the depth of the Theban phalanx.—Defeat and flight of
-  the Athenians—Hippokratês, with one thousand hoplites, is
-  slain.—Interchange of heralds—remonstrance of the Bœotians
-  against the Athenians for desecrating the temple of Delium—they
-  refuse permission to bury the slain except on condition of
-  quitting Delium.—Answer of the Athenian herald—he demands
-  permission to bury the bodies of the slain.—The Bœotians
-  persist in demanding the evacuation of Delium as a condition
-  for granting permission to bury the dead. Debate on the
-  subject. Remarks on the debate.—Siege and capture of Delium
-  by the Bœotians.—Sokratês and Alkibiadês, personally engaged
-  at Delium.—March of Brasidas through Thessaly to Thrace and
-  Macedonia. Rapidity and address with which he gets through
-  Thessaly.—Relations between Brasidas and Perdikkas—Brasidas
-  enters into an accommodation with Arrhibæus—Perdikkas is
-  offended.—Brasidas marches against Akanthus. State of parties
-  in the town.—He is admitted personally into the town to explain
-  his views—his speech before the Akanthian assembly.—Debate in
-  the Akanthian assembly, and decision of the majority voting
-  secretly to admit him, after much opposition.—Reflections upon
-  this proceeding—good political habits of the Akanthians.—Evidence
-  which this proceeding affords, that the body of citizens (among
-  the Athenian allies) did not hate Athens, and were not anxious
-  to revolt.—Brasidas establishes intelligences in Argilus. He
-  lays his plan for the surprise of Amphipolis.—Night-march of
-  Brasidas from Arnê, through Argilus to the river Strymon and
-  Amphipolis.—He becomes master of the lands round Amphipolis,
-  but is disappointed in gaining admission into the town.—He
-  offers to the citizens the most favorable terms of capitulation,
-  which they accept.—Amphipolis capitulates.—Thucydidês arrives
-  at Eion from Thasus with his squadron—not in time to preserve
-  Amphipolis—he preserves Eion.—Alarm and dismay produced at
-  Athens by the capture of Amphipolis—increased hopes among her
-  enemies.—Extraordinary personal glory, esteem, and influence
-  acquired by Brasidas.—Inaction and despondency of Athens after
-  the battle of Delium, especially in reference to arresting
-  the conquests of Brasidas in Thrace.—Loss of Amphipolis was
-  caused by the negligence of the Athenian commanders—Euklês,
-  and the historian Thucydidês.—The Athenians banish Thucydidês
-  on the proposition of Kleon.—Sentence of banishment passed on
-  Thucydidês by the Athenians—grounds of that sentence.—He justly
-  incurred their verdict of guilty.—Preparations of Brasidas
-  in Amphipolis for extended conquest—his operations against
-  the Aktê, or promontory of Athos.—He attacks Torônê in the
-  Sithonian peninsula—he is admitted into the town by an internal
-  party—surprises and takes it.—Some part of the population, with
-  the small Athenian garrison, retire to the separate citadel
-  called Lêkythus.—Conciliating address of Brasidas to the assembly
-  at Torônê.—He attacks Lêkythus and takes it by storm.—Personal
-  ability and conciliatory efficiency of Brasidas.               363-425
-
-
-  CHAPTER LIV.
-
-  TRUCE FOR ONE YEAR.—RENEWAL OF WAR AND BATTLE OF
-  AMPHIPOLIS.—PEACE OF NIKIAS.
-
-  Eighth year of the war—began with most favorable promise for
-  Athens—closed with great reverses to her.—Desire of Spartans to
-  make peace in order to regain the captives—they decline sending
-  reinforcements to Brasidas.—King Pleistoanax at Sparta—eager for
-  peace—his special reasons—his long banishment recently terminated
-  by recall.—Negotiations during the winter of 424-423 B.C. for
-  peace.—Truce for one year concluded, in March 423 B.C.—Conditions
-  of the truce.—Resolution to open negotiations for a definitive
-  treaty.—New events in Thrace—revolt of Skiônê from Athens to
-  Brasidas, two days after the truce was sworn.—Brasidas crosses
-  over to Skiônê—his judicious conduct—enthusiastic admiration
-  for him there.—Brasidas brings across reinforcements to
-  Skiônê—he conveys away the women and children into a place of
-  safety.—Commissioners from Sparta and Athens arrive in Thrace, to
-  announce to Brasidas the truce just concluded. Dispute respecting
-  Skiônê. The war continues in Thrace, but is suspended everywhere
-  else.—Revolt of Mendê from Athens—Brasidas receives the offers
-  of the Mendæans—engages to protect them and sends to them a
-  garrison against Athens. He departs upon an expedition against
-  Arrhibæus in the interior of Macedonia.—Nikias and Nikostratus
-  arrive with an Athenian armament in Pallênê. They attack Mendê.
-  The Lacedæmonian garrison under Polydamidas at first repulses
-  them.—Dissensions among the citizens of Mendê—mutiny of the Demos
-  against Polydamidas—the Athenians are admitted into the town.—The
-  Athenians besiege and blockade Skiônê. Nikias leaves a blockading
-  force there, and returns to Athens.—Expedition of Brasidas
-  along with Perdikkas into Macedonia against Arrhibæus.—Retreat
-  of Brasidas and Perdikkas before the Illyrians.—Address of
-  Brasidas to his soldiers before the retreat.—Contrast between
-  Grecian and barbaric military feeling.—Appeal of Brasidas to
-  the right of conquest or superior force.—The Illyrians attack
-  Brasidas in his retreat, but are repulsed.—Breach between
-  Brasidas and Perdikkas: the latter opens negotiations with the
-  Athenians.—Relations between Athens and the Peloponnesians—no
-  progress made towards definitive peace—Lacedæmonian reinforcement
-  on its way to Brasidas, prevented from passing through
-  Thessaly.—Incidents in Peloponnesus—the temple of Hêrê near Argos
-  accidentally burnt.—War in Arcadia—battle between Mantineia and
-  Tegea.—Bœotians at peace _de facto_, though not parties to the
-  truce.—Hard treatment of the Thespians by Thebes.—Expiration of
-  the truce for one year. Disposition of both Sparta and Athens
-  at that time towards peace; but peace impossible in consequence
-  of the relations of parties in Thrace.—No actual resumption
-  of hostilities, although the truce had expired, from the
-  month of March to the Pythian festival in August.—Alteration
-  in the language of statesmen at Athens—instances of Kleon
-  and his partisans to obtain a vigorous prosecution of the
-  war in Thrace.—Brasidas—an opponent of peace—his views and
-  motives.—Kleon—an opponent of peace—his views and motives
-  as stated by Thucydidês. Kleon had no personal interest in
-  war.—To prosecute the war vigorously in Thrace was at this
-  time the real political interest of Athens.—Question of peace
-  or war, as it stood between Nikias and Kleon, in March 422
-  B.C., after the expiration of the truce for one year.—Kleon’s
-  advocacy of war at this moment perfectly defensible—unjust
-  account of his motive given by Thucydidês.—Kleon at this time
-  adhered more closely than any other Athenian public man to the
-  foreign policy of Periklês.—Dispositions of Nikias and the
-  peace-party in reference to the reconquest of Amphipolis.—Kleon
-  conducts an expedition against Amphipolis—he takes Torônê.—He
-  arrives at Eion—sends envoys to invite Macedonian and Thracian
-  auxiliaries.—Dissatisfaction of his own troops with his
-  inaction while waiting for these auxiliaries.—He is forced
-  by these murmurs to make a demonstration—he marches from
-  Eion along the walls of Amphipolis to reconnoitre the top
-  of the hill—apparent quiescence in Amphipolis.—Brasidas, at
-  first on Mount Kerdylium—presently moves into the town across
-  the bridge.—His exhortation to his soldiers.—Kleon tries to
-  effect his retreat.—Brasidas sallies out upon the army in
-  its retreat—the Athenians are completely routed—Brasidas and
-  Kleon both slain.—Profound sorrow in Thrace for the death of
-  Brasidas—funeral honors paid him in Amphipolis.—The Athenian
-  armament, much diminished by its loss in the battle, returns
-  home.—Remarks on the battle of Amphipolis—wherein consisted
-  the faults of Kleon.—Disgraceful conduct of the Athenian
-  hoplites—the defeat of Amphipolis arose partly from political
-  feeling hostile to Kleon.—Important effect of the death of
-  Brasidas, in reference to the prospects of the war—his admirable
-  character and efficiency.—Feelings of Thucydidês towards Brasidas
-  and Kleon.—Character of Kleon—his foreign policy. Internal
-  policy of Kleon as a citizen in constitutional life.—Picture
-  in the Knights of Aristophanês.—Unfairness of judging Kleon
-  upon such evidence.—Picture of Sokratês by Aristophanês is
-  noway resembling.—The vices imputed by Aristophanês to Kleon
-  are not reconcilable one with the other.—Kleon—a man of strong
-  and bitter opposition talents—frequent in accusation—often on
-  behalf of poor men suffering wrong.—Necessity for voluntary
-  accusers at Athens—general danger and obloquy attending the
-  function.—We have no evidence to decide in what proportion of
-  cases he accused wrongfully.—Private dispute between Kleon
-  and Aristophanês.—Negotiations for peace during the winter
-  following the battle of Amphipolis.—Peace called the Peace of
-  Nikias—concluded in March 421 B.C.—Conditions of peace.—The peace
-  is only partially accepted by the allies of Sparta.—The Bœotians,
-  Megarians, and Corinthians, all repudiate it.                  426-494
-
-
-
-
-HISTORY OF GREECE.
-
-
-
-
-PART II.
-
-CONTINUATION OF HISTORICAL GREECE.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLVII.
-
-FROM THE THIRTY YEARS’ TRUCE, FOURTEEN YEARS BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN
-WAR, DOWN TO THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA, IN THE YEAR BEFORE THE
-PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-
-The judicial alterations effected at Athens by Periklês and
-Ephialtês, described in the preceding chapter, gave to a large
-proportion of the citizens direct jury functions and an active
-interest in the constitution, such as they had never before enjoyed;
-the change being at once a mark of previous growth of democratical
-sentiment during the past, and a cause of its farther development
-during the future. The Athenian people were at this time ready for
-personal exertion in all directions: military service on land or
-sea was not less conformable to their dispositions than attendance
-in the ekklesia or in the dikastery at home. The naval service
-especially was prosecuted with a degree of assiduity which brought
-about continual improvement in skill and efficiency, and the poorer
-citizens, of whom it chiefly consisted, were more exact in obedience
-and discipline than any of the more opulent persons from whom the
-infantry or the cavalry were drawn.[1] The maritime multitude, in
-addition to self-confidence and courage, acquired by this laborious
-training an increased skill, which placed the Athenian navy every
-year more and more above the rest of Greece: and the perfection of
-this force became the more indispensable as the Athenian empire
-was now again confined to the sea and seaport towns; the reverses
-immediately preceding the thirty years truce having broken up
-all Athenian land ascendency over Megara, Bœotia, and the other
-continental territories adjoining to Attica.
-
-  [1] Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 5, 18.
-
-The maritime confederacy,—originally commenced at Delos, under
-the headship of Athens, but with a common synod and deliberative
-voice on the part of each member,—had now become transformed into a
-confirmed empire on the part of Athens, over the remaining states as
-foreign dependencies; all of them rendering tribute except Chios,
-Samos, and Lesbos. These three still remained on their original
-footing of autonomous allies, retaining their armed force, ships, and
-fortifications, with the obligation of furnishing military and naval
-aid when required, but not of paying tribute: the discontinuance of
-the deliberative synod, however, had deprived them of their original
-security against the encroachments of Athens. I have already stated
-generally the steps, we do not know them in detail, whereby this
-important change was brought about, gradually and without any violent
-revolution,—for even the transfer of the common treasure from Delos
-to Athens, which was the most palpable symbol and evidence of the
-change, was not an act of Athenian violence, since it was adopted
-on the proposition of the Samians. The change resulted in fact
-almost inevitably from the circumstances of the case, and from the
-eager activity of the Athenians contrasted with the backwardness
-and aversion to personal service on the part of the allies. We must
-recollect that the confederacy, even in its original structure, was
-contracted for permanent objects, and was permanently binding by
-the vote of its majority, like the Spartan confederacy, upon every
-individual member:[2] it was destined to keep out the Persian fleet,
-and to maintain the police of the Ægean. Consistently with these
-objects, no individual member could be allowed to secede from the
-confederacy, and thus to acquire the benefit of protection at the
-cost of the remainder: so that when Naxos and other members actually
-did secede, the step was taken as a revolt, and Athens only did her
-duty as president of the confederacy in reducing them. By every
-such reduction, as well as by that exchange of personal service for
-money-payment, which most of the allies voluntarily sought, the
-power of Athens increased, until at length she found herself with an
-irresistible navy in the midst of disarmed tributaries, none of whom
-could escape from her constraining power,—and mistress of the sea,
-the use of which was indispensable to them. The synod of Delos, even
-if it had not before become partially deserted, must have ceased at
-the time when the treasure was removed to Athens,—probably about 460
-B.C., or shortly afterwards.
-
-  [2] Thucyd. v. 30: about the Spartan confederacy,—εἰρημένον,
-  κύριον εἶναι, ὅ,τι ἂν τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ξυμμάχων ψηφίσηται, ἢν μή τι
-  θεῶν ἢ ἡρώων κώλυμα ᾖ.
-
-The relations between Athens and her allies were thus materially
-changed by proceedings which gradually evolved themselves and
-followed one upon the other without any preconcerted plan: she became
-an imperial or despot city, governing an aggregate of dependent
-subjects, all without their own active concurrence, and in many
-cases doubtless contrary to their own sense of political right. It
-was not likely that they should conspire unanimously to break up
-the confederacy, and discontinue the collection of contribution
-from each of the members: nor would it have been at all desirable
-that they should do so: for while Greece generally would have been
-a great loser by such a proceeding, the allies themselves would
-have been the greatest losers of all, inasmuch as they would have
-been exposed without defence to the Persian and Phenician fleets.
-But the Athenians committed the capital fault of taking the whole
-alliance into their own hands, and treating the allies purely as
-subjects, without seeking to attach them by any form of political
-incorporation or collective meeting and discussion,—without taking
-any pains to maintain community of feeling with the idea of a joint
-interest,—without admitting any control, real or even pretended,
-over themselves as managers. Had they attempted to do this, it might
-have proved difficult to accomplish,—so powerful was the force of
-geographical dissemination, the tendency to isolated civic life, and
-the repugnance to any permanent extramural obligations, in every
-Grecian community: but they do not appear to have ever made the
-attempt. Finding Athens exalted by circumstances to empire, and the
-allies degraded into subjects, the Athenian statesmen grasped at
-the exaltation as a matter of pride as well as profit:[3] nor did
-even Periklês, the most prudent and far-sighted of them, betray any
-consciousness that an empire without the cement of some all-pervading
-interest or attachment, must have a natural tendency to become more
-and more burdensome and odious, and ultimately to crumble in pieces.
-Such was the course of events which, if the judicious counsels of
-Periklês had been followed, might have been postponed but could not
-have been averted.
-
-  [3] Thucyd. ii, 63. τῆς τε πόλεως ὑμᾶς εἰκὸς τῷ τιμωμένῳ ἀπὸ τοῦ
-  ἄρχειν, ᾧπερ ἅπαντες ἀγάλλεσθε, βοηθεῖν, καὶ μὴ φεύγειν τοὺς
-  πόνους, ἢ μηδὲ τὰς τιμὰς διώκειν, etc.
-
-Instead of trying to cherish or restore the feelings of equal
-alliance, Periklês formally disclaimed it. He maintained that Athens
-owed to her subject allies no account of the money received from
-them, so long as she performed her contract by keeping away the
-Persian enemy, and maintaining the safety of the Ægean waters.[4]
-This was, as he represented, the obligation which Athens had
-undertaken; and, provided it were faithfully discharged, the allies
-had no right to ask questions or institute control. That it was
-faithfully discharged no one could deny: no ship of war except that
-of Athens and her allies was ever seen between the eastern and
-western shores of the Ægean. An Athenian fleet of sixty triremes was
-kept on duty in these waters, chiefly manned by Athenian citizens,
-and beneficial as well from the protection afforded to commerce as
-for keeping the seaman in constant pay and training.[5] And such was
-the effective superintendence maintained, that in the disastrous
-period preceding the thirty years’ truce, when Athens lost Megara and
-Bœotia, and with difficulty recovered Eubœa, none of her numerous
-maritime subjects took the opportunity to revolt.
-
-  [4] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 12.
-
-  [5] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11.
-
-The total of these distinct tributary cities is said to have amounted
-to one thousand, according to a verse of Aristophanês,[6] which
-cannot be under the truth, though it may well be, and probably is,
-greatly above the truth. The total annual tribute collected at
-the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, and probably also for the
-years preceding it, is given by Thucydidês at about six hundred
-talents; of the sums paid by particular states, however, we have
-little or no information.[7] It was placed under the superintendence
-of the Hellenotamiæ; originally officers of the confederacy, but
-now removed from Delos to Athens, and acting altogether as an
-Athenian treasury-board. The sum total of the Athenian revenue,[8]
-from all sources, including this tribute, at the beginning of the
-Peloponnesian war, is stated by Xenophon at one thousand talents:
-customs, harbor, and market dues, receipts from the silver-mines at
-Laurium, rents of public property, fines from judicial sentences,
-a tax per head upon slaves, the annual payment made by each metic,
-etc., may have made up a larger sum than four hundred talents; which
-sum, added to the six hundred talents from tribute, would make the
-total named by Xenophon. But a verse of Aristophanês,[9] during the
-ninth year of the Peloponnesian war, B.C. 422, gives the general
-total of that time as “nearly two thousand talents:” this is in all
-probability much above the truth, though we may well imagine that
-the amount of tribute-money levied upon the allies may have been
-augmented during the interval: I think that the alleged duplication
-of the tribute by Alkibiadês, which Thucydidês nowhere notices, is
-not borne out by any good evidence, nor can I believe that it ever
-reached the sum of twelve hundred talents.[10] Whatever may have
-been the actual magnitude of the Athenian budget, however, prior to
-the Peloponnesian war, we know that during the larger part of the
-administration of Periklês, the revenue, including tribute, was so
-managed as to leave a large annual surplus; insomuch that a treasure
-of coined money was accumulated in the acropolis during the years
-preceding the Peloponnesian war,—which treasure, when at its maximum,
-reached the great sum of nine thousand seven hundred talents (equal
-to two million two hundred and thirty thousand pounds), and was still
-at six thousand talents, after a serious drain for various purposes,
-at the moment when that war began.[11] This system of public economy,
-constantly laying by a considerable sum year after year,—in which
-Athens stood alone, since none of the Peloponnesian states had any
-public reserve whatever,[12]—goes far of itself to vindicate Periklês
-from the charge of having wasted the public money in mischievous
-distributions for the purpose of obtaining popularity; and also to
-exonerate the Athenian Demos from that reproach of a greedy appetite
-for living by the public purse which it is common to ascribe
-to them. After the death of Kimon, no farther expeditions were
-undertaken against the Persians, and even for some years before his
-death, not much appears to have been done: so that the tribute-money
-remained unexpended, though it was the duty of Athens to hold it in
-reserve against future attack, which might at any time be renewed.
-
-  [6] Aristophan. Vesp. 707.
-
-  [7] The island of Kythêra was conquered by the Athenians from
-  Sparta in 425 B.C., and the annual tribute then imposed upon
-  it was four talents (Thucyd. iv, 57). In the Inscription No.
-  143, ap. Boeckh, Corp. Inscr., we find some names enumerated of
-  tributary towns, with the amount of tribute opposite to each,
-  but the stone is too much damaged to give us much information.
-  Tyrodiza, in Thrace, paid one thousand drachms: some other towns,
-  or junctions of towns, not clearly discernible, are rated at one
-  thousand, two thousand, three thousand drachms, one talent, and
-  even ten talents. This inscription must be anterior to 415 B.C.,
-  when the tribute was converted into a five per cent. duty upon
-  imports and exports: see Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, and his
-  Notes upon the above-mentioned Inscription.
-
-  It was the practice of Athens not always to rate each tributary
-  city separately, but sometimes to join several in one collective
-  rating; probably each responsible for the rest. This seems to
-  have provoked occasional remonstrances from the allies, in some
-  of which the rhetor, Antipho, was employed to furnish the speech
-  which the complainants pronounced before the dikastery: see
-  Antipho ap. Harpokration, v. Ἀπόταξις—Συντελεῖς. It is greatly
-  to be lamented that the orations composed by Antipho, for the
-  Samothrakians and Lindians,—the latter inhabiting one of the
-  three separate towns in the island of Rhodes,—have not been
-  preserved.
-
-  [8] Xenophon, Anab. vii, 1, 27. οὐ μεῖον χιλίων ταλάντων: compare
-  Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, b. iii, ch. 7, 15, 19.
-
-  [9] Aristophan. Vesp. 660. τάλαντ᾽ ἐγγὺς δισχίλια.
-
-  [10] Very excellent writers on Athenian antiquity (Boeckh, Public
-  Econ. of Athens, c. 15, 19, b. iii; Schömann, Antiq. J. P. Att.
-  sect. lxxiv; K. F. Hermann, Gr. Staatsalterthümer, sect. 157:
-  compare, however, a passage in Boeckh, ch. 17, p. 421, Eng.
-  transl., where he seems to be of an opposite opinion) accept
-  this statement, that the tribute levied by Athenians upon her
-  allies was doubled some years after the commencement of the
-  Peloponnesian war,—at which time it was six hundred talents,—and
-  that it came to amount to twelve hundred talents. Nevertheless,
-  I cannot follow them, upon the simple authority of Æschinês, and
-  the Pseudo-Andokidês (Æschin. De Fals. Legat. c. 54, p. 301;
-  Andokidês, De Pace, c. 1, and the same orator cont. Alkibiad.
-  c. 4). For we may state pretty confidently, that neither of the
-  two orations here ascribed to Andokidês is genuine: the oration
-  against Alkibiadês most decidedly not genuine. There remains,
-  therefore, as an original evidence, only the passage of Æschinês,
-  which has, apparently, been copied by the author of the Oration
-  De Pace, ascribed to Andokidês. Now the chapter of Æschinês,
-  which professes to furnish a general but brief sketch of Athenian
-  history for the century succeeding the Persian invasion, is so
-  full of historical and chronological inaccuracies, that we can
-  hardly accept it, when standing alone, as authority for any
-  matter of fact. In a note on the chapter immediately preceding,
-  I have already touched upon its extraordinary looseness of
-  statement,—pointed out by various commentators, among them
-  particularly by Mr. Fynes Clinton: see above, chap. xlv, note 2,
-  pp. 409-411, in the preceding volume.
-
-  The assertion, therefore, that the tribute from the Athenian
-  allies was raised to the sum of twelve hundred talents annually,
-  comes to us only from the orator Æschinês as an original
-  witness: and in him it forms part of a tissue of statements
-  alike confused and incorrect. But against it we have a powerful
-  negative argument,—the perfect silence of Thucydidês. Is it
-  possible that that historian would have omitted all notice of
-  a step so very important in its effects, if Athens had really
-  adopted it? He mentions to us the commutation by Athens of the
-  tribute from her allies into a duty of five per cent. payable
-  by them on their exports and imports (vii, 28)—this was in the
-  nineteenth year of the war, 413 B.C. But anything like the
-  duplication of the tribute all at once, would have altered much
-  more materially the relations between Athens and her allies and
-  would have constituted in the minds of the latter a substantive
-  grievance, such as to aggravate the motive for revolt in a
-  manner which Thucydidês could hardly fail to notice. The orator
-  Æschinês refers the augmentation of the tribute, up to twelve
-  hundred talents, to the time succeeding the peace of Nikias: M.
-  Boeckh (Public Econ. of Athens, b. iii, ch. 15-19, pp. 400-434)
-  supposes it to have taken place earlier than the representation
-  of the Vespæ of Aristophanês, that is, about three years before
-  that peace, or 423 B.C. But this would have been just before the
-  time of the expedition of Brasidas into Thrace, and his success
-  in exciting revolt among the dependencies of Athens: if Athens
-  had doubled her tribute upon all the allies, just before that
-  expedition, Thucydidês could not have omitted to mention it, as
-  increasing the chances of success to Brasidas, and helping to
-  determine the resolutions of the Akanthians and others, which
-  were by no means adopted unanimously or without hesitation, to
-  revolt.
-
-  In reference to the oration called that of Andokidês against
-  Alkibiadês, I made some remarks in the fourth volume of this
-  History (vol. iv, ch. xxxi, p. 151), tending to show it to be
-  spurious and of a time considerably later than that to which
-  it purports to belong. I will here add one other remark, which
-  appears to me decisive, tending to the same conclusion.
-
-  The oration professes to be delivered in a contest of ostracism
-  between Nikias, Alkibiadês, and the speaker: one of the three,
-  he says, must necessarily be ostracized, and the question is,
-  to determine which of the three: accordingly, the speaker
-  dwells upon many topics calculated to raise a bad impression of
-  Alkibiadês, and a favorable impression of himself.
-
-  Among the accusations against Alkibiadês, one is, that after
-  having recommended, in the assembly of the people, that the
-  inhabitants of Melos should be sold as slaves, he had himself
-  purchased a Melian woman among the captives, and had had a son by
-  her: it was criminal, argues the speaker, to beget offspring by
-  a woman whose relations he had contributed to cause to be put to
-  death, and whose city he had contributed to ruin (c. 8).
-
-  Upon this argument I do not here touch, any farther than to bring
-  out the point of chronology. The speech, if delivered at all,
-  must have been delivered, at the earliest, nearly a year after
-  the capture of Melos by the Athenians: it may be of later date,
-  but it _cannot possibly be earlier_.
-
-  Now Melos surrendered in the winter immediately preceding the
-  great expedition of the Athenians to Sicily in 415 B.C., which
-  expedition sailed about midsummer (Thucyd. v, 116; vi, 30).
-  Nikias and Alkibiadês both went as commanders of that expedition:
-  the latter was recalled to Athens for trial on the charge of
-  impiety about three months afterwards, but escaped in the way
-  home, was condemned and sentenced to banishment in his absence,
-  and did not return to Athens until 407 B.C., long after the death
-  of Nikias, who continued in command of the Athenian armament in
-  Sicily, enjoying the full esteem of his countrymen, until its
-  complete failure and ruin before Syracuse,—and perished himself
-  afterwards as a Syracusan prisoner.
-
-  Taking these circumstances together, it will at once be seen that
-  there never can have been any time, ten months or more after the
-  capture of Melos, when Nikias and Alkibiadês _could_ have been
-  exposed to a vote of ostracism at Athens. The thing is absolutely
-  impossible: and the oration in which such historical and
-  chronological incompatibilities are embodied, must be spurious:
-  furthermore, it must have been composed long after the pretended
-  time of delivery, when the chronological series of events had
-  been forgotten.
-
-  I may add that the story of this duplication of the tribute by
-  Alkibiadês is virtually contrary to the statement of Plutarch,
-  probably borrowed from Æschinês, who states that the demagogues
-  _gradually_ increased (κατὰ μικρὸν) the tribute to thirteen
-  hundred talents (Plutarch, Aristeid. c. 24).
-
-  [11] Thucyd. ii, 13.
-
-  [12] Thucyd. i, 80. The foresight of the Athenian people, in
-  abstaining from immediate use of public money and laying it up
-  for future wants, would be still more conspicuously demonstrated,
-  if the statement of Æschinês, the orator, were true, that they
-  got together seven thousand talents between the peace of Nikias
-  and the Sicilian expedition. M. Boeckh believes this statement,
-  and says: “It is not impossible that one thousand talents might
-  have been laid by every year, as the amount of tribute received
-  was so considerable.” (Public Economy of Athens, ch. xx. p. 446,
-  Eng. Trans.) I do not believe the statement: but M. Boeckh and
-  others, who do admit it, ought in fairness to set it against the
-  many remarks which they pass in condemnation of the democratical
-  prodigality.
-
-Though we do not know the exact amount of the other sources of
-Athenian revenue, however, we know that the tribute received from
-the allies was by far the largest item in it.[13] And altogether the
-exercise of empire abroad became a prominent feature in Athenian
-life, and a necessity to Athenian sentiment, not less than democracy
-at home. Athens was no longer, as she had been once, a single city,
-with Attica for her territory: she was a capital or imperial city,—a
-despot city, was the expression used by her enemies, and even
-sometimes by her own citizens,[14]—with many dependencies attached
-to her, and bound to follow her orders. Such was the manner in which
-not merely Periklês and the other leading statesmen, but even the
-humblest Athenian citizen, conceived the dignity of Athens; and the
-sentiment was one which carried with it both personal pride and
-stimulus to active patriotism. To establish Athenian interests among
-the dependent territories, was one important object in the eyes of
-Periklês, and while he discountenanced all distant[15] and rash
-enterprises, such as invasions of Egypt or Cyprus, he planted out
-many kleruchies and colonies of Athenian citizens, intermingled with
-allies, on islands, and parts of the coast. He conducted one thousand
-citizens to the Thracian Chersonese, five hundred to Naxos, and two
-hundred and fifty to Andros. In the Chersonese, he farther repelled
-the barbarous Thracian invaders from without, and even undertook
-the labor of carrying a wall of defence across the isthmus, which
-connected the peninsula with Thrace; since the barbarous Thracian
-tribes, though expelled some time before by Kimon,[16] had still
-continued to renew their incursions from time to time. Ever since the
-occupation of the elder Miltiadês, about eighty years before, there
-had been in this peninsula many Athenian proprietors, apparently
-intermingled with half-civilized Thracians: the settlers now acquired
-both greater numerical strength and better protection, though it
-does not appear that the cross-wall was permanently maintained.
-The maritime expeditions of Periklês even extended into the Euxine
-sea, as far as the important Greek city of Sinôpê, then governed by
-a despot named Timesilaus, against whom a large proportion of the
-citizens were in active discontent. He left Lamachus with thirteen
-Athenian triremes to assist in expelling the despot, who was driven
-into exile along with his friends and party: the properties of
-these exiles were confiscated, and assigned to the maintenance of
-six hundred Athenian citizens, admitted to equal fellowship and
-residence with the Sinôpeans. We may presume that on this occasion
-Sinôpê became a member of the Athenian tributary alliance, if it had
-not been so before: but we do not know whether Kotyôra and Trapezus,
-dependencies of Sinôpê, farther eastward, which the ten thousand
-Greeks found on their retreat fifty years afterwards, existed in the
-time of Periklês or not. Moreover, the numerous and well-equipped
-Athenian fleet, under the command of Periklês, produced an imposing
-effect upon the barbarous princes and tribes along the coast,[17]
-contributing certainly to the security of Grecian trade, and probably
-to the acquisition of new dependent allies.
-
-  [13] Thucyd. i. 122-143; ii, 13. The πεντηκοστὴ, or duty of two
-  per cent. upon imports and exports at the Peiræus, produced to
-  the state a revenue of thirty-six talents in the year in which
-  it was farmed by Andokidês, somewhere about 400 B.C., after
-  the restoration of the democracy at Athens from its defeat and
-  subversion at the close of the Peloponnesian war (Andokidês de
-  Mysteriis, c. 23, p. 65). This was at a period of depression in
-  Athenian affairs, and when trade was doubtless not near so good
-  as it had been during the earlier part of the Peloponnesian war.
-
-  It seems probable that this must have been the most considerable
-  permanent source of Athenian revenue next to the tribute; though
-  we do not know what rate of customs-duty was imposed at the
-  Peiræus during the Peloponnesian war. Comparing together the two
-  passages of Xenophon (Republ. Ath. 1, 17, and Aristophan. Vesp.
-  657), we may suppose that the regular and usual rate of duty
-  was one per cent. or one ἑκατοστὴ,—while in case of need this
-  may have been doubled or tripled.—τὰς πολλὰς ἑκατοστάς, (see
-  Boeckh, b. iii, chs. 1-4, pp. 298-318, Eng. Trans.) The amount of
-  revenue derived even from this source, however, can have borne no
-  comparison to the tribute.
-
-  [14] By Periklês, Thucyd. ii, 63. By Kleon, Thucyd. iii, 37. By
-  the envoys at Melos, v, 89. By Euphemus, vi, 85. By the hostile
-  Corinthians, i, 124 as a matter of course.
-
-  [15] Plutarch, Periklês. c. 20.
-
-  [16] Plutarch, Kimon. c. 14.
-
-  [17] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 19, 20.
-
-It was by successive proceedings of this sort that many detachments
-of Athenian citizens became settled in various portions of the
-maritime empire of the city,—some rich, investing their property
-in the islands as more secure—from the incontestable superiority
-of Athens at sea—even than Attica, which, since the loss of
-the Megarid, could not be guarded against a Peloponnesian land
-invasion,[18]—others poor, and hiring themselves out as laborers.[19]
-The islands of Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros, as well as the territory
-of Estiæa, on the north of Eubœa, were completely occupied by
-Athenian proprietors and citizens,—other places partially so
-occupied. And it was doubtless advantageous to the islanders to
-associate themselves with Athenians in trading enterprises, since
-they thereby obtained a better chance of the protection of the
-Athenian fleet. It seems that Athens passed regulations occasionally
-for the commerce of her dependent allies, as we see by the fact, that
-shortly before the Peloponnesian war, she excluded the Megarians
-from all their ports. The commercial relations between Peiræus and
-the Ægean reached their maximum during the interval immediately
-preceding the Peloponnesian war: nor were these relations confined to
-the country east and north of Attica: they reached also the western
-regions. The most important settlements founded by Athens during this
-period were Amphipolis in Thrace, and Thurii in Italy.
-
-  [18] Xenophon, Rep. Ath. ii, 16. τὴν μὲν οὐσίαν ταῖς νήσοις
-  παρατίθενται, πιστεύοντες τῇ ἀρχῇ τῇ κατὰ θάλασσαν· τὴν δὲ
-  Ἀττικὴν γῆν περιορῶσι τεμνομένην, γιγνώσκοντες ὅτι εἰ αὐτὴν
-  ἐλεήσουσιν, ἑτέρων ἀγαθῶν μειζόνων στερήσονται.
-
-  Compare also Xenophon (Memorabil. ii, 8, 1, and Symposion, iv,
-  31).
-
-  [19] See the case of the free laborer and the husbandman at
-  Naxos, Plato, Euthyphro, c. 3.
-
-Amphipolis was planted by a colony of Athenians and other Greeks,
-under the conduct of the Athenian Agnon, in 437 B.C. It was situated
-near the river Strymon, in Thrace, on the eastern bank, and at the
-spot where the Strymon resumes its river-course after emerging
-from the lake above. It was originally a township or settlement
-of the Edonian Thracians, called Ennea Hodoi, or Nine Ways,—in a
-situation doubly valuable, both as being close upon the bridge over
-the Strymon, and as a convenient centre for the ship-timber and gold
-and silver mines of the neighboring region,—and distant about three
-English miles from the Athenian settlement of Eion at the mouth of
-the river. The previous unsuccessful attempts to form establishments
-at Ennea Hodoi have already been noticed,—first, that of Histiæus
-the Milesian, followed up by his brother Aristagoras (about 497-496
-B.C.), next, that of the Athenians about 465 B.C., under Leagrus
-and others,—on both these occasions the intruding settlers had
-been defeated and expelled by the native Thracian tribes, though
-on the second occasion the number sent by Athens was not less than
-ten thousand.[20] So serious a loss deterred the Athenians for a
-long time from any repetition of the attempt: though it is highly
-probable that individual citizens from Eion and from Thasus connected
-themselves with powerful Thracian families, and became in this
-manner actively engaged in mining, to their own great profit,—as
-well as to the profit of the city collectively, since the property
-of the kleruchs, or Athenian citizens occupying colonial lands,
-bore its share in case of direct taxes being imposed on Athenian
-property generally. Among such fortunate adventurers we may number
-the historian Thucydidês himself; seemingly descended from Athenian
-parents intermarrying with Thracians, and himself married to a wife
-either Thracian or belonging to a family of Athenian colonists in
-that region, through whom he became possessed of a large property in
-the mines, as well as of great influence in the districts around.[21]
-This was one of the various ways in which the collective power of
-Athens enabled her chief citizens to enrich themselves individually.
-
-  [20] Thucyd. i. 100.
-
-  [21] Thucyd. iv, 105; Marcellinus, Vit. Thucyd. c. 19. See
-  Rotscher, Leben des Thukydides, ch. i, 4, p. 96, who gives a
-  genealogy of Thucydidês, as far as it can be made out with any
-  probability. The historian was connected by blood with Miltiadês
-  and Kimon, as well as with Olorus, king of one of the Thracian
-  tribes, whose daughter Hegesipylê was wife of Miltiadês, the
-  conqueror of Marathon. In this manner, therefore, he belonged to
-  one of the ancient heroic families of Athens, and even of Greece,
-  being an Ækid through Ajax and Philæus (Marcellin. c. 2).
-
-The colony under Agnon, despatched from Athens in the year 437 B.C.,
-appears to have been both numerous and well sustained, inasmuch as
-it conquered and maintained the valuable position of Ennea Hodoi in
-spite of those formidable Edonian neighbors who had baffled the two
-preceding attempts. Its name of Ennea Hodoi was exchanged for that of
-Amphipolis,—the hill on which the new town was situated being bounded
-on three sides by the river. The settlers seem to have been of mixed
-extraction, comprising no large proportion of Athenians: some were of
-Chalkidic race, others came from Argilus, a Grecian city colonized
-from Andros, which possessed the territory on the western bank of
-the Strymon, immediately opposite to Amphipolis,[22] and which was
-included among the subject allies of Athens. Amphipolis, connected
-with the sea by the Strymon and the port of Eion, became the most
-important of all the Athenian dependencies in reference to Thrace and
-Macedonia.
-
-  [22] Thucyd. iv, 102; v, 6.
-
-The colony of Thurii on the coast of the gulf of Tarentum in
-Italy, near the site and on the territory of the ancient Sybaris,
-was founded by Athens about seven years earlier than Amphipolis,
-not long after the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce with
-Sparta, B.C. 443. Since the destruction of the old Sybaris by the
-Krotoniates, in 509 B.C., its territory had for the most part
-remained unappropriated: the descendants of the former inhabitants,
-dispersed at Laus and in other portions of the territory, were not
-strong enough to establish any new city; nor did it suit the views
-of the Krotoniates themselves to do so. After an interval of more
-than sixty years, however, during which one unsuccessful attempt
-at occupation had been made by some Thessalian settlers, these
-Sybarites at length prevailed upon the Athenians to undertake and
-protect the recolonization; the proposition having been made in
-vain to the Spartans. Lampon and Xenokritus, the former a prophet
-and interpreter of oracles, were sent by Periklês with ten ships as
-chiefs of the new colony of Thurii, founded under the auspices of
-Athens. The settlers were collected from all parts of Greece, and
-included Dorians, Ionians, islanders, Bœotians, as well as Athenians.
-But the descendants of the ancient Sybarites procured themselves to
-be treated as privileged citizens, and monopolized for themselves
-the possession of political powers, as well as the most valuable
-lands in the immediate vicinity of the walls; while their wives also
-assumed an offensive preëminence over the other women of the city
-in the public religious processions. Such spirit of privilege and
-monopoly appears to have been a frequent manifestation among the
-ancient colonies, and often fatal either to their tranquillity or
-to their growth; sometimes to both. In the case of Thurii, founded
-under the auspices of the democratical Athens, it was not likely
-to have any lasting success: and we find that after no very long
-period, the majority of the colonists rose in insurrection against
-the privileged Sybarites, either slew or expelled them, and divided
-the entire territory of the city, upon equal principles, among the
-colonists of every different race. This revolution enabled them to
-make peace with the Krotoniates, who had probably been unfriendly
-so long as their ancient enemies, the Sybarites, were masters of
-the city, and likely to turn its powers to the purpose of avenging
-their conquered ancestors. And the city from this time forward,
-democratically governed, appears to have flourished steadily and
-without internal dissension for thirty years, until the ruinous
-disasters of the Athenians before Syracuse occasioned the overthrow
-of the Athenian party at Thurii. How miscellaneous the population
-of Thurii was, we may judge from the denominations of the ten
-tribes,—such was the number of tribes established, after the model
-of Athens,—Arkas, Achaïs, Eleia, Bœotia, Amphiktyonis, Doris, Ias,
-Athenaïs, Euboïs, Nesiôtis. From this mixture of race they could not
-agree in recognizing or honoring an Athenian œkist, or indeed any
-œkist except Apollo.[23] The Spartan general, Kleandridas, banished a
-few years before for having suffered himself to be bribed by Athens
-along with king Pleistoanax, removed to Thurii, and was appointed
-general of the citizens in their war against Tarentum. That war
-was ultimately adjusted by the joint foundation of the new city of
-Herakleia, half-way between the two,—in the fertile territory called
-Siritis.[24]
-
-  [23] Diodor. xii, 35.
-
-  [24] Diodor. xii, 11, 12; Strabo. vi, 264: Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-  22.
-
-The most interesting circumstance respecting Thurii is, that the
-rhetor Lysias, and the historian Herodotus, were both domiciliated
-there as citizens. The city was connected with Athens, yet seemingly
-only by a feeble tie; nor was it numbered among the tributary subject
-allies.[25] From the circumstance that so large a proportion of the
-settlers at Thurii were not native Athenians, we may infer that
-there were not many of the latter at that time who were willing to
-put themselves so far out of connection with Athens,—even though
-tempted by the prospect of lots of land in a fertile and promising
-territory. And Periklês was probably anxious that those poor citizens
-for whom emigration was desirable should become kleruchs in some
-of the islands or ports of the Ægean, where they would serve—like
-the colonies of Rome—as a sort of garrison for the insurance of the
-Athenian empire.[26]
-
-  [25] The Athenians pretended to no subject allies beyond the
-  Ionian gulf, Thucyd. vi, 14: compare vi, 45, 104; vii, 34.
-  Thucydidês does not even mention Thurii, in his catalogue of
-  the allies of Athens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war
-  (Thucyd. ii, 15).
-
-  [26] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11.
-
-The fourteen years between the thirty years’ truce and the breaking
-out of the Peloponnesian war, are a period of full maritime empire
-on the part of Athens,—partially indeed resisted, but never with
-success. They are a period of peace with all cities extraneous to
-her own empire; and of splendid decorations to the city itself,
-from the genius of Pheidias and others, in sculpture as well as in
-architecture. Since the death of Kimon, Periklês had become more and
-more the first citizen in the commonwealth: his qualities told for
-more the longer they were known, and even the disastrous reverses
-which preceded the thirty years’ truce had not overthrown him,
-since he had protested against that expedition of Tolmidês into
-Bœotia out of which they first arose. But if the personal influence
-of Periklês had increased, the party opposed to him seems also to
-have become stronger and better organized than it had been before;
-and to have acquired a leader in many respects more effective
-than Kimon,—Thucydidês, son of Melêsias. The new chief was a near
-relative of Kimon, but of a character and talents more analogous to
-that of Periklês: a statesman and orator rather than a general,
-though competent to both functions if occasion demanded, as every
-leading man in those days was required to be. Under Thucydidês, the
-political and parliamentary opposition against Periklês assumed
-a constant character and an organization such as Kimon, with his
-exclusively military aptitudes, had never been able to establish.
-The aristocratical party in the commonwealth,—the “honorable and
-respectable” citizens, as we find them styled, adopting their
-own nomenclature,—now imposed upon themselves the obligation of
-undeviating regularity in their attendance on the public assembly,
-sitting together in a particular section, so as to be conspicuously
-parted from the Demos. In this manner, their applause and dissent,
-their mutual encouragement to each other, their distribution of parts
-to different speakers, was made more conducive to the party purposes
-than it had been before, when these distinguished persons had been
-intermingled with the mass of citizens.[27] Thucydidês himself was
-eminent as a speaker, inferior only to Periklês,—perhaps hardly
-inferior even to him. We are told that in reply to a question put to
-him by Archidamus, whether Periklês or he were the better wrestler,
-Thucydidês replied: “Even when I throw him, he denies that he has
-fallen, gains his point, and talks over those who have actually seen
-him fall.”[28]
-
-  [27] Compare the speech of Nikias, in reference to the younger
-  citizens and partisans of Alkibiadês sitting together near the
-  latter in the assembly,—οὓς ἐγὼ ὁρῶν νῦν ἐνθάδε τῷ αὐτῷ ἀνδρὶ
-  ~παρακελευστοὺς καθημένους~ φοβοῦμαι, καὶ τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις
-  ἀντιπαρακελεύομαι μὴ καταισχυνθῆναι, εἴ τῴ τις παρακάθηται τῶνδε,
-  etc. (Thucyd. vi, 13.) See also Aristophanês, Ekklesiaz. 298,
-  _seq._, about partisans sitting near together.
-
-  [28] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 8. Ὅταν ἐγὼ καταβάλω παλαίων, ἐκεῖνος
-  ἀντιλέγων ὡς οὐ πέπτωκε, νικᾷ, καὶ μεταπείθει τοὺς ὁρῶντας.
-
-Such an opposition made to Periklês, in all the full license which a
-democratical constitution permitted, must have been both efficient
-and embarrassing; but the pointed severance of the aristocratical
-chiefs, which Thucydidês, son of Melêsias, introduced, contributed
-probably at once to rally the democratical majority round Periklês,
-and to exasperate the bitterness of party-conflict.[29] As far as
-we can make out the grounds of the opposition, it turned partly
-upon the pacific policy of Periklês towards the Persians, partly
-upon his expenditure for home ornament. Thucydidês contended that
-Athens was disgraced in the eyes of the Greeks, by having drawn the
-confederate treasure from Delos to her own acropolis, under pretence
-of greater security, and then employing it, not in prosecuting war
-against the Persians,[30] but in beautifying Athens by new temples
-and costly statues. To this Periklês replied, that Athens had
-undertaken the obligation, in consideration of the tribute-money, to
-protect her allies and keep off from them every foreign enemy,—that
-she had accomplished this object completely at the present, and
-retained a reserve sufficient to guarantee the like security for
-the future;—that, under such circumstances, she owed no account to
-her allies of the expenditure of the surplus, but was at liberty
-to expend it for purposes useful and honorable to the city. In
-this point of view it was an object of great public importance to
-render Athens imposing in the eyes both of the allies and of Hellas
-generally, by improved fortifications,—by accumulated ornaments,
-sculptural and architectural,—and by religious festivals,—frequent,
-splendid, musical, and poetical.
-
-  [29] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11. ἡ δ᾽ ἐκείνων ἅμιλλα καὶ φιλοτιμία
-  τῶν ἀνδρῶν βαθυτάτην τομὴν τεμοῦσα τῆς πόλεως, τὸ μὲν δῆμον, τὸ
-  δ᾽ ὀλίγους ἐποίησε καλεῖσθαι.
-
-  [30] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 12. διέβαλλον ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις
-  βοῶντες, ὡς ὁ μὲν δῆμος ἀδοξεῖ καὶ κακῶς ἀκούει τὰ κοινὰ τῶν
-  Ἑλλήνων χρήματα πρὸς αὑτὸν ἐκ Δήλου μεταγαγών, ἣ δ᾽ ἔνεστιν αὐτῷ
-  πρὸς τοὺς ἐγκαλοῦντας εὐπρεπεστάτη τῶν προφάσεων, δείσαντα τοὺς
-  βαρβάρους ἐκεῖθεν ἀνελέσθαι καὶ φυλάττειν ἐν ὀχυρῷ τὰ κοινά,
-  ταύτην ἀνῄρηκε Περικλῆς, etc.
-
-  Compare the speech of the Lesbians, and their complaints against
-  Athens, at the moment of their revolt in the fourth year of the
-  Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. iii, 10); where a similar accusation
-  is brought forward,—ἐπειδὴ δὲ ἑωρῶμεν αὐτοὺς (the Athenians)
-  τὴν μὲν τοῦ Μήδου ἔχθραν ἀνιέντας, τὴν δὲ τῶν ξυμμάχων δούλωσιν
-  ἐπαγομένους, etc.
-
-Such was the answer made by Periklês in defence of his policy
-against the opposition headed by Thucydidês. And as far as we can
-make out the ground taken by both parties, the answer was perfectly
-satisfactory. For when we look at the very large sum which Periklês
-continually kept in reserve in the treasury, no one could reasonably
-complain that his expenditure for ornamental purposes was carried so
-far as to encroach upon the exigences of defence. What Thucydidês and
-his partisans appear to have urged, was, that this common fund should
-still continue to be spent in aggressive warfare against the Persian
-king, in Egypt and elsewhere,—conformably to the projects pursued
-by Kimon during his life.[31] But Periklês was right in contending
-that such outlay would have been simply wasteful; of no use either
-to Athens or her allies, though risking all the chances of distant
-defeat, such as had been experienced a few years before in Egypt.
-The Persian force was already kept away, both from the waters of the
-Ægean and the coast of Asia, either by the stipulations of the treaty
-of Kallias, or—if that treaty be supposed apocryphal—by a conduct
-practically the same as those stipulations would have enforced. The
-_allies_, indeed, might have had some ground of complaint against
-Periklês, either for not reducing the amount of tribute required from
-them, seeing that it was more than sufficient for the legitimate
-purposes of the confederacy, or for not having collected their
-positive sentiment as to the disposal of it. But we do not find that
-this was the argument adopted by Thucydidês and his party, nor was it
-calculated to find favor either with aristocrats or democrats, in the
-Athenian assembly.
-
-  [31] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 20.
-
-Admitting the injustice of Athens—an injustice common to both the
-parties in that city, not less to Kimon than to Periklês—in acting
-as despot instead of chief, and in discontinuing all appeal to the
-active and hearty concurrence of her numerous allies, we shall
-find that the schemes of Periklês were at the same time eminently
-Pan-Hellenic. In strengthening and ornamenting Athens, in developing
-the full activity of her citizens, in providing temples, religious
-offerings, works of art, solemn festivals, all of surpassing
-attraction,—he intended to exalt her into something greater than an
-imperial city with numerous dependent allies. He wished to make her
-the centre of Grecian feeling, the stimulus of Grecian intellect,
-and the type of strong democratical patriotism combined with full
-liberty of individual taste and aspiration. He wished not merely
-to retain the adherence of the subject states, but to attract the
-admiration and spontaneous deference of independent neighbors, so
-as to procure for Athens a moral ascendency much beyond the range
-of her direct power. And he succeeded in elevating the city to a
-visible grandeur,[32] which made her appear even much stronger than
-she really was,—and which had the farther effect of softening to the
-minds of the subjects the humiliating sense of obedience; while it
-served as a normal school, open to strangers from all quarters, of
-energetic action even under full license of criticism,—of elegant
-pursuits economically followed,—and of a love for knowledge without
-enervation of character. Such were the views of Periklês in regard
-to his country, during the years which preceded the Peloponnesian
-war, as we find them recorded in his celebrated Funeral Oration,
-pronounced in the first year of that war,—an exposition forever
-memorable of the sentiment and purpose of Athenian democracy, as
-conceived by its ablest president.
-
-  [32] Thucyd. i, 10.
-
-So bitter, however, was the opposition made by Thucydidês and his
-party to this projected expenditure,—so violent and pointed did
-the scission of aristocrats and democrats become,—that the dispute
-came after no long time to that ultimate appeal which the Athenian
-constitution provided for the case of two opposite and nearly equal
-party-leaders,—a vote of ostracism. Of the particular details which
-preceded this ostracism, we are not informed; but we see clearly
-that the general position was such as the ostracism was intended to
-meet. Probably the vote was proposed by the party of Thucydidês, in
-order to procure the banishment of Periklês, the more powerful person
-of the two, and the most likely to excite popular jealousy. The
-challenge was accepted by Periklês and his friends, and the result
-of the voting was such that an adequate legal majority condemned
-Thucydidês to ostracism.[33] And it seems that the majority must have
-been very decisive, for the party of Thucydidês was completely broken
-by it: and we hear of no other single individual equally formidable
-as a leader of opposition, throughout all the remaining life of
-Periklês.
-
-  [33] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11-14. Τέλος δὲ πρὸς τὸν Θουκυδίδην
-  ~εἰς ἀγῶνα~ περὶ τοῦ ὀστράκου καταστὰς ~καὶ διακινδυνεύσας~,
-  ἐκεῖνον μὲν ἐξέβαλε, κατέλυσε δὲ τὴν ἀντιτεταγμένην ἑταιρείαν.
-  See, in reference to the principle of the ostracism, a remarkable
-  incident at Magnesia, between two political rivals, Krêtinês and
-  Hermeias: also the just reflections of Montesquieu, Esprit des
-  Loix, xxvi, c. 17; xxix, c. 7.
-
-The ostracism of Thucydidês apparently took place about two years[34]
-after the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce,—443-442 B.C.,—and
-it is to the period immediately following that the great Periklêan
-works belong. The southern wall of the acropolis had been built out
-of the spoils brought by Kimon from his Persian expeditions; but the
-third of the long walls connecting Athens with the harbor was the
-proposition of Periklês, at what precise time we do not know. The
-long walls originally completed—not long after the battle of Tanagra,
-as has already been stated—were two, one from Athens to Peiræus,
-another from Athens to Phalêrum: the space between them was broad,
-and if in the hands of an enemy, the communication with Peiræus
-would be interrupted. Accordingly, Periklês now induced the people
-to construct a third or intermediate wall, running parallel with the
-first wall to Peiræus, and within a short distance[35]—seemingly
-near one furlong—from it: so that the communication between the
-city and the port was placed beyond all possible interruption, even
-assuming an enemy to have got within the Phaleric wall. It was
-seemingly about this time, too, that the splendid docks and arsenal
-in Peiræus, alleged by Isokratês to have cost one thousand talents,
-were constructed:[36] while the town itself of Peiræus was laid out
-anew with straight streets intersecting at right angles. Apparently,
-this was something new in Greece,—the towns generally, and Athens
-itself in particular, having been built without any symmetry, or
-width, or continuity of streets:[37] and Hippodamus the Milesian, a
-man of considerable attainments in the physical philosophy of the
-age, derived much renown as the earliest town architect, for having
-laid out the Peiræus on a regular plan. The market-place, or one of
-them at least, permanently bore his name,—the Hippodamian agora.[38]
-At a time when so many great architects were displaying their genius
-in the construction of temples, we are not surprised to hear that the
-structure of towns began to be regularized also: moreover, we are
-told that the new colonial town of Thurii, to which Hippodamus went
-as a settler, was also constructed in the same systematic form as to
-straight and wide streets.[39]
-
-  [34] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 16: the indication of time, however,
-  is vague.
-
-  [35] Plato, Gorgias, p. 455, with Scholia; Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-  13: Forchhammer, Topographie von Athen, in Kieler Philologische
-  Studien, pp. 279-282.
-
-  [36] Isokratês, Orat. vii: Areopagit. p. 153. c. 27.
-
-  [37] See Dikæarchus, Vit. Græciæ, Fragm. ed. Fuhr. p. 140:
-  compare the description of Platæa in Thucydidês, ii, 3.
-
-  All the older towns now existing in the Grecian islands are put
-  together in this same manner,—narrow, muddy, crooked ways,—few
-  regular continuous lines of houses: see Ross, Reisen in den
-  Griechischen Inseln, Letter xxvii, vol. ii, p. 20.
-
-  [38] Aristotle, Politic. ii, 5, 1; Xenophon, Hellen. ii, 4, 1;
-  Harpokration, v, Ἱπποδάμεια.
-
-  [39] Diodor, xii, 9.
-
-The new scheme upon which the Peiræus was laid out, was not without
-its value as one visible proof of the naval grandeur of Athens.
-But the buildings in Athens and on the acropolis formed the real
-glory of the Periklêan age. A new theatre, termed the Odeon, was
-constructed for musical and poetical representations at the great
-Panathenaic solemnity; next, the splendid temple of Athênê, called
-the Parthenon, with all its masterpieces of decorative sculpture and
-reliefs; lastly, the costly portals erected to adorn the entrance of
-the acropolis, on the western side of the hill, through which the
-solemn processions on festival days were conducted. It appears that
-the Odeon and the Parthenon were both finished between 445 and 437
-B.C.: the Propylæa somewhat later, between 437 and 431 B.C., in which
-latter year the Peloponnesian war began.[40] Progress was also made
-in restoring or reconstructing the Erechtheion, or ancient temple of
-Athênê Polias, the patron goddess of the city,—which had been burnt
-in the invasion of Xerxes; but the breaking out of the Peloponnesian
-war seems to have prevented the completion of this, as well as of
-the great temple of Dêmêter, at Eleusis, for the celebration of
-the Eleusinian mysteries,—that of Athênê, at Sunium,—and that of
-Nemesis, at Rhamnus. Nor was the sculpture less memorable than the
-architecture: three statues of Athênê, all by the hand of Pheidias,
-decorated the acropolis,—one colossal, forty-seven feet high, of
-ivory, in the Parthenon,[41]—a second of bronze, called the Lemnian
-Athênê,—a third of colossal magnitude, also in bronze, called Athênê
-Promachos, placed between the Propylæa and the Parthenon, and visible
-from afar off, even to the navigator approaching Peiræus by sea.
-
-  [40] Leake, Topography of Athens, Append. ii and iii, pp.
-  328-336, 2d edit.
-
-  [41] See Leake, Topography of Athens, 2d ed. p. 111, Germ.
-  transl. O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, p. 18) mentions no less than
-  eight celebrated statues of Athênê, by the hand of Pheidias,—four
-  in the acropolis of Athens.
-
-It is not, of course, to Periklês that the renown of these splendid
-productions of art belongs: but the great sculptors and architects
-by whom they were conceived and executed, belonged to that same
-period of expanding and stimulating Athenian democracy which called
-forth a similar creative genius in oratory, in dramatic poetry,
-and in philosophical speculation. One man especially, of immortal
-name,—Pheidias,—born a little before the battle of Marathon, was the
-original mind in whom the sublime ideal conceptions of genuine art
-appear to have disengaged themselves from that hardness of execution
-and adherence to a consecrated type, which marked the efforts of his
-predecessors.[42] He was the great director and superintendent of
-all those decorative additions whereby Periklês imparted to Athens
-a majesty such as had never before belonged to any Grecian city:
-the architects of the Parthenon and the other buildings—Iktînus,
-Kallikratês, Korœbus, Mnesiklês, and others—worked under his
-superintendence: and he had, besides, a school of pupils and
-subordinates to whom the mechanical part of his labors was confided.
-With all the great additions which Pheidias made to the grandeur of
-Athens, his last and greatest achievement was out of Athens,—the
-colossal statue of Zeus, in the great temple of Olympia, executed in
-the years immediately preceding the Peloponnesian war. The effect
-produced by this stupendous work, sixty feet high, in ivory and
-gold, embodying in visible majesty some of the grandest conceptions
-of Grecian poetry and religion, upon the minds of all beholders for
-many centuries successively,—was such as never has been, and probably
-never will be, equalled in the annals of art, sacred or profane.
-
-  [42] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13-15; O. Müller, De Phidiæ Vitâ, pp
-  34-60, also his work, Archäologie der Kunst, sects. 108-113.
-
-Considering these prodigious achievements in the field of art only
-as they bear upon Athenian and Grecian history, they are phenomena
-of extraordinary importance. When we read the profound impression
-which they produced upon Grecian spectators of a later age, we may
-judge how immense was the effect upon that generation which saw
-them both begun and finished. In the year 480 B.C., Athens had been
-ruined by the occupation of Xerxes: since that period, the Greeks
-had seen, first, the rebuilding and fortifying of the city on an
-enlarged scale,—next, the addition of Peiræus with its docks and
-magazines,—thirdly, the junction of the two by the long walls,
-thus including the most numerous concentrated population, wealth,
-arms, ships, etc., in Greece,[43]—lastly, the rapid creation of so
-many new miracles of art,—the sculptures of Pheidias as well as
-the paintings of the Thasian painter, Polygnôtus, in the temple of
-Theseus, and in the portico called Pœkilê. Plutarch observes[44]
-that the celerity with which the works were completed was the most
-remarkable circumstance connected with them; and so it probably
-might be, in respect to the effect upon the contemporary Greeks. The
-gigantic strides by which Athens had reached her maritime empire
-were now immediately succeeded by a series of works which stamped
-her as the imperial city of Greece, gave to her an appearance of
-power even greater than the reality, and especially put to shame
-the old-fashioned simplicity of Sparta.[45] The cost was doubtless
-prodigious, and could only have been borne at a time when there
-was a large treasure in the acropolis, as well as a considerable
-tribute annually coming in: if we may trust a computation which
-seems to rest on plausible grounds, it cannot have been much less
-than three thousand talents in the aggregate,—about six hundred and
-ninety thousand pounds.[46] The expenditure of so large a sum was,
-of course, the source of great private gain to the contractors,
-tradesmen, merchants, artisans of various descriptions, etc.,
-concerned in it: in one way or another, it distributed itself over a
-large portion of the whole city. And it appears that the materials
-employed for much of the work were designedly of the most costly
-description, as being most consistent with the reverence due to the
-gods: marble was rejected as too common for the statue of Athênê,
-and ivory employed in its place;[47] while the gold with which it
-was surrounded weighed not less than forty talents.[48] A large
-expenditure for such purposes, considered as pious towards the gods,
-was at the same time imposing in reference to Grecian feeling,
-which regarded with admiration every variety of public show and
-magnificence, and repaid by grateful deference the rich men who
-indulged in it. Periklês knew well that the visible splendor of
-the city, so new to all his contemporaries, would cause her great
-real power to appear even greater than its reality, and would thus
-procure for her a real, though unacknowledged influence—perhaps even
-an ascendency—over all cities of the Grecian name. And it is certain
-that even among those who most hated and feared her, at the outbreak
-of the Peloponnesian war, there prevailed a powerful sentiment of
-involuntary deference.
-
-  [43] Thucyd. i, 80. καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασιν ἄριστα ἐξήρτυνται,
-  πλούτῳ τε ἰδίῳ καὶ δημοσίῳ καὶ ναυσὶ καὶ ἵπποις καὶ ὅπλοις, καὶ
-  ὄχλῳ ὅσος οὐκ ἐν ἄλλῳ ἑνί γε χωρίῳ Ἑλληνικῷ ἐστὶν, etc.
-
-  [44] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13.
-
-  [45] Thucyd. i, 10.
-
-  [46] See Leake, Topography of Athens, Append. iii, p. 329, 2d ed.
-  Germ. transl. Colonel Leake, with much justice, contends that the
-  amount of two thousand and twelve talents, stated by Harpokration
-  out of Philochorus as the cost of the Propylæa alone, must be
-  greatly exaggerated. Mr. Wilkins (Atheniensia, p. 84) expresses
-  the same opinion; remarking that the transport of marble from
-  Pentelikus to Athens is easy and on a descending road.
-
-  Demetrius Phalereus (ap. Cicer. de Officiis, ii, 17) blamed
-  Periklês for the large sum expended upon the Propylæa; nor is it
-  wonderful that he uttered this censure, if he had been led to
-  rate the cost of them at two thousand and twelve talents.
-
-  [47] Valer. Maxim. i, 7, 2.
-
-  [48] Thucyd. ii, 13.
-
-A step taken by Periklês, apparently not long after the commencement
-of the thirty years’ truce, evinces how much this ascendency was
-in his direct aim, and how much he connected it with views both
-of harmony and usefulness for Greece generally. He prevailed upon
-the people to send envoys to every city of the Greek name, great
-and small, inviting each to appoint deputies for a congress to be
-held at Athens. Three points were to be discussed in this intended
-congress. 1. The restitution of those temples which had been burnt
-by the Persian invaders. 2. The fulfilment of such vows, as on that
-occasion had been made to the gods. 3. The safety of the sea and of
-maritime commerce for all. Twenty elderly Athenians were sent round
-to obtain the convocation of this congress at Athens,—a Pan-Hellenic
-congress for Pan-Hellenic purposes. But those who were sent to
-Bœotia and Peloponnesus completely failed in their object, from the
-jealousy, noway astonishing, of Sparta and her allies: of the rest
-we hear nothing, for this refusal was quite sufficient to frustrate
-the whole scheme.[49] It is to be remarked that the dependent allies
-of Athens appear to have been summoned just as much as the cities
-perfectly autonomous; so that their tributary relation to Athens
-was not understood to degrade them. We may sincerely regret that
-such congress did not take effect, as it might have opened some new
-possibilities of converging tendency and alliance for the dispersed
-fractions of the Greek name,—a comprehensive benefit, to which Sparta
-was at once incompetent and indifferent, but which might, perhaps,
-have been realized under Athens, and seems in this case to have been
-sincerely aimed at by Periklês. The events of the Peloponnesian war,
-however, extinguished all hopes of any such union.
-
-  [49] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 17. Plutarch gives no precise date,
-  and O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, p. 9) places these steps for
-  convocation of a congress before the first war between Sparta and
-  Athens and the battle of Tanagra,—_i. e._, before 460 B.C. But
-  this date seems to me improbable: Thebes was not yet renovated
-  in power, nor had Bœotia as yet recovered from the fruits of her
-  alliance with the Persians; moreover, neither Athens nor Periklês
-  himself seem to have been at that time in a situation to conceive
-  so large a project; which suits in every respect much better for
-  the later period, after the thirty years’ truce, but before the
-  Peloponnesian war.
-
-The interval of fourteen years, between the beginning of the thirty
-years’ truce and that of the Peloponnesian war, was by no means one
-of undisturbed peace to Athens. In the sixth year of that period
-occurred the formidable revolt of Samos.
-
-That island appears to have been the most powerful of all the
-allies of Athens,[50]—more powerful even than Chios or Lesbos, and
-standing on the same footing as the two latter; that is, paying
-no tribute-money,—a privilege when compared with the body of the
-allies,—but furnishing ships and men when called upon, and retaining,
-subject to this condition, its complete autonomy, its oligarchical
-government, its fortifications, and its military force. Like most
-of the other islands near the coast, Samos possessed a portion
-of territory on the mainland, between which and the territory of
-Milêtus, lay the small town of Priênê, one of the twelve original
-members contributing to the Pan-Ionic solemnity. Respecting the
-possession of this town of Priênê, a war broke out between the
-Samians and Milesians, in the sixth year of the thirty years’ truce
-(B.C. 440-439): whether the town had before been independent, we do
-not know, but in this war the Milesians were worsted, and it fell
-into the hands of the Samians. The defeated Milesians, enrolled as
-they were among the tributary allies of Athens, complained to her of
-the conduct of the Samians, and their complaint was seconded by a
-party in Samos itself opposed to the oligarchy and its proceedings.
-The Athenians required the two disputing cities to bring the matter
-before discussion and award at Athens, with which the Samians refused
-to comply:[51] whereupon an armament of forty ships was despatched
-from Athens to the island, and established in it a democratical
-government; leaving in it a garrison, and carrying away to Lemnos
-fifty men and as many boys from the principal oligarchical families,
-to serve as hostages. Of these families, however, a certain number
-retired to the mainland, where they entered into negotiations with
-Pissuthnês, the satrap of Sardis, to procure aid and restoration.
-Obtaining from him seven hundred mercenary troops, and passing over
-in the night to the island, by previous concert with the oligarchical
-party, they overcame the Samian democracy as well as the Athenian
-garrison, who were sent over as prisoners to Pissuthnês. They were
-farther lucky enough to succeed in stealing away from Lemnos their
-own recently deposited hostages, and they then proclaimed open revolt
-against Athens, in which Byzantium also joined. It seems remarkable,
-that though, by such a proceeding, they would of course draw upon
-themselves the full strength of Athens, yet their first step was
-to resume aggressive hostilities against Milêtus,[52] whither they
-sailed with a powerful naval force of seventy ships, twenty of them
-carrying troops aboard.
-
-  [50] Thucyd. i, 115; viii, 76; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28.
-
-  [51] Thucyd. i, 115; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 25. Most of the
-  statements which appear in this chapter of Plutarch—over and
-  above the concise narrative of Thucydidês—appear to be borrowed
-  from exaggerated party stories of the day. We need make no remark
-  upon the story, that Periklês was induced to take the side of
-  Milêtus against Samos, by the fact that Aspasia was a native
-  of Milêtus. Nor is it at all more credible that the satrap
-  Pissuthnês, from good-will towards Samos, offered Periklês ten
-  thousand golden staters as an inducement to spare Samos. It may
-  perhaps be true however, that the Samian oligarchy, and those
-  wealthy men whose children were likely to be taken as hostages,
-  tried the effect of large bribes upon the mind of Periklês, to
-  prevail upon him not to alter the government.
-
-  [52] Thucyd. i, 114, 115.
-
-Immediately on the receipt of this grave intelligence, a fleet of
-sixty triremes—probably all that were in complete readiness—was
-despatched to Samos under ten generals, two of whom were Periklês
-himself and the poet Sophoklês,[53] both seemingly included among
-the ten ordinary stratêgi of the year. But it was necessary to
-employ sixteen of these ships, partly in summoning contingents from
-Chios and Lesbos, to which islands Sophoklês went in person;[54]
-partly in keeping watch off the coast of Karia for the arrival of
-the Phenician fleet, which report stated to be approaching; so that
-Periklês had only forty-four ships remaining in his squadron. Yet
-he did not hesitate to attack the Samian fleet of seventy ships
-on its way back from Milêtus, near the island of Tragia, and was
-victorious in the action. Presently, he was reinforced by forty
-ships from Athens, and by twenty-five from Chios and Lesbos, so
-as to be able to disembark at Samos, where he overcame the Samian
-land-force, and blocked up the harbor with a portion of his fleet,
-surrounding the city on the land-side with a triple wall. Meanwhile,
-the Samians had sent Stesagoras with five ships to press the coming
-of the Phenician fleet, and the report of their approach became
-again so prevalent that Periklês felt obliged to take sixty ships,
-out of the total one hundred and twenty-five, to watch for them off
-the coast of Kaunus and Karia, where he remained for about fourteen
-days. The Phenician fleet[55] never came, though Diodorus affirms
-that it was actually on its voyage. Pissuthnês certainly seems to
-have promised, and the Samians to have expected it: but I incline
-to believe that, though willing to hold out hopes and encourage
-revolt among the Athenian allies, the satrap, nevertheless, did not
-choose openly to violate the convention of Kallias, whereby the
-Persians were forbidden to send a fleet westward of the Chelidonian
-promontory. The departure of Periklês, however, so much weakened the
-Athenian fleet off Samos, that the Samians, suddenly sailing out of
-their harbor in an opportune moment, at the instigation and under
-the command of one of their most eminent citizens, the philosopher
-Melissus,—surprised and ruined the blockading squadron, and gained
-a victory over the remaining fleet, before the ships could be
-fairly got out to sea.[56] For fourteen days they remained masters
-of the sea, carrying in and out all that they thought proper: nor
-was it until the return of Periklês that they were again blocked
-up. Reinforcements, however, were now multiplied to the blockading
-squadron,—from Athens, forty ships, under Thucydidês,[57] Agnon, and
-Phormion, and twenty under Tlepolemus and Antiklês, besides thirty
-from Chios and Lesbos,—making altogether near two hundred sail.
-Against this overwhelming force, Melissus and the Samians made an
-unavailing attempt at resistance, but were presently quite blocked
-up, and remained so for nearly nine months, until they could hold
-out no longer. They then capitulated, being compelled to raze their
-fortifications, to surrender all their ships of war, to give hostages
-for future good conduct, and to make good by stated instalments the
-whole expense of the enterprise, said to have reached one thousand
-talents. The Byzantines, too, made their submission at the same
-time.[58]
-
-  [53] Strabo, xiv, p. 638; Schol. Aristeidês, t. iii, p. 485,
-  Dindorf.
-
-  [54] See the interesting particulars recounted respecting
-  Sophoklês by the Chian poet, Ion, who met and conversed with him
-  during the course of this expedition (Athenæus, xiii, p. 603).
-  He represents the poet as uncommonly pleasing and graceful in
-  society, but noway distinguished for active capacity. Sophoklês
-  was at this time in peculiar favor, from the success of his
-  tragedy, Antigonê, the year before. See the chronology of
-  these events discussed and elucidated in Boeckh’s preliminary
-  Dissertation to the Antigonê, c. 6-9.
-
-  [55] Diodor. xi, 27.
-
-  [56] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 26. Plutarch seems to have had
-  before him accounts respecting this Samian campaign, not only
-  from Ephorus, Stesimbrotus, and Duris, but also from Aristotle:
-  and the statements of the latter must have differed thus far
-  from Thucydidês, that he affirmed Melissus the Samian general to
-  have been victorious over Periklês himself, which is not to be
-  reconciled with the narrative of Thucydidês.
-
-  The Samian historian, Duris, living about a century after this
-  siege, seems to have introduced many falsehoods respecting the
-  cruelties of Athens: see Plutarch, _l. c._
-
-  [57] It appears very improbable that this Thucydidês can be the
-  historian himself. If it be Thucydidês son of Melêsias, we must
-  suppose him to have been restored from ostracism before the
-  regular time,—a supposition indeed noway inadmissible in itself,
-  but which there is nothing else to countenance. The author of the
-  Life of Sophoklês, as well as most of the recent critics, adopt
-  this opinion.
-
-  On the other hand, it may have been a third person named
-  Thucydidês; for the name seems to have been common, as we might
-  guess from the two words of which it is compounded. We find a
-  third Thucydidês mentioned viii, 92—a native of Pharsalus: and
-  the biographer, Marcellinus seems to have read of many persons so
-  called (Θουκύδιδαι πολλοὶ, p. xvi, ed. Arnold). The subsequent
-  history of Thucydidês son of Melêsias, is involved in complete
-  obscurity. We do not know the incident to which the remarkable
-  passage in Aristophanês (Acharn. 703) alludes,—compare Vespæ,
-  946: nor can we confirm the statement which the Scholiast cites
-  from Idomeneus, to the effect that Thucydidês was banished and
-  fled to Artaxerxes: see Bergk. Reliq. Com. Att. p. 61.
-
-  [58] Thucyd. i, 117; Diodor. xii, 27, 28; Isokratês, De Permutat.
-  Or. xv, sect. 118; Cornel. Nepos, Vit. Timoth. c. 1.
-
-  The assertion of Ephorus (see Diodorus, xii, 28, and Ephori
-  Fragm. 117 ed. Marx, with the note of Marx) that Periklês
-  employed battering machines against the town, under the
-  management of the Klazomenian Artemon, was called in question
-  by Herakleidês Ponticus, on the ground that Artemon was a
-  contemporary of Anakreon, near a century before: and Thucydidês
-  represents Periklês to have captured the town altogether by
-  blockade.
-
-Two or three circumstances deserve notice respecting this revolt, as
-illustrating the existing condition of the Athenian empire. First,
-that the whole force of Athens, together with the contingents from
-Chios and Lesbos, was necessary in order to crush it, so that even
-Byzantium, which joined in the revolt, seems to have been left
-unassailed. Now, it is remarkable that none of the dependent allies
-near Byzantium, or anywhere else, availed themselves of so favorable
-an opportunity to revolt also: a fact which seems plainly to imply
-that there was little positive discontent then prevalent among them.
-Had the revolt spread to other cities, probably Pissuthnês might have
-realized his promise of bringing in the Phenician fleet, which would
-have been a serious calamity for the Ægean Greeks, and was only kept
-off by the unbroken maintenance of the Athenian empire.
-
-Next, the revolted Samians applied for aid, not only to Pissuthnês,
-but also to Sparta and her allies; among whom, at a special
-meeting, the question of compliance or refusal was formally debated.
-Notwithstanding the thirty years’ truce then subsisting, of which
-only six years had elapsed, and which had been noway violated by
-Athens,—many of the allies of Sparta voted for assisting the Samians:
-what part Sparta herself took, we do not know,—but the Corinthians
-were the main and decided advocates for the negative. They not only
-contended that the truce distinctly forbade compliance with the
-Samian request, but also recognized the right of each confederacy to
-punish its own recusant members, and this was the decision ultimately
-adopted, for which the Corinthians afterwards took credit, in the
-eyes of Athens, as the chief authors.[59] Certainly, if the contrary
-policy had been pursued, the Athenian empire might have been in great
-danger, the Phenician fleet would probably have been brought in also,
-and the future course of events might have been greatly altered.
-
-  [59] Thucyd. i, 40, 41.
-
-Again, after the reconquest of Samos, we should assume it almost as a
-matter of certainty, that the Athenians would renew the democratical
-government which they had set up just before the revolt. Yet, if
-they did so, it must have been again overthrown, without any attempt
-to uphold it on the part of Athens. For we hardly hear of Samos
-again, until twenty-seven years afterwards, towards the latter
-division of the Peloponnesian war, in 412 B.C., and it then appears
-with an established oligarchical government of geomori, or landed
-proprietors, against which the people make a successful rising
-during the course of that year.[60] As Samos remained, during the
-interval between 439 B.C. and 412 B.C., unfortified, deprived of its
-fleet, and enrolled among the tribute-paying allies of Athens,—and
-as it, nevertheless, either retained or acquired its oligarchical
-government; so we may conclude that Athens cannot have systematically
-interfered to democratize by violence the subject-allies, in cases
-where the natural tendency of parties ran towards oligarchy. The
-condition of Lesbos at the time of its revolt, hereafter to be
-related, will be found to confirm this conclusion.[61]
-
-  [60] Thucyd. viii, 21.
-
-  [61] Compare Wachsmuth, Hellenische Alterthumskunde, sect. 58,
-  vol. ii, p. 82.
-
-On returning to Athens after the reconquest of Samos, Periklês was
-chosen to pronounce the funeral oration over the citizens slain in
-the war, to whom, according to custom, solemn and public obsequies
-were celebrated in the suburb called Kerameikus. This custom
-appears to have been introduced shortly after the Persian war,[62]
-and would doubtless contribute to stimulate the patriotism of the
-citizens, especially when the speaker elected to deliver it was of
-the personal dignity as well as the oratorical powers of Periklês.
-He was twice public funeral orator by the choice of the citizens:
-once after the Samian success, and a second time in the first year
-of the Peloponnesian war. His discourse on the first occasion has
-not reached us,[63] but the second has been fortunately preserved,
-in substance at least, by Thucydidês, who also briefly describes the
-funeral ceremony,—doubtless the same on all occasions. The bones
-of the deceased warriors were exposed in tents three days before
-the ceremony, in order that the relatives of each might have the
-opportunity of bringing offerings: they were then placed in coffins
-of cypress, and carried forth on carts to the public burial-place at
-the Kerameikus; one coffin for each of the ten tribes, and one empty
-couch, formally laid out, to represent those warriors whose bones
-had not been discovered or collected. The female relatives of each
-followed the carts, with loud wailings, and after them a numerous
-procession both of citizens and strangers. So soon as the bones had
-been consigned to the grave, some distinguished citizen, specially
-chosen for the purpose, mounted an elevated stage, and addressed to
-the multitude an appropriate discourse. Such was the effect produced
-by that of Periklês after the Samian expedition, that, when he had
-concluded, the audience present testified their emotion in the
-liveliest manner, and the women especially crowned him with garlands,
-like a victorious athlete.[64] Only Elpinikê, sister of the deceased
-Kimon, reminded him that the victories of her brother had been more
-felicitous, as gained over Persians and Phenicians, and not over
-Greeks and kinsmen. And the contemporary poet Ion, the friend of
-Kimon, reported what he thought an unseemly boast of Periklês,—to the
-effect that Agamemnon had spent ten years in taking a foreign city,
-while _he_ in nine months had reduced the first and most powerful of
-all the Ionic communities.[65] But if we possessed the actual speech
-pronounced, we should probably find that he assigned all the honor
-of the exploit to Athens and her citizens generally, placing their
-achievement in favorable comparison with that of Agamemnon and his
-host,—not himself with Agamemnon.
-
-  [62] See Westermann, Geschichte der Beredsamkeit in Griechenland
-  und Rom; Diodor. xi, 33; Dionys. Hal. A. R. v, 17.
-
-  Periklês, in the funeral oration preserved by Thucydidês (ii,
-  35-40), begins by saying—Οἱ μὲν πολλοὶ τῶν ἐνθάδε εἰρηκότων ἤδη
-  ἐπαινοῦσι ~τὸν προσθέντα~ τῷ νόμῳ τὸν λόγον τόνδε, etc.
-
-  The Scholiast, and other commentators—K. F. Weber and Westermann
-  among the number—make various guesses as to _what_ celebrated man
-  is here designated as the introducer of the custom of a funeral
-  harangue. The Scholiast says, Solon: Weber fixes on Kimon:
-  Westermann, on Aristeidês: another commentator on Themistoklês.
-  But we may reasonably doubt whether _any one_ very celebrated man
-  is specially indicated by the words τὸν προσθέντα. To commend the
-  introducer of the practice, is nothing more than a phrase for
-  commending the practice itself.
-
-  [63] Some fragments of it seem to have been preserved, in the
-  time of Aristotle: see his treatise De Rhetoricâ, i, 7; iii, 10,
-  3.
-
-  [64] Compare the enthusiastic demonstrations which welcomed
-  Brasidas at Skiônê (Thucyd. iv, 121).
-
-  [65] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28; Thucyd. ii, 34.
-
-Whatever may be thought of this boast, there can be no doubt that
-the result of the Samian war not only rescued the Athenian empire
-from great peril,[66] but rendered it stronger than ever: while the
-foundation of Amphipolis, which was effected two years afterwards,
-strengthened it still farther. Nor do we hear, during the ensuing few
-years, of any farther tendencies to disaffection among its members,
-until the period immediately before the Peloponnesian war. The
-feeling common among them towards Athens, seems to have been neither
-attachment nor hatred, but simple indifference and acquiescence
-in her supremacy. Such amount of positive discontent as really
-existed among them, arose, not from actual hardships suffered, but
-from the general political instinct of the Greek mind,—desire of
-separate autonomy for each city; which manifested itself in each,
-through the oligarchical party, whose power was kept down by Athens,
-and was stimulated by the sentiment communicated from the Grecian
-communities without the Athenian empire. According to that sentiment,
-the condition of a subject-ally of Athens was treated as one of
-degradation and servitude: and in proportion as fear and hatred of
-Athens became more and more predominant among the allies of Sparta,
-they gave utterance to the sentiment more and more emphatically, so
-as to encourage discontent artificially among the subject-allies of
-the Athenian empire. Possessing complete mastery of the sea, and
-every sort of superiority requisite for holding empire over islands,
-Athens had yet no sentiment to appeal to in her subjects, calculated
-to render her empire popular, except that of common democracy,
-which seems at first to have acted without any care on her part to
-encourage it, until the progress of the Peloponnesian war made such
-encouragement a part of her policy. And had she even tried sincerely
-to keep up in the allies the feeling of a common interest, and the
-attachment to a permanent confederacy, the instinct of political
-separation would probably have baffled all her efforts. But she took
-no such pains,—with the usual morality that grows up in the minds
-of the actual possessors of power, she conceived herself entitled
-to exact obedience as her right; and some of the Athenian speakers
-in Thucydidês go so far as to disdain all pretence of legitimate
-power, even such as might fairly be set up, resting the supremacy
-of Athens on the naked plea of superior force.[67] As the allied
-cities were mostly under democracies,—through the indirect influence
-rather than the systematic dictation of Athens,—yet each having its
-own internal aristocracy in a state of opposition; so the movements
-for revolt against Athens originated with the aristocracy or with
-some few citizens apart: while the people, though sharing more or
-less in the desire for autonomy, had yet either a fear of their
-own aristocracy or a sympathy with Athens, which made them always
-backward in revolting, sometimes decidedly opposed to it. Neither
-Periklês nor Kleon, indeed, lay stress on the attachment of the
-people as distinguished from that of the Few, in these dependent
-cities; but the argument is strongly insisted on by Diodorus,[68]
-in the discussion respecting Mitylênê after its surrender: and as
-the war advanced, the question of alliance with Athens or Sparta
-became more and more identified with the internal preponderance of
-democracy or oligarchy in each.[69] We shall find that in most of
-those cases of actual revolt where we are informed of the preceding
-circumstances, the step is adopted or contrived by a small number of
-oligarchical malcontents, without consulting the general voice; while
-in those cases where the general assembly is consulted beforehand,
-there is manifested indeed a preference for autonomy, but nothing
-like a hatred of Athens or decided inclination to break with her. In
-the case of Mitylênê,[70] in the fourth year of the war, it was the
-aristocratical government which revolted, while the people, as soon
-as they obtained arms, actually declared in favor of Athens: and the
-secession of Chios, the greatest of all the allies, in the twentieth
-year of the Peloponnesian war, even after all the hardships which
-the allies had been called upon to bear in that war, and after the
-ruinous disasters which Athens had sustained before Syracuse,—was
-both prepared beforehand and accomplished by secret negotiations
-of the Chian oligarchy, not only without the concurrence, but
-against the inclination, of their own people.[71] In like manner,
-the revolt of Thasos would not have occurred, had not the Thasian
-democracy been previously subverted by the Athenian Peisander and
-his oligarchical confederates. So in Akanthus, in Amphipolis, in
-Mendê, and those other Athenian dependencies which were wrested
-from Athens by Brasidas, we find the latter secretly introduced by
-a few conspirators, while the bulk of the citizens do not hail him
-at once as a deliverer, like men sick of Athenian supremacy: they
-acquiesce, not without debate, when Brasidas is already in the town,
-and his demeanor, just as well as conciliating, soon gains their
-esteem: but neither in Akanthus nor in Amphipolis would he have
-been admitted by the free decision of the citizens, if they had not
-been alarmed for the safety of their friends, their properties, and
-their harvest, still exposed in the lands without the walls.[72]
-These particular examples warrant us in affirming, that though the
-oligarchy in the various allied cities desired eagerly to shake off
-the supremacy of Athens, the people were always backward in following
-them, sometimes even opposed, and hardly ever willing to make
-sacrifices for the object. They shared the universal Grecian desire
-for separate autonomy,[73] felt the Athenian empire as an extraneous
-pressure which they would have been glad to shake off, whenever the
-change could be made with safety: but their condition was not one
-of positive hardship, nor did they overlook the hazardous side of
-such a change,—partly from the coercive hand of Athens, partly from
-new enemies against whom Athens had hitherto protected them, and not
-least, from their own oligarchy. Of course, the different allied
-cities were not all animated by the same feelings, some being more
-averse to Athens than others.
-
-  [66] A short fragment remaining from the comic poet Eupolis
-  (Κόλακες, Fr. xvi, p. 493, ed. Meineke), attests the anxiety at
-  Athens about the Samian war, and the great joy when the island
-  was reconquered: compare Aristophan. Vesp. 283.
-
-  [67] Thucyd. iii, 37; ii, 63. See the conference, at the island
-  of Melos in the sixteenth year of the Peloponnesian war (Thucyd.
-  v, 89, _seq._), between the Athenian commissioners and the
-  Melians. I think, however, that this conference is less to be
-  trusted as based in reality, than the speeches in Thucydidês
-  generally,—of which more hereafter.
-
-  [68] Thucyd. iii, 47. Νῦν μὲν γὰρ ὑμῖν ὁ δῆμος ἐν ἁπάσαις ταῖς
-  πόλεσιν εὔνους ἐστὶ, καὶ ἢ οὐ ξυναφίσταται τοῖς ὀλίγοις, ἢ ἐὰν
-  βιασθῇ, ὑπάρχει τοῖς ἀποστήσασι πολέμιος εὐθὺς, etc.
-
-  [69] See the striking observations of Thucydidês, iii, 82, 83;
-  Aristotel. Politic. v, 6, 9.
-
-  [70] Thucyd. iii, 27.
-
-  [71] Thucyd. viii, 9-14. He observes, also, respecting the
-  Thasian oligarchy just set up in lieu of the previous democracy
-  by the Athenian oligarchical conspirators who were then
-  organizing the revolution of the Four Hundred at Athens,—that
-  they immediately made preparations for revolting from
-  Athens,—ξυνέβη οὖν αὐτοῖς μάλιστα ἃ ἐβούλοντο, τὴν πόλιν τε
-  ἀκινδύνως ὀρθοῦσθαι, καὶ ~τὸν ἐναντιωσόμενον δῆμον καταλελύσθαι~
-  (viii, 64).
-
-  [72] Thucyd. iv, 86, 88, 106, 123.
-
-  [73] See the important passage, Thucyd. viii, 48.
-
-The particular modes in which Athenian supremacy was felt as a
-grievance by the allies appear to have been chiefly three. 1. The
-annual tribute. 2. The encroachments, exactions, or perhaps plunder,
-committed by individual Athenians, who would often take advantage of
-their superior position, either as serving in the naval armaments, as
-invested with the function of inspectors as placed in garrison, or as
-carrying on some private speculation. 3. The obligation under which
-the allies were placed, of bringing a large proportion of their
-judicial trials to be settled before the dikasteries at Athens.
-
-As to the tribute, I have before remarked that its amount had been
-but little raised from its first settlement down to the beginning
-of the Peloponnesian war, at which time it was six hundred talents
-yearly:[74] it appears to have been reviewed, and the apportionment
-corrected, in every fifth year, at which period the collecting
-officers may probably have been changed; but we shall afterwards
-find it becoming larger and more burdensome. The same gradual
-increase may probably be affirmed respecting the second head of
-inconvenience,—vexation caused to the allies by individual Athenians,
-chiefly officers of armaments, or powerful citizens.[75] Doubtless
-this was always more or less a real grievance, from the moment when
-the Athenians became despots in place of chiefs, but it was probably
-not very serious in extent until after the commencement of the
-Peloponnesian war, when revolt on the part of the allies became more
-apprehended, and when garrisons, inspectors, and tribute-gathering
-ships became more essential in the working of the Athenian empire.
-
-  [74] Xenophon. Repub. Athen. iii, 5. πλὴν αἱ τάξεις τοῦ φόρου·
-  τοῦτο δὲ γίγνεται ὡς τὰ πολλὰ δι᾽ ἔτους πέμπτου.
-
-  [75] Xenophon. Repub. Athen. i, 14. Περὶ δὲ τῶν συμμάχων, οἱ
-  ἐκπλέοντες συκοφαντοῦσιν, ὡς δοκοῦσι, καὶ μισοῦσι τοὺς χρηστοὺς,
-  etc.
-
-  Who are the persons designated by the expression οἱ ἐκπλέοντες,
-  appears to be specified more particularly a little farther on (i,
-  18); it means the generals, the officers, the envoys, etc. sent
-  forth by Athens.
-
-But the third circumstance above noticed—the subjection of the allied
-cities to the Athenian dikasteries—has been more dwelt upon as a
-grievance than the second, and seems to have been unduly exaggerated.
-We can hardly doubt that the beginning of this jurisdiction
-exercised by the Athenian dikasteries dates with the synod of Delos,
-at the time of the first formation of the confederacy. It was an
-indispensable element of that confederacy, that the members should
-forego their right of private war among each other, and submit their
-differences to peaceable arbitration,—a covenant introduced even
-into alliances much less intimate than this was, and absolutely
-essential to the efficient maintenance of any common action against
-Persia.[76] Of course, many causes of dispute, public as well as
-private, must have arisen among these wide-spread islands and
-seaports of the Ægean, connected with each other by relations of
-fellow-feeling, of trade, and of common apprehensions. The synod
-of Delos, composed of the deputies of all, was the natural board
-of arbitration for such disputes, and a habit must thus have been
-formed, of recognizing a sort of federal tribunal,—to decide
-peaceably how far each ally had faithfully discharged its duties,
-both towards the confederacy collectively, and towards other
-allies with their individual citizens separately,—as well as to
-enforce its decisions and punish refractory members, pursuant to
-the right which Sparta and her confederacy claimed and exercised
-also.[77] Now from the beginning, the Athenians were the guiding
-and enforcing presidents of this synod, and when it gradually died
-away, they were found occupying its place as well as clothed with its
-functions. It was in this manner that their judicial authority over
-the allies appears first to have begun, as the confederacy became
-changed into an Athenian empire,—the judicial functions of the synod
-being transferred along with the common treasure to Athens, and
-doubtless much extended. And on the whole, these functions must have
-been productive of more good than evil to the allies themselves,
-especially to the weakest and most defenceless among them.
-
-  [76] See the expression in Thucydidês (v, 27) describing the
-  conditions required when Argos was about to extend her alliances
-  in Peloponnesus. The conditions were two. 1. That the city should
-  be autonomous. 2. Next, that it should be willing to submit its
-  quarrels to equitable arbitration,—ἥτις αὐτόνομός τέ ἐστι, καὶ
-  δίκας ἴσας καὶ ὁμοίας δίδωσι.
-
-  In the oration against the Athenians, delivered by the Syracusan
-  Hermokratês at Kamarina, Athens is accused of having enslaved her
-  allies partly on the ground that they neglected to perform their
-  military obligations, partly because they made war upon each
-  other (Thucyd. vi, 76), partly also on other specious pretences.
-  How far this charge against Athens is borne out by the fact, we
-  can hardly say; in all those particular examples which Thucydidês
-  mentions of subjugation of allies by Athens, there is a cause
-  perfectly definite and sufficient,—not a mere pretence devised by
-  Athenian ambition.
-
-  [77] According to the principle laid down by the Corinthians
-  shortly before the Peloponnesian war,—τοὺς προσήκοντας ξυμμάχους
-  αὐτόν τινα κολάζειν (Thucyd. i, 40-43).
-
-  The Lacedæmonians, on preferring their accusation of treason
-  against Themistoklês, demanded that he should be tried at Sparta,
-  before the common Hellenic synod which held its sitting there,
-  and of which Athens was then a member: that is, the Spartan
-  confederacy, or alliance,—ἐπὶ τοῦ κοινοῦ συνεδρίου τῶν Ἑλλήνων
-  (Diodor. xi, 55).
-
-Among the thousand towns which paid tribute to Athens,—taking this
-numerical statement of Aristophanês, not in its exact meaning, but
-simply as a great number,—if a small town, or one of its citizens,
-had cause of complaint against a larger, there was no channel except
-the synod of Delos, or the Athenian tribunal, through which it could
-have any reasonable assurance of fair trial or justice. It is not
-to be supposed that all the private complaints and suits between
-citizen and citizen, in each respective subject town, were carried
-up for trial to Athens: yet we do not know distinctly how the line
-was drawn between matters carried up thither and matters tried at
-home. The subject cities appear to have been interdicted from the
-power of capital punishment, which could only be inflicted after
-previous trial and condemnation at Athens:[78] so that the latter
-reserved to herself the cognizance of most of the grave crimes,—or
-what may be called “the higher justice” generally. And the political
-accusations preferred by citizen against citizen, in any subject
-city, for alleged treason, corruption, non-fulfilment of public duty,
-etc., were doubtless carried to Athens for trial,—perhaps the most
-important part of her jurisdiction.
-
-  [78] Antipho, De Cæde Herôdis, c. 7, p. 135. ὃ οὐδὲ πόλει
-  ἔξεστιν, ἄνευ Ἀθηναίων οὐδένα θανάτῳ ζημιῶσαι.
-
-But the maintenance of this judicial supremacy was not intended by
-Athens for the substantive object of amending the administration of
-justice in each separate allied city: it went rather to regulate
-the relations between city and city,—between citizens of different
-cities,—between Athenian citizens or officers, and any of these
-allied cities with which they had relations,—between each city
-itself, as a dependent government with contending political parties,
-and the imperial head, Athens. All these were problems which imperial
-Athens was called on to solve, and the best way of solving them would
-have been through some common synod emanating from all the allies:
-putting this aside, we shall find that the solution provided by
-Athens was perhaps the next best, and we shall be the more induced
-to think so, when we compare it with the proceedings afterwards
-adopted by Sparta, when she had put down the Athenian empire. Under
-Sparta, the general rule was, to place each of the dependent cities
-under the government of a dekadarchy or oligarchical council of
-ten among its chief citizens, together with a Spartan harmost, or
-governor, having a small garrison under his orders. It will be found,
-when we come to describe the Spartan maritime empire, that these
-arrangements exposed each dependent city to very great violence and
-extortion, while, after all, they solved only a part of the problem:
-they served only to maintain each separate city under the dominion
-of Sparta, without contributing to regulate the dealings between the
-citizens of one and those of another, or to bind together the empire
-as a whole. Now the Athenians did not, as a system, place in their
-dependent cities, governors analogous to the harmosts, though they
-did so occasionally under special need; but their fleets and their
-officers were in frequent relation with these cities; and as the
-principal officers were noways indisposed to abuse their position, so
-the facility of complaint, constantly open to the Athenian popular
-dikastery, served both as redress and guarantee against misrule of
-this description. It was a guarantee which the allies themselves
-sensibly felt and valued, as we know from Thucydidês: the chief
-source from whence they had to apprehend evil was the Athenian
-officials and principal citizens, who could misemploy the power of
-Athens for their own private purposes,—but they looked up to the
-“Athenian Demos as a chastener of such evil-doers and as a harbor
-of refuge to themselves.”[79] If the popular dikasteries at Athens
-had not been thus open, the allied cities would have suffered much
-more severely from the captains and officials of Athens in their
-individual capacity. And the maintenance of political harmony,
-between the imperial city and the subject ally, was insured by Athens
-through the jurisdiction of her dikasteries with much less cost
-of injustice and violence than by Sparta; for though oligarchical
-partisans might sometimes be unjustly condemned at Athens, yet such
-accidental wrong was immensely overpassed by the enormities of the
-Spartan harmosts and dekadarchies, who put numbers to death without
-any trial at all.
-
-  [79] Thucyd. viii, 48. Τούς τε καλοὺς κἀγαθοὺς ὀνομαζομένους
-  οὐκ ἐλάσσω αὐτοὺς (that is, the subject-allies) νομίζειν σφίσι
-  πράγματα παρέξειν τοῦ δήμου, ποριστὰς ὄντας καὶ ἐσηγητὰς τῶν
-  κακῶν τῷ δήμῳ, ἐξ ὧν τὰ πλείω αὐτοὺς ὠφελεῖσθαι· καὶ τὸ μὲν ἐπ᾽
-  ἐκείνοις εἶναι καὶ ἄκριτοι ἂν καὶ βιαιότερον ἀποθνήσκειν, τὸν δὲ
-  δῆμον σφῶν τε καταφυγὴν εἶναι καὶ ἐκείνων σωφρονιστήν. Καὶ ταῦτα
-  παρ᾽ αὐτῶν τῶν ἔργων ἐπισταμένας τὰς πόλεις σαφῶς αὐτὸς εἰδέναι,
-  ὅτι οὕτω νομίζουσιν. This is introduced as the deliberate
-  judgment of the Athenian commander Phrynichus, whom Thucydidês
-  greatly commends for his sagacity, and with whom he seems in this
-  case to have concurred.
-
-  Xenophon (Rep. Ath. i. 14, 15) affirms that the Athenian officers
-  on service passed many unjust sentences upon the oligarchical
-  party in the allied cities,—fines, sentences of banishment,
-  capital punishments; and that the Athenian people, though they
-  had a strong public interest in the prosperity of the allies, in
-  order that their tribute might be larger, nevertheless thought
-  it better that any individual citizen of Athens should pocket
-  what he could out of the plunder of the allies, and leave to the
-  latter nothing more than was absolutely necessary for them to
-  live and work, without any superfluity, such as might tempt them
-  to revolt.
-
-  That the Athenian officers on service may have succeeded too
-  often in unjust peculation at the cost of the allies, is probable
-  enough: but that the Athenian people were pleased to see their
-  own individual citizens so enriching themselves is certainly not
-  true. The large jurisdiction of the dikasteries was intended,
-  among other effects, to open to the allies a legal redress
-  against such misconduct on the part of the Athenian officers: and
-  the passage above cited from Thucydidês proves that it really
-  produced such an effect.
-
-So again, it is to be recollected that Athenian private citizens, not
-officially employed, were spread over the whole range of the empire
-as kleruchs, proprietors, or traders; of course, therefore, disputes
-would arise between them and the natives of the subject cities, as
-well as among these latter themselves, in cases where both parties
-did not belong to the same city. Now in such cases the Spartan
-imperial authority was so exercised as to afford little or no remedy,
-since the action of the harmost or the dekadarchy was confined to
-one separate city; while the Athenian dikasteries, with universal
-competence and public trial, afforded the only redress which the
-contingency admitted. If a Thasian citizen believed himself aggrieved
-by the historian Thucydidês, either as commander of the Athenian
-fleet off the station, or as proprietor of gold mines in Thrace, he
-had his remedy against the latter by accusation before the Athenian
-dikasteries, to which the most powerful Athenian was amenable not
-less than the meanest Thasian. To a citizen of any allied city, it
-might be an occasional hardship to be sued before the courts at
-Athens, but it was also often a valuable privilege to him to be
-able to sue before those courts others whom else he could not have
-reached. He had his share both of the benefit and of the hardship.
-Athens, if she robbed her subject-allies of their independence, at
-least gave them in exchange the advantage of a central and common
-judiciary authority; thus enabling each of them to enforce claims
-of justice against the rest, in a way which would not have been
-practicable, to the weaker at least, even in a state of general
-independence.
-
-Now Sparta seems not even to have attempted anything of the kind with
-regard to her subject-allies, being content to keep them under the
-rule of a harmost, and a partisan oligarchy; and we read anecdotes
-which show that no justice could be obtained at Sparta, even for the
-grossest outrages committed by the harmost, or by private Spartans
-out of Laconia. The two daughters of a Bœotian named Skedasus, of
-Leuktra in Bœotia, had been first violated and then slain by two
-Spartan citizens: the son of a citizen of Oreus, in Eubœa, had
-been also outraged and killed by the harmost Aristodêmus:[80] in
-both cases the fathers went to Sparta to lay the enormity before
-the ephors and other authorities, and in both cases a deaf ear
-was turned to their complaints. But such crimes, if committed by
-Athenian citizens or officers, might have been brought to a formal
-exposure before the public sitting of the dikastery, and there can
-be no doubt that both would have been severely punished: we shall
-see hereafter that an enormity of this description, committed by
-the Athenian general Pachês, at Mitylênê, cost him his life before
-the Athenian dikasts.[81] Xenophon, in the dark and one-sided
-representation which he gives of the Athenian democracy, remarks,
-that if the subject-allies had not been made amenable to justice, at
-Athens, they would have cared little for the people of Athens, and
-would have paid court only to those individual Athenians—generals,
-trierarchs, or envoys—who visited the islands on service; but under
-the existing system, the subjects were compelled to visit Athens
-either as plaintiffs or defendants, and were thus under the necessity
-of paying court to the bulk of the people also,—that is, to those
-humbler citizens out of whom the dikasteries were formed; they
-supplicated the dikasts in court for favor or lenient dealing.[82]
-However true this may be, we must remark that it was a lighter lot
-to be brought for trial before the dikastery, than to be condemned
-without redress by the general on service, or to be forced to buy off
-his condemnation by a bribe; and, moreover, that the dikastery was
-open not merely to receive accusations against citizens of the allied
-cities, but also to entertain the complaints which they preferred
-against others.
-
-  [80] Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 20; Plutarch, Amator. Narrat. c. 3,
-  p. 773.
-
-  [81] See _infra_, chap. 49.
-
-  [82] Xenophon, Rep. Athen, i, 18. Πρὸς δὲ τούτοις, εἰ μὲν μὴ
-  ἐπὶ δίκας ᾔεσαν οἱ σύμμαχοι, τοὺς ἐκπλέοντας Ἀθηναίων ἐτίμων ἂν
-  μόνους, τούς τε στρατηγοὺς καὶ τοὺς τριηράρχους καὶ πρέσβεις· νῦν
-  δ᾽ ἠνάγκασται τὸν δῆμον κολακεύειν τῶν Ἀθηναίων εἷς ἕκαστος τῶν
-  συμμάχων, γιγνώσκων ὅτι δεῖ μὲν ἀφικόμενον Ἀθήναζε δίκην δοῦναι
-  καὶ λαβεῖν, οὐκ ἐν ἄλλοις τισὶν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν τῷ δήμῳ, ὅς ἐστι δὴ
-  νόμος Ἀθήνῃσι. Καὶ ἀντιβολῆσαι ἀναγκάζεται ἐν τοῖς δικαστηρίοις,
-  καὶ εἰσιόντος του, ἐπιλαμβάνεσθαι τῆς χειρός. Διὰ τοῦτο οὖν οἱ
-  σύμμαχοι δοῦλοι τοῦ δήμου τῶν Ἀθηναίων καθεστᾶσι μᾶλλον.
-
-Assuming the dikasteries at Athens to be ever so defective as
-tribunals for administering justice, we must recollect that they
-were the same tribunals under which every Athenian citizen held his
-own fortune or reputation, and that the native of any subject city
-was admitted to the same chance of justice as the native of Athens.
-Accordingly, we find the Athenian envoy at Sparta, immediately before
-the Peloponnesian war, taking peculiar credit to the imperial city
-on this ground for equal dealing with her subject-allies. “If our
-power (he says) were to pass into other hands, the comparison would
-presently show how moderate we are in the use of it: but as regards
-us, our very moderation is unfairly turned to our disparagement
-rather than to our praise. For even though we put ourselves at
-disadvantage in matters litigated with our allies, and though we have
-appointed such matters to be judged among ourselves and under laws
-equal to both parties, we are represented as animated by nothing
-better than a love of litigation.”[83] “Our allies (he adds) would
-complain less if we made open use of our superior force with regard
-to them; but we discard such maxims, and deal with them upon an
-equal footing: and they are so accustomed to this, that they think
-themselves entitled to complain at every trifling disappointment
-of their expectations.[84] They suffered worse hardships under
-the Persians before our empire began, and they would suffer worse
-under you (the Spartans), if you were to succeed in conquering us
-and making our empire yours.” History bears out the boast of the
-Athenian orator, both as to the time preceding and following the
-empire of Athens.[85] And an Athenian citizen, indeed, might well
-regard it, not as a hardship, but as a privilege, that subject-allies
-should be allowed to sue him before the dikastery, and to defend
-themselves before the same tribunal, either in case of wrong done
-to him, or in case of alleged treason to the imperial authority of
-Athens: they were thereby put upon a level with himself. Still more
-would he find reason to eulogize the universal competence of these
-dikasteries in providing a common legal authority for all disputes of
-the numerous distinct communities of the empire, one with another,
-and for the safe navigation and general commerce of the Ægean. That
-complaints were raised against it among the subject-allies, is noway
-surprising: for the empire of Athens generally was inconsistent
-with that separate autonomy to which every town thought itself
-entitled,—and this was one of its prominent and constantly operative
-institutions, as well as a striking mark of dependence to the
-subordinate communities. Yet we may safely affirm, that if empire
-was to be maintained at all, no way of maintaining it could be found
-at once less oppressive and more beneficial than the superintending
-competence of the dikasteries,—a system not taking its rise in the
-mere “love of litigation,” if, indeed, we are to reckon this a
-real feature in the Athenian character, which I shall take another
-opportunity of examining, much less in those petty collateral
-interests indicated by Xenophon,[86] such as the increased customs
-duty, rent of houses, and hire of slaves at Peiræus, and the larger
-profits of the heralds, arising from the influx of suitors. It was
-nothing but the power, originally inherent in the confederacy of
-Delos, of arbitration between members and enforcement of duties
-towards the whole,—a power inherited by Athens from that synod, and
-enlarged to meet the political wants of her empire; to which end
-it was essential, even in the view of Xenophon himself.[87] It may
-be that the dikastery was not always impartial between Athenian
-citizens privately, or the Athenian commonwealth collectively, and
-the subject-allies,—and in so far the latter had good reason to
-complain; but on the other hand, we have no ground for suspecting it
-of deliberate or standing unfairness, or of any other defects than
-such as were inseparable from its constitution and procedure, whoever
-might be the parties under trial.
-
-  [83] Thucyd. i, 76, 77. Ἄλλους γ᾽ ἂν οὖν οἰόμεθα τὰ ἡμέτερα
-  λαβόντας δεῖξαι ἂν μάλιστα εἴ τι μετριάζομεν· ἡμῖν δὲ καὶ ἐκ τοῦ
-  ἐπιεικοῦς ἀδοξία τὸ πλέον ἢ ἔπαινος οὐκ εἰκότως περιέστη. Καὶ
-  ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις,
-  καὶ παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις ποιήσαντες τὰς
-  κρίσεις, φιλοδικεῖν δοκοῦμεν, etc.
-
-  I construe ξυμβολαίαις δίκαις as connected in meaning with
-  ξυμβόλαια and not with ξύμβολα—following Duker and Bloomfield in
-  preference to Poppo and Göller: see the elaborate notes of the
-  two latter editors. Δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων indicated the arrangements
-  concluded by special convention between two different cities, by
-  consent of both, for the purpose of determining controversies
-  between their respective citizens: they were something
-  essentially apart from the ordinary judicial arrangements of
-  either state. Now what the Athenian orator here insists upon
-  is exactly the contrary of this idea: he says, that the allies
-  were admitted to the benefit of Athenian trial and Athenian
-  laws, in like manner with the citizens themselves. The judicial
-  arrangements by which the Athenian allies were brought before
-  the Athenian dikasteries cannot, with propriety, be said to be
-  δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων; unless the act of original incorporation into
-  the confederacy of Delos is to be regarded as a ξύμβολον, or
-  agreement,—which in a large sense it might be, though not in the
-  proper sense in which δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων are commonly mentioned.
-  Moreover. I think that the passage of Antipho (De Cæde Herôdis,
-  p. 745) proves that it was the citizens of places _not in
-  alliance with Athens_, who litigated with Athenians according to
-  δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων,—not the allies of Athens while they resided
-  in their own native cities; for I agree with the interpretation
-  which Boeckh puts upon this passage, in opposition to Platner
-  and Schömann (Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, book iii, ch. xvi,
-  p. 403, Eng. transl.; Schömann, Der Attisch. Prozess, p. 778;
-  Platner, Prozess und Klagen bei den Attikern, ch. iv, 2, pp.
-  110-112, where the latter discusses both the passages of Antipho
-  and Thucydidês).
-
-  The passages in Demosthenês Orat. de Halones. c. 3, pp. 98, 99;
-  and Andokidês cont. Alkibiad. c. 7, p. 121 (I quote this latter
-  oration, though it is undoubtedly spurious, because we may well
-  suppose the author of it to be conversant with the nature and
-  contents of ξύμβολα), give us a sufficient idea of these judicial
-  conventions, or ξύμβολα,—special and liable to differ in each
-  particular case. They seem to me essentially distinct from that
-  systematic scheme of proceeding whereby the dikasteries of Athens
-  were made cognizant of all, or most, important controversies
-  among or between the allied cities, as well as of political
-  accusations.
-
-  M. Boeckh draws a distinction between the _autonomous_
-  allies (Chios and Lesbos, at the time immediately before the
-  Peloponnesian war) and the _subject_-allies: “the former class
-  (he says) retained possession of unlimited jurisdiction, whereas
-  the latter were compelled to try all their disputes in the
-  courts of Athens.” Doubtless this distinction would prevail
-  to a certain degree, but how far it was pushed we can hardly
-  say. Suppose that a dispute took place between Chios and one
-  of the subject islands, or between an individual Chian and an
-  individual Thasian; would not the Chian plaintiff sue, or the
-  Chian defendant be sued, before the Athenian dikastery? Suppose
-  that an Athenian citizen or officer became involved in dispute
-  with a Chian, would not the Athenian dikastery be the competent
-  court, whichever of the two were plaintiff or defendant? Suppose
-  a Chian citizen or magistrate to be suspected of fomenting
-  revolt, would it not be competent to any accuser, either Chian or
-  Athenian, to indict him before the dikastery at Athens? Abuse of
-  power, or peculation, committed by Athenian officers at Chios,
-  must of course be brought before the Athenian dikasteries, just
-  as much as if the crime had been committed at Thasos or Naxos.
-  We have no evidence to help us in regard to these questions; but
-  I incline to believe that the difference in respect to judicial
-  arrangement, between the autonomous and the subject-allies, was
-  less in degree than M. Boeckh believes. We must recollect that
-  the arrangement was not all pure hardship to the allies,—the
-  liability to be prosecuted was accompanied with the privilege of
-  prosecuting for injuries received.
-
-  There is one remark, however, which appears to me of importance
-  for understanding the testimonies on this subject. The Athenian
-  empire, properly so called, which began by the confederacy of
-  Delos after the Persian invasion, was completely destroyed at
-  the close of the Peloponnesian war, when Athens was conquered
-  and taken. But after some years had elapsed, towards the year
-  377 B.C., Athens again began to make maritime conquests, to
-  acquire allies, to receive tribute, to assemble a synod, and to
-  resume her footing of something like an imperial city. But her
-  power over her allies, during this second period of empire, was
-  nothing like so great as it had been during the first, between
-  the Persian and Peloponnesian wars: nor can we be at all sure
-  that what is true of the second is also true of the first. Now
-  I think it probable, that those statements of the grammarians,
-  which represent the allies as carrying on δίκας ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων in
-  ordinary practice with the Athenians, may really be true about
-  the second empire or alliance. Bekker Anecdota, p. 436. Ἀθηναῖοι
-  ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων ἐδίκαζον τοῖς ὑπηκόοις· οὕτως Ἀριστοτέλης. Pollux,
-  viii. 63. Ἀπὸ συμβόλων δὲ δίκη ἦν, ὅτε οἱ σύμμαχοι ἐδικάζοντο.
-  Also Hesychius, i, 489. The statement here ascribed to Aristotle
-  may very probably be true about the second alliance, though it
-  cannot be held true for the first. In the second, the Athenians
-  may really have had σύμβολα, or special conventions for judicial
-  business, with many of their principal allies, instead of making
-  Athens the authoritative centre, and heir to the Delian synod, as
-  they did during the first. It is to be remarked, however, that
-  Harpokration, in the explanation which he gives of σύμβολα treats
-  them in a perfectly general way, as contentions for settlement
-  of judicial controversy between city and city, without any
-  particular allusion to Athens and her allies. Compare Heffter,
-  Athenäische Gerichtsverfassung, iii, 1, 3, p. 91.
-
-  [84] Thucyd. i. 77. Οἱ δὲ (the allies) ~εἰθισμένοι πρὸς ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ
-  τοῦ ἴσου ὁμιλεῖν~, etc.
-
-  [85] Compare Isokratês, Or. iv, Panegyric. pp. 62-66, sects.
-  116-138; and Or. xii, Panathenaic. pp. 247-254, sects. 72-111;
-  Or. viii, De Pace, p. 178, sect. 119, _seqq._; Plutarch, Lysand.
-  c. 13; Cornel. Nepos, Lysand. c. 2, 3.
-
-  [86] Xenophon, Repub. Ath. i, 17.
-
-  [87] Xenophon, Repub. Ath. i, 16. He states it as one of the
-  advantageous consequences, which induced the Athenians to bring
-  the suits and complaints of the allies to Athens for trial—that
-  the prytaneia, or fees paid upon entering a cause for trial,
-  became sufficiently large to furnish all the pay for the dikasts
-  throughout the year.
-
-  But in another part of his treatise (iii, 2, 3), he represents
-  the Athenian dikasteries as overloaded with judicial business,
-  much more than they could possibly get through; insomuch that
-  there were long delays before causes could be brought on for
-  trial. It could hardly be any great object, therefore, to
-  multiply complaints artificially, in order to make fees for the
-  dikasts.
-
-We are now considering the Athenian empire as it stood before the
-Peloponnesian war; before the increased exactions and the multiplied
-revolts, to which that war gave rise,—before the cruelties which
-accompanied the suppression of those revolts, and which so deeply
-stained the character of Athens,—before that aggravated fierceness,
-mistrust, contempt of obligation, and rapacious violence, which
-Thucydidês so emphatically indicates as having been infused into the
-Greek bosom by the fever of an all-pervading contest.[88] There had
-been before this time many revolts of the Athenian dependencies,
-from the earliest at Naxos down to the latest at Samos: all had
-been successfully suppressed, but in no case had Athens displayed
-the same unrelenting rigor as we shall find hereafter manifested
-towards Mitylênê, Skiônê, and Mêlos. The policy of Periklês, now in
-the plenitude of his power at Athens, was cautious and conservative,
-averse to forced extension of empire as well as to those increased
-burdens on the dependent allies which such schemes would have
-entailed, and tending to maintain that assured commerce in the
-Ægean by which all of them must have been gainers,—not without a
-conviction that the contest must arise sooner or later between
-Athens and Sparta, and that the resources as well as the temper of
-the allies must be husbanded against that contingency. If we read
-in Thucydidês the speech of the envoy from Mitylênê[89] at Olympia,
-delivered to the Lacedæmonians and their allies in the fourth year
-of the Peloponnesian war, on occasion of the revolt of the city
-from Athens,—a speech imploring aid and setting forth the strongest
-case against Athens which the facts could be made to furnish,—we
-shall be surprised how weak the case is, and how much the speaker is
-conscious of its weakness. He has nothing like practical grievances
-and oppressions to urge against the imperial city,—he does not
-dwell upon enormity of tribute, unpunished misconduct of Athenian
-officers, hardship of bringing causes for trial to Athens, or other
-sufferings of the subjects generally,—he has nothing to say except
-that they were defenceless and degraded subjects, and that Athens
-held authority over them without and against their own consent: and
-in the case of Mitylênê, not so much as this could be said, since
-she was on the footing of an equal, armed, and autonomous ally. Of
-course, this state of forced dependence was one which the allies, or
-such of them as could stand alone, would naturally and reasonably
-shake off whenever they had an opportunity:[90] but the negative
-evidence, derived from the speech of the Mitylenæan orator, goes far
-to make out the point contended for by the Athenian speaker at Sparta
-immediately before the war,—that, beyond the fact of such forced
-dependence, the allies had little practically to complain of. A city
-like Mitylênê, moreover, would be strong enough to protect itself
-and its own commerce without the help of Athens: but to the weaker
-allies, the breaking up of the Athenian empire would have greatly
-lessened the security both of individuals and of commerce, in the
-waters of the Ægean, and their freedom would thus have been purchased
-at the cost of considerable positive disadvantages.[91]
-
-  [88] See his well-known comments on the seditions at Korkyra,
-  iii, 82, 83.
-
-  [89] Thucyd. iii, 11-14.
-
-  [90] So the Athenian orator Diodotus puts it in his speech
-  deprecating the extreme punishment about to be inflicted on
-  Mitylênê—ἤν τινα ἐλεύθερον καὶ βίᾳ ἀρχόμενον ~εἰκότως πρὸς
-  αὐτονομίαν ἀποστάντα χειρωσώμεθα~, etc. (Thucyd. iii, 46.)
-
-  [91] It is to be recollected that the Athenian empire was
-  essentially _a government of dependencies_; Athens, as
-  an imperial state, exercising authority over subordinate
-  governments. To maintain beneficial relations between two
-  governments, one supreme, the other subordinate, and to make
-  the system work to the satisfaction of the people in the one
-  as well as of the people in the other, has always been found a
-  problem of great difficulty. Whoever reads the instructive volume
-  of Mr. G. C. Lewis (Essay on the Government of Dependencies),
-  and the number of instances of practical misgovernment in this
-  matter which are set forth therein, will be inclined to think
-  that the empire of Athens over her allies makes comparatively a
-  creditable figure. It will, most certainly, stand full comparison
-  with the government of England, over dependencies, in the last
-  century; as illustrated by the history of Ireland, with the penal
-  laws against the Catholics; by the Declaration of Independence,
-  published in 1776, by the American colonies, setting forth the
-  grounds of their separation; and by the pleadings of Mr. Burke
-  against Warren Hastings.
-
-  A statement and legal trial alluded to by Mr. Lewis (p. 367),
-  elucidates, farther, two points not unimportant on the present
-  occasion: 1. The illiberal and humiliating vein of sentiment
-  which is apt to arise in citizens of the supreme government
-  towards those of the subordinate. 2. The protection which English
-  jury-trial, nevertheless, afforded to the citizens of the
-  dependency against oppression by English officers.
-
-  “An action was brought, in the court of Common Pleas, in 1773,
-  by Mr. Anthony Fabrigas, a native of Minorca, against General
-  Mostyn, the governor of the island. The facts proved at the trial
-  were, that Governor Mostyn had arrested the plaintiff, imprisoned
-  him, and transported him to Spain, without any form of trial, on
-  the ground that the plaintiff had presented to him a petition for
-  redress of grievances, in a manner which he deemed improper. Mr.
-  Justice Gould left it to the jury to say, whether the plaintiff’s
-  behavior was such as to afford a just conclusion that he was
-  about to stir up sedition and mutiny in the garrison, or whether
-  he meant no more than earnestly to press his suit and obtain a
-  redress of grievances. If they thought the latter, the plaintiff
-  was entitled to recover in the action. The jury gave a verdict
-  for the plaintiff _with_ £3,000 _damages_. In the following term,
-  an application was made for a new trial, which was refused by the
-  whole court.
-
-  “The following remarks of the counsel for Governor Mostyn,
-  on this trial, contain a plain and _naïve_ statement of the
-  doctrine, _that a dependency is to be governed, not for its
-  own interest, but for that of the dominant state_. ‘Gentlemen
-  of the jury,’ said the counsel, ‘it will be time for me now
-  to take notice of another circumstance, notorious to all the
-  gentlemen who have been settled in the island, that the natives
-  of Minorca are but ill-affected to the English, and to the
-  English government. It is not much to be wondered at. They are
-  the descendants of Spaniards; and they consider Spain as the
-  country to which they ought naturally to belong: it is not at all
-  to be wondered at that they are indisposed to the English, whom
-  they consider as their conquerors.—Of all the Minorquins in the
-  island, the plaintiff perhaps stands singularly and eminently
-  the most seditious, turbulent, and dissatisfied subject to the
-  crown of Great Britain that is to be found in Minorca. Gentlemen,
-  _he is, or chooses to be called, the patriot of Minorca_. Now
-  patriotism is a very pretty thing among ourselves, and we owe
-  much to it: we owe our liberties to it; but we should have but
-  little to value, and we should have but little of what we now
-  enjoy, were it not for our trade. _And for the sake of our
-  trade, it is not fit that we should encourage patriotism in
-  Minorca_; for it is there destructive of our trade, and there
-  is an end to our trade in the Mediterranean, if it goes there.
-  But _here it is very well_; for the body of the people in this
-  country will have it: they have demanded it,—and in consequence
-  of their demands, they have enjoyed liberties which they will
-  transmit to their posterity,—and it is not in the power of this
-  government to deprive them of it. But they will take care of all
-  our conquests abroad. If that spirit prevailed in Minorca, the
-  consequence would be the loss of that country, and of course of
-  our Mediterranean trade. We should be sorry to set all our slaves
-  free in our plantations.’”
-
-  The prodigious sum of damages awarded by the jury, shows the
-  strength of their sympathy with this Minorquin plaintiff against
-  the English officer. I doubt not that the feeling of the
-  dikastery at Athens was much of the same kind, and often quite as
-  strong; sincerely disposed to protect the subject-allies against
-  misconduct of Athenian trierarchs, or inspectors.
-
-  The feelings expressed in the speech above cited would also often
-  find utterance from Athenian orators in the assembly; and it
-  would not be difficult to produce parallel passages, in which
-  these orators imply discontent on the part of the allies to be
-  the natural state of things, such as Athens could not hope to
-  escape. The speech here given shows that such feelings arise,
-  almost inevitably, out of the uncomfortable relation of two
-  governments, one supreme and the other subordinate. They are not
-  the product of peculiar cruelty and oppression on the part of the
-  Athenian democracy, as Mr. Mitford and so many others have sought
-  to prove.
-
-Nearly the whole of the Grecian world, putting aside Italian,
-Sicilian, and African Greeks, was at this time included either in
-the alliance of Lacedæmon or in that of Athens, so that the truce
-of thirty years insured a suspension of hostilities everywhere.
-Moreover, the Lacedæmonian confederates had determined by majority
-of votes to refuse the request of Samos for aid in her revolt
-against Athens: whereby it seemed established, as practical
-international law, that neither of these two great aggregate bodies
-should intermeddle with the other, and that each should restrain
-or punish its own disobedient members.[92] Of this refusal, which
-materially affected the course of events, the main advisers had
-been the Corinthians, in spite of that fear and dislike of Athens
-which prompted many of the allies to vote for war.[93] The position
-of the Corinthians was peculiar; for while Sparta and her other
-allies were chiefly land-powers, Corinth had been from early times
-maritime, commercial, and colonizing,—she had been indeed once the
-first naval power in Greece, along with Ægina; but either she had
-not increased it at all during the last forty years, or, if she
-had, her comparative naval importance had been entirely sunk by the
-gigantic expansion of Athens. The Corinthians had both commerce and
-colonies,—Leukas, Anaktorium, Ambrakia, Korkyra, etc., along or near
-the coast of Epirus: they had also their colony Potidæa, situated
-on the isthmus of Pallênê, in Thrace, and intimately connected with
-them: and the interest of their commerce made them extremely averse
-to any collision with the superior navy of the Athenians. It was this
-consideration which had induced them to resist the impulse of the
-Lacedæmonian allies towards war on behalf of Samos: for though their
-feelings, both of jealousy and hatred against Athens were even now
-strong,[94] arising greatly out of the struggle a few years before
-for the acquisition of Megara to the Athenian alliance,—prudence
-indicated that, in a war against the first naval power in Greece,
-they were sure to be the greatest losers. So long as the policy
-of Corinth pointed towards peace, there was every probability
-that war would be avoided, or at least accepted only in a case of
-grave necessity, by the Lacedæmonian alliance. But a contingency,
-distant as well as unexpected, which occurred about five years
-after the revolt of Samos, reversed all these chances, and not only
-extinguished the dispositions of Corinth towards peace, but even
-transformed her into the forward instigator of war.
-
-  [92] See the important passage already adverted to in a prior
-  note.
-
-  Thucyd. i, 40. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἡμεῖς Σαμίων ἀποστάντων ψῆφον προσεθέμεθα
-  ἐναντίαν ὑμῖν, τῶν ἄλλων Πελοποννησίων δίχα ἐψηφισμένων εἰ χρὴ
-  αὐτοῖς ἀμύνειν, ~φανερῶς δὲ ἀντείπομεν τοὺς προσήκοντας ξυμμάχους
-  αὐτόν τινα κολάζειν~.
-
-  [93] Thucyd. i. 33.
-
-  [94] Thucyd. i. 42.
-
-Amidst the various colonies planted from Corinth along the coast of
-Epirus, the greater number acknowledged on her part an hegemony,
-or supremacy.[95] What extent of real power and interference this
-acknowledgment implied, in addition to the honorary dignity, we
-are not in a condition to say; but the Corinthians were popular,
-and had not carried their interference beyond the point which the
-colonists themselves found acceptable. To these amicable relations,
-however, the powerful Korkyra formed a glaring exception, having been
-generally at variance, sometimes in the most aggravated hostility,
-with its mother-city, and withholding from her even the accustomed
-tributes of honorary and filial respect. It was amidst such relations
-of habitual ill-will between Corinth and Korkyra, that a dispute
-grew up respecting the city of Epidamnus, known afterwards, in the
-Roman times, as Dyrrachium, hard by the modern Durazzo,—a colony
-founded by the Korkyræans on the coast of Illyria, in the Ionic gulf,
-considerably to the north of their own island. So strong was the
-sanctity of Grecian custom in respect to the foundation of colonies,
-that the Korkyræans, in spite of their enmity to Corinth, had been
-obliged to select the œkist, or founder-in-chief of Epidamnus, from
-that city,—a citizen of Herakleid descent, named Phalius,—along
-with whom there had also come some Corinthian settlers: so that
-Epidamnus, though a Korkyræan colony, was nevertheless a recognized
-granddaughter, if the expression may be allowed, of Corinth, the
-recollection of which was perpetuated by the solemnities periodically
-celebrated in honor of the œkist.[96]
-
-  [95] Thucyd. i, 38. ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι καὶ τὰ εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι.
-
-  [96] Thucyd. i, 24, 25.
-
-Founded on the isthmus of an outlaying peninsula on the sea-coast of
-the Illyrian Taulantii, Epidamnus was at first very prosperous, and
-acquired a considerable territory as well as a numerous population.
-But during the years immediately preceding the period which we have
-now reached, it had been exposed to great reverses: internal sedition
-between the oligarchy and the people, aggravated by attacks from
-the neighboring Illyrians, had crippled its power: and a recent
-revolution, in which the people put down the oligarchy, had reduced
-it still farther,—since the oligarchical exiles, collecting a
-force and allying themselves with the Illyrians, harassed the city
-grievously both by sea and land. The Epidamnian democracy was in such
-straits as to be forced to send to Korkyra for aid: their envoys sat
-down as suppliants at the temple of Hêrê, cast themselves on the
-mercy of the Korkyræans, and besought them to act both as mediators
-with the exiled oligarchy and as auxiliaries against the Illyrians.
-Though the Korkyræans themselves, democratically governed, might
-have been expected to sympathize with these suppliants and their
-prayers, yet their feeling was decidedly opposite: for it was the
-Epidamnian oligarchy who were principally connected with Korkyra,
-from whence their forefathers had emigrated, and where their family
-burial-places as well as their kinsmen were still to be found:[97]
-while the demos, or small proprietors and tradesmen of Epidamnus,
-may perhaps have been of miscellaneous origin, and at any rate
-had no visible memorials of ancient lineage in the mother-island.
-Having been refused aid from Korkyra, and finding their distressed
-condition insupportable, the Epidamnians next thought of applying
-to Corinth: but as this was a step of questionable propriety, their
-envoys were directed first to take the opinion of the Delphian god.
-His oracle having given an unqualified sanction, they proceeded to
-Corinth with their mission; describing their distress as well as
-their unavailing application at Korkyra,—tendering Epidamnus to
-the Corinthians as to its œkists and chiefs, with the most urgent
-entreaties for immediate aid to preserve it from ruin,—and not
-omitting to insist on the divine sanction just obtained. It was
-found easy to persuade the Corinthians, who, looking upon Epidamnus
-as a joint colony from Corinth and Korkyra, thought themselves not
-only authorized, but bound, to undertake its defence, a resolution
-much prompted by their ancient feud against Korkyra. They speedily
-organized an expedition, consisting partly of intended new settlers,
-partly of a protecting military force,—Corinthian, Leukadian, and
-Ambrakiôtic: which combined body, in order to avoid opposition from
-the powerful Korkyræan navy, was marched by land as far as Apollônia,
-and transported from thence by sea to Epidamnus.[98]
-
-  [97] Thucyd. i, 26. ἦλθον γὰρ ἐς τὴν Κέρκυραν οἱ τῶν Ἐπιδαμνίων
-  φυγάδες, τάφους τε ἀποδεικνύντες καὶ ξυγγένειαν ἣν προϊσχόμενοι
-  ἐδέοντο σφᾶς κατάγειν.
-
-  [98] Thucyd. i, 26.
-
-The arrival of such a reinforcement rescued the city for the moment,
-but drew upon it a formidable increase of peril from the Korkyræans,
-who looked upon the interference of Corinth as an infringement of
-their rights, and resented it in the strongest manner. Their feelings
-were farther inflamed by the Epidamnian oligarchical exiles, who,
-coming to the island with petition for succor, and appeals to the
-tombs of their Korkyræan ancestors, found a ready sympathy. They
-were placed on board a fleet of twenty-five triremes, afterwards
-strengthened by a farther reinforcement, which was sent to Epidamnus
-with the insulting requisition that they should be forthwith
-restored, and the new-comers from Corinth dismissed. No attention
-being paid to these demands, the Korkyræans commenced the blockade
-of the city with forty ships, and with an auxiliary land-force of
-Illyrians,—making proclamation that any person within, citizen or
-not, might depart safely if he chose, but would be dealt with as an
-enemy if he remained. How many persons profited by this permission
-we do not know: but at least enough to convey to Corinth the news
-that their troops in Epidamnus were closely besieged. The Corinthians
-immediately hastened the equipment of a second expedition,—sufficient
-not only for the rescue of the place, but to surmount that resistance
-which the Korkyræans were sure to offer. In addition to thirty
-triremes, and three thousand hoplites, of their own, they solicited
-aid both in ships and money from many of their allies: eight ships
-fully manned were furnished by Megara, four by Palês, in the island
-of Kephallênia, five by Epidaurus, two by Trœzen, one by Hermionê,
-ten by Leukas, and eight by Ambrakia,—together with pecuniary
-contributions from Thebes, Phlius, and Elis. They farther proclaimed
-a public invitation for new settlers to Epidamnus, promising equal
-political rights to all; an option being allowed to anyone who wished
-to become a settler without being ready to depart at once, to insure
-future admission by depositing the sum of fifty Corinthian drachmas.
-Though it might seem that the prospects of these new settlers were
-full of doubt and danger, such was the confidence entertained in the
-metropolitan protection of Corinth, that many were found as well to
-join the fleet, as to pay down the deposit for the liberty of future
-junction.
-
-All these proceedings on the part of Corinth, though undertaken with
-intentional hostility towards Korkyra, had not been preceded by any
-formal proposition, such as was customary among Grecian states,—a
-harshness of dealing arising not merely from her hatred towards
-Korkyra, but also from the peculiar political position of that
-island, which stood alone and isolated, not enrolled either in the
-Athenian or in the Lacedæmonian alliance. The Korkyræans, well aware
-of the serious preparation now going on at Corinth, and of the union
-among so many cities against them, felt themselves hardly a match for
-it alone, in spite of their wealth and their formidable naval force
-of one hundred and twenty triremes, inferior only to that of Athens.
-They made an effort to avert the storm by peaceable means, prevailing
-upon some mediators from Sparta and Sikyon to accompany them to
-Corinth; where, while they required that the forces and settlers
-recently despatched to Epidamnus should be withdrawn, denying all
-right on the part of Corinth to interfere in that colony,—they at
-the same time offered, if the point were disputed, to refer it for
-arbitration either to some impartial Peloponnesian city, or to the
-Delphian oracle; such arbiter to determine to which of the two
-cities Epidamnus as a colony really belonged, and the decision to be
-obeyed by both. They solemnly deprecated recourse to arms, which,
-if persisted in, would drive them as a matter of necessity to seek
-new allies such as they would not willingly apply to. To this the
-Corinthians answered, that they could entertain no proposition until
-the Korkyræan besieging force was withdrawn from Epidamnus: whereupon
-the Korkyræans rejoined that they would withdraw it at once, provided
-the new settlers and the troops sent by Corinth were removed at the
-same time. Either there ought to be this reciprocal retirement, or
-the Korkyræans would acquiesce in this _statu quo_ on both sides,
-until the arbiters should have decided.[99]
-
-  [99] Thucyd. i, 28.
-
-Although the Korkyræans had been unwarrantably harsh in rejecting the
-first supplication from Epidamnus, yet in their propositions made at
-Corinth, right and equity were on their side. But the Corinthians
-had gone too far, and assumed an attitude too decidedly aggressive,
-to admit of listening to arbitration, and accordingly, so soon as
-their armament was equipped, they set sail for Epidamnus, despatching
-a herald to declare war formally against the Korkyræans. As soon
-as the armament, consisting of seventy triremes, under Aristeus,
-Kallikratês, and Timanor, with two thousand five hundred hoplites,
-under Archetimus and Isarchidas, had reached Cape Aktium, at the
-mouth of the Ambrakian gulf, it was met by a Korkyræan herald in
-a little boat forbidding all farther advance,—a summons of course
-unavailing, and quickly followed by the appearance of the Korkyræan
-fleet. Out of the one hundred and twenty triremes which constituted
-the naval establishment of the island, forty were engaged in the
-siege of Epidamnus, but all the remaining eighty were now brought
-into service; the older ships being specially repaired for the
-occasion. In the action which ensued, they gained a complete victory,
-destroying fifteen Corinthian ships, and taking a considerable
-number of prisoners. And on the very day of the victory, Epidamnus
-surrendered to their besieging fleet, under covenant that the
-Corinthians within it should be held as prisoners, and that the other
-new-comers should be sold as slaves. The Corinthians and their allies
-did not long keep the sea after their defeat, but retired home, while
-the Korkyræans remained undisputed masters of the neighboring sea.
-Having erected a trophy on Leukimmê, the adjoining promontory of
-their island, they proceeded, according to the melancholy practice of
-Grecian warfare, to kill all their prisoners,—except the Corinthians,
-who were carried home and detained as prizes of great value for
-purposes of negotiation. They next began to take vengeance on those
-allies of Corinth, who had lent assistance to the recent expedition:
-they ravaged the territory of Leukas, burned Kyllênê, the seaport
-of Elis, and inflicted so much damage that the Corinthians were
-compelled towards the end of the summer to send a second armament to
-Cape Aktium, for the defence of Leukas, Anaktorium, and Ambrakia.
-The Korkyræan fleet was again assembled near Cape Leukimmê, but
-no farther action took place, and at the approach of winter both
-armaments were disbanded.[100]
-
-  [100] Thucyd. i, 29, 30.
-
-Deeply were the Corinthians humiliated by their defeat at sea,
-together with the dispersion of the settlers whom they had brought
-together; and though their original project was frustrated by the
-loss of Epidamnus, they were only the more bent on complete revenge
-against their old enemy Korkyra. They employed themselves, for two
-entire years after the battle, in building new ships and providing
-an armament adequate to their purposes: and in particular, they sent
-round not only to the Peloponnesian seaports, but also to the islands
-under the empire of Athens, in order to take into their pay the
-best class of seamen. By such prolonged efforts, ninety well-manned
-Corinthian ships were ready to set sail in the third year after the
-battle: and the entire fleet, when reinforced by the allies, amounted
-to not less than one hundred and fifty sail: twenty-seven triremes
-from Ambrakia, twelve from Megara, ten from Elis, as many from
-Leukas, and one from Anaktorium. Each of these allied squadrons had
-officers of its own, while the Corinthian Xenokleidês and four others
-were commanders-in-chief.[101]
-
-  [101] Thucyd. i, 31-46.
-
-But the elaborate preparations going on at Corinth were no secret to
-the Korkyræans, who well knew, besides, the numerous allies which
-that city could command, and her extensive influence throughout
-Greece. So formidable an attack was more than they could venture to
-brave, alone and unaided. They had never yet enrolled themselves
-among the allies either of Athens or of Lacedæmon: it had always
-been their pride and policy to maintain a separate line of action,
-which, by means of their wealth, their power, and their very peculiar
-position, they had hitherto been enabled to do with safety. That they
-had been able so to proceed with safety, however, was considered
-both by friends and enemies as a peculiarity belonging to their
-island; from whence we may draw an inference how little the islands
-in the Ægean, now under the Athenian empire, would have been able to
-maintain any real independence, if that empire had been broken up.
-But though Korkyra had been secure in this policy of isolation up to
-the present moment, such had been the increase and consolidation of
-forces elsewhere throughout Greece, that even she could pursue it no
-longer. To apply for admission into the Lacedæmonian confederacy,
-wherein her immediate enemy exercised paramount influence, being
-out of the question, she had no choice except to seek alliance with
-Athens. That city had as yet no dependencies in the Ionic gulf; she
-was not of kindred lineage, nor had she had any previous amicable
-relations with the Dorian Korkyra. But if there was thus no previous
-fact or feeling to lay the foundation of alliance, neither was there
-anything to forbid it: for in the truce between Athens and Sparta, it
-had been expressly stipulated, that any city, not actually enrolled
-in the alliance of either, might join the one or the other at
-pleasure.[102] While the proposition of alliance was thus formally
-open either for acceptance or refusal, the time and circumstances
-under which it was to be made rendered it full of grave contingencies
-to all parties; and the Korkyræan envoys, who now for the first time
-visited Athens, for the purpose of making it, came thither with
-doubtful hopes of success, though to their island the question was
-one of life or death.
-
-  [102] Thucyd. i, 35-40.
-
-According to the modern theories of government, to declare war, to
-make peace, and to contract alliances, are functions proper to be
-intrusted to the executive government apart from the representative
-assembly. According to ancient ideas, these were precisely the topics
-most essential to submit for the decision of the full assembly of
-the people: and in point of fact they were so submitted, even under
-governments only partially democratical; much more, of course,
-under the complete democracy of Athens. The Korkyræan envoys, on
-reaching that city, would first open their business to the stratêgi,
-or generals of the state, who would appoint a day for them to be
-heard before the public assembly, with full notice beforehand
-to the citizens. The mission was no secret, for the Korkyræans
-had themselves intimated their intention at Corinth, at the time
-when they proposed reference of the quarrel to arbitration: and
-even without such notice, the political necessity of the step was
-obvious enough to make the Corinthians anticipate it. Lastly, their
-_proxeni_ at Athens, Athenian citizens who watched over Corinthian
-interests, public and private, in confidential correspondence with
-that government,—and who, sometimes by appointment, sometimes as
-volunteers, discharged partly the functions of ambassadors in modern
-times, would communicate to them the arrival of the Korkyræan envoys.
-So that, on the day appointed for the latter to be heard before the
-public assembly, Corinthian envoys were also present to answer them
-and to oppose the granting of their prayer.
-
-Thucydidês has given in his history the speeches of both; that is,
-speeches of his own composition, but representing in all probability
-the substance of what was actually said, and of what he perhaps
-himself heard. Though pervaded throughout by the peculiar style and
-harsh structure of the historian, these speeches are yet among the
-plainest and most business-like in his whole work, bringing before
-us thoroughly the existing situation; which was one of doubt and
-difficulty, presenting reasons of considerable force on each of
-the opposite sides. The Korkyræans, after lamenting their previous
-improvidence, which had induced them to defer seeking alliance until
-the hour of need arrived, presented themselves as claimants for the
-friendship of Athens, on the strongest grounds of common interest
-and reciprocal usefulness. Though their existing danger and want
-of Athenian support was now urgent, it had not been brought upon
-them in an unjust quarrel, or by disgraceful conduct: they had
-proposed to Corinth a fair arbitration respecting Epidamnus, and
-their application had been refused,—which showed where the right
-of the case lay; moreover, they were now exposed single-handed,
-not to Corinth alone, whom they had already vanquished, but to a
-formidable confederacy, organized under her auspices, including
-choice mariners hired even from the allies of Athens. In granting
-their prayer, Athens would, in the first place, neutralize this
-misemployment of her own mariners, and would, at the same time,
-confer an indelible obligation, protect the cause of right, and
-secure to herself a most important reinforcement. For, next to her
-own, the Korkyræan naval force was the most powerful in Greece,
-and this was now placed within her reach: if, by declining the
-present offer, she permitted Korkyra to be overcome, that naval
-force would pass to the side of her enemies: for such were Corinth
-and the Peloponnesian alliance,—and such they would soon be openly
-declared. In the existing state of Greece, a collision between that
-alliance and Athens could not long be postponed: and it was with a
-view to this contingency that the Corinthians were now seeking to
-seize Korkyra along with her naval force.[103] The policy of Athens,
-therefore, imperiously called upon her to frustrate such a design,
-by now assisting the Korkyræans. She was permitted to do this by the
-terms of the thirty years’ truce: and although some might contend
-that, in the present critical conjuncture, acceptance of Korkyra was
-tantamount to a declaration of war with Corinth, yet the fact would
-falsify such predictions; for Athens would so strengthen herself
-that her enemies would be more than ever unwilling to attack her.
-She would not only render her naval force irresistibly powerful,
-but would become mistress of the communication between Sicily and
-Peloponnesus, and thus prevent the Sicilian Dorians from sending
-reinforcements to the Peloponnesians.[104]
-
-  [103] Thucyd. i, 33. Τοὺς Λακεδαιμονίους φόβῳ τῷ ὑμετέρῳ
-  πολεμησείοντας, καὶ τοὺς Κορινθίους δυναμένους παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς
-  καὶ ὑμῖν ἐχθροὺς ὄντας καὶ προκαταλαμβάνοντας ἡμᾶς νῦν ἐς τὴν
-  ὑμετέραν ἐπιχείρησιν, ἵνα μὴ τῷ κοινῷ ἔχθει κατ᾽ αὐτῶν μετ᾽
-  ἀλλήλων στῶμεν, etc.
-
-  [104] Thucyd. i, 32-36.
-
-To these representations on the part of the Korkyræans, the
-Corinthian speakers made reply. They denounced the selfish and
-iniquitous policy pursued by Korkyra, not less in the matter of
-Epidamnus, than in all former time,[105]—which was the real reason
-why she had ever been ashamed of honest allies. Above all things,
-she had always acted undutifully and wickedly towards Corinth,
-her mother-city, to whom she was bound by those ties of colonial
-allegiance which Grecian morality recognized, and which the other
-Corinthian colonies cheerfully obeyed.[106] Epidamnus was not a
-Korkyræan, but a Corinthian colony, and the Korkyræans, having
-committed wrong in besieging it, had proposed arbitration without
-being willing to withdraw their troops while arbitration was pending:
-they now impudently came to ask Athens to become accessory after the
-fact in such injustice. The provision of the thirty years’ truce
-might seem indeed to allow Athens to receive them as allies: but
-that provision was not intended to permit the reception of cities
-already under the tie of colonial allegiance elsewhere,—still less
-the reception of cities engaged in an active and pending quarrel,
-where any countenance to one party in the quarrel was necessarily a
-declaration of war against the opposite. If either party had a right
-to invoke the aid of Athens on this occasion, Corinth had a better
-right than Korkyra: for the latter had never had any transactions
-with the Athenians, while Corinth was not only still under covenant
-of amity with them, through the thirty years’ truce,—but had also
-rendered material service to them by dissuading the Peloponnesian
-allies from assisting the revolted Samos. By such dissuasion, the
-Corinthians had upheld the principle of Grecian international
-law, that each alliance was entitled to punish its own refractory
-members: they now called upon Athens to respect this principle,
-by not interfering between Corinth and her colonial allies,[107]
-especially as the violation of it would recoil inconveniently upon
-Athens herself, with her numerous dependencies. As for the fear of an
-impending war between the Peloponnesian alliance and Athens, such a
-contingency was as yet uncertain,—and might possibly never occur at
-all, if Athens dealt justly, and consented to conciliate Corinth on
-this critical occasion: but it would assuredly occur if she refused
-such conciliation, and the dangers thus entailed upon Athens would
-be far greater than the promised naval coöperation of Korkyra would
-compensate.[108]
-
-  [105] The description given by Herodotus (vii, 168: compare
-  Diodor. xi. 15), of the duplicity of the Korkyræans when
-  solicited to aid the Grecian cause at the time of the invasion of
-  Xerxes, seems to imply that the unfavorable character of them,
-  given by the Corinthians, coincided with the general impression
-  throughout Greece.
-
-  Respecting the prosperity and insolence of the Korkyræans, see
-  Aristotle apud Zenob. Proverb. iv, 49.
-
-  [106] Thucyd. i, 38. ἄποικοι δὲ ὄντες ἀφεστᾶσί τε διὰ παντὸς
-  καὶ νῦν πολεμοῦσι, λέγοντες ὡς οὐκ ἐπὶ τῷ κακῶς πάσχειν
-  ἐκπεμφθείησαν· ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί φαμεν ἐπὶ τῷ ὑπὸ τούτων
-  ὑβρίζεσθαι κατοικίσαι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπὶ τῷ ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι καὶ τὰ
-  εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι· αἱ γοῦν ἄλλαι ἀποικίαι τιμῶσιν ἡμᾶς, καὶ
-  μάλιστα ὑπὸ ἀποίκων στεργόμεθα.
-
-  This is a remarkable passage in illustration of the position of
-  the metropolis in regard to her colony. The relation was such as
-  to be comprised under the general word _hegemony_: superiority
-  and right to command on the one side, inferiority with duty of
-  reverence and obedience on the other,—limited in point of extent,
-  though we do not know where the limit was placed, and varying
-  probably in each individual case. The Corinthians sent annual
-  magistrates to Potidæa, called Epidemiurgi (Thucyd. i, 56).
-
-  [107] Thucyd. i, 40. φανερῶς δὲ ἀντείπομεν ~τοὺς προσήκοντας
-  ξυμμάχους αὐτόν τινα κολάζειν~.
-
-  [108] Thucyd. i, 37-43.
-
-Such was the substance of the arguments urged by the contending
-envoys before the Athenian public assembly, in this momentous debate.
-For two days did the debate continue, the assembly being adjourned
-over to the morrow: so considerable was the number of speakers, and
-probably also the divergence of their views. Unluckily, Thucydidês
-does not give us any of these Athenian discourses,—not even that
-of Periklês, who determined the ultimate result. Epidamnus, with
-its disputed question of metropolitan right, occupied little of the
-attention of the Athenian assembly: but the Korkyræan naval force
-was indeed an immense item, since the question was, whether it
-should stand on their side or against them,—an item which nothing
-could counterbalance except the dangers of a Peloponnesian war. “Let
-us avoid this last calamity (was the opinion of many) even at the
-sacrifice of seeing Korkyra conquered, and all her ships and seamen
-in the service of the Peloponnesian league.” “You will not really
-avoid it, even by that great sacrifice (was the reply of others): the
-generating causes of war are at work,—and it will infallibly come,
-whatever you may determine respecting Korkyra: avail yourselves of
-the present opening, instead of being driven ultimately to undertake
-the war at great comparative disadvantage.” Of these two views, the
-former was at first decidedly preponderant in the assembly;[109] but
-they gradually came round to the latter, which was conformable to the
-steady conviction of Periklês. It was, however, resolved to take a
-sort of middle course, so as to save Korkyra, and yet, if possible,
-to escape violation of the existing truce and the consequent
-Peloponnesian war. To comply with the request of the Korkyræans, by
-adopting them unreservedly as allies, would have laid the Athenians
-under the necessity of accompanying them in an attack of Corinth, if
-required,—which would have been a manifest infringement of the truce.
-Accordingly, nothing more was concluded than an alliance for purposes
-strictly defensive, to preserve Korkyra and her possessions in case
-they were attacked: nor was any greater force equipped to back this
-resolve than a squadron of ten triremes, under Lacedæmonius, son of
-Kimon. The smallness of this force would satisfy the Corinthians
-that no aggression was contemplated against their city, while it
-would save Korkyra from ruin, and would in fact feed the war so as
-to weaken and cripple the naval force of both parties,[110]—which
-was the best result that Athens could hope for. The instructions to
-Lacedæmonius and his two colleagues were express; not to engage in
-fight with the Corinthians unless they were actually approaching
-Korkyra, or some Korkyræan possession, with a view to attack: but in
-that case to do his best on the defensive.
-
-  [109] Thucyd. i, 44. Ἀθηναῖοι δὲ ἀκούσαντες ἀμφοτέρων, γενομένης
-  καὶ δὶς ἐκκλησίας, τῇ μὲν προτέρᾳ οὐχ ἧσσον τῶν Κορινθίων
-  ἀπεδέξαντο τοὺς λόγους, ἐν δὲ τῇ ὑστεραίᾳ μετέγνωσαν, etc.
-
-  Οὐχ ἧσσον, in the language of Thucydidês, usually has the
-  positive meaning of _more_.
-
-  [110] Thucyd. i, 44. Plutarch (Periklês, c. 29) ascribes the
-  smallness of the squadron despatched under Lacedæmonius to a
-  petty spite of Periklês against that commander, as the son of his
-  old political antagonist, Kimon. From whomsoever he copied this
-  statement, the motive assigned seems quite unworthy of credit.
-
-The great Corinthian armament of one hundred and fifty sail soon
-took its departure from the gulf, and reached a harbor on the
-coast of Epirus, at the cape called Cheimerium, nearly opposite to
-the southern extremity of Korkyra: they there established a naval
-station and camp, summoning to their aid a considerable force from
-the friendly Epirotic tribes in the neighborhood. The Korkyræan
-fleet of one hundred and ten sail, under Meikiadês and two others,
-together with the ten Athenian ships, took station at one of the
-adjoining islands called Sybota, while the land force and one
-thousand Zakynthian hoplites were posted on the Korkyræan Cape
-Leukimmê. Both sides prepared for battle: the Corinthians, taking on
-board three days’ provisions, sailed by night from Cheimerium, and
-encountered in the morning the Korkyræan fleet advancing towards
-them, distributed into three squadrons, one under each of the three
-generals, and having the ten Athenian ships at the extreme right.
-Opposed to them were ranged the choice vessels of the Corinthians,
-occupying the left of their aggregate fleet: next came the various
-allies, with Megarians and Ambrakiots on the extreme right. Never
-before had two such numerous fleets, both Grecian, engaged in battle;
-but the tactics and manœuvring were not commensurate to the numbers.
-The decks were crowded with hoplites and bowmen, while the rowers
-below, on the Korkyræan side at least, were in great part slaves: the
-ships, on both sides, being rowed forward so as to drive in direct
-impact, prow against prow, were grappled together, and a fierce
-hand-combat was then commenced between the troops on board of each,
-as if they were on land,—or rather, like boarding-parties: all upon
-the old-fashioned system of Grecian sea-fight, without any of those
-improvements which had been introduced into the Athenian navy during
-the last generation. In Athenian naval attack, the ship, the rowers,
-and the steersman, were of much greater importance than the armed
-troops on deck: by strength and exactness of rowing, by rapid and
-sudden change of direction, by feints calculated to deceive, the
-Athenian captain sought to drive the sharp beak of his vessel, not
-against the prow, but against the weaker and more vulnerable parts of
-his enemy,—side, oars, or stern. The ship thus became in the hands of
-her crew the real weapon of attack, which was first to disable the
-enemy and leave him unmanageable on the water; and not until this
-was done did the armed troops on deck begin their operations.[111]
-Lacedæmonius, with his ten armed ships, though forbidden by his
-instructions to share in the battle, lent as much aid as he could by
-taking station at the extremity of the line, and by making motions as
-if about to attack; while his seamen had full leisure to contemplate
-what they would despise as the lubberly handling of the ships on both
-sides. All was confusion after the battle had been joined; the ships
-on both sides became entangled, the oars broken and unmanageable,
-orders could neither be heard nor obeyed, and the individual valor
-of the hoplites and bowmen on deck was the decisive point on which
-victory turned.
-
-  [111] Πεζομαχεῖν ἀπὸ νεῶν—to turn the naval battle into a
-  land-battle on shipboard, was a practice altogether repugnant
-  to Athenian feeling, as we see remarked also in Thucyd. iv, 14:
-  compare also vii, 61.
-
-  The Corinthian and Syracusan ships ultimately came to counteract
-  the Athenian manœuvring by constructing their prows with
-  increased solidity and strength, and forcing the Athenian vessel
-  to a direct shock, which its weaker prow was unable to bear
-  (Thucyd. vii, 36).
-
-On the right wing of the Corinthians, the left of the Korkyræans
-was victorious; their twenty ships drove back the Ambrakiot allies
-of Corinth, and not only pursued them to the shore, but also landed
-and plundered the tents. Their rashness in thus keeping so long out
-of the battle proved incalculably mischievous, the rather as their
-total number was inferior: for their right wing, opposed to the
-best ships of Corinth, was after a hard struggle thoroughly beaten.
-Many of the ships were disabled, and the rest obliged to retreat
-as they could,—a retreat which the victorious ships on the other
-wing might have protected, had there been any effective discipline
-in the fleet, but which now was only imperfectly aided by the ten
-Athenian ships under Lacedæmonius. These Athenians, though at first
-they obeyed the instructions from home, in abstaining from actual
-blows, yet,—when the battle became doubtful, and still more, when the
-Corinthians were pressing their victory,—could no longer keep aloof,
-but attacked the pursuers in good earnest, and did much to save the
-defeated Korkyræans. As soon as the latter had been pursued as far as
-their own island, the victorious Corinthians returned to the scene
-of action, which was covered with disabled and water-logged ships,
-their own and their enemies, as well as with seamen, soldiers, and
-wounded men, either helpless aboard the wrecks, or keeping above
-water as well as they could,—among them many of their own citizens
-and allies, especially on their defeated right wing. Through these
-disabled vessels they sailed, not attempting to tow them off, but
-looking only to the crews aboard, and making some of them prisoners,
-but putting the greater number to death: some even of their own
-allies were thus slain, not being easily distinguishable. They
-then picked up their own dead bodies as well as they could, and
-transported them to Sybota, the nearest point of the coast of Epirus;
-after which they again mustered their fleet, and returned to resume
-the attack against the Korkyræans on their own coast. The latter got
-together as many of their ships as were seaworthy, together with the
-small reserve which had remained in harbor, in order to prevent at
-any rate a landing on the coast: and the Athenian ships, now within
-the strict letter of their instructions, prepared to coöperate with
-full energy in the defence. It was already late in the afternoon:
-but the Corinthian fleet, though their pæan had already been shouted
-for attack, were suddenly seen to back water instead of advancing;
-presently they headed round, and sailed directly away to the Epirotic
-coast. Nor did the Korkyræans comprehend the cause of this sudden
-retreat, until at length it was proclaimed that an unexpected relief
-of twenty fresh Athenian ships was approaching, under Glaukon and
-Andokidês, which the Corinthians had been the first to descry, and
-had even believed to be the forerunners of a larger fleet. It was
-already dark when these fresh ships reached Cape Leukimmê, having
-traversed the waters covered with wrecks and dead bodies;[112] and at
-first the Korkyræans even mistook them for enemies. The reinforcement
-had been sent from Athens, probably after more accurate information
-of the comparative force of Corinth and Korkyra, under the impression
-that the original ten ships would prove inadequate for the purpose of
-defence,—an impression more than verified by the reality.
-
-  [112] Thucyd. i, 51. διὰ τῶν νεκρῶν καὶ ναυαγίων προσκομισθεῖσαι
-  κατέπλεον ἐς τὸ στρατόπεδον.
-
-Though the twenty Athenian ships were not, as the Corinthians
-had imagined, the precursors of a larger fleet, they were found
-sufficient to change completely the face of affairs. In the preceding
-action, the Korkyræans had had seventy ships sunk or disabled,—the
-Corinthians only thirty,—so that the superiority of numbers was
-still on the side of the latter, who were, however, encumbered
-with the care of one thousand prisoners, eight hundred of them
-slaves, captured, not easy either to lodge or to guard in the
-narrow accommodations of an ancient trireme. Even apart from this
-embarrassment, the Corinthians were in no temper to hazard a second
-battle against thirty Athenian ships, in addition to the remaining
-Korkyræan: and when their enemies sailed across to offer them battle
-on the Epirotic coast, they not only refused it, but thought of
-nothing but immediate retreat,—with serious alarm lest the Athenians
-should now act aggressively, treating all amicable relations between
-Athens and Corinth as practically extinguished by the events of the
-day before. Having ranged their fleet in line, not far from shore,
-they tested the dispositions of the Athenian commanders by sending
-forward a little boat with a few men to address to them the following
-remonstrance,—the men carried no herald’s staff (_we_ should say,
-no flag of truce), and were therefore completely without protection
-against an enemy. “Ye act wrongfully, Athenians (they exclaimed), in
-beginning the war and violating the truce; for ye are using arms to
-oppose us in punishing our enemies. If it be really your intention
-to hinder us from sailing against Korkyra, or anywhere else that
-we choose, in breach of the truce, take first of all us who now
-address you, and deal with us as enemies.” It was not the fault of
-the Korkyræans that this last idea was not instantly realized: for
-such of them as were near enough to hear, instigated the Athenians
-by violent shouts to kill the men in the boat. But the latter, far
-from listening to such an appeal, dismissed them with the answer: “We
-neither begin the war nor break the truce, Peloponnesians; we have
-come simply to aid these Korkyræans, our allies. If ye wish to sail
-anywhere else, we make no opposition: but if ye are about to sail
-against Korkyra, or any of her possessions, we shall use our best
-means to prevent you.” Both the answer, and the treatment of the men
-in the boat, satisfied the Corinthians that their retreat would be
-unopposed, and they accordingly commenced it as soon as they could
-get ready, staying, however, to erect a trophy at Sybota, on the
-Epirotic coast, in commemoration of their advantage on the preceding
-day. In their voyage homeward, they surprised Anaktorium, at the
-mouth of the Ambrakiôtic gulf, which they had hitherto possessed
-jointly with the Korkyræans; planting in it a reinforcement of
-Corinthian settlers as guarantee for future fidelity. On reaching
-Corinth, the armament was disbanded, and the great majority of the
-prisoners taken—eight hundred slaves—were sold; but the remainder,
-two hundred and fifty in number, were detained and treated with
-peculiar kindness. Many of them were of the first and richest
-families of the island, and the Corinthians designed to gain them
-over, so as to make them instruments for effecting a revolution in
-the island. The calamitous incidents arising from their return will
-appear in a future chapter.
-
-Thus relieved from all danger, the Korkyræans picked up the dead
-bodies and the wrecks which had floated during the night on to their
-island, and even found sufficient pretence to erect a trophy, chiefly
-in consequence of their partial success on the left wing. In truth,
-they had been only rescued from ruin by the unexpected coming of
-the last Athenian ships: but the last result was as triumphant to
-them as it was disastrous and humiliating to the Corinthians, who
-had incurred an immense cost, and taxed all their willing allies,
-only to leave their enemy stronger than she was before. From this
-time forward they considered the thirty years’ truce as broken, and
-conceived a hatred, alike deadly and undisguised, against Athens; so
-that the latter gained nothing by the moderation of her admirals in
-sparing the Corinthian fleet off the coast of Epirus. An opportunity
-was not long wanting for the Corinthians to strike a blow at their
-enemy, through one of her wide-spread dependencies.
-
-On the isthmus of that lesser peninsula called Pellênê, which
-forms the westernmost of the three prongs of the greater peninsula
-called Chalkidikê, between the Thermaic and the Strymonic gulfs,
-was situated the Dorian town of Potidæa, one of the tributary
-allies of Athens, but originally colonized from Corinth, and still
-maintaining a certain metropolitan allegiance towards the latter:
-insomuch that every year certain Corinthians were sent thither as
-magistrates, under the title of Epidemiurgi. On various points of the
-neighboring coast, also, there were several small towns belonging to
-the Chalkidians and Bottiæans, enrolled in like manner in the list
-of Athenian tributaries. The neighboring inland territory, Mygdonia
-and Chalkidikê,[113] was held by the Macedonian king Perdikkas, son
-of that Alexander who had taken part, fifty years before, in the
-expedition of Xerxes. These two princes appear gradually to have
-extended their dominions, after the ruin of Persian power in Thrace
-by the exertions of Athens, until at length they acquired all the
-territory between the rivers Axius and Strymon. Now Perdikkas had
-been for some time the friend and ally of Athens; but there were
-other Macedonian princes, his brother Philip and Derdas, holding
-independent principalities in the upper country,[114] apparently on
-the higher course of the Axius near the Pæonian tribes, with whom
-he was in a state of dispute. These princes having been accepted as
-the allies of Athens, Perdikkas from that time became her active
-enemy, and it was from his intrigues that all the difficulties of
-Athens on that coast took their first origin. The Athenian empire
-was much less complete and secure over the seaports on the mainland
-than over the islands:[115] for the former were always more or less
-dependent on any powerful land-neighbor, sometimes more dependent
-on him than upon the mistress of the sea; and we shall find Athens
-herself cultivating assiduously the favor of Sitalkês and other
-strong Thracian potentates, as an aid to her dominion over the
-seaports.[116] Perdikkas immediately began to incite and aid the
-Chalkidians and Bottiæans to revolt from Athens, and the violent
-enmity against the latter, kindled in the bosoms of the Corinthians
-by the recent events at Korkyra, enabled him to extend the same
-projects to Potidæa. Not only did he send envoys to Corinth in order
-to concert measures for provoking the revolt of Potidæa, but also to
-Sparta, instigating the Peloponnesian league to a general declaration
-of war against Athens.[117] And he farther prevailed on many of
-the Chalkidian inhabitants to abandon their separate small towns
-on the sea-coast, for the purpose of joint residence at Olynthus,
-which was several stadia from the sea. Thus that town, as well as
-the Chalkidian interest, became much strengthened, while Perdikkas
-farther assigned some territory near Lake Bolbê to contribute to the
-temporary maintenance of the concentrated population.
-
-  [113] See the geographical Commentary of Gatterer upon Thrace,
-  embodied in Poppo, Prolegg. ad Thucyd. vol. ii, ch. 29.
-
-  The words τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης—τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης χωρία (Thucyd. ii, 29)
-  denote generally the towns in Chalkidikê,—places _in the
-  direction or in the skirts of_ Thrace, rather than parts of
-  Thrace itself.
-
-  [114] Thucyd. i, 57; ii, 100.
-
-  [115] See two remarkable passages illustrating this difference,
-  Thucyd. iv, 120-122.
-
-  [116] Thucyd. ii, 29-98. Isokratês has a remarkable passage on
-  this subject in the beginning of Or. v, ad Philippum, sects.
-  5-7. After pointing out the imprudence of founding a colony
-  on the skirts of the territory of a powerful potentate, and
-  the excellent site which had been chosen far Kyrênê, as being
-  near only to feeble tribes,—he goes so far as to say that
-  the possession of Amphipolis would be injurious rather than
-  beneficial to Athens, because it would render her dependent upon
-  Philip, from his power of annoying her colonists,—just as she
-  had been dependent before upon Mêdokus, the Thracian king, in
-  consequence of her colonists in the Chersonese,—ἀναγκασθησόμεθα
-  τὴν αὐτὴν εὔνοιαν ἔχειν τοῖς σοῖς πράγμασι διὰ τοὺς ἐνταῦθα (at
-  Amphipolis) κατοικοῦντας, οἵαν περ εἴχομεν Μηδόκῳ τῷ παλαιῷ διὰ
-  τοὺς ἐν Χεῤῥονήσῳ γεωργοῦντας.
-
-  [117] Thucyd. i, 56, 57.
-
-The Athenians were not ignorant both of his hostile preparations and
-of the dangers which awaited them from Corinth after the Korkyræan
-sea-fight; immediately after which they sent to take precautions
-against the revolt of Potidæa; requiring the inhabitants to take down
-their wall on the side of Pellênê, so as to leave the town open on
-the side of the peninsula, or on what may be called the sea-side,
-and fortified only towards the mainland,—requiring them farther both
-to deliver hostages and to dismiss the annual magistrates who came
-to them from Corinth. An Athenian armament of thirty triremes and
-one thousand hoplites, under Archestratus and ten others, despatched
-to act against Perdikkas in the Thermaic gulf, was directed at the
-same time to enforce these requisitions against Potidæa, and to
-repress any dispositions to revolt among the neighboring Chalkidians.
-Immediately on receiving these requisitions, the Potidæans sent
-envoys both to Athens, for the purpose of evading and gaining
-time,—and to Sparta, in conjunction with Corinth, in order to
-determine a Lacedæmonian invasion of Attica, in the event of Potidæa
-being attacked by Athens. From the Spartan authorities they obtained
-a distinct affirmative promise, in spite of the thirty years’ truce
-still subsisting: at Athens they had no success, and they accordingly
-openly revolted (seemingly about midsummer, 432 B.C.), at the same
-time that the armament under Archestratus sailed. The Chalkidians and
-Bottiæans revolted at the same time, at the express instigation of
-Corinth, accompanied by solemn oaths and promises of assistance.[118]
-Archestratus with his fleet, on reaching the Thermaic gulf, found
-them all in proclaimed enmity, but was obliged to confine himself
-to the attack of Perdikkas in Macedonia, not having numbers enough
-to admit of a division of his force. He accordingly laid siege to
-Therma, in coöperation with the Macedonian troops from the upper
-country, under Philip and the brothers of Derdas; after taking that
-place, he next proceeded to besiege Pydna. But it would probably have
-been wiser had he turned his whole force instantly to the blockade
-of Potidæa; for during the period of more than six weeks that he
-spent in the operations against Therma, the Corinthians conveyed to
-Potidæa a reinforcement of sixteen hundred hoplites and four hundred
-light-armed, partly their own citizens, partly Peloponnesians, hired
-for the occasion,—under Aristeus, son of Adeimantus, a man of such
-eminent popularity, both at Corinth and at Potidæa, that most of the
-soldiers volunteered on his personal account. Potidæa was thus put
-into a state of complete defence shortly after the news of its revolt
-reached Athens, and long before any second armament could be sent to
-attack it. A second armament, however, was speedily sent forth.—forty
-triremes and two thousand Athenian hoplites, under Kallias, son of
-Kalliades,[119] with four other commanders,—who, on reaching the
-Thermaic gulf, joined the former body at the siege of Pydna. After
-prosecuting the siege in vain for a short time, they found themselves
-obliged to patch up an accommodation on the best terms they could
-with Perdikkas, from the necessity of commencing immediate operations
-against Aristeus and Potidæa. They then quitted Macedonia, first
-crossing by sea from Pydna to the eastern coast of the Thermaic
-gulf,—next attacking, though without effect, the town of Berœa,—and
-then marching by land along the eastern coast of the gulf, in the
-direction of Potidæa. On the third day of easy march, they reached
-the seaport called Gigônus, near which they encamped.[120]
-
-  [118] Thucyd. v, 30.
-
-  [119] Kallias was a young Athenian of noble family, who had
-  paid the large sum of one hundred minæ to Zeno of Elea, the
-  philosopher, for rhetorical, philosophical, and sophistical
-  instruction (Plato, Alkibiadês, i, c. 31, p. 119).
-
-  [120] Thucyd. i, 61. The statement of Thucydidês presents some
-  geographical difficulties which the critics have not adequately
-  estimated. Are we to assume as certain, that the _Berœa_ here
-  mentioned must be the Macedonian town of that name, afterwards
-  so well known, distant from the sea westward one hundred and
-  sixty stadia, or nearly twenty English miles (see Tafel, Historia
-  Thessalonicæ, p. 58), on a river which flows into the Haliakmon,
-  and upon one of the lower ridges of Mount Bermius?
-
-  The words of Thucydidês here are—Ἔπειτα δὲ ξύμβασιν ποιησάμενοι
-  καὶ ξυμμαχίαν ἀναγκαίαν πρὸς τὸν Περδίκκαν, ὡς αὐτοὺς κατήπειγεν
-  ἡ Ποτίδαια καὶ ὁ Ἀριστεὺς παρεληλυθὼς, ~ἀπανίστανται ἐκ τῆς
-  Μακεδονίας~, καὶ ἀφικόμενοι ἐς Βέροιαν κἀκεῖθεν ἐπιστρέψαντες,
-  καὶ πειράσαντες πρῶτον τοῦ χωρίου καὶ οὐχ ἑλόντες, ἐπορεύοντο
-  κατὰ γῆν πρὸς τὴν Ποτίδαιαν—ἅμα δὲ νῆες παρέπλεον ἑβδομήκοντα.
-
-  “The natural route from Pydna to Potidæa (observes Dr. Arnold in
-  his note) lay along the coast; and Berœa was _quite out of the
-  way_, at some _distance to the westward_, near the fort of the
-  Bermian mountains. But the hope of surprising Berœa induced the
-  Athenians to deviate from their direct line of march; then, after
-  the failure of this treacherous attempt, they returned again to
-  the sea-coast, and continued to follow it till they arrived at
-  Gigônus.”
-
-  I would remark upon this: 1. The words of Thucydidês imply that
-  Berœa was _not in_ Macedonia, but _out_ of it (see Poppo, Proleg.
-  ad Thucyd. vol. ii, pp. 408-418). 2. He uses no expression which
-  in the least implies that the attempt on Berœa on the part of the
-  Athenians was _treacherous_, that is, contrary to the convention
-  just concluded; though, had the fact been so, he would naturally
-  have been led to notice it, seeing that the deliberate breach of
-  the convention was the very first step which took place after
-  it was concluded. 3. What can have induced the Athenians to
-  leave their fleet and march near twenty miles inland to Mount
-  Bermius and Berœa, to attack a Macedonian town which they could
-  not possibly hold,—when they cannot even stay to continue the
-  attack on Pydna, a position maritime, useful, and tenable,—in
-  consequence of the pressing necessity of taking immediate
-  measures against Potidæa? 4. If they were compelled by this
-  latter necessity to patch up a peace on any terms with Perdikkas,
-  would they immediately endanger this peace by going out of their
-  way to attack one of his forts? Again, Thucydidês says, “that,
-  proceeding by slow land-marches, they reached Gigônus, and
-  encamped _on the third day_,”—κατ᾽ ὀλίγον δὲ προϊόντες τριταῖοι
-  ἀφίκοντο ἐς Γίγωνον καὶ ἐστρατοπεδεύσαντο. The computation of
-  time must here be made either from Pydna or from Berœa; and
-  the reader who examines the map will see that neither from the
-  one nor the other—assuming the Berœa on Mount Bermius—would it
-  be possible for an army to arrive at Gigônus on the third day,
-  marching round the head of the gulf, with easy days’ marches; the
-  more so, as they would have to cross the rivers Lydias, Axius.
-  and Echeidôrus, all not far from their mouths,—or, if these
-  rivers could not be crossed, to get on board the fleet and reland
-  on the other side.
-
-  This clear mark of time laid down by Thucydidês,—even apart
-  from the objections which I have just urged in reference to
-  Berœa on Mount Bermius,—made me doubt whether Dr. Arnold and
-  the other commentators have correctly conceived the operations
-  of the Athenian troops between Pydna and Gigônus. The _Berœa_
-  which Thucydidês means cannot be more distant from Gigônus, at
-  any rate, than a third day’s easy march, and therefore cannot
-  be the Berœa on Mount Bermius. But there was another town named
-  Berœa, either in Thrace or in Emathia, though we do not know
-  its exact site (see Wassi ad Thucyd. i, 61; Steph. Byz. v,
-  Βέρης; Tafel, Thessalonica, Index). This other Berœa, situated
-  somewhere between Gigônus and Therma, and out of the limits of
-  that Macedonia which Perdikkas governed, may probably be the
-  place which Thucydidês here indicates. The Athenians, raising
-  the siege of Pydna, crossed the gulf _on shipboard_ to Berœa,
-  and after vainly trying to surprise that town, marched along _by
-  land_ to Gigônus. Whoever inspects the map will see that the
-  Athenians would naturally employ their large fleet to transport
-  the army by the short transit across the gulf from Pydna (see
-  Livy, xliv, 10), and thus avoid the fatiguing land-march round
-  the head of the gulf. Moreover, the language of Thucydidês
-  would seem to make the land-march _begin at Berœa_ and not at
-  Pydna,—~ἀπανίστανται~ ἐκ τῆς Μακεδονίας, καὶ ~ἀφικόμενοι ἐς
-  Βέροιαν~ κἀκεῖθεν ἐπιστρέψαντες, καὶ πειράσαντες πρῶτον τοῦ
-  χωρίου καὶ οὐχ ἑλόντες, ~ἐπορεύοντο κατὰ γῆν~ πρὸς Ποτίδαιαν—ἅμα
-  δὲ νῆες παρέπλεον ἑβδομήκοντα. Κατ᾽ ὀλίγον δὲ προϊόντες τριταῖοι
-  ἀφίκοντο ἐς Γίγωνον καὶ ἐστρατοπεδεύσαντο. The change of tense
-  between ἀπανίστανται and ἐπορεύοντο,—and the connection of the
-  participle ἀφικόμενοι with the latter verb,—seems to divide the
-  whole proceeding into two distinct parts; first, departure from
-  Macedonia to Berœa, as it would seem, by sea,—next, a land-march
-  from Berœa to Gigônus, of three short days.
-
-  This is the best account, as it strikes me, of a passage, the
-  real difficulties of which are imperfectly noticed by the
-  commentators.
-
-  The site of Gigônus cannot be exactly determined, since all that
-  we know of the towns on the coast between Potidæa and Æneia, is
-  derived from their enumerated names in Herodotus (vii, 123); nor
-  can we be absolutely certain that he has enumerated them all in
-  the exact order in which they were placed. But I think that both
-  Col. Leake and Kiepert’s map place Gigônus too far from Potidæa;
-  for we see, from this passage of Thucydidês, that it formed the
-  camp from which the Athenian general went forth immediately to
-  give battle to an enemy posted between Olynthus and Potidæa; and
-  the Scholiast says of Gigônus,—οὐ πολὺ ἄπεχον Ποτιδαίας: and
-  Stephan. Byz. Γίγωνος, πόλις Θρᾴκης ~προσεχὴς τῇ Παλλήνῃ~.
-
-  See Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch.
-  xxxi, p. 452. That excellent observer calculates the march, from
-  Berœa on Mount Bermius to Potidæa, as being one of four days,
-  about twenty miles each day. Judging by the map, this seems lower
-  than the reality; but admitting it to be correct, Thucydidês
-  would never describe such a march as ~κατ᾽ ὀλίγον~ δὲ προϊόντες
-  τριταῖοι ἀφίκοντο ἐς Γίγωνον: it would be a march rather rapid
-  and fatiguing, especially as it would include the passage of the
-  rivers. Nor is it likely, from the description of this battle
-  in Thucydidês (i, 62), that Gigônus could be anything like a
-  full day’s march from Potidæa. According to his description,
-  the Athenian army advanced by three very easy marches; then
-  arriving at Gigônus, they encamp, being now near the enemy, who
-  on their side are already encamped, expecting them,—προσδεχόμενοι
-  τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ~ἐστρατοπεδεύοντο~ πρὸς Ὀλύνθου ἐν τῷ ἰσθμῷ: the
-  imperfect tense indicates that they were already there at the
-  time when the Athenians took camp at Gigônus; which would hardly
-  be the case if the Athenians had come by three successive marches
-  from Berœa on Mount Bermius.
-
-  I would add, that it is no more wonderful that there should be
-  one Berœa in Thrace and another in Macedonia, than that there
-  should be one Methônê in Thrace and another in Macedonia (Steph.
-  B. Μεθώνη).
-
-In spite of the convention concluded at Pydna, Perdikkas, whose
-character for faithlessness we shall have more than one occasion to
-notice, was now again on the side of the Chalkidians, and sent two
-hundred horse to join them, under the command of Iolaus. Aristeus
-posted his Corinthians and Potidæans on the isthmus near Potidæa,
-providing a market without the walls, in order that they might not
-stray in quest of provisions: his position was on the side towards
-Olynthus,—which was about seven miles off, but within sight, and in
-a lofty and conspicuous situation. He here awaited the approach of
-the Athenians, calculating that the Chalkidians from Olynthus would,
-upon the hoisting of a given signal, assail them in the rear when
-they attacked him. But Kallias was strong enough to place in reserve
-his Macedonian cavalry and other allies as a check against Olynthus;
-while with his Athenians and the main force he marched to the isthmus
-and took position in front of Aristeus. In the battle which ensued,
-Aristeus and the chosen band of Corinthians immediately about him
-were completely successful, breaking the troops opposed to them, and
-pursuing for a considerable distance: but the remaining Potidæans
-and Peloponnesians were routed by the Athenians and driven within
-the walls. On returning from pursuit, Aristeus found the victorious
-Athenians between him and Potidæa, and was reduced to the alternative
-either of cutting his way through them into the latter town, or of
-making a retreating march to Olynthus. He chose the former as the
-least of two hazards, and forced his way through the flank of the
-Athenians, wading into the sea in order to turn the extremity of
-the Potidæan wall, which reached entirely across the isthmus, with a
-mole running out at each end into the water: he effected this daring
-enterprise and saved his detachment, though not without considerable
-difficulty and some loss. Meanwhile, the auxiliaries from Olynthus,
-though they had begun their march on seeing the concerted signal, had
-been kept in check by the Macedonian horse, so that the Potidæans
-had been beaten and the signal again withdrawn, before they could
-make any effective diversion: nor did the cavalry on either side
-come into action. The defeated Potidæans and Corinthians, having the
-town immediately in their rear, lost only three hundred men, while
-the Athenians lost one hundred and fifty, together with the general
-Kallias.[121]
-
-  [121] Thucyd. i, 62, 63.
-
-The victory was, however, quite complete, and the Athenians, after
-having erected their trophy, and given up the enemy’s dead for
-burial, immediately built their blockading wall across the isthmus,
-on the side of the mainland, so as to cut off Potidæa from all
-communication with Olynthus and the Chalkidians. To make the blockade
-complete, a second wall across the isthmus was necessary, on the
-other side towards Pallênê: but they had not force enough to detach
-a completely separate body for this purpose, until after some time
-they were joined by Phormio with sixteen hundred fresh hoplites
-from Athens. That general, landing at Aphytis, in the peninsula of
-Pallênê, marched slowly up to Potidæa, ravaging the territory in
-order to draw out the citizens to battle: but the challenge not
-being accepted, he undertook, and finished without obstruction, the
-blockading wall on the side of Pallênê, so that the town was now
-completely inclosed, and the harbor watched by the Athenian fleet.
-The wall once finished, a portion of the force sufficed to guard
-it, leaving Phormio at liberty to undertake aggressive operations
-against the Chalkidic and Bottiæan townships. The capture of Potidæa
-was now only a question of more or less time, and Aristeus, in order
-that the provisions might last longer, proposed to the citizens to
-choose a favorable wind, get on shipboard, and break out suddenly
-from the harbor, taking their chance of eluding the Athenian fleet,
-and leaving only five hundred defenders behind: though he offered
-himself to be among those left behind, he could not determine the
-citizens to so bold an enterprise, and he therefore sallied forth
-in the way proposed with a small detachment, in order to try and
-procure relief from without,—especially some aid or diversion
-from Peloponnesus. But he was able to accomplish nothing beyond
-some partial warlike operations among the Chalkidians,[122] and a
-successful ambuscade against the citizens of Sermylus, which did
-nothing for the relief of the blockaded town: it had, however, been
-so well-provisioned that it held out for two whole years,—a period
-full of important events elsewhere.
-
-  [122] Thucyd. i, 65.
-
-From these two contests between Athens and Corinth, first indirectly
-at Korkyra, next distinctly and avowedly at Potidæa, sprung those
-important movements in the Lacedæmonian alliance which will be
-recounted in the next chapter.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLVIII.
-
-FROM THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA DOWN TO THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR OF THE
-PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-
-Even before the recent hostilities at Korkyra and Potidæa, it had
-been evident to reflecting Greeks that the continued observance of
-the thirty years’ truce was very uncertain, and that the mingled
-hatred, fear, and admiration, which Athens inspired throughout
-Greece, would prompt Sparta and the Spartan confederacy to seize
-the first favorable opening for breaking down the Athenian power.
-That such was the disposition of Sparta, was well understood among
-the Athenian allies, however considerations of prudence and general
-slowness in resolving might postpone the moment of carrying it into
-effect. Accordingly, not only the Samians when they revolted had
-applied to the Spartan confederacy for aid, which they appear to
-have been prevented from obtaining chiefly by the pacific interests
-then animating the Corinthians,—but also the Lesbians had endeavored
-to open negotiations with Sparta for a similar purpose, though
-the authorities—to whom alone the proposition could have been
-communicated, since it remained secret and was never executed—had
-given them no encouragement.[123] The affairs of Athens had been
-administered under the ascendency of Periklês, without any view to
-extension of empire or encroachment upon others, though with constant
-view to the probabilities of war, and with anxiety to keep the city
-in a condition to meet it: but even the splendid internal ornaments,
-which Athens at that time acquired, were probably not without their
-effect in provoking jealousy on the part of other Greeks as to her
-ultimate views. The only known incident, wherein Athens had been
-brought into collision with a member of the Spartan confederacy
-prior to the Korkyræan dispute, was the decree passed in regard to
-Megara,—prohibiting the Megarians, on pain of death, from all trade
-or intercourse as well with Athens as with all ports within the
-Athenian empire. This prohibition was grounded on the alleged fact,
-that the Megarians had harbored runaway slaves from Athens, and
-had appropriated and cultivated portions of land upon the border;
-partly land, the property of the goddesses of Eleusis,—partly a
-strip of territory disputed between the two states, and therefore
-left by mutual understanding in common pasture without any permanent
-inclosure.[124] In reference to this latter point, the Athenian
-herald, Anthemokritus had been sent to Megara to remonstrate, but
-had been so rudely dealt with, that his death shortly afterwards was
-imputed as a crime to the Megarians.[125] We may well suppose that
-ever since the revolt of Megara, fourteen years before, which caused
-to Athens an irreparable mischief, the feeling prevalent between the
-two towns had been one of bitter enmity, manifesting itself in many
-ways, but so much exasperated by recent events as to provoke Athens
-to a signal revenge.[126] Exclusion from Athens and all the ports in
-her empire, comprising nearly every island and seaport in the Ægean,
-was so ruinous to the Megarians, that they loudly complained of it at
-Sparta, representing it as an infraction of the thirty years’ truce;
-though it was undoubtedly within the legitimate right of Athens to
-enforce,—and was even less harsh than the systematic expulsion of
-foreigners by Sparta, with which Periklês compared it.
-
-  [123] Thucyd. iii, 2-13. This proposition of the Lesbians at
-  Sparta must have been made before the collision between Athens
-  and Corinth at Korkyra.
-
-  [124] Thucyd. i, 139. ἐπικαλοῦντες ἐπεργασίαν Μεγαρεῦσι τῆς γῆς
-  τῆς ἱερᾶς καὶ τῆς ἀορίστου, etc. Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30;
-  Schol. ad Aristophan. Pac. 609.
-
-  I agree with Göller that two distinct violations of right are
-  here imputed to the Megarians: the one, that they had cultivated
-  land, the property of the goddesses at Eleusis,—the other, that
-  they had appropriated and cultivated the unsettled pasture land
-  on the border. Dr. Arnold’s note takes a different view, less
-  correct, in my opinion: “The land on the frontier was consecrated
-  to prevent it from being inclosed: in which case the boundaries
-  might have been a subject of perpetual dispute between the
-  two countries,” etc. Compare Thucyd. v, 42, about the border
-  territory round Panaktum.
-
-  [125] Thucydidês (i, 139), in assigning the reasons of this
-  sentence of exclusion passed by Athens against the Megarians,
-  mentions only the two allegations here noticed,—wrongful
-  cultivation of territory, and reception of runaway slaves. He
-  does not allude to the herald, Anthemokritus: still less does
-  he notice that gossip of the day, which Aristophanês and other
-  comedians of this period turn to account in fastening the
-  Peloponnesian war upon the personal sympathies of Periklês,
-  namely, that first, some young men of Athens stole away the
-  courtezan, Simætha, from Megara: next, the Megarian youth
-  revenged themselves by stealing away from Athens “two engaging
-  courtezans,” one of whom was the mistress of Periklês; upon
-  which the latter was so enraged that he proposed the sentence
-  of exclusion against the Megarians (Aristoph. Acharn. 501-516;
-  Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30).
-
-  Such stories are chiefly valuable as they make us acquainted with
-  the political scandal of the time. But the story of the herald,
-  Anthemokritus, and his death, cannot be altogether rejected.
-  Though Thucydidês, not mentioning the fact, did not believe that
-  the herald’s death had really been occasioned by the Megarians;
-  yet there probably was a popular belief at Athens to that effect,
-  under the influence of which the deceased herald received a
-  public burial near the Thriasian gate of Athens, leading to
-  Eleusis: see Philippi Epistol. ad Athen. ap. Demosthen. p.
-  159, R.; Pausan. i, 36, 3; iii, 4, 2. The language of Plutarch
-  (Periklês, c. 30) is probably literally correct,—“the herald’s
-  death _appeared_ to have been caused by the Megarians,”—αἰτίᾳ τῶν
-  Μεγαρέων ἀποθανεῖν ἔδοξε. That neither Thucydidês, nor Periklês
-  himself, believed that the Megarians had really caused his
-  death, is pretty certain: otherwise, the fact would have been
-  urged when the Lacedæmonians sent to complain of the sentence of
-  exclusion,—being a deed so notoriously repugnant to all Grecian
-  feeling.
-
-  [126] Thucyd. i, 67. Μεγαρῆς, δηλοῦντες μὲν καὶ ἕτερα οὐκ ὀλίγα
-  διάφορα, μάλιστα δὲ, λιμένων τε εἴργεσθαι τῶν ἐν τῇ Ἀθηναίων
-  ἀρχῇ, etc.
-
-These complaints found increased attention after the war of Korkyra
-and the blockade of Potidæa by the Athenians. The sentiments of the
-Corinthians towards Athens had now become angry and warlike in the
-highest degree: nor was it simply resentment for the past which
-animated them, but also the anxiety farther to bring upon Athens so
-strong a hostile pressure as should preserve Potidæa and its garrison
-from capture. Accordingly, they lost no time in endeavoring to rouse
-the feelings of the Spartans against Athens, and in inducing them to
-invite to Sparta all such of the confederates as had any grievances
-against that city. Not merely the Megarians but several other
-confederates, appeared there as accusers; while the Æginetans, though
-their insular position made it perilous for them to appear, made
-themselves vehemently heard through the mouths of others, complaining
-that Athens withheld from them that autonomy to which they were
-entitled under the truce.[127]
-
-  [127] Thucyd. i, 67. λέγοντες οὐκ εἶναι αὐτόνομοι κατὰ τὰς
-  σπονδάς. O. Müller (Æginet. p. 180) and Göller in his note, think
-  that the _truce_ (or _covenant_ generally) here alluded to is,
-  not the thirty years’ truce, concluded fourteen years before
-  the period actually present, but the ancient alliance against
-  the Persians, solemnly ratified and continued after the victory
-  of Platæa. Dr. Arnold, on the contrary, thinks that the thirty
-  years’ truce is alluded to, which the Æginetans interpreted
-  (rightly or not) as entitling them to independence.
-
-  The former opinion might seem to be countenanced by the allusion
-  to Ægina in the speech of the Thebans (iii, 64): but on the
-  other hand, if we consult i, 115, it will appear possible that
-  the wording of the thirty years’ truce may have been general,
-  as,—Ἀποδοῦναι δὲ Ἀθηναίους ὅσα ἔχουσι Πελοποννησίων: at any rate,
-  the Æginetans may have pretended that, by the same rule as Athens
-  gave up Nisæa, Pegæ, etc., she ought also to renounce Ægina.
-
-  However, we must recollect that the one plea does not exclude
-  the other: the Æginetans may have taken advantage of _both_ in
-  enforcing their prayer for interference. This seems to have been
-  the idea of the Scholiast, when he says—κατὰ τὴν συμφωνίαν τῶν
-  σπονδῶν.
-
-According to the Lacedæmonian practice, it was necessary first that
-the Spartans themselves, apart from their allies, should decide
-whether there existed a sufficient case of wrong done by Athens
-against themselves or against Peloponnesus,—either in violation of
-the thirty years’ truce, or in any other way. If the determination
-of Sparta herself were in the negative, the case would never even
-be submitted to the vote of the allies; but if it were in the
-affirmative, then the latter would be convoked to deliver their
-opinion also: and assuming that the majority of votes coincided with
-the previous decision of Sparta, the entire confederacy stood then
-pledged to the given line of policy,—if the majority was contrary,
-the Spartans would stand alone, or with such only of the confederates
-as concurred. Each allied city, great or small, had an equal right
-of suffrage. It thus appears that Sparta herself did not vote as
-a member of the confederacy, but separately and individually as
-leader,—and that the only question ever submitted to the allies
-was, whether they would or would not go along with her previous
-decision. Such was the course of proceeding now followed: the
-Corinthians, together with such other of the confederates as felt
-either aggrieved or alarmed by Athens, presented themselves before
-the public assembly of Spartan citizens, prepared to prove that the
-Athenians had broken the truce, and were going on in a course of
-wrong towards Peloponnesus.[128] Even in the oligarchy of Sparta,
-such a question as this could only be decided by a general assembly
-of Spartan citizens, qualified both by age, by regular contribution
-to the public mess, and by obedience to Spartan discipline. To the
-assembly so constituted the deputies of the various allied cities
-addressed themselves, each setting forth his case against Athens.
-The Corinthians chose to reserve themselves to the last, after the
-assembly had been previously inflamed by the previous speakers.
-
-  [128] Thucyd. i, 67. κατεβόων ἐλθόντες τῶν Ἀθηναίων ὅτι σπονδάς
-  τε λελυκότες εἶεν καὶ ἀδικοῖεν τὴν Πελοπόννησον. The change of
-  tense in these two verbs is to be noticed.
-
-Of this important assembly, on which so much of the future fate of
-Greece turned, Thucydidês has preserved an account unusually copious.
-First, the speech delivered by the Corinthian envoys. Next, that of
-some Athenian envoys, who happening to be at the same time in Sparta
-on some other matters, and being present in the assembly so as to
-have heard the speeches both of the Corinthians and of the other
-complainants, obtained permission from the magistrates to address
-the assembly in their turn. Thirdly, the address of the Spartan king
-Archidamus, on the course of policy proper to be adopted by Sparta.
-Lastly, the brief, but eminently characteristic, address of the ephor
-Stheneläidas, on putting the question for decision. These speeches,
-the composition of Thucydidês himself, contain substantially the
-sentiments of the parties to whom they are ascribed: neither of them
-is distinctly a reply to that which has preceded, but each presents
-the situation of affairs from a different point of view.
-
-The Corinthians knew well that the audience whom they were about to
-address had been favorably prepared for them,—for the Lacedæmonian
-authorities had already given an actual promise to them and to the
-Potidæans at the moment before Potidæa revolted, that they would
-invade Attica. So great was the revolution in sentiment of the
-Spartans, since they had declined lending aid to the much more
-powerful island of Lesbos, when it proposed to revolt,—a revolution
-occasioned by the altered interests and sentiments of Corinth.
-Nor were the Corinthians ignorant that their positive grounds of
-complaint against Athens, in respect of wrong or violation of the
-existing truce, were both few and feeble. Neither in the dispute
-about Potidæa nor about Korkyra, had Athens infringed the truce
-or wronged the Peloponnesian alliance. In both, she had come into
-collision with Corinth, singly and apart from the confederacy:
-she had a right, both according to the truce and according to the
-received maxims of international law, to lend defensive aid to the
-Korkyræans at their own request,—she had a right also, according to
-the principles laid down by the Corinthians themselves on occasion of
-the revolt of Samos, to restrain the Potidæans from revolting. She
-had committed nothing which could fairly be called an aggression:
-indeed the aggression, both in the case of Potidæa and in that of
-Korkyra, was decidedly on the side of the Corinthians: and the
-Peloponnesian confederacy could only be so far implicated as it was
-understood to be bound to espouse the separate quarrels, right or
-wrong, of Corinth. All this was well known to the Corinthian envoys;
-and accordingly we find that, in their speech at Sparta, they touch
-but lightly, and in vague terms, on positive or recent wrongs. Even
-that which they do say completely justifies the proceedings of Athens
-about the affair of Korkyra, since they confess without hesitation
-the design of seizing the large Korkyræan navy for the use of the
-Peloponnesian alliance: while in respect of Potidæa, if we had only
-the speech of the Corinthian envoy before us without any other
-knowledge, we should have supposed it to be an independent state, not
-connected by any permanent bonds with Athens,—we should have supposed
-that the siege of Potidæa by Athens was an unprovoked aggression upon
-an autonomous ally of Corinth,[129]—we should never have imagined
-that Corinth had deliberately instigated and aided the revolt of the
-Chalkidians as well as of the Potidæans against Athens. It might be
-pretended that she had a right to do this, by virtue of her undefined
-metropolitan relations with Potidæa: but at any rate, the incident
-was not such as to afford any decent pretext for charge against the
-Athenians, either of outrage towards Corinth,[130] or of wrongful
-aggression against the Peloponnesian confederacy.
-
-  [129] Thucyd. i, 68. οὐ γὰρ ἂν Κέρκυράν τε ὑπολαβόντες βίᾳ ἡμῶν
-  εἶχον, καὶ Ποτίδαιαν ἐπολιόρκουν, ὧν τὸ μὲν ἐπικαιρότατον χωρίον
-  πρὸς τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης ἀποχρῆσθαι, ἡ δὲ ναυτικὸν ἂν μέγιστον παρέσχε
-  Πελοποννησίοις.
-
-  [130] Thucyd. i, 68. ἐν οἷς προσήκει ἡμᾶς οὐχ ἥκιστα εἰπεῖν, ὅσῳ
-  καὶ μέγιστα ἐγκλήματα ἔχομεν, ὑπὸ μὲν Ἀθηναίων ὑβριζόμενοι, ὑπὸ
-  δὲ ὑμῶν ἀμελούμενοι.
-
-To dwell much upon specific allegations of wrong, would not have
-suited the purpose of the Corinthian envoy; for against such, the
-thirty years’ truce expressly provided that recourse should be had
-to amicable arbitration,—to which recourse he never once alludes.
-He knew that, as between Corinth and Athens, war had already begun
-at Potidæa; and his business, throughout nearly all of a very
-emphatic speech is, to show that the Peloponnesian confederacy, and
-especially Sparta, is bound to take instant part in it, not less
-by prudence than by duty. He employs the most animated language to
-depict the ambition, the unwearied activity, the personal effort
-abroad as well as at home, the quick resolves, the sanguine hopes
-never dashed by failure,—of Athens; as contrasted with the cautious,
-home-keeping, indolent, scrupulous routine of Sparta. He reproaches
-the Spartans with their backwardness and timidity, in not having
-repressed the growth of Athens before she reached this formidable
-height,—especially in having allowed her to fortify her city after
-the retreat of Xerxes, and afterwards to build the long walls from
-the city to the sea.[131] The Spartans, he observes, stood alone
-among all Greeks, in the notable system of keeping down an enemy
-not by acting, but delaying to act,—not arresting his growth, but
-putting him down when his force was doubled. Falsely, indeed, had
-they acquired the reputation of being sure, when they were in reality
-merely slow:[132] in resisting Xerxes, as in resisting Athens, they
-had always been behindhand, disappointing and leaving their friends
-to ruin,—while both these enemies had only failed of complete success
-through their own mistakes.
-
-  [131] Thucyd. i, 69.
-
-  [132] Thucyd. i, 69. ἡσυχάζετε γὰρ μόνοι Ἑλλήνων, ὦ
-  Λακεδαιμόνιοι, οὐ τῇ δυνάμει τινὰ ἀλλὰ τῇ μελλήσει ἀμυνόμενοι,
-  καὶ μόνοι οὐκ ἀρχομένην τὴν αὔξησιν τῶν ἐχθρῶν, διπλασιουμένην
-  δὲ, καταλύοντες. Καίτοι ἐλέγεσθε ἀσφαλεῖς εἶναι, ὧν ἄρα ὁ λόγος
-  τοῦ ἔργου ἐκράτει· τόν τε γὰρ Μῆδον, etc.
-
-After half apologizing for the tartness of these reproofs,—which,
-however, as the Spartans were now well-disposed to go to war
-forthwith, would be well-timed and even agreeable,—the Corinthian
-orator vindicates the necessity of plain-speaking by the urgent
-peril of the emergency, and the formidable character of the enemy
-who threatened them. “You do not reflect (he says) how thoroughly
-different the Athenians are from yourselves. _They_ are innovators
-by nature; sharp both in devising, and in executing what they have
-determined: _you_ are sharp only in keeping what you have got, in
-determining on nothing beyond, and in doing even less than absolute
-necessity requires.[133] _They_ again dare beyond their means,
-run risks beyond their own judgment, and keep alive their hopes
-even in desperate circumstances: _your_ peculiarity is, that your
-performance comes short of your power,—you have no faith even in
-what your judgment guarantees,—when in difficulties, you despair of
-all escape. _They_ never hang back,—_you_ are habitual laggards:
-they love foreign service,—you cannot stir from home: for they are
-always under the belief that their movements will lead to some
-farther gain, while you fancy that new projects will endanger what
-you have already. When successful, they make the greatest forward
-march; when defeated, they fall back the least. Moreover, they task
-their bodies on behalf of their city as if they were the bodies of
-others,—while their minds are most of all their own, for exertion
-in her service.[134] When their plans for acquisition do not come
-successfully out, they feel like men robbed of what belongs to them:
-yet the acquisitions when realized appear like trifles compared with
-what remains to be acquired. If they sometimes fail in an attempt,
-new hopes arise in some other direction to supply the want: for with
-them alone the possession and the hope of what they aim at is almost
-simultaneous, from their habit of quickly executing all that they
-have once resolved. And in this manner do they toil throughout all
-their lives amidst hardship and peril, disregarding present enjoyment
-in the continual thirst for increase,—knowing no other festival
-recreation except the performance of active duty,—and deeming
-inactive repose a worse condition than fatiguing occupation. To speak
-the truth in two words: such is their inborn temper, that they will
-neither remain at rest themselves, nor allow rest to others.[135]
-
-  [133] Thucyd. i, 70. Οἱ μέν γε νεωτεροποιοὶ, καὶ ἐπιχειρῆσαι
-  ὀξεῖς καὶ ἐπιτελέσαι ἔργῳ ὃ ἂν γνῶσιν· ὑμεῖς δὲ τὰ ὑπάρχοντά τε
-  σώζειν, καὶ ἐπιγνῶναι μηδὲν, καὶ ἔργῳ οὐδὲ τἀναγκαῖα ἐξικέσθαι.
-
-  The meaning of the word ὀξεῖς—_sharp_—when applied to the latter
-  half of the sentence, is in the nature of a sarcasm. But this is
-  suitable to the character of the speech. Göller supposes some
-  such word as ἱκανοὶ, instead of ὀξεῖς, to be understood: but we
-  should thereby both depart from the more obvious syntax, and
-  weaken the general meaning.
-
-  [134] Thucyd. i, 70. ἔτι δὲ τοῖς μὲν σώμασιν ἀλλοτριωτάτοις ὑπὲρ
-  τῆς πόλεως χρῶνται, τῇ γνώμῃ δὲ οἰκειοτάτῃ ἐς τὸ πράσσειν τι ὑπὲρ
-  αὐτῆς.
-
-  It is difficult to convey, in translation, the antithesis between
-  ἀλλοτριωτάτοις and οἰκειοτάτῃ—not without a certain conceit,
-  which Thucydidês is occasionally fond of.
-
-  [135] Thucyd. _l. c._ καὶ ταῦτα μετὰ πόνων πάντα καὶ κινδύνων
-  δι᾽ ὅλου τοῦ αἰῶνος μοχθοῦσι, καὶ ἀπολαύουσιν ἐλάχιστα τῶν
-  ὑπαρχόντων, διὰ τὸ ἀεὶ κτᾶσθαι καὶ μήτε ἑορτὴν ἄλλο τι ἡγεῖσθαι
-  ἢ τὸ τὰ δέοντα πρᾶξαι, ξυμφορὰν δὲ οὐχ ἧσσον ἡσυχίαν ἀπράγμονα
-  ἢ ἀσχολίαν ἐπίπονον· ὥστε εἴ τις αὐτοὺς ξυνελὼν φαίη πεφυκέναι
-  ἐπὶ τῷ μήτε αὐτοὺς ἔχειν ἡσυχίαν μήτε τοὺς ἄλλους ἀνθρώπους ἐᾷν,
-  ὀρθῶς ἂν εἴποι.
-
-“Such is the city which stands opposed to you, Lacedæmonians,—yet ye
-still hang back from action.... Your continual scruples and apathy
-would hardly be safe, even if ye had neighbors like yourselves in
-character: but as to dealings with Athens, your system is antiquated
-and out of date. In politics as in art, it is the modern improvements
-which are sure to come out victorious: and though unchanged
-institutions are best, if a city be not called upon to act,—yet
-multiplicity of active obligations requires multiplicity and novelty
-of contrivance.[136] It is through these numerous trials that the
-means of Athens have acquired so much more new development than
-yours.”
-
-  [136] Thucyd. i, 71. ἀρχαιότροπα ὑμῶν τὰ ἐπιτηδεύματα πρὸς αὐτούς
-  ἐστιν. Ἀνάγκη δ᾽, ὥσπερ τέχνης, ἀεὶ τὰ ἐπιγιγνόμενα κρατεῖν· καὶ
-  ἡσυχαζούσῃ μὲν πόλει τὰ ἀκίνητα νόμιμα ἄριστα, πρὸς πολλὰ δὲ
-  ἀναγκαζομένοις ἰέναι, πολλῆς καὶ τῆς ἐπιτεχνήσεως δεῖ.
-
-The Corinthians concluded by saying, that if, after so many previous
-warnings, now repeated for the last time, Sparta still refused to
-protect her allies against Athens,—if she delayed to perform her
-promise made to the Potidæans, of immediately invading Attica,—they,
-the Corinthians, would forthwith look for safety in some new
-alliance, and they felt themselves fully justified in doing so.
-They admonished her to look well to the case, and to carry forward
-Peloponnesus with undiminished dignity as it had been transmitted to
-her from her predecessors.[137]
-
-  [137] Thucyd. i, 71.
-
-Such was the memorable picture of Athens and her citizens, as
-exhibited by her fiercest enemy, before the public assembly at
-Sparta. It was calculated to impress the assembly, not by appeal
-to recent or particular misdeeds, but by the general system of
-unprincipled and endless aggression which was imputed to Athens
-during the past,—and by the certainty held out that the same system,
-unless put down by measures of decisive hostility, would be pushed
-still farther in future to the utter ruin of Peloponnesus. And to
-this point did the Athenian envoy—staying in Sparta about some
-other negotiation, and now present in the assembly—address himself
-in reply, after having asked and obtained permission from the
-magistrates. The empire of Athens was now of such standing that the
-younger men present had no personal knowledge of the circumstances
-under which it had grown up: and what was needed as information for
-them would be impressive as a reminder even to their seniors.[138]
-
-  [138] Thucyd. i, 72.
-
-He began by disclaiming all intention of defending his native city
-against the charges of specific wrong or alleged infractions of the
-existing truce: this was no part of his mission, nor did he recognize
-Sparta as a competent judge in disputes between Athens and Corinth.
-But he nevertheless thought it his duty to vindicate Athens against
-the general character of injustice and aggression imputed to her,
-as well as to offer a solemn warning to the Spartans against the
-policy towards which they were obviously tending. He then proceeded
-to show that the empire of Athens had been honorably earned and
-amply deserved,—that it had been voluntarily ceded, and even pressed
-upon her,—and that she could not abdicate it without emperiling her
-own separate existence and security. Far from thinking that the
-circumstances under which it was acquired needed apology, he appealed
-to them with pride as a testimony of the genuine Hellenic patriotism
-of that city which the Spartan congress now seemed disposed to run
-down as an enemy.[139] He then dwelt upon the circumstances attending
-the Persian invasion, setting forth the superior forwardness and
-the unflinching endurance of Athens, in spite of ungenerous neglect
-from Sparta and the other Greeks,—the preponderance of her naval
-force in the entire armament,—the directing genius of her general
-Themistoklês, complimented even by Sparta herself,—and the title of
-Athens to rank on that memorable occasion as the principal saviour of
-Greece. This alone ought to save her empire from reproach: but this
-was not all,—for that empire had been tendered to her by the pressing
-instance of the allies, at a time when Sparta had proved herself both
-incompetent and unwilling to prosecute the war against Persia.[140]
-By simple exercise of the constraining force inseparable from her
-presidential obligations, and by the reduction of various allies who
-revolted, Athens had gradually become unpopular, while Sparta too
-had become her enemy instead of her friend. To relax her hold upon
-her allies would have been to make them the allies of Sparta against
-her; and thus the motive of fear was added to those of ambition and
-revenue, in inducing Athens to maintain her imperial dominion by
-force. In her position, no Grecian power either would or could have
-acted otherwise: no Grecian power, certainly not Sparta, would have
-acted with so much equity and moderation, or given so little ground
-of complaint to her subjects. Worse they _had_ suffered, while under
-Persia; worse they _would_ suffer, if they came under Sparta, who
-held her own allies under the thraldom of an oligarchical party in
-each city; and if they hated Athens, this was only because subjects
-always hated the _present_ dominion, whatever that might be.[141]
-
-  [139] Thucyd. i, 73. ῥηθήσεται δὲ οὐ παραιτήσεως μᾶλλον ἕνεκα ἢ
-  μαρτυρίου, καὶ δηλώσεως πρὸς οἵαν ὑμῖν πόλιν μὴ εὖ βουλευομένοις
-  ὁ ἀγὼν καταστήσεται.
-
-  [140] Thucyd. i, 75. Ἆρ᾽ ἄξιοί ἐσμεν, ὦ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, καὶ
-  προθυμίας ἕνεκα τῆς τότε καὶ γνώμης συνέσεως, ἀρχῆς γε ἧς ἔχομεν
-  τοῖς Ἕλλησι μὴ οὕτως ἄγαν ἐπιφθόνως διακεῖσθαι; καὶ γὰρ αὐτὴν
-  τήνδε ἐλάβομεν οὐ βιασάμενοι, ἀλλ᾽ ὑμῶν μὲν οὐκ ἐθελησάντων
-  παραμεῖναι πρὸς τὰ ὑπόλοιπα τοῦ βαρβάρου, ἡμῖν δὲ προσελθόντων
-  τῶν ξυμμάχων, καὶ αὐτῶν δεηθέντων ἡγεμόνας καταστῆναι· ἐξ αὐτοῦ
-  δὲ τοῦ ἔργου κατηναγκάσθημεν τὸ πρῶτον προαγαγεῖν αὐτὴν ἐς τόδε,
-  μάλιστα μὲν ὑπὸ δέους, ἔπειτα δὲ καὶ τιμῆς, ὕστερον καὶ ὠφελείας.
-
-  [141] Thucyd. i, 77.
-
-Having justified both the origin and the working of the Athenian
-empire, the envoy concluded by warning Sparta to consider calmly,
-without being hurried away by the passions and invectives of others,
-before she took a step from which there was no retreat, and which
-exposed the future to chances such as no man on either side could
-foresee. He called on her not to break the truce mutually sworn to,
-but to adjust all differences, as Athens was prepared to do, by the
-amicable arbitration which that truce provided. Should she begin
-war, the Athenians would follow her lead and resist her, calling to
-witness those gods under whose sanction the oaths were taken.[142]
-
-  [142] Thucyd. i, 78. ἡμεῖς δὲ ἐν οὐδεμίᾳ πω τοιαύτῃ ἁμαρτίᾳ
-  ὄντες, οὔτ᾽ αὐτοὶ οὔτε ὑμᾶς ὁρῶντες, λέγομεν ὑμῖν, ἕως ἔτι
-  αὐθαίρετος ἀμφοτέροις ἡ εὐβουλία, σπονδὰς μὴ λύειν μηδὲ
-  παραβαίνειν τοὺς ὅρκους, τὰ δὲ διάφορα δίκῃ λύεσθαι κατὰ τὴν
-  ξυνθήκην· ἢ θεοὺς τοὺς ὁρκίους μάρτυρας ποιούμενοι, πειρασόμεθα
-  ἀμύνεσθαι πολέμου ἄρχοντας ταύτῃ ᾗ ἂν ὑφηγῆσθε.
-
-The facts recounted in the preceding chapters will have shown, that
-the account given by the Athenian envoy at Sparta, of the origin
-and character of the empire exercised by his city, though doubtless
-the account of a partisan, is in substance correct and equitable;
-the envoys of Athens had not yet learned to take the tone which
-they assumed in the sixteenth and seventeenth years of the coming
-war, at Melos and Kamarina. At any time previous to the affair of
-Korkyra, the topics insisted upon by the Athenian would probably
-have been profoundly listened to at Sparta. But now the mind of the
-Spartans was made up. Having cleared the assembly of all “strangers,”
-and even all allies, they proceeded to discuss and determine the
-question among themselves. Most of their speakers held but one
-language,[143]—expatiating on the wrongs already done by Athens, and
-urging the necessity of instant war. There was, however, one voice,
-and that a commanding voice, raised against this conclusion: the
-ancient and respected king Archidamus opposed it.
-
-  [143] Thucyd. i, 79. καὶ τῶν μὲν πλειόνων ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτὸ αἱ γνῶμαι
-  ἔφερον, ἀδικεῖν τε Ἀθηναίους ἤδη, καὶ πολεμητέα εἶναι ἐν τάχει.
-
-The speech of Archidamus is that of a deliberate Spartan, who,
-setting aside both hatred to Athens and blind partiality to allies,
-looks at the question with a view to the interests and honor of
-Sparta only,—not, however, omitting her imperial as well as her
-separate character. The preceding native speakers, indignant
-against Athens, had probably appealed to Spartan pride, treating
-it as an intolerable disgrace that almost the entire land-force
-of Dorian Peloponnesus should be thus bullied by one single Ionic
-city, and should hesitate to commence a war which one invasion of
-Attica would probably terminate. As the Corinthians had tried to
-excite the Spartans by well-timed taunts and reproaches, so the
-subsequent speakers had aimed at the same objects by panegyric
-upon the well-known valor and discipline of the city. To all these
-arguments Archidamus set himself to reply. Invoking the experience
-of the elders his contemporaries around him, he impressed upon the
-assembly the grave responsibility, the uncertainties, difficulties,
-and perils, of the war into which they were hurrying without
-preparation.[144] He reminded them of the wealth, the population,
-greater than that of any other Grecian city, the naval force, the
-cavalry, the hoplites, the large foreign dominion of Athens,—and
-then asked by what means they proposed to put her down?[145] Ships,
-they had few; trained seamen, yet fewer; wealth, next to none. They
-could indeed invade and ravage Attica, by their superior numbers and
-land-force: but the Athenians had possessions abroad sufficient to
-enable them to dispense with the produce of Attica, while their great
-navy would retaliate the like ravages upon Peloponnesus. To suppose
-that one or two devastating expeditions into Attica would bring
-the war to an end, would be a deplorable error: such proceedings
-would merely enrage the Athenians, without impairing their real
-strength, and the war would thus be prolonged, perhaps, for a whole
-generation.[146] Before they determined upon war, it was absolutely
-necessary to provide more efficient means for carrying it on; and
-to multiply their allies, not merely among the Greeks, but among
-foreigners also: while this was in process, envoys ought to be sent
-to Athens to remonstrate and obtain redress for the grievances of
-the allies. If the Athenians granted this,—which they very probably
-would do, when they saw the preparations going forward, and when
-the ruin of the highly-cultivated soil of Attica was held over
-them _in terrorem_ without being actually consummated,—so much the
-better: if they refused, in the course of two or three years war
-might be commenced with some hopes of success. Archidamus reminded
-his countrymen that their allies would hold _them_ responsible for
-the good or bad issue of what was now determined;[147] admonishing
-them, in the true spirit of a conservative Spartan, to cling to that
-cautious policy which had been ever the characteristic of the state,
-despising both taunts on their tardiness and panegyric on their
-valor. “We, Spartans, owe both our bravery and our prudence to our
-admirable public discipline: it makes us warlike, because the sense
-of shame is most closely connected with discipline, as valor is with
-the sense of shame: it makes us prudent, because our training keeps
-us too ignorant to set ourselves above our own institutions, and
-holds us under sharp restraint so as not to disobey them.[148] And
-thus, not being overwise in unprofitable accomplishments, we Spartans
-are not given to disparage our enemy’s strength in clever speech,
-and then meet him with short-comings in reality: we think that the
-capacity of neighboring states is much on a par, and that the chances
-in reserve for both parties are too uncertain to be discriminated
-beforehand by speech. We always make real preparations against our
-enemies, as if they were proceeding wisely on their side: we must
-count upon security through our own precautions, not upon the chance
-of their errors. Indeed, there is no great superiority in one man
-as compared with another: he is the stoutest who is trained in the
-severest trials. Let us, for our parts, not renounce this discipline,
-which we have received from our fathers, and which we still continue,
-to our very great profit: let us not hurry on, in one short hour,
-a resolution upon which depend so many lives, so much property, so
-many cities, and our own reputation besides. Let us take time to
-consider, since our strength puts it fully in our power to do so.
-Send envoys to the Athenians on the subject of Potidæa, and of the
-other grievances alleged by our allies,—and that too, the rather
-as they are ready to give us satisfaction: against one who offers
-satisfaction, custom forbids you to proceed, without some previous
-application, as if he were a proclaimed wrong-doer. But, at the same
-time, make preparation for war; such will be the course of policy at
-once the best for your own power and the most terror-striking to your
-enemies.”[149]
-
-  [144] Thucyd. i, 80.
-
-  [145] Thucyd. i, 80. πρὸς δὲ ἄνδρας, οἳ γῆν τε ἑκὰς ἔχουσι καὶ
-  προσέτι πολέμου ἐμπειρότατοί εἰσι, καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασιν ἄριστα
-  ἐξήρτυνται, πλούτῳ τε ἰδίῳ καὶ δημοσίῳ καὶ ναυσὶ καὶ ἵπποις
-  καὶ ὅπλοις, καὶ ὄχλῳ, ὅσος οὐκ ἐν ἄλλῳ ἑνί γε χωρίῳ Ἑλληνικῷ
-  ἐστὶν, ἔτι δὲ καὶ ξυμμάχους πολλοὺς φόρου ὑποτελεῖς ἔχουσι, πῶς
-  χρὴ πρὸς τούτους ῥᾳδίως πόλεμον ἄρασθαι, καὶ τίνι πιστεύσαντας
-  ἀπαρασκεύους ἐπειχθῆναι.
-
-  [146] Thucyd. i, 81. δέδοικα δὲ μᾶλλον μὴ καὶ τοῖς παισὶν αὐτὸν
-  ὑπολίπωμεν, etc.
-
-  [147] Thucyd. i, 82, 83.
-
-  [148] Thucyd. i, 84. Πολεμικοί τε καὶ εὔβουλοι διὰ τὸ εὔκοσμον
-  γιγνόμεθα, τὸ μὲν, ὅτι αἰδὼς σωφροσύνης πλεῖστον μετέχει,
-  αἰσχύνης δὲ εὐψυχία· εὔβουλοι δὲ, ἀμαθέστερον τῶν νόμων τῆς
-  ὑπεροψίας παιδευόμενοι, καὶ ξὺν χαλεπότητι σωφρονέστερον ἢ ὥστε
-  αὐτῶν ἀνηκουστεῖν· καὶ μὴ, τὰ ἀχρεῖα ξυνετοὶ ἄγαν ὄντες, τὰς
-  τῶν πολεμίων παρασκευὰς λόγῳ καλῶς μεμφόμενοι, ἀνομοίως ἔργῳ
-  ἐπεξιέναι, νομίζειν δὲ τάς τε διανοίας τῶν πέλας παραπλησίους
-  εἶναι, καὶ τὰς προσπιπτούσας τύχας οὐ λόγῳ διαιρετάς.
-
-  In the construction of the last sentence, I follow Haack and
-  Poppo, in preference to Göller and Dr. Arnold.
-
-  The wording of this part of the speech of Archidamus is awkward
-  and obscure, though we make out pretty well the general sense.
-  It deserves peculiar attention, as coming from a king of Sparta,
-  personally, too, a man of superior judgment. The great points
-  of the Spartan character are all brought out. 1. A narrow,
-  strictly-defined, and uniform range of ideas. 2. Compression of
-  all other impulses and desires, but an increased sensibility to
-  their own public opinion. 3. Great habits of endurance as well as
-  of submission.
-
-  The way in which the features of Spartan character are
-  deduced from Spartan institutions, as well as the pride which
-  Archidamus expresses in the ignorance and narrow mental range
-  of his countrymen, are here remarkable. A similar championship
-  of ignorance and narrow-mindedness is not only to be found
-  among those who deride the literary and oratorical tastes of
-  the Athenian democracy (see Aristophanês, Ran. 1070: compare
-  Xenophon, Memorab. i, 2, 9-49), but also in the speech of Kleon
-  (Thucyd. iii, 37).
-
-  [149] Thucyd. i, 84, 85.
-
-The speech of Archidamus was not only in itself full of plain
-reason and good sense, but delivered altogether from the point
-of view of a Spartan; appealing greatly to Spartan conservative
-feeling and even prejudice. But in spite of all this, and in spite
-of the personal esteem entertained for the speaker, the tide of
-feeling in the opposite direction was at that moment irresistible.
-Stheneläidas—one of the five ephors, to whom it fell to put the
-question for voting—closed the debate; and his few words mark at
-once the character of the man, the temper of the assembly, and the
-simplicity of speech, though without the wisdom of judgment, for
-which Archidamus had taken credit to his countrymen.
-
-“I don’t understand (he said) these long speeches of the Athenians.
-They have praised themselves abundantly, but they have never rebutted
-what is laid to their charge,—that they are guilty of wrong against
-our allies and against Peloponnesus. Now, if in former days they
-were good men against the Persians, and are now evil-doers against
-us, they deserve double punishment, as having become evil-doers
-instead of good.[150] But _we_ are the same now as we were then:
-we know better than to sit still while our allies are suffering
-wrong: we shall not adjourn our aid while they cannot adjourn
-their sufferings.[151] Others have in abundance wealth, ships,
-and horses,—but _we_ have good allies, whom we are not to abandon
-to the mercy of the Athenians: nor are we to trust our redress to
-arbitration and to words, when our wrongs are not confined to words.
-We must help them speedily and with all our strength. Nor let any
-one tell us that we can with honor deliberate when we are actually
-suffering wrong,—it is rather for those who intend to do the wrong,
-to deliberate well beforehand. Resolve upon war then, Lacedæmonians,
-in a manner worthy of Sparta: suffer not the Athenians to become
-greater than they are: let us not betray our allies to ruin, but
-march, with the aid of the gods, against the wrong-doers.”
-
-  [150] Compare a similar sentiment in the speech of the Thebans
-  against the Platæans (Thucyd. iii, 67).
-
-  [151] Thucyd. i, 86. ἡμεῖς δὲ ὁμοῖοι καὶ τότε καὶ νῦν ἐσμὲν, καὶ
-  τοὺς ξυμμάχους, ἢν σωφρονῶμεν, οὐ περιοψόμεθα ἀδικουμένους, οὐδὲ
-  μελλήσομεν τιμωρεῖν· οἱ δὲ οὐκέτι μέλλουσι κακῶς πάσχειν.
-
-  There is here a play upon the word μέλλειν, which it is not easy
-  to preserve in a translation.
-
-With these few words, so well calculated to defeat the prudential
-admonitions of Archidamus, Stheneläidas put the question for the
-decision of the assembly,—which, at Sparta, was usually taken neither
-by show of hands nor by deposit of balls in an urn, but by cries
-analogous to the Aye or No of the English House of Commons,—the
-presiding ephor declaring which of the cries predominated. On
-this occasion the cry for war was manifestly the stronger:[152]
-yet Stheneläidas affected inability to determine which of the two
-cries was the louder, in order that he might have an excuse for
-bringing about a more impressive manifestation of sentiment and a
-stronger apparent majority,—since a portion of the minority would
-probably be afraid to show their real opinions as individuals
-openly. He accordingly directed a division, like the Speaker of the
-English House of Commons, when his decision in favor of aye or no
-is questioned by any member: “Such of you as think that the truce
-has been violated, and that the Athenians are doing us wrong, go to
-_that_ side; such as think the contrary, to the other side.” The
-assembly accordingly divided, and the majority was very great on the
-warlike side of the question.
-
-  [152] Thucyd. i, 87. βουλόμενος αὐτοὺς φανερῶς ἀποδεικνυμένους
-  τὴν γνώμην ἐς τὸ πολεμεῖν μᾶλλον ὁρμῆσαι, etc.
-
-The first step of the Lacedæmonians, after coming to this important
-decision was, to send to Delphi and inquire of the oracle whether it
-would be beneficial to them to undertake the war: the answer brought
-back (Thucydidês seems hardly certain that it was really given[153])
-was,—that if they did their best they would be victorious, and that
-the god would help them, invoked or uninvoked. They at the same
-time convened a general congress of their allies at Sparta, for the
-purpose of submitting their recent resolution to the vote of all.
-
-  [153] Thucyd. i, 118. ὁ δὲ ἀνεῖλεν αὐτοῖς, ~ὡς λέγεται~, etc.
-
-To the Corinthians, in their anxiety for the relief of Potidæa, the
-decision of this congress was not less important than that which
-the Spartans had just taken separately: and they sent round envoys
-to each of the allies, entreating them to authorize war without
-reserve. Through such instigations, acting upon the general impulse
-then prevalent, the congress came together in a temper decidedly
-warlike: most of the speakers were full of invective against Athens,
-and impatient for action, while the Corinthians, waiting as before to
-speak the last, wound up the discussion by a speech well calculated
-to insure a hearty vote. Their former speech had been directed to
-shame, exasperate, and alarm the Lacedæmonians: this point had now
-been carried, and they had to enforce, upon the allies generally,
-the dishonor as well as the impolicy of receding from a willing
-leader. The cause was one in which all were interested, the inland
-states not less than the maritime, for both would find themselves
-ultimately victims of the encroaching despot city: whatever efforts
-were necessary for the war, ought cheerfully to be made, since it was
-only through war that they could arrive at a secure and honorable
-peace. There were good hopes that this might soon be attained, and
-that the war would not last long,—so decided was the superiority of
-the confederacy, in numbers, in military skill, and in the equal
-heart and obedience of all its members.[154] The naval superiority
-of Athens depended chiefly upon hired seamen,—and the confederacy,
-by borrowing from the treasuries of Delphi and Olympia, would soon
-be able to overbid her, take into pay her best mariners, and equal
-her equipment at sea: they would excite revolt among her allies, and
-establish a permanent fortified post for the ruin of Attica. To make
-up a common fund for this purpose, was indispensably necessary; for
-Athens was far more than a match for each of them single-handed, and
-nothing less than hearty union could save them all from successive
-enslavement,—the very supposition of which was intolerable to
-Peloponnesian freemen, whose fathers had liberated Greece from the
-Persian. Let them not shrink from endurance and sacrifice in such a
-cause,—it was their hereditary pride to purchase success by laborious
-effort. The Delphian god had promised them his coöperation; and the
-whole of Greece would sympathize in the cause, either from fear of
-the despotism of Athens, or from hopes of profit. They would not be
-the first to break the truce, for the Athenians had already broken
-it, as the declaration of the Delphian god distinctly implied.
-Let them lose no time in sending aid to the Potidæans, a Dorian
-population now besieged by Ionians, as well as to those other Greeks
-whom Athens had enslaved. Every day the necessity for effort was
-becoming stronger, and the longer it was delayed, the more painful it
-would be when it came. “Be ye persuaded then, (concluded the orator),
-that this city, which has constituted herself despot of Greece, has
-her position against all of us alike, some for present rule, others
-for future conquest; let us assail and subdue her, that we may dwell
-securely ourselves hereafter, and may emancipate those Greeks who are
-now in slavery.”[155]
-
-  [154] Thucyd. i, 120, 121. Κατὰ πολλὰ δὲ ἡμᾶς εἰκὸς ἐπικρατῆσαι,
-  πρῶτον μὲν πλήθει προὔχοντας καὶ ἐμπειρίᾳ πολεμικῇ, ἔπειτα
-  ~ὁμοίως~ πάντας ἐς τὰ παραγγελλόμενα ἰόντας.
-
-  I conceive that the word ~ὁμοίως~ here alludes to the equal
-  interest of all the confederates in the quarrel, as opposed to
-  the Athenian power, which was composed partly of constrained
-  subjects, partly of hired mercenaries: to both of which points,
-  as weaknesses in the enemy, the Corinthian orator goes on
-  to allude. The word ὁμοίως here designates the same fact as
-  Periklês, in his speech at Athens (i, 141), mentions under the
-  words πάντες ἰσόψηφοι: the Corinthian orator treats it as an
-  advantage to have all confederates equal and hearty in the cause:
-  Periklês, on the contrary, looking at the same fact from the
-  Athenian point of view, considers it as a disadvantage, since it
-  prevented unity of command and determination.
-
-  Poppo’s view of this passage seems to me erroneous.
-
-  The same idea is reproduced, c. 124. εἴπερ βεβαιότατον τὸ ταὐτὰ
-  ξυμφέροντα καὶ πόλεσι καὶ ἰδιώταις εἶναι, etc.
-
-  [155] Thucyd. i, 123, 124.
-
-If there were any speeches delivered at this congress in opposition
-to the war, they were not likely to be successful in a cause wherein
-even Archidamus had failed. After the Corinthian had concluded,
-the question was put to the deputies of every city, great and
-small, indiscriminately and the majority decided for war.[156] This
-important resolution was adopted about the end of 432 B.C., or the
-beginning of January 431 B.C.: the previous decision of the Spartans
-separately may have been taken about two months earlier, in the
-preceding October or November 432 B.C.
-
-  [156] Thucyd. i, 125. καὶ τὸ πλῆθος ἐψηφίσαντο πολεμεῖν. It seems
-  that the decision was not absolutely unanimous.
-
-Reviewing the conduct of the two great Grecian parties at this
-momentous juncture, with reference to existing treaties and positive
-grounds of complaint, it seems clear that Athens was in the right.
-She had done nothing which could fairly be called a violation of the
-thirty years’ truce: and for such of her acts as were alleged to be
-such, she offered to submit them to that amicable arbitration which
-the truce itself prescribed. The Peloponnesian confederates were
-manifestly the aggressors in the contest; and if Sparta, usually so
-backward, now came forward in a spirit so decidedly opposite, we are
-to ascribe it partly to her standing fear and jealousy of Athens,
-partly to the pressure of her allies, especially of the Corinthians.
-Thucydidês, recognizing these two as the grand determining motives,
-and indicating the alleged infractions of truce as simple occasions
-or pretexts, seems to consider the fear and hatred of Athens as
-having contributed more to determine Sparta than the urgency of
-her allies.[157] That the extraordinary aggrandizement of Athens,
-during the period immediately succeeding the Persian invasion, was
-well calculated to excite alarm and jealousy in Peloponnesus, is
-indisputable: but if we take Athens as she stood in 432 B.C., it
-deserves notice that she had neither made, nor, so far as we know,
-tried to make, a single new acquisition during the whole fourteen
-years which had elapsed since the conclusion of the thirty years’
-truce;[158]— and, moreover, that that truce marked an epoch of
-signal humiliation and reduction of her power. The triumph which
-Sparta and the Peloponnesians then gained, though not sufficiently
-complete to remove all fear of Athens, was yet great enough to
-inspire them with the hope that a second combined effort would subdue
-her. This mixture of fear and hope was exactly the state of feeling
-out of which war was likely to grow,—and we see that even before the
-quarrel between Corinth and Korkyra, sagacious Greeks everywhere
-anticipated war as not far distant:[159] it was near breaking out
-even on occasion of the revolt of Samos,[160] and peace was then
-preserved partly by the commercial and nautical interests of Corinth,
-partly by the quiescence of Athens. But the quarrel of Corinth
-and Korkyra, which Sparta might have appeased beforehand had she
-thought it her interest to do so,—and the junction of Korkyra with
-Athens,—exhibited the latter as again in a career of aggrandizement,
-and thus again brought into play the warlike feelings of Sparta;
-while they converted Corinth from the advocate of peace into a
-clamorous organ of war. The revolt of Potidæa,—fomented by Corinth,
-and encouraged by Sparta in the form of a positive promise to invade
-Attica,—was, in point of fact, the first distinct violation of the
-truce, and the initiatory measure of the Peloponnesian war: nor did
-the Spartan meeting, and the subsequent congress of allies at Sparta,
-serve any other purpose than to provide such formalities as were
-requisite to insure the concurrent and hearty action of numbers, and
-to clothe with imposing sanction a state of war already existing in
-reality, though yet unproclaimed. The sentiment in Peloponnesus at
-this moment was not the fear of Athens, but the hatred of Athens,—and
-the confident hope of subduing her. And indeed such confidence
-was justified by plausible grounds: men might well think that the
-Athenians would never endure the entire devastation of their highly
-cultivated soil,—or at least that they would certainly come forth
-to fight for it in the field, which was all that the Peloponnesians
-desired. Nothing except the unparalleled ascendency and unshaken
-resolution of Periklês, induced the Athenians to persevere in a
-scheme of patient defence, and to trust to that naval superiority
-which the enemies of Athens, save and except the judicious
-Archidamus, had not yet learned fully to appreciate. Moreover, the
-confident hopes of the Peloponnesians were materially strengthened by
-the wide-spread sympathy in favor of their cause, proclaiming, as it
-did, the intended liberation of Greece from a despot city.[161]
-
-  [157] Thucyd. i, 88. Ἐψηφίσαντο δὲ οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι τὰς σπονδὰς
-  λελύσθαι καὶ πολεμητέα εἶναι, ~οὐ τοσοῦτον τῶν ξυμμάχων
-  πεισθέντες τοῖς λόγοις, ὅσον φοβούμενοι τοὺς Ἀθηναίους~, μὴ ἐπὶ
-  μεῖζον δυνηθῶσιν, ὁρῶντες αὐτοῖς τὰ πολλὰ τῆς Ἑλλάδος ὑποχείρια
-  ἤδη ὄντα: compare also c. 23 and 118.
-
-  [158] Plutarch’s biography of Periklês is very misleading, from
-  its inattention to chronology, ascribing to an earlier time
-  feelings and tendencies which really belong to a later. Thus
-  he represents (c. 20) the desire for acquiring possession of
-  Sicily, and even of Carthage and the Tyrrhenian coast, as having
-  become very popular at Athens even before the revolt of Megara
-  and Eubœa, and before those other circumstances which preceded
-  the thirty years’ truce: and he gives much credit to Periklês
-  for having repressed such unmeasured aspirations. But ambitious
-  hopes directed towards Sicily could not have sprung up in the
-  Athenian mind until after the beginning of the Peloponnesian war.
-  It was impossible that they could make any step in that direction
-  until they had established their alliance with Korkyra, and this
-  was only done in the year before the Peloponnesian war,—done
-  too, even then, in a qualified manner, and with much reserve. At
-  the first outbreak of the Peloponnesian war, the Athenians had
-  nothing but fears, while the Peloponnesians had large hopes of
-  aid, from the side of Sicily. While it is very true, therefore,
-  that Periklês was eminently useful in discouraging rash and
-  distant enterprises of ambition generally, we cannot give him the
-  credit of keeping down Athenian desires of acquisition in Sicily,
-  or towards Carthage,—if, indeed, this latter ever was included
-  in the catalogue of Athenian hopes,—for such desires were hardly
-  known until after his death, in spite of the assertion again
-  repeated by Plutarch, Alkibiadês, c. 17.
-
-  [159] Thucyd. i, 33-36.
-
-  [160] Thucyd. i, 40, 41.
-
-  [161] Thucyd. ii, 8.
-
-To Athens, on the other hand, the coming war presented itself in a
-very different aspect; holding out scarcely any hope of possible
-gain, and the certainty of prodigious loss and privation,—even
-granting, that, at this heavy cost, her independence and union at
-home, and her empire abroad, could be upheld. By Periklês, and by
-the more long-sighted Athenians, the chance of unavoidable war
-was foreseen even before the Korkyræan dispute.[162] But Periklês
-was only the first citizen in a democracy, esteemed, trusted, and
-listened to, more than any one else by the body of the citizens,
-but warmly opposed in most of his measures, under the free speech
-and latitude of individual action which reigned at Athens,—and
-even bitterly hated by many active political opponents. The formal
-determination of the Lacedæmonians, to declare war, must of course
-have been made known at Athens by those Athenian envoys, who had
-entered an unavailing protest against it in the Spartan assembly. No
-steps were taken by Sparta to carry this determination into effect
-until after the congress of allies and their pronounced confirmatory
-vote. Nor did the Spartans even then send any herald, or make any
-formal declaration. They despatched various propositions to Athens,
-not at all with a view of trying to obtain satisfaction, or of
-providing some escape from the probability of war; but with the
-contrary purpose,—of multiplying demands, and enlarging the grounds
-of quarrel.[163] Meanwhile, the deputies retiring home from the
-congress to their respective cities, carried with them the general
-resolution for immediate warlike preparations to be made, with as
-little delay as possible.[164]
-
-  [162] Thucyd. i, 45; Plutarch, Periklês. c. 8.
-
-  [163] Thucyd. i, 126. ἐν τούτῳ δὲ ἐπρεσβεύοντο τῷ χρόνῳ πρὸς τοὺς
-  Ἀθηναίους ~ἐγκλήματα ποιούμενοι, ὅπως σφίσιν ὅτι μεγίστη πρόφασις
-  εἴη τοῦ πολεμεῖν, ἢν μή τι ἐσακούωσι~.
-
-  [164] Thucyd. i, 125.
-
-The first requisition addressed by the Lacedæmonians to Athens was a
-political manœuvre aimed at Periklês, their chief opponent in that
-city. His mother, Agaristê, belonged to the great family of the
-Alkmæônids, who were supposed to be under an inexpiable hereditary
-taint, in consequence of the sacrilege committed by their ancestor
-Megaklês, nearly two centuries before, in the slaughter of the
-Kylonian suppliants near the altar of the Venerable Goddesses.[165]
-Ancient as this transaction was, it still had sufficient hold on the
-mind of the Athenians to serve as the basis of a political manœuvre:
-about seventy-seven years before, shortly after the expulsion of
-Hippias from Athens, it had been so employed by the Spartan king
-Kleomenês, who at that time exacted from the Athenians a clearance
-of the ancient sacrilege, to be effected by the banishment of
-Kleisthenês, the founder of the democracy, and his chief partisans.
-This demand, addressed by Kleomenês to the Athenians, at the instance
-of Isagoras, the rival of Kleisthenês,[166] had been then obeyed,
-and had served well the purposes of those who sent it; a similar
-blow was now aimed by the Lacedæmonians at Periklês, the grand
-nephew of Kleisthenês, and doubtless at the instance of his political
-enemies: religion required, it was pretended, that “the abomination
-of the goddess should be driven out.”[167] If the Athenians complied
-with this demand, they would deprive themselves, at this critical
-moment, of their ablest leader; but the Lacedæmonians, not expecting
-compliance, reckoned at all events upon discrediting Periklês with
-the people, as being partly the cause of the war through family
-taint of impiety,[168]—and this impression would doubtless be loudly
-proclaimed by his political opponents in the assembly.
-
-  [165] See the account of the Kylonian troubles, and the sacrilege
-  which followed, in vol. iii, of this History, ch. x, p. 110.
-
-  [166] See Herodot. v, 70: compare vi, 131; Thucyd. i, 126; and
-  vol. iv, ch. xxxi, p. 163 of this History.
-
-  [167] Thucyd. i, 126. ἐκέλευον τοὺς Ἀθηναίους τὸ ἄγος ἐλαύνειν
-  τῆς θεοῦ.
-
-  [168] Thucyd. i, 127.
-
-The influence of Periklês with the Athenian public had become greater
-and greater as their political experience of him was prolonged.
-But the bitterness of his enemies appears to have increased along
-with it; and not long before this period, he had been indirectly
-assailed, through the medium of accusations against three different
-persons, all more or less intimate with him,—his mistress Aspasia,
-the philosopher Anaxagoras, and the sculptor Pheidias. We cannot
-make out either the exact date, or the exact facts, of either of
-these accusations. Aspasia, daughter of Axiochus, was a native of
-Milêtus, beautiful, well educated, and ambitious. She resided at
-Athens, and is affirmed, though upon very doubtful evidence, to
-have kept slave-girls to be let out as courtezans; whatever may
-be the case with this report, which is most probably one of the
-scandals engendered by political animosity against Periklês,[169]
-it is certain that so remarkable were her own fascinations, her
-accomplishments, and her powers, not merely of conversation, but even
-of oratory and criticism,—that the most distinguished Athenians of
-all ages and characters, Sokratês among the number, visited her, and
-several of them took their wives along with them to hear her also.
-The free citizen women of Athens lived in strict and almost oriental
-recluseness, as well after being married as when single: everything
-which concerned their lives, their happiness, or their rights, was
-determined or managed for them by male relatives: and they seem
-to have been destitute of all mental culture and accomplishments.
-Their society presented no charm nor interest, which men accordingly
-sought for in the company of the class of women called hetæræ, or
-courtezans, literally female companions; who lived a free life,
-managed their own affairs, and supported themselves by their powers
-of pleasing. These women were numerous, and were doubtless of every
-variety of personal character: but the most distinguished and
-superior among them, such as Aspasia and Theodotê,[170] appear to
-have been the only women in Greece, except the Spartan, who either
-inspired strong passion or exercised mental ascendency.
-
-  [169] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 24. Respecting Aspasia, see Plato,
-  Menexenus, c. 3, 4; Xenophon, Memorab. ii, 6, 36; Harpokration,
-  v, Ἀσπασία. Aspasia was, doubtless, not an uncommon name among
-  Grecian women; we know of one Phokæan girl who bore it, the
-  mistress of Cyrus the younger (Plutarch, Artaxer. c. 26). The
-  story about Aspasia having kept slave-girls for hire, is stated
-  by both Plutarch and Athenæus (xiii, p. 570); but we may well
-  doubt whether there is any better evidence for it than that which
-  is actually cited by the latter, the passage in Aristophanês,
-  Acharn. 497-505:—
-
-    Κἀθ᾽ οἱ Μεγαρῆς ὀδύναις πεφυσιγγωμένοι
-    Ἀντεξέκλεψαν Ἀσπασίας ~πόρνα δύο~ or ~πόρνας δύο~.
-
-  Athenæus reads the latter, but the reading πόρνα δύο appears
-  in the received text of Aristophanês. Critics differ, whether
-  Ἀσπασίας is the genitive case singular of Ἀσπασία, or the
-  accusative plural of the adjective ἀσπάσιος. I believe that it is
-  the latter; but intended as a play on the word, capable of being
-  understood either as a substantive or as an adjective—ἀσπασίας
-  πόρνας δύο, or Ἀσπασίας πόρνας δύο. There is a similar play on
-  the word, in a line of Kratinus, quoted by Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-  24.
-
-  At the time, if ever, when this theft of the Megarian youth took
-  place, Aspasia must have been the beloved mistress and companion
-  of Periklês; and it is inconceivable that she should have kept
-  slave-girls for hire _then_, whatever she may have done before.
-
-  That reading and construction of the verse above cited, which
-  I think the least probable of the two, has been applied by the
-  commentators of Thucydidês to explain a line of his history,
-  and applied in a manner which I am persuaded is erroneous. When
-  the Lacedæmonians desired the Athenians to repeal the decree
-  excluding the Megarians from their ports, the Athenians refused,
-  alleging that the Megarians had appropriated some lands which
-  were disputed between the two countries, and some which were
-  even sacred property,—and also, that “_they had received runaway
-  slaves from Athens_,”—καὶ ἀνδραπόδων ὑποδοχὴν τῶν ἀφισταμένων
-  (i, 139). The Scholiast gives a perfectly just explanation of
-  these last words—ὡς ὅτι δούλους αὐτῶν ἀποφεύγοντας ἐδέχοντο.
-  But Wasse puts a note to the passage to this effect—“_Aspasiæ
-  servos_, v, Athenæum, p. 570; Aristoph. Acharn. 525, et Schol.”
-  This note of Wasse is adopted and transcribed by the three best
-  and most recent commentators on Thucydidês,—Poppo, Göller, and
-  Dr. Arnold. Yet, with all respect to their united authority,
-  the supposition is neither natural, as applied to the words,
-  nor admissible, as regards the matter of fact. Ἀνδράποδα
-  ἀφιστάμενα mean naturally (not _Aspasiæ servos_, or more properly
-  _servas_, for the very gender ought to have made Wasse suspect
-  the correctness of his interpretation,—but) the runaway slaves
-  of proprietors generally in Attica; of whom the Athenians lost
-  so prodigious a number after the Lacedæmonian garrison was
-  established at Dekeleia (Thucyd. vii, 28: compare i, 142; and
-  iv, 118, about the ἀυτόμολοι). Periklês might well set forth
-  the reception of such runaway slaves as a matter of complaint
-  against the Megarians, and the Athenian public assembly would
-  feel it so likewise: moreover, the Megarians are charged, not
-  with having _stolen away_ the slaves, but with _harboring_ them
-  (ὑποδοχὴν). But to suppose that Periklês, in defending the decree
-  of exclusion against the Megarians, would rest the defence on
-  the ground that some Megarian youth had run away with two girls
-  of the _cortège_ of Aspasia, argues a strange conception both of
-  him and of the people. If such an incident ever really happened,
-  or was even supposed to have happened, we may be sure that it
-  would be cited by his opponents, as a means of bringing contempt
-  upon the real accusation against the Megarians,—the purpose for
-  which Aristophanês produces it. This is one of the many errors
-  in respect to Grecian history, arising from the practice of
-  construing passages of comedy as if they were serious and literal
-  facts.
-
-  [170] The visit of Sokratês with some of his friends to Theodotê,
-  his dialogue with her, and the description of her manner of
-  living, is among the most curious remnants of Grecian antiquity,
-  on a side very imperfectly known to us (Xenophon, Memorab. iii,
-  11).
-
-  Compare the citations from Eubulus and Antiphanês, the comic
-  writers, apud Athenæum, xiii, p. 571, illustrating the
-  differences of character and behavior between some of these
-  hetæræ and others,—and Athenæ. xiii, p. 589.
-
-Periklês had been determined in his choice of a wife by those family
-considerations which were held almost obligatory at Athens, and
-had married a woman very nearly related to him, by whom he had two
-sons, Xanthippus and Paralus. But the marriage, having never been
-comfortable, was afterwards dissolved by mutual consent, according
-to that full liberty of divorce which the Attic law permitted; and
-Periklês concurred with his wife’s male relations, who formed her
-legal guardians, in giving her a way to another husband.[171] He
-then took Aspasia to live with him, had a son by her, who bore
-his name, and continued ever afterwards on terms of the greatest
-intimacy and affection with her. Without adopting those exaggerations
-which represent Aspasia as having communicated to Periklês his
-distinguished eloquence, or even as having herself composed orations
-for public delivery, we may well believe her to have been qualified
-to take interest and share in that literary and philosophical society
-which frequented the house of Periklês, and which his unprincipled
-son Xanthippus,—disgusted with his father’s regular expenditure,
-as withholding from him the means of supporting an extravagant
-establishment,—reported abroad with exaggerating calumnies and
-turned into derision. It was from that worthless young man, who
-died of the Athenian epidemic during the lifetime of Periklês, that
-his political enemies and the comic writers of the day were mainly
-furnished with scandalous anecdotes to assail the private habits
-of this distinguished man.[172] The comic writers attacked him for
-alleged intrigues with different women, but the name of Aspasia they
-treated as public property, without any mercy or reserve: she was
-the Omphalê, the Deianeira, or the Hêrê, to this great Hêraklês or
-Zeus of Athens. At length one of these comic writers, Hermippus, not
-contented with scenic attacks, indicted her before the dikastery for
-impiety, as participant in the philosophical discussions held, and
-the opinions professed, in the society of Periklês, by Anaxagoras
-and others. Against Anaxagoras himself, too, a similar indictment
-is said to have been preferred, either by Kleon or by Thucydidês,
-son of Melêsias, under a general resolution recently passed in the
-public assembly, at the instance of Diopeithês. And such was the
-sensitive antipathy of the Athenian public, shown afterwards fatally
-in the case of Sokratês, and embittered in this instance by all the
-artifices of political faction, against philosophers whose opinions
-conflicted with the received religious dogmas, that Periklês did
-not dare to place Anaxagoras on his trial: the latter retired from
-Athens, and the sentence of banishment was passed against him in his
-absence.[173] But he himself defended Aspasia before the diakastery:
-in fact, the indictment was as much against him as against her:
-one thing alleged against her, and also against Pheidias, was, the
-reception of free women to facilitate the intrigues of Periklês.
-He defended her successfully, and procured a verdict of acquittal:
-but we are not surprised to hear that his speech was marked by the
-strongest personal emotions, and even by tears.[174] The dikasts were
-accustomed to such appeals to their sympathies, sometimes even to
-extravagant excess, from ordinary accused persons: but in Periklês,
-so manifest an outburst of emotion stands out as something quite
-unparalleled: for constant self-mastery was one of the most prominent
-features in his character.[175] And we shall find him near the close
-of his political life, when he had become for the moment unpopular
-with the Athenian people, distracted as they were at the moment
-with the terrible sufferings of the pestilence,—bearing up against
-their unmerited anger not merely with dignity, but with a pride of
-conscious innocence and desert which rises almost into defiance;
-insomuch that the rhetor Dionysius, who criticizes the speech of
-Periklês as if it were simply the composition of Thucydidês, censures
-that historian for having violated dramatic propriety by a display of
-insolence where humility would have been becoming.[176]
-
-  [171] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 24 Εἶτα τῆς συμβιώσεως οὐκ οὔσης
-  αὐτοῖς ἀρεστῆς, ἐκείνην μὲν ἑτέρῳ βουλομένην συνεξέδωκεν, αὐτὸς
-  δὲ Ἀσπασίαν λαβὼν ἔστερξε διαφερόντως.
-
-  [172] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13-36.
-
-  [173] This seems the more probable story: but there are
-  differences of statement and uncertainties upon many points:
-  compare Plutarch, Periklês, c. 16-32; Plutarch, Nikias, c.
-  23; Diogen. Laërt. ii, 12, 13. See also Schaubach, Fragment.
-  Anaxagoræ, pp. 47-52.
-
-  [174] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 32.
-
-  [175] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 7, 36-39.
-
-  [176] Thucyd. ii, 60, 61: compare also his striking expressions,
-  c. 65; Dionys. Halikarn. De Thucydid. Judic. c. 44, p. 924.
-
-It appears, also, as far as we can judge amidst very imperfect
-data, that the trial of the great sculptor Pheidias, for alleged
-embezzlement in the contract for his celebrated gold and ivory statue
-of Athênê,[177] took place nearly at this period. That statue had
-been finished and dedicated in the Parthenon in 437 B.C., since
-which period Pheidias had been engaged at Olympia, in his last and
-great masterpiece, the colossal statue of the Olympian Zeus. On
-his return to Athens from the execution of this work, about 433 or
-432 B.C., the accusation of embezzlement was instituted against him
-by the political enemies of Periklês.[178] A slave of Pheidias,
-named Menon, planted himself as a suppliant at the altar, professing
-to be cognizant of certain facts which proved that his master had
-committed peculation. Motion was made to receive his depositions,
-and to insure to his person the protection of the people; upon which
-he revealed various statements impeaching the pecuniary probity of
-Pheidias, and the latter was put in prison, awaiting the day for his
-trial before the dikastery. The gold employed and charged for in the
-statue, however, was all capable of being taken off and weighed, so
-as to verify its accuracy, which Periklês dared the accusers to do.
-Besides the charge of embezzlement, there were other circumstances
-which rendered Pheidias unpopular: it had been discovered that, in
-the reliefs on the friese of the Parthenon, he had introduced the
-portraits both of himself and of Periklês in conspicuous positions.
-It seems that Pheidias died in prison before the day of trial;
-and some even said, that he had been poisoned by the enemies of
-Periklês, in order that the suspicions against the latter, who was
-the real object of attack, might be aggravated. It is said also that
-Drakontidês proposed and carried a decree in the public assembly,
-that Periklês should be called on to give an account of the money
-which he had expended, and that the dikasts, before whom the account
-was rendered, should give their suffrage in the most solemn manner
-from the altar: this latter provision was modified by Agnon, who,
-while proposing that the dikasts should be fifteen hundred in number,
-retained the vote by pebbles in the urn according to ordinary
-custom.[179]
-
-  [177] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31. Φειδίας—ἐργολάβος τοῦ ἀγάλματος.
-
-  This tale, about protecting Pheidias under the charge of
-  embezzlement, was the story most widely in circulation against
-  Periklês—ἡ χειρίστη μὲν αἰτία πασῶν, ἔχουσα δὲ πλείστους μάρτυρας
-  (Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31).
-
-  [178] See the Dissertation of O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, c. 17,
-  p. 35), who lays out the facts in the order in which I have given
-  them.
-
-  [179] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13-32.
-
-If Periklês was ever tried on such a charge, there can be no doubt
-that he was honorably acquitted: for the language of Thucydidês
-respecting his pecuniary probity is such as could never have been
-employed if a verdict of guilty on a charge of peculation had ever
-been publicly pronounced. But we cannot be certain that he ever
-was tried: indeed, another accusation urged by his enemies, and
-even by Aristophanês, in the sixth year of the Peloponnesian war,
-implies that no trial took place: for it was alleged that Periklês,
-in order to escape this danger, “blew up the Peloponnesian war,” and
-involved his country in such confusion and peril as made his own
-aid and guidance indispensably necessary to her: especially that he
-passed the decree against the Megarians by which the war was really
-brought on.[180] We know enough, however, to be certain that such
-a supposition is altogether inadmissible. The enemies of Periklês
-were far too eager, and too expert in Athenian political warfare,
-to have let him escape by such a stratagem: moreover, we learn from
-the assurance of Thucydidês, that the war depended upon far deeper
-causes,—that the Megarian decree was in no way the real cause of
-it,—that it was not Periklês, but the Peloponnesians, who brought it
-on, by the blow struck at Potidæa.
-
-  [180] Aristophan. Pac. 587-603: compare Acharn. 512; Ephorus,
-  ap. Diodor. xii, 38-40; and the Scholia on the two passages of
-  Aristophanês; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 32.
-
-  Diodorus (as well as Plutarch, Alkibiad. c. 7) relates another
-  tale, that Alkibiadês once approached Periklês when he was in
-  evident low spirits and embarrassment, and asked him the reason:
-  Periklês told him that the time was near at hand for rendering
-  his accounts, and that he was considering how this could be done:
-  upon which Alkibiadês advised him to consider rather how he could
-  evade doing it. The result of this advice was that Periklês
-  plunged Athens into the Peloponnesian war: compare Aristophan.
-  Nub. 855, with the Scholia,—and Ephorus, Fragm. 118, 119, ed.
-  Marx, with the notes of Marx.
-
-  It is probable enough that Ephorus copied the story, which
-  ascribes the Peloponnesian war to the accusations against
-  Pheidias and Periklês, from Aristophanês or other comic writers
-  of the time. But it deserves remark, that even Aristophanês is
-  not to be considered as certifying it. For if we consult the
-  passage above referred to in his comedy _Pax_, we shall find
-  that, first, Hermês tells the story about Pheidias, Periklês, and
-  the Peloponnesian war; upon which both Trygæus, and the Chorus,
-  remark that _they never heard a word of it before_: that it is
-  quite _new_ to them.
-
-    Tryg.   Ταῦτα τοίνυν, μὰ τὸν Ἀπόλλω, ᾽γὼ ᾽πεπύσμην οὐδενὸς,
-            Οὐδ᾽ ὅπως αὐτῇ (Εἰρήνῃ) προσήκοι Φειδίας ἠκηκόη.
-
-    Chorus. Οὐδ᾽ ἔγωγε πλήν γε νυνί.
-
-  If Aristophanês had stated the story ever so plainly, his
-  authority could only have been taken as proving that it was a
-  part of the talk of the time: but the lines just cited make him
-  as much a contradicting as an affirming witness.
-
-All that we can make out, amidst these uncertified allegations, is,
-that in the year or two immediately preceding the Peloponnesian
-war, Periklês was hard pressed by the accusations of political
-enemies,—perhaps even in his own person, but certainly in the persons
-of those who were most in his confidence and affection.[181] And it
-was in this turn of his political position that the Lacedæmonians
-sent to Athens the above-mentioned requisition, that the ancient
-Kylonian sacrilege might be at length cleared out; in other words,
-that Periklês and his family might be banished. Doubtless, his
-enemies, as well as the partisans of Lacedæmon at Athens, would
-strenuously support this proposition: and the party of Lacedæmon
-at Athens was always strong, even during the middle of the war:
-to act as proxenus to the Lacedæmonians was accounted an honor
-even by the greatest Athenian families.[182] On this occasion,
-however, the manœuvre did not succeed, nor did the Athenians listen
-to the requisition for banishing the sacrilegious Alkmæônids. On
-the contrary, they replied that the Spartans, too, had an account
-of sacrilege to clear off; for they had violated the sanctuary of
-Poseidon, at Cape Tænarus, in dragging from it some helot suppliants
-to be put to death,—and the sanctuary of Athênê Chalkiœkus at Sparta,
-in blocking up and starving to death the guilty regent Pausanias. To
-require that Laconia might be cleared of these two acts of sacrilege,
-was the only answer which the Athenians made to the demand sent for
-the banishment of Periklês.[183] Probably, the actual effect of
-that demand was, to strengthen him in the public esteem:[184] very
-different from the effect of the same manœuvre when practised before
-by Kleomenês against Kleisthenês.
-
-  [181] It would appear that not only Aspasia and Anaxagoras, but
-  also the musician and philosopher Damon, the personal friend and
-  instructor of Periklês, must have been banished at a time when
-  Periklês was old,—perhaps somewhere near about this time. The
-  passage in Plato, Alkibiadês, i, c. 30, p. 118, proves that Damon
-  was in Athens, and intimate with Periklês, when the latter was
-  of considerable age—καὶ νῦν ἔτι ~τηλικοῦτος~ ὢν Δάμωνι σύνεστιν
-  αὐτοῦ τούτου ἕνεκα.
-
-  Damon is said to have been ostracized,—perhaps he was tried and
-  condemned to banishment: for the two are sometimes confounded.
-
-  [182] See Thucyd. v, 43; vi, 89.
-
-  [183] Thucyd. i, 128, 135, 139.
-
-  [184] Plutarch, Perikl. c. 33.
-
-Other Spartan envoys shortly afterwards arrived, with fresh demands.
-The Athenians were now required: 1. To withdraw their troops from
-Potidæa. 2. To replace Ægina in its autonomy. 3. To repeal the decree
-of exclusion against the Megarians. It was upon the latter that the
-greatest stress was laid; an intimation being held out that war
-might be avoided if such repeal were granted. We see plainly, from
-this proceeding, that the Lacedæmonians acted in concert with the
-anti-Periklêan leaders at Athens. To Sparta and her confederacy the
-decree against the Megarians was of less importance than the rescue
-of the Corinthian troops now blocked up in Potidæa: but on the other
-hand, the party opposed to Periklês would have much better chance
-of getting a vote of the assembly against him on the subject of the
-Megarians: and this advantage, if gained, would serve to enfeeble
-his influence generally. No concession was obtained, however, on
-either of the three points: even in respect to Megara, the decree
-of exclusion was vindicated and upheld against all the force of
-opposition. At length the Lacedæmonians—who had already resolved
-upon war, and had sent these envoys in mere compliance with the
-exigencies of ordinary practice, not with any idea of bringing about
-an accommodation—sent a third batch of envoys with a proposition,
-which at least had the merit of disclosing their real purpose without
-disguise. Rhamphias and two other Spartans announced to the Athenians
-the simple injunction: “The Lacedæmonians wish the peace to stand;
-and it _may_ stand, if you will leave the Greeks autonomous.” Upon
-this demand, so very different from the preceding, the Athenians
-resolved to hold a fresh assembly on the subject of war or peace, to
-open the whole question anew for discussion, and to determine, once
-for all, on a peremptory answer.[185]
-
-  [185] Thucyd. i, 39. It rather appears, from the words of
-  Thucydidês, that these various demands of the Lacedæmonians
-  were made by _one_ embassy, joined by new members arriving with
-  fresh instructions, but remaining during a month or six weeks,
-  between January and March 431 B.C., installed in the house of the
-  proxenus of Sparta at Athens: compare Xenophon Hellenic. v, 4, 22.
-
-The last demands presented on the part of Sparta, which went
-to nothing less than the entire extinction of the Athenian
-empire,—combined with the character, alike wavering and insincere,
-of the demands previously made, and with the knowledge that the
-Spartan confederacy had pronounced peremptorily in favor of
-war,—seemed likely to produce unanimity at Athens, and to bring
-together this important assembly under the universal conviction that
-war was inevitable. Such, however, was not the fact. The reluctance
-to go to war was sincere amidst the large majority of the assembly;
-while among a considerable portion of them it was so preponderant,
-that they even now reverted to the opening which the Lacedæmonians
-had before held out about the anti-Megarian decree, as if that were
-the chief cause of war. There was much difference of opinion among
-the speakers, several of whom insisted upon the repeal of this
-decree, treating it as a matter far too insignificant to go to war
-about, and denouncing the obstinacy of Periklês for refusing to
-concede such a trifle.[186] Against this opinion Periklês entered his
-protest, in an harangue decisive and encouraging, which Dionysius of
-Halikarnassus ranks among the best speeches in Thucydidês: the latter
-historian may probably himself have heard the original speech.
-
-  [186] Thucyd. i, 139; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31.
-
-“I continue, Athenians, to adhere to the same conviction, that we
-must not yield to the Peloponnesians,—though I know that men are
-in one mood when they sanction the resolution to go to war, and in
-another when actually in the contest,—their judgments then depending
-upon the turn of events. I have only to repeat now what I have said
-on former occasions,—and I adjure you who follow my views to adhere
-to what we jointly resolve, though the result should be partially
-unfavorable: or else, not to take credit for wisdom in the event of
-success.[187] For it is very possible that the contingencies of
-events may depart more from all reasonable track than the counsels
-of man: such are the unexpected turns which we familiarly impute
-to fortune. The Lacedæmonians have before now manifested their
-hostile aims against us, but on this last occasion more than ever.
-While the truce prescribes that we are to give and receive amicable
-satisfaction for our differences, and each to retain what we
-possess,—they not only have not asked for such satisfaction, but will
-not receive it when tendered by us: they choose to settle complaints
-by war and not by discussion: they have got beyond the tone of
-complaint, and are here already with that of command. For they enjoin
-us to withdraw from Potidæa, to leave Ægina free, and to rescind the
-decree against the Megarians: nay, these last envoys are even come
-to proclaim to us, that we must leave all the Greeks free. Now let
-none of you believe, that we shall be going to war about a trifle,
-if we refuse to rescind the Megarian decree,—which they chiefly put
-forward, as if its repeal would avert the war,—let none of you take
-blame to yourselves as if we had gone to war about a small matter.
-For this small matter contains in itself the whole test and trial
-of your mettle: if ye yield it, ye will presently have some other
-greater exaction put upon you, like men who have already truckled on
-one point from fear: whereas if ye hold out stoutly, ye will make it
-clear to them that they must deal with you more upon a footing of
-equality.”[188]
-
-  [187] Thucyd. i, 140. ἐνδέχεται γὰρ τὰς ξυμφορὰς τῶν πραγμάτων
-  οὐχ ἧσσον ἀμαθῶς χωρῆσαι ἢ καὶ τὰς διανοίας τοῦ ἀνθρώπου· διόπερ
-  καὶ τὴν τύχην ὅσα ἂν παρὰ λόγον ξυμβῇ, εἰώθαμεν αἰτιᾶσθαι. I
-  could have wished, in the translation, to preserve the play
-  upon the words ἀμαθῶς χωρῆσαι, which Thucydidês introduces into
-  this sentence, and which seems to have been agreeable to his
-  taste. Ἀμαθῶς, when referred to ξυμφορὰς, is used in a passive
-  sense by no means common,—“in a manner which cannot be learned,
-  departing from all reasonable calculation.” Ἀμαθῶς, when referred
-  to διανοίας, bears its usual meaning,—“ignorant, deficient in
-  learning or in reason.”
-
-  [188] Thucyd. i, 140.
-
-Periklês then examined the relative strength of parties and the
-chances of war. The Peloponnesians were a self-working population,
-with few slaves, and without wealth, either private or public;
-they had no means of carrying on distant or long-continued war:
-they were ready to expose their persons, but not at all ready to
-contribute from their very narrow means:[189] in a border-war, or a
-single land battle, they were invincible, but for systematic warfare
-against a power like Athens, they had neither competent headship,
-nor habits of concert and punctuality, nor money to profit by
-opportunities, always rare and accidental, for successful attack.
-They might, perhaps, establish a fortified post in Attica, but it
-would do little serious mischief; while at sea, their inferiority and
-helplessness would be complete, and the irresistible Athenian navy
-would take care to keep it so. Nor would they be able to reckon on
-tempting away the able foreign seamen from Athenian ships by means
-of funds borrowed from Olympia or Delphi:[190] for besides that the
-mariners of the dependent islands would find themselves losers even
-by accepting a higher pay, with the certainty of Athenian vengeance
-afterwards,—Athens herself would suffice to man her fleet in case
-of need, with her own citizens and metics: she had within her own
-walls steersmen and mariners better as well as more numerous than
-all Greece besides. There was but one side on which Athens was
-vulnerable: Attica unfortunately was not an island,—it was exposed
-to invasion and ravage. To this the Athenians must submit, without
-committing the imprudence of engaging a land battle to avert it: they
-had abundant lands out of Attica, insular as well as continental, to
-supply their wants, and they could in their turn, by means of their
-navy, ravage the Peloponnesian territories, whose inhabitants had no
-subsidiary lands to recur to.[191]
-
-  [189] Thucyd. i, 141. αὐτουργοί τε γάρ εἰσι Πελοποννήσιοι, καὶ
-  οὔτε ἰδίᾳ οὔτε ἐν κοινῷ χρήματά ἐστιν αὐτοῖς· ἔπειτα χρονίων
-  πολέμων καὶ διαποντίων ἄπειροι, διὰ τὸ βραχέως αὐτοὶ ἐπ᾽ ἀλλήλους
-  ὑπὸ πενίας ἐπιφέρειν.
-
-  [190] Thucyd. i, 143. εἴτε καὶ κινήσαντες τῶν Ὀλυμπίασιν ἢ
-  Δελφοῖς χρημάτων μισθῷ μείζονι πειρῷντο ἡμῶν ὑπολαβεῖν τοὺς
-  ξένους τῶν ναυτῶν, μὴ ὄντων μὲν ἡμῶν ἀντιπάλων, ἐσβάντων αὐτῶν
-  τε καὶ τῶν μετοίκων, δεινὸν ἂν ἦν· νῦν δὲ τόδε τε ὑπάρχει, καὶ,
-  ὅπερ κράτιστον, κυβερνήτας ἔχομεν πολίτας καὶ τὴν ἄλλην ὑπηρεσίαν
-  πλείους καὶ ἀμείνους ἢ πᾶσα ἡ ἄλλη Ἑλλάς.
-
-  This is in reply to those hopes which we know to have been
-  conceived by the Peloponnesian leaders, and upon which the
-  Corinthian speaker in the Peloponnesian congress had dwelt (i,
-  121). Doubtless Periklês would be informed of the tenor of all
-  these public demonstrations at Sparta.
-
-  [191] Thucyd. i, 141, 142, 143.
-
-“Mourn not for the loss of land and houses (continued the orator):
-reserve your mourning for men: houses and land acquire not men, but
-men acquire them.[192] Nay, if I thought I could prevail upon you, I
-would exhort you to march out and ravage them yourselves, and thus
-show to the Peloponnesians that, for them at least, ye will not
-truckle. And I could exhibit many further grounds for confidently
-anticipating success, if ye will only be willing not to aim at
-increased dominion when we are in the midst of war, and not to take
-upon yourselves new self-imposed risks; for I have ever been more
-afraid of our own blunders than of the plans of our enemy.[193] But
-these are matters for future discussion, when we come to actual
-operations: for the present let us dismiss these envoys with the
-answer: That we will permit the Megarians to use our markets and
-harbors, if the Lacedæmonians on their side will discontinue their
-(xenêlasy or) summary expulsions of ourselves and our allies from
-their own territory,—for there is nothing in the truce to prevent
-either one or the other: that we will leave the Grecian cities
-autonomous, if we _had_ them as autonomous at the time when the truce
-was made,—and as soon as the Lacedæmonians shall grant to _their_
-allied cities autonomy such as each of them shall freely choose, not
-such as is convenient to Sparta: that while we are ready to give
-satisfaction according to the truce, we will not begin war, but will
-repel those who do begin it. Such is the reply at once just and
-suitable to the dignity of this city. We ought to make up our minds
-that war is inevitable: the more cheerfully we accept it, the less
-vehement shall we find our enemies in their attack: and where the
-danger is greatest, there also is the final honor greatest, both for
-a state and for a private citizen. Assuredly our fathers, when they
-bore up against the Persians,—having no such means as we possess
-to start from, and even compelled to abandon all that they did
-possess,—both repelled the invader and brought matters forward to our
-actual pitch, more by advised operation than by good fortune, and by
-a daring courage greater than their real power. We ought not to fall
-short of them: we must keep off our enemies in every way, and leave
-an unimpaired power to our successors.”[194]
-
-  [192] Thucyd. i, 143. τήν τε ὀλόφυρσιν μὴ οἰκιῶν καὶ γῆς
-  ποιεῖσθαι, ἀλλὰ τῶν σωμάτων· οὐ γὰρ τάδε τοὺς ἄνδρας, ἀλλ᾽ οἱ
-  ἄνδρες ταῦτα κτῶνται.
-
-  [193] Thucyd. i, 144. πολλὰ δὲ καὶ ἄλλα ἔχω ἐς ἐλπίδα τοῦ
-  περιέσεσθαι, ἢν ἐθέλητε ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι ἅμα πολεμοῦντες,
-  καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους μὴ προστίθεσθαι· μᾶλλον γὰρ πεφόβημαι
-  τὰς οἰκείας ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίας ἢ τὰς τῶν ἐναντίων διανοίας.
-
-  [194] Thucyd. i, 143, 144.
-
-These animating encouragements of Periklês carried with them the
-majority of the assembly, so that answer was made to the envoys, such
-as he recommended, on each of the particular points in debate. It was
-announced to them, moreover, on the general question of peace or
-war, that the Athenians were prepared to discuss all the grounds of
-complaint against them, pursuant to the truce, by equal and amicable
-arbitration,—but that they would do nothing under authoritative
-demand.[195] With this answer the envoys returned to Sparta, and an
-end was put to negotiation.
-
-  [195] Thucyd. i, 145. καὶ τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις ἀπεκρίναντο τῇ
-  ἐκείνου γνώμῃ, καθ᾽ ἕκαστά τε ὡς ἔφρασε, καὶ τὸ ξύμπαν οὐδὲν
-  κελευόμενοι ποιήσειν, δίκῃ δὲ κατὰ τὰς ξυνθήκας ἑτοῖμοι εἶναι
-  διαλύεσθαι περὶ τῶν ἐγκλημάτων ἐπὶ ἴσῃ καὶ ὁμοίᾳ.
-
-It seems evident, from the account of Thucydidês, that the Athenian
-public was not brought to this resolution without much reluctance,
-and great fear of the consequences, especially destruction of
-property in Attica: and that a considerable minority took opposition
-on the Megarian decree,—the ground skilfully laid by Sparta for
-breaking the unanimity of her enemy, and strengthening the party
-opposed to Periklês. But we may also decidedly infer from the same
-historian,—especially from the proceedings of Corinth and Sparta,
-as he sets them forth,—that Athens could not have avoided the war
-without such an abnegation, both of dignity and power as no nation
-under any government will ever submit to, and as would have even
-left her without decent security for her individual rights. To
-accept the war tendered to her, was a matter not merely of prudence
-but of necessity: the tone of exaction assumed by the Spartan
-envoys would have rendered concession a mere evidence of weakness
-and fear. As the account of Thucydidês bears out the judgment of
-Periklês on this important point,[196] so it also shows us that
-Athens was not less in the right upon the received principles of
-international dealing. It was not Athens, as the Spartans[197]
-themselves afterwards came to feel, but her enemies, who broke the
-provisions of the truce, by encouraging the revolt of Potidæa, and
-by promising invasion of Attica: it was not Athens, but her enemies,
-who, after thus breaking the truce, made a string of exorbitant
-demands, in order to get up as good a case as possible for war.[198]
-The case made out by Periklês, justifying the war on grounds both
-of right and prudence, is in all its main points borne out by the
-impartial voice of Thucydidês. And though it is perfectly true,
-that the ambition of Athens had been great, and the increase of her
-power marvellous, during the thirty-five years between the repulse
-of Xerxes and the thirty years’ truce,—it is not less true that by
-that truce she lost very largely, and that she acquired nothing to
-compensate such loss during the fourteen years between the truce and
-the Korkyræan alliance. The policy of Periklês had not been one of
-foreign aggrandizement, or of increasing vexation and encroachment
-towards other Grecian powers: even the Korkyræan alliance was noway
-courted by him, and was in truth accepted with paramount regard to
-the obligations of the existing truce: while the circumstances out
-of which that alliance grew, testify a more forward ambition on the
-part of Corinth than on that of Athens, to appropriate to herself
-the Korkyræan naval force. It is common to ascribe the Peloponnesian
-war to the ambition of Athens, but this is a partial view of the
-case. The aggressive sentiment, partly fear, partly hatred, was on
-the side of the Peloponnesians, who were not ignorant that Athens
-desired the continuance of peace, but were resolved not to let her
-stand as she was at the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce; it was
-their purpose to attack her and break down her empire, as dangerous,
-wrongful, and anti-Hellenic. The war was thus partly a contest of
-principle, involving the popular proclamation of the right of every
-Grecian state to autonomy, against Athens: partly a contest of power,
-wherein Spartan and Corinthian ambition was not less conspicuous, and
-far more aggressive in the beginning, than Athenian.
-
-  [196] In spite of the contrary view taken by Plutarch, Periklês,
-  c. 31: comparison of Perikl. and Fab. Max. c. 3.
-
-  [197] Thucyd. iv, 21. Οἱ μὲν οὖν Λακεδαιμόνιοι τοσαῦτα εἶπον,
-  νομίζοντες τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἐν τῷ πρὶν χρόνῳ σπονδῶν ἐπιθυμεῖν,
-  σφῶν δὲ ἐναντιουμένων κωλύεσθαι, διδομένης δὲ εἰρήνης ἀσμένως
-  δέξεσθαί τε καὶ τοὺς ἄνδρας ἀποδώσειν.
-
-  See also an important passage (vii, 18) about the feelings of the
-  Spartans. The Spartans thought, says Thucydidês, ἐν τῷ προτέρῳ
-  πολέμῳ (the beginning of the Peloponnesian war) σφέτερον τὸ
-  παρανόμημα μᾶλλον γενέσθαι, ὅτι τε ἐς Πλάταιαν ἦλθον Θηβαῖοι
-  ἐν σπονδαῖς, καὶ εἰρημένον ἐν ταῖς πρότερον ξυνθήκαις ὅπλα μὴ
-  ἐπιφέρειν ἢν δίκας θέλωσι διδόναι, αὐτοὶ οὐχ ὑπήκουον ἐς δίκας
-  προκαλουμένων τῶν Ἀθηναίων· καὶ διὰ τοῦτο εἰκότως δυστυχεῖν τε
-  ἐνόμιζον, etc.
-
-  [198] Thucyd. i, 126. ὅπως σφίσιν ὅτι μεγίστη πρόφασις εἴη τοῦ
-  πολεμεῖν.
-
-Conformably to what is here said, the first blow of the war was
-struck, not by Athens, but against her. After the decisive answer
-given to the Spartan envoys, taken in conjunction with the previous
-proceedings, and the preparations actually going on among the
-Peloponnesian confederacy,—the truce could hardly be said to be still
-in force, though there was no formal proclamation of rupture. A few
-weeks passed in restricted and mistrustful intercourse;[199] though
-individuals who passed the borders did not think it necessary to
-take a herald with them, as in time of actual war. Had the excess of
-ambition been on the side of Athens compared with her enemies, this
-was the time for her to strike the first blow, carrying with it of
-course great probability of success, before their preparations were
-completed. But she remained strictly within the limits of the truce,
-and the disastrous series of mutual aggressions, destined to tear
-in pieces the entrails of Hellas, was opened by her enemy and her
-neighbor.
-
-  [199] Thucyd. i, 146. ἐπεμίγνυντο δ᾽ ὅμως ἐν αὐταῖς καὶ παρ᾽
-  ἀλλήλους ἐφοίτων, ἀκηρύκτως μὲν, ἀνυπόπτως δ᾽ οὔ· σπονδῶν γὰρ
-  ξύγχυσις τὰ γιγνόμενα ἦν, καὶ πρόφασις τοῦ πολεμεῖν.
-
-The little town of Platæa, still hallowed by the memorable victory
-over the Persians, as well as by the tutelary consecration received
-from Pausanias, was the scene of this unforeseen enterprise. It stood
-in Bœotia, immediately north of Kithæron; on the borders of Attica
-on one side, and of the Theban territory on the other, from which it
-was separated by the river Asôpus: the distance between Platæa and
-Thebes being about seventy stadia, or a little more than eight miles.
-Though Bœotian by descent, the Platæans were completely separated
-from the Bœotian league, and in hearty alliance, as well as qualified
-communion of civil rights, with the Athenians, who had protected
-them against the bitter enmity of Thebes, for a period of time now
-nearly three generations. But in spite of this long prescription,
-the Thebans, as chiefs of the Bœotian league, still felt themselves
-wronged by the separation of Platæa: and an oligarchical faction
-of wealthy Platæans espoused their cause,[200] with a view of
-subverting the democratical government of the town, of destroying
-its leaders, their political rivals, and of establishing an
-oligarchy with themselves as the chiefs. Naukleidês, and others
-of this faction, entered into a secret conspiracy with Eurymachus
-and the oligarchy of Thebes: to both it appeared a tempting prize,
-since war was close at hand, to take advantage of this ambiguous
-interval, before watches had been placed, and the precautions of a
-state of war commenced, and to surprise the town of Platæa in the
-night: moreover, a period of religious festival was chosen, in order
-that the population might be most completely off their guard.[201]
-Accordingly, on a rainy night towards the close of March 431
-B.C.,[202] a body of rather more than three hundred Theban hoplites,
-commanded by two of the Bœotarchs, Pythangelus, and Diemporus, and
-including Eurymachus in the ranks, presented themselves at the gate
-of Platæa during the first sleep of the citizens: Naukleidês and his
-partisans opened the gate and conducted them to the agora, which they
-reached and occupied in military order without the least resistance.
-The best part of the Theban military force was intended to arrive at
-Platæa by break of day, in order to support them.[203]
-
-  [200] Thucyd. ii, 2. βουλόμενοι ἰδίας ἕνεκα δυνάμεως ἄνδρας τε
-  τῶν πολιτῶν τοὺς σφίσιν ὑπεναντίους διαφθεῖραι, καὶ τὴν πόλιν τοῖς
-  Θηβαίοις προσποιῆσαι: also iii, 65. ἄνδρες οἱ πρῶτοι καὶ χρήμασι
-  καὶ γένει, etc.
-
-  [201] Thucyd. iii, 56.
-
-  [202] Thucyd. ii, 2. ἅμα ἦρι ἀρχομένῳ—seems to indicate a period
-  rather before than after the first of April: we may consider
-  the bisection of the Thucydidean year into θέρος and χείμων as
-  marked by the equinoxes. His summer and winter are each a half
-  of the year (Thucyd. v, 20), though Poppo erroneously treats the
-  Thucydidean winter as only four months (Poppo, Proleg. i, c. v,
-  p. 72, and ad Thucyd. ii, 2: see F. W. Ullrich, Beiträge zur
-  Erklärung des Thukydidês, p. 32, Hamburg, 1846).
-
-  [203] Thucyd. ii, 2-5. ~θέμενοι δὲ ἐς τὴν ἀγορὰν τὰ ὅπλα~ ... καὶ
-  ἀνεῖπεν ὁ κήρυξ, εἴτις βούλεται κατὰ τὰ πάτρια τῶν πάντων Βοιωτῶν
-  ξυμμαχεῖν, ~τίθεσθαι παρ᾽ αὑτοὺς τὰ ὅπλα~.
-
-  Dr. Arnold has a note upon this passage, explaining τίθεσθαι, or
-  θέσθαι τὰ ὅπλα, to mean, “piling the arms,” or getting rid of
-  their spears and shields by piling them all in one or more heaps.
-  He says: “The Thebans, therefore, as usual on a halt, proceeded
-  to pile their arms, and by inviting the Platæans to come and pile
-  theirs with them, they meant that they should come in arms from
-  their several houses to join them, and thus naturally pile their
-  spears and shields with those of their friends, to be taken up
-  together with theirs, whenever there should be occasion either to
-  march or to fight.” The same explanation of the phrase had before
-  been given by Wesseling and Larcher, ad Herodot. ix, 52; though
-  Bähr on the passage is more satisfactory.
-
-  Both Poppo and Göller also sanction Dr. Arnold’s explanation: yet
-  I cannot but think that it is unsuitable to the passage before
-  us, as well as to several other passages in which τίθεσθαι τὰ
-  ὅπλα occurs: there may be other passages in which it will suit,
-  but as a general explanation it appears to me inadmissible. In
-  most cases, the words mean “_armati consistere_,”—to ground
-  arms,—to maintain rank, resting the spear and shield (see Xenoph.
-  Hellen. ii, 4, 12) upon the ground. In the incident now before
-  us, the Theban hoplites enter Platæa, a strange town, with the
-  population decidedly hostile, and likely to be provoked more
-  than ever by this surprise, add to which, that it is pitch dark,
-  and a rainy night. Is it likely, that the first thing which they
-  do will be to pile their arms? The darkness alone would render
-  it a slow and uncertain operation to resume the arms: so that
-  when the Platæans attacked them, as they did, quite suddenly
-  and unexpectedly, and while it was yet dark, the Thebans would
-  have been—upon Dr. Arnold’s supposition—altogether defenceless
-  and unarmed (see ii, 3. ~προσέβαλόν τε εὐθὺς~—οἱ Πλαταιῆς—καὶ ἐς
-  χεῖρας ᾔεσαν ~κατὰ τάχος~) which certainly they were not. Dr.
-  Arnold’s explanation may suit the case of the soldier in camp,
-  but certainly not that of the soldier in presence of an enemy, or
-  under circumstances of danger: the difference of the two will be
-  found illustrated in Xenophon, Hellenic. ii, 4, 5, 6.
-
-  Nor do the passages referred to by Dr. Arnold himself bear
-  out his interpretation of the phrase τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα. That
-  interpretation is, moreover, not conveniently applicable either
-  to Thucyd. vii, 3, or viii, 25,—decidedly inapplicable to iv,
-  68 (θησόμενον τὰ ὅπλα), in the description of the night attack
-  on Megara, very analogous to this upon Platæa,—and not less
-  decidedly inapplicable to two passages of Xenophon’s Anabasis, i,
-  5, 14; iv, 3, 7.
-
-  Schneider, in the Lexicon appended to his edition of Xenophon’s
-  Anabasis, has a long but not very distinct article upon τίθεσθαι
-  τὰ ὅπλα.
-
-Naukleidês and his friends, following the instincts of political
-antipathy, were eager to conduct the Thebans to the houses of their
-opponents, the democratical leaders, in order that the latter might
-be seized or despatched. But to this the Thebans would not consent:
-believing themselves now masters of the town, and certain of a
-large reinforcement at daylight, they thought they could overawe
-the citizens into an apparently willing acquiescence in their
-terms, without any actual violence: they wished, moreover, rather
-to soften and justify, than to aggravate, the gross public wrong
-already committed. Accordingly their herald was directed to invite,
-by public proclamation, all Platæans who were willing to return to
-their ancient sympathies of race, and to the Bœotian confederacy,
-that they should come forth and take station as brethren in the
-armed ranks of the Thebans. And the Platæans, suddenly roused from
-sleep by the astounding news that their great enemy was master of
-the town, supposed amidst the darkness that the number of assailants
-was far greater than the reality: so that in spite of their strong
-attachment to Athens, they thought their case hopeless, and began
-to open negotiations. But as they soon found out, in spite of the
-darkness, as the discussion proceeded, that the real numbers of the
-Thebans were not greater than could be dealt with,—they speedily took
-courage and determined to attack them; establishing communication
-with each other by breaking through the walls of their private
-houses, in order that they might not be detected in moving about in
-the streets or ways,[204]—and forming barricades with wagons across
-such of these ways as were suitable. A little before daybreak, when
-their preparations were fully completed, they sallied forth from
-their houses to the attack, and immediately came to close quarters
-with the Thebans. The latter, still fancying themselves masters of
-the town, and relying upon a satisfactory close to the discussions
-when daylight should arrive, now found themselves surprised in their
-turn, and under great disadvantages: for they had been out all night
-under a heavy rain,—they were in a town which they did not know,
-with narrow, crooked, and muddy ways, such as they would have had
-difficulty in finding even by daylight. Nevertheless, on finding
-themselves suddenly assailed, they got as well as they could into
-close order, and repelled the Platæans two or three times: but the
-attack was still repeated, with loud shouts, while the women also
-screamed, and howled, and threw tiles from the flat-roofed houses,
-until at length the Thebans became dismayed and broken. But flight
-was not less difficult than resistance; for they could not find their
-way out of the city, and even the gate by which they entered, the
-only one open, had been closed by a Platæan citizen, who thrust into
-it the point of a javelin in place of the peg whereby the bar was
-commonly held fast. Dispersed about the city, and pursued by men who
-knew every inch of the ground, some ran to the top of the wall, and
-jumped down on the outside, most of them perished in the attempt,—a
-few others escaped through an unguarded gate, by cutting through the
-bar with a hatchet which a woman gave to them,—while the greater
-number of them ran into the open doors of a large barn or building
-in conjunction with the wall, mistaking these doors for an approach
-to the town-gate. They were here blocked up without the chance of
-escape, and the Platæans at first thought of setting fire to the
-building: but at length a convention was concluded, whereby they, as
-well as all the other Thebans in the city, agreed to surrender at
-discretion.[205]
-
-  [204] Thucyd. ii, 3. ἐδόκει οὖν ἐπιχειρητέα εἶναι, καὶ
-  ξυνελέγοντο διορύσσοντες τοὺς κοινοὺς τοίχους παρ᾽ ἀλλήλους, ὅπως
-  μὴ διὰ τῶν ὁδῶν φανεροὶ ὦσιν ἰόντες, ἁμάξας δὲ ἄνευ τῶν ὑποζυγίων
-  ἐς τὰς ὁδοὺς καθίστασαν, ἵν᾽ ἀντὶ τείχους ᾖ, καὶ τἄλλα ἐξήρτυον,
-  etc.
-
-  I may be permitted to illustrate this by a short extract from the
-  letter of M. Marrast, mayor of Paris, to the National Assembly,
-  written during the formidable insurrection of June 25, 1848, in
-  that city, and describing the proceedings of the insurgents:
-  “Dans la plupart des rues longues, étroites et couvertes de
-  barricades qui vont de l’Hôtel de Ville à la Rue St. Antoine,
-  la garde nationale mobile, et la troupe de ligne, ont dû faire
-  le siège de chaque maison; et ce qui rendait l’œuvre plus
-  périlleuse, c’est que les insurgés avaient établi, de chaque
-  maison à chaque maison, des communications intérieures qui
-  reliaient les maisons entre elles, en sorte qu’ils pouvaient se
-  rendre, comme par une allée couverte, d’un point éloigné jusqu’au
-  centre d’une suite de barricades qui les protégeaient.” (Lettre
-  publiée dans le journal, le National, June 26, 1848).
-
-  [205] Thucyd. ii, 3, 4.
-
-Had the reinforcements from Thebes arrived at the expected hour,
-this disaster would have been averted. But the heavy rain and dark
-night retarded their whole march, while the river Asôpus was so
-much swollen as to be with difficulty fordable: so that before they
-reached the gates of Platæa, their comrades within were either slain
-or captured. Which fate had befallen them, the Thebans without could
-not tell: but they immediately resolved to seize what they could
-find, persons as well as property, in the Platæan territory,—no
-precautions having been taken as yet to guard against the perils
-of war by keeping within the walls,—in order that they might have
-something to exchange for such Thebans as were prisoners. Before this
-step could be executed, however, a herald came forth from the town
-to remonstrate with them upon their unholy proceeding in having so
-flagrantly violated the truce, and especially to warn them not to
-do any wrong without the walls. If they retired without inflicting
-farther mischief, their prisoners within should be given up to
-them; if otherwise, these prisoners would be slain immediately. A
-convention having been concluded and sworn to on this basis, the
-Thebans retired without any active measures. Such at least was the
-Theban account of what preceded their retirement: but the Platæans
-gave a very different statement; denying that they had made any
-categorical promise or sworn any oath,—and affirming that they had
-engaged for nothing, except to suspend any decisive step with regard
-to the prisoners until discussion had been entered into to see if a
-satisfactory agreement could be concluded.
-
-As Thucydidês records both of these statements, without intimating
-to which of the two he himself gave the preference, we may presume
-that both of them found credence with respectable persons. The Theban
-story is undoubtedly the most probable: but the Platæans appear to
-have violated the understanding, even upon their own construction
-of it. For no sooner had the Thebans retired, than they (the
-Platæans) hastily brought in their citizens and the best of their
-movable property within the walls, and then slew all their prisoners
-forthwith; without even entering into the formalities of negotiation.
-The prisoners thus put to death, among whom was Eurymachus himself,
-were one hundred and eighty in number.[206]
-
-  [206] Thucyd. ii, 5, 6; Herodot. vii, 233. Demosthenês (cont.
-  Neæram, c. 25, p. 1379) agrees with Thucydidês in the statement
-  that the Platæans slew their prisoners. From whom Diodorus
-  borrowed his inadmissible story, that the Platæans gave up their
-  prisoners to the Thebans, I cannot tell (Diodor. xii, 41, 42).
-
-  The passage in this oration against Neæra is also curious,
-  both as it agrees with Thucydidês on many points, and as it
-  differs from him on several others: in some sentences, even
-  the words agree with Thucydidês (ὁ γὰρ Ἀσωπὸς ποταμὸς μέγας
-  ἐῤῥύη, καὶ διαβῆναι οὐ ῥᾴδιον ἦν, etc.: compare Thucyd. ii,
-  2); while on other points there is discrepancy. Demosthenês—or
-  the Pseudo-Demosthenês—states that Archidamus, king of Sparta,
-  planned the surprise of Platæa,—that the Platæans only
-  discovered, when morning dawned, the small real number of the
-  Thebans in the town,—that the larger body of Thebans, when they
-  at last did arrive near Platæa after the great delay in their
-  march, were forced to retire by the numerous force arriving from
-  Athens, and that the Platæans then destroyed their prisoners
-  in the town. Demosthenês mentions nothing about any convention
-  between the Platæans and the Thebans without the town, respecting
-  the Theban prisoners within.
-
-  On every point on which the narrative of Thucydidês differs from
-  that of Demosthenês, that of the former stands out as the most
-  coherent and credible.
-
-On the first entrance of the Theban assailants at night, a messenger
-had started from Platæa to carry the news to Athens: a second
-messenger followed him to report the victory and capture of the
-prisoners, as soon as it had been achieved. The Athenians sent back
-a herald without delay, enjoining the Platæans to take no step
-respecting the prisoners until consultation should be had with
-Athens. Periklês doubtless feared what turned out to be the fact:
-for the prisoners had been slain before his messenger could arrive.
-Apart from the terms of the convention, and looking only to the
-received practice of ancient warfare, their destruction could not be
-denounced as unusually cruel, though the Thebans, when fortune was
-in their favor, chose to designate it as such,[207]—but impartial
-contemporaries would notice, and the Athenians in particular would
-deeply lament, the glaring impolicy of the act. For Thebes, the best
-thing of all would of course be to get back her captured citizens
-forthwith: but next to that, the least evil would be to hear that
-they had been put to death. In the hands of the Athenians and
-Platæans, they would have been the means of obtaining from her much
-more valuable sacrifices than their lives, considered as a portion of
-Theban power, were worth: so strong was the feeling of sympathy for
-imprisoned citizens, several of them men of rank and importance,—as
-may be seen by the past conduct of Athens after the battle of
-Korôneia, and by that of Sparta, hereafter to be recounted, after the
-taking of Sphakteria. The Platæans, obeying the simple instinct of
-wrath and vengeance, threw away this great political advantage, which
-the more long-sighted Periklês would gladly have turned to account.
-
-  [207] Thucyd. iii, 66.
-
-At the time when the Athenians sent their herald to Platæa, they also
-issued orders for seizing all Bœotians who might be found in Attica;
-while they lost no time in sending forces to provision Platæa, and
-placing it on the footing of a garrison town, removing to Athens
-the old men and sick, with the women and children. No complaint
-or discussion, respecting the recent surprise, was thought of by
-either party: it was evident to both that the war was now actually
-begun,—that nothing was to be thought of except the means of carrying
-it on,—and that there could be no farther personal intercourse
-except under the protection of heralds.[208] The incident at Platæa,
-striking in all its points, wound up both parties to the full pitch
-of warlike excitement. A spirit of resolution and enterprise was
-abroad everywhere, especially among those younger citizens, yet
-unacquainted with the actual bitterness of war, whom the long truce
-but just broken had raised up; and the contagion of high-strung
-feeling spread from the leading combatants into every corner of
-Greece, manifesting itself partly in multiplied oracles, prophecies,
-and religious legends adapted to the moment:[209] a recent earthquake
-at Delos, too, as well as various other extraordinary physical
-phenomena, were construed as prognostics of the awful struggle
-impending,—a period fatally marked not less by eclipses, earthquakes,
-drought, famine, and pestilence, than by the direct calamities of
-war.[210]
-
-  [208] Thucyd. ii, 1-6.
-
-  [209] Thucyd. ii. 7, 8. ἥ τε ἄλλη Ἑλλὰς ~πᾶσα μετέωρος ἦν~,
-  ξυνιουσῶν τῶν πρώτων πόλεων.
-
-  [210] Thucyd. i, 23.
-
-An aggression so unwarrantable as the assault on Platæa tended
-doubtless to strengthen the unanimity of the Athenian assembly, to
-silence the opponents of Periklês, and to lend additional weight
-to those frequent exhortations,[211] whereby the great statesman
-was wont to sustain the courage of his countrymen. Intelligence
-was sent round to forewarn and hearten up the numerous allies of
-Athens, tributary as well as free: the latter, with the exception
-of the Thessalians, Akarnanians, and Messenians at Naupaktus, were
-all insular,—Chians, Lesbians, Korkyræans, and Zakynthians: to the
-island of Kephallênia also they sent envoys, but it was not actually
-acquired to their alliance until a few months afterwards.[212] With
-the Akarnanians, too, their connection had only been commenced a
-short time before, seemingly during the preceding summer, arising
-out of the circumstances of the town of Argos in Amphilochia. That
-town, situated on the southern coast of the Ambrakian gulf, was
-originally occupied by a portion of the Amphilochi, a non-Hellenic
-tribe, whose lineage apparently was something intermediate between
-Akarnanians and Epirots. Some colonists from Ambrakia, having been
-admitted as co-residents with the Amphilochian inhabitants of this
-town, presently expelled them, and retained the town with its
-territory exclusively for themselves. The expelled inhabitants,
-fraternizing with their fellow tribes around as well as with the
-Akarnanians, looked out for the means of restoration; and in order
-to obtain it, invited the assistance of Athens. Accordingly, the
-Athenians sent an expedition of thirty triremes, under Phormio, who,
-joining the Amphilochians and Akarnanians, attacked and carried
-Argos, reduced the Ambrakiots to slavery, and restored the town to
-the Amphilochians and Akarnanians. It was on this occasion that the
-alliance of the Akarnanians with Athens was first concluded, and
-that their personal attachment to the Athenian admiral, Phormio,
-commenced.[213]
-
-  [211] Thucyd. ii, 13. ἅπερ καὶ πρότερον, etc., ἔλεγε δὲ καὶ ἄλλα,
-  ~οἷάπερ εἰώθει~, Περικλῆς ἐς ἀπόδειξιν τοῦ περιέσεσθαι τῷ πολέμῳ.
-
-  [212] Thucyd. ii, 7, 22, 30.
-
-  [213] Thucyd. ii, 68. The time at which this expedition of
-  Phormio and the capture of Argos happened, is not precisely
-  marked by Thucydidês. But his words seem to imply that it was
-  before the commencement of the war, as Poppo observes. Phormio
-  was sent to Chalkidikê about October or November 432 B.C. (i,
-  64); and the expedition against Argos probably occurred between
-  that event and the naval conflict of Korkyræans and Athenians
-  against Corinthians with their allies, Ambrakiots included,—which
-  conflict had happened in the preceding spring.
-
-The numerous subjects of Athens, whose contributions stood embodied
-in the annual tribute, were distributed all over and around the
-Ægean, including all the islands north of Krete, with the exception
-of Melos and Thera.[214] Moreover, the elements of force collected
-in Athens itself, were fully worthy of the metropolis of so great
-an empire. Periklês could make a report to his countrymen of three
-hundred triremes fit for active service; twelve hundred horsemen and
-horse-bowmen; sixteen hundred bowmen; and the great force of all,
-not less than twenty-nine thousand hoplites,—mostly citizens, but
-in part also metics. The chosen portion of these hoplites, both as
-to age and as to equipment, were thirteen thousand in number; while
-the remaining sixteen thousand, including the elder and younger
-citizens and the metics, did garrison-duty on the walls of Athens
-and Peiræus,—on the long line of wall which connected Athens both
-with Peiræus and Phalêrum,—and in the various fortified posts both
-in and out of Attica. In addition to these large military and naval
-forces, the city possessed in the acropolis, an accumulated treasure
-of coined silver amounting to not less than six thousand talents,
-or about one million four hundred thousand pounds, derived from
-annual laying by of tribute from the allies and perhaps of other
-revenues besides: the treasure had at one time been as large as nine
-thousand seven hundred talents, or about two million two hundred
-and thirty thousand pounds, but the cost of the recent religious
-and architectural decorations at Athens, as well as at the siege of
-Potidæa, had reduced it to six thousand. Moreover, the acropolis
-and the temples throughout the city were rich in votive offerings,
-deposits, sacred plate, and silver implements for the processions
-and festivals, etc., to an amount estimated at more than five
-hundred talents; while the great statue of the goddess recently
-set up by Pheidias in the Parthenon, composed of ivory and gold,
-included a quantity of the latter metal not less than forty talents
-in weight,—equal in value to more than four hundred talents of
-silver,—and all of it go arranged that it could be taken off from the
-statue at pleasure. In alluding to these sacred valuables among the
-resources of the state, Periklês spoke of them only as open to be so
-applied in case of need, with the firm resolution of replacing them
-during the first season of prosperity, just as the Corinthians had
-proposed to borrow from Delphi and Olympia. Besides the hoard thus
-actually in hand, there came in a large annual revenue, amounting,
-under the single head of tribute from the subject allies, to six
-hundred talents, equal to about one hundred and thirty-eight thousand
-pounds; besides all other items,[215] making up a general total of at
-least one thousand talents, or about two hundred and thirty thousand
-pounds.
-
-  [214] Thucyd. ii, 9.
-
-  [215] Thucyd. ii, 13; Xenophon, Anabas. vii, 4.
-
-To this formidable catalogue of means for war were to be added other
-items not less important, but which did not admit of being weighed
-and numbered; the unrivalled maritime skill and discipline of the
-seamen,—the democratical sentiment, alike fervent and unanimous,
-of the general mass of citizens,—and the superior development
-of directing intelligence. And when we consider that the enemy
-had indeed on his side an irresistible land-force, but scarcely
-anything else,—few ships, no trained seamen, no funds, no powers of
-combination or headship,—we may be satisfied that there were ample
-materials for an orator like Periklês to draw an encouraging picture
-of the future. He could depict Athens as holding Peloponnesus under
-siege by means of her navy and a chain of insular posts;[216] and
-he could guarantee success[217] as the sure reward of persevering,
-orderly, and well-considered exertion, combined with firm endurance
-under a period of temporary but unavoidable suffering; and combined
-too with another condition hardly less difficult for Athenian temper
-to comply with,—abstinence from seductive speculations of distant
-enterprise, while their force was required by the necessities of war
-near home.[218] But such prospects were founded upon a long-sighted
-calculation, looking beyond immediate loss, and therefore likely to
-take less hold of the mind of an ordinary citizen,—or at any rate,
-to be overwhelmed for the moment by the pressure of actual hardship.
-Moreover, the best which Periklês could promise was a successful
-resistance,—the unimpaired maintenance of that great empire to which
-Athens had become accustomed; a policy purely conservative, without
-any stimulus from the hope of positive acquisition,—and not only
-without the sympathy of other states, but with feelings of simple
-acquiescence on the part of most of her allies,—of strong hostility
-everywhere else.
-
-  [216] Thucyd. ii, 7. ὡς βεβαίως πέριξ τὴν Πελοπόννησον
-  καταπολεμήσοντες. vi, 90. πέριξ τὴν Πελοπόννησον πολιορκοῦντες.
-
-  [217] Thucyd. ii, 65. τοσοῦτον τῷ Περικλεῖ ἐπερίσσευσε τότε
-  ἀφ᾽ ὧν αὐτὸς προέγνω, καὶ πάνυ ἂν ῥᾳδίως περιγενέσθαι τῶν
-  Πελοποννησίων αὐτῶν τῷ πολέμῳ.
-
-  [218] Thucyd. i, 144. ἢν ἐθέλητε ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι ἅμα
-  πολεμοῦντες, καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους μὴ προστίθεσθαι.
-
-On all these latter points the position of the Peloponnesian alliance
-was far more encouraging. So powerful a body of confederates had
-never been got together,—not even to resist Xerxes. Not only the
-entire strength of Peloponnesus—except Argeians and Achæans, both
-of whom were neutral at first, though the Achæan town of Pellênê
-joined even at the beginning, and all the rest subsequently—was
-brought together, but also the Megarians, Bœotians, Phocians,
-Opuntian Lokrians, Ambrakiots, Leukadians, and Anaktorians. Among
-these, Corinth, Megara, Sikyon, Pellênê, Elis, Ambrakia, and Leukas,
-furnished maritime force, while the Bœotians, Phocians, and Lokrians
-supplied cavalry. Many of these cities, however, supplied hoplites
-besides; but the remainder of the confederates furnished hoplites
-only. It was upon this latter force, not omitting the powerful
-Bœotian cavalry, that the main reliance was placed; especially for
-the first and most important operation of the war,—the devastation
-of Attica. Bound together by the strongest common feeling of active
-antipathy to Athens, the whole confederacy was full of hope and
-confidence for this immediate forward march,—so gratifying at once
-both to their hatred and to their love of plunder, by the hand of
-destruction laid upon the richest country in Greece,—and presenting
-a chance even of terminating the war at once, if the pride of the
-Athenians should be so intolerably stung as to provoke them to come
-out and fight. Certainty of immediate success, at the first outset, a
-common purpose to be accomplished and a common enemy to be put down,
-and favorable sympathies throughout Greece,—all these circumstances
-filled the Peloponnesians with sanguine hopes at the beginning of the
-war: and the general persuasion was, that Athens, even if not reduced
-to submission by the first invasion, could not possibly hold out more
-than two or three summers against the repetition of this destructive
-process.[219] Strongly did this confidence contrast with the proud
-and resolute submission to necessity, not without desponding
-anticipations of the result, which reigned among the auditors of
-Periklês.[220]
-
-  [219] Thucyd. vii, 28. ὅσον κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς τοῦ πολέμου, οἱ μὲν
-  ἐνιαυτὸν, οἱ δὲ δύο, οἱ δὲ τριῶν γε ἐτῶν, ~οὐδεὶς πλείω χρόνον
-  ἐνόμιζον περιοίσειν αὐτοὺς~ (the Athenians), ~εἰ οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι
-  ἐσβάλοιεν ἐς τὴν χώραν~: compare v, 14.
-
-  [220] Thucyd. vi, 11. διὰ τὸ ~παρὰ γνώμην αὐτῶν, πρὸς ἃ ἐφοβεῖσθε
-  τὸ πρῶτον, περιγεγενῆσθαι~, καταφρονήσαντες ἤδη καὶ τῆς Σικελίας
-  ἐφίεσθε. It is Nikias, who, in dissuading the expedition against
-  Syracuse, reminds the Athenians of their past despondency at the
-  beginning of the war.
-
-But though the Peloponnesians entertained confident belief of
-carrying their point by simple land-campaign, they did not neglect
-auxiliary preparations for naval and prolonged war. The Lacedæmonians
-resolved to make up the naval force already existing among themselves
-and their allies to an aggregate of five hundred triremes; chiefly
-by the aid of the friendly Dorian cities on the Italian and Sicilian
-coast. Upon each of them a specific contribution was imposed,
-together with a given contingent; orders being transmitted to them to
-make such preparations silently without any immediate declaration of
-hostility against Athens, and even without refusing for the present
-to admit any single Athenian ship into their harbors.[221] Besides
-this, the Lacedæmonians laid their schemes for sending envoys to the
-Persian king, and to other barbaric powers,—a remarkable evidence of
-melancholy revolution in Grecian affairs, when that potentate, whom
-the common arm of Greece had so hardly repulsed a few years before,
-was now invoked to bring the Phenician fleet again into the Ægean for
-the purpose of crushing Athens.
-
-  [221] Thucyd. ii, 7. Diodorus says that the Italian and Sicilian
-  allies were required to furnish two hundred triremes (xii, 41).
-  Nothing of the kind seems to have been actually furnished.
-
-The invasion of Attica, however, without delay, was the primary
-object to be accomplished; and for that the Lacedæmonians issued
-circular orders immediately after the attempted surprise at Platæa.
-Though the vote of the allies was requisite to sanction any war,
-yet when that vote had once been passed, the Lacedæmonians took
-upon themselves to direct all the measures of execution. Two-thirds
-of the hoplites of each confederate city,—apparently two-thirds of
-a certain assumed rating, for which the city was held liable in
-the books of the confederacy, so that the Bœotians and others who
-furnished cavalry were not constrained to send two-thirds of their
-entire force of hoplites,—were summoned to be present on a certain
-day at the isthmus of Corinth, with provisions and equipment for an
-expedition of some length.[222] On the day named, the entire force
-was found duly assembled, and the Spartan king Archidamus, on taking
-the command, addressed to the commanders and principal officers from
-each city a discourse of solemn warning as well as encouragement.
-His remarks were directed chiefly to abate the tone of sanguine
-over-confidence which reigned in the army. After adverting to the
-magnitude of the occasion, the mighty impulse agitating all Greece,
-and the general good wishes which accompanied them against an enemy
-so much hated,—he admonished them not to let their great superiority
-of numbers and bravery seduce them into a spirit of rash disorder.
-“We are about to attack (he said) an enemy admirably equipped in
-every way, so that we may be very certain that they will come out
-and fight,[223] even if they be not now actually on the march to
-meet us at the border, at least when they see us in their territory
-ravaging and destroying their property. All men exposed to any
-unusual indignity become incensed, and act more under passion than
-under calculation, when it is actually brought under their eyes: much
-more will the Athenians do so, accustomed as they are to empire, and
-to ravage the territory of others rather than to see their own so
-treated.”
-
-  [222] Thucyd. ii, 10-12.
-
-  [223] Thucyd. ii, 11. ὥστε χρὴ καὶ πάνυ ἐλπίζειν διὰ μάχης ἰέναι
-  αὐτοὺς, εἰ μὴ καὶ νῦν ὥρμηνται, ἐν ᾧ οὔπω πάρεσμεν, ἀλλ᾽ ὅταν ἐν
-  τῇ γῇ ὁρῶσιν ἡμᾶς δῃοῦντάς τε καὶ τἀκείνων φθείροντας.
-
-  These reports of speeches are of great value as preserving a
-  record of the feelings and expectations of actors, apart from the
-  result of events. What Archidamus so confidently anticipated, did
-  _not_ come to pass.
-
-Immediately on the army being assembled, Archidamus sent Melêsippus
-as envoy to Athens to announce the coming invasion, being still in
-hopes that the Athenians would yield. But a resolution had been
-already adopted, at the instance of Periklês, to receive neither
-herald nor envoy from the Lacedæmonians when once their army was
-on its march: so that Melêsippus was sent back without even being
-permitted to enter the city. He was ordered to quit the territory
-before sunset, with guides to accompany him and prevent him from
-addressing a word to any one. On parting from his guides at the
-border, Melêsippus exclaimed,[224] with a solemnity but too
-accurately justified by the event: “This day will be the beginning of
-many calamities to the Greeks.”
-
-  [224] Thucyd. ii, 12.
-
-Archidamus, as soon as the reception of his last envoy was made known
-to him, continued his march from the isthmus into Attica,—which
-territory he entered by the road of Œnoê, the frontier Athenian
-fortress of Attica towards Bœotia. His march was slow, and he thought
-it necessary to make a regular attack on the fort of Œnoê, which had
-been put into so good a state of defence, that after all the various
-modes of assault, in which the Lacedæmonians were not skilful, had
-been tried in vain,[225]—and after a delay of several days before the
-place,—he was compelled to renounce the attempt.
-
-  [225] Thucyd. ii, 18. πᾶσαν ἰδέαν πειράσαντες οὐκ ἐδύναντο ἑλεῖν.
-  The situation of Œnoê is not exactly agreed upon by topographical
-  inquirers: it was near Eleutheræ, and on one of the roads from
-  Attica into Bœotia (Harpokration, v, Οἰνόη; Herodot. v, 74).
-  Archidamus marched, probably, from the isthmus over Geraneia,
-  and fell into this road in order to receive the junction of the
-  Bœotian contingent after it had crossed Kithæron.
-
-The want of enthusiasm on the part of the Spartan king,—his
-multiplied delays, first at the isthmus, next in the march, and
-lastly before Œnoê,—were all offensive to the fiery impatience of the
-army, who were loud in their murmurs against him. He acted upon the
-calculation already laid down in his discourse at Sparta,[226]—that
-the highly cultivated soil of Attica was to be looked upon as a
-hostage for the pacific dispositions of the Athenians, who would be
-more likely to yield when devastation, though not yet inflicted, was
-nevertheless impending, and at their doors. In this point of view,
-a little delay at the border was no disadvantage; and perhaps the
-partisans of peace at Athens may have encouraged him to hope that it
-would enable them to prevail. Nor can we doubt that it was a moment
-full of difficulty to Periklês at Athens. He had to proclaim to all
-the proprietors in Attica the painful truth, that they must prepare
-to see their lands and houses overrun and ruined; and that their
-persons, families, and movable property, must be brought in for
-safety either to Athens, or to one of the forts in the territory,—or
-carried across to one of the neighboring islands. It would, indeed,
-make a favorable impression when he told them that Archidamus was his
-own family friend, yet only within such limits as consisted with duty
-to the city: in case, therefore, the invaders, while ravaging Attica,
-should receive instruction to spare his own lands, he would forthwith
-make them over to the state as public property: nor was such a case
-unlikely to arise, if not from the personal feeling of Archidamus,
-at least from the deliberate manœuvre of the Spartans, who would
-seek thus to set the Athenian public against Periklês, as they had
-tried to do before by demanding the banishment of the sacrilegious
-Alkmæônid race.[227] But though this declaration would doubtless
-provoke a hearty cheer, the lesson which he had to inculcate, not
-simply for admission as prudent policy, but for actual practice,
-was one revolting alike to the immediate interest, the dignity, and
-the sympathies of his countrymen. To see their lands all ravaged,
-without raising an arm to defend them,—to carry away their wives
-and families, and to desert and dismantle their country residences,
-as they had done during the Persian invasion,—all in the confidence
-of compensation in other ways and of remote ultimate success,—were
-recommendations which, probably, no one but Periklês could have
-hoped to enforce. They were, moreover, the more painful to execute,
-inasmuch as the Athenian citizens had very generally retained the
-habits of residing permanently, not in Athens, but in the various
-demes of Attica; many of which still preserved their temples, their
-festivals, their local customs, and their limited municipal autonomy,
-handed down from the day when they had once been independent of
-Athens.[228] It was but recently that the farming, the comforts,
-and the ornaments, thus distributed over Attica, had been restored
-from the ruin of the Persian invasion, and brought to a higher pitch
-of improvement than ever; yet the fruits of this labor, and the
-scenes of these local affections, were now to be again deliberately
-abandoned to a new aggressor, and exchanged for the utmost privation
-and discomfort. Archidamus might well doubt whether the Athenians
-would nerve themselves up to the pitch of resolution necessary
-for this distressing step, when it came to the actual crisis; and
-whether they would not constrain Periklês against his will to make
-propositions for peace. His delay on the border, and postponement of
-actual devastation, gave the best chance for such propositions being
-made; though as this calculation was not realized, the army raised
-plausible complaints against him for having allowed the Athenians
-time to save so much of their property.
-
-  [226] Thucyd. i, 82; ii, 18.
-
-  [227] Thucyd. ii, 13: compare Tacitus, Histor. v, 23. “Cerealis,
-  insulam Batavorum hostiliter populatus, agros Civilis, _notâ arte
-  ducum_, intactos sinebat.” Also Livy, ii, 39.
-
-  Justin affirms that the Lacedæmonian invaders actually did leave
-  the lands of Periklês uninjured, and that he made them over to
-  the people (iii, 7). Thucydidês does not say whether the case
-  really occurred: see also Polyænus, i, 36.
-
-  [228] Thucyd. ii, 15, 16.
-
-From all parts of Attica the residents flocked within the spacious
-walls of Athens, which now served as shelter for the houseless, like
-Salamis, forty-nine years before: entire families with all their
-movable property, and even with the woodwork of their houses; the
-sheep and cattle were conveyed to Eubœa and the other adjoining
-islands.[229] Though a few among the fugitives obtained dwellings or
-reception from friends, the greater number were compelled to encamp
-in the vacant spaces of the city and Peiræus, or in and around the
-numerous temples of the city,—always excepting the acropolis and
-the eleusinion, which were at all times strictly closed to profane
-occupants; but even the ground called _the Pelasgikon_, immediately
-under the acropolis, which, by an ancient and ominous tradition,
-was interdicted to human abode,[230] was made use of under the
-present necessity. Many, too, placed their families in the towers
-and recesses of the city walls,[231] or in sheds, cabins, tents, or
-even tubs, disposed along the course of the long walls to Peiræus.
-In spite of so serious an accumulation of losses and hardships,
-the glorious endurance of their fathers in the time of Xerxes was
-faithfully copied, and copied too under more honorable circumstances,
-since at that time there had been no option possible; whereas,
-the march of Archidamus might, perhaps, now have been arrested by
-submissions, ruinous indeed to Athenian dignity, yet not inconsistent
-with the security of Athens, divested of her rank and power. Such
-submissions, if suggested as they probably may have been by the party
-opposed to Periklês, found no echo among the suffering population.
-
-  [229] Thucyd. ii, 14.
-
-  [230] Thucyd. ii, 17. καὶ τὸ Πελασγικὸν καλούμενον τὸ ὑπὸ τὴν
-  ἀκρόπολιν, ὃ καὶ ἐπάρατόν τε ἦν μὴ οἰκεῖν καί τι καὶ Πυθικοῦ
-  μαντείου ἀκροτελεύτιον τοιόνδε διεκώλυε, λέγον ὡς ~τὸ Πελασγικὸν
-  ἀργὸν ἄμεινον~, ὅμως ὑπὸ τῆς παραχρῆμα ἀνάγκης ἐξῳκήθη.
-
-  Thucydidês then proceeds to give an explanation of his own for
-  this ancient prophecy, intended to save its credit, as well as
-  to show that his countrymen had not, as some persons alleged,
-  violated any divine mandate by admitting residents into the
-  Pelasgikon. When the oracle said: “The Pelasgikon is better
-  unoccupied,” it did not mean to interdict the occupation of that
-  spot, but to foretell that it would never be occupied until a
-  time of severe calamity arrived. The necessity of occupying it
-  grew only out of national suffering. Such is the explanation
-  suggested by Thucydidês.
-
-  [231] Aristophanês, Equites, 789. οἰκοῦντ᾽ ἐν ταῖς πιθάκναισι
-  κἀν γυπαρίοις καὶ πυργιδίοις. The philosopher Diogenês, in taking
-  up his abode in a tub, had thus examples in history to follow.
-
-After having spent several days before Œnoê without either taking
-the fort or receiving any message from the Athenians, Archidamus
-marched onward to Eleusis and the Thriasian plain,—about the middle
-of June, eighty days after the surprise of Platæa. His army was of
-irresistible force, not less than sixty thousand hoplites, according
-to the statement of Plutarch,[232] or of one hundred thousand,
-according to others: considering the number of constituent allies,
-the strong feeling by which they were prompted, and the shortness
-of the expedition combined with the chance of plunder, even the
-largest of these two numbers is not incredibly great, if we take
-it to include not hoplites only, but cavalry and light-armed also:
-but as Thucydidês, though comparatively full in his account of this
-march, has stated no general total, we may presume that he had
-heard none upon which he could rely. As the Athenians had made no
-movement towards peace, Archidamus anticipated that they would come
-forth to meet him in the fertile plain of Eleusis and Thria, which
-was the first portion of territory that he sat down to ravage: but
-no Athenian force appeared to oppose him, except a detachment of
-cavalry, who were repulsed in a skirmish near the small lakes called
-Rheiti. Having laid waste this plain without any serious opposition,
-Archidamus did not think fit to pursue the straight road which from
-Thria conducted directly to Athens across the ridge of Mount Ægaleos,
-but turned off to the westward, leaving that mountain on his right
-hand until he came to Krôpeia, where he crossed a portion of the
-line of Ægaleos over to Acharnæ. He was here about seven miles from
-Athens, on a declivity sloping down into the plain which stretches
-westerly and northwesterly from Athens, and visible from the city
-walls: and he here encamped, keeping his army in perfect order for
-battle, but at the same time intending to damage and ruin the place
-and its neighborhood. Acharnæ was the largest and most populous of
-all the demes in Attica, furnishing no less than three thousand
-hoplites to the national line, and flourishing as well by its corn,
-vines, and olives, as by its peculiar abundance of charcoal-burning
-from the forests of ilex on the neighboring hills: moreover, if
-we are to believe Aristophanês, the Acharnian proprietors were
-not merely sturdy “hearts of oak,” but peculiarly vehement and
-irritable.[233] It illustrates the condition of a Grecian territory
-under invasion, when we find this great deme, which could not have
-contained less than twelve thousand free inhabitants of both sexes
-and all ages, with at least an equal number of slaves, completely
-deserted. Archidamus calculated that when the Athenians actually saw
-his troops so close to their city, carrying fire and sword over their
-wealthiest canton, their indignation would become uncontrollable, and
-they would march out forthwith to battle. The Acharnian proprietors
-especially, he thought, would be foremost in inflaming this temper,
-and insisting upon protection to their own properties,—or, if the
-remaining citizens refused to march out along with them, they would,
-after having been thus left undefended to ruin, become discontented
-and indifferent to the general weal.[234]
-
-  [232] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33.
-
-  [233] See the Acharneis of Aristophanês, represented in the sixth
-  year of the Peloponnesian war, v, 34, 180, 254, etc.
-
-                    πρεσβῦταί τινες
-    Ἀχαρνικοὶ, στιπτοὶ γέροντες, πρίνινοι,
-    ἀτεράμονες, Μαραθωνομάχαι, σφενδάμνινοι, etc.
-
-  [234] Thucyd. ii, 20.
-
-Though his calculation was not realized, it was, nevertheless,
-founded upon most rational grounds. What Archidamus anticipated
-was on the point of happening, and nothing prevented it, except
-the personal ascendency of Periklês, strained to its very utmost.
-So long as the invading army was engaged in the Thriasian plain,
-the Athenians had some faint hope that it might—like Pleistoanax,
-fourteen years before—advance no farther into the interior: but
-when it came to Acharnæ, within sight of the city walls,—when the
-ravagers were actually seen destroying buildings, fruit-trees, and
-crops, in the plain of Athens, a sight strange to every Athenian
-eye except to those very old men who recollected the Persian
-invasion,—the exasperation of the general body of citizens rose
-to a pitch never before known. The Acharnians first of all, next
-the youthful citizens generally,—became madly clamorous for arming
-and going forth to fight. Knowing well their own great strength,
-but less correctly informed of the superior strength of the enemy,
-they felt confident that victory was within their reach. Groups of
-citizens were everywhere gathered together,[235] angrily debating
-the critical question of the moment; while the usual concomitants of
-excited feeling,—oracles and prophecies of diverse tenor, many of
-them, doubtless, promising success against the enemy at Acharnæ,—were
-eagerly caught up and circulated.
-
-  [235] Thucyd. ii, 21. κατὰ ξυστάσεις δὲ γιγνόμενοι ἐν πολλῇ ἔριδι
-  ἦσαν: compare Euripidês, Herakleidæ, 416; and Andromachê, 1077.
-
-In this inflamed temper of the Athenian mind, Periklês was naturally
-the great object of complaint and wrath. He was denounced as the
-cause of all the existing suffering: he was reviled as a coward for
-not leading out the citizens to fight, in his capacity of general:
-the rational convictions as to the necessity of the war and the only
-practicable means of carrying it on, which his repeated speeches
-had implanted, seemed to be altogether forgotten.[236] This burst
-of spontaneous discontent was, of course, fomented by the numerous
-political enemies of Periklês, and particularly by Kleon,[237] now
-rising into importance as an opposition-speaker; whose talent for
-invective was thus first exercised under the auspices of the high
-aristocratical party, as well as of an excited public. But no
-manifestations, however violent, could disturb either the judgment
-or the firmness of Periklês. He listened, unmoved, to all the
-declarations made against him, and resolutely refused to convene
-any public assembly, or any meeting invested with an authorized
-character, under the present irritated temper of the citizens.[238]
-It appears that he, as general, or rather the board of ten generals,
-among whom he was one, must have been invested constitutionally with
-the power, not only of calling the ekklesia when they thought fit,
-but also of preventing it from meeting,[239] and of postponing even
-those regular meetings which commonly took place at fixed times,
-four times in the prytany. No assembly, accordingly, took place,
-and the violent exasperation of the people was thus prevented from
-realizing itself in any rash public resolution. That Periklês should
-have held firm against this raging force, is but one among the many
-honorable points in his political character; but it is far less
-wonderful than the fact, that his refusal to call the ekklesia was
-efficacious to prevent the ekklesia from being held. The entire body
-of Athenians were now assembled within the walls, and if he refused
-to convoke the ekklesia, they might easily have met in the Pnyx,
-without him; for which it would not have been difficult at such a
-juncture to provide plausible justification. The inviolable respect
-which the Athenian people manifested on this occasion for the forms
-of their democratical constitution—assisted doubtless by their
-long-established esteem for Periklês, yet opposed to an excitement
-alike intense and pervading, and to a demand apparently reasonable,
-in so far as regarded the calling of an assembly for discussion,—is
-one of the most memorable incidents in their history.
-
-  [236] Thucyd. ii, 21. παντί τε τρόπῳ ἀνηρέθιστο ἡ πόλις καὶ τὸν
-  Περικλέα ἐν ὀργῇ εἶχον, καὶ ὧν παρῄνεσε πρότερον ἐμέμνηντο οὐδὲν,
-  ἀλλ᾽ ἐκάκιζον ὅτι στρατηγὸς ὢν οὐκ ἐπεξάγοι, αἴτιόν τε σφίσιν
-  ἐνόμιζον πάντων ὧν ἔπασχον.
-
-  [237] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33.
-
-  [238] Thucyd. ii, 22.
-
-  [239] See Schömann, De Comitiis, c. iv, p. 62. The prytanes (_i.
-  e._ the fifty senators belonging to that tribe whose turn it was
-  to preside at the time), as well as the stratêgi, had the right
-  of convoking the ekklesia: see Thucyd. iv, 118, in which passage,
-  however, they are represented as convoking it in conjunction with
-  the stratêgi: probably a discretion on the point came gradually
-  to be understood as vested in the latter.
-
-While Periklês thus decidedly forbade any general march out for
-battle, he sought to provide as much employment as possible for the
-compressed eagerness of the citizens. The cavalry were sent out,
-together with the Thessalian cavalry their allies, for the purpose
-of restraining the excursions of the enemy’s light troops, and
-protecting the lands near the city from plunder.[240] At the same
-time, he fitted out a powerful expedition, which sailed forth to
-ravage Peloponnesus, even while the invaders were yet in Attica.[241]
-Archidamus, after having remained engaged in the devastation of
-Acharnæ long enough to satisfy himself that the Athenians would not
-hazard a battle, turned away from Athens in a northwesterly direction
-towards the demes between Mount Brilêssus and Mount Parnês, on the
-road passing through Dekeleia. The army continued ravaging these
-districts until their provisions were exhausted, and then quitted
-Attica by the northwestern road near Orôpus, which brought them into
-Bœotia. The Oropians were not Athenians, but dependent upon Athens,
-and the district of Græa, a portion of their territory, was laid
-waste; after which, the army dispersed and retired back to their
-respective homes.[242] It would seem that they quitted Attica towards
-the end of July, having remained in the country between thirty and
-forty days.
-
-  [240] Thucyd. ii, 22. The funeral monument of these slain
-  Thessalians, was among those seen by Pausanias near Athens, on
-  the side of the Academy (Pausan. i, 29, 5).
-
-  [241] Diodorus (xii, 42) would have us believe, that the
-  expedition sent out by Periklês, ravaging the Peloponnesian
-  coast, induced the Lacedæmonians to hurry away their troops out
-  of Attica. Thucydidês gives no countenance to this,—nor is it at
-  all credible.
-
-  [242] Thucyd. ii, 23. The reading Γραϊκὴν, belonging to Γραία,
-  seems preferable to Πειραϊκὴν. Poppo and Göller adopt the
-  former, Dr. Arnold the latter. Græa was a small maritime place
-  in the vicinity of Orôpus (Aristotel. ap. Stephan. Byz. v.
-  Τάναγρα),—known also now as an Attic deme belonging to the tribe
-  Pandionis: this has been discovered for the first time by an
-  inscription published in Professor Ross’s work (Ueber die Demen
-  von Attika, pp. 3-5). Orôpus was not an Attic deme; the Athenian
-  citizens residing in it were probably enrolled as Γραῆς.
-
-Meanwhile, the Athenian expedition under Karkinus, Prôteas, and
-Sokratês, joined by fifty Korkyræan ships, and by some other
-allies, sailed round Peloponnesus, landing in various parts to
-inflict damage, and among other places, at Methônê (Modon) on the
-southwestern peninsula of the Lacedæmonian territory.[243] The
-place, neither strong nor well-garrisoned, would have been carried
-with little difficulty, had not Brasidas the son of Tellis,—a
-gallant Spartan now mentioned for the first time, but destined
-to great celebrity afterwards,—who happened to be on guard at a
-neighboring post, thrown himself into it with one hundred men by
-a rapid movement, before the dispersed Athenian troops could be
-brought together to prevent him. He infused such courage into the
-defenders of the place that every attack was repelled, and the
-Athenians were forced to reëmbark,—an act of prowess which procured
-for him the first public honors bestowed by the Spartans during this
-war. Sailing northward along the western coast of Peloponnesus,
-the Athenians landed again on the coast of Elis, a little south of
-the promontory called Cape Ichthys: they ravaged the territory for
-two days, defeating both the troops in the neighborhood and three
-hundred chosen men from the central Eleian territory. Strong winds
-on a harborless coast now induced the captains to sail with most
-of the troops round Cape Ichthys, in order to reach the harbor of
-Pheia on the northern side of it; while the Messenian hoplites,
-marching by land across the promontory, attacked Pheia and carried
-it by assault. When the fleet arrived, all were reëmbarked,—the full
-force of Elis being under march to attack them: they then sailed
-northward, landing on various other spots to commit devastation,
-until they reached Sollium, a Corinthian settlement on the coast
-of Akarnania. They captured this place, which they handed over to
-the inhabitants of the neighboring Akarnanian town of Palærus,—as
-well as Astakus, from whence they expelled the despot Euarchus, and
-enrolled the town as a member of the Athenian alliance. From hence
-they passed over to Kephallênia, which they were fortunate enough
-also to acquire as an ally of Athens without any compulsion,—with its
-four distinct towns, or districts, Palês, Kranii, Samê, and Pionê.
-These various operations took up near three months from about the
-beginning of July, so that they returned to Athens towards the close
-of September,[244]—the beginning of the winter half of the year,
-according to the distribution of Thucydidês.
-
-  [243] Thucyd. ii, 25; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 34; Justin, iii, 7,
-  5.
-
-  [244] Thucyd. ii, 25-30; Diodor. xii, 43, 44.
-
-Nor was this the only maritime expedition of the summer: thirty
-more triremes, under Kleopompus, were sent through the Euripus to
-the Lokrian coast opposite to the northern part of Eubœa. Some
-disembarkations were made, whereby the Lokrian towns of Thronium
-and Alopê were sacked, and farther devastation inflicted: while a
-permanent garrison was planted, and a fortified post erected, in the
-uninhabited island of Atalanta, opposite to the Lokrian coast, in
-order to restrain privateers from Opus and the other Lokrian towns
-in their excursions against Eubœa.[245] It was farther determined
-to expel the Æginetan inhabitants from Ægina, and to occupy the
-island with Athenian colonists. This step was partly rendered prudent
-by the important position of the island midway between Attica and
-Peloponnesus; but a concurrent motive, and probably the stronger
-motive, was the gratification of ancient antipathy and revenge
-against a people who had been among the foremost in provoking the
-war and in inflicting upon Athens so much suffering. The Æginetans
-with their wives and children were all put on shipboard and landed
-in Peloponnesus,—where the Spartans permitted them to occupy the
-maritime district and town of Thyrea, their last frontier towards
-Argos: some of them, however, found shelter in other parts of Greece.
-The island was made over to a detachment of Athenian kleruchs, or
-citizen proprietors, sent thither by lot.[246]
-
-  [245] Thucyd. ii, 26-32; Diodor. xii, 44.
-
-  [246] Thucyd. ii, 27.
-
-To the sufferings of the Æginetans, which we shall hereafter find
-still more deplorably aggravated, we have to add those of the
-Megarians. Both had been most zealous in kindling the war, but upon
-none did the distress of war fall so heavily. Both probably shared
-the premature confidence felt among the Peloponnesian confederacy,
-that Athens could never hold out more than a year or two,—and were
-thus induced to overlook their own undefended position against her.
-Towards the close of September, the full force of Athens, citizens
-and metics, marched into the Megarid under Periklês, and laid waste
-the greater part of the territory: while they were in it, the hundred
-ships which had been circumnavigating Peloponnesus, having arrived
-at Ægina on their return, went and joined their fellow-citizens in
-the Megarid, instead of going straight home. The junction of the
-two formed the largest Athenian force that had ever yet been seen
-together: there were ten thousand citizen hoplites, independent of
-three thousand others who were engaged in the siege of Potidæa,
-and three thousand metic hoplites,—besides a large number of light
-troops.[247] Against so large a force the Megarians could of course
-make no head, and their territory was all laid waste, even to the
-city walls. For several years of the war, the Athenians inflicted
-this destruction once, and often twice in the same year: a decree was
-proposed in the Athenian ekklesia by Charinus, though perhaps not
-carried, to the effect that the stratêgi every year should swear, as
-a portion of their oath of office,[248] that they would twice invade
-and ravage the Megarid. As the Athenians at the same time kept the
-port of Nisæa blocked up, by means of their superior naval force and
-of the neighboring coast of Salamis, the privations imposed on the
-Megarians became extreme and intolerable.[249] Not merely their corn
-and fruits, but even their garden vegetables near the city, were
-rooted up and destroyed, and their situation seems often to have been
-that of a besieged city hard pressed by famine. Even in the time of
-Pausanias, so many centuries afterwards, the miseries of the town
-during these years were remembered and communicated to him, being
-assigned as the reason why one of their most memorable statues had
-never been completed.[250]
-
-  [247] Thucyd. ii, 31; Diodor. xii, 44.
-
-  [248] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30.
-
-  [249] See the striking picture in the Acharneis of Aristophanês
-  (685-781) of the distressed Megarian selling his hungry children
-  into slavery with their own consent: also Aristoph. Pac. 432.
-
-  The position of Megara, as the ally of Sparta and enemy of
-  Athens, was uncomfortable in the same manner,—though not to the
-  same intense pitch of suffering,—in the war which preceded the
-  battle of Leuktra, near fifty years after this (Demosthen. cont.
-  Neær., p. 1357, c. 12).
-
-  [250] Pausan. i, 40, 3.
-
-To these various military operations of Athens during the course
-of this summer, some other measures of moment are to be added;
-and Thucydidês also notices an eclipse of the sun which modern
-astronomical calculations refer to the third of August: had this
-eclipse happened three months earlier, immediately before the
-entrance of the Peloponnesians into Attica, it might probably have
-been construed as an unfavorable omen, and caused the postponement of
-the scheme. Expecting a prolonged struggle, the Athenians now made
-arrangements for placing Attica in a permanent state of defence,
-both by sea and land; what these arrangements were, we are not told
-in detail, but one of them was sufficiently remarkable to be named
-particularly. They set apart one thousand talents out of the treasure
-in the acropolis as an inviolable reserve, not to be touched except
-on the single contingency of a hostile naval force about to assail
-the city, with no other means at hand to defend it. They further
-enacted, that if any citizen should propose, or any magistrate
-put the question, in the public assembly, to make any different
-application of this reserve, he should be punishable with death.
-Moreover, they resolved every year to keep back one hundred of their
-best triremes, and trierarchs to command and equip them, for the
-same special necessity.[251] It may be doubted whether this latter
-provision was placed under the same stringent sanction, or observed
-with the same rigor, as that concerning the money, which latter was
-not departed from until the twentieth year of the war, after all the
-disasters of the Sicilian expedition, and on the terrible news of the
-revolt of Chios. It was on that occasion that the Athenians first
-repealed the sentence of capital punishment against the proposer of
-this forbidden change, and next appropriated the money to meet the
-then imminent peril of the commonwealth.[252]
-
-  [251] Thucyd. ii, 24.
-
-  [252] Thucyd. viii, 15.
-
-The resolution here taken about this sacred reserve, and the rigorous
-sentence interdicting contrary propositions, is pronounced by Mr.
-Mitford to be an evidence of the indelible barbarism of democratical
-government.[253] But we must recollect, first, that the sentence
-of capital punishment was one which could hardly by possibility
-come into execution; for no citizen would be so mad as to make
-the forbidden proposition, while this law was in force. Whoever
-desired to make it, would first begin by proposing to repeal the
-prohibitory law, whereby he would incur no danger, whether the
-assembly decided in the affirmative or negative; and if he obtained
-an affirmative decision, he would then, and then only, proceed to
-move the reappropriation of the fund. To speak the language of
-English parliamentary procedure, he would first move the suspension
-or abrogation of the standing order whereby the proposition was
-forbidden,—next, he would move the proposition itself: in fact, such
-was the mode actually pursued, when the thing at last came to be
-done.[254] But though the capital sentence could hardly come into
-effect, the proclamation of it _in terrorem_ had a very distinct
-meaning. It expressed the deep and solemn conviction which the
-people entertained of the importance of their own resolution about
-the reserve,—it forewarned all assemblies and all citizens to come,
-of the danger of diverting it to any other purpose,—it surrounded
-the reserve with an artificial sanctity, which forced every man who
-aimed at the reappropriation to begin with a preliminary proposition,
-formidable on the very face of it, as removing a guarantee which
-previous assemblies had deemed of immense value, and opening the
-door to a contingency which they had looked upon as treasonable. The
-proclamation of a lighter punishment, or a simple prohibition without
-any definite sanction whatever, would neither have announced the
-same emphatic conviction, nor produced the same deterring effect.
-The assembly of 431 B.C. could not in any way enact laws which
-subsequent assemblies could not reverse; but it could so frame its
-enactments, in cases of peculiar solemnity, as to make its authority
-strongly felt upon the judgment of its successors, and to prevent
-them from entertaining motions for repeal, except under necessity at
-once urgent and obvious. Far from thinking that the law now passed
-at Athens displayed barbarism, either in the end or in the means, I
-consider it principally remarkable for its cautious and long-sighted
-view of the future,—qualities the exact reverse of barbarism,—and
-worthy of the general character of Periklês, who probably suggested
-it. Athens was just entering into a war which threatened to be of
-indefinite length, and was certain to be very costly. To prevent the
-people from exhausting all their accumulated fund, and to place them
-under a necessity of reserving something against extreme casualties,
-was an object of immense importance. Now the particular casualty,
-which Periklês, assuming him to be the proposer, named as the sole
-condition of touching this one thousand talents, might be considered
-as of all others the most improbable, in the year 431 B.C. So immense
-was then the superiority of the Athenian naval force, that to suppose
-it defeated, and a Peloponnesian fleet in full sail for Peiræus, was
-a possibility which it required a statesman of extraordinary caution
-to look forward to, and which it is truly wonderful that the people
-generally could have been induced to contemplate. Once tied up to
-this purpose, however, the fund lay ready for any other terrible
-emergency: and we shall find the actual employment of it incalculably
-beneficial to Athens, at a moment of the gravest peril, when she
-could hardly have protected herself without some such special
-resource. The people would scarcely have sanctioned so rigorous an
-economy, had it not been proposed to them at a period so early in the
-war that their available reserve was still much larger: but it will
-be forever to the credit of their foresight as well as constancy,
-that they should first have adopted such a precautionary measure, and
-afterwards adhered to it for nineteen years, under severe pressure
-for money, until at length a case arose which rendered farther
-abstinence really, and not constructively, impossible.
-
-  [253] Mitford, Hist. of Greece, ch. xiv, sect. 1, vol. iii, p.
-  100. “Another measure followed, which, taking place at the time
-  when Thucydidês wrote and Periklês spoke, and while Periklês
-  held the principal influence in the administration, strongly
-  marks both the inherent weakness and the indelible barbarism of
-  democratical government. A decree of the people directed....
-  But so little confidence was placed in a decree so important,
-  sanctioned only by the present will of that giddy tyrant, the
-  multitude of Athens, against whose caprices, since the depression
-  of the court of Areopagus, no balancing power remained,—that the
-  denunciation of capital punishment was proposed against whosoever
-  should propose, and whosoever should _concur in_ (?) any decree
-  for the disposal of that money to any other purpose, or in any
-  other circumstances.”
-
-  [254] Thucyd. viii, 15. τὰ δὲ χίλια τάλαντα, ὧν διὰ παντὸς τοῦ
-  πολέμου ἐγλίχοντο μὴ ἅψεσθαι, εὐθὺς ἔλυσαν τὰς ἐπικειμένας ζημίας
-  τῷ εἰπόντι ἢ ἐπιψηφίσαντι, ὑπὸ τῆς παρούσης ἐκπλήξεως, καὶ
-  ἐψηφίσαντο κινεῖν.
-
-To display their force and take revenge by disembarking and ravaging
-parts of Peloponnesus, was doubtless of much importance to Athens
-during this first summer of the war: though it might seem that
-the force so employed was quite as much needed in the conquest of
-Potidæa, which still remained under blockade,—and of the neighboring
-Chalkidians in Thrace, still in revolt. It was during the course
-of this summer that a prospect opened to Athens of subduing these
-towns, through the assistance of Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian
-Thracians. That prince had married the sister of Nymphodôrus, a
-citizen of Abdêra; who engaged to render him, and his son Sadokus,
-allies of Athens. Sent for to Athens and appointed proxenus of Athens
-at Abdêra, which was one of the Athenian subject allies, Nymphodôrus
-made this alliance, and promised, in the name of Sitalkês, that
-a sufficient Thracian force should be sent to aid Athens in the
-reconquest of her revolted towns: the honor of Athenian citizenship
-was at the same time conferred upon Sadokus.[255] Nymphodôrus farther
-established a good understanding between Perdikkas of Macedonia and
-the Athenians, who were persuaded to restore to him Therma, which
-they had before taken from him. The Athenians had thus the promise
-of powerful aid against the Chalkidians and Potidæans: yet the
-latter still held out, with little prospect of immediate surrender.
-Moreover, the town of Astakus, in Akarnania, which the Athenians had
-captured during the summer, in the course of their expedition round
-Peloponnesus, was recovered during the autumn by the deposed despot
-Euarchus, assisted by forty Corinthian triremes and one thousand
-hoplites. This Corinthian armament, after restoring Euarchus, made
-some unsuccessful descents both upon other parts of Akarnania and
-upon the island of Kephallênia: in the latter, they were entrapped
-into an ambuscade, and obliged to return home with considerable
-loss.[256]
-
-  [255] Thucyd. ii, 29.
-
-  [256] Thucyd. ii, 33.
-
-It was towards the close of this autumn also that Periklês, chosen
-by the people for the purpose, delivered the funeral oration at
-the public interment of those warriors who had fallen during the
-campaign. The ceremonies of this public token of respect have already
-been described in a former chapter, on occasion of the conquest of
-Samos: but that which imparted to the present scene an imperishable
-interest, was the discourse of the chosen statesman and orator;
-probably heard by Thucydidês himself, and in substance reproduced. A
-large crowd of citizens and foreigners, of both sexes and all ages,
-accompanied the funeral procession from Athens to the suburb called
-the outer Kerameikus, where Periklês, mounted upon a lofty stage
-prepared for the occasion, closed the ceremony with his address. The
-law of Athens not only provided this public funeral and commemorative
-discourse, but also assigned maintenance at the public expense to
-the children of the slain warriors until they attained military age:
-a practice which was acted on throughout the whole war, though we
-have only the description and discourse belonging to this single
-occasion.[257]
-
-  [257] Thucyd. ii, 34-45. Sometimes, also, the allies of Athens,
-  who had fallen along with her citizens in battle, had a part in
-  the honors of the public burial (Lysias, Orat. Funebr. c. 13).
-
-The eleven chapters of Thucydidês which comprise this funeral speech
-are among the most memorable relics of antiquity; considering
-that under the language and arrangement of the historian,—always
-impressive, though sometimes harsh and peculiar, like the workmanship
-of a powerful mind, misled by a bad or an unattainable model,—we
-possess the substance and thoughts of the illustrious statesman. A
-portion of it, of course, is and must be common-place, belonging to
-all discourses composed for a similar occasion. Yet this is true
-only of a comparatively small portion: much of it is peculiar, and
-every way worthy of Periklês,—comprehensive, rational, and full,
-not less of sense and substance than of earnest patriotism. It thus
-forms a strong contrast with the jejune, though elegant, rhetoric
-of other harangues, mostly[258] not composed for actual delivery;
-and deserves, in comparison with the funeral discourses remaining
-to us from Plato, and the Pseudo-Demosthenês, and even Lysias, the
-honorable distinction which Thucydidês claims for his own history,—an
-ever-living possession, and not a mere show-piece for the moment.
-
-  [258] The critics, from Dionysius of Halikarnassus downward,
-  agree, for the most part, in pronouncing the feeble Λόγος
-  Ἐπιτάφιος, ascribed to Demosthenês, to be not really his. Of
-  those ascribed to Plato and Lysias also, the genuineness has been
-  suspected, though upon far less grounds. The Menexenus, if it be
-  really the work of Plato, however, does not add to his fame: but
-  the harangue of Lysias, a very fine composition, may well be his,
-  and may, perhaps, have been really delivered,—though probably not
-  delivered by him, as he was not a qualified citizen.
-
-  See the general instructions, in Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhetoric. c. 6,
-  pp. 258-268, Reisk, on the contents and composition of a funeral
-  discourse,—Lysias is said to have composed several,—Plutarch,
-  Vit. x, Orator. p. 836.
-
-  Compare, respecting the funeral discourse of Periklês, K. F.
-  Weber, Über die Stand-Rede des Periklês (Darmstadt, 1827);
-  Westermann, Geschichte der Beredsamkeit in Griechenland und Rom.
-  sects. 35, 63, 64; Kutzen, Perikles, als Staatsman, p. 158, sect.
-  12 (Grimma, 1834).
-
-  Dahlmann (Historische Forschungen, vol. i, p. 23) seems to
-  think that the original oration of Periklês contained a
-  large sprinkling of mythical allusions and stories out of
-  the antiquities of Athens, such as we now find in the other
-  funeral orations above alluded to; but that Thucydidês himself
-  deliberately left them out in his report. But there seems no
-  foundation for this suspicion. It is much more consonant to
-  the superior tone of dignity which reigns throughout all this
-  oration, to suppose that the mythical narratives, and even
-  the previous historical glories of Athens, never found any
-  special notice in the speech of Periklês,—nothing more than
-  a general recognition, with an intimation that he does not
-  dwell upon them at length because they were well known to his
-  audience,—μακρηγορεῖν ἐν εἰδόσιν οὐ βουλόμενος ἐάσω (ii, 36).
-
-In the outset of his speech, Periklês distinguishes himself from
-those who had preceded him in the same function of public orator,
-by dissenting from the encomiums which it had been customary to
-bestow on the law enjoining these funeral harangues: he thinks that
-the publicity of the funeral itself, and the general demonstrations
-of respect and grief by the great body of citizens, tell more
-emphatically in token of gratitude to the brave dead, when the
-scene passes in silence, than when it is translated into the words
-of a speaker, who may easily offend, either by incompetency or by
-apparent feebleness, or perhaps even by unseasonable exaggeration.
-Nevertheless, the custom having been embodied in law, and elected as
-he has been by the citizens, he comes forward to discharge the duty
-imposed upon him in the best manner he can.[259]
-
-  [259] Thucyd. ii, 35.
-
-One of the remarkable features in this discourse is, its
-business-like, impersonal character: it is Athens herself who
-undertakes to commend and decorate her departed sons, as well as to
-hearten up and admonish the living.
-
-After a few words on the magnitude of the empire, and on the glorious
-efforts as well as endurance whereby their forefathers and they
-had acquired it,—Periklês proceeds to sketch the plan of life, the
-constitution, and the manners, under which such achievements were
-brought about.[260]
-
-  [260] Thucyd. ii, 36. Ἀπὸ δὲ οἵας τε ἐπιτηδεύσεως ἤλθομεν ἐπ᾽
-  αὐτὰ, καὶ μεθ᾽ οἵας πολιτείας, καὶ τρόπων ἐξ οἵων μεγάλα ἐγένετο,
-  ταῦτα δηλώσας πρῶτον εἶμι, etc.
-
-  In the Demosthenic or pseudo-Demosthenic Orat. Funebris, c. 8, p.
-  1397—χρηστῶν ἐπιτηδευμάτων συνήθεια, τῆς ὅλης πολιτείας ὑπόθεσις,
-  etc.
-
-“We live under a constitution such as noway to envy the laws of
-our neighbors,—ourselves an example to others, rather than mere
-imitators. It is called a democracy, since its permanent aim tends
-towards the many and not towards the few: in regard to private
-matters and disputes, the laws deal equally with every man: while
-looking to public affairs and to claims of individual influence,
-every man’s chance of advancement is determined, not by party-favor
-but by real worth, according as his reputation stands in his own
-particular department: nor does poverty, or obscure station, keep him
-back,[261] if he really has the means of benefiting the city. And
-our social march is free, not merely in regard to public affairs,
-but also in regard to intolerance of each other’s diversity of daily
-pursuits. For we are not angry with our neighbor for what he may
-do to please himself, nor do we ever put on those sour looks,[262]
-which, though they do no positive damage, are not the less sure
-to offend. Thus conducting our private social intercourse with
-reciprocal indulgence, we are restrained from wrong on public matters
-by fear and reverence of our magistrates for the time being, and of
-our laws,—especially such laws as are instituted for the protection
-of wrongful sufferers, and even such others as, though not written,
-are enforced by a common sense of shame. Besides this, we have
-provided for our minds numerous recreations from toil, partly by
-our customary solemnities of sacrifice and festival throughout the
-year, partly by the elegance of our private establishments,—the daily
-charm of which banishes the sense of discomfort. From the magnitude
-of our city, the products of the whole earth are brought to us,
-so that our enjoyment of foreign luxuries is as much our own and
-assured as those which we grow at home. In respect to training for
-war, we differ from our opponents (the Lacedæmonians) on several
-material points. First, we lay open our city as a common resort: we
-apply no xenêlasy to exclude even an enemy either from any lesson or
-any spectacle, the full view of which he may think advantageous to
-him; for we trust less to manœuvres and quackery than to our native
-bravery, for warlike efficiency. Next, in regard to education, while
-the Lacedæmonians, even from their earliest youth, subject themselves
-to an irksome exercise for the attainment of courage, we, with our
-easy habits of life, are not less prepared than they, to encounter
-all perils within the measure of our strength. The proof of this is,
-that the Peloponnesian confederates do not attack us one by one, but
-with their whole united force; while we, when we attack them at home,
-overpower for the most part all of them who try to defend their own
-territory. None of our enemies has ever met and contended with our
-entire force; partly in consequence of our large navy,—partly from
-our dispersion in different simultaneous land-expeditions. But when
-they chance to be engaged with any part of it, if victorious, they
-pretend to have vanquished us all,—if defeated, they pretend to have
-been vanquished by all.
-
-  [261] Thucyd. ii, 37. οὐδ᾽ αὖ κατὰ πενίαν, ἔχων δέ τι ἀγαθὸν
-  δρᾶσαι τὴν πόλιν, ἀξιώματος ἀφανείᾳ κεκώλυται: compare Plato,
-  Menexenus, c. 8.
-
-  [262] Thucyd. ii, 37. ἐλευθέρως δὲ τά τε πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν
-  πολιτεύομεν, καὶ ἐς τὴν πρὸς ἀλλήλους τῶν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν
-  ἐπιτηδευμάτων ὑποψίαν, οὐ δι᾽ ὀργῆς τὸν πέλας, εἰ καθ᾽ ἡδονήν τι
-  δρᾷ, ἔχοντες, οὐδὲ ἀζημίους μὲν, λυπηρὰς δὲ, τῇ ὄψει ἀχθηδόνας
-  προστιθέμενοι. Ἀνεπαχθῶς δὲ τὰ ἴδια προσομιλοῦντες τὰ δημόσια
-  διὰ δέος μάλιστα οὐ παρανομοῦμεν, τῶν τε ἀεὶ ἐν ἀρχῇ ὄντων
-  ἀκροάσει καὶ τῶν νόμων, καὶ μάλιστα αὐτῶν ὅσοι τε ἐπ᾽ ὠφελείᾳ
-  τῶν ἀδικουμένων κεῖνται, καὶ ὅσοι ἄγραφοι ὄντες αἰσχύνην
-  ὁμολογουμένην φέρουσι.
-
-“Now, if we are willing to brave danger, just as much under an
-indulgent system as under constant toil, and by spontaneous courage
-as much as under force of law,—we are gainers in the end, by not
-vexing ourselves beforehand with sufferings to come, yet still
-appearing in the hour of trial not less daring than those who toil
-without ceasing.
-
-“In other matters, too, as well as in these, our city deserves
-admiration. For we combine elegance of taste with simplicity of
-life, and we pursue knowledge without being enervated:[263] we
-employ wealth, not for talking and ostentation, but as a real
-help in the proper season: nor is it disgraceful to any one who
-is poor to confess his poverty, though he _may_ rather incur
-reproach for not actually keeping himself out of poverty. The
-magistrates who discharge public trusts fulfil their domestic
-duties also,—the private citizen, while engaged in professional
-business, has competent knowledge on public affairs: for we stand
-alone in regarding the man who keeps aloof from these latter, not
-as harmless, but as useless. Moreover, we always hear and pronounce
-on public matters, when discussed by our leaders,—or perhaps strike
-out for ourselves correct reasonings about them: far from accounting
-discussion an impediment to action, we complain only if we are
-not told what is to be done before it becomes our duty to do it.
-For, in truth, we combine in the most remarkable manner these two
-qualities,—extreme boldness in execution, with full debate beforehand
-on that which we are going about: whereas, with others, ignorance
-alone imparts boldness,—debate introduces hesitation. Assuredly,
-those men are properly to be regarded as the stoutest of heart, who,
-knowing most precisely both the terrors of war and the sweets of
-peace, are still not the less willing to encounter peril.
-
-  [263] Thucyd. ii, 40. φιλοκαλοῦμεν γὰρ μετ᾽ εὐτελείας, καὶ
-  φιλοσοφοῦμεν ἄνευ μαλακίας· πλούτῳ τε ἔργου μᾶλλον καιρῷ ἢ λόγου
-  κόμπῳ χρώμεθα, καὶ τὸ πένεσθαι οὐχ ὁμολογεῖν τινὶ αἰσχρὸν, ἀλλὰ
-  μὴ διαφεύγειν ἔργῳ αἴσχιον.
-
-  The first strophe of the Chorus in Euripid. Medea, 824-841, may
-  be compared with the tenor of this discourse of Periklês: the
-  praises of Attica are there dwelt upon, as a country too good to
-  receive the guilty Medea.
-
-“In fine, I affirm that our city, considered as a whole, is the
-schoolmistress of Greece;[264] while, viewed individually, we
-enable the same man to furnish himself out and suffice to himself
-in the greatest variety of ways, and with the most complete grace
-and refinement. This is no empty boast of the moment, but genuine
-reality: and the power of the city, acquired through the dispositions
-just indicated, exists to prove it. Athens alone, of all cities,
-stands forth in actual trial greater than her reputation: her
-enemy, when he attacks her, will not have his pride wounded by
-suffering defeat from feeble hands,—her subjects will not think
-themselves degraded as if their obedience were paid to an unworthy
-superior.[265] Having thus put forward our power, not uncertified,
-but backed by the most evident proofs, we shall be admired not less
-by posterity than by our contemporaries. Nor do we stand in need
-either of Homer or of any other panegyrist, whose words may for
-the moment please, while the truth when known would confute their
-intended meaning: we have compelled all land and sea to become
-accessible to our courage, and have planted everywhere imperishable
-monuments of our kindness as well as of our hostility.
-
-  [264] Thucyd. ii, 41. ξυνελών τε λέγω, τήν τε πᾶσαν πόλιν τῆς
-  Ἑλλάδος παίδευσιν εἶναι, καὶ καθ᾽ ἕκαστον δοκεῖν ἄν μοι τὸν αὐτὸν
-  ἄνδρα παρ᾽ ἡμῶν ἐπὶ πλεῖστ᾽ ἂν εἴδη καὶ μετὰ χαρίτων μάλιστ᾽ ἂν
-  εὐτραπέλως τὸ σῶμα αὔταρκες παρέχεσθαι.
-
-  The abstract word παίδευσιν, in place of the concrete παιδευτρία,
-  seems to soften the arrogance of the affirmation.
-
-  [265] Thucyd. ii, 41. μόνη γὰρ τῶν νῦν ἀκοῆς κρείσσων ἐς πεῖραν
-  ἔρχεται, καὶ μόνη οὔτε τῷ πολεμίῳ ἐπελθόντι ἀγανάκτησιν ἔχει
-  ὑφ᾽ οἵων κακοπαθεῖ, οὔτε τῷ ὑπηκόῳ κατάμεμψιν ὡς οὐχ ὑπ᾽ ἀξίων
-  ἄρχεται.
-
-“Such is the city on behalf of which these warriors have nobly died
-in battle, vindicating her just title to unimpaired rights,[266]—and
-on behalf of which all of us here left behind must willingly toil.
-It is for this reason that I have spoken at length concerning the
-city, at once to draw from it the lesson that the conflict is not for
-equal motives between us and enemies who possess nothing of the like
-excellence,—and to demonstrate by proofs the truth of my encomium
-pronounced upon her.”
-
-  [266] Thucyd. ii. 42. περὶ τοιαύτης οὖν πόλεως οἵδε τε γενναίως
-  δικαιοῦντες μὴ ἀφαιρεθῆναι αὐτὴν μαχόμενοι ἐτελεύτησαν, καὶ τῶν
-  λειπομένων πάντα τινὰ εἰκὸς ἐθέλειν ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς κάμνειν.
-
-  I am not sure that I have rightly translated δικαιοῦντες μὴ
-  ἀφαιρεθῆναι αὐτὴν,—but neither Poppo, nor Göller, nor Dr. Arnold,
-  say anything about these words, which yet are not at all clear.
-
-Periklês pursues at considerable additional length the same tenor
-of mixed exhortation to the living and eulogy of the dead; with
-many special and emphatic observations addressed to the relatives
-of the latter, who were assembled around and doubtless very near
-him. But the extract which I have already made is so long, that
-no farther addition would be admissible: yet it was impossible to
-pass over lightly the picture of the Athenian commonwealth in its
-glory, as delivered by the ablest citizen of the age. The effect
-of the democratical constitution, with its diffused and equal
-citizenship, in calling forth not merely strong attachment, but
-painful self-sacrifice, on the part of all Athenians,—is nowhere more
-forcibly insisted upon than in the words above cited of Periklês,
-as well as in others afterwards: “Contemplating as you do daily
-before you the actual power of the state, and becoming passionately
-attached to it, when you conceive its full greatness, reflect that
-it was all acquired by men of daring, acquainted with their duty,
-and full of an honorable sense of shame in their actions,”[267]—such
-is the association which he presents between the greatness of the
-state as an object of common passion, and the courage, intelligence,
-and mutual esteem, of individual citizens, as its creating and
-preserving causes: poor as well as rich being alike interested in the
-partnership.
-
-  [267] Thucyd. ii. 43. τὴν τῆς πόλεως δύναμιν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἔργῳ
-  θεωμένους καὶ ἐραστὰς γιγνομένους αὐτῆς, καὶ ὅταν ὑμῖν μεγάλη
-  δόξῃ εἶναι, ἐνθυμουμένους ὅτι τολμῶντες καὶ γιγνώσκοντες τὰ
-  δέοντα, καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις αἰσχυνόμενοι ἄνδρες αὐτὰ ἐκτήσαντο,
-  etc.
-
-  Αἰσχυνόμενοι: compare Demosthen. Orat. Funebris, c. 7, p. 1396.
-  Αἱ μὲν γὰρ διὰ τῶν ὀλίγων δυναστεῖαι δέος μὲν ἐνεργάζονται τοῖς
-  πολίταις, αἰσχύνην δ᾽ οὐ παριστᾶσιν.
-
-But the claims of patriotism, though put forward as essentially
-and deservedly paramount, are by no means understood to reign
-exclusively, or to absorb the whole of the democratical activity.
-Subject to these, and to those laws and sanctions which protect
-both the public and individuals against wrong, it is the pride
-of Athens to exhibit a rich and varied fund of human impulse,—an
-unrestrained play of fancy and diversity of private pursuit,
-coupled with a reciprocity of cheerful indulgence between one
-individual and another, and an absence even of those “black looks”
-which so much embitter life, even if they never pass into enmity
-of fact. This portion of the speech of Periklês deserves peculiar
-attention, because it serves to correct an assertion, often far too
-indiscriminately made, respecting antiquity as contrasted with modern
-societies,—an assertion that the ancient societies sacrificed the
-individual to the state, and that only in modern times has individual
-agency been left free to the proper extent. This is preëminently true
-of Sparta: it is also true, in a great degree, of the ideal societies
-depicted by Plato and Aristotle: but it is pointedly untrue of the
-Athenian democracy, nor can we with any confidence predicate it of
-the major part of the Grecian cities.
-
-I shall hereafter return to this point when I reach the times of the
-great speculative philosophers: in the mean time I cannot pass over
-this speech of Periklês without briefly noticing the inference which
-it suggests, to negative the supposed exorbitant interference of the
-state with individual liberty, as a general fact among the ancient
-Greek republics. There is no doubt that he has present to his mind
-a comparison with the extreme narrowness and rigor of Sparta, and
-that therefore his assertions of the extent of positive liberty at
-Athens must be understood as partially qualified by such contrast.
-But even making allowance for this, the stress which he lays upon the
-liberty of thought and action at Athens, not merely from excessive
-restraint of law, but also from practical intolerance between man
-and man, and tyranny of the majority over individual dissenters in
-taste and pursuit,—deserves serious notice, and brings out one of
-those points in the national character upon which the intellectual
-development of the time mainly depended. The national temper was
-indulgent in a high degree to all the varieties of positive impulses:
-the peculiar promptings in every individual bosom were allowed
-to manifest themselves and bear fruit, without being suppressed
-by external opinion, or trained into forced conformity with some
-assumed standard: antipathies against any of them formed no part of
-the habitual morality of the citizen. While much of the generating
-causes of human hatred was thus rendered inoperative, and while
-society was rendered more comfortable, more instructive, and more
-stimulating,—all its germs of productive fruitful genius, so rare
-everywhere, found in such an atmosphere the maximum of encouragement.
-Within the limits of the law, assuredly as faithfully observed at
-Athens as anywhere in Greece, individual impulse, taste, and even
-eccentricity, were accepted with indulgence, instead of being a mark
-as elsewhere for the intolerance of neighbors or of the public. This
-remarkable feature in Athenian life will help us in a future chapter
-to explain the striking career of Sokratês, and it farther presents
-to us, under another face, a great part of that which the censors
-of Athens denounced under the name of “democratical license.” The
-liberty and diversity of individual life in that city were offensive
-to Xenophon,[268] Plato, and Aristotle,—attached either to the
-monotonous drill of Sparta, or to some other ideal standard, which,
-though much better than the Spartan in itself, they were disposed to
-impress upon society with a heavy-handed uniformity. That liberty
-of individual action, not merely from the over-restraints of law,
-but from the tyranny of jealous opinion, such as Periklês depicts
-in Athens, belongs more naturally to a democracy, where there is no
-select one or few to receive worship and set the fashion, than to any
-other form of government. But it is very rare even in democracies:
-nor can we dissemble the fact that none of the governments of modern
-times, democratical, aristocratical, or monarchical, presents any
-thing like the picture of generous tolerance towards social dissent,
-and spontaneity of individual taste, which we read in the speech
-of the Athenian statesman. In all of them, the intolerance of the
-national opinion cuts down individual character to one out of a few
-set types, to which every person, or every family, is constrained
-to adjust itself, and beyond which all exceptions meet either with
-hatred or with derision. To impose upon men such restraints either
-of law or of opinion as are requisite for the security and comfort
-of society, but to encourage rather than repress the free play of
-individual impulse subject to those limits,—is an ideal, which, if
-it was ever approached at Athens, has certainly never been attained,
-and has indeed comparatively been little studied or cared for in any
-modern society.
-
-  [268] Compare the sentiment of Xenophon, the precise reverse of
-  that which is here laid down by Periklês, extolling the rigid
-  discipline of Sparta, and denouncing the laxity of Athenian life
-  (Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 5, 15; iii, 12, 5). It is curious that
-  the sentiment appears in this dialogue as put in the mouth of the
-  younger Periklês (illegitimate son of the great Periklês) in a
-  dialogue with Sokratês.
-
-Connected with this reciprocal indulgence of individual diversity,
-was not only the hospitable reception of all strangers at Athens,
-which Periklês contrasts with the xenêlasy or jealous expulsion
-practised at Sparta,—but also the many-sided activity, bodily and
-mental, visible in the former, so opposite to that narrow range
-of thought, exclusive discipline of the body and never-ending
-preparation for war, which formed the system of the latter. His
-assertion that Athens was equal to Sparta, even in her own solitary
-excellence,—efficiency on the field of battle,—is doubtless
-untenable; but not the less impressive is his sketch of that
-multitude of concurrent impulses which at this same time agitated
-and impelled the Athenian mind,—the strength of one not implying
-the weakness of the remainder: the relish for all pleasures of
-art and elegance, and the appetite for intellectual expansion,
-coinciding in the same bosom with energetic promptitude as well as
-endurance: abundance of recreative spectacles, yet noway abating the
-cheerfulness of obedience even to the hardest calls of patriotic
-duty: that combination of reason and courage which encountered
-danger the more willingly from having discussed and calculated it
-beforehand: lastly, an anxious interest as well as a competence of
-judgment in public discussion and public action, common to every
-citizen rich and poor, and combined with every man’s own private
-industry. So comprehensive an ideal of many-sided social development,
-bringing out the capacities for action and endurance, as well as
-those for enjoyment, would be sufficiently remarkable, even if we
-supposed it only existing in the imagination of a philosopher: but it
-becomes still more so when we recollect that the main features of it
-at least were drawn from the fellow-citizens of the speaker. It must
-be taken, however, as belonging peculiarly to the Athens of Periklês
-and his contemporaries; nor would it have suited either the period of
-the Persian war, fifty years before, or that of Demosthenês, seventy
-years afterwards. At the former period, the art, the letters, and
-the philosophy, were as yet backward, while even the active energy
-and democratical stimulus, though very powerful, had not been worked
-up to the pitch which they afterwards reached: at the latter period,
-although the intellectual manifestations of Athens subsist in full
-or even increased vigor, we shall find the personal enterprise
-and energetic spirit of her citizens materially abated. As the
-circumstances, which I have already recounted, go far to explain the
-previous upward movement, so those which fill the coming chapters,
-containing the disasters of the Peloponnesian war, will be found to
-explain still more completely the declining tendency shortly about to
-commence. Athens was brought to the brink of entire ruin, from which
-it is surprising that she recovered at all,—but noway surprising
-that she recovered at the expense of a considerable loss of personal
-energy in the character of her citizens.
-
-And thus the season at which Periklês delivered his discourse lends
-to it an additional and peculiar pathos. It was delivered at a time
-when Athens was as yet erect and at her maximum for though her real
-power was, doubtless, much diminished, compared with the period
-before the thirty years’ truce, yet the great edifices and works
-of art, achieved since then, tended to compensate that loss, in so
-far as the sense of greatness was concerned; and no one, either
-citizen or enemy, considered Athens as having at all declined. It
-was delivered at the commencement of the great struggle with the
-Peloponnesian confederacy, the coming hardships of which Periklês
-never disguised either to himself or to his fellow-citizens, though
-he fully counted upon eventual success. Attica had been already
-invaded; it was no longer “the unwasted territory,” as Euripidês
-had designated it in his tragedy Medea,[269] represented three or
-four months before the march of Archidamus,—and a picture of Athens
-in her social glory was well calculated both to rouse the pride
-and nerve the courage of those individuals citizens, who had been
-compelled once, and would be compelled again and again, to abandon
-their country-residence and fields for a thin tent or confined hole
-in the city.[270] Such calamities might, indeed, be foreseen: but
-there was one still greater calamity, which, though actually then
-impending, could not be foreseen: the terrific pestilence which will
-be recounted in the coming chapter. The bright colors, and tone
-of cheerful confidence, which pervade the discourse of Periklês,
-appear the more striking from being in immediate antecedence to the
-awful description of this distemper: a contrast to which Thucydidês
-was, doubtless, not insensible, and which is another circumstance
-enhancing the interest of the composition.
-
-  [269] Euripidês, Medea, 824. ἱερᾶς χώρας ἀπορθήτου τ᾽, etc.
-
-  [270] The remarks of Dionysius Halikarnassus, tending to show
-  that the number of dead buried on this occasion was so small,
-  and the actions in which they had been slain so insignificant,
-  as to be unworthy of so elaborate an harangue as this of
-  Periklês,—and finding fault with Thucydidês on that ground,—are
-  by no means well-founded or justifiable. He treats Thucydidês
-  like a dramatic writer putting a speech into the mouth of one of
-  his characters, and he considers that the occasion chosen for
-  this speech was unworthy. But though this assumption would be
-  correct with regard to many ancient historians, and to Dionysius
-  himself in his Roman history,—it is not correct with reference
-  to Thucydidês. The speech of Periklês was a real speech, heard,
-  reproduced, and doubtless dressed up, by Thucydidês: if therefore
-  more is said than the number of the dead or the magnitude of the
-  occasion warranted, this is the fault of Periklês, and not of
-  Thucydidês. Dionysius says that there were many other occasions
-  throughout the war much more worthy of an elaborate funeral
-  harangue,—especially the disastrous loss of the Sicilian army.
-  But Thucydidês could not have heard any of them, after his exile
-  in the eighth year of the war: and we may well presume that none
-  of them would bear any comparison with this of Periklês. Nor does
-  Dionysius at all appreciate the full circumstances of this first
-  year of the war,—which, when completely felt, will be found to
-  render the splendid and copious harangue of the great statesman
-  eminently seasonable. See Dionys. H. de Thucyd. Judic. pp.
-  849-851.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLIX.
-
-FROM THE BEGINNING OE THE SECOND YEAR DOWN TO THE END OF THE THIRD
-YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.
-
-
-At the close of one year after the attempted surprise of Platæa
-by the Thebans, the belligerent parties in Greece remained in an
-unaltered position as to relative strength. Nothing decisive had
-been accomplished on either side, either by the invasion of Attica,
-or by the flying descents round the coast of Peloponnesus: in spite
-of mutual damage inflicted,—doubtless, in the greatest measure
-upon Attica,—no progress was yet made towards the fulfilment of
-those objects which had induced the Peloponnesians to go to war.
-Especially, the most pressing among all their wishes—the relief
-of Potidæa—was noway advanced; for the Athenians had not found it
-necessary to relax the blockade of that city. The result of the
-first year’s operations had thus been to disappoint the hopes of
-the Corinthians and the other ardent instigators of war, while it
-justified the anticipations both of Periklês and of Archidamus.
-
-A second devastation of Attica was resolved upon for the commencement
-of spring; and measures were taken for carrying it all over that
-territory, since the settled policy of Athens not to hazard a battle
-with the invaders was now ascertained. About the end of March, or
-beginning of April, the entire Peloponnesian force—two-thirds from
-each confederate city, as before—was assembled under the command of
-Archidamus, and marched into Attica. This time they carried the work
-of systematic destruction, not merely over the Thriasian plain and
-the plain immediately near to Athens, as before; but also to the
-more southerly portions of Attica, down even as far as the mines of
-Laurium. They traversed and ravaged both the eastern and the western
-coast, remaining not less than forty days in the country. They found
-the territory deserted as before, all the population having retired
-within the walls.[271]
-
-  [271] Thucyd. ii, 47-55.
-
-In regard to this second invasion, Periklês recommended the same
-defensive policy as he had applied to the first; and, apparently,
-the citizens had now come to acquiesce in it, if not willingly, at
-least with a full conviction of its necessity. But a new visitation
-had now occurred, diverting their attention from the invader, though
-enormously aggravating their sufferings. A few days after Archidamus
-entered Attica, a pestilence, or epidemic sickness, broke out
-unexpectedly at Athens.
-
-It appears that this terrific disorder had been raging for some
-time throughout the regions round the Mediterranean; having begun,
-as was believed, in Æthiopia,—thence passing into Egypt and Libya,
-and overrunning a considerable portion of Asia under the Persian
-government: about sixteen years before, too, there had been a similar
-calamity in Rome and in various parts of Italy. Recently, it had been
-felt in Lemnos and some other islands of the Ægean, yet seemingly not
-with such intensity as to excite much notice generally in the Grecian
-world: at length it passed to Athens, and first showed itself in the
-Peiræus. The progress of the disease was as rapid and destructive as
-its appearance had been sudden; whilst the extraordinary accumulation
-of people within the city and long walls, in consequence of the
-presence of the invaders in the country, was but too favorable
-to every form of contagion. Families crowded together in close
-cabins and places of temporary shelter,[272]—throughout a city
-constructed, like most of those in Greece, with little regard
-to the conditions of salubrity,—and in a state of mental chagrin
-from the forced abandonment and sacrifice of their properties in
-the country, transmitted the disorder with fatal facility from one
-to the other. Beginning as it did about the middle of April, the
-increasing heat of summer farther aided the disorder, the symptoms of
-which, alike violent and sudden, made themselves the more remarked
-because the year was particularly exempt from maladies of every other
-description.[273]
-
-  [272] Thucyd. ii, 52; Diodor. xii, 45; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 34.
-  It is to be remarked, that the Athenians, though their persons
-  and movable property were crowded within the walls, had not
-  driven in their sheep and cattle also, but had transported them
-  over to Eubœa and the neighboring islands (Thucyd. ii, 14). Hence
-  they escaped a serious aggravation of their epidemic: for in the
-  accounts of the epidemics which desolated Rome under similar
-  circumstances, we find the accumulation of great numbers of
-  cattle, along with human beings, specified as a terrible addition
-  to the calamity (see Livy, iii, 66; Dionys. Hal. Ant. Rom. x, 53:
-  compare Niebuhr, Römisch. Gesch. vol. ii, p. 90).
-
-  [273] Thucyd. ii, 49. Τὸ μὲν γὰρ ἔτος, ὡς ὡμολογεῖτο, ἐκ πάντων
-  μάλιστα δὴ ἐκεῖνο ἄνοσον ἐς τὰς ἄλλας ἀσθενείας ἐτύγχανεν ὄν.
-  Hippokratês, in his description of the epidemic fever at Thasos,
-  makes a similar remark on the absence of all other disorders at
-  the time (Epidem. i, 8, vol. ii, p. 640, ed. Littré).
-
-Of this plague,—or, more properly, eruptive typhoid fever,[274]
-distinct from, yet analogous to, the smallpox,—a description no less
-clear than impressive has been left by the historian Thucydidês,
-himself not only a spectator but a sufferer. It is not one of the
-least of his merits, that his notice of the symptoms, given at so
-early a stage of medical science and observation, is such as to
-instruct the medical reader of the present age, and to enable the
-malady to be understood and identified. The observations, with which
-that notice is ushered in, deserve particular attention. “In respect
-to this distemper (he says), let every man, physician or not, say
-what he thinks respecting the source from whence it may probably
-have arisen, and respecting the causes which he deems sufficiently
-powerful to have produced so great a revolution. But I, having myself
-had the distemper, and having seen others suffering under it, will
-state _what it actually was_, and will indicate, in addition, such
-other matters, as will furnish any man, who lays them to heart, with
-knowledge and the means of calculation beforehand, in case the same
-misfortune should ever again occur.”[275] To record past facts,
-as a basis for rational prevision in regard to the future,—the
-same sentiment which Thucydidês mentions in his preface,[276] as
-having animated him to the composition of his history,—was at that
-time a duty so little understood, that we have reason to admire
-not less the manner in which he performs it in practice, than the
-distinctness with which he conceives it in theory. We may infer from
-his language that speculation in his day was active respecting the
-causes of this plague, according to the vague and fanciful physics
-and scanty stock of ascertained facts, which was all that could then
-be consulted. By resisting the itch of theorising from one of those
-loose hypotheses which then appeared plausibly to explain everything,
-he probably renounced the point of view from which most credit and
-interest would be derivable at the time: but his simple and precise
-summary of observed facts carries with it an imperishable value, and
-even affords grounds for imagining, that he was no stranger to the
-habits and training of his contemporary, Hippokratês, and the other
-Asklepiads of Cos.[277]
-
-  [274] “La description de Thucydide (observes M. Littré, in his
-  introduction to the works of Hippokratês, tom. i, p. 122),
-  est tellement bonne qu’elle suffit pleinement pour nous faire
-  comprendre ce que cette ancienne maladie a été: et il est fort à
-  regretter que des médecins tels qu’Hippocrate et Galien n’aient
-  rien écrit sur les grandes épidémies, dont ils ont été les
-  spectateurs. Hippocrate a été témoin de cette peste racontée par
-  Thucydide, et il ne nous en a pas laissé la description. Galien
-  vit également la fièvre éruptive qui désola le monde sous Marc
-  Aurèle, et qu’il appelle lui-même la longue peste. Cependant
-  excepté quelques mots épars dans ses volumineux ouvrages, excepté
-  quelques indications fugitives, il ne nous a rien transmis sur
-  un événement médical aussi important; à tel point que si nous
-  n’avions pas le récit de Thucydide, il nous seroit fort difficile
-  de nous faire une idée de celle qu’a vue Galien, et qui est
-  la même (comme M. Hecker s’est attaché à le démontrer) que la
-  maladie connue sous le nom de Peste d’Athènes. C’était une fièvre
-  éruptive différente de la variole, et éteinte aujourdhui. On a
-  cru en voir les traces dans les _charbons_ (ἄνθρακες) des livres
-  Hippocratiques.”
-
-  Both Krauss (Disquisitio de naturâ morbi Atheniensium. Stuttgard,
-  1831, p. 38) and Hæser (Historisch. Patholog. Untersuchungen.
-  Dresden 1839, p. 50) assimilate the pathological phenomena
-  specified by Thucydidês to different portions of the Ἐπιδημίαι of
-  Hippokratês. M. Littré thinks that the resemblance is not close
-  or precise, so as to admit of the one being identified with the
-  other. “Le tableau si frappant qu’en a tracé ce grand historien
-  ne se réproduit pas certainement avec une netteté suffisante dans
-  les brefs détails donnés par Hippocrate. La maladie d’Athènes
-  avoit un type si tranché, que tous ceux qui en ont parlé ont du
-  le réproduire dans ses parties essentielles.” (Argument aux 2me
-  Livre des Epidémies, Œuvres d’Hippocrate, tom. v. p. 64.) There
-  appears good reason to believe that the great epidemic which
-  prevailed in the Roman world under Marcus Aurelius—the Pestis
-  Antoniniana—was a renewal of what is called the Plague of Athens.
-
-  [275] Thucyd. ii, 48. λεγέτω μὲν οὖν περὶ αὐτοῦ, ὡς ἕκαστος
-  γιγνώσκει, καὶ ἰατρὸς καὶ ἰδιώτης, ἀφ᾽ ὅτου εἰκὸς ἦν γενέσθαι
-  αὐτὸ, καὶ τὰς αἰτίας ἅστινας νομίζει τοσαύτης μεταβολῆς ἱκανὰς
-  εἶναι δύναμιν ἐς τὸ μεταστῆσαι σχεῖν· ἐγὼ δὲ οἷόν τε ἐγίγνετο
-  λέξω, καὶ ἀφ᾽ ὧν ἄν τις σκοπῶν, εἴ ποτε καὶ αὖθις ἐπιπέσοι,
-  μάλιστ᾽ ἂν ἔχοι τι προειδὼς μὴ ἀγνοεῖν, ταῦτα δηλώσω, αὐτός τε
-  νοσήσας καὶ αὐτὸς ἰδὼν ἄλλους πάσχοντας.
-
-  Demokritus, among others, connected the generation of these
-  epidemics with his general system of atoms, atmospheric effluvia,
-  and εἴδωλα: see Plutarch, Symposiac. viii, 9, p. 733; Demokriti
-  Fragment., ed. Mullach, lib. iv, p. 409.
-
-  The causes of the Athenian epidemic as given by Diodorus (xii,
-  58)—unusual rains, watery quality of grain, absence of the
-  Etesian winds, etc., may perhaps be true of the revival of the
-  epidemic in the fifth year of the war, but can hardly be true
-  of its first appearance; since Thucydidês states that the year
-  in other respects was unusually healthy, and the epidemic was
-  evidently brought from foreign parts to Peiræus.
-
-  [276] Thucyd. i, 22.
-
-  [277] See the words of Thucydidês. ii, 49. καὶ ἀποκαθάρσεις χολῆς
-  πᾶσαι, ~ὅσαι ὑπὸ ἰατρῶν ὠνομασμέναι εἰσὶν~, ἐπῄεσαν,—which would
-  seem to indicate a familiarity with the medical terminology:
-  compare also his allusion to the speculations of the physicians,
-  cited in the previous note; and c. 51—~τὰ πάσῃ διαίτῃ
-  θεραπευόμενα~, etc.
-
-  In proof how rare the conception was, in ancient times, of the
-  importance of collecting and registering particular medical
-  facts, I transcribe the following observations from M. Littré
-  (Œuvres d’Hippocrate, tom. iv, p. 646, Remarques Retrospectives).
-
-  “Toutefois ce qu’il importe ici de constater, ce n’est pas
-  qu’Hippocrate a observé de telle ou telle manière, mais c’est
-  qu’il a eu l’idée de recueillir et de consigner des faits
-  particuliers. En effet, rien, dans l’antiquité, n’a été plus rare
-  que ce soin: outre Hippocrate, je ne connois qu’Erasistrate qui
-  se soit occupé de relater sous cette forme les résultats de son
-  expérience clinique. Ni Galien lui-même, ni Arétée, ni Soranus,
-  ni les autres qui sont arrivés jusqu’à nous, n’ont suivi un aussi
-  louable exemple. Les observations consignées dans la collection
-  Hippocratique constituent la plus grande partie, à beaucoup près,
-  de ce que l’antiquité a possédé en ce genre: et si, en commentant
-  le travail d’Hippocrate, on l’avait un peu imité, nous aurions
-  des matériaux à l’aide desquels nous prendrions une idée bien
-  plus précise de la pathologie de ces siècles reculés.... Mais
-  tout en exprimant ce regret et en reconnaissant cette utilité
-  relative à nous autres modernes et véritablement considérable,
-  il faut ajouter que l’antiquité avoit dans les faits et la
-  doctrine Hippocratiques un aliment qui lui a suffi—et qu’une
-  collection, même étendue, d’histoires particulières n’auroit pas
-  alors modifié la médecine, du moins la médecine scientifique,
-  essentiellement et au delà de la limite que comportoit la
-  physiologie. Je pourrai montrer ailleurs que la doctrine
-  d’Hippocrate et de l’école de Cos a été la seule solide, la seule
-  fondée sur un aperçu vrai de la nature organisée; et que les
-  sectes postérieures, méthodisme et pneumatisme, n’ont bâti leurs
-  théories que sur des hypothèses sans consistance. Mais ici je me
-  contente de remarquer, que la pathologie, en tant que science,
-  ne peut marcher qu’à la suite de la physiologie, dont elle n’est
-  qu’une des faces: et d’Hippocrate à Galien inclusivement, la
-  physiologie ne fit pas assez de progrès pour rendre insuffisante
-  la conception Hippocratique. Il en résulte, nécessairement, que
-  la pathologie, toujours considérée comme science, n’auroit pu,
-  par quelque procédé que ce fût, gagner que des corrections et des
-  augmentations de détail.”
-
-It is hardly within the province of an historian of Greece to repeat
-after Thucydidês the painful enumeration of symptoms, violent in the
-extreme, and pervading every portion of the bodily system, which
-marked this fearful disorder. Beginning in Peiræus, it quickly passed
-into the city, and both the one and the other was speedily filled
-with sickness and suffering, the like of which had never before been
-known. The seizures were perfectly sudden, and a large proportion
-of the sufferers perished, after deplorable agonies, on the seventh
-or on the ninth day: others, whose strength of constitution carried
-them over this period, found themselves the victims of exhausting and
-incurable diarrhœa afterwards: with others again, after traversing
-both these stages, the distemper fixed itself in some particular
-member, the eyes, the genitals, the hands, or the feet, which were
-rendered permanently useless, or in some cases amputated, even
-where the patient himself recovered. There were also some whose
-recovery was attended with a total loss of memory, so that they
-no more knew themselves or recognized their friends. No treatment
-or remedy appearing, except in accidental cases, to produce any
-beneficial effect, the physicians or surgeons whose aid was invoked
-became completely at fault; while trying their accustomed means
-without avail, they soon ended by catching the malady themselves
-and perishing: nor were the charms and incantations[278] to which
-the unhappy patient resorted, likely to be more efficacious. While
-some asserted that the Peloponnesians had poisoned the cisterns of
-water, others referred the visitation to the wrath of the gods,
-and especially to Apollo, known by hearers of the Iliad as author
-of pestilence in the Greek host before Troy. It was remembered
-that this Delphian god had promised the Lacedæmonians, in reply to
-their application immediately before the war, that he would assist
-them whether invoked or uninvoked,—and the disorder now raging was
-ascribed to the intervention of their irresistible ally: while the
-elderly men farther called to mind an oracular verse sung in the time
-of their youth: “The Dorian war will come, and pestilence along with
-it.”[279] Under the distress which suggested, and was reciprocally
-aggravated by, these gloomy ideas, prophets were consulted, and
-supplications with solemn procession were held at the temples, to
-appease the divine wrath.
-
-  [278] Compare the story of Thalêtas appeasing an epidemic at
-  Sparta by his music and song (Plutarch, De Musicâ, p. 1146).
-
-  Some of the ancient physicians were firm believers in the
-  efficacy of these charms and incantations. Alexander of Tralles
-  says, that having originally treated them with contempt, he had
-  convinced himself of their value by personal observation, and
-  altered his opinion (ix, 4)—ἔνιοι γοῦν οἴονται τοῖς τῶν γραῶν
-  μύθοις ἐοικέναι τὰς ἐπῳδὰς, ὥσπερ κἀγὼ μέχρι πολλοῦ· τῷ χρόνῳ δὲ
-  ὑπὸ τῶν ἐναργῶς φαινομένων ἐπείσθην εἶναι δύναμιν ἐν αὐταῖς. See
-  an interesting and valuable dissertation, Origines Contagii, by
-  Dr. C. F. Marx (Stuttgard, 1824, p. 129).
-
-  The suffering Hêraklês, in his agony under the poisoned
-  tunic, invokes the ἀοιδὸς along with the χειροτέχνης ἰατοριάς
-  (Sophoklês, Trachin. 1005).
-
-  [279] Thucyd. ii, 54.
-
-    Φάσκοντες οἱ πρεσβύτεροι πάλαι ᾄδεσθαι—
-    Ἥξει Δωριακὸς πόλεμος, καὶ λοιμὸς ἅμ᾽ αὐτῷ.
-
-  See also the first among the epistles ascribed to the orator
-  Æschinês, respecting a λοιμὸς in Delos.
-
-  It appears that there was a debate whether, in this Hexameter
-  verse, λιμὸς (famine) or λοιμὸς (pestilence) was the correct
-  reading: and the probability is, that it had been originally
-  composed with the word λιμὸς,—for men might well fancy beforehand
-  that _famine_ would be a sequel of the Dorian war, but they
-  would not be likely to imagine _pestilence_ as accompanying it.
-  Yet, says Thucydidês, the reading λοιμὸς was held decidedly
-  preferable, as best fitting to the actual circumstances (οἱ γὰρ
-  ἄνθρωποι πρὸς ἃ ἔπασχον τὴν μνήμην ἐποιοῦντο). And “if (he goes
-  on to say) there should ever hereafter come another Dorian war,
-  and famine along with it, the oracle will probably be reproduced
-  with the word λιμὸς as part of it.”
-
-  This deserves notice, as illustrating the sort of admitted
-  license with which men twisted the oracles or prophecies, so as
-  to hit the feelings of the actual moment.
-
-When it was found that neither the priest nor the physician could
-retard the spread, or mitigate the intensity, of the disorder, the
-Athenians abandoned themselves to utter despair, and the space within
-the walls became a scene of desolating misery. Every man attacked
-with the malady at once lost his courage,—a state of depression,
-itself among the worst features of the case, which made him lie down
-and die, without the least attempt to seek for any preservatives. And
-though, at first, friends and relatives lent their aid to tend the
-sick with the usual family sympathies, yet so terrible was the number
-of these attendants who perished, “like sheep,” from such contact,
-that at length no man would thus expose himself; while the most
-generous spirits, who persisted longest in the discharge of their
-duty, were carried off in the greatest numbers.[280] The patient was
-thus left to die alone and unheeded: sometimes all the inmates of a
-house were swept away one after the other, no man being willing to go
-near it: desertion on one hand, attendance on the other, both tended
-to aggravate the calamity. There remained only those who, having
-had the disorder and recovered, were willing to tend the sufferers.
-These men formed the single exception to the all-pervading misery
-of the time,—for the disorder seldom attacked any one twice, and
-when it did, the second attack was never fatal. Elate with their own
-escape, they deemed themselves out of the reach of all disease, and
-were full of compassionate kindness for others whose sufferings were
-just beginning. It was from them, too, that the principal attention
-to the bodies of deceased victims proceeded: for such was the state
-of dismay and sorrow, that even the nearest relatives neglected the
-sepulchral duties, sacred beyond all others in the eyes of a Greek.
-Nor is there any circumstance which conveys to us so vivid an idea
-of the prevalent agony and despair, as when we read, in the words of
-an eye-witness, that the deaths took place among this close-packed
-crowd without the smallest decencies of attention,[281]—that the
-dead and the dying lay piled one upon another, not merely in the
-public roads, but even in the temples, in spite of the understood
-defilement of the sacred building,—that half-dead sufferers were
-seen lying round all the springs, from insupportable thirst,—that
-the numerous corpses thus unburied and exposed, were in such a
-condition, that the dogs which meddled with them died in consequence,
-while no vultures or other birds of the like habits ever came near.
-Those bodies which escaped entire neglect, were burnt or buried[282]
-without the customary mourning, and with unseemly carelessness. In
-some cases, the bearers of a body, passing by a funeral pile on which
-another body was burning, would put their own there to be burnt
-also;[283] or perhaps, if the pile was prepared ready for a body not
-yet arrived, would deposit their own upon it, set fire to the pile,
-and then depart. Such indecent confusion would have been intolerable
-to the feelings of the Athenians, in any ordinary times.
-
-  [280] Compare Diodor. xiv, 70, who mentions similar distresses
-  in the Carthaginian army besieging Syracuse, during the terrible
-  epidemic with which it was attacked in 395 B.C.; and Livy, xxv,
-  26, respecting the epidemic at Syracuse when it was besieged by
-  Marcellus and the Romans.
-
-  [281] Thucyd. ii, 52. Οἰκιῶν γὰρ οὐχ ὑπαρχουσῶν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν καλύβαις
-  πνιγηραῖς ὥρᾳ ἔτους διαιτωμένων, ὁ φθόρος ἐγίγνετο οὐδενὶ κόσμῳ,
-  ἀλλὰ καὶ νεκροὶ ἐπ᾽ ἀλλήλοις ἀποθνήσκοντες ἔκειντο, καὶ ἐν ταῖς
-  ὁδοῖς ἐκαλινδοῦντο καὶ περὶ τὰς κρήνας ἁπάσας ἡμιθνῆτες, τοῦ
-  ὕδατος ἐπιθυμίᾳ. Τά τε ἱερὰ ἐν οἷς ἐσκήνηντο, νεκρῶν πλέα ἦν,
-  αὐτοῦ ἐναποθνῃσκόντων· ὑπερβιαζομένου γὰρ τοῦ κακοῦ οἱ ἄνθρωποι,
-  οὐκ ἔχοντες, ὅ,τι γένωνται, ἐς ὀλιγωρίαν ἐτράποντο καὶ ἱερῶν καὶ
-  ὁσίων ὁμοίως.
-
-  [282] Thucyd. ii, 50: compare Livy, xli, 21, describing the
-  epidemic at Rome in 174 B.C. “Cadavera, intacta à canibus et
-  vulturibus, tabes absumebat: satisque constabat, nec illo, nec
-  priore anno in tantâ strage boum hominumque vulturium usquam
-  visum.”
-
-  [283] Thucyd. ii, 52. From the language of Thucydidês, we see
-  that this was regarded at Athens as highly unbecoming. Yet a
-  passage of Plutarch seems to show that it was very common, in his
-  time, to burn several bodies on the same funeral pile (Plutarch,
-  Symposiac. iii, 4, p. 651).
-
-To all these scenes of physical suffering, death, and reckless
-despair, was superadded another evil, which affected those who were
-fortunate enough to escape the rest. The bonds both of law and
-morality became relaxed, amidst such total uncertainty of every man
-both for his own life, and that of others. Men cared not to abstain
-from wrong, under circumstances in which punishment was not likely
-to overtake them,—nor to put a check upon their passions, and endure
-privations in obedience even to their strongest conviction, when
-the chance was so small of their living to reap reward or enjoy
-any future esteem. An interval short and sweet, before their doom
-was realized—before they became plunged in the wide-spread misery
-which they witnessed around, and which affected indiscriminately the
-virtuous and the profligate—was all they looked to enjoy; embracing
-with avidity the immediate pleasures of sense, as well as such
-positive gains, however ill-gotten, as could be made the means of
-procuring them, and throwing aside all thought both of honor or of
-long-sighted advantage. Life and property were alike ephemeral, nor
-was there any hope left but to snatch a moment of enjoyment, before
-the outstretched hand of destiny should fall upon its victims.
-
-The melancholy picture of society under the pressure of a murderous
-epidemic, with its train of physical torments, wretchedness, and
-demoralization, has been drawn by more than one eminent author,
-but by none with more impressive fidelity and conciseness than
-by Thucydidês,[284] who had no predecessor, and nothing but the
-reality to copy from. We may remark that, amidst all the melancholy
-accompaniments of the time, there are no human sacrifices, such as
-those offered up at Carthage during pestilence to appease the anger
-of the gods,—there are no cruel persecutions against imaginary
-authors of the disease, such as those against the Untori (anointers
-of doors) in the plague of Milan in 1630.[285] Three years altogether
-did this calamity desolate Athens: continuously, during the entire
-second and third years of the war,—after which, followed a period
-of marked abatement for a year and a half: but it then revived
-again, and lasted for another year, with the same fury as at first.
-The public loss, over and above the private misery, which this
-unexpected enemy inflicted upon Athens, was incalculable. Out of
-twelve hundred horsemen, all among the rich men of the state,
-three hundred died of the epidemic; besides four thousand and four
-hundred hoplites out of the roll formerly kept, and a number of the
-poorer population so great as to defy computation.[286] No efforts
-of the Peloponnesians could have done so much to ruin Athens, or
-to bring the war to a termination such as they desired: and the
-distemper told the more in their favor, as it never spread at all
-into Peloponnesus, though it passed from Athens to some of the more
-populous islands.[287] The Lacedæmonian army was withdrawn from
-Attica somewhat earlier than it would otherwise have been, for fear
-of taking the contagion.[288]
-
-  [284] The description in the sixth book of Lucretius, translated
-  and expanded from Thucydidês,—that of the plague at Florence in
-  1348, with which the Decameron of Boccacio opens,—and that of
-  Defoe, in his History of the Plague in London, are all well known.
-
-  [285] “Carthaginienses, cum inter cetera mala etiam peste
-  laborarent, cruentâ sacrorum religione, et scelere pro remedio,
-  usi sunt: quippe homines ut victimas immolabant; pacem deorum
-  sanguine eorum exposcentes, pro quorum vitâ Dii rogari maximè
-  solent.” (Justin, xviii, 6.)
-
-  For the facts respecting the plague of Milan and the Untori,
-  see the interesting novel of Manzoni, Promessi Sposi, and the
-  historical work of the same author, Storia della Colonna Infame.
-
-  [286] Thucyd. iii, 87. τοῦ δὲ ἄλλου ὄχλου ἀνεξεύρετος ἀριθμός.
-  Diodorus makes them above 10,000 (xii, 58) freemen and slaves
-  together, which must be greatly beneath the reality.
-
-  [287] Thucyd. ii, 54. τῶν ἄλλων χωρίων τὰ πολυανθρωπότατα. He
-  does not specify what places these were: perhaps Chios, but
-  hardly Lesbos, otherwise the fact would have been noticed when
-  the revolt of that island occurs.
-
-  [288] Thucyd. ii, 57.
-
-But it was while the Lacedæmonians were yet in Attica, and during the
-first freshness of the terrible malady, that Periklês equipped and
-conducted from Peiræus an armament of one hundred triremes, and four
-thousand hoplites to attack the coasts of Peloponnesus: three hundred
-horsemen were also carried in some horse-transports, prepared for
-the occasion out of old triremes. To diminish the crowd accumulated
-in the city, was doubtless of beneficial tendency, and perhaps those
-who went aboard, might consider it as a chance of escape to quit an
-infected home. But unhappily they carried the infection along with
-them, which desolated the fleet not less than the city, and crippled
-all its efforts. Reinforced by fifty ships of war from Chios and
-Lesbos, the Athenians first landed near Epidaurus in Peloponnesus,
-ravaging the territory, and making an unavailing attempt upon the
-city: next, they made like incursions on the more southerly portions
-of the Argolic peninsula,—Trœzen, Halieis, and Hermionê; and lastly
-attacked and captured Prasiæ, on the eastern coast of Laconia. On
-returning to Athens, the same armament was immediately conducted,
-under Agnon and Kleopompus, to press the siege of Potidæa, the
-blockade of which still continued without any visible progress. On
-arriving there, an attack was made on the walls by battering engines,
-and by the other aggressive methods then practised; but nothing
-whatever was achieved. In fact, the armament became incompetent for
-all serious effort, from the aggravated character which the distemper
-here assumed, communicated by the soldiers fresh from Athens, even to
-those who had before been free from it at Potidæa. So frightful was
-the mortality, that out of the four thousand hoplites under Agnon,
-no less than ten hundred and fifty died in the short space of forty
-days. The armament was brought back in this melancholy condition to
-Athens, while the reduction of Potidæa was left, as before, to the
-slow course of blockade.[289]
-
-  [289] Thucyd. ii, 56-58.
-
-On returning from the expedition against Peloponnesus, Periklês
-found his countrymen almost distracted[290] with their manifold
-sufferings. Over and above the raging epidemic, they had just gone
-over Attica and ascertained the devastations committed by the
-invaders throughout all the territory—except the Marathonian[291]
-Tetrapolis and Dekeleia; districts spared, as we are told, through
-indulgence founded on an ancient legendary sympathy—during their long
-stay of forty days. The rich had found their comfortable mansions and
-farms, the poor their modest cottages, in the various demes, torn
-down and ruined. Death,[292] sickness, loss of property, and despair
-of the future, now rendered the Athenians angry and intractable to
-the last degree; and they vented their feelings against Periklês,
-as the cause, not merely of the war, but also of all that they were
-now enduring. Either with or without his consent, they sent envoys
-to Sparta to open negotiations for peace, but the Spartans turned a
-deaf ear to the proposition. This new disappointment rendered them
-still more furious against Periklês, whose long-standing political
-enemies now doubtless found strong sympathy in their denunciations
-of his character and policy. That unshaken and majestic firmness,
-which ranked first among his many eminent qualities, was never more
-imperiously required, and never more effectively manifested. In his
-capacity of stratêgus, or general, he convoked a formal assembly of
-the people, for the purpose of vindicating himself publicly against
-the prevailing sentiment, and recommending perseverance in his line
-of policy. The speeches made by his opponents, assuredly very bitter,
-are not given by Thucydidês; but that of Periklês himself is set
-down at considerable length, and a memorable discourse it is. It
-strikingly brings into relief both the character of the man and the
-impress of actual circumstances,—an impregnable mind, conscious not
-only of right purposes, but of just and reasonable anticipations,
-and bearing up with manliness, or even defiance, against the natural
-difficulty of the case, heightened by an extreme of incalculable
-misfortune. He had foreseen,[293] while advising the war originally,
-the probable impatience of his countrymen under its first hardships,
-but he could not foresee the epidemic by which that impatience had
-been exasperated into madness: and he now addressed them, not merely
-with unabated adherence to his own deliberate convictions, but also
-in a tone of reproachful remonstrance against their unmerited change
-of sentiment towards him,—seeking at the same time to combat that
-uncontrolled despair which, for the moment, overlaid both their pride
-and their patriotism. Far from humbling himself before the present
-sentiment, it is at this time that he sets forth his titles to their
-esteem in the most direct and unqualified manner, and claims the
-continuance of that which they had so long accorded, as something
-belonging to him by acquired right.
-
-  [290] Thucyd. ii, 59. ἠλλοίωντο τὰς γνώμας.
-
-  [291] Diodor. xii, 45; Ister ap. Schol. ad Soph. Œdip. Colon.
-  689; Herodot. ix.
-
-  [292] Thucyd. ii, 65. Ὁ μὲν δῆμος, ὅτι ἀπ᾽ ἐλασσόνων ὁρμώμενος,
-  ἐστέρητο καὶ τούτων· οἱ δὲ δυνατοὶ, καλὰ κτήματα κατὰ τὴν χώραν
-  οἰκοδομίαις τε καὶ πολυτελέσι κατασκευαῖς ἀπολωλεκότες.
-
-  [293] Thucyd. i, 140.
-
-His main object, throughout this discourse, is to fill the minds of
-his audience with patriotic sympathy for the weal of the entire city,
-so as to counterbalance the absorbing sense of private woe. If the
-collective city flourishes, he argues, private misfortunes may at
-least be borne: but no amount of private prosperity will avail, if
-the collective city falls; a proposition literally true in ancient
-times, and under the circumstances of ancient warfare, though less
-true at present. “Distracted by domestic calamity, ye are now angry
-both with me, who advised you to go to war, and with yourselves, who
-followed the advice. Ye listened to me, considering me superior to
-others in judgment, in speech, in patriotism, and in incorruptible
-probity,[294]—nor ought I now to be treated as culpable for giving
-such advice, when in point of fact the war was unavoidable, and there
-would have been still greater danger in shrinking from it. I am the
-same man, still unchanged,—but ye, in your misfortunes, cannot stand
-to the convictions which ye adopted when yet unhurt. Extreme and
-unforeseen, indeed, are the sorrows which have fallen upon you: yet,
-inhabiting as ye do a great city, and brought up in dispositions
-suitable to it, ye must also resolve to bear up against the utmost
-pressure of adversity, and never to surrender your dignity. I have
-often explained to you that ye have no reason to doubt of eventual
-success in the war, but I will now remind you, more emphatically than
-before, and even with a degree of ostentation suitable as a stimulus
-to your present unnatural depression,—that your naval force makes you
-masters, not only of your allies, but of the entire sea,[295]—one
-half of the visible field for action and employment. Compared with so
-vast a power as this, the temporary use of your houses and territory
-is a mere trifle,—an ornamental accessory not worth considering; and
-this, too, if ye preserve your freedom, ye will quickly recover. It
-was your fathers who first gained this empire, without any of the
-advantages which ye now enjoy; ye must not disgrace yourselves by
-losing what they acquired. Delighting as ye all do in the honor and
-empire enjoyed by the city, ye must not shrink from the toils whereby
-alone that honor is sustained: moreover, ye now fight, not merely
-for freedom instead of slavery, but for empire against loss of
-empire, with all the perils arising out of imperial unpopularity. It
-is not safe for you now to abdicate, even if ye chose to do so; for
-ye hold your empire like a despotism,—unjust perhaps in the original
-acquisition, but ruinous to part with when once acquired. Be not
-angry with me, whose advice ye followed in going to war, because the
-enemy have done such damage as might be expected from them; still
-less on account of this unforeseen distemper: I know that this makes
-me an object of your special present hatred, though very unjustly,
-unless ye will consent to give me credit also for any unexpected
-good luck which may occur. Our city derives its particular glory
-from unshaken bearing up against misfortune: her power, her name,
-her empire of Greeks over Greeks, are such as have never before been
-seen: and if we choose to be great, we must take the consequence
-of that temporary envy and hatred which is the necessary price of
-permanent renown. Behave ye now in a manner worthy of that glory:
-display that courage which is essential to protect you against
-disgrace at present, as well as to guarantee your honor for the
-future. Send no farther embassy to Sparta, and bear your misfortunes
-without showing symptoms of distress.”[296]
-
-  [294] Thucyd. ii, 60. καίτοι ἐμοὶ τοιούτῳ ἀνδρὶ ὀργίζεσθε, ὃς
-  οὐδενὸς οἴομαι ἥσσων εἶναι γνῶναί τε τὰ δέοντα, καὶ ἑρμηνεῦσαι
-  ταῦτα, φιλόπολίς τε καὶ χρημάτων κρείσσων.
-
-  [295] Thucyd. ii, 62. δηλώσω δὲ καὶ τόδε, ὅ μοι δοκεῖτε οὔτ᾽
-  αὐτοὶ πώποτε ἐνθυμηθῆναι ὑπάρχον ὑμῖν μεγέθους πέρι ἐς τὴν ἀρχὴν,
-  οὔτ᾽ ἐγὼ ἐν τοῖς πρὶν λόγοις· οὐδ᾽ ἂν νῦν ἐχρησάμην κομπωδεστέραν
-  ἔχοντι τὴν προσποίησιν, εἰ μὴ καταπεπληγμένους ὑμᾶς παρὰ τὸ εἰκὸς
-  ἑώρων. Οἴεσθε μὲν γὰρ τῶν ξυμμάχων μόνον ἄρχειν—ἐγὼ δὲ ἀποφαίνω
-  δύο μερῶν τῶν ἐς χρῆσιν φανερῶν, γῆς καὶ θαλάττης, τοῦ ἑτέρου
-  ὑμᾶς παντὸς κυριωτάτους ὄντας, ἐφ᾽ ὅσον τε νῦν νέμεσθε, καὶ ἢν
-  ἐπιπλέον βουληθῆτε.
-
-  [296] Thucyd. ii, 60-64. I give a general summary of this
-  memorable speech, without setting forth its full contents, still
-  less the exact words.
-
-The irresistible reason, as well as the proud and resolute bearing
-of this discourse, set forth with an eloquence which it was not
-possible for Thucydidês to reproduce,—together with the age and
-character of Periklês,—carried the assent of the assembled people;
-who, when in the Pnyx, and engaged according to habit on public
-matters, would for a moment forget their private sufferings in
-considerations of the safety and grandeur of Athens: possibly,
-indeed, those sufferings, though still continuing, might become
-somewhat alleviated when the invaders quitted Attica, and when it
-was no longer indispensable for all the population to confine itself
-within the walls. Accordingly, the assembly resolved that no farther
-propositions should be made for peace, and that the war should be
-prosecuted with vigor. But though the public resolution thus adopted
-showed the ancient habit of deference to the authority of Periklês,
-the sentiments of individuals taken separately were still those of
-anger against him, as the author of that system which had brought
-them into so much distress. His political opponents—Kleon, Simmias,
-or Lakratidas, perhaps all three in conjunction—took care to provide
-an opportunity for this prevalent irritation to manifest itself in
-act, by bringing an accusation against him before the dikastery. The
-accusation is said to have been preferred on the ground of pecuniary
-malversation, and ended by his being sentenced to pay a considerable
-fine, the amount of which is differently reported,—fifteen, fifty,
-or eighty talents, by different authors.[297] The accusing party
-thus appeared to have carried their point, and to have disgraced,
-as well as excluded from reëlection, the veteran statesman. But the
-event disappointed their expectations: the imposition of the fine
-not only satiated all the irritation of the people against him, but
-even occasioned a serious reaction in his favor, and brought back as
-strongly as ever the ancient sentiment of esteem and admiration. It
-was quickly found that those who had succeeded Periklês as generals,
-neither possessed nor deserved in an equal degree, the public
-confidence, and he was accordingly soon reëlected, with as much power
-and influence as he had ever in his life enjoyed.[298]
-
-  [297] Thucyd. ii, 65: Plato, Gorgias, p. 515, c. 71: Plutarch,
-  Periklês, c. 35; Diodor. xii, c. 38-45. About Simmias, as the
-  vehement enemy of Periklês, see Plutarch, Reipub. Ger. Præcept.
-  p. 805.
-
-  Plutarch and Diodorus both state that Periklês was not only
-  fined, but also removed from his office of stratêgus. Thucydidês
-  mentions the fine, but not the removal: and his silence leads me
-  to doubt the reality of the latter event altogether. For with
-  such a man as Periklês, a vote of removal would have been a
-  penalty more marked and cutting than the fine; moreover, removal
-  from office, though capable of being pronounced by vote of the
-  public assembly, would hardly be inflicted as penalty by the
-  dikastery.
-
-  I imagine the events to have passed as follows: The stratêgi,
-  with most other officers of the commonwealth, were changed or
-  reëlected at the beginning of Hekatombæon, the first month of
-  the Attic year; that is, somewhere about midsummer. Now the
-  Peloponnesian army, invading Attica about the end of March or
-  beginning of April, and remaining forty days, would leave the
-  country about the first week in May. Periklês returned from his
-  expedition against Peloponnesus shortly after they left Attica;
-  that is, about the middle of May (Thucyd. ii, 57): there still
-  remained, therefore, a month or six weeks before his office of
-  stratêgus naturally expired, and required renewal. It was during
-  this interval (which Thucydidês expresses by the words ἔτι δ᾽
-  ἐστρατήγει, ii, 59) that he convoked the assembly and delivered
-  the harangue recently mentioned.
-
-  But when the time for a new election of stratêgi arrived, the
-  enemies of Periklês opposed his reëlection, and brought a charge
-  against him, in that trial of accountability to which every
-  magistrate at Athens was exposed, after his period of office.
-  They alleged against him some official misconduct in reference
-  to the public money, and the dikastery visited him with a fine.
-  His reëlection was thus prevented, and with a man who had been
-  so often reëlected, this might be loosely called “taking away
-  the office of general:” so that the language of Plutarch and
-  Diodorus, as well as the silence of Thucydidês, would, on this
-  supposition, be justified.
-
-  [298] Thucyd. ii, 65.
-
-But that life—long, honorable, and useful—had already been prolonged
-considerably beyond the sixtieth year, and there were but too many
-circumstances, besides the recent fine, which tended to hasten as
-well as to embitter its close. At the very moment when Periklês
-was preaching to his countrymen, in a tone almost reproachful, the
-necessity of manful and unabated devotion to the common country, in
-the midst of private suffering,—he was himself among the greatest of
-sufferers, and most hardly pressed to set the example of observing
-his own precepts. The epidemic carried off not merely his two sons,
-the only two legitimate, Xanthippus and Paralus, but also his sister,
-several other relatives, and his best and most useful political
-friends. Amidst this train of domestic calamities, and in the funeral
-obsequies of so many of his dearest friends, he remained master of
-his grief, and maintained his habitual self-command, until the last
-misfortune,—the death of his favorite son Paralus, which left his
-house without any legitimate representative to maintain the family
-and the hereditary sacred rites. On this final blow, though he strove
-to command himself as before, yet, at the obsequies of the young man,
-when it became his duty to place a garland on the dead body, his
-grief became uncontrollable, and he burst out, for the first time of
-his life, into profuse tears and sobbing.[299]
-
-  [299] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 36.
-
-In the midst of these several personal trials he received the
-intimation, through Alkibiadês and some other friends, of the
-restored confidence of the people towards him, and of his re-election
-to the office of stratêgus: nor was it without difficulty that
-he was persuaded to present himself again at the public assembly,
-and resume the direction of affairs. The regret of the people
-was formally expressed to him for the recent sentence,—perhaps,
-indeed, the fine may have been repaid to him, or some evasion of it
-permitted, saving the forms of law,[300]—in the present temper of
-the city; which was farther displayed towards him by the grant of
-a remarkable exemption from a law of his own original proposition.
-He had himself, some years before, been the author of that law,
-whereby the citizenship of Athens was restricted to persons born both
-of Athenian fathers and Athenian mothers, under which restriction
-several thousand persons, illegitimate on the mother’s side, are
-said to have been deprived of the citizenship, on occasion of a
-public distribution of corn. Invidious as it appeared to grant, to
-Periklês singly, an exemption from a law which had been strictly
-enforced against so many others, the people were now moved not less
-by compassion than by anxiety to redress their own previous severity.
-Without a legitimate heir, the house of Periklês, one branch of the
-great Alkmæônid gens by his mother’s side, would be left deserted,
-and the continuity of the family sacred rites would be broken,—a
-misfortune painfully felt by every Athenian family, as calculated
-to wrong all the deceased members, and provoke their posthumous
-displeasure towards the city. Accordingly, permission was granted to
-Periklês to legitimize, and to inscribe in his own gens and phratry
-his natural son by Aspasia, who bore his own name.[301]
-
-  [300] See Plutarch, Demosthen. c. 27, about the manner of
-  bringing about such an evasion of a fine: compare also the letter
-  of M. Boeckh, in Meineke, Fragment. Comic. Græcor. ad Fragm.
-  Eupolid. ii, 527.
-
-  [301] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 37.
-
-It was thus that Periklês was reinstated in his post of stratêgus,
-as well as in his ascendency over the public counsels,—seemingly
-about August or September, 430 B.C. He lived about one year longer,
-and seems to have maintained his influence as long as his health
-permitted. Yet we hear nothing of him after this moment, and he
-fell a victim, not to the violent symptoms of the epidemic, but to
-a slow and wearing fever,[302] which underminded his strength as
-well as his capacity. To a friend who came to ask after him when in
-this disease, Periklês replied by showing a charm or amulet which
-his female relations had hung about his neck,—a proof how low he was
-reduced, and how completely he had become a passive subject in the
-hands of others. And according to another anecdote which we read, yet
-more interesting and equally illustrative of his character,—it was
-during his last moments, when he was lying apparently unconscious and
-insensible, that the friends around his bed were passing in review
-the acts of his life, and the nine trophies which he had erected
-at different times for so many victories. He heard what they said,
-though they fancied that he was past hearing, and interrupted them
-by remarking: “What you praise in my life, belongs partly to good
-fortune,—and is, at best, common to me with many other generals. But
-the peculiarity of which I am most proud, you have not noticed,—no
-Athenian has ever put on mourning on my account.”[303]
-
-  [302] Plutarch (Perik. c. 38) treats the slow disorder under
-  which he suffered as one of the forms of the epidemic: but this
-  can hardly be correct, when we read the very marked character of
-  the latter, as described by Thucydidês.
-
-  [303] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 38.
-
-Such a cause of self-gratulation, doubtless more satisfactory to
-recall at such a moment than any other, illustrates that long-sighted
-calculation, aversion to distant or hazardous enterprise, and economy
-of the public force, which marked his entire political career; a
-career long, beyond all parallel, in the history of Athens,—since
-he maintained a great influence, gradually swelling into a decisive
-personal ascendency, for between thirty and forty years. His
-character has been presented in very different lights, by different
-authors, both ancient and modern, and our materials for striking
-the balance are not so good as we could wish. But his immense and
-long-continued ascendency, as well as his unparalleled eloquence, are
-facts attested not less by his enemies than by his friends,—nay, even
-more forcibly by the former than by the latter. The comic writers,
-who hated him, and whose trade it was to deride and hunt down every
-leading political character, exhaust their powers of illustration in
-setting forth both the one and the other:[304] Telekleidês, Kratinus,
-Eupolis, Aristophanês, all hearers and all enemies, speak of him
-like Olympian Zeus, hurling thunder and lightning,—like Hêraklês
-and Achilles,—as the only speaker on whose lips persuasion sat, and
-who left his sting in the minds of his audience: while Plato the
-philosopher,[305] who disapproved of his political working, and
-of the moral effects which he produced upon Athens, nevertheless
-extols his intellectual and oratorical ascendency: “his majestic
-intelligence,”—in language not less decisive than Thucydidês.
-There is another point of eulogy, not less valuable, on which the
-testimony appears uncontradicted: throughout his long career, amidst
-the hottest political animosities, the conduct of Periklês towards
-opponents was always mild and liberal.[306] The conscious self-esteem
-and arrogance of manner with which the contemporary poet Ion
-reproached him,[307] contrasting it with the unpretending simplicity
-of his own patron Kimon,—though probably invidiously exaggerated,
-is doubtless in substance well founded, and those who read the
-last speech given above out of Thucydidês, will at once recognize
-in it this attribute. His natural taste, his love of philosophical
-research, and his unwearied application to public affairs, all
-contributed to alienate him from ordinary familiarity, and to make
-him careless, perhaps improperly careless, of the lesser means of
-conciliating public favor.
-
-  [304] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 4, 8, 13, 16; Eupolis. Δῆμοι,
-  Fragm. vi. p. 459, ed. Meineke. Cicero (De Orator. iii, 34;
-  Brutus, 9-11) and Quintilian (ii, 16, 19; x, 1, 82) count only as
-  witnesses at second-hand.
-
-  [305] Plato, Gorgias, c. 71, p. 516; Phædrus, c. 54. p. 270.
-  Περικλέα, τὸν οὕτω μεγαλοπρεπῶς σοφὸν ἄνδρα. Plato, Mens. p. 94,
-  B.
-
-  [306] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 10-39.
-
-  [307] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 5.
-
-But admitting this latter reproach to be well founded, as it seems
-to be, it helps to negative that greater and graver political
-crime which has been imputed to him, of sacrificing the permanent
-well-being and morality of the state to the maintenance of his
-own political power,—of corrupting the people by distributions of
-the public money. “He gave the reins to the people (in Plutarch’s
-words[308]), and shaped his administration for their immediate
-favor, by always providing at home some public spectacle, or
-festival, or procession, thus nursing up the city in elegant
-pleasures,—and by sending out every year sixty triremes, manned
-by citizen-seamen on full pay, who were thus kept in practice and
-acquired nautical skill.” Now the charge here made against Periklês,
-and supported by allegations in themselves honorable rather than
-otherwise,—of a vicious appetite for immediate popularity, and of
-improper concessions to the immediate feelings of the people against
-their permanent interests,—is precisely that which Thucydidês, in
-the most pointed manner denies; and not merely denies, but contrasts
-Periklês with his successors in the express circumstances that
-_they_ did so, while _he_ did not. The language of the contemporary
-historian[309] well deserves to be cited: “Periklês, powerful from
-dignity of character as well as from wisdom, and conspicuously above
-the least tinge of corruption, held back the people with a free hand,
-and was their real leader instead of being led by them. For not
-being a seeker of power from unworthy sources, he did not speak with
-any view to present favor, but had sufficient sense of dignity to
-contradict them on occasion, even braving their displeasure. Thus,
-whenever he perceived them insolently and unseasonably confident, he
-shaped his speeches in such manner as to alarm and beat them down:
-when again he saw them unduly frightened, he tried to counteract
-it, and restore them confidence: so that the government was in
-name a democracy, but in reality an empire exercised by the first
-citizen in the state. But those who succeeded after his death, being
-more equal one with another, and each of them desiring preëminence
-over the rest, adopted the different course of courting the favor
-of the people, and sacrificing to that object even important
-state-interests. From whence arose many other bad measures, as might
-be expected in a great and imperial city, and especially the Sicilian
-expedition,” etc.
-
-  [308] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11. Διὸ καὶ τότε μάλιστα τῷ δήμῳ τὰς
-  ἡνίας ἀνεὶς ὁ Περικλῆς ἐπολιτεύετο πρὸς χάριν—ἀεὶ μέν τινα θέαν
-  πανηγυρικὴν ἢ ἑστίασιν ἢ πομπὴν εἶναι μηχανώμενος ἐν ἄστει, καὶ
-  διαπαιδαγωγῶν οὐκ ἀμούσοις ἡδοναῖς τὴν πόλιν—ἑξήκοντα δὲ τριήρεις
-  καθ᾽ ἕκαστον ἐνιαυτὸν ἐκπέμπων, ἐν αἷς πολλοὶ τῶν πολιτῶν ἔπλεον
-  ὀκτὼ μῆνας ἔμμισθοι, μελετῶντες ἅμα καὶ μανθάνοντες τὴν ναυτικὴν
-  ἐμπειρίαν.
-
-  Compare c. 9, where Plutarch states that Periklês, having no
-  other means of contending against the abundant private largesses
-  of his rival, Kimon, resorted to the expedient of distributing
-  the public money among the citizens, in order to gain influence;
-  acting in this matter upon the advice of his friend, Demonidês,
-  according to the statement of Aristotle.
-
-  [309] Thucyd. ii, 65. Ἐκεῖνος μὲν (Περικλῆς) δυνατὸς ὢν τῷ
-  ~τε ἀξιώματι~ καὶ τῇ γνώμῃ, ~χρημάτων τε διαφανῶς ἀδωρότατος
-  γενόμενος, κατεῖχε τὸ πλῆθος ἐλευθέρως~, καὶ οὐκ ἤγετο μᾶλλον
-  ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἢ αὐτὸς ἦγε, διὰ τὸ μὴ κτώμενος ἐξ οὐ προσηκόντων
-  τὴν δύναμιν πρὸς ἡδονήν τι λέγειν, ἀλλ᾽ ἔχων ἐπ᾽ ~ἀξιώσει~ καὶ
-  πρὸς ὀργήν τι ἀντειπεῖν. Ὁπότε γοῦν αἴσθοιτό τι αὐτοὺς παρὰ
-  καιρὸν ὕβρει θαρσοῦντας, λέγων κατέπλησσεν ἐπὶ τὸ φοβεῖσθαι· καὶ
-  δεδιότας αὖ ἀλόγως ἀντικαθίστη πάλιν ἐπὶ τὸ θαρσεῖν. Ἐγίγνετο δὲ
-  λόγῳ μὲν δημοκρατία, ἔργῳ δὲ ὑπὸ τοῦ πρώτου ἀνδρὸς ἀρχή. Οἱ δὲ
-  ὕστερον ἴσοι μᾶλλον αὐτοὶ πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὄντες, καὶ ὀρεγόμενοι τοῦ
-  πρῶτος ἕκαστος γίγνεσθαι, ἐτράποντο καθ᾽ ἡδονὰς τῷ δήμῳ καὶ τὰ
-  πράγματα ἐνδιδόναι. Ἐξ ὧν, ἄλλα τε πολλά, ὡς ἐν μεγάλῃ πόλει καὶ
-  ἀρχὴν ἐχούσῃ, ἡμαρτήθη, καὶ ὁ ἐς Σικελίαν πλοῦς· ὃς οὐ τοσοῦτον
-  γνώμης ἁμάρτημα ἦν, etc. Compare Plutarch, Nikias, c. 3.
-
-  Ἀξίωσις and ἀξίωμα, as used by Thucydidês seem to differ in this
-  respect: Ἀξίωσις signifies, a man’s dignity, or pretensions to
-  esteem and influence as felt and measured by himself; _his sense
-  of dignity_; Ἀξίωμα means his _dignity_, properly so called; as
-  felt and appreciated by others. See i, 37, 41, 69.
-
-It will be seen that the judgment here quoted from Thucydidês
-contradicts, in the most unqualified manner, the reproaches commonly
-made against Periklês, of having corrupted the Athenian people
-by distributions of the public money, and by giving way to their
-unwise caprices, for the purpose of acquiring and maintaining his
-own political power. Nay, the historian particularly notes the
-opposite qualities,—self-judgment, conscious dignity, indifference
-to immediate popular applause or wrath, when set against what was
-permanently right and useful,—as the special characteristic of that
-great statesman. A distinction might indeed be possible, and Plutarch
-professes to note such distinction, between the earlier and the later
-part of his long political career: he began, so that biographer
-says, by corrupting the people in order to acquire power, but having
-acquired it, he employed it in an independent and patriotic manner,
-so that the judgment of Thucydidês, true respecting the later part of
-his life, would not be applicable to the earlier. This distinction
-may be to a certain degree well founded, inasmuch as the power of
-opposing a bold and successful resistance to temporary aberrations
-of the public mind, necessarily implies an established influence,
-and can hardly ever be exercised even by the firmest politician
-during his years of commencement: he is at that time necessarily
-the adjunct of some party or tendency which he finds already in
-operation, and has to stand forward actively and assiduously before
-he can create for himself a separate personal influence. But while we
-admit the distinction to this extent, there is nothing to warrant us
-in restricting the encomium of Thucydidês exclusively to the later
-life of Periklês, or in representing the earlier life as something
-in pointed contrast with that encomium. Construing fairly what the
-historian says, he evidently did not so conceive the earlier life of
-Periklês. Either those political changes which are held by Plato,
-Aristotle, Plutarch, and others, to demonstrate the corrupting effect
-of Periklês and his political ascendency,—such as the limitation
-of the functions of the Areopagus, as well as of the power of the
-magistrates, the establishment of the numerous and frequent popular
-dikasteries with regular pay, and perhaps also the assignment of pay
-to those who attended the ekklesia, the expenditure for public works,
-religious edifices and ornaments, the diobely (or distribution of two
-oboli per head to the poorer citizens at various festivals, in order
-that they might be able to pay for their places in the theatre),
-taking it as it then stood, etc.,—did not appear to Thucydidês
-mischievous and corrupting, as these other writers thought them; or
-else he did not particularly refer them to Periklês.
-
-Both are true, probably, to some extent. The internal political
-changes at Athens, respecting the Areopagus and the dikasteries, took
-place when Periklês was a young man, and when he cannot be supposed
-to have yet acquired the immense personal ascendency which afterwards
-belonged to him. Ephialtês in fact seems in those early days to have
-been a greater man than Periklês, if we may judge by the fact that
-he was selected by his political adversaries for assassination,—so
-that they might with greater propriety be ascribed to the party with
-which Periklês was connected, rather than to that statesman himself.
-But next, we have no reason to presume that Thucydidês considered
-these changes as injurious, or as having deteriorated the Athenian
-character. All that he does say as to the working of Periklês on the
-sentiment and actions of his countrymen, is eminently favorable. He
-represents the presidency of that statesman as moderate, cautious,
-conservative, and successful; he describes him as uniformly keeping
-back the people from rash enterprises, and from attempts to extend
-their empire,—as looking forward to the necessity of a war, and
-maintaining the naval, military, and financial forces of the state in
-constant condition to stand it,—as calculating, with long-sighted
-wisdom, the conditions on which ultimate success depended. If we
-follow the elaborate funeral harangue of Periklês, which Thucydidês,
-since he produces it at length, probably considered as faithfully
-illustrating the political point of view of that statesman, we shall
-discover a conception of democratical equality no less rational
-than generous; an anxious care for the recreation and comfort of
-the citizens, but no disposition to emancipate them from active
-obligation, either public or private,—and least of all, any idea of
-dispensing with such activity by abusive largesses out of the general
-revenue. The whole picture, drawn by Periklês, of Athens, “as the
-schoolmistress of Greece,” implies a prominent development of private
-industry and commerce, not less than of public citizenship and
-soldiership,—of letters, arts, and recreative varieties of taste.
-
-Though Thucydidês does not directly canvass the constitutional
-changes effected in Athens under Periklês, yet everything which he
-does say leads us to believe that he accounted the working of that
-statesman, upon the whole, on Athenian power as well as on Athenian
-character, eminently valuable, and his death as an irreparable loss.
-And we may thus appeal to the judgment of an historian who is our
-best witness in every conceivable respect, as a valid reply to the
-charge against Periklês, of having corrupted the Athenian habits,
-character, and government. If he spent a large amount of the public
-treasure upon religious edifices and ornaments, and upon stately
-works for the city,—yet the sum which he left untouched, ready
-for use at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, was such as to
-appear more than sufficient for all purposes of defence, or public
-safety, or military honor. It cannot be shown of Periklês that
-he ever sacrificed the greater object to the less,—the permanent
-and substantially valuable, to the transitory and showy,—assured
-present possessions, to the lust of new, distant, or uncertain
-conquests. If his advice had been listened to, the rashness which
-brought on the defeat of the Athenian Tolmidês, at Korôneia in
-Bœotia, would have been avoided, and Athens might probably have
-maintained her ascendency over Megara and Bœotia, which would have
-protected her territory from invasion, and given a new turn to the
-subsequent history. Periklês is not to be treated as the author of
-the Athenian character: he found it with its very marked positive
-characteristics and susceptibilities, among which, those which
-he chiefly brought out and improved were the best. The lust of
-expeditions against the Persians, which Kimon would have pushed
-into Egypt and Cyprus, he repressed, after it had accomplished
-all which could be usefully aimed at: the ambition of Athens he
-moderated rather than encouraged: the democratical movement of
-Athens he regularized, and worked out into judicial institutions,
-which became one of the prominent features of Athenian life, and
-worked, in my judgment, with a very large balance of benefit to
-the national mind as well as to individual security, in spite of
-the many defects in their direct character as tribunals. But that
-point in which there was the greatest difference between Athens,
-as Periklês found if, and as he left it, is, unquestionably, the
-pacific and intellectual development,—rhetoric, poetry, arts,
-philosophical research, and recreative variety. To which if we add,
-great improvement in the cultivation of the Attic soil,—extension of
-Athenian trade,—attainment and laborious maintenance of the maximum
-of maritime skill, attested by the battles of Phormio,—enlargement
-of the area of complete security by construction of the Long
-Walls,—lastly, the clothing of Athens in her imperial mantle, by
-ornaments, architectural and sculptural,—we shall make out a case of
-genuine progress realized during the political life of Periklês, such
-as the evils imputed to him, far more imaginary than real, will go
-but a little way to alloy. How little, comparatively speaking, of the
-picture drawn by Periklês in his funeral harangue of 431 B.C. would
-have been correct, if the harangue had been delivered over those
-warriors who fell at Tanagra, twenty-seven years before!
-
-It has been remarked by M. Boeckh,[310] that Periklês sacrificed the
-landed proprietors of Attica to the maritime interests and empire of
-Athens. This is of course founded on the destructive invasions of the
-country during the Peloponnesian war; for down to the commencement
-of that war the position of Attic cultivators and proprietors was
-particularly enviable: and the censure of M. Boeckh, therefore,
-depends upon the question, how far Periklês contributed to produce,
-or had it in his power to avert, this melancholy war, in its results
-so fatal, not merely to Athens, but to the entire Grecian race. Now
-here again, if we follow attentively the narrative of Thucydidês, we
-shall see that in the judgment of that historian, not only Periklês
-did not bring on the war, but he could not have averted it without
-such concession as Athenian prudence, as well as Athenian patriotism
-peremptorily forbade: moreover, we shall see, that the calculations
-on which Periklês grounded his hopes of success if driven to war,
-were, in the opinion of the historian, perfectly sound and safe. We
-may even go farther, and affirm, that the administration of Periklês
-during the fourteen years preceding the war, exhibits a “moderation,”
-to use the words of Thucydidês,[311] dictated especially by anxiety
-to avoid raising causes of war; though in the months immediately
-preceding the breaking out of the war, after the conduct of the
-Corinthians at Potidæa, and the resolutions of the congress at
-Sparta, he resisted strenuously all compliance with special demands
-from Sparta,—demands essentially insincere, and in which partial
-compliance would have lowered the dignity of Athens without insuring
-peace. The stories about Pheidias, Aspasia, and the Megarians,
-even if we should grant that there is some truth at the bottom of
-them, must, if we follow Thucydidês, be looked upon at worst as
-concomitants and pretexts, rather than as real causes, of the war:
-though modern authors, in speaking of Periklês, are but too apt to
-use expressions which tacitly assume these stories to be well founded.
-
-  [310] Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, b. iii, ch. xv. p. 399,
-  Eng. Trans.
-
-  Kutzen, in the second Beylage to his treatise, Periklês als
-  Staatsmann (pp. 169-200), has collected and inserted a list of
-  various characters of Periklês, from twenty different authors,
-  English, French, and German. That of Wachsmuth is the best of the
-  collection,—though even he appears to think that Periklês is to
-  blame for having introduced a set of institutions which none but
-  himself could work well.
-
-  [311] Thucyd. ii, 65. ~μετρίως ἐξηγεῖτο~. i, 144. δίκας δὲ ὅτι
-  ἐθέλομεν δοῦναι κατὰ τὰς ξυνθήκας, πολέμου δὲ οὐκ ἄρξομεν,
-  ἀρχομένους δὲ ἀμυνούμεθα.
-
-Seeing then that Periklês did not bring on and could not have averted
-the Peloponnesian war,—that he steered his course in reference to
-that event with the long-sighted prudence of one who knew that
-the safety and the dignity of imperial Athens were essentially
-interwoven,—we have no right to throw upon him the blame of
-sacrificing the landed proprietors of Attica. These might, indeed, be
-excused for complaining, where they suffered so ruinously; but the
-impartial historian, looking at the whole of the case, cannot admit
-their complaints as a ground for censuring the Athenian statesman.
-
-The relation of Athens to her allies, the weak point of her position,
-it was beyond the power of Periklês seriously to amend, probably also
-beyond his will, since the idea of political incorporation, as well
-as that of providing a common and equal confederate bond, sustained
-by effective federal authority between different cities, was rarely
-entertained even by the best Greek minds.[312] We hear that he tried
-to summon at Athens a congress of deputies from all cities of Greece,
-the allies of Athens included;[313] but the scheme could not be
-brought to bear, in consequence of the reluctance, noway surprising,
-of the Peloponnesians. Practically, the allies were not badly treated
-during his administration: and if, among the other bad consequences
-of the prolonged war, they, as well as Athens, and all other Greeks
-come to suffer more and more, this depends upon causes with which he
-is not chargeable, and upon proceedings which departed altogether
-from his wise and sober calculations. Taking him altogether, with
-his powers of thought, speech, and action,—his competence, civil and
-military, in the council as well as in the field,—his vigorous and
-cultivated intellect, and his comprehensive ideas of a community
-in pacific and many-sided development,—his incorruptible public
-morality, caution, and firmness, in a country where all those
-qualities were rare, and the union of them in the same individual of
-course much rarer,—we shall find him without a parallel throughout
-the whole course of Grecian history.
-
-  [312] Herodotus (1, 170) mentions that previous to the conquest
-  of the twelve Ionic cities in Asia by Crœsus, Thalês had
-  advised them to consolidate themselves all into one single city
-  government at Teos, and to reduce the existing cities to mere
-  demes or constituent, fractional municipalities,—τὰς δὲ ἄλλας
-  πόλιας οἰκεομένας μηδὲν ἧσσον νομίζεσθαι κατάπερ εἰ δῆμοι εἶεν.
-  It is remarkable to observe that Herodotus himself bestows his
-  unqualified commendation on this idea.
-
-  [313] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 17.
-
-Under the great mortality and pressure of sickness at Athens, their
-operations of war naturally languished; while the enemies also,
-though more active, had but little success. A fleet of one hundred
-triremes, with one thousand hoplites on board, was sent by the
-Lacedæmonians under Knêmus to attack Zakynthus, but accomplished
-nothing beyond devastation of the open parts of the island, and then
-returned home. And it was shortly after this, towards the month of
-September, that the Ambrakiots made an attack upon the Amphilochian
-town called Argos, situated on the southern coast of the gulf of
-Ambrakia: which town, as has been recounted in the preceding chapter,
-had been wrested from them two years before by the Athenians, under
-Phormio, and restored to the Amphilochians and Akarnanians. The
-Ambrakiots, as colonists and allies of Corinth, were at the same time
-animated by active enmity to the Athenian influence in Akarnania,
-and by desire to regain the lost town of Argos. Procuring aid from
-the Chaonians, and some other Epirotic tribes, they marched against
-Argos, and after laying waste the territory, endeavored to take the
-town by assault, but were repulsed, and obliged to retire.[314] This
-expedition appears to have impressed the Athenians with the necessity
-of a standing force to protect their interest in those parts; so that
-in the autumn Phormio was sent with a squadron of twenty triremes to
-occupy Naupaktus, now inhabited by the Messenians, as a permanent
-naval station, and to watch the entrance of the Corinthian gulf.[315]
-We shall find in the events of the succeeding year ample confirmation
-of this necessity.
-
-  [314] Thucyd. ii, 68.
-
-  [315] Thucyd. ii, 69.
-
-Though the Peloponnesians were too inferior in maritime force to
-undertake formal war at sea against Athens, their single privateers,
-especially the Megarian privateers from the harbor of Nisæa, were
-active in injuring her commerce,[316]—and not merely the commerce
-of Athens, but also that of other neutral Greeks, without scruple
-or discrimination. Several merchantmen and fishing-vessels, with
-a considerable number of prisoners, were thus captured.[317] Such
-prisoners as fell into the hands of the Lacedæmonians,—even neutral
-Greeks as well as Athenians,—were all put to death, and their bodies
-cast into clefts of the mountains. In regard to the neutrals, this
-capture was piratical, and the slaughter unwarrantably cruel, judged
-even by the received practice of the Greeks, deficient as that was
-on the score of humanity: but to dismiss these neutral prisoners, or
-to sell them as slaves, would have given publicity to a piratical
-capture and provoked the neutral towns, so that the prisoners were
-probably slain as the best way of getting rid of them and thus
-suppressing evidence.[318]
-
-  [316] Thucyd. iii, 51.
-
-  [317] Thucyd. ii, 67-69; Herodot. vii, 137. Respecting the
-  Lacedæmonian privateering during the Peloponnesian war, compare
-  Thucyd. v, 115: compare also Xenophon, Hellen. v, 1, 29.
-
-  [318] Thucyd. ii, 67. Οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι ὕπηρξαν, τοὺς ἐμπόρους
-  οὓς ἔλαβον Ἀθηναίων καὶ τῶν ξυμμάχων ἐν ὁλκάσι περὶ Πελοπόννησον
-  πλέοντας ἀποκτείναντες καὶ ἐς φάραγγας ἐσβαλόντες. Πάντας γὰρ
-  δὴ κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς τοῦ πολέμου οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, ὅσους λάβοιεν ἐν
-  τῇ θαλάσσῃ, ὡς πολεμίους διέφθειρον, καὶ τοὺς μετὰ Ἀθηναίων
-  ξυμπολεμοῦντας καὶ τοὺς μηδὲ μεθ᾽ ἑτέρων.
-
-  The Lacedæmonian admiral Alkidas slew all the prisoners taken on
-  board merchantmen off the coast of Ionia, in the ensuing year
-  (Thucyd. iii, 32). Even this was considered extremely rigorous,
-  and excited strong remonstrance; yet the mariners slain were not
-  neutrals, but belonged to the subject-allies of Athens: moreover,
-  Alkidas was in his flight, and obliged to make choice between
-  killing his prisoners or setting them free.
-
-Some of these Peloponnesian privateers ranged as far as the
-southwestern coast of Asia Minor, where they found temporary shelter,
-and interrupted the trading-vessels from Phasêlis and Phenicia to
-Athens; to protect which, the Athenians despatched, in the course
-of the autumn, a squadron of six triremes under Melêsander. He
-was farther directed to insure the collection of the ordinary
-tribute from Athenian subject-allies, and probably to raise such
-contributions as he could elsewhere. In the prosecution of this
-latter duty, he undertook an expedition from the sea-coast against
-one of the Lykian towns in the interior, but his attack was repelled
-with loss, and he himself slain.[319]
-
-  [319] Thucyd. ii, 69.
-
-An opportunity soon offered itself to the Athenians, of retaliating
-on Sparta for this cruel treatment of the maritime prisoners. In
-execution of the idea projected at the commencement of the war, the
-Lacedæmonians sent Anêristus and two others as envoys to Persia,
-for the purpose of soliciting from the Great King aids of money
-and troops against Athens; the dissensions among the Greeks thus
-gradually paving the way for him to regain his ascendency in the
-Ægean. Timagoras of Tegea, together with an Argeian named Pollis,
-without any formal mission from his city, and the Corinthian
-Aristeus, accompanied them. As the sea was in the power of Athens,
-they travelled overland through Thrace to the Hellespont; and
-Aristeus, eager to leave nothing untried for the relief of Potidæa,
-prevailed upon them to make application to Sitalkês, king of the
-Odrysian Thracians. That prince was then in alliance with Athens, and
-his son Sadokus had even received the grant of Athenian citizenship:
-yet the envoys thought it possible not only to detach him from the
-Athenian alliance, but even to obtain from him an army to act against
-the Athenians and raise the blockade of Potidæa,—this being refused,
-they lastly applied to him for a safe escort to the banks of the
-Hellespont, in their way towards Persia. But Learchus and Ameiniadês,
-then Athenian residents near the person of Sitalkês, had influence
-enough not only to cause rejection of these requests, but also to
-induce Sadokus, as a testimony of zeal in his new character of
-Athenian citizen, to assist them in seizing the persons of Aristeus
-and his companions in their journey through Thrace. Accordingly, the
-whole party were seized and conducted as prisoners to Athens, where
-they were forthwith put to death, without trial or permission to
-speak,—and their bodies cast into rocky chasms, as a reprisal for the
-captured seamen slain by the Lacedæmonians.[320]
-
-  [320] Thucyd. ii. 67. Dr. Thirlwall (Hist. Greece, vol. iii,
-  ch. 20, p. 129) says that “the envoys were sacrificed chiefly
-  to give a decent color to the baseness” of killing Aristeus,
-  from whom the Athenians feared subsequent evil, in consequence
-  of his ability and active spirit. I do not think this is fairly
-  contained in the words of Thucydidês. He puts in the foreground
-  of Athenian motive, doubtless, fear from the future energy of
-  Aristeus; but if that had been the only motive, the Athenians
-  would probably have slain him singly without the rest: they would
-  hardly think it necessary to provide themselves with “any decent
-  color,” in the way that Dr. Thirlwall suggests. Thucydidês names
-  the special feeling of the Athenians against Aristeus (in my
-  judgment), chiefly in order to explain the extreme haste of the
-  Athenian sentence of execution—αὐθήμερον—ἀκρίτους, etc.: they
-  were under the influence of combined motives,—fear, revenge,
-  retaliation.
-
-  The envoys here slain were sons of Sperthiês and Bulis, former
-  Spartan heralds who had gone up to Xerxes at Susa to offer their
-  heads as atonement for the previous conduct of the Spartans in
-  killing the heralds of Darius. Xerxes dismissed them unhurt,—so
-  that the anger of Talthybius (the heroic progenitor of the
-  family of heralds at Sparta) remained still unsatisfied: it was
-  only satisfied by the death of their two sons, now slain by the
-  Athenians. The fact that the two persons now slain were sons of
-  those two (Sperthiês and Bulis) who had previously gone to Susa
-  to tender their lives,—is spoken of as a “romantic and tragical
-  coincidence.” But there surely is very little to wonder at. The
-  functions of herald at Sparta, were the privilege of a particular
-  gens, or family: every herald, therefore, was _ex officio_ the
-  son of a herald. Now when the Lacedæmonians, at the beginning
-  of this Peloponnesian war, were looking out for two members of
-  the heraldic gens to send up to Susa, upon whom would they so
-  naturally fix as upon the sons of those two men who had been to
-  Susa before? These sons had doubtless heard their fathers talk
-  a great deal about it,—probably with interest and satisfaction,
-  since they derived great glory from the unaccepted offer of their
-  lives in atonement. There was a particular reason why these two
-  men should be taken, in preference to any other heralds, to
-  fulfil this dangerous mission: and doubtless when they perished
-  in it, the religious imagination of the Lacedæmonians would
-  group all the series of events as consummation of the judgment
-  inflicted by Talthybius in his anger (Herodot. vii, 135—ὡς
-  λέγουσι Λακεδαιμόνιοι).
-
-  It appears that Anêristus, the herald here slain, had
-  distinguished himself personally in that capture of fishermen on
-  the coast of Peloponnesus by the Lacedæmonians, for which the
-  Athenians were now retaliating (Herodot. vii, 137). Though this
-  passage of Herodotus is not clear, yet the sense here put upon it
-  is the natural one,—and clearer (in my judgment) than that which
-  O. Müller would propose instead of it (Dorians, ii, p. 437).
-
-Such revenge against Aristeus, the instigator of the revolt of
-Potidæa, relieved the Athenians from a dangerous enemy; and that
-blockaded city was now left to its fate. About midwinter it
-capitulated, after a blockade of two years, and after going through
-the extreme of suffering from famine, to such a degree that some
-of those who died were even eaten by the survivors. In spite of
-such intolerable distress, the Athenian generals, Xenophon son of
-Euripidês and his two colleagues, admitted them to favorable terms
-of capitulation,—permitting the whole population and the Corinthian
-allies to retire freely, with a specified sum of money per head, as
-well as with one garment for each man and two for each woman,—so
-that they found shelter among the Chalkidic townships in the
-neighborhood. These terms were singularly favorable, considering the
-desperate state of the city, which must very soon have surrendered
-at discretion: but the hardships, even of the army without, in the
-cold of winter, were very severe, and they had become thoroughly
-tired both of the duration and the expense of the siege. The cost
-to Athens had been not less than two thousand talents; since the
-assailant force had never been lower than three thousand hoplites,
-during the entire two years of the siege, and for a portion of the
-time considerably greater,—each hoplite receiving two drachmas _per
-diem_. The Athenians at home, when they learned the terms of the
-capitulation, were displeased with the generals for the indulgence
-shown,—since a little additional patience would have constrained the
-city to surrender at discretion: in which case the expense would
-have been partly made good by selling the prisoners as slaves,—and
-Athenian vengeance probably gratified by putting the warriors to
-death.[321] A body of one thousand colonists were sent from Athens to
-occupy Potidæa and its vacant territory.[322]
-
-  [321] Thucyd. ii, 70; iii, 17. However, the displeasure of the
-  Athenians against the commanders cannot have been very serious,
-  since Xenophon was appointed to command against the Chalkidians
-  in the ensuing year.
-
-  [322] Diodor. xii, 46.
-
-Two full years had now elapsed since the actual commencement of war,
-by the attack of the Thebans on Platæa; yet the Peloponnesians had
-accomplished nothing of what they expected. They had not rescued
-Potidæa, nor had their twice-repeated invasion, although assisted by
-the unexpected disasters arising from the epidemic, as yet brought
-Athens to any sufficient humiliation,—though perhaps the envoys
-which she had sent during the foregoing summer with propositions
-for peace, contrary to the advice of Periklês, may have produced an
-impression that she could not hold out long. At the same time, the
-Peloponnesian allies had on their side suffered little damage, since
-the ravages inflicted by the Athenian fleet on their coast may have
-been nearly compensated by the booty which their invading troops
-gained in Attica. Probably by this time the public opinion in Greece
-had contracted an unhappy familiarity with the state of war, so
-that nothing but some decisive loss and humiliation on one side at
-least, if not on both, would suffice to terminate it. In this third
-spring, the Peloponnesians did not repeat their annual march into
-Attica,—deterred, partly, we may suppose, by fear of the epidemic
-yet raging there,—but still more by the strong desire of the Thebans
-to take their revenge on Platæa.
-
-To this ill-fated city, Archidamus marched forthwith, at the head of
-the confederate army. But no sooner had he entered and begun to lay
-waste the territory, than the Platæan heralds came forth to arrest
-his hand, and accosted him in the following terms: “Archidamus, and
-ye men of Lacedæmon, ye act wrong, and in a manner neither worthy of
-yourselves nor of your fathers, in thus invading the territory of
-Platæa. For the Lacedæmonian Pausanias, son of Kleombrotus, after he
-had liberated Greece from the Persians, in conjunction with those
-Greeks who stood forward to bear their share of the danger, offered
-sacrifice to Zeus Eleutherius, in the market-place of Platæa; and
-there, in presence of all the allies, assigned to the Platæans their
-own city and territory to hold in full autonomy, so that none should
-invade them wrongfully, or with a view to enslave them: should such
-invasion occur, the allies present pledged themselves to stand
-forward with all their force as protectors. While your fathers made
-to us this grant, in consideration of our valor and forwardness in
-that perilous emergency, ye are now doing the precise contrary: ye
-are come along with our worst enemies, the Thebans, to enslave us.
-And we on our side now adjure you, calling to witness the gods who
-sanctioned that oath, as well as your paternal and our local gods,
-not to violate the oath by doing wrong to the Platæan territory, but
-to let us live on in that autonomy which Pausanias guaranteed.”[323]
-
-  [323] Thucyd. ii, 71, 72.
-
-Whereunto Archidamus replied: “Ye speak fairly, men of Platæa, if
-your conduct shall be in harmony with your words. Remain autonomous
-yourselves, as Pausanias granted, and help us to liberate those other
-Greeks, who, after having shared in the same dangers and sworn the
-same oath along with you, have now been enslaved by the Athenians.
-It is for their liberation and that of the other Greeks that this
-formidable outfit of war has been brought forth. Pursuant to your
-oaths, ye ought by rights, and we now invite you, to take active part
-in this object. But if ye cannot act thus, at least remain quiet,
-conformably to the summons which we have already sent to you; enjoy
-your own territory, and remain neutral,—receiving both parties as
-friends, but neither party for warlike purposes. With this we shall
-be satisfied.”
-
-The reply of Archidamus discloses by allusion a circumstance
-which the historian had not before directly mentioned; that the
-Lacedæmonians had sent a formal summons to the Platæans to renounce
-their alliance with Athens and remain neutral: at what time this
-took place,[324] we do not know, but it marks the peculiar sentiment
-attaching to the town. But the Platæans did not comply with the
-invitation thus twice repeated. The heralds, having returned for
-instructions into the city, brought back for answer, that compliance
-was impossible, without the consent of the Athenians, since their
-wives and families were now harbored at Athens: besides, if they
-should profess neutrality, and admit both parties as friends, the
-Thebans might again make an attempt to surprise their city. In reply
-to their scruples, Archidamus again addressed them: “Well, then,
-hand over your city and houses to us Lacedæmonians: mark out the
-boundaries of your territory: specify the number of your fruit-trees,
-and all your other property which admits of being numbered; and then
-retire whithersoever ye choose, as long as the war continues. As soon
-as it is over, we will restore to you all that we have received,—in
-the interim, we will hold it in trust, and keep it in cultivation,
-and pay you such an allowance as shall suffice for your wants.”[325]
-
-  [324] This previous summons is again alluded to afterwards, on
-  occasion of the slaughter of the Platæan prisoners (iii, 68):
-  διότι ~τόν τε ἄλλον χρόνον~ ἠξίουν δῆθεν, etc.
-
-  [325] Thucyd. ii, 73, 74.
-
-The proposition now made was so fair and tempting, that the general
-body of the Platæans were at first inclined to accept it, provided
-the Athenians would acquiesce; and they obtained from Archidamus a
-truce long enough to enable them to send envoys to Athens. After
-communication with the Athenian assembly, the envoys returned to
-Platæa, bearing the following answer: “Men of Platæa, the Athenians
-say they have never yet permitted you to be wronged since the
-alliance first began,—nor will they now betray you, but will help
-you to the best of their power. And they adjure you, by the oaths
-which your fathers swore to them, not to depart in any way from the
-alliance.”
-
-This message awakened in the bosoms of the Platæans the full force
-of ancient and tenacious sentiment. They resolved to maintain, at
-all cost, and even to the extreme of ruin, if necessity should
-require it, their union with Athens. It was indeed impossible that
-they could do otherwise, considering the position of their wives and
-families, without the consent of the Athenians; and though we cannot
-wonder that the latter refused consent, we may yet remark, that, in
-their situation, a perfectly generous ally might well have granted
-it. For the forces of Platæa counted for little as a portion of
-the aggregate strength of Athens; nor could the Athenians possibly
-protect it against the superior land-force of their enemies,—in fact,
-so hopeless was the attempt that they never even tried, throughout
-the whole course of the long subsequent blockade.
-
-The final refusal of the Platæans was proclaimed to Archidamus, by
-word of mouth from the walls, since it was not thought safe to send
-out any messenger. As soon as the Spartan prince heard the answer,
-he prepared for hostile operations,—apparently with very sincere
-reluctance, attested in the following invocation, emphatically
-pronounced:—
-
-“Ye gods and heroes, who hold the Platæan territory, be ye my
-witnesses, that we have not in the first instance wrongfully—not
-until these Platæans have first renounced the oaths binding on all of
-us—invaded this territory, in which our fathers defeated the Persians
-after prayers to you, and which ye granted as propitious for Greeks
-to fight in,—nor shall we commit wrong in what we may do farther, for
-we have taken pains to tender reasonable terms, but without success.
-Be ye now consenting parties: may those who are beginning the wrong
-receive punishment for it,—may those who are aiming to inflict
-penalty righteously, obtain their object.”
-
-It was thus that Archidamus, in language delivered probably under
-the walls, and within hearing of the citizens who manned them,
-endeavored to conciliate the gods and heroes of that town which he
-was about to ruin and depopulate. The whole of this preliminary
-debate,[326] so strikingly and dramatically set forth by Thucydidês,
-illustrates forcibly the respectful reluctance with which the
-Lacedæmonians first brought themselves to assail this scene of the
-glories of their fathers. What deserves remark is, that their direct
-sentiment attaches itself, not at all to the Platæan people, but
-only to the Platæan territory; it is purely local, though it becomes
-partially transferred to the people, as tenants of this spot, by
-secondary association. It was, however, nothing but the long-standing
-antipathy[327] of the Thebans which induced Archidamus to undertake
-the enterprise; for the conquest of Platæa was of no avail towards
-the main objects of the war, though its exposed situation caused it
-to be crushed between the two great contending forces in Greece.
-
-  [326] Thucyd. ii, 71-75.
-
-  [327] Thucyd. iii, 68.
-
-Archidamus now commenced the siege forthwith, in full hopes that his
-numerous army, the entire strength of the Peloponnesian confederacy,
-would soon capture a place of no great size, and probably not very
-well fortified; yet defended by a resolute garrison of four hundred
-native citizens, with eighty Athenians: there was no one else in
-the town except one hundred and ten female slaves for cooking. The
-fruit-trees, cut down in laying waste the cultivated land, sufficed
-to form a strong palisade all round the town, so as completely to
-block up the inhabitants. Next, Archidamus, having abundance of
-timber near at hand in the forests of Kithæron, began to erect a
-mound up against a portion of the town wall, so as to be able to
-march up by an inclined plane, and thus take the place by assault.
-Wood, stones, and earth, were piled up in a vast heap,—cross palings
-of wood being carried on each side of it, in parallel lines at right
-angles to the town wall, for the purpose of keeping the loose mass of
-materials between them together. For seventy days and as many nights
-did the army labor at this work, without any intermission, taking
-turns for food and repose: and through such unremitting assiduity,
-the mound approached near to the height of the town wall. But as it
-gradually mounted up, the Platæans were not idle on their side: they
-constructed an additional wall of wood, which they planted on the
-top of their own town wall, so as to heighten the part over against
-the enemy’s mound: sustaining it by brickwork behind, for which
-the neighboring houses furnished materials: hides, raw as well as
-dressed, were suspended in front of it, in order to protect their
-workmen against missiles, and the woodwork against fire-carrying
-arrows.[328] And as the besiegers still continued heaping up
-materials, to carry their mound up to the height even of this recent
-addition, the Platæans met them by breaking a hole in the lower part
-of their town wall, and pulling in the earth from the lower portion
-of the mound; which thus gave way at the top and left a vacant space
-near the wall, until the besiegers filled it up by letting down
-quantities of stiff clay rolled up in wattled reeds, which could
-not be pulled away in the same manner. Again, the Platæans dug a
-subterranean passage from the interior of their town to the ground
-immediately under the mound, and thus carried away unseen the lower
-earth belonging to the latter; so that the besiegers saw their
-mound continually sinking down, in spite of fresh additions at the
-top,—yet without knowing the reason. Nevertheless, it was plain that
-these stratagems would be in the end ineffectual, and the Platæans
-accordingly built a new portion of town wall in the interior, in the
-shape of a crescent, taking its start from the old town wall on each
-side of the mound: the besiegers were thus deprived of all benefit
-from the mound, assuming it to be successfully completed; since when
-they had marched over it, there stood in front of them a new town
-wall to be carried in like manner.
-
-  [328] Thucyd. ii, 75.
-
-Nor was this the only method of attack employed. Archidamus farther
-brought up battering engines, one of which greatly shook and
-endangered the additional height of wall built by the Platæans over
-against the mound; while others were brought to bear on different
-portions of the circuit of the town wall. Against these new
-assailants, various means of defence were used: the defenders on
-the walls threw down ropes, got hold of the head of the approaching
-engine, and pulled it by main force out of the right line, either
-upwards or sideways: or they prepared heavy wooden beams on the
-wall, each attached to both ends by long iron chains to two poles
-projecting at right angles from the wall, by means of which poles
-it was raised up and held aloft: so that at the proper moment, when
-the battering machine approached the wall, the chain was suddenly
-let go, and the beam fell down with great violence directly upon the
-engine and broke off its projecting beak.[329] However rude these
-defensive processes may seem, they were found effective against
-the besiegers, who saw themselves, at the close of three months’
-unavailing efforts, obliged to renounce the idea of taking the town
-in any other way than by the process of blockade and famine,—a
-process alike tedious and costly.[330]
-
-  [329] The various processes, such as those here described,
-  employed both for offence and defence in the ancient sieges, are
-  noticed and discussed in Æneas Poliorketic. c. 33, _seq._
-
-  [330] Thucyd. ii, 76.
-
-Before they would incur so much inconvenience, however, they had
-recourse to one farther stratagem,—that of trying to set the town
-on fire. From the height of their mound, they threw down large
-quantities of fagots, partly into the space between the mound and
-the newly-built crescent piece of wall,—partly, as far as they could
-reach, into other parts of the city: pitch and other combustibles
-were next added, and the whole mass set on fire. The conflagration
-was tremendous, such as had never been before seen: a large portion
-of the town became unapproachable, and the whole of it narrowly
-escaped destruction. Nothing could have preserved it, had the wind
-been rather more favorable: there was indeed a farther story, of a
-most opportune thunder-storm coming to extinguish the flames, which
-Thucydidês does not seem to credit.[331] In spite of much partial
-damage, the town remained still defensible, and the spirit of the
-inhabitants unsubdued.
-
-  [331] Thucyd. ii, 77.
-
-There now remained no other resource except to build a wall of
-circumvallation round Platæa, and trust to the slow process of
-famine. The task was distributed in suitable fractions among the
-various confederate cities, and completed about the middle of
-September, a little before the autumnal equinox.[332] Two distinct
-walls were constructed, with sixteen feet of intermediate space all
-covered in, so as to look like one very thick wall: there were,
-moreover, two ditches, out of which the bricks for the wall had
-been taken,—one on the inside towards Platæa, and the other on the
-outside against any foreign relieving force. The interior covered
-space between the walls was intended to serve as permanent quarters
-for the troops left on guard, consisting half of Bœotians and half of
-Peloponnesians.[333]
-
-  [332] Thucyd. ii, 78. καὶ ἐπειδὴ πᾶν ἐξείργαστο περὶ Ἀρκτούρου
-  ἐπιτολάς, etc. at the period of the year when the star Arcturus
-  rises immediately before sunrise,—that is, sometime between the
-  12th and 17th of September: see Göller’s note on the passage.
-  Thucydidês does not often give any fixed marks to discriminate
-  the various periods of the year, as we find it here done. The
-  Greek months were all lunar months, or nominally so: the names
-  of months, as well as the practice of intercalation to rectify
-  the calendar, varied from city to city; so that if Thucydidês
-  had specified the day of the Attic month Boêdromion (instead
-  of specifying the rising of Arcturus) on which this work
-  was finished, many of his readers would not have distinctly
-  understood him. Hippokratês also, in indications of time for
-  medical purposes, employs the appearance of Arcturus and other
-  stars.
-
-  [333] Thucyd. ii, 78; iii, 21. From this description of the
-  double wall and covered quarters provided for what was foreknown
-  as a long blockade, we may understand the sufferings of the
-  Athenian troops (who probably had no double wall), in the two
-  years’ blockade of Potidæa,—and their readiness to grant an easy
-  capitulation to the besieged: see a few pages above.
-
-At the same time that Archidamus began the siege of Platæa, the
-Athenians on their side despatched a force of two thousand hoplites
-and two hundred horsemen, to the Chalkidic peninsula, under Xenophon
-son of Euripidês (with two colleagues), the same who had granted so
-recently the capitulation of Potidæa. It was necessary doubtless,
-to convoy and establish the new colonists who were about to occupy
-the deserted site of Potidæa: moreover, the general had acquired
-some knowledge of the position and parties of the Chalkidic towns,
-and hoped to be able to act against them with effect. They first
-invaded the territory belonging to the Bottiæan town of Spartôlus,
-not without hopes that the city itself would be betrayed to them
-by intelligences within: but this was prevented by the arrival
-of an additional force from Olynthus, partly hoplites, partly
-peltasts. These peltasts, a species of troops between heavy-armed
-and light-armed, furnished with a pelta (or light shield), and short
-spear, or javelin, appear to have taken their rise among these
-Chalkidic Greeks, being equipped in a manner half Greek and half
-Thracian: we shall find them hereafter much improved and turned
-to account by some of the ablest Grecian generals. The Chalkidic
-hoplites are generally of inferior merit: on the other hand, their
-cavalry and their peltasts are very good: in the action which now
-took place under the walls of Spartôlus, the Athenian hoplites
-defeated those of the enemy, but their cavalry and their light troops
-were completely worsted by the Chalkidic. These latter, still farther
-strengthened by the arrival of fresh peltasts from Olynthus, ventured
-even to attack the Athenian hoplites, who thought it prudent to fall
-back upon the two companies left in reserve to guard the baggage.
-During this retreat they were harassed by the Chalkidic horse and
-light-armed, who retired when the Athenians turned upon them, but
-attacked them on all sides when on their march; and employed missiles
-so effectively that the retreating hoplites could no longer maintain
-a steady order, but took to flight, and sought refuge at Potidæa.
-Four hundred and thirty hoplites, near one-fourth of the whole force,
-together with all three generals, perished in this defeat, and the
-expedition returned in dishonor to Athens.[334]
-
-  [334] Thucyd. ii, 79.
-
-In the western parts of Greece, the arms of Athens and her allies
-were more successful. The repulse of the Ambrakiots from the
-Amphilochian Argos, during the preceding year, had only exasperated
-them and induced them to conceive still larger plans of aggression
-against both the Akarnanians and Athenians. In concert with their
-mother-city Corinth, where they obtained warm support, they prevailed
-upon the Lacedæmonians to take part in a simultaneous attack of
-Akarnania, by land as well as by sea, which would prevent the
-Akarnanians from concentrating their forces in any one point, and put
-each of their townships upon an isolated self-defence; so that all
-of them might be overpowered in succession, and detached, together
-with Kephallênia and Zakynthus, from the Athenian alliance. The
-fleet of Phormio at Naupaktus, consisting only of twenty triremes,
-was accounted incompetent to cope with a Peloponnesian fleet such as
-might be fitted out at Corinth. There was even some hope that the
-important station at Naupaktus might itself be taken, so as to expel
-the Athenians completely from those parts.
-
-The scheme of operations now projected was far more comprehensive
-than anything which the war had yet afforded. The land-force of the
-Ambrakiots, together with their neighbors and fellow-colonists the
-Leukadians and Anaktorians, assembled near their own city, while
-their maritime force was collected at Leukas, on the Akarnanian
-coast. The force at Ambrakia was joined, not only by Knêmus, the
-Lacedæmonian admiral, with one thousand Peloponnesian hoplites, who
-found means to cross over from Peloponnesus, eluding the vigilance
-of Phormio,—but also by a numerous body of Epirotic and Macedonian
-auxiliaries, collected even from the distant and northernmost
-tribes. A thousand Chaonians were present, under the command of
-Photyus and Nikanor, two annual chiefs chosen from the regal gens.
-Neither this tribe, nor the Thesprotians who came along with them,
-acknowledged any hereditary king. The Molossians and Atintânes, who
-also joined the force, were under Sabylinthus, regent on behalf of
-the young prince Tharypas. There came, besides, the Paranæi, from
-the banks of the river Aôus under their king Orœdus, together with
-one thousand Orestæ, a tribe rather Macedonian than Epirot, sent by
-their king Antiochus. Even king Perdikkas, though then nominally in
-alliance with Athens, sent one thousand of his Macedonian subjects,
-who, however, arrived too late to be of any use.[335] This large
-and diverse body of Epirotic invaders, a new phenomenon in Grecian
-history, and got together doubtless by the hopes of plunder, proves
-the extensive relations of the tribes of the interior with the city
-of Ambrakia,—a city destined to become in later days the capital of
-the Epirotic king Pyrrhus.
-
-  [335] Thucyd. ii, 80.
-
-It had been concerted that the Peloponnesian fleet from Corinth
-should join that already assembled at Leukas, and act upon the coast
-of Akarnania at the same time that the land-force marched into that
-territory. But Knêmus finding the land-force united and ready, near
-Ambrakia, deemed it unnecessary to await the fleet from Corinth, and
-marched straight into Akarnania, through Limnæa, a frontier village
-territory belonging to the Amphilochian Argos. He directed his march
-upon Stratus,—an interior town, and the chief place in Akarnania,—the
-capture of which would be likely to carry with it the surrender of
-the rest; especially as the Akarnanians, distracted by the presence
-of the ships at Leukas, and alarmed by the large body of invaders
-on their frontier, did not dare to leave their own separate homes,
-so that Stratus was left altogether to its own citizens. Nor was
-Phormio, though they sent an urgent message to him, in any condition
-to help them; since he could not leave Naupaktus unguarded, when the
-large fleet from Corinth was known to be approaching. Under such
-circumstances, Knêmus and his army indulged the most confident hopes
-of overpowering Stratus without difficulty. They marched in three
-divisions: the Epirots in the centre,—the Leukadians and Anaktorians
-on the right,—the Peloponnesians and Ambrakiots, together with
-Knêmus himself, on the left. So little expectation was entertained
-of resistance, that these three divisions took no pains to keep near
-or even in sight of each other. Both the Greek divisions, indeed,
-maintained a good order of march, and kept proper scouts on the look
-out; but the Epirots advanced without any care or order whatever;
-especially the Chaonians, who formed the van. These men, accounted
-the most warlike of all the Epirotic tribes, were so full of conceit
-and rashness, that when they approached near to Stratus, they would
-not halt to encamp and assail the place conjointly with the Greeks;
-but marched along with the other Epirots right forward to the town,
-intending to attack it single-handed, and confident that they should
-carry it at the first assault, before the Greeks came up, so that
-the entire glory would be theirs. The Stratians watched and profited
-by this imprudence. Planting ambuscades in convenient places, and
-suffering the Epirots to approach without suspicion near to the
-gates, they then suddenly sallied out and attacked them, while the
-troops in ambuscade rose up and assailed them at the same time. The
-Chaonians who formed the van, thus completely surprised, were routed
-with great slaughter; while the other Epirots fled, after but little
-resistance. So much had they hurried forward in advance of their
-Greek allies, that neither the right nor the left division were at
-all aware of the battle, until the flying barbarians, hotly pursued
-by the Akarnanians, made it known to them. The two divisions then
-joined, protected the fugitives, and restrained farther pursuit,—the
-Stratians declining to come to hand-combat with them until the other
-Akarnanians should arrive. They seriously annoyed the forces of
-Knêmus, however, by distant slinging, in which the Akarnanians were
-preëminently skilful; nor did Knêmus choose to persist in his attack
-under such discouraging circumstances. As soon as night arrived,
-so that there was no longer any fear of slingers, he retreated to
-the river Anapus, a distance of between nine and ten miles. Well
-aware that the news of the victory would attract other Akarnanian
-forces immediately to the aid of Stratus, he took advantage of the
-arrival of his own Akarnanian allies from Œniadæ (the only town in
-the country which was attached to the Lacedæmonian interest), and
-sought shelter near their city. From thence his troops dispersed, and
-returned to their respective homes.[336]
-
-  [336] Thucyd. ii, 82; Diodor. xii, 48.
-
-Meanwhile, the Peloponnesian fleet from Corinth, which had been
-destined to coöperate with Knêmus off the coast of Akarnania, had
-found difficulties in its passage, alike unexpected and insuperable.
-Mustering forty-seven triremes of Corinth, Sikyon, and other
-places, with a body of soldiers on board, and with accompanying
-store-vessels,—it departed from the harbor of Corinth, and made
-its way along the northern coast of Achaia. Its commanders, not
-intending to meddle with Phormio and his twenty ships at Naupaktus,
-never for a moment imagined that he would venture to attack a
-number so greatly superior: the triremes were, accordingly, fitted
-out more as transports for numerous soldiers than with any view to
-naval combat,—and with little attention to the choice of skilful
-rowers.[337]
-
-  [337] Thucyd. ii, 83. οὐχ ὡς ἐπὶ ναυμαχίαν, ἀλλὰ στρατιωτικώτερον
-  παρεσκευασμένοι: compare the speech of Knêmus, c. 87. The
-  unskilfulness of the rowers is noticed (c. 84).
-
-Except in the combat near Korkyra, and there only partially, the
-Peloponnesians had never yet made actual trial of Athenian maritime
-efficiency, at the point of excellence which it had now reached:
-themselves retaining the old unimproved mode of fighting and of
-working ships at sea, they had no practical idea of the degree
-to which it had been superseded by Athenian training. Among the
-Athenians, on the contrary, not only the seamen generally had a
-confirmed feeling of their own superiority,—but Phormio especially,
-the ablest of all their captains, always familiarized his men with
-the conviction, that no Peloponnesian fleet, be its number ever
-so great, could possibly contend against them with success.[338]
-Accordingly, the Corinthian admirals, Machaon and his two colleagues,
-were surprised to observe that Phormio with his small Athenian
-squadron, instead of keeping safe in Naupaktus, was moving in
-parallel line with them and watching their progress until they
-should get out of the Corinthian gulf into the more open sea. Having
-advanced along the northern coast of Peloponnesus as far as Patræ in
-Achaia, they then altered their course, and bore to the northwest
-in order to cross over towards the Ætolian coast, in their way to
-Akarnania. In doing this, however, they perceived that Phormio was
-bearing down upon them from Chalkis and the mouth of the river
-Euenus, and they now discovered for the first time that he was going
-to attack them. Disconcerted by this incident, and not inclined for
-a naval combat in the wide and open sea, they altered their plan
-of passage, returned to the coast of Peloponnesus, and brought to
-for the night at some point near to Rhium, the narrowest breadth of
-the strait. Their bringing to was a mere feint intended to deceive
-Phormio, and induce him to go back for the night to his own coast:
-for, during the course of the night, they left their station, and
-tried to get across the breadth of the gulf, where it was near the
-strait, and comparatively narrow, before Phormio could come down
-upon them: and if the Athenian captain had really gone back to take
-night-station on his own coast, they would probably have got across
-to the Ætolian or northern coast without any molestation in the
-wide sea: but he watched their movements closely, kept the sea all
-night, and was thus enabled to attack them in mid-channel, even
-during the shorter passage near the strait, at the first dawn of
-morning.[339] On seeing his approach, the Corinthian admirals ranged
-their triremes in a circle with the prows outward, like the spokes
-of a wheel; the circle was made as large as it could be without
-leaving opportunity to the Athenian assailing ships to practise the
-manœuvre of the diekplus,[340] and the interior space was sufficient,
-not merely for the store-vessels, but also for five chosen triremes,
-who were kept as a reserve, to dart out when required through the
-intervals between the outer triremes.
-
-  [338] Thucyd. ii, 88. πρότερον μὲν γὰρ ~ἀεὶ αὐτοῖς ἔλεγε~
-  (Phormio) καὶ προπαρεσκεύαζε τὰς γνώμας, ὡς οὐδὲν αὐτοῖς πλῆθος
-  νεῶν τοσοῦτον, ἢν ἐπιπλέῃ, ὅ,τι οὐχ ὑπομενετέον αὐτοῖς ἐστί·
-  καὶ οἱ στρατιῶται ἐκ πολλοῦ ἐν σφίσιν αὐτοῖς τὴν ἀξίωσιν ταύτην
-  εἰλήφεσαν, ~μηδένα ὄχλον Ἀθηναῖοι ὄντες Πελοποννησίων νεῶν
-  ὑποχωρεῖν~.
-
-  This passage is not only remarkable as it conveys the striking
-  persuasion entertained by the Athenians of their own naval
-  superiority, but also as it discloses the frank and intimate
-  communication between the Athenian captain and his seamen,—so
-  strongly pervading and determining the feelings of the latter.
-  Compare what is told respecting the Syracusan Hermokratês,
-  Xenoph. Hellen. i, 1, 30.
-
-  [339] Thucyd. ii, 83. Ἐπειδὴ μέντοι ἀντιπαραπλέοντάς τε ἑώρων
-  αὐτοὺς (that is, when the Corinthians saw the Athenian ships)
-  παρὰ γῆν σφῶν κομιζομένων, καὶ ἐκ Πατρῶν τῆς Ἀχαΐας πρὸς τὴν
-  ἀντιπέρας ἤπειρον διαβαλλόντων ἐπὶ Ἀκαρνανίας κατεῖδον τοὺς
-  Ἀθηναίους ἀπὸ τῆς Χαλκίδος καὶ τοῦ Εὐήνου ποταμοῦ προσπλέοντας
-  σφίσι, ~καὶ οὐκ ἔλαθον νυκτὸς ὐφορμισάμενοι~, οὕτω δὴ
-  ἀναγκάζονται ναυμαχεῖν κατὰ μέσον τὸν πορθμόν.
-
-  There is considerable difficulty in clearly understanding what
-  was here done, especially what is meant by the words οὐκ ἔλαθον
-  νυκτὸς ὐφορμισάμενοι, which words the Scholiast construed as
-  if the nominative case to ἔλαθον were οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι, whereas the
-  natural structure of the sentence, as well as the probabilities
-  of fact, lead the best commentators to consider οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι
-  as the nominative case to that verb. The remark of the Scholiast,
-  however, shows us, that the difficulty of understanding the
-  sentence dates from ancient times.
-
-  Dr. Arnold—whose explanation is adopted by Poppo and Göller—says:
-  “The two fleets were moving parallel to one another along the
-  opposite shores of the Corinthian gulf. But even when they had
-  sailed out of the strait at Rhium, the opposite shores were still
-  so near, that the Peloponnesians hoped to cross over without
-  opposition, if they could so far deceive the Athenians, as to
-  the spot where they brought to for the night, as to induce them
-  either to stop too soon, or to advance too far, that they might
-  not be exactly opposite to them to intercept the passage. If they
-  could lead the Athenians to think that they meant to advance in
-  the night beyond Patræ, the Athenian fleet was likely to continue
-  its own course along the northern shore, to be ready to intercept
-  them when they should endeavor to run across to Acarnania. But
-  the Athenians, aware that they had stopped at Patræ, stopped
-  themselves at Chalkis, instead of proceeding further to the
-  westward; and thus were so nearly opposite to them, that the
-  Peloponnesians had not time to get more than half-way across,
-  before they found themselves encountered by their watchful enemy.”
-
-  This explanation seems to me not satisfactory, nor does it take
-  account of all the facts of the case. The first belief of the
-  Peloponnesians was, that Phormio would not dare to attack them
-  at all: accordingly, having arrived at Patræ, they stretched
-  from thence across the gulf to the mouth of the Euenus,—the
-  natural way of proceeding according to ancient navigation,—going
-  in the direction of Akarnania (ἐπὶ Ἀκαρνανίας). As they were
-  thus stretching across, they perceived Phormio bearing down upon
-  them from the Euenus: this was a surprise to them, and as they
-  wished to avoid a battle in the mid-channel, they desisted from
-  proceeding farther that day, in hopes to be able to deceive
-  Phormio in respect of their night-station. They made a feint of
-  taking night-station on the shore between Patræ and Rhium, near
-  the narrow part of the strait; but, in reality, they “slipped
-  anchor and put to sea during the night,” as Mr. Bloomfield says,
-  in hopes of getting across the shorter passage under favor of
-  darkness, before Phormio could come upon them. That they must
-  have done this is proved by the fact, that the subsequent battle
-  was fought on the morrow in the mid-channel _very little after
-  daybreak_ (we learn this from what Thucydidês says about the
-  gulf-breeze, for which Phormio waited before he would commence
-  his attack—ὅπερ ἀναμένων τε περιέπλει, καὶ εἰώθει γίγνεσθαι ~ἐπι
-  τὴν ἕω~). If Phormio had returned to Chalkis, they would probably
-  have succeeded; but he must have kept the sea all night, which
-  would be the natural proceeding of a vigilant captain, determined
-  not to let the Peloponnesians get across without fighting: so
-  that he was upon them in the mid-channel immediately that day
-  broke.
-
-  Putting all the statements of Thucydidês together, we may be
-  convinced that this is the way in which the facts occurred. But
-  of the precise sense of ὐφορμισάμενοι, I confess I do not feel
-  certain: Haack says, it means “clam appellere ad littus,” but
-  here, I think, that sense will not do: for the Peloponnesians did
-  not wish, and could indeed hardly hope, to conceal from Phormio
-  the spot where they brought to for the night, and to make him
-  suppose that they brought to at some point of the shore west of
-  Patræ, when in reality they passed the night in Patræ,—which
-  is what Dr. Arnold supposes. The shore west of Patræ makes a
-  bend to the southwest,—forming the gulf of Patras,—so that the
-  distance from the northern, or Ætolian and Akarnanian, side of
-  the gulf becomes for a considerable time longer and longer, and
-  the Peloponnesians would thus impose upon themselves a longer
-  crossing, increasing the difficulty of getting over without a
-  battle. But ὐφορμισάμενοι may reasonably be supposed to mean,
-  especially in conjunction with οὐκ ἔλαθον, “taking up a simulated
-  or imperfect night-station,” in which they did not really intend
-  to stay all night, and which could be quitted at short notice and
-  with ease. The preposition ὑπὸ, in composition, would thus have
-  the sense, not of _secrecy_ (_clam_) but of _sham-performance_,
-  or of mere going through the forms of an act for the purpose of
-  making a false impression (like ὑποφέρειν, Xenoph. Hell. iv, 72).
-  Mr. Bloomfield proposes conjecturally ἀφορμισάμενοι, meaning,
-  “that the Peloponnesians slipped their anchors in the night:” I
-  place no faith in the conjecture, but I believe him to be quite
-  right in supposing, that the Peloponnesians _did actually_ slip
-  their anchors in the night.
-
-  Another point remains to be adverted to. The battle took
-  place κατὰ μέσον τὸν πορθμόν. Now we need not understand this
-  expression to allude to the narrowest part of the sea, or the
-  strait, strictly and precisely; that is, the line of seven stadia
-  between Rhium and Antirrhium. But I think we must understand it
-  to mean a portion of sea not far westward of the strait, where
-  the breadth, though greater than that of the strait itself,
-  is yet not so great as it becomes in the line drawn northward
-  from Patræ. We cannot understand πορθμὸς (as Mr. Bloomfield and
-  Poppo do,—see the note of the latter on the Scholia) to mean
-  _trajectus_ simply, that is to say, the passage across even
-  the widest portion of the gulf of Patras: nor does the passage
-  cited out of c. 86 require us so to understand it. Πορθμὸς, in
-  Thucydidês, means a strait, or narrow crossing of sea, and Poppo
-  himself admits that Thucydidês always uses it so: nor would it be
-  reasonable to believe that he would call the line of sea across
-  the gulf, from Patræ to the mouth of the Euenus, a πορθμός. See
-  the note of Göller, on this point.
-
-  [340] Thucyd. ii, 86. μὴ δíδοντες διέκπλουν. The great object of
-  the fast-sailing Athenian trireme was, to drive its beak against
-  some weak part of the adversary’s ship: the stern, the side, or
-  the oars,—not against the beak, which was strongly constructed as
-  well for defence as for offence. The Athenian, therefore, rowing
-  through the intervals of the adversary’s line, and thus getting
-  in their rear, turned rapidly, and got the opportunity, before
-  the ship of the adversary could change its position, of striking
-  it either in the stern or some weak part. Such a manœuvre was
-  called the _diekplus_. The success of it, of course, depended
-  upon the extreme rapidity and precision of the movements of the
-  Athenian vessel, so superior in this respect to its adversary,
-  not only in the better construction of the ship, but the
-  excellence of rowers and steersmen.
-
-In this position they were found and attacked shortly after daybreak,
-by Phormio, who bore down upon them with his ships in single file,
-all admirable sailors, and his own ship leading; all being strictly
-forbidden to attack until he should give the signal. He rowed swiftly
-round the Peloponnesian circle, nearing the prows of their ships
-as closely as he could, and making constant semblance of being
-about to come to blows. Partly from the intimidating effect of this
-manœuvre, altogether novel to the Peloponnesians,—partly from the
-natural difficulty, well known to Phormio, of keeping every ship
-in its exact stationary position,—the order of the circle, both
-within and without, presently became disturbed. It was not long
-before a new ally came to his aid, on which he fully calculated,
-postponing his actual attack until this favorable incident occurred.
-The strong land-breeze out of the gulf of Corinth, always wont to
-begin shortly after daybreak, came down upon the Peloponnesian
-fleet with its usual vehemence, at a moment when the steadiness
-of their order was already somewhat giving way, and forced their
-ships more than ever out of proper relation one to the other. The
-triremes began to run foul of each other, or become entangled with
-the store-vessels: so that in every ship the men aboard were obliged
-to keep pushing off their neighbors on each side with poles,—not
-without loud clamor and mutual reproaches, which prevented both the
-orders of the captain, and the cheering sound or song whereby the
-keleustês animated the rowers and kept them to time, from being
-at all audible. Moreover, the fresh breeze had occasioned such a
-swell, that these rowers, unskilful under all circumstances, could
-not get their oars clear of the water, and the pilots thus lost all
-command over their vessels.[341] The critical moment was now come,
-and Phormio gave the signal for attack. He first drove against and
-disabled one of the admiral’s ships,—his comrades next assailed
-others with equal success,—so that the Peloponnesians, confounded and
-terrified, attempted hardly any resistance, but broke their order
-and sought safety in flight. They fled partly to Patræ, partly to
-Dymê, in Achaia, pursued by the Athenians; who, with scarcely the
-loss of a man, captured twelve triremes, took aboard and carried away
-almost the entire crews, and sailed off with them to Molykreium, or
-Antirrhium, the northern cape at the narrow mouth of the Corinthian
-gulf, opposite to the corresponding cape called Rhium in Achaia.
-Having erected at Antirrhium a trophy for the victory, dedicating
-one of the captive triremes to Poseidon, they returned to Naupaktus;
-while the Peloponnesian ships sailed along the shore from Patræ to
-Kyllênê, the principal port in the territory of Elis. They were here
-soon afterwards joined by Knêmus, who passed over with his squadron
-from Leukas.[342]
-
-  [341] See Dr. Arnold’s note upon this passage of Thucydidês,
-  respecting the keleustês and his functions: to the passages
-  which he indicates as reference, I will add two more of Plautus,
-  Mercat. iv, 2, 5, and Asinaria, iii, 1, 15.
-
-  When we conceive the structure of an ancient trireme, we shall
-  at once see, first, how essential the keleustês was, to keep the
-  rowers in harmonious action,—next, how immense the difference
-  must have been between practised and unpractised rowers. The
-  trireme had, in all, one hundred and seventy rowers, distributed
-  into three tiers. The upper tier, called thranitæ, were sixty-two
-  in number, or thirty-one on each side: the middle tier, or
-  zygitæ, as well as the lowest tier, or thalamitæ, were each
-  fifty-four in number, or twenty-seven on each side. Besides
-  these, there were belonging to each trireme a certain number,
-  seemingly about thirty, of supplementary oars (κῶπαι περινέω),
-  to be used by the epibatæ, or soldiers, serving on board, in
-  case of rowers being killed, or oars broken. Each tier of
-  rowers was distributed along the whole length of the vessel,
-  from head to stern, or at least along the greater part of it;
-  but the seats of the higher tiers were not placed in the exact
-  perpendicular line above the lower. Of course, the oars of the
-  thranitæ, or uppermost tier, were the longest: those of the
-  thalamitæ, or lowest tier, the shortest: those of the zygitæ, of
-  a length between the two. Each oar was rowed only by one man. The
-  thranitæ, as having the longest oars, were most hardly worked and
-  most highly paid. What the length of the oars was, belonging to
-  either tier, we do not know, but some of the supplementary oars
-  appear to have been about fifteen feet in length.
-
-  What is here stated, appears to be pretty well ascertained,
-  chiefly from the inscriptions discovered at Athens a few years
-  ago, so full of information respecting the Athenian marine,—and
-  from the most instructive commentary appended to these
-  inscriptions by M. Boeckh, Seewesen der Athener, ch. ix, pp.
-  94, 104, 115. But there is a great deal still, respecting the
-  equipment of an ancient trireme, unascertained and disputed.
-
-  Now there was nothing but the voice of the keleustês to keep
-  these one hundred and seventy rowers all to good time with their
-  strokes. With oars of different length, and so many rowers, this
-  must have been no easy matter, and apparently quite impossible,
-  unless the rowers were trained to act together. The difference
-  between those who were so trained and those who were not, must
-  have been immense. We may imagine the difference between the
-  ships of Phormio and those of his enemies, and the difficulty of
-  the latter in contending with the swell of the sea,—when we read
-  this description of the ancient trireme.
-
-  About two hundred men, that is to say, one hundred and seventy
-  rowers and thirty supernumeraries, mostly epibatæ or hoplites
-  serving on board, besides the pilot, the man at the ship’s bow,
-  the keleustês, etc., probably some half dozen officers, formed
-  the crew of a trireme: compare Herodot. viii, 17; vii, 184, where
-  he calculates the thirty epibatæ over and above the two hundred.
-  Dr. Arnold thinks that, at the beginning of the Peloponnesian
-  war, the epibatæ on board an Athenian trireme were no more than
-  ten: but this seems not quite made out: see his note on Thucyd.
-  iii, 95.
-
-  The Venetian galleys in the thirteenth century were manned by
-  about the same number of men. “Les galères Vénitiens du convoi de
-  Flandre devaient être montées par deux cent hommes libres, dont
-  180 rameurs, et 12 archers. Les arcs ou balistes furent préscrits
-  en 1333 pour toutes les galères de commerce armées.” (Depping,
-  Histoire du Commerce entre le Levant et l’Europe, vol. i, p. 163.)
-
-  [342] Thucyd. ii, 84.
-
-These two incidents, just recounted, with their details,—the
-repulse of Knêmus and his army from Stratus, and the defeat of the
-Peloponnesian fleet by Phormio,—afford ground for some interesting
-remarks. The first of the two displays the great inferiority of the
-Epirots to the Greeks,—and even to the less advanced portion of the
-Greeks,—in the qualities of order, discipline, steadiness, and power
-of coöperation for a joint purpose. Confidence of success with them
-is exaggerated into childish rashness, so that they despise even the
-commonest precautions either in march or attack; while the Greek
-divisions on their right and on their left are never so elate as to
-omit either. If, on land, we thus discover the inherent superiority
-of Greeks over Epirots involuntarily breaking out,—so in the
-sea-fight we are no less impressed with the astonishing superiority
-of the Athenians over their opponents; a superiority, indeed, noway
-inherent, such as that of Greeks over Epirots, but depending in
-this case on previous toil, training, and inventive talent, on the
-one side, compared with neglect and old-fashioned routine on the
-other. Nowhere does the extraordinary value of that seamanship,
-which the Athenians had been gaining by years of improved practice,
-stand so clearly marked as in these first battles of Phormio. It
-gradually becomes less conspicuous as we advance in the war, since
-the Peloponnesians improve, learning seamanship as the Russians,
-under Peter the Great, learned the art of war from the Swedes, under
-Charles the Twelfth,—while the Athenian triremes and their crews
-seem to become less choice and effective, even before the terrible
-disaster at Syracuse, and are irreparably deteriorated after that
-misfortune.
-
-To none did the circumstances of this memorable sea-fight seem so
-incomprehensible as to the Lacedæmonians. They had heard, indeed,
-of the seamanship of Athens, but had never felt it, and could not
-understand what it meant: so they imputed the defeat to nothing
-but disgraceful cowardice, and sent indignant orders to Knêmus at
-Kyllênê, to take the command, equip a larger and better fleet,
-and repair the dishonor. Three Spartan commissioners—Brasidas,
-Timokratês, and Lykophron—were sent down to assist him with their
-advice and exertions in calling together naval contingents from
-the different allied cities: and by this means, under the general
-resentment occasioned by the recent defeat, a large fleet of
-seventy-seven triremes was speedily mustered at Panormus,—a harbor
-of Achaia near to the promontory of Rhium, and immediately within
-the interior gulf. A land-force was also collected at the same place
-ashore, to aid the operations of the fleet. Such preparations did
-not escape the vigilance of Phormio, who transmitted to Athens news
-of his victory, at the same time urgently soliciting reinforcements
-to contend with the increasing strength of the enemy. The Athenians
-immediately sent twenty fresh ships to join him: but they were
-induced by the instances of a Kretan named Nikias, their proxenus
-at Gortyn, to allow him to take the ships first to Krete, on the
-faith of his promise to reduce the hostile town of Kydonia. He
-had made this promise as a private favor to the inhabitants of
-Polichna, border enemies of Kydonia; but when the fleet arrived he
-was unable to fulfil it: nothing was effected except ravage of the
-Kydonian lands, and the fleet was long prevented by adverse winds
-and weather from getting away.[343] This ill-advised diversion of
-the fleet from its straight course to join Phormio is a proof how
-much the counsels of Athens were beginning to suffer from the loss
-of Periklês, who was just now in his last illness and died shortly
-afterwards. That liability to be seduced by novel enterprises and
-projects of acquisition, against which he so emphatically warned his
-countrymen,[344] was even now beginning to manifest its disastrous
-consequences.
-
-  [343] Thucyd. ii, 85.
-
-  [344] Thucyd. i, 144. Πολλὰ δὲ καὶ ἄλλα ἔχω ἐς ἐλπίδα τοῦ
-  περιέσεσθαι, ἢν ἐθέλητε ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι ἅμα πολεμοῦντες,
-  καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους μὴ προστίθεσθαι· μᾶλλον γὰρ πεφόβημαι
-  τὰς οἰκείας ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίας ἢ τὰς τῶν ἐναντίων διανοίας.
-
-Through the loss of this precious interval, Phormio now found
-himself, with no more than his original twenty triremes, opposed to
-the vastly increased forces of the enemy,—seventy-seven triremes,
-with a large force on land to back them: the latter, no mean help in
-ancient warfare. He took up his station near the Cape Antirrhium,
-or the Molykric Rhium, as it was called,—the opposite cape to the
-Achaic Rhium: the line between them, seemingly about an English mile
-in breadth, forms the entrance of the Corinthian gulf. The Messenian
-force from Naupaktus attended him, and served on land. But he kept
-on the outside of the gulf, anxious to fight in a large and open
-breadth of sea, which was essential to Athenian manœuvring: while his
-adversaries on their side remained on the inside of the Achaic cape,
-from the corresponding reason,—feeling that to them the narrow sea
-was advantageous, as making the naval battle like to a land battle,
-effacing all superiority of nautical skill.[345] If we revert back
-to the occasion of the battle of Salamis, we find that narrowness of
-space was at that time accounted the best of all protections for a
-smaller fleet against a larger. But such had been the complete change
-of feeling, occasioned by the system of manœuvring introduced since
-that period in the Athenian navy, that amplitude of sea room is now
-not less coveted by Phormio than dreaded by his enemies. The improved
-practice of Athens had introduced a revolution in naval warfare.
-
-  [345] Thucyd. ii, 86-89: compare vii, 36-49.
-
-For six or seven days successively, the two fleets were drawn out
-against each other,—Phormio trying to entice the Peloponnesians to
-the outside of the gulf, while they on their side did what they could
-to bring him within it.[346] To him, every day’s postponement was
-gain, since it gave him a new chance of his reinforcements arriving:
-for that very reason, the Peloponnesian commanders were eager to
-accelerate an action, and at length resorted to a well-laid plan for
-forcing it on. But in spite of immense numerical superiority, such
-was the discouragement and reluctance, prevailing among their seamen,
-many of whom had been actual sufferers in the recent defeat,—that
-Knêmus and Brasidas had to employ emphatic exhortations; insisting
-on the favorable prospect before them,—pointing out that the late
-battle had been lost only by mismanagement and imprudence, which
-would be for the future corrected,—and appealing to the inherent
-bravery of the Peloponnesian warrior. They concluded by a hint, that
-while those who behaved well in the coming battle would receive due
-honor, the laggards would assuredly be punished:[347] a topic rarely
-touched upon by ancient generals in their harangues on the eve of
-battle, and demonstrating conspicuously the reluctance of many of
-the Peloponnesian seamen, who had been brought to the fight again
-chiefly by the ascendency and strenuous commands of Sparta. To this
-reluctance Phormio pointedly alluded, in the encouraging exhortations
-which he on his side addressed to his men: for they too, in spite of
-their habitual confidence at sea, strengthened by the recent victory,
-were dispirited by the smallness of their numbers. He reminded them
-of their long practice and rational conviction of superiority at
-sea, such as no augmentation of numbers, especially with an enemy
-conscious of his own weakness, could overbalance: and he called upon
-them to show their habitual discipline and quick apprehension of
-orders, and above all to perform their regular movements in perfect
-silence during the actual battle,[348]—useful in all matters of
-war, and essential to the proper conduct of a sea-fight. The idea
-of entire silence on board the Athenian ships while a sea-fight was
-going on, is not only striking as a feature in the picture, but is
-also one of the most powerful evidences of the force of self-control
-and military habits among these citizen-seamen.
-
-  [346] Thucyd. ii, 86.
-
-  [347] Thucyd. ii, 87. Τῶν δὲ πρότερον ἡγεμόνων οὐ χεῖρον τὴν
-  ἐπιχείρησιν ἡμεῖς παρασκευάσομεν, καὶ οὐκ ἐνδώσομεν πρόφασιν
-  οὐδενὶ κακῷ γενέσθαι· ἢν δέ τις ἄρα καὶ βουληθῇ, κολασθήσεται τῇ
-  πρεπούσῃ ζημίᾳ, οἱ δὲ ἀγαθοὶ τιμήσονται τοῖς προσήκουσιν ἄθλοις
-  τῆς ἀρετῆς.
-
-  [348] Thucyd. ii, 89. Καὶ ἐν τῷ ἔργῳ ~κόσμον καὶ σιγὴν~ περὶ
-  πλείστου ἡγεῖσθε, ὃ ἔς τε τὰ πολλὰ τῶν πολεμικῶν ξυμφέρει, καὶ
-  ναυμαχίᾳ οὐχ ἥκιστα, etc.
-
-The habitual position of the Peloponnesian fleet off Panormus was
-within the strait, but nearly fronting the breadth of it,—opposite to
-Phormio, who lay on the outer side of the strait, as well as off the
-opposite cape: in the Peloponnesian line, therefore, the right wing
-occupied the north, or northeast side towards Naupaktus. Knêmus and
-Brasidas now resolved to make a forward movement up the gulf, as if
-against that town, which was the main Athenian station; for they knew
-that Phormio would be under the necessity of coming to the defence
-of the place, and they hoped to pin him up and force him to action
-close under the land, where Athenian manœuvring would be unavailing.
-Accordingly, they commenced this movement early in the morning,
-sailing in line of four abreast towards the northern coast of the
-inner gulf; the right squadron, under the Lacedæmonian Timokratês,
-was in the van, according to its natural position,[349] and care had
-been taken to place in it twenty of the best sailing ships, since
-the success of the plan of action was known beforehand to depend
-upon their celerity. As they had foreseen, Phormio the moment he
-saw their movement, put his men on shipboard, and rowed into the
-interior of the strait, though with the greatest reluctance; for the
-Messenians were on land alongside of him, and he knew that Naupaktus,
-with their wives and families, and a long circuit of wall,[350] was
-utterly undefended. He ranged his ships in line of battle ahead,
-probably his own the leading ship; and sailed close along the land
-towards Naupaktus, while the Messenians marching ashore kept near to
-him. Both fleets were thus moving in the same direction, and towards
-the same point, the Athenian close along shore, the Peloponnesians
-somewhat farther off.[351] The latter had now got Phormio into the
-position which they wished, pinned up against the land, with no
-room for tactics. On a sudden the signal was given, and the whole
-Peloponnesian fleet facing to the left, changed from column into
-line, and instead of continuing to sail along the coast, rowed
-rapidly with their prows shore-ward to come to close quarters with
-the Athenians. The right squadron of the Peloponnesians occupying
-the side towards Naupaktus, was especially charged with the duty of
-cutting off the Athenians from all possibility of escaping thither;
-and the best ships had been placed on the right for that important
-object. As far as the commanders were concerned, the plan of action
-completely succeeded; the Athenians were caught in a situation where
-resistance was impossible, and had no chance of escape except in
-flight. But so superior were they in rapid movement even to the
-best Peloponnesians, that eleven ships, the headmost out of the
-twenty, just found means to run by,[352] before the right wing of the
-enemy closed in upon the shore; and made the best of their way to
-Naupaktus. The remaining nine ships were caught and driven ashore
-with serious damage,—their crews being partly slain, partly escaping
-by swimming. The Peloponnesians towed off one trireme with its entire
-crew, and some others empty; but more than one of them was rescued by
-the bravery of the Messenian hoplites, who, in spite of their heavy
-panoply, rushed into the water and got aboard them, fighting from the
-decks and driving off the enemy even after the rope had been actually
-made fast, and the process of dragging off had begun.[353]
-
-  [349] Thucyd. ii, 90. ἐπὶ τεσσάρων ταξάμενοι τὰς ναῦς. Matthiæ
-  in his Grammar (sect. 584), states that ἐπὶ τεσσάρων means “four
-  deep,” and cites this passage of Thucydidês as an instance of it.
-  But the words certainly mean here _four abreast_; though it is to
-  be recollected that a column four abreast, when turned into line,
-  becomes four deep.
-
-  [350] Thucyd. iii, 102.
-
-  [351] Thucyd. ii, 90. Οἱ δὲ Πελοποννήσιοι, ἐπειδὴ αὐτοῖς οἱ
-  Ἀθηναῖοι οὐκ ἐπέπλεον ἐς τὸν κόλπον καὶ τὰ στενὰ, βουλόμενοι
-  ἄκοντας ἔσω προαγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς, ἀναγόμενοι ἅμα ἕῳ ἔπλεον, ἐπὶ
-  τεσσάρων ταξάμενοι τὰς ναῦς, ~ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν ἔσω~ ἐπὶ τοῦ
-  κόλπου, δεξιῷ κέρᾳ ἡγουμένῳ, ὥσπερ καὶ ὥρμουν· ἐπὶ δ᾽ αὐτῷ
-  εἴκοσι νῆας ἔταξαν τὰς ἄριστα πλεούσας, ὅπως, εἰ ἄρα νομίσας ἐπὶ
-  τὴν Ναύπακτον αὐτοὺς πλεῖν ὁ Φορμίων καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπιβοηθῶν ταύτῃ
-  παραπλέοι, μὴ διαφύγοιεν πλέοντα τὸν ἐπίπλουν σφῶν οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι
-  ~ἔξω τοῦ ἑαυτῶν κέρως~, ἀλλ᾽ αὗται αἱ νῆες περικλῄσειαν.
-
-  It will be seen that I have represented in the text the
-  movement of the Peloponnesian fleet as directed ostensibly
-  and to all appearance against Naupaktus: and I translate the
-  words in the fourth line of the above passage—ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν
-  γῆν ἔσω ἐπὶ τοῦ κόλπου—as meaning “_against the station of the
-  Athenians up the gulf within_,” that is, against Naupaktus. Mr.
-  Bloomfield gives that meaning to the passage, though not to the
-  words; but the Scholiast, Dr. Arnold, Poppo, and Göller, all
-  construe it differently, and maintain that the words τὴν ἐαυτῶν
-  γῆν mean _the Peloponnesian shore_. To my view, this latter
-  interpretation renders the whole scheme of the battle confused
-  and unintelligible; while with the other meaning it is perfectly
-  clear, and all the circumstances fit in with each other.
-
-  Dr. Arnold does not seem even to admit that τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν can
-  mean anything else but the coast of Peloponnesus. He says: “The
-  Scholiast says that ἐπὶ is here used for παρά. It would be better
-  to say that it has a mixed signification of motion towards a
-  place and neighborhood to it: expressing that the Peloponnesians
-  sailed _towards_ their own land (_i. e._ towards Corinth, Sikyon,
-  and Pellênê, to which places the greater number of the ships
-  belonged), instead of standing over to the opposite coast, which
-  belonged to their enemies: and at the same time kept close _upon_
-  their own land, in the sense of ἐπὶ with a dative case.”
-
-  It appears to me that Dr. Arnold’s supposition of Corinth and
-  Sikyon as the meaning of τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν is altogether far-fetched
-  and improbable. As a matter of fact, it would only be true of
-  part of the confederate fleet; while it would be false with
-  regard to ships from Elis, Leukas, etc. And if it had been
-  true with regard to all, yet the distance of Corinth from the
-  Peloponnesian station was so very great, that Thucydidês would
-  hardly mark _direction_ by referring to a city so very far off.
-  Then again, both the Scholiast and Dr. Arnold do great violence
-  to the meaning of the preposition ἐπὶ with an accusative case,
-  and cite no examples to justify it. What the sense of ἐπὶ is with
-  an accusative case signifying locality, is shown by Thucydidês
-  in this very passage.—εἰ ἄρα νομίσας ~ἐπὶ τὴν Ναύπακτον~ αὐτοὺς
-  πλεῖν ὁ Φορμίων, etc. (again, c. 85. ἐπὶ Κυδωνίαν πλεῦσαι; and
-  i. 29, ἐπὶ Ἐπίδαμνον, etc.—ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν αὐτοῦ of Perdikkas, i,
-  57), that is, against, or to go thither with a hostile purpose.
-  So sensible does the Scholiast seem to be of this, that he
-  affirms ἐπὶ to be used instead of παρά. This is a most violent
-  supposition, for nothing can be more different than the two
-  phrases ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν and παρὰ τὴν γῆν. Dr. Arnold again assigns
-  to ἐπὶ with an accusative case another sense, which he himself
-  admits that it only has with a dative.
-
-  I make these remarks with a view to show that the sense which
-  Dr. Arnold and others put upon the words of Thucydidês,—ἔπλεον
-  ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν,—departs from the usual, and even from the
-  legitimate meaning of the words. But I have a stronger objection
-  still. If that sense be admitted, it will be found quite
-  inconsistent with the subsequent proceedings, as Thucydidês
-  describes; and any one who will look at the map in reading this
-  chapter, will see plainly that the fact is so. If, as Dr. Arnold
-  supposes, the Peloponnesian fleet kept close along the shore of
-  Peloponnesus, what was there in their movements to alarm Phormio
-  for the safety of Naupaktus, or to draw him so reluctantly into
-  the strait? Or if we even grant this, and suppose that Phormio
-  construed the movement along the coast of Achaia to indicate
-  designs against Naupaktus, and that he therefore came into the
-  gulf and sailed along his own shore to defend the town,—still the
-  Peloponnesians would be separated from him by the whole breadth
-  of the gulf at that point; and as soon as they altered their line
-  of direction for the purpose of crossing the gulf and attacking
-  him, he would have the whole breadth of the gulf in which to take
-  his measures for meeting them, so that instead of finding himself
-  jammed up against the land, he would have been able to go out
-  and fight them in the wide water, which he so much desired. The
-  whole description given by Thucydidês, of the sudden wheeling of
-  the Peloponnesian fleet, whereby Phormio’s ships were assailed,
-  and nine of them cut off, shows that the two fleets must have
-  been very close together when that movement was undertaken. If
-  they had not been close,—if the Peloponnesians had had to row
-  any considerable distance after wheeling,—all the Athenian ships
-  might have escaped along shore without any difficulty. In fact,
-  the words of Thucydidês imply that _both_ the two fleets, at the
-  time when the wheel of the Peloponnesians was made, _were sailing
-  in parallel directions along the northern coast in the direction
-  of Naupaktus_,—ὅπως εἰ ἄρα νομίσας ἐπὶ τὴν Ναύπακτον αὐτοὺς πλεῖν
-  ὁ Φορμίων ~καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπιβοηθῶν~ ταύτῃ παραπλέοι,—“if he _also_,
-  with a view to defend the place, should sail along that coast,”
-  (that is, if he, _as well as they_:) which seems to be the
-  distinct meaning of the particle καὶ in this place.
-
-  Now if we suppose the Peloponnesian fleet to have sailed from
-  its original station towards Naupaktus, all the events which
-  follow become thoroughly perspicuous and coherent. I apprehend
-  that no one would ever have entertained any other idea, except
-  from the words of Thucydidês,—ἔπλεον ἐπὶ τὴν ~ἑαυτῶν~ γῆν ἔσω
-  ἐπὶ τοῦ κόλπου. Since the subject or nominative case of the verb
-  ἔπλεον is οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι, it has been supposed that the word
-  ~ἑαυτῶν~ must necessarily refer to the Peloponnesians; and Mr.
-  Bloomfield, with whom I agree as to the signification of the
-  passage, proposes to alter ~ἑαυτῶν~ into ~αὐτῶν~. It appears
-  to me that this alteration is not necessary, and that ἑαυτῶν
-  may very well be construed so as to refer to the _Athenians_,
-  not to the Lacedæmonians. The reflective meaning of the pronoun
-  ἑαυτῶν is _not necessarily_ thrown back upon the subject of the
-  action _immediately_ preceding it, in a complicated sentence
-  where there is more than one subject and more than one action.
-  Thus, for instance, in this very passage of Thucydidês which I
-  have transcribed, we find the word ἑαυτῶν a second time used,
-  and used so that its meaning is thrown back, not upon the
-  subject immediately preceding, but upon a subject more distant
-  from it,—ἐπὶ δ᾽ αὐτῷ (τῷ κέρατι) εἴκοσι ναῦς ἔταξαν τὰς ἄριστα
-  πλεούσας, ὅπως, εἰ ἄρα..., μὴ διαφύγοιεν πλέοντα τὸν ἐπίπλουν
-  σφῶν οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ~ἔξω τοῦ ἑαυτῶν κέρως~, ἀλλ᾽ αὗται αἱ νῆες
-  περικλῄσειαν. Now here the words τοῦ ἑαυτῶν κέρως, allude to
-  the Peloponnesian fleet, not to the Athenians, which latter is
-  the subject immediately preceding. Poppo and Göller both admit
-  such to be the true meaning; and if this be admissible, there
-  appears to me no greater difficulty in construing the words ἐπὶ
-  τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν to mean, “the land of the _Athenians_,” _not_
-  “the land of the _Peloponnesians_.” Ἑαυτῶν might have been more
-  unambiguously expressed by ἐκείνων αὑτῶν; for the reflective
-  signification embodied in αὑτῶν is here an important addition to
-  the meaning: “Since the Athenians did not sail into the interior
-  of the gulf and the narrow waters, the Peloponnesians, wishing to
-  bring them in even reluctantly, sailed _against the Athenians’
-  own land_ in the interior.”
-
-  Another passage may be produced from Thucydidês, in which the
-  two words ἑαυτοῦ and ἐκείνου are both used in the same sentence
-  and designate the same person, ii, 13. Περικλῆς, ὑποτοπήσας,
-  ὅτι Ἀρχίδαμος αὐτῷ ξένος ὢν ἐτύγχανε, μὴ πολλάκις ἢ αὐτὸς ἰδίᾳ
-  βουλόμενος χαρίζεσθαι τοὺς ἀγροὺς αὐτοῦ παραλίπῃ καὶ μὴ δῃώσῃ,
-  ἢ καὶ Λακεδαιμονίων κελευσάντων ἐπὶ διαβολῇ τῇ ~ἑαυτοῦ~ γένηται
-  τοῦτο, ὥσπερ καὶ τὰ ἄγη ἐλαύνειν προεῖπον ἕνεκα ~ἐκείνου~·
-  προηγόρευε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ ὅτι Ἀρχίδαμος μὲν οἱ
-  ξένος εἴη, οὐ μέντοι ἐπὶ κακῷ γε τῆς πόλεως γένοιτο, τοὺς δ᾽
-  ἀγροὺς ~τοὺς ἑαυτοῦ~ καὶ οἰκίας ἢν ἄρα μὴ δῃώσωσιν οἱ πολέμιοι
-  ὥσπερ καὶ τὰ τῶν ἄλλων, ἀφίησιν αὐτὰ δημόσια εἶναι. Here ἑαυτοῦ
-  and ἐκείνου (compare an analogous passage, Xenophon, Hellen. i,
-  1, 27) both refer to Periklês; and ἑαυτοῦ is twice used, so that
-  it reflects back not upon the subject of the action immediately
-  preceding it, but upon another subject farther behind. Again, iv,
-  99. Οἱ δὲ Βοιωτοὶ ἀπεκρίναντο, εἰ μὲν ἐν τῇ Βοιωτίᾳ εἰσίν (οἱ
-  Ἀθηναῖοι), ἀπιόντας ~ἐκ τῆς ἑαυτῶν~ ἀποφέρεσθαι τὰ σφέτερα· εἰ δ᾽
-  ἐν τῇ ~ἐκείνων~, αὐτοὺς γιγνώσκειν τὸ ποιητέον. Here the use of
-  ἑαυτῶν and ἐκείνων is remarkable. Ἑαυτῶν refers to the Bœotians,
-  though the Athenians are the subject of the action immediately
-  preceding; while ἐκείνων refers to the Athenians, in another case
-  where they are the subject of the action immediately preceding.
-  We should almost have expected to find the position of the two
-  words reversed. Again, in iv, 57, we have—Καὶ τούτους μὲν οἱ
-  Ἀθηναῖοι ἐβουλεύσαντο καταθέσθαι ἐς τὰς νήσους, καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους
-  Κυθηρίους ~οἰκοῦντας τὴν ἑαυτῶν~ φόρον τέσσαρα τάλαντα φέρειν.
-  Here ἑαυτῶν refers to the subject of the action immediately
-  preceding—that is, to Κυθηρίους, not to Ἀθηναῖοι: but when we
-  turn to another chapter, iii, 78: οἱ δὲ Ἀθηναῖοι φοβούμενοι τὸ
-  πλῆθος καὶ τὴν περικύκλωσιν, ἁθρόαις μέν οὐ προσέπιπτον οὐδὲ
-  κατὰ μέσον ~ταῖς ἐφ᾽ ἑαυτοὺς τεταγμέναις~ (ναυσὶ)—we find ἑαυτῶν
-  thrown back upon the subject, _not_ immediately preceding it.
-  The same, iv, 47—εἴ πού τίς τινα ἴδοι ἐχθρὸν ἑαυτοῦ; and ii, 95.
-  Ὁ γὰρ Περδίκκας αὐτῷ ὑποσχόμενος, εἰ Ἀθηναίοις τε διαλλάξειεν
-  ~ἑαυτὸν~ (_i. e._ Perdikkas), κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς τῷ πολέμῳ πιεζόμενον,
-  etc.
-
-  Compare also Homer, Odyss. xvii, 387. Πτωχὸν δ᾽ οὐκ ἄν τις
-  καλέοι, τρύξοντα ἓ αὐτόν; and Xenophon, Memorab. iv, 2, 28; i, 6,
-  3; v, 2, 24; Anabas. vii. 2, 10; 6, 43; Hellen. v, 2, 39.
-
-  It appears to me, that when we study the use of the pronoun
-  ἑαυτὸς, we shall see reason to be convinced that in the passage
-  of Thucydidês now before us, the phrase οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι ἔπλεον
-  ἐς τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν, need not necessarily be referred to the
-  _Peloponnesian_ land, but may in perfect conformity with analogy
-  be understood to mean the _Athenian_ land. I am sure that, in so
-  construing it, we shall not put so much violence upon the meaning
-  as the Scholiast and Dr. Arnold have put upon the preposition
-  ἐπὶ, when the Scholiast states that ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν means the
-  same thing as παρὰ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν, and when Dr. Arnold admits
-  this opinion, only adding a new meaning which does not usually
-  belong to ἐπὶ with an accusative case.
-
-  An objection to the meaning which I propose may possibly be
-  grounded on the word νομίσας, applied to Phormio. If the
-  Peloponnesian fleet was sailing directly towards Naupaktus, it
-  may be urged, Phormio would not be said to _think_ that they
-  were going thither, but _to see_ or _become aware_ of it. But
-  in reply to this we may observe, that the Peloponnesians never
-  really intended to attack Naupaktus, though they directed their
-  course towards it; they wished in reality to draw Phormio within
-  the strait, and there to attack him. The historian, therefore,
-  says with propriety, that Phormio would _believe_, and not that
-  he would _perceive_, them to be going thither, since his belief
-  would really be erroneous.
-
-  [352] Thucyd. ii, 90. How narrow the escape was, is marked in
-  the words of the historian—τῶν δὲ ἕνδεκα μὲν αἵπερ ἡγοῦντο
-  ~ὑπεκφεύγουσι~ τὸ κέρας τῶν Πελοποννησίων καὶ τὴν ἐπιστροφήν, ἐς
-  τὴν εὐρυχωρίαν.
-
-  The proceedings of the Syracusan fleet against that of the
-  Athenians in the harbor of Syracuse, and the reflections of the
-  historian upon them, illustrate this attack of the Peloponnesians
-  upon the fleet of Phormio (Thucyd. vii. 36).
-
-  [353] Compare the like bravery on the part of the Lacedæmonian
-  hoplites at Pylus (Thucyd. iv, 14).
-
-The victory of the Peloponnesians seemed assured, and while their
-left and centre were thus occupied, the twenty ships of their right
-wing parted company with the rest, in order to pursue the eleven
-fugitive Athenian ships which they had failed in cutting off. Ten of
-these got clear away into the harbor of Naupaktus, and there posted
-themselves in an attitude of defence near the temple of Apollo,
-before any of the pursuers could come near; while the eleventh,
-somewhat less swift, was neared by the Lacedæmonian admiral; who, on
-board a Leukadian trireme, pushed greatly ahead of his comrades, in
-hopes of overtaking at least this one prey. There happened to lie
-moored a merchant vessel, at the entrance of the harbor of Naupaktus;
-and the Athenian captain in his flight, observing that the Leukadian
-pursuer was for the moment alone, seized the opportunity for a bold
-and rapid manœuvre. He pulled swiftly round the merchant vessel,
-directed his trireme so as to meet the advancing Leukadian, and drove
-his beak against her midships with an impact so violent as to disable
-her at once; her commander, the Lacedæmonian admiral, Timokratês, was
-so stung with anguish at this unexpected catastrophe, that he slew
-himself forthwith, and fell overboard into the harbor. The pursuing
-vessels coming up behind, too, were so astounded and dismayed by it,
-that the men, dropping their oars, held water, and ceased to advance;
-while some even found themselves half aground, from ignorance of the
-coast. On the other hand, the ten Athenian triremes in the harbor
-were beyond measure elated by the incident, so that a single word
-from Phormio sufficed to put them in active forward motion, and to
-make them strenuously attack the embarrassed enemy: whose ships,
-disordered by the heat of pursuit, and having been just suddenly
-stopped, could not be speedily got again under way, and expected
-nothing less than renewed attack. First, the Athenians broke the
-twenty pursuing ships, on the right wing; next, they pursued their
-advantage against the left and centre, who had probably neared to the
-right; so that after a short resistance, the whole were completely
-routed, and fled across the gulf to their original station at
-Panormus.[354] Not only did the eleven Athenian ships thus break,
-terrify, and drive away the entire fleet of the enemy, with the
-capture of six of the nearest Peloponnesian triremes,—but they also
-rescued those ships of their own which had been driven ashore and
-taken in the early part of the action: moreover, the Peloponnesian
-crews sustained a considerable loss, both in killed and in prisoners.
-
-  [354] Thucyd. ii, 92. It is sufficiently evident that
-  the Athenians defeated and drove off not only the twenty
-  Peloponnesian ships of the right or pursuing wing,—but also
-  the left and centre. Otherwise, they would not have been able
-  to recapture those Athenian ships which had been lost at the
-  beginning of the battle. Thucydidês, indeed, does not expressly
-  mention the Peloponnesian left and centre as following the
-  right in their pursuit towards Naupaktus. But we may presume
-  that they partially did so, probably careless of much order, as
-  being at first under the impression that the victory was gained.
-  They were probably, therefore, thrown into confusion without
-  much difficulty, when the twenty ships of the right were beaten
-  and driven back upon them,—even though the victorious Athenian
-  triremes were no more than eleven in number.
-
-Thus, in spite not only of the prodigious disparity of numbers, but
-also of the disastrous blow which the Athenians had sustained at
-first, Phormio ended by gaining a complete victory; a victory, to
-which even the Lacedæmonians were forced to bear testimony, since
-they were obliged to ask a truce for burying and collecting their
-dead, while the Athenians on their part picked up the bodies of their
-own warriors. The defeated party, however, still thought themselves
-entitled, in token of their success in the early part of the action,
-to erect a trophy on the Rhium of Achaia, where they also dedicated
-the single Athenian trireme which they had been able to carry off.
-Yet they were so completely discomfited,—and farther, so much in
-fear of the expected reinforcement from Athens,—that they took
-advantage of the night to retire, and sail into the gulf to Corinth:
-all except the Leukadians, who returned to their own home.
-
-Nor was it long before the reinforcement actually arrived, after
-that untoward detention which had wellnigh exposed Phormio and his
-whole fleet to ruin. It confirmed his mastery of the entrance of
-the gulf and of the coast of Akarnania, where the Peloponnesians
-had now no naval force at all. To establish more fully the Athenian
-influence in Akarnania, he undertook during the course of the autumn
-an expedition, landing at Astakus, and marching into the Akarnanian
-inland country with four hundred Athenian hoplites and four hundred
-Messenians. Some of the leading men of Stratus and Koronta, who were
-attached to the Peloponnesian interest, he caused to be sent into
-exile, while the chief named Kynês, of Koronta, who seems to have
-been hitherto in exile, was reëstablished in his native town. The
-great object was, to besiege and take the powerful town of Œniadæ,
-near the mouth of the Achelôus; a town at variance with the other
-Akarnanians, and attached to the Peloponnesians. But the great spread
-of the waters of the Achelôus rendered this siege impracticable
-during the winter, and Phormio returned to the station at Naupaktus.
-From hence he departed to Athens towards the end of the winter,
-carrying home both his prize-ships and such of his prisoners as were
-freemen. The latter were exchanged man for man against Athenian
-prisoners in the hands of Sparta.[355]
-
-  [355] Thucyd. ii, 102, 103.
-
-After abandoning the naval contest at Rhium, and retiring to
-Corinth, Knêmus and Brasidas were prevailed upon by the Megarians,
-before the fleet dispersed, to try the bold experiment of a sudden
-inroad upon Peiræus. Such was the confessed superiority of the
-Athenians at sea, that, while they guarded amply the coasts of
-Attica against privateers, they never imagined the possibility of
-an attack upon their own main harbor. Accordingly, Peiræus was not
-only unprotected by any chain across the entrance, but destitute
-even of any regular guard-ships manned and ready. The seamen of
-the retiring Peloponnesian armament, on reaching Corinth, were
-immediately disembarked and marched, first across the isthmus, next
-to Megara,—each man carrying his sitting-cloth,[356] and his oar,
-together with the loop whereby the oar was fastened to the oar-hole
-in the side, and thus prevented from slipping. There lay forty
-triremes in Nisæa, the harbor of Megara, which, though old and out
-of condition, were sufficient for so short a trip; and the seamen
-immediately on arriving, launched these and got aboard. But such was
-the awe entertained of Athens and her power, that when the scheme
-came really to be executed, the courage of the Peloponnesians failed,
-though there was nothing to hinder them from actually reaching
-Peiræus: but it was pretended that the wind was adverse, and they
-contented themselves with passing across to the station of Budorum,
-in the opposite Athenian island of Salamis, where they surprised and
-seized the three guard-ships which habitually blockaded the harbor of
-Megara, and then landed upon the island. They spread themselves over
-a large part of Salamis, ravaged the properties, and seized men as
-well as goods. Fire-signals immediately made known this unforeseen
-aggression, both at Peiræus and at Athens, occasioning in both the
-extreme of astonishment and alarm; for the citizens in Athens, not
-conceiving distinctly the meaning of the signals, fancied that
-Peiræus itself had fallen into the hands of the enemy. The whole
-population rushed down to the Peiræus at break of day, and put to sea
-with all the triremes that were ready against the Peloponnesians;
-but these latter, aware of the danger which menaced them, made haste
-to quit Salamis with their booty, and the three captured guard-ships.
-The lesson was salutary to the Athenians: from henceforward Peiræus
-was furnished with a chain across the mouth, and a regular guard,
-down to the end of the war.[357] Forty years afterwards, however,
-we shall find it just as negligently watched, and surprised with
-much more boldness and dexterity, by the Lacedæmonian captain
-Teleutias.[358]
-
-  [356] Thucyd. ii, 93. ἐδόκει δὲ λαβόντα τῶν ναυτῶν ἕκαστον τὴν
-  κώπην, καὶ τὸ ὑπηρέσιον, καὶ τὸν τροπωτῆρα, etc. On these words
-  there is an interesting letter of Dr. Bishop’s published in the
-  Appendix to Dr. Arnold’s Thucydidês, vol. i. His remarks upon
-  ὑπηρέσιον are more satisfactory than those upon τροπωτήρ. Whether
-  the fulcrum of the oar was formed by a thowell, or a notch, on
-  the gunwale, or by a perforation in the ship’s side, there must
-  in both cases have been required—since it seems to have had
-  nothing like what Dr. Bishop calls a _nut_—a thong to prevent it
-  from slipping down towards the water; especially with the oars of
-  the thranitæ, or upper tier of rowers, who pulled at so great an
-  elevation, comparatively speaking, above the water. Dr. Arnold’s
-  explanation of τροπωτὴρ is suited to the case of a boat, but not
-  to that of a trireme. Dr. Bishop shows that the explanation of
-  the purpose of the ὑπηρέσιον, given by the Scholiast, is not the
-  true one.
-
-  [357] Thucyd. ii, 94.
-
-  [358] Xenophon, Hellen. v. 1, 19.
-
-As during the summer of this year, the Ambrakiots had brought down
-a numerous host of Epirotic tribes to the invasion of Akarnania,
-in conjunction with the Peloponnesians,—so during the autumn, the
-Athenians obtained aid against the Chalkidians of Thrace from a
-still more powerful barbaric prince, Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian
-Thracians. Amidst the numerous tribes, between the Danube and the
-Ægean sea,—who all bore the generic name of Thracians, though
-each had a special name besides,—the Odrysians were at this time
-the most warlike and powerful. The Odrysian king Têrês, father of
-Sitalkês, had made use of this power to subdue[359] and render
-tributary a great number of these different tribes, especially those
-whose residence was in the plain rather than in the mountains. His
-dominion, the largest existing between the Ionian sea and the Euxine,
-extended from Abdêra, or the mouth of the Nestus, in the Ægean sea,
-to the mouth of the Danube in the Euxine; though it seems that this
-must be understood with deductions, since many intervening tribes,
-especially mountain tribes, did not acknowledge his authority.
-Sitalkês himself had invaded and conquered some of the Pæonian
-tribes who joined the Thracians on the west, between the Axius and
-the Strymon.[360] Dominion, in the sense of the Odrysian king, meant
-tribute, presents, and military force when required; and with the two
-former, at least, we may conclude that he was amply supplied, since
-his nephew and successor Seuthes, under whom the revenue increased
-and attained its maximum, received four hundred talents annually in
-gold and silver as tribute, and the like sum in various presents,
-over and above many other presents of manufactured articles and
-ornaments. These latter came from the Grecian colonies on the coast,
-which contributed moreover largely to the tribute, though in what
-proportions we are not informed: even Grecian cities not in Thrace
-sent presents to forward their trading objects, as purchasers for the
-produce, the plunder, and the slaves, acquired by Thracian chiefs or
-tribes.[361] The residence of the Odrysians properly so called, and
-of the princes of that tribe now ruling over so many of the remaining
-tribes, appears to have been about twelve days’ journey inland from
-Byzantium,[362] in the upper regions of the Hebrus and Strymon, south
-of Mount Hæmus, and northeast of Rhodopê. The Odrysian chiefs were
-connected by relationship more or less distant with those of the
-subordinate tribes, and by marriage even with the Scythian princes
-north of the Danube: the Scythian prince Ariapeithês[363] had married
-the daughter of the Odrysian Têrês, the first who extended the
-dominion of his tribe over any considerable portion of Thrace.
-
-  [359] Thucyd. ii, 29, 95, 96.
-
-  [360] Thucyd. ii, 99.
-
-  [361] See Xenophon, Anabas. vii, 3, 16; 4, 2. Diodorus (xii, 50)
-  gives the revenue of Sitalkês as more than one thousand talents
-  annually. This sum is not materially different from that which
-  Thucydidês states to be the annual receipt of Seuthes, successor
-  of Sitalkês,—revenue, properly so called, and presents, both
-  taken together.
-
-  Traders from Parium, on the Asiatic coast of the Propontis, are
-  among those who come with presents to the Odrysian king, Mêdokus
-  (Xenophon _ut supra_).
-
-  [362] Xenoph. Anabas. _l. c._
-
-  [363] Herodot. iv, 80.
-
-The natural state of the Thracian tribes—in the judgment of
-Herodotus, permanent and incorrigible—was that of disunion and
-incapacity of political association; were such association possible,
-he says, they would be strong enough to vanquish every other
-nation,—though Thucydidês considers them as far inferior to the
-Scythians. The Odrysian dominion had probably not reached, at the
-period when Herodotus made his inquiries, the same development
-which Thucydidês describes in the third year of the Peloponnesian
-war, and which imparted to these tribes an union, partial indeed
-and temporary, but such as they never reached either before or
-afterwards. It has been already mentioned that the Odrysian prince
-Sitalkês, had taken for his wife, or rather for one of his wives,
-the sister of Nymphodôrus, a Greek, of Abdêra; by whose mediation
-he had been made the ally, and his son Sadokus even a citizen, of
-Athens,—and had been induced to promise that he would reconquer the
-Chalkidians of Thrace for the benefit of the Athenians,[364]—his
-ancient kinsmen, according to the mythe of Tereus as interpreted
-by both parties. At the same time, Perdikkas, king of Macedonia,
-had offended him by refusing to perform a promise made of giving
-him his sister in marriage,—a promise made as consideration for
-the interference of Sitalkês and Nymphodôrus in procuring for him
-peace with Athens, at a moment when he was much embarrassed by civil
-dissensions with his brother Philip. The latter prince, ruling
-in his own name, and seemingly independent of Perdikkas, over a
-portion of the Macedonians along the upper course of the Axius,
-had been expelled by his more powerful brother, and taken refuge
-with Sitalkês: he was now apparently dead, but his son Amyntas
-received from the Odrysian prince the promise of restoration. The
-Athenians had ambassadors resident with Sitalkês, and they sent
-Agnon as special envoy to concert arrangements for his march against
-the Chalkidians, with which an Athenian armament was destined to
-coöperate. In treating with Sitalkês, it was necessary to be liberal
-in presents, both to himself and to the subordinate chieftains who
-held power dependent upon him: nothing could be accomplished among
-the Thracians except by the aid of bribes,[365] and the Athenians
-were more competent to supply this exigency than any other people
-in Greece. The joint expedition against the Chalkidians was finally
-resolved.
-
-  [364] Xenophon, Anabas. vii, 2, 31; Thucyd. ii, 29; Aristophan.
-  Aves, 366. Thucydidês goes out of his way to refute this current
-  belief,—a curious exemplification of ancient legend applied to
-  the convenience of present politics.
-
-  [365] Thucyd. ii, 97. Φόρος δὲ ἐκ πάσης τῆς βαρβάρου καὶ τῶν
-  Ἑλληνίδων πόλεων, ὅσον προσῆξαν ἐπὶ Σεύθου, ὃς ὕστερον Σιτάλκου
-  βασιλεύσας πλεῖστον δὴ ἐποίησε, τετρακοσίων ταλάντων μάλιστα
-  δύναμις, ἃ χρυσὸς καὶ ἄργυρος εἴη· καὶ δῶρα οὐκ ἐλάσσω τούτων
-  χρυσοῦ τε καὶ ἀργύρου προσεφέρετο, χωρὶς δὲ ὅσα ὑφαντά τε
-  καὶ λεῖα, καὶ ἡ ἄλλη κατασκευὴ, καὶ οὐ μόνον αὐτῷ ἀλλὰ καὶ
-  τοῖς παραδυναστεύουσι καὶ γενναίοις Ὀδρυσῶν· κατεστήσαντο
-  γὰρ τοὐναντίον τῆς Περσῶν βασιλείας τὸν νόμον, ὄντα μὲν καὶ
-  τοῖς ἄλλοις Θρᾳξὶ, λαμβάνειν μᾶλλον ἢ διδόναι, καὶ αἴσχιον ἦν
-  αἰτηθέντα μὴ δοῦναι ἢ αἰτήσαντα μὴ τυχεῖν· ὅμως δὲ κατὰ τὸ
-  δύνασθαι ἐπὶ πλέον αὐτῷ ἐχρήσαντο· οὐ γὰρ ἦν πρᾶξαι οὐδὲν μὴ
-  διδόντα δῶρα· ὥστε ἐπὶ μέγα ἡ βασιλεία ἦλθεν ἰσχύος.
-
-  This universal necessity of presents and bribes may be seen
-  illustrated in the dealings of Xenophon and the Cyreian army with
-  the Thracian prince Seuthes, described in the Anabasis, vii,
-  chapters 1 and 2. It appears that even at that time, B.C. 401,
-  the Odrysian dominion, though it had passed through disturbances
-  and had been practically enfeebled, still extended down to the
-  neighborhood of Byzantium. In commenting upon the venality of the
-  Thracians, the Scholiast has a curious comparison with his own
-  time—καὶ οὐκ ἦν τι πρᾶξαι παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς τὸν μὴ διδόντα χρήματα·
-  ~ὅπερ καὶ νῦν ἐν Ῥωμαίοις~. The Scholiast here tells us that the
-  venality in his time as to public affairs, in the Roman empire,
-  was not less universal: of what century of the Roman empire he
-  speaks, we do not know: perhaps about 500-600 A.D.
-
-  The contrast which Thucydidês here draws between the Thracians
-  and the Persians is also illustrated by what Xenophon says
-  respecting the habits of the younger Cyrus: (Anabas. i, 9, 22):
-  compare also the romance of the Cyropædia, viii, 14, 31, 32.
-
-But the forces of Sitalkês, collected from many different portions
-of Thrace, were tardy in coming together. He summoned all the tribes
-under his dominion, between Hæmus, Rhodopê, and the two seas:
-the Getæ, between Mount Hæmus and the Danube, equipped like the
-Scythians, their neighbors on the other side of the river, with bow
-and arrow on horseback, also joined him, as well as the Agrianes,
-the Lææi, and the other Pæonian tribes subject to his dominion;
-lastly, several of the Thracian tribes called Dii, distinguished by
-their peculiar short swords, and maintaining a fierce independence
-on the heights of Rhodopê, were tempted by the chance of plunder,
-or the offer of pay, to flock to his standard. Altogether, his
-army amounted, or was supposed to amount, to one hundred and fifty
-thousand men, one third of it cavalry, who were for the most part
-Getæ and Odrysians proper. The most formidable warriors in his camp
-were the independent tribes of Rhodopê; but the whole host, alike
-numerous, warlike, predatory, and cruel, spread terror amidst all
-those who were within even the remote possibilities of its march.
-
-Starting from the central Odrysian territory, and bringing with him
-Agnon and the other Athenian envoys, he first crossed the uninhabited
-mountain called Kerkinê, which divided the Pæonians on the west from
-the Thracian tribes called Sinti and Mædi on the east, until he
-reached the Pæonian town or district called Dobêrus;[366] it was
-here that many troops and additional volunteers reached him, making
-up his full total. From Dobêrus, probably marching down along one
-of the tributary streams of the Axius, he entered into that portion
-of Upper Macedonia, which lies along the higher Axius, and which
-had constituted the separate principality of Philip: the presence
-in his army of Amyntos son of Philip, induced some of the fortified
-places, Gortynia, Atalantê, and others, to open their gates without
-resistance, while Eidomenê was taken by storm, and Eurôpus in vain
-attacked. From hence, he passed still farther southward into Lower
-Macedonia, the kingdom of Perdikkas; ravaging the territory on both
-sides of the Axius even to the neighborhood of the towns Pella and
-Kyrrhus; and apparently down as far south as the mouth of the river
-and the head of the Thermaic gulf. Farther south than this he did not
-go, but spread his force over the districts between the left bank of
-the Axius and the head of the Strymonic gulf,—Mygdonia, Krestônia,
-and Anthemus,—while a portion of his army was detached to overrun the
-territory of the Chalkidians and Bottiæans. The Macedonians under
-Perdikkas, renouncing all idea of contending on foot against so
-overwhelming a host, either fled or shut themselves up in the small
-number of fortified places which the country presented. The cavalry
-from Upper Macedonia, indeed, well armed and excellent, made some
-orderly and successful charges against the Thracians, lightly armed
-with javelins, short swords, and the pelta, or small shield,—but it
-was presently shut in, harassed on all sides by superior numbers, and
-compelled to think only of retreat and extrication.[367]
-
-  [366] See Gatterer (De Herodoti et Thucydidis Thraciâ), sects.
-  44-57; Poppo (Prolegom. ad Thucydidem), vol. ii, ch. 31, about
-  the geography of this region, which is very imperfectly known,
-  even in modern times. We can hardly pretend to assign a locality
-  to these ancient names.
-
-  Thucydidês, in his brief statements respecting this march of
-  Sitalkês, speaks like one who had good information about the
-  inland regions; as he was likely to have from his familiarity
-  with the coasts, and resident proprietorship in Thrace (Thucyd.
-  ii, 100; Herodot. v, 16).
-
-  [367] Thucyd. ii, 100; Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 9, 2.
-
-Luckily for the enemies of the Odrysian king, his march was not made
-until the beginning of winter, seemingly about November or December.
-We may be sure that the Athenians, when they concerted with him the
-joint attack upon the Chalkidians, intended that it should be in a
-better time of the year: having probably waited to hear that his
-army was in motion, and waited long in vain, they began to despair
-of his coming at all, and thought it not worth while to despatch
-any force of their own to the spot.[368] Some envoys and presents
-only were sent as compliments, instead of the coöperating armament;
-and this disappointment, coupled with the severity of the weather,
-the nakedness of the country, and the privations of his army at
-that season, induced Sitalkês soon to enter into negotiations with
-Perdikkas; who, moreover, gained over Seuthes, nephew of the Odrysian
-prince, by promising his sister Stratonikê in marriage, together
-with a sum of money, on condition that the Thracian host should be
-speedily withdrawn. This was accordingly done, after it had been
-distributed for thirty days over Macedonia: during eight of those
-days his detachment had ravaged the Chalkidic lands. But the interval
-had been quite long enough to diffuse terror all around: such a
-host of fierce barbarians had never before been brought together,
-and no one knew in what direction they might be disposed to carry
-their incursions. The independent Thracian tribes (Panæi, Odomantê,
-Drôi, and Dersæi) in the plains on the northeast of the Strymon, and
-near Mount Pangæus, not far from Amphipolis, were the first to feel
-alarm lest Sitalkês should take the opportunity of trying to conquer
-them; on the other side, the Thessalians, Magnêtes, and other Greeks
-north of Thermopylæ, anticipated that he would carry his invasion
-farther south, and began to organize means for resisting him: even
-the general Peloponnesian confederacy heard with uneasiness of this
-new ally whom Athens was bringing into the field, perhaps against
-them. All such alarms were dissipated, when Sitalkês, after remaining
-thirty days, returned by the way he came, and the formidable
-avalanche was thus seen to melt away without falling on them. The
-faithless Perdikkas, on this occasion, performed his promise to
-Seuthes, having drawn upon himself much mischief by violating his
-previous similar promise to Sitalkês.[369]
-
-  [368] Thucyd. ii, 101. ἐπειδὴ οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι οὐ παρῆσαν ταῖς ναυσὶν,
-  ἀπιστοῦντες αὐτὸν μὴ ἥξειν, etc.
-
-  [369] Thucyd. ii, 101.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER L.
-
-FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE FOURTH YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR
-DOWN TO THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMOTIONS AT KORKYRA.
-
-
-The second and third years of the war had both been years of great
-suffering with the Athenians, from the continuance of the epidemic,
-which did not materially relax until the winter of the third
-year (B.C. 429-428). It is no wonder that, under the pressure of
-such a calamity, their military efforts were enfeebled, although
-the victories of Phormio had placed their maritime reputation
-at a higher point than ever. To their enemies, the destructive
-effects of this epidemic—effects still felt, although the disorder
-itself was suspended during the fourth year of the war—afforded
-material assistance as well as encouragement to persevere; and the
-Peloponnesians, under Archidamus, again repeated during this year
-their invasion and ravage of Attica, which had been intermitted
-during the year preceding. As before, they met with no serious
-resistance: entering the country about the beginning of May, they
-continued the process of devastation until their provisions were
-exhausted.[370] To this damage the Athenians had probably now
-accustomed themselves: but they speedily received, even while the
-invaders were in their country, intelligence of an event far more
-embarrassing and formidable,—the revolt of Mitylênê and of the
-greater part of Lesbos.
-
-  [370] Thucyd. iii, 1.
-
-This revolt, indeed, did not come even upon the Athenians wholly
-unawares; but the idea of it was of longer standing than they
-suspected, for the Mitylenæan oligarchy had projected it before the
-war, and had made secret application to Sparta for aid, but without
-success. Some time after hostilities broke out, they resumed the
-design, which was warmly promoted by the Bœotians, kinsmen of the
-Lesbians in Æolic lineage and dialect. The Mitylenæan leaders appear
-to have finally determined on revolt during the preceding autumn or
-winter; but they thought it prudent to make ample preparations before
-they declared themselves openly: and, moreover, they took measures
-for constraining three other towns in Lesbos—Antissa, Eresus,
-and Pyrrha—to share their fortunes, to merge their own separate
-governments, and to become incorporated with Mitylênê. Methymna,
-the second town in Lesbos, situated on the north of the island, was
-decidedly opposed to them and attached to Athens. The Mitylenæans
-built new ships, put their walls in an improved state of defence,
-carried out a mole in order to narrow the entrance of their harbor,
-and render it capable of being closed with a chain, despatched
-emissaries to hire Scythian bowmen and purchase corn in the Euxine,
-and took such other measures as were necessary for an effective
-resistance. Though the oligarchical character of their government
-gave them much means of secrecy, and above all, dispensed with the
-necessity of consulting the people beforehand,—still, measures of
-such importance could not be taken without provoking attention.
-Intimation was sent to the Athenians by various Mitylenæan citizens,
-partly from private feeling, partly in their capacity of _proxeni_
-(or _consuls_, to use a modern word which approaches to the meaning)
-for Athens,—especially by a Mitylenæan named Doxander, incensed with
-the government for having disappointed his two sons of a marriage
-with two orphan heiresses.[371] Not less communicative were the
-islanders of Tenedos, animated by ancient neighborly jealousy towards
-Mitylênê; so that the Athenians were thus forewarned both of the
-intrigues between Mitylênê and the Spartans and of her certain
-impending revolt unless they immediately interfered.[372]
-
-  [371] Aristotel. Politic. v, 2, 3. The fact respecting Doxander
-  here mentioned is stated by Aristotle, and there is no reason to
-  question its truth. But Aristotle states it in illustration of a
-  general position,—that the private quarrels of principal citizens
-  are often the cause of great misfortune to the commonwealth. He
-  represents Doxander and his private quarrel as having brought
-  upon Mitylênê the resentment of the Athenians and the war with
-  Athens—Δόξανδρος—ἦρξε τῆς στάσεως, καὶ παρώξυνε τοὺς Ἀθηναίους,
-  πρόξενος ὢν τῆς πόλεως.
-
-  Having the account of Thucydidês before us, we are enabled to
-  say that this is an incorrect conception, as far as concerns the
-  _cause_ of the war,—though the fact in itself may be quite true.
-
-  [372] Thucyd. iii, 2.
-
-This news seems to have become certain about February or March
-428 B.C.: but such was then the dispirited condition of the
-Athenians,—arising from two years’ suffering under the epidemic,
-and no longer counteracted by the wholesome remonstrances of
-Periklês,—that they could not at first bring themselves to believe
-what they were so much afraid to find true. Lesbos, like Chios,
-was their ally, upon an equal footing, still remaining under those
-conditions which had been at first common to all the members of
-the confederacy of Delos. Mitylênê paid no tribute to Athens: it
-retained its walls, its large naval force, and its extensive landed
-possessions on the opposite Asiatic continent: its government was
-oligarchical, administering all internal affairs without the least
-reference to Athens. Its obligations as an ally were, that, in
-case of war, it was held bound to furnish armed ships, whether in
-determinate number or not, we do not know: it would undoubtedly be
-restrained from making war upon Tenedos, or any other subject-ally
-of Athens: and its government or its citizens would probably be
-held liable to answer before the Athenian dikasteries, in case of
-any complaint of injury from the government or citizens of Tenedos
-or of any other ally of Athens,—these latter being themselves also
-accountable before the same tribunals, under like complaints from
-Mitylênê. That city was thus in practice all but independent, and
-so extremely powerful that the Athenians in their actual state
-of depression were fearful of coping with it, and therefore loth
-to believe the alarming intelligence which reached them. They
-sent envoys with a friendly message to persuade the Mitylenæans
-to suspend their proceedings, and it was only when these envoys
-returned without success that they saw the necessity of stronger
-measures. Ten Mitylenæan triremes, serving as contingent in the
-Athenian fleet, were seized, and their crews placed under guard;
-while Kleïppidês, then on the point of starting, along with two
-colleagues, to conduct a fleet of forty triremes round Peloponnesus,
-was directed to alter his destination and to proceed forthwith to
-Mitylênê.[373] It was expected that he would reach that town about
-the time of the approaching festival of Apollo Maloeis, celebrated in
-its neighborhood,—on which occasion the whole Mitylenæan population
-was in the habit of going forth to the temple: so that the town,
-while thus deserted, might easily be surprised and seized by the
-fleet. In case this calculation should be disappointed, Kleïppidês
-was instructed to require that the Mitylenæans should surrender their
-ships of war and raze their fortifications, and, in case of refusal,
-to attack them immediately.
-
-  [373] Thucyd. iii, 3.
-
-But the publicity of debate at Athens was far too great to allow
-such a scheme to succeed. The Mitylenæans had their spies in the
-city, and the moment the resolution was taken, one of them set off
-to communicate it at Mitylênê. Crossing over to Geræstus in Eubœa,
-he got aboard a merchantman on the point of departure, and reached
-Mitylênê with a favorable wind on the third day from Athens: so that
-when Kleïppidês arrived shortly afterwards, he found the festival
-adjourned and the government prepared for him. The requisition
-which he sent in was refused, and the Mitylenæan fleet even came
-forth from the harbor to assail him, but was beaten back with
-little difficulty: upon which, the Mitylenæan leaders, finding
-themselves attacked before their preparations were completed, and
-desiring still to gain time before they declared their revolt,
-opened negotiations with Kleïppidês, and prevailed on him to suspend
-hostilities until ambassadors could be sent to Athens,—protesting
-that they had no serious intention of revolting. This appears to
-have been about the middle of May, soon after the Lacedæmonian
-invasion of Attica. Kleïppidês was induced, not very prudently, to
-admit this proposition, under the impression that his armament was
-insufficient to cope with a city and island so powerful; and he
-remained moored off the harbor at the north of Mitylênê until the
-envoys, among whom was included one of the very citizens of Mitylênê
-who had sent to betray the intended revolt, but who had since changed
-his opinion, should return from Athens. Meanwhile the Mitylenæan
-government, unknown to Kleïppidês, and well aware that the embassy
-would prove fruitless, took advantage of the truce to send secret
-envoys to Sparta, imploring immediate aid: and on the arrival of
-the Lacedæmonian Meleas and the Theban Hermæondas, who had been
-despatched to Mitylênê earlier, but had only come in by stealth since
-the arrival of Kleïppidês, a second trireme was sent along with them,
-carrying additional envoys to reiterate the solicitation. These
-arrivals and despatches were carried on without the knowledge of the
-Athenian admiral, chiefly in consequence of the peculiar site of the
-town, which had originally been placed upon a little islet divided
-from Lesbos by a narrow channel, or _euripus_, and had subsequently
-been extended across into the main island,—like Syracuse, and so
-many other Grecian settlements. It had consequently two harbors, one
-north, the other south of the town: Kleïppidês was anchored off the
-former, but the latter remained unguarded.[374]
-
-  [374] Thucyd. iii, 3, 4: compare Strabo, xiii, p. 617; and Plehn,
-  Lesbiaca, pp. 12-18.
-
-  Thucydidês speaks of the spot at the mouth of the northern harbor
-  as being called Malea, which was also undoubtedly the name of the
-  southeastern promontory of Lesbos. We must therefore presume that
-  there were two places on the seaboard of Lesbos which bore that
-  name.
-
-  The easternmost of the two southern promontories of Peloponnesus
-  was also called Cape Malea.
-
-During the absence of the Mitylenæan envoys at Athens, reinforcements
-reached the Athenian admiral from Lemnos, Imbros, and some other
-allies, as well as from the Lesbian town of Methymna: so that when
-the envoys returned, as they presently did, with an unfavorable
-reply, war was resumed with increased vigor. The Mitylenæans, having
-made a general sally with their full military force, gained some
-advantage in the battle; yet, not feeling bold enough to maintain
-the field, they retreated back behind their walls. The news of
-their revolt, when first spread abroad, had created an impression
-unfavorable to the stability of the Athenian empire: but when it
-was seen that their conduct was irresolute, and their achievements
-disproportionate to their supposed power, a reaction of feeling took
-place,—and the Chians and other allies came in with increased zeal
-in obedience to the summons of Athens for reinforcements. Kleïppidês
-soon found his armament large enough to establish two separate camps,
-markets for provision, and naval stations, north and south of the
-town, so as to watch and block up both the harbors at once.[375] But
-he commanded little beyond the area of his camp, and was unable to
-invest the city by land; especially as the Mitylenæans had received
-reinforcements from Antissa, Pyrrha, and Eresus, the other towns of
-Lesbos which acted with them. They were even sufficiently strong to
-march against Methymna, in hopes that it would be betrayed to them
-by a party within; but this expectation was not realized, nor could
-they do more than strengthen the fortifications, and confirm the
-Mitylenæan supremacy, in the other three subordinate towns; in such
-manner that the Methymnæans, who soon afterwards attacked Antissa,
-were repulsed with considerable loss. In this undecided condition
-the island continued, until, somewhere about the month of August
-B.C. 428, the Athenians sent Pachês to take the command, with a
-reinforcement of one thousand hoplites, who rowed themselves thither
-in triremes. The Athenians were now in force enough not only to keep
-the Mitylenæans within their walls, but also to surround the city
-with a single wall of circumvallation, strengthened by separate forts
-in suitable positions. By the beginning of October, Mitylênê was thus
-completely blockaded, by land as well as by sea.[376]
-
-  [375] Thucyd. iii, 6.
-
-  [376] Thucyd. iii, 18.
-
-Meanwhile, the Mitylenæan envoys, after a troublesome voyage, reached
-Sparta a little before the Olympic festival, about the middle of
-June. The Spartans directed them to come to Olympia at the festival,
-where all the members of the Peloponnesian confederacy would
-naturally be present,—and there to set forth their requests, after
-the festival was concluded, in presence of all.[377] Thucydidês has
-given us, at some length, his version of the speech wherein this was
-done,—a speech not a little remarkable. Pronounced as it was by men
-who had just revolted from Athens, having the strongest interest to
-raise indignation against her as well as sympathy for themselves,—and
-before an audience exclusively composed of the enemies of Athens,
-all willing to hear, and none present to refute, the bitterest
-calumnies against her, we should have expected a confident sense of
-righteous and well-grounded though perilous effort on the part of the
-Mitylenæans, and a plausible collection of wrongs and oppressions
-alleged against the common enemy. Instead of which, the speech is
-apologetic and embarrassed: the speaker not only does not allege any
-extortion or severe dealing from Athens towards the Mitylenæans, but
-even admits the fact that they had been treated by her with marked
-honor;[378] and that, too, during a long period of peace, during
-which she stood less in awe of her allies generally, and would have
-had much more facility in realizing any harsh purposes towards them,
-than she could possibly enjoy now that the war had broken out, when
-their discontents would be likely to find powerful protectors.[379]
-According to his own showing, the Mitylenæans, while they had been
-perfectly well treated by Athens during the past, had now acquired,
-by the mere fact of war, increased security for continuance of the
-like treatment during the future. It is upon this ground of security
-for the future, nevertheless, that he rests the justification of the
-revolt, not pretending to have any subject of positive complaint.
-The Mitylenæans, he contends, could have no prospective security
-against Athens: for she had successively and systematically brought
-into slavery all her allies, except Lesbos and Chios, though all had
-originally been upon an equal footing: and there was every reason
-for fearing that she would take the first convenient opportunity of
-reducing the two last remaining to the same level,—the rather as
-their position was now one of privilege and exception, offensive
-to her imperial pride and exaggerated ascendency. It had hitherto
-suited the policy of Athens to leave these two exceptions, as a
-proof that the other allies had justly incurred their fate, since
-otherwise Lesbos and Chios, having equal votes, would not have
-joined forces in reducing them:[380] but this policy was now no
-longer necessary, and the Mitylenæans, feeling themselves free only
-in name, were imperatively called upon by regard for their own
-safety to seize the earliest opportunity for emancipating themselves
-in reality. Nor was it merely regard for their own safety, but a
-farther impulse of Pan-Hellenic patriotism; a desire to take rank
-among the opponents, and not among the auxiliaries of Athens, in her
-usurpation of sovereignty over so many free Grecian states.[381] The
-Mitylenæans had, however, been compelled to revolt with preparations
-only half-completed, and had therefore a double claim upon the succor
-of Sparta,—the single hope and protectress of Grecian autonomy. And
-Spartan aid—if now lent immediately and heartily, in a renewed attack
-on Attica during this same year, by sea as well as by land—could
-not fail to put down the common enemy, exhausted as she was by
-pestilence as well as by the cost of three years’ war, and occupying
-her whole maritime force, either in the siege of Mitylênê or round
-Peloponnesus. The orator concluded by appealing not merely to the
-Hellenic patriotism and sympathies of the Peloponnesians, but also to
-the sacred name of the Olympic Zeus, in whose precinct the meeting
-was held, that his pressing entreaty might not be disregarded.[382]
-
-  [377] Thucyd. iii, 9.
-
-  [378] Thucyd. iii, 10. μηδέ τῳ χείρους δόξωμεν εἶναι, εἰ ~ἐν τῇ
-  εἰρήνῃ τιμώμενοι ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν~ ἐν τοῖς δεινοῖς ἀφιστάμεθα.
-
-  The language in which the Mitylenæan envoys describe the
-  treatment which their city had received from Athens, is
-  substantially as strong as that which Kleon uses afterwards
-  in his speech at Athens, when he reproaches them with their
-  ingratitude,—Kleon says (iii, 39), αὐτόνομοί τε οἰκοῦντες, καὶ
-  ~τιμώμενοι ἐς τὰ πρῶτα ὑφ᾽ ἡμῶν~, τοιαῦτα εἰργάσαντο, etc.
-
-  [379] Thucyd. iii, 12. οὐ μέντοι ἐπὶ πολύ γ᾽ ἂν ἐδοκοῦμεν
-  δυνηθῆναι (περιγίγνεσθαι), εἰ μὴ ὁ πόλεμος ὅδε κατέστη,
-  παραδείγμασι χρώμενοι τοῖς ἐς τοὺς ἄλλους. Τίς οὖν αὐτὴ ἡ
-  φιλία ἐγίγνετο ἢ ἐλευθερία πιστὴ, ἐν ᾗ παρὰ γνώμην ἀλλήλους
-  ὑπεδεχόμεθα, καὶ οἱ μὲν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ πολέμῳ δεδιότες ἐθεράπευον,
-  ἡμεῖς δὲ ἐκείνους ἐν τῇ ἡσυχίᾳ τὸ αὐτὸ ἐποιοῦμεν.
-
-  [380] Thucyd. iii, 11. Αὐτόνομοι δὲ ἐλείφθημεν οὐ δι᾽ ἄλλο τι ἢ
-  ὅσον αὐτοῖς ἐς τὴν ἀρχὴν εὐπρεπείᾳ τε λόγου, καὶ γνώμης μᾶλλον
-  ἐφόδῳ ἢ ἰσχύος, τὰ πράγματα ἐφαίνετο καταληπτά. Ἅμα μὲν γὰρ
-  μαρτυρίῳ ἐχρῶντο, μὴ ἂν ~τούς γε ἰσοψήφους ἄκοντας~, εἰ μή τι
-  ἠδίκουν οἷς ἐπῄεσαν, ~ξυστρατεύειν~.
-
-  [381] Thucyd. iii, 13.
-
-  [382] Thucyd. iii, 13, 14.
-
-In following this speech of the orator, we see the plain confession
-that the Mitylenæans had no reason whatever to complain of the
-conduct of Athens towards themselves: she had respected alike their
-dignity, their public force, and their private security. This
-important fact helps us to explain, first, the indifference which the
-Mitylenæan people will be found to manifest in the revolt; next, the
-barbarous resolution taken by the Athenians after its suppression.
-The reasons given for the revolt are mainly two. 1. The Mitylenæans
-had no security that Athens would not degrade them into the condition
-of subject-allies like the rest. 2. They did not choose to second
-the ambition of Athens, and to become parties to a war, for the sake
-of maintaining an empire essentially offensive to Grecian political
-instincts. In both these two reasons there is force; and both touch
-the sore point of the Athenian empire. That empire undoubtedly
-contradicted one of the fundamental instincts of the Greek mind,—the
-right of every separate town to administer its own political affairs
-apart from external control. The Peloponnesian alliance recognized
-this autonomy in theory, by the general synod and equal voting of all
-the members at Sparta, on important occasions; though it was quite
-true,[383] as Periklês urged at Athens, that in practice nothing more
-was enjoyed than an autonomy confined by Spartan leading-strings,—and
-though Sparta held in permanent custody hostages for the fidelity of
-her Arcadian allies, summoning their military contingents without
-acquainting them whither they were destined to march. But Athens
-proclaimed herself a despot, effacing the autonomy of her allies not
-less in theory than in practice: far from being disposed to cultivate
-in them any sense of a real common interest with herself, she did not
-even cheat them with those forms and fictions which so often appease
-discontent in the absence of realities. Doubtless, the nature of
-her empire, at once widely extended, maritime, and unconnected, or
-only partially connected, with kindred of race, rendered the forms
-of periodical deliberation difficult to keep up; at the same time
-that it gave to her as naval chief an ascendency much more despotic
-than could have been exercised by any chief on land. It is doubtful
-whether she could have overcome—it is certain that she did not try
-to overcome—these political difficulties; so that her empire stood
-confessed as a despotism, opposed to the political instinct of the
-Greek mind; and the revolts against it, like this of Mitylênê,—in
-so far as they represented a genuine feeling, and were not merely
-movements of an oligarchical party against their own democracy,—were
-revolts of this offended instinct, much more than consequences of
-actual oppression. The Mitylenæans might certainly affirm that they
-had no security against being one day reduced to the common condition
-of subject-allies like the rest; yet an Athenian speaker, had he
-been here present, might have made no mean reply to this portion
-of their reasoning;—he would have urged that, had Athens felt any
-dispositions towards such a scheme, she would have taken advantage
-of the fourteen years’ truce to execute it; and he would have shown
-that the degradation of the allies by Athens, and the change in her
-position from president to despot had been far less intentional and
-systematic than the Mitylenæan orator affirmed.
-
-  [383] Thucyd. i, 144. Καὶ ὅταν κἀκεῖνοι (the Lacedæmonians) ταῖς
-  αὐτῶν ἀποδῶσι πόλεσι, μὴ ~σφίσι τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις ἐπιτηδείως
-  αὐτονομεῖσθαι, ἀλλ᾽ αὐτοῖς ἑκάστοις, ὡς βούλονται~.
-
-  About the hostages detained by Sparta for the fidelity of her
-  allies, see Thucyd. v, 54, 61.
-
-To the Peloponnesian auditors, however, the speech of the latter
-proved completely satisfactory; the Lesbians were declared members
-of the Peloponnesian alliance, and a second attack upon Attica was
-decreed. The Lacedæmonians, foremost in the movement, summoned
-contingents from their various allies, and were early in arriving
-with their own at the isthmus: they there began to prepare carriages
-or trucks for dragging across the isthmus the triremes which had
-fought against Phormio, from the harbor of Lechæum into the Saronic
-gulf, in order to employ them against Athens. But the remaining
-allies did not answer to the summons, remaining at home occupied
-with their harvest; and the Lacedæmonians, sufficiently disappointed
-with this languor and disobedience, were still farther confounded
-by the unexpected presence of one hundred Athenian triremes off the
-coast of the isthmus. The Athenians, though their own presence at
-the Olympic festival was forbidden by the war, had doubtless learned
-more or less thoroughly the proceedings which had taken place there
-respecting Mitylênê. Perceiving the general belief entertained of
-their depressed and helpless condition, they determined to contradict
-this by a great and instant effort, and accordingly manned forthwith
-one hundred triremes, requiring the personal service of all men,
-citizens as well as metics; and excepting only the two richest
-classes of the Solonian census, _i. e._ the pentakosiomedimni, and
-the hippeis, or horsemen. With this prodigious fleet they made a
-demonstration along the isthmus in view of the Lacedæmonians, and
-landed in various parts of the Peloponnesian coast to inflict damage.
-At the same time, thirty other Athenian triremes, despatched sometime
-previously to Akarnania, under Asôpius, son of Phormio, landed at
-different openings in Laconia, for the same purpose; and this news
-reached the Lacedæmonians at the isthmus while the other great
-Athenian fleet was parading before their eyes.[384] Amazed at so
-unexpected a demonstration of strength, they began to feel how much
-the Mitylenæans had misled them respecting the exhaustion of Athens,
-and how incompetent they were, especially without the presence of
-their allies, to undertake any joint effective movement by sea and
-land against Attica. They therefore returned home, resolving to send
-an expedition of forty triremes, under Alkidas, to the relief of
-Mitylênê itself; at the same time transmitting requisitions to their
-various allies, in order that these triremes might be furnished.[385]
-
-  [384] Thucyd. iii, 7-16.
-
-  [385] Thucyd. iii, 15, 16.
-
-Meanwhile, Asôpius, with his thirty triremes, had arrived in
-Akarnania, from whence all the ships except twelve were sent home.
-He had been nominated commander as the son of Phormio, who appears
-either to have died, or to have become unfit for service, since his
-victories of the preceding year; and the Akarnanians had preferred
-a special request that a son, or at least some relative of Phormio,
-should be invested with the command of the squadron; so beloved was
-his name and character among them. Asôpius, however, accomplished
-nothing of importance, though he again undertook conjointly with the
-Akarnanians a fruitless march against Œniadæ. Ultimately, he was
-defeated and slain, in attempting a disembarkation on the territory
-of Leukas.[386]
-
-  [386] Thucyd. iii, 7.
-
-The sanguine announcement made by the Mitylenæans at Olympia, that
-Athens was rendered helpless by the epidemic, had indeed been
-strikingly contradicted by her recent display; since, taking numbers
-and equipment together, the maritime force which she had put forth
-this summer, manned as it was by a higher class of seamen, surpassed
-all former years; although, in point of number only, it was inferior
-to the two hundred and fifty triremes which she had sent out during
-the first summer of the war.[387] But the assertion that Athens was
-impoverished in finances was not so destitute of foundation: for
-the whole treasure in the acropolis, six thousand talents at the
-commencement of the war, was now consumed, with the exception of
-that reserve of one thousand talents which had been solemnly set
-aside against the last exigences of defensive resistance. This is not
-surprising, when we learn that every hoplite engaged for near two
-years and a half in the blockade of Potidæa, received two drachmas
-per day, one for himself and a second for an attendant: there were
-during the whole time of the blockade three thousand hoplites engaged
-there,—and for a considerable portion of the time, four thousand six
-hundred; besides the fleet, all the seamen of which received one
-drachma per day per man. Accordingly the Athenians were now for the
-first time obliged to raise a direct contribution among themselves,
-to the amount of two hundred talents, for the purpose of prosecuting
-the siege of Mitylênê: and they at the same time despatched Lysiklês
-with four colleagues, in command of twelve triremes, to collect
-money. What relation these money-gathering ships bore to the regular
-tribute paid by the subject-allies, or whether they were allowed to
-visit these latter, we do not know: in the present case, Lysiklês
-landed at Myus, near the mouth of the Mæander, and marched up the
-country to levy contributions on the Karian villages in the plain of
-that river: but he was surprised by the Karians, perhaps aided by the
-active Samian exiles at Anæa in the neighborhood, and slain, with a
-considerable number of his men.[388]
-
-  [387] Thucyd. iii, 17. Καὶ κατὰ τὸν χρόνον τοῦτον, ὃν αἱ νῆες
-  ἔπλεον, ἐν τοῖς πλεῖσται δὴ νῆες ἅμ᾽ αὐτοῖς ἐνεργοὶ κάλλει
-  ἐγένοντο, παραπλήσιαι δὲ καὶ ἔτι πλείους ἀρχομένου τοῦ πολέμου.
-  Τήν τε γὰρ Ἀττικὴν καὶ Εὔβοιαν καὶ Σαλαμῖνα ἑκατὸν ἐφύλασσον, καὶ
-  περὶ Πελοπόννησον ἕτεραι ἑκατὸν ἦσαν, χωρὶς δὲ αἱ περὶ Ποτίδαιαν
-  καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἄλλοις χωρίοις, ὥστε αἱ πᾶσαι ἅμα ἐγίγνοντο ἐν ἑνὶ
-  θέρει διακόσιαι καὶ πεντήκοντα. Καὶ τὰ χρήματα τοῦτο μάλιστα
-  ὑπανάλωσε μετὰ Ποτιδαίας, etc.
-
-  I have endeavored to render as well as I can this obscure and
-  difficult passage; difficult both as to grammar and as to sense,
-  and not satisfactorily explained by any of the commentators,—if,
-  indeed, it can be held to stand now as Thucydidês wrote it.
-  In the preceding chapter, he had mentioned that this fleet of
-  one hundred sail was manned largely from the hoplite class of
-  citizens (iii, 16). Now we know from other passages in his
-  work (see v, 8; vi, 31) how much difference there was in the
-  appearance and efficiency of an armament, according to the class
-  of citizens who served on it. We may then refer the word κάλλος
-  to the excellence of outfit hence arising: I wish, indeed, that
-  any instance could be produced of κάλλος in this sense, but we
-  find the adjective κάλλιστος (Thucyd. v, 60) στρατόπεδον γὰρ δὴ
-  τοῦτο ~κάλλιστον~ Ἑλληνικὸν τῶν μέχρι τοῦδε ξυνῆλθεν. In v, 8,
-  Thucydidês employs the word ἀξίωμα to denote the same meaning;
-  and in vi, 31, he says: παρασκευὴ γὰρ αὑτὴ πρώτη ἐκπλεύσασα μιᾶς
-  πόλεως δυνάμει Ἑλληνικῇ πολυτελεστάτη δὴ καὶ εὐπρεπεστάτη τῶν
-  εἰς ἐκεῖνον τὸν χρόνον ἐγένετο. It may be remarked that in that
-  chapter too, he contrasts the expedition against Sicily with two
-  other Athenian expeditions, equal to it in number, but inferior
-  in equipment: the same comparison which I believe he means to
-  take in this passage.
-
-  [388] Thucyd. iii, 19.
-
-While the Athenians thus held Mitylênê under siege, their faithful
-friends, the Platæans, had remained closely blockaded by the
-Peloponnesians and Bœotians for more than a year, without any
-possibility of relief. At length, provisions began to fail, and
-the general, Eupompidês, backed by the prophet Theænetus,—these
-prophets[389] were often among the bravest soldiers in the
-army,—persuaded the garrison to adopt the daring but seemingly
-desperate resolution of breaking out over the blockading wall, and
-in spite of its guards. So desperate, indeed, did the project seem,
-that at the moment of execution, one half of the garrison shrank from
-it as equivalent to certain death: the other half, about two hundred
-and twelve in number, persisted and escaped. Happy would it have been
-for the remainder had they even perished in the attempt, and thus
-forestalled the more melancholy fate in store for them!
-
-  [389] Thucyd. iii, 20. Compare Xenophon, Hellen. ii, 4, 19;
-  Herodot. ix, 37; Plutarch, Aratus, c. 25.
-
-It has been already stated, that the circumvallation of Platæa was
-accomplished by a double wall and a double ditch, one ditch without
-the encircling walls, another between them and the town; the two
-walls being sixteen feet apart, joined together, and roofed all
-round, so as to look like one thick wall, and to afford covered
-quarters for the besiegers. Both the outer and inner circumference
-were furnished with battlements, and after every ten battlements
-came a roofed tower, covering the whole breadth of the double
-wall,—allowing a free passage inside, but none outside. In general,
-the entire circuit of the roofed wall was kept under watch night
-and day: but on wet nights the besiegers had so far relaxed their
-vigilance as to retire under cover of the towers, and leave the
-intermediate spaces unguarded: and it was upon this omission that
-the plan of escape was founded. The Platæans prepared ladders of a
-proper height to scale the blockading double wall, ascertaining its
-height by repeatedly counting the ranges of bricks, which were quite
-near enough for them to discern, and not effectually covered with
-whitewash. On a cold and dark December night, amidst rain, sleet, and
-a roaring wind, they marched forth from the gates, lightly armed,
-some few with shields and spears, but most of them with breastplates,
-javelins, and bows and arrows: the right foot was naked, and the left
-foot alone shod, so as to give to it a more assured footing on the
-muddy ground.[390] Taking care to sally out with the wind in their
-faces, and at such a distance from each other as to prevent any
-clattering of arms, they crossed the inner ditch and reached the foot
-of the wall without being discovered: the ladders, borne in the van,
-were immediately planted, and Ammeas, son of Korœbus, followed by
-eleven others, armed only with a short sword and breastplate, mounted
-the wall: others, armed with spears, followed him, their shields
-being carried and handed to them when on the top by comrades behind.
-It was the duty of this first company to master and maintain the two
-towers, right and left, so as to keep the intermediate space free for
-passing over. This was successfully done, the guards in both towers
-being surprised and slain, without alarming the remaining besiegers:
-and many of the Platæans had already reached the top of the wall,
-when the noise of a tile accidently knocked down by one of them,
-betrayed what was passing. Immediately a general clamor was raised,
-alarm was given, and the awakened garrison rushed up from beneath
-to the top of the wall, yet not knowing where the enemy was to be
-found; a perplexity farther increased by the Platæans in the town,
-who took this opportunity of making a false attack on the opposite
-side. Amidst such confusion and darkness, the blockading detachment
-could not tell where to direct their blows, and all remained at
-their posts, except a reserve of three hundred men, kept constantly
-in readiness for special emergencies, who marched out and patrolled
-the outside of the ditch to intercept any fugitives from within.
-At the same time, fire-signals were raised to warn their allies at
-Thebes,—but here again the Platæans in the town had foreseen and
-prepared fire-signals on their part, which they hoisted forthwith,
-in order to deprive this telegraphic communication of all special
-meaning.[391]
-
-  [390] Thucyd. iii, 22. Dr. Arnold, in his note, construes this
-  passage as if the right or bare foot were the _least_ likely to
-  slip in the mud, and the left or shod foot the _most_ likely.
-  The Scholiast and Wasse maintain the opposite opinion, which is
-  certainly the more obvious sense of the text, though the sense
-  of Dr. Arnold would also be admissible. The naked foot is very
-  liable to slip in the mud, and might easily be rendered less
-  liable, by sandals, or covering particularly adapted to that
-  purpose. Besides, Wasse remarks justly, that the warrior who is
-  to use his _right_ arm requires to have his _left_ foot firmly
-  planted.
-
-  [391] Thucyd. iii, 22. φρυκτοί τε ᾔροντο ἐς τὰς Θήβας πολέμιοι,
-  etc. It would seem by this statement that the blockaders must
-  have been often in the habit of transmitting intelligence to
-  Thebes by means of fire-signals; each particular combination of
-  lights having more or less of a special meaning. The Platæans
-  had observed this, and foresaw that the same means would be used
-  on the night of the outbreak, to bring assistance from Thebes
-  forthwith. If they had not observed it _before_, they could
-  not have prepared for the moment when the new signal would be
-  hoisted, so as to confound its meaning—ὅπως ἀσαφῆ τὰ σημεῖα ᾖ....
-
-  Compare iii, 80. I agree with the general opinion stated in Dr.
-  Arnold’s note respecting these fire-signals, and even think that
-  it might have been sustained more strongly.
-
-  “Non enim (observes Cicero, in the fifth oration against
-  Verres, c. 36), sicut erat nuper consuetudo, prædonum adventum
-  significabat _ignis è speculà sublatus aut tumulo_: sed flamma
-  ex ipso incendio navium et calamitatem acceptam et periculum
-  reliquum nuntiabat.”
-
-Meanwhile, the escaping Platæans, masters of the two adjoining
-towers,—on the top of which some of them mounted, while others
-held the doorway through, so as to repel with spears and darts
-all approach of the blockaders,—prosecuted their flight without
-interruption over the space between, shoving down the battlements in
-order to make it more level and plant a greater number of ladders.
-In this manner they all successively got over and crossed the outer
-ditch; every man, immediately after crossing, standing ready on the
-outer bank, with bow and javelin, to repel assailants and maintain
-safe passages for his comrades in the rear. At length, when all had
-descended, there remained the last and greatest difficulty,—the
-escape of those who occupied the two towers and kept the intermediate
-portion of wall free: yet even this was accomplished successfully and
-without loss. The outer ditch was, however, found embarrassing,—so
-full of water from the rain as to be hardly fordable, yet with
-thin ice on it also, from a previous frost: for the storm, which
-in other respects was the main help to their escape, here retarded
-their passage of the ditch by an unusual accumulation of water. It
-was not, however, until all had crossed except the defenders of the
-towers,—who were yet descending and scrambling through,—that the
-Peloponnesian reserve of three hundred were seen approaching the spot
-with torches. Their unshielded right side was turned towards the
-ditch, and the Platæans, already across and standing on the bank,
-immediately assailed them with arrows and javelins,—in which the
-torches enabled them to take tolerable aim, while the Peloponnesians
-on their side could not distinguish their enemies in the dark, and
-had no previous knowledge of their position. They were thus held in
-check until the rearmost Platæans had surmounted the difficulties
-of the passage: after which the whole body stole off as speedily as
-they could, taking at first the road towards Thebes, while their
-pursuers were seen with their torch-lights following the opposite
-direction, on the road which led by the heights called Dryos-Kephalæ
-to Athens: after having marched about three quarters of a mile on the
-road to Thebes, leaving the chapel of the Hero Androkratês on their
-right hand, the fugitives quitted it, and striking to the eastward
-towards Erythræ and Hysiæ, soon found themselves in safety among
-the mountains which separate Bœotia from Attica at that point; from
-whence they passed into the glad harbor and refuge of Athens.[392]
-
-  [392] Thucyd. iii, 24. Diodorus (xii, 56) gives a brief summary
-  of these facts, without either novelty or liveliness.
-
-Two hundred and twelve brave men thus emerged to life and liberty,
-breaking loose from that impending fate which too soon overtook the
-remainder, and preserving for future times the genuine breed and
-honorable traditions of Platæa. One man alone was taken prisoner
-at the brink of the outer ditch, while a few, who had enrolled
-themselves originally for the enterprise, lost courage and returned
-in despair even from the foot of the inner wall; telling their
-comrades within that the whole band had perished. Accordingly, at
-daybreak, the Platæans within sent out a herald to solicit a truce
-for burial of the dead bodies, and it was only by the answer made
-to this request, that they learned the actual truth. The description
-of this memorable outbreak exhibits not less daring in the execution
-than skill and foresight in the design; and is the more interesting,
-inasmuch as the men who thus worked out their salvation were
-precisely the bravest men, who best deserved it.
-
-Meanwhile, Pachês and the Athenians kept Mitylênê closely blocked
-up, the provisions were nearly exhausted, and the besieged were
-already beginning to think of capitulation,—when their spirits were
-raised by the arrival of the Lacedæmonian envoy Salæthus, who had
-landed at Pyrrha on the west of Lesbos, and contrived to steal in
-through a ravine which obstructed the continuity of the blockading
-wall,—about February 427 B.C. He encouraged the Mitylenæans to hold
-out, assuring them that a Peloponnesian fleet under Alkidas was on
-the point of setting out to assist them, and that Attica would be
-forthwith invaded by the general Peloponnesian army. His own arrival,
-also, and his stay in the town, was in itself no small encouragement:
-we shall see hereafter, when we come to the siege of Syracuse by the
-Athenians, how much might depend upon the presence of one single
-Spartan. All thought of surrender was accordingly abandoned, and
-the Mitylenæans awaited with impatience the arrival of Alkidas, who
-started from Peloponnesus at the beginning of April, with forty-two
-triremes; while the Lacedæmonian army at the same time invaded
-Attica, in order to keep the attention of Athens fully employed.
-Their ravages on this occasion were more diligent, searching, and
-destructive to the country than before, and were continued the longer
-because they awaited the arrival of news from Lesbos. But none
-reached them, their stock of provisions was exhausted, and the army
-was obliged to break up.[393]
-
-  [393] Thucyd. iii, 25, 26.
-
-The news, when it did arrive, proved very unsatisfactory.
-
-Salæthus and the Mitylenæans had held out until their provisions
-were completely exhausted, but neither relief, nor tidings, reached
-them from Peloponnesus. At length, even Salæthus became convinced
-that no relief would come; he projected, therefore, as a last hope,
-a desperate attack upon the Athenians and their wall of blockade.
-For this purpose, he distributed full panoplies among the mass of
-the people, or commons, who had hitherto been without them, having
-at best nothing more than bows or javelins.[394] But he had not
-sufficiently calculated the consequences of this important step.
-The Mitylenæan multitude, living under an oligarchical government,
-had no interest whatever in the present contest, which had been
-undertaken without any appeal to their opinion. They had no reason
-for aversion to Athens, seeing that they suffered no practical
-grievance from the Athenian alliance: and we shall find hereafter
-that even among the subject-allies—to say nothing of a privileged
-ally like Mitylênê—the bulk of the citizens were never forward,
-sometimes positively reluctant, to revolt. The Mitylenæan oligarchy
-had revolted, in spite of the absence of practical wrongs, because
-they desired an uncontrolled town-autonomy as well as security for
-its continuance: but this was a feeling to which the people were
-naturally strangers, having no share in the government of their own
-town, and being kept dead and passive, as it was the interest of the
-oligarchy that they should be, in respect to political sentiment. A
-Grecian oligarchy might obtain from its people quiet submission under
-ordinary circumstances, but if ever it required energetic effort,
-the genuine devotion under which alone such effort could be given,
-was found wanting. Accordingly, the Mitylenæan demos, so soon as
-they found themselves strengthened and ennobled by the possession of
-heavy armor, refused obedience to the orders of Salæthus for marching
-out and imperiling their lives in a desperate struggle. They were
-under the belief—not unnatural under the secrecy of public affairs
-habitually practised by an oligarchy, but which, assuredly, the
-Athenian demos would have been too well informed to entertain—that
-their governors were starving them, and had concealed stores of
-provisions for themselves. Accordingly, the first use which they
-made of their arms was, to demand that these concealed stores should
-be brought out and fairly apportioned to all, threatening, unless
-their demand was complied with at once, to enter into negotiations
-with the Athenians, and surrender the city. The ruling Mitylenæans,
-unable to prevent this, but foreseeing that it would be their
-irretrievable ruin, preferred the chance of negotiating themselves
-for a capitulation. It was agreed with Pachês, that the Athenian
-armament should enter into possession of Mitylênê; that the fate of
-its people and city should be left to the Athenian assembly, and
-that the Mitylenæans should send envoys to Athens to plead their
-cause: until the return of these envoys, Pachês engaged that no one
-should be either killed, or put in chains, or sold into slavery.
-Nothing was said about Salæthus, who hid himself as well as he could
-in the city. In spite of the guarantee received from Pachês, so
-great was the alarm of those Mitylenæans who had chiefly instigated
-the revolt, that when he actually took possession of the city, they
-threw themselves as suppliants upon the altars for protection; but
-being induced, by his assurances, to quit their sanctuary, were
-placed in the island of Tenedos until answer should be received from
-Athens.[395]
-
-  [394] Thucyd. iii, 27. ὁ Σάλαιθος, καὶ αὐτὸς οὐ προσδεχόμενος ἔτι
-  τὰς ναῦς, ὁπλίζει τὸν δῆμον, πρότερον ψιλὸν ὄντα, ὡς ἐπεξιὼν τοῖς
-  Ἀθηναίοις.
-
-  [395] Thucyd. iii, 28.
-
-Having thus secured possession of Mitylênê, Pachês sent round some
-triremes to the other side of the island, and easily captured
-Antissa. But before he had time to reduce the two remaining towns
-of Pyrrha and Eresus, he received news which forced him to turn his
-attention elsewhere.
-
-To the astonishment of every one, the Peloponnesian fleet of
-Alkidas was seen on the coast of Ionia. It ought to have been there
-much earlier, and had Alkidas been a man of energy, it would have
-reached Mitylênê even before the surrender of the city. But the
-Peloponnesians, when about to advance into the Athenian waters
-and brave the Athenian fleet, were under the same impressions of
-conscious weakness and timidity—especially since the victories of
-Phormio in the preceding year—as that which beset land-troops who
-marched up to attack the Lacedæmonian heavy-armed.[396] Alkidas,
-though unobstructed by the Athenians, who were not aware of his
-departure,—though pressed to hasten forward by Lesbian and Ionian
-exiles on board, and aided by expert pilots from those Samian
-exiles who had established themselves at Anæa,[397] on the Asiatic
-continent, and acted as zealous enemies of Athens,—nevertheless,
-instead of sailing straight to Lesbos, lingered first near
-Peloponnesus, next at the island of Delos, making capture of private
-vessels with their crews; until at length, on reaching the islands of
-Ikarus and Mykonus, he heard the unwelcome tidings that the besieged
-town had capitulated. Not at first crediting the report, he sailed
-onward to Embaton, in the Erythræan territory on the coast of Asia
-Minor, where he found the news confirmed. As only seven days had
-elapsed since the capitulation had been concluded, Teutiaplus, an
-Eleian captain in the fleet, strenuously urged the daring project
-of sailing on forthwith, and surprising Mitylênê by night in its
-existing unsettled condition: no preparation would have been made for
-receiving them, and there was good chance that the Athenians might
-be suddenly overpowered, the Mitylenæans again armed, and the town
-recovered.
-
-  [396] Thucyd. iv, 34. τῇ γνώμῃ δεδουλωμένοι ὡς ἐπὶ Λακεδαιμονίους.
-
-  [397] Thucyd. iv, 75.
-
-Such a proposition, which was indeed something more than daring,
-did not suit the temper of Alkidas. Nor could he be induced by the
-solicitation of the exiles to fix and fortify himself either in any
-port of Ionia, or in the Æolic town of Kymê, so as to afford support
-and countenance to such subjects of the Athenian empire as were
-disposed to revolt; though he was confidently assured that many of
-them would revolt on his proclamation, and that the satrap Pissuthnês
-of Sardis would help him to defray the expense. Having been sent for
-the express purpose of relieving Mitylênê, Alkidas believed himself
-interdicted from any other project, and determined to return to
-Peloponnesus at once, dreading nothing so much as the pursuit of
-Pachês and the Athenian fleet. From Embaton, accordingly, he started
-on his return, coasting southward along Asia Minor as far as Ephesus.
-But the prisoners taken in his voyage were now an encumbrance to
-his flight; and their number was not inconsiderable, since all the
-merchant-vessels in his route had approached the fleet without
-suspicion, believing it to be Athenian: a Peloponnesian fleet near
-the coast of Ionia was as yet something unheard of and incredible. To
-get rid of his prisoners, Alkidas stopped at Myonnêsus, near Teos,
-and there put to death the greater number of them,—a barbarous
-proceeding, which excited lively indignation among the neighboring
-Ionic cities to which they belonged; insomuch that when he reached
-Ephesus, the Samian exiles dwelling at Anæa, who had come forward so
-actively to help him, sent him a spirited remonstrance, reminding him
-that the slaughter of men neither engaged in war, nor enemies, nor
-even connected with Athens, except by constraint, was disgraceful
-to one who came forth as the liberator of Greece,—and that, if he
-persisted, he would convert his friends into enemies, not his enemies
-into friends. So keenly did Alkidas feel this animadversion, that he
-at once liberated the remainder of his prisoners, several of them
-Chians; and then started from Ephesus, taking his course across sea
-towards Krete and Peloponnesus. After much delay off the coast of
-Krete from stormy weather, which harassed and dispersed his fleet, he
-at length reached in safety the harbor of Kyllênê in Elis, where his
-scattered ships were ultimately reunited.[398]
-
-  [398] Thucyd. iii, 32, 33-69.
-
-Thus inglorious was the voyage of the first Peloponnesian admiral
-who dared to enter that _Mare clausum_ which passed for a portion
-of the territory of Athens.[399] But though he achieved little, his
-mere presence excited everywhere not less dismay than astonishment:
-for the Ionic towns were all unfortified, and Alkidas might take and
-sack any one of them by sudden assault, even though unable to hold
-it permanently. Pressing messages reached Pachês from Erythræ and
-from several other places, while the Athenian triremes called Paralus
-and Salaminia, the privileged vessels which usually carried public
-and sacred deputations, had themselves seen the Peloponnesian fleet
-anchored at Ikarus, and brought him the same intelligence. Pachês,
-having his hands now free by the capture of Mitylênê, set forth
-immediately in pursuit of the intruder, whom he chased as far the
-island of Patmos. It was there ascertained that Alkidas had finally
-disappeared from the eastern waters, and the Athenian admiral, though
-he would have rejoiced to meet the Peloponnesian fleet in the open
-sea, accounted it fortunate that they had not taken up a position in
-some Asiatic harbor,—in which case it would have been necessary for
-him to undertake a troublesome and tedious blockade,[400] besides all
-the chances of revolt among the Athenian dependencies. We shall see
-how much, in this respect, depended upon the personal character of
-the Lacedæmonian commander, when we come hereafter to the expedition
-of Brasidas.
-
-  [399] Thucyd. v, 56. Ἀργεῖοι δ᾽ ἐλθόντες παρ᾽ Ἀθηναίους ἐπεκάλουν
-  ὅτι, γεγραμμένον ἐν ταῖς σπονδαῖς ~διὰ τῆς ἑαυτῶν~ ἑκάστους μὴ
-  ἐᾶν πολεμίους διιέναι, ἐάσειαν ~κατὰ θάλασσαν~ (Λακεδαιμονίους)
-  παραπλεῦσαι.
-
-  We see that the sea is here reckoned as a portion of the Athenian
-  territory; and even the portion of sea near to Peloponnesus,—much
-  more, that on the coast of Ionia.
-
-  [400] Thucyd. iii, 33.
-
-On his return from Patmos to Mitylênê, Pachês was induced to stop at
-Notium by the solicitations of some exiles. Notium was the port of
-Kolophon, from which it was some little distance, as Peiræus was from
-Athens.[401]
-
-  [401] The dissensions between Notium and Kolophon are noticed by
-  Aristot. Politic. v, 3, 2.
-
-About three years before, a violent internal dissension had taken
-place in Kolophon, and one of the parties, invoking the aid of
-the Persian Itamanes (seemingly one of the generals of the satrap
-Pissuthnês), had placed him in possession of the town; whereupon the
-opposite party, forced to retire, had established itself separately
-and independently at Notium. But the Kolophonians who remained in
-the town soon contrived to procure a party in Notium, whereby they
-were enabled to regain possession of it, through the aid of a body of
-Arcadian mercenaries in the service of Pissuthnês. These Arcadians
-formed a standing garrison at Notium, in which they occupied a
-separate citadel, or fortified space, while the town became again
-attached as harbor to Kolophon. A considerable body of exiles,
-however, expelled on that occasion, now invoked the aid of Pachês to
-reinstate them, and to expel the Arcadians. On reaching the place,
-the Athenian general prevailed upon Hippias, the Arcadian captain,
-to come forth to a parley, under the promise that, if nothing
-mutually satisfactory could be settled, he would again replace
-him, “safe and sound,” in the fortification. But no sooner had the
-Arcadian come forth to this parley, than Pachês, causing him to be
-detained under guard, but without fetters or ill-usage, immediately
-attacked the fortification while the garrison were relying on the
-armistice, carried it by storm, and put to death both the Arcadians
-and the Persians who were found within. Having got possession of
-the fortification, he next brought Hippias again into it, “safe and
-sound,” according to the terms of the convention, which was thus
-literally performed, and then immediately afterwards caused him to
-be shot with arrows and javelins. Of this species of fraud, founded
-on literal performance and real violation of an agreement, there are
-various examples in Grecian history; but nowhere do we read of a
-more flagitious combination of deceit and cruelty than the behavior
-of Pachês at Notium. How it was noticed at Athens, we do not know:
-but we may remark, not without surprise, that Thucydidês recounts it
-plainly and calmly without a single word of comment.[402]
-
-  [402] Thucyd. iii, 34.
-
-Notium was separated from Kolophon, and placed in possession of
-those Kolophonians who were opposed to the Persian supremacy in the
-upper town. But as it had been down to this time a mere appendage of
-Kolophon and not a separate town, the Athenians soon afterwards sent
-œkists and performed for it the ceremonies of colonization according
-to their own laws and customs, inviting from every quarter the
-remaining exiles of Kolophon.[403] Whether any new settlers went from
-Athens itself, we do not know: but the step was intended to confer a
-sort of Hellenic citizenship, and recognized collective personality,
-on the new-born town of Notium; without which, neither its theôry or
-solemn deputation would have been admitted to offer public sacrifice,
-nor its private citizens to contend for the prize, at Olympic and
-other great festivals.
-
-  [403] Thucyd. iii, 34; C. A. Pertz, Colophoniaca, p. 36.
-  (Göttingen, 1848.)
-
-Having cleared the Asiatic waters from the enemies of Athens, Pachês
-returned to Lesbos, reduced the towns of Pyrrha and Eresus, and
-soon found himself so completely master both of Mitylênê and the
-whole island, as to be able to send home the larger part of his
-force; carrying with them as prisoners those Mitylenæans who had
-been deposited in Tenedos, as well as others, prominently implicated
-in the late revolt, to the number altogether of rather more than a
-thousand. The Lacedæmonian Salæthus, being recently detected in his
-place of concealment, was included among the prisoners transmitted.
-
-Upon the fate of these prisoners the Athenians had now to pronounce,
-and they entered upon the discussion in a temper of extreme wrath
-and vengeance. As to Salæthus, their resolution to put him to death
-was unanimous and immediate, nor would they listen to his promises,
-assuredly delusive, of terminating the blockade of Platæa, in case
-his life were spared. What to do with Mitylênê and its inhabitants
-was a point more doubtful, and was submitted to formal debate in the
-public assembly.
-
-It is in this debate that Thucydidês first takes notice of Kleon,
-who is, however, mentioned by Plutarch as rising into importance
-some few years earlier, during the lifetime of Periklês. Under the
-great increase of trade and population in Athens and Peiræus during
-the last forty years, a new class of politicians seem to have grown
-up, men engaged in various descriptions of trade and manufacture,
-who began to rival more or less in importance the ancient families
-of Attic proprietors. This change was substantially analogous to
-that which took place in the cities of mediæval Europe, when the
-merchants and traders of the various guilds gradually came to compete
-with, and ultimately supplanted, the patrician families in whom the
-supremacy had originally resided. In Athens, persons of ancient
-family and station enjoyed at this time no political privilege,
-and since the reforms of Ephialtês and Periklês, the political
-constitution had become thoroughly democratical. But they still
-continued to form the two highest classes in the Solonian census
-founded on property,—the pentakosiomedimni, and the hippeis, or
-knights: new men enriched by trade doubtless got into these classes,
-but probably only in minority, and imbibed the feeling of the class
-as they found it, instead of bringing into it any new spirit. Now an
-individual Athenian of this class, though without any legal title
-to preference, yet when he stood forward as candidate for political
-influence, continued to be decidedly preferred and welcomed by the
-social sentiment at Athens, which preserved in its spontaneous
-sympathies distinctions effaced from the political code.[404]
-Besides this place ready prepared for him in the public sympathy,
-especially advantageous at the outset of political life,—he found
-himself farther borne up by the family connections, associations,
-and political clubs, etc., which exercised very great influence both
-on the politics and the judicature of Athens, and of which he became
-a member as a matter of course. Such advantages were doubtless only
-auxiliary, carrying a man up to a certain point of influence, but
-leaving him to achieve the rest by his own personal qualities and
-capacity. But their effect was nevertheless very real, and those who,
-without possessing them, met and buffeted him in the public assembly,
-contended against great disadvantages. A person of such low or
-middling station obtained no favorable presumptions or indulgence on
-the part of the public to meet him half-way,—nor had he established
-connections to encourage first successes, or help him out of early
-scrapes. He found others already in possession of ascendency, and
-well-disposed to keep down new competitors; so that he had to win
-his own way unaided, from the first step to the last, by qualities
-personal to himself; by assiduity of attendance, by acquaintance with
-business, by powers of striking speech, and withal by unflinching
-audacity, indispensable to enable him to bear up against that
-opposition and enmity which he would incur from the high-born
-politicians, and organized party clubs, as soon as he appeared to be
-rising up into ascendency.
-
-  [404] Thucyd. v, 43. Ἀλκιβιάδης—ἀνὴρ ἡλικίᾳ μὲν ὢν ἔτι τότε
-  νέος, ὡς ἐν ἄλλῃ πόλει, ἀξιώματι δὲ προγόνων τιμώμενος. Compare
-  Xenophon, Memorabil. i, 2, 25; iii, 6, 1.
-
-The free march of political and judicial affairs raised up several
-such men, during the years beginning and immediately preceding
-the Peloponnesian war. Even during the lifetime of Periklês, they
-appear to have arisen in greater or less numbers: but the personal
-ascendency of that great man,—who combined an aristocratical position
-with a strong and genuine democratical sentiment, and an enlarged
-intellect rarely found attached to either,—impressed a peculiar
-character on Athenian politics. The Athenian world was divided into
-his partisans and his opponents, among each of whom there were
-individuals high-born and low-born,—though the aristocratical party,
-properly so called, the majority of wealthy and high-born Athenians,
-either opposed or disliked him. It is about two years after his death
-that we begin to hear of a new class of politicians: Eukratês, the
-rope-seller; Kleon, the leather-seller; Lysiklês, the sheep-seller;
-Hyperbolus, the lamp-maker;[405] the two first of whom must have
-been already well-known as speakers in the ekklesia, even during the
-lifetime of Periklês. Among them all, the most distinguished was
-Kleon, son of Kleænetus.
-
-  [405] Aristophan. Equit. 130, _seqq._, and Scholia; Eupolis,
-  Demi, Fram. xv, p. 466, ed. Meineke. See the remarks in Ranck,
-  Commentat. de Vitâ Aristophanis, p. cccxxxiv, _seqq._
-
-Kleon acquired his first importance among the speakers against
-Periklês, so that he would thus obtain for himself, during his early
-political career, the countenance of the numerous and aristocratical
-anti-Perikleans. He is described by Thucydidês in general terms as
-a person of the most violent temper and character in Athens,—as
-being dishonest in his calumnies, and virulent in his invective
-and accusation.[406] Aristophanês, in his comedy of the Knights,
-reproduces these features, with others new and distinct, as well
-as with exaggerated details, comic, satirical, and contemptuous.
-His comedy depicts Kleon in the point of view in which he would
-appear to the knights of Athens,—a leather-dresser, smelling of the
-tan-yard,—a low-born brawler, terrifying opponents by the violence
-of his criminations, the loudness of his voice, the impudence of his
-gestures,—moreover, as venal in his politics, threatening men with
-accusations, and then receiving money to withdraw them; a robber of
-the public treasury, persecuting merit as well as rank, and courting
-the favor of the assembly by the basest and most guilty cajolery. The
-general attributes set forth by Thucydidês (apart from Aristophanês,
-who does not profess to write history), we may well accept; the
-powerful and violent invective of Kleon, often dishonest, together
-with his self-confidence and audacity in the public assembly. Men of
-the middling class, like Kleon and Hyperbolus, who persevered in
-addressing the public assembly and trying to take a leading part in
-it, against persons of greater family pretension than themselves,
-were pretty sure to be men of more than usual audacity. Had they
-not possessed this quality, they would never have surmounted the
-opposition made to them: we may well believe that they had it to
-a displeasing excess,—and even if they had not, the same measure
-of self-assumption which in Alkibiadês would be tolerated from his
-rank and station, would in them pass for insupportable impudence.
-Unhappily, we have no specimens to enable us to appreciate the
-invective of Kleon. We cannot determine whether it was more virulent
-than that of Demosthenês and Æschinês, seventy years afterwards,—each
-of those eminent orators imputing to the other the grossest
-impudence, calumny, perjury, corruption, loud voice, and revolting
-audacity of manner, in language which Kleon can hardly have surpassed
-in intensity of vituperation, though he doubtless fell immeasurably
-short of it in classical finish. Nor can we even tell in what degree
-Kleon’s denunciations of the veteran Periklês were fiercer than those
-memorable invectives against the old age of Sir Robert Walpole,
-with which Lord Chatham’s political career opened. The talent for
-invective possessed by Kleon, employed first against Periklês, would
-be counted as great impudence by the partisans of that illustrious
-statesman, as well as by impartial and judicious citizens; but among
-the numerous enemies of Periklês, it would be applauded as a burst
-of patriotic indignation, and would procure for the orator that
-extraneous support at first which would sustain him until he acquired
-his personal hold on the public assembly.[407]
-
-  [406] Thucyd. iii, 36. Κλέων—ὢν καὶ ἐς τὰ ἄλλα βιαιότατος τῶν
-  πολιτῶν, καὶ τῷ δήμῳ παραπολὺ ἐν τῷ τότε πιθανώτατος.
-
-  He also mentions Kleon a second time, two years afterwards, but
-  in terms which also seem to imply a first introduction,—μάλιστα
-  δὲ αὐτοὺς ἐνῆγε Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου, ἀνὴρ δημαγωγὸς κατ᾽ ἐκεῖνον
-  τὸν χρόνον ὢν καὶ τῷ πλήθει πιθανώτατος, iv, 21-28, also v, 16.
-  Κλέων—νομίζων καταφανέστερος ἂν εἶναι κακουργῶν, καὶ ἀπιστότερος
-  διαβάλλων, etc.
-
-  [407] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33. Ἐπεφύετο δὲ καὶ Κλέων, ἤδη διὰ
-  τῆς πρὸς ἐκεῖνον ὀργῆς τῶν πολιτῶν πορευόμενος εἰς τὴν δημαγωγίαν.
-
-  Periklês was δηχθεὶς αἴθωνι Κλέωνι—in the words of the comic
-  author Hermippus.
-
-By what degrees or through what causes that hold was gradually
-increased, we do not know; but at the time when the question of
-Mitylênê came on for discussion, it had grown into a sort of
-ascendency which Thucydidês describes by saying that Kleon was
-“at that time by far the most persuasive speaker in the eyes of
-the people.” The fact of Kleon’s great power of speech, and his
-capacity of handling public business in a popular manner, is better
-attested than anything else respecting him, because it depends upon
-two witnesses both hostile to him,—Thucydidês and Aristophanês. The
-assembly and the dikastery were Kleon’s theatre and holding-ground:
-for the Athenian people taken collectively in their place of meeting,
-and the Athenian people taken individually, were not always the
-same person and had not the same mode of judgment: Demos sitting in
-the Pnyx, was a different man from Demos at home.[408] The lofty
-combination of qualities possessed by Periklês exercised ascendency
-over both one and the other; but the qualities of Kleon swayed
-considerably the former without standing high in the esteem of the
-latter.
-
-  [408] Aristophan. Equit. 750.
-
-When the fate of Mitylênê and its inhabitants was submitted to the
-Athenian assembly, Kleon took the lead in the discussion. There never
-was a theme more perfectly suited to his violent temperament and
-power of fierce invective. Taken collectively, the case of Mitylênê
-presented a revolt as inexcusable and aggravated as any revolt
-could be: and we have only to read the grounds of it, as set forth
-by the Mitylenæan speakers themselves before the Peloponnesians at
-Olympia, to be satisfied that such a proceeding, when looked at from
-the Athenian point of view, would be supposed to justify, and even
-to require, the very highest pitch of indignation. The Mitylenæans
-admit, not only that they have no ground of complaint against Athens,
-but that they have been well and honorably treated by her, with
-special privilege. But they fear that she may oppress them in future:
-they hate the very principle of her empire, and eagerly instigate,
-as well as aid, her enemies to subdue her: they select the precise
-moment in which she has been worn down by a fearful pestilence,
-invasion, and cost of war. Nothing more than this would be required
-to kindle the most intense wrath in the bosom of an Athenian patriot:
-but there was yet another point which weighed as much as the rest, if
-not more: the revolters had been the first to invite a Peloponnesian
-fleet across the Ægean, and the first to proclaim, both to Athens and
-her allies, the precarious tenure of her empire.[409] The violent
-Kleon would on this occasion find in the assembly an audience hardly
-less violent than himself, and would easily be able to satisfy them
-that anything like mercy to the Mitylenæans was treason to Athens.
-He proposed to apply to the captive city the penalties tolerated by
-the custom of war in their harshest and fullest measure: to kill
-the whole Mitylenæan male population of military age, probably
-about six thousand persons,—and to sell as slaves all the women and
-children.[410] The proposition, though strongly opposed by Diodotus
-and others, was sanctioned and passed by the assembly, and a trireme
-was forthwith despatched to Mitylênê, enjoining Pachês to put it in
-execution.[411]
-
-  [409] Thucyd. iii, 36. προσξυνεβάλετο οὐκ ἐλάχιστον τῆς ὁρμῆς,
-  etc.
-
-  [410] I infer this total number from the fact that the number
-  sent to Athens by Pachês, as foremost instigators, was rather
-  more than one thousand (Thucyd. iii, 50). The total of ἡβῶντες,
-  or males of military age, must have been (I imagine) six times
-  this number.
-
-  [411] Thucyd. iii, 36.
-
-Such a sentence was, in principle, nothing more than a very rigorous
-application of the received laws of war. Not merely the reconquered
-rebel, but even the prisoner of war, apart from any special
-convention, was at the mercy of his conqueror, to be slain, sold,
-or admitted to ransom: and we shall find the Lacedæmonians carrying
-out the maxim without the smallest abatement towards the Platæan
-prisoners, in the course of a very short time. And doubtless the
-Athenian people, so long as they remained in assembly, under that
-absorbing temporary intensification of the common and predominant
-sentiment which springs from the mere fact of multitude, and so
-long as they were discussing the principle of the case, What had
-Mitylênê deserved? thought only of this view. Less than the most
-rigorous measure of war, they would conceive, would be inadequate
-to the wrong done by the Mitylenæans. But when the assembly broke
-up,—when the citizen, no longer wound up by sympathizing companions
-and animated speakers in the Pnyx, subsided into the comparative
-quiescence of individual life,—when the talk came to be, not about
-the propriety of passing such a resolution, but about the details
-of executing it, a sensible change and marked repentance became
-presently visible. We must also recollect, and it is a principle of
-no small moment in human affairs, especially among a democratical
-people like the Athenians, who stand charged with so many
-resolutions passed and afterwards unexecuted, that the sentiment of
-wrath against the Mitylenæans had been really in part discharged by
-the mere _passing_ of the sentence, quite apart from its execution;
-just as a furious man relieves himself from overboiling anger by
-imprecations against others which he would himself shrink from
-afterwards realizing. The Athenians, on the whole the most humane
-people in Greece,—though humanity, according to our ideas, cannot be
-predicated of any Greeks,—became sensible that they had sanctioned
-a cruel and frightful decree, and the captain and seamen,[412] to
-whom it was given to carry, set forth on their voyage with mournful
-repugnance. The Mitylenæan envoys present in Athens, who had probably
-been allowed to speak in the assembly and plead their own cause,
-together with those Athenians who had been proxeni and friends of
-Mitylênê, and the minority generally of the previous assembly, soon
-discerned, and did their best to foster, this repentance; which
-became, during the course of the same evening, so powerful as well
-as so wide-spread, that the stratêgi acceded to the prayer of the
-envoys, and convoked a fresh assembly for the morrow to reconsider
-the proceeding. By so doing, they committed an illegality, and
-exposed themselves to the chance of impeachment: but the change of
-feeling among the people was so manifest as to overbear any such
-scruples.[413]
-
-  [412] Thucyd. iii, 36. Καὶ τῇ ὑστεραίᾳ μετάνοιά τις εὐθὺς ἦν
-  αὐτοῖς καὶ ἀναλογισμὸς, ὠμὸν τὸ βούλευμα καὶ μέγα ἐγνῶσθαι, πόλιν
-  ὅλην διαφθεῖραι μᾶλλον ἢ οὐ τοὺς αἰτίους.
-
-  The feelings of the seamen, in the trireme appointed to carry
-  the order of execution, are a striking point of evidence in this
-  case: τῆς προτέρας νεὼς οὐ σπουδῇ πλεούσης ἐπὶ πρᾶγμα ἀλλόκοτον,
-  etc. (iii, 50).
-
-  [413] Thucyd. iii, 36. As to the illegality, see Thucyd. vi,
-  14, which I think is good evidence to prove that there was
-  illegality. I agree with Schömann on this point, in spite of the
-  doubts of Dr. Arnold.
-
-Though Thucydidês had given us only a short summary, without any
-speeches, of what passed in the first assembly,—yet as to the second
-assembly, he gives us at length the speeches both of Kleon and
-Diodotus, the two principal orators of the first also. We may be
-sure that this second assembly was in all points one of the most
-interesting and anxious of the whole war; and though we cannot
-certainly determine what were the circumstances which determined
-Thucydidês in his selection of speeches, yet this cause, as well
-as the signal defeat of Kleon, whom he disliked, may probably be
-presumed to have influenced him here. That orator came forward to
-defend his proposition passed on the preceding day, and denounced
-in terms of indignation the unwise tenderness and scruples of the
-people, who could not bear to treat their subject-allies, according
-to the plain reality, as men held only by naked fear. He dwelt upon
-the mischief and folly of reversing on one day what had been decided
-on the day preceding,—upon the guilty ambition of orators, who
-sacrificed the most valuable interests of the commonwealth either to
-pecuniary gains, or to the personal credit of speaking with effect,
-triumphing over rivals, and setting up their own fancies in place
-of fact and reality. He deprecated the mistaken encouragement given
-to such delusions by a public “wise beyond what was written,” who
-came to the assembly, not to apply their good sense in judging of
-public matters, but merely for the delight of hearing speeches.[414]
-He restated the heinous and unprovoked wrong committed by the
-Mitylenæans,—and the grounds for inflicting upon them that maximum
-of punishment which “justice” enjoined. He called for “justice”
-against them; nothing less, but nothing more: warning the assembly
-that the imperial necessities of Athens essentially required the
-constant maintenance of a sentiment of fear in the minds of unwilling
-subjects, and that they must prepare to see their empire pass away
-if they suffered themselves to be guided either by compassion for
-those who, if victors, would have no compassion on them,[415]—or by
-unseasonable moderation towards those who would neither feel nor
-requite it,—or by the mere impression of seductive discourses.
-Justice against the Mitylenæans, not less than the strong political
-interests of Athens, required the infliction of the sentence decreed
-on the day preceding.[416]
-
-  [414] Thucyd. iii, 37. οἱ μὲν γὰρ τῶν τε νόμων σοφώτεροι
-  βούλονται φαίνεσθαι, τῶν τε ἀεὶ λεγομένων ἐς τὸ κοινὸν
-  περιγίγνεσθαι ... οἱ δ᾽ ἀπιστοῦντες τῇ ἐαυτῶν ξυνέσει ἀμαθέστεροι
-  μὲν τῶν νόμων ἀξιοῦσιν εἶναι, ἀδυνατώτεροι δὲ τοῦ καλῶς εἰπόντος
-  μέμψασθαι λόγον.
-
-  Compare the language of Archidamus at Sparta in the congress,
-  where he takes credit to the Spartans for being ἀμαθέστερον τῶν
-  νόμων τῆς ὑπεροψίας παιδευόμενοι, etc. (Thucyd. i, 84)—very
-  similar in spirit to the remarks of Kleon about the Athenians.
-
-  [415] Thucyd. iii, 40. μηδὲ τρισὶ τοῖς ἀξυμφορωτάτοις τῇ ἀρχῇ,
-  οἴκτῳ, καὶ ἡδονῇ λόγων, καὶ ἐπιεικείᾳ, ἁμαρτάνειν.
-
-  [416] Thucyd. iii, 40. πειθόμενοι δὲ ἐμοὶ τά τε δίκαια ἐς
-  Μυτιληναίους καὶ τὰ ξύμφορα ἅμα ποιήσετε· ἄλλως δὲ γνόντες τοῖς
-  μὲν οὐ χαριεῖσθε, ὑμᾶς δὲ αὐτοὺς μᾶλλον δικαιώσεσθε.
-
-The harangue of Kleon is in many respects remarkable. If we are
-surprised to find a man, whose whole importance resided in his
-tongue, denouncing so severely the license and the undue influence of
-speech in the public assembly, we must recollect that Kleon had the
-advantage of addressing himself to the intense prevalent sentiment of
-the moment,—that he could, therefore, pass off the dictates of this
-sentiment as plain, downright, honest sense and patriotism; while the
-opponents, speaking against the reigning sentiment, and therefore
-driven to collateral argument, circumlocution, and more or less of
-manœuvre, might be represented as mere clever sophists, showing
-their talents in making the worse appear the better reason,—if not
-actually bribed, at least unprincipled, and without any sincere moral
-conviction. As this is a mode of dealing with questions both of
-public concern and of private morality, not less common at present
-than it was in the time of the Peloponnesian war,—to seize upon some
-strong and tolerably wide-spread sentiment among the public, to treat
-the dictates of that sentiment as plain common sense and obvious
-right, and then to shut out all rational estimate of coming good
-and evil as if it were unholy or immoral, or at best mere uncandid
-subtlety,—we may well notice a case in which Kleon employs it to
-support a proposition now justly regarded as barbarous.
-
-Applying our modern views to this proposition, indeed, the prevalent
-sentiment would not only not be in favor of Kleon, but would be
-irresistibly in favor of his opponents. To put to death in cold
-blood some six thousand persons, would so revolt modern feelings,
-as to overbalance all considerations of past misconduct in the
-persons to be condemned. Nevertheless, the speech of Diodotus, who
-followed and opposed Kleon, not only contains no appeal to any such
-merciful predispositions, but even positively disclaims appealing
-to them: the orator deprecates, not less than Kleon, the influence
-of compassionate sentiment, or of a spirit of mere compromise and
-moderation.[417] He farther discards considerations of justice or
-the analogies of criminal judicature,[418]—and rests his opposition
-altogether upon reasons of public prudence, bearing upon the future
-welfare and security of Athens.
-
-  [417] Thucyd. iii. 48: compare the speech of Kleon. iii, 40.
-  ὑμεῖς δὲ γνόντες ἀμείνω τάδε εἶναι, καὶ μήτε οἴκτῳ πλέον
-  νείμαντες μήτε ἐπιεικείᾳ, ~οἷς οὐδὲ ἐγὼ ἐῶ προσάγεσθαι~, ἀπ᾽
-  αὐτῶν δὲ τῶν παραινουμένων, etc.
-
-  Dr. Arnold distinguishes οἶκτος (or ἔλεος) from ἐπιεικεία,
-  by saying that “the former is a feeling, the latter a habit:
-  οἶκτος, pity or compassion, may occasionally touch those who are
-  generally very far from being ἐπιεικεῖς—mild or gentle. Ἐπιεικεία
-  relates to all persons,—οἶκτος, to particular individuals.” The
-  distinction here taken is certainly in itself just, and ἐπιεικὴς
-  sometimes has the meaning ascribed to it by Dr. Arnold: but in
-  this passage I believe it has a different meaning. The contrast
-  between οἶκτος and ἐπιεικεία—as Dr. Arnold explains them—would be
-  too feeble, and too little marked, to serve the purpose of Kleon
-  and Diodotus. Ἐπιεικεία here rather means the disposition to stop
-  short of your full rights; a spirit of fairness and adjustment;
-  an abatement on your part likely to be requited by abatement on
-  the part of your adversary: compare Thucyd. i, 76; iv, 19; v, 86;
-  viii, 93.
-
-  [418] Thucyd. iii, 44. ἐγὼ δὲ παρῆλθον οὔτε ἀντερῶν περὶ
-  Μυτιληναίων οὔτε κατηγορήσων· οὐ γὰρ περὶ τῆς ἐκείνων ἀδικίας
-  ἡμῖν ὁ ἀγὼν, εἰ σωφρονοῦμεν, ἀλλὰ περὶ τῆς ἡμετέρας εὐβουλίας ...
-  ~δικαιότερος γὰρ ὢν αὐτοῦ (Κλέωνος) ὁ λόγος πρὸς τὴν νῦν ὑμετέραν
-  ὀργὴν ἐς Μυτιληναίους~, τάχα ἂν ἐπισπάσαιτο· ~ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐ
-  δικαζόμεθα πρὸς αὐτοὺς, ὥστε τῶν δικαίων δεῖν~, ἀλλὰ βουλευόμεθα
-  περὶ αὐτῶν, ὅπως χρησίμως ἕξουσιν.
-
-  So Mr. Burke, in his speech on Conciliation with America (Burke’s
-  Works, vol. iii. pp. 69-74), in discussing the proposition of
-  prosecuting the acts of the refractory colonies as criminal: “The
-  thing seems a great deal too big for my ideas of jurisprudence.
-  It should seem, to my way of conceiving such matters, that there
-  is a wide difference in reason and policy, between the mode of
-  proceeding on the irregular conduct of scattered individuals, or
-  even of bands of men who disturb order within the state,—and the
-  civil dissensions which may from time to time agitate the several
-  communities which compose a great empire. It looks to me to be
-  narrow and pedantic, to apply the ordinary ideas of criminal
-  justice to this great public contest. I do not know the method
-  of drawing up an indictment against a whole people,” etc.—“My
-  consideration is narrow, confined, and wholly limited to the
-  policy of the question.”
-
-He begins by vindicating[419] the necessity of reconsidering the
-resolution just passed, and insists on the mischief of deciding so
-important a question in haste or under strong passion; he enters
-a protest against the unwarrantable insinuations of corruption or
-self-conceit by which Kleon had sought to silence or discredit his
-opponents;[420] and then, taking up the question on the ground of
-public wisdom and prudence, he proceeds to show that the rigorous
-sentence decreed on the preceding day was not to be defended. That
-sentence would not prevent any other among the subject-allies from
-revolting, if they saw, or fancied that they saw, a fair chance of
-success: but it might perhaps drive them,[421] if once embarked in
-revolt, to persist even to desperation, and bury themselves under
-the ruins of their city. While every means ought to be employed to
-prevent them from revolting, by precautions beforehand, it was a
-mistaken reckoning to try to deter them by enormity of punishment,
-inflicted afterwards upon such as were reconquered. In developing
-this argument, the speaker gives some remarkable views on the
-theory of punishment generally, and on the small addition obtained
-in the way of preventive effect even by the greatest aggravation
-of the suffering inflicted upon the condemned criminal,—views
-which might have passed as rare and profound even down to the last
-century.[422] And he farther supports his argument by emphatically
-setting forth the impolicy of confounding the Mitylenæan Demos in
-the same punishment with their oligarchy: the revolt had been the
-act exclusively of the latter, and the former had not only taken
-no part in it, but, as soon as they obtained possession of arms,
-had surrendered the city spontaneously. In all the allied cities,
-it was the commons who were well-affected to Athens, and upon whom
-her hold chiefly depended against the doubtful fidelity of the
-oligarchies:[423] but this feeling could not possibly continue,
-if it were now seen that all the Mitylenæans indiscriminately
-were confounded in one common destruction. Diodotus concludes by
-recommending that those Mitylenæans whom Pachês had sent to Athens as
-chiefs of the revolt, should be put upon their trial separately; but
-that the remaining population should be spared.[424]
-
-  [419] Thucyd. iii, 42.
-
-  [420] Thucyd. iii, 43.
-
-  [421] Thucyd. iii, 45, 46.
-
-  [422] Compare this speech of Diodotus with the views of
-  punishment implied by Xenophon in his Anabasis, where he is
-  describing the government of Cyrus the younger:—
-
-  “Nor can any man contend, that Cyrus suffered criminals and
-  wrong-doers to laugh at him: he punished them with the most
-  unmeasured severity (ἀφειδέστατα πάντων ἐτιμωρεῖτο). And you
-  might often see along the frequented roads men deprived of their
-  eyes, their hands, and their feet: so that in his government
-  either Greek or barbarian, if he had no criminal purpose, might
-  go fearlessly through and carry whatever he found convenient.”
-  (Anabasis, i, 9, 13.)
-
-  The severity of the punishment is, in Xenophon’s mind, the
-  measure both of its effects in deterring criminals, and of the
-  character of the ruler inflicting it.
-
-  [423] Thucyd. iii, 47. Νῦν μὲν γὰρ ὑμῖν ὁ δῆμος ἐν πάσαις ταῖς
-  πόλεσιν εὔνους ἐστὶ, καὶ ἢ οὐ ξυναφίσταται τοῖς ὀλίγοις, ἢ
-  ἐὰν βιασθῇ, ὑπάρχει τοῖς ἀποστήσασι πολέμιος εὐθὺς, καὶ τῆς
-  ἀντικαθισταμένης πόλεως τὸ πλῆθος ξύμμαχον ἔχοντες ἐς πόλεμον
-  ἐπέρχεσθε.
-
-  [424] Thucyd. iii, 48.
-
-This speech is that of a man who feels that he has the reigning
-and avowed sentiment of the audience against him, and that he must
-therefore win his way by appeals to their reason. The same appeals,
-however, might have been made, and perhaps had been made, during the
-preceding discussion, without success; but Diodotus knew that the
-reigning sentiment, though still ostensibly predominant, had been
-silently undermined during the last few hours, and that the reaction
-towards pity and moderation, which had been growing up under it,
-would work in favor of his arguments, though he might disclaim all
-intention of invoking its aid. After several other discourses, both
-for and against,—the assembly came to a vote, and the proposition of
-Diodotus was adopted; but adopted by so small a majority, that the
-decision seemed at first doubtful.[425]
-
-  [425] Thucyd. iii, 49. ἐγένοντο ἐν τῇ χειροτονίᾳ ἀγχώμαλοι,
-  ἐκράτησε δ᾽ ἡ τοῦ Διοδότου.
-
-But the trireme carrying the first vote had started the day before,
-and was already twenty-four hours on its way to Mitylênê. A second
-trireme was immediately put to sea, bearing the new decree; yet
-nothing short of superhuman exertions could enable it to reach the
-condemned city before the terrific sentence now on its way might be
-actually in course of execution. The Mitylenæan envoys stored the
-vessel well with provisions, promising large rewards to the crew
-if they arrived in time; and an intensity of effort was manifested,
-without parallel in the history of Athenian seamanship,—the oar
-being never once relaxed between Athens and Mitylênê, and the rowers
-merely taking turns for short intervals of rest, with refreshment
-of barley-meal steeped with wine and oil swallowed on their seats.
-Luckily, there was no unfavorable wind to retard them: but the object
-would have been defeated, if it had not happened that the crew of the
-first trireme were as slow and averse in the transmission of their
-rigorous mandate, as those of the second were eager for the delivery
-of the reprieve in time. And, after all, it came no more than just
-in time; the first trireme had arrived, the order for execution
-was actually in the hands of Pachês, and his measures were already
-preparing. So near was the Mitylenæan population to this wholesale
-destruction:[426] so near was Athens to the actual perpetration of
-an enormity which would have raised against her throughout Greece a
-sentiment of exasperation more deadly than that which she afterwards
-incurred even from the proceedings at Melos, Skiônê, and elsewhere.
-Had the execution been realized, the person who would have suffered
-most by it, and most deservedly, would have been the proposer,
-Kleon. For if the reaction in Athenian sentiment was so immediate
-and sensible after the mere passing of the sentence, far more
-violent would it have been when they learned that the deed had been
-irrevocably done, and when all its painful details were presented to
-their imaginations: and Kleon would have been held responsible as the
-author of that which had so disgraced them in their own eyes. As the
-case turned out, he was fortunate enough to escape this danger; and
-his proposition, to put to death those Mitylenæans whom Pachês had
-sent home as the active revolting party, was afterwards adopted and
-executed. It doubtless appeared so moderate after the previous decree
-passed but rescinded, as to be adopted with little resistance, and to
-provoke no after-repentance: yet the men so slain were rather more
-than one thousand in number.[427]
-
-  [426] Thucyd. iii, 49. παρὰ τοσοῦτον μὲν ἡ Μυτιλήνη ἦλθε κινδύνου.
-
-  [427] Thucyd. iii, 50.
-
-Besides this sentence of execution, the Athenians razed the
-fortifications of Mitylênê, and took possession of all her ships of
-war. In lieu of tribute, they farther established a new permanent
-distribution of the land of the island; all except Methymna, which
-had remained faithful to them. They distributed it into three
-thousand lots, of which three hundred were reserved for consecration
-to the gods, and the remainder assigned to Athenian kleruchs, or
-proprietary settlers, chosen by lot among the citizens; the Lesbian
-proprietors still remaining on the land as cultivating tenants, and
-paying to the Athenian kleruch an annual rent of two minæ, near four
-pounds sterling, for each lot. We should have been glad to learn more
-about this new land-settlement than the few words of the historian
-suffice to explain. It would seem that two thousand seven hundred
-Athenian citizens, with their families must have gone to reside,
-for the time at least, in Lesbos, as kleruchs; that is, without
-abnegating their rights as Athenian citizens, and without being
-exonerated either from Athenian taxation, or from personal military
-service. But it seems certain that these men did not continue long
-to reside in Lesbos: and we may even suspect that the kleruchic
-allotment of the island must have been subsequently abrogated. There
-was a strip on the opposite mainland of Asia, which had hitherto
-belonged to Mitylênê; this was now separated from that town, and
-henceforward enrolled among the tributary subjects of Athens.[428]
-
-  [428] Thucyd. iii, 50; iv, 52. About the Lesbian kleruchs,
-  see Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, B. iii, c. 18; Wachsmuth,
-  Hell. Alt. i. 2, p. 36. These kleruchs must originally have
-  gone thither as a garrison, as M. Boeckh remarks; and may
-  probably have come back, either all or a part, when needed for
-  military service at home, and when it was ascertained that the
-  island might be kept without them. Still, however, there is
-  much which is puzzling in this arrangement. It seems remarkable
-  that the Athenians, at a time when their accumulated treasure
-  had been exhausted, and when they were beginning to pay direct
-  contributions from their private property, should sacrifice
-  five thousand four hundred minæ (ninety talents) annual revenue
-  capable of being appropriated by the state, unless that sum were
-  required to maintain the kleruchs as resident garrison for the
-  maintenance of Lesbos. And as it turned out afterwards that their
-  residence was not necessary, we may doubt whether the state did
-  not convert the kleruchic grants into a public tribute, wholly or
-  partially.
-
-  We may farther remark, that if the kleruch be supposed a citizen
-  resident at Athens, but receiving rent from his lot of land in
-  some other territory,—the analogy between him and the Roman
-  colonist fails. The Roman colonists, though retaining their
-  privileges as citizens, were sent out to reside on their grants
-  of land, and to constitute a sort of resident garrison over
-  the prior inhabitants, who had been despoiled of a portion of
-  territory to make room for them.
-
-  See, on this subject and analogy, the excellent Dissertation of
-  Madwig: De jure et conditione coloniarum Populi Romani quæstio
-  historica,—Madwig, Opuscul. Copenhag. 1834. Diss. viii, p. 246.
-
-  M. Boeckh and Dr. Arnold contend justly that at the time of the
-  expedition of Athens against Syracuse and afterwards (Thucyd.
-  vii, 57; viii, 23), there could have been but few, if any,
-  Athenian kleruchs resident in Lesbos. We might even push this
-  argument farther, and apply the same inference to an earlier
-  period, the eighth year of the war (Thucyd. iv, 75), when the
-  Mitylenæan exiles were so active in their aggressions upon
-  Antandrus and the other towns, originally Mitylenæan possessions,
-  on the opposite mainland. There was no force near at hand on the
-  part of Athens to deal with these exiles except the ἀργυρόλογαι
-  νῆες,—had there been kleruchs at Mitylênê, they would probably
-  have been able to defeat the exiles in their first attempts, and
-  would certainly have been among the most important forces to put
-  them down afterwards,—whereas Thucydidês makes no allusion to
-  them.
-
-  Farther, the oration of Antipho (De Cæde Herod. c. 13) makes
-  no allusion to Athenian kleruchs, either as resident in the
-  island, or even as absentees receiving the annual rent mentioned
-  by Thucydidês. The Mitylenæan citizen, father of the speaker
-  of that oration, had been one of those implicated—as he says,
-  unwillingly—in the past revolt of the city against Athens: since
-  the deplorable termination of that revolt he had continued
-  possessor of his Lesbian property, and continued also to
-  discharge his obligations as well (choregic obligations—χορηγίας)
-  towards Mitylênê as (his obligations of pecuniary payment—τέλη)
-  towards Athens. If the arrangement mentioned by Thucydidês had
-  been persisted in, this Mitylenæan proprietor would have paid
-  nothing towards the city of Athens, but merely a rent of two
-  minæ to some Athenian kleruch, or citizen; which can hardly be
-  reconciled with the words of the speaker as we find them in
-  Antipho.
-
-To the misfortunes of Mitylênê belongs, as a suitable appendix, the
-fate of Pachês, the Athenian commander, whose perfidy at Notium has
-been recently recounted. It appears, that having contracted a passion
-for two beautiful free women at Mitylênê, Hellânis and Lamaxis, he
-slew their husbands, and got possession of them by force. Possibly,
-they may have had private friends at Athens, which must of course
-have been the case with many Mitylenæan families: at all events they
-repaired thither, bent on obtaining redress for this outrage, and
-brought their complaint against Pachês before the Athenian dikastery,
-in that trial of accountability to which every officer was liable
-at the close of his command. So profound was the sentiment which
-their case excited, in this open and numerous assembly of Athenian
-citizens, that the guilty commander, not waiting for sentence, slew
-himself with his sword in open court.[429]
-
-  [429] See the Epigram of Agathias, 57, p. 377. Agathias, ed. Bonn.
-
-    Ἑλλανὶς τριμάκαιρα, καὶ ἁ χαρίεσσα Λάμαξις,
-      ἤστην μὲν πάτρας φέγγεα Λεσβιάδος.
-    Ὅκκα δ᾽ Ἀθηναίῃσι σὺν ὅλκασιν ἔνθαδε κέλσας
-      τὰν Μιτυληναίαν γᾶν ἀλάπαξε Πάχης,
-    Τᾶν κουρᾶν αδίκως ἡράσσατο, τὼς δὲ συνεύνως
-      ἔκτανεν, ὡς τήνας τῇδε βιησόμενος.
-    Ταὶ δὲ κατ᾽ Αἰγαίοιο ῥόου πλατὺ λαῖτμα φερέσθην,
-      καὶ ποτὶ τὰν κραναὰν Μοψοπίαν δραμέτην,
-    Δάμῳ δ᾽ ἀγγελέτην ἀλιτήμονος ἔργα Πάχητος
-      μέσφα μιν εἰς ὀλοὴν κῆρα συνηλασάτην.
-    Τοῖα μὲν, ὦ κούρα, πεπονήκατον· ἄψ δ᾽ ἐπὶ πάτραν
-      ἥκετον, ἐν δ᾽ αὐτᾷ κεῖσθον ἀποφθιμένα.
-    Εὖ δὲ πόνων ἀπόνασθον, ἐπεὶ ποτὶ σᾶμα συνεύνων
-      εὕδετον, ἐς κλεινᾶς μνᾶμα σαοφροσύνας·
-    Ὑμνεῦσιν δ᾽ ἔτι πάντες ὁμόφρονας ἡρωΐνας,
-      πάτρας καὶ ποσίων πήματα τισαμένας.
-
-  Plutarch (Nikias, 6: compare Plutarch, Aristeidês, c. 26) states
-  the fact of Pachês having slain himself before the dikastery
-  on occasion of his trial of accountability. Πάχητα τὸν ἕλοντα
-  Λέσβον, ὃς, εὐθύνας δίδους τῆς στρατηγίας, ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ δικαστηρίῳ
-  σπασάμενος ξίφος ἀνεῖλεν ἑαυτὸν, etc.
-
-  The statement in Plutarch, and that in the Epigram, hang together
-  so perfectly well, that each lends authority to the other, and
-  I think there is good reason for crediting the Epigram. The
-  suicide of Pachês, and that too before the dikasts, implies
-  circumstances very different from those usually brought in
-  accusation against a general on trial: it implies an intensity
-  of anger in the numerous dikasts greater than that which acts
-  of peculation would be likely to raise, and such as to strike a
-  guilty man with insupportable remorse and humiliation. The story
-  of Lamaxis and Hellânis would be just of a nature to produce
-  this vehement emotion among the Athenian dikasts. Moreover, the
-  words of the Epigram,—μέσφα μιν εἰς ὀλοὴν κῆρα συνηλασάτην,—are
-  precisely applicable to a self-inflicted death. It would seem by
-  the Epigram, moreover, that, even in the time of Agathias (A.D.
-  550—the reign of Justinian), there must have been preserved at
-  Mitylênê a sepulchral monument commemorating this incident.
-
-  Schneider (ad Aristotel. Politic. v, 3, 2) erroneously identifies
-  this story with that of Doxander and the two ἐπίκληροι whom he
-  wished to obtain in marriage for his two sons.
-
-The surrender of Platæa to the Lacedæmonians took place not long
-after that of Mitylênê to the Athenians,—somewhat later in the same
-summer. Though the escape of one-half of the garrison had made the
-provisions last longer for the rest, still they had now come to be
-exhausted, and the remaining defenders were enfeebled and on the
-point of perishing by starvation. The Lacedæmonian commander of the
-blockading force, knowing their defenceless condition, could easily
-have taken the town by storm, had he not been forbidden by express
-orders from Sparta. For the Spartan government, calculating that
-peace might one day be concluded with Athens on terms of mutual
-cession of places acquired by war, wished to acquire Platæa, not by
-force but by capitulation and voluntary surrender, which would serve
-as an excuse for not giving it up: though such a distinction, between
-capture by force and by capitulation, not admissible in modern
-diplomacy, was afterwards found to tell against the Lacedæmonians
-quite as much as in their favor.[430] Acting upon these orders, the
-Lacedæmonian commander sent in a herald, summoning the Platæans to
-surrender voluntarily, and submit themselves to the Lacedæmonians
-as judges,—with a stipulation “that the wrong-doers[431] should
-be punished, but that none should be punished unjustly.” To the
-besieged, in their state of hopeless starvation, all terms were
-nearly alike, and they accordingly surrendered the city. After a
-few days’ interval, during which they received nourishment from the
-blockading army, five persons arrived from Sparta to sit in judgment
-upon their fate,—one, Aristomenidas, a Herakleid of the regal
-family.[432]
-
-  [430] Thucyd. v, 17.
-
-  [431] Thucyd. iii, 52. προσπέμπει δ᾽ αὐτοῖς κήρυκα λέγοντα, εἰ
-  βούλονται παραδοῦναι τὴν πόλιν ~ἑκόντες~ τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις,
-  καὶ δικασταῖς ἐκείνοις χρήσασθαι, τούς τε ἀδίκους κολάζειν, παρὰ
-  δίκην δὲ οὐδένα.
-
-  [432] Pausan. iii, 9, 1.
-
-The five Spartans having taken their seat as judges, doubtless
-in full presence of the blockading army, and especially with the
-Thebans, the great enemies of Platæa, by their side,—the prisoners
-taken, two hundred Platæans and twenty-five Athenians, were brought
-up for trial, or sentence. No accusation was preferred against
-them by any one: but the simple question was put to them by the
-judges: “Have you, during the present war, rendered any service to
-the Lacedæmonians or to their allies?” The Platæans were confounded
-at a question alike unexpected and preposterous: it admitted but
-of one answer,—but before returning any categorical answer at all,
-they entreated permission to plead their cause at length. In spite
-of the opposition of the Thebans,[433] their request was granted:
-and Astymachus and Lakon, the latter proxenus of Sparta at Platæa,
-were appointed to speak on behalf of the body. Possibly, both these
-delegates may have spoken: if so, Thucydidês has blended the two
-speeches into one.
-
-  [433] Thucyd. iii, 60. ἐπειδὴ καὶ ἐκείνοις ~παρὰ γνώμην τὴν
-  αὑτῶν~ μακρότερος λόγος ἐδόθη τῆς πρὸς τὸ ἐρώτημα ἀποκρίσεως.
-  αὑτῶν here means _the Thebans_.
-
-A more desperate position cannot be imagined, for the interrogatory
-was expressly so framed as to exclude allusion to any facts preceding
-the Peloponnesian war,—but the speakers, though fully conscious
-how slight was their chance of success, disregarded the limits of
-the question itself, and while upholding with unshaken courage the
-dignity of their little city, neglected no topic which could touch
-the sympathies of their judges. After remonstrating against the
-mere mockery of trial and judgment to which they were submitted,
-they appealed to the Hellenic sympathies, and lofty reputation for
-commanding virtue, of the Lacedæmonians,—they adverted to the first
-alliance of Platæa with Athens, concluded at the recommendation of
-the Lacedæmonians themselves, who had then declined, though formally
-solicited, to undertake the protection of the town against Theban
-oppression. They next turned to the Persian war, wherein Platæan
-patriotism towards Greece was not less conspicuous than Theban
-treason,[434]—to the victory gained over the Persians on their soil,
-whereby it had become hallowed under the promises of Pausanias, and
-by solemn appeals to the local gods. From the Persian war, they
-passed on to the flagitious attack made by the Thebans on Platæa, in
-the midst of the truce,—nor did they omit to remind the judges of an
-obligation personal to Sparta,—the aid which they had rendered, along
-with the Athenians, to Sparta, when pressed by the revolt of the
-Helots at Ithôme. This speech is as touching as any which we find in
-Thucydidês, and the skill of it consists in the frequency with which
-the hearers are brought back, time after time, and by well-managed
-transitions, to these same topics.[435] And such was the impression
-which it seemed to make on the five Lacedæmonian judges, that the
-Thebans near at hand found themselves under the necessity of making
-a reply to it: although we see plainly that the whole scheme of
-proceeding—the formal and insulting question, as well as the sentence
-destined to follow upon answer given—had been settled beforehand
-between them and the Lacedæmonians.
-
-  [434] See this point emphatically set forth in Orat. xiv, called
-  Λόγος Πλαταϊκὸς, of Isokratês, p. 308, sect. 62.
-
-  The whole of that oration is interesting to be read in
-  illustration of the renewed sufferings of the Platæans near fifty
-  years after this capture.
-
-  [435] Thucyd. iii, 54-59. Dionysius of Halikarnassus bestows
-  especial commendation on the speech of the Platæan orator (De
-  Thucyd. Hist. Judic. p. 921). Concurring with him as to its
-  merits, I do not concur in the opinion which he expresses that
-  it is less artistically put together than those other harangues
-  which he considers inferior.
-
-  Mr. Mitford doubts whether these two orations are to be taken
-  as approximating to anything really delivered on the occasion.
-  But it seems to me that the means possessed by Thucydidês for
-  informing himself of what was actually said at this scene before
-  the captured Platæa must have been considerable and satisfactory:
-  I therefore place full confidence in them, as I do in most of the
-  other harangues in his work, so far as _the substance_ goes.
-
-The Theban speakers contended that the Platæans had deserved,
-and brought upon themselves by their own fault, the enmity of
-Thebes,—that they had stood forward earnestly against the Persians,
-only because Athens had done so too, and that all the merit, whatever
-it might be, which they had thereby acquired, was counterbalanced
-and cancelled by their having allied themselves with Athens
-afterwards for the oppression and enslavement of the Æginetans, and
-of other Greeks equally conspicuous for zeal against Xerxes, and
-equally entitled to protection under the promises of Pausanias. The
-Thebans went on to vindicate their nocturnal surprise of Platæa,
-by maintaining that they had been invited by the most respectable
-citizens of the town,[436] who were anxious only to bring back Platæa
-from its alliance with a stranger to its natural Bœotian home,—and
-that they had abstained from anything like injurious treatment of the
-inhabitants, until constrained to use force in their own defence.
-They then reproached the Platæans, in their turn, with that breach of
-faith whereby ultimately the Theban prisoners in the town had been
-put to death. And while they excused their alliance with Xerxes, at
-the time of the Persian invasion, by affirming that Thebes was then
-under a dishonest party-oligarchy, who took this side for their own
-factious purposes, and carried the people with them by force,—they at
-the same time charged the Platæans with permanent treason against the
-Bœotian customs and brotherhood.[437] All this was farther enforced
-by setting forth the claims of Thebes to the gratitude of Lacedæmon,
-both for having brought Bœotia into the Lacedæmonian alliance, at the
-time of the battle of Korôneia, and for having furnished so large a
-portion of the common force in the war then going on.[438]
-
-  [436] Thucyd. iii, 65.
-
-  [437] Thucyd. iii, 66. τὰ πάντων Βοιωτῶν πάτρια—iii, 62. ἔξω τῶν
-  ἄλλων Βοιωτῶν παραβαίνοντες τὰ πάτρια.
-
-  [438] Thucyd. iii, 61-68. It is probable that the slaughter of
-  the Theban prisoners taken in the town of Platæa was committed
-  by the Platæans in breach of a convention concluded with the
-  Thebans: and on this point, therefore, the Thebans had really
-  ground to complain. Respecting this convention, however, there
-  were two conflicting stories, between which Thucydidês does not
-  decide: see Thucyd. ii, 3, 4, and this History, above, chap.
-  xlviii.
-
-The discourse of the Thebans, inspired by bitter, and as yet
-unsatisfied hatred against Platæa, proved effectual: or rather it was
-superfluous,—the minds of the Lacedæmonians having before been made
-up. After the proposition twice made by Archidamus to the Platæans,
-inviting them to remain neutral, and even offering to guarantee
-their neutrality,—after the solemn apologetic protest tendered by
-him upon their refusal, to the gods, before he began the siege,—the
-Lacedæmonians conceived themselves exonerated from all obligation to
-respect the sanctity of the place;[439] looking upon the inhabitants
-as having voluntarily renounced their inviolability and sealed their
-own ruin. Hence the importance attached to that protest, and the
-emphatic detail with which it is set forth in Thucydidês. The five
-judges, as their only reply to the two harangues, again called the
-Platæans before them, and repeated to every one of them individually,
-the same question which had before been put: each one of them, as he
-successively replied in the negative,[440] was taken away and killed,
-together with the twenty-five Athenian prisoners. The women captured
-were sold as slaves: and the town and territory of Platæa were
-handed over to the Thebans, who at first established in them a few
-oligarchical Platæan exiles, together with some Megarian exiles,—but
-after a few months recalled this step, and blotted out Platæa,[441]
-as a separate town and territory, from the muster-roll of Hellas.
-They pulled down all the private buildings and employed the materials
-to build a vast barrack all round the Heræum, or temple of Hêrê, two
-hundred feet in every direction, with apartments of two stories above
-and below; partly as accommodation for visitors to the temple, partly
-as an abode for the tenant-farmers or graziers who were to occupy the
-land. A new temple of one hundred feet in length, was also built in
-honor of Hêrê, and ornamented with couches, prepared from the brass
-and iron furniture found in the private houses of the Platæans.[442]
-The Platæan territory was let out for ten years, as public property
-belonging to Thebes, and was hired by private Theban cultivators.
-
-  [439] Thucyd. iii, 68; ii, 74. To construe the former of these
-  passages (iii, 68) as it now stands, is very difficult, if not
-  impossible; we can only pretend to give what seems to be its
-  substantial meaning.
-
-  [440] Diodorus (xii, 56) in his meagre abridgment of the siege
-  and fate of Platæa, somewhat amplifies the brevity and simplicity
-  of the question as given by Thucydidês.
-
-  [441] Thucyd. iii, 57. ὑμᾶς δὲ (you Spartans) καὶ ἐκ παντὸς τοῦ
-  Ἑλληνικοῦ πανοικησίᾳ διὰ Θηβαίους (Πλάταιαν) ~ἐξαλεῖψαι~.
-
-  [442] Thucyd. iii, 69.
-
-Such was the melancholy fate of Platæa, after sustaining a blockade
-of about two years.[443] Its identity and local traditions seemed
-thus extinguished, and the sacrifices, in honor of the deceased
-victors who had fought under Pausanias, suspended,—which the Platæan
-speakers had urged upon the Lacedæmonians as an impiety not to be
-tolerated,[444] and which perhaps the latter would hardly have
-consented to under any other circumstances except from an anxious
-desire of conciliating the Thebans in their prominent antipathy.
-It is in this way that Thucydidês explains the conduct of Sparta,
-which he pronounces to have been rigorous in the extreme.[445] And
-in truth it was more rigorous, considering only the principle of
-the case, and apart from the number of victims, than even the first
-unexecuted sentence of Athens against the Mitylenæans: for neither
-Sparta, nor even Thebes, had any fair pretence for considering Platæa
-as a revolted town, whereas Mitylênê was a city which had revolted
-under circumstances peculiarly offensive to Athens. Moreover, Sparta
-promised trial and justice to the Platæans on their surrender: Pachês
-promised nothing to the Mitylenæans, except that their fate should
-be reserved for the decision of the Athenian people. This little
-city—interesting from its Hellenic patriotism, its grateful and
-tenacious attachments, and its unmerited suffering—now existed only
-in the persons of its citizens harbored at Athens: we shall find it
-hereafter restored, destroyed again, and finally again restored:
-so checkered was the fate of a little Grecian state swept away by
-the contending politics of the greater neighbors. The slaughter of
-the twenty-five Athenian prisoners, like that of Salæthus by the
-Athenians, was not beyond the rigor admitted and tolerated, though
-not always practised, on both sides, towards prisoners of war.
-
-  [443] Demosthenês—or the Pseudo-Demosthenês—in the oration
-  against Neæra (p. 1380, c. 25), says that the blockade of Platæa
-  was continued for ten years before it surrendered,—ἐπολιόρκουν
-  αὐτοὺς διπλῷ τείχει περιτειχίσαντες δέκα ἔτη. That the real
-  duration of the blockade was only _two_ years, is most certain:
-  accordingly, several eminent critics—Palmerius, Wasse, Duker,
-  Taylor, Auger, etc., all with one accord confidently enjoin us
-  to correct the text of Demosthenês from δέκα to δύο. “Repone
-  _fidenter_ δύο,” says Duker.
-
-  I have before protested against corrections of the text of
-  ancient authors grounded upon the reason which all these
-  critics think so obvious and so convincing; and I must again
-  renew the protest here. It shows how little the principles of
-  historical evidence have been reflected upon, when critics can
-  thus concur in forcing dissentient witnesses into harmony, and
-  in substituting a true statement of their own in place of an
-  erroneous statement which one of these witnesses gives them. And
-  in the present instance, the principle adopted by these critics
-  is the less defensible, because the Pseudo-Demosthenês introduces
-  a great many other errors and inaccuracies respecting Platæa,
-  besides his mistake about the duration of the siege. The ten
-  years’ siege of Troy was constantly present to the imaginations
-  of these literary Greeks.
-
-  [444] Thucyd. iii, 59.
-
-  [445] Thucyd. iii, 69. σχεδὸν δέ τι καὶ τὸ ξύμπαν περὶ Πλαταιῶν
-  οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι οὕτως ἀποτετραμμένοι ἐγένοντο Θηβαίων ἕνεκα,
-  νομίζοντες ἐς τὸν πόλεμον αὐτοὺς ἄρτι τότε καθιστάμενον ὠφελίμους
-  εἶναι.
-
-We have now gone through the circumstances, painfully illustrating
-the manners of the age, which followed on the surrender of Mitylênê
-and Platæa. We next pass to the west of Greece,—the island of
-Korkyra,—where we shall find scenes not less bloody, and even more
-revolting.
-
-It has been already mentioned,[446] that in the naval combats
-between the Corinthians and Korkyræans during the year before the
-Peloponnesian war, the former had captured two hundred and fifty
-Korkyræan prisoners, men of the first rank and consequence in
-the island. Instead of following the impulse of blind hatred in
-slaughtering their prisoners, the Corinthians displayed, if not
-greater humanity, at least a more long-sighted calculation: they
-had treated the prisoners well, and made every effort to gain them
-over, with a view of employing them on the first opportunity to
-effect a revolution in the island,—to bring it into alliance with
-Corinth,[447] and disconnect it from Athens. Such an opportunity
-appears first to have occurred during the winter or spring of the
-present year, while both Mitylênê and Platæa were under blockade;
-probably about the time when Alkidas departed for Ionia, and when
-it was hoped that not only Mitylênê would be relieved, but the
-neighboring dependencies of Athens excited to revolt, and her whole
-attention thus occupied in that quarter. Accordingly, the Korkyræan
-prisoners were then sent home from Corinth, nominally under a heavy
-ransom of eight hundred talents, for which those Korkyræan citizens
-who acted as proxeni to Corinth made themselves responsible:[448] the
-proxeni, lending themselves thus to the deception, were doubtless
-participant in the entire design.
-
-  [446] See above, chap. xlvii.
-
-  [447] Thucyd. i, 55.
-
-  [448] Thucyd. iii, 70: compare Diodor. xii, 57.
-
-But it was soon seen in what form the ransom was really to be paid.
-The new-comers, probably at first heartily welcomed, after so long
-a detention, employed all their influence, combined with the most
-active personal canvass, to bring about a complete rupture of all
-alliance with Athens. Intimation being sent to Athens of what was
-going on, an Athenian trireme arrived with envoys to try and defeat
-these manœuvres; while a Corinthian trireme also brought envoys from
-Corinth to aid the views of the opposite party. The mere presence
-of Corinthian envoys indicated a change in the political feeling of
-the island: but still more conspicuous did this change become, when
-a formal public assembly, after hearing both envoys, decided,—that
-Korkyra would maintain her alliance with Athens according to the
-limited terms of simple mutual defence originally stipulated;[449]
-but would at the same time be in relations of friendship with the
-Peloponnesians, as she had been before the Epidamnian quarrel. But
-the alliance between Athens and Korkyra had since become practically
-more intimate, and the Korkyræan fleet had aided the Athenians in
-the invasion of Peloponnesus:[450] accordingly, the resolution, now
-adopted, abandoned the present to go back to the past,—and to a past
-which could not be restored.
-
-  [449] Thucyd. i, 44.
-
-  [450] Thucyd. ii, 25.
-
-Looking to the war then raging between Athens and the Peloponnesians,
-such a declaration was self-contradictory: nor, indeed, did the
-oligarchical party intend it as anything else than a step to a more
-complete revolution, both foreign and domestic. They followed it up
-by a political prosecution against Peithias, the citizen of greatest
-personal influence among the people, who acted by his own choice as
-proxenus to the Athenians. They accused him of practising to bring
-Korkyra into slavery to Athens. What were the judicial institutions
-of the island, under which he was tried, we do not know: but he was
-acquitted of the charge; and he then revenged himself by accusing in
-his turn five of the richest among his oligarchical prosecutors, of
-the crime of sacrilege,—as having violated the sanctity of the sacred
-grove of Zeus and Alkinous, by causing stakes, for their vine-props,
-to be cut in it.[451] This was an act distinctly forbidden by law,
-under penalty of a stater or four drachms for every stake so cut:
-but it is no uncommon phenomenon, even in societies politically
-better organized than Korkyra, to find laws existing and unrepealed,
-yet habitually violated, sometimes even by every one, but still
-oftener by men of wealth and power, whom most people would be afraid
-to prosecute: moreover, in this case, no individual was injured by
-the act, and any one who came forward to prosecute would incur the
-odium of an informer,—which probably Peithias might not have chosen
-to brave under ordinary circumstances, though he thought himself
-justified in adopting this mode of retaliation against those who
-had prosecuted him. The language of Thucydidês implies that the
-fact was not denied: nor is there any difficulty in conceiving that
-these rich men may have habitually resorted to the sacred property
-for vine-stakes. On being found guilty and condemned, they cast
-themselves as suppliants at the temples, and entreated the indulgence
-of being allowed to pay the fine by instalments: but Peithias, then
-a member of the (annual) senate, to whom the petition was referred,
-opposed it, and caused its rejection, leaving the law to take its
-course. It was moreover understood, that he was about to avail
-himself of his character of senator,—and of his increased favor,
-probably arising from the recent judicial acquittal,—to propose in
-the public assembly a reversal of the resolution recently passed,
-and a new resolution to recognize only the same friends and the same
-enemies as Athens.
-
-  [451] Thucyd. iii, 70. φάσκων τέμνειν χάρακας ἐκ τοῦ τε Διὸς
-  τεμένους καὶ τοῦ Ἀλκίνου· ζημία δὲ καθ᾽ ἑκάστην χάρακα ἐπέκειτο
-  στατήρ.
-
-  The present tense τέμνειν seems to indicate that they were
-  going on habitually making use of the trees in the grove for
-  this purpose. Probably it is this cutting and fixing of stakes
-  to support the vines, which is meant by the word χαρακισμὸς in
-  Pherekratês. Pers. ap. Athenæum, vi, p. 269.
-
-  The Oration of Lysias (Or. vii), against Nikomachus, ὑπὲρ τοῦ
-  σηκοῦ ἀπολογία, will illustrate this charge made by Peithias at
-  Korkyra. There were certain ancient olive-trees near Athens,
-  consecrated and protected by law, so that the proprietors of
-  the ground on which they stood were forbidden to grub them up,
-  or to dig so near as to injure the roots. The speaker in that
-  oration defends himself against a charge of having grubbed up one
-  of these and sold the wood. It appears that there were public
-  visitors whose duty it was to watch over these old trees: see the
-  note of Markland on that oration, p. 270.
-
-Pressed by the ruinous fine upon the five persons condemned,
-as well as by the fear that Peithias might carry his point and
-thus completely defeat their project of Corinthian alliance, the
-oligarchical party resolved to carry their point by violence
-and murder. They collected a party armed with daggers, burst
-suddenly into the senate-house during full sitting, and there slew
-Peithias with sixty other persons, partly senators, partly private
-individuals: some others of his friends escaped the same fate by
-getting aboard the Attic trireme which had brought the envoys, and
-which was still in the harbor, but now departed forthwith to Athens.
-These assassins, under the fresh terror arising from their recent
-act, convoked an assembly, affirmed that what they had done was
-unavoidable to guard Korkyra against being made the slave of Athens,
-and proposed a resolution of full neutrality, both towards Athens
-and towards the Peloponnesians,—to receive no visit from either of
-the belligerents, except of a pacific character, and with one single
-ship at a time. And this resolution the assembly was constrained
-to pass,—it probably was not very numerous, and the oligarchical
-partisans were at hand in arms.[452] At the same time they sent
-envoys to Athens, to communicate the recent events with such coloring
-as suited their views, and to dissuade the fugitive partisans of
-Peithias from provoking any armed Athenian intervention, such as
-might occasion a counter-revolution in the island.[453] With some of
-the fugitives, representations of this sort, or perhaps the fear of
-compromising their own families, left behind, prevailed: but most
-of them, and the Athenians along with them, appreciated better both
-what had been done, and what was likely to follow. The oligarchical
-envoys, together with such of the fugitives as had been induced to
-adopt their views, were seized by the Athenians as conspirators,
-and placed in detention at Ægina; while a fleet of sixty Athenian
-triremes, under Eurymedon, was immediately fitted out to sail
-for Korkyra,—for which there was the greater necessity, as the
-Lacedæmonian fleet, under Alkidas, lately mustered at Kyllênê after
-its return from Ionia, was understood to be on the point of sailing
-thither.[454]
-
-  [452] Thucyd. iii, 71. ὡς δὲ εἶπον, καὶ ~ἐπικυρῶσαι ἠνάγκασαν τὴν
-  γνώμην~.
-
-  [453] Thucyd. iii, 71. καὶ τοὺς ἐκεῖ καταπεφευγότας πείσοντας
-  μηδὲν ἀνεπιτήδειον πράσσειν, ὅπως μή τις ἐπιστροφὴ γένηται.
-
-  [454] Thucyd. iii, 80.
-
-But the oligarchical leaders at Korkyra knew better than to rely
-on the chances of this mission to Athens, and proceeded in the
-execution of their conspiracy with that rapidity which was best
-calculated to insure its success. On the arrival of a Corinthian
-trireme, which brought ambassadors from Sparta, and probably also
-brought news that the fleet of Alkidas would shortly appear,—they
-organized their force, and attacked the people and the democratical
-authorities. The Korkyræan Demos were at first vanquished and
-dispersed; but during the night they collected together and fortified
-themselves in the upper parts of the town near the acropolis, and
-from thence down to the Hyllaic harbor, one of the two harbors which
-the town possessed; while the other harbor and the chief arsenal,
-facing the mainland of Epirus, was held by the oligarchical party,
-together with the market-place near to it, in and around which the
-wealthier Korkyræans chiefly resided. In this divided state the
-town remained throughout the ensuing day, during which the Demos
-sent emissaries round the territory soliciting aid from the working
-slaves, and promising to them emancipation as a reward; while the
-oligarchy also hired and procured eight hundred Epirotic mercenaries
-from the mainland. Reinforced by the slaves, who flocked in at the
-call received, the Demos renewed the struggle on the morrow, more
-furiously than before. Both in position and numbers they had the
-advantage over the oligarchy, and the intense resolution with which
-they fought communicated itself even to the women, who, braving
-danger and tumult, took active part in the combat, especially by
-flinging tiles from the housetops. Towards the afternoon, the people
-became decidedly victorious, and were even on the point of carrying
-by assault the lower town, together with the neighboring arsenal,
-both held by the oligarchy,—nor had the latter any other chance of
-safety except the desperate resource of setting fire to that part of
-the town, with the market-place, houses, and buildings all around it,
-their own among the rest. This proceeding drove back the assailants,
-but destroyed much property belonging to merchants in the warehouses,
-together with a large part of the town: indeed, had the wind been
-favorable the entire town would have been consumed. The people being
-thus victorious, the Corinthian trireme, together with most of the
-Epirotic mercenaries, thought it safer to leave the island; while the
-victors were still farther strengthened on the ensuing morning by the
-arrival of the Athenian admiral Nikostratus, with twelve triremes
-from Naupaktus,[455] and five hundred Messenian hoplites.
-
-  [455] Thucyd. iii, 74, 75.
-
-Nikostratus did his best to allay the furious excitement prevailing,
-and to persuade the people to use their victory with moderation.
-Under his auspices, a convention of amnesty and peace was concluded
-between the contending parties, save only ten proclaimed individuals
-of the most violent oligarchs, who were to be tried as ringleaders:
-these men of course soon disappeared, so that there would have been
-no trial at all, which seems to have been what Nikostratus desired.
-At the same time an alliance offensive and defensive was established
-between Korkyra and Athens, and the Athenian admiral was then on
-the point of departing, when the Korkyræan leaders entreated him to
-leave with them, for greater safety, five ships out of his little
-fleet of twelve,—offering him five of their own triremes instead.
-Notwithstanding the peril of this proposition to himself, Nikostratus
-acceded to it, and the Korkyræans, preparing the five ships to be
-sent along with him, began to enroll among the crews the names of
-their principal enemies. To the latter this presented the appearance
-of sending them to Athens, which they accounted a sentence of death.
-Under this impression they took refuge as suppliants in the temple
-of the Dioskuri, where Nikostratus went to visit them and tried to
-reassure them by the promise that nothing was intended against their
-personal safety. But he found it impossible to satisfy them, and as
-they persisted in refusing to serve, the Korkyræan Demos began to
-suspect treachery. They took arms again, searched the houses of the
-recusants for arms, and were bent on putting some of them to death,
-if Nikostratus had not taken them under his protection. The principal
-men of the defeated party, to the number of about four hundred,
-now took sanctuary in the temple and sacred ground of Hêrê; and
-the leaders of the people, afraid that in this inviolable position
-they might still cause further insurrection in the city, opened a
-negotiation and prevailed upon them to be ferried across to the
-little island immediately opposite to the Heræum; where they were
-kept under watch, with provisions regularly transmitted across to
-them, for four days.[456]
-
-  [456] Thucyd. iii, 75, 76.
-
-At the end of these four days, while the uneasiness of the
-popular leaders still continued, and Nikostratus still adjourned
-his departure, a new phase opened in this melancholy drama. The
-Peloponnesian fleet under Alkidas arrived at the road of Sybota on
-the opposite mainland,—fifty-three triremes in number, for the forty
-triremes brought back from Ionia had been reinforced by thirteen
-more from Leukas and Ambrakia, and the Lacedæmonians had sent down
-Brasidas as advising companion,—himself worth more than the new
-thirteen triremes, if he had been sent to supersede Alkidas, instead
-of bringing nothing but authority to advise.[457] Despising the
-small squadron of Nikostratus, then at Naupaktus, they were only
-anxious to deal with Korkyra before reinforcements should arrive from
-Athens: but the repairs necessary for the ships of Alkidas, after
-their disastrous voyage home, occasioned an unfortunate delay. When
-the Peloponnesian fleet was seen approaching from Sybota at break
-of day, the confusion in Korkyra was unspeakable: the Demos and the
-newly-emancipated slaves were agitated alike by the late terrible
-combat and by fear of the invaders,—the oligarchical party, though
-defeated, was still present and forming a considerable minority, and
-the town was half burnt. Amidst such elements of trouble, there was
-little authority to command, and still less confidence or willingness
-to obey. Plenty of triremes were indeed at hand, and orders were
-given to man sixty of them forthwith,—while Nikostratus, the only man
-who preserved the cool courage necessary for effective resistance,
-entreated the Korkyræan leaders to proceed with regularity, and to
-wait till all were manned, so as to sail forth from the harbor in
-a body. He offered himself with his twelve Athenian triremes to go
-forth first alone, and occupy the Peloponnesian fleet, until the
-Korkyræan sixty triremes could all come out in full array to support
-him. He accordingly went forth with his squadron; but the Korkyræans,
-instead of following his advice, sent their ships out one by one and
-without any selection of crews. Two of them deserted forthwith to
-the enemy, while others presented the spectacle of crews fighting
-among themselves; even those which actually joined battle came up by
-single ships, without the least order or concert.
-
-  [457] Thucyd. iii, 69-76.
-
-The Peloponnesians, soon seeing that they had little to fear from
-such enemies, thought it sufficient to set twenty of their ships
-against the Korkyræans, while with the remaining thirty-three they
-moved forward to contend with the twelve Athenians. Nikostratus,
-having plenty of sea-room, was not afraid of this numerical
-superiority,—the more so, as two of his twelve triremes were
-the picked vessels of the Athenian navy,—the Salaminia and the
-Paralus.[458] He took care to avoid entangling himself with the
-centre of the enemy, and to keep rowing about their flanks; and as
-he presently contrived to disable one of their ships, by a fortunate
-blow with the beak of one of his vessels, the Peloponnesians, instead
-of attacking him with their superior numbers, formed themselves into
-a circle and stood on the defensive, as they had done in the first
-combat with Phormio in the middle of the strait at Rhium. Nikostratus
-(like Phormio) rowed round this circle, trying to cause confusion by
-feigned approach, and waiting to see some of the ships lose their
-places or run foul of each other, so as to afford him an opening
-for attack. And he might perhaps have succeeded, if the remaining
-twenty Peloponnesian ships, seeing the proceeding, and recollecting
-with dismay the success of a similar manœuvre in the former battle,
-had not quitted the Korkyræan ships, whose disorderly condition they
-despised, and hastened to join their comrades. The whole fleet of
-fifty-three triremes now again took the aggressive, and advanced to
-attack Nikostratus, who retreated before them, but backing astern and
-keeping the head of his ships towards the enemy. In this manner he
-succeeded in drawing them away from the town, so as to leave to most
-of the Korkyræan ships opportunity for getting back to the harbor;
-while such was the superior manœuvring of the Athenian triremes,
-that the Peloponnesians were never able to come up with him or force
-him to action. They returned back in the evening to Sybota, with no
-greater triumph than their success against the Korkyræans, thirteen
-of whose triremes they carried away as prizes.[459]
-
-  [458] These two triremes had been with Pachês at Lesbos (Thucyd.
-  iii, 33), immediately on returning from thence, they must have
-  been sent round to join Nikostratus at Naupaktus. We see in what
-  constant service they were kept.
-
-  [459] Thucyd. iii, 77, 78, 79.
-
-It was the expectation in Korkyra, that they would on the morrow make
-a direct attack—which could hardly have failed of success—on the
-town and harbor; and we may easily believe (what report afterwards
-stated), that Brasidas advised Alkidas to this decisive proceeding.
-And the Korkyræan leaders, more terrified than ever, first removed
-their prisoners from the little island to the Heræum, and then tried
-to come to a compromise with the oligarchical party generally,
-for the purpose of organizing some effective and united defence.
-Thirty triremes were made ready and manned, wherein some even of the
-oligarchical Korkyræans were persuaded to form part of the crews.
-But the slackness of Alkidas proved their best defence: instead of
-coming straight to the town, he contented himself with landing in
-the island at some distance from it, on the promontory of Leukimnê:
-after ravaging the neighboring lands for some hours, he returned to
-his station at Sybota. He had lost an opportunity which never again
-returned: for on the very same night the fire-signals of Leukas
-telegraphed to him the approach of the fleet under Eurymedon from
-Athens,—sixty triremes. His only thought was now for the escape of
-the Peloponnesian fleet, which was in fact saved by this telegraphic
-notice. Advantage was taken of the darkness to retire close along
-the land as far as the isthmus which separates Leukas from the
-mainland,—across which isthmus the ships were dragged by hand or
-machinery, so that they might not fall in with or be descried by the
-Athenian fleet in sailing round the Leukadian promontory. From hence
-Alkidas made the best of his way home to Peloponnesus, leaving the
-Korkyræan oligarchs to their fate.[460]
-
-  [460] Thucyd. iii, 80.
-
-That fate was deplorable in the extreme. The arrival of Eurymedon
-opens a third unexpected transition in this checkered narrative,—the
-Korkyræan Demos passing, abruptly and unexpectedly, from intense
-alarm and helplessness to elate and irresistible mastery. In the
-bosom of Greeks, and in a population seemingly amongst the least
-refined of all Greeks,—including too a great many slaves just
-emancipated against the will of their masters, and of course the
-fiercest and most discontented of all the slaves in the island,—such
-a change was but too sure to kindle a thirst for revenge almost
-ungovernable, as the only compensation for foregone terror and
-suffering. As soon as the Peloponnesian fleet was known to have
-fled, and that of Eurymedon was seen approaching, the Korkyræan
-leaders brought into the town the five hundred Messenian hoplites
-who had hitherto been encamped without; thus providing a resource
-against any last effort of despair on the part of their interior
-enemies. Next, the thirty ships recently manned,—and held ready, in
-the harbor facing the continent, to go out against the Peloponnesian
-fleet, but now no longer needed, were ordered to sail round to the
-other or Hyllaic harbor. Even while they were thus sailing round,
-some obnoxious men of the defeated party, being seen in public, were
-slain: but when the ships arrived at the Hyllaic harbor, and the
-crews were disembarked, a more wholesale massacre was perpetrated,
-by singling out those individuals of the oligarchical faction who
-had been persuaded on the day before to go aboard as part of the
-crews, and putting them to death.[461] Then came the fate of those
-suppliants, about four hundred in number, who had been brought back
-from the islet opposite, and were yet under sanctuary in the sacred
-precinct of the Heræum. It was proposed to them to quit sanctuary and
-stand their trial; and fifty of them having accepted the proposition,
-were put on their trial,—all condemned, and all executed. Their
-execution took place, as it seems, immediately on the spot, and
-within actual view of the unhappy men still remaining in the sacred
-ground;[462] who, seeing that their lot was desperate, preferred
-dying by their own hands to starvation or the sword of their enemies.
-Some hung themselves on branches of the trees surrounding the temple,
-others helped their friends in the work of suicide, and, in one
-way or another, the entire band thus perished: it was probably a
-consolation to them to believe, that this desecration of the precinct
-would bring down the anger of the gods upon their surviving enemies.
-
-  [461] Thucyd. iii, 80, 81. καὶ ἐκ τῶν νεῶν, ὅσους ἔπεισαν
-  ἐσβῆναι, ἐκβιβάζοντες ἀπεχώρησαν. It is certain that the reading
-  ἀπεχώρησαν here must be wrong: no satisfactory sense can be made
-  out of it. The word substituted by Dr. Arnold is ἀνεχρῶντο; that
-  preferred by Göller is ἀπεχρῶντο; others recommend ἀπεχρήσαντο;
-  Hermann adopts ἀπεχώρισαν, and Dionysius, in his copy, read
-  ἀνεχώρησαν. I follow the meaning of the words proposed by
-  Dr. Arnold and Göller, which appear to be both equivalent to
-  ἐκτεῖνον. This meaning is at least plausible and consistent;
-  though I do not feel certain that we have the true sense of the
-  passage.
-
-  [462] Thucyd. iii, 81. οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ τῶν ἱκετῶν, ὅσοι οὐκ
-  ἐπείσθησαν, ~ὡς ἑώρων τὰ γιγνόμενα~, διέφθειραν αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ
-  ἀλλήλους, etc. The meagre abridgment of Diodorus (xii, 57) in
-  reference to these events in Korkyra, is hardly worth notice.
-
-Eurymedon remained with his fleet for seven days, during all which
-time the victorious Korkyræans carried on a sanguinary persecution
-against the party who had been concerned in the late oligarchical
-revolution. Five hundred of this party contrived to escape by flight
-to the mainland; while those who did not, or could not flee, were
-slain wherever they could be found. Some received their death-wounds
-even on the altar itself,—others shared the same fate, after having
-been dragged away from it by violence. In one case, a party of
-murderers having pursued their victims to the temple of Dionysius,
-refrained from shedding their blood, but built up the doorway and
-left them to starve; as the Lacedæmonians had done on a former
-occasion respecting Pausanias. Such was the ferocity of the time,
-that in one case a father slew his own son. Nor was it merely the
-oligarchical party who thus suffered: the floodgates of private feud
-were also opened, and various individuals, under false charges of
-having been concerned in the oligarchical movements, were slain by
-personal enemies or debtors. This deplorable suspension of legal, as
-well as moral restraints, continued during the week of Eurymedon’s
-stay,—a period long enough to satiate the fierce sentiment out of
-which it arose;[463] yet without any apparent effort on his part to
-soften the victors or protect the vanquished. We shall see farther
-reason hereafter to appreciate the baseness and want of humanity
-in his character: but had Nikostratus remained in command, we may
-fairly presume, judging by what he had done in the earlier part of
-the sedition, with very inferior force, that he would have set much
-earlier limits to the Korkyræan butchery: unfortunately, Thucydidês
-tells us nothing at all about Nikostratus, after the naval battle of
-the preceding day.[464]
-
-  [463] Thucyd. iii, 85. Οἱ μὲν οὖν κατὰ τὴν πόλιν Κερκυραῖοι
-  ~τοιαύταις ὀργαῖς ταῖς πρώταις~ ἐς ἀλλήλους ἐχρήσαντο, etc.
-
-  [464] In reading the account of the conduct of Nikostratus, as
-  well as that of Phormio, in the naval battles of the preceding
-  summer, we contract a personal interest respecting both of them.
-  Thucydidês does not seem to have anticipated that his account
-  would raise such a feeling in the minds of his readers, otherwise
-  he probably would have mentioned something to gratify it.
-  Respecting Phormio, his omission is the more remarkable; since we
-  are left to infer, from the request made by the Akarnanians to
-  have his son sent as commander, that he must have died or become
-  disabled: yet the historian does not distinctly say so (iii, 7).
-
-  The Scholiast on Aristophanês (Pac. 347) has a story that Phormio
-  was asked for by the Akarnanians, but that he could not serve in
-  consequence of being at that moment under sentence for a heavy
-  fine, which he was unable to pay: accordingly, the Athenians
-  contrived a means of evading the fine, in order that he might
-  be enabled to serve. It is difficult to see how this can be
-  reconciled with the story of Thucydidês, who says that the son of
-  Phormio went instead of his father.
-
-  Compare Meineke, Histor. Critic. Comicc. Græc. vol. i, p. 144,
-  and Fragment. Eupolid. vol. ii, p. 527. Phormio was introduced as
-  a chief character in the Ταξίαρχοι of Eupolis; as a brave, rough,
-  straightforward soldier something like Lamachus in the Acharneis
-  of Aristophanês.
-
-We should have been glad to hear something about the steps taken in
-the way of restoration or healing, after this burst of murderous
-fury, in which doubtless the newly-emancipated slaves were not
-the most backward, and after the departure of Eurymedon. But here
-again Thucydidês disappoints our curiosity. We only hear from him,
-that the oligarchical exiles who had escaped to the mainland were
-strong enough to get possession of the forts and most part of the
-territory there belonging to Korkyra; just as the exiles from Samos
-and Mitylênê became more or less completely masters of the Peræa
-or mainland possessions belonging to those islands. They even sent
-envoys to Corinth and Sparta, in hopes of procuring aid to accomplish
-their restoration by force, but their request found no favor, and
-they were reduced to their own resources. After harassing for some
-time the Korkyræans in the island by predatory incursions, so as to
-produce considerable dearth and distress, they at length collected a
-band of Epirotic mercenaries, passed over to the island, and there
-established a fortified position on the mountain called Istônê, not
-far from the city. They burned their vessels in order to cut off all
-hopes of retreat, and maintained themselves for near two years on
-a system of ravage and plunder which inflicted great misery on the
-island.[465] This was a frequent way whereby, of old, invaders wore
-out and mastered a city, the walls of which they found impregnable.
-The ultimate fate of these occupants of Istônê, which belongs to a
-future chapter, will be found to constitute a close suitable to the
-bloody drama yet unfinished in Korkyra.
-
-  [465] Thucyd. iii, 85.
-
-Such a drama could not be acted, in an important city belonging to
-the Greek name, without producing a deep and extensive impression
-throughout all the other cities. And Thucydidês has taken advantage
-of it to give a sort of general sketch of Grecian politics during
-the Peloponnesian war; violence of civil discord in each city,
-aggravated by foreign war, and by the contending efforts of Athens
-and Sparta,—the former espousing the democratical party everywhere;
-the latter, the oligarchical. The Korkyræan sedition was the
-first case in which these two causes of political antipathy and
-exasperation were seen acting with full united force, and where
-the malignity of sentiment and demoralization flowing from such an
-union was seen without disguise. The picture drawn by Thucydidês,
-of moral and political feeling under these influences, will ever
-remain memorable as the work of an analyst and a philosopher: he
-has conceived and described the perverting causes with a spirit
-of generalization which renders these two chapters hardly less
-applicable to other political societies, far distant both in time and
-place,—especially, under many points of view, to France between 1789
-and 1799,—than to Greece in the fifth century before the Christian
-era. The deadly bitterness infused into intestine party contests by
-the accompanying dangers of foreign war and intervention of foreign
-enemies,—the mutual fears between political rivals, where each thinks
-that the other will forestall him in striking a mortal blow, and
-where constitutional maxims have ceased to carry authority either
-as restraint or as protection,—the superior popularity of the man
-who is most forward with the sword, or who runs down his enemies in
-the most unmeasured language, coupled with the disposition to treat
-both prudence in action and candor in speech as if it were nothing
-but treachery or cowardice,—the exclusive regard to party ends, with
-the reckless adoption, and even admiring preference, of fraud or
-violence as the most effectual means,—the loss of respect for legal
-authority, as well as of confidence in private agreement, and the
-surrender even of blood and friendship to the overruling ascendency
-of party-ties,—the perversion of ordinary morality, bringing with
-it altered signification of all the common words importing blame
-or approbation,—the unnatural predominance of the ambitious and
-contentious passions, overpowering in men’s minds all real public
-objects, and equalizing for the time the better and the worse cause,
-by taking hold of democracy on one side and aristocracy on the other
-as mere pretences to sanctify personal triumph,—all these gloomy
-social phenomena, here indicated by the historian, have their causes
-deeply seated in the human mind, and are likely, unless the bases
-of constitutional morality shall come to be laid more surely and
-firmly than they have hitherto been, to recur from time to time,
-under diverse modifications, “so long as human nature shall be the
-same as it is now,” to use the language of Thucydidês himself.[466]
-He has described, with fidelity not inferior to his sketch of the
-pestilence at Athens, the symptoms of a certain morbid political
-condition, wherein the vehemence of intestine conflict, instead
-of being kept within such limits as consists with the maintenance
-of one society among the contending parties, becomes for the time
-inflamed and poisoned with all the unscrupulous hostility of foreign
-war, chiefly from actual alliance between parties within the state
-and foreigners without. In following the impressive description of
-the historian, we have to keep in mind the general state of manners
-in his time, especially the cruelties tolerated by the laws of war,
-as compared with that greater humanity and respect for life which
-has grown up during the last two centuries in modern Europe. And we
-have farther to recollect that if he had been describing the effects
-of political fury among Carthaginians and Jews, instead of among
-his contemporary Greeks, he would have added to his list of horrors
-mutilation, crucifixion, and other refinements on simple murder.
-
-  [466] Thucyd. iii, 82. γιγνόμενα μὲν καὶ ἀεὶ ἐσόμενα ἕως ἂν ἡ
-  αὐτὴ φύσις ἀνθρώπων ᾖ, μᾶλλον δὲ καὶ ἡσυχαίτερα καὶ τοῖς εἴδεσι
-  διηλλαγμένα, ὡς ἂν ἕκασται αἱ μεταβολαὶ τῶν ξυντυχιῶν ἐφιστῶνται,
-  etc.
-
-  The many obscurities and perplexities of construction which
-  pervade these memorable chapters, are familiar to all readers of
-  Thucydidês, ever since Dionysius of Halikarnassus, whose remarks
-  upon them are sufficiently severe (Judic. de Thucyd. p. 883). To
-  discuss difficulties which the best commentators are sometimes
-  unable satisfactorily to explain, is no part of the business of
-  this work: yet there is one sentence which I venture to notice as
-  erroneously construed by most of them, following the Scholiast.
-
-  Τὸ δ᾽ ἐμπλήκτως ὀξὺ ἀνδρὸς μοίρᾳ προσετέθη, ἀσφάλεια δὲ
-  (Dr. Arnold and others read ἀσφαλείᾳ in the dative) τὸ
-  ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, ἀποτροπῆς πρόφασις εὔλογος.
-
-  The Scholiast explains the latter half of this as follows:
-  τὸ ἐπιπολὺ βουλεύσασθαι δι᾽ ἀσφάλειαν πρόφασις ἀποτροπῆς
-  ἐνομίζετο,,—and this explanation is partly adopted by Poppo,
-  Göller, and Dr. Arnold, with differences about ἀσφάλεια and
-  ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, but all agreeing about the word ἀποτροπὴ so that
-  the sentence is made to mean, in the words of Dr. Arnold: “But
-  safely to concert measures against an enemy, was accounted but a
-  decent pretence for _declining the contest with him altogether_.”
-
-  Now the signification here assigned to ἀποτροπὴ is one which does
-  not belong to it. Ἀποτροπὴ, in Thucydidês as well as elsewhere,
-  does not mean “tergiversation, or declining the contest:” it
-  has an active sense, and means, “the deterring, preventing,
-  or dissuading another person from something which he might be
-  disposed to do,—or the warding off of some threatening danger or
-  evil:” the remarkable adjective ἀποτροπαῖος is derived from it,
-  and προτροπὴ, in rhetoric, is its contrary term. In Thucydidês
-  it is used in this active sense (iii, 45): compare also Plato,
-  Legg. ix, c. 1, p. 853; Isokratês, Areopagatic. Or. vii, p. 143,
-  sect. 17; Æschinês cont. Ktesiphon. c. 68, p. 442: Æschyl. Pers.
-  217; nor do the commentators produce any passage to sustain
-  the passive sense which they assign to it in the sentence here
-  under discussion, whereby they would make it equivalent to
-  ἀναχωρεῖν—ἀναχώρησις—or ἐξαναχωρεῖν (Thucyd. iv, 28; v, 65), “a
-  backing out.”
-
-  Giving the meaning which they do to ἀποτροπὴ, the commentators
-  are farther unavoidably embarrassed how to construe ἀσφάλεια
-  δὲ τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, as may be seen by the notes of Poppo,
-  Göller, and Dr. Arnold. The Scholiast and Göller give to the word
-  ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι the very unusual meaning of “repeated and careful
-  deliberation,” instead of its common meaning of “laying snares
-  for another, concerting secret measures of hostility:” and Poppo
-  and Dr. Arnold alter ἀσφάλεια into the dative case ἀσφαλείᾳ,
-  which, if it were understood to be governed by προσετέθη, might
-  make a fair construction,—but which they construe along with τὸ
-  ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, though the position of the particle δὲ, upon
-  that supposition, appears to me singularly awkward.
-
-  The great difficulty of construing the sentence arises from the
-  erroneous meaning attached to the word ἀποτροπὴ. But when we
-  interpret that word “deterrence, or prevention,” according to the
-  examples which I have cited, the whole meaning of the sentence
-  will become clear and consistent. Of the two modes of hurting a
-  party-enemy—1. violent and open attack; 2. secret manœuvre and
-  conspiracy—Thucydidês remarks first, what was thought of the one;
-  next, what was thought of the other, in the perverted state of
-  morality which he is discussing.
-
-  Τὸ δ᾽ ἐμπλήκτως ὀξὺ ἀνδρὸς μοίρᾳ προσετέθη—ἀσφάλεια δὲ τὸ
-  ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, ἀποτροπῆς πρόφασις εὔλογος.
-
-  “Sharp and reckless attack was counted among the necessities of
-  the manly character: secret conspiracy against an enemy was held
-  to be safe precaution,—a specious pretence of preventing him from
-  doing the like.”
-
-  According to this construction, τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι is the
-  subject; ἀσφάλεια belongs to the predicate and the concluding
-  words, ἀποτροπῆς πρόφασις εὔλογος, are an epexegesis, or
-  explanatory comment, upon ἀσφάλεια. Probably we ought to consider
-  some such word as ἐνομίζετο to be understood,—just as the
-  Scholiast understands that word for his view of the sentence.
-
-The language of Thucydidês is to be taken rather as a generalization
-and concentration of phenomena which he had observed among different
-communities, rather than as belonging altogether to any one of them.
-Nor are we to believe—what a superficial reading of his opening words
-might at first suggest—that the bloodshed in Korkyra was only the
-earliest, but by no means the worst, of a series of similar horrors
-spread over the Grecian world. The facts stated in his own history
-suffice to show that though the same causes which worked upon this
-unfortunate island became disseminated, and produced analogous
-mischiefs throughout many other communities, yet the case of Korkyra,
-as it was the first, so it was also the worst and most aggravated in
-point of intensity. Fortunately, the account of Thucydidês enables us
-to understand it from beginning to end, and to appreciate the degree
-of guilt of the various parties implicated, which we can seldom do
-with certainty; because when once the interchange of violence has
-begun, the feelings arising out of the contest itself presently
-overpower in the minds of both parties the original cause of dispute,
-as well as all scruples as to fitness of means. Unjustifiable acts
-in abundance are committed by both, and in comparing the two, we are
-often obliged to employ the emphatic language which Tacitus uses
-respecting Otho and Vitellius: “Deteriorem fore, quisquis vicisset;”
-of two bad men, all that the Roman world could foresee was, that the
-victor, whichsoever he was, would prove the worst.
-
-But in regard to the Korkyræan revolution, we can arrive at a more
-discriminating criticism. We see that it is from the beginning the
-work of a selfish oligarchical party, playing the game of a foreign
-enemy, and the worst and most ancient enemy of the island,—aiming to
-subvert the existing democracy and acquire power for themselves, and
-ready to employ any measure of fraud or violence for the attainment
-of these objects. While the democracy which they attack is purely
-defensive and conservative, the oligarchical movers, having tried
-fair means in vain, are the first to employ foul means, which
-latter they find retorted with greater effect against themselves.
-They set the example of judicial prosecution against Peithias,
-for the destruction of a political antagonist; in the use of this
-same weapon, he proves more than a match for them, and employs it
-to their ruin. Next, they pass to the use of the dagger in the
-senate-house, against him and his immediate fellow-leaders, and
-to the wholesale application of the sword against the democracy
-generally. The Korkyræan Demos are thus thrown upon the defensive,
-and instead of the affections of ordinary life, all the most intense
-anti-social sentiments,—fear, pugnacity, hatred, vengeance, obtain
-unqualified possession of their bosoms; exaggerated too through
-the fluctuations of victory and defeat successively brought by
-Nikostratus, Alkidas, and Eurymedon. Their conduct as victors is such
-as we should expect under such maddening circumstances, from coarse
-men, mingled with liberated slaves: it is vindictive and murderous in
-the extreme, not without faithless breach of assurances given. But
-we must remember that they are driven to stand upon their defence,
-and that all their energies are indispensable to make that defence
-successful. They are provoked by an aggression no less guilty in
-the end than in the means,—an aggression, too, the more gratuitous,
-because, if we look at the state of the island at the time when the
-oligarchical captives were restored from Corinth, there was no
-pretence for affirming that it had suffered, or was suffering, any
-loss, hardship, or disgrace, from its alliance with Athens. These
-oligarchical insurgents find the island in a state of security and
-tranquillity,—since the war imposed upon it little necessity for
-effort,—they plunge it into a sea of blood, with enormities as well
-as suffering on both sides, which end at length in their own complete
-extermination. Our compassion for their final misery must not hinder
-us from appreciating the behavior whereby it was earned.
-
-In the course of a few years from this time, we shall have occasion
-to recount two political movements in Athens, similar in principle
-and general result to this Korkyræan revolution; exhibiting
-oligarchical conspirators against an existing and conservative
-democracy, with this conspiracy at first successful, but afterwards
-put down, and the Demos again restored. The contrast between
-Athens and Korkyra, under such circumstances, will be found highly
-instructive, especially in regard to the Demos, both in the hours of
-defeat and in those of victory. It will then be seen how much the
-habit of active participation in political and judicial affairs,—of
-open, conflicting discussion, discharging the malignant passions
-by way of speech, and followed by appeal to the vote,—of having
-constantly present, to the mind of every citizen, in his character of
-dikast or ekklesiast, the conditions of a pacific society, and the
-paramount authority of a constitutional majority,—how much all these
-circumstances, brought home as they were at Athens more than in any
-other democracy to the feelings of individuals, contributed to soften
-the instincts of intestine violence and revenge, even under very
-great provocation.
-
-But the case of Korkyra, as well as that of Athens, different in
-so many respects, conspire to illustrate another truth, of much
-importance in Grecian history. Both of them show how false and
-impudent were the pretensions set up by the rich and great men of the
-various Grecian cities, to superior morality, superior intelligence,
-and greater fitness for using honorably and beneficially the powers
-of government, as compared with the mass of the citizens. Though
-the Grecian oligarchies, exercising powerful sway over fashion,
-and more especially over the meaning of words, bestowed upon
-themselves the appellation of “the best men, the honorable and good,
-the elegant, the superior,” etc., and attached to those without
-their own circle epithets of a contrary tenor, implying low moral
-attributes,—no such difference will be found borne out by the facts
-of Grecian history.[467] Abundance of infirmity, with occasional bad
-passions, was doubtless liable to work upon the people generally,
-often corrupting and misguiding even the Athenian democracy, the
-best apparently of all the democracies in Greece. But after all, the
-rich and great men were only a part of the people, and taking them
-as a class, apart from honorable individual exceptions, by no means
-the best part. If exempted by their position from some of the vices
-which beset smaller and poorer men, they imbibed from that same
-position an unmeasured self-importance, and an excess of personal
-ambition as well as of personal appetite, peculiar to themselves,
-not less anti-social in tendency, and operating upon a much grander
-scale. To the prejudices and superstitions belonging to the age,
-they were noway superior, considering them as a class; while their
-animosities among one another, virulent and unscrupulous, were among
-the foremost causes of misfortune in Grecian commonwealth,—and indeed
-many of the most exceptionable acts committed by the democracies,
-consisted in their allowing themselves to be made the tools of one
-aristocrat for the ruin of another. Of the intense party-selfishness
-which characterized them as a body, sometimes exaggerated into
-the strongest anti-popular antipathy, as we see in the famous
-oligarchical oath cited by Aristotle,[468] we shall find many
-illustrations as we advance in the history, but none more striking
-than this Korkyræan revolution.
-
-  [467] See the valuable preliminary discourse, prefixed to
-  Welcker’s edition of Theognis, page xxi, sect. 9, _seq._
-
-  [468] Aristotel. Politic. v. 7, 19. Καὶ τῷ δήμῳ κακόνους ἔσομαι,
-  καὶ βουλεύσω ὅ,τι ἂν ἔχω κακόν.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER LI.
-
-FROM THE TROUBLES IN KORKYRA, IN THE FIFTH YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN
-WAR, DOWN TO THE END OF THE SIXTH YEAR.
-
-
-About the same time as the troubles of Korkyra occurred, Nikias, the
-Athenian general, conducted an armament against the rocky island
-of Minôa, which lay at the mouth of the harbor of Megara, and was
-occupied by a Megarian fort and garrison. The narrow channel, which
-separated it from the Megarian port of Nisæa, and formed the entrance
-of the harbor, was defended by two towers projecting out from Nisæa,
-which Nikias attacked and destroyed by means of battering machines
-from his ships. He thus cut off Minôa from communication on that
-side with the Megarians, and fortified it on the other side, where
-it communicated with the mainland by a lagoon bridged over with
-a causeway. Minôa, thus becoming thoroughly insulated, was more
-completely fortified and made an Athenian possession; since it was
-eminently convenient to keep up an effective blockade against the
-Megarian harbor, which the Athenians had hitherto done only from the
-opposite shore of Salamis.[469]
-
-  [469] Thucyd. iii, 51. See the note of Dr. Arnold, and the plan
-  embodied in his work, for the topography of Minôa, which has now
-  ceased to be an island, and is a hill on the mainland near the
-  shore.
-
-Though Nikias, son of Nikeratus, had been for some time conspicuous
-in public life, and is said to have been more than once stratêgus
-along with Periklês, this is the first occasion on which Thucydidês
-introduces him to our notice. He was now one of the stratêgi, or
-generals of the commonwealth, and appears to have enjoyed, on the
-whole, a greater and more constant personal esteem than any citizen
-of Athens, from the present time down to his death. In wealth
-and in family he ranked among the first class of Athenians: in
-political character, Aristotle placed him, together with Thucydidês
-son of Melêsias and Theramenês, above all other names in Athenian
-history,—seemingly even above Periklês.[470] Such a criticism, from
-Aristotle, deserves respectful attention, though the facts before
-us completely belie so lofty an estimate. It marks, however, the
-position occupied by Nikias in Athenian politics, as the principal
-person of what maybe called the oligarchical party, succeeding
-Kimon and Thucydidês, and preceding Theramenês. In looking to the
-conditions under which this party continued to subsist, we shall
-see that, during the interval between Thucydidês (son of Melêsias)
-and Nikias, the democratical forms had acquired such confirmed
-ascendency, that it would not have suited the purpose of any
-politician to betray evidence of positive hostility to them, prior to
-the Sicilian expedition, and the great embarrassment in the foreign
-relations of Athens which arose out of that disaster. After that
-change, the Athenian oligarchs became emboldened and aggressive,
-so that we shall find Theramenês among the chief conspirators in
-the revolution of the Four Hundred: but Nikias represents the
-oligarchical party in its previous state of quiescence and torpidity,
-accommodating itself to a sovereign democracy, and existing in the
-form of common sentiment rather than of common purposes. And it is a
-remarkable illustration of the real temper of the Athenian people,
-that a man of this character, known as an oligarch but not feared
-as such, and doing his duty sincerely to the democracy, should have
-remained until his death the most esteemed and influential man in
-the city. He was a man of a sort of even mediocrity, in intellect,
-in education, and in oratory: forward in his military duties, and
-not only personally courageous in the field, but also competent as a
-general under ordinary circumstances:[471] assiduous in the discharge
-of all political duties at home, especially in the post of stratêgus,
-or one of the ten generals of the state, to which he was frequently
-chosen and rechosen. Of the many valuable qualities combined in his
-predecessor Periklês, the recollection of whom was yet fresh in
-the Athenian mind, Nikias possessed two, on which, most of all his
-influence rested,—though, properly speaking, that influence belongs
-to the sum total of his character, and not to any special attributes
-in it: First, he was thoroughly incorruptible, as to pecuniary
-gains,—a quality so rare in Grecian public men of all the cities,
-that when a man once became notorious for possessing it, he acquired
-a greater degree of trust than any superiority of intellect could
-have bestowed upon him: next, he adopted the Periklêan view as to
-the necessity of a conservative or stationary foreign policy for
-Athens, and of avoiding new acquisitions at a distance, adventurous
-risks, or provocation to fresh enemies. With this important point of
-analogy, there were at the same time material differences between
-them, even in regard to foreign policy. Periklês was a conservative,
-resolute against submitting to loss or abstraction of empire,
-as well as refraining from aggrandizement: Nikias was in policy
-faint-hearted, averse to energetic effort for any purpose whatever,
-and disposed, not only to maintain peace, but even to purchase it by
-considerable sacrifices. Nevertheless, he was the leading champion
-of the conservative party of his day, always powerful at Athens: and
-as he was constantly familiar with the details and actual course
-of public affairs, capable of giving full effect to the cautious
-and prudential point of view, and enjoying unqualified credit for
-honest purposes,—his value as a permanent counsellor was steadily
-recognized, even though in particular cases his counsel might not be
-followed.
-
-  [470] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 2, 3.
-
-  [471] Καίτοι ἔγωγε καὶ τιμῶμαι ἐκ τοῦ τοιούτου (says Nikias, in
-  the Athenian assembly, Thucyd. vi, 9) ~καὶ ἧσσον ἑτέρων περὶ τῷ
-  ἐμαυτοῦ σώματι ὀῤῥωδῶ~· νομίζων ὁμοίως ἀγαθὸν πολίτην εἶναι, ὃς
-  ἂν καὶ τοῦ σώματός τι καὶ τῆς οὐσίας προνοῆται.
-
-  The whole conduct of Nikias before Syracuse, under the most
-  trying circumstances, more than bears out this boast.
-
-Besides these two main points, which Nikias had in common with
-Periklês, he was perfect in the use of those minor and collateral
-modes of standing well with the people, which that great man had
-taken little pains to practise. While Periklês attached himself
-to Aspasia, whose splendid qualities did not redeem, in the eyes
-of the public, either her foreign origin or her unchastity, the
-domestic habits of Nikias appear to have been strictly conformable
-to the rules of Athenian decorum. Periklês was surrounded by
-philosophers, Nikias by prophets,—whose advice was necessary both as
-a consolation to his temperament, and as a guide to his intelligence
-under difficulties; one of them was constantly in his service and
-confidence, and his conduct appears to have been sensibly affected by
-the difference of character between one prophet and another,[472]
-just as the government of Louis the Fourteenth, and other Catholic
-princes, has been modified by the change of confessors. To a life
-thus rigidly decorous and ultra-religious—both eminently acceptable
-to the Athenians—Nikias added the judicious employment of a large
-fortune with a view to popularity. Those liturgies—or expensive
-public duties undertaken by rich men each in his turn, throughout
-other cities of Greece as well as in Athens—which fell to his lot
-were performed with such splendor, munificence, and good taste,
-as to procure for him universal encomiums; and so much above his
-predecessors as to be long remembered and extolled. Most of these
-liturgies were connected with the religious service of the state,
-so that Nikias, by his manner of performing them, displayed his
-zeal for the honor of the gods at the same time that he laid up for
-himself a store of popularity. Moreover, the remarkable caution
-and timidity—not before an enemy, but in reference to his own
-fellow-citizens—which marked his character, rendered him preëminently
-scrupulous as to giving offence or making personal enemies. While
-his demeanor towards the poorer citizens generally was equal and
-conciliating, the presents which he made were numerous, both to gain
-friends and to silence assailants. We are not surprised to hear that
-various bullies, whom the comic writers turn to scorn, made their
-profit out of this susceptibility,—but most assuredly Nikias as a
-public man, though he might occasionally be cheated out of money, was
-greatly assisted by the reputation which he thus acquired.
-
-  [472] Thucyd. vii. 50; Plutarch, Nikias, c. 4, 5, 23. Τῷ μέντοι
-  Νικίᾳ συνηνέχθη τότε μηδὲ μάντιν ἔχειν ἔμπειρον· ὁ γὰρ συνήθης
-  αὐτοῦ καὶ τὸ πολὺ τῆς δεισιδαιμονίας ἀφαιρῶν Στιλβίδης ἐτεθνήκει
-  μικρὸν ἔμπροσθεν. This is suggested by Plutarch as an excuse for
-  mistakes on the part of Nikias.
-
-The expenses unavoidable in such a career, combined with strict
-personal honesty, could not have been defrayed except by another
-quality, which ought not to count as discreditable to Nikias,
-though in this too he stood distinguished from Periklês. He was
-a careful and diligent money-getter; a speculator in the silver
-mines of Laurium, and proprietor of one thousand slaves, whom he
-let out for work in them, receiving a fixed sum per head for each:
-the superintending slaves who managed the details of this business
-were men of great ability and high pecuniary value.[473] Most of the
-wealth of Nikias was held in this form, and not in landed property.
-Judging by what remains to us of the comic authors, this must have
-been considered as a perfectly gentlemanlike way of making money:
-for while they abound with derision of the leather-dresser Kleon,
-the lamp-maker Hyperbolus, and the vegetable-selling mother to whom
-Euripidês owes his birth, we hear nothing from them in disparagement
-of the slave-letter Nikias. The degree to which the latter was thus
-occupied with the care of his private fortune, together with the
-general moderation of his temper, made him often wish to abstract
-himself from public duty: but such unambitious reluctance, rare
-among the public men of the day, rather made the Athenians more
-anxious to put him forward and retain his services. In the eyes of
-the Pentakosiomedimni and the Hippeis, the two richest classes in
-Athens, he was one of themselves,—and on the whole, the best man, as
-being so little open to reproach or calumny, whom they could oppose
-to the leather-dressers and lamp-makers who often out-talked them in
-the public assembly. The hoplites, who despised Kleon,—and did not
-much regard even the brave, hardy, and soldierlike Lamachus, because
-he happened to be poor,[474]—respected in Nikias the union of wealth
-and family with honesty, courage, and carefulness in command. The
-maritime and trading multitude esteemed him as a decorous, honest,
-religious gentleman, who gave splendid choregies, treated the poorest
-men with consideration, and never turned the public service into a
-job for his own profit,—who, moreover, if he possessed no commanding
-qualities, so as to give to his advice imperative and irresistible
-authority, was yet always worthy of being consulted, and a steady
-safeguard against public mischief. Before the fatal Sicilian
-expedition, he had never commanded on any very serious or difficult
-enterprise, but what he had done had been accomplished successfully;
-so that he enjoyed the reputation of a fortunate as well as a
-prudent commander.[475] He appears to have acted as proxenus to
-the Lacedæmonians at Athens; probably by his own choice, and among
-several others.
-
-  [473] Xenophon, Memorab. ii, 5, 2; Xenophon, De Vectigalibus, iv,
-  14.
-
-  [474] Thucyd. v, 7; Plutarch, Alkibiadês, c. 21. Ὁ γὰρ Λάμαχος ἦν
-  μὲν πολεμικὸς καὶ ἀνδρώδης, ἀξίωμα δ᾽ οὐ προσῆν οὐδ᾽ ὄγκος αὐτῷ
-  διὰ πενίαν; compare Plutarch, Nikias, c. 15.
-
-  [475] Thucyd. v, 16. Νικίας πλεῖστα τῶν τότε εὖ φερόμενος ἐν
-  στρατηγίαις,—Νικίας μὲν βουλόμενος, ἐν ᾧ ἀπαθὴς ἦν καὶ ἠξιοῦτο,
-  διασώσασθαι ~τὴν εὐτυχίαν~, etc.—vi, 17. ἕως ἐγώ τε (Alkibiadês)
-  ἔτι ἀκμάζω μετ᾽ αὐτῆς καὶ ὁ Νικίας ~εὐτυχὴς~ δοκεῖ εἶναι, etc.
-
-The first half of the political life of Nikias,—after the time
-when he rose to enjoy full consideration in Athens, being already
-of mature age,—was spent in opposition to Kleon; the last half,
-in opposition to Alkibiadês. To employ terms which are not fully
-suitable to the Athenian democracy, but which yet bring to view
-the difference intended to be noted better than any others, Nikias
-was a minister or ministerial man, often actually exercising and
-always likely to exercise official functions,—Kleon was a man of
-the opposition, whose province it was to supervise and censure
-official men for their public conduct. We must divest these words of
-that sense which they are understood to carry in English political
-life,—a standing parliamentary majority in favor of one party: Kleon
-would often carry in the public assembly resolutions, which his
-opponents Nikias and others of like rank and position,—who served
-in the posts of stratêgus, ambassador, and other important offices
-designated by the general vote, were obliged against their will
-to execute. In attaining such offices they were assisted by the
-political clubs, or established _conspiracies_ (to translate the
-original literally), among the leading Athenians, to stand by each
-other both for acquisition of office and for mutual insurance under
-judicial trial. These clubs, or hetæries, must without doubt have
-played a most important part in the practical working of Athenian
-politics, and it is much to be regretted that we are possessed of no
-details respecting them. We know that in Athens they were thoroughly
-oligarchical in disposition,[476]—while equality, or something near
-to it, in rank and position must have been essential to the social
-harmony of the members: in some towns, it appears that such political
-associations existed under the form of gymnasia,[477] for the mutual
-exercise of the members, or of syssitia for joint banquets. At Athens
-they were numerous, and doubtless not habitually in friendship with
-each other, since the antipathies among different oligarchical men
-were exceedingly strong, and the union brought about between them
-at the time of the Four Hundred arose only out of common desire
-to put down the democracy, and lasted but a little while. But the
-designation of persons to serve in the capacity of stratêgus and
-other principal offices greatly depended upon them,—as well as the
-facility of passing through that trial of accountability to which
-every man was liable after his year of office. Nikias, and men
-generally of his rank and fortune, helped by these clubs, and lending
-help in their turn, composed what may be called the ministers, or
-executive individual functionaries of Athens: the men who acted,
-gave orders to individual men as to specific acts, and saw to the
-execution of that which the senate and the public assembly resolved.
-Especially in regard to the military and naval force of the city, so
-large and so actively employed at this time, the powers of detail
-possessed by the stratêgi must have been very great and essential to
-the safety of the state.
-
-  [476] Thucyd. viii, 54. Καὶ ὁ μὲν Πείσανδρος τάς τε ξυνωμοσίας,
-  αἵπερ ἐτύγχανον πρότερον ἐν τῇ πόλει οὖσαι ἐπὶ δίκαις καὶ ἀρχαῖς,
-  ἁπάσας ἐπελθὼν, καὶ παρακελευσάμενος ὅπως ξυστραφέντες καὶ κοινῇ
-  βουλευσάμενοι καταλύσουσι τὸν δῆμον, καὶ τἆλλα παρασκευάσας, etc.
-
-  After having thus organized the hetæries, and brought them
-  into coöperation for his revolutionary objects against the
-  democracy, Peisander departed from Athens to Samos: on his
-  return, he finds that these hetæries have been very actively
-  employed, and had made great progress towards the subversion of
-  the democracy: they had assassinated the demagogue Androklês and
-  various other political enemies,—οἱ δὲ ἀμφὶ τὸν Πείσανδρον—ἦλθον
-  ἐς τὰς Ἀθήνας,—καὶ καταλαμβάνουσι τὰ πλεῖστα τοῖς ἑταίροις
-  προειργασμένα, etc. (viii, 65.)
-
-  The political ἑταίρεια to which Alkibiadês belonged is mentioned
-  in Isokratês, De Bigis, Or. xvi, p. 348, sect. 6. λέγοντες ὡς ὁ
-  πατὴρ ~συνάγοι τὴν ἑταίρειαν ἐπὶ νεωτέροις πράγμασι~. Allusions
-  to these ἑταιρεῖαι and to their well-known political and judicial
-  purposes (unfortunately they are only allusions), are found in
-  Plato, Theætet. c. 79, p. 173, σπουδαὶ δὲ ἑταιρειῶν ἐπ᾽ ἀρχὰς,
-  etc.: also Plato, Legg. ix, c. 3, p. 856; Plato, Republic, ii,
-  c. 8, p. 365, where they are mentioned in conjunction with
-  συνωμοσίαι—ἐπὶ γὰρ τὸ λανθάνειν ξυνωμοσίας τε καὶ ἑταιρείας
-  συνάξομεν—also in Pseudo-Andokidês cont. Alkibiad. c. 2, p.
-  112. Compare the general remarks of Thucydidês, iii, 82, and
-  Demosthenês cont. Stephan. ii, p. 1157.
-
-  Two Dissertations, by Messrs. Vischer and Büttner, collect the
-  scanty indications respecting these hetæries, together with some
-  attempts to enlarge and speculate upon them, which are more
-  ingenious than trustworthy (Die Oligarchische Partei und die
-  Hetairien in Athen, von W. Vischer, Basel, 1836; Geschichte der
-  politischen Hetairien zu Athen, von Hermann Büttner, Leipsic,
-  1840).
-
-  [477] About the political workings of the Syssitia and Gymnasia,
-  see Plato Legg. i, p. 636; Polybius, xx, 6.
-
-While Nikias was thus in what may be called ministerial function,
-Kleon was not of sufficient importance to attain the same, but
-was confined to the inferior function of opposition: we shall see
-in the coming chapter how he became as it were promoted, partly
-by his own superior penetration, partly by the dishonest artifice
-and misjudgment of Nikias and other opponents, in the affair of
-Sphakteria. But his vocation was now to find fault, to censure, to
-denounce; his theatre of action was the senate, the public assembly,
-the dikasteries; his principal talent was that of speech, in which he
-must unquestionably have surpassed all his contemporaries. The two
-gifts which had been united in Periklês—superior capacity for speech
-as well as for action—were now severed, and had fallen, though both
-in greatly inferior degree, the one to Nikias, the other to Kleon. As
-an opposition-man, fierce and violent in temper, Kleon was extremely
-formidable to all acting functionaries; and from his influence in
-the public assembly, he was doubtless the author of many important
-positive measures, thus going beyond the functions belonging to what
-is called opposition. But though the most effective speaker in the
-public assembly, he was not for that reason the most influential
-person in the democracy: his powers of speech in fact, stood out the
-more prominently, because they were found apart from that station,
-and those qualities which were considered, even at Athens, all but
-essential to make a man a leader in political life. To understand the
-political condition of Athens at this time, it has been necessary to
-take this comparison between Nikias and Kleon, and to remark, that
-though the latter might be a more victorious speaker, the former was
-the more guiding and influential leader; the points gained by Kleon
-were all noisy and palpable, sometimes however, without doubt, of
-considerable moment,—but the course of affairs was much more under
-the direction of Nikias.
-
-It was during the summer of this year, the fifth of the war,—B.C.
-427, that the Athenians began operations on a small scale in Sicily;
-probably contrary to the advice both of Nikias and Kleon, neither of
-them seemingly favorable to these distant undertakings. I reserve,
-however, the series of Athenian measures in Sicily—which afterwards
-became the turning-point of the fortunes of the state—for a
-department by themselves. I shall take them up separately, and bring
-them down to the Athenian expedition against Syracuse, when I reach
-the date of that important event.
-
-During the autumn of the same year, the epidemic disorder, after
-having intermitted for some time, resumed its ravages at Athens,
-and continued for one whole year longer, to the sad ruin both of
-the strength and the comfort of the city. And it seems that this
-autumn, as well as the ensuing summer, were distinguished by violent
-atmospheric and terrestrial disturbance. Numerous earthquakes
-were experienced at Athens, in Eubœa, in Bœotia, especially near
-Orchomenus. Sudden waves of the sea and unexampled tides were also
-felt on the coast of Eubœa and Lokris, and the islands of Atalantê
-and Peparêthus; the Athenian fort and one of the two guard-ships
-at Atalantê were partially destroyed. The earthquakes produced one
-effect favorable to Athens; they deterred the Lacedæmonians from
-invading Attica. Agis, king of Sparta, had already reached the
-isthmus for that purpose; but the repeated earthquakes were looked
-upon as an unfavorable portent, and the scheme was abandoned.[478]
-
-  [478] Thucyd. iii, 87, 89, 90.
-
-These earthquakes, however, were not considered as calculated to
-deter the Lacedæmonians from the foundation of Herakleia, a new
-colony near the strait of Thermopylæ. On this occasion, we hear of
-a branch of the Greek population not before mentioned during the
-war. The coast immediately north of the strait of Thermopylæ was
-occupied by the three subdivisions of the Malians,—Paralii, Hierês,
-and Trachinians. These latter, immediately adjoining Mount Œta on
-its north side,—as well as the Dorians, the little tribe properly
-so called, which was accounted the primitive hearth of the Dorians
-generally, who joined the same mountain-range on the south,—were
-both of them harassed and plundered by the predatory mountaineers,
-probably Ætolians, on the high lands between them. At first, the
-Trachinians were disposed to throw themselves on the protection
-of Athens; but not feeling sufficiently assured as to the way in
-which she would deal with them, they joined with the Dorians in
-claiming aid from Sparta: in fact, it does not appear that Athens,
-possessing naval superiority only, and being inferior on land, could
-have given them effective aid. The Lacedæmonians eagerly embraced
-the opportunity, and determined to plant a strong colony in this
-tempting situation: there was wood in the neighboring regions for
-ship-building,[479] so that they might hope to acquire a naval
-position for attacking the neighboring island of Eubœa, while the
-passage of troops against the subject-allies of Athens in Thrace,
-would also be facilitated; the impracticability of such passage had
-forced them, three years before, to leave Potidæa to its fate. A
-considerable body of colonists, Spartans and Lacedæmonian Periœki,
-was assembled under the conduct of three Spartan œkists,—Leon,
-Damagon, and Alkidas; the latter we are to presume, though Thucydidês
-does not say so, was the same admiral who had met with such little
-success in Ionia and at Korkyra. Proclamation was farther made to
-invite the junction of all other Greeks as colonists, excepting by
-name Ionians, Achæans, and some other tribes not here specified.
-Probably the distinct exclusion of the Achæans must have been rather
-the continuance of ancient sentiment than dictated by any present
-reasons; since the Achæans were not now pronounced enemies of Sparta.
-A number of colonists, stated as not less than ten thousand, flocked
-to the place, having confidence in the stability of the colony under
-the powerful protection of Sparta; and a new town, of large circuit,
-was built and fortified under the name of Herakleia;[480] not far
-from the site of Trachis, about two miles and a quarter from the
-nearest point of the Maliac gulf, but about double that distance
-from the strait of Thermopylæ. Near to the latter, and for the
-purpose of keeping effective possession of it, a port, with dock and
-accommodation for shipping, was constructed.
-
-  [479] Respecting this abundance of wood, as well as the site of
-  Herakleia generally, consult Livy, xxxvi, 22.
-
-  [480] Diodor. xii, 59. Not merely was Hêraklês the mythical
-  progenitor of the Spartan kings, but the whole region near Œta
-  and Trachis was adorned by legends and heroic incidents connected
-  with him: see the drama of the Trachiniæ by Sophoklês.
-
-A populous city, established under Lacedæmonian protection in this
-important post, alarmed the Athenians, and created much expectation
-in every part of Greece: but the Lacedæmonian œkists were harsh and
-unskilful in their management, and the Thessalians, to whom the
-Trachinian territory was tributary, considered the colony as an
-encroachment upon their soil. Anxious to prevent its increase, they
-harassed it with hostilities from the first moment, while the Œtæan
-assailants were not idle: and Herakleia, thus pressed from without,
-and misgoverned within, dwindled down from its original numbers and
-promise, barely maintaining its existence.[481] We shall find it in
-later times, however, revived, and becoming a place of considerable
-importance.
-
-  [481] Thucyd. iii, 92, 93; Diodor xi, 49; xii, 59.
-
-The main Athenian armament of this summer, consisting of sixty
-triremes, under Nikias, undertook an expedition against the island
-of Melos. Melos and Thera, both inhabited by ancient colonists from
-Lacedæmon, had never been from the beginning, and still refused to
-be, members of the Athenian alliance, or subjects of the Athenian
-empire. They thus stood out as exceptions to all the other islands in
-the Ægean, and the Athenians thought themselves authorized to resort
-to constraint and conquest; believing themselves entitled to command
-over all the islands. They might indeed urge, and with considerable
-plausibility, that the Melians now enjoyed their share of the
-protection of the Ægean from piracy, without contributing at all to
-the cost of it: but considering the obstinate reluctance and strong
-Lacedæmonian prepossessions of the Melians, who had taken no part in
-the war, and given no ground of offence to Athens, the attempt to
-conquer them by force could hardly be justified even as a calculation
-of gain and loss, and was a mere gratification to the pride of power
-in carrying out what, in modern days, we should call the principle
-of maritime empire. Melos and Thera formed awkward corners, which
-defaced the symmetry of a great proprietor’s field;[482] and the
-former ultimately entailed upon Athens the heaviest of all losses,—a
-deed of blood which deeply dishonored her annals. On this occasion,
-Nikias visited the island with his fleet, and after vainly summoning
-the inhabitants, ravaged the lands, but retired without undertaking
-a siege. He then sailed away, and came to Orôpus, on the northeast
-frontier of Attica, bordering on Bœotia: the hoplites on board his
-ships landed in the night, and marched into the interior of Bœotia,
-to the vicinity of Tanagra. They were here met, according to signal
-raised, by a military force from Athens, which marched thither by
-land; and the joint Athenian army ravaged the Tanagræan territory,
-gaining an insignificant advantage over its defenders. On retiring,
-Nikias reassembled his armament, sailed northward along the coast of
-Lokris with the usual ravages, and returned home without effecting
-anything farther.[483]
-
-  [482] Horat. Sat. ii, 6, 8:—
-
-            O! si angulus iste
-    Proximus accedat, qui nunc denormat agellum!
-
-  [483] Thucyd. iii, 91.
-
-About the same time that he started, thirty other Athenian triremes,
-under Demosthenês and Proklês, had been sent round Peloponnesus
-to act upon the coast of Akarnania. In conjunction with the whole
-Akarnanian force, except the men of Œniade,—with fifteen triremes
-from Korkyra, and some troops from Kephallênia and Zakynthus,—they
-ravaged the whole territory of Leukas, both within and without the
-isthmus, and confined the inhabitants to their town, which was
-too strong to be taken by anything but a wall of circumvallation
-and a tedious blockade. And the Akarnanians, to whom the city was
-especially hostile, were urgent with Demosthenês to undertake this
-measure forthwith, since the opportunity might not again recur, and
-success was nearly certain.
-
-But this enterprising officer committed the grave imprudence of
-offending them on a matter of great importance, in order to attack a
-country of all others the most impracticable,—the interior of Ætolia.
-The Messenians of Naupaktus, who suffered from the depredations
-of the neighboring Ætolian tribes, inflamed his imagination by
-suggesting to him a grand scheme of operations,[484] more worthy of
-the large force which he commanded than the mere reduction of Leukas.
-The various tribes of Ætolians,—rude, brave, active, predatory, and
-unrivalled in the use of the javelin, which they rarely laid out of
-their hands,—stretched across the country from between Parnassus
-and Œta to the eastern bank of the Achelôus. The scheme suggested
-by the Messenians was, that Demosthenês should attack the great
-central Ætolian tribes,—the Apodôti, Ophioneis, and Eurytânes: if
-they were conquered, all the remaining continental tribes between the
-Ambrakian gulf and Mount Parnassus might be invited or forced into
-the alliance of Athens,—the Akarnanians being already included in
-it. Having thus got the command of a large continental force,[485]
-Demosthenês contemplated the ulterior scheme of marching at the head
-of it on the west of Parnassus, through the territory of the Ozolian
-Lokrians,—inhabiting the north of the Corinthian gulf, friendly to
-Athens, and enemies to the Ætolians, whom they resembled both in
-their habits and in their fighting,—until he arrived at Kytinium,
-in Doris, in the upper portion of the valley of the river Kephisus.
-He would then easily descend that valley into the territory of the
-Phocians, who were likely to join the Athenians if a favorable
-opportunity occurred, but who might at any rate be constrained to
-do so. From Phocis, the scheme was to invade from the northward the
-conterminous territory of Bœotia, the great enemy of Athens: which
-might thus perhaps be completely subdued, if assailed at the same
-time from Attica. Any Athenian general, who could have executed
-this comprehensive scheme, would have acquired at home a high and
-well-merited celebrity. But Demosthenês had been ill-informed, both
-of the invincible barbarians and the pathless country comprehended
-under the name of Ætolia: some of the tribes spoke a language
-scarcely intelligible to Greeks, and even eat their meat raw, while
-the country has even down to the present time remained not only
-unconquered, but untraversed, by an enemy in arms.
-
-  [484] Thucyd. iii, 95. Δημοσθένης δ᾽ ἀναπείθεται κατὰ τὸν
-  χρόνον τοῦτον ὑπὸ Μεσσηνίων ὡς καλὸν αὐτῷ στρατιᾶς τοσαύτης
-  ξυνειλεγμένης, etc.
-
-  [485] Thucyd. iii, 95. τὸ ἄλλο ἠπειρωτικὸν τὸ ταύτῃ. None of
-  the tribes properly called Epirots, would be comprised in this
-  expression: the name ἠπειρῶται is here a general name, not
-  a proper name, as Poppo and Dr. Arnold remark. Demosthenês
-  would calculate on getting under his orders the Akarnanians
-  and Ætolians, and some other tribes besides; but _what_ other
-  tribes, it is not easy to specify: perhaps the Agræi, east of
-  Amphilochia, among them.
-
-Demosthenês accordingly retired from Leukas, in spite of the
-remonstrance of the Akarnanians, who not only could not be induced to
-accompany him, but went home in visible disgust, He then sailed with
-his other forces—Messenians, Kephallenians, and Zakynthians—to Œneon,
-in the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians, a maritime township on the
-Corinthian gulf, not far eastward of Naupaktus,—where his army was
-disembarked, together with three hundred epibatæ (or marines) from
-the triremes,—including on this occasion, what was not commonly the
-case on shipboard,[486] some of the choice hoplites, selected all
-from young men of the same age, on the Athenian muster-roll. Having
-passed the night in the sacred precinct of Zeus Nemeus at Œneon,
-memorable as the spot where the poet Hesiod was said to have been
-slain, he marched early in the morning, under the guidance of the
-Messenian Chromon, into Ætolia; on the first day he took Potidania,
-on the second Krokyleium, on the third Teichium,—all of them
-villages unfortified and undefended, for the inhabitants abandoned
-them and fled to the mountains above. He was here inclined to halt
-and wait the junction of the Ozolian Lokrians, who had engaged to
-invade Ætolia at the same time, and were almost indispensable to his
-success, from their familiarity with Ætolian warfare and similarity
-of weapons. But the Messenians again persuaded him to advance
-without delay into the interior, in order that the villages might be
-separately attacked and taken before any collective force could be
-gathered together: and Demosthenês was so encouraged by having as yet
-encountered no resistance, that he advanced to Ægitium, which he also
-found deserted, and captured without opposition.
-
-  [486] Thucyd. iii, 98. The epibatæ, or soldiers serving on
-  shipboard (marines), were more usually taken from the thetes,
-  or the poorest class of citizens, furnished by the state with a
-  panoply for the occasion,—not from the regular hoplites on the
-  muster-roll. Maritime soldiery is, therefore, usually spoken
-  of as something inferior: the present triremes of Demosthenês
-  are noticed in the light of an exception (ναυτικῆς καὶ φαύλου
-  στρατιᾶς, Thucyd. vi, 21).
-
-  So among the Romans, service in the legions was accounted higher
-  and more honorable than that of the classiarii milites (Tacit.
-  Histor. i, 87).
-
-  The Athenian epibatæ, though not forming a corps permanently
-  distinct, correspond in function to the English marines, who
-  seem to have been first distinguished permanently from other
-  foot-soldiers about the year 1684. “It having been found
-  necessary on many occasions to embark a number of soldiers
-  on board our ships of war, and mere landsmen being at first
-  extremely unhealthy,—and at first, until they had been accustomed
-  to the sea, in a great measure unserviceable,—it was at length
-  judged expedient to appoint certain regiments for that service,
-  who were trained to the different modes of sea-fighting, and also
-  made useful in some of those manœuvres of a ship where a great
-  many hands were required. These, from the nature of their duty,
-  were distinguished by the appellation of _maritime soldiers_, or
-  marines.”—Grose’s Military Antiquities of the English Army, vol.
-  i, p. 186. (London, 1786.)
-
-Here however was the term of his good fortune. The mountains round
-Ægitium were occupied not only by the inhabitants of that village,
-but also by the entire force of Ætolia, collected even from the
-distant tribes Bomiês and Kalliês, who bordered on the Maliac
-gulf. The invasion of Demosthenês had become known beforehand to
-the Ætolians, who not only forewarned all their tribes of the
-approaching enemy, but also sent ambassadors to Sparta and Corinth to
-ask for aid.[487] However, they showed themselves fully capable of
-defending their own territory, without foreign aid: and Demosthenês
-found himself assailed, in his position at Ægitium, on all sides
-at once, by these active highlanders, armed with javelins, pouring
-down from the neighboring hills. Not engaging in any close combat,
-they retreated when the Athenians advanced forward to charge
-them,—resuming their aggression the moment that the pursuers, who
-could never advance far in consequence of the ruggedness of the
-ground, began to return to the main body. The small number of bowmen
-along with Demosthenês for some time kept their unshielded assailants
-at bay; but the officer commanding the bowmen was presently slain,
-and the stock of arrows became nearly exhausted; and what was still
-worse, Chromon, the Messenian, the only man who knew the country, and
-could serve as guide, was slain also. The bowmen became thus either
-ineffective or dispersed; while the hoplites exhausted themselves
-in vain attempts to pursue and beat off an active enemy, who always
-returned upon them, and in every successive onset thinned and
-distressed them more and more. At length the force of Demosthenês
-was completely broken, and compelled to take flight; but without
-beaten roads, without guides, and in a country not only strange to
-them, but impervious from continual mountain, rock, and forest. Many
-of them were slain in the flight by pursuers, superior not less in
-rapidity of movement than in knowledge of the country: some even
-lost themselves in the forest, and perished miserably in flames
-kindled around them by the Ætolians: and the fugitives were at
-length reassembled at Œneon, near the sea, with the loss of Proklês,
-the colleague of Demosthenês in command, as well as of one hundred
-and twenty hoplites, among the best-armed and most vigorous in the
-Athenian muster-roll.[488] The remaining force was soon transported
-back from Naupaktus to Athens, but Demosthenês remained behind, being
-too much afraid of the displeasure of his countrymen to return at
-such a moment. It is certain that his conduct was such as justly to
-incur their displeasure; and that the expedition against Ætolia,
-alienating an established ally and provoking a new enemy, had been
-conceived with a degree of rashness which nothing but the unexpected
-favor of fortune could have counterbalanced.
-
-  [487] Thucyd. iii, 100. Προπέμψαντες πρότερον ἔς τε Κόρινθον καὶ
-  ἐς Λακεδαίμονα πρέσβεις—πείθουσιν ὥστε σφίσι πέμψαι στρατιὰν ἐπὶ
-  Ναύπακτον διὰ τὴν τῶν ~Ἀθηναίων ἐπαγωγήν~.
-
-  It is not here meant, I think—as Göller and Dr. Arnold
-  suppose—that the Ætolians sent envoys to Lacedæmon before there
-  was any talk or thought of the invasion of Ætolia, simply
-  in prosecution of the standing antipathy which they bore to
-  Naupaktus: but that they had sent envoys immediately when they
-  heard of the preparations for invading Ætolia,—yet before the
-  invasion actually took place. The words διὰ τὴν τῶν Ἀθηναίων
-  ἐπαγωγήν show that this is the meaning.
-
-  The word ἐπαγωγὴ is rightly construed by Haack, against the
-  Scholiast: “Because the Naupaktians were bringing in the
-  Athenians to invade Ætolia.”
-
-  [488] Thucyd. iii, 98.
-
-The force of the new enemy whom his unsuccessful attack had raised
-into activity, soon made itself felt. The Ætolian envoys despatched
-to Sparta and Corinth found it easy to obtain the promise of a
-considerable force to join them in an expedition against Naupaktus:
-and about the month of September, a body of three thousand
-Peloponnesian hoplites, including five hundred from the newly-founded
-colony of Herakleia, was assembled at Delphi, under the command of
-Eurylochus, Makarius, and Menedemus. Their road of march to Naupaktus
-lay through the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians, whom they proposed
-either to gain over or to subdue. With Amphissa, the largest Lokrian
-township, and in the immediate neighborhood of Delphi, they had
-little difficulty,—for the Amphissians were in a state of feud with
-their neighbors on the other side of Parnassus, and were afraid that
-the new armament might become the instrument of Phocian antipathy
-against them. On the very first application they joined the Spartan
-alliance, and gave hostages for their fidelity to it: moreover, they
-persuaded many other Lokrian petty villages—among others the Myoneis,
-who were masters of the most difficult pass on the road—to do the
-same. Eurylochus received from these various townships reinforcements
-for his army, as well as hostages for their fidelity, whom he
-deposited at Kytinium in Doris: and he was thus enabled to march
-through all the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians without resistance;
-except from Œneon and Eupalion, both which places he took by force.
-Having arrived in the territory of Naupaktus, he was there joined
-by the full force of the Ætolians; and their joint efforts, after
-laying waste all the neighborhood, captured the Corinthian colony of
-Molykreion, which had become subject to the Athenian empire.[489]
-
-  [489] Thucyd. iii, 101, 102.
-
-Naupaktus, with a large circuit of wall and thinly defended, was
-in the greatest danger, and would certainly have been taken, had
-it not been saved by the efforts of the Athenian Demosthenês, who
-had remained there ever since the unfortunate Ætolian expedition.
-Apprized of the coming march of Eurylochus, he went personally to
-the Akarnanians, and persuaded them to send a force to aid in the
-defence of Naupaktus: for a long time they turned a deaf ear to his
-solicitations, in consequence of the refusal to blockade Leukas, but
-they were at length induced to consent. At the head of one thousand
-Akarnanian hoplites, Demosthenês threw himself into Naupaktus;
-and Eurylochus, seeing that the town had thus been placed out of
-the reach of attack, abandoned all his designs upon it,—marching
-farther westward to the neighboring territories of Ætolia, Kalydon,
-Pleuron, and Proschium, near the Achelôus and the borders of
-Akarnania. The Ætolians, who had come down to join him for the common
-purpose of attacking Naupaktus, here abandoned him and retired to
-their respective homes. But the Ambrakiots, rejoiced to find so
-considerable a Peloponnesian force in their neighborhood, prevailed
-upon him to assist them in attacking the Amphilochian Argos as well
-as Akarnania; assuring him that there was now a fair prospect of
-bringing the whole of the population of the mainland, between the
-Ambrakian and Corinthian gulfs, under the supremacy of Lacedæmon.
-Having persuaded Eurylochus thus to keep his forces together and
-ready, they themselves with three thousand Ambrakiot hoplites invaded
-the territory of the Amphilochian Argos, and captured the fortified
-hill of Olpæ immediately bordering on the Ambrakian gulf, about three
-miles from Argos itself: this hill had been in former days employed
-by the Akarnanians as a place for public judicial congress of the
-whole nation.[490]
-
-  [490] Thucyd. iii, 102-105.
-
-This enterprise, communicated forthwith to Eurylochus, was the
-signal for movement on both sides. The Akarnanians marched with
-their whole force to the protection of Argos, and occupied a post
-called Krênæ in the Amphilochian territory, hoping to be able to
-prevent Eurylochus from effecting his junction with the Ambrakiots
-at Olpæ. They at the same time sent urgent messages to Demosthenês
-at Naupaktus, and to the Athenian guard-squadron of twenty triremes
-under Aristotelês and Hierophon, entreating their aid in the present
-need, and inviting Demosthenês to act as their commander. They had
-forgotten their displeasure against him arising out of his recent
-refusal to blockade at Leukas,—for which they probably thought that
-he had been sufficiently punished by his disgrace in Ætolia; while
-they knew and esteemed his military capacity. In fact, the accident
-whereby he had been detained at Naupaktus, now worked fortunately for
-them as well as for him: it secured to them a commander whom all of
-them respected, obviating the jealousies among their own numerous
-petty townships,—it procured for him the means of retrieving his
-own reputation at Athens. Demosthenês, not backward in seizing this
-golden opportunity, came speedily into the Ambrakian gulf with the
-twenty Athenian triremes, conducting two hundred Messenian hoplites
-and sixty Athenian bowmen. He found the whole Akarnanian force
-concentrated at the Amphilochian Argos, and was named general along
-with the Akarnanian generals, but in reality enjoying the whole
-direction of the operations.
-
-He found also the whole of the enemy’s force, both the three thousand
-Ambrakiot hoplites and the Peloponnesian division under Eurylochus,
-already united and in position at Olpæ, about three miles off. For
-Eurylochus, as soon as he was apprized that the Ambrakiots had
-reached Olpæ, broke up forthwith his camp at Proschium in Ætolia,
-knowing that his best chance of traversing the hostile territory of
-Akarnania consisted in celerity: the whole Akarnanian force, however,
-had already gone to Argos, so that his march was unopposed through
-that country. He crossed the Achelôus, marched westward of Stratus,
-through the Akarnanian townships of Phytia, Medeon, and Limnæa, then
-quitting both Akarnania and the direct road from Akarnania to Argos,
-he struck rather eastward into the mountainous district of Thyamus,
-in the territory of the Agræans, who were enemies of the Akarnanians.
-From hence he descended at night into the territory of Argos, and
-passed unobserved under cover of the darkness between Argos itself,
-and the Akarnanian force at Krênæ; so as to join in safety the three
-thousand Ambrakiots at Olpæ; to their great joy,—for they had feared
-that the enemy at Argos and Krênæ would have arrested his passage;
-and feeling their force inadequate to contend alone, they had sent
-pressing messages home to demand large reinforcements for themselves
-and their own protection.[491]
-
-  [491] Thucyd. iii, 105, 106, 107.
-
-Demosthenês thus found an united and formidable enemy, superior in
-number to himself, at Olpæ, and conducted his troops from Argos and
-Krênæ to attack them. The ground was rugged and mountainous, and
-between the two armies lay a steep ravine which neither liked to
-be the first to pass, so that they lay for five days inactive. If
-Herodotus had been our historian, he would probably have ascribed
-this delay to unfavorable sacrifices (which may probably have been
-the case), and would have given us interesting anecdotes respecting
-the prophets on both sides; but the more positive and practical
-genius of Thucydidês merely acquaints us, that on the sixth day
-both armies put themselves in order of battle,—both probably tired
-of waiting. The ground being favorable for ambuscade, Demosthenês
-hid in a bushy dell four hundred hoplites and light-armed, so that
-they might spring up suddenly in the midst of the action upon the
-Peloponnesian left, which outflanked his right. He was himself on the
-right with the Messenians and some Athenians, opposed to Eurylochus
-on the left of the enemy: the Akarnanians, with the Amphilochian
-akontists, or darters, occupied his left, opposed to the Ambrakiot
-hoplites: Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians were, however, intermixed in
-the line of Eurylochus, and it was only the Mantineans who maintained
-a separate station of their own towards the left centre. The battle
-accordingly began, and Eurylochus with his superior numbers was
-proceeding to surround Demosthenês, when on a sudden the men in
-ambush rose up and set upon his rear. A panic seized his men, and
-they made no resistance worthy of their Peloponnesian reputation:
-they broke and fled, while Eurylochus, doubtless exposing himself
-with peculiar bravery in order to restore the battle, was early
-slain. Demosthenês, having near him his best troops, pressed them
-vigorously and their panic communicated itself to the troops in the
-centre, so that all were put to flight and pursued to Olpæ. On the
-right of the line of Eurylochus, the Ambrakiots, the most warlike
-Greeks in the Epirotic regions, completely defeated the Akarnanians
-opposed to them, and carried their pursuit even as far as Argos.
-So complete, however, was the victory gained by Demosthenês over
-the remaining troops, that these Ambrakiots had great difficulty in
-fighting their way back to Olpæ, which was not accomplished without
-severe loss, and late in the evening. Among all the beaten troops,
-the Mantineans were those who best maintained their retreating
-order.[492] The loss in the army of Demosthenês was about three
-hundred: that of the opponents much greater, but the number is not
-specified.
-
-  [492] Thucyd. iii, 107, 108: compare Polyænus, iii, 1.
-
-Of the three Spartan commanders, two, Eurylochus and Makarius, had
-been slain: the third, Menedæus, found himself beleaguered both by
-sea and land,—the Athenian squadron being on guard along the coast.
-It would seem, indeed, that he might have fought his way to Ambrakia,
-especially as he would have met the Ambrakiot reinforcement coming
-from the city. But whether this were possible or not, the commander,
-too much dispirited to attempt it, took advantage of the customary
-truce granted for burying the dead, to open negotiations with
-Demosthenês and the Akarnanian generals, for the purpose of obtaining
-an unmolested retreat. This was peremptorily refused: but Demosthenês
-(with the consent of the Akarnanian leaders) secretly intimated to
-the Spartan commander and those immediately around him, together
-with the Mantineans and other Peloponnesian troops,—that if they
-chose to make a separate and surreptitious retreat, abandoning their
-comrades, no opposition would be offered: for he designed by this
-means, not merely to isolate the Ambrakiots, the great enemies of
-Argos and Akarnania, along with the body of miscellaneous mercenaries
-who had come under Eurylochus, but also to obtain the more permanent
-advantage of disgracing the Spartans and Peloponnesians in the
-eyes of the Epirotic Greeks, as cowards and traitors to military
-fellowship. The very reason which prompted Demosthenês to grant a
-separate facility of escape, ought to have been imperative with
-Menedæus and the Peloponnesians around him, to make them spurn it
-with indignation: yet such was their anxiety for personal safety,
-that this disgraceful convention was accepted, ratified, and carried
-into effect forthwith. It stands alone in Grecian history, as a
-specimen of separate treason in officers, to purchase safety for
-themselves by abandoning those under their command. Had the officers
-been Athenian, it would have been doubtless quoted as an example of
-the pretended faithlessness of democracy: but as it was the act of a
-Spartan commander in conjunction with many leading Peloponnesians,
-we can only remark upon it as a farther manifestation of that
-intra-Peloponnesian selfishness, and carelessness of obligation
-towards extra-Peloponnesian Greeks, which we found so lamentably
-prevalent during the invasion of Xerxes; in this case indeed
-heightened by the fact that the men deserted were fellow-Dorians and
-fellow-soldiers, who had just fought in the same ranks.
-
-As soon as the ceremony of burying the dead had been completed,
-Menedæus, and the Peloponnesians who were protected by this secret
-convention, stole away slyly and in small bands under pretence of
-collecting wood and vegetables: on getting to a little distance,
-they quickened their pace and made off,—much to the dismay of the
-Ambrakiots, who ran after them and tried to overtake them. The
-Akarnanians pursued, and their leaders had much difficulty in
-explaining to them the secret convention just concluded. Nor was
-it without some suspicions of treachery, and even personal hazard,
-from their own troops, that they at length caused the fugitive
-Peloponnesians to be respected; while the Ambrakiots, the most
-obnoxious of the two to Akarnanian feeling, were pursued without any
-reserve, and two hundred of them were slain before they could escape
-into the friendly territory of the Agræans.[493] To distinguish
-Ambrakiots from Peloponnesians, similar in race and dialect, was,
-however, no easy task, and much dispute arose in individual cases.
-
-  [493] Thucyd. iii, 111.
-
-Unfairly as this loss fell upon Ambrakia, a far more severe calamity
-was yet in store for her. The large reinforcement from the city,
-which had been urgently invoked by the detachment at Olpæ, started
-in due course as soon as it could be got ready, and entered the
-territory of Amphilochia about the time when the battle of Olpæ was
-fought, but ignorant of that misfortune, and hoping to arrive soon
-enough to stand by their friends. Their march was made known to
-Demosthenês, on the day after the battle, by the Amphilochians; who,
-at the same time, indicated to him the best way of surprising them
-in the rugged and mountainous road along which they had to march, at
-the two conspicuous peaks called Idomenê, immediately above a narrow
-pass leading farther on to Olpæ. It was known beforehand, by the
-line of march of the Ambrakiots, that they would rest for the night
-at the lower of these two peaks, ready to march through the pass on
-the next morning. On that same night, a detachment of Amphilochians,
-under direction from Demosthenês, seized the higher of the two peaks;
-while that commander himself, dividing his forces into two divisions,
-started from his position at Olpæ in the evening after supper. One of
-these divisions, having the advantage of Amphilochian guides in their
-own country, marched by an unfrequented mountain road to Idomenê;
-the other, under Demosthenês himself, went directly through the pass
-leading from Idomenê to Olpæ. After marching all night, they reached
-the camp of the Ambrakiots a little before daybreak,—Demosthenês
-himself with his Messenians in the van. The surprise was complete;
-the Ambrakiots were found still lying down and asleep, while even
-the sentinels, uninformed of the recent battle,—hearing themselves
-accosted in the Doric dialect by the Messenians, whom Demosthenês
-had placed in front for that express purpose, and not seeing very
-clearly in the morning twilight, mistook them for some of their own
-fellow-citizens coming back from the other camp. The Akarnanians
-and Messenians thus fell among the Ambrakiots sleeping and unarmed,
-and without any possibility of resistance. Large numbers of them
-were destroyed on the spot, and the remainder fled in all directions
-among the neighboring mountains, none knowing the roads and the
-country; it was the country of the Amphilochians, subjects of
-Ambrakia, but subjects averse to their condition, and now making
-use of their perfect local knowledge and light-armed equipment, to
-inflict a terrible revenge on their masters. Some of the Ambrakiots
-became entangled in ravines,—others fell into ambuscades laid by the
-Amphilochians. Others again, dreading most of all to fall into the
-hands of the Amphilochians, barbaric in race as well as intensely
-hostile in feeling, and seeing no other possibility of escaping
-them, swam off to the Athenian ships cruising along the shore.
-There were but a small proportion of them who survived to return to
-Ambrakia.[494]
-
-  [494] Thucyd. iii, 112.
-
-The complete victory of Idomenê, admirably prepared by Demosthenês,
-was achieved with scarce any loss: and the Akarnanians, after
-erecting their trophy, despoiled the enemy’s dead and carried off the
-arms thus taken to Argos.
-
-On the morrow they were visited by a herald, coming from those
-Ambrakiots who had fled into the Agræan territory, after the battle
-of Olpæ, and the subsequent pursuit. He came with the customary
-request from defeated soldiers, for permission to bury their dead who
-had fallen in that pursuit. Neither he, nor those from whom he came,
-knew anything of the destruction of their brethren at Idomenê,—just
-as these latter had been ignorant of the defeat at Olpæ; while,
-on the other hand, the Akarnanians in the camp, whose minds were
-full of the more recent and capital advantage at Idomenê, supposed
-that the message referred to the men slain in that engagement. The
-numerous panoplies just acquired at Idomenê lay piled up in the
-camp, and the herald, on seeing them, was struck with amazement at
-the size of the heap, so much exceeding the number of those who were
-missing in his own detachment. An Akarnanian present asked the reason
-of his surprise, and inquired how many of his comrades had been
-slain,—meaning to refer to the slain at Idomenê. “About two hundred,”
-the herald replied. “Yet these arms here show, not that number, but
-more than a thousand men.” “Then they are not the arms of those who
-fought with us.” “Nay, but they are; if ye were the persons who
-fought yesterday at Idomenê.” “We fought with no one yesterday: it
-was the day before yesterday, in the retreat.” “O, then ye have to
-learn, that _we_ were engaged yesterday with these others, who were
-on their march as reinforcement from the city of Ambrakia.”
-
-The unfortunate herald now learned for the first time that the large
-reinforcement from his city had been cut to pieces. So acute was his
-feeling of mingled anguish and surprise, that he raised a loud cry of
-woe, and hurried away at once, without saying another word; not even
-prosecuting his request about the burial of the dead bodies,—which
-appears on this fatal occasion to have been neglected.[495]
-
-  [495] Thucyd. iii, 113.
-
-His grief was justified by the prodigious magnitude of the calamity,
-which Thucydidês considers to have been the greatest that afflicted
-any Grecian city during the whole war prior to the peace of Nikias;
-so incredibly great, indeed, that though he had learned the number
-slain, he declines to set it down, from fear of not being believed,—a
-scruple which we, his readers, have much reason to regret. It appears
-that nearly the whole adult military population of Ambrakia was
-destroyed, and Demosthenês was urgent with the Akarnanians to march
-thither at once: had they consented, Thucydidês tells us positively
-that the city would have surrendered without a blow.[496] But they
-refused to undertake the enterprise, fearing, according to the
-historian, that the Athenians at Ambrakia would be more troublesome
-neighbors to them than the Ambrakiots. That this reason was
-operative, we need not doubt: but it can hardly have been either the
-single, or even the chief, reason; for, had it been so, they would
-have been equally afraid of Athenian coöperation in the blockade of
-Leukas, which they had strenuously solicited from Demosthenês, and
-had quarrelled with him for refusing. Ambrakia was less near to them
-than Leukas, and in its present exhausted state, inspired less fear:
-but the displeasure arising from the former refusal of Demosthenês
-had probably never been altogether appeased, nor were they sorry to
-find an opportunity of mortifying him in a similar manner.
-
-  [496] Thucyd. iii, 113. πάθος γὰρ τοῦτο μιᾷ πόλει Ἑλληνίδι
-  μέγιστον δὴ τῶν ~κατὰ τὸν πόλεμον τόνδε~ ἐγένετο. Καὶ ἀριθμὸν
-  οὐκ ἔγραψα τῶν ἀποθανόντων, διότι ἄπιστον τὸ πλῆθος λέγεται
-  ἀπολέσθαι, ὡς πρὸς τὸ μέγεθος τῆς πόλεως. Ἀμπρακίαν μέντοι
-  ~οἶδα~ ὅτι, εἰ ἐβουλήθησαν Ἀκαρνᾶνες καὶ Ἀμφίλοχοι, Ἀθηναίοις
-  καὶ Δημοσθένει πειθόμενοι, ἐξελεῖν, αὐτοβοεὶ ἂν εἷλον· νῦν δὲ
-  ἔδεισαν, μὴ οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ἔχοντες αὐτὴν χαλεπώτεροι σφίσι πάροικοι
-  ὦσι.
-
-  We may remark that the expression κατὰ τὸν πόλεμον τόνδε, when it
-  occurs in the first, second, third, or first half of the fourth
-  Book of Thucydidês, seems to allude to the first ten years of the
-  Peloponnesian war, which ended with the peace of Nikias.
-
-  In a careful dissertation, by Franz Wolfgang Ullrich, analyzing
-  the structure of the history of Thucydidês, it is made to appear
-  that the first, second, and third Books, with the first half of
-  the fourth, were composed during the interval between the peace
-  of Nikias and the beginning of the last nine years of the war,
-  called the Dekeleian war; allowing for two passages in these
-  early books which must have been subsequently introduced.
-
-  The later books seem to have been taken up by Thucydidês as a
-  separate work, continuing the former, and a sort of separate
-  preface is given for them (v, 26), γέγραφε δὲ καὶ ταῦτα ὁ αὐτὸς
-  Θουκυδίδης Ἀθηναῖος ἑξῆς, etc. It is in this later portion that
-  he first takes up the view peculiar to him, of reckoning the
-  whole twenty-seven years as one continued war only nominally
-  interrupted (Ullrich, Beiträge zur Erklärung des Thukydidês, pp.
-  85, 125, 138, etc. Hamburgh, 1846).
-
-  Compare ἐν τῷ πολέμῳ τῷδε (iii, 98), which in like manner means
-  the war prior to the peace of Nikias.
-
-In the distribution of the spoil, three hundred panoplies were
-first set apart as the perquisite of Demosthenês: the remainder
-were then distributed, one-third for the Athenians, the other
-two-thirds among the Akarnanian townships. The immense reserve,
-personally appropriated to Demosthenês, enables us to make some
-vague conjecture as to the total loss of Ambrakiots. The fraction of
-one-third, assigned to the Athenian people, must have been, we may
-imagine, six times as great, and perhaps even in larger proportion,
-than the reserve of the general: for the latter was at that time
-under the displeasure of the people, and anxious above all things
-to regain their favor,—an object which would be frustrated rather
-than promoted, if his personal share of the arms were not greatly
-disproportionate to the collective claim of the city. Reasoning upon
-this supposition, the panoplies assigned to Athens would be eighteen
-hundred, and the total of Ambrakiot slain, whose arms became public
-property, would be five thousand four hundred. To which must be
-added some Ambrakiots killed in their flight from Idomenê by the
-Amphilochians, in dells, ravines, and by-places: probably those
-Amphilochians, who slew them, would appropriate the arms privately,
-without bringing them into the general stock. Upon this calculation,
-the total number of Ambrakiot slain in both battles and both
-pursuits, would be about six thousand: a number suitable to the grave
-expressions of Thucydidês, as well as to his statements, that the
-first detachment which marched to Olpæ was three thousand strong, and
-that the message sent home invoked as reinforcement the total force
-of the city. How totally helpless Ambrakia had become, is still more
-conclusively proved by the fact that the Corinthians were obliged
-shortly afterwards to send by land a detachment of three hundred
-hoplites for its defence.[497]
-
-  [497] Thucyd. iii, 114. Diodorus (xii, 60) abridges the narrative
-  of Thucydidês.
-
-The Athenian triremes soon returned to their station at Naupaktus,
-after which a convention was concluded between the Akarnanians
-and Amphilochians on the one side, and the Ambrakiots and
-Peloponnesians—who had fled after the battle of Olpæ into the
-territory of Salynthius and the Agræi—on the other, insuring a safe
-and unmolested egress to both of the latter.[498] With the Ambrakiots
-a more permanent pacification was effected: the Akarnanians and
-Amphilochians concluded with them a peace and alliance for one
-hundred years, on condition that they should surrender all the
-Amphilochian territory and hostages in their possession, and should
-bind themselves to furnish no aid to Anaktorium, then in hostility
-to the Akarnanians. Each party, however, maintained its separate
-alliance,—the Ambrakiots with the Peloponnesian confederacy, the
-Akarnanians with Athens: it was stipulated that the Akarnanians
-should not be required to assist the Ambrakiots against Athens, nor
-the Ambrakiots to assist the Akarnanians against the Peloponnesian
-league; but against all other enemies, each engaged to lend aid to
-the other.[499]
-
-  [498] Thucyd. iii, 114. Ἀκαρνᾶνες δὲ καὶ Ἀμφίλοχοι, ἀπελθόντων
-  Ἀθηναίων καὶ Δημοσθένους, τοῖς ὡς Σαλύνθιον καὶ Ἀγραίους
-  καταφυγοῦσιν Ἀμπρακιώταις καὶ Πελοποννησίοις ἀναχώρησιν
-  ἐσπείσαντο ἐξ Οἰνιαδῶν, οἵπερ καὶ μετανέστησαν παρὰ Σαλυνθίον.
-
-  This is a very difficult passage. Hermann has conjectured, and
-  Poppo, Göller, and Dr. Arnold all approve, the reading παρὰ
-  Σαλυνθίου instead of the two last words of this sentence. The
-  passage might certainly be construed with this emendation, though
-  there would still be an awkwardness in the position of the
-  relative οἵπερ with regard to its antecedent, and in the position
-  of the particle καὶ, which ought then properly to come after
-  μετανέστησαν, and not before it. The sentence would then mean,
-  that “the Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians, who had originally taken
-  refuge with Salynthius, had moved away from his territory to
-  Œniadæ,” from which place they were now to enjoy safe departure.
-
-  I think, however, that the sentence would construe equally well,
-  or at least with no greater awkwardness, without any conjectural
-  alteration of the text, if we suppose Οἰνιαδῶν to be not merely
-  the name of the place, but the name of the inhabitants: and the
-  word seems to be used in this double sense (Thucyd. ii, 100). As
-  the word is already in the patronymic form, it would be difficult
-  to deduce from it a new _nomen gentile_. Several of the Attic
-  demes, which are in the patronymic form, present this same double
-  meaning. If this supposition be admitted, the sentence will mean,
-  that “safe retreat was granted to Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians
-  from the Œniade, who _also_—καὶ, that is, they as well as the
-  Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians—went up to the territory of
-  Salynthius.” These Œniadæ were enemies of the general body of
-  Akarnanians (ii, 100), and they may well have gone thither to
-  help in extricating the fugitive Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians.
-
-  [499] Thucyd. iii, 114.
-
-To Demosthenês personally, the events on the coast of the Ambrakian
-gulf proved a signal good fortune, well-earned indeed by the skill
-which he had displayed. He was enabled to atone for his imprudence
-in the Ætolian expedition, and to reëstablish himself in the favor
-of the Athenian people. He sailed home in triumph to Athens, during
-the course of the winter, with his reserved present of three hundred
-panoplies, which acquired additional value from the accident, that
-the larger number of panoplies, reserved out of the spoil for the
-Athenian people, were captured at sea, and never reached Athens.
-Accordingly, those brought by Demosthenês were the only trophy of
-the victory, and as such were deposited in the Athenian temples,
-where Thucydidês mentions them as still existing at the time when he
-wrote.[500]
-
-  [500] Thucyd. iii, 114. Τὰ δὲ ~νῦν ἀνακείμενα ἐν τοῖς Ἀττικοῖς
-  ἱεροῖς~ Δημοσθένει ἐξῃρέθησαν, τριακόσιαι πανοπλίαι, καὶ ἄγων
-  αὐτὰς κατέπλευσε. Καὶ ἐγένετο ἅμα αὐτῷ μετὰ τὴν ἐκ τῆς Αἰτωλίας
-  ξυμφορὰν ἀπὸ ταύτης τῆς πράξεως ἀδεεστέρα ἡ κάθοδος.
-
-It was in the same autumn that the Athenians were induced by an
-oracle to undertake the more complete purification of the sacred
-island of Delos. This step was probably taken to propitiate Apollo,
-since they were under the persuasion that the terrible visitation
-of the epidemic was owing to his wrath. And as it was about this
-period that the second attack of the epidemic, after having lasted a
-year, disappeared,—many of them probably ascribed this relief to the
-effect of their pious cares at Delos. All the tombs in the island
-were opened; the dead bodies were then exhumed, and reinterred in
-the neighboring island of Rheneia: and orders were given that for
-the future no deaths and no births should take place in the sacred
-island. Moreover, the ancient Delian festival—once the common point
-of meeting and solemnity for the whole Ionic race, and celebrated
-for its musical contests, before the Lydian and Persian conquests
-had subverted the freedom and prosperity of Ionia—was now renewed.
-The Athenians celebrated the festival with its accompanying matches,
-even the chariot-race, in a manner more splendid than had ever been
-known in former times: and they appointed a similar festival to be
-celebrated every fourth year. At this period they were excluded both
-from the Olympic and the Pythian games, which probably made the
-revival of the Delian festival more gratifying to them. The religious
-zeal and munificence of Nikias was strikingly displayed at Delos.[501]
-
-  [501] Thucyd. iii, 104; Plutarch, Nikias, c. 3, 4; Diodor. xii,
-  58.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER LII.
-
-SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR.—CAPTURE OF SPHAKTERIA.
-
-
-The invasion of Attica by the Lacedæmonians had now become an
-ordinary enterprise, undertaken in every year of the war except
-the third and sixth, and then omitted only from accidental causes;
-though the same hopes were no longer entertained from it as at the
-commencement of the war. During the present spring, Agis king of
-Sparta conducted the Peloponnesian army into the territory, seemingly
-about the end of April, and repeated the usual ravages.
-
-It seemed, however, as if Korkyra were about to become the principal
-scene of the year’s military operations: for the exiles of the
-oligarchical party, having come back to the island and fortified
-themselves on Mount Istônê, carried on war with so much activity
-against the Korkyræans in the city, that distress and even famine
-reigned there; while sixty Peloponnesian triremes were sent thither
-to assist the aggressors. As soon as it became known at Athens how
-hardly the Korkyræans in the city were pressed, orders were given to
-an Athenian fleet of forty triremes, about to sail for Sicily under
-Eurymedon and Sophoklês, to halt in their voyage at Korkyra, and
-to lend whatever aid might be needed.[502] But during the course
-of this voyage, an incident occurred elsewhere, neither foreseen
-nor imagined by any one, which gave a new character and promise to
-the whole war,—illustrating forcibly the observations of Periklês
-and Archidamus before its commencement, on the impossibility of
-calculating what turn events might take.[503]
-
-  [502] Thucyd. iv, 2, 3.
-
-  [503] Thucyd. i, 140; ii, 11.
-
-So high did Demosthenês stand in the favor of his countrymen, after
-his brilliant successes in the Ambrakian gulf, that they granted
-him permission, at his own request, to go aboard and to employ the
-fleet in any descent which he might think expedient on the coast of
-Peloponnesus. The attachment of this active officer to the Messenians
-at Naupaktus, inspired him with the idea of planting a detachment
-of them on some well-chosen maritime post in the ancient Messenian
-territory, from whence they would be able permanently to harass the
-Lacedæmonians and provoke revolt among the Helots,—the more so,
-from their analogy of race and dialect. The Messenians, active in
-privateering, and doubtless well acquainted with the points of this
-coast, all of which had formerly belonged to their ancestors, had
-probably indicated to him Pylus, on the southwestern shore. That
-ancient and Homeric name was applied specially and properly to denote
-the promontory which forms the northern termination of the modern
-bay of Navarino, opposite to the island of Sphagia, or Sphakteria;
-though in vague language the whole neighboring district seems also
-to have been called Pylus. Accordingly, in circumnavigating Laconia,
-Demosthenês requested that the fleet might be detained at this spot
-long enough to enable him to fortify it, engaging himself to stay
-afterwards and maintain it with a garrison. It was an uninhabited
-promontory, about forty-five miles from Sparta; that is, as far
-distant as any portion of her territory, presenting rugged cliffs,
-and easy of defence both by sea and land: but its great additional
-recommendation, with reference to the maritime power of Athens,
-consisted in its overhanging the spacious and secure basin now called
-the bay of Navarino. That basin was fronted and protected by the
-islet called Sphakteria, or Sphagia, untrodden, untenanted, and full
-of wood, which stretched along the coast for about a mile and three
-quarters, leaving only two narrow entrances: one at its northern end,
-opposite to the position fixed on by Demosthenês, so confined as
-to admit only two triremes abreast,—the other at the southern end,
-about four times as broad; while the inner water approached by these
-two channels was both roomy and protected. It was on the coast of
-Peloponnesus, a little within the northern or narrowest of the two
-channels, that Demosthenês proposed to plant his little fort,—the
-ground being itself eminently favorable, and a spring of fresh
-water[504] in the centre of the promontory.[505]
-
-  [504] Thucyd. iv, 26.
-
-  [505] Topography of Sphakteria and Pylus. The description given
-  by Thucydidês, of the memorable incidents in or near Pylus and
-  Sphakteria, is perfectly clear, intelligible, and consistent with
-  itself, as to topography. But when we consult the topography of
-  the scene as it stands now, we find various circumstances which
-  cannot possibly be reconciled with Thucydidês. Both Colonel
-  Leake (Travels in the Morea, vol. i, pp. 402-415) and Dr. Arnold
-  (Appendix to the second and third volume of his Thucydidês, p.
-  444) have given plans of the coast, accompanied with valuable
-  remarks.
-
-  The main discrepancy, between the statement of Thucydidês and the
-  present state of the coast, is to be found in the breadth of the
-  two channels between Sphakteria and the mainland. The southern
-  entrance into the bay of Navarino is now between thirteen hundred
-  and fourteen hundred yards, with a depth of water varying
-  from five, seven, twenty-eight, thirty-three fathoms; whereas
-  Thucydidês states it as being only a breadth adequate to admit
-  eight or nine triremes abreast. The northern entrance is about
-  one hundred and fifty yards in width, with a shoal or bar of
-  sand lying across it on which there are not more than eighteen
-  inches of water: Thucydidês tells us that it afforded room for no
-  more than two triremes, and his narrative implies a much greater
-  depth of water, so as to make the entrance for triremes perfectly
-  unobstructed.
-
-  Colonel Leake supposes that Thucydidês was misinformed as to
-  the breadth of the southern passage; but Dr. Arnold has on this
-  point given a satisfactory reply,—that the narrowness of the
-  breadth is not merely affirmed in the numbers of Thucydidês, but
-  is indirectly implied in his narrative, where he tells us that
-  the Lacedæmonians intended to choke up both of them by triremes
-  closely packed. Obviously, this expedient could not be dreamt
-  of, except for a very narrow mouth. The same reply suffices
-  against the doubts which Bloomfield and Poppo (Comment. p. 10)
-  raise about the genuineness of the numerals ὀκτὼ or ἐννέα in
-  Thucydidês; a doubt which merely transfers the supposed error
-  from Thucydidês to the writer of the MS.
-
-  Dr. Arnold has himself raised a still graver doubt; whether the
-  island now called Sphagia be really the same as Sphakteria,
-  and whether the bay of Navarino be the real harbor of Pylus.
-  He suspects that the Pale-Navarino which has been generally
-  understood to be Pylus, was in reality the ancient Sphakteria,
-  separated from the mainland in ancient times by a channel at the
-  north as well as by another at the southeast,—though now it is
-  not an island at all. He farther suspects that the lake or lagoon
-  called Lake of Osmyn Aga, north of the harbor of Navarino, and
-  immediately under that which he supposes to have been Sphakteria,
-  was the ancient harbor of Pylus, in which the sea-fight between
-  the Athenians and Lacedæmonians took place. He does not, indeed,
-  assert this as a positive opinion, but leans to it as the most
-  probable, admitting that there are difficulties either way.
-
-  Dr. Arnold has stated some of the difficulties which beset this
-  hypothesis (p. 447), but there was one which he has not stated,
-  which appears to me the most formidable of all, and quite fatal
-  to the admissibility of his opinion. If the Paleokastro of
-  Navarino was the real ancient Sphakteria, it must have been a
-  second island situated to the northward of Sphagia. There must
-  therefore have been _two_ islands close together off the coast
-  and near the scene. Now if the reader will follow the account of
-  Thucydidês, he will see that there certainly was no more than
-  _one_ island,—Sphakteria, without any other near or adjoining to
-  it; see especially c. 13: the Athenian fleet under Eurymedon,
-  on first arriving, was obliged to go back some distance to the
-  island of Prôtê, because _the island_ of Sphakteria was full of
-  Lacedæmonian hoplites: if Dr. Arnold’s hypothesis were admitted,
-  there would have been nothing to hinder them from landing on
-  Sphagia itself,—the same inference may be deduced from c. 8. The
-  statement of Pliny (H. N. iv, 12) that there were _tres Sphagiæ_
-  off Pylus, unless we suppose with Hardouin that two of them
-  were mere rocks, appears to me inconsistent with the account of
-  Thucydidês.
-
-  I think that there is no alternative except to suppose that
-  a great alteration has taken place in the two passages which
-  separate Sphagia from the mainland, during the interval of two
-  thousand four hundred years which separates us from Thucydidês.
-  The mainland to the south of Navarino must have been much nearer
-  than it is now to the southern portion of Sphagia, while the
-  northern passage also must have been then both narrower and
-  clearer. To suppose a change in the configuration of the coast to
-  this extent, seems noway extravagant: any other hypothesis which
-  may be started will be found involved in much greater difficulty.
-
-But Eurymedon and Sophoklês decidedly rejected all proposition of
-delay; and with much reason, since they had been informed (though
-seemingly without truth) that the Peloponnesian fleet had actually
-reached Korkyra: they might well have remembered the mischief which
-had ensued three years before from the delay of the reinforcement
-sent to Phormio in some desultory operations on the coast of Krete.
-The fleet accordingly passed by Pylus without stopping: but a
-terrible storm drove them back and forced them to seek shelter in
-the very harbor which Demosthenês had fixed upon,—the only harbor
-anywhere near. That officer took advantage of this accident to
-renew his proposition, which however appeared to the commanders
-chimerical: there were plenty of desert capes round Peloponnesus,
-they said, if he chose to waste the resources of the city in
-occupying them,[506]—nor were they at all moved by his reasons in
-reply. Finding himself thus unsuccessful, Demosthenês presumed upon
-the undefined permission granted to him by the Athenian people, to
-address himself first to the soldiers, last of all to the taxiarchs,
-or inferior officers, and to persuade them to second his project,
-even against the will of the commanders. Much inconvenience might
-well have arisen from such clashing of authority: but it happened
-that both the soldiers and the taxiarchs took the same view of
-the case as their commanders, and refused compliance: nor can we
-be surprised at such reluctance, when we reflect upon the seeming
-improbability of being able to maintain such a post against the
-great real, and still greater supposed, superiority of Lacedæmonian
-land-force. It happened, however, that the fleet was detained there
-for some days by stormy weather; so that the soldiers, having
-nothing to do, were seized with the spontaneous impulse of occupying
-themselves with the fortification, and crowded around to execute
-it with all the emulation of eager volunteers. Having contemplated
-nothing of the kind on starting from Athens, they had neither tools
-for cutting stone, nor hods for carrying mortar:[507] accordingly,
-they were compelled to build their wall by collecting such pieces
-of rock or stones as they found, and putting them together as each
-happened to fit in: whenever mortar was needed, they brought it up on
-their backs bent inwards, with hands joined behind them to prevent
-it from slipping away. Such deficiencies were made up, however,
-partly by the unbounded ardor of the soldiers, partly by the natural
-difficulties of the ground, which hardly required fortification
-except at particular points; the work was completed in a rough way
-in six days, and Demosthenês was left in garrison with five ships,
-while Eurymedon with the main fleet sailed away to Korkyra. The
-crews of the five ships, two of which, however, were sent away to
-warn Eurymedon afterwards, would amount to about one thousand in
-all: but there presently arrived two armed Messenian privateers,
-from which Demosthenês obtained a reinforcement of forty Messenian
-hoplites, together with a supply of wicker shields, though more fit
-for show than for use, wherewith to arm his rowers. Altogether, it
-appears that he must have had about two hundred hoplites, besides the
-half-armed seamen.[508]
-
-  [506] Thucyd. iv, 3. The account, alike meagre and inaccurate,
-  given by Diodorus, of these interesting events in Pylus and
-  Sphakteria, will be found in Diodor. xii, 61-64.
-
-  [507] Thucyd. iv, 4.
-
-  [508] Thucyd. iv, 9. Demosthenês placed the _greater number_
-  (τοὺς πολλοὺς) of his hoplites round the walls of his post, and
-  selected _sixty_ of them to march down to the shore. This implies
-  a total which can hardly be less than two hundred.
-
-Intelligence of this attempt to plant, even upon the Lacedæmonian
-territory, the annoyance and insult of a hostile post, was soon
-transmitted to Sparta,—yet no immediate measures were taken to
-march to the spot; as well from the natural slowness of the Spartan
-character, strengthened by a festival which happened to be then going
-on, as from the confidence entertained that, whenever attacked, the
-expulsion of the enemy was certain. A stronger impression, however,
-was made by the news upon the Lacedæmonian army invading Attica, who
-were at the same time suffering from want of provisions, the corn
-not being yet ripe, and from an unusually cold spring: accordingly,
-Agis marched them back to Sparta, and the fortification of Pylus thus
-produced the effect of abridging the invasion to the unusually short
-period of fifteen days. It operated in like manner to the protection
-of Korkyra: for the Peloponnesian fleet, recently arrived thither,
-or still on its way, received orders immediately to return for the
-attack of Pylus. Having avoided the Athenian fleet by transporting
-the ships across the isthmus at Leukas, it reached Pylus about the
-same time as the Lacedæmonian land-force from Sparta, composed of the
-Spartans themselves and the neighboring Periœki: for the more distant
-Periœki, as well as the Peloponnesian allies, being just returned
-from Attica, were summoned to come as soon as they could, but did not
-accompany this first march.[509]
-
-  [509] Thucyd. iv, 8.
-
-At the last moment, before the Peloponnesian fleet came in and
-occupied the harbor, Demosthenês detached two out of his five
-triremes to warn Eurymedon and the main fleet, and to entreat
-immediate succor: the remaining ships he hauled ashore under the
-fortification, protecting them by palisades planted in front, and
-preparing to defend himself in the best manner he could. Having
-posted the larger portion of his force,—some of them mere seamen
-without arms, and many only half-armed,—round the assailable points
-of the fortification, to resist attacks from the land-force, he
-himself, with sixty chosen hoplites and a few bowmen, marched out of
-the fortification down to the sea-shore. It was on that side that
-the wall was weakest, for the Athenians, confident in their naval
-superiority, had given themselves little trouble to provide against
-an assailant fleet. Accordingly, Demosthenês foresaw that the great
-stress of the attack would lie on the sea-side, and his only chance
-of safety consisted in preventing the enemy from landing; a purpose,
-seconded by the rocky and perilous shore, which left no possibility
-of approach for ships, except on a narrow space immediately under the
-fortification. It was here that he took post, on the water’s edge,
-addressing a few words of encouragement to his men, and warning them
-that it was useless now to display acuteness in summing up perils
-which were but too obvious,—and that the only chance of escape lay
-in boldly encountering the enemy before they could set foot ashore;
-the difficulty of effecting a landing from ships in the face of
-resistance being better known to Athenian mariners than to any one
-else.[510]
-
-  [510] Thucyd. iv, 10.
-
-With a fleet of forty-three triremes, under Thrasymelidas, and a
-powerful land-force, simultaneously attacking, the Lacedæmonians
-had good hopes of storming at once a rock so hastily converted into
-a military post. But as they foresaw that the first attack might
-possibly fail, and that the fleet of Eurymedon would probably return,
-they resolved to occupy forthwith the island of Sphakteria, the
-natural place where the Athenian fleet would take station for the
-purpose of assisting the garrison ashore. The neighboring coast on
-the mainland of Peloponnesus was both harborless and hostile, so
-that there was no other spot near, where they could take station.
-And the Lacedæmonian commanders reckoned upon being able to stop up,
-as it were mechanically, both the two entrances into the harbor, by
-triremes lashed together, from the island to the mainland, with their
-prows pointing outwards; so that they would be able at any rate,
-occupying the island as well as the two channels, to keep off the
-Athenian fleet, and to hold Demosthenês closely blocked up[511] on
-the rock of Pylus, where his provisions would quickly fail him. With
-these views, they drafted off by lot some hoplites from each of the
-Spartan lochi, accompanied as usual by Helots, and sent them across
-to Sphakteria; while their land-force and their fleet approached at
-once to attack the fortification.
-
-  [511] Thucyd. iv, 8. τοὺς μὲν οὖν ἔσπλους ταῖς ναυσὶν ἀντιπρώροις
-  βύζην κλῄσειν ἔμελλον.
-
-Of the assault on the land-side, we hear little: the Lacedæmonians
-were proverbially unskilful in the attack of anything like a
-fortified place, and they appear now to have made little impression.
-But the chief stress and vigor of the attack came on the sea-side, as
-Demosthenês had foreseen. The landing-place, even where practicable,
-was still rocky and difficult,—and so narrow in dimensions, that
-the Lacedæmonian ships could only approach by small squadrons at a
-time; while the Athenians maintained their ground firmly to prevent
-a single man from setting foot on land. The assailing triremes rowed
-up with loud shouts and exhortations to each other, striving to get
-so placed as that the hoplites in the bow could effect a landing:
-but such were the difficulties arising partly from the rocks and
-partly from the defence, that squadron after squadron tried this
-in vain. Nor did even the gallant example of Brasidas procure for
-them any better success. That officer, commanding a trireme, and
-observing that some of the pilots near him were cautious in driving
-their ships close in shore for fear of breaking them against the
-rocks, indignantly called to them not to spare the planks of their
-vessels, when the enemy had insulted them by erecting a fort in the
-country: Lacedæmonians, he exclaimed, ought to carry the landing by
-force, even though their ships should be dashed to pieces,—nor ought
-the Peloponnesian allies to be backward in sacrificing their ships
-for Sparta, in return for the many services which she had rendered
-to them.[512] Foremost in performance as well as in exhortation,
-Brasidas constrained his own pilot to drive his ship close in, and
-advanced in person even on to the landing-steps for the purpose of
-leaping first ashore. But here he stood exposed to all the weapons
-of the Athenian defenders, who beat him back and pierced him with so
-many wounds, that he fainted away, and fell back into the bows, or
-foremost part of the trireme, beyond the rowers; while his shield,
-slipping away from the arm, dropped down and rolled overboard into
-the sea. His ship was obliged to retire, like the rest, without
-having effected any landing: and all these successive attacks
-from the sea, repeated for one whole day and a part of the next
-were repulsed by Demosthenês and his little band with victorious
-bravery. To both sides it seemed a strange reversal of ordinary
-relations,[513] that the Athenians, essentially maritime, should
-be fighting on land—and that, too, Lacedæmonian land—against the
-Lacedæmonians, the select land-warriors of Greece, now on shipboard,
-and striving in vain to compass a landing on their own shore. The
-Athenians, in honor of their success, erected a trophy, the chief
-ornament of which was the shield of Brasidas, which had been cast
-ashore by the water.
-
-  [512] Thucyd. iv, 11, 12; Diodor. xii. Consult an excellent
-  note of Dr. Arnold on this passage, in which he contrasts
-  the looseness and exaggeration of Diodorus with the modest
-  distinctness of Thucydidês.
-
-  [513] Thucyd. iv, 12. ἐπὶ πολὺ γὰρ ἐποίει τῆς δόξης ~ἐν τῷ τότε~,
-  τοῖς μὲν ἠπειρώταις μάλιστα εἶναι καὶ τὰ πεζὰ κρατίστοις, τοῖς δὲ
-  θαλασσίοις τε καὶ ταῖς ναυσὶ πλεῖστον προέχειν.
-
-On the third day, the Lacedæmonians did not repeat their attack, but
-sent some of their vessels round to Asinê, in the Messenian gulf,
-for timber to construct battering machines; which they intended to
-employ against the wall of Demosthenês, on the side towards the
-harbor, where it was higher, and could not be assailed without
-machines, but where, at the same time, there was great facility
-in landing,—for their previous attack had been made on the side
-fronting the sea, where the wall was lower, but the difficulties
-of landing insuperable.[514] But before these ships came back, the
-face of affairs was seriously changed by the unwelcome return of
-the Athenian fleet from Zakynthus, under Eurymedon, reinforced by
-four Chian ships, and some of the guard-ships at Naupaktus, so as
-now to muster fifty sail. The Athenian admiral, finding the enemy’s
-fleet in possession of the harbor, and seeing both the island of
-Sphakteria occupied, and the opposite shore covered with Lacedæmonian
-hoplites,[515]—for the allies from all parts of Peloponnesus had
-now arrived,—looked around in vain for a place to land, and could
-find no other night-station except the uninhabited island of Prôtê,
-not very far distant. From hence he sailed forth in the morning to
-Pylus, prepared for a naval engagement,—hoping that perhaps the
-Lacedæmonians might come out to fight him in the open sea, but
-resolved, if this did not happen, to force his way in and attack
-the fleet in the harbor; the breadth of sea between Sphakteria and
-the mainland being sufficient to admit of nautical manœuvre.[516]
-The Lacedæmonian admirals, seemingly confounded by the speed of the
-Athenian fleet in coming back, never thought of sailing out of the
-harbor to fight, nor did they even realize their scheme of blocking
-up the two entrances of the harbor with triremes closely lashed
-together. Both entrances were left open, though they determined to
-defend themselves within: but even here, so defective were their
-precautions, that several of their triremes were yet moored, and the
-rowers not fully aboard, when the Athenian admirals sailed in by both
-entrances at once to attack them. Most of the Lacedæmonian triremes,
-afloat, and in fighting trim, resisted the attack for a certain
-time, but were at length vanquished, and driven back to the shore,
-many of them with serious injury.[517] Five of them were captured
-and towed off, one with all her crew aboard, and the Athenians,
-vigorously pursuing their success, drove against such as took refuge
-on the shore, as well as those which were not manned at the moment
-when the attack began, and had not been able to get afloat or into
-action. Some of the vanquished triremes being deserted by their
-crews, who jumped out upon the land, the Athenians were proceeding
-to tow them off, when the Lacedæmonian hoplites on the shore opposed
-a new and strenuous resistance. Excited to the utmost pitch by
-witnessing the disgraceful defeat of their fleet, and aware of the
-cruel consequences which turned upon it,—they marched all armed
-into the water, seized the ships to prevent them from being dragged
-off, and engaged in a desperate conflict to baffle the assailants:
-we have already seen a similar act of bravery, two years before,
-on the part of the Messenian hoplites accompanying the fleet of
-Phormio near Naupaktus.[518] Extraordinary daring and valor was here
-displayed on both sides, in the attack as well as in the defence,
-and such was the clamor and confusion, that neither the land skill
-of the Lacedæmonians, nor the sea skill of the Athenians, were of
-much avail: the contest was one of personal valor and considerable
-suffering on both sides. At length the Lacedæmonians carried their
-point, and saved all the ships ashore; none being carried away except
-those at first captured. Both parties thus separated: the Athenians
-retired to the fortress at Pylus, where they were doubtless hailed
-with overflowing joy by their comrades, and where they erected a
-trophy for their victory, giving up the enemy’s dead for burial, and
-picking up the floating wrecks and pieces.[519]
-
-  [514] Thucyd. iv, 13. ἐλπίζοντες τὸ κατὰ τὸν λιμένα τεῖχος ὕψος
-  μὲν ἔχειν, ἀποβάσεως δὲ μάλιστα οὔσης ἑλεῖν μηχαναῖς. See Poppo’s
-  note upon this passage.
-
-  [515] Thucyd. iv, 14.
-
-  [516] Thucyd. iv, 13. The Lacedæmonians παρεσκευάζοντο, ἢν ἐσπλέῃ
-  τις, ὡς ἐν τῷ λιμένι ὄντι οὐ σμικρῷ ναυμαχήσοντες.
-
-  The expression, “the harbor which was not small,” to designate
-  the spacious bay of Navarino, has excited much remark from Mr.
-  Bloomfield and Dr. Arnold, and was indeed one of the reasons
-  which induced the latter to suspect that the harbor meant by
-  Thucydidês was _not_ the bay of Navarino, but the neighboring
-  lake of Osmyn Aga.
-
-  I have already discussed that supposition in a former note: but
-  in reference to the expression οὐ σμικρῷ, we may observe, first,
-  that the use of negative expressions to convey a positive idea
-  would be in the ordinary manner of Thucydidês.
-
-  But farther, I have stated in a previous note that it is
-  indispensable, in my judgment, to suppose the island of
-  Sphakteria to have touched the mainland much more closely in the
-  time of Thucydidês than it does now. At that time, therefore,
-  very probably, the basin of Navarino was not so large as we now
-  find it.
-
-  [517] Thucyd. iv, 14. ~ἔτρωσαν~ μὲν πολλὰς, πέντε δ᾽ ἔλαβον. We
-  cannot in English speak of _wounding_ a trireme,—though the Greek
-  word is both lively and accurate, to represent the blow inflicted
-  by the impinging beak of an enemy’s ship.
-
-  [518] See above, in this History, chap. xlix.
-
-  [519] Thucyd. iv, 13, 14.
-
-But the great prize of the victory was neither in the five ships
-captured, nor in the relief afforded to the besieged at Pylus. It
-lay in the hoplites occupying the island of Sphakteria, who were
-now cut off from the mainland, as well as from all supplies. The
-Athenians, sailing round it in triumph, already looked upon them as
-their prisoners; while the Lacedæmonians on the opposite mainland,
-deeply distressed, but not knowing what to do, sent to Sparta for
-advice. So grave was the emergency, that the ephors came in person
-to the spot forthwith. Since they could still muster sixty triremes,
-a greater number than the Athenians,—besides a large force on land,
-and the whole command of the resources of the country,—while the
-Athenians had no footing on shore except the contracted promontory of
-Pylus, we might have imagined that a strenuous effort to carry off
-the imprisoned detachment across the narrow strait to the mainland
-would have had a fair chance of success. And probably, if either
-Demosthenês or Brasidas had been in command, such an effort would
-have been made. But Lacedæmonian courage was rather steadfast and
-unyielding than adventurous: and, moreover, the Athenian superiority
-at sea exercised a sort of fascination over men’s minds, analogous
-to that of the Spartans themselves on land; so that the ephors, on
-reaching Pylus, took a desponding view of their position, and sent a
-herald to the Athenian generals to propose an armistice, in order to
-allow time for envoys to go to Athens and treat for peace.
-
-To this Eurymedon and Demosthenês assented, and an armistice was
-concluded on the following terms: The Lacedæmonians agreed to
-surrender not only all their triremes now in the harbor, but also all
-the rest in their ports, altogether to the number of sixty; also,
-to abstain from all attack upon the fortress at Pylus, either by
-land or sea, for such time as should be necessary for the mission of
-envoys to Athens as well as for their return, both to be effected
-in an Athenian trireme provided for the purpose. The Athenians
-on their side engaged to desist from all hostilities during the
-like interval; but it was agreed that they should keep strict and
-unremitting watch over the island, yet without landing upon it. For
-the subsistence of the detachment in the island, the Lacedæmonians
-were permitted to send over every day two chœnikes of barley-meal in
-cakes, ready baked, two kotylæ of wine,[520] and some meat, for each
-hoplite,—together with half that quantity for each of the attendant
-Helots; but this was all to be done under the supervision of the
-Athenians, with peremptory obligation to send no secret additional
-supplies. It was, moreover, expressly stipulated that if any one
-provision of the armistice, small or great, were violated, the whole
-should be considered as null and void. Lastly, the Athenians engaged,
-on the return of the envoys from Athens, to restore the triremes in
-the same condition as they received them.
-
-  [520] Thucyd. iv, 16. The chœnix was equivalent to about two
-  pints, English dry measure: it was considered as the usual daily
-  sustenance for a slave. Each Lacedæmonian soldier had, therefore,
-  double of this daily allowance, besides meat, in weight and
-  quantity not specified: the fact that the quantity of meat is not
-  specified, seems to show that they did not fear abuse in this
-  item.
-
-  The kotyla contained about half a pint, English wine measure:
-  each Lacedæmonian soldier had, therefore, a pint of wine daily.
-  It was always the practice in Greece to drink the wine with a
-  large admixture of water.
-
-Such terms sufficiently attest the humiliation and anxiety of the
-Lacedæmonians; while the surrender of their entire naval force to
-the number of sixty triremes, which was forthwith carried into
-effect, demonstrates at the same time that they sincerely believed
-in the possibility of obtaining peace. Well aware that they were
-themselves the original beginners of the war, at a time when the
-Athenians desired peace, and that the latter had besides made
-fruitless overtures while under the pressure of the epidemic, they
-presumed that the same dispositions still prevailed at Athens, and
-that their present pacific wishes would be so gladly welcomed as to
-procure without difficulty the relinquishment of the prisoners in
-Sphakteria.[521]
-
-  [521] Thucyd. iv, 21: compare vii, 18.
-
-The Lacedæmonian envoys, conveyed to Athens in an Athenian trireme,
-appeared before the public assembly to set forth their mission,
-according to custom, prefacing their address with some apologies
-for that brevity of speech which belonged to their country. Their
-proposition was in substance a very simple one: “Give up to us the
-men in the island, and accept, in exchange for this favor, peace,
-with the alliance of Sparta.” They enforced their cause, by appeals,
-well-turned and conciliatory, partly indeed to the generosity, but
-still more to the prudential calculation of Athens; explicitly
-admitting the high and glorious vantage-ground on which she was
-now placed, as well as their own humbled dignity and inferior
-position.[522] They, the Lacedæmonians, the first and greatest power
-in Greece, were now smitten by adverse fortune of war,—and that too
-without misconduct of their own, so that they were for the first
-time obliged to solicit an enemy for peace; which Athens had the
-precious opportunity of granting, not merely with honor to herself,
-but also in such manner as to create in their minds an ineffaceable
-friendship. And it became Athens to make use of her present good
-fortune while she had it,—not to rely upon its permanence, nor to
-abuse it by extravagant demands; her own imperial prudence, as well
-as the present circumstances of the Spartans, might teach her how
-unexpectedly the most disastrous casualties occurred. By granting
-what was now asked, she might make a peace which would be far
-more durable than if it were founded on the extorted compliances
-of a weakened enemy, because it would rest on Spartan honor and
-gratitude; the greater the previous enmity, the stronger would be
-such reactionary sentiment.[523] But if Athens should now refuse,
-and if, in the farther prosecution of the war, the men in Sphakteria
-should perish,—a new and inexpiable ground of quarrel,[524] peculiar
-to Sparta herself, would be added to those already subsisting,
-which rather concerned Sparta as the chief of the Peloponnesian
-confederacy. Nor was it only the good-will and gratitude of the
-Spartans which Athens would earn by accepting the proposition
-tendered to her; she would farther acquire the grace and glory of
-conferring peace on Greece, which all the Greeks would recognize as
-her act. And when once the two preëminent powers, Athens and Sparta,
-were established in cordial amity, the remaining Grecian states would
-be too weak to resist what they two might prescribe.[525]
-
-  [522] Thucyd. iv, 18. γνῶτε δὲ καὶ ἐς τὰς ἡμετέρας νῦν ξυμφορὰς
-  ἀπιδόντες, etc.
-
-  [523] Thucyd. iv, 19.
-
-  [524] Thucyd. iv, 20. ἡμῖν δὲ καλῶς, εἴπερ πότε, ἔχει ἀμφοτέροις
-  ἡ ξυναλλαγὴ, πρίν τι ἀνήκεστον διὰ μέσου γενόμενον ἡμᾶς
-  καταλαβεῖν, ἐν ᾧ ἀνάγκη ἀΐδιον ὑμῖν ἔχθραν πρὸς τῇ ~κοινῇ καὶ
-  ἰδίαν~ ἔχειν, ὑμᾶς δὲ στερηθῆναι ὧν νῦν προκαλούμεθα.
-
-  I understand these words κοινὴ and ἰδία agreeably to the
-  explanation of the Scholiast, from whom Dr. Arnold, as well
-  as Poppo and Göller, depart, in my judgment erroneously. The
-  whole war had been begun in consequence of the complaints of
-  the Peloponnesian allies, and of wrongs alleged to have been
-  done to _them_ by Athens: Sparta herself had no ground of
-  complaint,—nothing of which she desired redress.
-
-  Dr. Arnold translates it: “We shall hate you not only
-  nationally, for the wound you have inflicted on Sparta; but also
-  individually, because so many of us will have lost our near
-  relations from your inflexibility.” “The Spartan aristocracy (he
-  adds) would feel it a personal wound to lose at once so many of
-  its members, connected by blood or marriage with its principal
-  families: compare Thucyd. v, 15.”
-
-  We must recollect, however, that the Athenians could not possibly
-  know at this time that the hoplites inclosed in Sphakteria
-  belonged in great proportion to the first families in Sparta. And
-  the Spartan envoys would surely have the diplomatic prudence to
-  abstain from any facts or arguments which would reveal, or even
-  suggest, to them so important a secret.
-
-  [525] Thucyd. iv, 20. ἡμῶν γὰρ καὶ ὑμῶν ταὐτὰ λεγόντων τό γε ἄλλο
-  Ἑλληνικὸν ἴστε ὅτι ὑποδεέστερον ὂν τὰ μέγιστα τιμήσει.
-
-  Aristophanês, Pac. 1048. Ἐξὸν σπεισαμένοις κοινῇ τῆς Ἑλλάδος
-  ἄρχειν.
-
-Such was the language held by the Lacedæmonians in the assembly at
-Athens. It was discreetly calculated for their purpose, though when
-we turn back to the commencement of the war, and read the lofty
-declarations of the Spartan ephors and assembly respecting the
-wrongs of their allies and the necessity of extorting full indemnity
-for them from Athens, the contrast is indeed striking. On this
-occasion, the Lacedæmonians acted entirely for themselves and from
-consideration of their own necessities; severing themselves from
-their allies, and soliciting a special peace for themselves, with as
-little scruple as the Spartan general, Menedæus, during the preceding
-year, when he abandoned his Ambrakiot confederates after the battle
-of Olpæ, to conclude a separate capitulation with Demosthenês.
-
-The course proper to be adopted by Athens in reference to the
-proposition, however, was by no means obvious. In all probability,
-the trireme which brought the Lacedæmonian envoys also brought the
-first news of that unforeseen and instantaneous turn of events which
-had rendered the Spartans in Sphakteria certain prisoners,—so it was
-then conceived,—and placed the whole Lacedæmonian fleet in their
-power; thus giving a totally new character of the war. The sudden
-arrival of such prodigious intelligence,—the astounding presence of
-Lacedæmonian envoys, bearing the olive-branch, and in an attitude of
-humiliation,—must have produced in the susceptible public of Athens
-emotions of the utmost intensity; an elation and confidence such as
-had probably never been felt since the reconquest of Samos. It was
-difficult at first to measure the full bearings of the new situation,
-and even Periklês himself might have hesitated what to recommend: but
-the immediate and dominant impression with the general public was,
-that Athens might now ask her own terms, as consideration for the
-prisoners in the island.[526] Of this reigning tendency Kleon[527]
-made himself the emphatic organ, as he had done three years before
-in the sentence passed on the Mitylenæans; a man who—like leading
-journals, in modern times—often appeared to guide the public because
-he gave vehement utterance to that which they were already feeling,
-and carried it out in its collateral bearings and consequences.
-On the present occasion, he doubtless spoke with the most genuine
-conviction; for he was full of the sentiment of Athenian force and
-Athenian imperial dignity, as well as disposed to a sanguine view of
-future chances. Moreover, in a discussion like that now opened, where
-there was much room for doubt, he came forward with a proposition
-at once plain and decisive. Reminding the Athenians of the
-dishonorable truce of thirty years to which they had been compelled
-by the misfortunes of the time to accede, fourteen years before the
-Peloponnesian war,—Kleon insisted that now was the time for Athens to
-recover what she had then lost,—Nisæa, Pegæ, Trœzen, and Achaia. He
-proposed that Sparta should be required to restore these to Athens,
-in exchange for the soldiers now blocked up in Sphakteria; after
-which a truce might be concluded for as long a time as might be
-deemed expedient.
-
-  [526] Thucyd. iv, 21.
-
-  [527] Thucyd. iv, 21. μάλιστα δὲ αὐτοὺς ἐνῆγε Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου,
-  ἀνὴρ δημαγωγὸς κατ᾽ ἐκεῖνον τὸν χρόνον ὢν καὶ τῷ δήμῳ
-  πιθανώτατος· καὶ ἔπεισεν ἀποκρίνασθαι, etc.
-
-  This sentence reads like a first introduction of Kleon to the
-  notice of the reader. It would appear that Thucydidês had
-  forgotten that he had before introduced Kleon on occasion
-  of the Mitylenæan surrender, and that too in language very
-  much the same, iii, 36. καὶ Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου,—ὢν καὶ ἐς τὰ
-  ἄλλα βιαιότατος τῶν πολιτῶν, καὶ τῷ δήμῳ παρὰ πολὺ ἐν τῷ τότε
-  πιθανώτατος, etc.
-
-This decree, adopted by the assembly, was communicated as the answer
-of Athens to the Lacedæmonian envoys, who had probably retired after
-their first address, and were now sent for again into the assembly,
-to hear it. On being informed of the resolution, they made no comment
-on its substance, but invited the Athenians to name commissioners,
-who might discuss with them freely and deliberately suitable terms
-for a pacification. Here, however, Kleon burst upon them with an
-indignant rebuke. He had thought from the first, he said, that they
-came with dishonest purposes, but now the thing was clear,—nothing
-else could be meant by this desire to treat with some few men apart
-from the general public. If they had really any fair proposition to
-make, he called upon them to proclaim it openly to all. But this
-the envoys could not bring themselves to do. They had probably come
-with authority to make certain concessions, but to announce these
-concessions forthwith would have rendered negotiation impossible,
-besides dishonoring them in the face of their allies. Such dishonor
-would be incurred, too, without any advantage, if the Athenians
-should after all reject the terms, which the temper of the assembly
-before them rendered but too probable. Moreover, they were totally
-unpractised in the talents for dealing with a public assembly,
-such discussions being so rare as to be practically unknown in the
-Lacedæmonian system. To reply to the denunciation of a vehement
-speaker like Kleon, required readiness of elocution, dexterity, and
-self-command, which they had had no opportunity of acquiring. They
-remained silent,—abashed by the speaker and intimidated by the temper
-of the assembly: their mission was thus terminated, and they were
-reconveyed in the trireme to Pylus.[528]
-
-  [528] Thucyd. iv, 22.
-
-It is probable that if these envoys had been able to make an
-effective reply to Kleon, and to defend their proposition against
-his charge of fraudulent purpose, they would have been sustained
-by Nikias and a certain number of leading Athenians, so that the
-assembly might have been brought at least to try the issue of a
-private discussion between diplomatic agents on both sides. But
-the case was one in which it was absolutely necessary that the
-envoys should stand forward with some defence for themselves; which
-Nikias might effectively second, but could not originate: and as
-they were incompetent to this task, the whole affair broke down.
-We shall hereafter find other examples, in which the incapacity
-of Lacedæmonian envoys, to meet the open debate of Athenian
-political life, is productive of mischievous results. In this case,
-the proposition of the envoys to enter into treaty with select
-commissioners, was not only quite reasonable, but afforded the
-only possibility—though doubtless not a certainty—of some ultimate
-pacification: and the manœuvre whereby Kleon discredited it was
-a grave abuse of publicity, not unknown in modern, though more
-frequent in ancient, political life. Kleon probably thought that
-if commissioners were named, Nikias, Lachês, and other politicians
-of the same rank and color, would be the persons selected; persons
-whose anxiety for peace and alliance with Sparta would make them
-over-indulgent and careless in securing the interests of Athens: and
-it will be seen, when we come to describe the conduct of Nikias four
-years afterwards, that this suspicion was not ill-grounded.
-
-Unfortunately Thucydidês, in describing the proceedings of this
-assembly, so important in its consequences because it intercepted a
-promising opening for peace, is brief as usual,—telling us only what
-was said by Kleon and what was decided by the assembly. But though
-nothing is positively stated respecting Nikias and his partisans,
-we learn from other sources, and we may infer from what afterwards
-occurred, that they vehemently opposed Kleon, and that they looked
-coldly on the subsequent enterprise against Sphakteria as upon his
-peculiar measure.[529]
-
-  [529] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 7; Philochorus, Fragm. 105, ed. Didot.
-
-It has been common to treat the dismissal of the Lacedæmonian envoys
-on this occasion as a peculiar specimen of democratical folly. But
-over-estimation of the prospective chances arising out of success,
-to a degree more extravagant than that of which Athens was now
-guilty, is by no means peculiar to democracy. Other governments,
-opposed to democracy not less in temper than in form,—an able
-despot like the emperor Napoleon, and a powerful aristocracy like
-that of England,[530]—have found success to the full as misleading.
-That Athens should desire to profit by this unexpected piece of
-good fortune, was perfectly reasonable: that she should make use
-of it to regain advantages which former misfortunes had compelled
-herself to surrender, was a feeling not unnatural. And whether the
-demand was excessive, or by how much, is a question always among
-the most embarrassing for any government—kingly, oligarchical, or
-democratical—to determine.
-
-  [530] Let us read some remarks of Mr. Burke on the temper of
-  England during the American war.
-
-  “You remember that in the beginning of this American war,
-  you were greatly divided: and a very strong body, if not the
-  strongest, opposed itself to the madness which every art and
-  every power were employed to render popular, in order that the
-  errors of the rulers might be lost in the general blindness of
-  the nation. This opposition continued until after our great,
-  but most unfortunate, victory at Long Island. Then all the
-  mounds and banks of our constancy were borne down at once; and
-  the frenzy of the American war broke in upon us like a deluge.
-  This victory, which seemed to put an immediate end to all
-  difficulties, perfected in us that spirit of domination which our
-  unparalleled prosperity had but too long nurtured. We had been
-  so very powerful, and so very prosperous, that even the humblest
-  of us were degraded into the devices and follies of kings. We
-  lost all measure between means and ends; and our headlong desires
-  became our politics and our morals. All men who wished for peace,
-  or retained any sentiments of moderation, were overborne or
-  silenced: and this city (Bristol) was led by every artifice (and
-  probably with the more management, because _I_ was one of your
-  members) to distinguish itself by its zeal for that fatal cause.”
-  Burke, Speech to the Electors of Bristol previous to the election
-  (Works, vol. iii, p. 365).
-
-  Compare Mr. Burke’s Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, p. 174 of
-  the same volume.
-
-We may, however, remark that Kleon gave an impolitic turn to Athenian
-feeling, by directing it towards the entire and literal reacquisition
-of what had been lost twenty years before. Unless we are to consider
-his quadruple demand as a flourish, to be modified by subsequent
-negotiation, it seems to present some plausibility, but little of
-long-sighted wisdom: for while, on the one hand, it called upon
-Sparta to give up much which was not in her possession and must have
-been extorted by force from allies,—on the other hand, the situation
-of Athens was not the same as it had been when she concluded the
-thirty years’ truce; nor does it seem that the restoration of Achaia
-and Trœzen would have been of any material value to her. Nisæa and
-Pegæ—which would have been tantamount to the entire Megarid, inasmuch
-as Megara itself could hardly have been held with both its ports in
-the possession of an enemy—would, indeed, have been highly valuable,
-since she could then have protected her territory against invasion
-from Peloponnesus, besides possessing a port in the Corinthian gulf.
-And it would seem that if able commissioners had now been named for
-private discussion with the Lacedæmonian envoys, under the present
-urgent desire of Sparta, coupled with her disposition to abandon her
-allies,—this important point might possibly have been pressed and
-carried, in exchange for Sphakteria. Nay, even if such acquisition
-had been found impracticable, still, the Athenians would have been
-able to effect some arrangement which would have widened the breach,
-and destroyed the confidence, between Sparta and her allies; a point
-of great moment for them to accomplish. There was therefore every
-reason for trying what could be done by negotiation, under the
-present temper of Sparta; and the step, by which Kleon abruptly broke
-off such hopes, was decidedly mischievous.
-
-On the return of the envoys without success to Pylus,[531] twenty
-days after their departure from that place, the armistice immediately
-terminated; and the Lacedæmonians redemanded the triremes which
-they had surrendered. But Eurymedon refused compliance with this
-demand, alleging that the Lacedæmonians had, during the truce, made
-a fraudulent attempt to surprise the rock of Pylus, and had violated
-the stipulations in other ways besides; while it stood expressly
-stipulated in the truce, that the violation by either side even of
-the least among its conditions, should cancel all obligation on both
-sides. Thucydidês, without distinctly giving his opinion, seems
-rather to imply, that there was no just ground for the refusal:
-though if any accidental want of vigilance had presented to the
-Lacedæmonians an opportunity for surprising Pylus, they would be
-likely enough to avail themselves of it, seeing that they would
-thereby drive off the Athenian fleet from its only landing-place, and
-render the continued blockade of Sphakteria impracticable. However
-the truth may be, Eurymedon persisted in his refusal, in spite of
-loud protests of the Lacedæmonians against his perfidy. Hostilities
-were energetically resumed: the Lacedæmonian army on land began again
-to attack the fortifications of Pylus, while the Athenian fleet
-became doubly watchful in the blockade of Sphakteria, in which they
-were reinforced by twenty fresh ships from Athens, making a fleet of
-seventy triremes in all. Two ships were perpetually rowing round the
-island in opposite directions, throughout the whole day; while at
-night, the whole fleet were kept on watch, except on the sea-side of
-the island in stormy weather.[532]
-
-  [531] Thucyd. iv, 39.
-
-  [532] Thucyd. iv, 23.
-
-The blockade, however, was soon found to be more full of privation
-in reference to the besiegers themselves, and more difficult of
-enforcement in respect to the island and its occupants, than had been
-originally contemplated. The Athenians were much distressed for want
-of water; they had only one really good spring in the fortification
-of Pylus itself, quite insufficient for the supply of a large fleet:
-many of them were obliged to scrape the shingle and drink such
-brackish water as they could find; while ships as well as men were
-perpetually afloat, since they could take rest and refreshment only
-by relays successively landing on the rock of Pylus, or even on the
-edge of Sphakteria itself, with all the chance of being interrupted
-by the enemy,—there being no other landing-place,[533] and the
-ancient trireme affording no accommodation either for eating or
-sleeping. At first, all this was patiently borne, in the hopes that
-Sphakteria would speedily be starved out, and the Spartans forced
-to renew the request for capitulation: but no such request came,
-and the Athenians in the fleet gradually became sick in body as well
-as impatient and angry in mind. In spite of all their vigilance,
-clandestine supplies of provisions continually reached the island,
-under the temptation of large rewards offered by the Spartan
-government. Able swimmers contrived to cross the strait, dragging
-after them by ropes skins full of linseed and poppy-seed mixed with
-honey; while merchant vessels, chiefly manned by Helots, started
-from various parts of the Laconian coast, selecting by preference
-the stormy nights, and encountering every risk in order to run their
-vessel with its cargo ashore on the sea-side of the island, at a time
-when the Athenian guard-ships could not be on the lookout.[534] They
-cared little about damage to their vessel in landing, provided they
-could get the cargo on shore; for ample compensation was insured to
-them, together with emancipation to every Helot who succeeded in
-reaching the island with a supply. Though the Athenians redoubled
-their vigilance, and intercepted many of these daring smugglers,
-still, there were others who eluded them: moreover, the rations
-supplied to the island by stipulation during the absence of the
-envoys in their journey to Athens had been so ample, that Epitadas
-the commander had been able to economize, and thus to make the stock
-hold out longer. Week after week passed without any symptoms of
-surrender, and the Athenians not only felt the present sufferings
-of their own position, but also became apprehensive for their own
-supplies, all brought by sea round Peloponnesus to this distant
-and naked shore. They began even to mistrust the possibility of
-thus indefinitely continuing the blockade against the contingencies
-of such violent weather, as would probably ensue at the close of
-summer. In this state of weariness and uncertainty, the active
-Demosthenês began to organize a descent upon the island, with the
-view of carrying it by force. He not only sent for forces from the
-neighboring allies, Zakynthus and Naupaktus, but also transmitted an
-urgent request to Athens that reinforcements might be furnished to
-him for the purpose, making known explicitly both the uncomfortable
-condition of the armament, and the unpromising chances of simple
-blockade.[535]
-
-  [533] Thucyd. iv, 25. τῶν νεῶν οὐκ ἐχούσων ὅρμον. This does not
-  mean (as some of the commentators seem to suppose, see Poppo’s
-  note) that the Athenians had not plenty of sea-room in the
-  harbor: it means, that they had no station ashore, except the
-  narrow space of Pylus itself.
-
-  [534] Thucyd. iv, 26.
-
-  [535] Thucyd. iv, 27, 29, 30.
-
-The arrival of these envoys caused infinite mortification to the
-Athenians at home. Having expected to hear, long before, that
-Sphakteria had surrendered, they were now taught to consider even
-the ultimate conquest as a matter of doubt: they were surprised that
-the Lacedæmonians sent no fresh envoys to solicit peace, and began
-to suspect that such silence was founded upon well-grounded hopes of
-being able to hold out. But the person most of all discomposed was
-Kleon, who observed that the people now regretted their insulting
-repudiation of the Lacedæmonian message, and were displeased with him
-as the author of it; while, on the contrary, his numerous political
-enemies were rejoiced at the turn which events had taken, as it
-opened a means of effecting his ruin. At first, Kleon contended
-that the envoys had misrepresented the state of facts; to which the
-latter replied by entreating, that if their accuracy were mistrusted,
-commissioners of inspection might be sent to verify it; and Kleon
-himself, along with Theogonês, was forthwith named for this function.
-
-But it did not suit Kleon’s purpose to go as commissioner to Pylus,
-since his mistrust of the statement was a mere general suspicion,
-not resting on any positive evidence: moreover, he saw that the
-dispositions of the assembly tended to comply with the request of
-Demosthenês, and to despatch a reinforcing armament. He accordingly
-altered his tone at once: “If ye really believe the story (he
-said), do not waste time in sending commissioners, but sail at once
-to capture the men. It would be easy with a proper force, if our
-generals were _men_ (here he pointed reproachfully to his enemy
-Nikias, then stratêgus[536]), to sail and take the soldiers in the
-island. That is what _I_ at least would do, if _I_ were general.”
-His words instantly provoked a hostile murmur from a portion of the
-assembly: “Why do you not sail then at once, if you think the matter
-so easy?” while Nikias, taking up this murmur, and delighted to have
-caught his political enemy in a trap, stood forward in person, and
-pressed him to set about the enterprise without delay; intimating the
-willingness of himself and his colleagues to grant him any portion
-of the military force of the city which he chose to ask for. Kleon
-at first closed with this proposition, believing it to be a mere
-stratagem of debate and not seriously intended: but so soon as he
-saw that what was said was really meant, he tried to back out, and
-observed to Nikias: “It is your place to sail: _you_ are general,
-not I.”[537] Nikias only replied by repeating his exhortation,
-renouncing formally the command against Sphakteria, and calling upon
-the Athenians to recollect what Kleon had said, as well as to hold
-him to his engagement. The more Kleon tried to evade the duty, the
-louder and more unanimous did the cry of the assembly become that
-Nikias should surrender it to him, and that _he_ should undertake
-it. At last, seeing that there was no possibility of receding,
-Kleon reluctantly accepted the charge, and came forward to announce
-his intention in a resolute address: “I am not at all afraid of
-the Lacedæmonians (he said): I shall sail without even taking with
-me any of the hoplites from the regular Athenian muster-roll, but
-only the Lemnian and Imbrian hoplites who are now here (that is,
-Athenian kleruchs or out-citizens who had properties in Lemnos and
-Imbros, and habitually resided there), together with some peltasts,
-brought from Ænos, in Thrace, and four hundred bowmen. With this
-force, added to what is already at Pylos, I engage in the space of
-twenty days either to bring the Lacedæmonians in Sphakteria hither
-as prisoners, or to kill them in the island.” The Athenians—observes
-Thucydidês—laughed somewhat at Kleon’s looseness of tongue; but
-prudent men had pleasure in reflecting that one or other of the two
-advantages was now certain: either they would get rid of Kleon,
-which they anticipated as the issue at once most probable and most
-desirable,—or, if mistaken on this point, the Lacedæmonians in the
-island would be killed or taken.[538] The vote was accordingly passed
-for the immediate departure of Kleon, who caused Demosthenês to be
-named as his colleague in command, and sent intelligence to Pylus at
-once that he was about to start with the reinforcement solicited.
-
-  [536] Thucyd. iv, 27. Καὶ ἐς Νικίαν τὸν Νικηράτου στρατηγὸν ὄντα
-  ἀπεσήμαινεν, ἐχθρὸς ὢν καὶ ἐπιτιμῶν—ῥᾴδιον εἶναι παρασκευῇ, εἰ
-  ἄνδρες εἶεν οἱ στρατηγοὶ, πλεύσαντας λαβεῖν τοὺς ἐν τῇ νήσῳ· καὶ
-  αὐτός γ᾽ ἂν, εἰ ἦρχε, ποιῆσαι τοῦτο. Ὁ δὲ Νικίας τῶν τε Ἀθηναίων
-  τι ὑποθορυβησάντων ἐς τὸν Κλέωνα, ὅτι οὐ καὶ νῦν πλεῖ, εἰ ῥᾴδιόν
-  γε αὐτῷ φαίνεται· καὶ ἅμα ὁρῶν αὐτὸν ἐπιτιμῶντα, ἐκέλευεν ἥντινα
-  βούλεται δύναμιν λαβόντα τὸ ἐπὶ σφᾶς εἶναι, ἐπιχειρεῖν.
-
-  [537] Thucyd. iv, 28. ὁ δὲ (Κλέων) τὸ μὲν πρῶτον οἰόμενος
-  αὐτὸν (Νικίαν) λόγῳ μόνον ἀφιέναι, ἑτοῖμος ἦν, γνοὺς δὲ τῷ
-  ὄντι παραδωσείοντα ἀνεχώρει, καὶ οὐκ ἔφη αὐτὸς ἀλλ᾽ ἐκεῖνον
-  στρατηγεῖν, δεδιὼς ἤδη καὶ οὐκ ἂν οἰόμενός οἱ αὐτὸν τολμῆσαι
-  ὑποχωρῆσαι. Αὖθις δὲ ὁ Νικίας ἐκέλευε καὶ ἐξίστατο τῆς ἐπὶ
-  Πύλῳ ἀρχῆς, καὶ μάρτυρας τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἐποιεῖτο. Οἱ δὲ, ~οἷον
-  ὄχλος φιλεῖ ποιεῖν~, ὅσῳ μᾶλλον ὁ Κλέων ὑπέφευγε τὸν πλοῦν καὶ
-  ἐξανεχώρει τὰ εἰρημένα, τόσῳ ἐπεκελεύοντο τῷ Νικίᾳ παραδιδόναι
-  τὴν ἀρχὴν καὶ ἐκείνῳ ἐπεβόων πλεῖν. Ὥστε οὐκ ἔχων ὅπως τῶν
-  εἰρημένων ἔτι ἐξαπαλλαγῇ, ὑφίσταται τὸν πλοῦν, καὶ παρελθὼν οὔτε
-  φοβεῖσθαι ἔφη Λακεδαιμονίους, etc.
-
-  [538] Thucyd. iv, 28. Τοῖς δὲ Ἀθηναίοις ἐνέπεσε μέν τι καὶ
-  γέλωτος τῇ κουφολογίᾳ αὐτοῦ· ἀσμένοις δ᾽ ὅμως ἐγίγνετο τοῖς
-  σώφροσι τῶν ἀνθρώπων, λογιζομένοις δυοῖν ἀγαθοῖν τοῦ ἑτέρου
-  τεύξεσθαι—ἢ Κλέωνος ἀπαλλαγήσεσθαι, ~ὃ μᾶλλον ἤλπιζον, ἢ σφαλεῖσι
-  γνώμης~ Λακεδαιμονίους σφίσι χειρώσασθαι.
-
-This curious scene, interesting as laying open the interior feeling
-of the Athenian assembly, suggests, when properly considered,
-reflections very different from those which have been usually
-connected with it. It seems to be conceived by most historians as
-a mere piece of levity or folly in the Athenian people, who are
-supposed to have enjoyed the excellent joke of putting an incompetent
-man against his own will at the head of this enterprise, in order
-that they might amuse themselves with his blunders: Kleon is thus
-contemptible, and the Athenian people ridiculous. Certainly, if that
-people had been disposed to conduct their public business upon such
-childish fancies as are here implied, they would have made a very
-different figure from that which history actually presents to us.
-The truth is, that in regard to Kleon’s alleged looseness of tongue,
-which excited more or less of laughter among the persons present,
-there was no one really ridiculous except the laughers themselves:
-for the announcement which he made was so far from being extravagant,
-that it was realized to the letter, and realized, too, let us add,
-without any peculiar aid from unforeseen favorable accident. To show
-how much this is the case, we have only to contrast the jesters
-before the fact with the jesters after it. While the former deride
-Kleon as a promiser of extravagant and impossible results, we find
-Aristophanês, in his comedy of the Knights, about six months
-afterwards,[539] laughing at him as having achieved nothing at
-all,—as having cunningly put himself into the shoes of Demosthenês,
-and stolen away from that general the glory of taking Sphakteria,
-after all the difficulties of the enterprise had been already got
-over, and “the cake ready baked,”—to use the phrase of the comic
-poet. Both of the jests are exaggerations in opposite directions; but
-the last in order of time, if it be good at all against Kleon, is a
-galling sarcasm against those who derided Kleon as an extravagant
-boaster.
-
-  [539] Aristophanês, Equit. 54:—
-
-    ... καὶ πρωήν γ᾽ ἐμοῦ
-    Μᾶζαν μεμαχότος ἐν Πύλῳ Λακωνικὴν,
-    Πανουργότατά πως περιδραμὼν ὑφαρπάσας
-    Αὐτὸς παρέθηκε τὴν ὑπ᾽ ἐμοῦ μεμαγμένην.
-
-  It is Demosthenês who speaks in reference to Kleon,—termed in
-  that comedy the Paphlagonian slave of Demos.
-
-  Compare v. 391,
-
-    Κᾆτ᾽ ἀνὴρ ἔδοξεν εἶναι, τἀλλότριον ἀμὼν θέρος, etc.,
-
-  and 740-1197.
-
-  So far from cunningly thrusting himself into the post as general,
-  Kleon did everything he possibly could to avoid the post, and
-  was only forced into it by the artifices of his enemies. It is
-  important to notice how little the jests of Aristophanês can be
-  taken as any evidence of historical reality.
-
-If we intend fairly to compare the behavior of Kleon with that of his
-political adversaries, we must distinguish between the two occasions:
-first, that in which he had frustrated the pacific mission of the
-Lacedæmonian envoys; next, the subsequent delay and dilemma which has
-been recently described. On the first occasion, his advice appears
-to have been mistaken in policy, as well as offensive in manner:
-his opponents, proposing a discussion by special commissioners as a
-fair chance for honorable terms of peace, took a juster view of the
-public interests. But the case was entirely altered when the mission
-for peace (wisely or unwisely) had been broken up, and when the
-fate of Sphakteria had been committed to the chances of war. There
-were then imperative reasons for prosecuting the war vigorously,
-and for employing all the force requisite to insure the capture of
-that island. And looking to this end, we shall find that there was
-nothing in the conduct of Kleon either to blame or to deride; while
-his political adversaries, Nikias among them, are deplorably timid,
-ignorant, and reckless of the public interest; seeking only to turn
-the existing disappointment and dilemma into a party opportunity for
-ruining him.
-
-To grant the reinforcement asked for by Demosthenês was obviously
-the proper measure, and Kleon saw that the people would go along
-with him in proposing it: but he had at the same time good grounds
-for reproaching Nikias, and the other stratêgi, whose duty it was
-to originate that proposition, with their backwardness in remaining
-silent, and in leaving the matter to go by default, as if it were
-Kleon’s affair and not theirs. His taunt: “This is what _I_ would
-have done, if _I_ were general,” was a mere phrase of the heat of
-debate, such as must have been very often used, without any idea
-on the part of the hearers of construing it as a pledge which the
-speaker was bound to realize: nor was it any disgrace to Kleon to
-decline a charge which he had never sought, and to confess his
-incompetence to command. The reason why he was forced into the
-post, in spite of his own unaffected reluctance, was not, as some
-historians would have us believe, because the Athenian people loved
-a joke, but from two feelings, both perfectly serious, which divided
-the assembly,—feelings opposite in their nature, but coinciding
-on this occasion to the same result. His enemies loudly urged him
-forward, anticipating that the enterprise under him would miscarry,
-and that he would thus be ruined: his friends, perceiving this
-manœuvre, but not sharing in such anticipations, and ascribing
-his reluctance to modesty, pronounced themselves so much the more
-vehemently on behalf of their leader, and repaid the scornful cheer
-by cheers of sincere encouragement. “Why do you not try your hand at
-this enterprise, Kleon, if you think it so easy? You will soon find
-that it is too much for you;” was the cry of his enemies: to which
-his friends would reply: “Yes, to be sure, try, Kleon: by all means,
-try: do not be backward; we warrant that you will come honorably out
-of it, and we will stand by you.” Such cheer and counter-cheer is
-precisely in the temper of an animated multitude, as Thucydidês[540]
-states it, divided in feeling; and friends as well as enemies thus
-concurred to impose upon Kleon a compulsion not to be eluded. Of
-all the parties here concerned those whose conduct is the most
-unpardonably disgraceful are Nikias and his oligarchical friends;
-who force a political enemy into a supreme command against his own
-strenuous protest, persuaded that he will fail so as to compromise
-the lives of many soldiers, and the destinies of the state on an
-important emergency,—but satisfying themselves with the idea that
-they shall bring him to disgrace and ruin.
-
-  [540] Thucyd. iv, 28. οἷον ὄχλος φιλεῖ ποιεῖν, etc.
-
-It is to be remarked, that Nikias and his fellow stratêgi were
-backward on this occasion, partly because they were really afraid of
-the duty. They anticipated a resistance to the death at Sphakteria,
-such as that at Thermopylæ: in which case, though victory might
-perhaps be won by a superior assailant force, it would not be won
-without much bloodshed and peril, besides an inexpiable quarrel with
-Sparta. If Kleon took a more correct measure of the chances, he ought
-to have credit for it, as one “bene ausus vana contemnere.” And it
-seems probable, that if he had not been thus forward in supporting
-the request of Demosthenês for reinforcement,—or rather, if he had
-not been so placed that he was compelled to be forward,—Nikias and
-his friends would have laid aside the enterprise, and reopened
-negotiations for peace, under circumstances neither honorable nor
-advantageous to Athens. Kleon was in this manner one main author of
-the most important success which Athens obtained throughout the whole
-war.
-
-On joining Demosthenês with his reinforcement, Kleon found every
-preparation for attack made by that general, and the soldiers at
-Pylus eager to commence such aggressive measures as would relieve
-them from the tedium of a blockade. Sphakteria had become recently
-more open to assault in consequence of an accidental conflagration of
-the wood, arising from a fire kindled by the Athenian seamen, while
-landing at the skirt of the island, and cooking their food: under the
-influence of a strong wind, most of the wood in the island had thus
-caught fire and been destroyed. To Demosthenês this was an accident
-especially welcome; for the painful experience of his defeat in the
-forest-covered hills of Ætolia had taught him how difficult it was
-for assailants to cope with an enemy whom they could not see, and
-who knew all the good points of defence in the country.[541] The
-island being thus stripped of its wood, he was enabled to survey
-the garrison, to count their number, and to lay his plan of attack
-on certain data. He now, too, for the first time, discovered that
-he had underrated their real number, having before suspected that
-the Lacedæmonians had sent in rations for a greater total than was
-actually there. The island was occupied altogether by four hundred
-and twenty Lacedæmonian hoplites, out of whom more than one hundred
-and twenty were native Spartans, belonging to the first families
-in the city. The commander, Epitadas, with the main body, occupied
-the centre of the island, near the only spring of water which it
-afforded:[542] an advanced guard of thirty hoplites was posted not
-far from the sea-shore, in the end of the island farthest from
-Pylus; while the end immediately fronting Pylus, peculiarly steep
-and rugged, and containing even a rude circuit of stones, of unknown
-origin, which served as a sort of defence, was held as a post of
-reserve.[543]
-
-  [541] Thucyd. iv, 30.
-
-  [542] Colonel Leake gives an interesting illustration of these
-  particulars in the topography of the island which may even now be
-  verified (Travels in Morea, vol. i, p. 408).
-
-  [543] Thucyd. iv, 31.
-
-Such was the prey which Kleon and Demosthenês were anxious to grasp.
-On the very day of the arrival of the former, they sent a herald to
-the Lacedæmonian generals on the mainland, inviting the surrender of
-the hoplites on the island, on condition of being simply detained
-under guard without any hardship, until a final pacification should
-take place. Of course the summons was refused; after which, leaving
-only one day for repose, the two generals took advantage of the night
-to put all their hoplites aboard a few triremes, making show as if
-they were merely commencing the ordinary nocturnal circumnavigation,
-so as to excite no suspicion in the occupants of the island. The
-entire body of Athenian hoplites, eight hundred in number, were thus
-disembarked in two divisions, one on each side of the island, a
-little before daybreak: the advanced guard of thirty Lacedæmonians,
-completely unprepared, were surprised even in their sleep and all
-slain.[544] At the point of day, the entire remaining force from
-the seventy-two triremes was also disembarked, leaving on board
-only the thalamii, or lowest tier of rowers, and reserving only a
-sufficient number to man the walls of Pylus. Altogether, there could
-not have been less than ten thousand troops employed in the attack of
-the island,—men of all arms: eight hundred hoplites, eight hundred
-peltasts, eight hundred bowmen; the rest armed with javelins, slings,
-and stones. Demosthenês kept his hoplites in one compact body, but
-distributed the light-armed into separate companies of about two
-hundred men each, with orders to occupy the rising grounds all round,
-and harass the flanks and rear of the Lacedæmonians.[545]
-
-  [544] Thucyd. iv, 32.
-
-  [545] Thucyd. iv, 32.
-
-To resist this large force, the Lacedæmonian commander Epitadas had
-only three hundred and sixty hoplites around him; for his advanced
-guard of thirty men had been slain, and as many more must have been
-held in reserve to guard the rocky station in his rear: of the Helots
-who were with him, Thucydidês says nothing, during the whole course
-of the action. As soon as he saw the numbers and disposition of his
-enemies, Epitadas placed his men in battle array, and advanced to
-encounter the main body of hoplites whom he saw before him. But the
-Spartan march was habitually slow:[546] moreover, the ground was
-rough and uneven, obstructed with stumps, and overlaid with dust and
-ashes, from the recently burnt wood, so that a march at once rapid
-and orderly was hardly possible: and he had to traverse the whole
-intermediate space, since the Athenian hoplites remained immovable
-in their position. No sooner had his march commenced, than he found
-himself assailed both in rear and flanks, especially in the right
-or unshielded flank, by the numerous companies of light-armed.[547]
-Notwithstanding their extraordinary superiority of number, these men
-were at first awe-stricken at finding themselves in actual contest
-with Lacedæmonian hoplites:[548] still, they began the fight, poured
-in their missile weapons, and so annoyed the march that the hoplites
-were obliged to halt, while Epitadas ordered the most active among
-them to spring out of their ranks and repel the assailants. But
-pursuers with spear and shield had little chance of overtaking men
-lightly clad and armed, who always retired, in whatever direction
-the pursuit was commenced, had the advantage of difficult ground,
-redoubled their annoyance against the rear of the pursuers as soon as
-the latter retreated to resume their place in the ranks, and always
-took care to get round to the rear of the hoplites.
-
-  [546] Thucyd. v, 71.
-
-  [547] Thucyd. iv, 33.
-
-  [548] Thucyd. iv, 33. ὥσπερ ὅτε πρῶτον ἀπέβαινον ~τῇ γνώμῃ
-  δεδουλωμένοι~ ὡς ἐπὶ Λακεδαιμονίους, etc.
-
-After some experience of the inefficacy of Lacedæmonian pursuit, the
-light-armed, becoming far bolder than at first, closed upon them
-nearer and more universally, with arrows, javelins, and stones,
-raising shouts and clamor that rent the air, rendering the word of
-command inaudible by the Lacedæmonian soldiers, who at the same time
-were almost blinded by the thick clouds of dust, kicked up from the
-recently spread wood-ashes.[549] Such method of fighting was one
-for which the Lykurgean drill made no provision, and the longer it
-continued the more painful did the embarrassment of the exposed
-hoplites become: their repeated efforts to destroy or even to reach
-nimble and ever-returning enemies, all proved abortive, whilst their
-own numbers were incessantly diminished by wounds which they could
-not return. Their only offensive arms consisted of the long spear and
-short sword usual to the Grecian hoplite, without any missile weapons
-whatever; nor could they even pick up and throw back the javelins
-of their enemies, since the points of these javelins commonly broke
-off and stuck in the shields, or sometimes even in the body which
-they had wounded. Moreover, the bows of the archers, doubtless
-carefully selected before starting from Athens, were powerfully
-drawn, so that their arrows may sometimes have pierced and inflicted
-wounds even through the shield or the helmet,—but at any rate, the
-stuffed doublet, which formed the only defence of the hoplite on his
-unshielded side, was a very inadequate protection against them.[550]
-Under this trying distress did the Lacedæmonians continue for a
-long time, poorly provided for defence, and altogether helpless for
-aggression,—without being able to approach at all nearer to the
-Athenian hoplites. At length the Lacedæmonian commander, seeing that
-his position grew worse and worse, gave orders to close the ranks
-and retreat to the last redoubt in the rear: but this movement was
-not accomplished without difficulty, for the light-armed assailants
-became doubly clamorous and forward, and many wounded men, unable to
-move, or at least to keep in rank, were overtaken and slain.[551]
-
-  [549] Thucyd. iv, 34: compare with this the narrative of the
-  destruction of the Lacedæmonian mora near Lechæum, by Iphikratês
-  and the Peltastæ (Xenophon. Hellen. iv, 5, 11).
-
-  [550] Thucyd. iv, 34. Τό τε ἔργον ἐνταῦθα χαλεπὸν τοῖς
-  Λακεδαιμονίοις καθίστατο· οὔτε γὰρ οἱ πῖλοι ἔστεγον τὰ τοξεύματα,
-  δοράτιά τε ἐναποκέκλαστο βαλλομένων, εἶχον δὲ οὐδὲν σφίσιν
-  αὐτοῖς χρήσασθαι, ἀποκεκλῃμένοι μὲν τῇ ὄψει τοῦ προορᾷν, ὑπὸ δὲ
-  τῆς μείζονος βοῆς τῶν πολεμίων τὰ ἐν αὐτοῖς παραγγελλόμενα οὐκ
-  ἐσακούοντες, κινδύνου δὲ πανταχόθεν περιεστῶτος, καὶ οὐκ ἔχοντες
-  ἐλπίδα καθ᾽ ὅ,τι χρὴ ἀμυνομένους σωθῆναι.
-
-  There has been doubt and difficulty in this passage, even from
-  the time of the Scholiasts. Some commentators have translated
-  πῖλοι _caps_ or _hats_,—others, _padded cuirasses_ of wool or
-  felt, round the breast and back: see the notes of Duker, Dr.
-  Arnold, Poppo, and Göller. That the word πῖλος is sometimes used
-  for the helmet, or head-piece, is unquestionable,—sometimes even
-  (with or without χαλκοὺς) for a brazen helmet (see Aristophan.
-  Lysis. 562; Antiphanês ap. Athenæ. xi, p. 503); but I cannot
-  think that on this occasion Thucydidês would specially indicate
-  the head of the Lacedæmonian hoplite as his chief vulnerable
-  part. Dr. Arnold, indeed, offers a reason to prove that he
-  might naturally do so; but in my judgment the reason is very
-  insufficient.
-
-  Πῖλοι means stuffed clothing of wool or felt, whether employed
-  to protect head, body, or feet: and I conceive, with Poppo
-  and others, that it here indicates the body-clothing of the
-  Lacedæmonian hoplite; his body being the part most open to be
-  wounded on the side undefended by the shield, as well as in the
-  rear. That the word πῖλοι will bear this sense may be seen in
-  Pollux, vii, 171; Plato, Timæus, p. 74; and Symposion, p. 220,
-  c. 35: respecting πῖλος as applied to the foot-covering,—Bekker,
-  Chariklês, vol. ii, p. 376.
-
-  [551] Thucyd. iv, 35.
-
-A diminished remnant, however, reached the last post in safety, and
-they were here in comparative protection, since the ground was so
-rocky and impracticable that their enemies could not attack them
-either in flank or rear: though the position at any rate could not
-have been long tenable separately, inasmuch as the only spring of
-water in the island was in the centre, which they had just been
-compelled to abandon. The light-armed being now less available,
-Demosthenês and Kleon brought up their eight hundred Athenian
-hoplites, who had not before been engaged; but the Lacedæmonians
-were here at home[552] with their weapons, and enabled to display
-their well-known superiority against opposing hoplites, especially
-as they had the advantage of higher ground against enemies charging
-from beneath. Although the Athenians were double their own numbers
-and withal yet unexhausted, they were repulsed in many successive
-attacks. The besieged maintained their ground in spite of all their
-previous fatigue and suffering, harder to be borne from the scanty
-diet on which they had recently subsisted. The struggle lasted so
-long that heat and thirst began to tell even upon the assailants,
-when the commander of the Messenians came to Kleon and Demosthenês,
-and intimated that they were now laboring in vain; promising at
-the same time that if they would confide to him a detachment of
-light troops and bowmen, he would find his way round to the higher
-cliffs, in the rear of the assailants.[553] He accordingly stole
-away unobserved from the rear, scrambling round over pathless crags,
-and by an almost impracticable footing on the brink of the sea,
-amidst approaches which the Lacedæmonians had left unguarded, never
-imagining that they could be molested in that direction. He suddenly
-appeared with his detachment on the higher peak above them, so that
-their position was thus commanded, and they found themselves, as at
-Thermopylæ, between two fires, without any hope of escape. Their
-enemies in front, encouraged by the success of the Messenians,
-pressed forward with increased ardor, until at length the courage of
-the Lacedæmonians gave way, and the position was carried.[554]
-
-  [552] Thucyd. iv, 33. τῇ σφετέρᾳ ἐμπειρίᾳ χρήσασθαι, etc.
-
-  [553] Thucyd. iv, 36.
-
-  [554] Thucyd. iv, 37.
-
-A few moments more, and they would have been all overpowered and
-slain, when Kleon and Demosthenês, anxious to carry them as prisoners
-to Athens, constrained their men to halt, and proclaimed by herald
-an invitation to surrender, on condition of delivering up their
-arms and being held at the disposal of the Athenians. Most of them,
-incapable of farther effort, closed with the proposition forthwith,
-signifying compliance by dropping their shields and waving both
-hands above their heads. The battle being thus ended, Styphon the
-commander—originally only third in command, but now chief, since
-Epitadas had been slain, and the second in command, Hippagretês,
-was lying disabled by wounds on the field—entered into conference
-with Kleon and Demosthenês, and entreated permission to send across
-for orders to the Lacedæmonians on the mainland. The Athenian
-commanders, though refusing this request, sent themselves and
-invited Lacedæmonian heralds over from the mainland, through whom
-communications were exchanged twice or three times between Styphon
-and the chief Lacedæmonian authorities. At length the final message
-came: “The Lacedæmonians direct you to take counsel for yourselves,
-but to do nothing disgraceful.”[555] Their counsel was speedily
-taken; they surrendered themselves and delivered up their arms; two
-hundred and ninety-two in number, the survivors of the original
-total of four hundred and twenty. And out of these, no less than
-one hundred and twenty were native Spartans, some of them belonging
-to the first families in the city.[556] They were kept under guard
-during that night, and distributed on the morrow among the Athenian
-trierarchs to be conveyed as prisoners to Athens; while a truce was
-granted to the Lacedæmonians on shore, in order that they might carry
-across the dead bodies for burial. So careful had Epitadas been
-in husbanding the provisions, that some food was yet found in the
-island; though the garrison had subsisted for fifty-two days upon
-casual supplies, aided by such economies as had been laid by during
-the twenty days of the armistice, when food of a stipulated quantity
-was regularly furnished. Seventy-two days had thus elapsed, from the
-first imprisonment in the island to the hour of their surrender.[557]
-
-  [555] Thucyd. iv. 38. Οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι κελεύουσιν ὑμᾶς αὐτοὺς
-  περὶ ὑμῶν αὐτῶν βουλεύεσθαι, μηδὲν αἰσχρὸν ποιοῦντας.
-
-  [556] Thucyd. iv, 38; v, 15.
-
-  [557] Thucyd. iv, 39.
-
-The best troops in modern times would neither incur reproach, nor
-occasion surprise, by surrendering, under circumstances in all
-respects similar to this gallant remnant in Sphakteria. Yet in Greece
-the astonishment was prodigious and universal, when it was learned
-that the Lacedæmonians had consented to become prisoners:[558] for
-the terror inspired by their name, and the deep-struck impression of
-Thermopylæ, had created a belief that they would endure any extremity
-of famine, and perish in the midst of any superiority of hostile
-force, rather than dream of giving up their arms and surviving as
-captives. The events of Sphakteria, shocking as they did this
-preconceived idea, discredited the military prowess of Sparta in the
-eyes of all Greece, and especially in those of her own allies. Even
-in Sparta itself, too, the same feeling prevailed,—partially revealed
-in the answer transmitted to Styphon from the generals on shore,
-who did not venture to forbid surrender, yet discountenanced it by
-implication: and it is certain that the Spartans would have lost less
-by their death than by their surrender. But we read with disgust
-the spiteful taunt of one of the allies of Athens (not an Athenian)
-engaged in the affair, addressed in the form of a question to one of
-the prisoners: “Have your best men then been all slain?” The reply
-conveyed an intimation of the standing contempt entertained by the
-Lacedæmonians for the bow and its chance-strokes in the line: “That
-would be a capital arrow which could single out the best man.” The
-language which Herodotus puts into the mouth of Demaratus, composed
-in the early years of the Peloponnesian war, attests this same belief
-in Spartan valor: “The Lacedæmonians die, but never surrender.”[559]
-Such impression was from henceforward, not indeed effaced, but
-sensibly enfeebled, and never again was it restored to its former
-pitch.
-
-  [558] Thucyd. iv, 40. παρὰ γνώμην τε δὴ μάλιστα τῶν κατὰ τὸν
-  πόλεμον τοῦτο τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐγένετο, etc.
-
-  [559] To adopt a phrase, the counterpart of that which has been
-  ascribed to the Vieille Garde of the Emperor Napoleon’s army;
-  compare Herodot. vii, 104.
-
-But the general judgment of the Greeks respecting the capture
-of Sphakteria, remarkable as it is to commemorate, is far less
-surprising than that pronounced by Thucydidês himself. Kleon and
-Demosthenês returning with a part of the squadron and carrying all
-the prisoners, started from Sphakteria on the next day but one after
-the action, and reached Athens within twenty days after Kleon had
-left it. Thus, “the promise of Kleon, _insane as it was_, came true,”
-observes the historian.[560]
-
-  [560] Thucyd. iv, 39. Καὶ τοῦ Κλέωνος ~καίπερ μανιώδης οὖσα ἡ
-  ὑπόσχεσις ἀπέβη~· ἐντὸς γὰρ εἴκοσιν ἡμερῶν ἤγαγε τοὺς ἄνδρας,
-  ὥσπερ ὑπέστη.
-
-  Mr. Mitford, in recounting these incidents, after having
-  said, respecting Kleon: “In a _very extraordinary train of
-  circumstances_ which followed, _his impudence and his fortune_
-  (if, in the want of another, we may use that term) wonderfully
-  favored him,” goes on to observe, two pages farther:—
-
-  “It however soon appeared, that though for a man like Cleon,
-  unversed in military command, the undertaking was rash and the
-  bragging promise abundantly ridiculous, yet the business was not
-  so desperate as it was in the moment generally imagined: and
-  in fact the folly of the Athenian people, in committing such a
-  trust to such a man, far exceeded that of the man himself, whose
-  impudence seldom carried him beyond the control of his cunning.
-  He had received intelligence that Demosthenês had already formed
-  the plan and was preparing for the attempt, with the forces upon
-  the spot and in the neighborhood. Hence, his apparent moderation
-  in the demand for troops; which he judiciously accommodated to
-  the gratification of the Athenian people, by avoiding to require
-  any Athenians. He farther showed his judgment, when the decree
-  was to be passed which was finally to direct the expedition, by
-  a request which was readily granted, that Demosthenês might be
-  joined with him in the command.” (Mitford, Hist. of Greece, vol.
-  iii, ch. xv, sect. vii. pp. 250-253.)
-
-  It appears as if no historian could write down the name of Kleon
-  without attaching to it some disparaging verb or adjective. We
-  are here told in the same sentence that Kleon was an _impudent
-  braggart_ for _promising the execution of the enterprise_,—and
-  yet that the enterprise itself was _perfectly feasible_. We
-  are told in one sentence that he was rash and ridiculous for
-  promising this, _unversed as he was in military command_: a few
-  words farther, we are informed that he expressly requested that
-  the most competent man to be found, Demosthenês, might be named
-  his colleague. We are told of the _cunning of Kleon_, and that
-  _Kleon had received intelligence from Demosthenês_,—as if this
-  were some private communication to himself. But Demosthenês had
-  sent no news to Kleon, nor did Kleon know anything which was not
-  equally known to every man in the assembly. _The folly of the
-  people in committing the trust to Kleon_ is denounced,—as if
-  Kleon had sought it himself, or as if his friends had been the
-  first to propose it for him. If the folly of the people was thus
-  great, what are we to say of the knavery of the oligarchical
-  party, with Nikias at their head, who impelled the people into
-  this folly, for the purpose of ruining a political antagonist,
-  and who forced Kleon into the post against his own most
-  unaffected reluctance? Against this manœuvre of the oligarchical
-  party, neither Mr. Mitford nor any other historian says a word.
-  When Kleon judges circumstances rightly, as Mr. Mitford allows
-  that he did in this case, he has credit for nothing better than
-  _cunning_.
-
-  The truth is, that the people committed no folly in appointing
-  Kleon, for he justified the best expectations of his friends. But
-  Nikias and his friends committed great knavery in proposing it,
-  since they fully believed that he would fail. And, even upon Mr.
-  Mitford’s statement of the case, the opinion of Thucydidês which
-  stands at the beginning of this note is thoroughly unjustifiable;
-  not less unjustifiable than the language of the modern historian
-  about the “extraordinary circumstances,” and the way in which
-  Kleon was “favored by fortune.” Not a single incident can
-  be specified in the narrative to bear out these invidious
-  assertions.
-
-Men with arms in their hands have always the option between death
-and imprisonment, and Grecian opinion was only mistaken in assuming
-as a certainty that the Lacedæmonians would choose the former. But
-Kleon had never promised to bring them home as prisoners: his promise
-was disjunctive,—that they should be either so brought home, or
-slain, within twenty days: and no sentence throughout the whole of
-Thucydidês astonishes me so much as that in which he stigmatizes
-such an expectation as “insane.” Here are four hundred and twenty
-Lacedæmonian hoplites, without any other description of troops to
-aid them,—without the possibility of being reinforced,—without
-any regular fortification,—without any narrow pass, such as that
-of Thermopylæ,—without either a sufficient or a certain supply
-of food,—cooped up in a small open island less than two miles in
-length. Against them are brought ten thousand troops of diverse arms,
-including eight hundred fresh hoplites from Athens, and marshalled
-by Demosthenês, a man alike enterprising and experienced: for the
-talents as well as the presence and preparations of Demosthenês
-are a part of the data of the case, and the personal competence
-of Kleon to command alone, is foreign to the calculation. Now if,
-under such circumstances, Kleon engaged that this forlorn company of
-brave men should be either slain or taken prisoners, how could he
-be looked upon, I will not say as indulging in an insane boast, but
-even as overstepping the most cautious and mistrustful estimate of
-probability? Even to doubt of this result, much more to pronounce
-such an opinion as that of Thucydidês, implies an idea not only of
-superhuman power in the Lacedæmonian hoplites, but of disgraceful
-cowardice on the part of Demosthenês and the assailants. Nor was the
-interval of twenty days, named by Kleon, at all extravagantly narrow,
-considering the distance of Athens from Pylus: for the attack of this
-petty island could not possibly occupy more than one or two days at
-the utmost, though the blockade of it might by various accidents have
-been prolonged, or might even, by some terrible storm, be altogether
-broken off. If, then, we carefully consider this promise made by
-Kleon in the assembly, we shall find that so far from deserving
-the sentence pronounced upon it by Thucydidês, of being a mad boast
-which came true by accident, it was a reasonable and even a modest
-anticipation of the future:[561] reserving the only really doubtful
-point in the case, whether the garrison of the island would be
-ultimately slain or made prisoners. Demosthenês, had he been present
-at Athens instead of being at Pylus, would willingly have set his
-seal to the engagement taken by Kleon.
-
-  [561] The jest of an unknown comic writer (probably Eupolis or
-  Aristophanês, in one of the many lost dramas) against Kleon:
-  “that he showed great powers of prophecy after the fact,” (Κλέων
-  Προμηθεύς ἐστι μετὰ τὰ πράγματα, Lucian, Prometheus, c. 2), may
-  probably have reference to his proceedings about Sphakteria: if
-  so, it is certainly undeserved.
-
-  In the letter which he sent to announce the capture of Sphakteria
-  and the prisoners to the Athenians, it is affirmed that he began
-  with the words—Κλέων Ἀθηναίων τῇ Βουλῇ καὶ τῷ Δήμῳ χαίρειν.
-  This was derided by Eupolis, and is even considered as a piece
-  of insolence, though it is difficult to see why (Schol. ad
-  Aristophan. Plut. 322; Bergk, De Reliquiis Comœdiæ Antiquæ, p.
-  362).
-
-I repeat with reluctance, though not without belief, the statement
-made by one of the biographers of Thucydidês,[562] that Kleon was the
-cause of the banishment of the latter as a general, and has therefore
-received from him harder measure than was due in his capacity
-of historian. But though this sentiment is not probably without
-influence in dictating the unaccountable judgment which I have just
-been criticizing,—as well as other opinions relative to Kleon, on
-which I shall say more in a future chapter,—I nevertheless look upon
-that judgment not as peculiar to Thucydidês, but as common to him
-with Nikias and those whom we must call, for want of a better name,
-the oligarchical party of the time at Athens. And it gives us some
-measure of the prejudice and narrowness of vision which prevailed
-among that party at the present memorable crisis; so pointedly
-contrasting with the clear-sighted and resolute calculations, and the
-judicious conduct in action, of Kleon, who, when forced against his
-will into the post of general, did the very best which could be done
-in his situation,—he selected Demosthenês as colleague and heartily
-seconded his operations. Though the military attack of Sphakteria,
-one of the ablest specimens of generalship in the whole war, and
-distinguished not less by the dextrous employment of different
-descriptions of troops, than by care to spare the lives of the
-assailants,—belongs altogether to Demosthenês, yet if Kleon had not
-been competent to stand up in the Athenian assembly and defy those
-gloomy predictions which we see attested in Thucydidês, Demosthenês
-would never have been reinforced nor placed in condition to land on
-the island. The glory of the enterprise, therefore, belongs jointly
-to both: and Kleon, far from stealing away the laurels of Demosthenês
-(as Aristophanês represents, in his comedy of the Knights), was
-really the means of placing them on his head, though he at the same
-time deservedly shared them. It has hitherto been the practice to
-look at Kleon only from the point of view of his opponents, through
-whose testimony we know him: but the real fact is, that this history
-of the events of Sphakteria, when properly surveyed, is a standing
-disgrace to those opponents and no inconsiderable honor to him;
-exhibiting them as alike destitute of political foresight and of
-straightforward patriotism,—as sacrificing the opportunities of war,
-along with the lives of their fellow-citizens and soldiers, for the
-purpose of ruining a political enemy. It was the duty of Nikias, as
-stratêgus, to propose, and undertake in person if necessary, the
-reduction of Sphakteria: if he thought the enterprise dangerous,
-that was a good reason for assigning to it a larger military force,
-as we shall find him afterwards reasoning about the Sicilian
-expedition,—but not for letting it slip or throwing it off upon
-others.[563]
-
-  [562] Vit. Thucydidis, p. xv, ed. Bekker.
-
-  [563] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 8; Thucyd. v, 7.
-
-The return of Kleon and Demosthenês to Athens, within the twenty
-days promised, bringing with them near three hundred Lacedæmonian
-prisoners, must have been by far the most triumphant and exhilarating
-event which had occurred to the Athenians throughout the whole war.
-It at once changed the prospects, position, and feelings of both
-the contending parties. Such a number of Lacedæmonian prisoners,
-especially one hundred and twenty Spartans, was a source of
-almost stupefaction to the general body of Greeks, and a prize of
-inestimable value to the captors. The return of Demosthenês in the
-preceding year from the Ambrakian gulf, when he brought with him
-three hundred Ambrakian panoplies, had probably been sufficiently
-triumphant; but the entry into Peiræus on this occasion from
-Sphakteria, with three hundred Lacedæmonian prisoners, must doubtless
-have occasioned emotions transcending all former experience; and it
-is much to be regretted that no description is preserved to us of
-the scene, as well as of the elate manifestations of the people when
-the prisoners were marched up from Peiræus to Athens. We should be
-curious, also, to read some account of the first Athenian assembly
-held after this event,—the overwhelming cheers heaped upon Kleon by
-his joyful partisans, who had helped to invest him with the duties of
-general, in confidence that he would discharge them well,—contrasted
-with the silence or retraction of Nikias, and the other humiliated
-political enemies. But all such details are unfortunately denied
-to us, though they constitute the blood and animation of Grecian
-history, now lying before us only in its skeleton.
-
-The first impulse of the Athenians was to regard the prisoners as a
-guarantee to their territory against invasion:[564] they resolved
-to keep them securely guarded until the peace, but if, at any time
-before that event, the Lacedæmonian army should enter Attica, to
-bring forth the prisoners and put them to death in sight of the
-invaders. They were at the same time full of spirits in regard to the
-prosecution of the war, and became farther confirmed in the hope, not
-merely of preserving their power undiminished, but even of recovering
-much of what they had lost before the thirty years’ truce. Pylus was
-placed in an improved state of defence, with the adjoining island of
-Sphakteria, doubtless as a subsidiary occupation: the Messenians,
-transferred thither from Naupaktus, and overjoyed to find themselves
-once more masters even of an outlying rock of their ancestorial
-territory, began with alacrity to overrun and ravage Laconia, while
-the Helots, shaken by the recent events, manifested inclination
-to desert to them. The Lacedæmonian authorities, experiencing
-evils before unfelt and unknown, became sensibly alarmed lest such
-desertions should spread through the country. Reluctant as they were
-to afford obvious evidence of their embarrassments, they nevertheless
-brought themselves, probably under the pressure of the friends and
-relatives of the Sphakterian captives, to send to Athens several
-missions for peace; but all proved abortive.[565] We are not told
-what they offered, but it did not come up to the expectations which
-the Athenians thought themselves entitled to indulge.
-
-  [564] Thucyd. iv, 41.
-
-  [565] Thucyd. iv, 41: compare Aristophan. Equit. 648 with Schol.
-
-We, who now review these facts with a knowledge of the subsequent
-history, see that the Athenians could have concluded a better bargain
-with the Lacedæmonians during the six or eight months succeeding
-the capture of Sphakteria, than it was ever open to them to make
-afterwards; and they had reason to repent that they let slip the
-opportunity. Perhaps also Periklês, had he been still alive, might
-have taken the same prudent measure of the future, and might have had
-ascendency enough over his countrymen to be able to arrest the tide
-of success at its highest point, before it began to ebb again. But if
-we put ourselves back into the situation of Athens during the autumn
-which succeeded the return of Kleon and Demosthenês from Sphakteria,
-we shall easily enter into the feelings under which the war was
-continued. The actual possession of the captives now placed Athens
-in a far better position than she had occupied at a time when they
-were only blocked up in Sphakteria, and when the Lacedæmonian envoys
-first arrived to ask for peace. She was now certain of being able to
-command peace with Sparta on terms at least tolerable, whenever she
-chose to invite it,—she had also a fair certainty of escaping the
-hardship of invasion. Next, and this was perhaps the most important
-feature of the case, the apprehension of Lacedæmonian prowess was now
-greatly lowered, and the prospects of success to Athens considered
-as prodigiously improved,[566] even in the estimation of impartial
-Greeks; much more in the eyes of the Athenians themselves. Moreover,
-the idea of a tide of good fortune, of the favor of the gods, now
-begun and likely to continue, of future success as a corollary
-from past, was one which powerfully affected Grecian calculations
-generally. Why not push the present good fortune, and try to regain
-the most important points lost before and by the thirty years’
-truce, especially in Megara and Bœotia,—points which Sparta could
-not concede by negotiation, since they were not in her possession?
-Though these speculations failed, as we shall see in the coming
-chapter, yet there was nothing unreasonable in undertaking them.
-Probably, the almost universal sentiment of Athens was at this moment
-warlike,—and even Nikias, humiliated as he must have been by the
-success in Sphakteria, would forget his usual caution in the desire
-of retrieving his own personal credit by some military exploit.
-That Demosthenês, now in full measure of esteem, would be eager
-to prosecute the war, with which his prospects of personal glory
-were essentially associated, just as Thucydidês[567] observes about
-Brasidas on the Lacedæmonian side, can admit of no doubt. The comedy
-of Aristophanês, called the Acharnians, was acted about six months
-before the affair of Sphakteria, when no one could possibly look
-forward to such an event,—the comedy of the Knights, about six months
-after it.[568] Now, there is this remarkable difference between the
-two,—that while the former breathes the greatest sickness of war,
-and presses in every possible way the importance of making peace,
-although at that time Athens had an opportunity of coming even to a
-decent accommodation,—the latter, running down Kleon with unmeasured
-scorn and ridicule, talks in one or two places only of the hardships
-of war, and drops altogether that emphasis and repetition with which
-peace had been dwelt upon in the Acharnians,—although coming out at a
-time when peace was within the reach of the Athenians.
-
-  [566] Thucyd. iv, 79.
-
-  [567] Thucyd. v, 16.
-
-  [568] The Acharneis was performed at the festival of the Lenæa,
-  at Athens, January, 425 B.C.: the Knights, at the same festival
-  in the ensuing year, 424 B.C.
-
-  The capture of Sphakteria took place about July, B.C. 425:
-  between the two dates above. See Mr. Clinton’s Fasti Hellenici,
-  ad ann.
-
-To understand properly the history of this period, therefore, we
-must distinguish various occasions which are often confounded.
-At the moment when Sphakteria was first blockaded, and when the
-Lacedæmonians first sent to solicit peace, there was a considerable
-party at Athens disposed to entertain the offer, and the ascendency
-of Kleon was one of the main causes why it was rejected. But after
-the captives were brought home from Sphakteria, the influence of
-Kleon, though positively greater than it had been before, was no
-longer required to procure the dismissal of Lacedæmonian pacific
-offers and the continuance of the war: the general temper of Athens
-was then warlike, and there were very few to contend strenuously for
-an opposite policy. During the ensuing year, however, the chances
-of war turned out mostly unfavorable to Athens, so that by the end
-of that year she had become much more disposed to peace.[569] The
-truce for one year was then concluded,—but even after that truce was
-expired, Kleon still continued eager, and on good grounds, as will
-be shown hereafter, for renewing the war in Thrace, at a time when
-a large proportion of the Athenian public had grown weary of it. He
-was one of the main causes of that resumption of warlike operations,
-which ended in the battle of Amphipolis, fatal both to himself and
-to Brasidas. There were thus two distinct occasions on which the
-personal influence and sanguine character of Kleon seems to have been
-of sensible moment in determining the Athenian public to war instead
-of peace. But at the moment which we have now reached, that is, the
-year immediately following the capture of Sphakteria, the Athenians
-were all sufficiently warlike without him; probably Nikias himself as
-well as the rest.
-
-  [569] Thucyd. iv, 117; v, 14.
-
-It was one of the earliest proceedings of Nikias, immediately
-after the inglorious exhibition which he had made in reference
-to Sphakteria, to conduct an expedition, in conjunction with two
-colleagues, against the Corinthian territory: he took with him eighty
-triremes, two thousand Athenian hoplites, two hundred horsemen aboard
-of some horse transports, and some additional hoplites from Milêtus,
-Andros, and Karystus.[570] Starting from Peiræus in the evening, he
-arrived a little before daybreak on a beach at the foot of the hill
-and village of Solygeia,[571] about seven miles from Corinth, and
-two or three miles south of the isthmus. The Corinthian troops,
-from all the territory of Corinth, within the isthmus, were already
-assembled at the isthmus itself to repel him; for intelligence of
-the intended expedition had reached Corinth some time before from
-Argos, with which latter place the scheme of the expedition may have
-been in some way connected. The Athenians having touched the coast
-during the darkness, the Corinthians were only apprized of the fact
-by fire-signals from Solygeia. Not being able to hinder the landing,
-they despatched forthwith half their forces, under Battus and
-Lykophron, to repel the invader, while the remaining half were left
-at the harbor of Kenchreæ, on the northern side of Mount Oneion, to
-guard the port of Krommyon, outside of the isthmus, in case it should
-be attacked by sea. Battus with one lochus of hoplites threw himself
-into the village of Solygeia, which was unfortified, while Lykophron
-conducted the remaining troops to attack the Athenians. The battle
-was first engaged on the Athenian right, almost immediately after its
-landing, on the point called Chersonesus. Here the Athenian hoplites,
-together with their Karystian allies, repelled the Corinthian attack,
-after a stout and warmly disputed hand-combat of spear and shield:
-but the Corinthians, retreating up to a higher point of ground,
-returned to the charge, and with the aid of a fresh lochus, drove
-the Athenians back to the shore and to their ships: from hence the
-latter again turned, and again recovered a partial advantage.[572]
-The battle was no less severe on the left wing of the Athenians:
-but here, after a contest of some length, the latter gained a more
-decided victory, greatly by the aid of their cavalry,—pursuing the
-Corinthians, who fled in some disorder to a neighboring hill and
-there took up a position.[573] The Athenians were thus victorious
-throughout the whole line, with the loss of about forty-seven men,
-while the Corinthians had lost two hundred and twelve, together with
-the general Lykophron. The victors erected their trophy, stripped the
-dead bodies, and buried their own dead.
-
-  [570] Thucyd. iv, 42. Τοῦ δ᾽ αὐτοῦ θέρους μετὰ ταῦτα ~εὐθὺς~, etc.
-
-  [571] See the geographical illustrations of this descent in Dr.
-  Arnold’s plan and note appended to the second volume of his
-  Thucydidês,—and in Colonel Leake, Travels in Morea, ch. xxviii,
-  p. 235; xxix, p. 309.
-
-  [572] Thucyd. iv, 43.
-
-  [573] Thucyd. iv, 44. ἔθεντο τὰ ὅπλα,—an expression which Dr.
-  Arnold explains, here as elsewhere, to mean “piling the arms:”
-  I do not think such an explanation is correct, even here: much
-  less in several other places to which he alludes. See a note on
-  the surprise of Platæa by the Thebans, immediately before the
-  Peloponnesian war.
-
-The Corinthian detachment left at Kenchreæ could not see the battle,
-in consequence of the interposing ridge of Mount Oneium: but it
-was at last made known to them by the dust of the fugitives, and
-they forthwith hastened to help. Reinforcements also came both
-from Corinth and from Kenchreæ, and as it seemed, too, from the
-neighboring Peloponnesian cities, so that Nikias thought it prudent
-to retire aboard his ships, and halt upon some neighboring islands.
-It was here first discovered that two of the Athenians slain had not
-been picked up for burial; upon which he immediately sent a herald
-to solicit a truce, in order to procure these two missing bodies. We
-have here a remarkable proof of the sanctity attached to that duty;
-for the mere sending of the herald was tantamount to confession of
-defeat.[574]
-
-  [574] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 6.
-
-From hence Nikias sailed to Krommyon, where he ravaged the
-neighborhood for a few hours and rested for the night. On the
-next day he reëmbarked, sailed along the coast of Epidaurus, upon
-which he inflicted some damage in passing, and stopped at last
-on the peninsula of Methana, between Epidaurus and Trœzen.[575]
-On this peninsula he established a permanent garrison, drawing a
-fortification across the narrow neck of land which joined it to the
-Epidaurian peninsula. This was his last exploit, and he then sailed
-home: but the post at Methana long remained as a centre for pillaging
-the neighboring regions of Epidaurus, Trœzen, and Halieis.
-
-  [575] Thucyd. iv, 45.
-
-While Nikias was engaged in this expedition, Eurymedon and Sophoklês
-had sailed forward from Pylus with a considerable portion of that
-fleet which had been engaged in the capture of Sphakteria, to the
-island of Korkyra. It has been already stated that the democratical
-government at Korkyra had been suffering severe pressure and
-privation from the oligarchical fugitives, who had come back into
-the island with a body of barbaric auxiliaries, and established
-themselves upon Mount Istônê, not far from the city.[576] Eurymedon
-and the Athenians joining the Korkyræans in the city, attacked and
-stormed the post on Mount Istônê; while the vanquished, retiring
-first to a lofty and inaccessible peak, were forced to surrender
-themselves on terms to the Athenians. They abandoned their mercenary
-auxiliaries altogether, and only stipulated that they should
-themselves be sent to Athens, and left to the discretion of the
-Athenian people. Eurymedon, assenting to these terms, deposited the
-disarmed prisoners in the neighboring islet of Ptychia, under the
-distinct condition that, if a single man tried to escape, the whole
-capitulation should be null and void.[577]
-
-  [576] Thucyd. iv, 2-45.
-
-  [577] Thucyd. iv, 46.
-
-Unfortunately for these prisoners, the orders given to Eurymedon
-carried him onward straight to Sicily. It was irksome, therefore, to
-him to send away a detachment of his squadron to convey these men to
-Athens,—while the honors of delivering them there would be reaped,
-not by himself, but by the officer to whom they might be confided:
-and the Korkyræans in the city, on their part, were equally anxious
-that the prisoners should not be sent to Athens; for their animosity
-against them was bitter in the extreme, and they were afraid that the
-Athenians might spare their lives, so that their hostility against
-the island might be again resumed. And thus a mean jealousy on the
-part of Eurymedon, combined with revenge and insecurity on the part
-of the victorious Korkyræans, brought about a cruel catastrophe,
-paralleled nowhere else in Greece, though too well in keeping with
-the previous acts of the bloody drama enacted in this island.
-
-The Korkyræan leaders, seemingly not without the privity of
-Eurymedon, sent across to Ptychia fraudulent emissaries under the
-guise of friends to the prisoners. These emissaries—assuring the
-prisoners that the Athenian commanders, in spite of the convention
-signed, were about to hand them over to the Korkyræan people for
-destruction—induced some of them to attempt escape in a boat prepared
-for the purpose. By concert, the boat was seized in the act of
-escaping, so that the terms of the capitulation were really violated:
-upon which Eurymedon handed over the prisoners to their enemies in
-the island, who imprisoned them all together in one vast building,
-under guard of hoplites. From this building they were drawn out
-in companies of twenty men each, chained together in couples, and
-compelled to march between two lines of hoplites marshalled on
-each side of the road. Those who loitered in the march were hurried
-on by whips from behind: as they advanced, their private enemies
-on both sides singled them out, striking and piercing them until
-at length they miserably perished. Three successive companies were
-thus destroyed, ere the remaining prisoners in the interior, who
-thought merely that their place of detention was about to be changed,
-suspected what was passing: at length they found it out, and one
-and all then refused either to quit the building or to permit any
-one else to enter. They at the same time piteously implored the
-intervention of the Athenians, if it were only to kill them, and thus
-preserve them from the cruelties of their merciless countrymen. The
-latter abstained from attempts to force the door of the building,
-but made an aperture in the roof, from whence they shot down arrows,
-and poured showers of tiles, upon the prisoners within; who sought
-at first to protect themselves, but at length abandoned themselves
-to despair, and assisted with their own hands in the work of
-destruction. Some of them pierced their throats with the arrows shot
-down from the roof: others hung themselves, either with cords from
-some bedding which happened to be in the building, or with strips
-torn and twisted from their own garments. Night came on, but the work
-of destruction, both from above and within, was continued without
-intermission, so that before morning all these wretched men perished,
-either by the hands of their enemies or by their own. At daybreak,
-the Korkyræans entered the building, piled up the dead bodies on
-carts, and transported them out of the city: the exact number we are
-not told, but seemingly it cannot have been less than three hundred.
-The women who had been taken at Istônê along with these prisoners,
-were all sold as slaves.[578]
-
-  [578] Thucyd. iv, 47, 48.
-
-Thus finished the bloody dissensions in this ill-fated island: for
-the oligarchical party were completely annihilated, the democracy was
-victorious, and there were no farther violences throughout the whole
-war.[579] It will be recollected that these deadly feuds began with
-the return of the oligarchical prisoners from Corinth, bringing along
-with them projects both of treason and of revolution: they ended
-with the annihilation of that party, in the manner above described;
-the interval being filled by mutual atrocities and retaliation,
-wherein of course the victors had most opportunity of gratifying
-their vindictive passions. Eurymedon, after the termination of these
-events, proceeded onward with the Athenian squadron to Sicily:
-what he did there will be described in a future chapter devoted to
-Sicilian affairs exclusively.
-
-  [579] Thucyd. iv, 48.
-
-The complete prostration of Ambrakia during the campaign of the
-preceding year had left Anaktorium without any defence against the
-Akarnanians and Athenian squadron from Naupaktus. They besieged and
-took it during the course of the present summer;[580] expelling the
-Corinthian proprietors, and repeopling the town and its territory
-with Akarnanian settlers from all the townships in the country.
-
-  [580] Thucyd. iv, 49.
-
-Throughout the maritime empire of Athens matters continued perfectly
-tranquil, except that the inhabitants of Chios, during the course
-of the autumn, incurred the suspicion of the Athenians from having
-recently built a new wall to their city, as if it were done with
-the intention of taking the first opportunity to revolt.[581] They
-solemnly protested their innocence of any such designs, but the
-Athenians were not satisfied without exacting the destruction of the
-obnoxious wall. The presence on the opposite continent of an active
-band of Mitylenæan exiles, who captured both Rhœteium and Antandrus
-during the ensuing spring, probably made the Athenians more anxious
-and vigilant on the subject of Chios.[582]
-
-  [581] Thucyd. iv, 51.
-
-  [582] Thucyd. iv, 52.
-
-The Athenian regular tribute-gathering squadron circulated among the
-maritime subjects, and captured, during the course of the present
-autumn, a prisoner of some importance and singularity. It was a
-Persian ambassador, Artaphernes, seized at Eion on the Strymon,
-in his way to Sparta with despatches from the Great King. He was
-brought to Athens, and his despatches, which were at some length,
-and written in the Assyrian character, were translated and made
-public. The Great King told the Lacedæmonians, in substance, that he
-could not comprehend what they meant; for that among the numerous
-envoys whom they had sent, no two told the same story. Accordingly
-he desired them, if they wished to make themselves understood, to
-send some envoys with fresh and plain instructions to accompany
-Artaphernes.[583] Such was the substance of the despatch, conveying a
-remarkable testimony as to the march of the Lacedæmonian government
-in its foreign policy. Had any similar testimony existed respecting
-Athens, demonstrating that her foreign policy was conducted with
-half as much unsteadiness and stupidity, ample inferences would have
-been drawn from it to the discredit of democracy. But there has been
-no motive generally to discredit Lacedæmonian institutions, which
-included kingship in double measure,—two parallel lines of hereditary
-kings: together with an entire exemption from everything like
-popular discussion. The extreme defects in the foreign management
-of Sparta, revealed by the despatch of Artaphernes, seem traceable
-partly to an habitual faithlessness often noted in the Lacedæmonian
-character, partly to the annual change of ephors, so frequently
-bringing into power men who strove to undo what had been done by
-their predecessors, and still more to the absence of everything like
-discussion or canvass of public measures among the citizens. We
-shall find more than one example, in the history about to follow,
-of this disposition on the part of ephors, not merely to change the
-policy of their predecessors, but even to subvert treaties sworn
-and concluded by them: and such was the habitual secrecy of Spartan
-public business, that in doing this they had neither criticism nor
-discussion to fear. Brasidas, when he started from Sparta on the
-expedition which will be described in the coming chapter, could not
-trust the assurances of the Lacedæmonian executive without binding
-them by the most solemn oaths.[584]
-
-  [583] Thucyd. iv, 50. ἐν αἷς πολλῶν ἄλλων γεγραμμένων κεφάλαιον
-  ἦν, πρὸς Λακεδαιμονίους, οὐκ εἰδέναι ὅ,τι βούλονται· πολλῶν γὰρ
-  ἐλθόντων πρέσβεων οὐδένα ταὐτὰ λέγειν· εἰ οὖν βούλονται σαφὲς
-  λέγειν, πέμψαι μετὰ τοῦ Πέρσου ἄνδρας ὡς αὐτόν.
-
-  [584] Thucyd. iv, 86. ὅρκοις τε Λακεδαιμονίων καταλαβὼν τὰ τέλη
-  τοῖς μεγίστοις, ἦ μὴν, etc.
-
-The Athenians sent back Artaphernes in a trireme to Ephesus, and
-availed themselves of this opportunity for procuring access to the
-Great King. They sent envoys along with him, with the intention that
-they should accompany him up to Susa: but on reaching Asia, the news
-had just arrived that King Artaxerxes had recently died. Under such
-circumstances, it was not judged expedient to prosecute the mission,
-and the Athenians dropped their design.[585]
-
-  [585] Thucyd. iv, 50; Diodor. xii, 64. The Athenians do not
-  appear to have ever before sent envoys or courted alliance with
-  the Great King; though the idea of doing so must have been
-  noway strange to them, as we may see by the humorous scene of
-  Pseudartabas in the Acharneis of Aristophanês, acted in the year
-  before this event.
-
-Respecting the great monarchy of Persia, during this long interval
-of fifty-four years since the repulse of Xerxes from Greece, we have
-little information before us except the names of the successive
-kings. In the year 465 B.C. Xerxes was assassinated by Artabanus and
-Mithridates, through one of those plots of great household officers,
-so frequent in oriental palaces. He left two sons, or at least two
-sons present and conspicuous among a greater number, Darius and
-Artaxerxes. But Artabanus persuaded Artaxerxes that Darius had been
-the murderer of Xerxes, and thus prevailed upon him to revenge his
-father’s death by becoming an accomplice in killing his brother
-Darius: he next tried to assassinate Artaxerxes himself, and to
-appropriate the crown. Artaxerxes however, apprized beforehand of
-the scheme, either slew Artabanus with his own hand or procured him
-to be slain and then reigned (known under the name of Artaxerxes
-Longimanus) for forty years, down to the period at which we are now
-arrived.[586]
-
-  [586] Diodor. xi, 65; Aristotel. Polit. v, 8, 3; Justin, iii,
-  1; Ktesias, Persica, c. 29, 30. It is evident that there were
-  contradictory stories current respecting the plot to which Xerxes
-  fell a victim: but we have no means of determining what the
-  details were.
-
-Mention has already been made of the revolt of Egypt from the
-dominion of Artaxerxes, under the Libyan prince Inanes, actively
-aided by the Athenians. After a few years of success, this revolt
-was crushed and Egypt again subjugated, by the energy of the Persian
-general Megabyzus, with severe loss to the Athenian forces engaged.
-After the peace of Kallias, erroneously called the Kimonian peace,
-between the Athenians and the king of Persia, war had not been since
-resumed. We read in Ktesias, amidst various anecdotes seemingly
-collected at the court of Susa, romantic adventures ascribed
-to Megabyzus, his wife Amytis, his mother Amestris, and a Greek
-physician of Kos, named Apollonides. Zopyrus son of Megabyzus, after
-the death of his father, deserted from Persia and came as an exile to
-Athens.[587]
-
-  [587] Ktesias, Persica, c. 38-43; Herodot. iii, 80.
-
-At the death of Artaxerxes Longimanus, the family violences incident
-to a Persian succession were again exhibited. His son Xerxes
-succeeded him, but was assassinated, after a reign of a few weeks or
-months. Another son, Sogdianus, followed, who perished in like manner
-after a short interval.[588] Lastly, a third son, Ochus (known under
-the name of Darius Nothus), either abler or more fortunate, kept his
-crown and life between nineteen and twenty years. By his queen, the
-savage Parysatis, he was father to Artaxerxes Mnemon and Cyrus the
-younger, both names of interest in reference to Grecian history, to
-whom we shall hereafter recur.
-
-  [588] Diodor. xii, 64-71; Ktesias, Persica, c. 44-46.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER LIII.
-
-EIGHTH YEAR OF THE WAR.
-
-
-The eighth year of the war, on which we now touch, presents events of
-a more important and decisive character than any of the preceding.
-In reviewing the preceding years, we observe that though there
-is much fighting, with hardship and privation inflicted on both
-sides, yet the operations are mostly of a desultory character, not
-calculated to determine the event of the war. But the capture of
-Sphakteria and its prisoners, coupled with the surrender of the whole
-Lacedæmonian fleet, was an event full of consequences and imposing
-in the eyes of all Greece. It stimulated the Athenians to a series
-of operations, larger and more ambitious than anything which they
-had yet conceived; directed, not merely against Sparta in her own
-country, but also to the reconquest of that ascendency in Megara and
-Bœotia which they had lost on or before the thirty years’ truce. On
-the other hand, it intimidated so much both the Lacedæmonians, the
-revolted Chalkidic allies of Athens in Thrace, and Perdikkas, king of
-Macedonia, that between them the expedition of Brasidas, which struck
-so serious a blow at the Athenian empire, was concerted. This year is
-thus the turning-point of the war. If the operations of Athens had
-succeeded, she would have regained nearly as great a power as she
-enjoyed before the thirty years’ truce: but it happened that Sparta,
-or rather the Spartan Brasidas, was successful, gaining enough to
-neutralize all the advantages derived by Athens from the capture of
-Sphakteria.
-
-The first enterprise undertaken by the Athenians in the course of the
-spring was against the island of Kythêra, on the southern coast of
-Laconia. It was inhabited by Lacedæmonian Periœki, and administered
-by a governor, and garrison of hoplites, annually sent thither. It
-was the usual point of landing for merchantmen from Libya and Egypt;
-and as it lay very near to Cape Malea, immediately over against
-the gulf of Gythium,—the only accessible portion of the generally
-inhospitable coast of Laconia,—the chance that it might fall into
-the hands of an enemy was considered as so menacing to Sparta, that
-some politicians are said to have wished the island at the bottom of
-the sea.[589] Nikias, in conjunction with Nikostratus and Autoklês,
-conducted thither a fleet of sixty triremes, with two thousand
-Athenian hoplites, some few horsemen, and a body of allies, mainly
-Milesians. There were in the island two towns,—Kythêra and Skandeia:
-the former having a lower town close to the sea, fronting Cape Malea,
-and an upper town on the hill above; the latter, seemingly, on the
-south or west coast. Both were attacked at the same time by order of
-Nikias; ten triremes and a body of Milesian[590] hoplites disembarked
-and captured Skandeia; while the Athenians landed at Kythêra, and
-drove the inhabitants out of the lower town into the upper, where
-they speedily capitulated. A certain party among them had indeed
-secretly invited the coming of Nikias, through which intrigue easy
-terms were obtained for the inhabitants. Some few men, indicated by
-the Kytherians in intelligence with Nikias, were carried away as
-prisoners to Athens: but the remainder were left undisturbed, and
-enrolled among the tributary allies under obligation to pay four
-talents per annum; an Athenian garrison being placed at Kythêra
-for the protection of the island. From hence Nikias employed seven
-days in descents and inroads upon the coast, near Helos, Asinê,
-Aphrodisia, Kotyrta, and elsewhere. The Lacedæmonian force was
-disseminated in petty garrisons, which remained each for the defence
-of its own separate post, without uniting to repel the Athenians, so
-that there was only one action, and that of little importance, which
-the Athenians deemed worthy of a trophy.
-
-  [589] Thucyd. iv, 54; Herodot. vii, 235. The manner in which
-  Herodotus alludes to the dangers which would arise to Sparta from
-  the occupation of Kythêra by an enemy, furnishes one additional
-  probability tending to show that his history was composed before
-  the actual occupation of the island by Nikias, in the eighth year
-  of the Peloponnesian war. Had he been cognizant of this latter
-  event, he would naturally have made some allusion to it.
-
-  The words of Thucydidês in respect to the island of Kythêra are,
-  the Lacedæmonians πολλὴν ἐπιμέλειαν ἐποιοῦντο· ἦν γὰρ αὐτοῖς
-  τῶν τε ἀπ᾽ Αἰγύπτου καὶ Λιβύης ὁλκάδων προσβολὴ, καὶ λῃσταὶ ἅμα
-  τὴν Λακωνικὴν ἧσσον ἐλύπουν ἐκ θαλάσσης, ᾗπερ μόνον οἷον τ᾽ ἦν
-  κακουργεῖσθαι· ~πᾶσα γὰρ ἀνέχει~ πρὸς τὸ Σικελικὸν καὶ Κρητικὸν
-  πέλαγος.
-
-  I do not understand this passage, with Dr. Arnold and Göller, to
-  mean, that Laconia was unassailable by land, but very assailable
-  by sea. It rather means that the only portion of the coast of
-  Laconia where a maritime invader could do much damage, was in the
-  interior of the Laconic gulf, near Helos, Gythium, etc., which
-  is in fact the only plain portion of the coast of Laconia. The
-  two projecting promontories, which end, the one in Cape Malea,
-  the other in Cape Tænarus, are high, rocky, harborless, and
-  afford very little temptation to a disembarking enemy. “The whole
-  Laconian coast is _high projecting cliff_, where it fronts the
-  Sicilian and Kretan seas,”—~πᾶσα ἀνέχει~. The island of Kythêra
-  was particularly favorable for facilitating descents on the
-  territory near Helos and Gythium. The ἀλιμενότης of Laconia is
-  noticed in Xenophon, Hellen. iv, 8, 7, where he describes the
-  occupation of the island by Konon and Pharnabazus.
-
-  See Colonel Leake’s description of this coast, and the high
-  cliffs between Cape Matapan—Tænarus—and Kalamata, which front the
-  Sicilian sea, as well as those eastward of Cape St. Angelo, or
-  Malea, which front the Kretan sea (Travels in Morea, vol. i, ch.
-  vii, p. 261: “tempestuous, rocky, unsheltered coast of Mesamani,”
-  ch. viii, p. 320; ch. vi, p. 205; Strabo, viii, p. 368; Pausan.
-  iii, c. xxvi, 2).
-
-  [590] Thucyd. iv, 54. δισχιλίοις Μιλησίων ὁπλίταις. It seems
-  impossible to believe that there could have been so many as
-  two thousand _Milesian_ hoplites: but we cannot tell where the
-  mistake lies.
-
-In returning home from Kythêra, Nikias first ravaged the small strip
-of cultivated land near Epidaurus Limêra, on the rocky eastern
-coast of Laconia, and then attacked the Æginetan settlement at
-Thyrea, the frontier strip between Laconia and Argolis. This town
-and district had been made over by Sparta to the Æginetans, at the
-time when they were expelled from their own island by Athens, in
-the first year of the war. The new inhabitants, finding the town
-too distant from the sea[591] for their maritime habits, were now
-employed in constructing a fortification close on the shore; in which
-work a Lacedæmonian detachment under Tantalus, on guard in that
-neighborhood, was assisting them. When the Athenians landed, both
-Æginetans and Lacedæmonians at once abandoned the new fortification.
-The former, with the commanding officer, Tantalus, occupied the
-upper town of Thyrea; but the Lacedæmonian troops, not thinking
-it tenable, refused to take part in the defence, and retired to
-the neighboring mountains, in spite of urgent entreaty from the
-Æginetans. The Athenians, immediately after landing, marched up to
-the town of Thyrea, and carried it by storm, burning or destroying
-everything within it: all the Æginetans were either killed or made
-prisoners, and even Tantalus, disabled by his wounds, became prisoner
-also. From hence the armament returned to Athens, where a vote was
-taken as to the disposal of the prisoners. The Kytherians brought
-home were distributed for safe custody among the dependent islands:
-Tantalus was retained along with the prisoners from Sphakteria; but
-a harder fate was reserved for the Æginetans; they were all put to
-death, victims to the long-standing apathy between Athens and Ægina.
-This cruel act was nothing more than a strict application of admitted
-customs of war in those days: had the Lacedæmonians been the victors,
-there can be little doubt that they would have acted with equal
-rigor.[592]
-
-  [591] Thucyd. iv, 56. He states that Thyrea was ten stadia, or
-  about a mile and one-fifth, distant from the sea. But Colonel
-  Leake (Travels in the Morea, vol. ii, ch. xxii, p. 492), who has
-  discovered quite sufficient ruins to identify the spot, affirms
-  “that it is at least three times that distance from the sea.”
-
-  This explains to us the more clearly why the Æginetans thought it
-  necessary to build their new fort.
-
-  [592] Thucyd. iv, 58; Diodor. xii, 65.
-
-The occupation of Kythêra, in addition to Pylus, by an Athenian
-garrison, following so closely upon the capital disaster in
-Sphakteria, produced in the minds of the Spartans feelings of alarm
-and depression such as they had never before experienced. Within
-the course of a few short months their position had completely
-changed from superiority and aggression abroad to insult and
-insecurity at home. They anticipated nothing less than incessant
-foreign attacks on all their weak points, with every probability of
-internal defection, from the standing discontent of the Helots: nor
-was it unknown to them, probably, that even Kythêra itself had been
-lost partly through betrayal. The capture of Sphakteria had caused
-peculiar sensations among the Helots, to whom the Lacedæmonians had
-addressed both appeals and promises of emancipation, in order to
-procure succor for their hoplites while blockaded in the island; and
-if the ultimate surrender of these hoplites had abated the terrors
-of Lacedæmonian prowess throughout all Greece, this effect had been
-produced to a still greater degree among the oppressed Helots. A
-refuge at Pylus, and a nucleus which presented some possibility of
-expanding into regenerated Messenia, were now before their eyes;
-while the establishment of an Athenian garrison at Kythêra opened a
-new channel of communication with the enemies of Sparta, so as to
-tempt all the Helots of daring temper to stand forward as liberators
-of their enslaved race.[593] The Lacedæmonians, habitually cautious
-at all times, felt now as if the tide of fortune had turned decidedly
-against them, and acted with confirmed mistrust and dismay, confining
-themselves to measures strictly defensive, and organizing a force of
-four hundred cavalry, together with a body of bowmen, beyond their
-ordinary establishment.
-
-  [593] Thucyd. iv, 41, 55, 56.
-
-But the precaution which they thought it necessary to take in regard
-to the Helots, affords the best measure of their apprehensions
-at the moment, and exhibits, indeed, a refinement of fraud and
-cruelty rarely equalled in history. Wishing to single out from the
-general body such as were most high-couraged and valiant, the ephors
-made proclamation, that those Helots, who conceived themselves to
-have earned their liberty by distinguished services in war, might
-stand forward to claim it. A considerable number obeyed the call;
-probably many who had undergone imminent hazards during the preceding
-summer, in order to convey provisions to the blockaded soldiers
-in Sphakteria.[594] They were examined by the government, and two
-thousand of them were selected as fully worthy of emancipation; which
-was forthwith bestowed upon them in public ceremonial, with garlands,
-visits to the temples, and the full measure of religious solemnity.
-The government had now made the selection which it desired; presently
-every man among these newly-enfranchized Helots was made away
-with, no one knew how.[595] A stratagem at once so perfidious in
-the contrivance, so murderous in the purpose, and so complete in
-the execution, stands without parallel in Grecian history,—we might
-almost say, without a parallel in any history. It implies a depravity
-far greater than the rigorous execution of a barbarous customary law
-against prisoners of war or rebels, even in large numbers. The ephors
-must have employed numerous instruments, apart from each other, for
-the performance of this bloody deed; yet it appears that no certain
-knowledge could be obtained of the details; a striking proof of the
-mysterious efficiency of this Council of Five, surpassing even that
-of the Council of Ten at Venice, as well as of the utter absence of
-public inquiry or discussion.
-
-  [594] Thucyd. iv, 80.
-
-  [595] Thucyd. iv, 80. Καὶ προκρίναντες ἐς δισχιλίους, οἱ μὲν
-  ἐστεφανώσαντό τε καὶ τὰ ἱερὰ περιῆλθον ὡς ἠλευθερωμένοι· οἱ δὲ
-  οὐ πολλῷ ὕστερον ἠφάνισάν τε αὐτοὺς, καὶ οὐδεὶς ᾔσθετο ὅτῳ τρόπῳ
-  ἕκαστος διεφθάρη: compare Diodor. xii, 67.
-
-  Dr. Thirlwall (History of Greece, vol. iii. ch. xxiii, p. 244,
-  2d edit. _note_) thinks that this assassination of Helots by the
-  Spartans took place at some other time unascertained, and not
-  at the time here indicated. I cannot concur in this opinion. It
-  appears to me, that there is the strongest probable reason for
-  referring the incident to the time immediately following the
-  disaster in Sphakteria, which Thucydidês so especially marks (iv,
-  41) by the emphatic words: Οἱ δὲ Λακεδαιμόνιοι ἀμαθεῖς ὄντες ἐν
-  τῷ πρὶν χρόνῳ λῃστείας καὶ τοῦ τοιούτου πολέμου, τῶν τε Εἱλώτων
-  αὐτομολούντων καὶ φοβούμενοι μὴ καὶ ἐπὶ μακρότερον σφίσι τι
-  νεωτερισθῇ τῶν κατὰ τὴν χώραν, οὐ ῥᾳδίως ἔφερον. This was just
-  after the Messenians were first established at Pylus, and began
-  their incursions over Laconia, with such temptations as they
-  could offer to the Helots to desert. And it was naturally just
-  then that the fear, entertained by the Spartans of their Helots,
-  became exaggerated to the maximum, leading to the perpetration
-  of the act mentioned in the text. Dr. Thirlwall observes, “that
-  the Spartan government would not order the massacre of the Helots
-  at a time when it could employ them on foreign service.” But
-  to this it may be replied, that the capture of Sphakteria took
-  place in July or August, while the expedition under Brasidas was
-  not organized until the following winter or spring. There was
-  therefore an interval of some months during which the government
-  had not yet formed the idea of employing the Helots on foreign
-  service. And this interval is quite sufficient to give a full and
-  distinct meaning to the expression καὶ τότε (Thucyd. iv, 80) on
-  which Dr. Thirlwall insists; without the necessity of going back
-  to any more remote point of antecedent time.
-
-It was while the Lacedæmonians were in this state of uneasiness
-at home, that envoys reached them from Perdikkas of Macedonia and
-the Chalkidians of Thrace, entreating aid against Athens; who
-was considered likely, in her present tide of success, to resume
-aggressive measures against them. There were, moreover, other
-parties, in the neighboring cities[596] subject to Athens, who
-secretly favored the application, engaging to stand forward in open
-revolt as soon as any auxiliary force should arrive to warrant their
-incurring the hazard. Perdikkas (who had on his hands a dispute with
-his kinsman Arrhibæus, prince of the Lynkestæ-Macedonians, which he
-was anxious to be enabled to close successfully) and the Chalkidians
-offered at the same time to provide the pay and maintenance, as well
-as to facilitate the transit, of the troops who might be sent to
-them; and what was of still greater importance to the success of the
-enterprise, they specially requested that Brasidas might be invested
-with the command.[597] He had now recovered from his wounds received
-at Pylus, and his reputation for adventurous valor, great as it was
-from positive desert, stood out still more conspicuously, because
-not a single other Spartan had as yet distinguished himself. His
-other great qualities, apart from personal valor, had not yet been
-shown, for he had never been in any supreme command. But he burned
-with impatience to undertake the operation destined for him by the
-envoys; although at this time it must have appeared so replete with
-difficulty and danger, that probably no other Spartan except himself
-would have entered upon it with the smallest hopes of success. To
-raise up embarrassments for Athens, in Thrace, was an object of great
-consequence to Sparta, while she also obtained an opportunity of
-sending away another large detachment of her dangerous Helots. Seven
-hundred of these latter were armed as hoplites and placed under the
-orders of Brasidas, but the Lacedæmonians would not assign to him any
-of their own proper forces. With the sanction of the Spartan name,
-with seven hundred Helot hoplites, and with such other hoplites as he
-could raise in Peloponnesus by means of the funds furnished from the
-Chalkidians, Brasidas prepared to undertake this expedition, alike
-adventurous and important.
-
-  [596] Thucyd. iv, 79.
-
-  [597] Thucyd. iv, 80. προὐθυμήθησαν δὲ καὶ οἱ Χαλκιδῆς ἄνδρα ἔν
-  τε τῇ Σπάρτῃ δοκοῦντα δραστήριον εἶναι ἐς τὰ πάντα, etc.
-
-Had the Athenians entertained any suspicion of his design, they
-could easily have prevented him from ever reaching Thrace. But they
-knew nothing of it until he had actually joined Perdikkas, nor did
-they anticipate any serious attack from Sparta, in this moment of
-her depression, much less an enterprise far bolder than any which
-she had ever been known to undertake. They were now elate with hopes
-of conquests to come on their own part, their affairs being so
-prosperous and promising that parties favorable to their interests
-began to revive, both in Megara and in Bœotia; while Hippokratês and
-Demosthenês, the two chief stratêgi for the year, were men of energy,
-well qualified both to project and execute military achievements.
-
-The first opportunity presented itself in regard to Megara. The
-inhabitants of that city had been greater sufferers by the war
-than any other persons in Greece: they had been the chief cause
-of bringing down the war upon Athens, and the Athenians revenged
-upon them all the hardships which they themselves endured from the
-Lacedæmonian invasion. Twice in every year they laid waste the
-Megarid, which bordered upon their own territory; and that too with
-such destructive hands throughout its limited extent, that they
-intercepted all subsistence from the lands near the town, at the
-same time keeping the harbor of Nisæa closely blocked up. Under such
-hard conditions the Megarians found much difficulty in supplying
-even the primary wants of life.[598] But their case had now, within
-the last few months, become still more intolerable by an intestine
-commotion in the city, ending in the expulsion of a powerful body of
-exiles, who seized and held possession of Pegæ, the Megarian port
-in the gulf of Corinth. Probably imports from Pegæ had been their
-chief previous resource against the destruction which came on them
-from the side of Athens; so that it became scarcely possible to
-sustain themselves, when the exiles in Pegæ not only deprived them
-of this resource, but took positive part in harassing them. These
-exiles were oligarchical, and the government in Megara had now become
-more or less democratical: but the privations in the city presently
-reached such a height, that several citizens began to labor for a
-compromise, whereby the exiles in Pegæ might be readmitted. It was
-evident to the leaders in Megara that the bulk of the citizens could
-not long sustain the pressure of enemies from both sides, but it was
-also their feeling that the exiles in Pegæ, their bitter political
-rivals, were worse enemies than the Athenians, and that the return of
-these exiles would be a sentence of death to themselves. To prevent
-this counter-revolution, they opened a secret correspondence with
-Hippokratês and Demosthenês, engaging to betray both Megara and Nisæa
-to the Athenians; though Nisæa, the harbor of Megara, about one mile
-from the city, was a separate fortress occupied by a Peloponnesian
-garrison, and by them exclusively, as well as the Long Walls, for the
-purpose of holding Megara fast to the Lacedæmonian confederacy.[599]
-
-  [598] The picture drawn by Aristophanês (Acharn. 760) is a
-  caricature, but of suffering probably but too real.
-
-  [599] Thucyd. iv, 66. Strabo (ix, p. 391) gives eighteen stadia
-  as the distance between Megara and Nisæa; Thucydidês only eight.
-  There appears sufficient reason to prefer the latter: see
-  Reinganum, Das alte Megaris, pp. 121-180.
-
-The scheme for surprise was concerted, and what is more remarkable,
-in the extreme publicity of all Athenian affairs, and in a matter
-to which many persons must have been privy, was kept secret, until
-the instant of execution. A large Athenian force, four thousand
-hoplites and six hundred cavalry, was appointed to march at night
-by the high road through Eleusis to Megara: but Hippokratês and
-Demosthenês themselves went on shipboard from Peiræus to the island
-of Minôa, which was close against Nisæa, and had been for some time
-under occupation by an Athenian garrison. Here Hippokratês concealed
-himself with six hundred hoplites, in a hollow space out of which
-brick earth had been dug, on the mainland opposite to Minôa, and not
-far from the gate in the Long Wall which opened near the junction
-of that wall with the ditch and wall surrounding Nisæa; while
-Demosthenês, with some light-armed Platæans and a detachment of
-active young Athenians, called Peripoli, and serving as the movable
-guard of Attica, in their first or second year of military service,
-placed himself in ambush in the sacred precinct of Arês, still closer
-to the same gate.
-
-To procure that the gate should be opened, was the task of the
-conspirators within. Amidst the shifts to which the Megarians had
-been reduced in order to obtain supplies, especially since the
-blockade of Minôa, predatory exit by night was not omitted. Some of
-these conspirators had been in the habit, before the intrigue with
-Athens was projected, of carrying out a small sculler-boat by night
-upon a cart, through this gate, by permission of the Peloponnesian
-commander of Nisæa and the Long Walls. The boat, when thus brought
-out, was carried down to the shore along the hollow of the dry
-ditch which surrounded the wall of Nisæa, then put to sea for some
-nightly enterprise, and was brought back again along the ditch before
-daylight in the morning; the gate being opened, by permission, to let
-it in. This was the only way by which any Megarian vessel could get
-to sea, since the Athenians at Minôa were complete masters of the
-harbor. On the night fixed for the surprise, this boat was carried
-out and brought back at the usual hour. But the moment that the
-gate in the Long Wall was opened to readmit it, Demosthenês and his
-comrades sprang forward to force their way in; the Megarians along
-with the boat at the same time setting upon and killing the guards,
-in order to facilitate his entrance. This active and determined band
-were successful in mastering the gate, and keeping it open until the
-six hundred hoplites under Hippokratês came up, and got into the
-interior space between the Long Walls. They immediately mounted the
-walls on each side, every man as he came in, with little thought
-of order, to drive off or destroy the Peloponnesian guards; who,
-taken by surprise, and fancying that the Megarians generally were in
-concert with the enemy against them,—confirmed, too, in such belief
-by hearing the Athenian herald proclaim aloud that every Megarian who
-chose might take his post in the line of Athenian hoplites,[600]—made
-at first some resistance, but were soon discouraged, and fled into
-Nisæa. By a little after daybreak, the Athenians found themselves
-masters of all the line of the Long Walls, and under the very gates
-of Megara,—reinforced by the larger force which, having marched by
-land through Eleusis, arrived at the concerted moment.
-
-  [600] Thucyd. iv, 68. Ξυνέπεσε γὰρ καὶ τὸν τῶν Ἀθηναίων κήρυκα
-  ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτοῦ γνώμης κηρύξαι, τὸν βουλόμενον ἰέναι Μεγαρέων μετὰ
-  Ἀθηναίων θησόμενον τὰ ὅπλα.
-
-  Here we have the phrase τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα employed in a case where
-  Dr. Arnold’s explanation of it would be eminently unsuitable.
-  There could be no thought of _piling arms_ at a critical moment
-  of actual fighting, with result as yet doubtful.
-
-Meanwhile, the Megarians within the city were in the greatest tumult
-and consternation. But the conspirators, prepared with their plan,
-had resolved to propose that the gates should be thrown open, and
-that the whole force of the city should be marched out to fight
-the Athenians: when once the gates should be open, they themselves
-intended to take part with the Athenians, and facilitate their
-entrance,—and they had rubbed their bodies over with oil in order
-to be visibly distinguished in the eyes of the latter. Their plan
-was only frustrated the moment before it was about to be put in
-execution, by the divulgation of one of their own comrades. Their
-opponents in the city, apprized of what was in contemplation,
-hastened to the gate, and intercepted the men rubbed with oil as
-they were about to open it. Without betraying any knowledge of the
-momentous secret which they had just learned, these opponents loudly
-protested against opening the gate and going out to fight an enemy
-for whom they had never conceived themselves, even in moments of
-greater strength, to be a match in the open field. While insisting
-only on the public mischiefs of the measure, they at the same time
-planted themselves in arms against the gate, and declared that they
-would perish before they would allow it to be opened. For this
-obstinate resistance the conspirators were not prepared, so that they
-were forced to abandon their design and leave the gate closed.
-
-The Athenian generals, who were waiting in expectation that it would
-be opened, soon perceived by the delay that their friends within
-had been baffled, and immediately resolved to make sure of Nisæa,
-which lay behind them; an acquisition important not less in itself,
-than as a probable means for the mastery of Megara. They set about
-the work with the characteristic rapidity of Athenians. Masons and
-tools in abundance were forthwith sent for from Athens, and the army
-distributed among themselves the wall of circumvallation round Nisæa
-in distinct parts. First, the interior space between the Long Walls
-themselves was built across, so as to cut off the communication
-with Megara; next, walls were carried out from the outside of both
-the Long Walls down to the sea, so as completely to inclose Nisæa,
-with its fortifications and ditch. The scattered houses which formed
-a sort of ornamented suburb to Nisæa, furnished bricks for this
-inclosing circle, or were sometimes even made to form a part of it as
-they stood, with the parapets on their roofs; while the trees were
-cut down to supply material wherever palisades were suitable. In a
-day and a half the work of circumvallation was almost completed,
-so that the Peloponnesians in Nisæa saw before them nothing but a
-hopeless state of blockade. Deprived of all communication, they
-not only fancied that the whole city of Megara had joined the
-Athenians, but they were moreover without any supply of provisions,
-which had been always furnished to them in daily rations from the
-city. Despairing of any speedy relief from Peloponnesus, they
-accepted easy terms of capitulation offered to them by the Athenian
-generals.[601] After delivering up their arms, each man among them
-was to be ransomed for a stipulated price; we are not told how much,
-but doubtless a moderate sum. The Lacedæmonian commander, and such
-other Lacedæmonians as might be in Nisæa, were, however, required
-to surrender themselves as prisoners to the Athenians, to be held
-at their disposal. On these terms Nisæa was surrendered to the
-Athenians, who cut off its communication with Megara, by keeping
-the intermediate space between the Long Walls effectively blocked
-up,—walls, of which they had themselves, in former days, been the
-original authors.[602]
-
-  [601] Thucyd. iv, 69.
-
-  [602] Thucyd. i, 103; iv, 69. Καὶ οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι, τὰ μακρὰ τείχη
-  ἀποῤῥήξαντες ἀπὸ τῆς τῶν Μεγαρέων πόλεως καὶ τὴν Νίσαιαν
-  παραλαβόντες, τἄλλα παρεσκευάζοντο.
-
-  I cannot think, with Poppo and Göller, that the participle
-  ἀποῤῥήξαντες is to be explained as meaning that the Athenians
-  PULLED DOWN the portion of the Long Walls near Megara. This
-  may have been done, but it would be an operation of no great
-  importance; for to pull down a portion of the wall would not
-  bar the access from the city, which it was the object of the
-  Athenians to accomplish. “They broke off” the communication
-  along the road between the Long Walls from the city to Nisæa, by
-  building across or barricading the space between: similar to what
-  is said a little above,—~διοικοδομησάμενοι~ τὸ πρὸς Μεγαρέας,
-  etc. Diodorus (xii, 66) abridges Thucydidês.
-
-Such interruption of communication by the Long Walls indicated in
-the minds of the Athenian generals a conviction that Megara was
-now out of their reach. But the town in its present distracted
-state, would certainly have fallen into their hands,[603] had it
-not been snatched from them by the accidental neighborhood and
-energetic intervention of Brasidas. That officer, occupied in the
-levy of troops for his Thracian expedition, was near Corinth and
-Sikyon, when he first learned the surprise and capture of the Long
-Walls. Partly from the alarm which the news excited among these
-Peloponnesian towns, partly from his own personal influence, he got
-together a body of two thousand seven hundred Corinthian hoplites,
-six hundred Sikyonian and four hundred Phliasian, besides his own
-small army, and marched with this united force to Tripodiskus, in
-the Megarid, half-way between Megara and Pegæ, on the road over
-Mount Geraneia; having first despatched a pressing summons to the
-Bœotians to request that they would meet him at that point with
-reinforcements. He trusted by a speedy movement to preserve Megara,
-and perhaps even Nisæa; but on reaching Tripodiskus in the night, he
-learned that the latter place had already surrendered. Alarmed for
-the safety of Megara, he proceeded thither by a night-march without
-delay. Taking with him only a chosen band of three hundred men, he
-presented himself, without being expected, at the gates of the city;
-entreating to be admitted, and offering to lend his immediate aid for
-the recovery of Nisæa. One of the two parties in Megara would have
-been glad to comply; but the other, knowing well that in that case
-the exiles in Pegæ would be brought back upon them, was prepared for
-a strenuous resistance, in which case the Athenian force, still only
-one mile off, would have been introduced as auxiliaries. Under these
-circumstances the two parties came to a compromise, and mutually
-agreed to refuse admittance to Brasidas. They expected that a battle
-would take place between him and the Athenians, and each calculated
-that Megara would follow the fortunes of the victor.[604]
-
-  [603] Thucyd. iv, 73. εἰ μὲν γὰρ μὴ ὤφθησαν ἐλθόντες (Brasidas
-  with his troops) οὐκ ἂν ἐν τύχῃ γίγνεσθαι σφίσιν, ἀλλὰ σαφῶς ἂν
-  ὥσπερ ἡσσηθέντων στερηθῆναι εὐθὺς τῆς πόλεως.
-
-  [604] Thucyd. iv, 71.
-
-Returning back without success to Tripodiskus, Brasidas was joined
-there early in the morning by two thousand Bœotian hoplites and six
-hundred cavalry; for the Bœotians had been put in motion by the same
-news as himself, and had even commenced their march, before his
-messenger arrived, with such celerity as to have already reached
-Platæa.[605] The total force under Brasidas was thus increased to
-six thousand hoplites and six hundred cavalry, with whom he marched
-straight to the neighborhood of Megara. The Athenian light troops,
-dispersed over the plain, were surprised and driven in by the Bœotian
-cavalry; but the Athenian cavalry, coming to their aid, maintained a
-sharp action with the assailants, wherein, after some loss on both
-sides, a slight advantage remained on the side of the Athenians. They
-granted a truce for the burial of the Bœotian officer of cavalry,
-who was slain with some others. After this indecisive cavalry
-skirmish, Brasidas advanced with his main force into the plain,
-between Megara and the sea, taking up a position near to the Athenian
-hoplites, who were drawn up in battle array, hard by Nisæa and the
-Long Walls. He thus offered them battle if they chose it; but each
-party expected that the other would attack and each was unwilling
-to begin the attack on his own side, Brasidas was well aware that,
-if the Athenians refused to fight, Megara would be preserved from
-falling into their hands,—which loss it was his main object to
-prevent, and which had in fact been prevented only by his arrival. If
-he attacked and was beaten, he would forfeit this advantage,—while,
-if victorious, he could hardly hope to gain much more. The Athenian
-generals on their side reflected, that they had already secured a
-material acquisition in Nisæa, which cut off Megara from their sea;
-that the army opposed to them was not only superior in number of
-hoplites, but composed of contingents from many different cities, so
-that no one city hazarded much in the action; while their own force
-was all Athenian, and composed of the best hoplites in Athens, which
-would render a defeat severely ruinous to the city: nor did they
-think it worth while to encounter this risk, even for the purpose
-of gaining possession of Megara. With such views in the leaders on
-both sides, the two armies remained for some time in position, each
-waiting for the other to attack: at length the Athenians, seeing that
-no aggressive movement was contemplated by their opponents, were the
-first to retire into Nisæa. Thus left master of the field, Brasidas
-retired in triumph to Megara, the gates of which were now opened
-without reserve to admit him.[606]
-
-  [605] Thucyd. iv, 72.
-
-  [606] Thucyd. iv, 73.
-
-The army of Brasidas, having gained the chief point for which it was
-collected, speedily dispersed,—he himself resuming his preparations
-for Thrace; while the Athenians on their side also returned home,
-leaving an adequate garrison for the occupation both of Nisæa and
-of the Long Walls. But the interior of Megara underwent a complete
-and violent revolution. While the leaders friendly to Athens, not
-thinking it safe to remain, fled forthwith and sought shelter with
-the Athenians,[607] the opposite party opened communication with
-the exiles at Pegæ and readmitted them into the city; binding them
-however, by the most solemn pledges, to observe absolute amnesty of
-the past and to study nothing but the welfare of the common city.
-The new-comers only kept their pledge during the interval which
-elapsed until they acquired power to violate it with effect. They
-soon got themselves placed in the chief commands of state, and
-found means to turn the military force to their own purposes. A
-review and examination of arms, of the hoplites in the city, having
-been ordered, the Megarian lochi were so marshalled and tutored as
-to enable the leaders to single out such victims as they thought
-expedient. They seized many of their most obnoxious enemies, some of
-them suspected as accomplices in the recent conspiracy with Athens:
-the men thus seized were subjected to the forms of a public trial,
-before that which was called a public assembly; wherein each voter,
-acting under military terror, was constrained to give his suffrage
-openly. All were condemned to death and executed, to the number of
-one hundred.[608] The constitution of Megara was then shaped into an
-oligarchy of the closest possible kind, a few of the most violent men
-taking complete possession of the government. But they must probably
-have conducted it with vigor and prudence for their own purposes,
-since Thucydidês remarks that it was rare to see a revolution
-accomplished by so small a party, and yet so durable. How long it
-lasted, he does not mention. A few months after these incidents,
-the Megarians regained possession of their Long Walls, by capture
-from the Athenians,[609] to whom indeed they could have been of no
-material service, and levelled the whole line of them to the ground:
-but the Athenians still retained Nisæa. We may remark, as explaining
-in part the durability of this new government, that the truce
-concluded at the beginning of the ensuing year must have greatly
-lightened the difficulties of any government, whether oligarchical or
-democratical, in Megara.
-
-  [607] We find some of them afterwards in the service of Athens,
-  employed as light-armed troops in the Sicilian expedition
-  (Thucyd. vi, 43).
-
-  [608] Thucyd. iv, 74. οἱ δὲ ἐπειδὴ ἐν ταῖς ἀρχαῖς ἐγένοντο, καὶ
-  ἐξέτασιν ὅπλων ἐποιήσαντο, διαστήσαντες τοὺς λόχους, ἐξελέξαντο
-  τῶν τε ἐχθρῶν καὶ οἵ ἐδόκουν μάλιστα ξυμπρᾶξαι τὰ πρὸς τοὺς
-  Ἀθηναίους, ἄνδρας ὡς ἑκατόν· καὶ ~τούτων πέρι ἀναγκάσαντες τὸν
-  δῆμον ψῆφον φανερὰν διενεγκεῖν~, ὡς κατεγνώσθησαν, ἔκτειναν,
-  καὶ ἐς ὀλιγαρχίαν τὰ μάλιστα κατέστησαν τὴν πόλιν. καὶ πλεῖστον
-  δὴ χρόνον αὕτη ὑπ᾽ ἐλαχίστων γενομένη ἐκ στάσεως μετάστασις
-  ξυνέμεινεν.
-
-  [609] Thucyd. iv, 109.
-
-The scheme for surprising Megara had been both laid and executed
-with skill, and only miscarried through an accident to which such
-schemes are always liable, as well as by the unexpected celerity
-of Brasidas. It had, moreover, succeeded so far as to enable the
-Athenians to carry Nisæa,—one of the posts which they had surrendered
-by the thirty years’ truce, and of considerable positive value
-to them: so that it counted on the whole as a victory, leaving
-the generals with increased encouragement to turn their activity
-elsewhere. Accordingly, very soon after the troops had been brought
-back from the Megarid,[610] Hippokratês and Demosthenês concerted a
-still more extensive plan for the invasion of Bœotia, in conjunction
-with some malcontents in the Bœotian towns, who desired to break
-down and democratize the oligarchical governments, and especially
-through the agency of a Theban exile named Ptœodôrus. Demosthenês,
-with forty triremes, was sent round Peloponnesus to Naupaktus, with
-instructions to collect an Akarnanian force, to sail into the inmost
-recess of the Corinthian or Krissæan gulf, and to occupy Siphæ, a
-maritime town belonging to the Bœotian Thespiæ, where intelligences
-had been already established. On the same day, determined beforehand,
-Hippokratês engaged to enter Bœotia, with the main force of Athens,
-at the southeastern corner of the territory near Tanagra, and to
-fortify Delium, the temple of Apollo, on the coast of the Eubœan
-strait: while at the same time it was concerted that some Bœotian
-and Phocian malcontents should make themselves masters of Chæroneia
-on the borders of Phocis. Bœotia would thus be assailed on three
-sides at the same moment, so that the forces of the country would be
-distracted and unable to coöperate. Internal movements were farther
-expected to take place in some of the cities, such as perhaps to
-establish democratical governments and place them at once in alliance
-with the Athenians.
-
-  [610] Thucyd. iv, 76. εὐθὺς μετὰ τὴν ἐκ τῆς Μεγαρίδος ἀναχώρησιν,
-  etc.
-
-Accordingly, about the month of August, Demosthenês sailed from
-Athens to Naupaktus, where he collected his Akarnanian allies,—now
-stronger and more united than ever, since the refractory inhabitants
-of Œniadæ had been at length compelled to join their Akarnanian
-brethren: moreover, the neighboring Agræans with their prince
-Salynthius were also brought into the Athenian alliance. On the
-appointed day, seemingly about the beginning of October, he
-sailed with a strong force of these allies up to Siphæ, in full
-expectation that it would be betrayed to him.[611] But the execution
-of this enterprise was less happy than that against Megara. In the
-first place, there was a mistake as to the day understood between
-Hippokratês and Demosthenês: in the next place, the entire plot was
-discovered and betrayed by a Phocian of Phanoteus (bordering on
-Chæroneia) named Nicomachus,—communicated first to the Lacedæmonians
-and through them to the bœotarchs. Siphæ and Chæroneia were
-immediately placed in a state of defence, and Demosthenês, on
-arriving at the former place, found not only no party within it
-favorable to him, but a formidable Bœotian force which rendered
-attack unavailing: moreover, Hippokratês had not yet begun his march,
-so that the defenders had nothing to distract their attention from
-Siphæ.[612] Under these circumstances, not only was Demosthenês
-obliged to withdraw without striking a blow, and to content himself
-with an unsuccessful descent upon the territory of Sikyon,[613] but
-all the expected internal movements in Bœotia were prevented from
-breaking out.
-
-  [611] Thucyd. iv, 77.
-
-  [612] Thucyd. iv, 89.
-
-  [613] Thucyd. iv, 101.
-
-It was not till after the Bœotian troops, having repelled the attack
-by sea, had retired from Siphæ, that Hippokratês commenced his
-march from Athens to invade the Bœotian territory near Tanagra. He
-was probably encouraged by false promises from the Bœotian exiles,
-otherwise it seems remarkable that he should have persisted in
-executing his part of the scheme alone, after the known failure of
-the other part. It was, however, executed in a manner which implies
-unusual alacrity and confidence. The whole military population of
-Athens was marched into Bœotia, to the neighborhood of Delium,
-the eastern coast-extremity of the territory belonging to the
-Bœotian town of Tanagra; the expedition comprising all classes,
-not merely citizens, but also metics or resident non-freemen, and
-even non-resident strangers then by accident at Athens. Of course
-this statement must be understood with the reserve of ample guards
-left behind for the city: but besides the really effective force
-of seven thousand hoplites, and several hundred horsemen, there
-appear to have been not less than twenty-five thousand light-armed,
-half-armed, or unarmed attendants accompanying the march.[614] The
-number of hoplites is here prodigiously great; brought together by
-general and indiscriminate proclamation, not selected by a special
-choice of the stratêgi out of the names on the muster-roll, as was
-usually the case for any distant expedition.[615] As to light-armed,
-there was at this time no trained force of that description at
-Athens, except a small body of archers. No pains had been taken to
-organize either darters or slingers: the hoplites, the horsemen,
-and the seamen, constituted the whole effective force of the
-city. Indeed, it appears that the Bœotians also were hardly less
-destitute than the Athenians of native darters and slingers, since
-those which they employed in the subsequent siege of Delium were in
-great part hired from the Malian gulf.[616] To employ at one and
-the same time heavy-armed and light-armed, was not natural to any
-Grecian community, but was a practice which grew up with experience
-and necessity. The Athenian feeling, as manifested in the Persæ
-of Æschylus a few years after the repulse of Xerxes, proclaims
-exclusive pride in the spear and shield, with contempt for the bow:
-and it was only during this very year, when alarmed by the Athenian
-occupation of Pylus and Kythêra, that the Lacedæmonians, contrary
-to their previous custom, had begun to organize a regiment of
-archers.[617] The effective manner in which Demosthenês had employed
-the light-armed in Sphakteria against the Lacedæmonian hoplites, was
-well calculated to teach an instructive lesson as to the value of the
-former description of troops.
-
-  [614] Thucyd. iv, 93, 94. He states that the Bœotian ψιλοὶ were
-  above ten thousand, and that the Athenian ψιλοὶ were πολλαπλάσιοι
-  τῶν ἐναντίων. We can hardly take this number as less than
-  twenty-five thousand ψιλῶν καὶ σκευοφόρων (iv, 101).
-
-  The hoplites, as well as the horsemen, had their baggage and
-  provision carried for them by attendants: see Thucyd. iii, 17;
-  vii, 75.
-
-  [615] Thucyd. iv, 90. Ὁ δ᾽ Ἱπποκράτης ἀναστήσας Ἀθηναίους
-  πανδημεὶ, αὐτοὺς καὶ τοὺς μετοίκους καὶ ξένων ὅσοι παρῆσαν, etc.:
-  also πανστρατιᾶς (iv, 94).
-
-  The meaning of the word πανδημεὶ is well illustrated by Nikias in
-  his exhortation to the Athenian army near Syracuse, immediately
-  antecedent to the first battle with the Syracusans,—levy
-  _en masse_, as opposed to hoplites specially selected (vi,
-  66-68),—ἄλλως τε καὶ πρὸς ἄνδρας πανδημεί τε ἀμυνομένους, καὶ οὐκ
-  ἀπολέκτους, ὥσπερ καὶ ἡμᾶς—καὶ προσέτι Σικελιώτας, etc.
-
-  When a special selection took place, the names of the hoplites
-  chosen by the generals to take part in any particular service
-  were written on boards according to their tribes: each of these
-  boards was affixed publicly against the statue of the Heros
-  Eponymus of the tribe to which it referred: Aristophanês,
-  Equites, 1369; Pac. 1184, with Scholiast; Wachsmuth, Hellen.
-  Alterthumsk. ii, p. 312.
-
-  [616] Thucyd. iv, 100.
-
-  [617] Thucyd. iv, 55.
-
-The Bœotian Delium,[618] which Hippokratês now intended to occupy and
-fortify, was a temple of Apollo, strongly situated and overhanging
-the sea, about five miles from Tanagra, and somewhat more than a
-mile from the border territory of Orôpus,—a territory originally
-Bœotian, but at this time dependent on Athens, and even partly
-incorporated in the political community of Athens, under the name
-of the Deme of Græa.[619] Orôpus itself was about a day’s march
-from Athens, by the road which led through Dekeleia and Sphendalê,
-between the mountains Parnês and Phelleus: so that as the distance to
-be traversed was so inconsiderable, and the general feeling of the
-time was that of confidence, it is probable that men of all ages,
-arms, and dispositions crowded to join the march, in part from mere
-curiosity and excitement. Hippokratês reached Delium on the day after
-he had started from Athens: on the succeeding day he began his work
-of fortification, which was completed, all hands aiding, and tools as
-well as workmen having been brought along with the army from Athens,
-in two days and a half. Having dug a ditch all round the sacred
-ground, he threw up the earth in a bank alongside of the ditch,
-planting stakes, throwing in fascines, and adding layers of stone
-and brick, to keep the work together, and make it into a rampart of
-tolerable height and firmness. The vines[620] round the temple,
-together with the stakes which served as supports to them, were cut
-to obtain wood; the houses adjoining furnished bricks and stone: the
-outer temple-buildings themselves also, on some of the sides, served
-as they stood to facilitate and strengthen the defence; but there was
-one side on which the annexed building, once a portico, had fallen
-down: and here the Athenians constructed some wooden towers as a
-help to the defenders. By the middle of the fifth day after leaving
-Athens, the work was so nearly completed, that the army quitted
-Delium, and began its march homeward, out of Bœotia; halting, after
-it had proceeded about a mile and a quarter, within the Athenian
-territory of Orôpus. It was here that the hoplites awaited the
-coming of Hippokratês, who still remained at Delium, stationing the
-garrison, and giving his final orders about future defence; while
-the greater number of the light-armed and unarmed, separating from
-the hoplites, and seemingly without any anticipation of the coming
-danger, continued their return-march to Athens.[621] Their position
-was probably about the western extremity of the plain of Orôpus, on
-the verge of the low heights between that plain and Delium.[622]
-
-  [618] Thucyd. iv, 90; Livy, xxxv, 51.
-
-  [619] Dikæarch. Βίος Ἑλλάδος. Fragm. ed. Fuhr, pp. 142-230;
-  Pausan. i, 34, 2; Aristotle ap. Stephan. Byz. v, Ὠρωπός. See
-  also Col. Leake, Athens and the Demi of Attica, vol. ii, sect.
-  iv, p. 123; Mr. Finlay, Oropus and the Diakria, p. 38; Ross, Die
-  Demen von Attika, p. 6, where the Deme of Græa is verified by an
-  inscription, and explained for the first time.
-
-  The road taken by the army of Hippokratês in the march to Delium,
-  was the same as that by which the Lacedæmonian army in their
-  first invasion of Attica had retired from Attica into Bœotia
-  (Thucyd. ii, 23).
-
-  [620] Dikæarchus (Βίος Ἑλλάδος, p. 142, ed. Fuhr) is full of
-  encomiums on the excellence of the wine drunk at Tanagra, and of
-  the abundant olive-plantations on the road between Orôpus and
-  Tanagra.
-
-  Since tools and masons were brought from Athens to fortify Nisæa
-  about three months before (Thucyd. iv, 69), we may be pretty sure
-  that similar apparatus was carried to Delium, though Thucydidês
-  does not state it.
-
-  [621] Thucyd. iv, 90. That the vines round the temple had
-  supporting-stakes, which furnished the σταυροὺς used by the
-  Athenians, we may reasonably presume: the same as those χάρακες
-  which are spoken of in Korkyra, iii, 70: compare Pollux, i, 162.
-
-  [622] “The plain of Oropus (observes Col. Leake) expands from
-  its upper angle at _Oropó_ towards the mouth of the Asopus, and
-  stretches about five miles along the shore, from the foot of the
-  hills of Markópulo on the east to the village of Khalkúki on
-  the west, where begin some heights extending westward towards
-  Dhilisi, the ancient Delium.”—“The plain of Oropus is separated
-  from the more inland plain of Tanagra by rocky gorges through
-  which the Asopus flows.” (Leake, Athens and the Demi of Attica,
-  vol. ii. sect. iv, p. 112.)
-
-During these five days, however, the forces from all parts of Bœotia
-had time to muster at Tanagra: and their number was just completed
-as the Athenians were beginning their march homeward from Delium.
-Contingents had arrived, not only from Thebes and its dependent
-townships around, but also from Haliartus, Korôneia, Orchomenus,
-Kôpæ, and Thespiæ: that of Tanagra joined on the spot. The government
-of the Bœotian confederacy at this time was vested in eleven
-bœotarchs,—two chosen from Thebes, the rest in unknown proportion
-by the other cities, immediate members of the confederacy,—and in
-four senates, or councils, the constitution of which is not known.
-Though all the bœotarchs, now assembled at Tanagra, formed a sort
-of council of war, yet the supreme command was vested in Pagondas
-and Aranthidês, the bœotarchs from Thebes; either in Pagondas as the
-senior of the two, or perhaps in both, alternating with each other
-day by day.[623] As the Athenians were evidently in full retreat,
-and had already passed the border, all the other bœotarchs, except
-Pagondas, were unwilling to hazard a battle[624] on soil not Bœotian,
-and were disposed to let them return home without obstruction. Such
-reluctance is not surprising, when we reflect that the chances of
-defeat were considerable, and that probably some of these bœotarchs
-were afraid of the increased power which a victory would lend to
-the oppressive tendencies of Thebes. But Pagondas strenuously
-opposed this proposition, and carried the soldiers of the various
-cities along with him, even in opposition to the sentiments of
-their separate leaders, in favor of immediately fighting. He called
-them apart and addressed them by separate divisions, in order that
-all might not quit their arms at one and the same moment.[625] He
-characterized the sentiment of the other bœotarchs as an unworthy
-manifestation of weakness, which, when properly considered, had not
-even the recommendation of superior prudence. For the Athenians
-had just invaded the country, and built a fort for the purpose of
-continuous devastation; nor were they less enemies on one side of the
-border than on the other. Moreover, they were the most restless and
-encroaching of all enemies; and the Bœotians, who had the misfortune
-to be their neighbors, could only be secure against them by the most
-resolute promptitude in defending themselves, as well as in returning
-the blows first given. If they wished to protect their autonomy and
-their property against the condition of slavery under which their
-neighbors in Eubœa had long suffered, as well as so many other
-portions of Greece, their only chance was to march onward and beat
-these invaders, following the glorious example of their fathers and
-predecessors in the field of Korôneia. The sacrifices were favorable
-to an advancing movement, and Apollo, whose temple the Athenians had
-desecrated by converting it into a fortified place, would lend his
-cordial aid to the Bœotian defence.[626]
-
-  [623] Thucyd. iv, 93; v, 38. Akræphiæ may probably be considered
-  as either a dependency of Thebes, or included in the general
-  expression of Thucydidês, after the word Κωπαιῆς—οἱ περὶ τὴν
-  λίμνην. Anthêdon and Lebadeia, which are recognized as separate
-  autonomous townships in various Bœotian inscriptions, are not
-  here named in Thucydidês. But there is no certain evidence
-  respecting the number of immediate members of the Bœotian
-  confederacy: compare the various conjectures in Boeckh, ad Corp.
-  Inscript. tom. i, p. 727; O. Müller, Orchomenus, p. 402; Kruse,
-  Hellas, tom. ii, p. 548.
-
-  [624] Thucyd. iv, 91. τῶν ἄλλων Βοιωταρχῶν, οἵ ~εἰσιν ἕνδεκα~, οὐ
-  ξυνεπαινούντων μάχεσθαι, etc.
-
-  The use of the present tense εἰσιν marks the number eleven as
-  that of _all the bœotarchs_; at this time, according to Boeckh’s
-  opinion, ad Corp. Inscript. i, vol. i, p. 729. The number,
-  however, appears to have been variable.
-
-  [625] Thucyd. iv, 91. προσκαλῶν ἑκάστους κατὰ λόχους, ὅπως μὴ
-  ἁθρόοι ἐκλίποιεν τὰ ὅπλα, ἔπειθε τοὺς Βοιωτοὺς ἰέναι ἐπὶ τοὺς
-  Ἀθηναίους καὶ τὸν ἀγῶνα ποιεῖσθαι.
-
-  Here Dr. Arnold observes: “This confirms and illustrates what
-  has been said in the note on ii, 2, 5, as to the practice of the
-  Greek soldiers piling their arms the moment they halted in a
-  particular part of the camp, and always attending the speeches of
-  their general without them.”
-
-  In the case here before us, it appears that the Bœotians did
-  come by separate lochi, pursuant to command, to hear the words
-  of Pagondas, and also that each lochus left its arms to do so;
-  though even here it is not absolutely certain that τὰ ὅπλα does
-  not mean _the military station_, as Dukas interprets it. But Dr.
-  Arnold generalizes too hastily from hence to a customary practice
-  as between soldiers and their general. The proceeding of the
-  Athenian general Hippokratês, on this very occasion, near Delium,
-  to be noticed a page or two forward, exhibits an arrangement
-  totally different. Moreover, the note on ii, 2, 5, to which Dr.
-  Arnold refers, has no sort of analogy to the passage here before
-  us, which does not include the words τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα; whereas
-  these words are the main matters in chapter ii, 2, 5. Whoever
-  attentively compares the two, will see that Dr. Arnold, followed
-  by Poppo and Göller, has stretched an explanation which suits
-  the passage here before us to other passages where it is no way
-  applicable.
-
-  [626] Thucyd. iv, 92.
-
-Finding his exhortations favorably received, Pagondas conducted the
-army by a rapid march to a position close to the Athenians. He was
-anxious to fight them before they should have retreated farther;
-and, moreover, the day was nearly spent,—it was already late in the
-afternoon. Having reached a spot where he was only separated from
-the Athenians by a hill, which prevented either army from seeing the
-other, he marshalled his troops in the array proper for fighting.
-The Theban hoplites, with their dependent allies, ranged in a depth
-of not less than twenty-five shields, occupied the right wing:
-the hoplites of Haliartus, Korôneia, Kôpæ, and its neighborhood,
-were in the centre: those of Thespiæ, Tanagra, and Orchomenus, on
-the left; for Orchomenus, being the second city in Bœotia next to
-Thebes, obtained a second post of honor at the opposite extremity
-of the line. Each contingent adopted its own mode of marshalling
-the hoplites, and its own depth of files: on this point there was
-no uniformity, a remarkable proof of the prevalence of dissentient
-custom in Greece, and how much each town, even among confederates,
-stood apart as a separate unit.[627] Thucydidês specifies only the
-prodigious depth of the Theban hoplites; respecting the rest, he
-merely intimates that no common rule was followed. There is another
-point also which he does not specify, but which, though we learn it
-only on the inferior authority of Diodorus, appears both true and
-important. The front ranks of the Theban heavy-armed were filled by
-three hundred select warriors, of distinguished bodily strength,
-valor, and discipline, who were accustomed to fight in pairs, each
-man being attached to his neighbor by a peculiar tie of intimate
-friendship. These pairs were termed the heniochi and parabatæ,
-charioteers and companions; a denomination probably handed down
-from the Homeric times, when the foremost heroes really combated in
-chariots in front of the common soldiers, but now preserved after
-it had outlived its appropriate meaning.[628] This band, composed
-of the finest men in the various palæstræ of Thebes, and enjoying a
-peculiar training for the defence of the kadmeia, or citadel, was
-in after-days detached from the front ranks of the phalanx, and
-organized into a separate regiment under the name of the Sacred
-Lochus, or Band: we shall see how much it contributed to the
-short-lived military ascendency of Thebes. On both flanks of this
-mass of Bœotian hoplites, about seven thousand in total number, were
-distributed one thousand cavalry, five hundred peltasts, and ten
-thousand light-armed or unarmed. The language of the historian seems
-to imply that the light-armed on the Bœotian side were something more
-effective than the mere multitude who followed the Athenians.
-
-  [627] Thucyd. iv, 93. ἐπ᾽ ἀσπίδας δὲ πέντε μὲν καὶ εἴκοσι Θηβαῖοι
-  ἐτάξαντο, οἱ δὲ ἄλλοι ὡς ἕκαστοι ἔτυχον.
-
-  What is still more remarkable, in the battle of Mantincia, in 418
-  B.C. between the Lacedæmonians on one side and the Athenians,
-  Argeians, Mantincians, etc., on the other, the different lochi or
-  divisions of the Lacedæmonian army were not all marshalled in the
-  same depth of files. Each lochage, or commander of the lochus,
-  directed the depth of his own division (Thucyd. v, 68).
-
-  [628] Diodor. xii, 70. Προεμάχοντο δὲ πάντων οἱ παρ᾽ ἐκείνοις
-  Ἡνίοχοι καὶ Παραβάται καλούμενοι, ἄνδρες ἐπίλεκτοι τριακόσιοι....
-  Οἱ δὲ Θηβαῖοι διαφέροντες ταῖς τῶν σωμάτων ῥώμαις, etc.
-
-  Compare Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 18, 19.
-
-Such was the order in which Pagondas marched his army over the hill,
-halting them for a moment in front and sight of the Athenians, to
-see that the ranks were even, before he gave the word for actual
-charge.[629] Hippokratês, on his side, apprized while still at
-Delium, that the Bœotians had moved from Tanagra, first sent orders
-to his army to place themselves in battle array, and presently
-arrived himself to command them; leaving three hundred cavalry at
-Delium, partly as garrison, partly for the purpose of acting on
-the rear of the Bœotians during the battle. The Athenian hoplites
-were ranged eight deep along the whole line,—with the cavalry, and
-such of the light-armed as yet remained, placed on each flank.
-Hippokratês, after arriving on the spot, and surveying the ground
-occupied, marched along the front of the line briefly encouraging
-his soldiers; who, as the battle was just on the Orôpian border,
-might fancy that they were not in their own country, and that they
-were therefore exposed without necessity. He, too, in a strain
-similar to that adopted by Pagondas, reminded the Athenians, that on
-either side of the border they were alike fighting for the defence
-of Attica, to keep the Bœotians out of it; since the Peloponnesians
-would never dare to enter the country without the aid of the Bœotian
-horse.[630] He farther called to their recollection the great name
-of Athens, and the memorable victory of Myronidês, at Œnophyta,
-whereby their fathers had acquired possession of all Bœotia. But
-he had scarcely half-finished his progress along the line, when he
-was forced to desist by the sound of the Bœotian pæan. Pagondas,
-after a few additional sentences of encouragement, had given the
-word: the Bœotian hoplites were seen charging down the hill; and the
-Athenian hoplites, not less eager, advanced to meet them at a running
-step.[631]
-
-  [629] Thucyd. iv, 93. Καὶ ἐπειδὴ καλῶς αὐτοῖς εἶχεν, ὑπερεφάνησαν
-  (the Bœotians) τοῦ λόφου καὶ ~ἔθεντο τὰ ὅπλα~ τεταγμένοι ὥσπερ
-  ἔμελλον, etc.
-
-  I transcribe this passage for the purpose of showing how
-  impossible it is to admit the explanation which Dr. Arnold,
-  Poppo, and Göller give of these words ἔθεντο τὰ ὅπλα (see Notes
-  ad Thucyd. ii, 2). They explain the words to mean, that the
-  soldiers “piled their arms into a heap,” disarmed themselves for
-  the time. But the Bœotians, in the situation here described,
-  cannot possibly have parted with their arms, they were just on
-  the point of charging the enemy: immediately afterwards, Pagondas
-  gives the word, the pæan for charging is sung, and the rush
-  commences. Pagondas had, doubtless, good reason for directing
-  a momentary halt, to see that his ranks were in perfectly good
-  condition before the charge began. But to command his troops to
-  “pile their arms” would be the last thing that he would think of.
-
-  In the interpretation of τεταγμένοι ὥσπερ ἔμελλον, I agree with
-  the Scholiast, who understands μαχέσασθαι or μαχεῖσθαι after
-  ἔμελλον (compare Thucyd. v, 66), dissenting from Dr. Arnold and
-  Göller, who would understand τάσσεσθαι; which, as it seems to me,
-  makes a very awkward meaning, and is not sustained by the passage
-  produced as parallel (viii, 51).
-
-  The infinitive verb, understood after ἔμελλον, need not
-  necessarily be a verb actually occurring before: it may be a verb
-  suggested by the general scope of the sentence: see ἐμέλλησαν,
-  iv, 123.
-
-  [630] Thucyd. iv, 95.
-
-  [631] Thucyd. iv, 95, 96. Καθεστώτων δ᾽ ἐς τὴν τάξιν καὶ
-  ἤδη μελλόντων ξυνιέναι, Ἱπποκράτης ὁ στρατηγὸς ἐπιπαριὼν τὸ
-  στρατόπεδον τῶν Ἀθηναίων παρεκελεύετό τε καὶ ἔλεγε τοιάδε....
-  Τοιαῦτα τοῦ Ἱπποκράτους παρακελευομένου, καὶ μέχρι μὲν μέσου τοῦ
-  στρατοπέδου ἐπελθόντος, τὸ δὲ πλέον οὐκέτι φθάσαντος, οἱ Βοιωτοὶ,
-  παρακελευσαμένου καὶ σφίσιν ὡς διὰ ταχέων καὶ ἐνταῦθα Παγώνδου,
-  παιωνίσαντες ἐπῄεσαν ἀπὸ τοῦ λόφου, etc.
-
-  This passage contradicts what is affirmed by Dr. Arnold, Poppo,
-  and Göller, to have been a _general practice_, that the soldiers
-  “piled their arms and _always_ attended the speeches of their
-  generals without them.” (See his note ad Thucyd. iv, 91.)
-
-At the extremity of the line on each side, the interposition
-of ravines prevented the actual meeting of the two armies: but
-throughout all the rest of the line, the clash was formidable and the
-conduct of both sides resolute. Both armies, maintaining their ranks
-compact and unbroken, came to the closest quarters; to the contact
-and pushing of shields against each other.[632] On the left half
-of the Bœotian line, consisting of hoplites from Thespiæ, Tanagra,
-and Orchomenus, the Athenians were victorious. The Thespians, who
-resisted longest, even after their comrades had given way, were
-surrounded and sustained the most severe loss from the Athenians;
-who in the ardor of success, while wheeling round to encircle the
-enemy, became disordered and came into conflict even with their own
-citizens, not recognizing them at the moment: some loss of life was
-the consequence.
-
-  [632] Thucyd. iv, 96. καρτερᾷ μάχῃ καὶ ὠθισμῷ ἀσπίδων
-  ξυνεστήκει, etc. Compare Xenophon, Cyropæd. vii, 1, 32.
-
-While the left of the Bœotian line was thus worsted and driven
-back for protection to the right, the Thebans on that side gained
-decided advantage. Though the resolution and discipline of the
-Athenians was noway inferior, yet as soon as the action came to close
-quarters and to propulsion with shield and spear, the prodigious
-depth of the Theban column (more than triple of the depth of the
-Athenians, twenty-five against eight) enabled them to bear down
-their enemies by mere superiority of weight and mass. Moreover, the
-Thebans appear to have been superior to the Athenians in gymnastic
-training and acquired bodily force, as they were inferior both in
-speech and in intelligence. The chosen Theban warriors in the front
-rank were especially superior: but apart from such superiority, if
-we assume simple equality of individual strength and resolution
-on both sides,[633] it is plain that when the two opposing columns
-came into conflict, shield against shield, the comparative force of
-forward pressure would decide the victory. This motive is sufficient
-to explain the extraordinary depth of the Theban column, which
-was increased by Epameinondas, half a century afterwards, at the
-battle of Leuktra, from a depth of twenty-five men to the still more
-astonishing depth of fifty: nor need we suspect the correctness
-of the text, with some critics, or suppose, with others, that the
-great depth of the Theban files arose from the circumstance that
-the rear ranks were too poor to provide themselves with armor.[634]
-Even in a depth of eight, which was that of the Athenian column in
-the present engagement,[635] and seemingly the usual depth in a
-battle, the spears of the four rear ranks could hardly have protruded
-sufficiently beyond the first line to do any mischief. The great use
-of all the ranks behind the first four, was partly to take the place
-of such of the foremost lines as might be slain, partly, to push
-forward the lines before them from behind. The greater the depth of
-the files, the more irresistible did this propelling force become:
-hence the Thebans at Delium, as well as at Leuktra, found their
-account in deepening the column to so remarkable a degree, to which
-we may fairly presume that their hoplites were trained beforehand.
-
-  [633] The proverbial expression of Βοιωτίαν ὗν, “the Bœotian
-  sow,” was ancient even in the town of Pindar (Olymp. vi, 90, with
-  the Scholia and Boeckh’s note): compare also Ephorus, Fragment
-  67, ed. Marx: Dikæarchus, Βίος Ἑλλάδος, p. 143, ed. Fuhr; Plato,
-  Legg. i, p. 636; and Symposion, p. 182, “pingues Thebani et
-  valentes,” Cicero de Fato, iv, 7.
-
-  Xenophon (Memorab. iii, 5, 2, 15; iii, 12, 5: compare Xenoph. de
-  Athen. Republ. i, 13) maintains the natural bodily capacity of
-  Athenians to be equal to that of Bœotians, but deplores the want
-  of σωμασκία, or bodily training.
-
-  [634] See the notes of Dr. Arnold and Poppo, ad Thucyd. iv, 96.
-
-  [635] Compare Thucyd. v, 68; vi, 67.
-
-The Thebans on the right thus pushed back[636] the troops on the
-left of the Athenian line, who retired at first slowly, and for a
-short space, maintaining their order unbroken, so that the victory
-of the Athenians on their own right would have restored the battle,
-had not Pagondas detached from the rear two squadrons of cavalry;
-who, wheeling unseen round the hill behind, suddenly appeared to
-the relief of the Bœotian left, and produced upon the Athenians on
-that side, already deranged in their ranks by the ardor of pursuit,
-the intimidating effect of a fresh army arriving to reinforce the
-Bœotians. And thus, even on the right, the victorious portion of
-their line, the Athenians lost courage and gave way; while on
-the left, where they were worsted from the beginning, they found
-themselves pressed harder and harder by the pursuing Thebans: so
-that in the end, the whole Athenian army was broken, dispersed, and
-fled. The garrison of Delium, reinforced by three hundred cavalry,
-whom Hippokratês had left there to assail the rear of the Bœotians
-during the action, either made no vigorous movement, or were repelled
-by a Bœotian reserve stationed to watch them. Flight having become
-general among the Athenians, the different parts of their army took
-different directions: the right sought refuge at Delium, the centre
-fled to Orôpus, and the left took a direction towards the high lands
-of Parnês. The pursuit of the Bœotians was vigorous and destructive:
-they had an efficient cavalry, strengthened by some Lokrian horse
-who had arrived even during the action: their peltasts also, and
-their light-armed, would render valuable service against retreating
-hoplites.[637] Fortunately for the vanquished, the battle had begun
-very late in the afternoon, leaving no long period of daylight:
-this important circumstance saved the Athenian army from almost
-total destruction.[638] As it was, however, the general Hippokratês,
-together with nearly one thousand hoplites, and a considerable number
-of light-armed and attendants, were slain; while the loss of the
-Bœotians, chiefly on their defeated left wing, was rather under five
-hundred hoplites. Some prisoners[639] seem to have been made, but we
-hear little about them. Those who had fled to Delium and Orôpus were
-conveyed back by sea to Athens.
-
-  [636] Thucyd. iv, 96. Τὸ δὲ δεξιὸν, ᾗ οἱ Θηβαῖοι ἦσαν, ἐκράτει τε
-  τῶν Ἀθηναίων, καὶ ~ὠσάμενοι~ κατὰ βραχὺ τὸ πρῶτον ἐπηκολούθουν.
-
-  The word ὠσάμενοι (compare iv, 35; vi, 70), exactly expresses the
-  forward pushing of the mass of hoplites with shield and spear.
-
-  [637] Thucyd. iv, 96; Athenæus, v, p. 215. Diodorus (xii, 70)
-  represents that the battle began with a combat of cavalry, in
-  which the Athenians had the advantage. This is quite inconsistent
-  with the narrative of Thucydidês.
-
-  [638] Diodorus (xii, 70) dwells upon this circumstance.
-
-  [639] Pyrilampês is spoken of as having been wounded and taken
-  prisoner in the retreat by the Thebans (Plutarch, De Genio
-  Socratis, c. 11, p. 581). See also Thucyd. v, 35, where allusion
-  is made to some prisoners.
-
-The victors retired to Tanagra, after erecting their trophy,
-burying their own dead, and despoiling those of their enemies. An
-abundant booty of arms from the stripped warriors, long remained
-to decorate the temples of Thebes, and the spoil in other ways is
-said to have been considerable. Pagondas also resolved to lay siege
-to the newly-established fortress at Delium: but before commencing
-operations,—which might perhaps prove tedious, since the Athenians
-could always reinforce the garrison by sea,—he tried another means of
-attaining the same object. He despatched to the Athenians a herald,
-who, happening in his way to meet the Athenian herald, coming to ask
-the ordinary permission for burial of the slain, warned him that no
-such request would be entertained until the message of the Bœotian
-general had first been communicated, and thus induced him to come
-back to the Athenian commanders. The Bœotian herald was instructed
-to remonstrate against the violation of holy custom committed by the
-Athenians in seizing and fortifying the temple of Delium; wherein
-their garrison was now dwelling, performing numerous functions
-which religion forbade to be done in a sacred place, and using as
-their common drink the water especially consecrated to sacrificial
-purposes. The Bœotians therefore solemnly summoned them in the name
-of Apollo, and the gods inmates along with him, to evacuate the
-place, carrying away all that belonged to them: and the herald gave
-it to be understood, that, unless this summons were complied with, no
-permission would be granted to bury the dead.
-
-Answer was returned by the Athenian herald, who now went to the
-Bœotian commanders, to the following effect: “The Athenians did not
-admit that they had hitherto been guilty of any wrong in reference
-to the temple, and protested that they would persist in respecting
-it for the future as much as possible. Their object in taking
-possession of it had been no evil sentiment towards the holy place,
-but the necessity of avenging the repeated invasions of Attica by
-the Bœotians. Possession of the territory, according to the received
-maxims of Greece, always carried along with it possession of
-temples therein situated, under obligation to fulfil all customary
-obligations to the resident god, as far as circumstances permitted.
-It was upon this maxim that the Bœotians had themselves acted when
-they took possession of their present territory, expelling the prior
-occupants and appropriating the temples: it was upon the same maxim
-that the Athenians would act in retaining so much of Bœotia as they
-had now conquered, and in conquering more of it, if they could.
-Necessity compelled them to use the consecrated water—a necessity
-not originating in the ambition of Athens, but in prior Bœotian
-aggressions upon Attica,—a necessity which they trusted that the
-gods would pardon, since their altars were allowed as a protection
-to the involuntary offender, and none but he who sinned without
-constraint experienced their displeasure. The Bœotians were guilty
-of far greater impiety in refusing to give back the dead, except
-upon certain conditions connected with the holy ground, than the
-Athenians, who merely refused to turn the duty of sepulture into an
-unseemly bargain. Tell us unconditionally (concluded the Athenian
-herald) that we may bury our dead under truce, pursuant to the maxims
-of our forefathers. Do not tell us that we may do so on condition of
-going out of Bœotia, for we are no longer in Bœotia; we are in our
-own territory, won by the sword.”
-
-The Bœotian generals dismissed the herald with a reply short and
-decisive: “If you are in Bœotia, you may take away all that belongs
-to you, but only on condition of going out of it. If on the other
-hand you are in your own territory, you can take your own resolution
-without asking us.”[640]
-
-  [640] See the two difficult chapters, iv, 98, 99, in Thucydidês.
-
-In this debate, curious as an illustration of Grecian manners and
-feelings, there seems to have been special pleading and evasion on
-both sides. The final sentence of the Bœotians was good as a reply
-to the incidental argument raised by the Athenian herald, who had
-rested the defence of Athens in regard to the temple of Delium on the
-allegation that the territory was Athenian, not Bœotian, Athenian
-by conquest and by the right of the strongest, and had concluded by
-affirming the same thing about Oropia, the district to which the
-battle-field belonged. It was only this same argument, of actual
-superior force, which the Bœotians retorted, when they said: “If
-the territory to which your application refers is yours by right
-of conquest (_i. e._ if you are _de facto_ masters of it, and are
-strongest within it), you can of course do what you think best in
-it: you need not ask any truce at our hands; you can bury your dead
-without a truce.”[641] The Bœotians knew that at this moment the
-field of battle was under guard by a detachment of their army,[642]
-and that the Athenians could not obtain the dead bodies without
-permission; but since the Athenian herald had asserted the reverse
-as a matter of fact, we can hardly wonder that they resented the
-production of such an argument; meeting it by a reply sufficiently
-pertinent in mere diplomatic fencing.
-
-  [641] See the notes of Poppo, Göller, Dr. Arnold, and other
-  commentators, on these chapters.
-
-  Neither these notes, nor the Scholiast, seem to me in all parts
-  satisfactory; nor do they seize the spirit of the argument
-  between the Athenian herald and the Bœotian officers, which
-  will be found perfectly consistent as a piece of diplomatic
-  interchange.
-
-  In particular, they do not take notice that it is the _Athenian_
-  herald who first raises the question, what is Athenian territory
-  and what is Bœotian: and that he defines Athenian territory to
-  be that in which the force of Athens is superior. The retort of
-  the Bœotians refers to that definition; not to the question of
-  rightful claim to any territory, apart from actual superiority of
-  force.
-
-  [642] Thucyd. iv, 97.
-
-But if the Athenian herald, instead of raising the incidental point
-of territorial property, combined with an incautious definition of
-that which constituted territorial property, as a defence against the
-alleged desecration of the temple of Delium, had confined himself
-to the main issue, he would have put the Bœotians completely in the
-wrong. According to principles universally respected in Greece, the
-victor, if solicited, was held bound to grant to the vanquished
-a truce for burying his dead; to grant and permit it absolutely,
-without annexing any conditions. On this, the main point in debate,
-the Bœotians sinned against the most sacred international law of
-Greece, when they exacted the evacuation of the temple at Delium
-as a condition for consenting to permit the burial of the Athenian
-dead. Ultimately, after they had taken Delium, we shall find that
-they did grant it unconditionally; and we may doubt whether they
-would have ever persisted in refusing it, if the Athenian herald had
-pressed this one important principle separately and exclusively; and
-if he had not, by an unskilful plea in vindication of the right
-to occupy and live at Delium, both exasperated their feelings, and
-furnished them with a collateral issue as a means of evading the main
-demand.[643]
-
-  [643] Thucydidês, in describing the state of mind of the
-  Bœotians, does not seem to imply that they thought this a good
-  and valid ground, upon which they could directly take their
-  stand; but merely that they considered it a fair diplomatic way
-  of meeting the alternative raised by the Athenian herald; for
-  εὐπρεπὲς means nothing more than this.
-
-  Οὐδ᾽ αὖ ἐσπένδοντο ~δῆθεν~ ὑπὲρ τῆς ἐκείνων (Ἀθηναίων)· τὸ δὲ ἐκ
-  τῆς ἑαυτῶν (Βοιωτῶν) ~εὐπρεπὲς~ εἶναι ἀποκρίνασθαι, ἀπιόντας καὶ
-  ἀπολαβεῖν ἃ ἀπαιτοῦσιν.
-
-  The adverb δῆθεν also marks the reference to the special
-  question, as laid out by the Athenian herald.
-
-To judge this curious debate with perfect impartiality, we ought
-to add, in reference to the conduct of the Athenians in occupying
-Delium, that for an enemy to make special choice of a temple, as
-a post to be fortified and occupied, was a proceeding certainly
-rare, perhaps hardly admissible, in Grecian warfare. Nor does the
-vindication offered by the Athenian herald meet the real charge
-preferred. It is one thing for an enemy of superior force to overrun
-a country, and to appropriate everything within it, sacred as well
-as profane: it is another thing for a border enemy, not yet in
-sufficient force for conquering the whole, to convert a temple of
-convenient site into a regular garrisoned fortress, and make it
-a base of operations against the neighboring population. On this
-ground, the Bœotians might reasonably complain of the seizure of
-Delium: though I apprehend that no impartial interpreter of Grecian
-international custom would have thought them warranted in attaching
-it as a condition to their grant of the burial-truce when solicited.
-
-All negotiation being thus broken off, the Bœotian generals prepared
-to lay siege to Delium, aided by two thousand Corinthian hoplites,
-together with some Megarians and the late Peloponnesian garrison of
-Nisæa, who joined after the news of the battle. Though they sent
-for darters and slingers, probably Œtæans and Ætolians, from the
-Maliac gulf, yet their direct attacks were at first all repelled
-by the garrison, aided by an Athenian squadron off the coast,
-in spite of the hasty and awkward defences by which alone the
-fort was protected. At length they contrived a singular piece of
-fire-mechanism, which enabled them to master the place. They first
-sawed in twain a thick beam, pierced a channel through it long-ways
-from end to end, coated most part of the channel with iron, and then
-joined the two halves accurately together. From the farther end of
-this hollowed beam they suspended by chains a boiler, full of pitch,
-brimstone, and burning charcoal; lastly, an iron tube projected from
-the end of the interior channel of the beam, in a direction so as to
-come near to the boiler. Such was the machine, which, constructed at
-some distance, was brought on carts and placed close to the wall,
-near the palisading and the wooden towers. The Bœotians then applied
-great bellows to their own end of the beam, blowing violently with
-a close current of air through the interior channel, so as to raise
-an intense fire in the boiler at the other end. The wooden portions
-of the wall, soon catching fire, became untenable for the defenders,
-who escaped in the best way they could, without attempting farther
-resistance. Two hundred of them were made prisoners and a few slain;
-but the greater number got safely on shipboard. This recapture of
-Delium took place on the seventeenth day after the battle, during
-all which interval the Athenians slain had remained on the field
-unburied. Presently, however, arrived the Athenian herald to make
-fresh application for the burial-truce; which was now forthwith
-granted, and granted unconditionally.[644]
-
-  [644] Thucyd. iv, 100, 101.
-
-Such was the memorable expedition and battle of Delium, a fatal
-discouragement to the feeling of confidence and hope which had
-previously reigned at Athens, besides the painful immediate loss
-which it inflicted on the city. Among the hoplites who took part in
-the vigorous charge and pushing of shields, the philosopher Sokratês
-is to be numbered. His bravery both in the battle and the retreat was
-much extolled by his friends, and doubtless with good reason: he had
-before served with credit in the ranks of the hoplites at Potidæa,
-and he served also at Amphipolis: his patience under hardship and
-endurance of heat and cold being not less remarkable than his
-personal bravery. He and his friend Lachês were among those hoplites,
-who, in the retreat from Delium, instead of flinging away their
-arms and taking to flight, kept their ranks, their arms, and their
-firmness of countenance; insomuch that the pursuing cavalry found it
-dangerous to meddle with them, and turned to an easier prey in the
-disarmed fugitives. Alkibiadês also served at Delium in the cavalry,
-and helped to protect Sokratês in the retreat. The latter was thus
-exposing his life at Delium nearly at the same time when Aristophanês
-was exposing him to derision in the comedy of the Clouds, as a
-dreamer alike morally worthless and physically incapable.[645]
-
-  [645] See Plato (Symposion, c. 36, p. 221; Lachês, p. 181;
-  Charmidês, p. 153; Apolog. Sokratis, p. 28), Strabo, ix, p. 403.
-
-  Plutarch, Alkibiadês, c. 7. We find it mentioned among the
-  stories told about Sokratês in the retreat from Delium, that his
-  life was preserved by the inspiration of his familiar dæmon, or
-  genius, which instructed him on one doubtful occasion which of
-  two roads was the safe one to take (Cicero, de Divinat. i, 54;
-  Plutarch, de Genio Sokratis, c. 11, p. 581).
-
-  The skepticism of Athenæus (v, p. 215) about the military service
-  of Sokratês is not to be defended, but it may probably be
-  explained by the exaggerations and falsehoods which he had read,
-  ascribing to the philosopher superhuman gallantry.
-
-Severe as the blow was which the Athenians suffered at Delium,
-their disasters in Thrace about the same time, or towards the close
-of the same summer and autumn, were yet more calamitous. I have
-already mentioned the circumstances which led to the preparation of a
-Lacedæmonian force intended to act against the Athenians in Thrace,
-under Brasidas, in concert with the Chalkidians, revolted subjects of
-Athens, and with Perdikkas of Macedon. Having frustrated the Athenian
-designs against Megara (as described above),[646] Brasidas completed
-the levy of his division,—seventeen hundred hoplites, partly Helots,
-partly Dorian Peloponnesians,—and conducted them, towards the close
-of the summer, to the Lacedæmonian colony of Herakleia, in the
-Trachinian territory near the Maliac gulf. To reach Macedonia and
-Thrace, it was necessary for him to pass through Thessaly, which was
-no easy task; for the war had now lasted so long that every state in
-Greece had become mistrustful of the transit of armed foreigners.
-Moreover, the mass of the Thessalian population were decidedly
-friendly to Athens, nor had he any sufficient means to force a
-passage: while, should he wait to apply for formal permission, there
-was much doubt whether it would be granted, and perfect certainty
-of such delay and publicity as would put the Athenians on their
-guard. But though such was the temper of the Thessalian people,
-yet the Thessalian governments, all oligarchical, sympathized with
-Lacedæmon; and the federal authority or power of the tagus, which
-bound together the separate cities, was generally very weak. What was
-of still greater importance, the Macedonian Perdikkas, as well as the
-Chalkidians, had in every city powerful guests and partisans, whom
-they prevailed upon to exert themselves actively in forwarding the
-passage of the army.[647]
-
-  [646] See above, page 378.
-
-  [647] Thucyd. iv, 78.
-
-To these men Brasidas sent a message at Pharsalus, as soon as he
-reached Herakleia; and Nikonidas, of Larissa, with other Thessalian
-friends of Perdikkas, assembling at Melitæa, in Achaia Phthiôtis,
-undertook to escort him through Thessaly. By their countenance
-and support, combined with his own boldness, dexterity, and rapid
-movements, he was enabled to accomplish the seemingly impossible
-enterprise of running through the country, not only without the
-consent but against the feeling of its inhabitants, simply by
-such celerity as to forestall opposition. After traversing Achaia
-Phthiôtis, a territory dependent on the Thessalians, Brasidas began
-his march from Melitæa through Thessaly itself, along with his
-powerful native guides. Notwithstanding all possible secrecy and
-celerity, his march became so far divulged, that a body of volunteers
-from the neighborhood, offended at the proceeding, and unfriendly
-to Nikonidas, assembled to oppose his progress down the valley of
-the river Enipeus. Reproaching him with wrongful violation of an
-independent territory, by the introduction of armed forces without
-permission from the general government, they forbade him to proceed
-farther. His only chance of making progress lay in disarming their
-opposition by fair words. His guides excused themselves by saying
-that the suddenness of his arrival had imposed upon them as his
-guests the obligation of conducting him through, without waiting
-to ask for formal permission: to offend their countrymen, however,
-was the farthest thing from their thoughts and they would renounce
-the enterprise if the persons now assembled persisted in their
-requisition. The same conciliatory tone was adopted by Brasidas
-himself. “He protested his strong feeling of respect and friendship
-for Thessaly and its inhabitants: his arms were directed against
-the Athenians, not against them: nor was he aware of any unfriendly
-relation subsisting between the Thessalians and Lacedæmonians, such
-as to exclude either of them from the territory of the other. Against
-the prohibition of the parties now before him, he could not possibly
-march forward, nor would he think of attempting it; but he put it
-to their good feeling whether they ought to prohibit him.” Such
-conciliatory language was successful in softening the opponents and
-inducing them to disperse. But so afraid were his guides of renewed
-opposition in other parts, that they hurried him forward still
-more rapidly,[648] and he “passed through the country at a running
-pace without halting.” Leaving Melitæa in the morning, he reached
-Pharsalus on the same night, encamping on the river Apidanus: thence
-he proceeded on the next day to Phakium, and on the day afterwards
-into Perrhæbia,[649] a territory adjoining to and dependent on
-Thessaly, under the mountain range of Olympus. Here he was in safety,
-so that his Thessalian guides left him; while the Perrhæbians
-conducted him over the pass of Olympus—the same over which the army
-of Xerxes had marched—to Dium, in Macedonia, in the territory of
-Perdikkas, on the northern edge of the mountain.[650]
-
-  [648] Thucyd. iv, 78. Ὁ δὲ, κελευόντων τῶν ἀγωγῶν, πρίν τι πλέον
-  ξυστῆναι τὸ κωλῦσον, ἐχώρει οὐδὲν ἐπισχὼν δρόμῳ.
-
-  [649] The geography of Thessaly is not sufficiently known
-  to enable us to verify these positions with exactness. That
-  which Thucydidês calls the Apidanus, is the river formed by
-  the junction of the Apidanus and Enipeus. See Kiepert’s map of
-  ancient Thessaly (Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, ch.
-  xlii, vol. iv, p. 470; and Dr. Arnold’s note on this chapter of
-  Thucydidês).
-
-  We must suppose that Brasidas was detained a considerable time
-  in parleying with the opposing band of Thessalians. Otherwise,
-  it would seem that the space between Melitæa and Pharsalus would
-  not be a great distance to get over in an entire day’s march,
-  considering that the pace was as rapid as the troops could
-  sustain. The much greater distance between Larissa and Melitæa,
-  was traversed in one night by Philip king of Macedon, the son
-  of Demetrius, with an army carrying ladders and other aids for
-  attacking a town, etc. (Polyb. v, 97.)
-
-   [650] Thucyd. iv, 78.
-
-The Athenians were soon apprized of this stolen passage, so ably
-and rapidly executed, in a manner which few other Greeks, certainly
-no other Lacedæmonian, would have conceived to be possible. Aware
-of the new enemy thus brought within reach of their possessions
-in Thrace, they transmitted orders thither for greater vigilance,
-and at the same time declared open war against Perdikkas;[651] but
-unfortunately without sending any efficient force, at the moment when
-timely defensive intervention was imperiously required. Perdikkas
-immediately invited Brasidas to join him in the attack of Arrhibæus,
-prince of the Macedonians, called Lynkestæ, or of Lynkus; a summons
-which the Spartan could not decline, since Perdikkas provided half
-of the pay and maintenance of the army,—but which he obeyed with
-reluctance, anxious as he was to commence operations against the
-allies of Athens. Such reluctance was still farther strengthened by
-envoys from the Chalkidians of Thrace, who, as zealous enemies of
-Athens, joined him forthwith, but discouraged any vigorous efforts
-to relieve Perdikkas from embarrassing enemies in the interior,
-in order that the latter might be under more pressing motives to
-conciliate and assist them. Accordingly Brasidas, though he joined
-Perdikkas, and marched along with the Macedonian army towards the
-territory of the Lynkestæ, was not only averse to active military
-operations, but even entertained with favor propositions from
-Arrhibæus, wherein the latter expressed his wish to become the ally
-of Lacedæmon, and offered to refer all his differences with Perdikkas
-to the arbitration of the Spartan general himself. Communicating
-these propositions to Perdikkas, Brasidas invited him to listen to
-an equitable compromise, admitting Arrhibæus into the alliance of
-Lacedæmon. But Perdikkas indignantly refused: “He had not called in
-Brasidas as a judge, to decide disputes between him and his enemies,
-but as an auxiliary, to put them down wherever he might point them
-out: and he protested against the iniquity of Brasidas in entering
-into terms with Arrhibæus, while the Lacedæmonian army was half
-paid and maintained by him,” (Perdikkas.[652]) Notwithstanding such
-remonstrances, and even a hostile protest, Brasidas persisted in his
-intended conference with Arrhibæus, and was so far satisfied with
-the propositions made that he withdrew his troops without marching
-over the pass into Lynkus. Too feeble to act alone, Perdikkas
-loudly complained, and contracted his allowance for the future so
-as to provide for only one-third of the army of Brasidas instead of
-one-half.
-
-  [651] Thucyd. iv, 82.
-
-  [652] Thucyd. iv, 83.
-
-To this inconvenience, however, Brasidas submitted, in haste to
-begin his march into Chalkidikê, and his operations jointly with the
-Chalkidians, for seducing or subduing the subject-allies of Athens.
-His first operation was against Akanthus, on the isthmus of the
-peninsula of Athos, the territory of which he invaded a little before
-the vintage, probably about the middle of September; when the grapes
-were ripe, but still out, and the whole crop of course exposed to
-ruin at the hands of an enemy superior in force: so important was it
-to Brasidas to have escaped the necessity of wasting another month
-in conquering the Lynkestæ. There was within the town of Akanthus a
-party in concert with the Chalkidians, anxious to admit him, and to
-revolt openly from Athens. But the mass of the citizens were averse
-to this step: and it was only by dwelling on the terrible loss from
-exposure of the crop without, that the anti-Athenian party could
-persuade them even to grant the request of Brasidas to be admitted
-singly,[653] so as to explain his purposes formally before the
-public assembly, which would take its own decision afterwards. “For
-a Lacedæmonian (says Thucydidês) he was no mean speaker:” and if
-he is to have credit for that which we find written in Thucydidês,
-such an epithet would be less than his desert. Doubtless, however,
-the substance of the speech is genuine: and it is one of the most
-interesting in Grecian history; partly as a manifesto of professed
-Lacedæmonian policy, partly because it had a great practical effect
-in determining, on an occasion of paramount importance, a multitude
-which, though unfavorably inclined to him, was not beyond the reach
-of argument. I give the chief points of the speech, without binding
-myself to the words.
-
-  [653] Thucyd. iv, 84. Οἱ δὲ ~περὶ τοῦ δέχεσθαι αὐτὸν κατ᾽
-  ἀλλήλους ἐστασίαζον, οἵ τε μετὰ τῶν Χαλκιδέων ξυνεπάγοντες καὶ ὁ
-  δῆμος~· ὅμως δὲ, ~διὰ τοῦ καρποῦ τὸ δέος ἔτι ἔξω ὄντος~, πεισθὲν
-  τὸ πλῆθος ὑπὸ τοῦ Βρασίδου δέξασθαί τε αὐτὸν μόνον καὶ ἀκούσαντας
-  βουλεύσασθαι, δέχεται, etc.
-
-“Myself and my soldiers have been sent, Akanthians, to realize the
-purpose which we proclaimed on beginning the war; that we took arms
-to liberate Greece from the Athenians. Let no man blame us for
-having been long in coming, or for the mistake which we made at the
-outset in supposing that we should quickly put down the Athenians by
-operations against Attica, without exposing you to any risk. Enough,
-that we are now here on the first opportunity, resolved to put them
-down if you will lend us your aid. To find myself shut out of your
-town, nay, to find that I am not heartily welcomed, astonishes me.
-We, Lacedæmonians, undertook this long and perilous march, in the
-belief that we were coming to friends eagerly expecting us; and
-it would indeed be terrible if you should now disappoint us, and
-stand out against your own freedom as well as that of other Greeks.
-Your example, standing high as you do both for prudence and power,
-will fatally keep back other Greeks, and make them suspect that I
-am wanting either in power to protect them against Athens, or in
-honest purpose. Now, in regard to power, my own present army was
-one which the Athenians, though superior in number, were afraid to
-fight near Nisæa; nor are they at all likely to send an equal force
-hither against me by sea. And in regard to my purpose, it is not
-one of mischief, but of liberation, the Lacedæmonian authorities
-having pledged themselves to me by the most solemn oaths, that every
-city which joins me shall retain its autonomy. You have therefore
-the best assurance both as to my purposes and as to my power; still
-less need you apprehend that I am come with factious designs, to
-serve the views of any particular men among you, and to remodel your
-established constitution to the disadvantage either of the many or
-of the few. That would be worse than foreign subjugation, so that
-we Lacedæmonians should be taking all this trouble to earn hatred
-instead of gratitude. We should play the part of unworthy traitors,
-worse even than that high-handed oppression of which we accuse the
-Athenians: we should at once violate our oaths and sin against our
-strongest political interests. Perhaps you may say, that though you
-wish me well, you desire for your parts to be let alone, and to
-stand aloof from a dangerous struggle. You will tell me to carry my
-propositions elsewhere, to those who can safely embrace them, but
-not to thrust my alliance upon any people against their own will.
-If this should be your language, I shall first call your local gods
-and heroes to witness that I have come to you with a mission of
-good, and have employed persuasion in vain; I shall then proceed to
-ravage your territory and extort your consent, thinking myself justly
-entitled to do so, on two grounds. First, that the Lacedæmonians may
-not sustain actual damage from these good wishes which you profess
-towards me without actually joining,—damage in the shape of that
-tribute which you annually send to Athens. Next, that the Greeks
-generally may not be prevented by you from becoming free. It is only
-on the ground of common good, that we Lacedæmonians can justify
-ourselves for liberating any city against its own will; but as we
-are conscious of desiring only extinction of the empire of others,
-not acquisition of empire for ourselves, we should fail in our duty
-if we suffered you to obstruct that liberation which we are now
-carrying to all. Consider well my words, then: take to yourselves
-the glory of beginning the era of emancipation for Greece, save your
-own properties from damage, and attach an ever-honorable name to the
-community of Akanthus.”[654]
-
-  [654] Thucyd. iv, 85, 86, 87.
-
-Nothing could be more plausible or judicious than this language of
-Brasidas to the Akanthians, nor had they any means of detecting the
-falsity of the assertion, which he afterwards repeated in other
-places besides,[655] that he had braved the forces of Athens at Nisæa
-with the same army as that now on the outside of the walls. Perhaps
-the simplicity of his speech and manner may even have lent strength
-to his assurances. As soon as he had retired, the subject was largely
-discussed in the assembly, with much difference of opinion among
-the speakers, and perfect freedom on both sides: and the decision,
-not called for until after a long debate, was determined partly by
-the fair promises of Brasidas, partly by the certain loss which
-the ruin of the vine-crop would entail. The votes of the citizens
-present being taken secretly, a majority resolved to accede to the
-propositions of Brasidas and revolt from Athens.[656] Exacting the
-renewal of his pledge and that of the Lacedæmonian authorities, for
-the preservation of full autonomy to every city which should join
-him, they received his army into the town. The neighboring city of
-Stageirus, a colony of Andros, as Akanthus also was, soon followed
-the example.[657]
-
-  [655] Thucyd. iv, 108.
-
-  [656] Thucyd. iv, 88. Οἱ δὲ Ἀκάνθιοι, πολλῶν λεχθέντων πρότερον
-  ἐπ᾽ ἀμφότερα, κρύφα διαψηφισάμενοι, διά τε τὸ ἐπαγωγὰ εἰπεῖν τὸν
-  Βρασίδαν καὶ περὶ τοῦ καρποῦ φόβῳ, ἔγνωσαν οἱ πλείους ἀφίστασθαι
-  Ἀθηναίων.
-
-  [657] Thucyd. iv, 88; Diodor. xii, 67.
-
-There are few acts in history wherein Grecian political reason and
-morality appear to greater advantage than in this proceeding of
-the Akanthians. The habit of fair, free, and pacific discussion;
-the established respect to the vote of the majority; the care to
-protect individual independence of judgment by secret suffrage; the
-deliberate estimate of reasons on both sides by each individual
-citizen, all these main laws and conditions of healthy political
-action appear as a part of the confirmed character of the Akanthians.
-We shall not find Brasidas entering other towns in a way so
-creditable or so harmonious.
-
-But there is another inference which the scene just described
-irresistibly suggests. It affords the clearest proof that the
-Akanthians had little to complain of as subject-allies of Athens, and
-that they would have continued in that capacity, if left to their
-own choice, without the fear of having their crop destroyed. Such is
-the pronounced feeling of the mass of the citizens: the party who
-desire otherwise are in a decided minority. It is only the combined
-effect of severe impending loss, and of tempting assurances held out
-by the worthiest representative whom Sparta ever sent out, which
-induces them to revolt from Athens: nor even then is the resolution
-taken without long opposition, and a large dissentient minority, in
-a case where secret suffrage insured free and genuine expression
-of preference from every individual. Now, it is impossible that
-the scene in Akanthus at this critical moment could have been of
-such a character, had the empire of Athens been practically odious
-and burdensome to the subject-allies, as it is commonly depicted.
-Had such been the fact; had the Akanthians felt that the imperial
-ascendency of Athens oppressed them with hardship or humiliation,
-from which their neighbors, the revolted Chalkidians in Olynthus and
-elsewhere, were exempt, they would have hailed the advent of Brasidas
-with that cordiality which he himself expected and was surprised
-not to find. The sense of present grievance, always acute and often
-excessive, would have stood out as their prominent impulse: nor would
-they have needed either intimidation or cajolery to induce them to
-throw open their gates to the liberator, who, in his speech within
-the town, finds no actual suffering to appeal to, but is obliged to
-gain over an audience evidently unwilling by alternate threats and
-promises.
-
-As in Akanthus, so in most of the other Thracian subjects of
-Athens, the bulk of the citizens, though strongly solicited by
-the Chalkidians, manifest no spontaneous disposition to revolt
-from Athens. We shall find the party who introduce Brasidas to be
-a conspiring minority, who not only do not consult the majority
-beforehand, but act in such a manner as to leave no free option to
-the majority afterwards, whether they will ratify or reject: bring in
-a foreign force to overawe them and compromise them without their own
-consent in hostility against Athens. Now that which makes the events
-of Akanthus so important as an evidence, is, that the majority is not
-thus entrapped and compressed, but pronounces its judgment freely
-after ample discussion: the grounds of that judgment are clearly set
-forth to us, so as to show that hatred of Athens, if even it exists
-at all, is in no way a strong or determining feeling. Had there
-existed any such strong feeling among the subject-allies of Athens in
-the Chalkidic peninsula, there was no Athenian force now present to
-hinder them all from opening their gates to the liberator Brasidas
-by spontaneous majorities, as he himself, encouraged by the sanguine
-promises of the Chalkidians, evidently expected that they would do.
-But nothing of this kind happened.
-
-That which I before remarked in recounting the revolt of Mitylênê,
-a privileged ally of Athens, is now confirmed in the revolt of
-Akanthus, a tributary and subject-ally. The circumstances of both
-prove that imperial Athens inspired no hatred, and occasioned no
-painful grievance, to the population of her subject-cities generally:
-the movements against her arose from party-minorities, of the
-same character as that Platæan party which introduced the Theban
-assailants into Platæa at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war.
-There are of course differences of sentiment between one town and
-another; but the conduct of the towns generally demonstrates that
-the Athenian empire was not felt by them to be a scheme of plunder
-and oppression, as Mr. Mitford and others would have us believe. It
-is indeed true that Athens managed her empire with reference to her
-own feelings and interests, and that her hold was rather upon the
-prudence than upon the affection of her allies, except in so far as
-those among them who were democratically governed sympathized with
-her democracy: it is also true that restrictions in any form on
-the autonomy of each separate city were offensive to the political
-instincts of the Greeks: moreover, Athens took less and less pains
-to disguise or soften the real character of her empire, as one
-resting simply on established fact and superior force. But this
-is a different thing from the endurance of practical hardship and
-oppression, which, had it been real, would have inspired strong
-positive hatred among the subject-allies, such as Brasidas expected
-to find universal in Thrace, but did not really find, in spite of the
-easy opening which his presence afforded.
-
-The acquisition of Akanthus and Stageirus enabled Brasidas in no very
-long time to extend his conquests; to enter Argilus, and from thence
-to make the capital acquisition of Amphipolis.
-
-Argilus was situated between Stageirus and the river Strymon, along
-the western bank of which river its territory extended. Along the
-eastern bank of the same river,—south of the lake which it forms
-under the name of Kerkinitis, and north of the town of Eion at
-its mouth, was situated the town and territory of Amphipolis,
-communicating with the lands of Argilus by the important bridge there
-situated. The Argilians were colonists from Andros, like Akanthus
-and Stageirus, and the adhesion of those two cities to Brasidas
-gave him opportunity to cultivate intelligences in Argilus, wherein
-there had existed a standing discontent against Athens, ever since
-the foundation of the neighboring city of Amphipolis.[658] The
-latter city had been established by the Athenian Agnon, at the head
-of a numerous body of colonists, on a spot belonging to the Edonian
-Thracians, called Ennea Hodoi, or Nine Ways, about five years prior
-to the commencement of the war (B.C. 437), after two previous
-attempts to colonize it,—one by Histiæus and Aristagoras, at the
-period of the Ionic revolt, and a second by the Athenians about 465
-B.C., both of which lamentably failed. So valuable, however, was
-the site, from its vicinity to the gold and silver mines near Mount
-Pangæus and to large forests of ship-timber, as well as for command
-of the Strymon, and for commerce with the interior of Thrace and
-Macedonia, that the Athenians had sent a second expedition under
-Agnon, who founded the city and gave it the name of Amphipolis. The
-resident settlers there, however, were only in small proportion
-Athenian citizens; the rest of mixed origin, some of them Argilian,
-a considerable number Chalkidians. The Athenian general Euklês was
-governor in the town, though seemingly with no paid force under his
-command.
-
-  [658] Thucyd. iv, 103. μάλιστα δὲ οἱ Ἀργίλιοι, ἐγγύς τε
-  προσοικοῦντες καὶ ἀεί ποτε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ὄντες ὕποπτοι καὶ
-  ἐπιβουλεύοντες τῷ χωρίῳ (Amphipolis).
-
-Among these mixed inhabitants a conspiracy was organized to betray
-the town to Brasidas, the inhabitants of Argilus as well as the
-Chalkidians each of them tampering with those of the same race
-who resided in Amphipolis; and the influence of Perdikkas, not
-inconsiderable, in consequence of the commerce of the place with
-Macedonia, was employed to increase the number of partisans. Of
-all the instigators, however, the most strenuous as well as the
-most useful were the inhabitants of Argilus. Amphipolis, together
-with the Athenians as its founders, had been odious to them from
-its commencement; and its foundation had doubtless abridged their
-commerce and importance as masters of the lower course of the
-Strymon. They had been long laying snares against the city, and the
-arrival of Brasidas now presented to them an unexpected chance of
-success. It was they who enabled him to accomplish the surprise,
-deferring proclamation of their own defection from Athens until they
-could make it subservient to his conquest of Amphipolis.
-
-Starting with his army from Arnê in the Chalkidic peninsula, Brasidas
-arrived in the afternoon at Aulon and Bromiskus, near the channel
-whereby the lake Bolbê is connected with the sea: from hence, after
-his men had supped, he began his night-march to Amphipolis, on a
-cold and snowy night of November, or the beginning of December. He
-reached Argilus in the middle of the night, where the leaders at once
-admitted him, proclaiming their revolt from Athens. With their aid
-and guidance, he then hastened forward without delay to the bridge
-across the Strymon, which he reached before break of day.[659] It
-was guarded only by a feeble piquet,—the town of Amphipolis itself
-being situated on the hill at some little distance higher up the
-river;[660] so that Brasidas, preceded by the Argilian conspirators,
-surprised and overpowered the guard without difficulty. Thus master
-of this important communication, he crossed with his army forthwith
-into the territory of Amphipolis, where his arrival spread the utmost
-dismay and terror. The governor Euklês, the magistrates, and the
-citizens, were all found wholly unprepared: the lands belonging to
-the city were occupied by residents, with their families and property
-around them, calculating upon undisturbed security, as if there had
-been no enemy within reach. Such of these as were close to the city
-succeeded in running thither with their families, though leaving
-their property exposed,—but the more distant became in person as
-well as in property at the mercy of the invader. Even within the
-town, filled with the friends and relatives of these victims without,
-indescribable confusion reigned, of which the conspirators within
-tried to avail themselves in order to get the gates thrown open. And
-so complete was the disorganization, that if Brasidas had marched
-up without delay to the gates and assaulted the town, many persons
-supposed that he would have carried it at once. Such a risk, however,
-was too great even for his boldness, the rather as repulse would
-have been probably his ruin. Moreover, confiding in the assurances
-of the conspirators that the gates would be thrown open, he thought
-it safer to seize as many persons as he could from the out-citizens,
-as a means of working upon the sentiments of those within the walls;
-lastly, this process of seizure and plunder was probably more to the
-taste of his own soldiers, and could not well be hindered.
-
-  [659] Thucyd. iv, 104. Κατέστησαν τὸν στρατὸν πρὸ ἕω ἐπὶ τὴν
-  γέφυραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ.
-
-  Bekker’s reading of πρὸ ἕω appears to me preferable to πρόσω. The
-  latter word really adds nothing to the meaning; whereas the fact
-  that Brasidas got over the river before daylight is one both new
-  and material: it is not necessarily implied in the previous words
-  ἐκείνῃ τῇ νυκτί.
-
-  [660] Thucyd. iv, 104. Ἀπέχει δὲ τὸ πόλισμα πλέον τῆς διαβάσεως,
-  καὶ οὐ καθεῖτο τείχη ὥσπερ νῦν, φυλακὴ δέ τις βραχεῖα
-  καθειστήκει, etc.
-
-  Dr. Arnold, with Dobree, Poppo, and most of the commentators,
-  translates these words: “The town (of Amphipolis) is farther
-  off (from Argilus) than the passage of the river.” But this
-  must be of course true, and conveys no new information, seeing
-  that Brasidas had to cross the river to reach the town. Smith
-  and Bloomfield are right, I think, in considering τῆς διαβάσεως
-  as governed by ἀπέχει and not by πλέον,—“the city is at some
-  distance from the crossing:” and the objection which Poppo makes
-  against them, that πλέον must necessarily imply a comparison
-  with something, cannot be sustained: for Thucydidês often uses
-  ἐκ πλείονος (iv, 103; viii, 83), as precisely identical with ἐκ
-  πολλοῦ (i, 68; iv, 67; v, 69); also περὶ πλείονος.
-
-  In the following chapter, on occasion of the battle of
-  Amphipolis, some farther remarks will be found on the locality.
-
-But he waited in vain for the opening of the gates. The conspirators
-in the city, in spite of the complete success of their surprise and
-the universal dismay around them, found themselves unable to carry
-the majority along with them. As in Akanthus, so in Amphipolis,
-those who really hated Athens and wished to revolt were only a
-party-minority; the greater number of citizens, at this critical
-moment, stood by Euklês and the few native Athenians around him in
-resolving upon defence, and in sending off an express to Thucydidês
-(the historian) at Thasos, the colleague of Euklês, as general
-in the region of Thrace, for immediate aid. This step, of course
-immediately communicated to Brasidas from within, determined him to
-make every effort for enticing the Amphipolitans to surrender before
-the reinforcement should arrive; the rather, as he was apprized
-that Thucydidês, being a large proprietor and worker of gold mines
-in the neighboring region, possessed extensive personal influence
-among the Thracian tribes, and would be able to bring them together
-for the relief of the place, in conjunction with his own Athenian
-squadron. He therefore sent in propositions for surrender on the most
-favorable terms, guaranteeing to every citizen who chose to remain,
-Amphipolitan or even Athenian, continued residence with undisturbed
-property and equal political rights, and granting to every one who
-chose to depart, five days for the purpose of carrying away his
-property.
-
-Such easy conditions, when made known in the city, produced
-presently a sensible change of opinion among the citizens, proving
-acceptable both to Athenians and Amphipolitans, though on different
-grounds.[661] The properties of the citizens without, as well as many
-of their relatives, were all in the hands of Brasidas: no one counted
-upon the speedy arrival of reinforcement; and even if it did arrive,
-the city might be preserved, but the citizens without would still
-be either slain or made captive: a murderous battle would ensue,
-and perhaps, after all, Brasidas, assisted by the party within,
-might prove victorious. The Athenian citizens in Amphipolis, knowing
-themselves to be exposed to peculiar danger, were perfectly well
-pleased with his offer, as extricating them from a critical position
-and procuring for them the means of escape, with comparatively little
-loss; while the non-Athenian citizens, partakers in the same relief
-from peril, felt little reluctance in accepting a capitulation which
-preserved both their rights and their properties inviolate, and
-merely severed them from Athens, towards which city they felt, not
-hatred, but indifference. Above all, the friends and relatives of
-the citizens exposed in the out-region were strenuous in urging on
-the capitulation, so that the conspirators soon became bold enough
-to proclaim themselves openly, insisting upon the moderation of
-Brasidas and the prudence of admitting him. Euklês found that the
-tone of opinion, even among his own Athenians, was gradually turned
-against him, nor could he prevent the acceptance of the terms, and
-the admission of the enemy into the city, on that same day.
-
-  [661] Thucyd. iv, 106. Οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ ἀκούσαντες ~ἀλλοιότεροι~
-  ἐγένοντο τὰς γνώμας, etc.
-
-  The word ἀλλοιότεροι seems to indicate both the change of view,
-  compared with what had been before, and new divergence introduced
-  among themselves.
-
-No such resolution would have been adopted, had the citizens been
-aware how near at hand Thucydidês and his forces were. The message
-despatched early in the morning from Amphipolis found him at Thasos
-with seven triremes; with which he instantly put to sea, so as to
-reach Eion at the mouth of the Strymon, within three miles of
-Amphipolis, on the same evening. He hoped to be in time for saving
-Amphipolis, but the place had surrendered a few hours before. He
-arrived, indeed, only just in time to preserve Eion; for parties
-in that town were already beginning to concert the admission of
-Brasidas, who would probably have entered it at daybreak the next
-morning. Thucydidês, putting the place in a condition of defence,
-successfully repelled an attack which Brasidas made both by land and
-by boats on the river. He at the same time received and provided for
-the Athenian citizens who were retiring from Amphipolis.[662]
-
-  [662] Thucyd. iv, 105, 106; Diodor. xii, 68.
-
-The capture of this city, perhaps the most important of all the
-foreign possessions of Athens, and the opening of the bridge over the
-Strymon, by which even all her eastern allies became approachable by
-land, occasioned prodigious emotion throughout all the Grecian world.
-The dismay felt at Athens[663] was greater than had been ever before
-experienced: hope and joy prevailed among her enemies, and excitement
-and new aspirations became widely spread among her subject-allies.
-The bloody defeat at Delium, and the unexpected conquests of
-Brasidas, now again lowered the _prestige_ of Athenian success,
-sixteen months after it had been so powerfully exalted by the capture
-of Sphakteria. The loss of reputation which Sparta had then incurred,
-was now compensated by a reaction against the unfounded terrors since
-conceived about the probable career of her enemy. It was not merely
-the loss of Amphipolis, serious as that was, which distressed the
-Athenians, but also their insecurity respecting the maintenance of
-their whole empire: they knew not which of their subject-allies might
-next revolt, in contemplation of aid from Brasidas, facilitated by
-the newly-acquired Strymonian bridge. And as the proceedings of that
-general counted in part to the credit of his country, it was believed
-that Sparta, now for the first time shaking off her languor,[664] had
-taken to herself the rapidity and enterprise once regarded as the
-exclusive characteristic of Athens. But besides all these chances
-of evil to the Athenians, there was another yet more threatening,
-the personal ascendency and position of Brasidas himself. It was not
-merely the boldness, the fertility of aggressive resource, the quick
-movements, the power of stimulating the minds of soldiers, which
-lent efficiency to that general; but also his incorruptible probity,
-his good faith, his moderation, his abstinence from party-cruelty or
-jobbing, and from all intermeddling with the internal constitutions
-of the different cities, in strict adherence to that manifesto
-whereby Sparta had proclaimed herself the liberator of Greece. Such
-talents and such official worth had never before been seen combined.
-Set off as they were by the full brilliancy of successes such as
-were deemed incredible before they actually occurred, they inspired
-a degree of confidence and turned a tide of opinion towards this
-eminent man which rendered him personally one of the first powers in
-Greece. Numerous solicitations were transmitted to him at Amphipolis
-from parties among the subject-allies of Athens, in their present
-temper of large hopes from him and diminished fear of the Athenians:
-the anti-Athenian party in each was impatient to revolt, the rest of
-the population less restrained by fear.[665]
-
-  [663] Thucyd. iv, 108. Ἐχομένης δὲ τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως, οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ἐς
-  μέγα δέος κατέστησαν, etc.
-
-  The prodigious importance of the site of Amphipolis, with its
-  adjoining bridge forming the communication between the regions
-  east and west of the Strymon, was felt not only by Philip of
-  Macedon, as will hereafter appear, but also by the Romans after
-  their conquest of Macedonia. Of the four regions into which the
-  Romans distributed Macedonia, “pars prima (says Livy, xlv, 30)
-  habet opportunitatem Amphipoleos; quæ objecta claudit omnes ab
-  oriente sole in Macedoniam aditus.”
-
-  [664] Thucyd. iv, 108. Τὸ δὲ μέγιστον, διὰ τὸ ἡδονὴν ἔχον
-  ἐν τῷ αὐτίκα, καὶ ὅτι ~τὸ πρῶτον Λακεδαιμονίων ὀργώντων
-  ἔμελλον πειρᾶσθαι~, κινδυνεύειν παντὶ τρόπῳ ἑτοῖμοι ἦσαν (the
-  subject-allies of Athens).
-
-  [665] Thucyd. iv, 108.
-
-Of those who indulged in these sanguine calculations, many had yet to
-learn by painful experience that Athens was still but little abated
-in power: but her inaction during this important autumn had been such
-as may well explain their mistake. It might have been anticipated
-that, on hearing the alarming news of the junction of Brasidas with
-the Chalkidians, and Perdikkas so close upon their dependent allies,
-they would forthwith have sent a competent force to Thrace, which,
-if despatched at that time, would probably have obviated all the
-subsequent disasters. So they would have acted at any other time,
-and perhaps even then, if Periklês had been alive. But the news
-arrived just at the period when Athens was engaged in the expedition
-against Bœotia, which ended very shortly in the ruinous defeat of
-Delium. Under the discouragement arising from the death of the
-stratêgus, Hippokratês, and one thousand citizens, the idea of a
-fresh expedition to Thrace would probably have been intolerable to
-Athenian hoplites: the hardships of a winter service in Thrace, as
-experienced a few years before in the blockade of Potidæa, would
-probably also aggravate their reluctance. In Grecian history, we
-must steadfastly keep in mind that we are reading about citizen
-soldiers, not about professional soldiers; and that the temper of the
-time, whether of confidence or dismay, modifies to an unspeakable
-degree all the calculations of military and political prudence. Even
-after the rapid successes of Brasidas, not merely at Akanthus and
-Stageirus, but even at Amphipolis, they sent only a few inadequate
-guards[666] to the points most threatened, thus leaving to their
-enterprising enemy the whole remaining winter for his operations,
-without hindrance. Without depreciating the merits of Brasidas, we
-may see that his extraordinary success was in great part owing to
-the no less extraordinary depression which at that time pervaded the
-Athenian public: a feeling encouraged by Nikias and other leading
-men of the same party, who were building upon it in order to get the
-Lacedæmonian proposals for peace accepted.
-
-  [666] Thucyd. iv, 108. Οἱ μὲν Ἀθηναῖοι φυλακὰς ὡς ἐξ ὀλίγου καὶ
-  ἐν χειμῶνι, διέπεμπον ἐς τὰς πόλεις etc.
-
-But while we thus notice the short-comings of Athens, in not sending
-timely forces against Brasidas, we must at the same time admit, that
-the most serious and irreparable loss which she sustained, that of
-Amphipolis, was the fault of her officers more than her own. Euklês,
-and the historian Thucydidês, the two joint Athenian commanders in
-Thrace, to whom she had confided the defence of that important town,
-had means amply sufficient to place it beyond all risk of capture,
-if they had employed the most ordinary vigilance and precaution
-beforehand. That Thucydidês became an exile immediately after this
-event, and remained so for twenty years, is certain from his own
-statement: and we hear, upon what in this case is quite sufficient
-authority, that the Athenians condemned him, probably Euklês also, to
-banishment, on the proposition of Kleon.[667]
-
-  [667] Thucyd. v, 26. See the biography of Thucydidês by
-  Marcellinus, prefixed to all the editions, p. 19, ed. Arnold.
-
-In considering this sentence, historians[668] commonly treat
-Thucydidês as an innocent man, and find nothing to condemn except the
-calumnies of the demagogue along with the injustice of the people.
-But this view of the case cannot be sustained, when we bring together
-all the facts even as indicated by Thucydidês himself. At the moment
-when Brasidas surprised Amphipolis, Thucydidês was at Thasos; and
-the event is always discussed as if he was there by necessity or
-duty; as if Thasos was his special mission. Now we know from his own
-statement that his command was not special or confined to Thasos: he
-was sent as joint commander along with Euklês generally to Thrace,
-and especially to Amphipolis.[669] Both of them were jointly and
-severally responsible for the proper defence of Amphipolis, with
-the Athenian empire and interests in that quarter such nomination
-of two or more officers, coördinate and jointly responsible, being
-the usual habit of Athens, wherever the scale or the area of
-military operations was considerable, instead of naming one supreme
-responsible commander, with subordinate officers acting under him and
-responsible to him. If, then, Thucydidês “was stationed at Thasos,”
-to use the phrase of Dr. Thirlwall, this was because he chose to
-station himself there, in the exercise of his own discretion.
-
-  [668] I transcribe the main features from the account of Dr.
-  Thirlwall, whose judgment coincides on this occasion with what is
-  generally given (Hist. of Greece, ch. xxiii, vol. iii, p. 268).
-
-  “On the evening of the same day Thucydidês, with seven galleys
-  which he happened to have with him at Thasos, when he received
-  the despatch from Euklês, sailed into the mouth of the Strymon,
-  and learning the fall of Amphipolis proceeded to put Eion in
-  a state of defence. His timely arrival saved the place, which
-  Brasidas attacked the next morning, both from the river and the
-  land, without effect: and the refugees who retired by virtue
-  of the treaty from Amphipolis, found shelter at Eion, and
-  contributed to its security. _The historian rendered an important
-  service to his country: and it does not appear that human
-  prudence and activity could have accomplished anything more under
-  the same circumstances._ Yet _his unavoidable failure_ proved
-  the occasion of a sentence, under which he spent twenty years of
-  his life in exile: and he was only restored to his country in
-  the season of her deepest humiliation by the public calamities.
-  So much only can be gathered with certainty from his language:
-  for he has not condescended to mention either the charge which
-  was brought against him, or the nature of the sentence, which
-  he may either have suffered, or avoided by a voluntary exile.
-  A statement, very probable in itself, though resting on slight
-  authority, attributes his banishment to Cleon’s calumnies: _that
-  the irritation produced by the loss of Amphipolis should have
-  been so directed against an innocent object, would perfectly
-  accord with the character of the people and of the demagogue_.
-  Posterity has gained by the injustice of his contemporaries,” etc.
-
-  [669] Thucyd. iv, 104. Οἱ δ᾽ ἐναντίοι τοῖς προδιδοῦσι (that is,
-  at Amphipolis) κρατοῦντες τῷ πλήθει ὥστε μὴ αὐτίκα τὰς πύλας
-  ἀνοίγεσθαι, πέμπουσι μετὰ Εὐκλέους τοῦ στρατηγοῦ, ὃς ἐκ τῶν
-  Ἀθηναίων παρῆν αὐτοῖς φύλαξ τοῦ χωρίου, ~ἐπὶ τὸν ἕτερον στρατηγὸν
-  τῶν ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, Θουκυδίδην τὸν Ὀλόρου, ὃς τάδε ξυνέγραψεν,
-  ὄντα περὶ Θάσον~ (ἔστι δ᾽ ἡ νῆσος, Παρίων ἀποικία, ἀπέχουσα
-  τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως ἡμισείας ἡμέρας μάλιστα πλοῦν) κελεύοντες σφίσι
-  βοηθεῖν.
-
-  Here Thucydidês describes himself as “the other general along
-  with Euklês, of the region of or towards Thrace.” There cannot be
-  a clearer designation of the extensive range of his functions and
-  duties.
-
-  I adopt here the reading τῶν ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, the genitive case of the
-  well-known Thucydidean phrase τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, in preference to τὸν
-  ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης; which would mean in substance the same thing, though
-  not so precisely, nor so suitably to the usual manner of the
-  historian. Bloomfield, Bekker, and Göller have all introduced τῶν
-  into the text, on the authority of various MSS.: Poppo and Dr.
-  Arnold also both express a preference for it, though they still
-  leave τὸν in the text.
-
-  Moreover, the words of Thucydidês himself, in the passage where
-  he mentions his own long exile, plainly prove that he was sent
-  out as general, not to Thasos, but _to Amphipolis_: (v, 26) καὶ
-  ξυνέβη μοι φεύγειν τὴν ἐμαυτοῦ ἔτη εἴκοσι ~μετὰ τὴν ἐς Ἀμφίπολιν
-  στρατηγίαν~, etc.
-
-Accordingly, the question which we have to put is, not whether
-Thucydidês did all that could be done, after he received the alarming
-express at Thasos, which is the part of the case that _he_ sets
-prominently before us, but whether he and Euklês jointly took the
-best general measures for the security of the Athenian empire in
-Thrace; especially for Amphipolis, the first jewel of her empire.
-They suffer Athens to be robbed of that jewel, and how? Had they a
-difficult position to defend? Were they overwhelmed by a superior
-force? Were they distracted by simultaneous revolts in different
-places, or assailed by enemies unknown or unforeseen? Not one of
-these grounds for acquittal can be pleaded. First, their position was
-of all others the most defensible: they had only to keep the bridge
-over the Strymon adequately watched and guarded, or to retain the
-Athenian squadron at Eion, and Amphipolis was safe. Either one or
-the other of these precautions would have sufficed; both together
-would have sufficed so amply, as probably to prevent the scheme of
-attack from being formed. Next, the force under Brasidas was in noway
-superior, not even adequate to the capture of the inferior place
-Eion, when properly guarded, much less to that of Amphipolis. Lastly,
-there were no simultaneous revolts to distract attention, nor unknown
-enemies to confound a well-laid scheme of defence. There was but
-one enemy, in one quarter, having one road by which to approach; an
-enemy of surpassing merit, indeed, and eminently dangerous to Athens,
-but without any chance of success except from the omissions of the
-Athenian officers.
-
-Now Thucydidês and Euklês both knew that Brasidas had prevailed
-upon Akanthus and Stageirus to revolt, and that too in such a way
-as to extend his own personal influence materially: they knew that
-the population of Argilus was of Andrian origin,[670] like that of
-Akanthus and Stageirus, and therefore peculiarly likely to be tempted
-by the example of those two towns. Lastly, they knew, and Thucydidês
-himself tells us,[671] that this Argilian population—whose territory
-bordered on the Strymon and the western foot of the bridge, and
-who had many connections in Amphipolis—had been long disaffected
-to Athens, and especially to the Athenian possession of that city.
-Yet, having such foreknowledge, ample warning for the necessity of
-a vigilant defence, Thucydidês and Euklês withdraw, or omit, both
-the two precautions upon which the security of Amphipolis rested;
-precautions both of them obvious, either of them sufficient. The
-one leaves the bridge under a feeble guard,[672] and is caught
-so unprepared everywhere, that one might suppose Athens to be in
-profound peace; the other is found with his squadron, not at Eion,
-but at Thasos; an island out of all possible danger, either from
-Brasidas, who had no ships, or any other enemy. The arrival of
-Brasidas comes on both of them like a clap of thunder. Nothing more
-is required than this plain fact, under the circumstances, to prove
-their improvidence as commanders.
-
-  [670] Compare Thucyd. iv, 84, 88, 103.
-
-  [671] Thucyd. iv, 103. ~μάλιστα δὲ οἱ Ἀργίλιοι, ἐγγύς τε
-  προσοικοῦντες καὶ ἀεί ποτε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ὄντες ὕποπτοι καὶ
-  ἐπιβουλεύοντες τῷ χωρίῳ~ (Amphipolis), ἐπειδὴ παρέτυχεν ὁ
-  καιρὸς καὶ Βρασίδας ἦλθεν, ἔπραξάν τε ~ἐκ πλείονος~ πρὸς τοὺς
-  ἐμπολιτεύοντας σφῶν ἐκεῖ ὅπως ἐνδοθήσεται ἡ πόλις, etc.
-
-  [672] Thucyd. iv, 103. ~φυλακὴ δέ τις βραχεῖα καθειστήκει, ἣν
-  βιασάμενος ῥᾳδίως~ ὁ Βρασίδας, ἅμα μὲν τῆς προδοσίας οὔσης, ἅμα
-  δὲ καὶ χειμῶνος ὄντος καὶ ~ἀπροσδοκήτος προσπεσὼν~, διέβη τὴν
-  γέφυραν, etc.
-
-The presence of Thucydidês on the station of Thrace was important
-to Athens, partly because he possessed valuable family connections,
-mining property, and commanding influence among the continental
-population round Amphipolis.[673] This was one main reason why he was
-named; the Athenian people confiding partly in his private influence,
-over and above the public force under his command, and looking to
-him, even more than to his colleague Euklês, for the continued
-security of the town: instead of which they find that not even their
-own squadron under him is at hand near the vulnerable point, at the
-moment when the enemy comes. Of the two, perhaps, the conduct of
-Euklês admits of conceivable explanation more easily than that of
-Thucydidês. For it seems that Euklês had no paid force in Amphipolis;
-only the citizen hoplites, partly Athenian, partly of other lineage.
-Doubtless, these men found it irksome to keep guard through the
-winter on the Strymonian bridge: and Euklês might fancy that, by
-enforcing a large perpetual guard, he ran the risk of making Athens
-unpopular: moreover, strict constancy of watch, night after night,
-when no actual danger comes, with an unpaid citizen force, is not
-easy to maintain. This is an insufficient excuse, but it is better
-than anything which can be offered on behalf of Thucydidês; who had
-with him a paid Athenian force, and might just as well have kept it
-at Eion as at Thasos. We may be sure that the absence of Thucydidês
-with his fleet, at Thasos, was one essential condition in the plot
-laid by Brasidas with the Argilians.
-
-  [673] Thucyd. iv, 105. καὶ ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ δύνασθαι ἐν τοῖς πρώτοις
-  ~τῶν ἠπειρωτῶν~, etc.
-
-  Rotscher, in his Life of Thucydidês (Leben des Thukydides,
-  Göttingen, 1842, sect. 4, pp. 97-99), admits it to be the
-  probable truth, that Thucydidês was selected for this command
-  expressly in consequence of his private influence in the region
-  around. Yet this biographer still repeats the view generally
-  taken, that Thucydidês did everything which an able commander
-  could do, and was most unjustly condemned.
-
-To say, with Dr. Thirlwall, that “human prudence and activity
-could not have accomplished more than Thucydidês did, _under the
-same circumstances_,” is true as matter of fact, and creditable as
-far as it goes. But it is wholly inadmissible as a justification,
-and meets only one part of the case. An officer in command is
-responsible, not only for doing most “under the circumstances,”
-but also for the circumstances themselves, in so far as they are
-under his control; and nothing is more under his control than the
-position which he chooses to occupy. If the emperor Napoleon, or
-the duke of Wellington, had lost, by surprise of an enemy not very
-numerous, a post of supreme importance which they thought adequately
-protected, would they be satisfied to hear from a responsible
-officer in command: “Having no idea that the enemy would attempt any
-surprise, I thought that I might keep my force half a day’s journey
-off from the post exposed, at another post which it was physically
-impossible for the enemy to reach; but, the moment I was informed
-that the surprise had occurred, I hastened to the scene, did all
-that human prudence and activity could do to repel the enemy; and
-though I found that he had already mastered the capital post of all,
-yet I beat him back from a second post which he was on the point of
-mastering also?” Does any one imagine that these illustrious chiefs,
-smarting under the loss of an inestimable position which alters
-the whole prospects of a campaign, would be satisfied with such a
-report, and would dismiss the officer with praises for his vigor
-and bravery, “under the circumstances?” They would most assuredly
-reply, that he had done right in coming back, that his conduct after
-coming back had been that of a brave man, and that there was no
-impeachment on his courage. But they would at the same time add,
-that his want of judgment and foresight, in omitting to place the
-valuable position really exposed under sufficient guard beforehand,
-and leaving it thus open to the enemy, while he himself was absent
-in another place which was out of danger, and his easy faith that
-there would be no dangerous surprise, at a time when the character
-of the enemy’s officer, as well as the disaffection of the neighbors
-(Argilus), plainly indicated that there _would_ be, if the least
-opening were afforded, that these were defects meriting serious
-reproof, and disqualifying him from any future command of trust
-and responsibility. Nor can we doubt that the whole feeling of the
-respective armies, who would have to pay with their best blood the
-unhappy miscalculation of this officer, would go along with such
-a sentence; without at all suspecting themselves to be guilty of
-injustice, or of “directing the irritation produced by the loss
-against an innocent object.”
-
-The vehement leather-seller in the Pnyx, at Athens, when he brought
-forward what are called “his calumnies” against Thucydidês and
-Euklês, as having caused, through culpable omission, a fatal and
-irreparable loss to their country, might perhaps state his case with
-greater loudness and acrimony; but it may be doubted whether he
-would say anything more really galling than would be contained in
-the dignified rebuke of an esteemed modern general to a subordinate
-officer under similar circumstances. In my judgment, not only the
-accusation against these two officers—I assume Euklês to have been
-included—was called for on the fairest _presumptive_ grounds, which
-would be sufficient as a justification of the leather-sell Kleon,
-but the positive verdict of guilty against them was fully merited.
-Whether the banishment inflicted was a greater penalty than the case
-warranted, I will not take upon me to pronounce. Every age has its
-own standard of feeling for measuring what is a proper intensity of
-punishment: penalties which our grandfathers thought right and meet,
-would in the present day appear intolerably rigorous. But when I
-consider the immense value of Amphipolis to Athens, combined with the
-conduct whereby it was lost, I cannot think that there was a single
-Athenian, or a single Greek, who would deem the penalty of banishment
-too severe.
-
-It is painful to find such strong grounds of official censure against
-a man who, as an historian, has earned the lasting admiration of
-posterity,—my own, among the first and warmest. But in criticizing
-the conduct of Thucydidês the officer, we are bound in common
-justice to forget Thucydidês the historian. He was not known in the
-latter character, at the time when this sentence was passed: perhaps
-he never would have been so known, like the Neapolitan historian
-Colletta, if exile had not thrown him out of the active duties and
-hopes of a citizen. It may be doubted whether he ever went home
-from Eion to encounter the grief, wrath, and alarm, so strongly
-felt at Athens after the loss of Amphipolis. Condemned, either
-with or without appearance, he remained in banishment for twenty
-years;[674] nor did he return to Athens until after the conclusion
-of the Peloponnesian war. Of this long exile, much is said to have
-been spent on his property in Thrace: yet he also visited most parts
-of Greece, enemies of Athens as well as neutral states. However much
-we may deplore such a misfortune on his account, mankind in general
-have, and ever will have, the strongest reason to rejoice at it. To
-this compulsory leisure we owe the completion, or rather the near
-approach to completion, of his history: nor is it less certain that
-the opportunities which an exile enjoyed of personally consulting
-neutrals and enemies, contributed much to form that impartial,
-comprehensive, Pan-Hellenic spirit, which reigns generally throughout
-his immortal work.
-
-  [674] Thucyd. v, 26.
-
-Meanwhile, Brasidas, installed in Amphipolis about the beginning
-of December, 424 B.C., employed his increased power only the more
-vigorously against Athens. His first care was to reconstitute
-Amphipolis; a task wherein the Macedonian Perdikkas, whose intrigues
-had contributed to the capture, came and personally assisted.
-That city was going through a partial secession and renovation of
-inhabitants, and was now moreover cut off from the port of Eion and
-the mouth of the river, which remained in the hands of the Athenians.
-Many new arrangements must have been required, as well for its
-internal polity as for its external defence. Brasidas took measures
-for building ships of war, in the lake above the city, in order to
-force the lower part of the river:[675] but his most important step
-was to construct a palisade work,[676] connecting the walls of the
-city with the bridge. He thus made himself permanently master of the
-crossing of the Strymon, so as to shut the door by which he himself
-had entered, and at the same time to keep an easy communication
-with Argilus and the western bank of the Strymon. He also made some
-acquisitions on the eastern side of the river. Pittakus, prince of
-the neighboring Edonian-Thracian township of Myrkinus, had been
-recently assassinated by his wife Brauro, and by some personal
-enemies: he had probably been the ally of Athens, and his assassins
-now sought to strengthen themselves by courting the alliance of the
-new conqueror of Amphipolis. The Thasian continental colonies of
-Galêpsus and Œsymê also declared their adhesion to him.
-
-  [675] Thucyd. iv, 104-108.
-
-  [676] This is the σταύρωμα, mentioned (v, 10) as existing a year
-  and a half afterwards, at the time of the battle of Amphipolis.
-  I shall say more respecting the topography of Amphipolis, when I
-  come to describe that battle.
-
-While he sent to Lacedæmon, communicating his excellent position as
-well as his large hopes, he at the same time, without waiting for the
-answer, began acting for himself, with all the allies whom he could
-get together. He marched first against the peninsula called Aktê,—the
-narrow tongue of land which stretches out from the neighborhood of
-Akanthus to the mighty headland called Mount Athos,—near thirty
-miles long, and between four and five miles for the most part in
-breadth.[677] The long, rugged, woody ridge,—covering this peninsula
-so as to leave but narrow spaces for dwelling or cultivation, or
-feeding of cattle,—was at this time occupied by many distinct petty
-communities, some of them divided in race and language. Sanê, a
-colony from Andros, was situated in the interior gulf, called the
-Singitic gulf, between Athos and the Sithonian peninsula, near
-the Xerxeian canal: the rest of the Aktê was distributed among
-Bisaltians, Krestônians, and Edonians, all fractions of the Thracian
-name; Pelasgians, or Tyrrhenians, of the race which had once
-occupied Lemnos and Imbros, and some Chalkidians. Some of these
-little communities spoke habitually two languages. Thyssus, Kleône,
-Olophyxus, and others, all submitted on the arrival of Brasidas; but
-Sanê and Dion held out, nor could he bring them to terms even by
-ravaging their territory.
-
-  [677] See Grisebach, Reise durch Rumelien und Brura, vol. i, ch.
-  viii, p. 226.
-
-He next marched into the Sithonian peninsula, to attack Torônê,
-situated near the southern extremity of that peninsula, opposite
-to Cape Kanastræum, the extreme headland of the peninsula of
-Pallênê.[678]
-
-  [678] Thucyd. iv, 109.
-
-Torônê was inhabited by a Chalkidic population, but had not partaken
-in the revolt of the neighboring Chalkidians against Athens. A
-small Athenian garrison had been sent there, probably since the
-recent dangers, and were now defending it, as well as repairing
-the town-wall in various parts where it had been so neglected
-as to crumble down. They occupied as a sort of distinct citadel
-the outlying cape called Lêkythus, joining by a narrow isthmus
-the hill on which the city stood, and forming a port wherein lay
-two Athenian triremes as guard-ships. A small party in Torônê,
-without privity[679] or even suspicion of the rest, entered into
-correspondence with Brasidas, and engaged to provide for him the
-means of entering and mastering the town. Accordingly, he advanced
-by a night-march to the temple of the Dioskuri, Kastor and Pollux,
-within about a quarter of a mile of the town-gates, which he reached
-a little before daybreak, sending forward one hundred peltasts to
-be still nearer, and to rush upon the gate at the instant when
-signal was made from within. His Torônæan partisans, some of whom
-were already concealed on the spot, awaiting his arrival, made
-their final arrangements with him, and then returned into the town,
-conducting with them seven determined men from his army, armed only
-with daggers, and having Lysistratus of Olynthus as their chief:
-twenty men had been originally named for this service, but the danger
-appeared so extreme, that only seven of them were bold enough to go.
-This forlorn hope, enabled to creep in, through a small aperture in
-the wall towards the sea, were conducted silently up to the topmost
-watch-tower on the city hill, where they surprised and slew the
-guards, and set open a neighboring postern gate, looking towards Cape
-Kanastræum, as well as the great gate leading towards the agora.
-They then brought in the peltasts from without, who, impatient with
-the delay, had gradually stolen closely under the walls: some of
-these peltasts kept possession of the great gate, others were led
-round to the postern at the top, while the fire-signal was forthwith
-lighted to invite Brasidas himself. He and his men hastened forward
-towards the city at their utmost speed and with loud shouts, a
-terror-striking notice of his presence to the unprepared citizens.
-Admission was easy through the open gates, but some also clambered
-up by means of beams or a sort of scaffolding, which was lying close
-to the wall as a help to the workmen repairing it. And while the
-assailants were thus active in every direction, Brasidas himself
-conducted a portion of them, to assure himself of the high and
-commanding parts of the city.
-
-  [679] Thucyd. iv, 110. καὶ αὐτὸν ~ἄνδρες ὀλίγοι ἐπῆγον κρύφα~,
-  ἑτοῖμοι ὄντες τὴν πόλιν παραδοῦναι, iv, 113. Τῶν δὲ Τορωναίων
-  γιγνομένης τῆς ἁλώσεως ~τὸ μὲν πολὺ, οὐδὲν εἰδὸς, ἐθορυβεῖτο~,
-  etc.
-
-So completely were the Torônæans surprised and thunderstruck, that
-hardly any attempt was made to resist. Even the fifty Athenian
-hoplites who occupied the agora, being found still asleep,
-were partly slain, and partly compelled to seek refuge in the
-separately-garrisoned cape of Lêkythus, whither they were followed by
-a portion of the Torônæan population; some from attachment to Athens,
-others from sheer terror. To these fugitives Brasidas addressed a
-proclamation, inviting them to return, and promising them perfect
-security, for person, property, and political rights; while at the
-same time he sent a herald with a formal summons to the Athenians
-in Lêkythus, requiring them to quit the place as belonging to the
-Chalkidians, but permitting them to carry away their property. They
-refused to evacuate the place, but solicited a truce of one day for
-the purpose of burying their slain. Brasidas granted them two days,
-which were employed both by them and by him in preparations for the
-defence and attack of Lêkythus; each party fortifying the houses on
-or near the connecting isthmus.
-
-In the mean time he convened a general assembly of the Torônæan
-population, whom he addressed in the same conciliating and equitable
-language as he had employed elsewhere. “He had not come to harm
-either the city, or any individual citizen. Those who had let him
-in, ought not to be regarded as bad men or traitors, for they had
-acted with a view to the benefit and the liberation of their city,
-not in order to enslave it, or to acquire profit for themselves. On
-the other hand, he did not think the worse of those who had gone
-over to Lêkythus, for their liking towards Athens: he wished them
-to come back freely; and he was sure that the more they knew the
-Lacedæmonians the better they would esteem them. He was prepared to
-forgive and forget previous hostility, but while he invited all of
-them to live for the future as cordial friends and fellow-citizens,
-he should also for the future hold each man responsible for his
-conduct, either as friend or as enemy.”
-
-On the expiration of the two days’ truce, Brasidas attacked the
-Athenian garrison in Lêkythus, promising a recompense of thirty
-minæ to the soldier who should first force his way into it.
-Notwithstanding very poor means of defence, partly a wooden palisade,
-partly houses with battlements on the roof, this garrison repelled
-him for one whole day: on the next morning he brought up a machine,
-for the same purpose as that which the Bœotians had employed at
-Delium, to set fire to the woodwork. The Athenians on their side,
-seeing this fire-machine approaching, put up, on a building in
-front of their position, a wooden scaffolding, upon which many of
-them mounted, with casks of water and large stones to break it or
-to extinguish the flames. At last, the weight accumulated becoming
-greater than the scaffolding could support, it broke down with a
-prodigious noise; so that all the persons and things upon it rolled
-down in confusion. Some of these men were hurt, yet the injury was
-not in reality serious; had not the noise, the cries, and strangeness
-of the incident alarmed those behind, who could not see precisely
-what had occurred, to such a degree, that they believed the enemy
-to have already forced the defences. Many of them accordingly took
-to flight, and those who remained were insufficient to prolong
-the resistance successfully; so that Brasidas, perceiving the
-disorder and diminished number of the defenders, relinquished his
-fire-machine, and again renewed his attempt to carry the place by
-assault, which now fully succeeded. A considerable proportion of
-the Athenians and others in the fort escaped across the narrow gulf
-to the peninsula of Pallênê, by means of the two triremes and some
-merchant-vessels at hand: but every man found in it was put to
-death. Brasidas, thus master of the fort, and considering that he
-owed his success to the sudden rupture of the Athenian scaffolding,
-regarded this incident as a divine interposition, and presented the
-thirty minæ, which he had promised as a reward to the first man who
-broke in, to the goddess Athênê, for her temple at Lêkythus. He
-moreover consecrated to her the entire cape of Lêkythus; not only
-demolishing the defences, but also dismantling the private residences
-which it contained,[680] so that nothing remained except the temple,
-with its ministers and appurtenances.
-
-  [680] Thucyd. iv. 114, 115. νομίσας ἄλλῳ τινὶ τρόπῳ ἢ ἀνθρωπείῳ
-  τὴν ἅλωσιν γενέσθαι.
-
-What proportion of the Torônæans who had taken refuge at Lêkythus
-had been induced to return by the proclamation of Brasidas, alike
-generous and politic, we are not informed. His language and conduct
-were admirably calculated to set this little community again in
-harmonious movement, and to obliterate the memory of past feuds.
-And above all, it inspired a strong sentiment of attachment and
-gratitude towards himself personally; a sentiment which gained
-strength with every successive incident in which he was engaged,
-and which enabled him to exercise a greater ascendency than could
-ever be acquired by Sparta, and in some respects greater than had
-ever been possessed by Athens. It is this remarkable development of
-commanding individuality, animated throughout by straightforward
-public purposes, and binding together so many little communities who
-had few other feelings in common, which lends to the short career of
-this eminent man a romantic and even an heroic interest.
-
-During the remainder of the winter Brasidas employed himself in
-setting in order the acquisitions already made, and in laying plans
-for farther conquests in the spring.[681] But the beginning of
-spring—or the close of the eighth year, and beginning of the ninth
-year of the war, as Thucydidês reckons—brought with it a new train of
-events, which will be recounted in the following chapter.
-
-   [681] Thucyd. iv, 119.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER LIV.
-
-TRUCE FOR ONE YEAR.—RENEWAL OF WAR AND BATTLE OF AMPHIPOLIS.—PEACE OF
-NIKIAS.
-
-
-The eighth year of the war, described in the last chapter, had opened
-with sanguine hopes for Athens, and with dark promise for Sparta,
-chiefly in consequence of the memorable capture of Sphakteria towards
-the end of the preceding summer. It included, not to mention other
-events, two considerable and important enterprises on the part of
-Athens, against Megara and against Bœotia; the former plan, partially
-successful, the latter, not merely unsuccessful, but attended with
-a ruinous defeat. Lastly, the losses in Thrace, following close
-upon the defeat at Delium, together with the unbounded expectations
-everywhere entertained from the future career of Brasidas, had again
-seriously lowered the impression entertained of Athenian power. The
-year thus closed amidst humiliations the more painful to Athens, as
-contrasted with the glowing hopes with which it had begun.
-
-It was now that Athens felt the full value of those prisoners whom
-she had taken at Sphakteria. With those prisoners, as Kleon and his
-supporters had said truly, she might be sure of making peace whenever
-she desired it.[682] Having such a certainty to fall back upon, she
-had played a bold game, and aimed at larger acquisitions during the
-past year; and this speculation, though not in itself unreasonable,
-had failed: moreover, a new phenomenon, alike unexpected by all, had
-occurred, when Brasidas broke open and cut up her empire in Thrace.
-Still, so great was the anxiety of the Spartans to regain their
-captives, who had powerful friends and relatives at home, that they
-considered the victories of Brasidas chiefly as a stepping-stone
-towards that object, and as a means of prevailing upon Athens to make
-peace. To his animated representations sent home from Amphipolis,
-setting forth the prospects of still farther success and entreating
-reinforcements, they had returned a discouraging reply, dictated in
-no small degree by the miserable jealousy of some of their chief
-men;[683] who, feeling themselves cast into the shade, and looking
-upon his splendid career as an eccentric movement breaking loose from
-Spartan routine, were thus on personal as well as political grounds
-disposed to labor for peace. Such collateral motives, working upon
-the caution usual with Sparta, determined her to make use of the
-present fortune and realized conquests of Brasidas as a basis for
-negotiation and recovery of the prisoners; without opening the chance
-of ulterior enterprises, which though they might perhaps end in
-results yet more triumphant, would unavoidably put in risk that which
-was now secure.[684] The history of the Athenians during the past
-year might, indeed, serve as a warning to deter the Spartans from
-playing an adventurous game.
-
-  [682] Thucyd. iv, 21.
-
-  [683] Thucyd. iv, 108. Ὁ δὲ ἐς τὴν Λακεδαίμονα ἐφιέμενος στρατιάν
-  τε προσαποστέλλειν ἐκέλευε.... Οἱ δὲ Λακεδαιμόνιοι τὰ μὲν καὶ
-  φθόνῳ ἀπὸ τῶν πρώτων ἀνδρῶν οὐχ ὑπηρέτησαν αὐτῷ, etc.
-
-  [684] Thucyd. iv, 117. Τοὺς γὰρ δὴ ἄνδρας περὶ πλέονος ἐποιοῦντο
-  κομίσασθαι, ὡς ἔτι Βρασίδας εὐτύχει· καὶ ἔμελλον, ἐπὶ μεῖζον
-  χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος, τῶν μὲν στέρεσθαι,
-  τοῖς δ᾽ ἐκ τοῦ ἴσου ἀμυνόμενοι κινδυνεύειν καὶ κρατήσειν.
-
-  This is a perplexing passage, and the sense put upon it by the
-  best commentators appears to me unsatisfactory.
-
-  Dr. Arnold observes: “The sense required must be something
-  of this sort. If Brasidas were still more successful, the
-  consequence would be that they would lose their men taken at
-  Sphakteria, and after all would run the risk of not being
-  finally victorious.” To the same purpose, substantially Haack,
-  Poppo, Göller, etc. But surely this is a meaning which cannot
-  have been present to the mind of Thucydidês. For how could
-  the fact, of Brasidas being _more successful_, cause the
-  Lacedæmonians to lose the chance of regaining their prisoners?
-  The larger the acquisitions of Brasidas, the greater chance
-  did the Lacedæmonians stand of getting back their prisoners,
-  because they would have more to give up in exchange for them.
-  And the meaning proposed by the commentators, inadmissible under
-  all circumstances, is still more excluded by the very words
-  immediately preceding in Thucydidês: “The Lacedæmonians were
-  above all things anxious to get back their prisoners, while
-  Brasidas was yet in full success;” (for ὡς with ἔτι must mean
-  substantially the same as ἕως.) It is impossible immediately
-  after this, that he can go on to say: “Yet if Brasidas became
-  _still more successful_, they would _lose_ the chance of
-  getting the prisoners back.” Bauer and Poppo, who notice this
-  contradiction, profess to solve it by saying, “that if Brasidas
-  pushed his successes farther, the Athenians would be seized with
-  such violence of hatred and indignation, that they would put the
-  prisoners to death.” Poppo supports this by appealing to iv, 41,
-  which passage, however, will be found to carry no proof in the
-  case: and the hypothesis is in itself inadmissible, put up to
-  sustain an inadmissible meaning.
-
-  Next, as to the words ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος (ἐπὶ μεῖζον
-  χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος); Göller translates
-  these: “Postquam Brasidas in majus profecisset, et _sua arma cum
-  potestate Atheniensium æquasset_.” To the same purpose also Haack
-  and Poppo. But if this were the meaning, it would seem to imply,
-  that Brasidas had, as yet, done nothing and gained nothing;
-  that his gains were all to be made during the future. Whereas
-  the fact is distinctly the reverse, as Thucydidês himself has
-  told us in the line preceding: Brasidas had already made immense
-  acquisitions,—so great and serious, that the principal anxiety of
-  the Lacedæmonians was to make use of what he had already gained
-  as a means of getting back their prisoners, before the tide of
-  fortune could turn against him.
-
-  Again, the last part of the sentence is considered by Dr. Arnold
-  and other commentators as corrupt; nor is it agreed to what
-  previous subject τοῖς δὲ is intended to refer.
-
-  So inadmissible, in my judgment, is the meaning assigned by the
-  commentators to the general passage, that, if no other meaning
-  could be found in the words, I should regard the whole sentence
-  as corrupt in some way or other. But I think another meaning may
-  be found.
-
-  I admit that the words ἐπὶ μεῖζον χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ _might_
-  signify, “if he should arrive at greater success;” upon the
-  analogy of i, 17, and i, 118, ἐπὶ πλεῖστον ἐχώρησαν δυνάμεως—ἐπὶ
-  μέγα ἐχώρησαν δυνάμεως. But they do not necessarily, nor even
-  naturally, bear this signification. Χωρεῖν ἐπὶ (with accus.
-  case) means to _march upon_, to _aim at_, to _go at_ or _go
-  for_ (adopting an English colloquial equivalent), ἐχώρουν ἐπὶ
-  τὴν ἀντικρὺς ἐλευθερίαν (Thucyd. viii, 64). The phrase might be
-  used, whether the person of whom it was affirmed succeeded in his
-  object or not. I conceive that in this place the words mean: “if
-  Brasidas should go at something greater;” if he should aim at,
-  “or march upon, greater objects;” without affirming the point,
-  one way or the other, whether he would attain or miss what he
-  aimed at.
-
-  Next, the words ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος do not refer, in my
-  judgment, to the future gains of Brasidas, or to their magnitude
-  and comparative avail in negotiation. The words rather mean: “if
-  he should set out in open contest and hostility that which he
-  had already acquired,” (thus exposing it to the chance of being
-  lost), “if he should put himself and his already-acquired gains
-  in battle-front against the enemy.” The meaning would be then
-  substantially the same as καταστήσαντος ἑαυτὸν ἀντίπαλον. The two
-  words here discussed are essentially obscure and elliptical, and
-  every interpretation must proceed by bringing into light those
-  ideas which they imperfectly indicate. Now, the interpretation
-  which I suggest keeps quite as closely to the meaning of the two
-  words as that of Haack and Göller; while it brings out a general
-  sense, making the whole sentence, of which these two words form a
-  part, distinct and instructive. The substantive, which would be
-  understood along with ἀντίπαλα, would be τὰ πράγματα; or perhaps
-  τὰ εὐτυχήματα, borrowed from the verb εὐτύχει, which immediately
-  precedes.
-
-  In the latter part of the sentence, I think that τοῖς δὲ refers
-  to the same subject as ἀντίπαλα: in fact, ἀπὸ τοῦ ἴσου ἀμυνόμενοι
-  is only a fuller expression of the same general idea as ἀντίπαλα.
-
-  The whole sentence would then be construed thus: “For they were
-  most anxious to recover their captives while Brasidas was yet in
-  good fortune; while they were likely, if he should go at more,
-  and put himself as he now stood into hostile contention, to
-  remain deprived of their captives; and even in regard to their
-  successes, to take the chance of danger or victory in equal
-  conflict.”
-
-  The sense here brought out is distinct and rational; and I think
-  it lies fairly in the words. Thucydidês does not intend to
-  represent the Lacedæmonians as feeling, that if Brasidas should
-  _really gain_ more than he had gained already, such further
-  acquisition would be a disadvantage to them, and prevent them
-  from recovering their captives. He represents them as preferring
-  _the certainty_ of those acquisitions which Brasidas had already
-  made, to _the chance and hazard_ of his aiming at greater; which
-  could not be done without endangering that which was now secure,
-  and not only secure, but sufficient, if properly managed, to
-  procure the restoration of the captives.
-
-  Poppo refers τοῖς δὲ to the Athenians: Göller refers it to
-  the remaining Spartan military force, apart from the captives
-  who were detained at Athens. The latter reference seems to me
-  inadmissible, for τοῖς δὲ must signify some persons or things
-  which have been before specified or indicated; and that which
-  Göller supposes it to mean has not been before indicated. To
-  refer it to the Athenians, with Poppo and Haack, in his second
-  edition, we should have to look a great way back for the subject,
-  and there is, moreover, a difficulty in construing ἀμυνόμενοι
-  with the dative case. Otherwise, this reference would be
-  admissible; though I think it better to refer τοῖς δὲ to the same
-  subject as ἀντίπαλα. In the phrase κινδυνεύειν, or κινδυνεύσειν,
-  for there seems no sufficient reason why this old reading should
-  be altered, ~καὶ~ κρατήσειν, the particle ~καὶ~ has a disjunctive
-  sense, of which there are analogous examples; see Kühner,
-  Griechische Grammmatik, sect. 726, signifying, substantially, the
-  same as ἢ: and examples even in Thucydidês, in such phrases as
-  τοιαῦτα καὶ παραπλήσια (i, 22, 143), τοιαύτη καὶ ὅτι ἐγγύτατα
-  τούτων, v, 74; see Poppo’s note on i, 22.
-
-Ever since the capture of Sphakteria, the Lacedæmonians had
-been attempting, directly or indirectly, negotiations for peace
-and the recovery of the prisoners; their pacific dispositions
-being especially instigated by king Pleistoanax, whose peculiar
-circumstances gave him a strong motive to bring the war to a
-close. He had been banished from Sparta, fourteen years before the
-commencement of the war, and a little before the thirty years’
-truce, under the charge of having taken bribes from the Athenians on
-occasion of invading Attica. For more than eighteen years, he lived
-in banishment, close to the temple of Zeus Lykæus, in Arcadia; in
-such constant fear of the Lacedæmonians, that his dwelling-house was
-half within the consecrated ground.[685] But he never lost the hope
-of procuring restoration, through the medium of the Pythian priestess
-at Delphi, whom he and his brother Aristoklês kept in their pay. To
-every sacred legation which went from Sparta to Delphi, she repeated
-the same imperative injunction: “They must bring back the seed of
-(Hêraklês) the demi-god son of Zeus, from foreign land to their own:
-if they did not, it would be their fate to plough with a silver
-ploughshare.” The command of the god, thus incessantly repeated and
-backed by the influence of those friends who supported Pleistoanax
-at home, at length produced an entire change of sentiment at Sparta.
-In the fourth or fifth year of the Peloponnesian war, the exile
-was recalled; and not merely recalled, but welcomed with unbounded
-honors, received with the same sacrifices and choric shows as those
-which were said to have been offered to the primitive kings, on the
-first settlement of Sparta.
-
-  [685] Thucyd. v, 17. ἥμισυ τῆς οἰκίας τοῦ ἱεροῦ τότε τοῦ Διὸς
-  οἰκοῦντα φόβῳ τῶν Λακεδαιμονίων.
-
-  “The reason was, that he might be in sanctuary at an instant’s
-  notice, and yet might be able to perform some of the common
-  offices of life without profanation, which could not have been
-  the case had the whole dwelling been within the sacred precinct.”
-  (Dr. Arnold’s note.)
-
-As in the case of Kleomenês and Demaratus, however, it was not
-long before the previous intrigue came to be detected, or at
-least generally suspected and believed; to the great discredit of
-Pleistoanax, though he could not be again banished. Every successive
-public calamity which befell the state, the miscarriages of
-Alkidas, the defeat of Eurylochus in Amphilochia, and above all,
-the unprecedented humiliation in Sphakteria, were imputed to the
-displeasure of the gods in consequence of the impious treachery of
-Pleistoanax. Suffering under such an imputation, this king was most
-eager to exchange the hazards of war for the secure march of peace,
-so that he was thus personally interested in opening every door
-for negotiation with Athens, and in restoring himself to credit by
-regaining the prisoners.[686]
-
-  [686] Thucyd. v, 17, 18.
-
-After the battle of Delium,[687] the pacific dispositions of Nikias,
-Lachês, and the philo-Laconian party, began to find increasing favor
-at Athens;[688] while the unforeseen losses in Thrace, coming thick
-upon each other, each successive triumph of Brasidas apparently
-increasing his means of achieving more, tended to convert the
-discouragement of the Athenians into positive alarm. Negotiations
-appear to have been in progress throughout great part of the winter:
-and the continual hope that these might be brought to a close,
-combined with the impolitic aversion of Nikias and his friends to
-energetic military action, help to explain the unwonted apathy of
-Athens, under the pressure of such disgraces. But so much did her
-courage flag, towards the close of the winter, that she came to look
-upon a truce as her only means[689] of preservation against the
-victorious progress of Brasidas. What the tone of Kleon now was, we
-are not directly informed: he would probably still continue opposed
-to the propositions of peace, at least indirectly, by insisting on
-terms more favorable than could be obtained. On this point, his
-political counsels would be wrong; but on another point, they would
-be much sounder and more judicious than those of his rival Nikias:
-for he would recommend a strenuous prosecution of hostilities by
-Athenian force against Brasidas in Thrace. At the present moment
-this was the most urgent political necessity of Athens, whether
-she entertained or rejected the views of peace: and the policy of
-Nikias, who cradled up the existing depression of the citizens by
-encouraging them to rely on the pacific inclinations of Sparta,
-was ill-judged and disastrous in its results, as the future will
-hereafter show.
-
-  [687] Thucyd. v, 15. σφαλέντων δ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τῷ Δηλίῳ ~παραχρῆμα~
-  οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, γνόντες νῦν μᾶλλον ἂν ἐνδεξομένους, ποιοῦνται
-  τὴν ἐνιαύσιον ἐκεχειρίαν, etc.
-
-  [688] Thucyd. iv, 118; v, 43.
-
-  [689] Thucyd. iv, 117. νομίσαντες Ἀθηναῖοι μὲν οὐκ ἂν ἔτι τὸν
-  Βρασίδαν σφῶν προσαποστῆσαι οὐδὲν πρὶν παρασκευάσαιντο καθ᾽
-  ἡσυχίαν, etc.
-
-Attempts were made by the peace-party both at Athens and Sparta to
-negotiate at first for a definitive peace: but the conditions of such
-a peace were not easy to determine, so as to satisfy both parties,
-and became more and more difficult, with every success of Brasidas.
-At length the Athenians, eager above all things to arrest his
-progress, sent to Sparta to propose a truce for one year, desiring
-the Spartans to send to Athens envoys with full powers to settle the
-terms: the truce would allow time and tranquillity for settling the
-conditions of a definitive treaty. The proposition of the truce for
-one year,[690] together with the first two articles ready prepared,
-came from Athens, as indeed we might have presumed even without
-proof; since the interest of Sparta was rather against it, as
-allowing to the Athenians the fullest leisure for making preparations
-against farther losses in Thrace. But her main desire was, not so
-much to put herself in condition to make the best possible peace,
-as to insure some peace which would liberate her captives: and she
-calculated that when once the Athenians had tasted the sweets of
-peace for one year, they would not again voluntarily impose upon
-themselves the rigorous obligations of war.[691]
-
-  [690] This appears from the form of the truce in Thucyd. iv,
-  118; it is prepared at Sparta, in consequence of a previous
-  proposition from Athens; in sect. 6. οἱ δὲ ἰόντες, τέλος ἔχοντες
-  ἰόντων, ᾗπερ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἡμᾶς κελεύετε.
-
-  [691] Thucyd. iv, 117. καὶ γενομένης ἀνακωχῆς κακῶν καὶ
-  ταλαιπωρίας μᾶλλον ἐπιθυμήσειν (τοὺς Ἀθηναίους) αὐτοὺς
-  πειρασαμένους ξυναλλαγῆναι, etc.
-
-In the month of March, 423 B.C., on the fourteenth day of the
-month Elaphebolion at Athens, and on the twelfth day of the month
-Gerastius at Sparta, a truce for one year was concluded and sworn,
-between Athens on one side, and Sparta, Corinth, Sikyon, Epidaurus,
-and Megara, on the other.[692] The Spartans, instead of merely
-despatching plenipotentiaries to Athens as the Athenians had desired,
-went a step farther: in concurrence with the Athenian envoys, they
-drew up a form of truce, approved by themselves and their allies, in
-such manner that it only required to be adopted and ratified by the
-Athenians. The general principle of the truce was _uti possidetis_,
-and the conditions were in substance as follows:—
-
-  [692] Thucyd. iv, 119. The fourteenth of Elaphebolion, and the
-  twelfth of Gerastius, designate the same day. The truce went
-  ready-prepared from Sparta to Athens, together with envoys
-  Spartan, Corinthian, Megarian, Sikyonian, and Epidaurian.
-  The truce was accepted by the Athenian assembly, and sworn
-  to at once by all the envoys as well as by three Athenian
-  stratêgi (σπείσασθαι δὲ ~αὐτίκα μάλα~ τὰς πρεσβείας ἐν τῷ δήμῳ
-  τὰς παρούσας, iv, 118, 119); that day being fixed on as the
-  commencement.
-
-  The lunar months in different cities were never in precise
-  agreement.
-
-1. Respecting the temple at Delphi, every Greek shall have the
-right to make use of it honestly and without fear, pursuant to
-the customs of his particular city. The main purpose of this
-stipulation, prepared and sent verbatim from Athens, was to allow
-Athenian visitors to go thither, which had been impossible during
-the war, in consequence of the hostility of the Bœotians[693] and
-Phocians: the Delphian authorities also were in the interest of
-Sparta, and doubtless the Athenians received no formal invitation
-to the Pythian games. But the Bœotians and Phocians were no parties
-to the truce: accordingly the Lacedæmonians, while accepting the
-article and proclaiming the general liberty in principle, do not
-pledge themselves to enforce it by arms as far as the Bœotians and
-Phocians are concerned, but only to try and persuade them by amicable
-representations. The liberty of sacrificing at Delphi was at this
-moment the more welcome to the Athenians, as they seem to have
-fancied themselves under the displeasure of Apollo.[694]
-
-  [693] See Aristophan. Aves, 188.
-
-  [694] Thucyd. v, 1-32. They might perhaps believe that the
-  occupation of Delium had given offence to Apollo.
-
-2. All the contracting parties will inquire out and punish, each
-according to its own laws, such persons as may violate the property
-of the Delphian god.[695] This article also is prepared at Athens,
-for the purpose seemingly of conciliating the favor of Apollo and the
-Delphians. The Lacedæmonians accept the article literally, of course.
-
-  [695] Thucyd. iv, 118 Περὶ δὲ τῶν χρημάτων τοῦ θεοῦ ἐπιμελεῖσθαι
-  ὅπως ~τοὺς ἀδικοῦντας~ ἐξευρήσομεν, etc. Dr. Thirlwall (Hist.
-  Gr. vol. iii. ch. xxiii, p. 273) thinks that this article has
-  reference to past appropriation of the Delphian treasure by
-  the Peloponnesian alliance, for warlike purposes. Had such a
-  reference been intended, we should probably have found the past
-  participle, τοὺς ἀδικήσαντας: whereas the present participle, as
-  it now stands, is perfectly general, designating acts future and
-  contingent.
-
-3. The Athenian garrisons at Pylus, Kythêra, Nisæa, and Minôa, and
-Methana in the neighborhood of Trœzen, are to remain as at present.
-No communication to take place between Kythêra and any portion of
-the mainland belonging to the Lacedæmonian alliance. The soldiers
-occupying Pylus shall confine themselves within the space between
-Buphras and Tomeus; those in Nisæa and Minôa, within the road which
-leads from the chapel of the hero Nisus to the temple of Poseidon,
-without any communication with the population beyond that limit. In
-like manner, the Athenians in the peninsula of Methana near Trœzen,
-and the inhabitants of the latter city, shall observe the special
-convention concluded between them respecting boundaries.[696]
-
-  [696] Thucyd. iv, 118: see Poppo’s note.
-
-4. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall make use of the sea for
-trading purposes, on their own coasts, but shall not have liberty
-to sail in any ship of war, nor in any rowed merchant-vessel of
-tonnage equal to five hundred talents. [All war-ships were generally
-impelled by oar: they sometimes used sails, but never when wanted for
-fighting. Merchant-vessels seem generally to have sailed, but were
-sometimes rowed: the limitation of size is added, to insure that the
-Lacedæmonians shall not, under color of merchantmen, get up a warlike
-navy.]
-
-5. There shall be free communication by sea as well as by land
-between Peloponnesus and Athens for herald or embassy with suitable
-attendants, to treat for a definitive peace or for the adjustment of
-differences.
-
-6. Neither side shall receive deserters from the other, whether free
-or slave. [This article was alike important to both parties. Athens
-had to fear the revolt of her subject-allies, Sparta the desertion of
-Helots.]
-
-7. Disputes shall be amicably settled, by both parties, according to
-their established laws and customs.
-
-Such was the substance of the treaty prepared at Sparta, seemingly
-in concert with Athenian envoys, and sent by the Spartans to Athens
-for approval, with the following addition: “If there be any provision
-which occurs to you, more honorable or just than these, come to
-Lacedæmon and tell us: for neither the Spartans nor their allies will
-resist any just suggestions. But let those who come, bring with them
-full powers to conclude, in the same manner as you desire of us. The
-truce shall be for one year.”
-
-By the resolution which Lachês proposed in the Athenian public
-assembly, ratifying the truce, the people farther decreed that
-negotiations should be open for a definitive treaty, and directed
-the stratêgi to propose to the next ensuing assembly, a scheme and
-principles for conducting the negotiations. But at the very moment
-when the envoys between Sparta and Athens were bringing the truce
-to final adoption, events happened in Thrace which threatened to
-cancel it altogether. Two days[697] after the important fourteenth
-of Elaphebolion, but before the truce could be made known in Thrace,
-Skiônê revolted from Athens to Brasidas.
-
-  [697] Thucyd. iv, 122.
-
-Skiônê was a town calling itself Achæan, one of the numerous colonies
-which, in the want of an acknowledged mother city, traced its origin
-to warriors returning from Troy. It was situated in the peninsula
-of Pallênê (the westernmost of those three narrow tongues of land
-into which Chalkidikê branches out); conterminous with the Eretrian
-colony Mendê. The Skiônæans, not without considerable dissent among
-themselves, proclaimed their revolt from Athens, under concert with
-Brasidas. He immediately crossed the gulf into Pallênê, himself in a
-little boat, but with a trireme close at his side; calculating that
-she would protect him against any small Athenian vessel,—while any
-Athenian trireme which he might encounter would attack his trireme,
-paying no attention to the little boat in which he himself was. The
-revolt of Skiônê was, from the position of the town, a more striking
-defiance of Athens than any of the preceding events. For the isthmus
-connecting Pallênê with the mainland was occupied by the town of
-Potidæa, a town assigned at the period of its capture seven years
-before to Athenian settlers, though probably containing some other
-residents besides. Moreover, the isthmus was so narrow, that the
-wall of Potidæa barred it across completely from sea to sea: Pallênê
-was therefore a quasi-island, not open to the aid of land-force from
-the continent, like the towns previously acquired by Brasidas. The
-Skiônæans thus put themselves, without any foreign aid, into conflict
-against the whole force of Athens, bringing into question her empire
-not merely over continental towns, but over islands.
-
-Even to Brasidas himself their revolt appeared a step of astonishing
-boldness. On being received into the city, he convened a public
-assembly, and addressed to them the same language which he had
-employed at Akanthus and Torônê, disavowing all party preferences as
-well as all interference with the internal politics of the town, and
-exhorting them only to unanimous efforts against the common enemy.
-He bestowed upon them at the same time the warmest praise for their
-courage. “They, though exposed to all hazards of islanders, had
-stood forward of their own accord to procure freedom,[698] without
-waiting like cowards to be driven on by a foreign force towards
-what was clearly their own good. He considered them capable of any
-measure of future heroism, if the danger now impending from Athens
-should be averted, and he should assign to them the very first post
-of honor among the faithful allies of Lacedæmon.” This generous,
-straightforward, and animating tone of exhortation, appealing to the
-strongest political instinct of the Greek mind, the love of complete
-city autonomy, and coming from the lips of one whose whole conduct
-had hitherto been conformable to it, had proved highly efficacious in
-all the previous towns. But in Skiônê it roused the population to the
-highest pitch of enthusiasm:[699] it worked even upon the feelings
-of the dissentient minority, bringing them round to partake heartily
-in the movement: it produced a unanimous and exalted confidence
-which made them look forward cheerfully to all the desperate chances
-in which they had engaged themselves; and it produced at the same
-time, in still more unbounded manifestation, the same personal
-attachment and admiration as Brasidas inspired elsewhere. The
-Skiônæans not only voted to him publicly a golden crown, as the
-liberator of Greece, but when it was placed on his head, the burst
-of individual sentiment and sympathy was the strongest of which the
-Grecian bosom was capable. “They crowded round him individually, and
-encircled his head with fillets, like a victorious athlete,”[700]
-says the historian. This remarkable incident illustrates what I
-observed before, that the achievements, the self-relying march,
-the straightforward politics and probity of this illustrious man,
-who in character was more Athenian than Spartan, yet with the good
-qualities of Athens predominant, inspired a personal emotion towards
-him such as rarely found its way into Grecian political life. The
-sympathy and admiration felt in Greece towards a victorious athlete
-was not merely an intense sentiment in the Grecian mind, but was,
-perhaps of all others, the most wide-spread and Pan-Hellenic. It was
-connected with the religion, the taste, and the love of recreation,
-common to the whole nation, while politics tended rather to disunite
-the separate cities: it was farther a sentiment at once familiar
-and exclusively personal. Of its exaggerated intensity throughout
-Greece the philosophers often complained, not without good reason;
-but Thucydidês cannot convey a more lively idea of the enthusiasm and
-unanimity with which Brasidas was welcomed at Skiônê, just after the
-desperate resolution taken by the citizens, than by using this simile.
-
-  [698] Thucyd. iv, 120. ὄντες οὐδὲν ἄλλο ἢ νησιῶται, etc.
-
-  [699] Thucyd. iv, 121. Καὶ οἱ μὲν Σκιωναῖοι ἐπῄρθησάν τε τοῖς
-  λόγοις, καὶ θαρσήσαντες πάντες ὁμοίως, καὶ οἷς πρότερον μὴ ἤρεσκε
-  τὰ πρασσόμενα, etc.
-
-  [700] Thucyd. iv, 121. Καὶ δημοσίᾳ μὲν χρυσῷ στεφάνῳ ἀνέδησαν ὡς
-  ἐλευθεροῦντα τὴν Ἑλλάδα, ἰδίᾳ τε ἐταινίουν τε καὶ προσήρχοντο
-  ὥσπερ ἀθλητῇ.
-
-  Compare Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28: compare also Krause (Olympia),
-  sect. 17, p. 162 (Wien, 1838). It was customary to place a fillet
-  of cloth or linen on the head of the victors at Olympia, before
-  putting on the olive wreath.
-
-The Lacedæmonian commander knew well how much the utmost resolution
-of the Skiônæans was needed, and how speedily their insular position
-would draw upon them the vigorous invasion of Athens. He accordingly
-brought across to Pallênê a considerable portion of his army, not
-merely with a view to the defence of Skiônê, but also with the
-intention of surprising both Mendê and Potidæa, in both which places
-there were small parties of conspirators prepared to open the gates.
-
-It was in this position that he was found by the commissioners who
-came to announce formally the conclusion of the truce for one year,
-and to enforce its provisions: Athenæus from Sparta, one of the three
-Spartans who had sworn to the treaty: Aristonymus, from Athens.
-The face of affairs was materially altered by this communication;
-much to the satisfaction of the newly acquired allies of Sparta in
-Thrace, who accepted the truce forthwith, but to the great chagrin
-of Brasidas, whose career was thus suddenly arrested. But he could
-not openly refuse obedience, and his army was accordingly transferred
-from the peninsula of Pallênê to Torônê.
-
-The case of Skiônê, however, immediately raised an obstruction,
-doubtless very agreeable to him. The commissioners who had come in
-an Athenian trireme, had heard nothing of the revolt of that place,
-and Aristonymus was astonished to find the enemy in Pallênê. But on
-inquiring into the case, he discovered that the Skiônæans had not
-revolted until two days after the day fixed for the commencement
-of the truce: accordingly, while sanctioning the truce for all the
-other cities in Thrace, he refused to comprehend Skiônê in it,
-sending immediate news home to Athens. Brasidas, protesting loudly
-against this proceeding, refused on his part to abandon Skiônê,
-which was peculiarly endeared to him by the recent scenes; and
-even obtained the countenance of the Lacedæmonian commissioners,
-by falsely asseverating that the city had revolted before the day
-named in the truce. Violent was the burst of indignation when the
-news sent home by Aristonymus reached Athens: nor was it softened,
-when the Lacedæmonians, acting upon the version of the case sent to
-them by Brasidas and Athenæus, despatched an embassy hither to claim
-protection for Skiônê, or at any rate to procure the adjustment of
-the dispute by arbitration or pacific decision. Having the terms of
-the treaty on their side, the Athenians were least of all disposed to
-relax from their rights in favor of the first revolting islanders.
-They resolved at once to undertake an expedition for the reconquest
-of Skiônê; and farther, on the proposition of Kleon, to put to death
-all the adult male inhabitants of that place as soon as it should
-have been reconquered. At the same time, they showed no disposition
-to throw up the truce generally; and the state of feeling on both
-sides tended to this result, that, while the war continued in Thrace,
-it was suspended everywhere else.[701]
-
-   [701] Thucyd. iv, 122, 123.
-
-Fresh intelligence soon arrived, carrying exasperation at Athens
-yet farther, of the revolt of Mendê, the adjoining town to
-Skiônê. Those Mendæans, who had laid their measures for secretly
-introducing Brasidas, were at first baffled by the arrival of the
-truce-commissioners; but they saw that he retained his hold on
-Skiônê, in spite of the provisions of the truce, and they ascertained
-that he was willing still to protect them if they revolted, though
-he could not be an accomplice, as originally projected, in the
-surprise of the town. Being, moreover, only a small party, with the
-sentiment of the population against them, they were afraid, if they
-now relinquished their scheme, of being detected and punished for the
-partial steps already taken, when the Athenians should come against
-Skiônê. They therefore thought it on the whole the least dangerous
-course to persevere. They proclaimed their revolt from Athens,
-constraining the reluctant citizens to obey them:[702] the government
-seems before to have been democratical, but they now found means
-to bring about an oligarchical revolution along with the revolt.
-Brasidas immediately accepted their adhesion, and willingly undertook
-to protect them, professing to think that he had a right to do so,
-because they had revolted openly after the truce had been proclaimed.
-But the truce upon this point was clear, which he himself virtually
-admitted, by setting up as justification certain alleged matters in
-which the Athenians had themselves violated it. He immediately made
-preparation for the defence both of Mendê and Skiônê against the
-attack, which was now rendered more certain than before, conveying
-the women and children of those two towns across to the Chalkidic
-Olynthus, and sending thither as garrison five hundred Peloponnesian
-hoplites with three hundred Chalkidic peltasts; the commander of
-which force, Polydamidas, took possession of the acropolis with his
-own troops separately.[703] Brasidas then withdrew himself with the
-greater part of his army, to accompany Perdikkas on an expedition
-into the interior against Arrhibæus and the Lynkêstæ. On what ground,
-after having before entered into terms with Arrhibæus, he now became
-his active enemy, we are left to conjecture: probably his relations
-with Perdikkas, whose alliance was of essential importance, were
-such that this step was forced upon him against his will, or he may
-really have thought that the force under Polydamidas was adequate
-to the defence of Mendê and Skiônê; an idea which the unaccountable
-backwardness of Athens for the last six or eight months might well
-foster. Had he even remained, indeed, he could hardly have saved
-them, considering the situation of Pallênê and the superiority of
-Athens at sea; but his absence made their ruin certain.[704]
-
-  [702] Thucyd. iv, 123. Διὸ καὶ οἱ Μενδαῖοι μᾶλλον ἐτόλμησαν, τήν
-  τε τοῦ Βρασίδου γνώμην ὁρῶντες ἑτοίμην, καὶ ἅμα τῶν ~πρασσόντων
-  σφίσιν ὀλίγων τε ὄντων~, καὶ ὡς τότε ἐμέλλησαν οὐκέτι ἀνέντων,
-  ἀλλὰ ~καταβιασαμένων παρὰ γνώμην τοὺς πολλούς~, iv, 130. ὁ δῆμος
-  εὐθὺς ἀναλαβὼν τὰ ὅπλα περιοργὴς ἐχώρει ἐπί τε Πελοποννησίους
-  ~καὶ τοὺς τὰ ἐναντία σφίσι μετ᾽ αὐτῶν πράξαντας~, etc.
-
-  The Athenians, after the conquest of the place, desire the
-  Mendæans πολιτεύειν ὥσπερ εἰωθέσαν.
-
-  Mendê is another case in which the bulk of the citizens were
-  averse to revolt from Athens, in spite of neighboring example.
-
-  [703] Thucyd. iv, 130.
-
-  [704] Thucyd. iv, 123, 124.
-
-While Brasidas was thus engaged far in the interior, the Athenian
-armament under Nikias and Nikostratus reached Potidæa: fifty
-triremes, ten of them Chian; one thousand hoplites and six hundred
-bowmen from Athens; one thousand mercenary Thracians, with some
-peltasts from Methônê and other towns in the neighborhood. From
-Potidæa, they proceeded by sea to Cape Poseidonium, near which
-they landed for the purpose of attacking Mendê. Polydamidas, the
-Peloponnesian commander in the town, took post with his force of
-seven hundred hoplites, including three hundred Skiônæans, upon
-an eminence near the city, strong and difficult of approach: upon
-which the Athenian generals divided their forces; Nikias, with
-sixty Athenian chosen hoplites, one hundred and twenty Methonean
-peltasts, and all the bowmen, tried to march up the hill by a side
-path and thus turn the position; while Nikostratus with the main
-army attacked it in front. But such were the extreme difficulties of
-the ground that both were repulsed: Nikias was himself wounded, and
-the division of Nikostratus was thrown into great disorder, narrowly
-escaping a destructive defeat. The Mendæans, however, evacuated the
-position in the night and retired into the city; while the Athenians,
-sailing round on the morrow to the suburb on the side of Skiônê,
-ravaged the neighboring lands; and Nikias on the ensuing day carried
-his devastations still farther, even to the border of the Skiônæan
-territory.
-
-But dissensions had already commenced within the walls, and the
-Skiônæan auxiliaries, becoming mistrustful of their situation, took
-advantage of the night to return home. The revolt of Mendê had been
-brought about against the will of the citizens by the intrigues and
-for the benefit of an oligarchical faction: moreover, it does not
-appear that Brasidas personally visited the town, as he had visited
-Skiônê and the other revolted towns: had he come, his personal
-influence might have done much to soothe the offended citizens, and
-create some disposition to adopt the revolt as a fact accomplished,
-after they had once been compromised with Athens. But his animating
-words had not been heard, and the Peloponnesian troops whom he had
-sent to Mendê, were mere instruments to sustain the newly erected
-oligarchy and keep out the Athenians. The feelings of the citizens
-generally towards them were soon unequivocally displayed. Nikostratus
-with half of the Athenian force was planted before that gate of Mendê
-which opened towards Potidæa: in the neighborhood of that gate,
-within the city, was the place of arms and the chief station both of
-the Peloponnesians and of the citizens; and Polydamidas, intending
-to make a sally forth, was marshalling both of them in battle order,
-when one of the Mendæan Demos, manifesting with angry vehemence
-a sentiment common to most of them, told him, “that he would not
-sally forth, and did not choose to take part in the contest.”
-Polydamidas seized hold of the man to punish him, when the mass of
-the armed Demos, taking part with their comrade, made a sudden rush
-upon the Peloponnesians. The latter, unprepared for such an onset,
-sustained at first some loss, and were soon forced to retreat into
-the acropolis; the rather, as they saw some of the Mendæans open
-the gates to the besiegers without, which induced them to suspect a
-preconcerted betrayal. No such concert, however, existed, though the
-besieging generals, when they saw the gates thus suddenly opened,
-soon comprehended the real position of affairs. But they found it
-impossible to restrain their soldiers, who pushed in forthwith, from
-plundering the town; and they had even some difficulty in saving the
-lives of the citizens.[705]
-
-  [705] Thucyd. iv, 130; Diodor. xii, 72.
-
-Mendê being thus taken, the Athenian generals desired the body of
-the citizens to resume their former government, leaving it to them
-to single out and punish the authors of the late revolt. What use
-was made of this permission, we are not told; but probably most
-of the authors had already escaped into the acropolis along with
-Polydamidas. Having erected a wall of circumvallation round the
-acropolis, joining the sea at both ends, and left a force to guard
-it, the Athenians moved away to begin the siege of Skiônê, where they
-found both the citizens and the Peloponnesian garrison posted on a
-strong hill, not far from the walls. As it was impossible to surround
-the town without being masters of this hill, the Athenians attacked
-it at once, and were more fortunate than they had been before Mendê;
-for they carried it by assault, compelling the defenders to take
-refuge in the town. After erecting their trophy, they commenced
-the wall of circumvallation. Before it was finished, the garrison
-who had been shut up in the acropolis of Mendê, got into Skiônê at
-night, having broken out by a sudden sally where the blockading
-wall around them joined the sea. But this did not hinder Nikias
-from prosecuting his operations, so that Skiônê was in no long time
-completely inclosed, and a division placed to guard the wall of
-circumvallation.[706]
-
-  [706] Thucyd. iv, 131.
-
-Such was the state of affairs which Brasidas found on returning from
-the inland Macedonia. Unable either to recover Mendê or to relieve
-Skiônê, he was forced to confine himself to the protection of Torônê.
-Nikias, however, without attacking Torônê, returned soon afterwards
-with his armament to Athens, leaving Skiônê under blockade.
-
-The march of Brasidas into Macedonia had been unfortunate in every
-way, and nothing but his extraordinary gallantry rescued him from
-utter ruin. The joint force of himself and Perdikkas consisted of
-three thousand Grecian hoplites, Peloponnesian, Akanthian, and
-Chalkidian, with one thousand Macedonian and Chalkidian horse, and
-a considerable number of non-Hellenic auxiliaries. As soon as they
-had got beyond the mountain-pass into the territory of the Lynkêstæ,
-they were met by Arrhibæus, and a battle ensued, in which that
-prince was completely worsted. They halted here for a few days,
-awaiting—before they pushed forward to attack the villages in the
-territory of Arrhibæus—the arrival of a body of Illyrian mercenaries,
-with whom Perdikkas had concluded a bargain.[707] At length Perdikkas
-became impatient to advance without them; while Brasidas, on the
-contrary, apprehensive for the fate of Mendê during his absence,
-was bent on returning back. The dissension between them becoming
-aggravated, they parted company and occupied separate encampments
-at some distance from each other, when both received unexpected
-intelligence which made Perdikkas as anxious to retreat as Brasidas.
-The Illyrians, having broken their compact, had joined Arrhibæus,
-and were now in full march to attack the invaders. The untold number
-of these barbarians was reported as overwhelming, and such was their
-reputation for ferocity as well as for valor, that the Macedonian
-army of Perdikkas, seized with a sudden panic, broke up in the night
-and fled without orders, hurrying Perdikkas himself along with them,
-and not even sending notice to Brasidas, with whom nothing had
-been concerted about the retreat. In the morning, the latter found
-Arrhibæus and the Illyrians close upon him, while the Macedonians
-were already far advanced in their journey homeward.
-
-  [707] Thucyd. iv, 124.
-
-The contrast between the man of Hellas and of Macedonia, general as
-well as soldiers, was never more strikingly exhibited than on this
-critical occasion. The soldiers of Brasidas, though surprised as
-well as deserted, lost neither their courage nor their discipline:
-the commander preserved not only his presence of mind, but his full
-authority. His hoplites were directed to form in a hollow square, or
-oblong, with the light-armed and attendants in the centre, for the
-retreating march: youthful soldiers were posted either in the outer
-ranks, or in convenient stations, to run out swiftly and repel the
-assailing enemy; while Brasidas himself, with three hundred chosen
-men, formed the rear-guard.[708]
-
-  [708] Thucyd. iv, 125.
-
-The short harangue which, according to a custom universal with
-Grecian generals, he addressed to his troops immediately before
-the enemy approached, is in many respects remarkable. Though some
-were Akanthians, some Chalkidians, some Helots, he designates all
-by the honorable title of “Peloponnesians.” Reassuring them against
-the desertion of their allies, as well as against the superior
-numbers of the advancing enemy, he invokes their native, homebred
-courage.[709] “_Ye_ do not require the presence of allies to inspire
-you with bravery, nor do ye fear superior numbers of an enemy; for
-ye belong not to those political communities in which the larger
-number governs the smaller, but to those in which a few men rule
-subjects more numerous than themselves, having acquired their power
-by no other means than by superiority in battle.” Next, Brasidas
-tried to dissipate the _prestige_ of the Illyrian name; his army
-had already vanquished the Lynkêstæ, and these other barbarians
-were noway better. A nearer acquaintance would soon show that they
-were only formidable from the noise, the gestures, the clashing of
-arms, and the accompaniments of their onset; and that they were
-incapable of sustaining the reality of close combat, hand to hand.
-“They have no regular order (said he) such as to impress them with
-shame for deserting their post: flight and attack are with them
-in equally honorable esteem, so that there is nothing to test the
-really courageous man: their battle, wherein every man fights as he
-chooses, is just the thing to furnish each with a decent pretence
-for running away.” “Repel ye their onset whenever it comes; and so
-soon as opportunity offers, resume your retreat in rank and order. Ye
-will soon arrive in a place of safety; and ye will be convinced that
-such crowds, when their enemy has stood to defy the first onset, keep
-aloof with empty menace and a parade of courage which never strikes;
-while if their enemy gives way, they show themselves smart and bold
-in running after him where there is no danger.”[710]
-
-  [709] Thucyd. iv, 126. Ἀγαθοῖς γὰρ εἶναι ὑμῖν προσήκει τὰ
-  πολέμια, οὐ διὰ ξυμμάχων παρουσίαν ἑκάστοτε, ἀλλὰ δι᾽ οἰκείαν
-  ἀρετὴν, καὶ μηδὲν πλῆθος πεφοβῆσθαι ἑτέρων, οἵ γε (μηδὲ) ἀπὸ
-  πολιτειῶν τοιούτων ἥκετε, ἐν αἷς οὐ πολλοὶ ὀλίγων ἄρχουσιν,
-  ἀλλὰ πλειόνων μᾶλλον ἐλάσσους· ~οὐκ ἄλλῳ τινὶ κτησάμενοι τὴν
-  δυναστείαν ἢ τῷ μαχόμενοι κρατεῖν~.
-
-  [710] Thucyd. iv, 126. Οὔτε γὰρ τάξιν ἔχοντες αἰσχυνθεῖεν ἂν
-  λιπεῖν τινα χώραν βιαζόμενοι· ἥ τε φυγὴ αὐτῶν καὶ ἡ ἔφοδος
-  ἴσην ἔχουσα δόξαν τοῦ καλοῦ ἀνεξέλεγκτον καὶ τὸ ἀνδρεῖον ἔχει·
-  αὐτοκράτωρ δὲ μάχη μάλιστ᾽ ἂν καὶ πρόφασιν τοῦ σῴζεσθαί (se
-  sauver) τινι πρεπόντως πορίσειε.
-
-  Σαφῶς τε πᾶν τὸ προϋπάρχον δεινὸν ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν ὁρᾶτε, ἔργῳ μὲν βραχὺ
-  ὂν, ὄψει δὲ καὶ ἀκοῇ κατάσπερχον. Ὃ ὑπομείναντες ἐπιφερόμενον,
-  καὶ ὅταν καιρὸς ᾖ, κόσμῳ καὶ τάξει αὖθις ὑπαγαγόντες, ἔς τε τὸ
-  ἀσφαλὲς θᾶσσον ἀφίξεσθε, καὶ γνώσεσθε τὸ λοιπὸν ὅτι οἱ τοιοῦτοι
-  ὄχλοι τοῖς μὲν τὴν πρώτην ἔφοδον δεξαμένοις ~ἄποθεν ἀπειλαῖς τὸ
-  ἀνδρεῖον μελλήσει ἐπικομποῦσιν~, οἳ δ᾽ ἂν εἴξωσιν αὐτοῖς, κατὰ
-  πόδας τὸ εὔψυχον ἐν τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ ὀξεῖς ἐπιδείκνυνται.
-
-  The word μέλλησις which occurs twice in this chapter in regard to
-  the Illyrians, is very expressive and at the same time difficult
-  to translate into any other language,—“what they seem on the
-  point of doing, but never realize.” See also i, 69.
-
-  The speech of the Roman consul Manlius, in describing the Gauls,
-  deserves to be compared: “Procera corpora, promissæ et rutilatæ
-  comæ, vasta scuta, prælongi gladii: ad hoc cantus ineuntium
-  prælium, et ululatus et tripudia, et quatientium scuta in patrium
-  quendam morem horrendus armorum crepitus: _omnia de industriâ
-  composita ad terrorem_” (Livy, xxxviii, 17.)
-
-The superiority of disciplined and regimented force over disorderly
-numbers, even with equal undivided courage, is now a truth so
-familiar, that we require an effort of imagination to put ourselves
-back into the fifth century before the Christian era, when this
-truth was recognized only among the Hellenic communities; when the
-practice of all their neighbors—Illyrians, Thracians, Asiatics,
-Epirots, and even Macedonians—implied ignorance or contradiction of
-it. In respect to the Epirots, the difference between their military
-habits and those of the Greeks has been already noticed, having been
-pointedly manifested in the memorable joint attack on the Akarnanian
-town of Stratus, in the second year of the war.[711] Both Epirots and
-Macedonians, however, are a step nearer to the Greeks than either
-Thracians, or these Illyrian barbarians against whom Brasidas was now
-about to contend, and in whose case the contrast comes out yet more
-forcibly. Nor is it merely the contrast between two modes of fighting
-which the Lacedæmonian commander impresses upon his soldiers: he
-gives what may be called a moral theory of the principles on which
-that contrast is founded,—a theory of large range and going to the
-basis of Grecian social life, in peace as well as in war. The
-sentiment in each individual man’s bosom, of a certain place which he
-has to fill and duties which he has to perform, combined with fear of
-the displeasure of his neighbors as well as of his own self-reproach
-if he shrinks back, but at the same time essentially bound up
-and reciprocating with the feeling that his neighbors are under
-corresponding obligations towards him,—this sentiment, which Brasidas
-invokes as the settled military creed of his soldiers in their ranks,
-was not less the regulating principle of their intercourse in peace
-as citizens of the same community. Simple as this principle may seem,
-it would have found no response in the army of Xerxes, or of the
-Thracian Sitalkês, or of the Gaul Brennus. The Persian soldier rushes
-to death by order of the Great King, perhaps under terror of a whip
-which the Great King commands to be administered to him: the Illyrian
-or the Gaul scorns such a stimulus, and obeys only the instigation of
-his own pugnacity, or vengeance, or love of blood, or love of booty,
-but recedes as soon as that individual sentiment is either satisfied
-or overcome by fear. It is the Greek soldier alone who feels himself
-bound to his comrades by ties reciprocal and indissoluble,[712]—who
-obeys neither the will of a king, nor his own individual impulse, but
-a common and imperative sentiment of obligation,—whose honor or shame
-is attached to his own place in the ranks, never to be abandoned nor
-overstepped. Such conceptions of military duty, established in the
-minds of these soldiers whom Brasidas addressed, will come to be
-farther illustrated when we describe the memorable Retreat of the
-Ten Thousand: at present, I merely indicate them as forming a part
-of that general scheme of morality, social and political as well as
-military, wherein the Greeks stood exalted above the nations who
-surrounded them.
-
-  [711] Thucyd. ii, 81. See above, chap. xlviii, of this History.
-
-  [712] See the memorable remarks of Hippokratês and Aristotle
-  on the difference in respect of courage between Europeans
-  and Asiatics, as well as between Hellens and non-Hellens
-  (Hippokratês, De Aëre, Locis, et Aquis, c. 24, ed. Littré, sect.
-  116, _seq._, ed. Petersen; Aristotel. Politic. vii, 6, 1-5), and
-  the conversation between Xerxes and Demaratus (Herodot. vii, 103,
-  104).
-
-But there is another point in the speech of Brasidas which deserves
-notice. He tells his soldiers: “Courage is your homebred property;
-for ye belong to communities wherein the small number governs
-the larger, simply by reason of superior prowess in themselves
-and conquest by their ancestors.” First, it is remarkable that
-a large proportion of the Peloponnesian soldiers, whom Brasidas
-thus addresses, consisted of Helots, the conquered race, not the
-conquerors: yet so easily does the military or regimental pride
-supplant the sympathies of race, that these men would feel flattered
-by being addressed as if they were themselves sprung from the race
-which had enslaved their ancestors. Next, we here see the right of
-the strongest invoked as the legitimate source of power, and as
-an honorable and ennobling recollection, by an officer of Dorian
-race, oligarchical politics, unperverted intellect, and estimable
-character: and we shall accordingly be prepared, when we find a
-similar principle hereafter laid down by the Athenian envoys at
-Melos, to disallow the explanation of those who treat it merely as
-a theory invented by demagogues and sophists, upon one or other of
-whom it is common to throw the blame of all that is objectionable in
-Grecian politics or morality.
-
-Having finished his harangue, Brasidas gave orders for retreat. As
-soon as his march began, the Illyrians rushed upon him with all the
-confidence and shouts of pursuers against a flying enemy, believing
-that they should completely destroy his army. But wherever they
-approached near, the young soldiers specially stationed for the
-purpose, turned upon and beat them back with severe loss; while
-Brasidas himself, with his rear-guard of three hundred, was present
-everywhere rendering vigorous aid. When the Lynkêstæ and Illyrians
-attacked, the army halted and repelled them, after which it resumed
-its retreating march. The barbarians found themselves so rudely
-handled, and with such unwonted vigor,—for they probably had had no
-previous experience of Grecian troops,—that after a few trials they
-desisted from meddling with the army in its retreat along the plain.
-They ran forward rapidly, partly in order to overtake the Macedonians
-under Perdikkas, who had fled before, partly to occupy the narrow
-pass, with high hills on each side, which formed the entrance into
-Lynkêstis, and which lay in the road of Brasidas. When the latter
-approached this narrow pass, he saw the barbarians masters of it;
-several of them were already on the summits, and more were ascending
-to reinforce them; while a portion of them were moving down upon his
-rear. Brasidas immediately gave orders to his chosen three hundred,
-to charge up the most assailable of the two hills, with their best
-speed, before it became more numerously occupied, not staying to
-preserve compact ranks. This unexpected and vigorous movement
-disconcerted the barbarians, who fled, abandoning the eminence to the
-Greeks, and leaving their own men in the pass exposed on one of their
-flanks.[713] The retreating army, thus master of one of the side
-hills, was enabled to force its way through the middle pass, and to
-drive away the Lynkêstian and Illyrian occupants. Having got through
-this narrow outlet, Brasidas found himself on the higher ground, nor
-did his enemies dare to attack him farther: so that he was enabled
-to reach, even in that day’s march, the first town or village in the
-kingdom of Perdikkas, called Arnissa. So incensed were his soldiers
-with the Macedonian subjects of Perdikkas, who had fled on the first
-news of danger without giving them any notice, that they seized and
-appropriated all the articles of baggage, not inconsiderable in
-number, which happened to have been dropped in the disorder of a
-nocturnal flight; and they even unharnessed and slew the oxen out of
-the baggage carts.[714]
-
-  [713] Thucyd. iv, 128. It is not possible clearly to understand
-  this passage without some knowledge of the ground to which it
-  refers. I presume that the regular road through the defile, along
-  which the main army of Brasidas passed, was long and winding,
-  making the ascent to the top very gradual, but at the same time
-  exposed on both sides from the heights above. The detachment of
-  three hundred scaled the steep heights on one side, and drove
-  away the enemy, thus making it impossible for him to remain
-  any longer even in the main road. But I do not suppose, with
-  Dr. Arnold, that the main army of Brasidas followed the three
-  hundred, and “broke out of the valley by scaling one of its
-  sides:” they pursued the main road, as soon as it was cleared for
-  them.
-
-  [714] Thucyd. iv, 127, 128.
-
-Perdikkas keenly resented this behavior of the troops of Brasidas,
-following as it did immediately upon his own quarrel with that
-general, and upon the mortification of his repulse from Lynkêstis.
-From this moment he broke off his alliance with the Peloponnesians,
-and opened negotiations with Nikias, then engaged in constructing the
-wall of blockade round Skiônê. Such was the general faithlessness
-of this prince, however, that Nikias required as a condition of the
-alliance, some manifest proof of the sincerity of his intentions;
-and Perdikkas was soon enabled to afford a proof of considerable
-importance.[715]
-
-  [715] Thucyd. iv, 128-132. Some lines of the comic poet Hermippus
-  are preserved (in the Φορμοφόροι, Meineke, Fragm. p. 407)
-  respecting Sitalkês and Perdikkas. Among the presents brought
-  home by Dionysus in his voyage, there is numbered “the itch from
-  Sitalkês, intended for the Lacedæmonians, and many shiploads
-  of lies from Perdikkas.” Καὶ παρὰ Περδίκκου ψεύδη ναυσὶν πάνυ
-  πολλαῖς.
-
-The relations between Athens and Peloponnesus, since the conclusion
-of the truce in the preceding March, had settled into a curious
-combination. In Thrace, war was prosecuted by mutual understanding,
-and with unabated vigor; but everywhere else the truce was observed.
-The main purpose of the truce, however, that of giving time for
-discussions preliminary to a definitive peace, was completely
-frustrated; nor does the decree of the Athenian people, which stands
-included in their vote sanctioning the truce, for sending and
-receiving envoys to negotiate such a peace, ever seem to have been
-executed.
-
-Instead of this, the Lacedæmonians despatched a considerable
-reinforcement by land to join Brasidas; probably at his own
-request, and also instigated by hearing of the Athenian armament
-now under Nikias in Pallênê. But Ischagoras, the commander of the
-reinforcement, on reaching the borders of Thessaly, found all farther
-progress impracticable, and was compelled to send back his troops.
-For Perdikkas, by whose powerful influence alone Brasidas had been
-enabled to pass through Thessaly, now directed his Thessalian guests
-to keep the new-comers off; which was far more easily executed, and
-was gratifying to the feelings of Perdikkas himself, as well as an
-essential service to the Athenians.[716] Ischagoras, however, with
-a few companions, but without his army, made his way to Brasidas,
-having been particularly directed by the Lacedæmonians to inspect and
-report upon the state of affairs. He numbered among his companions
-a few select Spartans of the military age, intended to be placed as
-harmosts or governors in the cities reduced by Brasidas: this was
-among the first violations, apparently often repeated afterwards, of
-the ancient Spartan custom, that none except elderly men, above the
-military age, should be named to such posts. Indeed, Brasidas himself
-was an illustrious departure from the ancient rule. The mission of
-these officers was intended to guard against the appointment of any
-but Spartans to such posts, for there were no Spartans in the army
-of Brasidas. One of the new-comers, Klearidas, was made governor of
-Amphipolis; another, Pasitelidas, of Torônê.[717] It is probable that
-these inspecting commissioners may have contributed to fetter the
-activity of Brasidas: and the newly-declared hostility of Perdikkas,
-together with disappointment in the non-arrival of the fresh troops
-intended to join him, much abridged his means. We hear of only one
-exploit performed by him at this time, and that too more than six
-months after the retreat from Macedonia, about January or February
-422 B.C. Having established intelligence with some parties in the
-town of Potidæa, in the view of surprising it, he contrived to bring
-up his army in the night to the foot of the walls, and even to plant
-his scaling ladders, without being discovered. The sentinel carrying
-and ringing the bell had just passed by on the wall, leaving for a
-short interval an unguarded space (the practice apparently being, to
-pass this bell round along the walls from one sentinel to another
-throughout the night), when some of the soldiers of Brasidas took
-advantage of the moment to try and mount. But before they could reach
-the top of the wall, the sentinel came back, alarm was given, and the
-assailants were compelled to retreat.[718]
-
-  [716] Thucyd. iv, 132.
-
-  [717] Thucyd. iv, 132. Καὶ ~τῶν ἡβώντων αὐτῶν~ παρανόμως ἄνδρας
-  ἐξῆγον ἐκ Σπάρτης, ὥστε τῶν πόλεων ἄρχοντας καθιστάναι καὶ μὴ
-  ~τοῖς ἐντυχοῦσιν~ ἐπιτρέπειν.
-
-  Most of the commentators translate ἡβώντων, “_young men_,” which
-  is not the usual meaning of the word: it signifies, “_men of
-  military age_,” which includes both young and middle-aged. If we
-  compare iv, 132 with iii, 36, v, 32, and v, 116, we shall see
-  that ἡβῶντες really has this larger meaning: compare also μέχρι
-  ἥβης (ii, 46), which means, “until the age of military service
-  commenced.”
-
-  It is not therefore necessary to suppose that the men taken out
-  by Ischagoras were very young, for example that they were below
-  the age of thirty, as Manso, O. Müller, and Göller would have us
-  believe. It is enough that they were within the limits of the
-  military age, both ways.
-
-  Considering the extraordinary reverence paid to old age at
-  Sparta, it is by no means wonderful that old men should have been
-  thought exclusively fitted for such commands, in the ancient
-  customs and constitution.
-
-  The extensive operations, however, in which Sparta became
-  involved through the Peloponnesian war, would render it
-  impossible to maintain such a maxim in practice: but at this
-  moment, the step was still recognized as a departure from a
-  received maxim, and is characterized as such by Thucydidês under
-  the term παρανόμως.
-
-  I explain τοῖς ἐντυχοῦσιν to refer to the case of men _not
-  Spartans_ being named to these posts: see in reference to this
-  point, the stress which Brasidas lays on the fact that Klearidas
-  was a Spartan, Thucyd. v, 9.
-
-  [718] Thucyd. iv, 135.
-
-In the absence of actual war between the ascendent powers in and near
-Peloponnesus, during the course of this summer, Thucydidês mentions
-to us some incidents which perhaps he would have omitted had there
-been great warlike operations to describe. The great temple of Hêrê,
-between Mykenæ and Argos (nearer to the former, and in early times
-more intimately connected with it, but now an appendage of the
-latter, Mykenæ itself having been subjected and almost depopulated
-by the Argeians), enjoyed an ancient Pan-Hellenic reputation; the
-catalogue of its priestesses, seemingly with a statue or bust of
-each, was preserved or imagined through centuries of past time, real
-and mythical, beginning with the goddess herself or her immediate
-nominees. Chrysis, an old woman, who had been priestess there for
-fifty-six years, happened to fall asleep in the temple with a burning
-lamp near to her head: the fillet encircling her head took fire, and
-though she herself escaped unhurt, the temple itself, very ancient,
-and perhaps built of wood, was consumed. From fear of the wrath of
-the Argeians, Chrysis fled to Phlius, and subsequently thought it
-necessary to seek protection as a suppliant in the temple of Athênê
-Alea, at Tegea: Phaeinis was appointed priestess in her place.[719]
-The temple was rebuilt on an adjoining spot by Eupolemus, of Argos,
-continuing as much as possible the antiquities and traditions of
-the former, but with greater splendor and magnitude: Pausanias, the
-traveller, who describes this temple as a visitor, near six hundred
-years afterwards, saw near it the remnant of the old temple which had
-been burned.
-
-  [719] Thucyd. ii, 5; iv, 133; Pausan. ii, 17, 7; iii, 5, 6.
-  Hellanikus (a contemporary of Thucydidês, but somewhat older,
-  coming in point of age between him and Herodotus) had framed a
-  chronological series of these priestesses of Hêrê, with a history
-  of past events belonging to the supposed times of each. And such
-  was the Pan-Hellenic importance of the temple at this time,
-  that Thucydidês, when he describes accurately the beginning of
-  the Peloponnesian war, tells us, as one of his indications of
-  time, that Chrysis had then been forty-eight years priestess at
-  the Heræum. To employ the series of Olympic prize-runners and
-  Olympiads as a continuous distribution of time, was a practice
-  which had not yet got footing.
-
-  The catalogue of these priestesses of Hêrê, beginning with
-  mythical and descending to historical names, is illustrated by
-  the inscription belonging to the temple of Halikarnassus in
-  Boeckh, Corpus Inscr. No. 2655: see Boeckh’s Commentary, and
-  Preller, Hellanici Fragmenta, pp. 34, 46.
-
-We hear farther of a war in Arcadia, between the two important cities
-of Mantineia and Tegea, each attended by its Arcadian allies, partly
-free, partly subject. In a battle fought between them at Laodikion,
-the victory was disputed: each party erected a trophy, each sent
-spoils to the temple of Delphi. We shall have occasion soon to speak
-farther of these Arcadian dissensions.
-
-The Bœotians had been no parties to the truce sworn between Sparta
-and Athens in the preceding month of March; but they seem to have
-followed the example of Sparta in abstaining from hostilities _de
-facto_: and we may conclude that they acceded to the request of
-Sparta so far as to allow the transit of Athenian visitors and
-sacred envoys through Bœotia to the Delphian temple. The only actual
-incident which we hear of in Bœotia during this interval, is one
-which illustrates forcibly the harsh and ungenerous ascendency of the
-Thebans over the inferior Bœotian cities.[720] The Thebans destroyed
-the walls of Thespiæ, and condemned the city to remain unfortified,
-on the charge of _atticizing_ tendencies. How far this suspicion was
-well founded we have no means of judging: but the Thespians, far from
-being dangerous at this moment, were altogether helpless, having
-lost the flower of their military force at the battle of Delium,
-where their station was on the defeated wing. It was this very
-helplessness, brought upon them by their services to Thebes against
-Athens, which now both impelled and enabled the Thebans to enforce
-the rigorous sentence above mentioned.[721]
-
-  [720] Xenophon, Memorabil. iii, 5, 6.
-
-  [721] Thucyd. iv, 133.
-
-But the month of March, or the Attic Elaphebolion, 422 B.C., the time
-prescribed for expiration of the one year’s truce, had now arrived.
-It has already been mentioned that this truce had never been more
-than partially observed: Brasidas in Thrace had disregarded it from
-the beginning, and both the contracting powers had tacitly acquiesced
-in the anomalous condition, of war in Thrace coupled with peace
-elsewhere. Either of them had thus an excellent pretext for breaking
-the truce altogether; and as neither acted upon this pretext, we
-plainly see that the paramount feeling and ascendent parties, among
-both, tended to peace of their own accord, at that time. Nor was
-there anything except the interest of Brasidas, and of those revolted
-subjects of Athens to whom he had bound himself, which kept alive
-the war in Thrace. Under such a state of feeling, the oath taken to
-maintain the truce still seemed imperative on both parties, always
-excepting Thracian affairs. Moreover, the Athenians were to a certain
-degree soothed by their success at Mendê and Skiônê, and by their
-acquisition of Perdikkas as an ally, during the summer and autumn of
-423 B.C. But the state of sentiment between the contracting parties
-was not such as to make it possible to treat for any longer peace, or
-to conclude any new agreement, though neither were disposed to depart
-from that which had been already concluded.
-
-The mere occurrence of the last day of the truce made no practical
-difference at first in this condition of things. The truce had
-expired: either party might renew hostilities; but neither actually
-did renew them. To the Athenians, there was this additional motive
-for abstaining from hostilities for a few months longer: the great
-Pythian festival would be celebrated at Delphi in July or the
-beginning of August, and as they had been excluded from that holy
-spot during all the interval between the beginning of the war and the
-conclusion of the one year’s truce, their pious feelings seem now to
-have taken a peculiar longing towards the visits, pilgrimages, and
-festivals connected with it. Though the truce, therefore, had really
-ceased, no actual warfare took place until the Pythian games were
-over.[722]
-
-  [722] This seems to me the most reasonable sense to put upon the
-  much-debated passage of Thucyd. v, 1. Τοῦ δ᾽ ἐπιγιγνομένου θέρους
-  αἱ μὲν ἐνιαύσιοι σπονδαὶ διελέλυντο μέχρι τῶν Πυθίων· καὶ ἐν τῇ
-  ~ἐκεχειρίᾳ~ Ἀθηναῖοι Δηλίους ἀνέστησαν ἐκ Δήλου; again, v, 2.
-  Κλέων δὲ Ἀθηναίους πείσας ἐς τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης χωρία ἐξέπλευσε μετὰ
-  τὴν ~ἐκεχειρίαν~, etc.
-
-  Thucydidês says here, that “the truce was dissolved:” the
-  bond imposed upon both parties was untied, and both resumed
-  their natural liberty. But he does not say that “_hostilities
-  recommenced_” before the Pythia, as Göller and other critics
-  affirm that he says. The interval between the 14th of the month
-  Elaphebolion and the Pythian festival was one in which there
-  was no binding truce any longer in force, and yet no actual
-  hostilities: it was an ἀνακωχὴ ἄσπονδος, to use the words of
-  Thucydidês, when he describes the relations between Corinth and
-  Athens in the ensuing year (v, 32).
-
-  The word ἐκεχειρία here means, in my judgment, the truce
-  proclaimed at the season of the Pythian festival,—quite distinct
-  from the truce for one year which had expired a little while
-  before. The change of the word in the course of one line from
-  σπονδαὶ to ἐκεχειρία marks this distinction.
-
-  I agree with Dr. Arnold, dissenting both from M. Boeckh and
-  from Mr. Clinton, in his conception of the events of this year.
-  Kleon sailed on his expedition to Thrace after the Pythian holy
-  truce, in the beginning of August: between that date and the end
-  of September, happened the capture of Torônê and the battle of
-  Amphipolis. But the way in which Dr. Arnold defends his opinion
-  is not at all satisfactory. In the Dissertation appended to his
-  second volume of Thucydidês (p. 458), he says: “The words in
-  Thucydidês αἱ ἐνιαύσιοι σπονδαὶ διελέλυντο μέχρι Πυθίων, mean,
-  as I understand them, ‘that the truce for a year had _lasted
-  on_ till the Pythian games, and then ended:’ that is, instead
-  of expiring on the 14th of Elaphebolion, it had been _tacitly
-  continued_ nearly four months longer, till after midsummer: and
-  it was not till the middle of Hekatombæon that Cleon was sent out
-  to recover Amphipolis.”
-
-  Such a construction of the word διελέλυντο appears to me
-  inadmissible, nor is Dr. Arnold’s defence of it, p. 454, of much
-  value: σπονδὰς διαλύειν is an expression well known to Thucydidês
-  (iv, 23; v, 36), “to dissolve the truce.” I go along with Boeckh
-  and Mr. Clinton in construing the words, except that I strike
-  out what they introduce from their own imagination. They say:
-  “The truce was ended, and _the war again renewed_, up to the
-  time of the Pythian games.” Thucydidês only says “that the truce
-  was dissolved;” he does not say “_that the war was renewed_.” It
-  is not at all necessary to Dr. Arnold’s conception of the facts
-  that the words should be translated as he proposes. His remarks
-  also (p. 460) upon the relation of the Athenians to the Pythian
-  games, appear to me just: but he does not advert to the fact,
-  which would have strengthened materially what he there says, that
-  the Athenians had been excluded from Delphi and from the Pythian
-  festival between the commencement of the war and the one year’s
-  truce. I conceive that the Pythian games were celebrated about
-  July or August. In an earlier part of this History (ch. xxviii,
-  vol. iv, p. 67), I said that they were celebrated in _autumn_;
-  it ought rather to be “towards the end of summer.”
-
-But though the actions of Athens remained unaltered, the talk at
-Athens became very different. Kleon and his supporters renewed their
-instances to obtain a vigorous prosecution of the war, and renewed
-them with great additional strength of argument; the question being
-now open to considerations of political prudence, without any binding
-obligation.
-
-“At this time (observes Thucydidês)[723] the great enemies of peace
-were, Brasidas on one side, and Kleon on the other: the former,
-because he was in full success and rendered illustrious by the war;
-the latter, because he thought that if peace were concluded, he
-should be detected in his dishonest politics, and be less easily
-credited in his criminations of others.” As to Brasidas, the remark
-of the historian is indisputable: it would be wonderful, indeed,
-if he, in whom so many splendid qualities were brought out by the
-war, and who had moreover contracted obligations with the Thracian
-towns which gave him hopes and fears of his own, entirely apart from
-Lacedæmon,—it would be wonderful if the war and its continuance were
-not in his view the paramount object. In truth, his position in
-Thrace constituted an insurmountable obstacle to any solid or steady
-peace, independently of the dispositions of Kleon.
-
-  [723] Thucyd. v, 16. Κλέων τε καὶ Βρασίδας, οἵπερ ἀμφοτέρωθεν
-  μάλιστα ἠναντιοῦντο τῇ εἰρήνῃ, ὁ μὲν, διὰ τὸ εὐτυχεῖν τε καὶ
-  τιμᾶσθαι ἐκ τοῦ πολεμεῖν, ὁ δὲ, γενομένης ἡσυχίας καταφανέστερος
-  νομίζων ἂν εἶναι κακουργῶν, καὶ ἀπιστότερος διαβάλλων, etc.
-
-But the coloring which Thucydidês gives to Kleon’s support of the
-war is open to much greater comment. First, we may well raise the
-question, whether Kleon had any real interest in war,—whether his
-personal or party consequence in the city was at all enhanced by
-it. He had himself no talent or competence for warlike operations,
-which tended infallibly to place ascendency in the hands of others,
-and to throw him into the shade. As to his power of carrying on
-dishonest intrigues with success, that must depend on the extent of
-his political ascendency; while matter of crimination against others,
-assuming him to be careless of truth or falsehood, could hardly be
-wanting either in war or peace; and if the war brought forward
-unsuccessful generals open to his accusations, it would also throw
-up successful generals who would certainly outshine him, and would
-probably put him down. In the life which Plutarch has given us of
-Phokion, a plain and straightforward military man, we read that one
-of the frequent and criminative speakers of Athens, of character
-analogous to that which is ascribed to Kleon, expressed his surprise
-on hearing Phokion dissuade the Athenians from embarking in a new
-war: “Yes (said Phokion), I think it right to dissuade them; though
-I know well, that if there be war, I shall have command over you;
-if there be peace, you will have command over me.”[724] This is
-surely a more rational estimate of the way in which war affects the
-comparative importance of the orator and the military officer, than
-that which Thucydidês pronounces in reference to the interests of
-Kleon. Moreover, when we come to follow the political history of
-Syracuse, we shall find the demagogue Athenagoras ultra-pacific,
-and the aristocrat Hermokratês far more warlike:[725] the former is
-afraid, not without reason, that war will raise into consequence
-energetic military leaders dangerous to the popular constitution. We
-may add, that Kleon himself had not been always warlike: he commenced
-his political career as an opponent of Periklês, when the latter was
-strenuously maintaining the necessity and prudence of beginning the
-Peloponnesian war.[726]
-
-  [724] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 16.
-
-  [725] See the speeches of Athenagoras and Hermokratês, Thucyd.
-  vi, 33-36.
-
-  [726] Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33-35.
-
-But farther, if we should even grant that Kleon had a separate
-party-interest in promoting the war, it will still remain to be
-considered, whether, at this particular crisis, the employment of
-energetic warlike measures in Thrace was not really the sound and
-prudent policy for Athens. Taking Periklês as the best judge of
-that policy, we shall find him at the outset of the war inculcating
-emphatically two important points: 1. To stand vigorously upon the
-defensive, maintaining unimpaired their maritime empire, “keeping
-their subject-allies well in hand,” submitting patiently even to see
-Attica ravaged. 2. To abstain from trying to enlarge their empire
-or to make new conquests during the war.[727] Consistently with this
-well-defined plan of action, Periklês, had he lived, would have taken
-care to interfere vigorously and betimes to prevent Brasidas from
-making his conquests: had such interference been either impossible
-or accidentally frustrated, he would have thought no efforts too
-great to recover them. To maintain undiminished the integrity of
-the empire, as well as that impression of Athenian force upon which
-the empire rested, was his cardinal principle. Now it is impossible
-to deny that in reference to Thrace, Kleon adhered more closely
-than his rival Nikias to the policy of Periklês. It was to Nikias,
-more than to Kleon, that the fatal mistake made by Athens in not
-interfering speedily after Brasidas first broke into Thrace is to be
-imputed: it was Nikias and his partisans, desirous of peace at almost
-any price, and knowing that the Lacedæmonians also desired it, who
-encouraged his countrymen, at a moment of great public depression
-of spirit, to leave Brasidas unopposed in Thrace, and rely on the
-chance of negotiation with Sparta for arresting his progress. The
-peace-party at Athens carried their point of the truce for a year,
-with the promise and for the express purpose of checking the farther
-conquests of Brasidas; also with the farther promise of maturing that
-truce into a permanent peace, and obtaining under the peace even the
-restoration of Amphipolis.
-
-  [727] Thucyd. i, 142, 143, 144; ii, 13. καὶ τὸ ναυτικὸν
-  ᾗπερ ἰσχύουσιν ἐξαρτύεσθαι, ~τά τε τῶν ξυμμάχων διὰ χειρὸς
-  ἔχειν~—λέγων τὴν ἰσχὺν αὐτοῖς ἀπὸ τούτων εἶναι τῶν χρημάτων τῆς
-  προσόδου, etc.
-
-Such was the policy of Nikias and his party, the friends of peace
-and opponents of Kleon. And the promises which they thus held out
-might perhaps appear plausible in March 422 B.C., at the moment when
-the truce for one year was concluded. But the subsequent events had
-frustrated them in the most glaring manner, and had even shown the
-best reason for believing that no such expectations could possibly
-be realized while Brasidas was in unbroken and unopposed action. For
-the Lacedæmonians, though seemingly sincere in concluding the truce
-on the basis of _uti possidetis_, and desiring to extend it to Thrace
-as well as elsewhere, had been unable to enforce the observance of it
-upon Brasidas, or to restrain him even from making new acquisitions,
-so that Athens never obtained the benefit of the truce, exactly in
-that region where she most stood in need of it. Only by the despatch
-of her armament to Skiônê and Mendê had she maintained herself in
-possession even of Pallênê. Now what was the lesson to be derived
-from this experience, when the Athenians came to discuss their
-future policy, after the truce was at an end? The great object of
-all parties at Athens was to recover the lost possessions in Thrace,
-especially Amphipolis. Nikias, still urging negotiations for peace,
-continued to hold out hopes that the Lacedæmonians would be willing
-to restore that place, as the price of their captives now at Athens;
-and his connection with Sparta would enable him to announce her
-professions even upon authority. But to this Kleon might make, and
-doubtless did make, a complete reply, grounded upon the most recent
-experience: “If the Lacedæmonians consent to the restitution of
-Amphipolis (he would say), it will probably be only with the view of
-finding some means to escape performance, and yet to get back their
-prisoners. But granting that they are perfectly sincere, they will
-never be able to control Brasidas, and those parties in Thrace who
-are bound up with him by community of feeling and interest; so that
-after all, you will give them back their prisoners on the faith of an
-equivalent beyond their power to realize. Look at what has happened
-during the truce! So different are the views and obligations of
-Brasidas in Thrace from those of the Lacedæmonians, that he would not
-even obey their order when they directed him to stand as he was, and
-to desist from farther conquest: much less will he obey them when
-they direct him to surrender what he has already got: least of all,
-if they enjoin the surrender of Amphipolis, his grand acquisition
-and his central point for all future effort. Depend upon it, if you
-desire to regain Amphipolis, you will only regain it by energetic
-employment of force, as has happened with Skiônê and Mendê: and you
-ought to put forth your strength for this purpose immediately, while
-the Lacedæmonian prisoners are yet in your hands, instead of waiting
-until after you shall have been deluded into giving them up, thereby
-losing all your hold upon Lacedæmon.”
-
-Such anticipations were fully verified by the result: for subsequent
-history will show that the Lacedæmonians, when they had bound
-themselves by treaty to give up Amphipolis, either would not, or
-could not, enforce performance of their stipulation, even after the
-death of Brasidas: much less could they have done so during his life,
-when there was his great personal influence, strenuous will, and
-hopes of future conquest, to serve as increased obstruction to them.
-Such anticipations were also plainly suggested by the recent past: so
-that in putting them into the mouth of Kleon, we are only supposing
-him to read the lesson open before his eyes.
-
-Now since the war-policy of Kleon, taken at this moment after the
-expiration of the one year’s truce, may be thus shown to be not only
-more conformable to the genius of Periklês, but also founded on a
-juster estimate of events both past and future, than the peace-policy
-of Nikias, what are we to say to the historian, who, without
-refuting such presumptions, every one of which is deduced from his
-own narrative, nay, without even indicating their existence, merely
-tells us that “Kleon opposed the peace in order that he might cloke
-dishonest intrigues and find matter for plausible crimination?” We
-cannot but say of this criticism, with profound regret that such
-words must be pronounced respecting any judgment of Thucydidês, that
-it is harsh and unfair towards Kleon, and careless in regard to truth
-and the instruction of his readers. It breathes not that same spirit
-of honorable impartiality which pervades his general history: it is
-an interpolation by the officer whose improvidence had occasioned to
-his countrymen the fatal loss of Amphipolis, retaliating upon the
-citizen who justly accused him: it is conceived in the same tone as
-his unaccountable judgment in the matter of Sphakteria.
-
-Rejecting on this occasion the judgment of Thucydidês, we may
-confidently affirm that Kleon had rational public grounds for urging
-his countrymen to undertake with energy the reconquest of Amphipolis.
-Demagogue and leather-seller though he was, he stands here honorably
-distinguished, as well from the tameness and inaction of Nikias,
-who grasped at peace with hasty credulity through sickness of the
-efforts of war, as from the restless movement and novelties, not
-merely unprofitable but ruinous, which we shall presently find
-springing up under the auspices of Alkibiadês. Periklês had said to
-his countrymen, at a time when they were enduring all the miseries
-of pestilence, and were in a state of despondency even greater than
-that which prevailed in B.C. 422: “You hold your empire and your
-proud position, by the condition of being willing to encounter cost,
-fatigue, and danger: abstain from all views of enlarging the empire,
-but think no effort too great to maintain it unimpaired. To lose what
-we have once got is more disgraceful than to fail in attempts at
-acquisition.”[728] The very same language was probably held by Kleon
-when exhorting his countrymen to an expedition for the reconquest
-of Amphipolis. But when uttered by him, it would have a very
-different effect from that which it had formerly produced when held
-by Periklês, and different also from that which it would now have
-produced if held by Nikias. The entire peace-party would repudiate it
-when it came from Kleon; partly out of dislike to the speaker, partly
-from a conviction, doubtless felt by every one, that an expedition
-against Brasidas would be a hazardous and painful service to all
-concerned in it, general as well as soldiers; partly also from a
-persuasion, sincerely entertained at the time, though afterwards
-proved to be illusory by the result, that Amphipolis might really be
-got back through peace with the Lacedæmonians.
-
-  [728] Thucyd. ii, 63. Τῆς δὲ πόλεως ὑμᾶς εἰκὸς τῷ τιμωμένῳ ἀπὸ
-  τοῦ ἄρχειν, ᾧπερ ἅπαντες ἀγάλλεσθε, βοηθεῖν, καὶ μὴ φεύγειν τοὺς
-  πόνους ἢ μηδὲ τὰς τιμὰς διώκειν, etc. c. 62, αἴσχιον δὲ, ἔχοντας
-  ἀφαιρεθῆναι ἢ κτωμένους ἀτυχῆσαι. Contrast the tenor of the two
-  speeches of Periklês (Thucyd. i, 140-144; ii, 60-64) with the
-  description which Thucydidês gives of the simple “avoidance of
-  risk,” (τὸ ἀκίνδυνον), which characterized Nikias (v. 16).
-
-If Kleon, in proposing the expedition, originally proposed himself
-as the commander, a new ground of objection, and a very forcible
-ground, would thus be furnished. Since everything which Kleon does is
-understood to be a manifestation of some vicious or silly attribute,
-we are told that this was an instance of his absurd presumption,
-arising out of the success of Pylus, and persuading him that he was
-the only general who could put down Brasidas. But if the success at
-Pylus had really filled him with such overweening military conceit,
-it is most unaccountable that he should not have procured for himself
-some command during the year which immediately succeeded the affair
-at Sphakteria, the eighth year of the war: a season of most active
-warlike enterprise, when his presumption and influence arising out
-of the Sphakterian victory must have been fresh and glowing. As he
-obtained no command during this immediately succeeding period we
-may fairly doubt whether he ever really conceived such excessive
-personal presumption of his own talents for war, and whether he did
-not retain after the affair of Sphakteria the same character which
-he had manifested in that affair, reluctance to engage in military
-expeditions himself, and a disposition to see them commanded as well
-as carried on by others. It is by no means certain that Kleon, in
-proposing the expedition against Amphipolis, originally proposed to
-take the command of it himself: I think it at least equally probable,
-that his original wish was to induce Nikias or the stratêgi to take
-the command of it, as in the case of Sphakteria. Nikias, doubtless,
-opposed the expedition as much as he could: when it was determined
-by the people, in spite of his opposition, he would peremptorily
-decline the command for himself, and would do all he could to force
-it upon Kleon, or at least would be better pleased to see it under
-his command than under that of any one else. He would be not less
-glad to exonerate himself from a dangerous service than to see
-his rival entangled in it; and he would have before him the same
-alternative which he and his friends had contemplated with so much
-satisfaction in the affair of Sphakteria: either the expedition would
-succeed, in which case Amphipolis would be taken, or it would fail,
-and the consequence would be the ruin of Kleon. The last of the two
-was really the more probable at Amphipolis, as Nikias had erroneously
-imagined it to be at Sphakteria.
-
-It is easy to see, however, that an expedition proposed under these
-circumstances by Kleon, though it might command a majority in the
-public assembly, would have a large proportion of the citizens
-unfavorable to it, and even wishing that it might fail. Moreover,
-Kleon had neither talents nor experience for commanding an army, and
-the being engaged under his command in fighting against the ablest
-officer of the time, could inspire no confidence to any man in
-putting on his armor. From all these circumstances united, political
-as well as military, we are not surprised to hear that the hoplites
-whom he took out with him went with much reluctance.[729] An
-ignorant general, with unwilling soldiers, many of them politically
-disliking him, stood little chance of wresting Amphipolis from
-Brasidas: but had Nikias or the stratêgi done their duty, and carried
-the entire force of the city under competent command to the same
-object, the issue would probably have been different as to gain and
-loss; certainly very different as to dishonor.
-
-  [729] Thucyd. v, 7. καὶ οἴκοθεν ὡς ἄκοντες αὐτῷ ξυνῆλθον.
-
-Kleon started from Peiræus, apparently towards the beginning of
-August, with twelve hundred Athenian, Lemnian, and Imbrian hoplites,
-and three hundred horsemen, troops of excellent quality and
-condition: besides an auxiliary force of allies, number not exactly
-known, and thirty triremes. This armament was not of magnitude at all
-equal to the taking of Amphipolis; for Brasidas had equal numbers,
-besides all the advantages of the position. But it was a part of
-the scheme of Kleon, on arriving at Eion, to procure Macedonian and
-Thracian reinforcements before he commenced his attack. He first
-halted in his voyage near Skiônê, from which place he took away such
-of the hoplites as could be spared from the blockade. He next sailed
-across the gulf from Pallênê to the Sithonian peninsula, to a place
-called the Harbor of the Kolophonians, near Torônê.[730] Having
-here learned that neither Brasidas himself, nor any considerable
-Peloponnesian garrison were present in Torônê, he landed his forces
-and marched to attack the town, sending ten triremes at the same time
-round a promontory which separated the harbor of the Kolophonians
-from Torônê, to assail the latter place from seaward. It happened
-that Brasidas, desiring to enlarge the fortified circle of Torônê,
-had broken down a portion of the old wall, and employed the materials
-in building a new and larger wall inclosing the proasteion, or
-suburb: this new wall appears to have been still incomplete and
-in an imperfect state of defence. Pasitelidas, the Peloponnesian
-commander, resisted the attack of the Athenians as long as he could;
-but when already beginning to give way, he saw the ten Athenian
-triremes sailing into the harbor, which was hardly guarded at all.
-Abandoning the defence of the suburb, he hastened to repel these
-new assailants, but came too late, so that the town was entered
-from both sides at once. Brasidas, who was not far off, rendered
-aid with the utmost celerity, but was yet at five miles’ distance
-from the city when he learned the capture, and was obliged to retire
-unsuccessfully. Pasitelidas the commander, with the Peloponnesian
-garrison and the Torônæan male population, were despatched as
-prisoners to Athens; while the Torônæan women and children, by a fate
-but too common in those days, were sold as slaves.[731]
-
-  [730] The town of Torônê was situated near the extremity of the
-  Sithonian peninsula, on the side looking towards Pallênê. But the
-  territory belonging to the town comprehended all the extremity
-  of the peninsula on both sides, including the terminating point
-  Cape Ampelos,—Ἄμπελον τὴν Τορωναίην ἄκρην (Herodot. vii, 122).
-  Herodotus calls the Singitic gulf θάλασσαν τὴν ἄντιον Τορώνης
-  (vii, 122).
-
-  The ruins of Torônê, bearing the ancient name, and Kufo, a
-  land-locked harbor near it, are still to be seen (Leake, Travels
-  in Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxiv, p. 119).
-
-  [731] Thucyd. v, 3.
-
-After this not unimportant success, Kleon sailed round the promontory
-of Athos to Eion at the mouth of the Strymon, within three miles of
-Amphipolis. From hence, in execution of his original scheme, he sent
-envoys to Perdikkas, urging him to lend effective aid as the ally of
-Athens in the attack of Amphipolis, with his whole forces; and to
-Pollês the king of the Thracian Odomantes, inviting him also to come
-with as many Thracian mercenaries as could be levied. The Edonians,
-the Thracian tribe nearest to Amphipolis, took part with Brasidas:
-and the local influence of the banished Thucydidês would no longer be
-at the service of Athens, much less at the service of Kleon. Awaiting
-the expected reinforcements, Kleon employed himself, first in an
-attack upon Stageirus in the Strymonic gulf, which was repulsed; next
-upon Galêpsus, on the coast opposite the island of Thasos, which
-was successful. But the reinforcements did not at once arrive, and
-being too weak to attack Amphipolis without them, he was obliged to
-remain inactive at Eion; while Brasidas on his side made no movement
-out of Amphipolis, but contented himself with keeping constant
-watch over the forces of Kleon, the view of which he commanded from
-his station on the hill of Kerdylion, on the western bank of the
-river-communication with Amphipolis by the bridge. Some days elapsed
-in such inaction on both sides; but the Athenian hoplites, becoming
-impatient of doing nothing, soon began to give vent to those
-feelings of dislike which they had brought out from Athens against
-their general, “whose ignorance and cowardice (says the historian)
-they contrasted with the skill and bravery of his opponent.”[732]
-Athenian hoplites, if they felt such a sentiment, were not likely
-to refrain from manifesting it; and Kleon was presently made aware
-of the fact in a manner sufficiently painful to force him against
-his will into some movement; which, however, he did not intend to be
-anything else than a march for the purpose of surveying the ground
-all round the city, and a demonstration to escape the appearance of
-doing nothing, being aware that it was impossible to attack the place
-with any effect before his reinforcements arrived.
-
-  [732] Thucyd. v, 7. Ὁ δὲ Κλέων τέως μὲν ἡσύχαζεν, ἔπειτα δὲ
-  ~ἠναγκάσθη~ ποιῆσαι ὅπερ ὁ Βρασίδας προσεδέχετο. Τῶν γὰρ
-  στρατιωτῶν ἀχθομένων μὲν τῇ ἕδρᾳ, ἀναλογιζομένων δὲ τὴν
-  ἐκείνου ἡγεμονίαν, πρὸς οἵαν ἐμπειρίαν καὶ τόλμαν μεθ᾽ οἵας
-  ἀνεπιστημοσύνης καὶ μαλακίας γενήσοιτο, καὶ οἴκοθεν ὡς ἄκοντες
-  αὐτῷ ξυνῆλθον, αἰσθόμενος τὸν θροῦν, καὶ οὐ βουλόμενος αὐτοὺς διὰ
-  τὸ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ καθημένους βαρύνεσθαι, ἀναλαβὼν ἦγε.
-
-To comprehend the important incidents which followed, it is necessary
-to say a few words on the topography of Amphipolis, as far as we can
-understand it on the imperfect evidence before us. That city was
-placed on the left bank of the Strymon, on a conspicuous hill around
-which the river makes a bend, first in a southwesterly direction,
-then, after a short course to the southward, back in a southeasterly
-direction. Amphipolis had for its only artificial fortification
-one long wall, which began near the point northeast of the town,
-where the river narrows again into a channel, after passing through
-the lake Kerkinitis, ascended along the eastern side of the hill,
-crossing the ridge which connects it with Mount Pangæus, and then
-descended so as to touch the river again at another point south
-of the town; thus being, as it were, a string to the highly-bent
-bow formed by the river. On three sides therefore, north, west,
-and south, the city was defended only by the Strymon, and was thus
-visible without any intervening wall to spectators from the side
-of the sea (south), as well as from the side of the continent (or
-west and north).[733] At some little distance below the point where
-the wall touched the river south of the city, was the bridge,[734]
-a communication of great importance for the whole country, which
-connected the territory of Amphipolis with that of Argilus. On the
-western or right bank of the river, bordering it, and forming an
-outer bend corresponding to the bend of the river, was situated Mount
-Kerdylium: in fact, the course of the Strymon is here determined by
-these two steep eminences, Kerdylium on the west, and the hill of
-Amphipolis on the east, between which it flows. At the time when
-Brasidas first took the place, the bridge was totally unconnected
-with the long city wall; but during the intervening eighteen months,
-he had erected a palisade work—probably an earthen bank topped with
-a palisade—connecting the two. By means of this palisade, the bridge
-was thus at the time of Kleon’s expedition comprehended within the
-fortifications of the city; and Brasidas, while keeping watch on
-Mount Kerdylium, could pass over whenever he chose into the city,
-without any fear of impediment.[735]
-
-  [733] Thucyd. iv, 102. Ἀπὸ τῆς νῦν πόλεως, ἣν Ἀμφίπολιν Ἅγνων
-  ὠνόμασεν, ὅτι ἐπ᾽ ἀμφότερα περιῤῥέοντος τοῦ Στρύμονος, διὰ τὸ
-  περιέχειν αὐτὴν, τείχει μακρῷ ἀπολαβὼν ἐκ ποταμοῦ ἐς ποταμὸν,
-  περιφανῆ ἐς θάλασσάν τε καὶ τὴν ἤπειρον ᾤκισεν.
-
-  Ὁ καλλιγέφυρος ποταμὸς Στρύμων, Euripid. Rhesus, 346.
-
-  I annex a plan which will convey some idea of the hill of
-  Amphipolis and the circumjacent territory: compare the plan in
-  Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxv, p.
-  191, and that from Mr. Hawkins, which is annexed to the third
-  volume of Dr. Arnold’s Thucydidês, combined with a Dissertation
-  which appears in the second volume of the same work, p. 450.
-  See also the remarks in Kutzen, De Atheniensium imperio circa
-  Strymonem, ch. ii, pp. 18-21; Weissenborn, Beiträge zur genaueren
-  Erforschung der alt-griechischen Geschichte, pp. 152-156;
-  Cousinéry, Voyage dans la Macédoine, vol. i, ch. iv, p. 124,
-  _seq._
-
-  Colonel Leake supposes the ancient bridge to have been at the
-  same point of the river as the modern bridge; that is, north of
-  Amphipolis, and a little westward of the corner of the lake.
-  On this point I differ from him, and have placed it, with Dr.
-  Arnold, near the southeastern end of the reach of the Strymon,
-  which flows round Amphipolis. But there is another circumstance,
-  in which Col. Leake’s narrative corrects a material error in
-  Dr. Arnold’s Dissertation. Colonel Leake particularly notices
-  the high ridge which connects the hill of Amphipolis with Mount
-  Pangæus to the eastward (pp. 182, 183, 191-194), whereas Dr.
-  Arnold represents them as separated by a deep ravine (p. 451):
-  upon which latter supposition the whole account of Kleon’s march
-  and survey appears to me unintelligible.
-
-  The epithet which Thucydidês gives to Amphipolis, “conspicuous
-  both towards the sea and towards the land,” which occasions some
-  perplexity to the commentators, appears to me one of obvious
-  propriety. Amphipolis was indeed situated on a hill; so were many
-  other towns: but its peculiarity was, that on three sides it had
-  no wall to interrupt the eye of the spectator: one of those sides
-  was towards the sea.
-
-  Kutzen and Cousinéry make the long wall to be the segment of a
-  curve highly bent, touching the river at both ends. But I agree
-  with Weissenborn that this is inadmissible; and that the words
-  “long wall” imply something near a straight direction.
-
-  [734] Ἀπέχει δὲ τὸ πόλισμα πλέον τῆς διαβάσεως: see a note a few
-  pages ago upon these words. This does not necessarily imply that
-  the bridge was at any considerable distance from the extreme
-  point where the long wall touched the river to the south: but
-  this latter point was a good way off from the town properly so
-  called, which occupied the higher slope of the hill. We are not
-  to suppose that the _whole_ space between the long wall and the
-  river was covered by buildings.
-
-  [735] Thucyd. v. 10. Καὶ ὁ μὲν (Brasidas) κατὰ τὰς ἐπὶ τὸ
-  σταύρωμα πύλας, καὶ τὰς πρώτας τοῦ μακροῦ τείχους τότε ὄντος
-  ἐξελθὼν, ἔθει δρόμῳ τὴν ὁδὸν ταύτην εὐθεῖαν, ᾗπερ νῦν, etc.
-
-  The explanation which I have here given to the word σταύρωμα is
-  not given by any one else; but it appears to me the only one
-  calculated to impart clearness and consistency to the whole
-  narrative.
-
-  When Brasidas surprised Amphipolis first, the bridge was
-  completely unconnected with the Long Wall, and at a certain
-  distance from it. But when Thucydidês wrote his history, there
-  were a pair of _connecting walls_ between the bridge and the
-  fortifications of the city as they then stood—οὐ καθεῖτο τείχη
-  ὥσπερ νῦν (iv, 103): the whole fortifications of the city had
-  been altered during the intermediate period.
-
-  Now the question is, was the Long Wall of Amphipolis connected
-  or unconnected with the bridge, at the time of the conflict
-  between Brasidas and Kleon? Whoever reads the narrative of
-  Thucydidês attentively will see, I think, that they must have
-  been connected, though Thucydidês does not in express terms
-  specify the fact. For if the bridge had been detached from the
-  wall, as it was when Brasidas surprised the place first, the hill
-  of Kerdylium on the opposite side of the river would have been
-  an unsafe position for him to occupy. He might have been cut off
-  from Amphipolis by an enemy attacking the bridge. But we shall
-  find him remaining quietly on the hill of Kerdylium with the
-  perfect certainty of entering Amphipolis at any moment that he
-  chose. If it be urged that the bridge, though unconnected with
-  the Long Wall, might still be under a strong separate guard,
-  I reply, that on that supposition an enemy from Eion would
-  naturally attack the bridge first. To have to defend a bridge
-  completely detached from the city, simply by means of a large
-  constant guard, would materially aggravate the difficulties of
-  Brasidas. If it had been possible to attack the bridge separately
-  from the city, something must have been said about it in
-  describing the operations of Kleon, who is represented as finding
-  nothing to meddle with except the fortifications of the town.
-
-  Assuming, then, that there was such a line of connection between
-  the bridge and the Long Wall, added by Brasidas since the first
-  capture of the place, I know no meaning so natural to give to
-  the word σταύρωμα. No other distinct meaning is proposed by any
-  one. There was, of course, a gate, or more than one, in the Long
-  Wall, leading into the space inclosed by the palisade; through
-  this gate Brasidas would enter the town when he crossed from
-  Kerdylium. This gate is called by Thucydidês αἱ ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα
-  πύλαι. There must have been also a gate, or more than one, in
-  the palisade itself, leading into the space without: so that
-  passengers or cattle traversing the bridge from the westward and
-  going to Myrkinus (_e. g._) would not necessarily be obliged to
-  turn out of their way and enter the town of Amphipolis.
-
-  On the plan which I have here given, the line running nearly from
-  north to south represents the Long Wall of Agnon, touching the
-  river at both ends, and bounding as well as fortifying the town
-  of Amphipolis on its eastern side.
-
-  The shorter line, which cuts off the southern extremity of this
-  Long Wall, and joins the river immediately below the bridge,
-  represents the σταύρωμα, or palisade: probably it was an earthen
-  mound and ditch, with a strong palisade at the top.
-
-  By means of this palisade, the bridge was included in the
-  fortifications of Amphipolis, and Brasidas could pass over from
-  Mount Kerdylium into the city whenever he pleased.
-
-In the march which Kleon now undertook, he went up to the top of the
-ridge which runs nearly in an easterly direction from Amphipolis to
-Mount Pangæus, in order to survey the city and its adjoining ground
-on the northern and northeastern side which he had not yet seen;
-that is, the side towards the lake, and towards Thrace,[736] which
-was not visible from the lower ground near Eion. The road which he
-was to take from Eion lay at a small distance eastward of the city
-long wall, and from the palisade which connected that wall with the
-bridge. But he had no expectation of being attacked in his march, the
-rather as Brasidas with the larger portion of his force was visible
-on Mount Kerdylium: moreover, the gates of Amphipolis were all shut,
-not a man was on the wall, nor were any symptoms of movement to be
-detected. As there was no evidence before him of intention to attack,
-he took no precautions, and marched in careless and disorderly
-array.[737] Having reached the top of the ridge, and posted his army
-on the strong eminence fronting the highest portion of the Long Wall,
-he surveyed at leisure the lake before him, and the side of the city
-which lay towards Thrace, or towards Myrkinus, Drabêskus, etc., thus
-viewing all the descending portion of the Long Wall northward towards
-the Strymon. The perfect quiescence of the city imposed upon and
-even astonished him: it seemed altogether undefended, and he almost
-fancied that, if he had brought battering-engines, he could have
-taken it forthwith.[738] Impressed with the belief that there was no
-enemy prepared to fight, he took his time to survey the ground; while
-his soldiers became more and more relaxed and careless in their trim,
-some even advancing close up to the walls and gates.
-
-  [736] Thucyd. v, 7; compare Colonel Leake, _l. c._ p. 182; αὐτὸς
-  ἐθεᾶτο τὸ λιμνῶδες τοῦ Στρύμονος, καὶ τὴν θέσιν τῆς πόλεως ἐπὶ τῇ
-  Θρᾴκῃ, ὡς ἔχοι.
-
-  [737] Thucyd. v, 7. Κατὰ θέαν δὲ μᾶλλον ἔφη ἀναβαίνειν τοῦ
-  χωρίου, καὶ τὴν μείζω παρασκευὴν περιέμενεν, οὐχ ὡς τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ,
-  ἢν ἀναγκάζηται, περισχήσων, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς κύκλῳ περιστὰς βίᾳ αἱρήσων
-  τὴν πόλιν.
-
-  The words οὐχ ὡς τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ, etc. do not refer to μείζω
-  παρασκευὴν, as the Scholiast, with whom Dr. Arnold agrees,
-  considers them, but to the general purpose and dispositions of
-  Kleon. “He marched up, not like one who is abundantly provided
-  with means of safety, in case of being put on his defence; but
-  like one who is going to surround the city and take it at once.”
-
-  Nor do these last words represent any real design conceived in
-  the mind of Kleon (for Amphipolis from its locality _could not
-  be really surrounded_), but are merely given as illustrating the
-  careless confidence of his march from Eion up to the ridge: in
-  the same manner as Herodotus describes the forward rush of the
-  Persians before the battle of Platæa, to overtake the Greeks whom
-  they supposed to be running away—Καὶ οὗτοι μὲν βοῇ τε καὶ ὁμίλῳ
-  ἐπήισαν, ὡς ~ἀναρπασόμενοι~ τοὺς Ἕλληνας (ix, 59): compare viii,
-  28.
-
-  [738] Thucyd. v, 7. ὥστε καὶ μηχανὰς ὅτι οὐκ κατῆλθεν ἔχων,
-  ἁμαρτεῖν ἐδόκει· ἑλεῖν γὰρ ἂν τὴν πόλιν διὰ τὸ ἐρῆμον.
-
-  I apprehend that the verb κατῆλθεν refers to the coming of the
-  armament to Eion: analogous to what is said v, 2, ~κατέπλευσεν~
-  ἐς τὸν Τορωναίων λιμένα: compare i, 51; iii, 4, etc. The march
-  from Eion up to the ridge could not well be expressed by
-  the word κατῆλθεν: but the arrival of the expedition at the
-  Strymon, the place of its destination, might be so described.
-  Battering-engines would be brought from nowhere else but from
-  Athens.
-
-  Dr. Arnold interprets the word κατῆλθεν to mean that Kleon had
-  first marched up to a higher point, and then descended from this
-  point upon Amphipolis. But I contest the correctness of this
-  assumption, as a matter of topography: it does not appear to me
-  that Kleon ever reached any point higher than the summit of the
-  hill and wall of Amphipolis. Besides, even if he had reached a
-  higher point of the mountain, he could not well talk of “bringing
-  down battering-machines _from that point_.”
-
-But this state of affairs was soon materially changed. Brasidas
-knew that the Athenian hoplites would not long endure the tedium
-of absolute inaction, and he calculated that by affecting extreme
-backwardness and apparent fear, he should seduce Kleon into some
-incautious movement of which advantage might be taken. His station
-on Mount Kerdylium enabled him to watch the march of the Athenian
-army from Eion, and when he saw them pass up along the road outside
-of the Long Wall of Amphipolis,[739] he immediately crossed the
-river with his forces and entered the town. But it was not his
-intention to march out and offer them open battle; for his army,
-though equal in number to theirs, was extremely inferior in arms and
-equipment;[740] in which points the Athenian force now present was
-so admirably provided, that his own men would not think themselves
-a match for it, if the two armies faced each other in open field.
-He relied altogether on the effect of sudden sally and well-timed
-surprise, when the Athenians should have been thrown into a feeling
-of contemptuous security by an exaggerated show of impotence in their
-enemy.
-
-  [739] Thucyd. v, 6. Βρασίδας δὲ—ἀντεκάθητο καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπὶ τῷ
-  Κερδυλίῳ· ἔστι δὲ τὸ χωρίον τοῦτο Ἀργιλίων, πέραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ, οὐ
-  πολὺ ἀπέχον τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως, καὶ ~κατεφαίνετο πάντα αὐτόθεν, ὥστε
-  οὐκ ἂν ἔλαθεν αὐτόθεν ὁρμώμενος ὁ Κλέων τῷ στρατῷ~, etc.
-
-  [740] Thucyd. v, 8.
-
-Having offered the battle sacrifice at the temple of Athênê, Brasidas
-called his men together to address to them the usual encouragements
-prior to an engagement. After appealing to the Dorian pride of his
-Peloponnesians, accustomed to triumph over Ionians, he explained
-to them his design of relying upon a bold and sudden movement with
-comparatively small numbers, against the Athenian army when not
-prepared for it,[741] when their courage was not wound up to battle
-pitch, and when, after carelessly mounting the hill to survey the
-ground, they were thinking only of quietly returning to quarters. He
-himself at the proper moment would rush out from one gate, and be
-foremost in conflict with the enemy: Klearidas, with that bravery
-which became him as a Spartan, would follow the example by sallying
-out from another gate: and the enemy, taken thus unawares, would
-probably make little resistance. For the Amphipolitans, this day and
-their own behavior would determine whether they were to be allies of
-Lacedæmon, or slaves of Athens, perhaps sold into captivity or even
-put to death as a punishment for their recent revolt.
-
-  [741] Thucyd. v, 9. Τοὺς γὰρ ἐναντίους εἰκάζω καταφρονήσει
-  τε ἡμῶν καὶ οὐκ ἂν ἐλπίσαντας ὡς ἂν ἐπεξέλθοι τις αὐτοῖς ἐς
-  μάχην, ἀναβῆναί τε πρὸς τὸ χωρίον, καὶ νῦν ἀτάκτως κατὰ θέαν
-  τετραμμένους ὀλιγωρεῖν.... Ἕως οὖν ἔτι ~ἀπαράσκευοι θαρσοῦσι~,
-  καὶ τοῦ ὑπαπιέναι πλέον ἢ τοῦ μένοντος, ἐξ ὧν ἐμοὶ φαίνονται,
-  τὴν διάνοιαν ἔχουσιν, ~ἐν τῷ ἀνειμένῳ αὐτῶν τῆς γνώμης, καὶ πρὶν
-  ξυνταχθῆναι μᾶλλον τὴν δόξαν~, ἐγὼ μὲν, etc.
-
-  The words τὸ ἀνειμένον τῆς γνώμης are full of significance in
-  regard to ancient military affairs. The Grecian hoplites, even
-  the best of them, required to be peculiarly _wound up_ for a
-  battle; hence the necessity of the harangue from the general
-  which always preceded. Compare Xenophon’s eulogy of the manœuvres
-  of Epameinondas before the battle of Mantineia, whereby he made
-  the enemy fancy that he was not going to fight, and took down the
-  preparation in the minds of their soldiers for battle: ἔλυσε μὲν
-  τῶν πλείστων πολεμίων τὴν ἐν ταῖς ψυχαῖς πρὸς μάχην παρασκευὴν,
-  etc. (Xenoph. Hellen. vii, 5, 22.)
-
-These preparations, however, could not be completed in secrecy; for
-Brasidas and his army were perfectly visible while descending the
-hill of Kerdylium, crossing the bridge and entering Amphipolis,
-to the Athenian scouts without: moreover, so conspicuous was the
-interior of the city to spectators without, that the temple of
-Athênê, and Brasidas with its ministers around him, performing the
-ceremony of sacrifice, was distinctly recognized. The fact was made
-known to Kleon as he stood on the high ridge taking his survey,
-while at the same time those who had gone near to the gates reported
-that the feet of many horses and men were beginning to be seen
-under them, as if preparing for a sally.[742] He himself went close
-to the gate, and satisfied himself of this circumstance: we must
-recollect that there was no defender on the walls, and no danger from
-missiles. Anxious to avoid coming to any real engagement before his
-reinforcements should arrive, he at once gave orders for retreat,
-which he thought might be accomplished before the attack from within
-could be fully organized; for he imagined that a considerable number
-of troops would be marched out, and ranged in battle order, before
-the attack was actually begun, not dreaming that the sally would be
-instantaneous, made with a mere handful of men. Orders having been
-proclaimed to wheel to the left, and retreat in column on the left
-flank towards Eion, Kleon, who was himself on the top of the hill
-with the right wing, waited only to see his left and centre actually
-in march on the road to Eion, and then directed his right also to
-wheel to the left and follow them.
-
-  [742] Thucyd. v, 10. Τῷ δὲ Κλέωνι, φανεροῦ γενομένου αὐτοῦ
-  ἀπὸ τοῦ Κερδυλίου καταβάντος καὶ ἐν τῇ πόλει ἐπιφανεῖ οὔσῃ
-  ἔξωθεν περὶ τὸ ἱεροῦ τῆς Ἀθηνᾶς θυομένου καὶ ταῦτα πράσσοντος,
-  ἀγγέλλεται (προὐκεχωρήκει γὰρ τότε κατὰ τὴν θέαν) ὅτι ἥ τε
-  στρατιὰ ἅπασα φανερὰ τῶν πολεμίων ἐν τῇ πόλει, etc.
-
-  Kleon did not himself _see_ Brasidas sacrificing, or see the
-  enemy’s army within the city; others on the lower ground were
-  better situated for seeing what was going on in Amphipolis,
-  than he was while on the high ridge. Others saw it, and gave
-  intimation to him.
-
-The whole Athenian army were thus in full retreat, marching in a
-direction nearly parallel to the Long Wall of Amphipolis, with
-their right or unshielded side exposed to the enemy, when Brasidas,
-looking over the southernmost gates of the Long Wall with his small
-detachment ready marshalled near him, burst out into contemptuous
-exclamations on the disorder of their array.[743] “These men will
-not stand us; I see it by the quivering of their spears and of their
-heads. Men who reel about in that way, never stand an assailing
-enemy. Open the gates for me instantly, and let us sally out with
-confidence.”
-
-  [743] Thucyd. v, 10. Οἱ ἄνδρες ἡμᾶς οὐ μένουσι (q. μενοῦσι?)·
-  δῆλοι δὲ τῶν τε δοράτων τῇ κινήσει καὶ τῶν κεφαλῶν· οἷς γὰρ ἂν
-  τοῦτο γίγνηται, οὐκ εἰώθασι μένειν τοὺς ἐπιόντας.
-
-  This is a remarkable illustration of the regular movement of
-  heads and spears, which characterized a well-ordered body of
-  Grecian hoplites.
-
-With that, both the gate of the Long Wall nearest to the palisade,
-and the adjoining gate of the palisade itself, were suddenly thrown
-open, and Brasidas with his one hundred and fifty chosen soldiers
-issued out through them to attack the retreating Athenians. Running
-rapidly down the straight road which joined laterally the road
-towards Eion along which the Athenians were marching, he charged
-their central division on the right flank:[744] their left wing had
-already got beyond him on the road towards Eion. Taken completely
-unprepared, conscious of their own disorderly array, and astounded at
-the boldness of their enemy, the Athenians of the centre were seized
-with panic, made not the least resistance, and presently fled. Even
-the Athenian left, though not attacked at all, instead of halting
-to lend assistance, shared the panic and fled in disorder. Having
-thus disorganized this part of the army, Brasidas passed along the
-line to press his attack on the Athenian right: but in this movement
-he was mortally wounded and carried off the field, unobserved by
-his enemies. Meanwhile Klearidas, sallying forth from the Thracian
-gate, had attacked the Athenian right on the ridge opposite to him,
-immediately after it began its retreat. But the soldiers on the
-Athenian right had probably seen the previous movement of Brasidas
-against the other division, and though astonished at the sudden
-danger, had thus a moment’s warning, before they were themselves
-assailed, to halt and take close rank on the hill. Klearidas here
-found a considerable resistance, in spite of the desertion of Kleon;
-who, more astonished than any man in his army by a catastrophe so
-unlooked for, lost his presence of mind and fled at once; but was
-overtaken by a Thracian peltast from Myrkinus and slain. His soldiers
-on the right wing, however, repelled two or three attacks in front
-from Klearidas, and maintained their ground, until at length the
-Chalkidian cavalry and the peltasts from Myrkinus, having come forth
-out of the gates, assailed them with missiles in flank and rear so as
-to throw them into disorder. The whole Athenian army was thus put to
-flight; the left hurrying to Eion, the men of the right dispersing
-and seeking safety among the hilly grounds of Pangæus in their rear.
-Their sufferings and loss in the flight, from the hands of the
-pursuing peltasts and cavalry, were most severe: and when they at
-last again mustered at Eion, not only the commander Kleon, but six
-hundred Athenian hoplites, half of the force sent out, were found
-missing.[745]
-
-  [744] Thucyd. v, 10. Καὶ ὁ μὲν, κατὰ τὰς ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλας,
-  καὶ τὰς πρώτας τοῦ μακροῦ τείχους τότε ὄντος ἐξελθὼν, ἔθει δρόμῳ
-  τὴν ὁδὸν ταύτην εὐθεῖαν, ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ καρτερώτατον τοῦ χωρίου
-  ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε.
-
-  Brasidas and his men sallied forth by two different gates at
-  the same time. One was the first gate in the Long Wall, which
-  would be the first gate in order, to a person coming from the
-  southward. The other was the _gate upon the palisade_ (αἱ ἐπὶ τὸ
-  σταύρωμα πύλαι), that is, the gate in the Long Wall which opened
-  _from the town upon the palisade_. The persons who sallied out by
-  this gate would get out to attack the enemy by the gate in the
-  palisade itself.
-
-  The gate in the Long Wall which opened from the town upon the
-  palisade, would be that by which Brasidas himself with his army
-  entered Amphipolis from Mount Kerdylium. It probably stood open
-  at this moment when he directed the sally forth: that which
-  had to be opened at the moment, was the gate in the palisade,
-  together with the first gate in the Long Wall.
-
-  The last words cited in Thucydidês—ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ καρτερώτατον
-  τοῦ χωρίου ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε—are not intelligible without
-  better knowledge of the topography than we possess. What
-  Thucydidês means by “the strongest point in the place,” we cannot
-  tell. We only understand that the trophy was erected in the road
-  by which a person went up to that point. We must recollect that
-  the expressions of Thucydidês here refer to the ground as it
-  stood sometime afterwards, not as it stood at the time of the
-  battle between Kleon and Brasidas.
-
-  [745] It is almost painful to read the account given by Diodorus
-  (xii, 73, 74) of the battle of Amphipolis, when one’s mind is
-  full of the distinct and admirable narrative of Thucydidês, only
-  defective by being too brief. It is difficult to believe that
-  Diodorus is describing the same event; so totally different are
-  all the circumstances, except that the Lacedæmonians at last
-  gain the victory. To say, with Wesseling in his note, “Hæc _non
-  usquequaque_ conveniunt Thucydideis,” is prodigiously below the
-  truth.
-
-So admirably had the attack been concerted, and so entire was its
-success, that only seven men perished on the side of the victors.
-But of those seven, one was the gallant Brasidas himself, who being
-carried into Amphipolis, lived just long enough to learn the complete
-victory of his troops and then expired. Great and bitter was the
-sorrow which his death occasioned throughout Thrace, especially among
-the Amphipolitans. He received, by special decree, the distinguished
-honor of interment within their city, the universal habit being to
-inter even the most eminent deceased persons in a suburb without
-the walls. All the allies attended his funeral in arms and with
-military honors: his tomb was encircled by a railing, and the space
-immediately fronting it was consecrated as the great agora of the
-city, which was remodelled accordingly. He was also proclaimed œkist,
-or founder, of Amphipolis, and as such, received heroic worship
-with annual games and sacrifices to his honor.[746] The Athenian
-Agnon, the real founder and originally recognized œkist of the city,
-was stripped of all his commemorative honors and expunged from the
-remembrance of the people: his tomb and the buildings connected
-with it, together with every visible memento of his name, being
-destroyed. Full of hatred as the Amphipolitans now were towards
-Athens,—and not merely of hatred, but of fear, since the loss which
-they had just sustained of their saviour and protector,—they felt
-repugnance to the idea of rendering farther worship to an Athenian
-œkist. Nor was it convenient to keep up such a religious link with
-Athens, now that they were forced to look anxiously to Lacedæmon
-for assistance. Klearidas, as governor of Amphipolis, superintended
-those numerous alterations in the city which this important change
-required, together with the erection of the trophy, just at the spot
-where Brasidas had first charged the Athenians; while the remaining
-armament of Athens, having obtained the usual truce and buried their
-dead, returned home without farther operations.
-
-  [746] Thucyd. v, 11. Aristotle, a native of Stageirus near
-  to Amphipolis, cites the sacrifices rendered to Brasidas as
-  an instance of institutions established by special and local
-  enactment (Ethic. Nikomach. v, 7).
-
-  In reference to the aversion now entertained by the Amphipolitans
-  to the continued worship of Agnon as their œkist, compare the
-  discourse addressed by the Platæans to the Lacedæmonians,
-  pleading for mercy. The Thebans, if they became possessors of
-  the Platæid, would not continue the sacrifices to the gods who
-  had granted victory at the great battle of Platæa, nor funereal
-  mementos to the slain (Thucyd. iii, 58).
-
-There are few battles recorded in history wherein the disparity and
-contrast of the two generals opposed has been so manifest,—consummate
-skill and courage on the one side against ignorance and panic on the
-other. On the singular ability and courage of Brasidas there can be
-but one verdict of unqualified admiration: but the criticism passed
-by Thucydidês on Kleon, here as elsewhere, cannot be adopted without
-reserves. He tells us that Kleon undertook his march, from Eion up
-to the hill in front of Amphipolis, in the same rash and confident
-spirit with which he had embarked on the enterprise against Pylus, in
-the blind confidence that no one would resist him.[747] Now I have
-already, in a former chapter, shown grounds for concluding that the
-anticipations of Kleon respecting the capture of Sphakteria, far from
-being marked by any spirit of unmeasured presumption, were sober and
-judicious, realized to the letter without any unlooked-for aid from
-fortune. Nor are the remarks, here made by Thucydidês on that affair,
-more reasonable than the judgment on it in his former chapter; for it
-is not true, as he here implies, that Kleon expected no resistance in
-Sphakteria: he calculated on resistance, but knew that he had force
-sufficient to overcome it. His fault even at Amphipolis, great as
-that fault was, did not consist in rashness and presumption. This
-charge at least is rebutted by the circumstance, that he himself
-wished to make no aggressive movement until his reinforcements should
-arrive, and that he was only constrained, against his own will, to
-abandon his intended temporary inactivity during that interval, by
-the angry murmurs of his soldiers, who reproached him with ignorance
-and backwardness, the latter quality being the reverse of that with
-which he is branded by Thucydidês.
-
-  [747] Thucyd. v, 7. Καὶ ἐχρήσατο τῷ τρόπῳ ᾧπερ καὶ ἐς τὴν Πύλον
-  εὐτυχήσας ἐπίστευσέ τι φρονεῖν· ἐς μάχην μὲν γὰρ οὐδὲ ἤλπισέν οἱ
-  ἐπεξιέναι οὐδένα, κατὰ θέαν δὲ μᾶλλον ἔφη ἀναβαίνειν τοῦ χωρίου,
-  καὶ τὴν μείζω παρασκευὴν περιέμενεν, etc.
-
-When Kleon was thus driven to do something, his march up to the
-top of the hill, for the purpose of reconnoitring the ground, was
-not in itself unreasonable, and might have been accomplished in
-perfect safety, if he had kept his army in orderly array, prepared
-for contingencies. But he suffered himself to be completely
-out-generalled and overreached by that simulated consciousness of
-impotence and unwillingness to fight, which Brasidas took care to
-present to him. Among all military stratagems, this has perhaps been
-the most frequently practised with success against inexperienced
-generals, who are thrown off their guard and induced to neglect
-precaution, not because they are naturally more rash or presumptuous
-than ordinary men, but because nothing except either a high order
-of intellect, or special practice and training, will enable a man
-to keep steadily present to his mind liabilities even real and
-serious, when there is no discernible evidence to suggest their
-approach; much more when there _is_ positive evidence, artfully laid
-out by a superior enemy, to create belief in their absence. A fault
-substantially the same had been committed by Thucydidês himself and
-his colleague Euklês a year and a half before, when they suffered
-Brasidas to surprise the Strymonian bridge and Amphipolis: not even
-taking common precautions, nor thinking it necessary to keep the
-fleet at Eion. They were not men peculiarly rash and presumptuous,
-but ignorant and unpractised, in a military sense; incapable of
-keeping before them dangerous contingencies which they perfectly
-knew, simply because there was no present evidence of approaching
-explosion.
-
-This military incompetence, which made Kleon fall into the trap laid
-for him by Brasidas, also made him take wrong measures against the
-danger, when he unexpectedly discovered at last that the enemy within
-were preparing to attack him. His fatal error consisted in giving
-instant order for retreat, under the vain hope that he could get away
-before the enemy’s attack could be brought to bear.[748] An abler
-officer, before he commenced the retreating march so close to the
-hostile walls, would have taken care to marshal his men in proper
-array, to warn and address them with the usual harangue, and to wind
-up their courage to the fighting-point: for up to that moment they
-had no idea of being called upon to fight; and the courage of Grecian
-hoplites, taken thus unawares while hurrying to get away in disorder
-visible both to themselves and their enemies, without any of the
-usual preliminaries of battle, was but too apt to prove deficient.
-To turn the right or unshielded flank to the enemy, was unavoidable
-from the direction of the retreating movement; nor is it reasonable
-to blame Kleon for this, as some historians have done, or for causing
-his right wing to move too soon in following the lead of the left, as
-Dr. Arnold seems to think. The grand fault seems to have consisted in
-not waiting to marshal his men and prepare them for standing fight
-during their retreat. Let us add, however, and the remark, if it
-serves to explain Kleon’s idea of being able to get away before he
-was actually assailed, counts as a double compliment to the judgment
-as well as boldness of Brasidas, that no other Lacedæmonian general
-of that day perhaps, not even Demosthenês, the most enterprising
-general of Athens, would have ventured upon an attack with so very
-small a band, relying altogether upon the panic produced by his
-sudden movement.
-
-  [748] Thucyd. v, 10. Οἰόμενος φθήσεσθαι ἀπελθὼν, etc.
-
-But the absence of military knowledge and precaution is not the
-worst of Kleon’s faults on this occasion. His want of courage at the
-moment of conflict is yet more lamentable, and divests his end of
-that personal sympathy which would otherwise have accompanied it.
-A commander who has been out-generalled is under a double force of
-obligation to exert and expose himself, to the uttermost, in order to
-retrieve the consequences of his own mistakes. He will thus at least
-preserve his own personal honor, whatever censure he may deserve on
-the score of deficient knowledge and judgment.[749]
-
-  [749] Contrast the brave death of the Lacedæmonian general
-  Anaxibius, when he found himself out-generalled and surprised by
-  the Athenian Iphikratês (Xenoph. Hellen. iv, 8, 38).
-
-What is said about the disgraceful flight of Kleon himself, must be
-applied, with hardly less severity of criticism, to the Athenian
-hoplites under him. They behaved in a manner altogether unworthy of
-the reputation of their city; especially the left wing, which seems
-to have broken and run away without waiting to be attacked. And when
-we read in Thucydidês, that the men who thus disgraced themselves
-were among the best, and the best-armed hoplites in Athens; that they
-came out unwillingly under Kleon; that they began their scornful
-murmurs against him before he had committed any fault, despising
-him for backwardness when he was yet not strong enough to attempt
-anything serious, and was only manifesting a reasonable prudence in
-waiting the arrival of expected reinforcements; when we read this,
-we shall be led to compare the expedition against Amphipolis with
-former manœuvres respecting the attack of Sphakteria, and to discern
-other causes for its failure besides the military incompetence of
-the commander. These hoplites brought out with them from Athens
-the feelings prevalent among the political adversaries of Kleon.
-The expedition was proposed and carried by him, contrary to their
-wishes: they could not prevent it, but their opposition enfeebled it
-from the beginning, kept within too narrow limits the force assigned
-to it, and was one main reason which frustrated its success.
-
-Had Periklês been alive, Amphipolis might perhaps still have been
-lost, since its capture was the fault of the officers employed to
-defend it. But if lost, it would probably have been attacked and
-recovered with the same energy as the revolted Samos had been, with
-the full force and the best generals that Athens could furnish.
-With such an armament under good officers, there was nothing at all
-impracticable in the reconquest of the place; especially as at that
-time it had no defence on three sides except the Strymon, and might
-thus be approached by Athenian ships on that navigable river. The
-armament of Kleon,[750] even if his reinforcements had arrived, was
-hardly sufficient for the purpose. But Periklês would have been able
-to concentrate upon it the whole strength of the city, without being
-paralyzed by the contentions of political party: he would have seen
-as clearly as Kleon, that the place could only be recovered by force,
-and that its recovery was the most important object to which Athens
-could devote her energies.
-
-  [750] Amphipolis was actually thus attacked by the Athenians
-  eight years afterwards, by ships on the Strymon, Thucyd. vii,
-  9. Εὐετίων στρατηγὸς Ἀθηναίων, μετὰ Περδίκκου στρατεύσας ἐπ᾽
-  Ἀμφίπολιν Θρᾳξὶ πολλοῖς, τὴν μὲν πόλιν οὐχ εἷλεν, ἐς δὲ τὸν
-  Στρύμονα περικομίσας τριήρεις ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ ἐπολιόρκει,
-  ὁρμώμενος ἐξ Ἱμεραίου. (In the eighteenth year of the war.) But
-  the fortifications of the place seem to have been materially
-  altered during the interval. Instead of one long wall, with three
-  sides open to the river, it seems to have acquired a curved wall,
-  only open to the river on a comparatively narrow space near to
-  the lake; while this curved wall joined the bridge southerly by
-  means of a parallel pair of long walls with road between.
-
-It was thus that the Athenians, partly from political intrigue,
-partly from the incompetence of Kleon, underwent a disastrous
-defeat instead of carrying Amphipolis. But the death of Brasidas
-converted their defeat into a substantial victory. There remained
-no Spartan either like or second to that eminent man, either as a
-soldier or a conciliating politician; none who could replace him
-in the confidence and affection of the allies of Athens in Thrace;
-none who could prosecute those enterprising plans against Athens
-on her unshielded side, which he had first shown to be practicable.
-The fears of Athens, and the hopes of Sparta, in respect to the
-future, disappeared alike with him. The Athenian generals, Phormio
-and Demosthenês, had both of them acquired among the Akarnanians an
-influence personal to themselves, apart from their post and from
-their country: but the career of Brasidas, exhibited an extent of
-personal ascendency and admiration, obtained as well as deserved,
-such as had never before been paralleled by any military chieftain
-in Greece: and Plato might well select him as the most suitable
-historical counterpart to the heroic Achilles.[751] All the
-achievements of Brasidas were his own individually, with nothing more
-than bare encouragement, sometimes even without encouragement, from
-his country. And when we recollect the strict and narrow routine in
-which as a Spartan he had been educated, so fatal to the development
-of everything like original thought or impulse, and so completely
-estranged from all experience of party or political discussion, we
-are amazed at his resource and flexibility of character, his power
-of adapting himself to new circumstances and new persons, and his
-felicitous dexterity in making himself the rallying-point of opposite
-political parties in each of the various cities which he acquired.
-The combination “of every sort of practical excellence,” valor,
-intelligence, probity, and gentleness of dealing, which his character
-presented, was never forgotten among the subject-allies of Athens,
-and procured for other Spartan officers in subsequent years favorable
-presumptions, which their conduct was seldom found to realize.[752]
-At the time when Brasidas perished, in the flower of his age, he was
-unquestionably the first man in Greece; and though it is not given to
-us to predict what he would have become had he lived, we may be sure
-that the future course of the war would have been sensibly modified;
-perhaps even to the advantage of Athens, since she might have had
-sufficient occupation at home to keep her from the disastrous
-enterprise in Sicily.
-
-  [751] Plato, Symp. c. 36, p. 221.
-
-  [752] Thuc. iv, 81. δόξας εἶναι κατὰ πάντα ἀγαθὸς, etc.
-
-Thucydidês seems to take pleasure in setting forth the gallant
-exploits of Brasidas, from the first at Methônê to the last at
-Amphipolis, not less than the dark side of Kleon; both, though in
-different senses, the causes of his banishment. He never mentions
-the latter except in connection with some proceeding represented as
-unwise or discreditable. The barbarities which the offended majesty
-of empire thought itself entitled to practise in ancient times
-against dependencies revolted and reconquered, reach their maximum
-in the propositions against Mitylênê and Skiônê: both of them are
-ascribed to Kleon by name as their author. But when we come to the
-slaughter of the Melians, equally barbarous, and worse in respect to
-grounds of excuse, inasmuch as the Melians had never been subjects
-of Athens, we find Thucydidês mentioning the deed without naming the
-proposer.[753]
-
-  [753] Thucyd. v, 116.
-
-Respecting the foreign policy of Kleon, the facts already narrated
-will enable the reader to form an idea of it as compared with that
-of his opponents. I have shown grounds for believing that Thucydidês
-has forgotten his usual impartiality in criticizing this personal
-enemy; that in regard to Sphakteria, Kleon was really one main
-and indispensable cause of procuring for his country the greatest
-advantage which she obtained throughout the whole war; and that in
-regard to his judgment as advocating the prosecution of war, three
-different times must be distinguished: 1. After the first blockade
-of the hoplites in Sphakteria; 2. After the capture of the island;
-3. After the expiration of the one year truce. On the earliest of
-those three occasions he was wrong, for he seems to have shut the
-door on all possibilities of negotiation, by his manner of dealing
-with the Lacedæmonian envoys. On the second occasion, he had fair and
-plausible grounds to offer on behalf of his opinion, though it turned
-out unfortunate: moreover, at that time, all Athens was warlike, and
-Kleon is not to be treated as the peculiar adviser of that policy. On
-the third and last occasion, after the expiration of the truce, the
-political counsel of Kleon was right, judicious, and truly Periklêan,
-much surpassing in wisdom that of his opponents. We shall see in the
-coming chapters how those opponents managed the affairs of the state
-after his death; how Nikias threw away the interests of Athens in the
-enforcement of the conditions of peace; how Nikias and Alkibiadês
-together shipwrecked the power of their country on the shores of
-Syracuse. And when we judge the demagogue Kleon in this comparison,
-we shall find ground for remarking that Thucydidês is reserved and
-even indulgent towards the errors and vices of other statesmen, harsh
-only towards those of his accuser.
-
-As to the internal policy of Kleon, and his conduct as a politician
-in Athenian constitutional life, we have but little trustworthy
-evidence. There exists, indeed, a portrait of him, drawn in colors
-broad and glaring, most impressive to the imagination, and hardly
-effaceable from the memory; the portrait in the “Knights” of
-Aristophanês. It is through this representation that Kleon has been
-transmitted to posterity, crucified by a poet who admits himself
-to have had a personal grudge against him, just as he has been
-commemorated in the prose of an historian whose banishment he had
-proposed. Of all the productions of Aristophanês, so replete with
-comic genius throughout, the “Knights” is the most consummate and
-irresistible; the most distinct in its character, symmetry, and
-purpose. Looked at with a view to the object of its author, both in
-reference to the audience and to Kleon, it deserves the greatest
-possible admiration, and we are not surprised to learn that it
-obtained the first prize. It displays the maximum of that which wit
-combined with malice can achieve, in covering an enemy with ridicule,
-contempt, and odium. Dean Swift would have desired nothing worse,
-even for Ditton and Winston. The old man, Demos of Pnyx, introduced
-on the stage as personifying the Athenian people,—Kleon, brought
-on as his newly-bought Paphlagonian slave, who by coaxing, lying,
-impudent and false denunciation of others, has gained his master’s
-ear, and heaps ill-usage upon every one else, while he enriches
-himself,—the Knights, or chief members of what we may call the
-Athenian aristocracy, forming the Chorus of the piece as Kleon’s
-pronounced enemies,—the sausage-seller from the market-place, who,
-instigated by Nikias find Demosthenês along with these Knights,
-overdoes Kleon in all his own low arts, and supplants him in the
-favor of Demos; all this, exhibited with inimitable vivacity of
-expression, forms the masterpiece and glory of libellous comedy.
-The effect produced upon the Athenian audience when this piece was
-represented at the Lenæan festival, January B.C. 424, about six
-months after the capture of Sphakteria, with Kleon himself and most
-of the real Knights present, must have been intense beyond what we
-can now easily imagine. That Kleon could maintain himself after
-this humiliating exposure, is no small proof of his mental vigor
-and ability. It does not seem to have impaired his influence, at
-least not permanently; for not only do we see him the most effective
-opponent of peace during the next two years, but there is ground for
-believing that the poet himself found it convenient to soften his
-tone towards this powerful enemy.
-
-So ready are most writers to find Kleon guilty, that they are
-satisfied with Aristophanês as a witness against him: though no other
-public man, of any age or nation, has ever been condemned upon such
-evidence. No man thinks of judging Sir Robert Walpole, or Mr. Fox, or
-Mirabeau, from the numerous lampoons put in circulation against them:
-no man will take measure of a political Englishman from Punch, or of
-a Frenchman from the Charivari. The unrivalled comic merit of the
-“Knights” of Aristophanês is only one reason the more for distrusting
-the resemblance of its picture to the real Kleon. We have means too
-of testing the candor and accuracy of Aristophanês by his delineation
-of Sokratês, whom he introduced in the comedy of “Clouds” in the year
-after that of the “Knights.” As a comedy, the “Clouds” stands second
-only to the “Knights”: as a picture of Sokratês, it is little better
-than pure fancy: it is not even a caricature, but a totally different
-person. We may indeed perceive single features of resemblance; the
-bare feet, and the argumentative subtlety, belong to both; but the
-entire portrait is such, that if it bore a different name, no one
-would think of comparing it with Sokratês, whom we know well from
-other sources. With such an analogy before us, not to mention what we
-know generally of the portraits of Periklês by these authors, we are
-not warranted in treating the portrait of Kleon as a likeness, except
-on points where there is corroborative evidence. And we may add, that
-some of the hits against him, where we can accidentally test their
-pertinence, are decidedly not founded in fact; as, for example, where
-the poet accuses Kleon of having deliberately and cunningly robbed
-Demosthenês of his laurels in the enterprise against Sphakteria.[754]
-
-  [754] Aristophan. Equit. 55, 391, 740, etc. In one passage of
-  the play, Kleon is reproached with pretending to be engaged at
-  Argos in measures for winning the alliance of that city, but in
-  reality, under cover of this proceeding, carrying on clandestine
-  negotiations with the Lacedæmonians (464). In two other passages,
-  he is denounced as being the person who obstructs the conclusion
-  of peace with the Lacedæmonians (790, 1390).
-
-In the prose of Thucydidês, we find Kleon described as a dishonest
-politician, a wrongful accuser of others, the most violent of all
-the citizens:[755] throughout the verse of Aristophanês, these
-same charges are set forth with his characteristic emphasis, but
-others are also superadded; Kleon practises the basest artifices and
-deceptions to gain favor with the people, steals the public money,
-receives bribes, and extorts compositions from private persons by
-wholesale, and thus enriches himself under pretence of zeal for the
-public treasury. In the comedy of the Acharnians, represented one
-year earlier than the Knights, the poet alludes with great delight to
-a sum of five talents, which Kleon had been compelled “to disgorge”:
-a present tendered to him by the insular subjects of Athens, if we
-may believe Theopompus, for the purpose of procuring a remission of
-their tribute, and which the Knights, whose evasions of military
-service he had exposed, compelled him to relinquish.[756]
-
-  [755] Thucyd. v, 17; iii, 45. καταφανέστερος μὲν εἶναι κακουργῶν,
-  καὶ ἀπιστότερος διαβάλλων—βιαιότατος τῶν πολιτῶν.
-
-  [756] Aristophan. Acharn. 8, with the Scholiast, who quotes from
-  Theopompus. Theopompus, Fragment, 99, 100, 101, ed. Didot.
-
-But when we put together the different heads of indictment
-accumulated by Aristophanês, it will be found that they are not
-easily reconcilable one with the other; for an Athenian, whose temper
-led him to violent crimination of others, at the inevitable price
-of multiplying and exasperating personal enemies, would find it
-peculiarly dangerous, if not impossible, to carry on peculation for
-his own account. If, on the other hand, he took the latter turn, he
-would be inclined to purchase connivance from others even by winking
-at real guilt on their part, far from making himself conspicuous
-as a calumniator of innocence. We must therefore discuss the side
-of the indictment which is indicated in Thucydidês; not Kleon, as
-truckling to the people and cheating for his own pecuniary profit
-(which is certainly not the character implied in his speech about
-the Mitylenæans, as given to us by the historian),[757] but Kleon
-as a man of violent temper and fierce political antipathies, a
-bitter speaker, and sometimes dishonest in his calumnies against
-adversaries. These are the qualities which, in all countries of free
-debate, go to form what is called a great opposition speaker. It was
-thus that the elder Cato, “the universal biter, whom Persephonê was
-afraid even to admit into Hades after his death,” was characterized
-at Rome, even by the admission of his admirers to some extent, and
-in a still stronger manner by those who were unfriendly to him,
-as Thucydidês was to Kleon.[758] In Cato, such a temper was not
-inconsistent with a high sense of public duty. And Plutarch recounts
-an anecdote respecting Kleon, that, on first beginning his political
-career, he called his friends together, and dissolved his intimacy
-with them, conceiving that private friendships would distract him
-from his paramount duty to the commonwealth.[759]
-
-  [757] The public speaking of Kleon was characterized by Aristotle
-  and Theopompus (see Schol. ad Lucian. Timon, c. 30), not as
-  wheedling, but as full of arrogance; in this latter point too
-  like that of the elder Cato at Rome (Plutarch, Cato, c. 14). The
-  derisory tone of Cato in his public speaking, too, is said to
-  have been impertinent and disgusting (Plutarch, Reipub. Gerend.
-  Præcept. p. 803, c. 7).
-
-  [758] An epigram which Plutarch (Cato, c. 1) gives us from a poet
-  contemporary of Cato the Censor, describes him:—
-
-    Πυῤῥὸν, ~πανδακέτην~, γλαυκόμματον, οὐδὲ θανόντα
-      Πόρκιον εἰς Ἀΐδην Περσεφόνη δέχεται.
-
-  Livy says, in an eloquent encomium on Cato (xxxix, 40):
-  “Simultates nimio plures et exercuerunt eum, et ipse exercuit
-  eas: nec facile dixeris utrum magis presserit eum nobilitas, an
-  ille agitaverit nobilitatem. Asperi procul dubio animi, et linguæ
-  acerbæ et immodice liberæ fuit: sed invicti a cupiditatibus
-  animi et rigidæ innocentiæ: contemptor gratiæ, divitiarum....
-  Hunc sicut omni vitâ, tum censuram petentem premebat nobilitas;
-  coierantque candidati omnes ad dejiciendum honore eum; non
-  solum ut ipsi potius adipiscerentur, nec quia indignabantur
-  novum hominem censorem videre; sed etiam quod tristem censuram,
-  periculosamque multorum famæ, et _ab læso a plerisque et lædendi
-  cupido_, expectabant.”
-
-  See also Plutarch (Cato, c. 15, 16: his comparison between
-  Aristeidês and Cato, c. 2) about the prodigious number of
-  accusations in which Cato was engaged, either as prosecutor or
-  as party prosecuted. His bitter feud with the _nobilitas_ is
-  analogous to that of Kleon against the Hippeis.
-
-  I need hardly say that the comparison of Cato with Kleon applies
-  only to domestic politics: in the military courage and energy for
-  which Cato was distinguished, Kleon is utterly wanting, nor are
-  we entitled to ascribe to him anything like the superiority of
-  knowledge and general intelligence which we find recorded of Cato.
-
-  The expression of Cicero respecting Kleon: “turbulentum quidem
-  civem, sed tamen eloquentem,” (Cicero, Brutus, 7) appears to be
-  a translation of the epithets of Thucydidês—βιαιότατος—τῷ δήμῳ
-  πιθανώτατος (iii, 45).
-
-  The remarks made too by Latin critics on the style and temper
-  of Cato’s speeches, might almost seem to be a translation of
-  the words of Thucydidês about Kleon. Fronto said about Cato:
-  “Concionatur Cato _infeste_, Gracchus turbulente, Tullius
-  copiose. Jam in judiciis _sævit_ idem Cato, triumphat Cicero,
-  tumultuatur Gracchus.” See Dübner’s edition of Meyer’s Oratorum
-  Romanorum Fragmenta, p. 117 (Paris, 1837).
-
-  [759] Plutarch, Reip. Ger. Præcept. p. 806. Compare two other
-  passages in the same treatise, p. 805, where Plutarch speaks of
-  the ἀπόνοια καὶ δεινότης of Kleon; and p. 812, where he says,
-  with truth, that Kleon was not at all qualified to act as general
-  in a campaign.
-
-Moreover, the reputation of Kleon as a frequent and unmeasured
-accuser of others, may be explained partly by a passage of his enemy
-Aristophanês: a passage the more deserving of confidence as a just
-representation of fact, since it appears in a comedy (the “Frogs”)
-represented (405 B.C.) fifteen years after the death of Kleon, and
-five years after that of Hyperbolus, when the poet had less motive
-for misrepresentations against either. In the “Frogs,” the scene
-is laid in Hades, whither the god Dionysus goes, in the attire of
-Hêraklês and along with his slave Xanthias, for the purpose of
-bringing up again to earth the deceased poet Euripidês. Among the
-incidents, Xanthias, in the attire which his master had worn, is
-represented as acting with violence and insult towards two hostesses
-of eating-houses; consuming their substance, robbing them, refusing
-to pay when called upon, and even threatening their lives with a
-drawn sword. Upon which the women, having no other redress left,
-announce their resolution of calling, the one upon her protector
-Kleon, the other on Hyperbolus, for the purpose of bringing the
-offender to justice before the dikastery.[760] This passage shows us,
-if inferences on comic evidence are to be held as admissible, that
-Kleon and Hyperbolus became involved in accusations partly by helping
-poor persons who had been wronged to obtain justice before the
-dikastery. A rich man who had suffered injury might apply to Antipho
-or some other rhetor for paid advice and aid as to the conduct of his
-complaint; but a poor man or woman would think themselves happy to
-obtain the gratuitous suggestion, and sometimes the auxiliary speech,
-of Kleon or Hyperbolus; who would thus extend their own popularity,
-by means very similar to those practised by the leading men in
-Rome.[761]
-
-  [760] Aristophan. Ran. 566-576.
-
-  [761] Here again we find Cato the elder represented as constantly
-  in the forum at Rome, lending aid of this kind, and espousing
-  the cause of others who had grounds of complaint (Plutarch,
-  Cato, c. 3), πρωῒ μὲν εἰς ἀγορὰν βαδίζει καὶ παρίσταται
-  τοῖς δεομένοις—τοὺς μὲν θαυμαστὰς καὶ φίλους ἐκτᾶτο διὰ τῶν
-  ξυνηγοριῶν, etc.
-
-But besides lending aid to others, doubtless Kleon was often also
-a prosecutor, in his own name, of official delinquents, real or
-alleged. That some one should undertake this duty was indispensable
-for the protection of the city; otherwise, the responsibility to
-which official persons were subjected after their term of office
-would have been merely nominal: and we have proof enough that
-the general public morality of these official persons, acting
-individually, was by no means high. But the duty was at the same
-time one which most persons would and did shun. The prosecutor,
-while obnoxious to general dislike, gained nothing even by the
-most complete success; and if he failed so much as not to procure
-a minority of votes among the dikasts, equal to one-fifth of the
-numbers present, he was condemned to pay a fine of one thousand
-drachms. What was still more serious, he drew upon himself a
-formidable mass of private hatred, from the friends, partisans, and
-the political club, of the accused party, extremely menacing to his
-own future security and comfort, in a community like Athens. There
-was therefore little motive to accept, and great motive to decline,
-the task of prosecuting on public grounds. A prudent politician at
-Athens would undertake it occasionally, and against special rivals,
-but he would carefully guard himself against the reputation of doing
-it frequently or by inclination, and the orators constantly do so
-guard themselves in those speeches which yet remain.
-
-It is this reputation which Thucydidês fastens upon Kleon, and which,
-like Cato the censor at Rome, he probably merited; from native
-acrimony of temper, from a powerful talent for invective and from
-his position, both inferior and hostile to the Athenian knights, or
-aristocracy, who overshadowed him by their family importance. But in
-what proportion of cases his accusations were just or calumnious,
-the real question upon which a candid judgment turns, we have no
-means of deciding, either in his case or that of Cato. “To lash the
-wicked (observes Aristophanês himself[762]) is not only no blame,
-but is even a matter of honor to the good.” It has not been common
-to allow to Kleon the benefit of this observation, though he is
-much more entitled to it than Aristophanês. For the attacks of a
-poetical libeller admit neither of defence nor retaliation; whereas a
-prosecutor before the dikastery found his opponent prepared to reply
-or even to retort, and was obliged to specify his charge, as well
-as to furnish proof of it; so that there was a fair chance for the
-innocent man not to be confounded with the guilty.
-
-  [762] Aristophan. Equit. 1271:—
-
-    Λοιδορῆσαι τοὺς πονηροὺς, οὐδέν ἐστ᾽ ἐπίφθονον,
-    Ἀλλὰ τιμὴ τοῖσι χρηστοῖς, ὅστις εὖ λογίζεται.
-
-The quarrel of Kleon with Aristophanês is said to have arisen out
-of an accusation which he brought against that poet[763] in the
-Senate of Five Hundred, on the subject of his second comedy, the
-“Babylonians,” exhibited B.C. 426, at the festival of the urban
-Dionysia in the month of March. At that season many strangers were
-present at Athens, and especially many visitors and deputies from
-the subject-allies, who were bringing their annual tribute: and
-as the “Babylonians,” (now lost), like so many other productions
-of Aristophanês, was full of slashing ridicule, not only against
-individual citizens but against the functionaries and institutions
-of the city,[764] Kleon instituted a complaint against it in the
-senate, as an exposure dangerous to the public security before
-strangers and allies. We have to recollect that Athens was then
-in the midst of an embarrassing war; that the fidelity of her
-subject-allies was much doubted; that Lesbos, the greatest of her
-allies, had been reconquered only in the preceding year, after a
-revolt both troublesome and perilous to the Athenians. Under such
-circumstances, Kleon had good reason for thinking that a political
-comedy of the Aristophanic vein and talent tended to degrade the
-city in the eyes of strangers, even granting that it was innocuous
-when confined to the citizens themselves. The poet complains[765]
-that Kleon summoned him before the senate, with terrible threats and
-calumny: but it does not appear that any penalty was inflicted. Nor,
-indeed, had the senate competence to find him guilty or punish him
-except to the extent of a small fine: they could only bring him to
-trial before the dikastery, which in this case plainly was not done.
-He himself, however, seems to have felt the justice of the warning:
-for we find that three out of his four next following plays, before
-the Peace of Nikias,—the Acharnians, the Knights, and the Wasps,—were
-represented at the Lenæan festival,[766] in the month of January, a
-season when no strangers nor allies were present. Kleon was doubtless
-much incensed with the play of the Knights, and seems to have annoyed
-the poet either by bringing an indictment against him for exercising
-freemen’s rights without being duly qualified, since none but
-citizens were allowed to appear and act in the dramatic exhibitions,
-or by some other means which are not clearly explained. Nor can we
-make out in what way the poet met him, though it appears that finding
-less public sympathy than he thought himself entitled to, he made an
-apology without intending to be bound by it.[767] Certain it is, that
-his remaining plays subsequent to the Knights, though containing some
-few bitter jests against Kleon, manifest no second deliberate set
-against him.
-
-  [763] It appears that the complaint was made ostensibly
-  against Kalistratus, in whose name the poet brought out the
-  “Babylonians,” (Schol. ad Arist. Vesp. 1284), and who was
-  of course the responsible party, though the real author was
-  doubtless perfectly well known. The Knights was the first play
-  brought out by the poet in his own name.
-
-  [764] See Acharn. 377, with the Scholia, and the anonymous
-  biography of Aristophanês.
-
-  Both Meineke (Aristoph. Fragm. Comic. Gr. vol. ii, p. 966) and
-  Ranke (Commentat. de Aristoph. Vitâ, p. cccxxx) try to divine the
-  plot of the “Babylonians;” but there is no sufficient information
-  to assist them.
-
-  [765] Aristoph. Acharn. 355-475.
-
-  [766] See the Arguments prefixed to these three plays; and
-  Acharn. 475, Equit. 881.
-
-  It is not known whether the first comedy, entitled _The Clouds_
-  (represented in the earlier part of B.C. 423, a year after the
-  Knights, and a year before the Wasps), appeared at the Lenæan
-  festival of January, or at the urban Dionysia in March. It was
-  unsuccessful, and the poet partially altered it with the view
-  to a second representation. If it be true that this second
-  representation took place during the year immediately following
-  (B.C. 422: see Mr. Clinton’s Fasti Hellenici, ad ann. 422), it
-  must have been at the urban Dionysia in March, just at the time
-  when the truce for one year was coming to a close; for the Wasps
-  was represented in that year at the Lenæan festival, and the same
-  poet would hardly be likely to bring out two plays. The inference
-  which Ranke draws from Nubes 310, that it was represented at the
-  Dionysia, is not, however, very conclusive (Ranke, Commentat. de
-  Aristoph. Vitâ, p. ccxxi, prefixed to his edition of the Plutus).
-
-  [767] See the obscure passage, Vespæ, 1285, _seqq._; Aristoph.
-  Vita Anonymi, p. xiii, ed. Bekker; Demosthen. cont. Meid. p. 532.
-
-  It appears that Aristophanês was of Æginetan parentage (Acharn.
-  629); so that the γραφὴ ξενίας (indictment for undue assumption
-  of the rights of an Athenian citizen) was founded upon a real
-  fact. Between the time of the conquest of Ægina by Athens, and
-  the expulsion of the native inhabitants in the first year of the
-  Peloponnesian war (an interval of about twenty years), probably
-  no inconsiderable number of Æginetans became intermingled or
-  intermarried with Athenian citizens. Especially men of poetical
-  talent in the subject-cities would find it their interest to
-  repair to Athens: Ion came from Chios, and Achæus from Eretria;
-  both tragic composers.
-
-  The comic author Eupolis seems also to have directed some taunts
-  against the foreign origin of Aristophanês, if Meineke is correct
-  in his interpretation of a passage (Historia Comicor. Græc. i, p.
-  111).
-
-The battle of Amphipolis removed at once the two most pronounced
-individual opponents of peace, Kleon and Brasidas. Athens too was
-more than ever discouraged and averse to prolonged fighting; for the
-number of hoplites slain at Amphipolis doubtless filled the city
-with mourning, besides the unparalleled disgrace now tarnishing
-Athenian soldiership. The peace-party under the auspices of Nikias
-and Lachês, relieved at once from the internal opposition of Kleon,
-as well as from the foreign enterprise of Brasidas, were enabled to
-resume their negotiations with Sparta in a spirit promising success.
-King Pleistoanax, and the Spartan ephors of the year, were on their
-side equally bent on terminating the war, and the deputies of all
-the allies were convoked at Sparta for discussion with the envoys of
-Athens. Such discussion was continued during the whole autumn and
-winter after the battle of Amphipolis, without any actual hostilities
-on either side. At first, the pretensions advanced were found very
-conflicting; but at length, after several debates, it was agreed
-to treat upon the basis of each party surrendering what had been
-acquired by war. The Athenians insisted at first on the restoration
-of Platæa; but the Thebans replied that Platæa was theirs neither by
-force nor by treason, but by voluntary capitulation and surrender
-of the inhabitants. This distinction seems to our ideas somewhat
-remarkable, since the capitulation of a besieged town is not less
-the result of force than capture by storm. But it was adopted in
-the present treaty; and under it the Athenians, while foregoing
-their demand of Platæa, were enabled to retain Nisæa, which they had
-acquired from the Megarians, and Anaktorium and Sollium,[768] which
-they had taken from Corinth. To insure accommodating temper on the
-part of Athens, the Spartans held out the threat of invading Attica
-in the spring, and of establishing a permanent fortification in the
-territory: and they even sent round proclamation to their allies,
-enjoining all the details requisite for this step. Since Attica had
-now been exempt from invasion for three years, the Athenians were
-probably not insensible to this threat of renewal under a permanent
-form.
-
-  [768] Thucyd. v, 17-30. The statement in cap. 30 seems to show
-  that this was the ground on which the Athenians were allowed to
-  retain Sollium and Anaktorium. For if their retention of these
-  two places had been distinctly and in terms at variance with the
-  treaty, the Corinthians would doubtless have chosen this fact as
-  the ostensible ground of their complaint: whereas they preferred
-  to have recourse to a πρόσχημα, or sham plea.
-
-At the beginning of spring, about the end of March, 421 B.C.,
-shortly after the urban Dionysia at Athens, the important treaty
-was concluded for the term of fifty years. The following were its
-principal conditions:—
-
-1. All shall have full liberty to visit all the public temples of
-Greece, for purposes of private sacrifice, consultation of oracle,
-or public sacred mission. Every man shall be undisturbed both in
-going and coming. [The value of this article will be felt, when we
-recollect that the Athenians and their allies had been unable to
-visit the Olympic or Pythian festival since the beginning of the war.]
-
-2. The Delphians shall enjoy full autonomy and mastery of their
-temple and their territory. [This article was intended to exclude
-the ancient claim of the Phocian confederacy to the management of the
-temple; a claim which the Athenians had once supported, before the
-thirty years’ truce: but they had now little interest in the matter,
-since the Phocians were in the ranks of their enemies.]
-
-3. There shall be peace for fifty years, between Athens and Sparta
-with their respective allies, with abstinence from mischief, either
-overt or fraudulent, by land as well as by sea.
-
-4. Neither party shall invade for purposes of mischief the territory
-of the other, not by any artifice or under any pretence.
-
-Should any subject of difference arise, it shall be settled by
-equitable means, and by oaths tendered and taken, in form to be
-hereafter agreed on.
-
-5. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall restore Amphipolis to the
-Athenians.
-
-They shall farther _relinquish_ to the Athenians Argilus, Stageirus,
-Akanthus, Skôlus, Olynthus, and Spartôlus. But these cities shall
-remain autonomous, on condition of paying tribute to Athens according
-to the assessment of Aristeidês. Any of their citizens who may choose
-to quit them shall be at liberty to do so, and to carry away his
-property. Nor shall the cities be counted hereafter either as allies
-of Athens or of Sparta, unless Athens shall induce them by amicable
-persuasions to become her allies, which she is at liberty to do if
-she can.
-
-The inhabitants of Mekyberna, Sanê, and Singê, shall dwell
-independently in their respective cities, just as much as the
-Olynthians and Akanthians. [These were towns which adhered to Athens,
-and were still numbered as her allies; though they were near enough
-to be molested by Olynthus[769] and Akanthus, against which this
-clause was intended to insure them.]
-
-  [769] Compare v, 39 with v, 18, which seems to me to refute the
-  explanation suggested by Dr. Arnold, and adopted by Poppo.
-
-  The use of the word ἀποδόντων in regard to the restoration of
-  Amphipolis to Athens, and of the word παρέδοσαν in regard to the
-  _relinquishment_ of the other cities, deserves notice. Those
-  who drew up the treaty, which is worded in a very confused way,
-  seem to have intended that the word παρέδοσαν should apply both
-  to Amphipolis and the other cities, but that the word ἀποδόντων
-  should apply exclusively to Amphipolis. The word παρέδοσαν is
-  of course applicable to the restoration of Amphipolis, for that
-  which is _restored_ is of course _delivered up_. But it is
-  remarkable that this word παρέδοσαν does not properly apply to
-  the other cities: for they were not _delivered up_ to Athens,
-  they were only _relinquished_, as the clauses immediately
-  following farther explain. Perhaps there is a little Athenian
-  pride in the use of the word, first to intimate indirectly that
-  the Lacedæmonians were to _deliver up_ various cities to Athens,
-  then to add words afterwards, which show that the cities were
-  only to be _relinquished_, not surrendered to Athens.
-
-  The provision, for guaranteeing liberty of retirement and
-  carrying away of property, was of course intended chiefly for the
-  Amphipolitans, who would naturally desire to emigrate, if the
-  town had been actually restored to Athens.
-
-The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall also restore Panaktum to the
-Athenians.
-
-6. The Athenians shall restore to Sparta Koryphasium, Kythêra,
-Methônê, Pteleum, Atalantê, with all the captives in their hands from
-Sparta or her allies. They shall farther release all Spartans or
-allies of Sparta now blocked up in Skiônê.
-
-7. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall also restore all the
-captives in their hands, from Athens or her allies.
-
-8. Respecting Skiônê, Torônê, Sermylus, or any other town in the
-possession of Athens, the Athenians may take their own measures.
-
-9. Oaths shall be exchanged between the contracting parties,
-according to the solemnities held most binding in each city
-respectively, and in the following words: “I will adhere to this
-convention and truce sincerely and without fraud.” The oaths shall
-be annually renewed, and the terms of peace shall be inscribed on
-columns at Olympia, Delphi, and the Isthmus, as well as at Sparta and
-Athens.
-
-10. Should any matter have been forgotten in the present convention,
-the Athenians and Lacedæmonians may alter it by mutual understanding
-and consent, without being held to violate their oaths.
-
-These oaths were accordingly exchanged: they were taken by seventeen
-principal Athenians, and as many Spartans, on behalf of their
-respective countries, on the 26th day of the month Artemisius at
-Sparta, and on the 24th day of Elaphebolion at Athens, immediately
-after the urban Dionysia; Pleistolas being ephor eponymus at Sparta,
-and Alkæus archon eponymus at Athens. Among the Lacedæmonians
-swearing, are included the two kings Agis and Pleistoanax, the ephor
-Pleistolas, and perhaps other ephors, but this we do not know, and
-Tellis, the father of Brasidas. Among the Athenians sworn, are
-comprised Nikias, Lachês, Agnon, Lamachus, and Demosthenês.[770]
-
-  [770] Thucyd. v, 19.
-
-Such was the peace—commonly known by the name of the Peace of
-Nikias—concluded in the beginning of the eleventh spring of the
-war, which had just lasted ten full years. Its conditions were
-put to the vote at Sparta, in the assembly of deputies from the
-Lacedæmonian allies, the majority of whom accepted them: which,
-according to the condition adopted and sworn to by every member of
-the confederacy,[771] made it binding upon all. There was, indeed, a
-special reserve allowed to any particular state in case of religious
-scruple, arising out of the fear of offending some of their gods or
-heroes, but, saving this reserve, the peace had been formally acceded
-to by the decision of the confederates. But it soon appeared how
-little the vote of the majority was worth, even when enforced by the
-strong pressure of Lacedæmon herself, when the more powerful members
-were among the dissentient minority. The Bœotians, Megarians, and
-Corinthians, all refused to accept it; nor does it seem that any
-deputies from the allies took the oath along with the Lacedæmonian
-envoys; though the truce for a year, two years before,[772] had
-been sworn to by Lacedæmonian, Corinthian, Megarian, Sikyonian, and
-Epidaurian envoys.
-
-  [771] Thucyd. v, 17-30. παραβήσεσθαί τε ἔφασαν (the Lacedæmonians
-  said) αὐτοὺς (the Corinthians) τοὺς ὅρκους, καὶ ἤδη ἀδικεῖν ὅτι
-  οὐ δέχονται τὰς Ἀθηναίων σπονδὰς, εἰρημένον, κύριον εἶναι ὅτι ἂν
-  τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ξυμμάχων ψηφίσηται, ἢν μή τι θεῶν ἢ ἡρώων κώλυμα ᾖ.
-
-  [772] Compare Thucyd. iv, 119; v, 19. Though the words of the
-  peace stand ὤμοσαν κατὰ πόλεις (v, 18), yet it seems that this
-  oath was not _actually_ taken by any of the allied cities; only
-  by the Lacedæmonians themselves, upon the vote of the majority of
-  the confederates (v, 17: compare v, 23).
-
-The Corinthians were displeased because they did not recover Sollium
-and Anaktorium; the Megarians, because they did not regain Nisæa; the
-Bœotians, because they were required to surrender Panaktum. In spite
-of the urgent solicitations of Sparta, the deputies of all these
-powerful states not only denounced the peace as unjust, and voted
-against it in the general assembly of allies, but refused to accept
-it when the vote was carried, and went home to their respective
-cities for instructions.[773]
-
-  [773] Thucyd. v, 22.
-
-Such were the conditions, and such the accompanying circumstances,
-of the Peace of Nikias, which terminated, or professed to terminate,
-the great Peloponnesian war, after a duration of ten years.
-Its consequences and fruits, in many respects such as were not
-anticipated by either of the concluding parties, will be seen in my
-next volume.
-
-
-
-
-
-End of Project Gutenberg's History of Greece, v. 6 (of 12), by George Grote
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-<pre>
-
-Project Gutenberg's History of Greece, v. 6 (of 12), by George Grote
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: History of Greece, v. 6 (of 12)
-
-Author: George Grote
-
-Release Date: June 19, 2017 [EBook #54936]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF GREECE, V. 6 (OF 12) ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Henry Flower, Adrian Mastronardi, Ramon Pajares
-Box, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
-http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
-generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
-Libraries.)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-</pre>
-
-
-<div class="front">
-  <p><a href="#tnote">Transcriber's note</a></p>
-  <p><a href="#ToC">Table of Contents</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="screenonly">
-  <hr class="chap" />
-  <div class="figcenter">
-    <img src="images/cover.jpg"
-         alt="Book cover" />
-  </div>
-  <hr class="chap" />
-</div>
-
-<div class="tit pt3">
-  <p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_i">[p. i]</span></p>
-  <h1>HISTORY OF GREECE.</h1>
-
-  <p class="xl mt2"><small>BY</small><br />
-  GEORGE GROTE, <span class="smcap">Esq.</span></p>
-
-  <p class="large mt2">VOL. VI.</p>
-
-  <p class="xs mt4">REPRINTED FROM THE LONDON EDITION</p>
-
-  <p class="medium mt2">NEW YORK:<br />
-  HARPER &amp; BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,<br />
-  <span class="small">329 <small>AND</small> 331 <small>PEARL STREET.</small></span><br />
-  <span class="large g1">1879</span>.</p>
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="ToC">
-  <p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_iii">[p. iii]</span></p>
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CONTENTS.<br />
-  <span class="large">VOL. VI.</span></h2>
-  <hr class="sep2" />
-  <p class="xl center">PART II.</p>
-  <p class="large center">CONTINUATION OF HISTORICAL GREECE.</p>
-  <hr class="sep2" />
-</div>
-
-<div class="contents">
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER XLVII.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">FROM THE THIRTY YEARS’ TRUCE, FOURTEEN YEARS
-BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA, IN THE
-YEAR BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Personal activity now prevalent among the Athenian
-citizens — empire of Athens again exclusively maritime, after the
-Thirty years’ truce. — Chios, Samos, and Lesbos, were now the
-only free allies of Athens, on the same footing as the original
-confederates of Delos — the rest were subject and tributary. —
-Athens took no pains to inspire her allies with the idea of a common
-interest — nevertheless, the allies were gainers by the continuance
-of her empire. — Conception of Periklês — Athens, an imperial
-city, owing protection to the subject-allies; who, on their part,
-owed obedience and tribute. — Large amount of revenue laid by and
-accumulated by Athens, during the years preceding the Peloponnesian
-war. — Pride felt by Athenian citizens in the imperial power of
-their city. — Numerous Athenian citizens planted out as kleruchs by
-Periklês. — Chersonesus of Thrace. Sinôpê. — Active personal and
-commercial relations between Athens and all parts of the Ægean.
-— Amphipolis in Thrace founded by Athens. — Agnon is sent out as
-Œkist. — Situation and importance of Amphipolis. — Foundation, by the
-Athenians, of Thurii, on the southern coast of Italy. — Conduct of
-the refugee inhabitants of the ruined Sybaris — their encroachments
-in the foundation of Thurii: they are expelled, and Thurii
-reconstituted. — Herodotus and Lysias — both domiciliated as citizens
-at Thurii. Few Athenian citizens settled there as colonists. — Period
-from 445-431 <small>B.C.</small> Athens at peace. Her political
-condition. Rivalry of Periklês with Thucydidês son of Melêsias. —
-Points of contention between the two parties: 1. Peace with Persia.
-2. Expenditure of money for the decoration of Athens. — Defence of
-Periklês perfectly good against his political rivals. — Pan-Hellenic
-schemes and sentiment of Periklês. — Bitter contention of parties at
-Athens — vote of ostracism<span class="pagenum" id="Page_iv">[p.
-iv]</span> — Thucydidês is ostracized about 443 <small>B.C.</small>
-— New works undertaken at Athens. Third Long Wall. Docks in Peiræus
-— which is newly laid out as a town, by the architect Hippodamus.
-— Odeon, Parthenon, Propylæa. Other temples. Statues of Athênê. —
-Illustrious artists and architects — Pheidias, Iktînus, Kallikratês.
-— Effect of these creations of art and architecture upon the minds
-of contemporaries. — Attempt of Periklês to convene a general
-congress at Athens, of deputies from all the Grecian states. —
-Revolt of Samos from the Athenians. — Athenian armament against
-Samos, under Periklês, Sophoklês the tragedian, etc. — Doubtful and
-prolonged contest — great power of Samos — it is at last reconquered,
-disarmed, and dismantled. — None of the other allies of Athens,
-except Byzantium, revolted at the same time. — Application of the
-Samians to Sparta for aid against Athens — it is refused, chiefly
-through the Corinthians. — Government of Samos after the reconquest
-— doubtful whether the Athenians renewed the democracy which they
-had recently established. — Funeral oration pronounced by Periklês
-upon the Athenian citizens slain in the Samian war. — Position of
-the Athenian empire — relation of Athens to her subject allies —
-their feelings towards her generally were those of indifference and
-acquiescence, not of hatred. — Particular grievances complained of
-in the dealing of Athens with her allies. — Annual tribute — changes
-made in its amount. Athenian officers and inspectors throughout the
-empire. — Disputes and offences in and among the subject-allies,
-were brought for trial before the dikasteries at Athens. Productive
-of some disadvantages, but of preponderance of advantage to the
-subject-allies themselves. — Imperial Athens compared with imperial
-Sparta. — Numerous Athenian citizens spread over the Ægean — the
-allies had no redress against them, except through the Athenian
-dikasteries. — The dikasteries afforded protection against misconduct
-both of Athenian citizens and Athenian officers. — The dikasteries,
-defective or not, were the same tribunals under which every Athenian
-held his own security. — Athenian empire was affected for the worse
-by the circumstances of the Peloponnesian war: more violence was
-introduced into it by that war than had prevailed before. — The
-subject-allies of Athens had few practical grievances to complain of.
-— The Grecian world was now divided into two great systems; with a
-right supposed to be vested in each, of punishing its own refractory
-members. — Policy of Corinth, from being pacific, becomes warlike.
-— Disputes arise between Corinth and Korkyra — case of Epidamnus. —
-The Epidamnians apply for aid in their distress to Korkyra; they are
-refused — the Corinthians send aid to the place. — The Korkyræans
-attack Epidamnus — armament sent thither by Corinth. — Remonstrance
-of the Korkyræans with Corinth and the Peloponnesians. — Hostilities
-between Corinth and Korkyra — naval victory of the latter. — Large
-preparations made by Corinth for renewing the war. — Application of
-the Korkyræans to be received among the allies of Athens. — Address
-of the Korkyræan envoys to the Athenian public assembly. Principal
-topics upon which it insists, as given in Thucydidês. — Envoys from
-Corinth address the Athenian assembly in reply. — Decision of the
-Athenians — a qualified compliance with the request of Korkyra.
-The Athenian triremes sent to Korkyra. — Naval combat between the
-Corinthians and Korkyræans: rude tactics on both sides. — The
-Korkyræans are defeated. — Arrival of a reinforcement from Athens
-— the Corinthian fleet retires, carrying off numerous Korkyræan
-prisoners. — Hostilities not yet professedly begun between Athens
-and Corinth. — Hatred conceived by the Corinthians towards Athens.
-— They begin to stir up revolt among the Athenian allies — Potidæa,
-colony of Corinth, but ally of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_v">[p.
-v]</span> Athens. — Relations of Athens with Perdikkas king of
-Macedonia, his intrigues along with Corinth against her — he induces
-the Chalkidians to revolt from her — increase of Olynthus. — Revolt
-of Potidæa — armament sent thither from Athens. — Combat near
-Potidæa, between the Athenian force and the allied Corinthians.
-Potidæans, and Chalkidians. — Victory of the Athenians. — Potidæa
-placed in blockade by the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_47">1-75</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER XLVIII.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">FROM THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA DOWN TO THE END OF
-THE FIRST YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">State of feeling in Greece between the Thirty years’
-truce and the Peloponnesian war — recognized probability of war —
-Athens at that time not encroaching — decree interdicting trade
-with the Megarians. — Zealous importunity of the Corinthians in
-bringing about a general war, for the purpose of preserving Potidæa.
-— Relations of Sparta with her allies — they had a determining vote,
-whether they would or would not approve of a course of policy which
-had been previously revived by Sparta separately. — Assembly of
-the Spartans separately addressed by envoys of the allied powers,
-complaining that Athens had violated the truce. — The Corinthian
-envoys address the assembly last, after the envoys of the other
-allies have inflamed it against Athens. — International customs of
-the time, as bearing upon the points in dispute between Athens and
-Corinth. — Athens in the right. — Tenor of the Corinthian address
-— little allusion to recent wrong — strong efforts to raise hatred
-and alarm against Athens. — Remarkable picture drawn of Athens by
-her enemies. — Reply made by an Athenian envoy, accidentally present
-in Sparta. — His account of the empire of Athens — how it had been
-acquired, and how it was maintained. — He adjures them not to break
-the truce, but to adjust all differences by that pacific appeal which
-the truce provided. — The Spartans exclude strangers, and discuss
-the point among themselves in the assembly. — Most Spartan speakers
-are in favor of war. King Archidamus opposes war. His speech. — The
-speech of Archidamus is ineffectual. Short, but warlike appeal of the
-Ephor Stheneläidas. — Vote of the Spartan assembly in favor of war. —
-The Spartans send to Delphi — obtain an encouraging reply. — General
-congress of allies at Sparta. Second speech of the Corinthian envoys,
-enforcing the necessity and propriety of war. — Vote of the majority
-of the allies in favor of war, <small>B.C.</small>
-432. — Views and motives of the opposing powers. — The hopes and
-confidence, on the side of Sparta; the fears, on the side of Athens.
-Heralds sent from Sparta to Athens with complaints and requisitions
-meanwhile the preparations for war go on. — Requisitions addressed
-by Sparta to Athens — demand for the expulsion of the Alkmæonidæ
-as impious — aimed at Periklês. — Position of Periklês at Athens:
-bitter hostility of his political opponents: attacks made upon him. —
-Prosecution of Aspasia. Her character and accomplishments. — Family
-relations of Periklês — his connection with Aspasia. License of the
-comic writers in their attacks upon both. — Prosecution of Anaxagoras
-the philosopher as well as of Aspasia — Anaxagoras retires from
-Athens — Periklês defends Aspasia before the dikastery, and obtains
-her acquittal.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_vi">[p. vi]</span> —
-Prosecution of the sculptor Pheidias for embezzlement — instituted by
-the political opponents of Periklês. — Charge of peculation against
-Periklês himself. — Probability that Periklês was never even tried
-for peculation, certainly that he was never found guilty of it. —
-Requisition from the Lacedæmonians, for the banishment of Periklês
-— arrived when Periklês was thus pressed by his political enemies
-— rejected. — Counter-requisition sent by the Athenians to Sparta,
-for expiation of sacrilege. — Fresh requisitions sent from Sparta
-to Athens — to withdraw the troops from Potidæa — to leave Ægina
-free — to readmit the Megarians to Athenian harbors. — Final and
-peremptory requisition of Sparta — public assembly held at Athens on
-the whole subject of war and peace. — Great difference of opinion in
-the assembly — important speech of Periklês. — Periklês strenuously
-urges the Athenians not to yield. — His review of the comparative
-forces, and probable chances of success or defeat, in the war.
-— The assembly adopts the recommendation of Periklês — firm and
-determined reply sent to Sparta. — Views of Thucydidês respecting
-the grounds, feelings, and projects of the two parties now about to
-embark in war. — Equivocal period — war not yet proclaimed — first
-blow struck, not by Athens, but by her enemies. — Open violation
-of the truce by the Thebans — they surprise Platæa in the night. —
-The gates of Platæa are opened by an oligarchical party within — a
-Theban detachment are admitted into the agora at night — at first
-apparently successful, afterwards overpowered and captured. — Large
-force intended to arrive from Thebes to support the assailants early
-in the morning — they are delayed by the rain and the swelling of
-the Asôpus — they commence hostilities against the Platæan persons
-and property without the walls. — Parley between the Platæans and
-the Theban force without — the latter evacuate the territory — the
-Theban prisoners in Platæa are slain. — Messages from Platæa to
-Athens — answer. — Grecian feeling, already predisposed to the war,
-was wound up to the highest pitch by the striking incident at Platæa.
-— Preparations for war on the part of Athens — intimations sent round
-to her allies — Akarnanians recently acquired by Athens as allies —
-recent capture of the Amphilochian Argos by the Athenian Phormio.
-— Strength and resources of Athens and her allies — military and
-naval means — treasure. — Ample grounds for the confidence expressed
-by Periklês in the result. — Position and power of Sparta and the
-Peloponnesian allies — they are full of hope and confidence of
-putting down Athens speedily. — Efforts of Sparta to get up a naval
-force. — Muster of the combined Peloponnesian force at the isthmus
-of Corinth, under Archidamus, to invade Attica. — Last envoy sent to
-Athens — he is dismissed without being allowed to enter the town.
-— March of Archidamus into Attica — his fruitless siege of Œnoê. —
-Expectation of Archidamus that Athens would yield at the last moment.
-— Difficulty of Periklês in persuading the Athenians to abandon
-their territory and see it all ravaged. — Attica deserted — the
-population flock within the walls of Athens. Hardships, privations,
-and distress endured. — March of Archidamus into Attica. — Archidamus
-advances to Acharnæ, within seven miles of Athens. — Intense clamor
-within the walls of Athens — eagerness to go forth and fight. —
-Trying position, firmness, and sustained ascendency, of Periklês,
-in dissuading them from going forth. — The Athenians remain within
-their walls: partial skirmishes only, no general action. — Athenian
-fleet is despatched to ravage the coasts of Peloponnesus — first
-notice of the Spartan Brasidas — operations of the Athenians in
-Akarnania, Kephallênia, etc. — The Athenians expel the Æginetans from
-Ægina, and people the island with Athenian kleruchs. The Ægi<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_vii">[p. vii]</span>netans settle at Thyrea
-in Peloponnesus. — The Athenians invade and ravage the Megarid:
-sufferings of the Megarians. — Measures taken by Athens for permanent
-defence. — Sum put by in the acropolis, against urgent need, not to
-be touched unless under certain defined dangers. — Capital punishment
-against any who should propose otherwise. — Remarks on this decree.
-— Blockade of Potidæa — Sitalkês king of the Odrysian Thracians —
-alliance made between him and Athens. — Periklês is chosen orator
-to deliver the funeral discourse over the citizens slain during
-the year. — Funeral oration of Periklês. — Sketch of Athenian
-political constitution, and social life, as conceived by Periklês.
-— Eulogy upon Athens and the Athenian character. — Mutual tolerance
-of diversity of tastes and pursuits in Athens. — It is only true
-partially and in some memorable instances that the state interfered
-to an exorbitant degree with individual liberty in Greece. — Free
-play of individual taste and impulse in Athens — importance of this
-phenomenon in society. — Extraordinary and many-sided activity of
-Athens. — Peculiar and interesting moment at which the discourse of
-Periklês was delivered. Athens now at the maximum of her power —
-declining tendency commences soon afterwards.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_48">75-153</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER XLIX.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE SECOND YEAR DOWN TO THE
-END OF THE THIRD YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Barren results of the operations during the first
-year of war. — Second invasion of Attica by the Peloponnesians —
-more spreading and ruinous than the first. — Commencement of the
-pestilence or epidemic at Athens. — Description of the epidemic by
-Thucydidês — his conception of the duty of exactly observing and
-recording. — Extensive and terrible suffering of Athens. — Inefficacy
-of remedies — despair and demoralization of the Athenians. — Lawless
-recklessness of conduct engendered. — Great loss of life among the
-citizens — blow to the power of Athens. — Athenian armament sent
-first against Peloponnesus, next, against Potidæa — it is attacked
-and ruined by the epidemic. — Irritation of the Athenians under their
-sufferings and losses — they become incensed against Periklês — his
-unshaken firmness in defending himself. — Athenian public assembly —
-last speech of Periklês — his high tone of self-esteem against the
-public discontent. Powerful effect of his address — new resolution
-shown for continuing the war — nevertheless, the discontent against
-Periklês still continues. He is accused and condemned in a fine. —
-Old age of Periklês — his family misfortunes and suffering. He is
-reëlected stratêgus — restored to power and to the confidence of the
-people. — Last moments and death of Periklês. His life and character.
-— Judgment of Thucydidês respecting Periklês. — Earlier and later
-political life of Periklês — how far the one differed from the other.
-— Accusation against Periklês of having corrupted the Athenian
-people — untrue, and not believed by Thucydidês. — Great progress
-and improvement of the Athenians under Periklês. — Periklês is not
-to blame for the Peloponnesian war. — Operations of war languid,
-under the pressure of the epidemic. — Attack of the Ambrakiots on
-the Amphilochian Argos: the Athenian Phormio is sent with a squadron
-to Naupaktus. — Injury done to Athenian commerce by Pelo<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_viii">[p. viii]</span>ponnesian privateers
-— The Lacedæmonians put to death all their prisoners taken at sea,
-even neutrals. — Lacedæmonian envoys seized in their way to Persia
-and put to death by the Athenians. — Surrender of Potidæa — indulgent
-capitulation granted by the Athenian generals. — Third year of the
-war — king Archidamus marches to Platæa — no invasion of Attica. —
-Remonstrance of the Platæans to Archidamus — his reply — he summons
-Platæa in vain. — The Platæans resolve to stand out and defy the
-Lacedæmonian force. — Invocation and excuse of Archidamus on hearing
-the refusal of the Platæans. — Commencement of the siege of Platæa.
-— Operations of attack and defence — the besiegers make no progress,
-and are obliged to resort to blockade. — Wall of circumvallation
-built round Platæa — the place completely beleaguered and a force
-left to maintain the blockade. — Athenian armament sent to Potidæa
-and Chalkidic Thrace — it is defeated and returns. — Operations
-on the coast of Akarnania. — Joint attack upon Akarnania, by land
-and sea, concerted between the Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians. —
-Assemblage of the Ambrakiots, Peloponnesians, and Epirotic allies —
-divisions of Epirots. — They march to attack the Akarnanian town of
-Stratus. — Rashness of the Epirots — defeat and repulse of the army.
-— The Peloponnesian fleet comes from Corinth to Akarnania — movements
-of the Athenian Phormio to oppose it. — Naval battle between Phormio
-and the Peloponnesian fleet — his complete victory. — Reflections
-upon these two defeats of the Peloponnesians. — Indignation of the
-Lacedæmonians at the late naval defeat: they collect a larger fleet
-under Knêmus to act against Phormio. — Inferior numbers of Phormio —
-his manœuvring. — The Peloponnesian fleet forces Phormio to a battle
-on the line of coast near Naupaktus. Dispositions and harangues on
-both sides. — Battle near Naupaktus. The Peloponnesian fleet at first
-successful, but afterwards defeated. — Retirement of the defeated
-Peloponnesian fleet. — Phormio is reinforced — his operations in
-Akarnania — he returns to Athens. — Attempt of Knêmus and Brasidas to
-surprise Peiræus, starting from Corinth. — Alliance of the Athenians
-with the Odrysian king Sitalkês. — Power of the Odrysians in Thrace —
-their extensive dominion over the other Thracian tribes. — Sitalkês,
-at the instigation of Athens, undertakes to attack Perdikkas and the
-Chalkidians of Thrace. — His vast and multifarious host of Thracians
-and other barbarians. — He invades and ravages Macedonia and
-Chalkidikê. — He is forced to retire by the severity of the season
-and want of Athenian coöperation.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_49">153-221</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER L.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE FOURTH YEAR OF THE
-PELOPONNESIAN WAR DOWN TO THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMOTIONS AT KORKYRA.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Fourth year of the war — internal suffering at Athens.
-— Renewed invasion of Attica. — Revolt of Mitylênê and most part of
-Lesbos from Athens. — Proceedings of Athens — powerful condition of
-Mitylênê — Athenian fleet sent thither under Kleïppidês. — Kleïppidês
-fails in surprising Mitylênê — carries on an imperfect blockade.
-— He receives reinforcements, and presses the siege with greater
-vigor — want of resolution on the part of the Mitylenæans. — The
-Mitylenæan envoys address themselves to the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_ix">[p. ix]</span> Spartans at the Olympic festival,
-entreating aid. — Tone and topics of their address. — Practical
-grounds of complaint on the part of the Mitylenæans against Athens
-few or none. — The Peloponnesians promise assistance to Mitylênê —
-energetic demonstrations of the Athenians. — Asôpius son of Phormio
-in Akarnania. — The accumulated treasure of Athens exhausted by
-her efforts — necessity for her to raise a direct contribution.
-— Outbreak of the Platæans from their blockaded town. — Their
-plan of escape — its extraordinary difficulty and danger. Half of
-the garrison of Platæa escapes to Athens. — Blockade of Mitylênê
-closely carried on by the Athenian general Pachês — the Mitylenæans
-are encouraged to hold out by the Lacedæmonians, who send thither
-Salæthus. — Mitylênê holds out till provisions are exhausted —
-Salæthus arms all the people of Mitylênê for a general sally —
-the people refuse to join — the city is surrendered to Athens, at
-discretion. — The Peloponnesian fleet under Alkidas arrives off the
-coast of Ionia — astonishment and alarm which its presence creates. —
-Pachês, after the capture of Mitylênê, pursues the fleet of Alkidas,
-which returns to Peloponnesus without having done anything. — Pachês
-at Notium — he captures the place — his perfidy towards Hippias,
-the leader of the garrison. — Notium recolonized from Athens as a
-separate town. — Pachês sends to Athens about a thousand Mitylenæan
-prisoners, the persons chiefly concerned in the late revolt, together
-with Salæthus. — Important debate in the Athenian assembly upon the
-treatment of the prisoners. — First mention of Kleon by Thucydidês
-— new class of politicians to which he belonged. — Eukratês, Kleon,
-Lysiklês, Hyperbolus, etc. — Character of Kleon. — Indignation of
-the Athenians against Mitylênê — proposition of Kleon to put to
-death the whole male population of military age is carried and
-passed. — Repentance of the Athenians after the decree is passed.
-A fresh assembly is convened to reconsider the decree. — Account
-of the second assembly given by Thucydidês — speech of Kleon in
-support of the resolution already passed. — Remarks on the speech of
-Kleon. — Speech of Diodotus in opposition to Kleon — second decree
-mitigating the former. Rapid voyage of the trireme which carries the
-second decree to Mitylênê — it arrives just in time to prevent the
-execution of the first. — Those Mitylenæans whom Pachês had sent to
-Athens are put to death — treatment of Mitylênê by the Athenians. —
-Enormities committed by Pachês at Mitylênê — his death before the
-Athenian dikastery. — Surrender of Platæa to the Lacedæmonians. — The
-Platæan captive garrison are put upon their trial before Lacedæmonian
-judges. — Speech of the Platæan deputies to these judges on behalf of
-themselves and their comrades. — Reply of the Thebans. — The Platæans
-are sentenced to death by the Lacedæmonian judges, and all slain.
-— Reason of the severity of the Lacedæmonians — cases of Platæa
-and Mitylênê compared. — Circumstances of Korkyra — the Korkyræan
-captives are sent back from Corinth, under agreement to effect a
-revolution in the government and foreign politics of the island.
-— Their attempts to bring about a revolution — they prosecute the
-democratical leader Peithias — he prosecutes five of them in revenge
-— they are found guilty. — They assassinate Peithias and several
-other senators, and make themselves masters of the government —
-they decree neutrality — their unavailing mission to Athens. — The
-oligarchical party at Korkyra attack the people — obstinate battle in
-the city — victory of the people — arrival of the Athenian admiral
-Nikostratus. — Moderation of Nikostratus — proceedings of the people
-towards the vanquished oligarchs. — Arrival of the Lacedæmonian
-admiral Alkidas, with a fleet of fifty-three triremes. Renewed terror
-and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_x">[p. x]</span> struggle in the
-island. — Naval battle off Korkyra between Nikostratus and Alkidas.
-— Confusion and defenceless state of Korkyra — Alkidas declines
-to attack it — arrival of the Athenian fleet under Eurymedon —
-flight of Alkidas. — Vengeance of the victorious Demos in Korkyra
-against the prostrate oligarchs — fearful bloodshed. — Lawless
-and ferocious murders — base connivance of Eurymedon. — Band of
-oligarchical fugitives escape to the mainland — afterwards land again
-on the island and establish themselves on Mount Istônê. — Political
-reflections introduced by Thucydidês on occasion of the Korkyræan
-massacre. — The political enormities of Korkyra were the worst that
-occurred in the whole war. — How these enormities began and became
-exaggerated. Conduct of the opposing parties. — Contrast between the
-bloody character of revolutions at Korkyra and the mild character of
-analogous phenomena at Athens. — Bad morality of the rich and great
-men throughout the Grecian cities.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_50">221-285</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER LI.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">FROM THE TROUBLES IN KORKYRA, IN THE FIFTH YEAR OF
-THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE END OF THE SIXTH YEAR.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Capture of Minôa, opposite Megara, by the Athenians
-under Nikias. — Nikias — his first introduction, position, and
-character. — Varying circumstances and condition of the oligarchical
-party at Athens. — Points of analogy between Nikias and Periklês —
-material differences. — Care of Nikias in maintaining his popularity
-and not giving offence; his very religious character. — His diligence
-in increasing his fortune — speculations in the mines of Laurium —
-letting out of slaves for hire. — Nikias first opposed to Kleon —
-next to Alkibiadês. — Oligarchical clubs, or Hetæries, at Athens,
-for political and judicial purposes. — Kleon — his real function
-that of opposition — real power inferior to Nikias. — Revival of
-the epidemic distemper at Athens for another year — atmospheric and
-terrestrial disturbances in Greece. Lacedæmonian invasion of Attica
-suspended for this year. — Foundation of the colony of Herakleia by
-the Lacedæmonians, near Thermopylæ — its numerous settlers, great
-promise, and unprosperous career. — Athenian expedition against
-Melos, under Nikias. — Proceedings of the Athenians under Demosthenês
-in Akarnania. — Expedition of Demosthenês against Ætolia — his large
-plans. — March of Demosthenês — impracticability of the territory of
-Ætolia. — rudeness and bravery of the inhabitants. — He is completely
-beaten and obliged to retire with loss. — Attack of Ætolians and
-Peloponnesians under Eurylochus upon Naupaktus. — Naupaktus is
-saved by Demosthenês and the Akarnanians. — Eurylochus, repulsed
-from Naupaktus, concerts with the Ambrakiots an attack on Argos. —
-Demosthenês and the Athenians, as well as the Akarnanians, come to
-the protection of Argos. — March of Eurylochus across Akarnania to
-join the Ambrakiots. — Their united army is defeated by Demosthenês
-at Olpæ — Eurylochus slain. — The surviving Spartan commander makes a
-separate capitulation for himself and the Peloponnesians, deserting
-the Ambrakiots. — The Ambrakiots sustain much loss in their retreat.
-— Another large body of Ambrakiots, coming from the city as a
-reinforcement, is intercepted by Demosthenês at Idomenê and cut to
-pieces. — Despair of the Am<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xi">[p.
-xi]</span>brakiot herald on seeing the great number of slain. —
-Defenceless and feeble condition of Ambrakia after this ruinous loss.
-— Attempt to calculate the loss of the Ambrakiots. — Convention
-concluded between Ambrakia on one side, and the Akarnanians and
-Amphilochians on the other. — Return of Demosthenês in triumph to
-Athens. — Purification of Delos by the Athenians. Revival of the
-Delian festival with peculiar splendor.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_51">285-313</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER LII.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR.—CAPTURE OF SPHAKTERIA.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Seventh year of the war — invasion of Attica. —
-Distress in Korkyra from the attack of the oligarchical exiles. A
-Peloponnesian fleet and an Athenian fleet are both sent thither. —
-Demosthenês goes on board the Athenian fleet with a separate command.
-— He fixes upon Pylus in Laconia for the erection of a fort. Locality
-of Pylus and Sphakteria. — Eurymedon the admiral of the fleet insists
-upon going on to Korkyra, without stopping at Pylus. The fleet are
-driven into Pylus by a storm. — Demosthenês fortifies the place,
-through the voluntary zeal of the soldiers. He is left there with
-a garrison while the fleet goes on to Korkyra. — Slow march of the
-Lacedæmonians to recover Pylus. — Preparations of Demosthenês to
-defend Pylus against them. — Proceedings of the Lacedæmonian army —
-they send a detachment to occupy the island of Sphakteria, opposite
-Pylus. — They attack the place by sea and land — gallant conduct of
-Brasidas in the attack on the sea-side. — Return of Eurymedon and
-the Athenian fleet to Pylus. — He defeats the Lacedæmonian fleet in
-the harbor of Pylus. — The Lacedæmonian detachment is blocked up by
-the Athenian fleet in the island of Sphakteria — armistice concluded
-at Pylus. — Mission of Lacedæmonian envoys to Athens, to propose
-peace and solicit the release of their soldiers in Sphakteria. —
-The Athenians, at the instance of Kleon, require the restoration
-of Nisæa, Pegæ, Trœzen, and Achaia, as conditions of giving up the
-men in Sphakteria and making peace. — The envoys will not consent
-to these demands — Kleon prevents negotiation — they are sent back
-to Pylus without any result. — Remarks on this assembly and on the
-conduct of Athens. — The armistice is terminated, and war resumed
-at Pylus. Eurymedon keeps possession of the Lacedæmonian fleet.
-— Blockade of Sphakteria by the Athenian fleet — difficulty and
-hardships to the sea men of the fleet. — Protracted duration and
-seeming uncertainty of the blockade — Demosthenês sends to Athens
-for reinforcements to attack the island. — Proceedings in the
-Athenian assembly on receiving this news — proposition of Kleon
-— manœuvre of his political enemies to send him against his will
-as general to Pylus. — Reflections upon this proceeding and upon
-the conduct of parties at Athens. — Kleon goes to Pylus with a
-reinforcement — condition of the island of Sphakteria — numbers and
-positions of the Lacedæmonians in it. — Kleon and Demosthenês land
-their forces in the island, and attack it. — Numerous light troops
-of Demosthenês employed against the Lacedæmonians in Sphakteria. —
-Distress of the Lacedæmonians — their bravery and long resistance.
-They retreat to their last redoubt at the extremity of the island.
-They are surrounded and forced to surrender. — Astonishment caused
-through<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xii">[p. xii]</span>out
-Greece by the surrender of Lacedæmonian hoplites — diminished lustre
-of Spartan arms. — Judgment pronounced by Thucydidês himself —
-reflections upon it. — Prejudice of Thucydidês in regard to Kleon.
-Kleon displayed sound judgment and decision, and was one of the
-essential causes of the success. — Effect produced at Athens by the
-arrival of the Lacedæmonian prisoners. — The Athenians prosecute the
-war with increased hopefulness and vigor. The Lacedæmonians make
-new advances for peace without effect. — Remarks upon the policy
-of Athens — her chance was now universally believed to be most
-favorable in prosecuting the war. — Fluctuations in Athenian feeling
-for or against the war: there were two occasions on which Kleon
-contributed to influence them towards it. — Expedition of Nikias
-against the Corinthian territory. — He reëmbarks — ravages Epidaurus
-— establishes a post on the peninsula of Methana. — Eurymedon with
-the Athenian fleet goes to Korkyra. Defeat and captivity of the
-Korkyræan exiles in the island. — The captives are put to death —
-cruelty and horrors in the proceeding. — Capture of Anaktorium by the
-Athenians and Akarnanians. — Proceedings of the Athenians at Chios
-and Lesbos. — The Athenians capture Artaphernes, a Persian envoy, on
-his way to Sparta. — Succession of Persian kings — Xerxes, Artaxerxes
-Longimanus, etc., Darius Nothus.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_52">313-363</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap">CHAPTER LIII.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">EIGHTH YEAR OF THE WAR.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Important operations of the eighth year of the war.
-— Capture of Kythêra by the Athenians. Nikias ravages the Laconian
-coast. — Capture of Thyrea — all the Æginetans resident there are
-either slain in the attack or put to death afterwards as prisoners.
-— Alarm and depression among the Lacedæmonians — their insecurity in
-regard to the Helots. — They entrap, and cause to be assassinated,
-two thousand of the bravest Helots. — Request from the Chalkidians
-and Perdikkas that Spartan aid may be sent to them under Brasidas.
-— Brasidas is ordered to go thither, with Helot and Peloponnesian
-hoplites. — Elate and enterprising dispositions prevalent at Athens.
-Plan formed against Megara. Condition of Megara. — The Athenians,
-under Hippokratês and Demosthenês, attempt to surprise Nisæa and
-Megara. — Conspirators within open the gate, and admit them into
-the Megarian Long Walls. They master the whole line of the Long
-Walls. — The Athenians march to the gates of Megara — failure of
-the scheme of the party within to open them. — The Athenians attack
-Nisæa — the place surrenders to them. — Dissension of parties in
-Megara — intervention of Brasidas. — Brasidas gets together an
-army, and relieves Megara — no battle takes place — the Athenians
-retire. — Revolution at Megara — return of the exiles from Pegæ,
-under pledge of amnesty — they violate their oaths, and effect a
-forcible oligarchical revolution. — Combined plan by Hippokratês
-and Demosthenês for the invasion of Bœotia on three sides at once.
-— Demosthenês, with an Akarnanian force, makes a descent on Bœotia
-at Siphæ in the Corinthian gulf — his scheme fails and he retires.
-— Disappointment of the Athenian plans — no internal movements
-take place in Bœotia. Hippokratês marches with the army from
-Athens to Delium in Bœotia. — Hippokratês fortifies Delium,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_xiii">[p. xiii]</span> after which the
-army retires homeward. — Gathering of the Bœotian military force at
-Tanagra. Pagondas, the Theban bœotarch, determines them to fight.
-— Marshalling of the Bœotian army — great depth of the Theban
-hoplites — special Theban band of Three Hundred. — Order of battle
-of the Athenian army. — Battle of Delium — vigorously contested —
-advantage derived from the depth of the Theban phalanx. — Defeat and
-flight of the Athenians — Hippokratês, with one thousand hoplites,
-is slain. — Interchange of heralds — remonstrance of the Bœotians
-against the Athenians for desecrating the temple of Delium — they
-refuse permission to bury the slain except on condition of quitting
-Delium. — Answer of the Athenian herald — he demands permission to
-bury the bodies of the slain. — The Bœotians persist in demanding
-the evacuation of Delium as a condition for granting permission to
-bury the dead. Debate on the subject. Remarks on the debate. — Siege
-and capture of Delium by the Bœotians. — Sokratês and Alkibiadês,
-personally engaged at Delium. — March of Brasidas through Thessaly to
-Thrace and Macedonia. Rapidity and address with which he gets through
-Thessaly. — Relations between Brasidas and Perdikkas — Brasidas
-enters into an accommodation with Arrhibæus — Perdikkas is offended.
-— Brasidas marches against Akanthus. State of parties in the town.
-— He is admitted personally into the town to explain his views —
-his speech before the Akanthian assembly. — Debate in the Akanthian
-assembly, and decision of the majority voting secretly to admit him,
-after much opposition. — Reflections upon this proceeding — good
-political habits of the Akanthians. — Evidence which this proceeding
-affords, that the body of citizens (among the Athenian allies)
-did not hate Athens, and were not anxious to revolt. — Brasidas
-establishes intelligences in Argilus. He lays his plan for the
-surprise of Amphipolis. — Night-march of Brasidas from Arnê, through
-Argilus to the river Strymon and Amphipolis. — He becomes master of
-the lands round Amphipolis, but is disappointed in gaining admission
-into the town. — He offers to the citizens the most favorable terms
-of capitulation, which they accept. — Amphipolis capitulates. —
-Thucydidês arrives at Eion from Thasus with his squadron — not in
-time to preserve Amphipolis — he preserves Eion. — Alarm and dismay
-produced at Athens by the capture of Amphipolis — increased hopes
-among her enemies. — Extraordinary personal glory, esteem, and
-influence acquired by Brasidas. — Inaction and despondency of Athens
-after the battle of Delium, especially in reference to arresting the
-conquests of Brasidas in Thrace. — Loss of Amphipolis was caused by
-the negligence of the Athenian commanders — Euklês, and the historian
-Thucydidês. — The Athenians banish Thucydidês on the proposition of
-Kleon. — Sentence of banishment passed on Thucydidês by the Athenians
-— grounds of that sentence. — He justly incurred their verdict
-of guilty. — Preparations of Brasidas in Amphipolis for extended
-conquest — his operations against the Aktê, or promontory of Athos.
-— He attacks Torônê in the Sithonian peninsula — he is admitted
-into the town by an internal party — surprises and takes it. — Some
-part of the population, with the small Athenian garrison, retire
-to the separate citadel called Lêkythus. — Conciliating address of
-Brasidas to the assembly at Torônê. — He attacks Lêkythus and takes
-it by storm. — Personal ability and conciliatory efficiency of
-Brasidas.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_53">363-425</a></p>
-
-
-<p class="chap"><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiv">[p.
-xiv]</span>CHAPTER LIV.</p>
-
-<p class="subchap">TRUCE FOR ONE YEAR.—RENEWAL OF WAR AND BATTLE OF
-AMPHIPOLIS.—PEACE OF NIKIAS.</p>
-
-<p class="mt1">Eighth year of the war — began with most favorable
-promise for Athens — closed with great reverses to her. — Desire of
-Spartans to make peace in order to regain the captives — they decline
-sending reinforcements to Brasidas. — King Pleistoanax at Sparta —
-eager for peace — his special reasons — his long banishment recently
-terminated by recall. — Negotiations during the winter of 424-423
-<small>B.C.</small> for peace. — Truce for one year concluded, in
-March 423 <small>B.C.</small> — Conditions of the truce. — Resolution
-to open negotiations for a definitive treaty. — New events in Thrace
-— revolt of Skiônê from Athens to Brasidas, two days after the truce
-was sworn. — Brasidas crosses over to Skiônê — his judicious conduct
-— enthusiastic admiration for him there. — Brasidas brings across
-reinforcements to Skiônê — he conveys away the women and children
-into a place of safety. — Commissioners from Sparta and Athens arrive
-in Thrace, to announce to Brasidas the truce just concluded. Dispute
-respecting Skiônê. The war continues in Thrace, but is suspended
-everywhere else. — Revolt of Mendê from Athens — Brasidas receives
-the offers of the Mendæans — engages to protect them and sends to
-them a garrison against Athens. He departs upon an expedition against
-Arrhibæus in the interior of Macedonia. — Nikias and Nikostratus
-arrive with an Athenian armament in Pallênê. They attack Mendê. The
-Lacedæmonian garrison under Polydamidas at first repulses them.
-— Dissensions among the citizens of Mendê — mutiny of the Demos
-against Polydamidas — the Athenians are admitted into the town. — The
-Athenians besiege and blockade Skiônê. Nikias leaves a blockading
-force there, and returns to Athens. — Expedition of Brasidas along
-with Perdikkas into Macedonia against Arrhibæus. — Retreat of
-Brasidas and Perdikkas before the Illyrians. — Address of Brasidas
-to his soldiers before the retreat. — Contrast between Grecian and
-barbaric military feeling. — Appeal of Brasidas to the right of
-conquest or superior force. — The Illyrians attack Brasidas in his
-retreat, but are repulsed. — Breach between Brasidas and Perdikkas:
-the latter opens negotiations with the Athenians. — Relations between
-Athens and the Peloponnesians — no progress made towards definitive
-peace — Lacedæmonian reinforcement on its way to Brasidas, prevented
-from passing through Thessaly. — Incidents in Peloponnesus — the
-temple of Hêrê near Argos accidentally burnt. — War in Arcadia —
-battle between Mantineia and Tegea. — Bœotians at peace <i>de facto</i>,
-though not parties to the truce. — Hard treatment of the Thespians by
-Thebes. — Expiration of the truce for one year. Disposition of both
-Sparta and Athens at that time towards peace; but peace impossible
-in consequence of the relations of parties in Thrace. — No actual
-resumption of hostilities, although the truce had expired, from the
-month of March to the Pythian festival in August. — Alteration in
-the language of statesmen at Athens — instances of Kleon and his
-partisans to obtain a vigorous prosecution of the war in Thrace. —
-Brasidas — an opponent of peace — his views and motives. — Kleon — an
-opponent of peace — his views and motives as stated by Thucydidês.
-Kleon had no personal interest in war. — To prosecute the war
-vigorously in Thrace was at this time the real political interest of
-Athens. — Question of peace or war, as it stood between Nikias<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_xv">[p. xv]</span> and Kleon, in March
-422 <small>B.C.</small>, after the expiration of the truce for one
-year. — Kleon’s advocacy of war at this moment perfectly defensible
-— unjust account of his motive given by Thucydidês. — Kleon at this
-time adhered more closely than any other Athenian public man to
-the foreign policy of Periklês. — Dispositions of Nikias and the
-peace-party in reference to the reconquest of Amphipolis. — Kleon
-conducts an expedition against Amphipolis — he takes Torônê. — He
-arrives at Eion — sends envoys to invite Macedonian and Thracian
-auxiliaries. — Dissatisfaction of his own troops with his inaction
-while waiting for these auxiliaries. — He is forced by these murmurs
-to make a demonstration — he marches from Eion along the walls of
-Amphipolis to reconnoitre the top of the hill — apparent quiescence
-in Amphipolis. — Brasidas, at first on Mount Kerdylium — presently
-moves into the town across the bridge. — His exhortation to his
-soldiers. — Kleon tries to effect his retreat. — Brasidas sallies out
-upon the army in its retreat — the Athenians are completely routed —
-Brasidas and Kleon both slain. — Profound sorrow in Thrace for the
-death of Brasidas — funeral honors paid him in Amphipolis. — The
-Athenian armament, much diminished by its loss in the battle, returns
-home. — Remarks on the battle of Amphipolis — wherein consisted the
-faults of Kleon. — Disgraceful conduct of the Athenian hoplites
-— the defeat of Amphipolis arose partly from political feeling
-hostile to Kleon. — Important effect of the death of Brasidas, in
-reference to the prospects of the war — his admirable character and
-efficiency. — Feelings of Thucydidês towards Brasidas and Kleon. —
-Character of Kleon — his foreign policy. Internal policy of Kleon
-as a citizen in constitutional life. — Picture in the Knights of
-Aristophanês. — Unfairness of judging Kleon upon such evidence. —
-Picture of Sokratês by Aristophanês is noway resembling. — The vices
-imputed by Aristophanês to Kleon are not reconcilable one with the
-other. — Kleon — a man of strong and bitter opposition talents —
-frequent in accusation — often on behalf of poor men suffering wrong.
-— Necessity for voluntary accusers at Athens — general danger and
-obloquy attending the function. — We have no evidence to decide in
-what proportion of cases he accused wrongfully. — Private dispute
-between Kleon and Aristophanês. — Negotiations for peace during the
-winter following the battle of Amphipolis. — Peace called the Peace
-of Nikias — concluded in March 421 <small>B.C.</small> — Conditions
-of peace. — The peace is only partially accepted by the allies of
-Sparta. — The Bœotians, Megarians, and Corinthians, all repudiate
-it.</p>
-
-<p class="toright"><a href="#Chap_54">426-494</a></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter" id="Chap_47">
-  <p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
-  <p class="falseh1">HISTORY OF GREECE.</p>
-  <hr class="sep2" />
-  <p class="xl center">PART II.<br />
-  <small>CONTINUATION OF HISTORICAL GREECE.</small></p>
-  <hr class="sep2" />
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER XLVII.<br />
-    FROM THE THIRTY YEARS’ TRUCE, FOURTEEN YEARS BEFORE
-    THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE BLOCKADE OF
-    POTIDÆA, IN THE YEAR BEFORE THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">The</span> judicial alterations
-effected at Athens by Periklês and Ephialtês, described in the
-preceding chapter, gave to a large proportion of the citizens
-direct jury functions and an active interest in the constitution,
-such as they had never before enjoyed; the change being at once a
-mark of previous growth of democratical sentiment during the past,
-and a cause of its farther development during the future. The
-Athenian people were at this time ready for personal exertion in all
-directions: military service on land or sea was not less conformable
-to their dispositions than attendance in the ekklesia or in the
-dikastery at home. The naval service especially was prosecuted with
-a degree of assiduity which brought about continual improvement in
-skill and efficiency, and the poorer citizens, of whom it chiefly
-consisted, were more exact in obedience and discipline than any of
-the more opulent persons from whom the infantry or the cavalry were
-drawn.<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a>
-The maritime multitude, in addition to self-confi<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[p. 2]</span>dence and courage, acquired
-by this laborious training an increased skill, which placed the
-Athenian navy every year more and more above the rest of Greece: and
-the perfection of this force became the more indispensable as the
-Athenian empire was now again confined to the sea and seaport towns;
-the reverses immediately preceding the thirty years truce having
-broken up all Athenian land ascendency over Megara, Bœotia, and the
-other continental territories adjoining to Attica.</p>
-
-<p>The maritime confederacy,—originally commenced at Delos, under
-the headship of Athens, but with a common synod and deliberative
-voice on the part of each member,—had now become transformed into a
-confirmed empire on the part of Athens, over the remaining states as
-foreign dependencies; all of them rendering tribute except Chios,
-Samos, and Lesbos. These three still remained on their original
-footing of autonomous allies, retaining their armed force, ships, and
-fortifications, with the obligation of furnishing military and naval
-aid when required, but not of paying tribute: the discontinuance
-of the deliberative synod, however, had deprived them of their
-original security against the encroachments of Athens. I have
-already stated generally the steps, we do not know them in detail,
-whereby this important change was brought about, gradually and
-without any violent revolution,—for even the transfer of the common
-treasure from Delos to Athens, which was the most palpable symbol
-and evidence of the change, was not an act of Athenian violence,
-since it was adopted on the proposition of the Samians. The change
-resulted in fact almost inevitably from the circumstances of the
-case, and from the eager activity of the Athenians contrasted with
-the backwardness and aversion to personal service on the part of the
-allies. We must recollect that the confederacy, even in its original
-structure, was contracted for permanent objects, and was permanently
-binding by the vote of its majority, like the Spartan confederacy,
-upon every individual member:<a id="FNanchor_2" href="#Footnote_2"
-class="fnanchor">[2]</a> it was destined to keep out the Persian
-fleet, and to maintain the police of the Ægean. Consistently with
-these objects, no individual member could be allowed to secede
-from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[p. 3]</span> the confederacy,
-and thus to acquire the benefit of protection at the cost of the
-remainder: so that when Naxos and other members actually did
-secede, the step was taken as a revolt, and Athens only did her
-duty as president of the confederacy in reducing them. By every
-such reduction, as well as by that exchange of personal service for
-money-payment, which most of the allies voluntarily sought, the
-power of Athens increased, until at length she found herself with an
-irresistible navy in the midst of disarmed tributaries, none of whom
-could escape from her constraining power,—and mistress of the sea,
-the use of which was indispensable to them. The synod of Delos, even
-if it had not before become partially deserted, must have ceased at
-the time when the treasure was removed to Athens,—probably about 460
-<small>B.C.</small>, or shortly afterwards.</p>
-
-<p>The relations between Athens and her allies were thus materially
-changed by proceedings which gradually evolved themselves and
-followed one upon the other without any preconcerted plan: she became
-an imperial or despot city, governing an aggregate of dependent
-subjects, all without their own active concurrence, and in many
-cases doubtless contrary to their own sense of political right. It
-was not likely that they should conspire unanimously to break up
-the confederacy, and discontinue the collection of contribution
-from each of the members: nor would it have been at all desirable
-that they should do so: for while Greece generally would have been
-a great loser by such a proceeding, the allies themselves would
-have been the greatest losers of all, inasmuch as they would have
-been exposed without defence to the Persian and Phenician fleets.
-But the Athenians committed the capital fault of taking the whole
-alliance into their own hands, and treating the allies purely as
-subjects, without seeking to attach them by any form of political
-incorporation or collective meeting and discussion,—without taking
-any pains to maintain community of feeling with the idea of a joint
-interest,—without admitting any control, real or even pretended,
-over themselves as managers. Had they attempted to do this, it might
-have proved difficult to accomplish,—so powerful was the force of
-geographical dissemination, the tendency to isolated civic life,
-and the repugnance to any permanent extramural obligations, in
-every Grecian community: but they do not ap<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_4">[p. 4]</span>pear to have ever made the attempt.
-Finding Athens exalted by circumstances to empire, and the allies
-degraded into subjects, the Athenian statesmen grasped at the
-exaltation as a matter of pride as well as profit:<a id="FNanchor_3"
-href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> nor did even Periklês,
-the most prudent and far-sighted of them, betray any consciousness
-that an empire without the cement of some all-pervading interest or
-attachment, must have a natural tendency to become more and more
-burdensome and odious, and ultimately to crumble in pieces. Such was
-the course of events which, if the judicious counsels of Periklês
-had been followed, might have been postponed but could not have been
-averted.</p>
-
-<p>Instead of trying to cherish or restore the feelings of equal
-alliance, Periklês formally disclaimed it. He maintained that Athens
-owed to her subject allies no account of the money received from
-them, so long as she performed her contract by keeping away the
-Persian enemy, and maintaining the safety of the Ægean waters.<a
-id="FNanchor_4" href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> This was,
-as he represented, the obligation which Athens had undertaken; and,
-provided it were faithfully discharged, the allies had no right to
-ask questions or institute control. That it was faithfully discharged
-no one could deny: no ship of war except that of Athens and her
-allies was ever seen between the eastern and western shores of the
-Ægean. An Athenian fleet of sixty triremes was kept on duty in these
-waters, chiefly manned by Athenian citizens, and beneficial as well
-from the protection afforded to commerce as for keeping the seaman
-in constant pay and training.<a id="FNanchor_5" href="#Footnote_5"
-class="fnanchor">[5]</a> And such was the effective superintendence
-maintained, that in the disastrous period preceding the thirty years’
-truce, when Athens lost Megara and Bœotia, and with difficulty
-recovered Eubœa, none of her numerous maritime subjects took the
-opportunity to revolt.</p>
-
-<p>The total of these distinct tributary cities is said to have
-amounted to one thousand, according to a verse of Aristophanês,<a
-id="FNanchor_6" href="#Footnote_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> which
-cannot be under the truth, though it may well be, and probably
-is, greatly above the truth. The total annual tribute<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[p. 5]</span> collected at the
-beginning of the Peloponnesian war, and probably also for the
-years preceding it, is given by Thucydidês at about six hundred
-talents; of the sums paid by particular states, however, we have
-little or no information.<a id="FNanchor_7" href="#Footnote_7"
-class="fnanchor">[7]</a> It was placed under the superintendence
-of the Hellenotamiæ; originally officers of the confederacy, but
-now removed from Delos to Athens, and acting altogether as an
-Athenian treasury-board. The sum total of the Athenian revenue,<a
-id="FNanchor_8" href="#Footnote_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a>
-from all sources, including this tribute, at the beginning of
-the Peloponnesian war, is stated by Xenophon at one thousand
-talents: customs, harbor, and market dues, receipts from the
-silver-mines at Laurium, rents of public property, fines from
-judicial sentences, a tax per head upon slaves, the annual
-payment made by each metic, etc., may have made up a larger sum
-than four hundred talents; which sum, added to the six hundred
-talents from tribute, would make the total named by Xenophon. But
-a verse of Aristophanês,<a id="FNanchor_9" href="#Footnote_9"
-class="fnanchor">[9]</a> during the ninth year of the Peloponnesian
-war, <small>B.C.</small> 422, gives the general
-total of that time as “nearly two thousand talents:” this<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[p. 6]</span> is in all probability
-much above the truth, though we may well imagine that the amount of
-tribute-money levied upon the allies may have been augmented during
-the interval: I think that the alleged duplication of the tribute by
-Alkibiadês, which Thucydidês nowhere notices, is not borne out by
-any good evidence, nor can I believe that it ever reached the sum
-of twelve hundred talents.<a id="FNanchor_10" href="#Footnote_10"
-class="fnanchor">[10]</a> Whatever may have been the actual magnitude
-of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[p. 7]</span> Athenian
-budget, however, prior to the Peloponnesian war, we know that during
-the larger part of the administration of Peri<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_8">[p. 8]</span>klês, the revenue, including tribute, was
-so managed as to leave a large annual surplus; insomuch that a
-treasure of coined money was accumulated in the acropolis during the
-years preceding the Peloponnesian war,—which treasure, when at its
-maximum, reached the great sum of nine thousand seven hundred talents
-(equal to two million two hundred and thirty thousand pounds), and
-was still at six thousand talents, after a serious drain for various
-purposes, at the moment when that war began.<a id="FNanchor_11"
-href="#Footnote_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> This system of public
-economy, constantly laying by a considerable sum year after year,—in
-which Athens stood alone, since none of the Peloponnesian states had
-any public reserve whatever,<a id="FNanchor_12" href="#Footnote_12"
-class="fnanchor">[12]</a>—goes far of itself to vindicate Periklês
-from the charge of having wasted the public money in mischievous
-distributions for the purpose of obtaining popularity; and also to
-exonerate the Athenian Demos from that reproach of a greedy appetite
-for living<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[p. 9]</span> by the
-public purse which it is common to ascribe to them. After the
-death of Kimon, no farther expeditions were undertaken against the
-Persians, and even for some years before his death, not much appears
-to have been done: so that the tribute-money remained unexpended,
-though it was the duty of Athens to hold it in reserve against future
-attack, which might at any time be renewed.</p>
-
-<p>Though we do not know the exact amount of the other sources of
-Athenian revenue, however, we know that the tribute received from
-the allies was by far the largest item in it.<a id="FNanchor_13"
-href="#Footnote_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> And altogether the
-exercise of empire abroad became a prominent feature in Athenian
-life, and a necessity to Athenian sentiment, not less than democracy
-at home. Athens was no longer, as she had been once, a single city,
-with Attica for her territory: she was a capital or imperial city,—a
-despot city, was the expression used by her enemies, and even
-sometimes by her own citizens,<a id="FNanchor_14" href="#Footnote_14"
-class="fnanchor">[14]</a>—with many dependencies attached to her,
-and bound to follow her orders. Such was the manner in which not
-merely Periklês and the other leading statesmen, but even the
-humblest Athenian citizen, conceived the dignity of Athens; and
-the sen<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[p. 10]</span>timent
-was one which carried with it both personal pride and stimulus
-to active patriotism. To establish Athenian interests among the
-dependent territories, was one important object in the eyes of
-Periklês, and while he discountenanced all distant<a id="FNanchor_15"
-href="#Footnote_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> and rash enterprises,
-such as invasions of Egypt or Cyprus, he planted out many kleruchies
-and colonies of Athenian citizens, intermingled with allies, on
-islands, and parts of the coast. He conducted one thousand citizens
-to the Thracian Chersonese, five hundred to Naxos, and two hundred
-and fifty to Andros. In the Chersonese, he farther repelled the
-barbarous Thracian invaders from without, and even undertook the
-labor of carrying a wall of defence across the isthmus, which
-connected the peninsula with Thrace; since the barbarous Thracian
-tribes, though expelled some time before by Kimon,<a id="FNanchor_16"
-href="#Footnote_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> had still continued to
-renew their incursions from time to time. Ever since the occupation
-of the elder Miltiadês, about eighty years before, there had been in
-this peninsula many Athenian proprietors, apparently intermingled
-with half-civilized Thracians: the settlers now acquired both
-greater numerical strength and better protection, though it does not
-appear that the cross-wall was permanently maintained. The maritime
-expeditions of Periklês even extended into the Euxine sea, as far
-as the important Greek city of Sinôpê, then governed by a despot
-named Timesilaus, against whom a large proportion of the citizens
-were in active discontent. He left Lamachus with thirteen Athenian
-triremes to assist in expelling the despot, who was driven into
-exile along with his friends and party: the properties of these
-exiles were confiscated, and assigned to the maintenance of six
-hundred Athenian citizens, admitted to equal fellowship and residence
-with the Sinôpeans. We may presume that on this occasion Sinôpê
-became a member of the Athenian tributary alliance, if it had not
-been so before: but we do not know whether Kotyôra and Trapezus,
-dependencies of Sinôpê, farther eastward, which the ten thousand
-Greeks found on their retreat fifty years afterwards, existed in the
-time of Periklês or not. Moreover, the numerous and well-equipped
-Athenian fleet, under the command of Periklês, produced an imposing
-effect upon the barbarous princes and tribes along the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[p. 11]</span> coast,<a id="FNanchor_17"
-href="#Footnote_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> contributing certainly
-to the security of Grecian trade, and probably to the acquisition of
-new dependent allies.</p>
-
-<p>It was by successive proceedings of this sort that many
-detachments of Athenian citizens became settled in various portions
-of the maritime empire of the city,—some rich, investing their
-property in the islands as more secure—from the incontestable
-superiority of Athens at sea—even than Attica, which, since
-the loss of the Megarid, could not be guarded against a
-Peloponnesian land invasion,<a id="FNanchor_18" href="#Footnote_18"
-class="fnanchor">[18]</a>—others poor, and hiring themselves
-out as laborers.<a id="FNanchor_19" href="#Footnote_19"
-class="fnanchor">[19]</a> The islands of Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros,
-as well as the territory of Estiæa, on the north of Eubœa, were
-completely occupied by Athenian proprietors and citizens,—other
-places partially so occupied. And it was doubtless advantageous to
-the islanders to associate themselves with Athenians in trading
-enterprises, since they thereby obtained a better chance of the
-protection of the Athenian fleet. It seems that Athens passed
-regulations occasionally for the commerce of her dependent allies,
-as we see by the fact, that shortly before the Peloponnesian war,
-she excluded the Megarians from all their ports. The commercial
-relations between Peiræus and the Ægean reached their maximum during
-the interval immediately preceding the Peloponnesian war: nor were
-these relations confined to the country east and north of Attica:
-they reached also the western regions. The most important settlements
-founded by Athens during this period were Amphipolis in Thrace, and
-Thurii in Italy.</p>
-
-<p>Amphipolis was planted by a colony of Athenians and other Greeks,
-under the conduct of the Athenian Agnon, in 437 <small>B.C.</small>
-It was situated near the river Strymon, in Thrace, on the eastern
-bank, and at the spot where the Strymon resumes its river-course
-after emerging from the lake above. It was originally a township
-or settlement of the Edonian Thracians, called Ennea<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[p. 12]</span> Hodoi, or Nine Ways,—in
-a situation doubly valuable, both as being close upon the bridge
-over the Strymon, and as a convenient centre for the ship-timber
-and gold and silver mines of the neighboring region,—and distant
-about three English miles from the Athenian settlement of Eion at
-the mouth of the river. The previous unsuccessful attempts to form
-establishments at Ennea Hodoi have already been noticed,—first, that
-of Histiæus the Milesian, followed up by his brother Aristagoras
-(about 497-496 <small>B.C.</small>), next, that of the Athenians
-about 465 <small>B.C.</small>, under Leagrus and others,—on both
-these occasions the intruding settlers had been defeated and
-expelled by the native Thracian tribes, though on the second
-occasion the number sent by Athens was not less than ten thousand.<a
-id="FNanchor_20" href="#Footnote_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a>
-So serious a loss deterred the Athenians for a long time from
-any repetition of the attempt: though it is highly probable that
-individual citizens from Eion and from Thasus connected themselves
-with powerful Thracian families, and became in this manner actively
-engaged in mining, to their own great profit,—as well as to the
-profit of the city collectively, since the property of the kleruchs,
-or Athenian citizens occupying colonial lands, bore its share in case
-of direct taxes being imposed on Athenian property generally. Among
-such fortunate adventurers we may number the historian Thucydidês
-himself; seemingly descended from Athenian parents intermarrying
-with Thracians, and himself married to a wife either Thracian or
-belonging to a family of Athenian colonists in that region, through
-whom he became possessed of a large property in the mines, as well
-as of great influence in the districts around.<a id="FNanchor_21"
-href="#Footnote_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> This was one of the
-various ways in which the collective power of Athens enabled her
-chief citizens to enrich themselves individually.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[p. 13]</span></p>
-
-<p>The colony under Agnon, despatched from Athens in the year 437
-<small>B.C.</small>, appears to have been both numerous
-and well sustained, inasmuch as it conquered and maintained the
-valuable position of Ennea Hodoi in spite of those formidable
-Edonian neighbors who had baffled the two preceding attempts. Its
-name of Ennea Hodoi was exchanged for that of Amphipolis,—the hill
-on which the new town was situated being bounded on three sides
-by the river. The settlers seem to have been of mixed extraction,
-comprising no large proportion of Athenians: some were of Chalkidic
-race, others came from Argilus, a Grecian city colonized from
-Andros, which possessed the territory on the western bank of the
-Strymon, immediately opposite to Amphipolis,<a id="FNanchor_22"
-href="#Footnote_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> and which was included
-among the subject allies of Athens. Amphipolis, connected with the
-sea by the Strymon and the port of Eion, became the most important
-of all the Athenian dependencies in reference to Thrace and
-Macedonia.</p>
-
-<p>The colony of Thurii on the coast of the gulf of Tarentum in
-Italy, near the site and on the territory of the ancient Sybaris,
-was founded by Athens about seven years earlier than Amphipolis, not
-long after the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce with Sparta,
-<small>B.C.</small> 443. Since the destruction of the old
-Sybaris by the Krotoniates, in 509 <small>B.C.</small>,
-its territory had for the most part remained unappropriated: the
-descendants of the former inhabitants, dispersed at Laus and in other
-portions of the territory, were not strong enough to establish any
-new city; nor did it suit the views of the Krotoniates themselves
-to do so. After an interval of more than sixty years, however,
-during which one unsuccessful attempt at occupation had been made
-by some Thessalian settlers, these Sybarites at length prevailed
-upon the Athenians to undertake and protect the recolonization;
-the proposition having been made in vain to the Spartans. Lampon
-and Xenokritus, the former a prophet and interpreter of oracles,
-were sent by Periklês with ten ships as chiefs of the new colony
-of Thurii, founded under the auspices of Athens. The settlers were
-collected from all parts of Greece, and included Dorians, Ionians,
-islanders, Bœotians, as well as Athenians. But the descendants of the
-ancient Sybarites procured themselves to be<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_14">[p. 14]</span> treated as privileged citizens, and
-monopolized for themselves the possession of political powers, as
-well as the most valuable lands in the immediate vicinity of the
-walls; while their wives also assumed an offensive preëminence over
-the other women of the city in the public religious processions. Such
-spirit of privilege and monopoly appears to have been a frequent
-manifestation among the ancient colonies, and often fatal either to
-their tranquillity or to their growth; sometimes to both. In the case
-of Thurii, founded under the auspices of the democratical Athens, it
-was not likely to have any lasting success: and we find that after no
-very long period, the majority of the colonists rose in insurrection
-against the privileged Sybarites, either slew or expelled them, and
-divided the entire territory of the city, upon equal principles,
-among the colonists of every different race. This revolution enabled
-them to make peace with the Krotoniates, who had probably been
-unfriendly so long as their ancient enemies, the Sybarites, were
-masters of the city, and likely to turn its powers to the purpose
-of avenging their conquered ancestors. And the city from this time
-forward, democratically governed, appears to have flourished steadily
-and without internal dissension for thirty years, until the ruinous
-disasters of the Athenians before Syracuse occasioned the overthrow
-of the Athenian party at Thurii. How miscellaneous the population
-of Thurii was, we may judge from the denominations of the ten
-tribes,—such was the number of tribes established, after the model
-of Athens,—Arkas, Achaïs, Eleia, Bœotia, Amphiktyonis, Doris, Ias,
-Athenaïs, Euboïs, Nesiôtis. From this mixture of race they could
-not agree in recognizing or honoring an Athenian œkist, or indeed
-any œkist except Apollo.<a id="FNanchor_23" href="#Footnote_23"
-class="fnanchor">[23]</a> The Spartan general, Kleandridas, banished
-a few years before for having suffered himself to be bribed by
-Athens along with king Pleistoanax, removed to Thurii, and was
-appointed general of the citizens in their war against Tarentum.
-That war was ultimately adjusted by the joint foundation of the
-new city of Herakleia, half-way between the two,—in the fertile
-territory called Siritis.<a id="FNanchor_24" href="#Footnote_24"
-class="fnanchor">[24]</a></p>
-
-<p>The most interesting circumstance respecting Thurii is, that<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[p. 15]</span> the rhetor Lysias, and
-the historian Herodotus, were both domiciliated there as citizens.
-The city was connected with Athens, yet seemingly only by a feeble
-tie; nor was it numbered among the tributary subject allies.<a
-id="FNanchor_25" href="#Footnote_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> From
-the circumstance that so large a proportion of the settlers at Thurii
-were not native Athenians, we may infer that there were not many of
-the latter at that time who were willing to put themselves so far
-out of connection with Athens,—even though tempted by the prospect
-of lots of land in a fertile and promising territory. And Periklês
-was probably anxious that those poor citizens for whom emigration
-was desirable should become kleruchs in some of the islands or ports
-of the Ægean, where they would serve—like the colonies of Rome—as
-a sort of garrison for the insurance of the Athenian empire.<a
-id="FNanchor_26" href="#Footnote_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a></p>
-
-<p>The fourteen years between the thirty years’ truce and the
-breaking out of the Peloponnesian war, are a period of full
-maritime empire on the part of Athens,—partially indeed resisted,
-but never with success. They are a period of peace with all cities
-extraneous to her own empire; and of splendid decorations to the
-city itself, from the genius of Pheidias and others, in sculpture
-as well as in architecture. Since the death of Kimon, Periklês had
-become more and more the first citizen in the commonwealth: his
-qualities told for more the longer they were known, and even the
-disastrous reverses which preceded the thirty years’ truce had not
-overthrown him, since he had protested against that expedition of
-Tolmidês into Bœotia out of which they first arose. But if the
-personal influence of Periklês had increased, the party opposed to
-him seems also to have become stronger and better organized than
-it had been before; and to have acquired a leader in many respects
-more effective than Kimon,—Thucydidês, son of Melêsias. The new
-chief was a near relative of Kimon, but of a character and talents
-more analogous to that of Periklês: a statesman and orator<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[p. 16]</span> rather than a general,
-though competent to both functions if occasion demanded, as every
-leading man in those days was required to be. Under Thucydidês, the
-political and parliamentary opposition against Periklês assumed
-a constant character and an organization such as Kimon, with his
-exclusively military aptitudes, had never been able to establish.
-The aristocratical party in the commonwealth,—the “honorable and
-respectable” citizens, as we find them styled, adopting their
-own nomenclature,—now imposed upon themselves the obligation of
-undeviating regularity in their attendance on the public assembly,
-sitting together in a particular section, so as to be conspicuously
-parted from the Demos. In this manner, their applause and dissent,
-their mutual encouragement to each other, their distribution of
-parts to different speakers, was made more conducive to the party
-purposes than it had been before, when these distinguished persons
-had been intermingled with the mass of citizens.<a id="FNanchor_27"
-href="#Footnote_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> Thucydidês himself
-was eminent as a speaker, inferior only to Periklês,—perhaps hardly
-inferior even to him. We are told that in reply to a question
-put to him by Archidamus, whether Periklês or he were the better
-wrestler, Thucydidês replied: “Even when I throw him, he denies
-that he has fallen, gains his point, and talks over those who have
-actually seen him fall.”<a id="FNanchor_28" href="#Footnote_28"
-class="fnanchor">[28]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such an opposition made to Periklês, in all the full license
-which a democratical constitution permitted, must have been both
-efficient and embarrassing; but the pointed severance of the
-aristocratical chiefs, which Thucydidês, son of Melêsias, introduced,
-contributed probably at once to rally the democratical majority round
-Periklês, and to exasperate the bitterness of party-conflict.<a
-id="FNanchor_29" href="#Footnote_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> As
-far as we can make out the grounds of the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_17">[p. 17]</span> opposition, it turned partly upon the
-pacific policy of Periklês towards the Persians, partly upon his
-expenditure for home ornament. Thucydidês contended that Athens
-was disgraced in the eyes of the Greeks, by having drawn the
-confederate treasure from Delos to her own acropolis, under pretence
-of greater security, and then employing it, not in prosecuting
-war against the Persians,<a id="FNanchor_30" href="#Footnote_30"
-class="fnanchor">[30]</a> but in beautifying Athens by new temples
-and costly statues. To this Periklês replied, that Athens had
-undertaken the obligation, in consideration of the tribute-money, to
-protect her allies and keep off from them every foreign enemy,—that
-she had accomplished this object completely at the present, and
-retained a reserve sufficient to guarantee the like security for
-the future;—that, under such circumstances, she owed no account to
-her allies of the expenditure of the surplus, but was at liberty
-to expend it for purposes useful and honorable to the city. In
-this point of view it was an object of great public importance to
-render Athens imposing in the eyes both of the allies and of Hellas
-generally, by improved fortifications,—by accumulated ornaments,
-sculptural and architectural,—and by religious festivals,—frequent,
-splendid, musical, and poetical.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the answer made by Periklês in defence of his policy
-against the opposition headed by Thucydidês. And as far as we can
-make out the ground taken by both parties, the answer was perfectly
-satisfactory. For when we look at the very large sum which Periklês
-continually kept in reserve in the treasury, no one could reasonably
-complain that his expenditure for ornamental purposes was carried so
-far as to encroach upon the exigences of defence. What Thucydidês
-and his partisans appear to have urged, was, that this common fund
-should still<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[p. 18]</span>
-continue to be spent in aggressive warfare against the Persian
-king, in Egypt and elsewhere,—conformably to the projects pursued
-by Kimon during his life.<a id="FNanchor_31" href="#Footnote_31"
-class="fnanchor">[31]</a> But Periklês was right in contending that
-such outlay would have been simply wasteful; of no use either to
-Athens or her allies, though risking all the chances of distant
-defeat, such as had been experienced a few years before in Egypt.
-The Persian force was already kept away, both from the waters of the
-Ægean and the coast of Asia, either by the stipulations of the treaty
-of Kallias, or—if that treaty be supposed apocryphal—by a conduct
-practically the same as those stipulations would have enforced. The
-<i>allies</i>, indeed, might have had some ground of complaint against
-Periklês, either for not reducing the amount of tribute required from
-them, seeing that it was more than sufficient for the legitimate
-purposes of the confederacy, or for not having collected their
-positive sentiment as to the disposal of it. But we do not find that
-this was the argument adopted by Thucydidês and his party, nor was it
-calculated to find favor either with aristocrats or democrats, in the
-Athenian assembly.</p>
-
-<p>Admitting the injustice of Athens—an injustice common to both the
-parties in that city, not less to Kimon than to Periklês—in acting
-as despot instead of chief, and in discontinuing all appeal to the
-active and hearty concurrence of her numerous allies, we shall
-find that the schemes of Periklês were at the same time eminently
-Pan-Hellenic. In strengthening and ornamenting Athens, in developing
-the full activity of her citizens, in providing temples, religious
-offerings, works of art, solemn festivals, all of surpassing
-attraction,—he intended to exalt her into something greater than an
-imperial city with numerous dependent allies. He wished to make her
-the centre of Grecian feeling, the stimulus of Grecian intellect,
-and the type of strong democratical patriotism combined with full
-liberty of individual taste and aspiration. He wished not merely
-to retain the adherence of the subject states, but to attract the
-admiration and spontaneous deference of independent neighbors, so as
-to procure for Athens a moral ascendency much beyond the range of
-her direct power. And he succeeded in elevating the city to<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[p. 19]</span> a visible grandeur,<a
-id="FNanchor_32" href="#Footnote_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a>
-which made her appear even much stronger than she really was,—and
-which had the farther effect of softening to the minds of the
-subjects the humiliating sense of obedience; while it served as a
-normal school, open to strangers from all quarters, of energetic
-action even under full license of criticism,—of elegant pursuits
-economically followed,—and of a love for knowledge without enervation
-of character. Such were the views of Periklês in regard to his
-country, during the years which preceded the Peloponnesian war, as
-we find them recorded in his celebrated Funeral Oration, pronounced
-in the first year of that war,—an exposition forever memorable of
-the sentiment and purpose of Athenian democracy, as conceived by its
-ablest president.</p>
-
-<p>So bitter, however, was the opposition made by Thucydidês and
-his party to this projected expenditure,—so violent and pointed
-did the scission of aristocrats and democrats become,—that the
-dispute came after no long time to that ultimate appeal which the
-Athenian constitution provided for the case of two opposite and
-nearly equal party-leaders,—a vote of ostracism. Of the particular
-details which preceded this ostracism, we are not informed; but we
-see clearly that the general position was such as the ostracism
-was intended to meet. Probably the vote was proposed by the party
-of Thucydidês, in order to procure the banishment of Periklês, the
-more powerful person of the two, and the most likely to excite
-popular jealousy. The challenge was accepted by Periklês and his
-friends, and the result of the voting was such that an adequate
-legal majority condemned Thucydidês to ostracism.<a id="FNanchor_33"
-href="#Footnote_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> And it seems that
-the majority must have been very decisive, for the party of
-Thucydidês was completely broken by it: and we hear of no other
-single individual equally formidable as a leader of opposition,
-throughout all the remaining life of Periklês.</p> <p><span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[p. 20]</span></p> <p>The ostracism of
-Thucydidês apparently took place about two years<a id="FNanchor_34"
-href="#Footnote_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a> after the conclusion
-of the thirty years’ truce,—443-442 <small>B.C.</small>,—and it
-is to the period immediately following that the great Periklêan
-works belong. The southern wall of the acropolis had been built
-out of the spoils brought by Kimon from his Persian expeditions;
-but the third of the long walls connecting Athens with the harbor
-was the proposition of Periklês, at what precise time we do not
-know. The long walls originally completed—not long after the
-battle of Tanagra, as has already been stated—were two, one from
-Athens to Peiræus, another from Athens to Phalêrum: the space
-between them was broad, and if in the hands of an enemy, the
-communication with Peiræus would be interrupted. Accordingly,
-Periklês now induced the people to construct a third or intermediate
-wall, running parallel with the first wall to Peiræus, and
-within a short distance<a id="FNanchor_35" href="#Footnote_35"
-class="fnanchor">[35]</a>—seemingly near one furlong—from it: so that
-the communication between the city and the port was placed beyond
-all possible interruption, even assuming an enemy to have got within
-the Phaleric wall. It was seemingly about this time, too, that the
-splendid docks and arsenal in Peiræus, alleged by Isokratês to have
-cost one thousand talents, were constructed:<a id="FNanchor_36"
-href="#Footnote_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> while the town itself
-of Peiræus was laid out anew with straight streets intersecting at
-right angles. Apparently, this was something new in Greece,—the
-towns generally, and Athens itself in particular, having been
-built without any symmetry, or width, or continuity of streets:<a
-id="FNanchor_37" href="#Footnote_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a>
-and Hippodamus the Milesian, a man of considerable attainments in
-the physical philosophy of the age, derived much renown as the
-earliest town architect, for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[p.
-21]</span> having laid out the Peiræus on a regular plan. The
-market-place, or one of them at least, permanently bore his
-name,—the Hippodamian agora.<a id="FNanchor_38" href="#Footnote_38"
-class="fnanchor">[38]</a> At a time when so many great architects
-were displaying their genius in the construction of temples, we
-are not surprised to hear that the structure of towns began to be
-regularized also: moreover, we are told that the new colonial town of
-Thurii, to which Hippodamus went as a settler, was also constructed
-in the same systematic form as to straight and wide streets.<a
-id="FNanchor_39" href="#Footnote_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a></p>
-
-<p>The new scheme upon which the Peiræus was laid out, was not
-without its value as one visible proof of the naval grandeur of
-Athens. But the buildings in Athens and on the acropolis formed the
-real glory of the Periklêan age. A new theatre, termed the Odeon,
-was constructed for musical and poetical representations at the
-great Panathenaic solemnity; next, the splendid temple of Athênê,
-called the Parthenon, with all its masterpieces of decorative
-sculpture and reliefs; lastly, the costly portals erected to adorn
-the entrance of the acropolis, on the western side of the hill,
-through which the solemn processions on festival days were conducted.
-It appears that the Odeon and the Parthenon were both finished
-between 445 and 437 <small>B.C.</small>: the Propylæa somewhat later,
-between 437 and 431 <small>B.C.</small>, in which latter year the
-Peloponnesian war began.<a id="FNanchor_40" href="#Footnote_40"
-class="fnanchor">[40]</a> Progress was also made in restoring
-or reconstructing the Erechtheion, or ancient temple of Athênê
-Polias, the patron goddess of the city,—which had been burnt in
-the invasion of Xerxes; but the breaking out of the Peloponnesian
-war seems to have prevented the completion of this, as well as of
-the great temple of Dêmêter, at Eleusis, for the celebration of
-the Eleusinian mysteries,—that of Athênê, at Sunium,—and that of
-Nemesis, at Rhamnus. Nor was the sculpture less memorable than the
-architecture: three statues of Athênê, all by the hand of Pheidias,
-decorated the acropolis,—one colossal, forty-seven feet high, of
-ivory, in the Parthenon,<a id="FNanchor_41" href="#Footnote_41"
-class="fnanchor">[41]</a>—a second of bronze, called the Lemnian
-Athênê,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[p. 22]</span>—a third of
-colossal magnitude, also in bronze, called Athênê Promachos, placed
-between the Propylæa and the Parthenon, and visible from afar off,
-even to the navigator approaching Peiræus by sea.</p>
-
-<p>It is not, of course, to Periklês that the renown of these
-splendid productions of art belongs: but the great sculptors and
-architects by whom they were conceived and executed, belonged to
-that same period of expanding and stimulating Athenian democracy
-which called forth a similar creative genius in oratory, in dramatic
-poetry, and in philosophical speculation. One man especially, of
-immortal name,—Pheidias,—born a little before the battle of Marathon,
-was the original mind in whom the sublime ideal conceptions of
-genuine art appear to have disengaged themselves from that hardness
-of execution and adherence to a consecrated type, which marked the
-efforts of his predecessors.<a id="FNanchor_42" href="#Footnote_42"
-class="fnanchor">[42]</a> He was the great director and
-superintendent of all those decorative additions whereby Periklês
-imparted to Athens a majesty such as had never before belonged to
-any Grecian city: the architects of the Parthenon and the other
-buildings—Iktînus, Kallikratês, Korœbus, Mnesiklês, and others—worked
-under his superintendence: and he had, besides, a school of pupils
-and subordinates to whom the mechanical part of his labors was
-confided. With all the great additions which Pheidias made to the
-grandeur of Athens, his last and greatest achievement was out of
-Athens,—the colossal statue of Zeus, in the great temple of Olympia,
-executed in the years immediately preceding the Peloponnesian war.
-The effect produced by this stupendous work, sixty feet high, in
-ivory and gold, embodying in visible majesty some of the grandest
-conceptions of Grecian poetry and religion, upon the minds of all
-beholders for many centuries successively,—was such as never has
-been, and probably never will be, equalled in the annals of art,
-sacred or profane.</p>
-
-<p>Considering these prodigious achievements in the field of
-art only as they bear upon Athenian and Grecian history, they
-are<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[p. 23]</span> phenomena of
-extraordinary importance. When we read the profound impression which
-they produced upon Grecian spectators of a later age, we may judge
-how immense was the effect upon that generation which saw them both
-begun and finished. In the year 480 <small>B.C.</small>, Athens had
-been ruined by the occupation of Xerxes: since that period, the
-Greeks had seen, first, the rebuilding and fortifying of the city
-on an enlarged scale,—next, the addition of Peiræus with its docks
-and magazines,—thirdly, the junction of the two by the long walls,
-thus including the most numerous concentrated population, wealth,
-arms, ships, etc., in Greece,<a id="FNanchor_43" href="#Footnote_43"
-class="fnanchor">[43]</a>—lastly, the rapid creation of so many new
-miracles of art,—the sculptures of Pheidias as well as the paintings
-of the Thasian painter, Polygnôtus, in the temple of Theseus, and
-in the portico called Pœkilê. Plutarch observes<a id="FNanchor_44"
-href="#Footnote_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> that the celerity with
-which the works were completed was the most remarkable circumstance
-connected with them; and so it probably might be, in respect to
-the effect upon the contemporary Greeks. The gigantic strides by
-which Athens had reached her maritime empire were now immediately
-succeeded by a series of works which stamped her as the imperial
-city of Greece, gave to her an appearance of power even greater
-than the reality, and especially put to shame the old-fashioned
-simplicity of Sparta.<a id="FNanchor_45" href="#Footnote_45"
-class="fnanchor">[45]</a> The cost was doubtless prodigious, and
-could only have been borne at a time when there was a large treasure
-in the acropolis, as well as a considerable tribute annually coming
-in: if we may trust a computation which seems to rest on plausible
-grounds, it cannot have been much less than three thousand talents in
-the aggregate,—about six hundred and ninety thousand pounds.<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[p. 24]</span><a id="FNanchor_46"
-href="#Footnote_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> The expenditure of so
-large a sum was, of course, the source of great private gain to the
-contractors, tradesmen, merchants, artisans of various descriptions,
-etc., concerned in it: in one way or another, it distributed itself
-over a large portion of the whole city. And it appears that the
-materials employed for much of the work were designedly of the most
-costly description, as being most consistent with the reverence
-due to the gods: marble was rejected as too common for the statue
-of Athênê, and ivory employed in its place;<a id="FNanchor_47"
-href="#Footnote_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> while the gold with
-which it was surrounded weighed not less than forty talents.<a
-id="FNanchor_48" href="#Footnote_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a> A
-large expenditure for such purposes, considered as pious towards
-the gods, was at the same time imposing in reference to Grecian
-feeling, which regarded with admiration every variety of public show
-and magnificence, and repaid by grateful deference the rich men who
-indulged in it. Periklês knew well that the visible splendor of
-the city, so new to all his contemporaries, would cause her great
-real power to appear even greater than its reality, and would thus
-procure for her a real, though unacknowledged influence—perhaps even
-an ascendency—over all cities of the Grecian name. And it is certain
-that even among those who most hated and feared her, at the outbreak
-of the Peloponnesian war, there prevailed a powerful sentiment of
-involuntary deference.</p>
-
-<p>A step taken by Periklês, apparently not long after the
-commencement of the thirty years’ truce, evinces how much this
-ascendency was in his direct aim, and how much he connected it
-with views both of harmony and usefulness for Greece generally.
-He prevailed upon the people to send envoys to every city of the
-Greek name, great and small, inviting each to appoint deputies for
-a congress to be held at Athens. Three points were to be discussed
-in this intended congress. 1. The restitution of those temples
-which had been burnt by the Persian invaders. 2. The fulfilment of
-such vows, as on that occasion had been made to the gods. 3. The
-safety of the sea and of maritime commerce for all. Twenty elderly
-Athenians were sent round<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[p.
-25]</span> to obtain the convocation of this congress at Athens,—a
-Pan-Hellenic congress for Pan-Hellenic purposes. But those who were
-sent to Bœotia and Peloponnesus completely failed in their object,
-from the jealousy, noway astonishing, of Sparta and her allies: of
-the rest we hear nothing, for this refusal was quite sufficient to
-frustrate the whole scheme.<a id="FNanchor_49" href="#Footnote_49"
-class="fnanchor">[49]</a> It is to be remarked that the dependent
-allies of Athens appear to have been summoned just as much as the
-cities perfectly autonomous; so that their tributary relation to
-Athens was not understood to degrade them. We may sincerely regret
-that such congress did not take effect, as it might have opened
-some new possibilities of converging tendency and alliance for the
-dispersed fractions of the Greek name,—a comprehensive benefit, to
-which Sparta was at once incompetent and indifferent, but which
-might, perhaps, have been realized under Athens, and seems in this
-case to have been sincerely aimed at by Periklês. The events of
-the Peloponnesian war, however, extinguished all hopes of any such
-union.</p>
-
-<p>The interval of fourteen years, between the beginning of the
-thirty years’ truce and that of the Peloponnesian war, was by no
-means one of undisturbed peace to Athens. In the sixth year of that
-period occurred the formidable revolt of Samos.</p>
-
-<p>That island appears to have been the most powerful of all
-the allies of Athens,<a id="FNanchor_50" href="#Footnote_50"
-class="fnanchor">[50]</a>—more powerful even than Chios or Lesbos,
-and standing on the same footing as the two latter; that is,
-paying no tribute-money,—a privilege when compared with the body
-of the allies,—but furnishing ships and men when called upon, and
-retaining, subject to this condition, its complete autonomy, its
-oligarchical government, its fortifications, and its military
-force. Like most of the other islands near the coast, Samos<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[p. 26]</span> possessed a portion
-of territory on the mainland, between which and the territory of
-Milêtus, lay the small town of Priênê, one of the twelve original
-members contributing to the Pan-Ionic solemnity. Respecting the
-possession of this town of Priênê, a war broke out between the
-Samians and Milesians, in the sixth year of the thirty years’
-truce (<small>B.C.</small> 440-439): whether the town
-had before been independent, we do not know, but in this war the
-Milesians were worsted, and it fell into the hands of the Samians.
-The defeated Milesians, enrolled as they were among the tributary
-allies of Athens, complained to her of the conduct of the Samians,
-and their complaint was seconded by a party in Samos itself opposed
-to the oligarchy and its proceedings. The Athenians required the
-two disputing cities to bring the matter before discussion and
-award at Athens, with which the Samians refused to comply:<a
-id="FNanchor_51" href="#Footnote_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a>
-whereupon an armament of forty ships was despatched from Athens
-to the island, and established in it a democratical government;
-leaving in it a garrison, and carrying away to Lemnos fifty men and
-as many boys from the principal oligarchical families, to serve as
-hostages. Of these families, however, a certain number retired to
-the mainland, where they entered into negotiations with Pissuthnês,
-the satrap of Sardis, to procure aid and restoration. Obtaining from
-him seven hundred mercenary troops, and passing over in the night to
-the island, by previous concert with the oligarchical party, they
-overcame the Samian democracy as well as the Athenian garrison,
-who were sent over as prisoners to Pissuthnês. They were farther
-lucky enough to succeed in stealing away from Lemnos their own
-recently deposited hostages, and they then proclaimed open revolt
-against Athens, in which Byzantium also joined. It seems re<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[p. 27]</span>markable, that though, by
-such a proceeding, they would of course draw upon themselves the full
-strength of Athens, yet their first step was to resume aggressive
-hostilities against Milêtus,<a id="FNanchor_52" href="#Footnote_52"
-class="fnanchor">[52]</a> whither they sailed with a powerful naval
-force of seventy ships, twenty of them carrying troops aboard.</p>
-
-<p>Immediately on the receipt of this grave intelligence, a
-fleet of sixty triremes—probably all that were in complete
-readiness—was despatched to Samos under ten generals, two of whom
-were Periklês himself and the poet Sophoklês,<a id="FNanchor_53"
-href="#Footnote_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> both seemingly included
-among the ten ordinary stratêgi of the year. But it was necessary
-to employ sixteen of these ships, partly in summoning contingents
-from Chios and Lesbos, to which islands Sophoklês went in person;<a
-id="FNanchor_54" href="#Footnote_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a>
-partly in keeping watch off the coast of Karia for the arrival of
-the Phenician fleet, which report stated to be approaching; so that
-Periklês had only forty-four ships remaining in his squadron. Yet
-he did not hesitate to attack the Samian fleet of seventy ships
-on its way back from Milêtus, near the island of Tragia, and was
-victorious in the action. Presently, he was reinforced by forty
-ships from Athens, and by twenty-five from Chios and Lesbos, so
-as to be able to disembark at Samos, where he overcame the Samian
-land-force, and blocked up the harbor with a portion of his fleet,
-surrounding the city on the land-side with a triple wall. Meanwhile,
-the Samians had sent Stesagoras with five ships to press the coming
-of the Phenician fleet, and the report of their approach became
-again so prevalent that Periklês felt obliged to take sixty ships,
-out of the total one hundred and twenty-five, to watch for them off
-the coast of Kaunus and Karia, where he remained for about fourteen
-days. The Phenician fleet<a id="FNanchor_55" href="#Footnote_55"
-class="fnanchor">[55]</a> never came, though Diodorus affirms that it
-was actually on its voyage.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[p.
-28]</span> Pissuthnês certainly seems to have promised, and the
-Samians to have expected it: but I incline to believe that, though
-willing to hold out hopes and encourage revolt among the Athenian
-allies, the satrap, nevertheless, did not choose openly to violate
-the convention of Kallias, whereby the Persians were forbidden to
-send a fleet westward of the Chelidonian promontory. The departure
-of Periklês, however, so much weakened the Athenian fleet off
-Samos, that the Samians, suddenly sailing out of their harbor in an
-opportune moment, at the instigation and under the command of one
-of their most eminent citizens, the philosopher Melissus,—surprised
-and ruined the blockading squadron, and gained a victory over the
-remaining fleet, before the ships could be fairly got out to sea.<a
-id="FNanchor_56" href="#Footnote_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a> For
-fourteen days they remained masters of the sea, carrying in and
-out all that they thought proper: nor was it until the return of
-Periklês that they were again blocked up. Reinforcements, however,
-were now multiplied to the blockading squadron,—from Athens, forty
-ships, under Thucydidês,<a id="FNanchor_57" href="#Footnote_57"
-class="fnanchor">[57]</a> Agnon, and Phormion, and twenty under
-Tlepole<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[p. 29]</span>mus and
-Antiklês, besides thirty from Chios and Lesbos,—making altogether
-near two hundred sail. Against this overwhelming force, Melissus
-and the Samians made an unavailing attempt at resistance, but were
-presently quite blocked up, and remained so for nearly nine months,
-until they could hold out no longer. They then capitulated, being
-compelled to raze their fortifications, to surrender all their ships
-of war, to give hostages for future good conduct, and to make good
-by stated instalments the whole expense of the enterprise, said to
-have reached one thousand talents. The Byzantines, too, made their
-submission at the same time.<a id="FNanchor_58" href="#Footnote_58"
-class="fnanchor">[58]</a></p>
-
-<p>Two or three circumstances deserve notice respecting this revolt,
-as illustrating the existing condition of the Athenian empire.
-First, that the whole force of Athens, together with the contingents
-from Chios and Lesbos, was necessary in order to crush it, so that
-even Byzantium, which joined in the revolt, seems to have been left
-unassailed. Now, it is remarkable that none of the dependent allies
-near Byzantium, or anywhere else, availed themselves of so favorable
-an opportunity to revolt also: a fact which seems plainly to imply
-that there was little positive discontent then prevalent among them.
-Had the revolt spread to other cities, probably Pissuthnês might have
-realized his promise of bringing in the Phenician fleet, which would
-have been a serious calamity for the Ægean Greeks, and was only kept
-off by the unbroken maintenance of the Athenian empire.</p>
-
-<p>Next, the revolted Samians applied for aid, not only to
-Pissuthnês, but also to Sparta and her allies; among whom, at
-a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[p. 30]</span> special meeting,
-the question of compliance or refusal was formally debated.
-Notwithstanding the thirty years’ truce then subsisting, of which
-only six years had elapsed, and which had been noway violated by
-Athens,—many of the allies of Sparta voted for assisting the Samians:
-what part Sparta herself took, we do not know,—but the Corinthians
-were the main and decided advocates for the negative. They not only
-contended that the truce distinctly forbade compliance with the
-Samian request, but also recognized the right of each confederacy
-to punish its own recusant members, and this was the decision
-ultimately adopted, for which the Corinthians afterwards took credit,
-in the eyes of Athens, as the chief authors.<a id="FNanchor_59"
-href="#Footnote_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> Certainly, if the
-contrary policy had been pursued, the Athenian empire might have been
-in great danger, the Phenician fleet would probably have been brought
-in also, and the future course of events might have been greatly
-altered.</p>
-
-<p>Again, after the reconquest of Samos, we should assume it almost
-as a matter of certainty, that the Athenians would renew the
-democratical government which they had set up just before the revolt.
-Yet, if they did so, it must have been again overthrown, without
-any attempt to uphold it on the part of Athens. For we hardly hear
-of Samos again, until twenty-seven years afterwards, towards the
-latter division of the Peloponnesian war, in 412 <small>B.C.</small>,
-and it then appears with an established oligarchical government of
-geomori, or landed proprietors, against which the people make a
-successful rising during the course of that year.<a id="FNanchor_60"
-href="#Footnote_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a> As Samos remained,
-during the interval between 439 <small>B.C.</small> and 412
-<small>B.C.</small>, unfortified, deprived of its fleet, and enrolled
-among the tribute-paying allies of Athens,—and as it, nevertheless,
-either retained or acquired its oligarchical government; so we
-may conclude that Athens cannot have systematically interfered to
-democratize by violence the subject-allies, in cases where the
-natural tendency of parties ran towards oligarchy. The condition
-of Lesbos at the time of its revolt, hereafter to be related,
-will be found to confirm this conclusion.<a id="FNanchor_61"
-href="#Footnote_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[p. 31]</span></p>
-
-<p>On returning to Athens after the reconquest of Samos, Periklês
-was chosen to pronounce the funeral oration over the citizens
-slain in the war, to whom, according to custom, solemn and public
-obsequies were celebrated in the suburb called Kerameikus. This
-custom appears to have been introduced shortly after the Persian
-war,<a id="FNanchor_62" href="#Footnote_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a>
-and would doubtless contribute to stimulate the patriotism of
-the citizens, especially when the speaker elected to deliver it
-was of the personal dignity as well as the oratorical powers of
-Periklês. He was twice public funeral orator by the choice of the
-citizens: once after the Samian success, and a second time in the
-first year of the Peloponnesian war. His discourse on the first
-occasion has not reached us,<a id="FNanchor_63" href="#Footnote_63"
-class="fnanchor">[63]</a> but the second has been fortunately
-preserved, in substance at least, by Thucydidês, who also briefly
-describes the funeral ceremony,—doubtless the same on all occasions.
-The bones of the deceased warriors were exposed in tents three days
-before the ceremony, in order that the relatives of each might
-have the opportunity of bringing offerings: they were then placed
-in coffins of cypress, and carried forth on carts to the public
-burial-place at the Kerameikus; one coffin for each of the ten
-tribes, and one empty couch, formally laid out, to represent those
-warriors whose bones had not been discovered or collected. The female
-relatives of each followed the carts, with loud wailings, and after
-them a numerous procession both of citizens and strangers. So soon
-as the bones had been consigned to the grave, some distinguished
-citizen,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[p. 32]</span> specially
-chosen for the purpose, mounted an elevated stage, and addressed to
-the multitude an appropriate discourse. Such was the effect produced
-by that of Periklês after the Samian expedition, that, when he had
-concluded, the audience present testified their emotion in the
-liveliest manner, and the women especially crowned him with garlands,
-like a victorious athlete.<a id="FNanchor_64" href="#Footnote_64"
-class="fnanchor">[64]</a> Only Elpinikê, sister of the deceased
-Kimon, reminded him that the victories of her brother had been more
-felicitous, as gained over Persians and Phenicians, and not over
-Greeks and kinsmen. And the contemporary poet Ion, the friend of
-Kimon, reported what he thought an unseemly boast of Periklês,—to the
-effect that Agamemnon had spent ten years in taking a foreign city,
-while <i>he</i> in nine months had reduced the first and most powerful of
-all the Ionic communities.<a id="FNanchor_65" href="#Footnote_65"
-class="fnanchor">[65]</a> But if we possessed the actual speech
-pronounced, we should probably find that he assigned all the honor
-of the exploit to Athens and her citizens generally, placing their
-achievement in favorable comparison with that of Agamemnon and his
-host,—not himself with Agamemnon.</p>
-
-<p>Whatever may be thought of this boast, there can be no doubt
-that the result of the Samian war not only rescued the Athenian
-empire from great peril,<a id="FNanchor_66" href="#Footnote_66"
-class="fnanchor">[66]</a> but rendered it stronger than ever:
-while the foundation of Amphipolis, which was effected two years
-afterwards, strengthened it still farther. Nor do we hear, during the
-ensuing few years, of any farther tendencies to disaffection among
-its members, until the period immediately before the Peloponnesian
-war. The feeling common among them towards Athens, seems to have
-been neither attachment nor hatred, but simple indifference and
-acquiescence in her supremacy. Such amount of positive discontent
-as really existed among them, arose, not from actual hardships
-suffered, but from the general political instinct of the Greek
-mind,—desire of separate auto<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[p.
-33]</span>nomy for each city; which manifested itself in each,
-through the oligarchical party, whose power was kept down by
-Athens, and was stimulated by the sentiment communicated from the
-Grecian communities without the Athenian empire. According to that
-sentiment, the condition of a subject-ally of Athens was treated
-as one of degradation and servitude: and in proportion as fear and
-hatred of Athens became more and more predominant among the allies
-of Sparta, they gave utterance to the sentiment more and more
-emphatically, so as to encourage discontent artificially among the
-subject-allies of the Athenian empire. Possessing complete mastery
-of the sea, and every sort of superiority requisite for holding
-empire over islands, Athens had yet no sentiment to appeal to in
-her subjects, calculated to render her empire popular, except that
-of common democracy, which seems at first to have acted without
-any care on her part to encourage it, until the progress of the
-Peloponnesian war made such encouragement a part of her policy.
-And had she even tried sincerely to keep up in the allies the
-feeling of a common interest, and the attachment to a permanent
-confederacy, the instinct of political separation would probably
-have baffled all her efforts. But she took no such pains,—with the
-usual morality that grows up in the minds of the actual possessors
-of power, she conceived herself entitled to exact obedience as her
-right; and some of the Athenian speakers in Thucydidês go so far
-as to disdain all pretence of legitimate power, even such as might
-fairly be set up, resting the supremacy of Athens on the naked
-plea of superior force.<a id="FNanchor_67" href="#Footnote_67"
-class="fnanchor">[67]</a> As the allied cities were mostly under
-democracies,—through the indirect influence rather than the
-systematic dictation of Athens,—yet each having its own internal
-aristocracy in a state of opposition; so the movements for revolt
-against Athens originated with the aristocracy or with some few
-citizens apart: while the people, though sharing more or less in the
-desire for autonomy, had yet either a fear of their own aristocracy
-or a sympathy with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[p. 34]</span>
-Athens, which made them always backward in revolting, sometimes
-decidedly opposed to it. Neither Periklês nor Kleon, indeed, lay
-stress on the attachment of the people as distinguished from that
-of the Few, in these dependent cities; but the argument is strongly
-insisted on by Diodorus,<a id="FNanchor_68" href="#Footnote_68"
-class="fnanchor">[68]</a> in the discussion respecting Mitylênê after
-its surrender: and as the war advanced, the question of alliance with
-Athens or Sparta became more and more identified with the internal
-preponderance of democracy or oligarchy in each.<a id="FNanchor_69"
-href="#Footnote_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> We shall find that
-in most of those cases of actual revolt where we are informed of
-the preceding circumstances, the step is adopted or contrived by a
-small number of oligarchical malcontents, without consulting the
-general voice; while in those cases where the general assembly is
-consulted beforehand, there is manifested indeed a preference for
-autonomy, but nothing like a hatred of Athens or decided inclination
-to break with her. In the case of Mitylênê,<a id="FNanchor_70"
-href="#Footnote_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a> in the fourth year of
-the war, it was the aristocratical government which revolted, while
-the people, as soon as they obtained arms, actually declared in
-favor of Athens: and the secession of Chios, the greatest of all the
-allies, in the twentieth year of the Peloponnesian war, even after
-all the hardships which the allies had been called upon to bear in
-that war, and after the ruinous disasters which Athens had sustained
-before Syracuse,—was both prepared beforehand and accomplished by
-secret negotiations of the Chian oligarchy, not only without the
-concurrence, but against the inclination, of their own people.<a
-id="FNanchor_71" href="#Footnote_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a>
-In like manner, the revolt of Thasos would not have occurred,
-had not the Thasian democracy been previ<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_35">[p. 35]</span>ously subverted by the Athenian Peisander
-and his oligarchical confederates. So in Akanthus, in Amphipolis,
-in Mendê, and those other Athenian dependencies which were wrested
-from Athens by Brasidas, we find the latter secretly introduced by
-a few conspirators, while the bulk of the citizens do not hail him
-at once as a deliverer, like men sick of Athenian supremacy: they
-acquiesce, not without debate, when Brasidas is already in the town,
-and his demeanor, just as well as conciliating, soon gains their
-esteem: but neither in Akanthus nor in Amphipolis would he have
-been admitted by the free decision of the citizens, if they had not
-been alarmed for the safety of their friends, their properties,
-and their harvest, still exposed in the lands without the walls.<a
-id="FNanchor_72" href="#Footnote_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a>
-These particular examples warrant us in affirming, that though the
-oligarchy in the various allied cities desired eagerly to shake
-off the supremacy of Athens, the people were always backward in
-following them, sometimes even opposed, and hardly ever willing to
-make sacrifices for the object. They shared the universal Grecian
-desire for separate autonomy,<a id="FNanchor_73" href="#Footnote_73"
-class="fnanchor">[73]</a> felt the Athenian empire as an extraneous
-pressure which they would have been glad to shake off, whenever the
-change could be made with safety: but their condition was not one
-of positive hardship, nor did they overlook the hazardous side of
-such a change,—partly from the coercive hand of Athens, partly from
-new enemies against whom Athens had hitherto protected them, and not
-least, from their own oligarchy. Of course, the different allied
-cities were not all animated by the same feelings, some being more
-averse to Athens than others.</p>
-
-<p>The particular modes in which Athenian supremacy was felt as a
-grievance by the allies appear to have been chiefly three. 1. The
-annual tribute. 2. The encroachments, exactions, or perhaps plunder,
-committed by individual Athenians, who would often take advantage of
-their superior position, either as serving in the naval armaments, as
-invested with the function of inspectors as placed in garrison, or as
-carrying on some private speculation. 3. The obligation under which
-the allies were placed, of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[p.
-36]</span> bringing a large proportion of their judicial trials to be
-settled before the dikasteries at Athens.</p>
-
-<p>As to the tribute, I have before remarked that its amount had
-been but little raised from its first settlement down to the
-beginning of the Peloponnesian war, at which time it was six
-hundred talents yearly:<a id="FNanchor_74" href="#Footnote_74"
-class="fnanchor">[74]</a> it appears to have been reviewed, and the
-apportionment corrected, in every fifth year, at which period the
-collecting officers may probably have been changed; but we shall
-afterwards find it becoming larger and more burdensome. The same
-gradual increase may probably be affirmed respecting the second
-head of inconvenience,—vexation caused to the allies by individual
-Athenians, chiefly officers of armaments, or powerful citizens.<a
-id="FNanchor_75" href="#Footnote_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a>
-Doubtless this was always more or less a real grievance, from the
-moment when the Athenians became despots in place of chiefs, but it
-was probably not very serious in extent until after the commencement
-of the Peloponnesian war, when revolt on the part of the allies
-became more apprehended, and when garrisons, inspectors, and
-tribute-gathering ships became more essential in the working of the
-Athenian empire.</p>
-
-<p>But the third circumstance above noticed—the subjection of
-the allied cities to the Athenian dikasteries—has been more
-dwelt upon as a grievance than the second, and seems to have
-been unduly exaggerated. We can hardly doubt that the beginning
-of this jurisdiction exercised by the Athenian dikasteries dates
-with the synod of Delos, at the time of the first formation of the
-confederacy. It was an indispensable element of that confederacy,
-that the members should forego their right of private war among each
-other, and submit their differences to peaceable arbitration,—a
-covenant introduced even into alliances much less intimate than
-this was, and absolutely essential to the efficient maintenance of
-any common action against<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[p.
-37]</span> Persia.<a id="FNanchor_76" href="#Footnote_76"
-class="fnanchor">[76]</a> Of course, many causes of dispute, public
-as well as private, must have arisen among these wide-spread islands
-and seaports of the Ægean, connected with each other by relations
-of fellow-feeling, of trade, and of common apprehensions. The
-synod of Delos, composed of the deputies of all, was the natural
-board of arbitration for such disputes, and a habit must thus have
-been formed, of recognizing a sort of federal tribunal,—to decide
-peaceably how far each ally had faithfully discharged its duties,
-both towards the confederacy collectively, and towards other allies
-with their individual citizens separately,—as well as to enforce
-its decisions and punish refractory members, pursuant to the right
-which Sparta and her confederacy claimed and exercised also.<a
-id="FNanchor_77" href="#Footnote_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> Now
-from the beginning, the Athenians were the guiding and enforcing
-presidents of this synod, and when it gradually died away, they were
-found occupying its place as well as clothed with its functions. It
-was in this manner that their judicial authority over the allies
-appears first to have begun, as the confederacy became changed
-into an Athenian empire,—the judicial functions of the synod being
-transferred<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[p. 38]</span> along
-with the common treasure to Athens, and doubtless much extended. And
-on the whole, these functions must have been productive of more good
-than evil to the allies themselves, especially to the weakest and
-most defenceless among them.</p>
-
-<p>Among the thousand towns which paid tribute to Athens,—taking this
-numerical statement of Aristophanês, not in its exact meaning, but
-simply as a great number,—if a small town, or one of its citizens,
-had cause of complaint against a larger, there was no channel
-except the synod of Delos, or the Athenian tribunal, through which
-it could have any reasonable assurance of fair trial or justice.
-It is not to be supposed that all the private complaints and suits
-between citizen and citizen, in each respective subject town, were
-carried up for trial to Athens: yet we do not know distinctly how
-the line was drawn between matters carried up thither and matters
-tried at home. The subject cities appear to have been interdicted
-from the power of capital punishment, which could only be inflicted
-after previous trial and condemnation at Athens:<a id="FNanchor_78"
-href="#Footnote_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> so that the latter
-reserved to herself the cognizance of most of the grave crimes,—or
-what may be called “the higher justice” generally. And the political
-accusations preferred by citizen against citizen, in any subject
-city, for alleged treason, corruption, non-fulfilment of public duty,
-etc., were doubtless carried to Athens for trial,—perhaps the most
-important part of her jurisdiction.</p>
-
-<p>But the maintenance of this judicial supremacy was not intended
-by Athens for the substantive object of amending the administration
-of justice in each separate allied city: it went rather to regulate
-the relations between city and city,—between citizens of different
-cities,—between Athenian citizens or officers, and any of these
-allied cities with which they had relations,—between each city
-itself, as a dependent government with contending political parties,
-and the imperial head, Athens. All these were problems which imperial
-Athens was called on to solve, and the best way of solving them
-would have been through some common synod emanating from all the
-allies: putting this aside, we shall find that the solution provided
-by Athens was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[p. 39]</span>
-perhaps the next best, and we shall be the more induced to think
-so, when we compare it with the proceedings afterwards adopted by
-Sparta, when she had put down the Athenian empire. Under Sparta, the
-general rule was, to place each of the dependent cities under the
-government of a dekadarchy or oligarchical council of ten among its
-chief citizens, together with a Spartan harmost, or governor, having
-a small garrison under his orders. It will be found, when we come to
-describe the Spartan maritime empire, that these arrangements exposed
-each dependent city to very great violence and extortion, while,
-after all, they solved only a part of the problem: they served only
-to maintain each separate city under the dominion of Sparta, without
-contributing to regulate the dealings between the citizens of one
-and those of another, or to bind together the empire as a whole. Now
-the Athenians did not, as a system, place in their dependent cities,
-governors analogous to the harmosts, though they did so occasionally
-under special need; but their fleets and their officers were in
-frequent relation with these cities; and as the principal officers
-were noways indisposed to abuse their position, so the facility of
-complaint, constantly open to the Athenian popular dikastery, served
-both as redress and guarantee against misrule of this description. It
-was a guarantee which the allies themselves sensibly felt and valued,
-as we know from Thucydidês: the chief source from whence they had to
-apprehend evil was the Athenian officials and principal citizens,
-who could misemploy the power of Athens for their own private
-purposes,—but they looked up to the “Athenian Demos as a chastener
-of such evil-doers and as a harbor of refuge to themselves.”<a
-id="FNanchor_79" href="#Footnote_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a>
-If<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[p. 40]</span> the popular
-dikasteries at Athens had not been thus open, the allied cities would
-have suffered much more severely from the captains and officials
-of Athens in their individual capacity. And the maintenance of
-political harmony, between the imperial city and the subject ally,
-was insured by Athens through the jurisdiction of her dikasteries
-with much less cost of injustice and violence than by Sparta; for
-though oligarchical partisans might sometimes be unjustly condemned
-at Athens, yet such accidental wrong was immensely overpassed by the
-enormities of the Spartan harmosts and dekadarchies, who put numbers
-to death without any trial at all.</p>
-
-<p>So again, it is to be recollected that Athenian private citizens,
-not officially employed, were spread over the whole range of the
-empire as kleruchs, proprietors, or traders; of course, therefore,
-disputes would arise between them and the natives of the subject
-cities, as well as among these latter themselves, in cases where
-both parties did not belong to the same city. Now in such cases the
-Spartan imperial authority was so exercised as to afford little or
-no remedy, since the action of the harmost or the dekadarchy was
-confined to one separate city; while the Athenian dikasteries, with
-universal competence and public trial, afforded the only redress
-which the contingency admitted. If a Thasian citizen believed himself
-aggrieved by the historian Thucydidês, either as commander of the
-Athenian fleet off the station, or as proprietor of gold mines in
-Thrace, he had his remedy against the latter<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_41">[p. 41]</span> by accusation before the Athenian
-dikasteries, to which the most powerful Athenian was amenable not
-less than the meanest Thasian. To a citizen of any allied city, it
-might be an occasional hardship to be sued before the courts at
-Athens, but it was also often a valuable privilege to him to be
-able to sue before those courts others whom else he could not have
-reached. He had his share both of the benefit and of the hardship.
-Athens, if she robbed her subject-allies of their independence, at
-least gave them in exchange the advantage of a central and common
-judiciary authority; thus enabling each of them to enforce claims
-of justice against the rest, in a way which would not have been
-practicable, to the weaker at least, even in a state of general
-independence.</p>
-
-<p>Now Sparta seems not even to have attempted anything of the
-kind with regard to her subject-allies, being content to keep
-them under the rule of a harmost, and a partisan oligarchy; and
-we read anecdotes which show that no justice could be obtained at
-Sparta, even for the grossest outrages committed by the harmost,
-or by private Spartans out of Laconia. The two daughters of a
-Bœotian named Skedasus, of Leuktra in Bœotia, had been first
-violated and then slain by two Spartan citizens: the son of a
-citizen of Oreus, in Eubœa, had been also outraged and killed by
-the harmost Aristodêmus:<a id="FNanchor_80" href="#Footnote_80"
-class="fnanchor">[80]</a> in both cases the fathers went to Sparta to
-lay the enormity before the ephors and other authorities, and in both
-cases a deaf ear was turned to their complaints. But such crimes, if
-committed by Athenian citizens or officers, might have been brought
-to a formal exposure before the public sitting of the dikastery, and
-there can be no doubt that both would have been severely punished: we
-shall see hereafter that an enormity of this description, committed
-by the Athenian general Pachês, at Mitylênê, cost him his life
-before the Athenian dikasts.<a id="FNanchor_81" href="#Footnote_81"
-class="fnanchor">[81]</a> Xenophon, in the dark and one-sided
-representation which he gives of the Athenian democracy, remarks,
-that if the subject-allies had not been made amenable to justice, at
-Athens, they would have cared little for the people of Athens, and
-would<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[p. 42]</span> have paid
-court only to those individual Athenians—generals, trierarchs, or
-envoys—who visited the islands on service; but under the existing
-system, the subjects were compelled to visit Athens either as
-plaintiffs or defendants, and were thus under the necessity of paying
-court to the bulk of the people also,—that is, to those humbler
-citizens out of whom the dikasteries were formed; they supplicated
-the dikasts in court for favor or lenient dealing.<a id="FNanchor_82"
-href="#Footnote_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a> However true this may
-be, we must remark that it was a lighter lot to be brought for trial
-before the dikastery, than to be condemned without redress by the
-general on service, or to be forced to buy off his condemnation by
-a bribe; and, moreover, that the dikastery was open not merely to
-receive accusations against citizens of the allied cities, but also
-to entertain the complaints which they preferred against others.</p>
-
-<p>Assuming the dikasteries at Athens to be ever so defective as
-tribunals for administering justice, we must recollect that they
-were the same tribunals under which every Athenian citizen held
-his own fortune or reputation, and that the native of any subject
-city was admitted to the same chance of justice as the native
-of Athens. Accordingly, we find the Athenian envoy at Sparta,
-immediately before the Peloponnesian war, taking peculiar credit
-to the imperial city on this ground for equal dealing with her
-subject-allies. “If our power (he says) were to pass into other
-hands, the comparison would presently show how moderate we are in
-the use of it: but as regards us, our very moderation is unfairly
-turned to our disparagement rather than to our praise. For even
-though we put ourselves at disadvantage in matters litigated with our
-allies, and though we have appointed such matters to be judged among
-ourselves and under laws equal<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[p.
-43]</span> to both parties, we are represented as animated by
-nothing better than a love of litigation.”<a id="FNanchor_83"
-href="#Footnote_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a> “Our allies (he adds)
-would com<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[p. 44]</span>plain
-less if we made open use of our superior force with regard to
-them; but we discard such maxims, and deal with them upon<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[p. 45]</span> an equal footing: and
-they are so accustomed to this, that they think themselves entitled
-to complain at every trifling disappointment of their expectations.<a
-id="FNanchor_84" href="#Footnote_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a> They
-suffered worse hardships under the Persians before our empire began,
-and they would suffer worse under you (the Spartans), if you were
-to succeed in conquering us and making our empire yours.” History
-bears out the boast of the Athenian orator, both as to the time
-preceding and following the empire of Athens.<a id="FNanchor_85"
-href="#Footnote_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a> And an Athenian
-citizen, indeed, might well regard it, not as a hardship, but as a
-privilege, that subject-allies should be allowed to sue him before
-the dikastery, and to defend themselves before the same tribunal,
-either in case of wrong done to him, or in case of alleged treason
-to the imperial authority of Athens: they were thereby put upon a
-level with himself. Still more would he find reason to eulogize the
-universal competence of these dikasteries in providing a common legal
-authority for all disputes of the numerous distinct communities
-of the empire, one with another, and for the safe navigation and
-general commerce of the Ægean. That complaints were raised against
-it among the subject-allies, is noway surprising: for the empire
-of Athens generally was inconsistent with that separate autonomy
-to which every town thought itself entitled,—and this was one of
-its prominent and constantly operative institutions, as well as a
-striking mark of dependence to the subordinate communities. Yet we
-may safely affirm, that if empire was to be maintained at all, no way
-of maintaining it could be found at once less oppressive and more
-beneficial than the superintending competence of the dikasteries,—a
-system not taking its rise in the mere “love of litigation,” if,
-indeed, we are to reckon this a real feature in the Athenian
-character, which I shall take another opportunity of examining, much
-less in those<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[p. 46]</span>
-petty collateral interests indicated by Xenophon,<a id="FNanchor_86"
-href="#Footnote_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> such as the increased
-customs duty, rent of houses, and hire of slaves at Peiræus, and
-the larger profits of the heralds, arising from the influx of
-suitors. It was nothing but the power, originally inherent in the
-confederacy of Delos, of arbitration between members and enforcement
-of duties towards the whole,—a power inherited by Athens from that
-synod, and enlarged to meet the political wants of her empire; to
-which end it was essential, even in the view of Xenophon himself.<a
-id="FNanchor_87" href="#Footnote_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a> It
-may be that the dikastery was not always impartial between Athenian
-citizens privately, or the Athenian commonwealth collectively, and
-the subject-allies,—and in so far the latter had good reason to
-complain; but on the other hand, we have no ground for suspecting it
-of deliberate or standing unfairness, or of any other defects than
-such as were inseparable from its constitution and procedure, whoever
-might be the parties under trial.</p>
-
-<p>We are now considering the Athenian empire as it stood before
-the Peloponnesian war; before the increased exactions and the
-multiplied revolts, to which that war gave rise,—before the cruelties
-which accompanied the suppression of those revolts, and which so
-deeply stained the character of Athens,—before that aggravated
-fierceness, mistrust, contempt of obligation, and rapacious violence,
-which Thucydidês so emphatically indicates as having been infused
-into the Greek bosom by the fever of an all-pervading contest.<a
-id="FNanchor_88" href="#Footnote_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a> There
-had been before this time many revolts of the Athenian dependencies,
-from the earliest at Naxos down to the latest at Samos: all had been
-successfully suppressed, but in no case had Athens displayed the same
-unre<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[p. 47]</span>lenting rigor
-as we shall find hereafter manifested towards Mitylênê, Skiônê, and
-Mêlos. The policy of Periklês, now in the plenitude of his power at
-Athens, was cautious and conservative, averse to forced extension of
-empire as well as to those increased burdens on the dependent allies
-which such schemes would have entailed, and tending to maintain that
-assured commerce in the Ægean by which all of them must have been
-gainers,—not without a conviction that the contest must arise sooner
-or later between Athens and Sparta, and that the resources as well as
-the temper of the allies must be husbanded against that contingency.
-If we read in Thucydidês the speech of the envoy from Mitylênê<a
-id="FNanchor_89" href="#Footnote_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a> at
-Olympia, delivered to the Lacedæmonians and their allies in the
-fourth year of the Peloponnesian war, on occasion of the revolt
-of the city from Athens,—a speech imploring aid and setting forth
-the strongest case against Athens which the facts could be made to
-furnish,—we shall be surprised how weak the case is, and how much the
-speaker is conscious of its weakness. He has nothing like practical
-grievances and oppressions to urge against the imperial city,—he does
-not dwell upon enormity of tribute, unpunished misconduct of Athenian
-officers, hardship of bringing causes for trial to Athens, or other
-sufferings of the subjects generally,—he has nothing to say except
-that they were defenceless and degraded subjects, and that Athens
-held authority over them without and against their own consent: and
-in the case of Mitylênê, not so much as this could be said, since
-she was on the footing of an equal, armed, and autonomous ally. Of
-course, this state of forced dependence was one which the allies, or
-such of them as could stand alone, would naturally and reasonably
-shake off whenever they had an opportunity:<a id="FNanchor_90"
-href="#Footnote_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> but the negative
-evidence, derived from the speech of the Mitylenæan orator, goes far
-to make out the point contended for by the Athenian speaker at Sparta
-immediately before the war,—that, beyond the fact of such forced
-dependence, the allies had little practically to complain of. A city
-like Mitylênê, moreover,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[p.
-48]</span> would be strong enough to protect itself and its own
-commerce without the help of Athens: but to the weaker allies, the
-breaking up of the Athenian empire would have greatly lessened the
-security both of individuals and of commerce, in the waters of the
-Ægean, and their freedom would thus have been purchased at the
-cost of considerable positive disadvantages.<a id="FNanchor_91"
-href="#Footnote_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[p. 49]</span></p>
-
-<p>Nearly the whole of the Grecian world, putting aside Italian,
-Sicilian, and African Greeks, was at this time included either in
-the alliance of Lacedæmon or in that of Athens, so that the truce
-of thirty years insured a suspension of hostilities everywhere.
-Moreover, the Lacedæmonian confederates had determined by majority
-of votes to refuse the request of Samos for<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_50">[p. 50]</span> aid in her revolt against Athens:
-whereby it seemed established, as practical international law, that
-neither of these two great aggregate bodies should intermeddle
-with the other, and that each should restrain or punish its own
-disobedient members.<a id="FNanchor_92" href="#Footnote_92"
-class="fnanchor">[92]</a> Of this refusal, which materially
-affected the course of events, the main advisers had been the
-Corinthians, in spite of that fear and dislike of Athens which
-prompted many of the allies to vote for war.<a id="FNanchor_93"
-href="#Footnote_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a> The position of the
-Corinthians was peculiar; for while Sparta and her other allies were
-chiefly land-powers, Corinth had been from early times maritime,
-commercial, and colonizing,—she had been indeed once the first
-naval power in Greece, along with Ægina; but either she had not
-increased it at all during the last forty years, or, if she had,
-her comparative naval importance had been entirely sunk by the
-gigantic expansion of Athens. The Corinthians had both commerce and
-colonies,—Leukas, Anaktorium, Ambrakia, Korkyra, etc., along or near
-the coast of Epirus: they had also their colony Potidæa, situated
-on the isthmus of Pallênê, in Thrace, and intimately connected
-with them: and the interest of their commerce made them extremely
-averse to any collision with the superior navy of the Athenians.
-It was this consideration which had induced them to resist the
-impulse of the Lacedæmonian allies towards war on behalf of Samos:
-for though their feelings, both of jealousy and hatred against
-Athens were even now strong,<a id="FNanchor_94" href="#Footnote_94"
-class="fnanchor">[94]</a> arising greatly out of the struggle a
-few years before for the acquisition of Megara to the Athenian
-alliance,—prudence indicated that, in a war against the first
-naval power in Greece, they were sure to be the greatest losers.
-So long as the policy of Corinth pointed towards peace, there was
-every probability that war would be avoided, or at least accepted
-only in a case of grave necessity, by the Lacedæmonian alliance.
-But a contingency, distant as well as unexpected, which occurred
-about five years<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[p. 51]</span>
-after the revolt of Samos, reversed all these chances, and not only
-extinguished the dispositions of Corinth towards peace, but even
-transformed her into the forward instigator of war.</p>
-
-<p>Amidst the various colonies planted from Corinth along the
-coast of Epirus, the greater number acknowledged on her part an
-hegemony, or supremacy.<a id="FNanchor_95" href="#Footnote_95"
-class="fnanchor">[95]</a> What extent of real power and interference
-this acknowledgment implied, in addition to the honorary dignity,
-we are not in a condition to say; but the Corinthians were popular,
-and had not carried their interference beyond the point which the
-colonists themselves found acceptable. To these amicable relations,
-however, the powerful Korkyra formed a glaring exception, having been
-generally at variance, sometimes in the most aggravated hostility,
-with its mother-city, and withholding from her even the accustomed
-tributes of honorary and filial respect. It was amidst such relations
-of habitual ill-will between Corinth and Korkyra, that a dispute
-grew up respecting the city of Epidamnus, known afterwards, in the
-Roman times, as Dyrrachium, hard by the modern Durazzo,—a colony
-founded by the Korkyræans on the coast of Illyria, in the Ionic gulf,
-considerably to the north of their own island. So strong was the
-sanctity of Grecian custom in respect to the foundation of colonies,
-that the Korkyræans, in spite of their enmity to Corinth, had been
-obliged to select the œkist, or founder-in-chief of Epidamnus, from
-that city,—a citizen of Herakleid descent, named Phalius,—along
-with whom there had also come some Corinthian settlers: so that
-Epidamnus, though a Korkyræan colony, was nevertheless a recognized
-granddaughter, if the expression may be allowed, of Corinth,
-the recollection of which was perpetuated by the solemnities
-periodically celebrated in honor of the œkist.<a id="FNanchor_96"
-href="#Footnote_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a></p>
-
-<p>Founded on the isthmus of an outlaying peninsula on the sea-coast
-of the Illyrian Taulantii, Epidamnus was at first very prosperous,
-and acquired a considerable territory as well as a numerous
-population. But during the years immediately preceding the period
-which we have now reached, it had been exposed to great reverses:
-internal sedition between the oligarchy<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_52">[p. 52]</span> and the people, aggravated by attacks
-from the neighboring Illyrians, had crippled its power: and a recent
-revolution, in which the people put down the oligarchy, had reduced
-it still farther,—since the oligarchical exiles, collecting a
-force and allying themselves with the Illyrians, harassed the city
-grievously both by sea and land. The Epidamnian democracy was in such
-straits as to be forced to send to Korkyra for aid: their envoys sat
-down as suppliants at the temple of Hêrê, cast themselves on the
-mercy of the Korkyræans, and besought them to act both as mediators
-with the exiled oligarchy and as auxiliaries against the Illyrians.
-Though the Korkyræans themselves, democratically governed, might have
-been expected to sympathize with these suppliants and their prayers,
-yet their feeling was decidedly opposite: for it was the Epidamnian
-oligarchy who were principally connected with Korkyra, from whence
-their forefathers had emigrated, and where their family burial-places
-as well as their kinsmen were still to be found:<a id="FNanchor_97"
-href="#Footnote_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a> while the demos, or
-small proprietors and tradesmen of Epidamnus, may perhaps have been
-of miscellaneous origin, and at any rate had no visible memorials of
-ancient lineage in the mother-island. Having been refused aid from
-Korkyra, and finding their distressed condition insupportable, the
-Epidamnians next thought of applying to Corinth: but as this was a
-step of questionable propriety, their envoys were directed first to
-take the opinion of the Delphian god. His oracle having given an
-unqualified sanction, they proceeded to Corinth with their mission;
-describing their distress as well as their unavailing application at
-Korkyra,—tendering Epidamnus to the Corinthians as to its œkists and
-chiefs, with the most urgent entreaties for immediate aid to preserve
-it from ruin,—and not omitting to insist on the divine sanction
-just obtained. It was found easy to persuade the Corinthians, who,
-looking upon Epidamnus as a joint colony from Corinth and Korkyra,
-thought themselves not only authorized, but bound, to undertake its
-defence, a resolution much prompted by their ancient feud against
-Korkyra. They speedily organized an expedition, consisting partly of
-intended new settlers, partly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[p.
-53]</span> of a protecting military force,—Corinthian, Leukadian, and
-Ambrakiôtic: which combined body, in order to avoid opposition from
-the powerful Korkyræan navy, was marched by land as far as Apollônia,
-and transported from thence by sea to Epidamnus.<a id="FNanchor_98"
-href="#Footnote_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p>
-
-<p>The arrival of such a reinforcement rescued the city for the
-moment, but drew upon it a formidable increase of peril from the
-Korkyræans, who looked upon the interference of Corinth as an
-infringement of their rights, and resented it in the strongest
-manner. Their feelings were farther inflamed by the Epidamnian
-oligarchical exiles, who, coming to the island with petition for
-succor, and appeals to the tombs of their Korkyræan ancestors, found
-a ready sympathy. They were placed on board a fleet of twenty-five
-triremes, afterwards strengthened by a farther reinforcement,
-which was sent to Epidamnus with the insulting requisition that
-they should be forthwith restored, and the new-comers from Corinth
-dismissed. No attention being paid to these demands, the Korkyræans
-commenced the blockade of the city with forty ships, and with an
-auxiliary land-force of Illyrians,—making proclamation that any
-person within, citizen or not, might depart safely if he chose, but
-would be dealt with as an enemy if he remained. How many persons
-profited by this permission we do not know: but at least enough
-to convey to Corinth the news that their troops in Epidamnus were
-closely besieged. The Corinthians immediately hastened the equipment
-of a second expedition,—sufficient not only for the rescue of the
-place, but to surmount that resistance which the Korkyræans were
-sure to offer. In addition to thirty triremes, and three thousand
-hoplites, of their own, they solicited aid both in ships and money
-from many of their allies: eight ships fully manned were furnished
-by Megara, four by Palês, in the island of Kephallênia, five by
-Epidaurus, two by Trœzen, one by Hermionê, ten by Leukas, and eight
-by Ambrakia,—together with pecuniary contributions from Thebes,
-Phlius, and Elis. They farther proclaimed a public invitation for new
-settlers to Epidamnus, promising equal political rights to all; an
-option being allowed to anyone who wished to become a settler without
-being ready<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[p. 54]</span> to
-depart at once, to insure future admission by depositing the sum of
-fifty Corinthian drachmas. Though it might seem that the prospects
-of these new settlers were full of doubt and danger, such was the
-confidence entertained in the metropolitan protection of Corinth,
-that many were found as well to join the fleet, as to pay down the
-deposit for the liberty of future junction.</p>
-
-<p>All these proceedings on the part of Corinth, though undertaken
-with intentional hostility towards Korkyra, had not been preceded by
-any formal proposition, such as was customary among Grecian states,—a
-harshness of dealing arising not merely from her hatred towards
-Korkyra, but also from the peculiar political position of that
-island, which stood alone and isolated, not enrolled either in the
-Athenian or in the Lacedæmonian alliance. The Korkyræans, well aware
-of the serious preparation now going on at Corinth, and of the union
-among so many cities against them, felt themselves hardly a match for
-it alone, in spite of their wealth and their formidable naval force
-of one hundred and twenty triremes, inferior only to that of Athens.
-They made an effort to avert the storm by peaceable means, prevailing
-upon some mediators from Sparta and Sikyon to accompany them to
-Corinth; where, while they required that the forces and settlers
-recently despatched to Epidamnus should be withdrawn, denying all
-right on the part of Corinth to interfere in that colony,—they at
-the same time offered, if the point were disputed, to refer it for
-arbitration either to some impartial Peloponnesian city, or to the
-Delphian oracle; such arbiter to determine to which of the two
-cities Epidamnus as a colony really belonged, and the decision to be
-obeyed by both. They solemnly deprecated recourse to arms, which,
-if persisted in, would drive them as a matter of necessity to seek
-new allies such as they would not willingly apply to. To this the
-Corinthians answered, that they could entertain no proposition until
-the Korkyræan besieging force was withdrawn from Epidamnus: whereupon
-the Korkyræans rejoined that they would withdraw it at once, provided
-the new settlers and the troops sent by Corinth were removed at the
-same time. Either there ought to be this reciprocal retirement,
-or the Korkyræans would acquiesce in<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_55">[p. 55]</span> this <i>statu quo</i> on both sides, until the
-arbiters should have decided.<a id="FNanchor_99" href="#Footnote_99"
-class="fnanchor">[99]</a></p>
-
-<p>Although the Korkyræans had been unwarrantably harsh in rejecting
-the first supplication from Epidamnus, yet in their propositions made
-at Corinth, right and equity were on their side. But the Corinthians
-had gone too far, and assumed an attitude too decidedly aggressive,
-to admit of listening to arbitration, and accordingly, so soon as
-their armament was equipped, they set sail for Epidamnus, despatching
-a herald to declare war formally against the Korkyræans. As soon
-as the armament, consisting of seventy triremes, under Aristeus,
-Kallikratês, and Timanor, with two thousand five hundred hoplites,
-under Archetimus and Isarchidas, had reached Cape Aktium, at the
-mouth of the Ambrakian gulf, it was met by a Korkyræan herald in
-a little boat forbidding all farther advance,—a summons of course
-unavailing, and quickly followed by the appearance of the Korkyræan
-fleet. Out of the one hundred and twenty triremes which constituted
-the naval establishment of the island, forty were engaged in the
-siege of Epidamnus, but all the remaining eighty were now brought
-into service; the older ships being specially repaired for the
-occasion. In the action which ensued, they gained a complete victory,
-destroying fifteen Corinthian ships, and taking a considerable
-number of prisoners. And on the very day of the victory, Epidamnus
-surrendered to their besieging fleet, under covenant that the
-Corinthians within it should be held as prisoners, and that the other
-new-comers should be sold as slaves. The Corinthians and their allies
-did not long keep the sea after their defeat, but retired home, while
-the Korkyræans remained undisputed masters of the neighboring sea.
-Having erected a trophy on Leukimmê, the adjoining promontory of
-their island, they proceeded, according to the melancholy practice of
-Grecian warfare, to kill all their prisoners,—except the Corinthians,
-who were carried home and detained as prizes of great value for
-purposes of negotiation. They next began to take vengeance on those
-allies of Corinth, who had lent assistance to the recent expedition:
-they ravaged the territory of Leukas, burned Kyllênê, the seaport of
-Elis,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[p. 56]</span> and inflicted
-so much damage that the Corinthians were compelled towards the end
-of the summer to send a second armament to Cape Aktium, for the
-defence of Leukas, Anaktorium, and Ambrakia. The Korkyræan fleet
-was again assembled near Cape Leukimmê, but no farther action took
-place, and at the approach of winter both armaments were disbanded.<a
-id="FNanchor_100" href="#Footnote_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a></p>
-
-<p>Deeply were the Corinthians humiliated by their defeat at sea,
-together with the dispersion of the settlers whom they had brought
-together; and though their original project was frustrated by the
-loss of Epidamnus, they were only the more bent on complete revenge
-against their old enemy Korkyra. They employed themselves, for two
-entire years after the battle, in building new ships and providing
-an armament adequate to their purposes: and in particular, they sent
-round not only to the Peloponnesian seaports, but also to the islands
-under the empire of Athens, in order to take into their pay the
-best class of seamen. By such prolonged efforts, ninety well-manned
-Corinthian ships were ready to set sail in the third year after the
-battle: and the entire fleet, when reinforced by the allies, amounted
-to not less than one hundred and fifty sail: twenty-seven triremes
-from Ambrakia, twelve from Megara, ten from Elis, as many from
-Leukas, and one from Anaktorium. Each of these allied squadrons had
-officers of its own, while the Corinthian Xenokleidês and four others
-were commanders-in-chief.<a id="FNanchor_101" href="#Footnote_101"
-class="fnanchor">[101]</a></p>
-
-<p>But the elaborate preparations going on at Corinth were no secret
-to the Korkyræans, who well knew, besides, the numerous allies which
-that city could command, and her extensive influence throughout
-Greece. So formidable an attack was more than they could venture to
-brave, alone and unaided. They had never yet enrolled themselves
-among the allies either of Athens or of Lacedæmon: it had always
-been their pride and policy to maintain a separate line of action,
-which, by means of their wealth, their power, and their very peculiar
-position, they had hitherto been enabled to do with safety. That they
-had been able so to proceed with safety, however, was considered
-both by friends and enemies as a peculiarity belonging to their
-island; from whence we may draw an inference how little the islands
-in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[p. 57]</span> Ægean, now
-under the Athenian empire, would have been able to maintain any real
-independence, if that empire had been broken up. But though Korkyra
-had been secure in this policy of isolation up to the present moment,
-such had been the increase and consolidation of forces elsewhere
-throughout Greece, that even she could pursue it no longer. To
-apply for admission into the Lacedæmonian confederacy, wherein her
-immediate enemy exercised paramount influence, being out of the
-question, she had no choice except to seek alliance with Athens.
-That city had as yet no dependencies in the Ionic gulf; she was not
-of kindred lineage, nor had she had any previous amicable relations
-with the Dorian Korkyra. But if there was thus no previous fact or
-feeling to lay the foundation of alliance, neither was there anything
-to forbid it: for in the truce between Athens and Sparta, it had been
-expressly stipulated, that any city, not actually enrolled in the
-alliance of either, might join the one or the other at pleasure.<a
-id="FNanchor_102" href="#Footnote_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a>
-While the proposition of alliance was thus formally open either for
-acceptance or refusal, the time and circumstances under which it was
-to be made rendered it full of grave contingencies to all parties;
-and the Korkyræan envoys, who now for the first time visited Athens,
-for the purpose of making it, came thither with doubtful hopes of
-success, though to their island the question was one of life or
-death.</p>
-
-<p>According to the modern theories of government, to declare
-war, to make peace, and to contract alliances, are functions
-proper to be intrusted to the executive government apart from the
-representative assembly. According to ancient ideas, these were
-precisely the topics most essential to submit for the decision of
-the full assembly of the people: and in point of fact they were
-so submitted, even under governments only partially democratical;
-much more, of course, under the complete democracy of Athens. The
-Korkyræan envoys, on reaching that city, would first open their
-business to the stratêgi, or generals of the state, who would appoint
-a day for them to be heard before the public assembly, with full
-notice beforehand to the citizens. The mission was no secret, for
-the Korkyræans had themselves intimated their intention at Corinth,
-at the time when they proposed reference<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_58">[p. 58]</span> of the quarrel to arbitration: and
-even without such notice, the political necessity of the step was
-obvious enough to make the Corinthians anticipate it. Lastly, their
-<i>proxeni</i> at Athens, Athenian citizens who watched over Corinthian
-interests, public and private, in confidential correspondence with
-that government,—and who, sometimes by appointment, sometimes as
-volunteers, discharged partly the functions of ambassadors in modern
-times, would communicate to them the arrival of the Korkyræan envoys.
-So that, on the day appointed for the latter to be heard before the
-public assembly, Corinthian envoys were also present to answer them
-and to oppose the granting of their prayer.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês has given in his history the speeches of both; that is,
-speeches of his own composition, but representing in all probability
-the substance of what was actually said, and of what he perhaps
-himself heard. Though pervaded throughout by the peculiar style and
-harsh structure of the historian, these speeches are yet among the
-plainest and most business-like in his whole work, bringing before
-us thoroughly the existing situation; which was one of doubt and
-difficulty, presenting reasons of considerable force on each of
-the opposite sides. The Korkyræans, after lamenting their previous
-improvidence, which had induced them to defer seeking alliance until
-the hour of need arrived, presented themselves as claimants for the
-friendship of Athens, on the strongest grounds of common interest
-and reciprocal usefulness. Though their existing danger and want
-of Athenian support was now urgent, it had not been brought upon
-them in an unjust quarrel, or by disgraceful conduct: they had
-proposed to Corinth a fair arbitration respecting Epidamnus, and
-their application had been refused,—which showed where the right of
-the case lay; moreover, they were now exposed single-handed, not to
-Corinth alone, whom they had already vanquished, but to a formidable
-confederacy, organized under her auspices, including choice mariners
-hired even from the allies of Athens. In granting their prayer,
-Athens would, in the first place, neutralize this misemployment of
-her own mariners, and would, at the same time, confer an indelible
-obligation, protect the cause of right, and secure to herself a most
-important reinforcement. For, next to her own, the Korkyræan naval
-force was the most powerful in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[p.
-59]</span> Greece, and this was now placed within her reach: if, by
-declining the present offer, she permitted Korkyra to be overcome,
-that naval force would pass to the side of her enemies: for such were
-Corinth and the Peloponnesian alliance,—and such they would soon be
-openly declared. In the existing state of Greece, a collision between
-that alliance and Athens could not long be postponed: and it was with
-a view to this contingency that the Corinthians were now seeking
-to seize Korkyra along with her naval force.<a id="FNanchor_103"
-href="#Footnote_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a> The policy of Athens,
-therefore, imperiously called upon her to frustrate such a design,
-by now assisting the Korkyræans. She was permitted to do this by the
-terms of the thirty years’ truce: and although some might contend
-that, in the present critical conjuncture, acceptance of Korkyra
-was tantamount to a declaration of war with Corinth, yet the fact
-would falsify such predictions; for Athens would so strengthen
-herself that her enemies would be more than ever unwilling to
-attack her. She would not only render her naval force irresistibly
-powerful, but would become mistress of the communication between
-Sicily and Peloponnesus, and thus prevent the Sicilian Dorians from
-sending reinforcements to the Peloponnesians.<a id="FNanchor_104"
-href="#Footnote_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></p>
-
-<p>To these representations on the part of the Korkyræans, the
-Corinthian speakers made reply. They denounced the selfish and
-iniquitous policy pursued by Korkyra, not less in the matter
-of Epidamnus, than in all former time,<a id="FNanchor_105"
-href="#Footnote_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a>—which was the
-real reason why she had ever been ashamed of honest allies.
-Above all things, she had always acted undutifully and wickedly
-towards Corinth, her mother-city, to whom she was bound by those
-ties of colonial allegiance which Grecian morality recognized,
-and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[p. 60]</span> which the
-other Corinthian colonies cheerfully obeyed.<a id="FNanchor_106"
-href="#Footnote_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a> Epidamnus was not
-a Korkyræan, but a Corinthian colony, and the Korkyræans, having
-committed wrong in besieging it, had proposed arbitration without
-being willing to withdraw their troops while arbitration was pending:
-they now impudently came to ask Athens to become accessory after the
-fact in such injustice. The provision of the thirty years’ truce
-might seem indeed to allow Athens to receive them as allies: but
-that provision was not intended to permit the reception of cities
-already under the tie of colonial allegiance elsewhere,—still less
-the reception of cities engaged in an active and pending quarrel,
-where any countenance to one party in the quarrel was necessarily a
-declaration of war against the opposite. If either party had a right
-to invoke the aid of Athens on this occasion, Corinth had a better
-right than Korkyra: for the latter had never had any transactions
-with the Athenians, while Corinth was not only still under covenant
-of amity with them, through the thirty years’ truce,—but had also
-rendered material service to them by dissuading the Peloponnesian
-allies from assisting the revolted Samos. By such dissuasion, the
-Corinthians had upheld the principle of Grecian international
-law, that each alliance was entitled to punish its own refractory
-members: they now called upon Athens to respect this principle,
-by not interfering between Corinth and her colonial allies,<a
-id="FNanchor_107" href="#Footnote_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a>
-especially as the violation of it would recoil inconveniently
-upon Athens herself, with her numerous dependencies. As for the
-fear of an impending war<span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[p.
-61]</span> between the Peloponnesian alliance and Athens, such a
-contingency was as yet uncertain,—and might possibly never occur at
-all, if Athens dealt justly, and consented to conciliate Corinth
-on this critical occasion: but it would assuredly occur if she
-refused such conciliation, and the dangers thus entailed upon
-Athens would be far greater than the promised naval coöperation of
-Korkyra would compensate.<a id="FNanchor_108" href="#Footnote_108"
-class="fnanchor">[108]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the substance of the arguments urged by the contending
-envoys before the Athenian public assembly, in this momentous debate.
-For two days did the debate continue, the assembly being adjourned
-over to the morrow: so considerable was the number of speakers, and
-probably also the divergence of their views. Unluckily, Thucydidês
-does not give us any of these Athenian discourses,—not even that
-of Periklês, who determined the ultimate result. Epidamnus, with
-its disputed question of metropolitan right, occupied little of the
-attention of the Athenian assembly: but the Korkyræan naval force
-was indeed an immense item, since the question was, whether it
-should stand on their side or against them,—an item which nothing
-could counterbalance except the dangers of a Peloponnesian war. “Let
-us avoid this last calamity (was the opinion of many) even at the
-sacrifice of seeing Korkyra conquered, and all her ships and seamen
-in the service of the Peloponnesian league.” “You will not really
-avoid it, even by that great sacrifice (was the reply of others): the
-generating causes of war are at work,—and it will infallibly come,
-whatever you may determine respecting Korkyra: avail yourselves of
-the present opening, instead of being driven ultimately to undertake
-the war at great comparative disadvantage.” Of these two views,
-the former was at first decidedly preponderant in the assembly;<a
-id="FNanchor_109" href="#Footnote_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a>
-but they gradually came round to the latter, which was conformable
-to the steady conviction of Periklês. It was, however, resolved to
-take<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[p. 62]</span> a sort of
-middle course, so as to save Korkyra, and yet, if possible, to escape
-violation of the existing truce and the consequent Peloponnesian
-war. To comply with the request of the Korkyræans, by adopting
-them unreservedly as allies, would have laid the Athenians under
-the necessity of accompanying them in an attack of Corinth, if
-required,—which would have been a manifest infringement of the
-truce. Accordingly, nothing more was concluded than an alliance
-for purposes strictly defensive, to preserve Korkyra and her
-possessions in case they were attacked: nor was any greater force
-equipped to back this resolve than a squadron of ten triremes,
-under Lacedæmonius, son of Kimon. The smallness of this force
-would satisfy the Corinthians that no aggression was contemplated
-against their city, while it would save Korkyra from ruin, and
-would in fact feed the war so as to weaken and cripple the naval
-force of both parties,<a id="FNanchor_110" href="#Footnote_110"
-class="fnanchor">[110]</a>—which was the best result that Athens
-could hope for. The instructions to Lacedæmonius and his two
-colleagues were express; not to engage in fight with the Corinthians
-unless they were actually approaching Korkyra, or some Korkyræan
-possession, with a view to attack: but in that case to do his best on
-the defensive.</p>
-
-<p>The great Corinthian armament of one hundred and fifty sail
-soon took its departure from the gulf, and reached a harbor on the
-coast of Epirus, at the cape called Cheimerium, nearly opposite to
-the southern extremity of Korkyra: they there established a naval
-station and camp, summoning to their aid a considerable force from
-the friendly Epirotic tribes in the neighborhood. The Korkyræan
-fleet of one hundred and ten sail, under Meikiadês and two others,
-together with the ten Athenian ships, took station at one of the
-adjoining islands called Sybota, while the land force and one
-thousand Zakynthian hoplites were posted on the Korkyræan Cape
-Leukimmê. Both sides prepared for battle: the Corinthians, taking on
-board three days’ provisions, sailed by night from Cheimerium, and
-encountered in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[p. 63]</span> the
-morning the Korkyræan fleet advancing towards them, distributed into
-three squadrons, one under each of the three generals, and having
-the ten Athenian ships at the extreme right. Opposed to them were
-ranged the choice vessels of the Corinthians, occupying the left of
-their aggregate fleet: next came the various allies, with Megarians
-and Ambrakiots on the extreme right. Never before had two such
-numerous fleets, both Grecian, engaged in battle; but the tactics
-and manœuvring were not commensurate to the numbers. The decks were
-crowded with hoplites and bowmen, while the rowers below, on the
-Korkyræan side at least, were in great part slaves: the ships, on
-both sides, being rowed forward so as to drive in direct impact, prow
-against prow, were grappled together, and a fierce hand-combat was
-then commenced between the troops on board of each, as if they were
-on land,—or rather, like boarding-parties: all upon the old-fashioned
-system of Grecian sea-fight, without any of those improvements
-which had been introduced into the Athenian navy during the last
-generation. In Athenian naval attack, the ship, the rowers, and the
-steersman, were of much greater importance than the armed troops on
-deck: by strength and exactness of rowing, by rapid and sudden change
-of direction, by feints calculated to deceive, the Athenian captain
-sought to drive the sharp beak of his vessel, not against the prow,
-but against the weaker and more vulnerable parts of his enemy,—side,
-oars, or stern. The ship thus became in the hands of her crew the
-real weapon of attack, which was first to disable the enemy and leave
-him unmanageable on the water; and not until this was done did the
-armed troops on deck begin their operations.<a id="FNanchor_111"
-href="#Footnote_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a> Lacedæmonius, with
-his ten armed ships, though forbidden by his instructions to share
-in the battle, lent as much aid as he could by taking station at
-the extremity of the line, and by making motions as if about<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[p. 64]</span> to attack; while his
-seamen had full leisure to contemplate what they would despise as the
-lubberly handling of the ships on both sides. All was confusion after
-the battle had been joined; the ships on both sides became entangled,
-the oars broken and unmanageable, orders could neither be heard nor
-obeyed, and the individual valor of the hoplites and bowmen on deck
-was the decisive point on which victory turned.</p>
-
-<p>On the right wing of the Corinthians, the left of the Korkyræans
-was victorious; their twenty ships drove back the Ambrakiot allies
-of Corinth, and not only pursued them to the shore, but also landed
-and plundered the tents. Their rashness in thus keeping so long out
-of the battle proved incalculably mischievous, the rather as their
-total number was inferior: for their right wing, opposed to the best
-ships of Corinth, was after a hard struggle thoroughly beaten. Many
-of the ships were disabled, and the rest obliged to retreat as they
-could,—a retreat which the victorious ships on the other wing might
-have protected, had there been any effective discipline in the fleet,
-but which now was only imperfectly aided by the ten Athenian ships
-under Lacedæmonius. These Athenians, though at first they obeyed the
-instructions from home, in abstaining from actual blows, yet,—when
-the battle became doubtful, and still more, when the Corinthians were
-pressing their victory,—could no longer keep aloof, but attacked
-the pursuers in good earnest, and did much to save the defeated
-Korkyræans. As soon as the latter had been pursued as far as their
-own island, the victorious Corinthians returned to the scene of
-action, which was covered with disabled and water-logged ships, their
-own and their enemies, as well as with seamen, soldiers, and wounded
-men, either helpless aboard the wrecks, or keeping above water as
-well as they could,—among them many of their own citizens and allies,
-especially on their defeated right wing. Through these disabled
-vessels they sailed, not attempting to tow them off, but looking
-only to the crews aboard, and making some of them prisoners, but
-putting the greater number to death: some even of their own allies
-were thus slain, not being easily distinguishable. They then picked
-up their own dead bodies as well as they could, and transported
-them to Sybota, the nearest point of the coast of Epirus; after
-which they again mustered their fleet, and returned to resume<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[p. 65]</span> the attack against the
-Korkyræans on their own coast. The latter got together as many of
-their ships as were seaworthy, together with the small reserve which
-had remained in harbor, in order to prevent at any rate a landing on
-the coast: and the Athenian ships, now within the strict letter of
-their instructions, prepared to coöperate with full energy in the
-defence. It was already late in the afternoon: but the Corinthian
-fleet, though their pæan had already been shouted for attack, were
-suddenly seen to back water instead of advancing; presently they
-headed round, and sailed directly away to the Epirotic coast. Nor did
-the Korkyræans comprehend the cause of this sudden retreat, until
-at length it was proclaimed that an unexpected relief of twenty
-fresh Athenian ships was approaching, under Glaukon and Andokidês,
-which the Corinthians had been the first to descry, and had even
-believed to be the forerunners of a larger fleet. It was already
-dark when these fresh ships reached Cape Leukimmê, having traversed
-the waters covered with wrecks and dead bodies;<a id="FNanchor_112"
-href="#Footnote_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a> and at first the
-Korkyræans even mistook them for enemies. The reinforcement had been
-sent from Athens, probably after more accurate information of the
-comparative force of Corinth and Korkyra, under the impression that
-the original ten ships would prove inadequate for the purpose of
-defence,—an impression more than verified by the reality.</p>
-
-<p>Though the twenty Athenian ships were not, as the Corinthians
-had imagined, the precursors of a larger fleet, they were found
-sufficient to change completely the face of affairs. In the
-preceding action, the Korkyræans had had seventy ships sunk or
-disabled,—the Corinthians only thirty,—so that the superiority of
-numbers was still on the side of the latter, who were, however,
-encumbered with the care of one thousand prisoners, eight hundred
-of them slaves, captured, not easy either to lodge or to guard in
-the narrow accommodations of an ancient trireme. Even apart from
-this embarrassment, the Corinthians were in no temper to hazard a
-second battle against thirty Athenian ships, in addition to the
-remaining Korkyræan: and when their enemies<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_66">[p. 66]</span> sailed across to offer them battle on
-the Epirotic coast, they not only refused it, but thought of nothing
-but immediate retreat,—with serious alarm lest the Athenians should
-now act aggressively, treating all amicable relations between Athens
-and Corinth as practically extinguished by the events of the day
-before. Having ranged their fleet in line, not far from shore,
-they tested the dispositions of the Athenian commanders by sending
-forward a little boat with a few men to address to them the following
-remonstrance,—the men carried no herald’s staff (<i>we</i> should say,
-no flag of truce), and were therefore completely without protection
-against an enemy. “Ye act wrongfully, Athenians (they exclaimed), in
-beginning the war and violating the truce; for ye are using arms to
-oppose us in punishing our enemies. If it be really your intention
-to hinder us from sailing against Korkyra, or anywhere else that
-we choose, in breach of the truce, take first of all us who now
-address you, and deal with us as enemies.” It was not the fault of
-the Korkyræans that this last idea was not instantly realized: for
-such of them as were near enough to hear, instigated the Athenians
-by violent shouts to kill the men in the boat. But the latter, far
-from listening to such an appeal, dismissed them with the answer: “We
-neither begin the war nor break the truce, Peloponnesians; we have
-come simply to aid these Korkyræans, our allies. If ye wish to sail
-anywhere else, we make no opposition: but if ye are about to sail
-against Korkyra, or any of her possessions, we shall use our best
-means to prevent you.” Both the answer, and the treatment of the men
-in the boat, satisfied the Corinthians that their retreat would be
-unopposed, and they accordingly commenced it as soon as they could
-get ready, staying, however, to erect a trophy at Sybota, on the
-Epirotic coast, in commemoration of their advantage on the preceding
-day. In their voyage homeward, they surprised Anaktorium, at the
-mouth of the Ambrakiôtic gulf, which they had hitherto possessed
-jointly with the Korkyræans; planting in it a reinforcement of
-Corinthian settlers as guarantee for future fidelity. On reaching
-Corinth, the armament was disbanded, and the great majority of the
-prisoners taken—eight hundred slaves—were sold; but the remainder,
-two hundred and fifty in number, were detained and treated with
-peculiar kindness. Many of them were of the first and richest
-families of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[p. 67]</span> the
-island, and the Corinthians designed to gain them over, so as to
-make them instruments for effecting a revolution in the island. The
-calamitous incidents arising from their return will appear in a
-future chapter.</p>
-
-<p>Thus relieved from all danger, the Korkyræans picked up the dead
-bodies and the wrecks which had floated during the night on to their
-island, and even found sufficient pretence to erect a trophy, chiefly
-in consequence of their partial success on the left wing. In truth,
-they had been only rescued from ruin by the unexpected coming of
-the last Athenian ships: but the last result was as triumphant to
-them as it was disastrous and humiliating to the Corinthians, who
-had incurred an immense cost, and taxed all their willing allies,
-only to leave their enemy stronger than she was before. From this
-time forward they considered the thirty years’ truce as broken, and
-conceived a hatred, alike deadly and undisguised, against Athens; so
-that the latter gained nothing by the moderation of her admirals in
-sparing the Corinthian fleet off the coast of Epirus. An opportunity
-was not long wanting for the Corinthians to strike a blow at their
-enemy, through one of her wide-spread dependencies.</p>
-
-<p>On the isthmus of that lesser peninsula called Pellênê, which
-forms the westernmost of the three prongs of the greater peninsula
-called Chalkidikê, between the Thermaic and the Strymonic gulfs,
-was situated the Dorian town of Potidæa, one of the tributary
-allies of Athens, but originally colonized from Corinth, and still
-maintaining a certain metropolitan allegiance towards the latter:
-insomuch that every year certain Corinthians were sent thither as
-magistrates, under the title of Epidemiurgi. On various points of the
-neighboring coast, also, there were several small towns belonging
-to the Chalkidians and Bottiæans, enrolled in like manner in the
-list of Athenian tributaries. The neighboring inland territory,
-Mygdonia and Chalkidikê,<a id="FNanchor_113" href="#Footnote_113"
-class="fnanchor">[113]</a> was held by the Macedonian king
-Perdikkas, son of that Alexander who had<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_68">[p. 68]</span> taken part, fifty years before, in the
-expedition of Xerxes. These two princes appear gradually to have
-extended their dominions, after the ruin of Persian power in Thrace
-by the exertions of Athens, until at length they acquired all the
-territory between the rivers Axius and Strymon. Now Perdikkas had
-been for some time the friend and ally of Athens; but there were
-other Macedonian princes, his brother Philip and Derdas, holding
-independent principalities in the upper country,<a id="FNanchor_114"
-href="#Footnote_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a> apparently on the
-higher course of the Axius near the Pæonian tribes, with whom he
-was in a state of dispute. These princes having been accepted as
-the allies of Athens, Perdikkas from that time became her active
-enemy, and it was from his intrigues that all the difficulties of
-Athens on that coast took their first origin. The Athenian empire
-was much less complete and secure over the seaports on the mainland
-than over the islands:<a id="FNanchor_115" href="#Footnote_115"
-class="fnanchor">[115]</a> for the former were always more or
-less dependent on any powerful land-neighbor, sometimes more
-dependent on him than upon the mistress of the sea; and we shall
-find Athens herself cultivating assiduously the favor of Sitalkês
-and other strong Thracian potentates, as an aid to her dominion
-over the seaports.<a id="FNanchor_116" href="#Footnote_116"
-class="fnanchor">[116]</a> Perdikkas immediately began to incite
-and aid the Chalkidians and Bottiæans to revolt from Athens, and
-the violent enmity against the latter, kindled in the bosoms of
-the Corinthians by the recent events at Korkyra, enabled him to
-extend the same projects to Potidæa. Not only did he send envoys to
-Corinth in order to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[p. 69]</span>
-concert measures for provoking the revolt of Potidæa, but also to
-Sparta, instigating the Peloponnesian league to a general declaration
-of war against Athens.<a id="FNanchor_117" href="#Footnote_117"
-class="fnanchor">[117]</a> And he farther prevailed on many of
-the Chalkidian inhabitants to abandon their separate small towns
-on the sea-coast, for the purpose of joint residence at Olynthus,
-which was several stadia from the sea. Thus that town, as well as
-the Chalkidian interest, became much strengthened, while Perdikkas
-farther assigned some territory near Lake Bolbê to contribute to the
-temporary maintenance of the concentrated population.</p>
-
-<p>The Athenians were not ignorant both of his hostile preparations
-and of the dangers which awaited them from Corinth after the
-Korkyræan sea-fight; immediately after which they sent to take
-precautions against the revolt of Potidæa; requiring the inhabitants
-to take down their wall on the side of Pellênê, so as to leave the
-town open on the side of the peninsula, or on what may be called
-the sea-side, and fortified only towards the mainland,—requiring
-them farther both to deliver hostages and to dismiss the annual
-magistrates who came to them from Corinth. An Athenian armament of
-thirty triremes and one thousand hoplites, under Archestratus and
-ten others, despatched to act against Perdikkas in the Thermaic
-gulf, was directed at the same time to enforce these requisitions
-against Potidæa, and to repress any dispositions to revolt among the
-neighboring Chalkidians. Immediately on receiving these requisitions,
-the Potidæans sent envoys both to Athens, for the purpose of evading
-and gaining time,—and to Sparta, in conjunction with Corinth, in
-order to determine a Lacedæmonian invasion of Attica, in the event
-of Potidæa being attacked by Athens. From the Spartan authorities
-they obtained a distinct affirmative promise, in spite of the thirty
-years’ truce still subsisting: at Athens they had no success, and
-they accordingly openly revolted (seemingly about midsummer, 432
-<small>B.C.</small>), at the same time that the armament
-under Archestratus sailed. The Chalkidians and Bottiæans revolted at
-the same time, at the express instigation of Corinth, accompanied
-by solemn oaths and promises of assistance.<a id="FNanchor_118"
-href="#Footnote_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a> Archestratus with his
-fleet, on reaching the Thermaic gulf, found them all in pro<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[p. 70]</span>claimed enmity, but was
-obliged to confine himself to the attack of Perdikkas in Macedonia,
-not having numbers enough to admit of a division of his force. He
-accordingly laid siege to Therma, in coöperation with the Macedonian
-troops from the upper country, under Philip and the brothers of
-Derdas; after taking that place, he next proceeded to besiege Pydna.
-But it would probably have been wiser had he turned his whole force
-instantly to the blockade of Potidæa; for during the period of more
-than six weeks that he spent in the operations against Therma, the
-Corinthians conveyed to Potidæa a reinforcement of sixteen hundred
-hoplites and four hundred light-armed, partly their own citizens,
-partly Peloponnesians, hired for the occasion,—under Aristeus, son
-of Adeimantus, a man of such eminent popularity, both at Corinth and
-at Potidæa, that most of the soldiers volunteered on his personal
-account. Potidæa was thus put into a state of complete defence
-shortly after the news of its revolt reached Athens, and long
-before any second armament could be sent to attack it. A second
-armament, however, was speedily sent forth.—forty triremes and two
-thousand Athenian hoplites, under Kallias, son of Kalliades,<a
-id="FNanchor_119" href="#Footnote_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a>
-with four other commanders,—who, on reaching the Thermaic gulf,
-joined the former body at the siege of Pydna. After prosecuting
-the siege in vain for a short time, they found themselves obliged
-to patch up an accommodation on the best terms they could with
-Perdikkas, from the necessity of commencing immediate operations
-against Aristeus and Potidæa. They then quitted Macedonia, first
-crossing by sea from Pydna to the eastern coast of the Thermaic
-gulf,—next attacking, though without effect, the town of Berœa,—and
-then marching by land along the eastern coast of the gulf, in
-the direction of Potidæa. On the third day of easy march, they
-reached the seaport called Gigônus, near which they encamped.<a
-id="FNanchor_120" href="#Footnote_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[p. 71]</span></p>
-
-<p>In spite of the convention concluded at Pydna, Perdikkas, whose
-character for faithlessness we shall have more than one<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[p. 72]</span> occasion to notice,
-was now again on the side of the Chalkidians, and sent two hundred
-horse to join them, under the command of<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_73">[p. 73]</span> Iolaus. Aristeus posted his Corinthians
-and Potidæans on the isthmus near Potidæa, providing a market without
-the walls, in order that they might not stray in quest of provisions:
-his position was on the side towards Olynthus,—which was about
-seven miles off, but within sight, and in a lofty and conspicuous
-situation. He here awaited the approach of the Athenians, calculating
-that the Chalkidians from Olynthus would, upon the hoisting of
-a given signal, assail them in the rear when they attacked him.
-But Kallias was strong enough to place in reserve his Macedonian
-cavalry and other allies as a check against Olynthus; while with
-his Athenians and the main force he marched to the isthmus and
-took position in front of Aristeus. In the battle which ensued,
-Aristeus and the chosen band of Corinthians immediately about him
-were completely successful, breaking the troops opposed to them, and
-pursuing for a considerable distance: but the remaining Potidæans
-and Peloponnesians were routed by the Athenians and driven within
-the walls. On returning from pursuit, Aristeus found the victorious
-Athenians between him and Potidæa, and was reduced to the alternative
-either of cutting his way through them into the latter town, or of
-making a retreating march to Olynthus. He chose the former as the
-least of two hazards, and forced his way through the flank of the
-Athenians,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[p. 74]</span> wading
-into the sea in order to turn the extremity of the Potidæan wall,
-which reached entirely across the isthmus, with a mole running out
-at each end into the water: he effected this daring enterprise and
-saved his detachment, though not without considerable difficulty and
-some loss. Meanwhile, the auxiliaries from Olynthus, though they had
-begun their march on seeing the concerted signal, had been kept in
-check by the Macedonian horse, so that the Potidæans had been beaten
-and the signal again withdrawn, before they could make any effective
-diversion: nor did the cavalry on either side come into action. The
-defeated Potidæans and Corinthians, having the town immediately
-in their rear, lost only three hundred men, while the Athenians
-lost one hundred and fifty, together with the general Kallias.<a
-id="FNanchor_121" href="#Footnote_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a></p>
-
-<p>The victory was, however, quite complete, and the Athenians,
-after having erected their trophy, and given up the enemy’s dead
-for burial, immediately built their blockading wall across the
-isthmus, on the side of the mainland, so as to cut off Potidæa from
-all communication with Olynthus and the Chalkidians. To make the
-blockade complete, a second wall across the isthmus was necessary,
-on the other side towards Pallênê: but they had not force enough to
-detach a completely separate body for this purpose, until after some
-time they were joined by Phormio with sixteen hundred fresh hoplites
-from Athens. That general, landing at Aphytis, in the peninsula of
-Pallênê, marched slowly up to Potidæa, ravaging the territory in
-order to draw out the citizens to battle: but the challenge not
-being accepted, he undertook, and finished without obstruction, the
-blockading wall on the side of Pallênê, so that the town was now
-completely inclosed, and the harbor watched by the Athenian fleet.
-The wall once finished, a portion of the force sufficed to guard
-it, leaving Phormio at liberty to undertake aggressive operations
-against the Chalkidic and Bottiæan townships. The capture of Potidæa
-was now only a question of more or less time, and Aristeus, in order
-that the provisions might last longer, proposed to the citizens to
-choose a favorable wind, get on shipboard, and break out suddenly
-from the harbor, taking their chance of eluding the Athenian fleet,
-and leaving only five hundred defenders behind:<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_75">[p. 75]</span> though he offered himself to be among
-those left behind, he could not determine the citizens to so bold
-an enterprise, and he therefore sallied forth in the way proposed
-with a small detachment, in order to try and procure relief from
-without,—especially some aid or diversion from Peloponnesus. But he
-was able to accomplish nothing beyond some partial warlike operations
-among the Chalkidians,<a id="FNanchor_122" href="#Footnote_122"
-class="fnanchor">[122]</a> and a successful ambuscade against the
-citizens of Sermylus, which did nothing for the relief of the
-blockaded town: it had, however, been so well-provisioned that it
-held out for two whole years,—a period full of important events
-elsewhere.</p>
-
-<p>From these two contests between Athens and Corinth, first
-indirectly at Korkyra, next distinctly and avowedly at Potidæa,
-sprung those important movements in the Lacedæmonian alliance which
-will be recounted in the next chapter.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_48">
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER XLVIII.<br />
-    FROM THE BLOCKADE OF POTIDÆA DOWN TO THE END OF THE
-    FIRST YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">Even</span> before the recent
-hostilities at Korkyra and Potidæa, it had been evident to reflecting
-Greeks that the continued observance of the thirty years’ truce was
-very uncertain, and that the mingled hatred, fear, and admiration,
-which Athens inspired throughout Greece, would prompt Sparta and
-the Spartan confederacy to seize the first favorable opening for
-breaking down the Athenian power. That such was the disposition
-of Sparta, was well understood among the Athenian allies, however
-considerations of prudence and general slowness in resolving might
-postpone the moment of carrying it into effect. Accordingly, not
-only the Samians when they revolted had applied to the Spartan<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[p. 76]</span> confederacy for aid,
-which they appear to have been prevented from obtaining chiefly
-by the pacific interests then animating the Corinthians,—but also
-the Lesbians had endeavored to open negotiations with Sparta for a
-similar purpose, though the authorities—to whom alone the proposition
-could have been communicated, since it remained secret and was
-never executed—had given them no encouragement.<a id="FNanchor_123"
-href="#Footnote_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> The affairs of Athens
-had been administered under the ascendency of Periklês, without any
-view to extension of empire or encroachment upon others, though with
-constant view to the probabilities of war, and with anxiety to keep
-the city in a condition to meet it: but even the splendid internal
-ornaments, which Athens at that time acquired, were probably not
-without their effect in provoking jealousy on the part of other
-Greeks as to her ultimate views. The only known incident, wherein
-Athens had been brought into collision with a member of the Spartan
-confederacy prior to the Korkyræan dispute, was the decree passed
-in regard to Megara,—prohibiting the Megarians, on pain of death,
-from all trade or intercourse as well with Athens as with all
-ports within the Athenian empire. This prohibition was grounded on
-the alleged fact, that the Megarians had harbored runaway slaves
-from Athens, and had appropriated and cultivated portions of land
-upon the border; partly land, the property of the goddesses of
-Eleusis,—partly a strip of territory disputed between the two states,
-and therefore left by mutual understanding in common pasture without
-any permanent inclosure.<a id="FNanchor_124" href="#Footnote_124"
-class="fnanchor">[124]</a> In reference to this latter point,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[p. 77]</span> the Athenian herald,
-Anthemokritus had been sent to Megara to remonstrate, but had been so
-rudely dealt with, that his death shortly afterwards was imputed as
-a crime to the Megarians.<a id="FNanchor_125" href="#Footnote_125"
-class="fnanchor">[125]</a> We may well suppose that ever since the
-revolt of Megara, fourteen years before, which caused to Athens an
-irreparable mischief, the feeling prevalent between the two towns
-had been one of bitter enmity, manifesting itself in many ways,
-but so much exasperated by recent events as to provoke Athens
-to a signal revenge.<a id="FNanchor_126" href="#Footnote_126"
-class="fnanchor">[126]</a> Exclusion from Athens and all the ports in
-her empire, comprising nearly every island and seaport in the Ægean,
-was so ruinous to the Megarians, that they loudly complained of it at
-Sparta, representing it as an infraction of the thirty years<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[p. 78]</span>’ truce; though it was
-undoubtedly within the legitimate right of Athens to enforce,—and
-was even less harsh than the systematic expulsion of foreigners by
-Sparta, with which Periklês compared it.</p>
-
-<p>These complaints found increased attention after the war of
-Korkyra and the blockade of Potidæa by the Athenians. The sentiments
-of the Corinthians towards Athens had now become angry and warlike in
-the highest degree: nor was it simply resentment for the past which
-animated them, but also the anxiety farther to bring upon Athens so
-strong a hostile pressure as should preserve Potidæa and its garrison
-from capture. Accordingly, they lost no time in endeavoring to rouse
-the feelings of the Spartans against Athens, and in inducing them to
-invite to Sparta all such of the confederates as had any grievances
-against that city. Not merely the Megarians but several other
-confederates, appeared there as accusers; while the Æginetans, though
-their insular position made it perilous for them to appear, made
-themselves vehemently heard through the mouths of others, complaining
-that Athens withheld from them that autonomy to which they were
-entitled under the truce.<a id="FNanchor_127" href="#Footnote_127"
-class="fnanchor">[127]</a></p>
-
-<p>According to the Lacedæmonian practice, it was necessary first
-that the Spartans themselves, apart from their allies, should
-de<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[p. 79]</span>cide whether
-there existed a sufficient case of wrong done by Athens against
-themselves or against Peloponnesus,—either in violation of the thirty
-years’ truce, or in any other way. If the determination of Sparta
-herself were in the negative, the case would never even be submitted
-to the vote of the allies; but if it were in the affirmative, then
-the latter would be convoked to deliver their opinion also: and
-assuming that the majority of votes coincided with the previous
-decision of Sparta, the entire confederacy stood then pledged
-to the given line of policy,—if the majority was contrary, the
-Spartans would stand alone, or with such only of the confederates
-as concurred. Each allied city, great or small, had an equal right
-of suffrage. It thus appears that Sparta herself did not vote as
-a member of the confederacy, but separately and individually as
-leader,—and that the only question ever submitted to the allies
-was, whether they would or would not go along with her previous
-decision. Such was the course of proceeding now followed: the
-Corinthians, together with such other of the confederates as felt
-either aggrieved or alarmed by Athens, presented themselves before
-the public assembly of Spartan citizens, prepared to prove that the
-Athenians had broken the truce, and were going on in a course of
-wrong towards Peloponnesus.<a id="FNanchor_128" href="#Footnote_128"
-class="fnanchor">[128]</a> Even in the oligarchy of Sparta, such
-a question as this could only be decided by a general assembly of
-Spartan citizens, qualified both by age, by regular contribution
-to the public mess, and by obedience to Spartan discipline. To the
-assembly so constituted the deputies of the various allied cities
-addressed themselves, each setting forth his case against Athens.
-The Corinthians chose to reserve themselves to the last, after the
-assembly had been previously inflamed by the previous speakers.</p>
-
-<p>Of this important assembly, on which so much of the future fate
-of Greece turned, Thucydidês has preserved an account unusually
-copious. First, the speech delivered by the Corinthian envoys. Next,
-that of some Athenian envoys, who happening to be at the same time
-in Sparta on some other matters, and being<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_80">[p. 80]</span> present in the assembly so as to
-have heard the speeches both of the Corinthians and of the other
-complainants, obtained permission from the magistrates to address
-the assembly in their turn. Thirdly, the address of the Spartan king
-Archidamus, on the course of policy proper to be adopted by Sparta.
-Lastly, the brief, but eminently characteristic, address of the ephor
-Stheneläidas, on putting the question for decision. These speeches,
-the composition of Thucydidês himself, contain substantially the
-sentiments of the parties to whom they are ascribed: neither of them
-is distinctly a reply to that which has preceded, but each presents
-the situation of affairs from a different point of view.</p>
-
-<p>The Corinthians knew well that the audience whom they were about
-to address had been favorably prepared for them,—for the Lacedæmonian
-authorities had already given an actual promise to them and to the
-Potidæans at the moment before Potidæa revolted, that they would
-invade Attica. So great was the revolution in sentiment of the
-Spartans, since they had declined lending aid to the much more
-powerful island of Lesbos, when it proposed to revolt,—a revolution
-occasioned by the altered interests and sentiments of Corinth.
-Nor were the Corinthians ignorant that their positive grounds of
-complaint against Athens, in respect of wrong or violation of the
-existing truce, were both few and feeble. Neither in the dispute
-about Potidæa nor about Korkyra, had Athens infringed the truce
-or wronged the Peloponnesian alliance. In both, she had come into
-collision with Corinth, singly and apart from the confederacy:
-she had a right, both according to the truce and according to the
-received maxims of international law, to lend defensive aid to the
-Korkyræans at their own request,—she had a right also, according to
-the principles laid down by the Corinthians themselves on occasion of
-the revolt of Samos, to restrain the Potidæans from revolting. She
-had committed nothing which could fairly be called an aggression:
-indeed the aggression, both in the case of Potidæa and in that of
-Korkyra, was decidedly on the side of the Corinthians: and the
-Peloponnesian confederacy could only be so far implicated as it was
-understood to be bound to espouse the separate quarrels, right or
-wrong, of Corinth. All this was well known to the Corinthian envoys;
-and accordingly we find that, in their speech<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_81">[p. 81]</span> at Sparta, they touch but lightly, and
-in vague terms, on positive or recent wrongs. Even that which they
-do say completely justifies the proceedings of Athens about the
-affair of Korkyra, since they confess without hesitation the design
-of seizing the large Korkyræan navy for the use of the Peloponnesian
-alliance: while in respect of Potidæa, if we had only the speech
-of the Corinthian envoy before us without any other knowledge, we
-should have supposed it to be an independent state, not connected
-by any permanent bonds with Athens,—we should have supposed that
-the siege of Potidæa by Athens was an unprovoked aggression upon an
-autonomous ally of Corinth,<a id="FNanchor_129" href="#Footnote_129"
-class="fnanchor">[129]</a>—we should never have imagined that
-Corinth had deliberately instigated and aided the revolt of the
-Chalkidians as well as of the Potidæans against Athens. It might be
-pretended that she had a right to do this, by virtue of her undefined
-metropolitan relations with Potidæa: but at any rate, the incident
-was not such as to afford any decent pretext for charge against the
-Athenians, either of outrage towards Corinth,<a id="FNanchor_130"
-href="#Footnote_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a> or of wrongful
-aggression against the Peloponnesian confederacy.</p>
-
-<p>To dwell much upon specific allegations of wrong, would not have
-suited the purpose of the Corinthian envoy; for against such, the
-thirty years’ truce expressly provided that recourse should be had
-to amicable arbitration,—to which recourse he never once alludes.
-He knew that, as between Corinth and Athens, war had already begun
-at Potidæa; and his business, throughout nearly all of a very
-emphatic speech is, to show that the Peloponnesian confederacy, and
-especially Sparta, is bound to take instant part in it, not less
-by prudence than by duty. He employs the most animated language to
-depict the ambition, the unwearied activity, the personal effort
-abroad as well as at home, the quick resolves, the sanguine hopes
-never dashed by failure,—of Athens; as contrasted with the cautious,
-home-keeping, indolent, scrupulous routine of Sparta. He reproaches
-the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[p. 82]</span> Spartans with
-their backwardness and timidity, in not having repressed the growth
-of Athens before she reached this formidable height,—especially in
-having allowed her to fortify her city after the retreat of Xerxes,
-and afterwards to build the long walls from the city to the sea.<a
-id="FNanchor_131" href="#Footnote_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a>
-The Spartans, he observes, stood alone among all Greeks, in
-the notable system of keeping down an enemy not by acting, but
-delaying to act,—not arresting his growth, but putting him down
-when his force was doubled. Falsely, indeed, had they acquired the
-reputation of being sure, when they were in reality merely slow:<a
-id="FNanchor_132" href="#Footnote_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a>
-in resisting Xerxes, as in resisting Athens, they had always been
-behindhand, disappointing and leaving their friends to ruin,—while
-both these enemies had only failed of complete success through their
-own mistakes.</p>
-
-<p>After half apologizing for the tartness of these reproofs,—which,
-however, as the Spartans were now well-disposed to go to war
-forthwith, would be well-timed and even agreeable,—the Corinthian
-orator vindicates the necessity of plain-speaking by the urgent
-peril of the emergency, and the formidable character of the enemy
-who threatened them. “You do not reflect (he says) how thoroughly
-different the Athenians are from yourselves. <i>They</i> are innovators
-by nature; sharp both in devising, and in executing what they have
-determined: <i>you</i> are sharp only in keeping what you have got, in
-determining on nothing beyond, and in doing even less than absolute
-necessity requires.<a id="FNanchor_133" href="#Footnote_133"
-class="fnanchor">[133]</a> <i>They</i> again dare beyond their means,
-run risks beyond their own judgment, and keep alive their hopes
-even in desperate circumstances: <i>your</i><span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_83">[p. 83]</span> peculiarity is, that your performance
-comes short of your power,—you have no faith even in what your
-judgment guarantees,—when in difficulties, you despair of all
-escape. <i>They</i> never hang back,—<i>you</i> are habitual laggards: they
-love foreign service,—you cannot stir from home: for they are always
-under the belief that their movements will lead to some farther
-gain, while you fancy that new projects will endanger what you have
-already. When successful, they make the greatest forward march; when
-defeated, they fall back the least. Moreover, they task their bodies
-on behalf of their city as if they were the bodies of others,—while
-their minds are most of all their own, for exertion in her service.<a
-id="FNanchor_134" href="#Footnote_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a>
-When their plans for acquisition do not come successfully out, they
-feel like men robbed of what belongs to them: yet the acquisitions
-when realized appear like trifles compared with what remains to be
-acquired. If they sometimes fail in an attempt, new hopes arise in
-some other direction to supply the want: for with them alone the
-possession and the hope of what they aim at is almost simultaneous,
-from their habit of quickly executing all that they have once
-resolved. And in this manner do they toil throughout all their lives
-amidst hardship and peril, disregarding present enjoyment in the
-continual thirst for increase,—knowing no other festival recreation
-except the performance of active duty,—and deeming inactive repose a
-worse condition than fatiguing occupation. To speak the truth in two
-words: such is their inborn temper, that they will neither remain
-at rest themselves, nor allow rest to others.<a id="FNanchor_135"
-href="#Footnote_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a></p>
-
-<p>“Such is the city which stands opposed to you, Lacedæmonians,—yet
-ye still hang back from action.... Your continual scruples and apathy
-would hardly be safe, even if ye had neigh<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_84">[p. 84]</span>bors like yourselves in character: but as
-to dealings with Athens, your system is antiquated and out of date.
-In politics as in art, it is the modern improvements which are sure
-to come out victorious: and though unchanged institutions are best,
-if a city be not called upon to act,—yet multiplicity of active
-obligations requires multiplicity and novelty of contrivance.<a
-id="FNanchor_136" href="#Footnote_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a>
-It is through these numerous trials that the means of Athens have
-acquired so much more new development than yours.”</p>
-
-<p>The Corinthians concluded by saying, that if, after so many
-previous warnings, now repeated for the last time, Sparta still
-refused to protect her allies against Athens,—if she delayed to
-perform her promise made to the Potidæans, of immediately invading
-Attica,—they, the Corinthians, would forthwith look for safety in
-some new alliance, and they felt themselves fully justified in
-doing so. They admonished her to look well to the case, and to
-carry forward Peloponnesus with undiminished dignity as it had
-been transmitted to her from her predecessors.<a id="FNanchor_137"
-href="#Footnote_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the memorable picture of Athens and her citizens, as
-exhibited by her fiercest enemy, before the public assembly at
-Sparta. It was calculated to impress the assembly, not by appeal
-to recent or particular misdeeds, but by the general system of
-unprincipled and endless aggression which was imputed to Athens
-during the past,—and by the certainty held out that the same system,
-unless put down by measures of decisive hostility, would be pushed
-still farther in future to the utter ruin of Peloponnesus. And to
-this point did the Athenian envoy—staying in Sparta about some
-other negotiation, and now present in the assembly—address himself
-in reply, after having asked and obtained permission from the
-magistrates. The empire of Athens was now of such standing that the
-younger men present had no personal knowledge of the circumstances
-under which it had grown up: and what was needed as information for
-them would be impressive as a reminder even to their seniors.<a
-id="FNanchor_138" href="#Footnote_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></p>
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[p. 85]</span></p> <p>He
-began by disclaiming all intention of defending his native city
-against the charges of specific wrong or alleged infractions of
-the existing truce: this was no part of his mission, nor did he
-recognize Sparta as a competent judge in disputes between Athens
-and Corinth. But he nevertheless thought it his duty to vindicate
-Athens against the general character of injustice and aggression
-imputed to her, as well as to offer a solemn warning to the Spartans
-against the policy towards which they were obviously tending. He
-then proceeded to show that the empire of Athens had been honorably
-earned and amply deserved,—that it had been voluntarily ceded,
-and even pressed upon her,—and that she could not abdicate it
-without emperiling her own separate existence and security. Far
-from thinking that the circumstances under which it was acquired
-needed apology, he appealed to them with pride as a testimony of the
-genuine Hellenic patriotism of that city which the Spartan congress
-now seemed disposed to run down as an enemy.<a id="FNanchor_139"
-href="#Footnote_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a> He then dwelt upon
-the circumstances attending the Persian invasion, setting forth the
-superior forwardness and the unflinching endurance of Athens, in
-spite of ungenerous neglect from Sparta and the other Greeks,—the
-preponderance of her naval force in the entire armament,—the
-directing genius of her general Themistoklês, complimented even by
-Sparta herself,—and the title of Athens to rank on that memorable
-occasion as the principal saviour of Greece. This alone ought to
-save her empire from reproach: but this was not all,—for that empire
-had been tendered to her by the pressing instance of the allies,
-at a time when Sparta had proved herself both incompetent and
-unwilling to prosecute the war against Persia.<a id="FNanchor_140"
-href="#Footnote_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a> By simple exercise of
-the constraining force inseparable from her presidential obligations,
-and by the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[p. 86]</span>
-reduction of various allies who revolted, Athens had gradually
-become unpopular, while Sparta too had become her enemy instead of
-her friend. To relax her hold upon her allies would have been to
-make them the allies of Sparta against her; and thus the motive
-of fear was added to those of ambition and revenue, in inducing
-Athens to maintain her imperial dominion by force. In her position,
-no Grecian power either would or could have acted otherwise: no
-Grecian power, certainly not Sparta, would have acted with so much
-equity and moderation, or given so little ground of complaint to
-her subjects. Worse they <i>had</i> suffered, while under Persia; worse
-they <i>would</i> suffer, if they came under Sparta, who held her own
-allies under the thraldom of an oligarchical party in each city; and
-if they hated Athens, this was only because subjects always hated
-the <i>present</i> dominion, whatever that might be.<a id="FNanchor_141"
-href="#Footnote_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a></p>
-
-<p>Having justified both the origin and the working of the Athenian
-empire, the envoy concluded by warning Sparta to consider calmly,
-without being hurried away by the passions and invectives of others,
-before she took a step from which there was no retreat, and which
-exposed the future to chances such as no man on either side could
-foresee. He called on her not to break the truce mutually sworn to,
-but to adjust all differences, as Athens was prepared to do, by the
-amicable arbitration which that truce provided. Should she begin
-war, the Athenians would follow her lead and resist her, calling
-to witness those gods under whose sanction the oaths were taken.<a
-id="FNanchor_142" href="#Footnote_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a></p>
-
-<p>The facts recounted in the preceding chapters will have shown,
-that the account given by the Athenian envoy at Sparta, of the origin
-and character of the empire exercised by his city, though doubtless
-the account of a partisan, is in substance correct and equitable;
-the envoys of Athens had not yet learned to take the tone which they
-assumed in the sixteenth and seventeenth years<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_87">[p. 87]</span> of the coming war, at Melos and Kamarina.
-At any time previous to the affair of Korkyra, the topics insisted
-upon by the Athenian would probably have been profoundly listened
-to at Sparta. But now the mind of the Spartans was made up. Having
-cleared the assembly of all “strangers,” and even all allies, they
-proceeded to discuss and determine the question among themselves.
-Most of their speakers held but one language,<a id="FNanchor_143"
-href="#Footnote_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a>—expatiating on the
-wrongs already done by Athens, and urging the necessity of instant
-war. There was, however, one voice, and that a commanding voice,
-raised against this conclusion: the ancient and respected king
-Archidamus opposed it.</p>
-
-<p>The speech of Archidamus is that of a deliberate Spartan, who,
-setting aside both hatred to Athens and blind partiality to allies,
-looks at the question with a view to the interests and honor of
-Sparta only,—not, however, omitting her imperial as well as her
-separate character. The preceding native speakers, indignant
-against Athens, had probably appealed to Spartan pride, treating
-it as an intolerable disgrace that almost the entire land-force
-of Dorian Peloponnesus should be thus bullied by one single Ionic
-city, and should hesitate to commence a war which one invasion of
-Attica would probably terminate. As the Corinthians had tried to
-excite the Spartans by well-timed taunts and reproaches, so the
-subsequent speakers had aimed at the same objects by panegyric
-upon the well-known valor and discipline of the city. To all
-these arguments Archidamus set himself to reply. Invoking the
-experience of the elders his contemporaries around him, he impressed
-upon the assembly the grave responsibility, the uncertainties,
-difficulties, and perils, of the war into which they were hurrying
-without preparation.<a id="FNanchor_144" href="#Footnote_144"
-class="fnanchor">[144]</a> He reminded them of the wealth, the
-population, greater than that of any other Grecian city, the naval
-force, the cavalry, the hoplites, the large foreign dominion of
-Athens,—and then asked by what means they proposed to put her down?<a
-id="FNanchor_145" href="#Footnote_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a>
-Ships, they had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[p. 88]</span>
-few; trained seamen, yet fewer; wealth, next to none. They could
-indeed invade and ravage Attica, by their superior numbers and
-land-force: but the Athenians had possessions abroad sufficient to
-enable them to dispense with the produce of Attica, while their
-great navy would retaliate the like ravages upon Peloponnesus.
-To suppose that one or two devastating expeditions into Attica
-would bring the war to an end, would be a deplorable error: such
-proceedings would merely enrage the Athenians, without impairing
-their real strength, and the war would thus be prolonged, perhaps,
-for a whole generation.<a id="FNanchor_146" href="#Footnote_146"
-class="fnanchor">[146]</a> Before they determined upon war, it was
-absolutely necessary to provide more efficient means for carrying
-it on; and to multiply their allies, not merely among the Greeks,
-but among foreigners also: while this was in process, envoys ought
-to be sent to Athens to remonstrate and obtain redress for the
-grievances of the allies. If the Athenians granted this,—which they
-very probably would do, when they saw the preparations going forward,
-and when the ruin of the highly-cultivated soil of Attica was held
-over them <i>in terrorem</i> without being actually consummated,—so much
-the better: if they refused, in the course of two or three years war
-might be commenced with some hopes of success. Archidamus reminded
-his countrymen that their allies would hold <i>them</i> responsible for
-the good or bad issue of what was now determined;<a id="FNanchor_147"
-href="#Footnote_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a> admonishing them,
-in the true spirit of a conservative Spartan, to cling to that
-cautious policy which had been ever the characteristic of the state,
-despising both taunts on their tardiness and panegyric on their
-valor. “We, Spartans, owe both our bravery and our prudence to our
-admirable public discipline: it makes us warlike, because the sense
-of shame is most closely connected with discipline, as valor is with
-the sense of shame: it makes us prudent, because our training keeps
-us too ignorant to set ourselves above our own institutions, and
-holds us<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[p. 89]</span> under
-sharp restraint so as not to disobey them.<a id="FNanchor_148"
-href="#Footnote_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a> And thus, not being
-overwise in unprofitable accomplishments, we Spartans are not given
-to disparage our enemy’s strength in clever speech, and then meet
-him with short-comings in reality: we think that the capacity of
-neighboring states is much on a par, and that the chances in reserve
-for both parties are too uncertain to be discriminated beforehand
-by speech. We always make real preparations against our enemies, as
-if they were proceeding wisely on their side: we must count upon
-security through our own precautions, not upon the chance of their
-errors. Indeed, there is no great superiority in one man as compared
-with another: he is the stoutest who is trained in the severest
-trials. Let us, for our parts, not renounce this discipline, which
-we have received from our fathers, and which we still continue, to
-our very great profit: let us not hurry on, in one short hour, a
-resolution upon which depend so many lives, so much property, so many
-cities, and our own reputation besides. Let us take time to consider,
-since our<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[p. 90]</span> strength
-puts it fully in our power to do so. Send envoys to the Athenians
-on the subject of Potidæa, and of the other grievances alleged by
-our allies,—and that too, the rather as they are ready to give us
-satisfaction: against one who offers satisfaction, custom forbids
-you to proceed, without some previous application, as if he were
-a proclaimed wrong-doer. But, at the same time, make preparation
-for war; such will be the course of policy at once the best for
-your own power and the most terror-striking to your enemies.”<a
-id="FNanchor_149" href="#Footnote_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a></p>
-
-<p>The speech of Archidamus was not only in itself full of plain
-reason and good sense, but delivered altogether from the point
-of view of a Spartan; appealing greatly to Spartan conservative
-feeling and even prejudice. But in spite of all this, and in spite
-of the personal esteem entertained for the speaker, the tide of
-feeling in the opposite direction was at that moment irresistible.
-Stheneläidas—one of the five ephors, to whom it fell to put the
-question for voting—closed the debate; and his few words mark at
-once the character of the man, the temper of the assembly, and the
-simplicity of speech, though without the wisdom of judgment, for
-which Archidamus had taken credit to his countrymen.</p>
-
-<p>“I don’t understand (he said) these long speeches of the
-Athenians. They have praised themselves abundantly, but they have
-never rebutted what is laid to their charge,—that they are guilty of
-wrong against our allies and against Peloponnesus. Now, if in former
-days they were good men against the Persians, and are now evil-doers
-against us, they deserve double punishment, as having become
-evil-doers instead of good.<a id="FNanchor_150" href="#Footnote_150"
-class="fnanchor">[150]</a> But <i>we</i> are the same now as we were
-then: we know better than to sit still while our allies are
-suffering wrong: we shall not adjourn our aid while they cannot
-adjourn their sufferings.<a id="FNanchor_151" href="#Footnote_151"
-class="fnanchor">[151]</a> Others have in<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_91">[p. 91]</span> abundance wealth, ships, and horses,—but
-<i>we</i> have good allies, whom we are not to abandon to the mercy of
-the Athenians: nor are we to trust our redress to arbitration and to
-words, when our wrongs are not confined to words. We must help them
-speedily and with all our strength. Nor let any one tell us that we
-can with honor deliberate when we are actually suffering wrong,—it
-is rather for those who intend to do the wrong, to deliberate well
-beforehand. Resolve upon war then, Lacedæmonians, in a manner worthy
-of Sparta: suffer not the Athenians to become greater than they are:
-let us not betray our allies to ruin, but march, with the aid of the
-gods, against the wrong-doers.”</p>
-
-<p>With these few words, so well calculated to defeat the prudential
-admonitions of Archidamus, Stheneläidas put the question for the
-decision of the assembly,—which, at Sparta, was usually taken neither
-by show of hands nor by deposit of balls in an urn, but by cries
-analogous to the Aye or No of the English House of Commons,—the
-presiding ephor declaring which of the cries predominated. On
-this occasion the cry for war was manifestly the stronger:<a
-id="FNanchor_152" href="#Footnote_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a>
-yet Stheneläidas affected inability to determine which of the two
-cries was the louder, in order that he might have an excuse for
-bringing about a more impressive manifestation of sentiment and a
-stronger apparent majority,—since a portion of the minority would
-probably be afraid to show their real opinions as individuals
-openly. He accordingly directed a division, like the Speaker of the
-English House of Commons, when his decision in favor of aye or no
-is questioned by any member: “Such of you as think that the truce
-has been violated, and that the Athenians are doing us wrong, go to
-<i>that</i> side; such as think the contrary, to the other side.” The
-assembly accordingly divided, and the majority was very great on the
-warlike side of the question.</p>
-
-<p>The first step of the Lacedæmonians, after coming to this
-important decision was, to send to Delphi and inquire of the oracle
-whether it would be beneficial to them to undertake the war: the
-answer brought back (Thucydidês seems hardly certain that<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[p. 92]</span> it was really given<a
-id="FNanchor_153" href="#Footnote_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a>)
-was,—that if they did their best they would be victorious, and that
-the god would help them, invoked or uninvoked. They at the same
-time convened a general congress of their allies at Sparta, for the
-purpose of submitting their recent resolution to the vote of all.</p>
-
-<p>To the Corinthians, in their anxiety for the relief of Potidæa,
-the decision of this congress was not less important than that which
-the Spartans had just taken separately: and they sent round envoys
-to each of the allies, entreating them to authorize war without
-reserve. Through such instigations, acting upon the general impulse
-then prevalent, the congress came together in a temper decidedly
-warlike: most of the speakers were full of invective against Athens,
-and impatient for action, while the Corinthians, waiting as before to
-speak the last, wound up the discussion by a speech well calculated
-to insure a hearty vote. Their former speech had been directed to
-shame, exasperate, and alarm the Lacedæmonians: this point had now
-been carried, and they had to enforce, upon the allies generally,
-the dishonor as well as the impolicy of receding from a willing
-leader. The cause was one in which all were interested, the inland
-states not less than the maritime, for both would find themselves
-ultimately victims of the encroaching despot city: whatever efforts
-were necessary for the war, ought cheerfully to be made, since it was
-only through war that they could arrive at a secure and honorable
-peace. There were good hopes that this might soon be attained, and
-that the war would not last long,—so decided was the superiority
-of the confederacy, in numbers, in military skill, and in the
-equal heart and obedience of all its members.<a id="FNanchor_154"
-href="#Footnote_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a> The<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[p. 93]</span> naval superiority of
-Athens depended chiefly upon hired seamen,—and the confederacy, by
-borrowing from the treasuries of Delphi and Olympia, would soon be
-able to overbid her, take into pay her best mariners, and equal her
-equipment at sea: they would excite revolt among her allies, and
-establish a permanent fortified post for the ruin of Attica. To make
-up a common fund for this purpose, was indispensably necessary; for
-Athens was far more than a match for each of them single-handed, and
-nothing less than hearty union could save them all from successive
-enslavement,—the very supposition of which was intolerable to
-Peloponnesian freemen, whose fathers had liberated Greece from the
-Persian. Let them not shrink from endurance and sacrifice in such a
-cause,—it was their hereditary pride to purchase success by laborious
-effort. The Delphian god had promised them his coöperation; and the
-whole of Greece would sympathize in the cause, either from fear of
-the despotism of Athens, or from hopes of profit. They would not be
-the first to break the truce, for the Athenians had already broken
-it, as the declaration of the Delphian god distinctly implied.
-Let them lose no time in sending aid to the Potidæans, a Dorian
-population now besieged by Ionians, as well as to those other Greeks
-whom Athens had enslaved. Every day the necessity for effort was
-becoming stronger, and the longer it was delayed, the more painful it
-would be when it came. “Be ye persuaded then, (concluded the orator),
-that this city, which has constituted herself despot of Greece, has
-her position against all of us alike, some for present rule, others
-for future conquest; let us assail and subdue her, that we may
-dwell securely ourselves hereafter, and may emancipate those Greeks
-who are now in slavery.”<a id="FNanchor_155" href="#Footnote_155"
-class="fnanchor">[155]</a></p>
-
-<p>If there were any speeches delivered at this congress in
-opposition to the war, they were not likely to be successful in
-a cause wherein even Archidamus had failed. After the Corinthian
-had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[p. 94]</span> concluded,
-the question was put to the deputies of every city, great and
-small, indiscriminately and the majority decided for war.<a
-id="FNanchor_156" href="#Footnote_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a>
-This important resolution was adopted about the end of
-432 <small>B.C.</small>, or the beginning of January 431
-<small>B.C.</small>: the previous decision of the Spartans separately
-may have been taken about two months earlier, in the preceding
-October or November 432 <small>B.C.</small></p>
-
-<p>Reviewing the conduct of the two great Grecian parties at this
-momentous juncture, with reference to existing treaties and positive
-grounds of complaint, it seems clear that Athens was in the right.
-She had done nothing which could fairly be called a violation of the
-thirty years’ truce: and for such of her acts as were alleged to be
-such, she offered to submit them to that amicable arbitration which
-the truce itself prescribed. The Peloponnesian confederates were
-manifestly the aggressors in the contest; and if Sparta, usually
-so backward, now came forward in a spirit so decidedly opposite,
-we are to ascribe it partly to her standing fear and jealousy
-of Athens, partly to the pressure of her allies, especially of
-the Corinthians. Thucydidês, recognizing these two as the grand
-determining motives, and indicating the alleged infractions of truce
-as simple occasions or pretexts, seems to consider the fear and
-hatred of Athens as having contributed more to determine Sparta than
-the urgency of her allies.<a id="FNanchor_157" href="#Footnote_157"
-class="fnanchor">[157]</a> That the extraordinary aggrandizement
-of Athens, during the period immediately succeeding the Persian
-invasion, was well calculated to excite alarm and jealousy in
-Peloponnesus, is indisputable: but if we take Athens as she stood in
-432 <small>B.C.</small>, it deserves notice that she had
-neither made, nor, so far as we know, tried to make, a single new
-acquisition during the whole fourteen years which had elapsed since
-the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce;<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_95">[p. 95]</span><a id="FNanchor_158" href="#Footnote_158"
-class="fnanchor">[158]</a>— and, moreover, that that truce marked
-an epoch of signal humiliation and reduction of her power. The
-triumph which Sparta and the Peloponnesians then gained, though
-not sufficiently complete to remove all fear of Athens, was yet
-great enough to inspire them with the hope that a second combined
-effort would subdue her. This mixture of fear and hope was exactly
-the state of feeling out of which war was likely to grow,—and we
-see that even before the quarrel between Corinth and Korkyra,
-sagacious Greeks everywhere anticipated war as not far distant:<a
-id="FNanchor_159" href="#Footnote_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a>
-it was near breaking out even on occasion of the revolt of Samos,<a
-id="FNanchor_160" href="#Footnote_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a>
-and peace was then preserved partly by the commercial and nautical
-interests of Corinth, partly by the quiescence of Athens. But the
-quarrel of Corinth and Korkyra, which Sparta might have appeased
-beforehand had she thought it her interest to do so,—and the junction
-of Korkyra with Athens,—exhibited the latter as again in a career
-of aggrandizement, and thus again brought into play the warlike
-feelings of Sparta; while they converted Corinth from the advocate of
-peace into a clamorous organ of war. The revolt of Potidæa,—fomented
-by Corinth, and encouraged by Sparta in the form of a positive
-promise to invade<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[p. 96]</span>
-Attica,—was, in point of fact, the first distinct violation of the
-truce, and the initiatory measure of the Peloponnesian war: nor did
-the Spartan meeting, and the subsequent congress of allies at Sparta,
-serve any other purpose than to provide such formalities as were
-requisite to insure the concurrent and hearty action of numbers, and
-to clothe with imposing sanction a state of war already existing in
-reality, though yet unproclaimed. The sentiment in Peloponnesus at
-this moment was not the fear of Athens, but the hatred of Athens,—and
-the confident hope of subduing her. And indeed such confidence
-was justified by plausible grounds: men might well think that the
-Athenians would never endure the entire devastation of their highly
-cultivated soil,—or at least that they would certainly come forth
-to fight for it in the field, which was all that the Peloponnesians
-desired. Nothing except the unparalleled ascendency and unshaken
-resolution of Periklês, induced the Athenians to persevere in a
-scheme of patient defence, and to trust to that naval superiority
-which the enemies of Athens, save and except the judicious
-Archidamus, had not yet learned fully to appreciate. Moreover, the
-confident hopes of the Peloponnesians were materially strengthened
-by the wide-spread sympathy in favor of their cause, proclaiming,
-as it did, the intended liberation of Greece from a despot city.<a
-id="FNanchor_161" href="#Footnote_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p>
-
-<p>To Athens, on the other hand, the coming war presented itself in
-a very different aspect; holding out scarcely any hope of possible
-gain, and the certainty of prodigious loss and privation,—even
-granting, that, at this heavy cost, her independence and union at
-home, and her empire abroad, could be upheld. By Periklês, and by
-the more long-sighted Athenians, the chance of unavoidable war was
-foreseen even before the Korkyræan dispute.<a id="FNanchor_162"
-href="#Footnote_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a> But Periklês was only
-the first citizen in a democracy, esteemed, trusted, and listened
-to, more than any one else by the body of the citizens, but warmly
-opposed in most of his measures, under the free speech and latitude
-of individual action which reigned at Athens,—and even bitterly
-hated by many active political opponents. The formal determination
-of the Lacedæmonians, to declare war, must of course have been made
-known at Athens<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[p. 97]</span>
-by those Athenian envoys, who had entered an unavailing protest
-against it in the Spartan assembly. No steps were taken by Sparta
-to carry this determination into effect until after the congress of
-allies and their pronounced confirmatory vote. Nor did the Spartans
-even then send any herald, or make any formal declaration. They
-despatched various propositions to Athens, not at all with a view of
-trying to obtain satisfaction, or of providing some escape from the
-probability of war; but with the contrary purpose,—of multiplying
-demands, and enlarging the grounds of quarrel.<a id="FNanchor_163"
-href="#Footnote_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a> Meanwhile, the
-deputies retiring home from the congress to their respective cities,
-carried with them the general resolution for immediate warlike
-preparations to be made, with as little delay as possible.<a
-id="FNanchor_164" href="#Footnote_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a></p>
-
-<p>The first requisition addressed by the Lacedæmonians to Athens
-was a political manœuvre aimed at Periklês, their chief opponent in
-that city. His mother, Agaristê, belonged to the great family of the
-Alkmæônids, who were supposed to be under an inexpiable hereditary
-taint, in consequence of the sacrilege committed by their ancestor
-Megaklês, nearly two centuries before, in the slaughter of the
-Kylonian suppliants near the altar of the Venerable Goddesses.<a
-id="FNanchor_165" href="#Footnote_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a>
-Ancient as this transaction was, it still had sufficient hold on the
-mind of the Athenians to serve as the basis of a political manœuvre:
-about seventy-seven years before, shortly after the expulsion of
-Hippias from Athens, it had been so employed by the Spartan king
-Kleomenês, who at that time exacted from the Athenians a clearance
-of the ancient sacrilege, to be effected by the banishment of
-Kleisthenês, the founder of the democracy, and his chief partisans.
-This demand, addressed by Kleomenês to the Athenians, at the
-instance of Isagoras, the rival of Kleisthenês,<a id="FNanchor_166"
-href="#Footnote_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a> had been then obeyed,
-and had served well the purposes of those who sent it; a similar
-blow was now aimed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[p. 98]</span>
-by the Lacedæmonians at Periklês, the grand nephew of Kleisthenês,
-and doubtless at the instance of his political enemies: religion
-required, it was pretended, that “the abomination of the goddess
-should be driven out.”<a id="FNanchor_167" href="#Footnote_167"
-class="fnanchor">[167]</a> If the Athenians complied with this
-demand, they would deprive themselves, at this critical moment, of
-their ablest leader; but the Lacedæmonians, not expecting compliance,
-reckoned at all events upon discrediting Periklês with the people, as
-being partly the cause of the war through family taint of impiety,<a
-id="FNanchor_168" href="#Footnote_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a>—and
-this impression would doubtless be loudly proclaimed by his political
-opponents in the assembly.</p>
-
-<p>The influence of Periklês with the Athenian public had become
-greater and greater as their political experience of him was
-prolonged. But the bitterness of his enemies appears to have
-increased along with it; and not long before this period, he had been
-indirectly assailed, through the medium of accusations against three
-different persons, all more or less intimate with him,—his mistress
-Aspasia, the philosopher Anaxagoras, and the sculptor Pheidias. We
-cannot make out either the exact date, or the exact facts, of either
-of these accusations. Aspasia, daughter of Axiochus, was a native
-of Milêtus, beautiful, well educated, and ambitious. She resided
-at Athens, and is affirmed, though upon very doubtful evidence, to
-have kept slave-girls to be let out as courtezans; whatever may
-be the case with this report, which is most probably one of the
-scandals engendered by political animosity against Periklês,<a
-id="FNanchor_169" href="#Footnote_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a>
-it is certain that so re<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[p.
-99]</span>markable were her own fascinations, her accomplishments,
-and her powers, not merely of conversation, but even of oratory
-and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[p. 100]</span>
-criticism,—that the most distinguished Athenians of all ages and
-characters, Sokratês among the number, visited her, and several
-of them took their wives along with them to hear her also. The
-free citizen women of Athens lived in strict and almost oriental
-recluseness, as well after being married as when single: everything
-which concerned their lives, their happiness, or their rights, was
-determined or managed for them by male relatives: and they seem
-to have been destitute of all mental culture and accomplishments.
-Their society presented no charm nor interest, which men accordingly
-sought for in the company of the class of women called hetæræ, or
-courtezans, literally female companions; who lived a free life,
-managed their own affairs, and supported themselves by their powers
-of pleasing. These women were numerous, and were doubtless of
-every variety of personal character: but the most distinguished
-and superior among them, such as Aspasia and Theodotê,<a
-id="FNanchor_170" href="#Footnote_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a>
-appear to have been the only women in Greece, except the Spartan, who
-either inspired strong passion or exercised mental ascendency.</p>
-
-<p>Periklês had been determined in his choice of a wife by those
-family considerations which were held almost obligatory at
-Athens, and had married a woman very nearly related to him, by
-whom he had two sons, Xanthippus and Paralus. But the marriage,
-having never been comfortable, was afterwards dissolved by mutual
-consent, according to that full liberty of divorce which the
-Attic law permitted; and Periklês concurred with his wife’s male
-relations, who formed her legal guardians, in giving her a way
-to another husband.<a id="FNanchor_171" href="#Footnote_171"
-class="fnanchor">[171]</a> He then took Aspasia to live with
-him,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[p. 101]</span> had a son
-by her, who bore his name, and continued ever afterwards on terms
-of the greatest intimacy and affection with her. Without adopting
-those exaggerations which represent Aspasia as having communicated
-to Periklês his distinguished eloquence, or even as having herself
-composed orations for public delivery, we may well believe her to
-have been qualified to take interest and share in that literary and
-philosophical society which frequented the house of Periklês, and
-which his unprincipled son Xanthippus,—disgusted with his father’s
-regular expenditure, as withholding from him the means of supporting
-an extravagant establishment,—reported abroad with exaggerating
-calumnies and turned into derision. It was from that worthless
-young man, who died of the Athenian epidemic during the lifetime
-of Periklês, that his political enemies and the comic writers of
-the day were mainly furnished with scandalous anecdotes to assail
-the private habits of this distinguished man.<a id="FNanchor_172"
-href="#Footnote_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a> The comic writers
-attacked him for alleged intrigues with different women, but the
-name of Aspasia they treated as public property, without any mercy
-or reserve: she was the Omphalê, the Deianeira, or the Hêrê, to
-this great Hêraklês or Zeus of Athens. At length one of these
-comic writers, Hermippus, not contented with scenic attacks,
-indicted her before the dikastery for impiety, as participant in
-the philosophical discussions held, and the opinions professed,
-in the society of Periklês, by Anaxagoras and others. Against
-Anaxagoras himself, too, a similar indictment is said to have been
-preferred, either by Kleon or by Thucydidês, son of Melêsias, under
-a general resolution recently passed in the public assembly, at
-the instance of Diopeithês. And such was the sensitive antipathy
-of the Athenian public, shown afterwards fatally in the case of
-Sokratês, and embittered in this instance by all the artifices of
-political faction, against philosophers whose opinions conflicted
-with the received religious dogmas, that Periklês did not dare to
-place Anaxagoras on his trial: the latter retired from Athens, and
-the sentence of banishment was passed against him in his absence.<a
-id="FNanchor_173" href="#Footnote_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a>
-But he himself defended Aspasia before<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_102">[p. 102]</span> the diakastery: in fact, the indictment
-was as much against him as against her: one thing alleged against
-her, and also against Pheidias, was, the reception of free women to
-facilitate the intrigues of Periklês. He defended her successfully,
-and procured a verdict of acquittal: but we are not surprised to
-hear that his speech was marked by the strongest personal emotions,
-and even by tears.<a id="FNanchor_174" href="#Footnote_174"
-class="fnanchor">[174]</a> The dikasts were accustomed to such
-appeals to their sympathies, sometimes even to extravagant excess,
-from ordinary accused persons: but in Periklês, so manifest an
-outburst of emotion stands out as something quite unparalleled:
-for constant self-mastery was one of the most prominent features
-in his character.<a id="FNanchor_175" href="#Footnote_175"
-class="fnanchor">[175]</a> And we shall find him near the close of
-his political life, when he had become for the moment unpopular
-with the Athenian people, distracted as they were at the moment
-with the terrible sufferings of the pestilence,—bearing up against
-their unmerited anger not merely with dignity, but with a pride of
-conscious innocence and desert which rises almost into defiance;
-insomuch that the rhetor Dionysius, who criticizes the speech
-of Periklês as if it were simply the composition of Thucydidês,
-censures that historian for having violated dramatic propriety by
-a display of insolence where humility would have been becoming.<a
-id="FNanchor_176" href="#Footnote_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a></p>
-
-<p>It appears, also, as far as we can judge amidst very imperfect
-data, that the trial of the great sculptor Pheidias, for alleged
-embezzlement in the contract for his celebrated gold and ivory
-statue of Athênê,<a id="FNanchor_177" href="#Footnote_177"
-class="fnanchor">[177]</a> took place nearly at this period. That
-statue had been finished and dedicated in the Parthenon in 437
-<small>B.C.</small>, since which period Pheidias had
-been engaged at Olympia, in his last and great masterpiece, the
-colossal statue of the Olym<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[p.
-103]</span>pian Zeus. On his return to Athens from the execution
-of this work, about 433 or 432 <small>B.C.</small>,
-the accusation of embezzlement was instituted against him
-by the political enemies of Periklês.<a id="FNanchor_178"
-href="#Footnote_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a> A slave of Pheidias,
-named Menon, planted himself as a suppliant at the altar, professing
-to be cognizant of certain facts which proved that his master had
-committed peculation. Motion was made to receive his depositions,
-and to insure to his person the protection of the people; upon which
-he revealed various statements impeaching the pecuniary probity of
-Pheidias, and the latter was put in prison, awaiting the day for his
-trial before the dikastery. The gold employed and charged for in the
-statue, however, was all capable of being taken off and weighed, so
-as to verify its accuracy, which Periklês dared the accusers to do.
-Besides the charge of embezzlement, there were other circumstances
-which rendered Pheidias unpopular: it had been discovered that, in
-the reliefs on the friese of the Parthenon, he had introduced the
-portraits both of himself and of Periklês in conspicuous positions.
-It seems that Pheidias died in prison before the day of trial;
-and some even said, that he had been poisoned by the enemies of
-Periklês, in order that the suspicions against the latter, who
-was the real object of attack, might be aggravated. It is said
-also that Drakontidês proposed and carried a decree in the public
-assembly, that Periklês should be called on to give an account of
-the money which he had expended, and that the dikasts, before whom
-the account was rendered, should give their suffrage in the most
-solemn manner from the altar: this latter provision was modified
-by Agnon, who, while proposing that the dikasts should be fifteen
-hundred in number, retained the vote by pebbles in the urn according
-to ordinary custom.<a id="FNanchor_179" href="#Footnote_179"
-class="fnanchor">[179]</a></p>
-
-<p>If Periklês was ever tried on such a charge, there can be no doubt
-that he was honorably acquitted: for the language of Thucydidês
-respecting his pecuniary probity is such as could never have been
-employed if a verdict of guilty on a charge of peculation had
-ever been publicly pronounced. But we cannot be certain that he
-ever was tried: indeed, another accusation<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_104">[p. 104]</span> urged by his enemies, and even by
-Aristophanês, in the sixth year of the Peloponnesian war, implies
-that no trial took place: for it was alleged that Periklês, in
-order to escape this danger, “blew up the Peloponnesian war,”
-and involved his country in such confusion and peril as made his
-own aid and guidance indispensably necessary to her: especially
-that he passed the decree against the Megarians by which the war
-was really brought on.<a id="FNanchor_180" href="#Footnote_180"
-class="fnanchor">[180]</a> We know enough, however, to be certain
-that such a supposition is altogether inadmissible. The enemies of
-Periklês were far too eager, and too expert in Athenian political
-warfare, to have let him escape by such a stratagem: moreover, we
-learn from the assurance of Thucydidês, that the war depended upon
-far deeper causes,—that the Megarian decree was in no way the real
-cause of it,—that it was not Periklês, but the Peloponnesians,
-who brought it on, by the blow struck at Potidæa.</p> <p><span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[p. 105]</span></p> <p>All that we
-can make out, amidst these uncertified allegations, is, that in the
-year or two immediately preceding the Peloponnesian war, Periklês
-was hard pressed by the accusations of political enemies,—perhaps
-even in his own person, but certainly in the persons of those who
-were most in his confidence and affection.<a id="FNanchor_181"
-href="#Footnote_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a> And it was in this
-turn of his political position that the Lacedæmonians sent to
-Athens the above-mentioned requisition, that the ancient Kylonian
-sacrilege might be at length cleared out; in other words, that
-Periklês and his family might be banished. Doubtless, his enemies,
-as well as the partisans of Lacedæmon at Athens, would strenuously
-support this proposition: and the party of Lacedæmon at Athens
-was always strong, even during the middle of the war: to act as
-proxenus to the Lacedæmonians was accounted an honor even by the
-greatest Athenian families.<a id="FNanchor_182" href="#Footnote_182"
-class="fnanchor">[182]</a> On this occasion, however, the manœuvre
-did not succeed, nor did the Athenians listen to the requisition for
-banishing the sacrilegious Alkmæônids. On the contrary, they replied
-that the Spartans, too, had an account of sacrilege to clear off;
-for they had violated the sanctuary of Poseidon, at Cape Tænarus,
-in dragging from it some helot suppliants to be put to death,—and
-the sanctuary of Athênê Chalkiœkus at Sparta, in blocking up and
-starving to death the guilty regent Pausanias. To require that
-Laconia might be cleared of these two acts of sacrilege, was the
-only answer which the Athenians made to the demand sent for the
-banishment of Periklês.<a id="FNanchor_183" href="#Footnote_183"
-class="fnanchor">[183]</a> Probably, the actual effect of that demand
-was, to strengthen him in the public esteem:<a id="FNanchor_184"
-href="#Footnote_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a> very different from
-the effect of the same manœuvre when practised before by Kleomenês
-against Kleisthenês.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[p. 106]</span></p>
-
-<p>Other Spartan envoys shortly afterwards arrived, with fresh
-demands. The Athenians were now required: 1. To withdraw their
-troops from Potidæa. 2. To replace Ægina in its autonomy. 3. To
-repeal the decree of exclusion against the Megarians. It was upon
-the latter that the greatest stress was laid; an intimation being
-held out that war might be avoided if such repeal were granted. We
-see plainly, from this proceeding, that the Lacedæmonians acted in
-concert with the anti-Periklêan leaders at Athens. To Sparta and her
-confederacy the decree against the Megarians was of less importance
-than the rescue of the Corinthian troops now blocked up in Potidæa:
-but on the other hand, the party opposed to Periklês would have much
-better chance of getting a vote of the assembly against him on the
-subject of the Megarians: and this advantage, if gained, would serve
-to enfeeble his influence generally. No concession was obtained,
-however, on either of the three points: even in respect to Megara,
-the decree of exclusion was vindicated and upheld against all the
-force of opposition. At length the Lacedæmonians—who had already
-resolved upon war, and had sent these envoys in mere compliance
-with the exigencies of ordinary practice, not with any idea of
-bringing about an accommodation—sent a third batch of envoys with a
-proposition, which at least had the merit of disclosing their real
-purpose without disguise. Rhamphias and two other Spartans announced
-to the Athenians the simple injunction: “The Lacedæmonians wish the
-peace to stand; and it <i>may</i> stand, if you will leave the Greeks
-autonomous.” Upon this demand, so very different from the preceding,
-the Athenians resolved to hold a fresh assembly on the subject of
-war or peace, to open the whole question anew for discussion, and to
-determine, once for all, on a peremptory answer.<a id="FNanchor_185"
-href="#Footnote_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a></p>
-
-<p>The last demands presented on the part of Sparta, which went
-to nothing less than the entire extinction of the Athenian
-empire,—combined with the character, alike wavering and insin<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[p. 107]</span>cere, of the demands
-previously made, and with the knowledge that the Spartan confederacy
-had pronounced peremptorily in favor of war,—seemed likely to produce
-unanimity at Athens, and to bring together this important assembly
-under the universal conviction that war was inevitable. Such,
-however, was not the fact. The reluctance to go to war was sincere
-amidst the large majority of the assembly; while among a considerable
-portion of them it was so preponderant, that they even now reverted
-to the opening which the Lacedæmonians had before held out about the
-anti-Megarian decree, as if that were the chief cause of war. There
-was much difference of opinion among the speakers, several of whom
-insisted upon the repeal of this decree, treating it as a matter far
-too insignificant to go to war about, and denouncing the obstinacy of
-Periklês for refusing to concede such a trifle.<a id="FNanchor_186"
-href="#Footnote_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a> Against this
-opinion Periklês entered his protest, in an harangue decisive and
-encouraging, which Dionysius of Halikarnassus ranks among the best
-speeches in Thucydidês: the latter historian may probably himself
-have heard the original speech.</p>
-
-<p>“I continue, Athenians, to adhere to the same conviction, that
-we must not yield to the Peloponnesians,—though I know that men
-are in one mood when they sanction the resolution to go to war,
-and in another when actually in the contest,—their judgments then
-depending upon the turn of events. I have only to repeat now what
-I have said on former occasions,—and I adjure you who follow my
-views to adhere to what we jointly resolve, though the result should
-be partially unfavorable: or else, not to take credit for wisdom
-in the event of success.<a id="FNanchor_187" href="#Footnote_187"
-class="fnanchor">[187]</a> For it is very<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_108">[p. 108]</span> possible that the contingencies of
-events may depart more from all reasonable track than the counsels
-of man: such are the unexpected turns which we familiarly impute
-to fortune. The Lacedæmonians have before now manifested their
-hostile aims against us, but on this last occasion more than
-ever. While the truce prescribes that we are to give and receive
-amicable satisfaction for our differences, and each to retain what
-we possess,—they not only have not asked for such satisfaction,
-but will not receive it when tendered by us: they choose to settle
-complaints by war and not by discussion: they have got beyond the
-tone of complaint, and are here already with that of command. For
-they enjoin us to withdraw from Potidæa, to leave Ægina free, and
-to rescind the decree against the Megarians: nay, these last envoys
-are even come to proclaim to us, that we must leave all the Greeks
-free. Now let none of you believe, that we shall be going to war
-about a trifle, if we refuse to rescind the Megarian decree,—which
-they chiefly put forward, as if its repeal would avert the war,—let
-none of you take blame to yourselves as if we had gone to war about
-a small matter. For this small matter contains in itself the whole
-test and trial of your mettle: if ye yield it, ye will presently have
-some other greater exaction put upon you, like men who have already
-truckled on one point from fear: whereas if ye hold out stoutly, ye
-will make it clear to them that they must deal with you more upon
-a footing of equality.”<a id="FNanchor_188" href="#Footnote_188"
-class="fnanchor">[188]</a></p>
-
-<p>Periklês then examined the relative strength of parties and the
-chances of war. The Peloponnesians were a self-working population,
-with few slaves, and without wealth, either private or public;
-they had no means of carrying on distant or long-continued war:
-they were ready to expose their persons, but not at all ready
-to contribute from their very narrow means:<a id="FNanchor_189"
-href="#Footnote_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a> in a border-war,
-or a single land battle, they were invincible, but for systematic
-warfare against a power like Athens, they had neither competent
-headship, nor habits of concert and punctuality, nor money to
-profit<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[p. 109]</span> by
-opportunities, always rare and accidental, for successful attack.
-They might, perhaps, establish a fortified post in Attica, but it
-would do little serious mischief; while at sea, their inferiority
-and helplessness would be complete, and the irresistible Athenian
-navy would take care to keep it so. Nor would they be able to reckon
-on tempting away the able foreign seamen from Athenian ships by
-means of funds borrowed from Olympia or Delphi:<a id="FNanchor_190"
-href="#Footnote_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a> for besides that
-the mariners of the dependent islands would find themselves losers
-even by accepting a higher pay, with the certainty of Athenian
-vengeance afterwards,—Athens herself would suffice to man her fleet
-in case of need, with her own citizens and metics: she had within
-her own walls steersmen and mariners better as well as more numerous
-than all Greece besides. There was but one side on which Athens
-was vulnerable: Attica unfortunately was not an island,—it was
-exposed to invasion and ravage. To this the Athenians must submit,
-without committing the imprudence of engaging a land battle to
-avert it: they had abundant lands out of Attica, insular as well as
-continental, to supply their wants, and they could in their turn,
-by means of their navy, ravage the Peloponnesian territories, whose
-inhabitants had no subsidiary lands to recur to.<a id="FNanchor_191"
-href="#Footnote_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a></p>
-
-<p>“Mourn not for the loss of land and houses (continued the orator):
-reserve your mourning for men: houses and land acquire not men,
-but men acquire them.<a id="FNanchor_192" href="#Footnote_192"
-class="fnanchor">[192]</a> Nay, if I thought I could prevail upon
-you, I would exhort you to march out and ravage them yourselves,
-and thus show to the Peloponnesians that, for them at least,
-ye will not truckle. And I could exhibit many further grounds
-for confidently anticipating success, if ye will only be<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[p. 110]</span> willing not to aim
-at increased dominion when we are in the midst of war, and not to
-take upon yourselves new self-imposed risks; for I have ever been
-more afraid of our own blunders than of the plans of our enemy.<a
-id="FNanchor_193" href="#Footnote_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a>
-But these are matters for future discussion, when we come to actual
-operations: for the present let us dismiss these envoys with the
-answer: That we will permit the Megarians to use our markets and
-harbors, if the Lacedæmonians on their side will discontinue their
-(xenêlasy or) summary expulsions of ourselves and our allies from
-their own territory,—for there is nothing in the truce to prevent
-either one or the other: that we will leave the Grecian cities
-autonomous, if we <i>had</i> them as autonomous at the time when the truce
-was made,—and as soon as the Lacedæmonians shall grant to <i>their</i>
-allied cities autonomy such as each of them shall freely choose, not
-such as is convenient to Sparta: that while we are ready to give
-satisfaction according to the truce, we will not begin war, but
-will repel those who do begin it. Such is the reply at once just
-and suitable to the dignity of this city. We ought to make up our
-minds that war is inevitable: the more cheerfully we accept it, the
-less vehement shall we find our enemies in their attack: and where
-the danger is greatest, there also is the final honor greatest,
-both for a state and for a private citizen. Assuredly our fathers,
-when they bore up against the Persians,—having no such means as we
-possess to start from, and even compelled to abandon all that they
-did possess,—both repelled the invader and brought matters forward
-to our actual pitch, more by advised operation than by good fortune,
-and by a daring courage greater than their real power. We ought not
-to fall short of them: we must keep off our enemies in every way, and
-leave an unimpaired power to our successors.”<a id="FNanchor_194"
-href="#Footnote_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a></p>
-
-<p>These animating encouragements of Periklês carried with them
-the majority of the assembly, so that answer was made to the
-envoys, such as he recommended, on each of the particular points in
-debate. It was announced to them, moreover, on the general<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[p. 111]</span> question of peace
-or war, that the Athenians were prepared to discuss all the
-grounds of complaint against them, pursuant to the truce, by equal
-and amicable arbitration,—but that they would do nothing under
-authoritative demand.<a id="FNanchor_195" href="#Footnote_195"
-class="fnanchor">[195]</a> With this answer the envoys returned to
-Sparta, and an end was put to negotiation.</p>
-
-<p>It seems evident, from the account of Thucydidês, that the
-Athenian public was not brought to this resolution without much
-reluctance, and great fear of the consequences, especially
-destruction of property in Attica: and that a considerable minority
-took opposition on the Megarian decree,—the ground skilfully laid by
-Sparta for breaking the unanimity of her enemy, and strengthening
-the party opposed to Periklês. But we may also decidedly infer from
-the same historian,—especially from the proceedings of Corinth and
-Sparta, as he sets them forth,—that Athens could not have avoided
-the war without such an abnegation, both of dignity and power as
-no nation under any government will ever submit to, and as would
-have even left her without decent security for her individual
-rights. To accept the war tendered to her, was a matter not merely
-of prudence but of necessity: the tone of exaction assumed by the
-Spartan envoys would have rendered concession a mere evidence of
-weakness and fear. As the account of Thucydidês bears out the
-judgment of Periklês on this important point,<a id="FNanchor_196"
-href="#Footnote_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a> so it also shows us
-that Athens was not less in the right upon the received principles
-of international dealing. It was not Athens, as the Spartans<a
-id="FNanchor_197" href="#Footnote_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a>
-them<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[p. 112]</span>selves
-afterwards came to feel, but her enemies, who broke the provisions
-of the truce, by encouraging the revolt of Potidæa, and by
-promising invasion of Attica: it was not Athens, but her enemies,
-who, after thus breaking the truce, made a string of exorbitant
-demands, in order to get up as good a case as possible for war.<a
-id="FNanchor_198" href="#Footnote_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a>
-The case made out by Periklês, justifying the war on grounds both
-of right and prudence, is in all its main points borne out by the
-impartial voice of Thucydidês. And though it is perfectly true,
-that the ambition of Athens had been great, and the increase of her
-power marvellous, during the thirty-five years between the repulse
-of Xerxes and the thirty years’ truce,—it is not less true that by
-that truce she lost very largely, and that she acquired nothing to
-compensate such loss during the fourteen years between the truce and
-the Korkyræan alliance. The policy of Periklês had not been one of
-foreign aggrandizement, or of increasing vexation and encroachment
-towards other Grecian powers: even the Korkyræan alliance was noway
-courted by him, and was in truth accepted with paramount regard to
-the obligations of the existing truce: while the circumstances out
-of which that alliance grew, testify a more forward ambition on the
-part of Corinth than on that of Athens, to appropriate to herself
-the Korkyræan naval force. It is common to ascribe the Peloponnesian
-war to the ambition of Athens, but this is a partial view of the
-case. The aggressive sentiment, partly fear, partly hatred, was on
-the side of the Peloponnesians, who were not ignorant that Athens
-desired the continuance of peace, but were resolved not to let her
-stand as she was at the conclusion of the thirty years’ truce; it was
-their purpose to attack her and break down her empire, as dangerous,
-wrongful, and anti-Hellenic. The war was thus partly a contest of
-principle, involving the popular proclamation of the right of every
-Grecian state to autonomy, against Athens: partly a contest of power,
-wherein Spartan and Corinthian ambition was not less conspicuous, and
-far more aggressive in the beginning, than Athenian.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[p. 113]</span></p>
-
-<p>Conformably to what is here said, the first blow of the war
-was struck, not by Athens, but against her. After the decisive
-answer given to the Spartan envoys, taken in conjunction with the
-previous proceedings, and the preparations actually going on among
-the Peloponnesian confederacy,—the truce could hardly be said to be
-still in force, though there was no formal proclamation of rupture.
-A few weeks passed in restricted and mistrustful intercourse;<a
-id="FNanchor_199" href="#Footnote_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a>
-though individuals who passed the borders did not think it necessary
-to take a herald with them, as in time of actual war. Had the excess
-of ambition been on the side of Athens compared with her enemies,
-this was the time for her to strike the first blow, carrying with it
-of course great probability of success, before their preparations
-were completed. But she remained strictly within the limits of the
-truce, and the disastrous series of mutual aggressions, destined to
-tear in pieces the entrails of Hellas, was opened by her enemy and
-her neighbor.</p>
-
-<p>The little town of Platæa, still hallowed by the memorable victory
-over the Persians, as well as by the tutelary consecration received
-from Pausanias, was the scene of this unforeseen enterprise. It stood
-in Bœotia, immediately north of Kithæron; on the borders of Attica
-on one side, and of the Theban territory on the other, from which it
-was separated by the river Asôpus: the distance between Platæa and
-Thebes being about seventy stadia, or a little more than eight miles.
-Though Bœotian by descent, the Platæans were completely separated
-from the Bœotian league, and in hearty alliance, as well as qualified
-communion of civil rights, with the Athenians, who had protected
-them against the bitter enmity of Thebes, for a period of time now
-nearly three generations. But in spite of this long prescription,
-the Thebans, as chiefs of the Bœotian league, still felt themselves
-wronged by the separation of Platæa: and an oligarchical faction
-of wealthy Platæans espoused their cause,<a id="FNanchor_200"
-href="#Footnote_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a> with a<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[p. 114]</span> view of subverting the
-democratical government of the town, of destroying its leaders, their
-political rivals, and of establishing an oligarchy with themselves
-as the chiefs. Naukleidês, and others of this faction, entered into
-a secret conspiracy with Eurymachus and the oligarchy of Thebes:
-to both it appeared a tempting prize, since war was close at hand,
-to take advantage of this ambiguous interval, before watches had
-been placed, and the precautions of a state of war commenced, and
-to surprise the town of Platæa in the night: moreover, a period
-of religious festival was chosen, in order that the population
-might be most completely off their guard.<a id="FNanchor_201"
-href="#Footnote_201" class="fnanchor">[201]</a> Accordingly, on a
-rainy night towards the close of March 431 <small>B.C.</small>,<a
-id="FNanchor_202" href="#Footnote_202" class="fnanchor">[202]</a> a
-body of rather more than three hundred Theban hoplites, commanded
-by two of the Bœotarchs, Pythangelus, and Diemporus, and including
-Eurymachus in the ranks, presented themselves at the gate of Platæa
-during the first sleep of the citizens: Naukleidês and his partisans
-opened the gate and conducted them to the agora, which they reached
-and occupied in military order without the least resistance. The
-best part of the Theban military force was intended to arrive at
-Platæa by break of day, in order to support them.<a id="FNanchor_203"
-href="#Footnote_203" class="fnanchor">[203]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[p. 115]</span></p>
-
-<p>Naukleidês and his friends, following the instincts of political
-antipathy, were eager to conduct the Thebans to the houses of their
-opponents, the democratical leaders, in order that the latter
-might be seized or despatched. But to this the Thebans would not
-consent: believing themselves now masters of the town, and certain
-of a large reinforcement at daylight, they thought they could
-overawe the citizens into an apparently willing acquiescence in
-their terms, without any actual violence: they wished, moreover,
-rather to soften and justify, than to aggravate, the gross public
-wrong already committed. Accordingly their herald was directed
-to invite, by public proclamation, all Platæans who were willing
-to return to their ancient sympathies of race, and to the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[p. 116]</span> Bœotian confederacy,
-that they should come forth and take station as brethren in the
-armed ranks of the Thebans. And the Platæans, suddenly roused from
-sleep by the astounding news that their great enemy was master of
-the town, supposed amidst the darkness that the number of assailants
-was far greater than the reality: so that in spite of their strong
-attachment to Athens, they thought their case hopeless, and began
-to open negotiations. But as they soon found out, in spite of the
-darkness, as the discussion proceeded, that the real numbers of the
-Thebans were not greater than could be dealt with,—they speedily took
-courage and determined to attack them; establishing communication
-with each other by breaking through the walls of their private
-houses, in order that they might not be detected in moving about
-in the streets or ways,<a id="FNanchor_204" href="#Footnote_204"
-class="fnanchor">[204]</a>—and forming barricades with wagons across
-such of these ways as were suitable. A little before daybreak, when
-their preparations were fully completed, they sallied forth from
-their houses to the attack, and immediately came to close quarters
-with the Thebans. The latter, still fancying themselves masters of
-the town, and relying upon a satisfactory close to the discussions
-when daylight should arrive, now found themselves surprised in their
-turn, and under great disadvantages: for they had been out all night
-under a heavy rain,—they were in a town which they did not know,
-with narrow, crooked, and muddy ways, such as they would have had
-difficulty in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[p. 117]</span>
-finding even by daylight. Nevertheless, on finding themselves
-suddenly assailed, they got as well as they could into close order,
-and repelled the Platæans two or three times: but the attack was
-still repeated, with loud shouts, while the women also screamed, and
-howled, and threw tiles from the flat-roofed houses, until at length
-the Thebans became dismayed and broken. But flight was not less
-difficult than resistance; for they could not find their way out of
-the city, and even the gate by which they entered, the only one open,
-had been closed by a Platæan citizen, who thrust into it the point of
-a javelin in place of the peg whereby the bar was commonly held fast.
-Dispersed about the city, and pursued by men who knew every inch of
-the ground, some ran to the top of the wall, and jumped down on the
-outside, most of them perished in the attempt,—a few others escaped
-through an unguarded gate, by cutting through the bar with a hatchet
-which a woman gave to them,—while the greater number of them ran
-into the open doors of a large barn or building in conjunction with
-the wall, mistaking these doors for an approach to the town-gate.
-They were here blocked up without the chance of escape, and the
-Platæans at first thought of setting fire to the building: but at
-length a convention was concluded, whereby they, as well as all the
-other Thebans in the city, agreed to surrender at discretion.<a
-id="FNanchor_205" href="#Footnote_205" class="fnanchor">[205]</a></p>
-
-<p id="two_views">Had the reinforcements from Thebes arrived at
-the expected hour, this disaster would have been averted. But the
-heavy rain and dark night retarded their whole march, while the
-river Asôpus was so much swollen as to be with difficulty fordable:
-so that before they reached the gates of Platæa, their comrades
-within were either slain or captured. Which fate had befallen them,
-the Thebans without could not tell: but they immediately resolved
-to seize what they could find, persons as well as property, in the
-Platæan territory,—no precautions having been taken as yet to guard
-against the perils of war by keeping within the walls,—in order
-that they might have something to exchange for such Thebans as were
-prisoners. Before this step could be executed, however, a herald
-came forth from the town to remonstrate with them upon their unholy
-proceeding in having so<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[p.
-118]</span> flagrantly violated the truce, and especially to warn
-them not to do any wrong without the walls. If they retired without
-inflicting farther mischief, their prisoners within should be given
-up to them; if otherwise, these prisoners would be slain immediately.
-A convention having been concluded and sworn to on this basis, the
-Thebans retired without any active measures. Such at least was the
-Theban account of what preceded their retirement: but the Platæans
-gave a very different statement; denying that they had made any
-categorical promise or sworn any oath,—and affirming that they had
-engaged for nothing, except to suspend any decisive step with regard
-to the prisoners until discussion had been entered into to see if a
-satisfactory agreement could be concluded.</p>
-
-<p>As Thucydidês records both of these statements, without intimating
-to which of the two he himself gave the preference, we may presume
-that both of them found credence with respectable persons. The Theban
-story is undoubtedly the most probable: but the Platæans appear to
-have violated the understanding, even upon their own construction
-of it. For no sooner had the Thebans retired, than they (the
-Platæans) hastily brought in their citizens and the best of their
-movable property within the walls, and then slew all their prisoners
-forthwith; without even entering into the formalities of negotiation.
-The prisoners thus put to death, among whom was Eurymachus himself,
-were one hundred and eighty in number.<a id="FNanchor_206"
-href="#Footnote_206" class="fnanchor">[206]</a></p> <p><span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[p. 119]</span></p> <p>On the first
-entrance of the Theban assailants at night, a messenger had started
-from Platæa to carry the news to Athens: a second messenger followed
-him to report the victory and capture of the prisoners, as soon as it
-had been achieved. The Athenians sent back a herald without delay,
-enjoining the Platæans to take no step respecting the prisoners
-until consultation should be had with Athens. Periklês doubtless
-feared what turned out to be the fact: for the prisoners had been
-slain before his messenger could arrive. Apart from the terms of the
-convention, and looking only to the received practice of ancient
-warfare, their destruction could not be denounced as unusually
-cruel, though the Thebans, when fortune was in their favor, chose
-to designate it as such,<a id="FNanchor_207" href="#Footnote_207"
-class="fnanchor">[207]</a>—but impartial contemporaries would
-notice, and the Athenians in particular would deeply lament, the
-glaring impolicy of the act. For Thebes, the best thing of all
-would of course be to get back her captured citizens forthwith:
-but next to that, the least evil would be to hear that they had
-been put to death. In the hands of the Athenians and Platæans, they
-would have been the means of obtaining from her much more valuable
-sacrifices than their lives, considered as a portion of Theban power,
-were worth: so strong was the feeling of sympathy for imprisoned
-citizens, several of them men of rank and importance,—as may be seen
-by the past conduct of Athens after the battle of Korôneia, and
-by that of Sparta, hereafter to be recounted, after the taking of
-Sphakteria. The Platæans, obeying the simple instinct of wrath and
-vengeance, threw away this great political advantage, which the more
-long-sighted Periklês would gladly have turned to account.</p>
-
-<p>At the time when the Athenians sent their herald to Platæa,
-they also issued orders for seizing all Bœotians who might be
-found in Attica; while they lost no time in sending forces to
-provision Platæa, and placing it on the footing of a garrison<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[p. 120]</span> town, removing to
-Athens the old men and sick, with the women and children. No
-complaint or discussion, respecting the recent surprise, was
-thought of by either party: it was evident to both that the war
-was now actually begun,—that nothing was to be thought of except
-the means of carrying it on,—and that there could be no farther
-personal intercourse except under the protection of heralds.<a
-id="FNanchor_208" href="#Footnote_208" class="fnanchor">[208]</a>
-The incident at Platæa, striking in all its points, wound up both
-parties to the full pitch of warlike excitement. A spirit of
-resolution and enterprise was abroad everywhere, especially among
-those younger citizens, yet unacquainted with the actual bitterness
-of war, whom the long truce but just broken had raised up; and the
-contagion of high-strung feeling spread from the leading combatants
-into every corner of Greece, manifesting itself partly in multiplied
-oracles, prophecies, and religious legends adapted to the moment:<a
-id="FNanchor_209" href="#Footnote_209" class="fnanchor">[209]</a>
-a recent earthquake at Delos, too, as well as various other
-extraordinary physical phenomena, were construed as prognostics of
-the awful struggle impending,—a period fatally marked not less by
-eclipses, earthquakes, drought, famine, and pestilence, than by the
-direct calamities of war.<a id="FNanchor_210" href="#Footnote_210"
-class="fnanchor">[210]</a></p>
-
-<p>An aggression so unwarrantable as the assault on Platæa tended
-doubtless to strengthen the unanimity of the Athenian assembly, to
-silence the opponents of Periklês, and to lend additional weight to
-those frequent exhortations,<a id="FNanchor_211" href="#Footnote_211"
-class="fnanchor">[211]</a> whereby the great statesman was wont to
-sustain the courage of his countrymen. Intelligence was sent round
-to forewarn and hearten up the numerous allies of Athens, tributary
-as well as free: the latter, with the exception of the Thessalians,
-Akarnanians, and Messenians at Naupaktus, were all insular,—Chians,
-Lesbians, Korkyræans, and Zakynthians: to the island of Kephallênia
-also they sent envoys, but it was not actually acquired to their
-alliance until a few months afterwards.<a id="FNanchor_212"
-href="#Footnote_212" class="fnanchor">[212]</a> With the Akarnanians,
-too, their connection had only been commenced a short time before,
-seem<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[p. 121]</span>ingly during
-the preceding summer, arising out of the circumstances of the
-town of Argos in Amphilochia. That town, situated on the southern
-coast of the Ambrakian gulf, was originally occupied by a portion
-of the Amphilochi, a non-Hellenic tribe, whose lineage apparently
-was something intermediate between Akarnanians and Epirots. Some
-colonists from Ambrakia, having been admitted as co-residents with
-the Amphilochian inhabitants of this town, presently expelled them,
-and retained the town with its territory exclusively for themselves.
-The expelled inhabitants, fraternizing with their fellow tribes
-around as well as with the Akarnanians, looked out for the means
-of restoration; and in order to obtain it, invited the assistance
-of Athens. Accordingly, the Athenians sent an expedition of thirty
-triremes, under Phormio, who, joining the Amphilochians and
-Akarnanians, attacked and carried Argos, reduced the Ambrakiots to
-slavery, and restored the town to the Amphilochians and Akarnanians.
-It was on this occasion that the alliance of the Akarnanians with
-Athens was first concluded, and that their personal attachment
-to the Athenian admiral, Phormio, commenced.<a id="FNanchor_213"
-href="#Footnote_213" class="fnanchor">[213]</a></p>
-
-<p>The numerous subjects of Athens, whose contributions stood
-embodied in the annual tribute, were distributed all over and
-around the Ægean, including all the islands north of Krete,
-with the exception of Melos and Thera.<a id="FNanchor_214"
-href="#Footnote_214" class="fnanchor">[214]</a> Moreover, the
-elements of force collected in Athens itself, were fully worthy
-of the metropolis of so great an empire. Periklês could make a
-report to his countrymen of three hundred triremes fit for active
-service; twelve hundred horsemen and horse-bowmen; sixteen hundred
-bowmen; and the great force of all, not less than twenty-nine
-thousand hoplites,—mostly citizens, but in part also metics.<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[p. 122]</span> The chosen portion of
-these hoplites, both as to age and as to equipment, were thirteen
-thousand in number; while the remaining sixteen thousand, including
-the elder and younger citizens and the metics, did garrison-duty
-on the walls of Athens and Peiræus,—on the long line of wall which
-connected Athens both with Peiræus and Phalêrum,—and in the various
-fortified posts both in and out of Attica. In addition to these large
-military and naval forces, the city possessed in the acropolis, an
-accumulated treasure of coined silver amounting to not less than
-six thousand talents, or about one million four hundred thousand
-pounds, derived from annual laying by of tribute from the allies
-and perhaps of other revenues besides: the treasure had at one time
-been as large as nine thousand seven hundred talents, or about two
-million two hundred and thirty thousand pounds, but the cost of the
-recent religious and architectural decorations at Athens, as well as
-at the siege of Potidæa, had reduced it to six thousand. Moreover,
-the acropolis and the temples throughout the city were rich in
-votive offerings, deposits, sacred plate, and silver implements for
-the processions and festivals, etc., to an amount estimated at more
-than five hundred talents; while the great statue of the goddess
-recently set up by Pheidias in the Parthenon, composed of ivory and
-gold, included a quantity of the latter metal not less than forty
-talents in weight,—equal in value to more than four hundred talents
-of silver,—and all of it go arranged that it could be taken off from
-the statue at pleasure. In alluding to these sacred valuables among
-the resources of the state, Periklês spoke of them only as open to
-be so applied in case of need, with the firm resolution of replacing
-them during the first season of prosperity, just as the Corinthians
-had proposed to borrow from Delphi and Olympia. Besides the hoard
-thus actually in hand, there came in a large annual revenue,
-amounting, under the single head of tribute from the subject allies,
-to six hundred talents, equal to about one hundred and thirty-eight
-thousand pounds; besides all other items,<a id="FNanchor_215"
-href="#Footnote_215" class="fnanchor">[215]</a> making up a general
-total of at least one thousand talents, or about two hundred and
-thirty thousand pounds.</p>
-
-<p>To this formidable catalogue of means for war were to be<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[p. 123]</span> added other items
-not less important, but which did not admit of being weighed and
-numbered; the unrivalled maritime skill and discipline of the
-seamen,—the democratical sentiment, alike fervent and unanimous,
-of the general mass of citizens,—and the superior development
-of directing intelligence. And when we consider that the enemy
-had indeed on his side an irresistible land-force, but scarcely
-anything else,—few ships, no trained seamen, no funds, no powers
-of combination or headship,—we may be satisfied that there were
-ample materials for an orator like Periklês to draw an encouraging
-picture of the future. He could depict Athens as holding Peloponnesus
-under siege by means of her navy and a chain of insular posts;<a
-id="FNanchor_216" href="#Footnote_216" class="fnanchor">[216]</a> and
-he could guarantee success<a id="FNanchor_217" href="#Footnote_217"
-class="fnanchor">[217]</a> as the sure reward of persevering,
-orderly, and well-considered exertion, combined with firm endurance
-under a period of temporary but unavoidable suffering; and combined
-too with another condition hardly less difficult for Athenian temper
-to comply with,—abstinence from seductive speculations of distant
-enterprise, while their force was required by the necessities
-of war near home.<a id="FNanchor_218" href="#Footnote_218"
-class="fnanchor">[218]</a> But such prospects were founded upon
-a long-sighted calculation, looking beyond immediate loss, and
-therefore likely to take less hold of the mind of an ordinary
-citizen,—or at any rate, to be overwhelmed for the moment by the
-pressure of actual hardship. Moreover, the best which Periklês could
-promise was a successful resistance,—the unimpaired maintenance of
-that great empire to which Athens had become accustomed; a policy
-purely conservative, without any stimulus from the hope of positive
-acquisition,—and not only without the sympathy of other states, but
-with feelings of simple acquiescence on the part of most of her
-allies,—of strong hostility everywhere else.</p>
-
-<p>On all these latter points the position of the Peloponnesian
-alliance was far more encouraging. So powerful a body of con<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[p. 124]</span>federates had never
-been got together,—not even to resist Xerxes. Not only the entire
-strength of Peloponnesus—except Argeians and Achæans, both of whom
-were neutral at first, though the Achæan town of Pellênê joined
-even at the beginning, and all the rest subsequently—was brought
-together, but also the Megarians, Bœotians, Phocians, Opuntian
-Lokrians, Ambrakiots, Leukadians, and Anaktorians. Among these,
-Corinth, Megara, Sikyon, Pellênê, Elis, Ambrakia, and Leukas,
-furnished maritime force, while the Bœotians, Phocians, and Lokrians
-supplied cavalry. Many of these cities, however, supplied hoplites
-besides; but the remainder of the confederates furnished hoplites
-only. It was upon this latter force, not omitting the powerful
-Bœotian cavalry, that the main reliance was placed; especially for
-the first and most important operation of the war,—the devastation
-of Attica. Bound together by the strongest common feeling of active
-antipathy to Athens, the whole confederacy was full of hope and
-confidence for this immediate forward march,—so gratifying at once
-both to their hatred and to their love of plunder, by the hand of
-destruction laid upon the richest country in Greece,—and presenting
-a chance even of terminating the war at once, if the pride of the
-Athenians should be so intolerably stung as to provoke them to come
-out and fight. Certainty of immediate success, at the first outset, a
-common purpose to be accomplished and a common enemy to be put down,
-and favorable sympathies throughout Greece,—all these circumstances
-filled the Peloponnesians with sanguine hopes at the beginning of
-the war: and the general persuasion was, that Athens, even if not
-reduced to submission by the first invasion, could not possibly
-hold out more than two or three summers against the repetition of
-this destructive process.<a id="FNanchor_219" href="#Footnote_219"
-class="fnanchor">[219]</a> Strongly did this confidence contrast
-with the proud and resolute submission to necessity, not without
-desponding anticipations of the result, which reigned among the
-auditors of Periklês.<a id="FNanchor_220" href="#Footnote_220"
-class="fnanchor">[220]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[p. 125]</span></p>
-
-<p>But though the Peloponnesians entertained confident belief of
-carrying their point by simple land-campaign, they did not neglect
-auxiliary preparations for naval and prolonged war. The Lacedæmonians
-resolved to make up the naval force already existing among themselves
-and their allies to an aggregate of five hundred triremes; chiefly
-by the aid of the friendly Dorian cities on the Italian and Sicilian
-coast. Upon each of them a specific contribution was imposed,
-together with a given contingent; orders being transmitted to them
-to make such preparations silently without any immediate declaration
-of hostility against Athens, and even without refusing for the
-present to admit any single Athenian ship into their harbors.<a
-id="FNanchor_221" href="#Footnote_221" class="fnanchor">[221]</a>
-Besides this, the Lacedæmonians laid their schemes for sending envoys
-to the Persian king, and to other barbaric powers,—a remarkable
-evidence of melancholy revolution in Grecian affairs, when that
-potentate, whom the common arm of Greece had so hardly repulsed a few
-years before, was now invoked to bring the Phenician fleet again into
-the Ægean for the purpose of crushing Athens.</p>
-
-<p>The invasion of Attica, however, without delay, was the primary
-object to be accomplished; and for that the Lacedæmonians issued
-circular orders immediately after the attempted surprise at Platæa.
-Though the vote of the allies was requisite to sanction any war, yet
-when that vote had once been passed, the Lacedæmonians took upon
-themselves to direct all the measures of execution. Two-thirds of the
-hoplites of each confederate city,—apparently two-thirds of a certain
-assumed rating, for which the city was held liable in the books
-of the confederacy, so that the Bœotians and others who furnished
-cavalry were not constrained to send two-thirds of their entire force
-of hoplites,—were summoned to be present on a certain day at the
-isthmus of Corinth, with provisions and equipment for an expedition
-of some length.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[p. 126]</span><a
-id="FNanchor_222" href="#Footnote_222" class="fnanchor">[222]</a>
-On the day named, the entire force was found duly assembled, and
-the Spartan king Archidamus, on taking the command, addressed to
-the commanders and principal officers from each city a discourse of
-solemn warning as well as encouragement. His remarks were directed
-chiefly to abate the tone of sanguine over-confidence which reigned
-in the army. After adverting to the magnitude of the occasion, the
-mighty impulse agitating all Greece, and the general good wishes
-which accompanied them against an enemy so much hated,—he admonished
-them not to let their great superiority of numbers and bravery seduce
-them into a spirit of rash disorder. “We are about to attack (he
-said) an enemy admirably equipped in every way, so that we may be
-very certain that they will come out and fight,<a id="FNanchor_223"
-href="#Footnote_223" class="fnanchor">[223]</a> even if they be
-not now actually on the march to meet us at the border, at least
-when they see us in their territory ravaging and destroying their
-property. All men exposed to any unusual indignity become incensed,
-and act more under passion than under calculation, when it is
-actually brought under their eyes: much more will the Athenians do
-so, accustomed as they are to empire, and to ravage the territory of
-others rather than to see their own so treated.”</p>
-
-<p>Immediately on the army being assembled, Archidamus sent
-Melêsippus as envoy to Athens to announce the coming invasion, being
-still in hopes that the Athenians would yield. But a resolution had
-been already adopted, at the instance of Periklês, to receive neither
-herald nor envoy from the Lacedæmonians when once their army was
-on its march: so that Melêsippus was sent back without even being
-permitted to enter the city. He was ordered to quit the territory
-before sunset, with guides to accompany him and prevent him from
-addressing a word to any one. On parting from his guides at the
-border, Melêsippus exclaimed,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[p.
-127]</span><a id="FNanchor_224" href="#Footnote_224"
-class="fnanchor">[224]</a> with a solemnity but too accurately
-justified by the event: “This day will be the beginning of many
-calamities to the Greeks.”</p>
-
-<p>Archidamus, as soon as the reception of his last envoy was made
-known to him, continued his march from the isthmus into Attica,—which
-territory he entered by the road of Œnoê, the frontier Athenian
-fortress of Attica towards Bœotia. His march was slow, and he thought
-it necessary to make a regular attack on the fort of Œnoê, which had
-been put into so good a state of defence, that after all the various
-modes of assault, in which the Lacedæmonians were not skilful,
-had been tried in vain,<a id="FNanchor_225" href="#Footnote_225"
-class="fnanchor">[225]</a>—and after a delay of several days before
-the place,—he was compelled to renounce the attempt.</p>
-
-<p>The want of enthusiasm on the part of the Spartan king,—his
-multiplied delays, first at the isthmus, next in the march,
-and lastly before Œnoê,—were all offensive to the fiery
-impatience of the army, who were loud in their murmurs against
-him. He acted upon the calculation already laid down in his
-discourse at Sparta,<a id="FNanchor_226" href="#Footnote_226"
-class="fnanchor">[226]</a>—that the highly cultivated soil of Attica
-was to be looked upon as a hostage for the pacific dispositions of
-the Athenians, who would be more likely to yield when devastation,
-though not yet inflicted, was nevertheless impending, and at their
-doors. In this point of view, a little delay at the border was no
-disadvantage; and perhaps the partisans of peace at Athens may have
-encouraged him to hope that it would enable them to prevail. Nor
-can we doubt that it was a moment full of difficulty to Periklês
-at Athens. He had to proclaim to all the proprietors in Attica the
-painful truth, that they must prepare to see their lands and houses
-overrun and ruined; and that their persons, families, and movable
-property, must be brought in for safety either to Athens, or to
-one of the forts in the territory,—or carried across to one of the
-neighboring islands. It<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[p.
-128]</span> would, indeed, make a favorable impression when he told
-them that Archidamus was his own family friend, yet only within
-such limits as consisted with duty to the city: in case, therefore,
-the invaders, while ravaging Attica, should receive instruction
-to spare his own lands, he would forthwith make them over to the
-state as public property: nor was such a case unlikely to arise,
-if not from the personal feeling of Archidamus, at least from the
-deliberate manœuvre of the Spartans, who would seek thus to set the
-Athenian public against Periklês, as they had tried to do before
-by demanding the banishment of the sacrilegious Alkmæônid race.<a
-id="FNanchor_227" href="#Footnote_227" class="fnanchor">[227]</a>
-But though this declaration would doubtless provoke a hearty cheer,
-the lesson which he had to inculcate, not simply for admission as
-prudent policy, but for actual practice, was one revolting alike
-to the immediate interest, the dignity, and the sympathies of his
-countrymen. To see their lands all ravaged, without raising an arm to
-defend them,—to carry away their wives and families, and to desert
-and dismantle their country residences, as they had done during the
-Persian invasion,—all in the confidence of compensation in other ways
-and of remote ultimate success,—were recommendations which, probably,
-no one but Periklês could have hoped to enforce. They were, moreover,
-the more painful to execute, inasmuch as the Athenian citizens had
-very generally retained the habits of residing permanently, not in
-Athens, but in the various demes of Attica; many of which still
-preserved their temples, their festivals, their local customs,
-and their limited municipal autonomy, handed down from the day
-when they had once been independent of Athens.<a id="FNanchor_228"
-href="#Footnote_228" class="fnanchor">[228]</a> It was but recently
-that the farming, the comforts, and the ornaments, thus distributed
-over Attica, had been restored from the ruin of the Persian invasion,
-and brought to a higher pitch of improvement than ever; yet the
-fruits of this labor, and the scenes of these local affections,
-were now to be again delib<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[p.
-129]</span>erately abandoned to a new aggressor, and exchanged for
-the utmost privation and discomfort. Archidamus might well doubt
-whether the Athenians would nerve themselves up to the pitch of
-resolution necessary for this distressing step, when it came to the
-actual crisis; and whether they would not constrain Periklês against
-his will to make propositions for peace. His delay on the border, and
-postponement of actual devastation, gave the best chance for such
-propositions being made; though as this calculation was not realized,
-the army raised plausible complaints against him for having allowed
-the Athenians time to save so much of their property.</p>
-
-<p>From all parts of Attica the residents flocked within the
-spacious walls of Athens, which now served as shelter for the
-houseless, like Salamis, forty-nine years before: entire families
-with all their movable property, and even with the woodwork of
-their houses; the sheep and cattle were conveyed to Eubœa and the
-other adjoining islands.<a id="FNanchor_229" href="#Footnote_229"
-class="fnanchor">[229]</a> Though a few among the fugitives obtained
-dwellings or reception from friends, the greater number were
-compelled to encamp in the vacant spaces of the city and Peiræus, or
-in and around the numerous temples of the city,—always excepting the
-acropolis and the eleusinion, which were at all times strictly closed
-to profane occupants; but even the ground called <i>the Pelasgikon</i>,
-immediately under the acropolis, which, by an ancient and ominous
-tradition, was interdicted to human abode,<a id="FNanchor_230"
-href="#Footnote_230" class="fnanchor">[230]</a> was made use of
-under the present necessity. Many, too, placed their families in
-the towers and recesses of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[p.
-130]</span> the city walls,<a id="FNanchor_231" href="#Footnote_231"
-class="fnanchor">[231]</a> or in sheds, cabins, tents, or even tubs,
-disposed along the course of the long walls to Peiræus. In spite of
-so serious an accumulation of losses and hardships, the glorious
-endurance of their fathers in the time of Xerxes was faithfully
-copied, and copied too under more honorable circumstances, since at
-that time there had been no option possible; whereas, the march of
-Archidamus might, perhaps, now have been arrested by submissions,
-ruinous indeed to Athenian dignity, yet not inconsistent with the
-security of Athens, divested of her rank and power. Such submissions,
-if suggested as they probably may have been by the party opposed to
-Periklês, found no echo among the suffering population.</p>
-
-<p>After having spent several days before Œnoê without either taking
-the fort or receiving any message from the Athenians, Archidamus
-marched onward to Eleusis and the Thriasian plain,—about the middle
-of June, eighty days after the surprise of Platæa. His army was
-of irresistible force, not less than sixty thousand hoplites,
-according to the statement of Plutarch,<a id="FNanchor_232"
-href="#Footnote_232" class="fnanchor">[232]</a> or of one hundred
-thousand, according to others: considering the number of constituent
-allies, the strong feeling by which they were prompted, and the
-shortness of the expedition combined with the chance of plunder,
-even the largest of these two numbers is not incredibly great, if we
-take it to include not hoplites only, but cavalry and light-armed
-also: but as Thucydidês, though comparatively full in his account
-of this march, has stated no general total, we may presume that he
-had heard none upon which he could rely. As the Athenians had made
-no movement towards peace, Archidamus anticipated that they would
-come forth to meet him in the fertile plain of Eleusis and Thria,
-which was the first portion of territory that he sat down to ravage:
-but no Athenian force appeared to oppose him, except a detachment
-of cavalry, who were repulsed in a skirmish near the small lakes
-called Rheiti. Having laid waste this plain without any serious
-opposition, Archidamus did not think fit to<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_131">[p. 131]</span> pursue the straight road which from
-Thria conducted directly to Athens across the ridge of Mount
-Ægaleos, but turned off to the westward, leaving that mountain on
-his right hand until he came to Krôpeia, where he crossed a portion
-of the line of Ægaleos over to Acharnæ. He was here about seven
-miles from Athens, on a declivity sloping down into the plain which
-stretches westerly and northwesterly from Athens, and visible from
-the city walls: and he here encamped, keeping his army in perfect
-order for battle, but at the same time intending to damage and
-ruin the place and its neighborhood. Acharnæ was the largest and
-most populous of all the demes in Attica, furnishing no less than
-three thousand hoplites to the national line, and flourishing as
-well by its corn, vines, and olives, as by its peculiar abundance
-of charcoal-burning from the forests of ilex on the neighboring
-hills: moreover, if we are to believe Aristophanês, the Acharnian
-proprietors were not merely sturdy “hearts of oak,” but peculiarly
-vehement and irritable.<a id="FNanchor_233" href="#Footnote_233"
-class="fnanchor">[233]</a> It illustrates the condition of a Grecian
-territory under invasion, when we find this great deme, which could
-not have contained less than twelve thousand free inhabitants of
-both sexes and all ages, with at least an equal number of slaves,
-completely deserted. Archidamus calculated that when the Athenians
-actually saw his troops so close to their city, carrying fire and
-sword over their wealthiest canton, their indignation would become
-uncontrollable, and they would march out forthwith to battle. The
-Acharnian proprietors especially, he thought, would be foremost in
-inflaming this temper, and insisting upon protection to their own
-properties,—or, if the remaining citizens refused to march out along
-with them, they would, after having been thus left undefended to
-ruin, become discontented and indifferent to the general weal.<a
-id="FNanchor_234" href="#Footnote_234" class="fnanchor">[234]</a></p>
-
-<p>Though his calculation was not realized, it was, nevertheless,
-founded upon most rational grounds. What Archidamus antic<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[p. 132]</span>ipated was on the
-point of happening, and nothing prevented it, except the personal
-ascendency of Periklês, strained to its very utmost. So long as the
-invading army was engaged in the Thriasian plain, the Athenians
-had some faint hope that it might—like Pleistoanax, fourteen years
-before—advance no farther into the interior: but when it came to
-Acharnæ, within sight of the city walls,—when the ravagers were
-actually seen destroying buildings, fruit-trees, and crops, in
-the plain of Athens, a sight strange to every Athenian eye except
-to those very old men who recollected the Persian invasion,—the
-exasperation of the general body of citizens rose to a pitch never
-before known. The Acharnians first of all, next the youthful
-citizens generally,—became madly clamorous for arming and going
-forth to fight. Knowing well their own great strength, but less
-correctly informed of the superior strength of the enemy, they
-felt confident that victory was within their reach. Groups of
-citizens were everywhere gathered together,<a id="FNanchor_235"
-href="#Footnote_235" class="fnanchor">[235]</a> angrily debating the
-critical question of the moment; while the usual concomitants of
-excited feeling,—oracles and prophecies of diverse tenor, many of
-them, doubtless, promising success against the enemy at Acharnæ,—were
-eagerly caught up and circulated.</p>
-
-<p>In this inflamed temper of the Athenian mind, Periklês was
-naturally the great object of complaint and wrath. He was denounced
-as the cause of all the existing suffering: he was reviled as a
-coward for not leading out the citizens to fight, in his capacity
-of general: the rational convictions as to the necessity of the
-war and the only practicable means of carrying it on, which his
-repeated speeches had implanted, seemed to be altogether forgotten.<a
-id="FNanchor_236" href="#Footnote_236" class="fnanchor">[236]</a>
-This burst of spontaneous discontent was, of course, fomented by the
-numerous political enemies of Periklês, and particularly by Kleon,<a
-id="FNanchor_237" href="#Footnote_237" class="fnanchor">[237]</a> now
-rising into importance as an opposition-speaker; whose talent for
-invective was thus first exercised under the auspices of the high
-aristocratical party, as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[p.
-133]</span> well as of an excited public. But no manifestations,
-however violent, could disturb either the judgment or the firmness
-of Periklês. He listened, unmoved, to all the declarations made
-against him, and resolutely refused to convene any public assembly,
-or any meeting invested with an authorized character, under the
-present irritated temper of the citizens.<a id="FNanchor_238"
-href="#Footnote_238" class="fnanchor">[238]</a> It appears that he,
-as general, or rather the board of ten generals, among whom he was
-one, must have been invested constitutionally with the power, not
-only of calling the ekklesia when they thought fit, but also of
-preventing it from meeting,<a id="FNanchor_239" href="#Footnote_239"
-class="fnanchor">[239]</a> and of postponing even those regular
-meetings which commonly took place at fixed times, four times in
-the prytany. No assembly, accordingly, took place, and the violent
-exasperation of the people was thus prevented from realizing itself
-in any rash public resolution. That Periklês should have held firm
-against this raging force, is but one among the many honorable
-points in his political character; but it is far less wonderful than
-the fact, that his refusal to call the ekklesia was efficacious to
-prevent the ekklesia from being held. The entire body of Athenians
-were now assembled within the walls, and if he refused to convoke
-the ekklesia, they might easily have met in the Pnyx, without him;
-for which it would not have been difficult at such a juncture to
-provide plausible justification. The inviolable respect which
-the Athenian people manifested on this occasion for the forms
-of their democratical constitution—assisted doubtless by their
-long-established esteem for Periklês, yet opposed to an excitement
-alike intense and pervading, and to a demand apparently reasonable,
-in so far as regarded the calling of an assembly for discussion,—is
-one of the most memorable incidents in their history.</p>
-
-<p>While Periklês thus decidedly forbade any general march out for
-battle, he sought to provide as much employment as possible for
-the compressed eagerness of the citizens. The cavalry were<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[p. 134]</span> sent out, together with
-the Thessalian cavalry their allies, for the purpose of restraining
-the excursions of the enemy’s light troops, and protecting the lands
-near the city from plunder.<a id="FNanchor_240" href="#Footnote_240"
-class="fnanchor">[240]</a> At the same time, he fitted out a powerful
-expedition, which sailed forth to ravage Peloponnesus, even while the
-invaders were yet in Attica.<a id="FNanchor_241" href="#Footnote_241"
-class="fnanchor">[241]</a> Archidamus, after having remained engaged
-in the devastation of Acharnæ long enough to satisfy himself that
-the Athenians would not hazard a battle, turned away from Athens
-in a northwesterly direction towards the demes between Mount
-Brilêssus and Mount Parnês, on the road passing through Dekeleia.
-The army continued ravaging these districts until their provisions
-were exhausted, and then quitted Attica by the northwestern road
-near Orôpus, which brought them into Bœotia. The Oropians were
-not Athenians, but dependent upon Athens, and the district of
-Græa, a portion of their territory, was laid waste; after which,
-the army dispersed and retired back to their respective homes.<a
-id="FNanchor_242" href="#Footnote_242" class="fnanchor">[242]</a> It
-would seem that they quitted Attica towards the end of July, having
-remained in the country between thirty and forty days.</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, the Athenian expedition under Karkinus, Prôteas,
-and Sokratês, joined by fifty Korkyræan ships, and by some other
-allies, sailed round Peloponnesus, landing in various parts to
-inflict damage, and among other places, at Methônê (Modon) on
-the southwestern peninsula of the Lacedæmonian territory.<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[p. 135]</span><a id="FNanchor_243"
-href="#Footnote_243" class="fnanchor">[243]</a> The place, neither
-strong nor well-garrisoned, would have been carried with little
-difficulty, had not Brasidas the son of Tellis,—a gallant Spartan
-now mentioned for the first time, but destined to great celebrity
-afterwards,—who happened to be on guard at a neighboring post,
-thrown himself into it with one hundred men by a rapid movement,
-before the dispersed Athenian troops could be brought together to
-prevent him. He infused such courage into the defenders of the place
-that every attack was repelled, and the Athenians were forced to
-reëmbark,—an act of prowess which procured for him the first public
-honors bestowed by the Spartans during this war. Sailing northward
-along the western coast of Peloponnesus, the Athenians landed again
-on the coast of Elis, a little south of the promontory called Cape
-Ichthys: they ravaged the territory for two days, defeating both
-the troops in the neighborhood and three hundred chosen men from
-the central Eleian territory. Strong winds on a harborless coast
-now induced the captains to sail with most of the troops round Cape
-Ichthys, in order to reach the harbor of Pheia on the northern side
-of it; while the Messenian hoplites, marching by land across the
-promontory, attacked Pheia and carried it by assault. When the fleet
-arrived, all were reëmbarked,—the full force of Elis being under
-march to attack them: they then sailed northward, landing on various
-other spots to commit devastation, until they reached Sollium, a
-Corinthian settlement on the coast of Akarnania. They captured this
-place, which they handed over to the inhabitants of the neighboring
-Akarnanian town of Palærus,—as well as Astakus, from whence they
-expelled the despot Euarchus, and enrolled the town as a member of
-the Athenian alliance. From hence they passed over to Kephallênia,
-which they were fortunate enough also to acquire as an ally of Athens
-without any compulsion,—with its four distinct towns, or districts,
-Palês, Kranii, Samê, and Pionê. These various operations took up near
-three months from about the beginning of July, so that they returned
-to Athens towards the close of September,<a id="FNanchor_244"
-href="#Footnote_244" class="fnanchor">[244]</a>—the beginning of
-the winter half of the year, according to the distribution of
-Thucydidês.</p>
-
-<p>Nor was this the only maritime expedition of the summer:<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[p. 136]</span> thirty more triremes,
-under Kleopompus, were sent through the Euripus to the Lokrian coast
-opposite to the northern part of Eubœa. Some disembarkations were
-made, whereby the Lokrian towns of Thronium and Alopê were sacked,
-and farther devastation inflicted: while a permanent garrison
-was planted, and a fortified post erected, in the uninhabited
-island of Atalanta, opposite to the Lokrian coast, in order to
-restrain privateers from Opus and the other Lokrian towns in their
-excursions against Eubœa.<a id="FNanchor_245" href="#Footnote_245"
-class="fnanchor">[245]</a> It was farther determined to expel
-the Æginetan inhabitants from Ægina, and to occupy the island
-with Athenian colonists. This step was partly rendered prudent by
-the important position of the island midway between Attica and
-Peloponnesus; but a concurrent motive, and probably the stronger
-motive, was the gratification of ancient antipathy and revenge
-against a people who had been among the foremost in provoking the
-war and in inflicting upon Athens so much suffering. The Æginetans
-with their wives and children were all put on shipboard and landed
-in Peloponnesus,—where the Spartans permitted them to occupy the
-maritime district and town of Thyrea, their last frontier towards
-Argos: some of them, however, found shelter in other parts of Greece.
-The island was made over to a detachment of Athenian kleruchs,
-or citizen proprietors, sent thither by lot.<a id="FNanchor_246"
-href="#Footnote_246" class="fnanchor">[246]</a></p>
-
-<p>To the sufferings of the Æginetans, which we shall hereafter
-find still more deplorably aggravated, we have to add those of the
-Megarians. Both had been most zealous in kindling the war, but upon
-none did the distress of war fall so heavily. Both probably shared
-the premature confidence felt among the Peloponnesian confederacy,
-that Athens could never hold out more than a year or two,—and were
-thus induced to overlook their own undefended position against her.
-Towards the close of September, the full force of Athens, citizens
-and metics, marched into the Megarid under Periklês, and laid waste
-the greater part of the territory: while they were in it, the hundred
-ships which had been circumnavigating Peloponnesus, having arrived at
-Ægina on their return, went and joined their fellow-citizens in<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[p. 137]</span> the Megarid, instead
-of going straight home. The junction of the two formed the largest
-Athenian force that had ever yet been seen together: there were ten
-thousand citizen hoplites, independent of three thousand others
-who were engaged in the siege of Potidæa, and three thousand metic
-hoplites,—besides a large number of light troops.<a id="FNanchor_247"
-href="#Footnote_247" class="fnanchor">[247]</a> Against so large a
-force the Megarians could of course make no head, and their territory
-was all laid waste, even to the city walls. For several years of the
-war, the Athenians inflicted this destruction once, and often twice
-in the same year: a decree was proposed in the Athenian ekklesia by
-Charinus, though perhaps not carried, to the effect that the stratêgi
-every year should swear, as a portion of their oath of office,<a
-id="FNanchor_248" href="#Footnote_248" class="fnanchor">[248]</a>
-that they would twice invade and ravage the Megarid. As the Athenians
-at the same time kept the port of Nisæa blocked up, by means of their
-superior naval force and of the neighboring coast of Salamis, the
-privations imposed on the Megarians became extreme and intolerable.<a
-id="FNanchor_249" href="#Footnote_249" class="fnanchor">[249]</a>
-Not merely their corn and fruits, but even their garden vegetables
-near the city, were rooted up and destroyed, and their situation
-seems often to have been that of a besieged city hard pressed by
-famine. Even in the time of Pausanias, so many centuries afterwards,
-the miseries of the town during these years were remembered and
-communicated to him, being assigned as the reason why one of their
-most memorable statues had never been completed.<a id="FNanchor_250"
-href="#Footnote_250" class="fnanchor">[250]</a></p>
-
-<p>To these various military operations of Athens during the
-course of this summer, some other measures of moment are to be
-added; and Thucydidês also notices an eclipse of the sun which
-modern astronomical calculations refer to the third of August: had
-this eclipse happened three months earlier, immediately before
-the entrance of the Peloponnesians into Attica, it might<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[p. 138]</span> probably have been
-construed as an unfavorable omen, and caused the postponement of
-the scheme. Expecting a prolonged struggle, the Athenians now made
-arrangements for placing Attica in a permanent state of defence,
-both by sea and land; what these arrangements were, we are not told
-in detail, but one of them was sufficiently remarkable to be named
-particularly. They set apart one thousand talents out of the treasure
-in the acropolis as an inviolable reserve, not to be touched except
-on the single contingency of a hostile naval force about to assail
-the city, with no other means at hand to defend it. They further
-enacted, that if any citizen should propose, or any magistrate
-put the question, in the public assembly, to make any different
-application of this reserve, he should be punishable with death.
-Moreover, they resolved every year to keep back one hundred of their
-best triremes, and trierarchs to command and equip them, for the
-same special necessity.<a id="FNanchor_251" href="#Footnote_251"
-class="fnanchor">[251]</a> It may be doubted whether this latter
-provision was placed under the same stringent sanction, or observed
-with the same rigor, as that concerning the money, which latter was
-not departed from until the twentieth year of the war, after all the
-disasters of the Sicilian expedition, and on the terrible news of the
-revolt of Chios. It was on that occasion that the Athenians first
-repealed the sentence of capital punishment against the proposer
-of this forbidden change, and next appropriated the money to meet
-the then imminent peril of the commonwealth.<a id="FNanchor_252"
-href="#Footnote_252" class="fnanchor">[252]</a></p>
-
-<p>The resolution here taken about this sacred reserve, and the
-rigorous sentence interdicting contrary propositions, is pronounced
-by Mr. Mitford to be an evidence of the indelible barbarism of
-democratical government.<a id="FNanchor_253" href="#Footnote_253"
-class="fnanchor">[253]</a> But we must recollect, first, that
-the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[p. 139]</span> sentence
-of capital punishment was one which could hardly by possibility
-come into execution; for no citizen would be so mad as to make
-the forbidden proposition, while this law was in force. Whoever
-desired to make it, would first begin by proposing to repeal
-the prohibitory law, whereby he would incur no danger, whether
-the assembly decided in the affirmative or negative; and if he
-obtained an affirmative decision, he would then, and then only,
-proceed to move the reappropriation of the fund. To speak the
-language of English parliamentary procedure, he would first move
-the suspension or abrogation of the standing order whereby the
-proposition was forbidden,—next, he would move the proposition
-itself: in fact, such was the mode actually pursued, when the thing
-at last came to be done.<a id="FNanchor_254" href="#Footnote_254"
-class="fnanchor">[254]</a> But though the capital sentence could
-hardly come into effect, the proclamation of it <i>in terrorem</i>
-had a very distinct meaning. It expressed the deep and solemn
-conviction which the people entertained of the importance of their
-own resolution about the reserve,—it forewarned all assemblies and
-all citizens to come, of the danger of diverting it to any other
-purpose,—it surrounded the reserve with an artificial sanctity,
-which forced every man who aimed at the reappropriation to begin
-with a preliminary proposition, formidable on the very face of it,
-as removing a guarantee which previous assemblies had deemed of
-immense value, and opening the door to a contingency which they
-had looked upon as treasonable. The proclamation of a lighter
-punishment, or a simple prohibition without any definite sanction
-whatever, would neither have announced the same emphatic conviction,
-nor produced the same deterring effect. The assembly of 431 <small>B.C.</small> could not in any way enact laws which
-subsequent assemblies could not reverse; but it could so frame
-its enactments, in cases of peculiar solemnity, as to make its
-authority strongly felt upon the judgment of its successors, and
-to prevent them from entertaining motions for repeal, except under
-necessity at once urgent and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">[p.
-140]</span> obvious. Far from thinking that the law now passed at
-Athens displayed barbarism, either in the end or in the means, I
-consider it principally remarkable for its cautious and long-sighted
-view of the future,—qualities the exact reverse of barbarism,—and
-worthy of the general character of Periklês, who probably suggested
-it. Athens was just entering into a war which threatened to be of
-indefinite length, and was certain to be very costly. To prevent
-the people from exhausting all their accumulated fund, and to place
-them under a necessity of reserving something against extreme
-casualties, was an object of immense importance. Now the particular
-casualty, which Periklês, assuming him to be the proposer, named as
-the sole condition of touching this one thousand talents, might be
-considered as of all others the most improbable, in the year 431
-<small>B.C.</small> So immense was then the superiority
-of the Athenian naval force, that to suppose it defeated, and a
-Peloponnesian fleet in full sail for Peiræus, was a possibility which
-it required a statesman of extraordinary caution to look forward
-to, and which it is truly wonderful that the people generally could
-have been induced to contemplate. Once tied up to this purpose,
-however, the fund lay ready for any other terrible emergency: and
-we shall find the actual employment of it incalculably beneficial
-to Athens, at a moment of the gravest peril, when she could hardly
-have protected herself without some such special resource. The people
-would scarcely have sanctioned so rigorous an economy, had it not
-been proposed to them at a period so early in the war that their
-available reserve was still much larger: but it will be forever to
-the credit of their foresight as well as constancy, that they should
-first have adopted such a precautionary measure, and afterwards
-adhered to it for nineteen years, under severe pressure for money,
-until at length a case arose which rendered farther abstinence
-really, and not constructively, impossible.</p>
-
-<p>To display their force and take revenge by disembarking and
-ravaging parts of Peloponnesus, was doubtless of much importance
-to Athens during this first summer of the war: though it might
-seem that the force so employed was quite as much needed in the
-conquest of Potidæa, which still remained under blockade,—and of the
-neighboring Chalkidians in Thrace, still in revolt. It was during the
-course of this summer that a prospect opened<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_141">[p. 141]</span> to Athens of subduing these towns,
-through the assistance of Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian Thracians.
-That prince had married the sister of Nymphodôrus, a citizen of
-Abdêra; who engaged to render him, and his son Sadokus, allies of
-Athens. Sent for to Athens and appointed proxenus of Athens at
-Abdêra, which was one of the Athenian subject allies, Nymphodôrus
-made this alliance, and promised, in the name of Sitalkês, that
-a sufficient Thracian force should be sent to aid Athens in the
-reconquest of her revolted towns: the honor of Athenian citizenship
-was at the same time conferred upon Sadokus.<a id="FNanchor_255"
-href="#Footnote_255" class="fnanchor">[255]</a> Nymphodôrus farther
-established a good understanding between Perdikkas of Macedonia
-and the Athenians, who were persuaded to restore to him Therma,
-which they had before taken from him. The Athenians had thus the
-promise of powerful aid against the Chalkidians and Potidæans:
-yet the latter still held out, with little prospect of immediate
-surrender. Moreover, the town of Astakus, in Akarnania, which the
-Athenians had captured during the summer, in the course of their
-expedition round Peloponnesus, was recovered during the autumn by
-the deposed despot Euarchus, assisted by forty Corinthian triremes
-and one thousand hoplites. This Corinthian armament, after restoring
-Euarchus, made some unsuccessful descents both upon other parts
-of Akarnania and upon the island of Kephallênia: in the latter,
-they were entrapped into an ambuscade, and obliged to return home
-with considerable loss.<a id="FNanchor_256" href="#Footnote_256"
-class="fnanchor">[256]</a></p>
-
-<p>It was towards the close of this autumn also that Periklês,
-chosen by the people for the purpose, delivered the funeral oration
-at the public interment of those warriors who had fallen during the
-campaign. The ceremonies of this public token of respect have already
-been described in a former chapter, on occasion of the conquest of
-Samos: but that which imparted to the present scene an imperishable
-interest, was the discourse of the chosen statesman and orator;
-probably heard by Thucydidês himself, and in substance reproduced. A
-large crowd of citizens and foreigners, of both sexes and all ages,
-accompanied the funeral procession from Athens to the suburb called
-the outer Kerameikus, where Periklês, mounted upon a lofty stage
-pre<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">[p. 142]</span>pared for the
-occasion, closed the ceremony with his address. The law of Athens
-not only provided this public funeral and commemorative discourse,
-but also assigned maintenance at the public expense to the children
-of the slain warriors until they attained military age: a practice
-which was acted on throughout the whole war, though we have only
-the description and discourse belonging to this single occasion.<a
-id="FNanchor_257" href="#Footnote_257" class="fnanchor">[257]</a></p>
-
-<p>The eleven chapters of Thucydidês which comprise this funeral
-speech are among the most memorable relics of antiquity; considering
-that under the language and arrangement of the historian,—always
-impressive, though sometimes harsh and peculiar, like the workmanship
-of a powerful mind, misled by a bad or an unattainable model,—we
-possess the substance and thoughts of the illustrious statesman. A
-portion of it, of course, is and must be common-place, belonging to
-all discourses composed for a similar occasion. Yet this is true
-only of a comparatively small portion: much of it is peculiar, and
-every way worthy of Periklês,—comprehensive, rational, and full,
-not less of sense and substance than of earnest patriotism. It thus
-forms a strong contrast with the jejune, though elegant, rhetoric
-of other harangues, mostly<a id="FNanchor_258" href="#Footnote_258"
-class="fnanchor">[258]</a> not composed for actual delivery;
-and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">[p. 143]</span> deserves,
-in comparison with the funeral discourses remaining to us from
-Plato, and the Pseudo-Demosthenês, and even Lysias, the honorable
-distinction which Thucydidês claims for his own history,—an
-ever-living possession, and not a mere show-piece for the moment.</p>
-
-<p>In the outset of his speech, Periklês distinguishes himself from
-those who had preceded him in the same function of public orator,
-by dissenting from the encomiums which it had been customary to
-bestow on the law enjoining these funeral harangues: he thinks that
-the publicity of the funeral itself, and the general demonstrations
-of respect and grief by the great body of citizens, tell more
-emphatically in token of gratitude to the brave dead, when the
-scene passes in silence, than when it is translated into the words
-of a speaker, who may easily offend, either by incompetency or by
-apparent feebleness, or perhaps even by unseasonable exaggeration.
-Nevertheless, the custom having been embodied in law, and elected
-as he has been by the citizens, he comes forward to discharge the
-duty imposed upon him in the best manner he can.<a id="FNanchor_259"
-href="#Footnote_259" class="fnanchor">[259]</a></p>
-
-<p>One of the remarkable features in this discourse is, its
-business-like, impersonal character: it is Athens herself who
-undertakes to commend and decorate her departed sons, as well as to
-hearten up and admonish the living.</p>
-
-<p>After a few words on the magnitude of the empire, and on the
-glorious efforts as well as endurance whereby their forefathers and
-they had acquired it,—Periklês proceeds to sketch the plan of life,
-the constitution, and the manners, under which such achievements
-were brought about.<a id="FNanchor_260" href="#Footnote_260"
-class="fnanchor">[260]</a></p> <p><span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_144">[p. 144]</span></p> <p>“We live under a constitution
-such as noway to envy the laws of our neighbors,—ourselves an example
-to others, rather than mere imitators. It is called a democracy,
-since its permanent aim tends towards the many and not towards
-the few: in regard to private matters and disputes, the laws deal
-equally with every man: while looking to public affairs and to
-claims of individual influence, every man’s chance of advancement
-is determined, not by party-favor but by real worth, according as
-his reputation stands in his own particular department: nor does
-poverty, or obscure station, keep him back,<a id="FNanchor_261"
-href="#Footnote_261" class="fnanchor">[261]</a> if he really has
-the means of benefiting the city. And our social march is free,
-not merely in regard to public affairs, but also in regard to
-intolerance of each other’s diversity of daily pursuits. For we
-are not angry with our neighbor for what he may do to please
-himself, nor do we ever put on those sour looks,<a id="FNanchor_262"
-href="#Footnote_262" class="fnanchor">[262]</a> which, though they do
-no positive damage, are not the less sure to offend. Thus conducting
-our private social intercourse with reciprocal indulgence, we are
-restrained from wrong on public matters by fear and reverence of our
-magistrates for the time being, and of our laws,—especially such
-laws as are instituted for the protection of wrongful sufferers,
-and even such others as, though not written, are enforced by a
-common sense of shame. Besides this, we have provided for our minds
-numerous recreations from toil, partly by our customary solemnities
-of sacrifice and festival throughout the year, partly by the elegance
-of our private establishments,—the daily charm of which banishes the
-sense of discomfort. From the magnitude of our city, the products of
-the whole earth are brought to us, so that our enjoyment of foreign
-luxuries is as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">[p. 145]</span>
-much our own and assured as those which we grow at home. In respect
-to training for war, we differ from our opponents (the Lacedæmonians)
-on several material points. First, we lay open our city as a common
-resort: we apply no xenêlasy to exclude even an enemy either from
-any lesson or any spectacle, the full view of which he may think
-advantageous to him; for we trust less to manœuvres and quackery than
-to our native bravery, for warlike efficiency. Next, in regard to
-education, while the Lacedæmonians, even from their earliest youth,
-subject themselves to an irksome exercise for the attainment of
-courage, we, with our easy habits of life, are not less prepared than
-they, to encounter all perils within the measure of our strength.
-The proof of this is, that the Peloponnesian confederates do not
-attack us one by one, but with their whole united force; while we,
-when we attack them at home, overpower for the most part all of them
-who try to defend their own territory. None of our enemies has ever
-met and contended with our entire force; partly in consequence of
-our large navy,—partly from our dispersion in different simultaneous
-land-expeditions. But when they chance to be engaged with any part
-of it, if victorious, they pretend to have vanquished us all,—if
-defeated, they pretend to have been vanquished by all.</p>
-
-<p>“Now, if we are willing to brave danger, just as much under an
-indulgent system as under constant toil, and by spontaneous courage
-as much as under force of law,—we are gainers in the end, by not
-vexing ourselves beforehand with sufferings to come, yet still
-appearing in the hour of trial not less daring than those who toil
-without ceasing.</p>
-
-<p>“In other matters, too, as well as in these, our city deserves
-admiration. For we combine elegance of taste with simplicity of life,
-and we pursue knowledge without being enervated:<a id="FNanchor_263"
-href="#Footnote_263" class="fnanchor">[263]</a> we employ wealth, not
-for talking and ostentation, but as a real help<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_146">[p. 146]</span> in the proper season: nor is it
-disgraceful to any one who is poor to confess his poverty, though
-he <i>may</i> rather incur reproach for not actually keeping himself
-out of poverty. The magistrates who discharge public trusts fulfil
-their domestic duties also,—the private citizen, while engaged in
-professional business, has competent knowledge on public affairs:
-for we stand alone in regarding the man who keeps aloof from these
-latter, not as harmless, but as useless. Moreover, we always hear
-and pronounce on public matters, when discussed by our leaders,—or
-perhaps strike out for ourselves correct reasonings about them: far
-from accounting discussion an impediment to action, we complain only
-if we are not told what is to be done before it becomes our duty
-to do it. For, in truth, we combine in the most remarkable manner
-these two qualities,—extreme boldness in execution, with full debate
-beforehand on that which we are going about: whereas, with others,
-ignorance alone imparts boldness,—debate introduces hesitation.
-Assuredly, those men are properly to be regarded as the stoutest
-of heart, who, knowing most precisely both the terrors of war and
-the sweets of peace, are still not the less willing to encounter
-peril.</p>
-
-<p>“In fine, I affirm that our city, considered as a whole, is the
-schoolmistress of Greece;<a id="FNanchor_264" href="#Footnote_264"
-class="fnanchor">[264]</a> while, viewed individually, we enable
-the same man to furnish himself out and suffice to himself in the
-greatest variety of ways, and with the most complete grace and
-refinement. This is no empty boast of the moment, but genuine
-reality: and the power of the city, acquired through the dispositions
-just indicated, exists to prove it. Athens alone, of all cities,
-stands forth in actual trial greater than her reputation: her enemy,
-when he attacks her, will not have his pride wounded by suffering
-defeat from feeble hands,—her subjects will not think themselves
-degraded as if their obedience were paid to an unworthy superior.<a
-id="FNanchor_265" href="#Footnote_265" class="fnanchor">[265]</a>
-Having thus put forward our power, not<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_147">[p. 147]</span> uncertified, but backed by the most
-evident proofs, we shall be admired not less by posterity than by
-our contemporaries. Nor do we stand in need either of Homer or of
-any other panegyrist, whose words may for the moment please, while
-the truth when known would confute their intended meaning: we have
-compelled all land and sea to become accessible to our courage, and
-have planted everywhere imperishable monuments of our kindness as
-well as of our hostility.</p>
-
-<p>“Such is the city on behalf of which these warriors have nobly
-died in battle, vindicating her just title to unimpaired rights,<a
-id="FNanchor_266" href="#Footnote_266" class="fnanchor">[266]</a>—and
-on behalf of which all of us here left behind must willingly toil.
-It is for this reason that I have spoken at length concerning the
-city, at once to draw from it the lesson that the conflict is not for
-equal motives between us and enemies who possess nothing of the like
-excellence,—and to demonstrate by proofs the truth of my encomium
-pronounced upon her.”</p>
-
-<p>Periklês pursues at considerable additional length the same tenor
-of mixed exhortation to the living and eulogy of the dead; with
-many special and emphatic observations addressed to the relatives
-of the latter, who were assembled around and doubtless very near
-him. But the extract which I have already made is so long, that
-no farther addition would be admissible: yet it was impossible to
-pass over lightly the picture of the Athenian commonwealth in its
-glory, as delivered by the ablest citizen of the age. The effect
-of the democratical constitution, with its diffused and equal
-citizenship, in calling forth not merely strong attachment, but
-painful self-sacrifice, on the part of all Athenians,—is nowhere more
-forcibly insisted upon than in the words above cited of Periklês,
-as well as in others afterwards: “Contemplating as you do daily
-before you the actual power of the state, and becoming passionately
-attached to it, when you conceive its full<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_148">[p. 148]</span> greatness, reflect that it was all
-acquired by men of daring, acquainted with their duty, and full of
-an honorable sense of shame in their actions,”<a id="FNanchor_267"
-href="#Footnote_267" class="fnanchor">[267]</a>—such is the
-association which he presents between the greatness of the state
-as an object of common passion, and the courage, intelligence,
-and mutual esteem, of individual citizens, as its creating and
-preserving causes: poor as well as rich being alike interested in the
-partnership.</p>
-
-<p>But the claims of patriotism, though put forward as essentially
-and deservedly paramount, are by no means understood to reign
-exclusively, or to absorb the whole of the democratical activity.
-Subject to these, and to those laws and sanctions which protect
-both the public and individuals against wrong, it is the pride
-of Athens to exhibit a rich and varied fund of human impulse,—an
-unrestrained play of fancy and diversity of private pursuit,
-coupled with a reciprocity of cheerful indulgence between one
-individual and another, and an absence even of those “black looks”
-which so much embitter life, even if they never pass into enmity
-of fact. This portion of the speech of Periklês deserves peculiar
-attention, because it serves to correct an assertion, often far too
-indiscriminately made, respecting antiquity as contrasted with modern
-societies,—an assertion that the ancient societies sacrificed the
-individual to the state, and that only in modern times has individual
-agency been left free to the proper extent. This is preëminently true
-of Sparta: it is also true, in a great degree, of the ideal societies
-depicted by Plato and Aristotle: but it is pointedly untrue of the
-Athenian democracy, nor can we with any confidence predicate it of
-the major part of the Grecian cities.</p>
-
-<p>I shall hereafter return to this point when I reach the times of
-the great speculative philosophers: in the mean time I cannot pass
-over this speech of Periklês without briefly noticing the inference
-which it suggests, to negative the supposed exorbitant<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_149">[p. 149]</span> interference of the
-state with individual liberty, as a general fact among the ancient
-Greek republics. There is no doubt that he has present to his mind
-a comparison with the extreme narrowness and rigor of Sparta, and
-that therefore his assertions of the extent of positive liberty at
-Athens must be understood as partially qualified by such contrast.
-But even making allowance for this, the stress which he lays upon the
-liberty of thought and action at Athens, not merely from excessive
-restraint of law, but also from practical intolerance between man
-and man, and tyranny of the majority over individual dissenters in
-taste and pursuit,—deserves serious notice, and brings out one of
-those points in the national character upon which the intellectual
-development of the time mainly depended. The national temper was
-indulgent in a high degree to all the varieties of positive impulses:
-the peculiar promptings in every individual bosom were allowed
-to manifest themselves and bear fruit, without being suppressed
-by external opinion, or trained into forced conformity with some
-assumed standard: antipathies against any of them formed no part of
-the habitual morality of the citizen. While much of the generating
-causes of human hatred was thus rendered inoperative, and while
-society was rendered more comfortable, more instructive, and more
-stimulating,—all its germs of productive fruitful genius, so rare
-everywhere, found in such an atmosphere the maximum of encouragement.
-Within the limits of the law, assuredly as faithfully observed at
-Athens as anywhere in Greece, individual impulse, taste, and even
-eccentricity, were accepted with indulgence, instead of being a mark
-as elsewhere for the intolerance of neighbors or of the public.
-This remarkable feature in Athenian life will help us in a future
-chapter to explain the striking career of Sokratês, and it farther
-presents to us, under another face, a great part of that which
-the censors of Athens denounced under the name of “democratical
-license.” The liberty and diversity of individual life in that city
-were offensive to Xenophon,<a id="FNanchor_268" href="#Footnote_268"
-class="fnanchor">[268]</a> Plato, and Aristotle,—attached
-either<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">[p. 150]</span> to the
-monotonous drill of Sparta, or to some other ideal standard, which,
-though much better than the Spartan in itself, they were disposed to
-impress upon society with a heavy-handed uniformity. That liberty
-of individual action, not merely from the over-restraints of law,
-but from the tyranny of jealous opinion, such as Periklês depicts
-in Athens, belongs more naturally to a democracy, where there is no
-select one or few to receive worship and set the fashion, than to any
-other form of government. But it is very rare even in democracies:
-nor can we dissemble the fact that none of the governments of modern
-times, democratical, aristocratical, or monarchical, presents any
-thing like the picture of generous tolerance towards social dissent,
-and spontaneity of individual taste, which we read in the speech
-of the Athenian statesman. In all of them, the intolerance of the
-national opinion cuts down individual character to one out of a few
-set types, to which every person, or every family, is constrained
-to adjust itself, and beyond which all exceptions meet either with
-hatred or with derision. To impose upon men such restraints either
-of law or of opinion as are requisite for the security and comfort
-of society, but to encourage rather than repress the free play of
-individual impulse subject to those limits,—is an ideal, which, if
-it was ever approached at Athens, has certainly never been attained,
-and has indeed comparatively been little studied or cared for in any
-modern society.</p>
-
-<p>Connected with this reciprocal indulgence of individual diversity,
-was not only the hospitable reception of all strangers at Athens,
-which Periklês contrasts with the xenêlasy or jealous expulsion
-practised at Sparta,—but also the many-sided activity, bodily and
-mental, visible in the former, so opposite to that narrow range
-of thought, exclusive discipline of the body and never-ending
-preparation for war, which formed the system of the latter. His
-assertion that Athens was equal to Sparta, even in her own solitary
-excellence,—efficiency on the field of battle,—is doubtless
-untenable; but not the less impressive is his sketch of that
-multitude of concurrent impulses which at this same time agitated
-and impelled the Athenian mind,—the strength<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_151">[p. 151]</span> of one not implying the weakness of
-the remainder: the relish for all pleasures of art and elegance,
-and the appetite for intellectual expansion, coinciding in the same
-bosom with energetic promptitude as well as endurance: abundance
-of recreative spectacles, yet noway abating the cheerfulness
-of obedience even to the hardest calls of patriotic duty: that
-combination of reason and courage which encountered danger the
-more willingly from having discussed and calculated it beforehand:
-lastly, an anxious interest as well as a competence of judgment in
-public discussion and public action, common to every citizen rich
-and poor, and combined with every man’s own private industry. So
-comprehensive an ideal of many-sided social development, bringing
-out the capacities for action and endurance, as well as those for
-enjoyment, would be sufficiently remarkable, even if we supposed it
-only existing in the imagination of a philosopher: but it becomes
-still more so when we recollect that the main features of it at least
-were drawn from the fellow-citizens of the speaker. It must be taken,
-however, as belonging peculiarly to the Athens of Periklês and his
-contemporaries; nor would it have suited either the period of the
-Persian war, fifty years before, or that of Demosthenês, seventy
-years afterwards. At the former period, the art, the letters, and
-the philosophy, were as yet backward, while even the active energy
-and democratical stimulus, though very powerful, had not been worked
-up to the pitch which they afterwards reached: at the latter period,
-although the intellectual manifestations of Athens subsist in full
-or even increased vigor, we shall find the personal enterprise
-and energetic spirit of her citizens materially abated. As the
-circumstances, which I have already recounted, go far to explain the
-previous upward movement, so those which fill the coming chapters,
-containing the disasters of the Peloponnesian war, will be found to
-explain still more completely the declining tendency shortly about to
-commence. Athens was brought to the brink of entire ruin, from which
-it is surprising that she recovered at all,—but noway surprising
-that she recovered at the expense of a considerable loss of personal
-energy in the character of her citizens.</p>
-
-<p>And thus the season at which Periklês delivered his discourse
-lends to it an additional and peculiar pathos. It was delivered<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_152">[p. 152]</span> at a time when Athens
-was as yet erect and at her maximum for though her real power
-was, doubtless, much diminished, compared with the period before
-the thirty years’ truce, yet the great edifices and works of art,
-achieved since then, tended to compensate that loss, in so far as
-the sense of greatness was concerned; and no one, either citizen or
-enemy, considered Athens as having at all declined. It was delivered
-at the commencement of the great struggle with the Peloponnesian
-confederacy, the coming hardships of which Periklês never disguised
-either to himself or to his fellow-citizens, though he fully counted
-upon eventual success. Attica had been already invaded; it was no
-longer “the unwasted territory,” as Euripidês had designated it
-in his tragedy Medea,<a id="FNanchor_269" href="#Footnote_269"
-class="fnanchor">[269]</a> represented three or four months before
-the march of Archidamus,—and a picture of Athens in her social glory
-was well calculated both to rouse the pride and nerve the courage of
-those individuals citizens, who had been compelled once, and would
-be compelled again and again, to abandon their country-residence
-and fields for a thin tent or confined hole in the city.<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_153">[p. 153]</span><a id="FNanchor_270"
-href="#Footnote_270" class="fnanchor">[270]</a> Such calamities
-might, indeed, be foreseen: but there was one still greater calamity,
-which, though actually then impending, could not be foreseen: the
-terrific pestilence which will be recounted in the coming chapter.
-The bright colors, and tone of cheerful confidence, which pervade
-the discourse of Periklês, appear the more striking from being in
-immediate antecedence to the awful description of this distemper:
-a contrast to which Thucydidês was, doubtless, not insensible,
-and which is another circumstance enhancing the interest of the
-composition.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_49">
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER XLIX.<br />
-    FROM THE BEGINNING OE THE SECOND YEAR DOWN TO THE
-    END OF THE THIRD YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">At</span> the close of one
-year after the attempted surprise of Platæa by the Thebans, the
-belligerent parties in Greece remained in an unaltered position as
-to relative strength. Nothing decisive had been accomplished on
-either side, either by the invasion of Attica, or by the flying
-descents round the coast of Peloponnesus: in spite of mutual damage
-inflicted,—doubtless, in the greatest measure upon Attica,—no
-progress was yet made towards the fulfilment of those objects which
-had induced the Peloponnesians to go to war. Especially, the most
-pressing among all their wishes—the relief of Potidæa—was noway
-advanced; for the Athenians had not found it necessary to relax the
-blockade of that city. The result of the first year’s operations had
-thus been to disappoint the hopes of the Corinthians and the other
-ardent instigators of war, while it justified the anticipations both
-of Periklês and of Archidamus.</p>
-
-<p>A second devastation of Attica was resolved upon for the
-commencement of spring; and measures were taken for carrying it
-all over that territory, since the settled policy of Athens<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_154">[p. 154]</span> not to hazard a battle
-with the invaders was now ascertained. About the end of March, or
-beginning of April, the entire Peloponnesian force—two-thirds from
-each confederate city, as before—was assembled under the command of
-Archidamus, and marched into Attica. This time they carried the work
-of systematic destruction, not merely over the Thriasian plain and
-the plain immediately near to Athens, as before; but also to the
-more southerly portions of Attica, down even as far as the mines of
-Laurium. They traversed and ravaged both the eastern and the western
-coast, remaining not less than forty days in the country. They
-found the territory deserted as before, all the population having
-retired within the walls.<a id="FNanchor_271" href="#Footnote_271"
-class="fnanchor">[271]</a></p>
-
-<p>In regard to this second invasion, Periklês recommended the same
-defensive policy as he had applied to the first; and, apparently,
-the citizens had now come to acquiesce in it, if not willingly, at
-least with a full conviction of its necessity. But a new visitation
-had now occurred, diverting their attention from the invader, though
-enormously aggravating their sufferings. A few days after Archidamus
-entered Attica, a pestilence, or epidemic sickness, broke out
-unexpectedly at Athens.</p>
-
-<p>It appears that this terrific disorder had been raging for
-some time throughout the regions round the Mediterranean; having
-begun, as was believed, in Æthiopia,—thence passing into Egypt and
-Libya, and overrunning a considerable portion of Asia under the
-Persian government: about sixteen years before, too, there had
-been a similar calamity in Rome and in various parts of Italy.
-Recently, it had been felt in Lemnos and some other islands of
-the Ægean, yet seemingly not with such intensity as to excite
-much notice generally in the Grecian world: at length it passed
-to Athens, and first showed itself in the Peiræus. The progress
-of the disease was as rapid and destructive as its appearance
-had been sudden; whilst the extraordinary accumulation of people
-within the city and long walls, in consequence of the presence of
-the invaders in the country, was but too favorable to every form
-of contagion. Families crowded together in close cabins and places
-of temporary shelter,<a id="FNanchor_272" href="#Footnote_272"
-class="fnanchor">[272]</a>—throughout a city constructed,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_155">[p. 155]</span> like most of those in
-Greece, with little regard to the conditions of salubrity,—and in a
-state of mental chagrin from the forced abandonment and sacrifice of
-their properties in the country, transmitted the disorder with fatal
-facility from one to the other. Beginning as it did about the middle
-of April, the increasing heat of summer farther aided the disorder,
-the symptoms of which, alike violent and sudden, made themselves the
-more remarked because the year was particularly exempt from maladies
-of every other description.<a id="FNanchor_273" href="#Footnote_273"
-class="fnanchor">[273]</a></p>
-
-<p>Of this plague,—or, more properly, eruptive typhoid fever,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_156">[p. 156]</span><a id="FNanchor_274"
-href="#Footnote_274" class="fnanchor">[274]</a> distinct from,
-yet analogous to, the smallpox,—a description no less clear than
-impressive has been left by the historian Thucydidês, himself not
-only a spectator but a sufferer. It is not one of the least of
-his merits, that his notice of the symptoms, given at so early a
-stage of medical science and observation, is such as to instruct
-the medical reader of the present age, and to enable the malady to
-be understood and identified. The observations, with which that
-notice is ushered in, deserve particular attention. “In respect
-to this distemper (he says), let every man, physician or not, say
-what he thinks respecting the source from whence it may probably
-have arisen, and respecting the causes which he deems sufficiently
-powerful to have produced so great a revolution. But I, having myself
-had the distemper, and having seen others suffering under it, will
-state <i>what it actually was</i>, and will indicate, in addition, such
-other matters, as will furnish any man, who lays them to heart,
-with knowledge and the means of calculation beforehand, in case
-the same misfortune should ever again occur.”<a id="FNanchor_275"
-href="#Footnote_275" class="fnanchor">[275]</a> To record past facts,
-as a basis for rational pre<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">[p.
-157]</span>vision in regard to the future,—the same sentiment
-which Thucydidês mentions in his preface,<a id="FNanchor_276"
-href="#Footnote_276" class="fnanchor">[276]</a> as having animated
-him to the composition of his history,—was at that time a duty so
-little understood, that we have reason to admire not less the manner
-in which he performs it in practice, than the distinctness with
-which he conceives it in theory. We may infer from his language
-that speculation in his day was active respecting the causes of
-this plague, according to the vague and fanciful physics and scanty
-stock of ascertained facts, which was all that could then be
-consulted. By resisting the itch of theorising from one of those
-loose hypotheses which then appeared plausibly to explain everything,
-he probably renounced the point of view from which most credit and
-interest would be derivable at the time: but his simple and precise
-summary of observed facts carries with it an imperishable value,
-and even affords grounds for imagining, that he was no stranger to
-the habits and training of his contemporary, Hippokratês, and the
-other Asklepiads of Cos.<a id="FNanchor_277" href="#Footnote_277"
-class="fnanchor">[277]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">[p. 158]</span></p>
-
-<p>It is hardly within the province of an historian of Greece
-to repeat after Thucydidês the painful enumeration of symptoms,
-violent in the extreme, and pervading every portion of the bodily
-system, which marked this fearful disorder. Beginning in Peiræus,
-it quickly passed into the city, and both the one and the other
-was speedily filled with sickness and suffering, the like of which
-had never before been known. The seizures were perfectly sudden,
-and a large proportion of the sufferers perished, after deplorable
-agonies, on the seventh or on the ninth day: others, whose strength
-of constitution carried them over this period, found themselves
-the victims of exhausting and incurable diarrhœa afterwards: with
-others again, after traversing both these stages, the distemper
-fixed itself in some particular member, the eyes, the genitals, the
-hands, or the feet, which were rendered permanently useless, or in
-some cases amputated, even where the patient himself recovered.
-There were also some whose recovery was attended with a total loss
-of memory, so that they no more knew themselves or recognized their
-friends. No treatment or remedy appearing, except in accidental
-cases, to produce any beneficial effect, the physicians or surgeons
-whose aid was invoked became completely at fault; while trying
-their accustomed means without avail, they soon ended by catching
-the malady themselves and perishing: nor were the charms and<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_159">[p. 159]</span> incantations<a
-id="FNanchor_278" href="#Footnote_278" class="fnanchor">[278]</a> to
-which the unhappy patient resorted, likely to be more efficacious.
-While some asserted that the Peloponnesians had poisoned the
-cisterns of water, others referred the visitation to the wrath of
-the gods, and especially to Apollo, known by hearers of the Iliad
-as author of pestilence in the Greek host before Troy. It was
-remembered that this Delphian god had promised the Lacedæmonians,
-in reply to their application immediately before the war, that he
-would assist them whether invoked or uninvoked,—and the disorder
-now raging was ascribed to the intervention of their irresistible
-ally: while the elderly men farther called to mind an oracular verse
-sung in the time of their youth: “The Dorian war will come, and
-pestilence along with it.”<a id="FNanchor_279" href="#Footnote_279"
-class="fnanchor">[279]</a> Under the distress which suggested, and
-was reciprocally<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">[p. 160]</span>
-aggravated by, these gloomy ideas, prophets were consulted, and
-supplications with solemn procession were held at the temples, to
-appease the divine wrath.</p>
-
-<p>When it was found that neither the priest nor the physician could
-retard the spread, or mitigate the intensity, of the disorder, the
-Athenians abandoned themselves to utter despair, and the space within
-the walls became a scene of desolating misery. Every man attacked
-with the malady at once lost his courage,—a state of depression,
-itself among the worst features of the case, which made him lie down
-and die, without the least attempt to seek for any preservatives. And
-though, at first, friends and relatives lent their aid to tend the
-sick with the usual family sympathies, yet so terrible was the number
-of these attendants who perished, “like sheep,” from such contact,
-that at length no man would thus expose himself; while the most
-generous spirits, who persisted longest in the discharge of their
-duty, were carried off in the greatest numbers.<a id="FNanchor_280"
-href="#Footnote_280" class="fnanchor">[280]</a> The patient was thus
-left to die alone and unheeded: sometimes all the inmates of a house
-were swept away one after the other, no man being willing to go near
-it: desertion on one hand, attendance on the other, both tended to
-aggravate the calamity. There remained only those who, having had
-the disorder and recovered, were willing to tend the sufferers.
-These men formed the single exception to the all-pervading misery
-of the time,—for the disorder seldom attacked any one twice, and
-when it did, the second attack was never fatal. Elate with their own
-escape, they deemed themselves out of the reach of all disease, and
-were full of compassionate kindness for others whose sufferings were
-just beginning. It was from them, too, that the principal attention
-to the bodies of deceased victims proceeded: for such was the state
-of dismay and sorrow, that even the nearest relatives neglected the
-sepulchral duties, sacred beyond all others in the eyes of a Greek.
-Nor is there any circumstance which conveys to us so vivid an idea
-of the prevalent agony and despair, as when we read, in the words of
-an eye-witness, that the deaths took place among this close-packed
-crowd<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">[p. 161]</span>
-without the smallest decencies of attention,<a id="FNanchor_281"
-href="#Footnote_281" class="fnanchor">[281]</a>—that the dead and the
-dying lay piled one upon another, not merely in the public roads, but
-even in the temples, in spite of the understood defilement of the
-sacred building,—that half-dead sufferers were seen lying round all
-the springs, from insupportable thirst,—that the numerous corpses
-thus unburied and exposed, were in such a condition, that the dogs
-which meddled with them died in consequence, while no vultures or
-other birds of the like habits ever came near. Those bodies which
-escaped entire neglect, were burnt or buried<a id="FNanchor_282"
-href="#Footnote_282" class="fnanchor">[282]</a> without the
-customary mourning, and with unseemly carelessness. In some cases,
-the bearers of a body, passing by a funeral pile on which another
-body was burning, would put their own there to be burnt also;<a
-id="FNanchor_283" href="#Footnote_283" class="fnanchor">[283]</a> or
-perhaps, if the pile was prepared ready for a body not yet arrived,
-would deposit their own upon it, set fire to the pile, and then
-depart. Such indecent confusion would have been intolerable to the
-feelings of the Athenians, in any ordinary times.</p>
-
-<p>To all these scenes of physical suffering, death, and reckless
-despair, was superadded another evil, which affected those who were
-fortunate enough to escape the rest. The bonds both of law and
-morality became relaxed, amidst such total uncertainty of every
-man both for his own life, and that of others. Men cared not to
-abstain from wrong, under circumstances in which punishment was not
-likely to overtake them,—nor to put a check upon their passions,
-and endure privations in obedience even to<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_162">[p. 162]</span> their strongest conviction, when the
-chance was so small of their living to reap reward or enjoy any
-future esteem. An interval short and sweet, before their doom was
-realized—before they became plunged in the wide-spread misery which
-they witnessed around, and which affected indiscriminately the
-virtuous and the profligate—was all they looked to enjoy; embracing
-with avidity the immediate pleasures of sense, as well as such
-positive gains, however ill-gotten, as could be made the means of
-procuring them, and throwing aside all thought both of honor or of
-long-sighted advantage. Life and property were alike ephemeral, nor
-was there any hope left but to snatch a moment of enjoyment, before
-the outstretched hand of destiny should fall upon its victims.</p>
-
-<p>The melancholy picture of society under the pressure of
-a murderous epidemic, with its train of physical torments,
-wretchedness, and demoralization, has been drawn by more than
-one eminent author, but by none with more impressive fidelity
-and conciseness than by Thucydidês,<a id="FNanchor_284"
-href="#Footnote_284" class="fnanchor">[284]</a> who had no
-predecessor, and nothing but the reality to copy from. We may
-remark that, amidst all the melancholy accompaniments of the time,
-there are no human sacrifices, such as those offered up at Carthage
-during pestilence to appease the anger of the gods,—there are
-no cruel persecutions against imaginary authors of the disease,
-such as those against the Untori (anointers of doors) in the
-plague of Milan in 1630.<a id="FNanchor_285" href="#Footnote_285"
-class="fnanchor">[285]</a> Three years altogether did this calamity
-desolate Athens: continuously, during the entire second and third
-years of the war,—after which, followed a period of marked abatement
-for a year and a half: but it then revived again, and lasted
-for another year, with the same fury as at first. The pub<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_163">[p. 163]</span>lic loss, over and
-above the private misery, which this unexpected enemy inflicted
-upon Athens, was incalculable. Out of twelve hundred horsemen,
-all among the rich men of the state, three hundred died of the
-epidemic; besides four thousand and four hundred hoplites out of the
-roll formerly kept, and a number of the poorer population so great
-as to defy computation.<a id="FNanchor_286" href="#Footnote_286"
-class="fnanchor">[286]</a> No efforts of the Peloponnesians
-could have done so much to ruin Athens, or to bring the war to a
-termination such as they desired: and the distemper told the more
-in their favor, as it never spread at all into Peloponnesus, though
-it passed from Athens to some of the more populous islands.<a
-id="FNanchor_287" href="#Footnote_287" class="fnanchor">[287]</a> The
-Lacedæmonian army was withdrawn from Attica somewhat earlier than
-it would otherwise have been, for fear of taking the contagion.<a
-id="FNanchor_288" href="#Footnote_288" class="fnanchor">[288]</a></p>
-
-<p>But it was while the Lacedæmonians were yet in Attica, and during
-the first freshness of the terrible malady, that Periklês equipped
-and conducted from Peiræus an armament of one hundred triremes,
-and four thousand hoplites to attack the coasts of Peloponnesus:
-three hundred horsemen were also carried in some horse-transports,
-prepared for the occasion out of old triremes. To diminish the crowd
-accumulated in the city, was doubtless of beneficial tendency,
-and perhaps those who went aboard, might consider it as a chance
-of escape to quit an infected home. But unhappily they carried
-the infection along with them, which desolated the fleet not less
-than the city, and crippled all its efforts. Reinforced by fifty
-ships of war from Chios and Lesbos, the Athenians first landed near
-Epidaurus in Peloponnesus, ravaging the territory, and making an
-unavailing attempt upon the city: next, they made like incursions
-on the more southerly portions of the Argolic peninsula,—Trœzen,
-Halieis, and Hermionê; and lastly attacked and captured Prasiæ,
-on the eastern coast of Laconia. On returning to Athens, the same
-armament<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">[p. 164]</span> was
-immediately conducted, under Agnon and Kleopompus, to press the
-siege of Potidæa, the blockade of which still continued without
-any visible progress. On arriving there, an attack was made on the
-walls by battering engines, and by the other aggressive methods then
-practised; but nothing whatever was achieved. In fact, the armament
-became incompetent for all serious effort, from the aggravated
-character which the distemper here assumed, communicated by the
-soldiers fresh from Athens, even to those who had before been free
-from it at Potidæa. So frightful was the mortality, that out of the
-four thousand hoplites under Agnon, no less than ten hundred and
-fifty died in the short space of forty days. The armament was brought
-back in this melancholy condition to Athens, while the reduction
-of Potidæa was left, as before, to the slow course of blockade.<a
-id="FNanchor_289" href="#Footnote_289" class="fnanchor">[289]</a></p>
-
-<p>On returning from the expedition against Peloponnesus, Periklês
-found his countrymen almost distracted<a id="FNanchor_290"
-href="#Footnote_290" class="fnanchor">[290]</a> with their manifold
-sufferings. Over and above the raging epidemic, they had just gone
-over Attica and ascertained the devastations committed by the
-invaders throughout all the territory—except the Marathonian<a
-id="FNanchor_291" href="#Footnote_291" class="fnanchor">[291]</a>
-Tetrapolis and Dekeleia; districts spared, as we are told, through
-indulgence founded on an ancient legendary sympathy—during their long
-stay of forty days. The rich had found their comfortable mansions
-and farms, the poor their modest cottages, in the various demes,
-torn down and ruined. Death,<a id="FNanchor_292" href="#Footnote_292"
-class="fnanchor">[292]</a> sickness, loss of property, and despair
-of the future, now rendered the Athenians angry and intractable to
-the last degree; and they vented their feelings against Periklês,
-as the cause, not merely of the war, but also of all that they were
-now enduring. Either with or without his consent, they sent envoys
-to Sparta to open negotiations for peace, but the Spartans turned a
-deaf ear to the proposition. This new disappointment rendered them
-still more furious against Periklês, whose long-standing political
-enemies now doubtless found strong sympathy in their denuncia<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_165">[p. 165]</span>tions of his character
-and policy. That unshaken and majestic firmness, which ranked
-first among his many eminent qualities, was never more imperiously
-required, and never more effectively manifested. In his capacity
-of stratêgus, or general, he convoked a formal assembly of the
-people, for the purpose of vindicating himself publicly against the
-prevailing sentiment, and recommending perseverance in his line of
-policy. The speeches made by his opponents, assuredly very bitter,
-are not given by Thucydidês; but that of Periklês himself is set
-down at considerable length, and a memorable discourse it is. It
-strikingly brings into relief both the character of the man and the
-impress of actual circumstances,—an impregnable mind, conscious not
-only of right purposes, but of just and reasonable anticipations,
-and bearing up with manliness, or even defiance, against the natural
-difficulty of the case, heightened by an extreme of incalculable
-misfortune. He had foreseen,<a id="FNanchor_293" href="#Footnote_293"
-class="fnanchor">[293]</a> while advising the war originally, the
-probable impatience of his countrymen under its first hardships, but
-he could not foresee the epidemic by which that impatience had been
-exasperated into madness: and he now addressed them, not merely with
-unabated adherence to his own deliberate convictions, but also in
-a tone of reproachful remonstrance against their unmerited change
-of sentiment towards him,—seeking at the same time to combat that
-uncontrolled despair which, for the moment, overlaid both their pride
-and their patriotism. Far from humbling himself before the present
-sentiment, it is at this time that he sets forth his titles to their
-esteem in the most direct and unqualified manner, and claims the
-continuance of that which they had so long accorded, as something
-belonging to him by acquired right.</p>
-
-<p>His main object, throughout this discourse, is to fill the minds
-of his audience with patriotic sympathy for the weal of the entire
-city, so as to counterbalance the absorbing sense of private woe.
-If the collective city flourishes, he argues, private misfortunes
-may at least be borne: but no amount of private prosperity will
-avail, if the collective city falls; a proposition literally
-true in ancient times, and under the circumstances of ancient
-warfare, though less true at present. “Distracted by domestic
-calamity,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">[p. 166]</span> ye
-are now angry both with me, who advised you to go to war, and with
-yourselves, who followed the advice. Ye listened to me, considering
-me superior to others in judgment, in speech, in patriotism, and
-in incorruptible probity,<a id="FNanchor_294" href="#Footnote_294"
-class="fnanchor">[294]</a>—nor ought I now to be treated as
-culpable for giving such advice, when in point of fact the war
-was unavoidable, and there would have been still greater danger
-in shrinking from it. I am the same man, still unchanged,—but ye,
-in your misfortunes, cannot stand to the convictions which ye
-adopted when yet unhurt. Extreme and unforeseen, indeed, are the
-sorrows which have fallen upon you: yet, inhabiting as ye do a
-great city, and brought up in dispositions suitable to it, ye must
-also resolve to bear up against the utmost pressure of adversity,
-and never to surrender your dignity. I have often explained to you
-that ye have no reason to doubt of eventual success in the war,
-but I will now remind you, more emphatically than before, and even
-with a degree of ostentation suitable as a stimulus to your present
-unnatural depression,—that your naval force makes you masters, not
-only of your allies, but of the entire sea,<a id="FNanchor_295"
-href="#Footnote_295" class="fnanchor">[295]</a>—one half of the
-visible field for action and employment. Compared with so vast a
-power as this, the temporary use of your houses and territory is
-a mere trifle,—an ornamental accessory not worth considering; and
-this, too, if ye preserve your freedom, ye will quickly recover. It
-was your fathers who first gained this empire, without any of the
-advantages which ye now enjoy; ye must not disgrace yourselves by
-losing what they acquired. Delighting as ye all do in the honor and
-empire enjoyed by the city, ye must not shrink from the toils whereby
-alone that honor is sustained: moreover, ye now fight, not merely
-for freedom instead of slavery, but for empire<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_167">[p. 167]</span> against loss of empire, with all the
-perils arising out of imperial unpopularity. It is not safe for you
-now to abdicate, even if ye chose to do so; for ye hold your empire
-like a despotism,—unjust perhaps in the original acquisition, but
-ruinous to part with when once acquired. Be not angry with me, whose
-advice ye followed in going to war, because the enemy have done
-such damage as might be expected from them; still less on account
-of this unforeseen distemper: I know that this makes me an object
-of your special present hatred, though very unjustly, unless ye
-will consent to give me credit also for any unexpected good luck
-which may occur. Our city derives its particular glory from unshaken
-bearing up against misfortune: her power, her name, her empire of
-Greeks over Greeks, are such as have never before been seen: and
-if we choose to be great, we must take the consequence of that
-temporary envy and hatred which is the necessary price of permanent
-renown. Behave ye now in a manner worthy of that glory: display
-that courage which is essential to protect you against disgrace at
-present, as well as to guarantee your honor for the future. Send no
-farther embassy to Sparta, and bear your misfortunes without showing
-symptoms of distress.”<a id="FNanchor_296" href="#Footnote_296"
-class="fnanchor">[296]</a></p>
-
-<p>The irresistible reason, as well as the proud and resolute
-bearing of this discourse, set forth with an eloquence which it
-was not possible for Thucydidês to reproduce,—together with the
-age and character of Periklês,—carried the assent of the assembled
-people; who, when in the Pnyx, and engaged according to habit on
-public matters, would for a moment forget their private sufferings
-in considerations of the safety and grandeur of Athens: possibly,
-indeed, those sufferings, though still continuing, might become
-somewhat alleviated when the invaders quitted Attica, and when
-it was no longer indispensable for all the population to confine
-itself within the walls. Accordingly, the assembly resolved that
-no farther propositions should be made for peace, and that the war
-should be prosecuted with vigor. But though the public resolution
-thus adopted showed the ancient habit of deference to the authority
-of Periklês, the sentiments<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">[p.
-168]</span> of individuals taken separately were still those of anger
-against him, as the author of that system which had brought them
-into so much distress. His political opponents—Kleon, Simmias, or
-Lakratidas, perhaps all three in conjunction—took care to provide
-an opportunity for this prevalent irritation to manifest itself in
-act, by bringing an accusation against him before the dikastery. The
-accusation is said to have been preferred on the ground of pecuniary
-malversation, and ended by his being sentenced to pay a considerable
-fine, the amount of which is differently reported,—fifteen, fifty,
-or eighty talents, by different authors.<a id="FNanchor_297"
-href="#Footnote_297" class="fnanchor">[297]</a> The accusing party
-thus appeared to have carried<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">[p.
-169]</span> their point, and to have disgraced, as well as excluded
-from reëlection, the veteran statesman. But the event disappointed
-their expectations: the imposition of the fine not only satiated
-all the irritation of the people against him, but even occasioned
-a serious reaction in his favor, and brought back as strongly as
-ever the ancient sentiment of esteem and admiration. It was quickly
-found that those who had succeeded Periklês as generals, neither
-possessed nor deserved in an equal degree, the public confidence,
-and he was accordingly soon reëlected, with as much power and
-influence as he had ever in his life enjoyed.<a id="FNanchor_298"
-href="#Footnote_298" class="fnanchor">[298]</a></p>
-
-<p>But that life—long, honorable, and useful—had already been
-prolonged considerably beyond the sixtieth year, and there were
-but too many circumstances, besides the recent fine, which tended
-to hasten as well as to embitter its close. At the very moment
-when Periklês was preaching to his countrymen, in a tone almost
-reproachful, the necessity of manful and unabated devotion to the
-common country, in the midst of private suffering,—he was himself
-among the greatest of sufferers, and most hardly pressed to set
-the example of observing his own precepts. The epidemic carried
-off not merely his two sons, the only two legitimate, Xanthippus
-and Paralus, but also his sister, several other relatives, and
-his best and most useful political friends. Amidst this train of
-domestic calamities, and in the funeral obsequies of so many of his
-dearest friends, he remained master of his grief, and maintained
-his habitual self-command, until the last misfortune,—the death
-of his favorite son Paralus, which left his house without any
-legitimate representative to maintain the family and the hereditary
-sacred rites. On this final blow, though he strove to command
-himself as before, yet, at the obsequies of the young man, when
-it became his duty to place a garland on the dead body, his grief
-became uncontrollable, and he burst out, for the first time of
-his life, into profuse tears and sobbing.<a id="FNanchor_299"
-href="#Footnote_299" class="fnanchor">[299]</a></p>
-
-<p>In the midst of these several personal trials he received the
-intimation, through Alkibiadês and some other friends, of the
-restored confidence of the people towards him, and of his re-election
-to the office of stratêgus: nor was it without difficulty<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_170">[p. 170]</span> that he was persuaded
-to present himself again at the public assembly, and resume the
-direction of affairs. The regret of the people was formally
-expressed to him for the recent sentence,—perhaps, indeed, the
-fine may have been repaid to him, or some evasion of it permitted,
-saving the forms of law,<a id="FNanchor_300" href="#Footnote_300"
-class="fnanchor">[300]</a>—in the present temper of the city; which
-was farther displayed towards him by the grant of a remarkable
-exemption from a law of his own original proposition. He had
-himself, some years before, been the author of that law, whereby
-the citizenship of Athens was restricted to persons born both of
-Athenian fathers and Athenian mothers, under which restriction
-several thousand persons, illegitimate on the mother’s side, are
-said to have been deprived of the citizenship, on occasion of a
-public distribution of corn. Invidious as it appeared to grant, to
-Periklês singly, an exemption from a law which had been strictly
-enforced against so many others, the people were now moved not
-less by compassion than by anxiety to redress their own previous
-severity. Without a legitimate heir, the house of Periklês, one
-branch of the great Alkmæônid gens by his mother’s side, would be
-left deserted, and the continuity of the family sacred rites would
-be broken,—a misfortune painfully felt by every Athenian family,
-as calculated to wrong all the deceased members, and provoke their
-posthumous displeasure towards the city. Accordingly, permission was
-granted to Periklês to legitimize, and to inscribe in his own gens
-and phratry his natural son by Aspasia, who bore his own name.<a
-id="FNanchor_301" href="#Footnote_301" class="fnanchor">[301]</a></p>
-
-<p>It was thus that Periklês was reinstated in his post of stratêgus,
-as well as in his ascendency over the public counsels,—seemingly
-about August or September, 430 <small>B.C.</small>
-He lived about one year longer, and seems to have maintained his
-influence as long as his health permitted. Yet we hear nothing of
-him after this moment, and he fell a victim, not to the violent
-symptoms of the epidemic, but to a slow and wearing fever,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_171">[p. 171]</span><a id="FNanchor_302"
-href="#Footnote_302" class="fnanchor">[302]</a> which underminded
-his strength as well as his capacity. To a friend who came to
-ask after him when in this disease, Periklês replied by showing
-a charm or amulet which his female relations had hung about his
-neck,—a proof how low he was reduced, and how completely he had
-become a passive subject in the hands of others. And according to
-another anecdote which we read, yet more interesting and equally
-illustrative of his character,—it was during his last moments, when
-he was lying apparently unconscious and insensible, that the friends
-around his bed were passing in review the acts of his life, and
-the nine trophies which he had erected at different times for so
-many victories. He heard what they said, though they fancied that
-he was past hearing, and interrupted them by remarking: “What you
-praise in my life, belongs partly to good fortune,—and is, at best,
-common to me with many other generals. But the peculiarity of which
-I am most proud, you have not noticed,—no Athenian has ever put on
-mourning on my account.”<a id="FNanchor_303" href="#Footnote_303"
-class="fnanchor">[303]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such a cause of self-gratulation, doubtless more satisfactory to
-recall at such a moment than any other, illustrates that long-sighted
-calculation, aversion to distant or hazardous enterprise, and economy
-of the public force, which marked his entire political career; a
-career long, beyond all parallel, in the history of Athens,—since
-he maintained a great influence, gradually swelling into a decisive
-personal ascendency, for between thirty and forty years. His
-character has been presented in very different lights, by different
-authors, both ancient and modern, and our materials for striking
-the balance are not so good as we could wish. But his immense and
-long-continued ascendency, as well as his unparalleled eloquence, are
-facts attested not less by his enemies than by his friends,—nay, even
-more forcibly by the former than by the latter. The comic writers,
-who hated him, and whose trade it was to deride and hunt down every
-leading political character, exhaust their powers of illustration
-in setting forth both the one and the other:<a id="FNanchor_304"
-href="#Footnote_304" class="fnanchor">[304]</a> Telekleidês,
-Kratinus, Eupolis,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">[p.
-172]</span> Aristophanês, all hearers and all enemies, speak
-of him like Olympian Zeus, hurling thunder and lightning,—like
-Hêraklês and Achilles,—as the only speaker on whose lips persuasion
-sat, and who left his sting in the minds of his audience: while
-Plato the philosopher,<a id="FNanchor_305" href="#Footnote_305"
-class="fnanchor">[305]</a> who disapproved of his political working,
-and of the moral effects which he produced upon Athens, nevertheless
-extols his intellectual and oratorical ascendency: “his majestic
-intelligence,”—in language not less decisive than Thucydidês.
-There is another point of eulogy, not less valuable, on which the
-testimony appears uncontradicted: throughout his long career,
-amidst the hottest political animosities, the conduct of Periklês
-towards opponents was always mild and liberal.<a id="FNanchor_306"
-href="#Footnote_306" class="fnanchor">[306]</a> The conscious
-self-esteem and arrogance of manner with which the contemporary
-poet Ion reproached him,<a id="FNanchor_307" href="#Footnote_307"
-class="fnanchor">[307]</a> contrasting it with the unpretending
-simplicity of his own patron Kimon,—though probably invidiously
-exaggerated, is doubtless in substance well founded, and those who
-read the last speech given above out of Thucydidês, will at once
-recognize in it this attribute. His natural taste, his love of
-philosophical research, and his unwearied application to public
-affairs, all contributed to alienate him from ordinary familiarity,
-and to make him careless, perhaps improperly careless, of the lesser
-means of conciliating public favor.</p>
-
-<p>But admitting this latter reproach to be well founded, as it
-seems to be, it helps to negative that greater and graver political
-crime which has been imputed to him, of sacrificing the permanent
-well-being and morality of the state to the maintenance of his own
-political power,—of corrupting the people by distributions of the
-public money. “He gave the reins to the people (in Plutarch’s words<a
-id="FNanchor_308" href="#Footnote_308" class="fnanchor">[308]</a>),
-and shaped his administration for their<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_173">[p. 173]</span> immediate favor, by always providing at
-home some public spectacle, or festival, or procession, thus nursing
-up the city in elegant pleasures,—and by sending out every year
-sixty triremes, manned by citizen-seamen on full pay, who were thus
-kept in practice and acquired nautical skill.” Now the charge here
-made against Periklês, and supported by allegations in themselves
-honorable rather than otherwise,—of a vicious appetite for immediate
-popularity, and of improper concessions to the immediate feelings
-of the people against their permanent interests,—is precisely that
-which Thucydidês, in the most pointed manner denies; and not merely
-denies, but contrasts Periklês with his successors in the express
-circumstances that <i>they</i> did so, while <i>he</i> did not. The language of
-the contemporary historian<a id="FNanchor_309" href="#Footnote_309"
-class="fnanchor">[309]</a> well deserves to be cited: “Periklês,
-powerful from dignity of character as well as from wisdom, and
-conspicuously above the least tinge of corruption, held back the
-people with a free hand, and was their real leader instead of
-being led by them. For not being a seeker of power from unworthy
-sources, he did not speak with any view to present favor, but had
-sufficient sense of dignity to contradict<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_174">[p. 174]</span> them on occasion, even braving their
-displeasure. Thus, whenever he perceived them insolently and
-unseasonably confident, he shaped his speeches in such manner as to
-alarm and beat them down: when again he saw them unduly frightened,
-he tried to counteract it, and restore them confidence: so that
-the government was in name a democracy, but in reality an empire
-exercised by the first citizen in the state. But those who succeeded
-after his death, being more equal one with another, and each of them
-desiring preëminence over the rest, adopted the different course of
-courting the favor of the people, and sacrificing to that object even
-important state-interests. From whence arose many other bad measures,
-as might be expected in a great and imperial city, and especially the
-Sicilian expedition,” etc.</p>
-
-<p>It will be seen that the judgment here quoted from Thucydidês
-contradicts, in the most unqualified manner, the reproaches commonly
-made against Periklês, of having corrupted the Athenian people
-by distributions of the public money, and by giving way to their
-unwise caprices, for the purpose of acquiring and maintaining his
-own political power. Nay, the historian particularly notes the
-opposite qualities,—self-judgment, conscious dignity, indifference
-to immediate popular applause or wrath, when set against what was
-permanently right and useful,—as the special characteristic of that
-great statesman. A distinction might indeed be possible, and Plutarch
-professes to note such distinction, between the earlier and the later
-part of his long political career: he began, so that biographer
-says, by corrupting the people in order to acquire power, but having
-acquired it, he employed it in an independent and patriotic manner,
-so that the judgment of Thucydidês, true respecting the later part of
-his life, would not be applicable to the earlier. This distinction
-may be to a certain degree well founded, inasmuch as the power of
-opposing a bold and successful resistance to temporary aberrations of
-the public mind, necessarily implies an established influence, and
-can hardly ever be exercised even by the firmest politician during
-his years of commencement: he is at that time necessarily the adjunct
-of some party or tendency which he finds already in operation, and
-has to stand forward actively and assiduously before he can create
-for himself a separate personal influence. But while we admit the
-distinction to this extent,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">[p.
-175]</span> there is nothing to warrant us in restricting the
-encomium of Thucydidês exclusively to the later life of Periklês, or
-in representing the earlier life as something in pointed contrast
-with that encomium. Construing fairly what the historian says, he
-evidently did not so conceive the earlier life of Periklês. Either
-those political changes which are held by Plato, Aristotle, Plutarch,
-and others, to demonstrate the corrupting effect of Periklês and
-his political ascendency,—such as the limitation of the functions
-of the Areopagus, as well as of the power of the magistrates, the
-establishment of the numerous and frequent popular dikasteries with
-regular pay, and perhaps also the assignment of pay to those who
-attended the ekklesia, the expenditure for public works, religious
-edifices and ornaments, the diobely (or distribution of two oboli per
-head to the poorer citizens at various festivals, in order that they
-might be able to pay for their places in the theatre), taking it as
-it then stood, etc.,—did not appear to Thucydidês mischievous and
-corrupting, as these other writers thought them; or else he did not
-particularly refer them to Periklês.</p>
-
-<p>Both are true, probably, to some extent. The internal political
-changes at Athens, respecting the Areopagus and the dikasteries, took
-place when Periklês was a young man, and when he cannot be supposed
-to have yet acquired the immense personal ascendency which afterwards
-belonged to him. Ephialtês in fact seems in those early days to have
-been a greater man than Periklês, if we may judge by the fact that
-he was selected by his political adversaries for assassination,—so
-that they might with greater propriety be ascribed to the party with
-which Periklês was connected, rather than to that statesman himself.
-But next, we have no reason to presume that Thucydidês considered
-these changes as injurious, or as having deteriorated the Athenian
-character. All that he does say as to the working of Periklês on the
-sentiment and actions of his countrymen, is eminently favorable. He
-represents the presidency of that statesman as moderate, cautious,
-conservative, and successful; he describes him as uniformly
-keeping back the people from rash enterprises, and from attempts
-to extend their empire,—as looking forward to the necessity of a
-war, and maintaining the naval, military, and financial forces of
-the state in constant condition to stand it,<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_176">[p. 176]</span>—as calculating, with long-sighted
-wisdom, the conditions on which ultimate success depended. If we
-follow the elaborate funeral harangue of Periklês, which Thucydidês,
-since he produces it at length, probably considered as faithfully
-illustrating the political point of view of that statesman, we shall
-discover a conception of democratical equality no less rational
-than generous; an anxious care for the recreation and comfort of
-the citizens, but no disposition to emancipate them from active
-obligation, either public or private,—and least of all, any idea of
-dispensing with such activity by abusive largesses out of the general
-revenue. The whole picture, drawn by Periklês, of Athens, “as the
-schoolmistress of Greece,” implies a prominent development of private
-industry and commerce, not less than of public citizenship and
-soldiership,—of letters, arts, and recreative varieties of taste.</p>
-
-<p>Though Thucydidês does not directly canvass the constitutional
-changes effected in Athens under Periklês, yet everything which he
-does say leads us to believe that he accounted the working of that
-statesman, upon the whole, on Athenian power as well as on Athenian
-character, eminently valuable, and his death as an irreparable loss.
-And we may thus appeal to the judgment of an historian who is our
-best witness in every conceivable respect, as a valid reply to the
-charge against Periklês, of having corrupted the Athenian habits,
-character, and government. If he spent a large amount of the public
-treasure upon religious edifices and ornaments, and upon stately
-works for the city,—yet the sum which he left untouched, ready
-for use at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, was such as to
-appear more than sufficient for all purposes of defence, or public
-safety, or military honor. It cannot be shown of Periklês that he
-ever sacrificed the greater object to the less,—the permanent and
-substantially valuable, to the transitory and showy,—assured present
-possessions, to the lust of new, distant, or uncertain conquests.
-If his advice had been listened to, the rashness which brought on
-the defeat of the Athenian Tolmidês, at Korôneia in Bœotia, would
-have been avoided, and Athens might probably have maintained her
-ascendency over Megara and Bœotia, which would have protected her
-territory from invasion, and given a new turn to the subsequent
-history. Periklês is not to be treated as the author of the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_177">[p. 177]</span> Athenian character:
-he found it with its very marked positive characteristics and
-susceptibilities, among which, those which he chiefly brought out and
-improved were the best. The lust of expeditions against the Persians,
-which Kimon would have pushed into Egypt and Cyprus, he repressed,
-after it had accomplished all which could be usefully aimed at:
-the ambition of Athens he moderated rather than encouraged: the
-democratical movement of Athens he regularized, and worked out into
-judicial institutions, which became one of the prominent features of
-Athenian life, and worked, in my judgment, with a very large balance
-of benefit to the national mind as well as to individual security,
-in spite of the many defects in their direct character as tribunals.
-But that point in which there was the greatest difference between
-Athens, as Periklês found if, and as he left it, is, unquestionably,
-the pacific and intellectual development,—rhetoric, poetry, arts,
-philosophical research, and recreative variety. To which if we add,
-great improvement in the cultivation of the Attic soil,—extension of
-Athenian trade,—attainment and laborious maintenance of the maximum
-of maritime skill, attested by the battles of Phormio,—enlargement
-of the area of complete security by construction of the Long
-Walls,—lastly, the clothing of Athens in her imperial mantle, by
-ornaments, architectural and sculptural,—we shall make out a case
-of genuine progress realized during the political life of Periklês,
-such as the evils imputed to him, far more imaginary than real, will
-go but a little way to alloy. How little, comparatively speaking,
-of the picture drawn by Periklês in his funeral harangue of 431
-<small>B.C.</small> would have been correct, if the
-harangue had been delivered over those warriors who fell at Tanagra,
-twenty-seven years before!</p>
-
-<p>It has been remarked by M. Boeckh,<a id="FNanchor_310"
-href="#Footnote_310" class="fnanchor">[310]</a> that Periklês
-sacrificed the landed proprietors of Attica to the maritime interests
-and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">[p. 178]</span> empire of
-Athens. This is of course founded on the destructive invasions of the
-country during the Peloponnesian war; for down to the commencement
-of that war the position of Attic cultivators and proprietors was
-particularly enviable: and the censure of M. Boeckh, therefore,
-depends upon the question, how far Periklês contributed to produce,
-or had it in his power to avert, this melancholy war, in its results
-so fatal, not merely to Athens, but to the entire Grecian race. Now
-here again, if we follow attentively the narrative of Thucydidês, we
-shall see that in the judgment of that historian, not only Periklês
-did not bring on the war, but he could not have averted it without
-such concession as Athenian prudence, as well as Athenian patriotism
-peremptorily forbade: moreover, we shall see, that the calculations
-on which Periklês grounded his hopes of success if driven to war,
-were, in the opinion of the historian, perfectly sound and safe.
-We may even go farther, and affirm, that the administration of
-Periklês during the fourteen years preceding the war, exhibits a
-“moderation,” to use the words of Thucydidês,<a id="FNanchor_311"
-href="#Footnote_311" class="fnanchor">[311]</a> dictated especially
-by anxiety to avoid raising causes of war; though in the months
-immediately preceding the breaking out of the war, after the conduct
-of the Corinthians at Potidæa, and the resolutions of the congress at
-Sparta, he resisted strenuously all compliance with special demands
-from Sparta,—demands essentially insincere, and in which partial
-compliance would have lowered the dignity of Athens without insuring
-peace. The stories about Pheidias, Aspasia, and the Megarians,
-even if we should grant that there is some truth at the bottom of
-them, must, if we follow Thucydidês, be looked upon at worst as
-concomitants and pretexts, rather than as real causes, of the war:
-though modern authors, in speaking of Periklês, are but too apt
-to use expressions which tacitly assume these stories to be well
-founded.</p>
-
-<p>Seeing then that Periklês did not bring on and could not have
-averted the Peloponnesian war,—that he steered his course in
-reference to that event with the long-sighted prudence of one<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_179">[p. 179]</span> who knew that
-the safety and the dignity of imperial Athens were essentially
-interwoven,—we have no right to throw upon him the blame of
-sacrificing the landed proprietors of Attica. These might, indeed, be
-excused for complaining, where they suffered so ruinously; but the
-impartial historian, looking at the whole of the case, cannot admit
-their complaints as a ground for censuring the Athenian statesman.</p>
-
-<p>The relation of Athens to her allies, the weak point of her
-position, it was beyond the power of Periklês seriously to amend,
-probably also beyond his will, since the idea of political
-incorporation, as well as that of providing a common and equal
-confederate bond, sustained by effective federal authority
-between different cities, was rarely entertained even by the
-best Greek minds.<a id="FNanchor_312" href="#Footnote_312"
-class="fnanchor">[312]</a> We hear that he tried to summon at
-Athens a congress of deputies from all cities of Greece, the allies
-of Athens included;<a id="FNanchor_313" href="#Footnote_313"
-class="fnanchor">[313]</a> but the scheme could not be brought to
-bear, in consequence of the reluctance, noway surprising, of the
-Peloponnesians. Practically, the allies were not badly treated during
-his administration: and if, among the other bad consequences of the
-prolonged war, they, as well as Athens, and all other Greeks come to
-suffer more and more, this depends upon causes with which he is not
-chargeable, and upon proceedings which departed altogether from his
-wise and sober calculations. Taking him altogether, with his powers
-of thought, speech, and action,—his competence, civil and military,
-in the council as well as in the field,—his vigorous and cultivated
-intellect, and his comprehensive ideas of a community in pacific and
-many-sided development,—his incorruptible public morality, caution,
-and firmness, in a country where all those qualities were rare, and
-the union of them in the same individual of course much rarer,—we
-shall find him without a parallel throughout the whole course of
-Grecian history.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">[p. 180]</span></p>
-
-<p>Under the great mortality and pressure of sickness at Athens,
-their operations of war naturally languished; while the enemies
-also, though more active, had but little success. A fleet of one
-hundred triremes, with one thousand hoplites on board, was sent by
-the Lacedæmonians under Knêmus to attack Zakynthus, but accomplished
-nothing beyond devastation of the open parts of the island, and then
-returned home. And it was shortly after this, towards the month of
-September, that the Ambrakiots made an attack upon the Amphilochian
-town called Argos, situated on the southern coast of the gulf of
-Ambrakia: which town, as has been recounted in the preceding chapter,
-had been wrested from them two years before by the Athenians, under
-Phormio, and restored to the Amphilochians and Akarnanians. The
-Ambrakiots, as colonists and allies of Corinth, were at the same time
-animated by active enmity to the Athenian influence in Akarnania,
-and by desire to regain the lost town of Argos. Procuring aid from
-the Chaonians, and some other Epirotic tribes, they marched against
-Argos, and after laying waste the territory, endeavored to take
-the town by assault, but were repulsed, and obliged to retire.<a
-id="FNanchor_314" href="#Footnote_314" class="fnanchor">[314]</a>
-This expedition appears to have impressed the Athenians with the
-necessity of a standing force to protect their interest in those
-parts; so that in the autumn Phormio was sent with a squadron
-of twenty triremes to occupy Naupaktus, now inhabited by the
-Messenians, as a permanent naval station, and to watch the entrance
-of the Corinthian gulf.<a id="FNanchor_315" href="#Footnote_315"
-class="fnanchor">[315]</a> We shall find in the events of the
-succeeding year ample confirmation of this necessity.</p>
-
-<p>Though the Peloponnesians were too inferior in maritime force
-to undertake formal war at sea against Athens, their single
-privateers, especially the Megarian privateers from the harbor of
-Nisæa, were active in injuring her commerce,<a id="FNanchor_316"
-href="#Footnote_316" class="fnanchor">[316]</a>—and not merely the
-commerce of Athens, but also that of other neutral Greeks, without
-scruple or discrimination. Several merchantmen and fishing-vessels,
-with a considerable number of prisoners, were thus captured.<a
-id="FNanchor_317" href="#Footnote_317" class="fnanchor">[317]</a>
-Such prisoners as fell into the hands of the Lacedæ<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_181">[p. 181]</span>monians,—even neutral
-Greeks as well as Athenians,—were all put to death, and their bodies
-cast into clefts of the mountains. In regard to the neutrals, this
-capture was piratical, and the slaughter unwarrantably cruel, judged
-even by the received practice of the Greeks, deficient as that was
-on the score of humanity: but to dismiss these neutral prisoners, or
-to sell them as slaves, would have given publicity to a piratical
-capture and provoked the neutral towns, so that the prisoners were
-probably slain as the best way of getting rid of them and thus
-suppressing evidence.<a id="FNanchor_318" href="#Footnote_318"
-class="fnanchor">[318]</a></p>
-
-<p>Some of these Peloponnesian privateers ranged as far as the
-southwestern coast of Asia Minor, where they found temporary
-shelter, and interrupted the trading-vessels from Phasêlis and
-Phenicia to Athens; to protect which, the Athenians despatched,
-in the course of the autumn, a squadron of six triremes under
-Melêsander. He was farther directed to insure the collection of
-the ordinary tribute from Athenian subject-allies, and probably to
-raise such contributions as he could elsewhere. In the prosecution
-of this latter duty, he undertook an expedition from the sea-coast
-against one of the Lykian towns in the interior, but his attack
-was repelled with loss, and he himself slain.<a id="FNanchor_319"
-href="#Footnote_319" class="fnanchor">[319]</a></p>
-
-<p>An opportunity soon offered itself to the Athenians, of
-retaliating on Sparta for this cruel treatment of the maritime
-prisoners. In execution of the idea projected at the commencement of
-the war, the Lacedæmonians sent Anêristus and two others as envoys
-to Persia, for the purpose of soliciting from the Great King aids of
-money and troops against Athens; the dissensions among the Greeks
-thus gradually paving the way for him to<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_182">[p. 182]</span> regain his ascendency in the Ægean.
-Timagoras of Tegea, together with an Argeian named Pollis, without
-any formal mission from his city, and the Corinthian Aristeus,
-accompanied them. As the sea was in the power of Athens, they
-travelled overland through Thrace to the Hellespont; and Aristeus,
-eager to leave nothing untried for the relief of Potidæa, prevailed
-upon them to make application to Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian
-Thracians. That prince was then in alliance with Athens, and his son
-Sadokus had even received the grant of Athenian citizenship: yet the
-envoys thought it possible not only to detach him from the Athenian
-alliance, but even to obtain from him an army to act against the
-Athenians and raise the blockade of Potidæa,—this being refused,
-they lastly applied to him for a safe escort to the banks of the
-Hellespont, in their way towards Persia. But Learchus and Ameiniadês,
-then Athenian residents near the person of Sitalkês, had influence
-enough not only to cause rejection of these requests, but also to
-induce Sadokus, as a testimony of zeal in his new character of
-Athenian citizen, to assist them in seizing the persons of Aristeus
-and his companions in their journey through Thrace. Accordingly, the
-whole party were seized and conducted as prisoners to Athens, where
-they were forthwith put to death, without trial or permission to
-speak,—and their bodies cast into rocky chasms, as a reprisal for
-the captured seamen slain by the Lacedæmonians.<a id="FNanchor_320"
-href="#Footnote_320" class="fnanchor">[320]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">[p. 183]</span></p>
-<p>Such revenge against Aristeus, the instigator of the revolt
-of Potidæa, relieved the Athenians from a dangerous enemy; and
-that blockaded city was now left to its fate. About midwinter it
-capitulated, after a blockade of two years, and after going through
-the extreme of suffering from famine, to such a degree that some
-of those who died were even eaten by the survivors. In spite of
-such intolerable distress, the Athenian generals, Xenophon son of
-Euripidês and his two colleagues, admitted them to favorable terms
-of capitulation,—permitting the whole population and the Corinthian
-allies to retire freely, with a specified sum of money per head, as
-well as with one garment for each man and two for each woman,—so
-that they found shelter among the Chalkidic townships in the
-neighborhood. These terms were singularly favorable, considering the
-desperate state of the city, which must very soon have surrendered
-at discretion: but the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">[p.
-184]</span> hardships, even of the army without, in the cold of
-winter, were very severe, and they had become thoroughly tired both
-of the duration and the expense of the siege. The cost to Athens had
-been not less than two thousand talents; since the assailant force
-had never been lower than three thousand hoplites, during the entire
-two years of the siege, and for a portion of the time considerably
-greater,—each hoplite receiving two drachmas <i>per diem</i>. The
-Athenians at home, when they learned the terms of the capitulation,
-were displeased with the generals for the indulgence shown,—since
-a little additional patience would have constrained the city to
-surrender at discretion: in which case the expense would have been
-partly made good by selling the prisoners as slaves,—and Athenian
-vengeance probably gratified by putting the warriors to death.<a
-id="FNanchor_321" href="#Footnote_321" class="fnanchor">[321]</a>
-A body of one thousand colonists were sent from Athens to
-occupy Potidæa and its vacant territory.<a id="FNanchor_322"
-href="#Footnote_322" class="fnanchor">[322]</a></p>
-
-<p>Two full years had now elapsed since the actual commencement of
-war, by the attack of the Thebans on Platæa; yet the Peloponnesians
-had accomplished nothing of what they expected. They had not rescued
-Potidæa, nor had their twice-repeated invasion, although assisted by
-the unexpected disasters arising from the epidemic, as yet brought
-Athens to any sufficient humiliation,—though perhaps the envoys
-which she had sent during the foregoing summer with propositions
-for peace, contrary to the advice of Periklês, may have produced
-an impression that she could not hold out long. At the same time,
-the Peloponnesian allies had on their side suffered little damage,
-since the ravages inflicted by the Athenian fleet on their coast
-may have been nearly compensated by the booty which their invading
-troops gained in Attica. Probably by this time the public opinion
-in Greece had contracted an unhappy familiarity with the state of
-war, so that nothing but some decisive loss and humiliation on one
-side at least, if not on both, would suffice to terminate it. In
-this third spring, the Peloponnesians did not repeat their annual
-march into Attica,—deterred, partly, we may sup<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_185">[p. 185]</span>pose, by fear of the epidemic yet raging
-there,—but still more by the strong desire of the Thebans to take
-their revenge on Platæa.</p>
-
-<p>To this ill-fated city, Archidamus marched forthwith, at the
-head of the confederate army. But no sooner had he entered and
-begun to lay waste the territory, than the Platæan heralds came
-forth to arrest his hand, and accosted him in the following terms:
-“Archidamus, and ye men of Lacedæmon, ye act wrong, and in a manner
-neither worthy of yourselves nor of your fathers, in thus invading
-the territory of Platæa. For the Lacedæmonian Pausanias, son of
-Kleombrotus, after he had liberated Greece from the Persians, in
-conjunction with those Greeks who stood forward to bear their
-share of the danger, offered sacrifice to Zeus Eleutherius, in
-the market-place of Platæa; and there, in presence of all the
-allies, assigned to the Platæans their own city and territory to
-hold in full autonomy, so that none should invade them wrongfully,
-or with a view to enslave them: should such invasion occur, the
-allies present pledged themselves to stand forward with all their
-force as protectors. While your fathers made to us this grant,
-in consideration of our valor and forwardness in that perilous
-emergency, ye are now doing the precise contrary: ye are come along
-with our worst enemies, the Thebans, to enslave us. And we on our
-side now adjure you, calling to witness the gods who sanctioned that
-oath, as well as your paternal and our local gods, not to violate
-the oath by doing wrong to the Platæan territory, but to let us live
-on in that autonomy which Pausanias guaranteed.”<a id="FNanchor_323"
-href="#Footnote_323" class="fnanchor">[323]</a></p>
-
-<p>Whereunto Archidamus replied: “Ye speak fairly, men of Platæa, if
-your conduct shall be in harmony with your words. Remain autonomous
-yourselves, as Pausanias granted, and help us to liberate those other
-Greeks, who, after having shared in the same dangers and sworn the
-same oath along with you, have now been enslaved by the Athenians.
-It is for their liberation and that of the other Greeks that this
-formidable outfit of war has been brought forth. Pursuant to your
-oaths, ye ought by rights, and we now invite you, to take active
-part in this object. But if ye cannot act thus, at least remain
-quiet, conformably to the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">[p.
-186]</span> summons which we have already sent to you; enjoy your own
-territory, and remain neutral,—receiving both parties as friends,
-but neither party for warlike purposes. With this we shall be
-satisfied.”</p>
-
-<p>The reply of Archidamus discloses by allusion a circumstance
-which the historian had not before directly mentioned; that
-the Lacedæmonians had sent a formal summons to the Platæans to
-renounce their alliance with Athens and remain neutral: at what
-time this took place,<a id="FNanchor_324" href="#Footnote_324"
-class="fnanchor">[324]</a> we do not know, but it marks the peculiar
-sentiment attaching to the town. But the Platæans did not comply with
-the invitation thus twice repeated. The heralds, having returned for
-instructions into the city, brought back for answer, that compliance
-was impossible, without the consent of the Athenians, since their
-wives and families were now harbored at Athens: besides, if they
-should profess neutrality, and admit both parties as friends, the
-Thebans might again make an attempt to surprise their city. In reply
-to their scruples, Archidamus again addressed them: “Well, then,
-hand over your city and houses to us Lacedæmonians: mark out the
-boundaries of your territory: specify the number of your fruit-trees,
-and all your other property which admits of being numbered; and then
-retire whithersoever ye choose, as long as the war continues. As soon
-as it is over, we will restore to you all that we have received,—in
-the interim, we will hold it in trust, and keep it in cultivation,
-and pay you such an allowance as shall suffice for your wants.”<a
-id="FNanchor_325" href="#Footnote_325" class="fnanchor">[325]</a></p>
-
-<p>The proposition now made was so fair and tempting, that the
-general body of the Platæans were at first inclined to accept
-it, provided the Athenians would acquiesce; and they obtained
-from Archidamus a truce long enough to enable them to send envoys
-to Athens. After communication with the Athenian assembly, the
-envoys returned to Platæa, bearing the following answer: “Men of
-Platæa, the Athenians say they have never yet permitted you to be
-wronged since the alliance first began,—nor will they now betray
-you, but will help you to the best of their<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_187">[p. 187]</span> power. And they adjure you, by the
-oaths which your fathers swore to them, not to depart in any way from
-the alliance.”</p>
-
-<p>This message awakened in the bosoms of the Platæans the full
-force of ancient and tenacious sentiment. They resolved to maintain,
-at all cost, and even to the extreme of ruin, if necessity should
-require it, their union with Athens. It was indeed impossible that
-they could do otherwise, considering the position of their wives and
-families, without the consent of the Athenians; and though we cannot
-wonder that the latter refused consent, we may yet remark, that, in
-their situation, a perfectly generous ally might well have granted
-it. For the forces of Platæa counted for little as a portion of
-the aggregate strength of Athens; nor could the Athenians possibly
-protect it against the superior land-force of their enemies,—in fact,
-so hopeless was the attempt that they never even tried, throughout
-the whole course of the long subsequent blockade.</p>
-
-<p>The final refusal of the Platæans was proclaimed to Archidamus, by
-word of mouth from the walls, since it was not thought safe to send
-out any messenger. As soon as the Spartan prince heard the answer,
-he prepared for hostile operations,—apparently with very sincere
-reluctance, attested in the following invocation, emphatically
-pronounced:—</p>
-
-<p>“Ye gods and heroes, who hold the Platæan territory, be ye my
-witnesses, that we have not in the first instance wrongfully—not
-until these Platæans have first renounced the oaths binding on all of
-us—invaded this territory, in which our fathers defeated the Persians
-after prayers to you, and which ye granted as propitious for Greeks
-to fight in,—nor shall we commit wrong in what we may do farther, for
-we have taken pains to tender reasonable terms, but without success.
-Be ye now consenting parties: may those who are beginning the wrong
-receive punishment for it,—may those who are aiming to inflict
-penalty righteously, obtain their object.”</p>
-
-<p>It was thus that Archidamus, in language delivered probably
-under the walls, and within hearing of the citizens who manned
-them, endeavored to conciliate the gods and heroes of that town
-which he was about to ruin and depopulate. The whole of this
-preliminary debate,<a id="FNanchor_326" href="#Footnote_326"
-class="fnanchor">[326]</a> so strikingly and dramatically set forth
-by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">[p. 188]</span> Thucydidês,
-illustrates forcibly the respectful reluctance with which the
-Lacedæmonians first brought themselves to assail this scene of
-the glories of their fathers. What deserves remark is, that their
-direct sentiment attaches itself, not at all to the Platæan people,
-but only to the Platæan territory; it is purely local, though it
-becomes partially transferred to the people, as tenants of this
-spot, by secondary association. It was, however, nothing but the
-long-standing antipathy<a id="FNanchor_327" href="#Footnote_327"
-class="fnanchor">[327]</a> of the Thebans which induced Archidamus to
-undertake the enterprise; for the conquest of Platæa was of no avail
-towards the main objects of the war, though its exposed situation
-caused it to be crushed between the two great contending forces in
-Greece.</p>
-
-<p>Archidamus now commenced the siege forthwith, in full hopes
-that his numerous army, the entire strength of the Peloponnesian
-confederacy, would soon capture a place of no great size, and
-probably not very well fortified; yet defended by a resolute garrison
-of four hundred native citizens, with eighty Athenians: there was no
-one else in the town except one hundred and ten female slaves for
-cooking. The fruit-trees, cut down in laying waste the cultivated
-land, sufficed to form a strong palisade all round the town, so as
-completely to block up the inhabitants. Next, Archidamus, having
-abundance of timber near at hand in the forests of Kithæron, began to
-erect a mound up against a portion of the town wall, so as to be able
-to march up by an inclined plane, and thus take the place by assault.
-Wood, stones, and earth, were piled up in a vast heap,—cross palings
-of wood being carried on each side of it, in parallel lines at right
-angles to the town wall, for the purpose of keeping the loose mass of
-materials between them together. For seventy days and as many nights
-did the army labor at this work, without any intermission, taking
-turns for food and repose: and through such unremitting assiduity,
-the mound approached near to the height of the town wall. But as it
-gradually mounted up, the Platæans were not idle on their side: they
-constructed an additional wall of wood, which they planted on the
-top of their own town wall, so as to heighten the part over against
-the enemy’s mound: sustaining it by brickwork behind, for which the
-neigh<span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">[p. 189]</span>boring
-houses furnished materials: hides, raw as well as dressed, were
-suspended in front of it, in order to protect their workmen
-against missiles, and the woodwork against fire-carrying arrows.<a
-id="FNanchor_328" href="#Footnote_328" class="fnanchor">[328]</a> And
-as the besiegers still continued heaping up materials, to carry their
-mound up to the height even of this recent addition, the Platæans
-met them by breaking a hole in the lower part of their town wall,
-and pulling in the earth from the lower portion of the mound; which
-thus gave way at the top and left a vacant space near the wall, until
-the besiegers filled it up by letting down quantities of stiff clay
-rolled up in wattled reeds, which could not be pulled away in the
-same manner. Again, the Platæans dug a subterranean passage from the
-interior of their town to the ground immediately under the mound, and
-thus carried away unseen the lower earth belonging to the latter;
-so that the besiegers saw their mound continually sinking down, in
-spite of fresh additions at the top,—yet without knowing the reason.
-Nevertheless, it was plain that these stratagems would be in the end
-ineffectual, and the Platæans accordingly built a new portion of
-town wall in the interior, in the shape of a crescent, taking its
-start from the old town wall on each side of the mound: the besiegers
-were thus deprived of all benefit from the mound, assuming it to
-be successfully completed; since when they had marched over it,
-there stood in front of them a new town wall to be carried in like
-manner.</p>
-
-<p>Nor was this the only method of attack employed. Archidamus
-farther brought up battering engines, one of which greatly shook
-and endangered the additional height of wall built by the Platæans
-over against the mound; while others were brought to bear on
-different portions of the circuit of the town wall. Against these
-new assailants, various means of defence were used: the defenders on
-the walls threw down ropes, got hold of the head of the approaching
-engine, and pulled it by main force out of the right line, either
-upwards or sideways: or they prepared heavy wooden beams on the
-wall, each attached to both ends by long iron chains to two poles
-projecting at right angles from the wall, by means of which poles it
-was raised up and held aloft: so that at the proper moment, when the
-battering machine approached<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">[p.
-190]</span> the wall, the chain was suddenly let go, and the beam
-fell down with great violence directly upon the engine and broke
-off its projecting beak.<a id="FNanchor_329" href="#Footnote_329"
-class="fnanchor">[329]</a> However rude these defensive processes
-may seem, they were found effective against the besiegers, who saw
-themselves, at the close of three months’ unavailing efforts, obliged
-to renounce the idea of taking the town in any other way than by the
-process of blockade and famine,—a process alike tedious and costly.<a
-id="FNanchor_330" href="#Footnote_330" class="fnanchor">[330]</a></p>
-
-<p>Before they would incur so much inconvenience, however, they
-had recourse to one farther stratagem,—that of trying to set the
-town on fire. From the height of their mound, they threw down large
-quantities of fagots, partly into the space between the mound and
-the newly-built crescent piece of wall,—partly, as far as they could
-reach, into other parts of the city: pitch and other combustibles
-were next added, and the whole mass set on fire. The conflagration
-was tremendous, such as had never been before seen: a large portion
-of the town became unapproachable, and the whole of it narrowly
-escaped destruction. Nothing could have preserved it, had the wind
-been rather more favorable: there was indeed a farther story, of
-a most opportune thunder-storm coming to extinguish the flames,
-which Thucydidês does not seem to credit.<a id="FNanchor_331"
-href="#Footnote_331" class="fnanchor">[331]</a> In spite of much
-partial damage, the town remained still defensible, and the spirit of
-the inhabitants unsubdued.</p>
-
-<p>There now remained no other resource except to build a wall
-of circumvallation round Platæa, and trust to the slow process
-of famine. The task was distributed in suitable fractions among
-the various confederate cities, and completed about the middle of
-September, a little before the autumnal equinox.<a id="FNanchor_332"
-href="#Footnote_332" class="fnanchor">[332]</a> Two dis<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_191">[p. 191]</span>tinct walls were
-constructed, with sixteen feet of intermediate space all covered in,
-so as to look like one very thick wall: there were, moreover, two
-ditches, out of which the bricks for the wall had been taken,—one
-on the inside towards Platæa, and the other on the outside against
-any foreign relieving force. The interior covered space between the
-walls was intended to serve as permanent quarters for the troops left
-on guard, consisting half of Bœotians and half of Peloponnesians.<a
-id="FNanchor_333" href="#Footnote_333" class="fnanchor">[333]</a></p>
-
-<p>At the same time that Archidamus began the siege of Platæa, the
-Athenians on their side despatched a force of two thousand hoplites
-and two hundred horsemen, to the Chalkidic peninsula, under Xenophon
-son of Euripidês (with two colleagues), the same who had granted so
-recently the capitulation of Potidæa. It was necessary doubtless,
-to convoy and establish the new colonists who were about to occupy
-the deserted site of Potidæa: moreover, the general had acquired
-some knowledge of the position and parties of the Chalkidic towns,
-and hoped to be able to act against them with effect. They first
-invaded the territory belonging to the Bottiæan town of Spartôlus,
-not without hopes that the city itself would be betrayed to them
-by intelligences within: but this was prevented by the arrival
-of an additional force from Olynthus, partly hoplites, partly
-peltasts. These peltasts, a species of troops between heavy-armed
-and light-armed, furnished with a pelta (or light shield), and short
-spear, or javelin, appear to have taken their rise among these
-Chalkidic Greeks, being equipped in a manner half Greek and half
-Thracian: we shall find them hereafter much improved and turned
-to account by some of the ablest Grecian generals. The Chalkidic
-hoplites are generally of inferior merit: on the other hand, their
-cavalry<span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">[p. 192]</span> and their
-peltasts are very good: in the action which now took place under
-the walls of Spartôlus, the Athenian hoplites defeated those of the
-enemy, but their cavalry and their light troops were completely
-worsted by the Chalkidic. These latter, still farther strengthened
-by the arrival of fresh peltasts from Olynthus, ventured even
-to attack the Athenian hoplites, who thought it prudent to fall
-back upon the two companies left in reserve to guard the baggage.
-During this retreat they were harassed by the Chalkidic horse and
-light-armed, who retired when the Athenians turned upon them, but
-attacked them on all sides when on their march; and employed missiles
-so effectively that the retreating hoplites could no longer maintain
-a steady order, but took to flight, and sought refuge at Potidæa.
-Four hundred and thirty hoplites, near one-fourth of the whole force,
-together with all three generals, perished in this defeat, and the
-expedition returned in dishonor to Athens.<a id="FNanchor_334"
-href="#Footnote_334" class="fnanchor">[334]</a></p>
-
-<p>In the western parts of Greece, the arms of Athens and her
-allies were more successful. The repulse of the Ambrakiots from the
-Amphilochian Argos, during the preceding year, had only exasperated
-them and induced them to conceive still larger plans of aggression
-against both the Akarnanians and Athenians. In concert with their
-mother-city Corinth, where they obtained warm support, they prevailed
-upon the Lacedæmonians to take part in a simultaneous attack of
-Akarnania, by land as well as by sea, which would prevent the
-Akarnanians from concentrating their forces in any one point, and put
-each of their townships upon an isolated self-defence; so that all
-of them might be overpowered in succession, and detached, together
-with Kephallênia and Zakynthus, from the Athenian alliance. The
-fleet of Phormio at Naupaktus, consisting only of twenty triremes,
-was accounted incompetent to cope with a Peloponnesian fleet such as
-might be fitted out at Corinth. There was even some hope that the
-important station at Naupaktus might itself be taken, so as to expel
-the Athenians completely from those parts.</p>
-
-<p>The scheme of operations now projected was far more comprehensive
-than anything which the war had yet afforded. The land-force of the
-Ambrakiots, together with their neighbors and<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_193">[p. 193]</span> fellow-colonists the Leukadians and
-Anaktorians, assembled near their own city, while their maritime
-force was collected at Leukas, on the Akarnanian coast. The force at
-Ambrakia was joined, not only by Knêmus, the Lacedæmonian admiral,
-with one thousand Peloponnesian hoplites, who found means to cross
-over from Peloponnesus, eluding the vigilance of Phormio,—but also
-by a numerous body of Epirotic and Macedonian auxiliaries, collected
-even from the distant and northernmost tribes. A thousand Chaonians
-were present, under the command of Photyus and Nikanor, two annual
-chiefs chosen from the regal gens. Neither this tribe, nor the
-Thesprotians who came along with them, acknowledged any hereditary
-king. The Molossians and Atintânes, who also joined the force, were
-under Sabylinthus, regent on behalf of the young prince Tharypas.
-There came, besides, the Paranæi, from the banks of the river Aôus
-under their king Orœdus, together with one thousand Orestæ, a tribe
-rather Macedonian than Epirot, sent by their king Antiochus. Even
-king Perdikkas, though then nominally in alliance with Athens, sent
-one thousand of his Macedonian subjects, who, however, arrived too
-late to be of any use.<a id="FNanchor_335" href="#Footnote_335"
-class="fnanchor">[335]</a> This large and diverse body of Epirotic
-invaders, a new phenomenon in Grecian history, and got together
-doubtless by the hopes of plunder, proves the extensive relations of
-the tribes of the interior with the city of Ambrakia,—a city destined
-to become in later days the capital of the Epirotic king Pyrrhus.</p>
-
-<p>It had been concerted that the Peloponnesian fleet from Corinth
-should join that already assembled at Leukas, and act upon the coast
-of Akarnania at the same time that the land-force marched into that
-territory. But Knêmus finding the land-force united and ready, near
-Ambrakia, deemed it unnecessary to await the fleet from Corinth,
-and marched straight into Akarnania, through Limnæa, a frontier
-village territory belonging to the Amphilochian Argos. He directed
-his march upon Stratus,—an interior town, and the chief place in
-Akarnania,—the capture of which would be likely to carry with it the
-surrender of the rest; especially as the Akarnanians, distracted by
-the presence of the ships at Leukas, and alarmed by the large body
-of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">[p. 194]</span> invaders on
-their frontier, did not dare to leave their own separate homes,
-so that Stratus was left altogether to its own citizens. Nor was
-Phormio, though they sent an urgent message to him, in any condition
-to help them; since he could not leave Naupaktus unguarded, when the
-large fleet from Corinth was known to be approaching. Under such
-circumstances, Knêmus and his army indulged the most confident hopes
-of overpowering Stratus without difficulty. They marched in three
-divisions: the Epirots in the centre,—the Leukadians and Anaktorians
-on the right,—the Peloponnesians and Ambrakiots, together with
-Knêmus himself, on the left. So little expectation was entertained
-of resistance, that these three divisions took no pains to keep near
-or even in sight of each other. Both the Greek divisions, indeed,
-maintained a good order of march, and kept proper scouts on the look
-out; but the Epirots advanced without any care or order whatever;
-especially the Chaonians, who formed the van. These men, accounted
-the most warlike of all the Epirotic tribes, were so full of conceit
-and rashness, that when they approached near to Stratus, they would
-not halt to encamp and assail the place conjointly with the Greeks;
-but marched along with the other Epirots right forward to the town,
-intending to attack it single-handed, and confident that they should
-carry it at the first assault, before the Greeks came up, so that
-the entire glory would be theirs. The Stratians watched and profited
-by this imprudence. Planting ambuscades in convenient places, and
-suffering the Epirots to approach without suspicion near to the
-gates, they then suddenly sallied out and attacked them, while the
-troops in ambuscade rose up and assailed them at the same time. The
-Chaonians who formed the van, thus completely surprised, were routed
-with great slaughter; while the other Epirots fled, after but little
-resistance. So much had they hurried forward in advance of their
-Greek allies, that neither the right nor the left division were at
-all aware of the battle, until the flying barbarians, hotly pursued
-by the Akarnanians, made it known to them. The two divisions then
-joined, protected the fugitives, and restrained farther pursuit,—the
-Stratians declining to come to hand-combat with them until the
-other Akarnanians should arrive. They seriously annoyed the forces
-of Knêmus, however, by distant slinging, in which the Akarnanians
-were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">[p. 195]</span> preëminently
-skilful; nor did Knêmus choose to persist in his attack under such
-discouraging circumstances. As soon as night arrived, so that there
-was no longer any fear of slingers, he retreated to the river Anapus,
-a distance of between nine and ten miles. Well aware that the news
-of the victory would attract other Akarnanian forces immediately
-to the aid of Stratus, he took advantage of the arrival of his own
-Akarnanian allies from Œniadæ (the only town in the country which
-was attached to the Lacedæmonian interest), and sought shelter
-near their city. From thence his troops dispersed, and returned to
-their respective homes.<a id="FNanchor_336" href="#Footnote_336"
-class="fnanchor">[336]</a></p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, the Peloponnesian fleet from Corinth, which had been
-destined to coöperate with Knêmus off the coast of Akarnania, had
-found difficulties in its passage, alike unexpected and insuperable.
-Mustering forty-seven triremes of Corinth, Sikyon, and other
-places, with a body of soldiers on board, and with accompanying
-store-vessels,—it departed from the harbor of Corinth, and made its
-way along the northern coast of Achaia. Its commanders, not intending
-to meddle with Phormio and his twenty ships at Naupaktus, never
-for a moment imagined that he would venture to attack a number so
-greatly superior: the triremes were, accordingly, fitted out more
-as transports for numerous soldiers than with any view to naval
-combat,—and with little attention to the choice of skilful rowers.<a
-id="FNanchor_337" href="#Footnote_337" class="fnanchor">[337]</a></p>
-
-<p>Except in the combat near Korkyra, and there only partially,
-the Peloponnesians had never yet made actual trial of Athenian
-maritime efficiency, at the point of excellence which it had now
-reached: themselves retaining the old unimproved mode of fighting
-and of working ships at sea, they had no practical idea of the
-degree to which it had been superseded by Athenian training. Among
-the Athenians, on the contrary, not only the seamen generally had a
-confirmed feeling of their own superiority,—but Phormio especially,
-the ablest of all their captains, always familiarized his men with
-the conviction, that no Peloponnesian fleet,<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_196">[p. 196]</span> be its number ever so great, could
-possibly contend against them with success.<a id="FNanchor_338"
-href="#Footnote_338" class="fnanchor">[338]</a> Accordingly, the
-Corinthian admirals, Machaon and his two colleagues, were surprised
-to observe that Phormio with his small Athenian squadron, instead of
-keeping safe in Naupaktus, was moving in parallel line with them and
-watching their progress until they should get out of the Corinthian
-gulf into the more open sea. Having advanced along the northern coast
-of Peloponnesus as far as Patræ in Achaia, they then altered their
-course, and bore to the northwest in order to cross over towards the
-Ætolian coast, in their way to Akarnania. In doing this, however,
-they perceived that Phormio was bearing down upon them from Chalkis
-and the mouth of the river Euenus, and they now discovered for the
-first time that he was going to attack them. Disconcerted by this
-incident, and not inclined for a naval combat in the wide and open
-sea, they altered their plan of passage, returned to the coast of
-Peloponnesus, and brought to for the night at some point near to
-Rhium, the narrowest breadth of the strait. Their bringing to was a
-mere feint intended to deceive Phormio, and induce him to go back
-for the night to his own coast: for, during the course of the night,
-they left their station, and tried to get across the breadth of the
-gulf, where it was near the strait, and comparatively narrow, before
-Phormio could come down upon them: and if the Athenian captain had
-really gone back to take night-station on his own coast, they would
-probably have got across to the Ætolian or northern coast without
-any molestation in the wide sea: but he watched their movements
-closely, kept the sea all night, and was thus enabled to attack
-them in mid-channel, even<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">[p.
-197]</span> during the shorter passage near the strait, at the
-first dawn of morning.<a id="FNanchor_339" href="#Footnote_339"
-class="fnanchor">[339]</a> On seeing his approach, the Corinthian
-admirals<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">[p. 198]</span>
-ranged their triremes in a circle with the prows outward, like the
-spokes of a wheel; the circle was made as large as it could<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_199">[p. 199]</span> be without leaving
-opportunity to the Athenian assailing ships to practise the
-manœuvre of the diekplus,<a id="FNanchor_340" href="#Footnote_340"
-class="fnanchor">[340]</a> and the interior space was sufficient,
-not merely for the store-vessels, but also for five chosen triremes,
-who were kept as a reserve, to dart out when required through the
-intervals between the outer triremes.</p>
-
-<p>In this position they were found and attacked shortly after
-daybreak, by Phormio, who bore down upon them with his ships in
-single file, all admirable sailors, and his own ship leading; all
-being strictly forbidden to attack until he should give the signal.
-He rowed swiftly round the Peloponnesian circle, nearing the prows
-of their ships as closely as he could, and making constant semblance
-of being about to come to blows. Partly from the intimidating effect
-of this manœuvre, altogether novel to the Peloponnesians,—partly
-from the natural difficulty, well known to Phormio, of keeping every
-ship in its exact stationary position,—the order of the circle, both
-within and without, presently became disturbed. It was not long
-before a new ally came to his aid, on which he fully calculated,
-postponing his actual attack until this favorable incident occurred.
-The strong land-breeze out of the gulf of Corinth, always wont to
-begin shortly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">[p. 200]</span>
-after daybreak, came down upon the Peloponnesian fleet with its
-usual vehemence, at a moment when the steadiness of their order was
-already somewhat giving way, and forced their ships more than ever
-out of proper relation one to the other. The triremes began to run
-foul of each other, or become entangled with the store-vessels: so
-that in every ship the men aboard were obliged to keep pushing off
-their neighbors on each side with poles,—not without loud clamor and
-mutual reproaches, which prevented both the orders of the captain,
-and the cheering sound or song whereby the keleustês animated the
-rowers and kept them to time, from being at all audible. Moreover,
-the fresh breeze had occasioned such a swell, that these rowers,
-unskilful under all circumstances, could not get their oars clear of
-the water, and the pilots thus lost all command over their vessels.<a
-id="FNanchor_341" href="#Footnote_341" class="fnanchor">[341]</a>
-The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">[p. 201]</span> critical
-moment was now come, and Phormio gave the signal for attack. He first
-drove against and disabled one of the admiral’s ships,—his comrades
-next assailed others with equal success,—so that the Peloponnesians,
-confounded and terrified, attempted hardly any resistance, but broke
-their order and sought safety in flight. They fled partly to Patræ,
-partly to Dymê, in Achaia, pursued by the Athenians; who, with
-scarcely the loss of a man, captured twelve triremes, took aboard and
-carried away almost the entire crews, and sailed off with them to
-Molykreium, or Antirrhium, the northern cape at the narrow mouth of
-the Corinthian gulf, opposite to the corresponding cape called Rhium
-in Achaia. Having erected at Antirrhium a trophy for the victory,
-dedicating one of the captive triremes to Poseidon, they returned
-to Naupaktus; while the Peloponnesian ships sailed along the shore
-from Patræ to Kyllênê, the principal port in the territory<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_202">[p. 202]</span> of Elis. They were
-here soon afterwards joined by Knêmus, who passed over with his
-squadron from Leukas.<a id="FNanchor_342" href="#Footnote_342"
-class="fnanchor">[342]</a></p>
-
-<p>These two incidents, just recounted, with their details,—the
-repulse of Knêmus and his army from Stratus, and the defeat of the
-Peloponnesian fleet by Phormio,—afford ground for some interesting
-remarks. The first of the two displays the great inferiority of the
-Epirots to the Greeks,—and even to the less advanced portion of the
-Greeks,—in the qualities of order, discipline, steadiness, and power
-of coöperation for a joint purpose. Confidence of success with them
-is exaggerated into childish rashness, so that they despise even the
-commonest precautions either in march or attack; while the Greek
-divisions on their right and on their left are never so elate as to
-omit either. If, on land, we thus discover the inherent superiority
-of Greeks over Epirots involuntarily breaking out,—so in the
-sea-fight we are no less impressed with the astonishing superiority
-of the Athenians over their opponents; a superiority, indeed, noway
-inherent, such as that of Greeks over Epirots, but depending in
-this case on previous toil, training, and inventive talent, on the
-one side, compared with neglect and old-fashioned routine on the
-other. Nowhere does the extraordinary value of that seamanship,
-which the Athenians had been gaining by years of improved practice,
-stand so clearly marked as in these first battles of Phormio. It
-gradually becomes less conspicuous as we advance in the war, since
-the Peloponnesians improve, learning seamanship as the Russians,
-under Peter the Great, learned the art of war from the Swedes, under
-Charles the Twelfth,—while the Athenian triremes and their crews
-seem to become less choice and effective, even before the terrible
-disaster at Syracuse, and are irreparably deteriorated after that
-misfortune.</p>
-
-<p>To none did the circumstances of this memorable sea-fight seem
-so incomprehensible as to the Lacedæmonians. They had heard,
-indeed, of the seamanship of Athens, but had never felt it, and
-could not understand what it meant: so they imputed the defeat to
-nothing but disgraceful cowardice, and sent indignant orders to
-Knêmus at Kyllênê, to take the command, equip a larger and better
-fleet, and repair the dishonor. Three Spartan<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_203">[p. 203]</span> commissioners—Brasidas, Timokratês,
-and Lykophron—were sent down to assist him with their advice and
-exertions in calling together naval contingents from the different
-allied cities: and by this means, under the general resentment
-occasioned by the recent defeat, a large fleet of seventy-seven
-triremes was speedily mustered at Panormus,—a harbor of Achaia near
-to the promontory of Rhium, and immediately within the interior
-gulf. A land-force was also collected at the same place ashore, to
-aid the operations of the fleet. Such preparations did not escape
-the vigilance of Phormio, who transmitted to Athens news of his
-victory, at the same time urgently soliciting reinforcements to
-contend with the increasing strength of the enemy. The Athenians
-immediately sent twenty fresh ships to join him: but they were
-induced by the instances of a Kretan named Nikias, their proxenus
-at Gortyn, to allow him to take the ships first to Krete, on the
-faith of his promise to reduce the hostile town of Kydonia. He
-had made this promise as a private favor to the inhabitants of
-Polichna, border enemies of Kydonia; but when the fleet arrived he
-was unable to fulfil it: nothing was effected except ravage of the
-Kydonian lands, and the fleet was long prevented by adverse winds and
-weather from getting away.<a id="FNanchor_343" href="#Footnote_343"
-class="fnanchor">[343]</a> This ill-advised diversion of the fleet
-from its straight course to join Phormio is a proof how much the
-counsels of Athens were beginning to suffer from the loss of
-Periklês, who was just now in his last illness and died shortly
-afterwards. That liability to be seduced by novel enterprises
-and projects of acquisition, against which he so emphatically
-warned his countrymen,<a id="FNanchor_344" href="#Footnote_344"
-class="fnanchor">[344]</a> was even now beginning to manifest its
-disastrous consequences.</p>
-
-<p>Through the loss of this precious interval, Phormio now found
-himself, with no more than his original twenty triremes, opposed to
-the vastly increased forces of the enemy,—seventy-seven triremes,
-with a large force on land to back them: the latter, no mean help
-in ancient warfare. He took up his station<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_204">[p. 204]</span> near the Cape Antirrhium, or the
-Molykric Rhium, as it was called,—the opposite cape to the Achaic
-Rhium: the line between them, seemingly about an English mile in
-breadth, forms the entrance of the Corinthian gulf. The Messenian
-force from Naupaktus attended him, and served on land. But he kept
-on the outside of the gulf, anxious to fight in a large and open
-breadth of sea, which was essential to Athenian manœuvring: while his
-adversaries on their side remained on the inside of the Achaic cape,
-from the corresponding reason,—feeling that to them the narrow sea
-was advantageous, as making the naval battle like to a land battle,
-effacing all superiority of nautical skill.<a id="FNanchor_345"
-href="#Footnote_345" class="fnanchor">[345]</a> If we revert back to
-the occasion of the battle of Salamis, we find that narrowness of
-space was at that time accounted the best of all protections for a
-smaller fleet against a larger. But such had been the complete change
-of feeling, occasioned by the system of manœuvring introduced since
-that period in the Athenian navy, that amplitude of sea room is now
-not less coveted by Phormio than dreaded by his enemies. The improved
-practice of Athens had introduced a revolution in naval warfare.</p>
-
-<p>For six or seven days successively, the two fleets were drawn out
-against each other,—Phormio trying to entice the Peloponnesians to
-the outside of the gulf, while they on their side did what they could
-to bring him within it.<a id="FNanchor_346" href="#Footnote_346"
-class="fnanchor">[346]</a> To him, every day’s postponement was
-gain, since it gave him a new chance of his reinforcements arriving:
-for that very reason, the Peloponnesian commanders were eager to
-accelerate an action, and at length resorted to a well-laid plan for
-forcing it on. But in spite of immense numerical superiority, such
-was the discouragement and reluctance, prevailing among their seamen,
-many of whom had been actual sufferers in the recent defeat,—that
-Knêmus and Brasidas had to employ emphatic exhortations; insisting
-on the favorable prospect before them,—pointing out that the late
-battle had been lost only by mismanagement and imprudence, which
-would be for the future corrected,—and appealing to the inherent
-bravery of the Peloponnesian warrior. They concluded by a hint, that
-while those who behaved well in the coming battle would receive due
-honor, the laggards would assuredly be pun<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_205">[p. 205]</span>ished:<a id="FNanchor_347"
-href="#Footnote_347" class="fnanchor">[347]</a> a topic rarely
-touched upon by ancient generals in their harangues on the eve of
-battle, and demonstrating conspicuously the reluctance of many of
-the Peloponnesian seamen, who had been brought to the fight again
-chiefly by the ascendency and strenuous commands of Sparta. To this
-reluctance Phormio pointedly alluded, in the encouraging exhortations
-which he on his side addressed to his men: for they too, in spite of
-their habitual confidence at sea, strengthened by the recent victory,
-were dispirited by the smallness of their numbers. He reminded them
-of their long practice and rational conviction of superiority at
-sea, such as no augmentation of numbers, especially with an enemy
-conscious of his own weakness, could overbalance: and he called
-upon them to show their habitual discipline and quick apprehension
-of orders, and above all to perform their regular movements in
-perfect silence during the actual battle,<a id="FNanchor_348"
-href="#Footnote_348" class="fnanchor">[348]</a>—useful in all matters
-of war, and essential to the proper conduct of a sea-fight. The idea
-of entire silence on board the Athenian ships while a sea-fight was
-going on, is not only striking as a feature in the picture, but is
-also one of the most powerful evidences of the force of self-control
-and military habits among these citizen-seamen.</p>
-
-<p>The habitual position of the Peloponnesian fleet off Panormus was
-within the strait, but nearly fronting the breadth of it,—opposite
-to Phormio, who lay on the outer side of the strait, as well as
-off the opposite cape: in the Peloponnesian line, therefore, the
-right wing occupied the north, or northeast side towards Naupaktus.
-Knêmus and Brasidas now resolved to make a forward movement up
-the gulf, as if against that town, which was the main Athenian
-station; for they knew that Phormio would be under the necessity
-of coming to the defence of the place, and they hoped to pin him
-up and force him to action close under the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_206">[p. 206]</span> land, where Athenian manœuvring would
-be unavailing. Accordingly, they commenced this movement early in
-the morning, sailing in line of four abreast towards the northern
-coast of the inner gulf; the right squadron, under the Lacedæmonian
-Timokratês, was in the van, according to its natural position,<a
-id="FNanchor_349" href="#Footnote_349" class="fnanchor">[349]</a> and
-care had been taken to place in it twenty of the best sailing ships,
-since the success of the plan of action was known beforehand to
-depend upon their celerity. As they had foreseen, Phormio the moment
-he saw their movement, put his men on shipboard, and rowed into the
-interior of the strait, though with the greatest reluctance; for the
-Messenians were on land alongside of him, and he knew that Naupaktus,
-with their wives and families, and a long circuit of wall,<a
-id="FNanchor_350" href="#Footnote_350" class="fnanchor">[350]</a>
-was utterly undefended. He ranged his ships in line of battle ahead,
-probably his own the leading ship; and sailed close along the land
-towards Naupaktus, while the Messenians marching ashore kept near to
-him. Both fleets were thus moving in the same direction, and towards
-the same point, the Athenian close along shore, the Peloponnesians
-somewhat farther off.<a id="FNanchor_351" href="#Footnote_351"
-class="fnanchor">[351]</a> The latter had now got Phormio into
-the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">[p. 207]</span> position
-which they wished, pinned up against the land, with no room
-for tactics. On a sudden the signal was given, and the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_208">[p. 208]</span> whole Peloponnesian
-fleet facing to the left, changed from column into line, and instead
-of continuing to sail along the coast, rowed<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_209">[p. 209]</span> rapidly with their prows shore-ward to
-come to close quarters with the Athenians. The right squadron of the
-Peloponnesians<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">[p. 210]</span>
-occupying the side towards Naupaktus, was especially charged with the
-duty of cutting off the Athenians from all possibility of escaping
-thither; and the best ships had been placed on the right for that
-important object. As far as the commanders were concerned, the
-plan of action completely succeeded; the Athenians were caught in
-a situation where resistance was impossible, and had no chance of
-escape except in flight. But so superior were they in rapid movement
-even to the best Peloponnesians, that eleven ships, the headmost
-out of the twenty, just found means to run by,<a id="FNanchor_352"
-href="#Footnote_352" class="fnanchor">[352]</a> before the right
-wing of the enemy closed in upon the shore; and made the best of
-their way to Naupaktus. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">[p.
-211]</span> remaining nine ships were caught and driven ashore with
-serious damage,—their crews being partly slain, partly escaping by
-swimming. The Peloponnesians towed off one trireme with its entire
-crew, and some others empty; but more than one of them was rescued
-by the bravery of the Messenian hoplites, who, in spite of their
-heavy panoply, rushed into the water and got aboard them, fighting
-from the decks and driving off the enemy even after the rope had been
-actually made fast, and the process of dragging off had begun.<a
-id="FNanchor_353" href="#Footnote_353" class="fnanchor">[353]</a></p>
-
-<p>The victory of the Peloponnesians seemed assured, and while their
-left and centre were thus occupied, the twenty ships of their right
-wing parted company with the rest, in order to pursue the eleven
-fugitive Athenian ships which they had failed in cutting off. Ten of
-these got clear away into the harbor of Naupaktus, and there posted
-themselves in an attitude of defence near the temple of Apollo,
-before any of the pursuers could come near; while the eleventh,
-somewhat less swift, was neared by the Lacedæmonian admiral; who,
-on board a Leukadian trireme, pushed greatly ahead of his comrades,
-in hopes of overtaking at least this one prey. There happened to
-lie moored a merchant vessel, at the entrance of the harbor of
-Naupaktus; and the Athenian captain in his flight, observing that the
-Leukadian pursuer was for the moment alone, seized the opportunity
-for a bold and rapid manœuvre. He pulled swiftly round the merchant
-vessel, directed his trireme so as to meet the advancing Leukadian,
-and drove his beak against her midships with an impact so violent
-as to disable her at once; her commander, the Lacedæmonian admiral,
-Timokratês, was so stung with anguish at this unexpected catastrophe,
-that he slew himself forthwith, and fell overboard into the harbor.
-The pursuing vessels coming up behind, too, were so astounded and
-dismayed by it, that the men, dropping their oars, held water, and
-ceased to advance; while some even found themselves half aground,
-from ignorance of the coast. On the other hand, the ten Athenian
-triremes in the harbor were beyond measure elated by the incident,
-so that a single word from Phormio sufficed to put them in active
-forward<span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">[p. 212]</span> motion,
-and to make them strenuously attack the embarrassed enemy: whose
-ships, disordered by the heat of pursuit, and having been just
-suddenly stopped, could not be speedily got again under way, and
-expected nothing less than renewed attack. First, the Athenians
-broke the twenty pursuing ships, on the right wing; next, they
-pursued their advantage against the left and centre, who had probably
-neared to the right; so that after a short resistance, the whole
-were completely routed, and fled across the gulf to their original
-station at Panormus.<a id="FNanchor_354" href="#Footnote_354"
-class="fnanchor">[354]</a> Not only did the eleven Athenian ships
-thus break, terrify, and drive away the entire fleet of the enemy,
-with the capture of six of the nearest Peloponnesian triremes,—but
-they also rescued those ships of their own which had been driven
-ashore and taken in the early part of the action: moreover, the
-Peloponnesian crews sustained a considerable loss, both in killed and
-in prisoners.</p>
-
-<p>Thus, in spite not only of the prodigious disparity of numbers,
-but also of the disastrous blow which the Athenians had sustained at
-first, Phormio ended by gaining a complete victory; a victory, to
-which even the Lacedæmonians were forced to bear testimony, since
-they were obliged to ask a truce for burying and collecting their
-dead, while the Athenians on their part picked up the bodies of their
-own warriors. The defeated party, however, still thought themselves
-entitled, in token of their success in the early part of the action,
-to erect a trophy on the Rhium of Achaia, where they also dedicated
-the single Athenian trireme which they had been able to carry
-off. Yet they were so com<span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">[p.
-213]</span>pletely discomfited,—and farther, so much in fear of the
-expected reinforcement from Athens,—that they took advantage of the
-night to retire, and sail into the gulf to Corinth: all except the
-Leukadians, who returned to their own home.</p>
-
-<p>Nor was it long before the reinforcement actually arrived, after
-that untoward detention which had wellnigh exposed Phormio and his
-whole fleet to ruin. It confirmed his mastery of the entrance of
-the gulf and of the coast of Akarnania, where the Peloponnesians
-had now no naval force at all. To establish more fully the Athenian
-influence in Akarnania, he undertook during the course of the
-autumn an expedition, landing at Astakus, and marching into the
-Akarnanian inland country with four hundred Athenian hoplites and
-four hundred Messenians. Some of the leading men of Stratus and
-Koronta, who were attached to the Peloponnesian interest, he caused
-to be sent into exile, while the chief named Kynês, of Koronta,
-who seems to have been hitherto in exile, was reëstablished in his
-native town. The great object was, to besiege and take the powerful
-town of Œniadæ, near the mouth of the Achelôus; a town at variance
-with the other Akarnanians, and attached to the Peloponnesians. But
-the great spread of the waters of the Achelôus rendered this siege
-impracticable during the winter, and Phormio returned to the station
-at Naupaktus. From hence he departed to Athens towards the end of the
-winter, carrying home both his prize-ships and such of his prisoners
-as were freemen. The latter were exchanged man for man against
-Athenian prisoners in the hands of Sparta.<a id="FNanchor_355"
-href="#Footnote_355" class="fnanchor">[355]</a></p>
-
-<p>After abandoning the naval contest at Rhium, and retiring to
-Corinth, Knêmus and Brasidas were prevailed upon by the Megarians,
-before the fleet dispersed, to try the bold experiment of a sudden
-inroad upon Peiræus. Such was the confessed superiority of the
-Athenians at sea, that, while they guarded amply the coasts of
-Attica against privateers, they never imagined the possibility of
-an attack upon their own main harbor. Accordingly, Peiræus was not
-only unprotected by any chain across the entrance, but destitute
-even of any regular guard-ships manned and ready. The seamen of
-the retiring Pelopon<span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">[p.
-214]</span>nesian armament, on reaching Corinth, were immediately
-disembarked and marched, first across the isthmus, next to
-Megara,—each man carrying his sitting-cloth,<a id="FNanchor_356"
-href="#Footnote_356" class="fnanchor">[356]</a> and his oar, together
-with the loop whereby the oar was fastened to the oar-hole in the
-side, and thus prevented from slipping. There lay forty triremes in
-Nisæa, the harbor of Megara, which, though old and out of condition,
-were sufficient for so short a trip; and the seamen immediately
-on arriving, launched these and got aboard. But such was the awe
-entertained of Athens and her power, that when the scheme came
-really to be executed, the courage of the Peloponnesians failed,
-though there was nothing to hinder them from actually reaching
-Peiræus: but it was pretended that the wind was adverse, and they
-contented themselves with passing across to the station of Budorum,
-in the opposite Athenian island of Salamis, where they surprised and
-seized the three guard-ships which habitually blockaded the harbor
-of Megara, and then landed upon the island. They spread themselves
-over a large part of Salamis, ravaged the properties, and seized
-men as well as goods. Fire-signals immediately made known this
-unforeseen aggression, both at Peiræus and at Athens, occasioning
-in both the extreme of astonishment and alarm; for the citizens
-in Athens, not conceiving distinctly the meaning of the signals,
-fancied that Peiræus itself had fallen into the hands of the enemy.
-The whole population rushed down to the Peiræus at break of day, and
-put to sea with all the triremes that were<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_215">[p. 215]</span> ready against the Peloponnesians; but
-these latter, aware of the danger which menaced them, made haste to
-quit Salamis with their booty, and the three captured guard-ships.
-The lesson was salutary to the Athenians: from henceforward Peiræus
-was furnished with a chain across the mouth, and a regular guard,
-down to the end of the war.<a id="FNanchor_357" href="#Footnote_357"
-class="fnanchor">[357]</a> Forty years afterwards, however, we shall
-find it just as negligently watched, and surprised with much more
-boldness and dexterity, by the Lacedæmonian captain Teleutias.<a
-id="FNanchor_358" href="#Footnote_358" class="fnanchor">[358]</a></p>
-
-<p>As during the summer of this year, the Ambrakiots had brought down
-a numerous host of Epirotic tribes to the invasion of Akarnania,
-in conjunction with the Peloponnesians,—so during the autumn, the
-Athenians obtained aid against the Chalkidians of Thrace from a
-still more powerful barbaric prince, Sitalkês, king of the Odrysian
-Thracians. Amidst the numerous tribes, between the Danube and the
-Ægean sea,—who all bore the generic name of Thracians, though
-each had a special name besides,—the Odrysians were at this time
-the most warlike and powerful. The Odrysian king Têrês, father of
-Sitalkês, had made use of this power to subdue<a id="FNanchor_359"
-href="#Footnote_359" class="fnanchor">[359]</a> and render tributary
-a great number of these different tribes, especially those whose
-residence was in the plain rather than in the mountains. His
-dominion, the largest existing between the Ionian sea and the
-Euxine, extended from Abdêra, or the mouth of the Nestus, in the
-Ægean sea, to the mouth of the Danube in the Euxine; though it
-seems that this must be understood with deductions, since many
-intervening tribes, especially mountain tribes, did not acknowledge
-his authority. Sitalkês himself had invaded and conquered some of
-the Pæonian tribes who joined the Thracians on the west, between
-the Axius and the Strymon.<a id="FNanchor_360" href="#Footnote_360"
-class="fnanchor">[360]</a> Dominion, in the sense of the Odrysian
-king, meant tribute, presents, and military force when required; and
-with the two former, at least, we may conclude that he was amply
-supplied, since his nephew and successor Seuthes, under whom the
-revenue increased and attained its maximum, received four hundred
-talents annually in gold and silver as tribute, and the like sum in
-various presents, over and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">[p.
-216]</span> above many other presents of manufactured articles
-and ornaments. These latter came from the Grecian colonies on the
-coast, which contributed moreover largely to the tribute, though
-in what proportions we are not informed: even Grecian cities not
-in Thrace sent presents to forward their trading objects, as
-purchasers for the produce, the plunder, and the slaves, acquired by
-Thracian chiefs or tribes.<a id="FNanchor_361" href="#Footnote_361"
-class="fnanchor">[361]</a> The residence of the Odrysians properly so
-called, and of the princes of that tribe now ruling over so many of
-the remaining tribes, appears to have been about twelve days’ journey
-inland from Byzantium,<a id="FNanchor_362" href="#Footnote_362"
-class="fnanchor">[362]</a> in the upper regions of the Hebrus and
-Strymon, south of Mount Hæmus, and northeast of Rhodopê. The Odrysian
-chiefs were connected by relationship more or less distant with those
-of the subordinate tribes, and by marriage even with the Scythian
-princes north of the Danube: the Scythian prince Ariapeithês<a
-id="FNanchor_363" href="#Footnote_363" class="fnanchor">[363]</a> had
-married the daughter of the Odrysian Têrês, the first who extended
-the dominion of his tribe over any considerable portion of Thrace.</p>
-
-<p>The natural state of the Thracian tribes—in the judgment
-of Herodotus, permanent and incorrigible—was that of disunion
-and incapacity of political association; were such association
-possible, he says, they would be strong enough to vanquish every
-other nation,—though Thucydidês considers them as far inferior to
-the Scythians. The Odrysian dominion had probably not reached, at
-the period when Herodotus made his inquiries, the same development
-which Thucydidês describes in the third year of the Peloponnesian
-war, and which imparted to these tribes an union, partial indeed
-and temporary, but such as they never reached either before or
-afterwards. It has been already mentioned that the Odrysian prince
-Sitalkês, had taken for his wife, or rather for one of his wives,
-the sister of Nymphodôrus, a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">[p.
-217]</span> Greek, of Abdêra; by whose mediation he had been made
-the ally, and his son Sadokus even a citizen, of Athens,—and had
-been induced to promise that he would reconquer the Chalkidians
-of Thrace for the benefit of the Athenians,<a id="FNanchor_364"
-href="#Footnote_364" class="fnanchor">[364]</a>—his ancient kinsmen,
-according to the mythe of Tereus as interpreted by both parties.
-At the same time, Perdikkas, king of Macedonia, had offended him
-by refusing to perform a promise made of giving him his sister in
-marriage,—a promise made as consideration for the interference of
-Sitalkês and Nymphodôrus in procuring for him peace with Athens,
-at a moment when he was much embarrassed by civil dissensions with
-his brother Philip. The latter prince, ruling in his own name, and
-seemingly independent of Perdikkas, over a portion of the Macedonians
-along the upper course of the Axius, had been expelled by his
-more powerful brother, and taken refuge with Sitalkês: he was now
-apparently dead, but his son Amyntas received from the Odrysian
-prince the promise of restoration. The Athenians had ambassadors
-resident with Sitalkês, and they sent Agnon as special envoy to
-concert arrangements for his march against the Chalkidians, with
-which an Athenian armament was destined to coöperate. In treating
-with Sitalkês, it was necessary to be liberal in presents, both to
-himself and to the subordinate chieftains who held power dependent
-upon him: nothing could be accomplished among the Thracians except
-by the aid of bribes,<a id="FNanchor_365" href="#Footnote_365"
-class="fnanchor">[365]</a> and the Athenians were more<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_218">[p. 218]</span> competent to supply
-this exigency than any other people in Greece. The joint expedition
-against the Chalkidians was finally resolved.</p>
-
-<p>But the forces of Sitalkês, collected from many different
-portions of Thrace, were tardy in coming together. He summoned all
-the tribes under his dominion, between Hæmus, Rhodopê, and the two
-seas: the Getæ, between Mount Hæmus and the Danube, equipped like the
-Scythians, their neighbors on the other side of the river, with bow
-and arrow on horseback, also joined him, as well as the Agrianes,
-the Lææi, and the other Pæonian tribes subject to his dominion;
-lastly, several of the Thracian tribes called Dii, distinguished by
-their peculiar short swords, and maintaining a fierce independence
-on the heights of Rhodopê, were tempted by the chance of plunder,
-or the offer of pay, to flock to his standard. Altogether, his
-army amounted, or was supposed to amount, to one hundred and fifty
-thousand men, one third of it cavalry, who were for the most part
-Getæ and Odrysians proper. The most formidable warriors in his camp
-were the independent tribes of Rhodopê; but the whole host, alike
-numerous, warlike, predatory, and cruel, spread terror amidst all
-those who were within even the remote possibilities of its march.</p>
-
-<p>Starting from the central Odrysian territory, and bringing with
-him Agnon and the other Athenian envoys, he first crossed the
-uninhabited mountain called Kerkinê, which divided the Pæonians
-on the west from the Thracian tribes called Sinti and Mædi on the
-east, until he reached the Pæonian town or district called<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_219">[p. 219]</span> Dobêrus;<a
-id="FNanchor_366" href="#Footnote_366" class="fnanchor">[366]</a>
-it was here that many troops and additional volunteers reached him,
-making up his full total. From Dobêrus, probably marching down
-along one of the tributary streams of the Axius, he entered into
-that portion of Upper Macedonia, which lies along the higher Axius,
-and which had constituted the separate principality of Philip:
-the presence in his army of Amyntos son of Philip, induced some
-of the fortified places, Gortynia, Atalantê, and others, to open
-their gates without resistance, while Eidomenê was taken by storm,
-and Eurôpus in vain attacked. From hence, he passed still farther
-southward into Lower Macedonia, the kingdom of Perdikkas; ravaging
-the territory on both sides of the Axius even to the neighborhood of
-the towns Pella and Kyrrhus; and apparently down as far south as the
-mouth of the river and the head of the Thermaic gulf. Farther south
-than this he did not go, but spread his force over the districts
-between the left bank of the Axius and the head of the Strymonic
-gulf,—Mygdonia, Krestônia, and Anthemus,—while a portion of his
-army was detached to overrun the territory of the Chalkidians and
-Bottiæans. The Macedonians under Perdikkas, renouncing all idea of
-contending on foot against so overwhelming a host, either fled or
-shut themselves up in the small number of fortified places which
-the country presented. The cavalry from Upper Macedonia, indeed,
-well armed and excellent, made some orderly and successful charges
-against the Thracians, lightly armed with javelins, short swords, and
-the pelta, or small shield,—but it was presently shut in, harassed
-on all sides by superior numbers, and compelled to think only of
-retreat and extrication.<a id="FNanchor_367" href="#Footnote_367"
-class="fnanchor">[367]</a></p>
-
-<p>Luckily for the enemies of the Odrysian king, his march was not
-made until the beginning of winter, seemingly about November or
-December. We may be sure that the Athenians,<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_220">[p. 220]</span> when they concerted with him the joint
-attack upon the Chalkidians, intended that it should be in a better
-time of the year: having probably waited to hear that his army was
-in motion, and waited long in vain, they began to despair of his
-coming at all, and thought it not worth while to despatch any force
-of their own to the spot.<a id="FNanchor_368" href="#Footnote_368"
-class="fnanchor">[368]</a> Some envoys and presents only were
-sent as compliments, instead of the coöperating armament; and
-this disappointment, coupled with the severity of the weather,
-the nakedness of the country, and the privations of his army at
-that season, induced Sitalkês soon to enter into negotiations with
-Perdikkas; who, moreover, gained over Seuthes, nephew of the Odrysian
-prince, by promising his sister Stratonikê in marriage, together
-with a sum of money, on condition that the Thracian host should be
-speedily withdrawn. This was accordingly done, after it had been
-distributed for thirty days over Macedonia: during eight of those
-days his detachment had ravaged the Chalkidic lands. But the interval
-had been quite long enough to diffuse terror all around: such a
-host of fierce barbarians had never before been brought together,
-and no one knew in what direction they might be disposed to carry
-their incursions. The independent Thracian tribes (Panæi, Odomantê,
-Drôi, and Dersæi) in the plains on the northeast of the Strymon, and
-near Mount Pangæus, not far from Amphipolis, were the first to feel
-alarm lest Sitalkês should take the opportunity of trying to conquer
-them; on the other side, the Thessalians, Magnêtes, and other Greeks
-north of Thermopylæ, anticipated that he would carry his invasion
-farther south, and began to organize means for resisting him: even
-the general Peloponnesian confederacy heard with uneasiness of this
-new ally whom Athens was bringing into the field, perhaps against
-them. All such alarms were dissipated, when Sitalkês, after remaining
-thirty days, returned by the way he came, and the formidable
-avalanche was thus seen to melt away without falling on them.
-The faithless Perdikkas, on this occasion, performed his promise
-to Seuthes, having drawn upon himself much mischief by violating
-his previous similar promise to Sitalkês.<a id="FNanchor_369"
-href="#Footnote_369" class="fnanchor">[369]</a></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_50">
-  <p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">[p. 221]</span></p>
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER L.<br />
-    FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE FOURTH YEAR OF THE
-    PELOPONNESIAN WAR DOWN TO THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMOTIONS
-    AT KORKYRA.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">The</span> second and third years
-of the war had both been years of great suffering with the Athenians,
-from the continuance of the epidemic, which did not materially relax
-until the winter of the third year (<small>B.C.</small> 429-428).
-It is no wonder that, under the pressure of such a calamity, their
-military efforts were enfeebled, although the victories of Phormio
-had placed their maritime reputation at a higher point than ever. To
-their enemies, the destructive effects of this epidemic—effects still
-felt, although the disorder itself was suspended during the fourth
-year of the war—afforded material assistance as well as encouragement
-to persevere; and the Peloponnesians, under Archidamus, again
-repeated during this year their invasion and ravage of Attica, which
-had been intermitted during the year preceding. As before, they met
-with no serious resistance: entering the country about the beginning
-of May, they continued the process of devastation until their
-provisions were exhausted.<a id="FNanchor_370" href="#Footnote_370"
-class="fnanchor">[370]</a> To this damage the Athenians had probably
-now accustomed themselves: but they speedily received, even while
-the invaders were in their country, intelligence of an event far
-more embarrassing and formidable,—the revolt of Mitylênê and of the
-greater part of Lesbos.</p>
-
-<p>This revolt, indeed, did not come even upon the Athenians wholly
-unawares; but the idea of it was of longer standing than they
-suspected, for the Mitylenæan oligarchy had projected it before
-the war, and had made secret application to Sparta for aid, but
-without success. Some time after hostilities broke out, they resumed
-the design, which was warmly promoted by the Bœotians, kinsmen of
-the Lesbians in Æolic lineage and dialect. The Mitylenæan leaders
-appear to have finally determined on revolt<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_222">[p. 222]</span> during the preceding autumn or winter;
-but they thought it prudent to make ample preparations before they
-declared themselves openly: and, moreover, they took measures
-for constraining three other towns in Lesbos—Antissa, Eresus,
-and Pyrrha—to share their fortunes, to merge their own separate
-governments, and to become incorporated with Mitylênê. Methymna,
-the second town in Lesbos, situated on the north of the island, was
-decidedly opposed to them and attached to Athens. The Mitylenæans
-built new ships, put their walls in an improved state of defence,
-carried out a mole in order to narrow the entrance of their harbor,
-and render it capable of being closed with a chain, despatched
-emissaries to hire Scythian bowmen and purchase corn in the Euxine,
-and took such other measures as were necessary for an effective
-resistance. Though the oligarchical character of their government
-gave them much means of secrecy, and above all, dispensed with the
-necessity of consulting the people beforehand,—still, measures of
-such importance could not be taken without provoking attention.
-Intimation was sent to the Athenians by various Mitylenæan citizens,
-partly from private feeling, partly in their capacity of <i>proxeni</i>
-(or <i>consuls</i>, to use a modern word which approaches to the meaning)
-for Athens,—especially by a Mitylenæan named Doxander, incensed with
-the government for having disappointed his two sons of a marriage
-with two orphan heiresses.<a id="FNanchor_371" href="#Footnote_371"
-class="fnanchor">[371]</a> Not less communicative were the islanders
-of Tenedos, animated by ancient neighborly jealousy towards Mitylênê;
-so that the Athenians were thus forewarned both of the intrigues
-between Mitylênê and the Spartans and of her certain impending
-revolt unless they immediately interfered.<a id="FNanchor_372"
-href="#Footnote_372" class="fnanchor">[372]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">[p. 223]</span></p>
-
-<p>This news seems to have become certain about February or March 428
-<small>B.C.</small>: but such was then the dispirited
-condition of the Athenians,—arising from two years’ suffering
-under the epidemic, and no longer counteracted by the wholesome
-remonstrances of Periklês,—that they could not at first bring
-themselves to believe what they were so much afraid to find true.
-Lesbos, like Chios, was their ally, upon an equal footing, still
-remaining under those conditions which had been at first common
-to all the members of the confederacy of Delos. Mitylênê paid no
-tribute to Athens: it retained its walls, its large naval force, and
-its extensive landed possessions on the opposite Asiatic continent:
-its government was oligarchical, administering all internal affairs
-without the least reference to Athens. Its obligations as an ally
-were, that, in case of war, it was held bound to furnish armed ships,
-whether in determinate number or not, we do not know: it would
-undoubtedly be restrained from making war upon Tenedos, or any other
-subject-ally of Athens: and its government or its citizens would
-probably be held liable to answer before the Athenian dikasteries, in
-case of any complaint of injury from the government or citizens of
-Tenedos or of any other ally of Athens,—these latter being themselves
-also accountable before the same tribunals, under like complaints
-from Mitylênê. That city was thus in practice all but independent,
-and so extremely powerful that the Athenians in their actual state
-of depression were fearful of coping with it, and therefore loth
-to believe the alarming intelligence which reached them. They sent
-envoys with a friendly message to persuade the Mitylenæans to suspend
-their proceedings, and it was only when these envoys returned without
-success that they saw the necessity of stronger measures. Ten
-Mitylenæan triremes, serving as contingent in the Athenian fleet,
-were seized, and their crews placed under guard; while Kleïppidês,
-then on the point of starting, along with two colleagues, to
-conduct a fleet of forty triremes round Peloponnesus, was directed
-to alter his destination and to proceed forthwith to Mitylênê.<a
-id="FNanchor_373" href="#Footnote_373" class="fnanchor">[373]</a>
-It was expected that he would reach that town about the time
-of the approaching festival of Apollo Maloeis, celebrated in
-its neighborhood,—on which occasion the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_224">[p. 224]</span> whole Mitylenæan population was in the
-habit of going forth to the temple: so that the town, while thus
-deserted, might easily be surprised and seized by the fleet. In case
-this calculation should be disappointed, Kleïppidês was instructed to
-require that the Mitylenæans should surrender their ships of war and
-raze their fortifications, and, in case of refusal, to attack them
-immediately.</p>
-
-<p>But the publicity of debate at Athens was far too great to
-allow such a scheme to succeed. The Mitylenæans had their spies
-in the city, and the moment the resolution was taken, one of them
-set off to communicate it at Mitylênê. Crossing over to Geræstus
-in Eubœa, he got aboard a merchantman on the point of departure,
-and reached Mitylênê with a favorable wind on the third day from
-Athens: so that when Kleïppidês arrived shortly afterwards, he found
-the festival adjourned and the government prepared for him. The
-requisition which he sent in was refused, and the Mitylenæan fleet
-even came forth from the harbor to assail him, but was beaten back
-with little difficulty: upon which, the Mitylenæan leaders, finding
-themselves attacked before their preparations were completed, and
-desiring still to gain time before they declared their revolt,
-opened negotiations with Kleïppidês, and prevailed on him to suspend
-hostilities until ambassadors could be sent to Athens,—protesting
-that they had no serious intention of revolting. This appears to
-have been about the middle of May, soon after the Lacedæmonian
-invasion of Attica. Kleïppidês was induced, not very prudently, to
-admit this proposition, under the impression that his armament was
-insufficient to cope with a city and island so powerful; and he
-remained moored off the harbor at the north of Mitylênê until the
-envoys, among whom was included one of the very citizens of Mitylênê
-who had sent to betray the intended revolt, but who had since changed
-his opinion, should return from Athens. Meanwhile the Mitylenæan
-government, unknown to Kleïppidês, and well aware that the embassy
-would prove fruitless, took advantage of the truce to send secret
-envoys to Sparta, imploring immediate aid: and on the arrival of
-the Lacedæmonian Meleas and the Theban Hermæondas, who had been
-despatched to Mitylênê earlier, but had only come in by stealth since
-the arrival of Kleïppidês, a second trireme was sent along with them,
-carrying additional envoys to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_225">[p.
-225]</span> reiterate the solicitation. These arrivals and despatches
-were carried on without the knowledge of the Athenian admiral,
-chiefly in consequence of the peculiar site of the town, which had
-originally been placed upon a little islet divided from Lesbos by
-a narrow channel, or <i>euripus</i>, and had subsequently been extended
-across into the main island,—like Syracuse, and so many other Grecian
-settlements. It had consequently two harbors, one north, the other
-south of the town: Kleïppidês was anchored off the former, but the
-latter remained unguarded.<a id="FNanchor_374" href="#Footnote_374"
-class="fnanchor">[374]</a></p>
-
-<p>During the absence of the Mitylenæan envoys at Athens,
-reinforcements reached the Athenian admiral from Lemnos, Imbros, and
-some other allies, as well as from the Lesbian town of Methymna:
-so that when the envoys returned, as they presently did, with
-an unfavorable reply, war was resumed with increased vigor. The
-Mitylenæans, having made a general sally with their full military
-force, gained some advantage in the battle; yet, not feeling bold
-enough to maintain the field, they retreated back behind their
-walls. The news of their revolt, when first spread abroad, had
-created an impression unfavorable to the stability of the Athenian
-empire: but when it was seen that their conduct was irresolute,
-and their achievements disproportionate to their supposed power,
-a reaction of feeling took place,—and the Chians and other allies
-came in with increased zeal in obedience to the summons of Athens
-for reinforcements. Kleïppidês soon found his armament large enough
-to establish two separate camps, markets for provision, and naval
-stations, north and south of the town, so as to watch and block up
-both the harbors at once.<a id="FNanchor_375" href="#Footnote_375"
-class="fnanchor">[375]</a> But he commanded little beyond the area
-of his camp, and was unable to invest the city by land; especially
-as the Mitylenæans had received reinforcements from An<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_226">[p. 226]</span>tissa, Pyrrha, and
-Eresus, the other towns of Lesbos which acted with them. They were
-even sufficiently strong to march against Methymna, in hopes that it
-would be betrayed to them by a party within; but this expectation
-was not realized, nor could they do more than strengthen the
-fortifications, and confirm the Mitylenæan supremacy, in the other
-three subordinate towns; in such manner that the Methymnæans, who
-soon afterwards attacked Antissa, were repulsed with considerable
-loss. In this undecided condition the island continued, until,
-somewhere about the month of August <small>B.C.</small>
-428, the Athenians sent Pachês to take the command, with a
-reinforcement of one thousand hoplites, who rowed themselves thither
-in triremes. The Athenians were now in force enough not only to keep
-the Mitylenæans within their walls, but also to surround the city
-with a single wall of circumvallation, strengthened by separate forts
-in suitable positions. By the beginning of October, Mitylênê was thus
-completely blockaded, by land as well as by sea.<a id="FNanchor_376"
-href="#Footnote_376" class="fnanchor">[376]</a></p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, the Mitylenæan envoys, after a troublesome voyage,
-reached Sparta a little before the Olympic festival, about the
-middle of June. The Spartans directed them to come to Olympia
-at the festival, where all the members of the Peloponnesian
-confederacy would naturally be present,—and there to set forth their
-requests, after the festival was concluded, in presence of all.<a
-id="FNanchor_377" href="#Footnote_377" class="fnanchor">[377]</a>
-Thucydidês has given us, at some length, his version of the speech
-wherein this was done,—a speech not a little remarkable. Pronounced
-as it was by men who had just revolted from Athens, having the
-strongest interest to raise indignation against her as well as
-sympathy for themselves,—and before an audience exclusively composed
-of the enemies of Athens, all willing to hear, and none present to
-refute, the bitterest calumnies against her, we should have expected
-a confident sense of righteous and well-grounded though perilous
-effort on the part of the Mitylenæans, and a plausible collection
-of wrongs and oppressions alleged against the common enemy. Instead
-of which, the speech is apologetic and embarrassed: the speaker not
-only does not allege any extortion or severe dealing from Athens
-towards the Mitylenæans, but even admits the fact that they had
-been treated<span class="pagenum" id="Page_227">[p. 227]</span>
-by her with marked honor;<a id="FNanchor_378" href="#Footnote_378"
-class="fnanchor">[378]</a> and that, too, during a long period of
-peace, during which she stood less in awe of her allies generally,
-and would have had much more facility in realizing any harsh
-purposes towards them, than she could possibly enjoy now that the
-war had broken out, when their discontents would be likely to find
-powerful protectors.<a id="FNanchor_379" href="#Footnote_379"
-class="fnanchor">[379]</a> According to his own showing, the
-Mitylenæans, while they had been perfectly well treated by Athens
-during the past, had now acquired, by the mere fact of war, increased
-security for continuance of the like treatment during the future. It
-is upon this ground of security for the future, nevertheless, that
-he rests the justification of the revolt, not pretending to have
-any subject of positive complaint. The Mitylenæans, he contends,
-could have no prospective security against Athens: for she had
-successively and systematically brought into slavery all her allies,
-except Lesbos and Chios, though all had originally been upon an
-equal footing: and there was every reason for fearing that she would
-take the first convenient opportunity of reducing the two last
-remaining to the same level,—the rather as their position was now
-one of privilege and exception, offensive to her imperial pride and
-exaggerated ascendency. It had hitherto suited the policy of Athens
-to leave these two exceptions, as a proof that the other allies
-had justly incurred their fate, since otherwise Lesbos and Chios,
-having equal votes, would not have joined forces in reducing them:<a
-id="FNanchor_380" href="#Footnote_380" class="fnanchor">[380]</a>
-but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_228">[p. 228]</span> this policy
-was now no longer necessary, and the Mitylenæans, feeling themselves
-free only in name, were imperatively called upon by regard for
-their own safety to seize the earliest opportunity for emancipating
-themselves in reality. Nor was it merely regard for their own safety,
-but a farther impulse of Pan-Hellenic patriotism; a desire to take
-rank among the opponents, and not among the auxiliaries of Athens,
-in her usurpation of sovereignty over so many free Grecian states.<a
-id="FNanchor_381" href="#Footnote_381" class="fnanchor">[381]</a> The
-Mitylenæans had, however, been compelled to revolt with preparations
-only half-completed, and had therefore a double claim upon the succor
-of Sparta,—the single hope and protectress of Grecian autonomy. And
-Spartan aid—if now lent immediately and heartily, in a renewed attack
-on Attica during this same year, by sea as well as by land—could
-not fail to put down the common enemy, exhausted as she was by
-pestilence as well as by the cost of three years’ war, and occupying
-her whole maritime force, either in the siege of Mitylênê or round
-Peloponnesus. The orator concluded by appealing not merely to the
-Hellenic patriotism and sympathies of the Peloponnesians, but also to
-the sacred name of the Olympic Zeus, in whose precinct the meeting
-was held, that his pressing entreaty might not be disregarded.<a
-id="FNanchor_382" href="#Footnote_382" class="fnanchor">[382]</a></p>
-
-<p>In following this speech of the orator, we see the plain
-confession that the Mitylenæans had no reason whatever to complain
-of the conduct of Athens towards themselves: she had respected alike
-their dignity, their public force, and their private security. This
-important fact helps us to explain, first, the indifference which the
-Mitylenæan people will be found to manifest in the revolt; next, the
-barbarous resolution taken by the Athenians after its suppression.
-The reasons given for the revolt are mainly two. 1. The Mitylenæans
-had no security that Athens would not degrade them into the condition
-of subject-allies like the rest. 2. They did not choose to second
-the ambition of Athens, and to become parties to a war, for the sake
-of maintaining an empire essentially offensive to Grecian political
-instincts. In both these two reasons there is force; and both touch
-the sore point of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229">[p.
-229]</span> Athenian empire. That empire undoubtedly contradicted one
-of the fundamental instincts of the Greek mind,—the right of every
-separate town to administer its own political affairs apart from
-external control. The Peloponnesian alliance recognized this autonomy
-in theory, by the general synod and equal voting of all the members
-at Sparta, on important occasions; though it was quite true,<a
-id="FNanchor_383" href="#Footnote_383" class="fnanchor">[383]</a>
-as Periklês urged at Athens, that in practice nothing more was
-enjoyed than an autonomy confined by Spartan leading-strings,—and
-though Sparta held in permanent custody hostages for the fidelity of
-her Arcadian allies, summoning their military contingents without
-acquainting them whither they were destined to march. But Athens
-proclaimed herself a despot, effacing the autonomy of her allies not
-less in theory than in practice: far from being disposed to cultivate
-in them any sense of a real common interest with herself, she did not
-even cheat them with those forms and fictions which so often appease
-discontent in the absence of realities. Doubtless, the nature of
-her empire, at once widely extended, maritime, and unconnected, or
-only partially connected, with kindred of race, rendered the forms
-of periodical deliberation difficult to keep up; at the same time
-that it gave to her as naval chief an ascendency much more despotic
-than could have been exercised by any chief on land. It is doubtful
-whether she could have overcome—it is certain that she did not try
-to overcome—these political difficulties; so that her empire stood
-confessed as a despotism, opposed to the political instinct of the
-Greek mind; and the revolts against it, like this of Mitylênê,—in
-so far as they represented a genuine feeling, and were not merely
-movements of an oligarchical party against their own democracy,—were
-revolts of this offended instinct, much more than consequences of
-actual oppression. The Mitylenæans might certainly affirm that
-they had no security against being one day reduced to the common
-condition of subject-allies like the rest; yet an Athenian speaker,
-had he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_230">[p. 230]</span> been here
-present, might have made no mean reply to this portion of their
-reasoning;—he would have urged that, had Athens felt any dispositions
-towards such a scheme, she would have taken advantage of the fourteen
-years’ truce to execute it; and he would have shown that the
-degradation of the allies by Athens, and the change in her position
-from president to despot had been far less intentional and systematic
-than the Mitylenæan orator affirmed.</p>
-
-<p>To the Peloponnesian auditors, however, the speech of the latter
-proved completely satisfactory; the Lesbians were declared members
-of the Peloponnesian alliance, and a second attack upon Attica was
-decreed. The Lacedæmonians, foremost in the movement, summoned
-contingents from their various allies, and were early in arriving
-with their own at the isthmus: they there began to prepare carriages
-or trucks for dragging across the isthmus the triremes which had
-fought against Phormio, from the harbor of Lechæum into the Saronic
-gulf, in order to employ them against Athens. But the remaining
-allies did not answer to the summons, remaining at home occupied with
-their harvest; and the Lacedæmonians, sufficiently disappointed with
-this languor and disobedience, were still farther confounded by the
-unexpected presence of one hundred Athenian triremes off the coast of
-the isthmus. The Athenians, though their own presence at the Olympic
-festival was forbidden by the war, had doubtless learned more or less
-thoroughly the proceedings which had taken place there respecting
-Mitylênê. Perceiving the general belief entertained of their
-depressed and helpless condition, they determined to contradict this
-by a great and instant effort, and accordingly manned forthwith one
-hundred triremes, requiring the personal service of all men, citizens
-as well as metics; and excepting only the two richest classes of the
-Solonian census, <i>i. e.</i> the pentakosiomedimni, and the hippeis, or
-horsemen. With this prodigious fleet they made a demonstration along
-the isthmus in view of the Lacedæmonians, and landed in various
-parts of the Peloponnesian coast to inflict damage. At the same
-time, thirty other Athenian triremes, despatched sometime previously
-to Akarnania, under Asôpius, son of Phormio, landed at different
-openings in Laconia, for the same purpose; and this news reached
-the Lacedæmonians at the isthmus while the other great Athe<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_231">[p. 231]</span>nian fleet was parading
-before their eyes.<a id="FNanchor_384" href="#Footnote_384"
-class="fnanchor">[384]</a> Amazed at so unexpected a demonstration
-of strength, they began to feel how much the Mitylenæans had misled
-them respecting the exhaustion of Athens, and how incompetent they
-were, especially without the presence of their allies, to undertake
-any joint effective movement by sea and land against Attica. They
-therefore returned home, resolving to send an expedition of forty
-triremes, under Alkidas, to the relief of Mitylênê itself; at the
-same time transmitting requisitions to their various allies, in
-order that these triremes might be furnished.<a id="FNanchor_385"
-href="#Footnote_385" class="fnanchor">[385]</a></p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, Asôpius, with his thirty triremes, had arrived in
-Akarnania, from whence all the ships except twelve were sent home.
-He had been nominated commander as the son of Phormio, who appears
-either to have died, or to have become unfit for service, since his
-victories of the preceding year; and the Akarnanians had preferred
-a special request that a son, or at least some relative of Phormio,
-should be invested with the command of the squadron; so beloved was
-his name and character among them. Asôpius, however, accomplished
-nothing of importance, though he again undertook conjointly with
-the Akarnanians a fruitless march against Œniadæ. Ultimately, he
-was defeated and slain, in attempting a disembarkation on the
-territory of Leukas.<a id="FNanchor_386" href="#Footnote_386"
-class="fnanchor">[386]</a></p>
-
-<p>The sanguine announcement made by the Mitylenæans at Olympia,
-that Athens was rendered helpless by the epidemic, had indeed been
-strikingly contradicted by her recent display; since, taking numbers
-and equipment together, the maritime force which she had put forth
-this summer, manned as it was by a higher class of seamen, surpassed
-all former years; although, in point of number only, it was inferior
-to the two hundred and fifty triremes which she had sent out during
-the first summer of the war.<a id="FNanchor_387" href="#Footnote_387"
-class="fnanchor">[387]</a> But the assertion that Athens was
-impoverished in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_232">[p. 232]</span>
-finances was not so destitute of foundation: for the whole treasure
-in the acropolis, six thousand talents at the commencement of the
-war, was now consumed, with the exception of that reserve of one
-thousand talents which had been solemnly set aside against the last
-exigences of defensive resistance. This is not surprising, when we
-learn that every hoplite engaged for near two years and a half in
-the blockade of Potidæa, received two drachmas per day, one for
-himself and a second for an attendant: there were during the whole
-time of the blockade three thousand hoplites engaged there,—and for a
-considerable portion of the time, four thousand six hundred; besides
-the fleet, all the seamen of which received one drachma per day per
-man. Accordingly the Athenians were now for the first time obliged
-to raise a direct contribution among themselves, to the amount of
-two hundred talents, for the purpose of prosecuting the siege of
-Mitylênê: and they at the same time despatched Lysiklês with four
-colleagues, in command of twelve triremes, to collect money. What
-relation these money-gathering ships bore to the regular tribute paid
-by the subject-allies, or whether they were allowed to visit these
-latter, we do not know: in the present case, Lysiklês landed<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_233">[p. 233]</span> at Myus, near the mouth
-of the Mæander, and marched up the country to levy contributions on
-the Karian villages in the plain of that river: but he was surprised
-by the Karians, perhaps aided by the active Samian exiles at Anæa in
-the neighborhood, and slain, with a considerable number of his men.<a
-id="FNanchor_388" href="#Footnote_388" class="fnanchor">[388]</a></p>
-
-<p>While the Athenians thus held Mitylênê under siege, their
-faithful friends, the Platæans, had remained closely blockaded
-by the Peloponnesians and Bœotians for more than a year,
-without any possibility of relief. At length, provisions began
-to fail, and the general, Eupompidês, backed by the prophet
-Theænetus,—these prophets<a id="FNanchor_389" href="#Footnote_389"
-class="fnanchor">[389]</a> were often among the bravest soldiers in
-the army,—persuaded the garrison to adopt the daring but seemingly
-desperate resolution of breaking out over the blockading wall, and
-in spite of its guards. So desperate, indeed, did the project seem,
-that at the moment of execution, one half of the garrison shrank from
-it as equivalent to certain death: the other half, about two hundred
-and twelve in number, persisted and escaped. Happy would it have been
-for the remainder had they even perished in the attempt, and thus
-forestalled the more melancholy fate in store for them!</p>
-
-<p>It has been already stated, that the circumvallation of Platæa
-was accomplished by a double wall and a double ditch, one ditch
-without the encircling walls, another between them and the town;
-the two walls being sixteen feet apart, joined together, and roofed
-all round, so as to look like one thick wall, and to afford covered
-quarters for the besiegers. Both the outer and inner circumference
-were furnished with battlements, and after every ten battlements
-came a roofed tower, covering the whole breadth of the double
-wall,—allowing a free passage inside, but none outside. In general,
-the entire circuit of the roofed wall was kept under watch night
-and day: but on wet nights the besiegers had so far relaxed their
-vigilance as to retire under cover of the towers, and leave the
-intermediate spaces unguarded: and it was upon this omission that the
-plan of escape was founded. The Platæans prepared ladders of a proper
-height to scale the block<span class="pagenum" id="Page_234">[p.
-234]</span>ading double wall, ascertaining its height by repeatedly
-counting the ranges of bricks, which were quite near enough for them
-to discern, and not effectually covered with whitewash. On a cold and
-dark December night, amidst rain, sleet, and a roaring wind, they
-marched forth from the gates, lightly armed, some few with shields
-and spears, but most of them with breastplates, javelins, and bows
-and arrows: the right foot was naked, and the left foot alone shod,
-so as to give to it a more assured footing on the muddy ground.<a
-id="FNanchor_390" href="#Footnote_390" class="fnanchor">[390]</a>
-Taking care to sally out with the wind in their faces, and at such a
-distance from each other as to prevent any clattering of arms, they
-crossed the inner ditch and reached the foot of the wall without
-being discovered: the ladders, borne in the van, were immediately
-planted, and Ammeas, son of Korœbus, followed by eleven others, armed
-only with a short sword and breastplate, mounted the wall: others,
-armed with spears, followed him, their shields being carried and
-handed to them when on the top by comrades behind. It was the duty
-of this first company to master and maintain the two towers, right
-and left, so as to keep the intermediate space free for passing
-over. This was successfully done, the guards in both towers being
-surprised and slain, without alarming the remaining besiegers:
-and many of the Platæans had already reached the top of the wall,
-when the noise of a tile accidently knocked down by one of them,
-betrayed what was passing. Immediately a general clamor was raised,
-alarm was given, and the awakened garrison rushed up from beneath
-to the top of the wall, yet not knowing where the enemy was to be
-found; a perplexity farther increased by the Platæans in the town,
-who took this opportunity of making a false attack on the opposite
-side. Amidst such confusion and darkness, the blockading detachment
-could not tell where to di<span class="pagenum" id="Page_235">[p.
-235]</span>rect their blows, and all remained at their posts, except
-a reserve of three hundred men, kept constantly in readiness for
-special emergencies, who marched out and patrolled the outside of
-the ditch to intercept any fugitives from within. At the same time,
-fire-signals were raised to warn their allies at Thebes,—but here
-again the Platæans in the town had foreseen and prepared fire-signals
-on their part, which they hoisted forthwith, in order to deprive this
-telegraphic communication of all special meaning.<a id="FNanchor_391"
-href="#Footnote_391" class="fnanchor">[391]</a></p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, the escaping Platæans, masters of the two adjoining
-towers,—on the top of which some of them mounted, while others
-held the doorway through, so as to repel with spears and darts
-all approach of the blockaders,—prosecuted their flight without
-interruption over the space between, shoving down the battlements in
-order to make it more level and plant a greater number of ladders.
-In this manner they all successively got over and crossed the
-outer ditch; every man, immediately after crossing, standing ready
-on the outer bank, with bow and javelin, to repel assailants and
-maintain safe passages for his comrades in the rear. At length,
-when all had descended, there remained the last and greatest
-difficulty,—the escape of those who occupied the two towers and kept
-the intermediate portion of wall free: yet even this was accomplished
-successfully and without loss. The outer ditch was, however, found
-embarrassing,—so<span class="pagenum" id="Page_236">[p. 236]</span>
-full of water from the rain as to be hardly fordable, yet with
-thin ice on it also, from a previous frost: for the storm, which
-in other respects was the main help to their escape, here retarded
-their passage of the ditch by an unusual accumulation of water. It
-was not, however, until all had crossed except the defenders of the
-towers,—who were yet descending and scrambling through,—that the
-Peloponnesian reserve of three hundred were seen approaching the spot
-with torches. Their unshielded right side was turned towards the
-ditch, and the Platæans, already across and standing on the bank,
-immediately assailed them with arrows and javelins,—in which the
-torches enabled them to take tolerable aim, while the Peloponnesians
-on their side could not distinguish their enemies in the dark, and
-had no previous knowledge of their position. They were thus held in
-check until the rearmost Platæans had surmounted the difficulties
-of the passage: after which the whole body stole off as speedily as
-they could, taking at first the road towards Thebes, while their
-pursuers were seen with their torch-lights following the opposite
-direction, on the road which led by the heights called Dryos-Kephalæ
-to Athens: after having marched about three quarters of a mile on
-the road to Thebes, leaving the chapel of the Hero Androkratês on
-their right hand, the fugitives quitted it, and striking to the
-eastward towards Erythræ and Hysiæ, soon found themselves in safety
-among the mountains which separate Bœotia from Attica at that point;
-from whence they passed into the glad harbor and refuge of Athens.<a
-id="FNanchor_392" href="#Footnote_392" class="fnanchor">[392]</a></p>
-
-<p>Two hundred and twelve brave men thus emerged to life and liberty,
-breaking loose from that impending fate which too soon overtook the
-remainder, and preserving for future times the genuine breed and
-honorable traditions of Platæa. One man alone was taken prisoner
-at the brink of the outer ditch, while a few, who had enrolled
-themselves originally for the enterprise, lost courage and returned
-in despair even from the foot of the inner wall; telling their
-comrades within that the whole band had perished. Accordingly,
-at daybreak, the Platæans within sent out a herald to solicit a
-truce for burial of the dead bodies, and<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_237">[p. 237]</span> it was only by the answer made to this
-request, that they learned the actual truth. The description of this
-memorable outbreak exhibits not less daring in the execution than
-skill and foresight in the design; and is the more interesting,
-inasmuch as the men who thus worked out their salvation were
-precisely the bravest men, who best deserved it.</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, Pachês and the Athenians kept Mitylênê closely blocked
-up, the provisions were nearly exhausted, and the besieged were
-already beginning to think of capitulation,—when their spirits
-were raised by the arrival of the Lacedæmonian envoy Salæthus,
-who had landed at Pyrrha on the west of Lesbos, and contrived to
-steal in through a ravine which obstructed the continuity of the
-blockading wall,—about February 427 <small>B.C.</small>
-He encouraged the Mitylenæans to hold out, assuring them that a
-Peloponnesian fleet under Alkidas was on the point of setting out
-to assist them, and that Attica would be forthwith invaded by the
-general Peloponnesian army. His own arrival, also, and his stay
-in the town, was in itself no small encouragement: we shall see
-hereafter, when we come to the siege of Syracuse by the Athenians,
-how much might depend upon the presence of one single Spartan. All
-thought of surrender was accordingly abandoned, and the Mitylenæans
-awaited with impatience the arrival of Alkidas, who started from
-Peloponnesus at the beginning of April, with forty-two triremes;
-while the Lacedæmonian army at the same time invaded Attica, in
-order to keep the attention of Athens fully employed. Their ravages
-on this occasion were more diligent, searching, and destructive
-to the country than before, and were continued the longer because
-they awaited the arrival of news from Lesbos. But none reached
-them, their stock of provisions was exhausted, and the army was
-obliged to break up.<a id="FNanchor_393" href="#Footnote_393"
-class="fnanchor">[393]</a></p>
-
-<p>The news, when it did arrive, proved very unsatisfactory.</p>
-
-<p>Salæthus and the Mitylenæans had held out until their provisions
-were completely exhausted, but neither relief, nor tidings, reached
-them from Peloponnesus. At length, even Salæthus became convinced
-that no relief would come; he projected, therefore, as a last
-hope, a desperate attack upon the Athenians<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_238">[p. 238]</span> and their wall of blockade. For
-this purpose, he distributed full panoplies among the mass of the
-people, or commons, who had hitherto been without them, having
-at best nothing more than bows or javelins.<a id="FNanchor_394"
-href="#Footnote_394" class="fnanchor">[394]</a> But he had not
-sufficiently calculated the consequences of this important step.
-The Mitylenæan multitude, living under an oligarchical government,
-had no interest whatever in the present contest, which had been
-undertaken without any appeal to their opinion. They had no reason
-for aversion to Athens, seeing that they suffered no practical
-grievance from the Athenian alliance: and we shall find hereafter
-that even among the subject-allies—to say nothing of a privileged
-ally like Mitylênê—the bulk of the citizens were never forward,
-sometimes positively reluctant, to revolt. The Mitylenæan oligarchy
-had revolted, in spite of the absence of practical wrongs, because
-they desired an uncontrolled town-autonomy as well as security for
-its continuance: but this was a feeling to which the people were
-naturally strangers, having no share in the government of their
-own town, and being kept dead and passive, as it was the interest
-of the oligarchy that they should be, in respect to political
-sentiment. A Grecian oligarchy might obtain from its people quiet
-submission under ordinary circumstances, but if ever it required
-energetic effort, the genuine devotion under which alone such effort
-could be given, was found wanting. Accordingly, the Mitylenæan
-demos, so soon as they found themselves strengthened and ennobled
-by the possession of heavy armor, refused obedience to the orders
-of Salæthus for marching out and imperiling their lives in a
-desperate struggle. They were under the belief—not unnatural under
-the secrecy of public affairs habitually practised by an oligarchy,
-but which, assuredly, the Athenian demos would have been too well
-informed to entertain—that their governors were starving them, and
-had concealed stores of provisions for themselves. Accordingly, the
-first use which they made of their arms was, to demand that these
-concealed stores should be brought out and fairly apportioned to
-all, threatening, unless their demand was complied with at once,
-to enter into negotiations with the Athenians, and surrender the
-city.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_239">[p. 239]</span> The ruling
-Mitylenæans, unable to prevent this, but foreseeing that it would
-be their irretrievable ruin, preferred the chance of negotiating
-themselves for a capitulation. It was agreed with Pachês, that the
-Athenian armament should enter into possession of Mitylênê; that the
-fate of its people and city should be left to the Athenian assembly,
-and that the Mitylenæans should send envoys to Athens to plead their
-cause: until the return of these envoys, Pachês engaged that no one
-should be either killed, or put in chains, or sold into slavery.
-Nothing was said about Salæthus, who hid himself as well as he could
-in the city. In spite of the guarantee received from Pachês, so great
-was the alarm of those Mitylenæans who had chiefly instigated the
-revolt, that when he actually took possession of the city, they threw
-themselves as suppliants upon the altars for protection; but being
-induced, by his assurances, to quit their sanctuary, were placed in
-the island of Tenedos until answer should be received from Athens.<a
-id="FNanchor_395" href="#Footnote_395" class="fnanchor">[395]</a></p>
-
-<p>Having thus secured possession of Mitylênê, Pachês sent round
-some triremes to the other side of the island, and easily captured
-Antissa. But before he had time to reduce the two remaining towns
-of Pyrrha and Eresus, he received news which forced him to turn his
-attention elsewhere.</p>
-
-<p>To the astonishment of every one, the Peloponnesian fleet of
-Alkidas was seen on the coast of Ionia. It ought to have been
-there much earlier, and had Alkidas been a man of energy, it
-would have reached Mitylênê even before the surrender of the
-city. But the Peloponnesians, when about to advance into the
-Athenian waters and brave the Athenian fleet, were under the same
-impressions of conscious weakness and timidity—especially since
-the victories of Phormio in the preceding year—as that which beset
-land-troops who marched up to attack the Lacedæmonian heavy-armed.<a
-id="FNanchor_396" href="#Footnote_396" class="fnanchor">[396]</a>
-Alkidas, though unobstructed by the Athenians, who were not aware
-of his departure,—though pressed to hasten forward by Lesbian
-and Ionian exiles on board, and aided by expert pilots from
-those Samian exiles who<span class="pagenum" id="Page_240">[p.
-240]</span> had established themselves at Anæa,<a id="FNanchor_397"
-href="#Footnote_397" class="fnanchor">[397]</a> on the Asiatic
-continent, and acted as zealous enemies of Athens,—nevertheless,
-instead of sailing straight to Lesbos, lingered first near
-Peloponnesus, next at the island of Delos, making capture of private
-vessels with their crews; until at length, on reaching the islands of
-Ikarus and Mykonus, he heard the unwelcome tidings that the besieged
-town had capitulated. Not at first crediting the report, he sailed
-onward to Embaton, in the Erythræan territory on the coast of Asia
-Minor, where he found the news confirmed. As only seven days had
-elapsed since the capitulation had been concluded, Teutiaplus, an
-Eleian captain in the fleet, strenuously urged the daring project
-of sailing on forthwith, and surprising Mitylênê by night in its
-existing unsettled condition: no preparation would have been made for
-receiving them, and there was good chance that the Athenians might
-be suddenly overpowered, the Mitylenæans again armed, and the town
-recovered.</p>
-
-<p>Such a proposition, which was indeed something more than daring,
-did not suit the temper of Alkidas. Nor could he be induced by the
-solicitation of the exiles to fix and fortify himself either in any
-port of Ionia, or in the Æolic town of Kymê, so as to afford support
-and countenance to such subjects of the Athenian empire as were
-disposed to revolt; though he was confidently assured that many of
-them would revolt on his proclamation, and that the satrap Pissuthnês
-of Sardis would help him to defray the expense. Having been sent for
-the express purpose of relieving Mitylênê, Alkidas believed himself
-interdicted from any other project, and determined to return to
-Peloponnesus at once, dreading nothing so much as the pursuit of
-Pachês and the Athenian fleet. From Embaton, accordingly, he started
-on his return, coasting southward along Asia Minor as far as Ephesus.
-But the prisoners taken in his voyage were now an encumbrance to
-his flight; and their number was not inconsiderable, since all the
-merchant-vessels in his route had approached the fleet without
-suspicion, believing it to be Athenian: a Peloponnesian fleet near
-the coast of Ionia was as yet something unheard of and incredible. To
-get rid of his prisoners, Alkidas stopped at Myonnêsus, near Teos,
-and there put to death the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_241">[p.
-241]</span> greater number of them,—a barbarous proceeding, which
-excited lively indignation among the neighboring Ionic cities to
-which they belonged; insomuch that when he reached Ephesus, the
-Samian exiles dwelling at Anæa, who had come forward so actively
-to help him, sent him a spirited remonstrance, reminding him that
-the slaughter of men neither engaged in war, nor enemies, nor even
-connected with Athens, except by constraint, was disgraceful to one
-who came forth as the liberator of Greece,—and that, if he persisted,
-he would convert his friends into enemies, not his enemies into
-friends. So keenly did Alkidas feel this animadversion, that he
-at once liberated the remainder of his prisoners, several of them
-Chians; and then started from Ephesus, taking his course across sea
-towards Krete and Peloponnesus. After much delay off the coast of
-Krete from stormy weather, which harassed and dispersed his fleet,
-he at length reached in safety the harbor of Kyllênê in Elis, where
-his scattered ships were ultimately reunited.<a id="FNanchor_398"
-href="#Footnote_398" class="fnanchor">[398]</a></p>
-
-<p>Thus inglorious was the voyage of the first Peloponnesian admiral
-who dared to enter that <i>Mare clausum</i> which passed for a portion of
-the territory of Athens.<a id="FNanchor_399" href="#Footnote_399"
-class="fnanchor">[399]</a> But though he achieved little, his mere
-presence excited everywhere not less dismay than astonishment: for
-the Ionic towns were all unfortified, and Alkidas might take and
-sack any one of them by sudden assault, even though unable to hold
-it permanently. Pressing messages reached Pachês from Erythræ and
-from several other places, while the Athenian triremes called Paralus
-and Salaminia, the privileged vessels which usually carried public
-and sacred deputations, had themselves seen the Peloponnesian fleet
-anchored at Ikarus, and brought him the same intelligence. Pachês,
-having his hands now free by the capture of Mitylênê, set forth
-immediately in pursuit of the intruder, whom he chased as far<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_242">[p. 242]</span> the island of Patmos.
-It was there ascertained that Alkidas had finally disappeared from
-the eastern waters, and the Athenian admiral, though he would have
-rejoiced to meet the Peloponnesian fleet in the open sea, accounted
-it fortunate that they had not taken up a position in some Asiatic
-harbor,—in which case it would have been necessary for him to
-undertake a troublesome and tedious blockade,<a id="FNanchor_400"
-href="#Footnote_400" class="fnanchor">[400]</a> besides all the
-chances of revolt among the Athenian dependencies. We shall see how
-much, in this respect, depended upon the personal character of the
-Lacedæmonian commander, when we come hereafter to the expedition of
-Brasidas.</p>
-
-<p>On his return from Patmos to Mitylênê, Pachês was induced to
-stop at Notium by the solicitations of some exiles. Notium was
-the port of Kolophon, from which it was some little distance, as
-Peiræus was from Athens.<a id="FNanchor_401" href="#Footnote_401"
-class="fnanchor">[401]</a></p>
-
-<p>About three years before, a violent internal dissension had taken
-place in Kolophon, and one of the parties, invoking the aid of
-the Persian Itamanes (seemingly one of the generals of the satrap
-Pissuthnês), had placed him in possession of the town; whereupon
-the opposite party, forced to retire, had established itself
-separately and independently at Notium. But the Kolophonians who
-remained in the town soon contrived to procure a party in Notium,
-whereby they were enabled to regain possession of it, through the
-aid of a body of Arcadian mercenaries in the service of Pissuthnês.
-These Arcadians formed a standing garrison at Notium, in which they
-occupied a separate citadel, or fortified space, while the town
-became again attached as harbor to Kolophon. A considerable body of
-exiles, however, expelled on that occasion, now invoked the aid of
-Pachês to reinstate them, and to expel the Arcadians. On reaching
-the place, the Athenian general prevailed upon Hippias, the Arcadian
-captain, to come forth to a parley, under the promise that, if
-nothing mutually satisfactory could be settled, he would again
-replace him, “safe and sound,” in the fortification. But no sooner
-had the Arcadian come forth to this parley, than Pachês, causing
-him to be detained under guard, but without fetters or ill-usage,
-immediately<span class="pagenum" id="Page_243">[p. 243]</span>
-attacked the fortification while the garrison were relying on the
-armistice, carried it by storm, and put to death both the Arcadians
-and the Persians who were found within. Having got possession of
-the fortification, he next brought Hippias again into it, “safe and
-sound,” according to the terms of the convention, which was thus
-literally performed, and then immediately afterwards caused him to
-be shot with arrows and javelins. Of this species of fraud, founded
-on literal performance and real violation of an agreement, there
-are various examples in Grecian history; but nowhere do we read
-of a more flagitious combination of deceit and cruelty than the
-behavior of Pachês at Notium. How it was noticed at Athens, we do
-not know: but we may remark, not without surprise, that Thucydidês
-recounts it plainly and calmly without a single word of comment.<a
-id="FNanchor_402" href="#Footnote_402" class="fnanchor">[402]</a></p>
-
-<p>Notium was separated from Kolophon, and placed in possession
-of those Kolophonians who were opposed to the Persian supremacy
-in the upper town. But as it had been down to this time a mere
-appendage of Kolophon and not a separate town, the Athenians soon
-afterwards sent œkists and performed for it the ceremonies of
-colonization according to their own laws and customs, inviting from
-every quarter the remaining exiles of Kolophon.<a id="FNanchor_403"
-href="#Footnote_403" class="fnanchor">[403]</a> Whether any new
-settlers went from Athens itself, we do not know: but the step was
-intended to confer a sort of Hellenic citizenship, and recognized
-collective personality, on the new-born town of Notium; without
-which, neither its theôry or solemn deputation would have been
-admitted to offer public sacrifice, nor its private citizens to
-contend for the prize, at Olympic and other great festivals.</p>
-
-<p>Having cleared the Asiatic waters from the enemies of Athens,
-Pachês returned to Lesbos, reduced the towns of Pyrrha and Eresus,
-and soon found himself so completely master both of Mitylênê and
-the whole island, as to be able to send home the larger part of his
-force; carrying with them as prisoners those Mitylenæans who had
-been deposited in Tenedos, as well as others, prominently implicated
-in the late revolt, to the number altogether of rather more than a
-thousand. The Lacedæmonian<span class="pagenum" id="Page_244">[p.
-244]</span> Salæthus, being recently detected in his place of
-concealment, was included among the prisoners transmitted.</p>
-
-<p>Upon the fate of these prisoners the Athenians had now to
-pronounce, and they entered upon the discussion in a temper of
-extreme wrath and vengeance. As to Salæthus, their resolution to
-put him to death was unanimous and immediate, nor would they listen
-to his promises, assuredly delusive, of terminating the blockade
-of Platæa, in case his life were spared. What to do with Mitylênê
-and its inhabitants was a point more doubtful, and was submitted to
-formal debate in the public assembly.</p>
-
-<p>It is in this debate that Thucydidês first takes notice of Kleon,
-who is, however, mentioned by Plutarch as rising into importance some
-few years earlier, during the lifetime of Periklês. Under the great
-increase of trade and population in Athens and Peiræus during the
-last forty years, a new class of politicians seem to have grown up,
-men engaged in various descriptions of trade and manufacture, who
-began to rival more or less in importance the ancient families of
-Attic proprietors. This change was substantially analogous to that
-which took place in the cities of mediæval Europe, when the merchants
-and traders of the various guilds gradually came to compete with, and
-ultimately supplanted, the patrician families in whom the supremacy
-had originally resided. In Athens, persons of ancient family and
-station enjoyed at this time no political privilege, and since the
-reforms of Ephialtês and Periklês, the political constitution had
-become thoroughly democratical. But they still continued to form the
-two highest classes in the Solonian census founded on property,—the
-pentakosiomedimni, and the hippeis, or knights: new men enriched
-by trade doubtless got into these classes, but probably only in
-minority, and imbibed the feeling of the class as they found it,
-instead of bringing into it any new spirit. Now an individual
-Athenian of this class, though without any legal title to preference,
-yet when he stood forward as candidate for political influence,
-continued to be decidedly preferred and welcomed by the social
-sentiment at Athens, which preserved in its spontaneous sympathies
-distinctions effaced from the political code.<a id="FNanchor_404"
-href="#Footnote_404" class="fnanchor">[404]</a> Besides this
-place ready prepared for him in the public<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_245">[p. 245]</span> sympathy, especially advantageous at
-the outset of political life,—he found himself farther borne up by
-the family connections, associations, and political clubs, etc.,
-which exercised very great influence both on the politics and the
-judicature of Athens, and of which he became a member as a matter of
-course. Such advantages were doubtless only auxiliary, carrying a man
-up to a certain point of influence, but leaving him to achieve the
-rest by his own personal qualities and capacity. But their effect
-was nevertheless very real, and those who, without possessing them,
-met and buffeted him in the public assembly, contended against great
-disadvantages. A person of such low or middling station obtained no
-favorable presumptions or indulgence on the part of the public to
-meet him half-way,—nor had he established connections to encourage
-first successes, or help him out of early scrapes. He found others
-already in possession of ascendency, and well-disposed to keep down
-new competitors; so that he had to win his own way unaided, from
-the first step to the last, by qualities personal to himself; by
-assiduity of attendance, by acquaintance with business, by powers of
-striking speech, and withal by unflinching audacity, indispensable
-to enable him to bear up against that opposition and enmity which
-he would incur from the high-born politicians, and organized party
-clubs, as soon as he appeared to be rising up into ascendency.</p>
-
-<p>The free march of political and judicial affairs raised up several
-such men, during the years beginning and immediately preceding
-the Peloponnesian war. Even during the lifetime of Periklês, they
-appear to have arisen in greater or less numbers: but the personal
-ascendency of that great man,—who combined an aristocratical position
-with a strong and genuine democratical sentiment, and an enlarged
-intellect rarely found attached to either,—impressed a peculiar
-character on Athenian politics. The Athenian world was divided into
-his partisans and his opponents, among each of whom there were
-individuals high-born and low-born,—though the aristocratical party,
-properly so called, the majority of wealthy and high-born Athenians,
-either opposed or disliked him. It is about two years after his
-death that we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_246">[p. 246]</span>
-begin to hear of a new class of politicians: Eukratês, the
-rope-seller; Kleon, the leather-seller; Lysiklês, the sheep-seller;
-Hyperbolus, the lamp-maker;<a id="FNanchor_405" href="#Footnote_405"
-class="fnanchor">[405]</a> the two first of whom must have been
-already well-known as speakers in the ekklesia, even during the
-lifetime of Periklês. Among them all, the most distinguished was
-Kleon, son of Kleænetus.</p>
-
-<p>Kleon acquired his first importance among the speakers against
-Periklês, so that he would thus obtain for himself, during his
-early political career, the countenance of the numerous and
-aristocratical anti-Perikleans. He is described by Thucydidês in
-general terms as a person of the most violent temper and character
-in Athens,—as being dishonest in his calumnies, and virulent in his
-invective and accusation.<a id="FNanchor_406" href="#Footnote_406"
-class="fnanchor">[406]</a> Aristophanês, in his comedy of the
-Knights, reproduces these features, with others new and distinct, as
-well as with exaggerated details, comic, satirical, and contemptuous.
-His comedy depicts Kleon in the point of view in which he would
-appear to the knights of Athens,—a leather-dresser, smelling of the
-tan-yard,—a low-born brawler, terrifying opponents by the violence
-of his criminations, the loudness of his voice, the impudence of
-his gestures,—moreover, as venal in his politics, threatening men
-with accusations, and then receiving money to withdraw them; a
-robber of the public treasury, persecuting merit as well as rank,
-and courting the favor of the assembly by the basest and most guilty
-cajolery. The general attributes set forth by Thucydidês (apart
-from Aristophanês, who does not profess to write history), we may
-well accept; the powerful and violent invective of Kleon, often
-dishonest, together with his self-confidence and audacity in the
-public assembly. Men of the middling class, like Kleon and<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_247">[p. 247]</span> Hyperbolus, who
-persevered in addressing the public assembly and trying to take a
-leading part in it, against persons of greater family pretension than
-themselves, were pretty sure to be men of more than usual audacity.
-Had they not possessed this quality, they would never have surmounted
-the opposition made to them: we may well believe that they had it
-to a displeasing excess,—and even if they had not, the same measure
-of self-assumption which in Alkibiadês would be tolerated from his
-rank and station, would in them pass for insupportable impudence.
-Unhappily, we have no specimens to enable us to appreciate the
-invective of Kleon. We cannot determine whether it was more virulent
-than that of Demosthenês and Æschinês, seventy years afterwards,—each
-of those eminent orators imputing to the other the grossest
-impudence, calumny, perjury, corruption, loud voice, and revolting
-audacity of manner, in language which Kleon can hardly have surpassed
-in intensity of vituperation, though he doubtless fell immeasurably
-short of it in classical finish. Nor can we even tell in what degree
-Kleon’s denunciations of the veteran Periklês were fiercer than those
-memorable invectives against the old age of Sir Robert Walpole,
-with which Lord Chatham’s political career opened. The talent for
-invective possessed by Kleon, employed first against Periklês, would
-be counted as great impudence by the partisans of that illustrious
-statesman, as well as by impartial and judicious citizens; but among
-the numerous enemies of Periklês, it would be applauded as a burst
-of patriotic indignation, and would procure for the orator that
-extraneous support at first which would sustain him until he acquired
-his personal hold on the public assembly.<a id="FNanchor_407"
-href="#Footnote_407" class="fnanchor">[407]</a></p>
-
-<p>By what degrees or through what causes that hold was gradually
-increased, we do not know; but at the time when the question of
-Mitylênê came on for discussion, it had grown into a sort of
-ascendency which Thucydidês describes by saying that Kleon was
-“at that time by far the most persuasive speaker in the eyes of
-the people.” The fact of Kleon’s great power of speech, and his
-capacity<span class="pagenum" id="Page_248">[p. 248]</span> of
-handling public business in a popular manner, is better attested than
-anything else respecting him, because it depends upon two witnesses
-both hostile to him,—Thucydidês and Aristophanês. The assembly and
-the dikastery were Kleon’s theatre and holding-ground: for the
-Athenian people taken collectively in their place of meeting, and
-the Athenian people taken individually, were not always the same
-person and had not the same mode of judgment: Demos sitting in the
-Pnyx, was a different man from Demos at home.<a id="FNanchor_408"
-href="#Footnote_408" class="fnanchor">[408]</a> The lofty combination
-of qualities possessed by Periklês exercised ascendency over both one
-and the other; but the qualities of Kleon swayed considerably the
-former without standing high in the esteem of the latter.</p>
-
-<p>When the fate of Mitylênê and its inhabitants was submitted to the
-Athenian assembly, Kleon took the lead in the discussion. There never
-was a theme more perfectly suited to his violent temperament and
-power of fierce invective. Taken collectively, the case of Mitylênê
-presented a revolt as inexcusable and aggravated as any revolt
-could be: and we have only to read the grounds of it, as set forth
-by the Mitylenæan speakers themselves before the Peloponnesians at
-Olympia, to be satisfied that such a proceeding, when looked at from
-the Athenian point of view, would be supposed to justify, and even
-to require, the very highest pitch of indignation. The Mitylenæans
-admit, not only that they have no ground of complaint against Athens,
-but that they have been well and honorably treated by her, with
-special privilege. But they fear that she may oppress them in future:
-they hate the very principle of her empire, and eagerly instigate,
-as well as aid, her enemies to subdue her: they select the precise
-moment in which she has been worn down by a fearful pestilence,
-invasion, and cost of war. Nothing more than this would be required
-to kindle the most intense wrath in the bosom of an Athenian
-patriot: but there was yet another point which weighed as much as
-the rest, if not more: the revolters had been the first to invite
-a Peloponnesian fleet across the Ægean, and the first to proclaim,
-both to Athens and her allies, the precarious tenure of her empire.<a
-id="FNanchor_409" href="#Footnote_409" class="fnanchor">[409]</a> The
-violent Kleon would on this occasion find in<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_249">[p. 249]</span> the assembly an audience hardly less
-violent than himself, and would easily be able to satisfy them that
-anything like mercy to the Mitylenæans was treason to Athens. He
-proposed to apply to the captive city the penalties tolerated by the
-custom of war in their harshest and fullest measure: to kill the
-whole Mitylenæan male population of military age, probably about six
-thousand persons,—and to sell as slaves all the women and children.<a
-id="FNanchor_410" href="#Footnote_410" class="fnanchor">[410]</a>
-The proposition, though strongly opposed by Diodotus and others, was
-sanctioned and passed by the assembly, and a trireme was forthwith
-despatched to Mitylênê, enjoining Pachês to put it in execution.<a
-id="FNanchor_411" href="#Footnote_411" class="fnanchor">[411]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such a sentence was, in principle, nothing more than a very
-rigorous application of the received laws of war. Not merely the
-reconquered rebel, but even the prisoner of war, apart from any
-special convention, was at the mercy of his conqueror, to be slain,
-sold, or admitted to ransom: and we shall find the Lacedæmonians
-carrying out the maxim without the smallest abatement towards the
-Platæan prisoners, in the course of a very short time. And doubtless
-the Athenian people, so long as they remained in assembly, under that
-absorbing temporary intensification of the common and predominant
-sentiment which springs from the mere fact of multitude, and so
-long as they were discussing the principle of the case, What had
-Mitylênê deserved? thought only of this view. Less than the most
-rigorous measure of war, they would conceive, would be inadequate
-to the wrong done by the Mitylenæans. But when the assembly broke
-up,—when the citizen, no longer wound up by sympathizing companions
-and animated speakers in the Pnyx, subsided into the comparative
-quiescence of individual life,—when the talk came to be, not about
-the propriety of passing such a resolution, but about the details
-of executing it, a sensible change and marked repentance became
-presently visible. We must also recollect, and it is a principle of
-no small moment in human affairs, especially among a democratical
-people<span class="pagenum" id="Page_250">[p. 250]</span> like
-the Athenians, who stand charged with so many resolutions passed
-and afterwards unexecuted, that the sentiment of wrath against the
-Mitylenæans had been really in part discharged by the mere <i>passing</i>
-of the sentence, quite apart from its execution; just as a furious
-man relieves himself from overboiling anger by imprecations against
-others which he would himself shrink from afterwards realizing. The
-Athenians, on the whole the most humane people in Greece,—though
-humanity, according to our ideas, cannot be predicated of any
-Greeks,—became sensible that they had sanctioned a cruel and
-frightful decree, and the captain and seamen,<a id="FNanchor_412"
-href="#Footnote_412" class="fnanchor">[412]</a> to whom it was given
-to carry, set forth on their voyage with mournful repugnance. The
-Mitylenæan envoys present in Athens, who had probably been allowed
-to speak in the assembly and plead their own cause, together with
-those Athenians who had been proxeni and friends of Mitylênê, and
-the minority generally of the previous assembly, soon discerned, and
-did their best to foster, this repentance; which became, during the
-course of the same evening, so powerful as well as so wide-spread,
-that the stratêgi acceded to the prayer of the envoys, and convoked
-a fresh assembly for the morrow to reconsider the proceeding. By so
-doing, they committed an illegality, and exposed themselves to the
-chance of impeachment: but the change of feeling among the people was
-so manifest as to overbear any such scruples.<a id="FNanchor_413"
-href="#Footnote_413" class="fnanchor">[413]</a></p>
-
-<p>Though Thucydidês had given us only a short summary, without
-any speeches, of what passed in the first assembly,—yet as to the
-second assembly, he gives us at length the speeches both of Kleon
-and Diodotus, the two principal orators of the first also. We may
-be sure that this second assembly was in all points one of the most
-interesting and anxious of the whole war;<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_251">[p. 251]</span> and though we cannot certainly
-determine what were the circumstances which determined Thucydidês
-in his selection of speeches, yet this cause, as well as the signal
-defeat of Kleon, whom he disliked, may probably be presumed to
-have influenced him here. That orator came forward to defend his
-proposition passed on the preceding day, and denounced in terms of
-indignation the unwise tenderness and scruples of the people, who
-could not bear to treat their subject-allies, according to the plain
-reality, as men held only by naked fear. He dwelt upon the mischief
-and folly of reversing on one day what had been decided on the day
-preceding,—upon the guilty ambition of orators, who sacrificed the
-most valuable interests of the commonwealth either to pecuniary
-gains, or to the personal credit of speaking with effect, triumphing
-over rivals, and setting up their own fancies in place of fact and
-reality. He deprecated the mistaken encouragement given to such
-delusions by a public “wise beyond what was written,” who came to the
-assembly, not to apply their good sense in judging of public matters,
-but merely for the delight of hearing speeches.<a id="FNanchor_414"
-href="#Footnote_414" class="fnanchor">[414]</a> He restated the
-heinous and unprovoked wrong committed by the Mitylenæans,—and the
-grounds for inflicting upon them that maximum of punishment which
-“justice” enjoined. He called for “justice” against them; nothing
-less, but nothing more: warning the assembly that the imperial
-necessities of Athens essentially required the constant maintenance
-of a sentiment of fear in the minds of unwilling subjects, and that
-they must prepare to see their empire pass away if they suffered
-themselves to be guided either by compassion for those who, if
-victors, would have no compassion on them,<a id="FNanchor_415"
-href="#Footnote_415" class="fnanchor">[415]</a>—or by unseasonable
-moderation towards those who would neither feel nor requite<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_252">[p. 252]</span> it,—or by the mere
-impression of seductive discourses. Justice against the Mitylenæans,
-not less than the strong political interests of Athens, required
-the infliction of the sentence decreed on the day preceding.<a
-id="FNanchor_416" href="#Footnote_416" class="fnanchor">[416]</a></p>
-
-<p>The harangue of Kleon is in many respects remarkable. If we are
-surprised to find a man, whose whole importance resided in his
-tongue, denouncing so severely the license and the undue influence of
-speech in the public assembly, we must recollect that Kleon had the
-advantage of addressing himself to the intense prevalent sentiment of
-the moment,—that he could, therefore, pass off the dictates of this
-sentiment as plain, downright, honest sense and patriotism; while the
-opponents, speaking against the reigning sentiment, and therefore
-driven to collateral argument, circumlocution, and more or less of
-manœuvre, might be represented as mere clever sophists, showing
-their talents in making the worse appear the better reason,—if not
-actually bribed, at least unprincipled, and without any sincere moral
-conviction. As this is a mode of dealing with questions both of
-public concern and of private morality, not less common at present
-than it was in the time of the Peloponnesian war,—to seize upon some
-strong and tolerably wide-spread sentiment among the public, to treat
-the dictates of that sentiment as plain common sense and obvious
-right, and then to shut out all rational estimate of coming good
-and evil as if it were unholy or immoral, or at best mere uncandid
-subtlety,—we may well notice a case in which Kleon employs it to
-support a proposition now justly regarded as barbarous.</p>
-
-<p>Applying our modern views to this proposition, indeed, the
-prevalent sentiment would not only not be in favor of Kleon, but
-would be irresistibly in favor of his opponents. To put to death
-in cold blood some six thousand persons, would so revolt modern
-feelings, as to overbalance all considerations of past misconduct in
-the persons to be condemned. Nevertheless, the speech of Diodotus,
-who followed and opposed Kleon, not only contains no appeal to
-any such merciful predispositions, but even positively<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_253">[p. 253]</span> disclaims appealing
-to them: the orator deprecates, not less than Kleon, the influence
-of compassionate sentiment, or of a spirit of mere compromise
-and moderation.<a id="FNanchor_417" href="#Footnote_417"
-class="fnanchor">[417]</a> He farther discards considerations of
-justice or the analogies of criminal judicature,<a id="FNanchor_418"
-href="#Footnote_418" class="fnanchor">[418]</a>—and rests his
-opposition altogether upon reasons of public prudence, bearing upon
-the future welfare and security of Athens.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_254">[p. 254]</span></p>
-
-<p>He begins by vindicating<a id="FNanchor_419" href="#Footnote_419"
-class="fnanchor">[419]</a> the necessity of reconsidering the
-resolution just passed, and insists on the mischief of deciding
-so important a question in haste or under strong passion; he
-enters a protest against the unwarrantable insinuations of
-corruption or self-conceit by which Kleon had sought to silence or
-discredit his opponents;<a id="FNanchor_420" href="#Footnote_420"
-class="fnanchor">[420]</a> and then, taking up the question on the
-ground of public wisdom and prudence, he proceeds to show that
-the rigorous sentence decreed on the preceding day was not to be
-defended. That sentence would not prevent any other among the
-subject-allies from revolting, if they saw, or fancied that they
-saw, a fair chance of success: but it might perhaps drive them,<a
-id="FNanchor_421" href="#Footnote_421" class="fnanchor">[421]</a>
-if once embarked in revolt, to persist even to desperation, and
-bury themselves under the ruins of their city. While every means
-ought to be employed to prevent them from revolting, by precautions
-beforehand, it was a mistaken reckoning to try to deter them by
-enormity of punishment, inflicted afterwards upon such as were
-reconquered. In developing this argument, the speaker gives some
-remarkable views on the theory of punishment generally, and on the
-small addition obtained in the way of preventive effect even by the
-greatest aggravation of the suffering inflicted upon the condemned
-criminal,—views which might have passed as rare and profound even
-down to the last century.<a id="FNanchor_422" href="#Footnote_422"
-class="fnanchor">[422]</a> And he farther supports his argument
-by emphatically setting forth the impolicy of confounding the
-Mitylenæan Demos in the same punishment with their oligarchy: the
-revolt had been the act exclusively of the latter, and the former had
-not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_255">[p. 255]</span> only taken
-no part in it, but, as soon as they obtained possession of arms, had
-surrendered the city spontaneously. In all the allied cities, it was
-the commons who were well-affected to Athens, and upon whom her hold
-chiefly depended against the doubtful fidelity of the oligarchies:<a
-id="FNanchor_423" href="#Footnote_423" class="fnanchor">[423]</a>
-but this feeling could not possibly continue, if it were now seen
-that all the Mitylenæans indiscriminately were confounded in one
-common destruction. Diodotus concludes by recommending that those
-Mitylenæans whom Pachês had sent to Athens as chiefs of the revolt,
-should be put upon their trial separately; but that the remaining
-population should be spared.<a id="FNanchor_424" href="#Footnote_424"
-class="fnanchor">[424]</a></p>
-
-<p>This speech is that of a man who feels that he has the reigning
-and avowed sentiment of the audience against him, and that he must
-therefore win his way by appeals to their reason. The same appeals,
-however, might have been made, and perhaps had been made, during the
-preceding discussion, without success; but Diodotus knew that the
-reigning sentiment, though still ostensibly predominant, had been
-silently undermined during the last few hours, and that the reaction
-towards pity and moderation, which had been growing up under it,
-would work in favor of his arguments, though he might disclaim all
-intention of invoking its aid. After several other discourses, both
-for and against,—the assembly came to a vote, and the proposition
-of Diodotus was adopted; but adopted by so small a majority,
-that the decision seemed at first doubtful.<a id="FNanchor_425"
-href="#Footnote_425" class="fnanchor">[425]</a></p>
-
-<p>But the trireme carrying the first vote had started the day
-before, and was already twenty-four hours on its way to Mitylênê. A
-second trireme was immediately put to sea, bearing the new decree;
-yet nothing short of superhuman exertions could enable it to reach
-the condemned city before the terrific sentence now on its way might
-be actually in course of execution. The Mitylenæan envoys stored
-the vessel well with provisions, promising<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_256">[p. 256]</span> large rewards to the crew if they
-arrived in time; and an intensity of effort was manifested, without
-parallel in the history of Athenian seamanship,—the oar being
-never once relaxed between Athens and Mitylênê, and the rowers
-merely taking turns for short intervals of rest, with refreshment
-of barley-meal steeped with wine and oil swallowed on their seats.
-Luckily, there was no unfavorable wind to retard them: but the object
-would have been defeated, if it had not happened that the crew of
-the first trireme were as slow and averse in the transmission of
-their rigorous mandate, as those of the second were eager for the
-delivery of the reprieve in time. And, after all, it came no more
-than just in time; the first trireme had arrived, the order for
-execution was actually in the hands of Pachês, and his measures were
-already preparing. So near was the Mitylenæan population to this
-wholesale destruction:<a id="FNanchor_426" href="#Footnote_426"
-class="fnanchor">[426]</a> so near was Athens to the actual
-perpetration of an enormity which would have raised against her
-throughout Greece a sentiment of exasperation more deadly than that
-which she afterwards incurred even from the proceedings at Melos,
-Skiônê, and elsewhere. Had the execution been realized, the person
-who would have suffered most by it, and most deservedly, would
-have been the proposer, Kleon. For if the reaction in Athenian
-sentiment was so immediate and sensible after the mere passing of
-the sentence, far more violent would it have been when they learned
-that the deed had been irrevocably done, and when all its painful
-details were presented to their imaginations: and Kleon would have
-been held responsible as the author of that which had so disgraced
-them in their own eyes. As the case turned out, he was fortunate
-enough to escape this danger; and his proposition, to put to death
-those Mitylenæans whom Pachês had sent home as the active revolting
-party, was afterwards adopted and executed. It doubtless appeared so
-moderate after the previous decree passed but rescinded, as to be
-adopted with little resistance, and to provoke no after-repentance:
-yet the men so slain were rather more than one thousand in number.<a
-id="FNanchor_427" href="#Footnote_427" class="fnanchor">[427]</a></p>
-
-<p>Besides this sentence of execution, the Athenians razed the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_257">[p. 257]</span> fortifications of
-Mitylênê, and took possession of all her ships of war. In lieu of
-tribute, they farther established a new permanent distribution of
-the land of the island; all except Methymna, which had remained
-faithful to them. They distributed it into three thousand lots, of
-which three hundred were reserved for consecration to the gods,
-and the remainder assigned to Athenian kleruchs, or proprietary
-settlers, chosen by lot among the citizens; the Lesbian proprietors
-still remaining on the land as cultivating tenants, and paying to
-the Athenian kleruch an annual rent of two minæ, near four pounds
-sterling, for each lot. We should have been glad to learn more
-about this new land-settlement than the few words of the historian
-suffice to explain. It would seem that two thousand seven hundred
-Athenian citizens, with their families must have gone to reside,
-for the time at least, in Lesbos, as kleruchs; that is, without
-abnegating their rights as Athenian citizens, and without being
-exonerated either from Athenian taxation, or from personal military
-service. But it seems certain that these men did not continue long
-to reside in Lesbos: and we may even suspect that the kleruchic
-allotment of the island must have been subsequently abrogated. There
-was a strip on the opposite mainland of Asia, which had hitherto
-belonged to Mitylênê; this was now separated from that town, and
-henceforward enrolled among the tributary subjects of Athens.<a
-id="FNanchor_428" href="#Footnote_428" class="fnanchor">[428]</a></p>
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_258">[p. 258]</span></p> <p>To
-the misfortunes of Mitylênê belongs, as a suitable appendix, the
-fate of Pachês, the Athenian commander, whose perfidy at Notium
-has been recently recounted. It appears, that having contracted
-a passion for two beautiful free women at Mitylênê, Hellânis and
-Lamaxis, he slew their husbands, and got possession of them by
-force. Possibly, they may have had private friends at Athens, which
-must of course have been the case with many<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_259">[p. 259]</span> Mitylenæan families: at all events they
-repaired thither, bent on obtaining redress for this outrage, and
-brought their complaint against Pachês before the Athenian dikastery,
-in that trial of accountability to which every officer was liable
-at the close of his command. So profound was the sentiment which
-their case excited, in this open and numerous assembly of Athenian
-citizens, that the guilty commander, not waiting for sentence,
-slew himself with his sword in open court.<a id="FNanchor_429"
-href="#Footnote_429" class="fnanchor">[429]</a></p> <p><span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_260">[p. 260]</span></p> <p>The surrender
-of Platæa to the Lacedæmonians took place not long after that of
-Mitylênê to the Athenians,—somewhat later in the same summer. Though
-the escape of one-half of the garrison had made the provisions last
-longer for the rest, still they had now come to be exhausted, and
-the remaining defenders were enfeebled and on the point of perishing
-by starvation. The Lacedæmonian commander of the blockading force,
-knowing their defenceless condition, could easily have taken the
-town by storm, had he not been forbidden by express orders from
-Sparta. For the Spartan government, calculating that peace might one
-day be concluded with Athens on terms of mutual cession of places
-acquired by war, wished to acquire Platæa, not by force but by
-capitulation and voluntary surrender, which would serve as an excuse
-for not giving it up: though such a distinction, between capture
-by force and by capitulation, not admissible in modern diplomacy,
-was afterwards found to tell against the Lacedæmonians quite as
-much as in their favor.<a id="FNanchor_430" href="#Footnote_430"
-class="fnanchor">[430]</a> Acting upon these orders, the Lacedæmonian
-commander sent in a herald, summoning the Platæans to surrender
-voluntarily, and submit themselves to the Lacedæmonians as
-judges,—with a stipulation “that the wrong-doers<a id="FNanchor_431"
-href="#Footnote_431" class="fnanchor">[431]</a> should be punished,
-but that none should be punished unjustly.” To the besieged, in
-their state of hopeless starvation, all terms were nearly alike, and
-they accordingly surrendered the city. After a few days’ interval,
-during which they received nourishment from the blockading army, five
-persons arrived from Sparta to sit in judgment upon their fate,—one,
-Aristomenidas, a Herakleid of the regal family.<a id="FNanchor_432"
-href="#Footnote_432" class="fnanchor">[432]</a></p>
-
-<p>The five Spartans having taken their seat as judges, doubtless
-in full presence of the blockading army, and especially with the
-Thebans, the great enemies of Platæa, by their side,—the prisoners
-taken, two hundred Platæans and twenty-five Athenians, were
-brought up for trial, or sentence. No accusation was pre<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_261">[p. 261]</span>ferred against them
-by any one: but the simple question was put to them by the judges:
-“Have you, during the present war, rendered any service to the
-Lacedæmonians or to their allies?” The Platæans were confounded at a
-question alike unexpected and preposterous: it admitted but of one
-answer,—but before returning any categorical answer at all, they
-entreated permission to plead their cause at length. In spite of the
-opposition of the Thebans,<a id="FNanchor_433" href="#Footnote_433"
-class="fnanchor">[433]</a> their request was granted: and Astymachus
-and Lakon, the latter proxenus of Sparta at Platæa, were appointed to
-speak on behalf of the body. Possibly, both these delegates may have
-spoken: if so, Thucydidês has blended the two speeches into one.</p>
-
-<p>A more desperate position cannot be imagined, for the
-interrogatory was expressly so framed as to exclude allusion to
-any facts preceding the Peloponnesian war,—but the speakers,
-though fully conscious how slight was their chance of success,
-disregarded the limits of the question itself, and while upholding
-with unshaken courage the dignity of their little city, neglected
-no topic which could touch the sympathies of their judges. After
-remonstrating against the mere mockery of trial and judgment to which
-they were submitted, they appealed to the Hellenic sympathies, and
-lofty reputation for commanding virtue, of the Lacedæmonians,—they
-adverted to the first alliance of Platæa with Athens, concluded at
-the recommendation of the Lacedæmonians themselves, who had then
-declined, though formally solicited, to undertake the protection
-of the town against Theban oppression. They next turned to the
-Persian war, wherein Platæan patriotism towards Greece was
-not less conspicuous than Theban treason,<a id="FNanchor_434"
-href="#Footnote_434" class="fnanchor">[434]</a>—to the victory
-gained over the Persians on their soil, whereby it had become
-hallowed under the promises of Pausanias, and by solemn appeals
-to the local gods. From the Persian war, they passed on to the
-flagitious attack made by the Thebans on Platæa, in the midst of
-the truce,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_262">[p. 262]</span>—nor
-did they omit to remind the judges of an obligation personal to
-Sparta,—the aid which they had rendered, along with the Athenians,
-to Sparta, when pressed by the revolt of the Helots at Ithôme. This
-speech is as touching as any which we find in Thucydidês, and the
-skill of it consists in the frequency with which the hearers are
-brought back, time after time, and by well-managed transitions,
-to these same topics.<a id="FNanchor_435" href="#Footnote_435"
-class="fnanchor">[435]</a> And such was the impression which it
-seemed to make on the five Lacedæmonian judges, that the Thebans near
-at hand found themselves under the necessity of making a reply to
-it: although we see plainly that the whole scheme of proceeding—the
-formal and insulting question, as well as the sentence destined to
-follow upon answer given—had been settled beforehand between them and
-the Lacedæmonians.</p>
-
-<p>The Theban speakers contended that the Platæans had deserved,
-and brought upon themselves by their own fault, the enmity of
-Thebes,—that they had stood forward earnestly against the Persians,
-only because Athens had done so too, and that all the merit, whatever
-it might be, which they had thereby acquired, was counterbalanced
-and cancelled by their having allied themselves with Athens
-afterwards for the oppression and enslavement of the Æginetans, and
-of other Greeks equally conspicuous for zeal against Xerxes, and
-equally entitled to protection under the promises of Pausanias. The
-Thebans went on to vindicate their nocturnal surprise of Platæa,
-by maintaining that they had been invited by the most respectable
-citizens of the town,<a id="FNanchor_436" href="#Footnote_436"
-class="fnanchor">[436]</a> who were anxious only to bring back
-Platæa from its alliance with a stranger to its natural Bœotian
-home,—and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263">[p. 263]</span> that
-they had abstained from anything like injurious treatment of the
-inhabitants, until constrained to use force in their own defence.
-They then reproached the Platæans, in their turn, with that breach
-of faith whereby ultimately the Theban prisoners in the town had
-been put to death. And while they excused their alliance with
-Xerxes, at the time of the Persian invasion, by affirming that
-Thebes was then under a dishonest party-oligarchy, who took this
-side for their own factious purposes, and carried the people with
-them by force,—they at the same time charged the Platæans with
-permanent treason against the Bœotian customs and brotherhood.<a
-id="FNanchor_437" href="#Footnote_437" class="fnanchor">[437]</a>
-All this was farther enforced by setting forth the claims of Thebes
-to the gratitude of Lacedæmon, both for having brought Bœotia into
-the Lacedæmonian alliance, at the time of the battle of Korôneia,
-and for having furnished so large a portion of the common force in
-the war then going on.<a id="FNanchor_438" href="#Footnote_438"
-class="fnanchor">[438]</a></p>
-
-<p>The discourse of the Thebans, inspired by bitter, and as yet
-unsatisfied hatred against Platæa, proved effectual: or rather
-it was superfluous,—the minds of the Lacedæmonians having before
-been made up. After the proposition twice made by Archidamus to
-the Platæans, inviting them to remain neutral, and even offering
-to guarantee their neutrality,—after the solemn apologetic protest
-tendered by him upon their refusal, to the gods, before he began the
-siege,—the Lacedæmonians conceived themselves exonerated from all
-obligation to respect the sanctity of the place;<a id="FNanchor_439"
-href="#Footnote_439" class="fnanchor">[439]</a> looking upon the
-inhabitants as having voluntarily renounced their inviolability and
-sealed their own ruin. Hence<span class="pagenum" id="Page_264">[p.
-264]</span> the importance attached to that protest, and the
-emphatic detail with which it is set forth in Thucydidês. The
-five judges, as their only reply to the two harangues, again
-called the Platæans before them, and repeated to every one of
-them individually, the same question which had before been put:
-each one of them, as he successively replied in the negative,<a
-id="FNanchor_440" href="#Footnote_440" class="fnanchor">[440]</a>
-was taken away and killed, together with the twenty-five Athenian
-prisoners. The women captured were sold as slaves: and the town and
-territory of Platæa were handed over to the Thebans, who at first
-established in them a few oligarchical Platæan exiles, together with
-some Megarian exiles,—but after a few months recalled this step,
-and blotted out Platæa,<a id="FNanchor_441" href="#Footnote_441"
-class="fnanchor">[441]</a> as a separate town and territory,
-from the muster-roll of Hellas. They pulled down all the private
-buildings and employed the materials to build a vast barrack all
-round the Heræum, or temple of Hêrê, two hundred feet in every
-direction, with apartments of two stories above and below; partly as
-accommodation for visitors to the temple, partly as an abode for the
-tenant-farmers or graziers who were to occupy the land. A new temple
-of one hundred feet in length, was also built in honor of Hêrê, and
-ornamented with couches, prepared from the brass and iron furniture
-found in the private houses of the Platæans.<a id="FNanchor_442"
-href="#Footnote_442" class="fnanchor">[442]</a> The Platæan territory
-was let out for ten years, as public property belonging to Thebes,
-and was hired by private Theban cultivators.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the melancholy fate of Platæa, after sustaining a
-blockade of about two years.<a id="FNanchor_443" href="#Footnote_443"
-class="fnanchor">[443]</a> Its identity and local traditions<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_265">[p. 265]</span> seemed thus
-extinguished, and the sacrifices, in honor of the deceased victors
-who had fought under Pausanias, suspended,—which the Platæan speakers
-had urged upon the Lacedæmonians as an impiety not to be tolerated,<a
-id="FNanchor_444" href="#Footnote_444" class="fnanchor">[444]</a>
-and which perhaps the latter would hardly have consented to
-under any other circumstances except from an anxious desire of
-conciliating the Thebans in their prominent antipathy. It is in
-this way that Thucydidês explains the conduct of Sparta, which he
-pronounces to have been rigorous in the extreme.<a id="FNanchor_445"
-href="#Footnote_445" class="fnanchor">[445]</a> And in truth it
-was more rigorous, considering only the principle of the case, and
-apart from the number of victims, than even the first unexecuted
-sentence of Athens against the Mitylenæans: for neither Sparta,
-nor even Thebes, had any fair pretence for considering Platæa as a
-revolted town, whereas Mitylênê was a city which had revolted under
-circumstances peculiarly offensive to Athens. Moreover, Sparta
-promised trial and justice to the Platæans on their surrender: Pachês
-promised nothing to the Mitylenæans, except that their fate should
-be reserved for the decision of the Athenian people. This little
-city—interesting from its Hellenic patriotism, its grateful and
-tenacious attachments, and its unmerited suffering—now existed only
-in the persons of its citizens harbored at Athens: we shall find it
-hereafter restored, destroyed again, and finally again restored:
-so checkered was the fate of a little Grecian state swept away by
-the contending politics of the greater neighbors. The slaughter
-of the twenty-five Athe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_266">[p.
-266]</span>nian prisoners, like that of Salæthus by the Athenians,
-was not beyond the rigor admitted and tolerated, though not always
-practised, on both sides, towards prisoners of war.</p>
-
-<p>We have now gone through the circumstances, painfully illustrating
-the manners of the age, which followed on the surrender of Mitylênê
-and Platæa. We next pass to the west of Greece,—the island of
-Korkyra,—where we shall find scenes not less bloody, and even more
-revolting.</p>
-
-<p>It has been already mentioned,<a id="FNanchor_446"
-href="#Footnote_446" class="fnanchor">[446]</a> that in the naval
-combats between the Corinthians and Korkyræans during the year
-before the Peloponnesian war, the former had captured two hundred
-and fifty Korkyræan prisoners, men of the first rank and consequence
-in the island. Instead of following the impulse of blind hatred in
-slaughtering their prisoners, the Corinthians displayed, if not
-greater humanity, at least a more long-sighted calculation: they had
-treated the prisoners well, and made every effort to gain them over,
-with a view of employing them on the first opportunity to effect a
-revolution in the island,—to bring it into alliance with Corinth,<a
-id="FNanchor_447" href="#Footnote_447" class="fnanchor">[447]</a>
-and disconnect it from Athens. Such an opportunity appears first to
-have occurred during the winter or spring of the present year, while
-both Mitylênê and Platæa were under blockade; probably about the
-time when Alkidas departed for Ionia, and when it was hoped that not
-only Mitylênê would be relieved, but the neighboring dependencies
-of Athens excited to revolt, and her whole attention thus occupied
-in that quarter. Accordingly, the Korkyræan prisoners were then
-sent home from Corinth, nominally under a heavy ransom of eight
-hundred talents, for which those Korkyræan citizens who acted as
-proxeni to Corinth made themselves responsible:<a id="FNanchor_448"
-href="#Footnote_448" class="fnanchor">[448]</a> the proxeni, lending
-themselves thus to the deception, were doubtless participant in the
-entire design.</p>
-
-<p>But it was soon seen in what form the ransom was really to
-be paid. The new-comers, probably at first heartily welcomed,
-after so long a detention, employed all their influence, combined
-with the most active personal canvass, to bring about a complete
-rupture of all alliance with Athens. Intimation being sent to<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_267">[p. 267]</span> Athens of what was
-going on, an Athenian trireme arrived with envoys to try and defeat
-these manœuvres; while a Corinthian trireme also brought envoys from
-Corinth to aid the views of the opposite party. The mere presence
-of Corinthian envoys indicated a change in the political feeling of
-the island: but still more conspicuous did this change become, when
-a formal public assembly, after hearing both envoys, decided,—that
-Korkyra would maintain her alliance with Athens according to the
-limited terms of simple mutual defence originally stipulated;<a
-id="FNanchor_449" href="#Footnote_449" class="fnanchor">[449]</a>
-but would at the same time be in relations of friendship with the
-Peloponnesians, as she had been before the Epidamnian quarrel. But
-the alliance between Athens and Korkyra had since become practically
-more intimate, and the Korkyræan fleet had aided the Athenians in the
-invasion of Peloponnesus:<a id="FNanchor_450" href="#Footnote_450"
-class="fnanchor">[450]</a> accordingly, the resolution, now adopted,
-abandoned the present to go back to the past,—and to a past which
-could not be restored.</p>
-
-<p>Looking to the war then raging between Athens and the
-Peloponnesians, such a declaration was self-contradictory: nor,
-indeed, did the oligarchical party intend it as anything else than
-a step to a more complete revolution, both foreign and domestic.
-They followed it up by a political prosecution against Peithias,
-the citizen of greatest personal influence among the people, who
-acted by his own choice as proxenus to the Athenians. They accused
-him of practising to bring Korkyra into slavery to Athens. What
-were the judicial institutions of the island, under which he was
-tried, we do not know: but he was acquitted of the charge; and he
-then revenged himself by accusing in his turn five of the richest
-among his oligarchical prosecutors, of the crime of sacrilege,—as
-having violated the sanctity of the sacred grove of Zeus and
-Alkinous, by causing stakes, for their vine-props, to be cut in it.<a
-id="FNanchor_451" href="#Footnote_451" class="fnanchor">[451]</a>
-This was an act distinctly forbidden by law, under<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_268">[p. 268]</span> penalty of a stater
-or four drachms for every stake so cut: but it is no uncommon
-phenomenon, even in societies politically better organized than
-Korkyra, to find laws existing and unrepealed, yet habitually
-violated, sometimes even by every one, but still oftener by men of
-wealth and power, whom most people would be afraid to prosecute:
-moreover, in this case, no individual was injured by the act, and
-any one who came forward to prosecute would incur the odium of an
-informer,—which probably Peithias might not have chosen to brave
-under ordinary circumstances, though he thought himself justified in
-adopting this mode of retaliation against those who had prosecuted
-him. The language of Thucydidês implies that the fact was not denied:
-nor is there any difficulty in conceiving that these rich men may
-have habitually resorted to the sacred property for vine-stakes. On
-being found guilty and condemned, they cast themselves as suppliants
-at the temples, and entreated the indulgence of being allowed to pay
-the fine by instalments: but Peithias, then a member of the (annual)
-senate, to whom the petition was referred, opposed it, and caused
-its rejection, leaving the law to take its course. It was moreover
-understood, that he was about to avail himself of his character of
-senator,—and of his increased favor, probably arising from the recent
-judicial acquittal,—to propose in the public assembly a reversal of
-the resolution recently passed, and a new resolution to recognize
-only the same friends and the same enemies as Athens.</p>
-
-<p>Pressed by the ruinous fine upon the five persons condemned,
-as well as by the fear that Peithias might carry his point and
-thus completely defeat their project of Corinthian alliance, the
-oligarchical party resolved to carry their point by violence and
-murder. They collected a party armed with daggers, burst sud<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_269">[p. 269]</span>denly into the
-senate-house during full sitting, and there slew Peithias with
-sixty other persons, partly senators, partly private individuals:
-some others of his friends escaped the same fate by getting
-aboard the Attic trireme which had brought the envoys, and which
-was still in the harbor, but now departed forthwith to Athens.
-These assassins, under the fresh terror arising from their recent
-act, convoked an assembly, affirmed that what they had done was
-unavoidable to guard Korkyra against being made the slave of
-Athens, and proposed a resolution of full neutrality, both towards
-Athens and towards the Peloponnesians,—to receive no visit from
-either of the belligerents, except of a pacific character, and with
-one single ship at a time. And this resolution the assembly was
-constrained to pass,—it probably was not very numerous, and the
-oligarchical partisans were at hand in arms.<a id="FNanchor_452"
-href="#Footnote_452" class="fnanchor">[452]</a> At the same time
-they sent envoys to Athens, to communicate the recent events with
-such coloring as suited their views, and to dissuade the fugitive
-partisans of Peithias from provoking any armed Athenian intervention,
-such as might occasion a counter-revolution in the island.<a
-id="FNanchor_453" href="#Footnote_453" class="fnanchor">[453]</a>
-With some of the fugitives, representations of this sort, or perhaps
-the fear of compromising their own families, left behind, prevailed:
-but most of them, and the Athenians along with them, appreciated
-better both what had been done, and what was likely to follow. The
-oligarchical envoys, together with such of the fugitives as had
-been induced to adopt their views, were seized by the Athenians as
-conspirators, and placed in detention at Ægina; while a fleet of
-sixty Athenian triremes, under Eurymedon, was immediately fitted
-out to sail for Korkyra,—for which there was the greater necessity,
-as the Lacedæmonian fleet, under Alkidas, lately mustered at
-Kyllênê after its return from Ionia, was understood to be on the
-point of sailing thither.<a id="FNanchor_454" href="#Footnote_454"
-class="fnanchor">[454]</a></p>
-
-<p>But the oligarchical leaders at Korkyra knew better than to rely
-on the chances of this mission to Athens, and proceeded in<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_270">[p. 270]</span> the execution of
-their conspiracy with that rapidity which was best calculated to
-insure its success. On the arrival of a Corinthian trireme, which
-brought ambassadors from Sparta, and probably also brought news that
-the fleet of Alkidas would shortly appear,—they organized their
-force, and attacked the people and the democratical authorities.
-The Korkyræan Demos were at first vanquished and dispersed; but
-during the night they collected together and fortified themselves
-in the upper parts of the town near the acropolis, and from thence
-down to the Hyllaic harbor, one of the two harbors which the town
-possessed; while the other harbor and the chief arsenal, facing the
-mainland of Epirus, was held by the oligarchical party, together
-with the market-place near to it, in and around which the wealthier
-Korkyræans chiefly resided. In this divided state the town remained
-throughout the ensuing day, during which the Demos sent emissaries
-round the territory soliciting aid from the working slaves, and
-promising to them emancipation as a reward; while the oligarchy
-also hired and procured eight hundred Epirotic mercenaries from
-the mainland. Reinforced by the slaves, who flocked in at the
-call received, the Demos renewed the struggle on the morrow, more
-furiously than before. Both in position and numbers they had the
-advantage over the oligarchy, and the intense resolution with which
-they fought communicated itself even to the women, who, braving
-danger and tumult, took active part in the combat, especially by
-flinging tiles from the housetops. Towards the afternoon, the people
-became decidedly victorious, and were even on the point of carrying
-by assault the lower town, together with the neighboring arsenal,
-both held by the oligarchy,—nor had the latter any other chance
-of safety except the desperate resource of setting fire to that
-part of the town, with the market-place, houses, and buildings all
-around it, their own among the rest. This proceeding drove back the
-assailants, but destroyed much property belonging to merchants in
-the warehouses, together with a large part of the town: indeed, had
-the wind been favorable the entire town would have been consumed.
-The people being thus victorious, the Corinthian trireme, together
-with most of the Epirotic mercenaries, thought it safer to leave the
-island; while the victors were still farther strengthened on the
-ensuing morning by the arrival of the Athenian<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_271">[p. 271]</span> admiral Nikostratus, with twelve
-triremes from Naupaktus,<a id="FNanchor_455" href="#Footnote_455"
-class="fnanchor">[455]</a> and five hundred Messenian hoplites.</p>
-
-<p>Nikostratus did his best to allay the furious excitement
-prevailing, and to persuade the people to use their victory with
-moderation. Under his auspices, a convention of amnesty and peace was
-concluded between the contending parties, save only ten proclaimed
-individuals of the most violent oligarchs, who were to be tried
-as ringleaders: these men of course soon disappeared, so that
-there would have been no trial at all, which seems to have been
-what Nikostratus desired. At the same time an alliance offensive
-and defensive was established between Korkyra and Athens, and the
-Athenian admiral was then on the point of departing, when the
-Korkyræan leaders entreated him to leave with them, for greater
-safety, five ships out of his little fleet of twelve,—offering
-him five of their own triremes instead. Notwithstanding the peril
-of this proposition to himself, Nikostratus acceded to it, and
-the Korkyræans, preparing the five ships to be sent along with
-him, began to enroll among the crews the names of their principal
-enemies. To the latter this presented the appearance of sending
-them to Athens, which they accounted a sentence of death. Under
-this impression they took refuge as suppliants in the temple of
-the Dioskuri, where Nikostratus went to visit them and tried to
-reassure them by the promise that nothing was intended against
-their personal safety. But he found it impossible to satisfy them,
-and as they persisted in refusing to serve, the Korkyræan Demos
-began to suspect treachery. They took arms again, searched the
-houses of the recusants for arms, and were bent on putting some
-of them to death, if Nikostratus had not taken them under his
-protection. The principal men of the defeated party, to the number
-of about four hundred, now took sanctuary in the temple and sacred
-ground of Hêrê; and the leaders of the people, afraid that in this
-inviolable position they might still cause further insurrection
-in the city, opened a negotiation and prevailed upon them to be
-ferried across to the little island immediately opposite to the
-Heræum; where they were kept under watch, with provisions regularly
-transmitted across to them, for four days.<a id="FNanchor_456"
-href="#Footnote_456" class="fnanchor">[456]</a></p> <p><span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_272">[p. 272]</span></p> <p>At the end
-of these four days, while the uneasiness of the popular leaders
-still continued, and Nikostratus still adjourned his departure,
-a new phase opened in this melancholy drama. The Peloponnesian
-fleet under Alkidas arrived at the road of Sybota on the opposite
-mainland,—fifty-three triremes in number, for the forty triremes
-brought back from Ionia had been reinforced by thirteen more from
-Leukas and Ambrakia, and the Lacedæmonians had sent down Brasidas
-as advising companion,—himself worth more than the new thirteen
-triremes, if he had been sent to supersede Alkidas, instead of
-bringing nothing but authority to advise.<a id="FNanchor_457"
-href="#Footnote_457" class="fnanchor">[457]</a> Despising the small
-squadron of Nikostratus, then at Naupaktus, they were only anxious to
-deal with Korkyra before reinforcements should arrive from Athens:
-but the repairs necessary for the ships of Alkidas, after their
-disastrous voyage home, occasioned an unfortunate delay. When the
-Peloponnesian fleet was seen approaching from Sybota at break of
-day, the confusion in Korkyra was unspeakable: the Demos and the
-newly-emancipated slaves were agitated alike by the late terrible
-combat and by fear of the invaders,—the oligarchical party, though
-defeated, was still present and forming a considerable minority, and
-the town was half burnt. Amidst such elements of trouble, there was
-little authority to command, and still less confidence or willingness
-to obey. Plenty of triremes were indeed at hand, and orders were
-given to man sixty of them forthwith,—while Nikostratus, the only man
-who preserved the cool courage necessary for effective resistance,
-entreated the Korkyræan leaders to proceed with regularity, and to
-wait till all were manned, so as to sail forth from the harbor in
-a body. He offered himself with his twelve Athenian triremes to go
-forth first alone, and occupy the Peloponnesian fleet, until the
-Korkyræan sixty triremes could all come out in full array to support
-him. He accordingly went forth with his squadron; but the Korkyræans,
-instead of following his advice, sent their ships out one by one and
-without any selection of crews. Two of them deserted forthwith to the
-enemy, while others presented the spectacle of crews fighting among
-themselves; even those which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_273">[p.
-273]</span> actually joined battle came up by single ships, without
-the least order or concert.</p>
-
-<p>The Peloponnesians, soon seeing that they had little to fear from
-such enemies, thought it sufficient to set twenty of their ships
-against the Korkyræans, while with the remaining thirty-three they
-moved forward to contend with the twelve Athenians. Nikostratus,
-having plenty of sea-room, was not afraid of this numerical
-superiority,—the more so, as two of his twelve triremes were the
-picked vessels of the Athenian navy,—the Salaminia and the Paralus.<a
-id="FNanchor_458" href="#Footnote_458" class="fnanchor">[458]</a>
-He took care to avoid entangling himself with the centre of the
-enemy, and to keep rowing about their flanks; and as he presently
-contrived to disable one of their ships, by a fortunate blow with
-the beak of one of his vessels, the Peloponnesians, instead of
-attacking him with their superior numbers, formed themselves into
-a circle and stood on the defensive, as they had done in the first
-combat with Phormio in the middle of the strait at Rhium. Nikostratus
-(like Phormio) rowed round this circle, trying to cause confusion by
-feigned approach, and waiting to see some of the ships lose their
-places or run foul of each other, so as to afford him an opening
-for attack. And he might perhaps have succeeded, if the remaining
-twenty Peloponnesian ships, seeing the proceeding, and recollecting
-with dismay the success of a similar manœuvre in the former battle,
-had not quitted the Korkyræan ships, whose disorderly condition they
-despised, and hastened to join their comrades. The whole fleet of
-fifty-three triremes now again took the aggressive, and advanced to
-attack Nikostratus, who retreated before them, but backing astern and
-keeping the head of his ships towards the enemy. In this manner he
-succeeded in drawing them away from the town, so as to leave to most
-of the Korkyræan ships opportunity for getting back to the harbor;
-while such was the superior manœuvring of the Athenian triremes,
-that the Peloponnesians were never able to come up with him or force
-him to action. They returned back in the evening to Sybota, with no
-greater triumph<span class="pagenum" id="Page_274">[p. 274]</span>
-than their success against the Korkyræans, thirteen of whose triremes
-they carried away as prizes.<a id="FNanchor_459" href="#Footnote_459"
-class="fnanchor">[459]</a></p>
-
-<p>It was the expectation in Korkyra, that they would on the morrow
-make a direct attack—which could hardly have failed of success—on the
-town and harbor; and we may easily believe (what report afterwards
-stated), that Brasidas advised Alkidas to this decisive proceeding.
-And the Korkyræan leaders, more terrified than ever, first removed
-their prisoners from the little island to the Heræum, and then tried
-to come to a compromise with the oligarchical party generally,
-for the purpose of organizing some effective and united defence.
-Thirty triremes were made ready and manned, wherein some even of the
-oligarchical Korkyræans were persuaded to form part of the crews.
-But the slackness of Alkidas proved their best defence: instead of
-coming straight to the town, he contented himself with landing in
-the island at some distance from it, on the promontory of Leukimnê:
-after ravaging the neighboring lands for some hours, he returned to
-his station at Sybota. He had lost an opportunity which never again
-returned: for on the very same night the fire-signals of Leukas
-telegraphed to him the approach of the fleet under Eurymedon from
-Athens,—sixty triremes. His only thought was now for the escape of
-the Peloponnesian fleet, which was in fact saved by this telegraphic
-notice. Advantage was taken of the darkness to retire close along
-the land as far as the isthmus which separates Leukas from the
-mainland,—across which isthmus the ships were dragged by hand or
-machinery, so that they might not fall in with or be descried by
-the Athenian fleet in sailing round the Leukadian promontory.
-From hence Alkidas made the best of his way home to Peloponnesus,
-leaving the Korkyræan oligarchs to their fate.<a id="FNanchor_460"
-href="#Footnote_460" class="fnanchor">[460]</a></p>
-
-<p>That fate was deplorable in the extreme. The arrival of
-Eurymedon opens a third unexpected transition in this checkered
-narrative,—the Korkyræan Demos passing, abruptly and unexpectedly,
-from intense alarm and helplessness to elate and irresistible
-mastery. In the bosom of Greeks, and in a population seemingly
-amongst the least refined of all Greeks,—including too a great many
-slaves just emancipated against the will of<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_275">[p. 275]</span> their masters, and of course the
-fiercest and most discontented of all the slaves in the island,—such
-a change was but too sure to kindle a thirst for revenge almost
-ungovernable, as the only compensation for foregone terror and
-suffering. As soon as the Peloponnesian fleet was known to have
-fled, and that of Eurymedon was seen approaching, the Korkyræan
-leaders brought into the town the five hundred Messenian hoplites
-who had hitherto been encamped without; thus providing a resource
-against any last effort of despair on the part of their interior
-enemies. Next, the thirty ships recently manned,—and held ready, in
-the harbor facing the continent, to go out against the Peloponnesian
-fleet, but now no longer needed, were ordered to sail round to the
-other or Hyllaic harbor. Even while they were thus sailing round,
-some obnoxious men of the defeated party, being seen in public, were
-slain: but when the ships arrived at the Hyllaic harbor, and the
-crews were disembarked, a more wholesale massacre was perpetrated, by
-singling out those individuals of the oligarchical faction who had
-been persuaded on the day before to go aboard as part of the crews,
-and putting them to death.<a id="FNanchor_461" href="#Footnote_461"
-class="fnanchor">[461]</a> Then came the fate of those suppliants,
-about four hundred in number, who had been brought back from the
-islet opposite, and were yet under sanctuary in the sacred precinct
-of the Heræum. It was proposed to them to quit sanctuary and stand
-their trial; and fifty of them having accepted the proposition, were
-put on their trial,—all condemned, and all executed. Their execution
-took place, as it seems, immediately on the spot, and within actual
-view of the unhappy men still remaining in the sacred ground;<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_276">[p. 276]</span><a id="FNanchor_462"
-href="#Footnote_462" class="fnanchor">[462]</a> who, seeing that
-their lot was desperate, preferred dying by their own hands to
-starvation or the sword of their enemies. Some hung themselves on
-branches of the trees surrounding the temple, others helped their
-friends in the work of suicide, and, in one way or another, the
-entire band thus perished: it was probably a consolation to them to
-believe, that this desecration of the precinct would bring down the
-anger of the gods upon their surviving enemies.</p>
-
-<p>Eurymedon remained with his fleet for seven days, during all which
-time the victorious Korkyræans carried on a sanguinary persecution
-against the party who had been concerned in the late oligarchical
-revolution. Five hundred of this party contrived to escape by flight
-to the mainland; while those who did not, or could not flee, were
-slain wherever they could be found. Some received their death-wounds
-even on the altar itself,—others shared the same fate, after having
-been dragged away from it by violence. In one case, a party of
-murderers having pursued their victims to the temple of Dionysius,
-refrained from shedding their blood, but built up the doorway and
-left them to starve; as the Lacedæmonians had done on a former
-occasion respecting Pausanias. Such was the ferocity of the time,
-that in one case a father slew his own son. Nor was it merely the
-oligarchical party who thus suffered: the floodgates of private feud
-were also opened, and various individuals, under false charges of
-having been concerned in the oligarchical movements, were slain by
-personal enemies or debtors. This deplorable suspension of legal, as
-well as moral restraints, continued during the week of Eurymedon’s
-stay,—a period long enough to satiate the fierce sentiment out
-of which it arose;<a id="FNanchor_463" href="#Footnote_463"
-class="fnanchor">[463]</a> yet without any apparent effort on his
-part to soften the victors or protect the vanquished. We shall
-see farther reason hereafter to appreciate the baseness and want
-of humanity in his character: but had Nikostratus remained in
-command, we may fairly presume, judging by what he had done in the
-earlier part of the sedition, with very inferior force, that he
-would have set much earlier limits to the Kor<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_277">[p. 277]</span>kyræan butchery: unfortunately,
-Thucydidês tells us nothing at all about Nikostratus, after the naval
-battle of the preceding day.<a id="FNanchor_464" href="#Footnote_464"
-class="fnanchor">[464]</a></p>
-
-<p>We should have been glad to hear something about the steps taken
-in the way of restoration or healing, after this burst of murderous
-fury, in which doubtless the newly-emancipated slaves were not
-the most backward, and after the departure of Eurymedon. But here
-again Thucydidês disappoints our curiosity. We only hear from him,
-that the oligarchical exiles who had escaped to the mainland were
-strong enough to get possession of the forts and most part of the
-territory there belonging to Korkyra; just as the exiles from Samos
-and Mitylênê became more or less completely masters of the Peræa
-or mainland possessions belonging to those islands. They even sent
-envoys to Corinth and Sparta, in hopes of procuring aid to accomplish
-their restoration by force, but their request found no favor, and
-they were reduced to their own resources. After harassing for some
-time the Korkyræans in the island by predatory incursions, so as to
-produce considerable dearth and distress, they at length collected a
-band of Epirotic mercenaries, passed over to the island, and<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_278">[p. 278]</span> there established a
-fortified position on the mountain called Istônê, not far from the
-city. They burned their vessels in order to cut off all hopes of
-retreat, and maintained themselves for near two years on a system
-of ravage and plunder which inflicted great misery on the island.<a
-id="FNanchor_465" href="#Footnote_465" class="fnanchor">[465]</a>
-This was a frequent way whereby, of old, invaders wore out and
-mastered a city, the walls of which they found impregnable. The
-ultimate fate of these occupants of Istônê, which belongs to a <a
-href="#Istone">future chapter</a>, will be found to constitute a
-close suitable to the bloody drama yet unfinished in Korkyra.</p>
-
-<p>Such a drama could not be acted, in an important city belonging
-to the Greek name, without producing a deep and extensive impression
-throughout all the other cities. And Thucydidês has taken advantage
-of it to give a sort of general sketch of Grecian politics during
-the Peloponnesian war; violence of civil discord in each city,
-aggravated by foreign war, and by the contending efforts of Athens
-and Sparta,—the former espousing the democratical party everywhere;
-the latter, the oligarchical. The Korkyræan sedition was the
-first case in which these two causes of political antipathy and
-exasperation were seen acting with full united force, and where
-the malignity of sentiment and demoralization flowing from such an
-union was seen without disguise. The picture drawn by Thucydidês,
-of moral and political feeling under these influences, will ever
-remain memorable as the work of an analyst and a philosopher: he
-has conceived and described the perverting causes with a spirit
-of generalization which renders these two chapters hardly less
-applicable to other political societies, far distant both in time and
-place,—especially, under many points of view, to France between 1789
-and 1799,—than to Greece in the fifth century before the Christian
-era. The deadly bitterness infused into intestine party contests
-by the accompanying dangers of foreign war and intervention of
-foreign enemies,—the mutual fears between political rivals, where
-each thinks that the other will forestall him in striking a mortal
-blow, and where constitutional maxims have ceased to carry authority
-either as restraint or as protection,—the superior popularity of
-the man who is most forward with the sword, or who runs down<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_279">[p. 279]</span> his enemies in the
-most unmeasured language, coupled with the disposition to treat
-both prudence in action and candor in speech as if it were nothing
-but treachery or cowardice,—the exclusive regard to party ends,
-with the reckless adoption, and even admiring preference, of fraud
-or violence as the most effectual means,—the loss of respect for
-legal authority, as well as of confidence in private agreement,
-and the surrender even of blood and friendship to the overruling
-ascendency of party-ties,—the perversion of ordinary morality,
-bringing with it altered signification of all the common words
-importing blame or approbation,—the unnatural predominance of the
-ambitious and contentious passions, overpowering in men’s minds
-all real public objects, and equalizing for the time the better
-and the worse cause, by taking hold of democracy on one side and
-aristocracy on the other as mere pretences to sanctify personal
-triumph,—all these gloomy social phenomena, here indicated by the
-historian, have their causes deeply seated in the human mind, and
-are likely, unless the bases of constitutional morality shall come
-to be laid more surely and firmly than they have hitherto been, to
-recur from time to time, under diverse modifications, “so long as
-human nature shall be the same as it is now,” to use the language
-of Thucydidês himself.<a id="FNanchor_466" href="#Footnote_466"
-class="fnanchor">[466]</a> He has described, with fidelity not<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_280">[p. 280]</span> inferior to his sketch
-of the pestilence at Athens, the symptoms of a certain morbid
-political condition, wherein the vehemence<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_281">[p. 281]</span> of intestine conflict, instead of being
-kept within such limits as consists with the maintenance of one
-society among the contending parties, becomes for the time inflamed
-and poisoned with all the unscrupulous hostility of foreign war,
-chiefly from actual alliance between parties within the state and
-foreigners without. In following the impressive description of the
-historian, we have to keep in mind the general state of manners in
-his time, especially the cruelties tolerated by the laws of war, as
-compared with that greater humanity and respect for life which has
-grown up during the last two centuries in modern Europe. And we have
-farther to recollect that if he had been describing the effects of
-political fury among Carthaginians and Jews, instead of among his
-contemporary Greeks, he would have added to his list of horrors
-mutilation, crucifixion, and other refinements on simple murder.</p>
-
-<p>The language of Thucydidês is to be taken rather as a
-generalization and concentration of phenomena which he had observed
-among different communities, rather than as belonging altogether to
-any one of them. Nor are we to believe—what a superficial reading
-of his opening words might at first suggest—that the bloodshed in
-Korkyra was only the earliest, but by no means the worst, of a series
-of similar horrors spread over the Grecian world. The facts stated
-in his own history suffice to show that though the same causes
-which worked upon this unfortunate island became disseminated, and
-produced analogous mischiefs throughout many other communities,
-yet the case of Korkyra, as it was the first, so it was also the
-worst and most aggravated in point of intensity. Fortunately, the
-account of Thucydidês enables us to understand it from beginning
-to end, and to appreciate the degree of guilt of the various
-parties implicated, which we can seldom do with certainty; because
-when once the interchange of violence has begun, the feelings
-arising out of the contest itself presently overpower in the minds
-of both parties the original cause of dispute, as well as all
-scruples<span class="pagenum" id="Page_282">[p. 282]</span> as to
-fitness of means. Unjustifiable acts in abundance are committed by
-both, and in comparing the two, we are often obliged to employ the
-emphatic language which Tacitus uses respecting Otho and Vitellius:
-“Deteriorem fore, quisquis vicisset;” of two bad men, all that the
-Roman world could foresee was, that the victor, whichsoever he was,
-would prove the worst.</p>
-
-<p>But in regard to the Korkyræan revolution, we can arrive at a more
-discriminating criticism. We see that it is from the beginning the
-work of a selfish oligarchical party, playing the game of a foreign
-enemy, and the worst and most ancient enemy of the island,—aiming to
-subvert the existing democracy and acquire power for themselves, and
-ready to employ any measure of fraud or violence for the attainment
-of these objects. While the democracy which they attack is purely
-defensive and conservative, the oligarchical movers, having tried
-fair means in vain, are the first to employ foul means, which
-latter they find retorted with greater effect against themselves.
-They set the example of judicial prosecution against Peithias, for
-the destruction of a political antagonist; in the use of this same
-weapon, he proves more than a match for them, and employs it to their
-ruin. Next, they pass to the use of the dagger in the senate-house,
-against him and his immediate fellow-leaders, and to the wholesale
-application of the sword against the democracy generally. The
-Korkyræan Demos are thus thrown upon the defensive, and instead of
-the affections of ordinary life, all the most intense anti-social
-sentiments,—fear, pugnacity, hatred, vengeance, obtain unqualified
-possession of their bosoms; exaggerated too through the fluctuations
-of victory and defeat successively brought by Nikostratus, Alkidas,
-and Eurymedon. Their conduct as victors is such as we should expect
-under such maddening circumstances, from coarse men, mingled with
-liberated slaves: it is vindictive and murderous in the extreme, not
-without faithless breach of assurances given. But we must remember
-that they are driven to stand upon their defence, and that all their
-energies are indispensable to make that defence successful. They
-are provoked by an aggression no less guilty in the end than in
-the means,—an aggression, too, the more gratuitous, because, if we
-look at the state of the island at the time when the oligarchical
-captives<span class="pagenum" id="Page_283">[p. 283]</span> were
-restored from Corinth, there was no pretence for affirming that it
-had suffered, or was suffering, any loss, hardship, or disgrace, from
-its alliance with Athens. These oligarchical insurgents find the
-island in a state of security and tranquillity,—since the war imposed
-upon it little necessity for effort,—they plunge it into a sea of
-blood, with enormities as well as suffering on both sides, which end
-at length in their own complete extermination. Our compassion for
-their final misery must not hinder us from appreciating the behavior
-whereby it was earned.</p>
-
-<p>In the course of a few years from this time, we shall have
-occasion to recount two political movements in Athens, similar in
-principle and general result to this Korkyræan revolution; exhibiting
-oligarchical conspirators against an existing and conservative
-democracy, with this conspiracy at first successful, but afterwards
-put down, and the Demos again restored. The contrast between
-Athens and Korkyra, under such circumstances, will be found highly
-instructive, especially in regard to the Demos, both in the hours of
-defeat and in those of victory. It will then be seen how much the
-habit of active participation in political and judicial affairs,—of
-open, conflicting discussion, discharging the malignant passions
-by way of speech, and followed by appeal to the vote,—of having
-constantly present, to the mind of every citizen, in his character of
-dikast or ekklesiast, the conditions of a pacific society, and the
-paramount authority of a constitutional majority,—how much all these
-circumstances, brought home as they were at Athens more than in any
-other democracy to the feelings of individuals, contributed to soften
-the instincts of intestine violence and revenge, even under very
-great provocation.</p>
-
-<p>But the case of Korkyra, as well as that of Athens, different
-in so many respects, conspire to illustrate another truth, of much
-importance in Grecian history. Both of them show how false and
-impudent were the pretensions set up by the rich and great men of the
-various Grecian cities, to superior morality, superior intelligence,
-and greater fitness for using honorably and beneficially the powers
-of government, as compared with the mass of the citizens. Though
-the Grecian oligarchies, exercising powerful sway over fashion,
-and more especially over the meaning of<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_284">[p. 284]</span> words, bestowed upon themselves the
-appellation of “the best men, the honorable and good, the elegant,
-the superior,” etc., and attached to those without their own circle
-epithets of a contrary tenor, implying low moral attributes,—no such
-difference will be found borne out by the facts of Grecian history.<a
-id="FNanchor_467" href="#Footnote_467" class="fnanchor">[467]</a>
-Abundance of infirmity, with occasional bad passions, was doubtless
-liable to work upon the people generally, often corrupting and
-misguiding even the Athenian democracy, the best apparently of all
-the democracies in Greece. But after all, the rich and great men
-were only a part of the people, and taking them as a class, apart
-from honorable individual exceptions, by no means the best part. If
-exempted by their position from some of the vices which beset smaller
-and poorer men, they imbibed from that same position an unmeasured
-self-importance, and an excess of personal ambition as well as of
-personal appetite, peculiar to themselves, not less anti-social in
-tendency, and operating upon a much grander scale. To the prejudices
-and superstitions belonging to the age, they were noway superior,
-considering them as a class; while their animosities among one
-another, virulent and unscrupulous, were among the foremost causes
-of misfortune in Grecian commonwealth,—and indeed many of the most
-exceptionable acts committed by the democracies, consisted in their
-allowing themselves to be made the tools of one aristocrat for the
-ruin of another. Of the intense party-selfishness which characterized
-them as a body, sometimes exaggerated into the strongest
-anti-popular antipathy, as we see in the famous oligarchical oath
-cited by Aristotle,<a id="FNanchor_468" href="#Footnote_468"
-class="fnanchor">[468]</a> we shall find many illustrations as we
-advance in the history, but none more striking than this Korkyræan
-revolution.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_51">
-  <p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_285">[p. 285]</span></p>
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER LI.<br />
-    FROM THE TROUBLES IN KORKYRA, IN THE FIFTH YEAR OF THE
-    PELOPONNESIAN WAR, DOWN TO THE END OF THE SIXTH YEAR.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">About</span> the same time as
-the troubles of Korkyra occurred, Nikias, the Athenian general,
-conducted an armament against the rocky island of Minôa, which
-lay at the mouth of the harbor of Megara, and was occupied by a
-Megarian fort and garrison. The narrow channel, which separated
-it from the Megarian port of Nisæa, and formed the entrance of
-the harbor, was defended by two towers projecting out from Nisæa,
-which Nikias attacked and destroyed by means of battering machines
-from his ships. He thus cut off Minôa from communication on that
-side with the Megarians, and fortified it on the other side, where
-it communicated with the mainland by a lagoon bridged over with
-a causeway. Minôa, thus becoming thoroughly insulated, was more
-completely fortified and made an Athenian possession; since it was
-eminently convenient to keep up an effective blockade against the
-Megarian harbor, which the Athenians had hitherto done only from the
-opposite shore of Salamis.<a id="FNanchor_469" href="#Footnote_469"
-class="fnanchor">[469]</a></p>
-
-<p>Though Nikias, son of Nikeratus, had been for some time
-conspicuous in public life, and is said to have been more than
-once stratêgus along with Periklês, this is the first occasion on
-which Thucydidês introduces him to our notice. He was now one of
-the stratêgi, or generals of the commonwealth, and appears to have
-enjoyed, on the whole, a greater and more constant personal esteem
-than any citizen of Athens, from the present time down to his
-death. In wealth and in family he ranked among the first class of
-Athenians: in political character, Aristotle placed him, together
-with Thucydidês son of Melêsias and Theramenês, above all other
-names in Athenian history,—seemingly even<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_286">[p. 286]</span> above Periklês.<a id="FNanchor_470"
-href="#Footnote_470" class="fnanchor">[470]</a> Such a criticism,
-from Aristotle, deserves respectful attention, though the facts
-before us completely belie so lofty an estimate. It marks, however,
-the position occupied by Nikias in Athenian politics, as the
-principal person of what maybe called the oligarchical party,
-succeeding Kimon and Thucydidês, and preceding Theramenês. In looking
-to the conditions under which this party continued to subsist, we
-shall see that, during the interval between Thucydidês (son of
-Melêsias) and Nikias, the democratical forms had acquired such
-confirmed ascendency, that it would not have suited the purpose of
-any politician to betray evidence of positive hostility to them,
-prior to the Sicilian expedition, and the great embarrassment in the
-foreign relations of Athens which arose out of that disaster. After
-that change, the Athenian oligarchs became emboldened and aggressive,
-so that we shall find Theramenês among the chief conspirators in
-the revolution of the Four Hundred: but Nikias represents the
-oligarchical party in its previous state of quiescence and torpidity,
-accommodating itself to a sovereign democracy, and existing in the
-form of common sentiment rather than of common purposes. And it is a
-remarkable illustration of the real temper of the Athenian people,
-that a man of this character, known as an oligarch but not feared
-as such, and doing his duty sincerely to the democracy, should have
-remained until his death the most esteemed and influential man in
-the city. He was a man of a sort of even mediocrity, in intellect,
-in education, and in oratory: forward in his military duties, and
-not only personally courageous in the field, but also competent
-as a general under ordinary circumstances:<a id="FNanchor_471"
-href="#Footnote_471" class="fnanchor">[471]</a> assiduous in the
-discharge of all political duties at home, especially in the post
-of stratêgus, or one of the ten generals of the state, to which he
-was frequently chosen and rechosen. Of the many valuable qualities
-combined in his predecessor Periklês, the recollection of whom was
-yet fresh in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_287">[p. 287]</span>
-the Athenian mind, Nikias possessed two, on which, most of all his
-influence rested,—though, properly speaking, that influence belongs
-to the sum total of his character, and not to any special attributes
-in it: First, he was thoroughly incorruptible, as to pecuniary
-gains,—a quality so rare in Grecian public men of all the cities,
-that when a man once became notorious for possessing it, he acquired
-a greater degree of trust than any superiority of intellect could
-have bestowed upon him: next, he adopted the Periklêan view as to
-the necessity of a conservative or stationary foreign policy for
-Athens, and of avoiding new acquisitions at a distance, adventurous
-risks, or provocation to fresh enemies. With this important point of
-analogy, there were at the same time material differences between
-them, even in regard to foreign policy. Periklês was a conservative,
-resolute against submitting to loss or abstraction of empire,
-as well as refraining from aggrandizement: Nikias was in policy
-faint-hearted, averse to energetic effort for any purpose whatever,
-and disposed, not only to maintain peace, but even to purchase it by
-considerable sacrifices. Nevertheless, he was the leading champion
-of the conservative party of his day, always powerful at Athens: and
-as he was constantly familiar with the details and actual course
-of public affairs, capable of giving full effect to the cautious
-and prudential point of view, and enjoying unqualified credit for
-honest purposes,—his value as a permanent counsellor was steadily
-recognized, even though in particular cases his counsel might not be
-followed.</p>
-
-<p>Besides these two main points, which Nikias had in common with
-Periklês, he was perfect in the use of those minor and collateral
-modes of standing well with the people, which that great man had
-taken little pains to practise. While Periklês attached himself
-to Aspasia, whose splendid qualities did not redeem, in the eyes
-of the public, either her foreign origin or her unchastity, the
-domestic habits of Nikias appear to have been strictly conformable
-to the rules of Athenian decorum. Periklês was surrounded by
-philosophers, Nikias by prophets,—whose advice was necessary both as
-a consolation to his temperament, and as a guide to his intelligence
-under difficulties; one of them was constantly in his service and
-confidence, and his conduct appears to have been sensibly affected
-by the difference of character between<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_288">[p. 288]</span> one prophet and another,<a
-id="FNanchor_472" href="#Footnote_472" class="fnanchor">[472]</a>
-just as the government of Louis the Fourteenth, and other Catholic
-princes, has been modified by the change of confessors. To a life
-thus rigidly decorous and ultra-religious—both eminently acceptable
-to the Athenians—Nikias added the judicious employment of a large
-fortune with a view to popularity. Those liturgies—or expensive
-public duties undertaken by rich men each in his turn, throughout
-other cities of Greece as well as in Athens—which fell to his lot
-were performed with such splendor, munificence, and good taste,
-as to procure for him universal encomiums; and so much above his
-predecessors as to be long remembered and extolled. Most of these
-liturgies were connected with the religious service of the state,
-so that Nikias, by his manner of performing them, displayed his
-zeal for the honor of the gods at the same time that he laid up for
-himself a store of popularity. Moreover, the remarkable caution
-and timidity—not before an enemy, but in reference to his own
-fellow-citizens—which marked his character, rendered him preëminently
-scrupulous as to giving offence or making personal enemies. While
-his demeanor towards the poorer citizens generally was equal and
-conciliating, the presents which he made were numerous, both to gain
-friends and to silence assailants. We are not surprised to hear that
-various bullies, whom the comic writers turn to scorn, made their
-profit out of this susceptibility,—but most assuredly Nikias as a
-public man, though he might occasionally be cheated out of money, was
-greatly assisted by the reputation which he thus acquired.</p>
-
-<p>The expenses unavoidable in such a career, combined with strict
-personal honesty, could not have been defrayed except by another
-quality, which ought not to count as discreditable to Nikias,
-though in this too he stood distinguished from Periklês. He was
-a careful and diligent money-getter; a speculator in the silver
-mines of Laurium, and proprietor of one thousand slaves, whom
-he let out for work in them, receiving a fixed sum per head for
-each: the superintending slaves who managed the details of<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_289">[p. 289]</span> this business were
-men of great ability and high pecuniary value.<a id="FNanchor_473"
-href="#Footnote_473" class="fnanchor">[473]</a> Most of the wealth
-of Nikias was held in this form, and not in landed property. Judging
-by what remains to us of the comic authors, this must have been
-considered as a perfectly gentlemanlike way of making money: for
-while they abound with derision of the leather-dresser Kleon, the
-lamp-maker Hyperbolus, and the vegetable-selling mother to whom
-Euripidês owes his birth, we hear nothing from them in disparagement
-of the slave-letter Nikias. The degree to which the latter was thus
-occupied with the care of his private fortune, together with the
-general moderation of his temper, made him often wish to abstract
-himself from public duty: but such unambitious reluctance, rare
-among the public men of the day, rather made the Athenians more
-anxious to put him forward and retain his services. In the eyes of
-the Pentakosiomedimni and the Hippeis, the two richest classes in
-Athens, he was one of themselves,—and on the whole, the best man, as
-being so little open to reproach or calumny, whom they could oppose
-to the leather-dressers and lamp-makers who often out-talked them in
-the public assembly. The hoplites, who despised Kleon,—and did not
-much regard even the brave, hardy, and soldierlike Lamachus, because
-he happened to be poor,<a id="FNanchor_474" href="#Footnote_474"
-class="fnanchor">[474]</a>—respected in Nikias the union of wealth
-and family with honesty, courage, and carefulness in command. The
-maritime and trading multitude esteemed him as a decorous, honest,
-religious gentleman, who gave splendid choregies, treated the poorest
-men with consideration, and never turned the public service into a
-job for his own profit,—who, moreover, if he possessed no commanding
-qualities, so as to give to his advice imperative and irresistible
-authority, was yet always worthy of being consulted, and a steady
-safeguard against public mischief. Before the fatal Sicilian
-expedition, he had never commanded on any very serious or difficult
-enterprise, but what he had done had been accomplished successfully;
-so that he enjoyed the reputation of a for<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_290">[p. 290]</span>tunate as well as a prudent commander.<a
-id="FNanchor_475" href="#Footnote_475" class="fnanchor">[475]</a> He
-appears to have acted as proxenus to the Lacedæmonians at Athens;
-probably by his own choice, and among several others.</p>
-
-<p>The first half of the political life of Nikias,—after the time
-when he rose to enjoy full consideration in Athens, being already
-of mature age,—was spent in opposition to Kleon; the last half,
-in opposition to Alkibiadês. To employ terms which are not fully
-suitable to the Athenian democracy, but which yet bring to view
-the difference intended to be noted better than any others, Nikias
-was a minister or ministerial man, often actually exercising and
-always likely to exercise official functions,—Kleon was a man of
-the opposition, whose province it was to supervise and censure
-official men for their public conduct. We must divest these words of
-that sense which they are understood to carry in English political
-life,—a standing parliamentary majority in favor of one party:
-Kleon would often carry in the public assembly resolutions, which
-his opponents Nikias and others of like rank and position,—who
-served in the posts of stratêgus, ambassador, and other important
-offices designated by the general vote, were obliged against their
-will to execute. In attaining such offices they were assisted by
-the political clubs, or established <i>conspiracies</i> (to translate
-the original literally), among the leading Athenians, to stand by
-each other both for acquisition of office and for mutual insurance
-under judicial trial. These clubs, or hetæries, must without
-doubt have played a most important part in the practical working
-of Athenian politics, and it is much to be regretted that we are
-possessed of no details respecting them. We know that in Athens they
-were thoroughly oligarchical in disposition,<a id="FNanchor_476"
-href="#Footnote_476" class="fnanchor">[476]</a>—while equality, or
-something near to it, in rank<span class="pagenum" id="Page_291">[p.
-291]</span> and position must have been essential to the social
-harmony of the members: in some towns, it appears that such political
-associations existed under the form of gymnasia,<a id="FNanchor_477"
-href="#Footnote_477" class="fnanchor">[477]</a> for the mutual
-exercise of the members, or of syssitia for joint banquets. At Athens
-they were numerous, and doubtless not habitually in friendship with
-each other, since the antipathies among different oligarchical men
-were exceedingly strong, and the union brought about between them
-at the time of the Four Hundred arose only out of common desire
-to put down the democracy, and lasted but a little while. But
-the designation of persons to serve in the capacity of stratêgus
-and other principal offices greatly depended upon them,—as well
-as the facility of passing through that trial of accountability
-to which every man was liable after his year of office. Nikias,
-and men generally of his rank and fortune, helped by these clubs,
-and lending help in their turn, composed what may be called the
-ministers, or executive individual functionaries of Athens: the men
-who acted, gave orders to individual men as to<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_292">[p. 292]</span> specific acts, and saw to the execution
-of that which the senate and the public assembly resolved. Especially
-in regard to the military and naval force of the city, so large and
-so actively employed at this time, the powers of detail possessed by
-the stratêgi must have been very great and essential to the safety of
-the state.</p>
-
-<p>While Nikias was thus in what may be called ministerial function,
-Kleon was not of sufficient importance to attain the same, but
-was confined to the inferior function of opposition: we shall see
-in the coming chapter how he became as it were promoted, partly
-by his own superior penetration, partly by the dishonest artifice
-and misjudgment of Nikias and other opponents, in the affair of
-Sphakteria. But his vocation was now to find fault, to censure, to
-denounce; his theatre of action was the senate, the public assembly,
-the dikasteries; his principal talent was that of speech, in which he
-must unquestionably have surpassed all his contemporaries. The two
-gifts which had been united in Periklês—superior capacity for speech
-as well as for action—were now severed, and had fallen, though both
-in greatly inferior degree, the one to Nikias, the other to Kleon. As
-an opposition-man, fierce and violent in temper, Kleon was extremely
-formidable to all acting functionaries; and from his influence in
-the public assembly, he was doubtless the author of many important
-positive measures, thus going beyond the functions belonging to what
-is called opposition. But though the most effective speaker in the
-public assembly, he was not for that reason the most influential
-person in the democracy: his powers of speech in fact, stood out the
-more prominently, because they were found apart from that station,
-and those qualities which were considered, even at Athens, all but
-essential to make a man a leader in political life. To understand the
-political condition of Athens at this time, it has been necessary to
-take this comparison between Nikias and Kleon, and to remark, that
-though the latter might be a more victorious speaker, the former was
-the more guiding and influential leader; the points gained by Kleon
-were all noisy and palpable, sometimes however, without doubt, of
-considerable moment,—but the course of affairs was much more under
-the direction of Nikias.</p>
-
-<p>It was during the summer of this year, the fifth of the war,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_293">[p. 293]</span>—<small>B.C.</small>
-427, that the Athenians began operations on a small scale in Sicily;
-probably contrary to the advice both of Nikias and Kleon, neither of
-them seemingly favorable to these distant undertakings. I reserve,
-however, the series of Athenian measures in Sicily—which afterwards
-became the turning-point of the fortunes of the state—for a
-department by themselves. I shall take them up separately, and bring
-them down to the Athenian expedition against Syracuse, when I reach
-the date of that important event.</p>
-
-<p>During the autumn of the same year, the epidemic disorder, after
-having intermitted for some time, resumed its ravages at Athens,
-and continued for one whole year longer, to the sad ruin both of
-the strength and the comfort of the city. And it seems that this
-autumn, as well as the ensuing summer, were distinguished by violent
-atmospheric and terrestrial disturbance. Numerous earthquakes
-were experienced at Athens, in Eubœa, in Bœotia, especially near
-Orchomenus. Sudden waves of the sea and unexampled tides were also
-felt on the coast of Eubœa and Lokris, and the islands of Atalantê
-and Peparêthus; the Athenian fort and one of the two guard-ships
-at Atalantê were partially destroyed. The earthquakes produced one
-effect favorable to Athens; they deterred the Lacedæmonians from
-invading Attica. Agis, king of Sparta, had already reached the
-isthmus for that purpose; but the repeated earthquakes were looked
-upon as an unfavorable portent, and the scheme was abandoned.<a
-id="FNanchor_478" href="#Footnote_478" class="fnanchor">[478]</a></p>
-
-<p>These earthquakes, however, were not considered as calculated
-to deter the Lacedæmonians from the foundation of Herakleia, a new
-colony near the strait of Thermopylæ. On this occasion, we hear of
-a branch of the Greek population not before mentioned during the
-war. The coast immediately north of the strait of Thermopylæ was
-occupied by the three subdivisions of the Malians,—Paralii, Hierês,
-and Trachinians. These latter, immediately adjoining Mount Œta on
-its north side,—as well as the Dorians, the little tribe properly
-so called, which was accounted the primitive hearth of the Dorians
-generally, who joined the same mountain-range on the south,—were both
-of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_294">[p. 294]</span> them harassed
-and plundered by the predatory mountaineers, probably Ætolians, on
-the high lands between them. At first, the Trachinians were disposed
-to throw themselves on the protection of Athens; but not feeling
-sufficiently assured as to the way in which she would deal with them,
-they joined with the Dorians in claiming aid from Sparta: in fact,
-it does not appear that Athens, possessing naval superiority only,
-and being inferior on land, could have given them effective aid.
-The Lacedæmonians eagerly embraced the opportunity, and determined
-to plant a strong colony in this tempting situation: there was wood
-in the neighboring regions for ship-building,<a id="FNanchor_479"
-href="#Footnote_479" class="fnanchor">[479]</a> so that they might
-hope to acquire a naval position for attacking the neighboring island
-of Eubœa, while the passage of troops against the subject-allies of
-Athens in Thrace, would also be facilitated; the impracticability of
-such passage had forced them, three years before, to leave Potidæa to
-its fate. A considerable body of colonists, Spartans and Lacedæmonian
-Periœki, was assembled under the conduct of three Spartan
-œkists,—Leon, Damagon, and Alkidas; the latter we are to presume,
-though Thucydidês does not say so, was the same admiral who had met
-with such little success in Ionia and at Korkyra. Proclamation was
-farther made to invite the junction of all other Greeks as colonists,
-excepting by name Ionians, Achæans, and some other tribes not here
-specified. Probably the distinct exclusion of the Achæans must have
-been rather the continuance of ancient sentiment than dictated by any
-present reasons; since the Achæans were not now pronounced enemies of
-Sparta. A number of colonists, stated as not less than ten thousand,
-flocked to the place, having confidence in the stability of the
-colony under the powerful protection of Sparta; and a new town, of
-large circuit, was built and fortified under the name of Herakleia;<a
-id="FNanchor_480" href="#Footnote_480" class="fnanchor">[480]</a> not
-far from the site of Trachis, about two miles and a quarter from the
-nearest point of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_295">[p. 295]</span>
-the Maliac gulf, but about double that distance from the strait
-of Thermopylæ. Near to the latter, and for the purpose of keeping
-effective possession of it, a port, with dock and accommodation for
-shipping, was constructed.</p>
-
-<p>A populous city, established under Lacedæmonian protection in this
-important post, alarmed the Athenians, and created much expectation
-in every part of Greece: but the Lacedæmonian œkists were harsh and
-unskilful in their management, and the Thessalians, to whom the
-Trachinian territory was tributary, considered the colony as an
-encroachment upon their soil. Anxious to prevent its increase, they
-harassed it with hostilities from the first moment, while the Œtæan
-assailants were not idle: and Herakleia, thus pressed from without,
-and misgoverned within, dwindled down from its original numbers
-and promise, barely maintaining its existence.<a id="FNanchor_481"
-href="#Footnote_481" class="fnanchor">[481]</a> We shall find it in
-later times, however, revived, and becoming a place of considerable
-importance.</p>
-
-<p>The main Athenian armament of this summer, consisting of sixty
-triremes, under Nikias, undertook an expedition against the island
-of Melos. Melos and Thera, both inhabited by ancient colonists from
-Lacedæmon, had never been from the beginning, and still refused to
-be, members of the Athenian alliance, or subjects of the Athenian
-empire. They thus stood out as exceptions to all the other islands
-in the Ægean, and the Athenians thought themselves authorized to
-resort to constraint and conquest; believing themselves entitled
-to command over all the islands. They might indeed urge, and with
-considerable plausibility, that the Melians now enjoyed their share
-of the protection of the Ægean from piracy, without contributing at
-all to the cost of it: but considering the obstinate reluctance and
-strong Lacedæmonian prepossessions of the Melians, who had taken
-no part in the war, and given no ground of offence to Athens, the
-attempt to conquer them by force could hardly be justified even as
-a calculation of gain and loss, and was a mere gratification to
-the pride of power in carrying out what, in modern days, we should
-call the principle of maritime empire. Melos and Thera formed
-awkward corners, which defaced the symmetry of a great propri<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_296">[p. 296]</span>etor’s field;<a
-id="FNanchor_482" href="#Footnote_482" class="fnanchor">[482]</a>
-and the former ultimately entailed upon Athens the heaviest of all
-losses,—a deed of blood which deeply dishonored her annals. On this
-occasion, Nikias visited the island with his fleet, and after vainly
-summoning the inhabitants, ravaged the lands, but retired without
-undertaking a siege. He then sailed away, and came to Orôpus, on the
-northeast frontier of Attica, bordering on Bœotia: the hoplites on
-board his ships landed in the night, and marched into the interior
-of Bœotia, to the vicinity of Tanagra. They were here met, according
-to signal raised, by a military force from Athens, which marched
-thither by land; and the joint Athenian army ravaged the Tanagræan
-territory, gaining an insignificant advantage over its defenders. On
-retiring, Nikias reassembled his armament, sailed northward along the
-coast of Lokris with the usual ravages, and returned home without
-effecting anything farther.<a id="FNanchor_483" href="#Footnote_483"
-class="fnanchor">[483]</a></p>
-
-<p>About the same time that he started, thirty other Athenian
-triremes, under Demosthenês and Proklês, had been sent round
-Peloponnesus to act upon the coast of Akarnania. In conjunction
-with the whole Akarnanian force, except the men of Œniade,—with
-fifteen triremes from Korkyra, and some troops from Kephallênia and
-Zakynthus,—they ravaged the whole territory of Leukas, both within
-and without the isthmus, and confined the inhabitants to their
-town, which was too strong to be taken by anything but a wall of
-circumvallation and a tedious blockade. And the Akarnanians, to whom
-the city was especially hostile, were urgent with Demosthenês to
-undertake this measure forthwith, since the opportunity might not
-again recur, and success was nearly certain.</p>
-
-<p>But this enterprising officer committed the grave imprudence of
-offending them on a matter of great importance, in order to attack a
-country of all others the most impracticable,—the interior of Ætolia.
-The Messenians of Naupaktus, who suffered from the depredations
-of the neighboring Ætolian tribes, inflamed his imagination by
-suggesting to him a grand scheme of opera<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_297">[p. 297]</span>tions,<a id="FNanchor_484"
-href="#Footnote_484" class="fnanchor">[484]</a> more worthy of the
-large force which he commanded than the mere reduction of Leukas.
-The various tribes of Ætolians,—rude, brave, active, predatory, and
-unrivalled in the use of the javelin, which they rarely laid out of
-their hands,—stretched across the country from between Parnassus
-and Œta to the eastern bank of the Achelôus. The scheme suggested
-by the Messenians was, that Demosthenês should attack the great
-central Ætolian tribes,—the Apodôti, Ophioneis, and Eurytânes: if
-they were conquered, all the remaining continental tribes between
-the Ambrakian gulf and Mount Parnassus might be invited or forced
-into the alliance of Athens,—the Akarnanians being already included
-in it. Having thus got the command of a large continental force,<a
-id="FNanchor_485" href="#Footnote_485" class="fnanchor">[485]</a>
-Demosthenês contemplated the ulterior scheme of marching at the
-head of it on the west of Parnassus, through the territory of the
-Ozolian Lokrians,—inhabiting the north of the Corinthian gulf,
-friendly to Athens, and enemies to the Ætolians, whom they resembled
-both in their habits and in their fighting,—until he arrived at
-Kytinium, in Doris, in the upper portion of the valley of the
-river Kephisus. He would then easily descend that valley into the
-territory of the Phocians, who were likely to join the Athenians
-if a favorable opportunity occurred, but who might at any rate be
-constrained to do so. From Phocis, the scheme was to invade from
-the northward the conterminous territory of Bœotia, the great enemy
-of Athens: which might thus perhaps be completely subdued, if
-assailed at the same time from Attica. Any Athenian general, who
-could have executed this comprehensive scheme, would have acquired
-at home a high and well-merited celebrity. But Demosthenês had been
-ill-informed, both of the invincible barbarians and the pathless
-country comprehended under the name of Ætolia: some of<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_298">[p. 298]</span> the tribes spoke a
-language scarcely intelligible to Greeks, and even eat their meat
-raw, while the country has even down to the present time remained not
-only unconquered, but untraversed, by an enemy in arms.</p>
-
-<p>Demosthenês accordingly retired from Leukas, in spite of the
-remonstrance of the Akarnanians, who not only could not be induced
-to accompany him, but went home in visible disgust, He then sailed
-with his other forces—Messenians, Kephallenians, and Zakynthians—to
-Œneon, in the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians, a maritime township
-on the Corinthian gulf, not far eastward of Naupaktus,—where his army
-was disembarked, together with three hundred epibatæ (or marines)
-from the triremes,—including on this occasion, what was not commonly
-the case on shipboard,<a id="FNanchor_486" href="#Footnote_486"
-class="fnanchor">[486]</a> some of the choice hoplites, selected
-all from young men of the same age, on the Athenian muster-roll.
-Having passed the night in the sacred precinct of Zeus Nemeus at
-Œneon, memorable as the spot where the poet Hesiod was said to have
-been slain, he marched early in the morning, under the guidance of
-the Messenian Chromon, into<span class="pagenum" id="Page_299">[p.
-299]</span> Ætolia; on the first day he took Potidania, on the second
-Krokyleium, on the third Teichium,—all of them villages unfortified
-and undefended, for the inhabitants abandoned them and fled to the
-mountains above. He was here inclined to halt and wait the junction
-of the Ozolian Lokrians, who had engaged to invade Ætolia at the
-same time, and were almost indispensable to his success, from their
-familiarity with Ætolian warfare and similarity of weapons. But the
-Messenians again persuaded him to advance without delay into the
-interior, in order that the villages might be separately attacked
-and taken before any collective force could be gathered together:
-and Demosthenês was so encouraged by having as yet encountered
-no resistance, that he advanced to Ægitium, which he also found
-deserted, and captured without opposition.</p>
-
-<p>Here however was the term of his good fortune. The mountains
-round Ægitium were occupied not only by the inhabitants of that
-village, but also by the entire force of Ætolia, collected even
-from the distant tribes Bomiês and Kalliês, who bordered on the
-Maliac gulf. The invasion of Demosthenês had become known beforehand
-to the Ætolians, who not only forewarned all their tribes of
-the approaching enemy, but also sent ambassadors to Sparta and
-Corinth to ask for aid.<a id="FNanchor_487" href="#Footnote_487"
-class="fnanchor">[487]</a> However, they showed themselves fully
-capable of defending their own territory, without foreign aid: and
-Demosthenês found himself assailed, in his position at Ægitium, on
-all sides at once, by these active highlanders, armed with javelins,
-pouring down from the neighboring hills. Not engaging in any close
-combat, they retreated when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_300">[p.
-300]</span> the Athenians advanced forward to charge them,—resuming
-their aggression the moment that the pursuers, who could never
-advance far in consequence of the ruggedness of the ground, began
-to return to the main body. The small number of bowmen along with
-Demosthenês for some time kept their unshielded assailants at bay;
-but the officer commanding the bowmen was presently slain, and the
-stock of arrows became nearly exhausted; and what was still worse,
-Chromon, the Messenian, the only man who knew the country, and
-could serve as guide, was slain also. The bowmen became thus either
-ineffective or dispersed; while the hoplites exhausted themselves
-in vain attempts to pursue and beat off an active enemy, who always
-returned upon them, and in every successive onset thinned and
-distressed them more and more. At length the force of Demosthenês
-was completely broken, and compelled to take flight; but without
-beaten roads, without guides, and in a country not only strange to
-them, but impervious from continual mountain, rock, and forest. Many
-of them were slain in the flight by pursuers, superior not less in
-rapidity of movement than in knowledge of the country: some even
-lost themselves in the forest, and perished miserably in flames
-kindled around them by the Ætolians: and the fugitives were at
-length reassembled at Œneon, near the sea, with the loss of Proklês,
-the colleague of Demosthenês in command, as well as of one hundred
-and twenty hoplites, among the best-armed and most vigorous in the
-Athenian muster-roll.<a id="FNanchor_488" href="#Footnote_488"
-class="fnanchor">[488]</a> The remaining force was soon transported
-back from Naupaktus to Athens, but Demosthenês remained behind, being
-too much afraid of the displeasure of his countrymen to return at
-such a moment. It is certain that his conduct was such as justly to
-incur their displeasure; and that the expedition against Ætolia,
-alienating an established ally and provoking a new enemy, had been
-conceived with a degree of rashness which nothing but the unexpected
-favor of fortune could have counterbalanced.</p>
-
-<p>The force of the new enemy whom his unsuccessful attack had
-raised into activity, soon made itself felt. The Ætolian envoys
-despatched to Sparta and Corinth found it easy to obtain the
-promise of a considerable force to join them in an expedition<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_301">[p. 301]</span> against Naupaktus: and
-about the month of September, a body of three thousand Peloponnesian
-hoplites, including five hundred from the newly-founded colony of
-Herakleia, was assembled at Delphi, under the command of Eurylochus,
-Makarius, and Menedemus. Their road of march to Naupaktus lay
-through the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians, whom they proposed
-either to gain over or to subdue. With Amphissa, the largest Lokrian
-township, and in the immediate neighborhood of Delphi, they had
-little difficulty,—for the Amphissians were in a state of feud with
-their neighbors on the other side of Parnassus, and were afraid that
-the new armament might become the instrument of Phocian antipathy
-against them. On the very first application they joined the Spartan
-alliance, and gave hostages for their fidelity to it: moreover, they
-persuaded many other Lokrian petty villages—among others the Myoneis,
-who were masters of the most difficult pass on the road—to do the
-same. Eurylochus received from these various townships reinforcements
-for his army, as well as hostages for their fidelity, whom he
-deposited at Kytinium in Doris: and he was thus enabled to march
-through all the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians without resistance;
-except from Œneon and Eupalion, both which places he took by force.
-Having arrived in the territory of Naupaktus, he was there joined
-by the full force of the Ætolians; and their joint efforts, after
-laying waste all the neighborhood, captured the Corinthian colony
-of Molykreion, which had become subject to the Athenian empire.<a
-id="FNanchor_489" href="#Footnote_489" class="fnanchor">[489]</a></p>
-
-<p>Naupaktus, with a large circuit of wall and thinly defended, was
-in the greatest danger, and would certainly have been taken, had
-it not been saved by the efforts of the Athenian Demosthenês, who
-had remained there ever since the unfortunate Ætolian expedition.
-Apprized of the coming march of Eurylochus, he went personally to
-the Akarnanians, and persuaded them to send a force to aid in the
-defence of Naupaktus: for a long time they turned a deaf ear to his
-solicitations, in consequence of the refusal to blockade Leukas, but
-they were at length induced to consent. At the head of one thousand
-Akarnanian hoplites, Demosthenês threw himself into Naupaktus; and
-Eurylochus,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_302">[p. 302]</span>
-seeing that the town had thus been placed out of the reach of attack,
-abandoned all his designs upon it,—marching farther westward to the
-neighboring territories of Ætolia, Kalydon, Pleuron, and Proschium,
-near the Achelôus and the borders of Akarnania. The Ætolians, who had
-come down to join him for the common purpose of attacking Naupaktus,
-here abandoned him and retired to their respective homes. But the
-Ambrakiots, rejoiced to find so considerable a Peloponnesian force in
-their neighborhood, prevailed upon him to assist them in attacking
-the Amphilochian Argos as well as Akarnania; assuring him that there
-was now a fair prospect of bringing the whole of the population of
-the mainland, between the Ambrakian and Corinthian gulfs, under the
-supremacy of Lacedæmon. Having persuaded Eurylochus thus to keep
-his forces together and ready, they themselves with three thousand
-Ambrakiot hoplites invaded the territory of the Amphilochian Argos,
-and captured the fortified hill of Olpæ immediately bordering on
-the Ambrakian gulf, about three miles from Argos itself: this hill
-had been in former days employed by the Akarnanians as a place for
-public judicial congress of the whole nation.<a id="FNanchor_490"
-href="#Footnote_490" class="fnanchor">[490]</a></p>
-
-<p>This enterprise, communicated forthwith to Eurylochus, was the
-signal for movement on both sides. The Akarnanians marched with
-their whole force to the protection of Argos, and occupied a post
-called Krênæ in the Amphilochian territory, hoping to be able to
-prevent Eurylochus from effecting his junction with the Ambrakiots
-at Olpæ. They at the same time sent urgent messages to Demosthenês
-at Naupaktus, and to the Athenian guard-squadron of twenty triremes
-under Aristotelês and Hierophon, entreating their aid in the present
-need, and inviting Demosthenês to act as their commander. They had
-forgotten their displeasure against him arising out of his recent
-refusal to blockade at Leukas,—for which they probably thought that
-he had been sufficiently punished by his disgrace in Ætolia; while
-they knew and esteemed his military capacity. In fact, the accident
-whereby he had been detained at Naupaktus, now worked fortunately
-for them as well as for him: it secured to them a commander whom all
-of them respected, obviating the jealousies<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_303">[p. 303]</span> among their own numerous petty
-townships,—it procured for him the means of retrieving his own
-reputation at Athens. Demosthenês, not backward in seizing this
-golden opportunity, came speedily into the Ambrakian gulf with the
-twenty Athenian triremes, conducting two hundred Messenian hoplites
-and sixty Athenian bowmen. He found the whole Akarnanian force
-concentrated at the Amphilochian Argos, and was named general along
-with the Akarnanian generals, but in reality enjoying the whole
-direction of the operations.</p>
-
-<p>He found also the whole of the enemy’s force, both the three
-thousand Ambrakiot hoplites and the Peloponnesian division under
-Eurylochus, already united and in position at Olpæ, about three miles
-off. For Eurylochus, as soon as he was apprized that the Ambrakiots
-had reached Olpæ, broke up forthwith his camp at Proschium in Ætolia,
-knowing that his best chance of traversing the hostile territory of
-Akarnania consisted in celerity: the whole Akarnanian force, however,
-had already gone to Argos, so that his march was unopposed through
-that country. He crossed the Achelôus, marched westward of Stratus,
-through the Akarnanian townships of Phytia, Medeon, and Limnæa, then
-quitting both Akarnania and the direct road from Akarnania to Argos,
-he struck rather eastward into the mountainous district of Thyamus,
-in the territory of the Agræans, who were enemies of the Akarnanians.
-From hence he descended at night into the territory of Argos, and
-passed unobserved under cover of the darkness between Argos itself,
-and the Akarnanian force at Krênæ; so as to join in safety the three
-thousand Ambrakiots at Olpæ; to their great joy,—for they had feared
-that the enemy at Argos and Krênæ would have arrested his passage;
-and feeling their force inadequate to contend alone, they had sent
-pressing messages home to demand large reinforcements for themselves
-and their own protection.<a id="FNanchor_491" href="#Footnote_491"
-class="fnanchor">[491]</a></p>
-
-<p>Demosthenês thus found an united and formidable enemy, superior
-in number to himself, at Olpæ, and conducted his troops from Argos
-and Krênæ to attack them. The ground was rugged and mountainous, and
-between the two armies lay a steep ravine which neither liked to be
-the first to pass, so that they lay for five<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_304">[p. 304]</span> days inactive. If Herodotus had
-been our historian, he would probably have ascribed this delay to
-unfavorable sacrifices (which may probably have been the case), and
-would have given us interesting anecdotes respecting the prophets on
-both sides; but the more positive and practical genius of Thucydidês
-merely acquaints us, that on the sixth day both armies put themselves
-in order of battle,—both probably tired of waiting. The ground being
-favorable for ambuscade, Demosthenês hid in a bushy dell four hundred
-hoplites and light-armed, so that they might spring up suddenly in
-the midst of the action upon the Peloponnesian left, which outflanked
-his right. He was himself on the right with the Messenians and
-some Athenians, opposed to Eurylochus on the left of the enemy:
-the Akarnanians, with the Amphilochian akontists, or darters,
-occupied his left, opposed to the Ambrakiot hoplites: Ambrakiots and
-Peloponnesians were, however, intermixed in the line of Eurylochus,
-and it was only the Mantineans who maintained a separate station of
-their own towards the left centre. The battle accordingly began,
-and Eurylochus with his superior numbers was proceeding to surround
-Demosthenês, when on a sudden the men in ambush rose up and set
-upon his rear. A panic seized his men, and they made no resistance
-worthy of their Peloponnesian reputation: they broke and fled, while
-Eurylochus, doubtless exposing himself with peculiar bravery in
-order to restore the battle, was early slain. Demosthenês, having
-near him his best troops, pressed them vigorously and their panic
-communicated itself to the troops in the centre, so that all were
-put to flight and pursued to Olpæ. On the right of the line of
-Eurylochus, the Ambrakiots, the most warlike Greeks in the Epirotic
-regions, completely defeated the Akarnanians opposed to them, and
-carried their pursuit even as far as Argos. So complete, however, was
-the victory gained by Demosthenês over the remaining troops, that
-these Ambrakiots had great difficulty in fighting their way back to
-Olpæ, which was not accomplished without severe loss, and late in
-the evening. Among all the beaten troops, the Mantineans were those
-who best maintained their retreating order.<a id="FNanchor_492"
-href="#Footnote_492" class="fnanchor">[492]</a> The loss in the army
-of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_305">[p. 305]</span> Demosthenês
-was about three hundred: that of the opponents much greater, but the
-number is not specified.</p>
-
-<p>Of the three Spartan commanders, two, Eurylochus and Makarius, had
-been slain: the third, Menedæus, found himself beleaguered both by
-sea and land,—the Athenian squadron being on guard along the coast.
-It would seem, indeed, that he might have fought his way to Ambrakia,
-especially as he would have met the Ambrakiot reinforcement coming
-from the city. But whether this were possible or not, the commander,
-too much dispirited to attempt it, took advantage of the customary
-truce granted for burying the dead, to open negotiations with
-Demosthenês and the Akarnanian generals, for the purpose of obtaining
-an unmolested retreat. This was peremptorily refused: but Demosthenês
-(with the consent of the Akarnanian leaders) secretly intimated to
-the Spartan commander and those immediately around him, together
-with the Mantineans and other Peloponnesian troops,—that if they
-chose to make a separate and surreptitious retreat, abandoning their
-comrades, no opposition would be offered: for he designed by this
-means, not merely to isolate the Ambrakiots, the great enemies of
-Argos and Akarnania, along with the body of miscellaneous mercenaries
-who had come under Eurylochus, but also to obtain the more permanent
-advantage of disgracing the Spartans and Peloponnesians in the
-eyes of the Epirotic Greeks, as cowards and traitors to military
-fellowship. The very reason which prompted Demosthenês to grant a
-separate facility of escape, ought to have been imperative with
-Menedæus and the Peloponnesians around him, to make them spurn it
-with indignation: yet such was their anxiety for personal safety,
-that this disgraceful convention was accepted, ratified, and carried
-into effect forthwith. It stands alone in Grecian history, as a
-specimen of separate treason in officers, to purchase safety for
-themselves by abandoning those under their command. Had the officers
-been Athenian, it would have been doubtless quoted as an example of
-the pretended faithlessness of democracy: but as it was the act of a
-Spartan commander in conjunction with many leading Peloponnesians,
-we can only remark upon it as a farther manifestation of that
-intra-Peloponnesian selfishness, and carelessness of obligation<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_306">[p. 306]</span> towards
-extra-Peloponnesian Greeks, which we found so lamentably prevalent
-during the invasion of Xerxes; in this case indeed heightened by the
-fact that the men deserted were fellow-Dorians and fellow-soldiers,
-who had just fought in the same ranks.</p>
-
-<p>As soon as the ceremony of burying the dead had been completed,
-Menedæus, and the Peloponnesians who were protected by this secret
-convention, stole away slyly and in small bands under pretence of
-collecting wood and vegetables: on getting to a little distance,
-they quickened their pace and made off,—much to the dismay of the
-Ambrakiots, who ran after them and tried to overtake them. The
-Akarnanians pursued, and their leaders had much difficulty in
-explaining to them the secret convention just concluded. Nor was
-it without some suspicions of treachery, and even personal hazard,
-from their own troops, that they at length caused the fugitive
-Peloponnesians to be respected; while the Ambrakiots, the most
-obnoxious of the two to Akarnanian feeling, were pursued without any
-reserve, and two hundred of them were slain before they could escape
-into the friendly territory of the Agræans.<a id="FNanchor_493"
-href="#Footnote_493" class="fnanchor">[493]</a> To distinguish
-Ambrakiots from Peloponnesians, similar in race and dialect, was,
-however, no easy task, and much dispute arose in individual cases.</p>
-
-<p>Unfairly as this loss fell upon Ambrakia, a far more severe
-calamity was yet in store for her. The large reinforcement from the
-city, which had been urgently invoked by the detachment at Olpæ,
-started in due course as soon as it could be got ready, and entered
-the territory of Amphilochia about the time when the battle of Olpæ
-was fought, but ignorant of that misfortune, and hoping to arrive
-soon enough to stand by their friends. Their march was made known to
-Demosthenês, on the day after the battle, by the Amphilochians; who,
-at the same time, indicated to him the best way of surprising them
-in the rugged and mountainous road along which they had to march,
-at the two conspicuous peaks called Idomenê, immediately above a
-narrow pass leading farther on to Olpæ. It was known beforehand, by
-the line of march of the Ambrakiots, that they would rest for the
-night at the lower of these two peaks, ready to march through<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_307">[p. 307]</span> the pass on the next
-morning. On that same night, a detachment of Amphilochians, under
-direction from Demosthenês, seized the higher of the two peaks; while
-that commander himself, dividing his forces into two divisions,
-started from his position at Olpæ in the evening after supper. One of
-these divisions, having the advantage of Amphilochian guides in their
-own country, marched by an unfrequented mountain road to Idomenê;
-the other, under Demosthenês himself, went directly through the pass
-leading from Idomenê to Olpæ. After marching all night, they reached
-the camp of the Ambrakiots a little before daybreak,—Demosthenês
-himself with his Messenians in the van. The surprise was complete;
-the Ambrakiots were found still lying down and asleep, while even
-the sentinels, uninformed of the recent battle,—hearing themselves
-accosted in the Doric dialect by the Messenians, whom Demosthenês
-had placed in front for that express purpose, and not seeing very
-clearly in the morning twilight, mistook them for some of their own
-fellow-citizens coming back from the other camp. The Akarnanians
-and Messenians thus fell among the Ambrakiots sleeping and unarmed,
-and without any possibility of resistance. Large numbers of them
-were destroyed on the spot, and the remainder fled in all directions
-among the neighboring mountains, none knowing the roads and the
-country; it was the country of the Amphilochians, subjects of
-Ambrakia, but subjects averse to their condition, and now making
-use of their perfect local knowledge and light-armed equipment, to
-inflict a terrible revenge on their masters. Some of the Ambrakiots
-became entangled in ravines,—others fell into ambuscades laid by the
-Amphilochians. Others again, dreading most of all to fall into the
-hands of the Amphilochians, barbaric in race as well as intensely
-hostile in feeling, and seeing no other possibility of escaping them,
-swam off to the Athenian ships cruising along the shore. There were
-but a small proportion of them who survived to return to Ambrakia.<a
-id="FNanchor_494" href="#Footnote_494" class="fnanchor">[494]</a></p>
-
-<p>The complete victory of Idomenê, admirably prepared by
-Demosthenês, was achieved with scarce any loss: and the Akarnanians,
-after erecting their trophy, despoiled the enemy’s dead and carried
-off the arms thus taken to Argos.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_308">[p. 308]</span></p>
-
-<p>On the morrow they were visited by a herald, coming from those
-Ambrakiots who had fled into the Agræan territory, after the battle
-of Olpæ, and the subsequent pursuit. He came with the customary
-request from defeated soldiers, for permission to bury their dead who
-had fallen in that pursuit. Neither he, nor those from whom he came,
-knew anything of the destruction of their brethren at Idomenê,—just
-as these latter had been ignorant of the defeat at Olpæ; while,
-on the other hand, the Akarnanians in the camp, whose minds were
-full of the more recent and capital advantage at Idomenê, supposed
-that the message referred to the men slain in that engagement. The
-numerous panoplies just acquired at Idomenê lay piled up in the
-camp, and the herald, on seeing them, was struck with amazement at
-the size of the heap, so much exceeding the number of those who were
-missing in his own detachment. An Akarnanian present asked the reason
-of his surprise, and inquired how many of his comrades had been
-slain,—meaning to refer to the slain at Idomenê. “About two hundred,”
-the herald replied. “Yet these arms here show, not that number, but
-more than a thousand men.” “Then they are not the arms of those who
-fought with us.” “Nay, but they are; if ye were the persons who
-fought yesterday at Idomenê.” “We fought with no one yesterday: it
-was the day before yesterday, in the retreat.” “O, then ye have to
-learn, that <i>we</i> were engaged yesterday with these others, who were
-on their march as reinforcement from the city of Ambrakia.”</p>
-
-<p>The unfortunate herald now learned for the first time that
-the large reinforcement from his city had been cut to pieces.
-So acute was his feeling of mingled anguish and surprise, that
-he raised a loud cry of woe, and hurried away at once, without
-saying another word; not even prosecuting his request about the
-burial of the dead bodies,—which appears on this fatal occasion
-to have been neglected.<a id="FNanchor_495" href="#Footnote_495"
-class="fnanchor">[495]</a></p>
-
-<p>His grief was justified by the prodigious magnitude of the
-calamity, which Thucydidês considers to have been the greatest that
-afflicted any Grecian city during the whole war prior to the peace
-of Nikias; so incredibly great, indeed, that though he had<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_309">[p. 309]</span> learned the number
-slain, he declines to set it down, from fear of not being believed,—a
-scruple which we, his readers, have much reason to regret. It
-appears that nearly the whole adult military population of Ambrakia
-was destroyed, and Demosthenês was urgent with the Akarnanians to
-march thither at once: had they consented, Thucydidês tells us
-positively that the city would have surrendered without a blow.<a
-id="FNanchor_496" href="#Footnote_496" class="fnanchor">[496]</a> But
-they refused to undertake the enterprise, fearing, according to the
-historian, that the Athenians at Ambrakia would be more troublesome
-neighbors to them than the Ambrakiots. That this reason was
-operative, we need not doubt: but it can hardly have been either the
-single, or even the chief, reason; for, had it been so, they would
-have been equally afraid of Athenian coöperation in the blockade
-of Leukas, which they had strenuously solicited from Demosthenês,
-and had quarrelled with him for refusing. Ambrakia was less near
-to them<span class="pagenum" id="Page_310">[p. 310]</span> than
-Leukas, and in its present exhausted state, inspired less fear: but
-the displeasure arising from the former refusal of Demosthenês had
-probably never been altogether appeased, nor were they sorry to find
-an opportunity of mortifying him in a similar manner.</p>
-
-<p>In the distribution of the spoil, three hundred panoplies were
-first set apart as the perquisite of Demosthenês: the remainder
-were then distributed, one-third for the Athenians, the other
-two-thirds among the Akarnanian townships. The immense reserve,
-personally appropriated to Demosthenês, enables us to make some
-vague conjecture as to the total loss of Ambrakiots. The fraction of
-one-third, assigned to the Athenian people, must have been, we may
-imagine, six times as great, and perhaps even in larger proportion,
-than the reserve of the general: for the latter was at that time
-under the displeasure of the people, and anxious above all things
-to regain their favor,—an object which would be frustrated rather
-than promoted, if his personal share of the arms were not greatly
-disproportionate to the collective claim of the city. Reasoning upon
-this supposition, the panoplies assigned to Athens would be eighteen
-hundred, and the total of Ambrakiot slain, whose arms became public
-property, would be five thousand four hundred. To which must be
-added some Ambrakiots killed in their flight from Idomenê by the
-Amphilochians, in dells, ravines, and by-places: probably those
-Amphilochians, who slew them, would appropriate the arms privately,
-without bringing them into the general stock. Upon this calculation,
-the total number of Ambrakiot slain in both battles and both
-pursuits, would be about six thousand: a number suitable to the grave
-expressions of Thucydidês, as well as to his statements, that the
-first detachment which marched to Olpæ was three thousand strong, and
-that the message sent home invoked as reinforcement the total force
-of the city. How totally helpless Ambrakia had become, is still more
-conclusively proved by the fact that the Corinthians were obliged
-shortly afterwards to send by land a detachment of three hundred
-hoplites for its defence.<a id="FNanchor_497" href="#Footnote_497"
-class="fnanchor">[497]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Athenian triremes soon returned to their station at Nau<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_311">[p. 311]</span>paktus, after which a
-convention was concluded between the Akarnanians and Amphilochians
-on the one side, and the Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians—who had
-fled after the battle of Olpæ into the territory of Salynthius
-and the Agræi—on the other, insuring a safe and unmolested egress
-to both of the latter.<a id="FNanchor_498" href="#Footnote_498"
-class="fnanchor">[498]</a> With the Ambrakiots a more permanent
-pacification was effected: the Akarnanians and Amphilochians
-concluded with them a peace and alliance for one hundred years, on
-condition that they should surrender all the Amphilochian territory
-and hostages in their possession, and should bind themselves to
-furnish no aid to Anaktorium, then in hostility to the Akarnanians.
-Each party, however, maintained its separate alliance,—the Ambrakiots
-with the Peloponnesian confederacy, the Akarnanians with Athens: it
-was stipulated that the Akarnanians should<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_312">[p. 312]</span> not be required to assist the
-Ambrakiots against Athens, nor the Ambrakiots to assist the
-Akarnanians against the Peloponnesian league; but against all other
-enemies, each engaged to lend aid to the other.<a id="FNanchor_499"
-href="#Footnote_499" class="fnanchor">[499]</a></p>
-
-<p>To Demosthenês personally, the events on the coast of the
-Ambrakian gulf proved a signal good fortune, well-earned indeed by
-the skill which he had displayed. He was enabled to atone for his
-imprudence in the Ætolian expedition, and to reëstablish himself
-in the favor of the Athenian people. He sailed home in triumph to
-Athens, during the course of the winter, with his reserved present
-of three hundred panoplies, which acquired additional value from
-the accident, that the larger number of panoplies, reserved out of
-the spoil for the Athenian people, were captured at sea, and never
-reached Athens. Accordingly, those brought by Demosthenês were
-the only trophy of the victory, and as such were deposited in the
-Athenian temples, where Thucydidês mentions them as still existing
-at the time when he wrote.<a id="FNanchor_500" href="#Footnote_500"
-class="fnanchor">[500]</a></p>
-
-<p>It was in the same autumn that the Athenians were induced by an
-oracle to undertake the more complete purification of the sacred
-island of Delos. This step was probably taken to propitiate Apollo,
-since they were under the persuasion that the terrible visitation
-of the epidemic was owing to his wrath. And as it was about this
-period that the second attack of the epidemic, after having lasted a
-year, disappeared,—many of them probably ascribed this relief to the
-effect of their pious cares at Delos. All the tombs in the island
-were opened; the dead bodies were then exhumed, and reinterred in
-the neighboring island of Rheneia: and orders were given that for
-the future no deaths and no births should take place in the sacred
-island. Moreover, the ancient Delian festival—once the common point
-of meeting and solemnity for the whole Ionic race, and celebrated
-for its musical contests, before the Lydian and Persian conquests
-had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_313">[p. 313]</span> subverted
-the freedom and prosperity of Ionia—was now renewed. The Athenians
-celebrated the festival with its accompanying matches, even the
-chariot-race, in a manner more splendid than had ever been known in
-former times: and they appointed a similar festival to be celebrated
-every fourth year. At this period they were excluded both from the
-Olympic and the Pythian games, which probably made the revival of
-the Delian festival more gratifying to them. The religious zeal
-and munificence of Nikias was strikingly displayed at Delos.<a
-id="FNanchor_501" href="#Footnote_501" class="fnanchor">[501]</a></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_52">
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER LII.<br />
-    SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR.—CAPTURE OF SPHAKTERIA.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">The</span> invasion of Attica by
-the Lacedæmonians had now become an ordinary enterprise, undertaken
-in every year of the war except the third and sixth, and then omitted
-only from accidental causes; though the same hopes were no longer
-entertained from it as at the commencement of the war. During the
-present spring, Agis king of Sparta conducted the Peloponnesian army
-into the territory, seemingly about the end of April, and repeated
-the usual ravages.</p>
-
-<p>It seemed, however, as if Korkyra were about to become the
-principal scene of the year’s military operations: for the exiles
-of the oligarchical party, having come back to the island and
-fortified themselves on Mount Istônê, carried on war with so much
-activity against the Korkyræans in the city, that distress and even
-famine reigned there; while sixty Peloponnesian triremes were sent
-thither to assist the aggressors. As soon as it became known at
-Athens how hardly the Korkyræans in the city were pressed, orders
-were given to an Athenian fleet of forty triremes, about to sail for
-Sicily under Eurymedon and Sophoklês, to halt<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_314">[p. 314]</span> in their voyage at Korkyra, and
-to lend whatever aid might be needed.<a id="FNanchor_502"
-href="#Footnote_502" class="fnanchor">[502]</a> But during the
-course of this voyage, an incident occurred elsewhere, neither
-foreseen nor imagined by any one, which gave a new character and
-promise to the whole war,—illustrating forcibly the observations of
-Periklês and Archidamus before its commencement, on the impossibility
-of calculating what turn events might take.<a id="FNanchor_503"
-href="#Footnote_503" class="fnanchor">[503]</a></p>
-
-<p>So high did Demosthenês stand in the favor of his countrymen,
-after his brilliant successes in the Ambrakian gulf, that they
-granted him permission, at his own request, to go aboard and to
-employ the fleet in any descent which he might think expedient on the
-coast of Peloponnesus. The attachment of this active officer to the
-Messenians at Naupaktus, inspired him with the idea of planting a
-detachment of them on some well-chosen maritime post in the ancient
-Messenian territory, from whence they would be able permanently to
-harass the Lacedæmonians and provoke revolt among the Helots,—the
-more so, from their analogy of race and dialect. The Messenians,
-active in privateering, and doubtless well acquainted with the points
-of this coast, all of which had formerly belonged to their ancestors,
-had probably indicated to him Pylus, on the southwestern shore. That
-ancient and Homeric name was applied specially and properly to denote
-the promontory which forms the northern termination of the modern
-bay of Navarino, opposite to the island of Sphagia, or Sphakteria;
-though in vague language the whole neighboring district seems
-also to have been called Pylus. Accordingly, in circumnavigating
-Laconia, Demosthenês requested that the fleet might be detained at
-this spot long enough to enable him to fortify it, engaging himself
-to stay afterwards and maintain it with a garrison. It was an
-uninhabited promontory, about forty-five miles from Sparta; that is,
-as far distant as any portion of her territory, presenting rugged
-cliffs, and easy of defence both by sea and land: but its great
-additional recommendation, with reference to the maritime power
-of Athens, consisted in its overhanging the spacious and secure
-basin now called the bay of Navarino. That basin was fronted and
-protected by the islet called Sphakteria, or Sphagia, untrod<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_315">[p. 315]</span>den, untenanted, and
-full of wood, which stretched along the coast for about a mile
-and three quarters, leaving only two narrow entrances: one at its
-northern end, opposite to the position fixed on by Demosthenês,
-so confined as to admit only two triremes abreast,—the other at
-the southern end, about four times as broad; while the inner water
-approached by these two channels was both roomy and protected. It
-was on the coast of Peloponnesus, a little within the northern or
-narrowest of the two channels, that Demosthenês proposed to plant
-his little fort,—the ground being itself eminently favorable, and
-a spring of fresh water<a id="FNanchor_504" href="#Footnote_504"
-class="fnanchor">[504]</a> in the centre of the promontory.<a
-id="FNanchor_505" href="#Footnote_505" class="fnanchor">[505]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_316">[p. 316]</span></p>
-
-<p>But Eurymedon and Sophoklês decidedly rejected all proposition of
-delay; and with much reason, since they had been informed (though
-seemingly without truth) that the Peloponnesian fleet had actually
-reached Korkyra: they might well have remembered the mischief which
-had ensued three years before<span class="pagenum" id="Page_317">[p.
-317]</span> from the delay of the reinforcement sent to Phormio
-in some desultory operations on the coast of Krete. The fleet
-accordingly passed by Pylus without stopping: but a terrible
-storm drove them back and forced them to seek shelter in the very
-harbor which Demosthenês had fixed upon,—the only harbor anywhere
-near. That officer took advantage of this accident to renew his
-proposition, which however appeared to the commanders chimerical:
-there were plenty of desert capes round Peloponnesus, they said, if
-he chose to waste the resources of the city in occupying them,<a
-id="FNanchor_506" href="#Footnote_506" class="fnanchor">[506]</a>—nor
-were they at all moved by his reasons in reply. Finding himself thus
-unsuccessful, Demosthenês presumed upon the undefined permission
-granted to him by the Athenian people, to address himself first to
-the soldiers, last of all to the taxiarchs, or inferior officers,
-and to persuade them to second his project, even against the will
-of the commanders. Much inconvenience might well have arisen
-from such clashing of authority: but it happened that both the
-soldiers and the taxiarchs took the same view of the case as their
-commanders, and refused compliance: nor can we be surprised at
-such reluctance, when we reflect upon the seeming improbability
-of being able to maintain such a post against the great real, and
-still greater supposed, superiority of Lacedæmonian land-force.
-It happened, however, that the fleet was detained there for some
-days by stormy weather; so that the soldiers, having nothing to do,
-were seized with the spontaneous impulse of occupying themselves
-with the fortification, and crowded around to execute it with all
-the emulation of eager volunteers. Having contemplated nothing
-of the kind on starting from Athens, they had neither tools for
-cutting stone, nor hods for carrying mortar:<a id="FNanchor_507"
-href="#Footnote_507" class="fnanchor">[507]</a> accordingly, they
-were compelled to build their wall by collecting such pieces of rock
-or stones as they found, and putting them together as each happened
-to fit in: whenever mortar was needed, they brought it up on their
-backs bent inwards, with hands joined behind them to prevent it from
-slipping away. Such deficiencies were made up, however, partly by the
-unbounded<span class="pagenum" id="Page_318">[p. 318]</span> ardor
-of the soldiers, partly by the natural difficulties of the ground,
-which hardly required fortification except at particular points; the
-work was completed in a rough way in six days, and Demosthenês was
-left in garrison with five ships, while Eurymedon with the main fleet
-sailed away to Korkyra. The crews of the five ships, two of which,
-however, were sent away to warn Eurymedon afterwards, would amount
-to about one thousand in all: but there presently arrived two armed
-Messenian privateers, from which Demosthenês obtained a reinforcement
-of forty Messenian hoplites, together with a supply of wicker
-shields, though more fit for show than for use, wherewith to arm
-his rowers. Altogether, it appears that he must have had about two
-hundred hoplites, besides the half-armed seamen.<a id="FNanchor_508"
-href="#Footnote_508" class="fnanchor">[508]</a></p>
-
-<p>Intelligence of this attempt to plant, even upon the Lacedæmonian
-territory, the annoyance and insult of a hostile post, was soon
-transmitted to Sparta,—yet no immediate measures were taken to
-march to the spot; as well from the natural slowness of the Spartan
-character, strengthened by a festival which happened to be then going
-on, as from the confidence entertained that, whenever attacked, the
-expulsion of the enemy was certain. A stronger impression, however,
-was made by the news upon the Lacedæmonian army invading Attica, who
-were at the same time suffering from want of provisions, the corn
-not being yet ripe, and from an unusually cold spring: accordingly,
-Agis marched them back to Sparta, and the fortification of Pylus thus
-produced the effect of abridging the invasion to the unusually short
-period of fifteen days. It operated in like manner to the protection
-of Korkyra: for the Peloponnesian fleet, recently arrived thither,
-or still on its way, received orders immediately to return for the
-attack of Pylus. Having avoided the Athenian fleet by transporting
-the ships across the isthmus at Leukas, it reached Pylus about the
-same time as the Lacedæmonian land-force from Sparta, composed
-of the Spartans themselves and the neighboring Periœki: for the
-more distant Periœki, as well as the Pelopon<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_319">[p. 319]</span>nesian allies, being just returned from
-Attica, were summoned to come as soon as they could, but did not
-accompany this first march.<a id="FNanchor_509" href="#Footnote_509"
-class="fnanchor">[509]</a></p>
-
-<p>At the last moment, before the Peloponnesian fleet came in and
-occupied the harbor, Demosthenês detached two out of his five
-triremes to warn Eurymedon and the main fleet, and to entreat
-immediate succor: the remaining ships he hauled ashore under the
-fortification, protecting them by palisades planted in front, and
-preparing to defend himself in the best manner he could. Having
-posted the larger portion of his force,—some of them mere seamen
-without arms, and many only half-armed,—round the assailable points
-of the fortification, to resist attacks from the land-force, he
-himself, with sixty chosen hoplites and a few bowmen, marched out of
-the fortification down to the sea-shore. It was on that side that
-the wall was weakest, for the Athenians, confident in their naval
-superiority, had given themselves little trouble to provide against
-an assailant fleet. Accordingly, Demosthenês foresaw that the great
-stress of the attack would lie on the sea-side, and his only chance
-of safety consisted in preventing the enemy from landing; a purpose,
-seconded by the rocky and perilous shore, which left no possibility
-of approach for ships, except on a narrow space immediately under
-the fortification. It was here that he took post, on the water’s
-edge, addressing a few words of encouragement to his men, and
-warning them that it was useless now to display acuteness in summing
-up perils which were but too obvious,—and that the only chance of
-escape lay in boldly encountering the enemy before they could set
-foot ashore; the difficulty of effecting a landing from ships in
-the face of resistance being better known to Athenian mariners
-than to any one else.<a id="FNanchor_510" href="#Footnote_510"
-class="fnanchor">[510]</a></p>
-
-<p>With a fleet of forty-three triremes, under Thrasymelidas, and
-a powerful land-force, simultaneously attacking, the Lacedæmonians
-had good hopes of storming at once a rock so hastily converted
-into a military post. But as they foresaw that the first attack
-might possibly fail, and that the fleet of Eurymedon would probably
-return, they resolved to occupy forthwith the island of Sphakteria,
-the natural place where the Athenian fleet would take station for
-the purpose of assisting the garrison ashore.<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_320">[p. 320]</span> The neighboring coast on the mainland
-of Peloponnesus was both harborless and hostile, so that there was no
-other spot near, where they could take station. And the Lacedæmonian
-commanders reckoned upon being able to stop up, as it were
-mechanically, both the two entrances into the harbor, by triremes
-lashed together, from the island to the mainland, with their prows
-pointing outwards; so that they would be able at any rate, occupying
-the island as well as the two channels, to keep off the Athenian
-fleet, and to hold Demosthenês closely blocked up<a id="FNanchor_511"
-href="#Footnote_511" class="fnanchor">[511]</a> on the rock of Pylus,
-where his provisions would quickly fail him. With these views, they
-drafted off by lot some hoplites from each of the Spartan lochi,
-accompanied as usual by Helots, and sent them across to Sphakteria;
-while their land-force and their fleet approached at once to attack
-the fortification.</p>
-
-<p>Of the assault on the land-side, we hear little: the Lacedæmonians
-were proverbially unskilful in the attack of anything like a
-fortified place, and they appear now to have made little impression.
-But the chief stress and vigor of the attack came on the sea-side, as
-Demosthenês had foreseen. The landing-place, even where practicable,
-was still rocky and difficult,—and so narrow in dimensions, that
-the Lacedæmonian ships could only approach by small squadrons at a
-time; while the Athenians maintained their ground firmly to prevent
-a single man from setting foot on land. The assailing triremes rowed
-up with loud shouts and exhortations to each other, striving to get
-so placed as that the hoplites in the bow could effect a landing:
-but such were the difficulties arising partly from the rocks and
-partly from the defence, that squadron after squadron tried this
-in vain. Nor did even the gallant example of Brasidas procure for
-them any better success. That officer, commanding a trireme, and
-observing that some of the pilots near him were cautious in driving
-their ships close in shore for fear of breaking them against the
-rocks, indignantly called to them not to spare the planks of their
-vessels, when the enemy had insulted them by erecting a fort in the
-country: Lacedæmonians, he exclaimed, ought to carry the landing by
-force, even though their ships should be dashed<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_321">[p. 321]</span> to pieces,—nor ought the Peloponnesian
-allies to be backward in sacrificing their ships for Sparta, in
-return for the many services which she had rendered to them.<a
-id="FNanchor_512" href="#Footnote_512" class="fnanchor">[512]</a>
-Foremost in performance as well as in exhortation, Brasidas
-constrained his own pilot to drive his ship close in, and advanced in
-person even on to the landing-steps for the purpose of leaping first
-ashore. But here he stood exposed to all the weapons of the Athenian
-defenders, who beat him back and pierced him with so many wounds,
-that he fainted away, and fell back into the bows, or foremost part
-of the trireme, beyond the rowers; while his shield, slipping away
-from the arm, dropped down and rolled overboard into the sea. His
-ship was obliged to retire, like the rest, without having effected
-any landing: and all these successive attacks from the sea, repeated
-for one whole day and a part of the next were repulsed by Demosthenês
-and his little band with victorious bravery. To both sides it seemed
-a strange reversal of ordinary relations,<a id="FNanchor_513"
-href="#Footnote_513" class="fnanchor">[513]</a> that the Athenians,
-essentially maritime, should be fighting on land—and that, too,
-Lacedæmonian land—against the Lacedæmonians, the select land-warriors
-of Greece, now on shipboard, and striving in vain to compass a
-landing on their own shore. The Athenians, in honor of their success,
-erected a trophy, the chief ornament of which was the shield of
-Brasidas, which had been cast ashore by the water.</p>
-
-<p>On the third day, the Lacedæmonians did not repeat their attack,
-but sent some of their vessels round to Asinê, in the Messenian
-gulf, for timber to construct battering machines; which they
-intended to employ against the wall of Demosthenês, on the side
-towards the harbor, where it was higher, and could not be assailed
-without machines, but where, at the same time, there was great
-facility in landing,—for their previous attack had been made on
-the side fronting the sea, where the wall was lower, but<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_322">[p. 322]</span> the difficulties
-of landing insuperable.<a id="FNanchor_514" href="#Footnote_514"
-class="fnanchor">[514]</a> But before these ships came back, the
-face of affairs was seriously changed by the unwelcome return of
-the Athenian fleet from Zakynthus, under Eurymedon, reinforced by
-four Chian ships, and some of the guard-ships at Naupaktus, so
-as now to muster fifty sail. The Athenian admiral, finding the
-enemy’s fleet in possession of the harbor, and seeing both the
-island of Sphakteria occupied, and the opposite shore covered with
-Lacedæmonian hoplites,<a id="FNanchor_515" href="#Footnote_515"
-class="fnanchor">[515]</a>—for the allies from all parts of
-Peloponnesus had now arrived,—looked around in vain for a place to
-land, and could find no other night-station except the uninhabited
-island of Prôtê, not very far distant. From hence he sailed forth in
-the morning to Pylus, prepared for a naval engagement,—hoping that
-perhaps the Lacedæmonians might come out to fight him in the open
-sea, but resolved, if this did not happen, to force his way in and
-attack the fleet in the harbor; the breadth of sea between Sphakteria
-and the mainland being sufficient to admit of nautical manœuvre.<a
-id="FNanchor_516" href="#Footnote_516" class="fnanchor">[516]</a>
-The Lacedæmonian admirals, seemingly confounded by the speed of
-the Athenian fleet in coming back, never thought of sailing out
-of the harbor to fight, nor did they even realize their scheme of
-blocking up the two entrances of the harbor with triremes<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_323">[p. 323]</span> closely lashed
-together. Both entrances were left open, though they determined to
-defend themselves within: but even here, so defective were their
-precautions, that several of their triremes were yet moored, and
-the rowers not fully aboard, when the Athenian admirals sailed in
-by both entrances at once to attack them. Most of the Lacedæmonian
-triremes, afloat, and in fighting trim, resisted the attack for a
-certain time, but were at length vanquished, and driven back to
-the shore, many of them with serious injury.<a id="FNanchor_517"
-href="#Footnote_517" class="fnanchor">[517]</a> Five of them were
-captured and towed off, one with all her crew aboard, and the
-Athenians, vigorously pursuing their success, drove against such as
-took refuge on the shore, as well as those which were not manned
-at the moment when the attack began, and had not been able to get
-afloat or into action. Some of the vanquished triremes being deserted
-by their crews, who jumped out upon the land, the Athenians were
-proceeding to tow them off, when the Lacedæmonian hoplites on the
-shore opposed a new and strenuous resistance. Excited to the utmost
-pitch by witnessing the disgraceful defeat of their fleet, and aware
-of the cruel consequences which turned upon it,—they marched all
-armed into the water, seized the ships to prevent them from being
-dragged off, and engaged in a desperate conflict to baffle the
-assailants: we have already seen a similar act of bravery, two years
-before, on the part of the Messenian hoplites accompanying the fleet
-of Phormio near Naupaktus.<a id="FNanchor_518" href="#Footnote_518"
-class="fnanchor">[518]</a> Extraordinary daring and valor was here
-displayed on both sides, in the attack as well as in the defence,
-and such was the clamor and confusion, that neither the land skill
-of the Lacedæmonians, nor the sea skill of the Athenians, were of
-much avail: the contest was one of personal valor and considerable
-suffering on both sides. At length the Lacedæmonians carried
-their point, and saved all the ships ashore; none being carried
-away except those at first captured. Both parties thus separated:
-the Athenians retired to the fortress at Pylus, where they were
-doubtless hailed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_324">[p. 324]</span>
-with overflowing joy by their comrades, and where they erected a
-trophy for their victory, giving up the enemy’s dead for burial,
-and picking up the floating wrecks and pieces.<a id="FNanchor_519"
-href="#Footnote_519" class="fnanchor">[519]</a></p>
-
-<p>But the great prize of the victory was neither in the five ships
-captured, nor in the relief afforded to the besieged at Pylus. It
-lay in the hoplites occupying the island of Sphakteria, who were
-now cut off from the mainland, as well as from all supplies. The
-Athenians, sailing round it in triumph, already looked upon them as
-their prisoners; while the Lacedæmonians on the opposite mainland,
-deeply distressed, but not knowing what to do, sent to Sparta for
-advice. So grave was the emergency, that the ephors came in person
-to the spot forthwith. Since they could still muster sixty triremes,
-a greater number than the Athenians,—besides a large force on land,
-and the whole command of the resources of the country,—while the
-Athenians had no footing on shore except the contracted promontory of
-Pylus, we might have imagined that a strenuous effort to carry off
-the imprisoned detachment across the narrow strait to the mainland
-would have had a fair chance of success. And probably, if either
-Demosthenês or Brasidas had been in command, such an effort would
-have been made. But Lacedæmonian courage was rather steadfast and
-unyielding than adventurous: and, moreover, the Athenian superiority
-at sea exercised a sort of fascination over men’s minds, analogous
-to that of the Spartans themselves on land; so that the ephors, on
-reaching Pylus, took a desponding view of their position, and sent a
-herald to the Athenian generals to propose an armistice, in order to
-allow time for envoys to go to Athens and treat for peace.</p>
-
-<p>To this Eurymedon and Demosthenês assented, and an armistice
-was concluded on the following terms: The Lacedæmonians agreed to
-surrender not only all their triremes now in the harbor, but also all
-the rest in their ports, altogether to the number of sixty; also,
-to abstain from all attack upon the fortress at Pylus, either by
-land or sea, for such time as should be necessary for the mission of
-envoys to Athens as well as for their return, both to be effected in
-an Athenian trireme provided for the purpose. The Athenians on their
-side engaged to desist from all hostilities<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_325">[p. 325]</span> during the like interval; but it was
-agreed that they should keep strict and unremitting watch over
-the island, yet without landing upon it. For the subsistence of
-the detachment in the island, the Lacedæmonians were permitted to
-send over every day two chœnikes of barley-meal in cakes, ready
-baked, two kotylæ of wine,<a id="FNanchor_520" href="#Footnote_520"
-class="fnanchor">[520]</a> and some meat, for each hoplite,—together
-with half that quantity for each of the attendant Helots; but this
-was all to be done under the supervision of the Athenians, with
-peremptory obligation to send no secret additional supplies. It
-was, moreover, expressly stipulated that if any one provision of
-the armistice, small or great, were violated, the whole should be
-considered as null and void. Lastly, the Athenians engaged, on the
-return of the envoys from Athens, to restore the triremes in the same
-condition as they received them.</p>
-
-<p>Such terms sufficiently attest the humiliation and anxiety
-of the Lacedæmonians; while the surrender of their entire naval
-force to the number of sixty triremes, which was forthwith carried
-into effect, demonstrates at the same time that they sincerely
-believed in the possibility of obtaining peace. Well aware that
-they were themselves the original beginners of the war, at a time
-when the Athenians desired peace, and that the latter had besides
-made fruitless overtures while under the pressure of the epidemic,
-they presumed that the same dispositions still prevailed at
-Athens, and that their present pacific wishes would be so gladly
-welcomed as to procure without difficulty the relinquishment of the
-prisoners in Sphakteria.<a id="FNanchor_521" href="#Footnote_521"
-class="fnanchor">[521]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Lacedæmonian envoys, conveyed to Athens in an Athenian
-trireme, appeared before the public assembly to set forth their
-mission, according to custom, prefacing their address with<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_326">[p. 326]</span> some apologies for
-that brevity of speech which belonged to their country. Their
-proposition was in substance a very simple one: “Give up to us the
-men in the island, and accept, in exchange for this favor, peace,
-with the alliance of Sparta.” They enforced their cause, by appeals,
-well-turned and conciliatory, partly indeed to the generosity, but
-still more to the prudential calculation of Athens; explicitly
-admitting the high and glorious vantage-ground on which she was now
-placed, as well as their own humbled dignity and inferior position.<a
-id="FNanchor_522" href="#Footnote_522" class="fnanchor">[522]</a>
-They, the Lacedæmonians, the first and greatest power in Greece,
-were now smitten by adverse fortune of war,—and that too without
-misconduct of their own, so that they were for the first time
-obliged to solicit an enemy for peace; which Athens had the precious
-opportunity of granting, not merely with honor to herself, but
-also in such manner as to create in their minds an ineffaceable
-friendship. And it became Athens to make use of her present good
-fortune while she had it,—not to rely upon its permanence, nor to
-abuse it by extravagant demands; her own imperial prudence, as well
-as the present circumstances of the Spartans, might teach her how
-unexpectedly the most disastrous casualties occurred. By granting
-what was now asked, she might make a peace which would be far
-more durable than if it were founded on the extorted compliances
-of a weakened enemy, because it would rest on Spartan honor and
-gratitude; the greater the previous enmity, the stronger would be
-such reactionary sentiment.<a id="FNanchor_523" href="#Footnote_523"
-class="fnanchor">[523]</a> But if Athens should now refuse, and if,
-in the farther prosecution of the war, the men in Sphakteria should
-perish,—a new and inexpiable ground of quarrel,<a id="FNanchor_524"
-href="#Footnote_524" class="fnanchor">[524]</a> peculiar to Sparta
-herself, would<span class="pagenum" id="Page_327">[p. 327]</span>
-be added to those already subsisting, which rather concerned Sparta
-as the chief of the Peloponnesian confederacy. Nor was it only the
-good-will and gratitude of the Spartans which Athens would earn
-by accepting the proposition tendered to her; she would farther
-acquire the grace and glory of conferring peace on Greece, which
-all the Greeks would recognize as her act. And when once the two
-preëminent powers, Athens and Sparta, were established in cordial
-amity, the remaining Grecian states would be too weak to resist what
-they two might prescribe.<a id="FNanchor_525" href="#Footnote_525"
-class="fnanchor">[525]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the language held by the Lacedæmonians in the assembly
-at Athens. It was discreetly calculated for their purpose, though
-when we turn back to the commencement of the war, and read the lofty
-declarations of the Spartan ephors and assembly respecting the
-wrongs of their allies and the necessity of extorting full indemnity
-for them from Athens, the contrast is indeed striking. On this
-occasion, the Lacedæmonians acted entirely for themselves and from
-consideration of their own necessities; severing themselves from
-their allies, and soliciting a special peace for themselves, with as
-little scruple as the Spartan general, Menedæus, during the preceding
-year, when he abandoned his Ambrakiot confederates after the battle
-of Olpæ, to conclude a separate capitulation with Demosthenês.</p>
-
-<p>The course proper to be adopted by Athens in reference to
-the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_328">[p. 328]</span> proposition,
-however, was by no means obvious. In all probability, the trireme
-which brought the Lacedæmonian envoys also brought the first news
-of that unforeseen and instantaneous turn of events which had
-rendered the Spartans in Sphakteria certain prisoners,—so it was
-then conceived,—and placed the whole Lacedæmonian fleet in their
-power; thus giving a totally new character of the war. The sudden
-arrival of such prodigious intelligence,—the astounding presence of
-Lacedæmonian envoys, bearing the olive-branch, and in an attitude of
-humiliation,—must have produced in the susceptible public of Athens
-emotions of the utmost intensity; an elation and confidence such as
-had probably never been felt since the reconquest of Samos. It was
-difficult at first to measure the full bearings of the new situation,
-and even Periklês himself might have hesitated what to recommend: but
-the immediate and dominant impression with the general public was,
-that Athens might now ask her own terms, as consideration for the
-prisoners in the island.<a id="FNanchor_526" href="#Footnote_526"
-class="fnanchor">[526]</a> Of this reigning tendency Kleon<a
-id="FNanchor_527" href="#Footnote_527" class="fnanchor">[527]</a>
-made himself the emphatic organ, as he had done three years before
-in the sentence passed on the Mitylenæans; a man who—like leading
-journals, in modern times—often appeared to guide the public because
-he gave vehement utterance to that which they were already feeling,
-and carried it out in its collateral bearings and consequences.
-On the present occasion, he doubtless spoke with the most genuine
-conviction; for he was full of the sentiment of Athenian force and
-Athenian imperial dignity, as well as disposed to a sanguine view of
-future chances. Moreover, in a discussion like that now opened, where
-there was much room for doubt, he came forward with a proposition
-at once plain and decisive. Reminding the Athenians of<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_329">[p. 329]</span> the dishonorable truce
-of thirty years to which they had been compelled by the misfortunes
-of the time to accede, fourteen years before the Peloponnesian
-war,—Kleon insisted that now was the time for Athens to recover what
-she had then lost,—Nisæa, Pegæ, Trœzen, and Achaia. He proposed that
-Sparta should be required to restore these to Athens, in exchange for
-the soldiers now blocked up in Sphakteria; after which a truce might
-be concluded for as long a time as might be deemed expedient.</p>
-
-<p>This decree, adopted by the assembly, was communicated as the
-answer of Athens to the Lacedæmonian envoys, who had probably retired
-after their first address, and were now sent for again into the
-assembly, to hear it. On being informed of the resolution, they
-made no comment on its substance, but invited the Athenians to name
-commissioners, who might discuss with them freely and deliberately
-suitable terms for a pacification. Here, however, Kleon burst upon
-them with an indignant rebuke. He had thought from the first, he
-said, that they came with dishonest purposes, but now the thing was
-clear,—nothing else could be meant by this desire to treat with some
-few men apart from the general public. If they had really any fair
-proposition to make, he called upon them to proclaim it openly to
-all. But this the envoys could not bring themselves to do. They had
-probably come with authority to make certain concessions, but to
-announce these concessions forthwith would have rendered negotiation
-impossible, besides dishonoring them in the face of their allies.
-Such dishonor would be incurred, too, without any advantage, if
-the Athenians should after all reject the terms, which the temper
-of the assembly before them rendered but too probable. Moreover,
-they were totally unpractised in the talents for dealing with a
-public assembly, such discussions being so rare as to be practically
-unknown in the Lacedæmonian system. To reply to the denunciation
-of a vehement speaker like Kleon, required readiness of elocution,
-dexterity, and self-command, which they had had no opportunity
-of acquiring. They remained silent,—abashed by the speaker and
-intimidated by the temper of the assembly: their mission was thus
-terminated, and they were reconveyed in the trireme to Pylus.<a
-id="FNanchor_528" href="#Footnote_528" class="fnanchor">[528]</a></p>
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_330">[p. 330]</span></p>
-<p>It is probable that if these envoys had been able to make an
-effective reply to Kleon, and to defend their proposition against
-his charge of fraudulent purpose, they would have been sustained
-by Nikias and a certain number of leading Athenians, so that the
-assembly might have been brought at least to try the issue of a
-private discussion between diplomatic agents on both sides. But
-the case was one in which it was absolutely necessary that the
-envoys should stand forward with some defence for themselves; which
-Nikias might effectively second, but could not originate: and as
-they were incompetent to this task, the whole affair broke down.
-We shall hereafter find other examples, in which the incapacity
-of Lacedæmonian envoys, to meet the open debate of Athenian
-political life, is productive of mischievous results. In this case,
-the proposition of the envoys to enter into treaty with select
-commissioners, was not only quite reasonable, but afforded the
-only possibility—though doubtless not a certainty—of some ultimate
-pacification: and the manœuvre whereby Kleon discredited it was
-a grave abuse of publicity, not unknown in modern, though more
-frequent in ancient, political life. Kleon probably thought that
-if commissioners were named, Nikias, Lachês, and other politicians
-of the same rank and color, would be the persons selected; persons
-whose anxiety for peace and alliance with Sparta would make them
-over-indulgent and careless in securing the interests of Athens: and
-it will be seen, when we come to describe the conduct of Nikias four
-years afterwards, that this suspicion was not ill-grounded.</p>
-
-<p>Unfortunately Thucydidês, in describing the proceedings of this
-assembly, so important in its consequences because it intercepted a
-promising opening for peace, is brief as usual,—telling us only what
-was said by Kleon and what was decided by the assembly. But though
-nothing is positively stated respecting Nikias and his partisans,
-we learn from other sources, and we may infer from what afterwards
-occurred, that they vehemently opposed Kleon, and that they looked
-coldly on the subsequent enterprise against Sphakteria as upon
-his peculiar measure.<a id="FNanchor_529" href="#Footnote_529"
-class="fnanchor">[529]</a></p>
-
-<p>It has been common to treat the dismissal of the Lacedæmonian
-envoys on this occasion as a peculiar specimen of democrat<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_331">[p. 331]</span>ical folly. But
-over-estimation of the prospective chances arising out of success,
-to a degree more extravagant than that of which Athens was now
-guilty, is by no means peculiar to democracy. Other governments,
-opposed to democracy not less in temper than in form,—an able
-despot like the emperor Napoleon, and a powerful aristocracy
-like that of England,<a id="FNanchor_530" href="#Footnote_530"
-class="fnanchor">[530]</a>—have found success to the full as
-misleading. That Athens should desire to profit by this unexpected
-piece of good fortune, was perfectly reasonable: that she should make
-use of it to regain advantages which former misfortunes had compelled
-herself to surrender, was a feeling not unnatural. And whether the
-demand was excessive, or by how much, is a question always among
-the most embarrassing for any government—kingly, oligarchical, or
-democratical—to determine.</p>
-
-<p>We may, however, remark that Kleon gave an impolitic turn to
-Athenian feeling, by directing it towards the entire and literal
-reacquisition of what had been lost twenty years before. Unless we
-are to consider his quadruple demand as a flourish, to be<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_332">[p. 332]</span> modified by subsequent
-negotiation, it seems to present some plausibility, but little of
-long-sighted wisdom: for while, on the one hand, it called upon
-Sparta to give up much which was not in her possession and must have
-been extorted by force from allies,—on the other hand, the situation
-of Athens was not the same as it had been when she concluded the
-thirty years’ truce; nor does it seem that the restoration of Achaia
-and Trœzen would have been of any material value to her. Nisæa and
-Pegæ—which would have been tantamount to the entire Megarid, inasmuch
-as Megara itself could hardly have been held with both its ports in
-the possession of an enemy—would, indeed, have been highly valuable,
-since she could then have protected her territory against invasion
-from Peloponnesus, besides possessing a port in the Corinthian gulf.
-And it would seem that if able commissioners had now been named for
-private discussion with the Lacedæmonian envoys, under the present
-urgent desire of Sparta, coupled with her disposition to abandon her
-allies,—this important point might possibly have been pressed and
-carried, in exchange for Sphakteria. Nay, even if such acquisition
-had been found impracticable, still, the Athenians would have been
-able to effect some arrangement which would have widened the breach,
-and destroyed the confidence, between Sparta and her allies; a point
-of great moment for them to accomplish. There was therefore every
-reason for trying what could be done by negotiation, under the
-present temper of Sparta; and the step, by which Kleon abruptly broke
-off such hopes, was decidedly mischievous.</p>
-
-<p>On the return of the envoys without success to Pylus,<a
-id="FNanchor_531" href="#Footnote_531" class="fnanchor">[531]</a>
-twenty days after their departure from that place, the armistice
-immediately terminated; and the Lacedæmonians redemanded the triremes
-which they had surrendered. But Eurymedon refused compliance with
-this demand, alleging that the Lacedæmonians had, during the truce,
-made a fraudulent attempt to surprise the rock of Pylus, and had
-violated the stipulations in other ways besides; while it stood
-expressly stipulated in the truce, that the violation by either
-side even of the least among its conditions, should cancel all
-obligation on both sides. Thucydidês, without<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_333">[p. 333]</span> distinctly giving his opinion, seems
-rather to imply, that there was no just ground for the refusal:
-though if any accidental want of vigilance had presented to the
-Lacedæmonians an opportunity for surprising Pylus, they would be
-likely enough to avail themselves of it, seeing that they would
-thereby drive off the Athenian fleet from its only landing-place,
-and render the continued blockade of Sphakteria impracticable.
-However the truth may be, Eurymedon persisted in his refusal, in
-spite of loud protests of the Lacedæmonians against his perfidy.
-Hostilities were energetically resumed: the Lacedæmonian army on
-land began again to attack the fortifications of Pylus, while the
-Athenian fleet became doubly watchful in the blockade of Sphakteria,
-in which they were reinforced by twenty fresh ships from Athens,
-making a fleet of seventy triremes in all. Two ships were perpetually
-rowing round the island in opposite directions, throughout the whole
-day; while at night, the whole fleet were kept on watch, except on
-the sea-side of the island in stormy weather.<a id="FNanchor_532"
-href="#Footnote_532" class="fnanchor">[532]</a></p>
-
-<p>The blockade, however, was soon found to be more full of privation
-in reference to the besiegers themselves, and more difficult of
-enforcement in respect to the island and its occupants, than had been
-originally contemplated. The Athenians were much distressed for want
-of water; they had only one really good spring in the fortification
-of Pylus itself, quite insufficient for the supply of a large fleet:
-many of them were obliged to scrape the shingle and drink such
-brackish water as they could find; while ships as well as men were
-perpetually afloat, since they could take rest and refreshment only
-by relays successively landing on the rock of Pylus, or even on the
-edge of Sphakteria itself, with all the chance of being interrupted
-by the enemy,—there being no other landing-place,<a id="FNanchor_533"
-href="#Footnote_533" class="fnanchor">[533]</a> and the ancient
-trireme affording no accommodation either for eating or sleeping. At
-first, all this was patiently borne, in the hopes that Sphakteria
-would speedily be starved out, and the Spartans forced to renew the
-request for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_334">[p. 334]</span>
-capitulation: but no such request came, and the Athenians in the
-fleet gradually became sick in body as well as impatient and angry
-in mind. In spite of all their vigilance, clandestine supplies of
-provisions continually reached the island, under the temptation
-of large rewards offered by the Spartan government. Able swimmers
-contrived to cross the strait, dragging after them by ropes skins
-full of linseed and poppy-seed mixed with honey; while merchant
-vessels, chiefly manned by Helots, started from various parts of
-the Laconian coast, selecting by preference the stormy nights, and
-encountering every risk in order to run their vessel with its cargo
-ashore on the sea-side of the island, at a time when the Athenian
-guard-ships could not be on the lookout.<a id="FNanchor_534"
-href="#Footnote_534" class="fnanchor">[534]</a> They cared little
-about damage to their vessel in landing, provided they could get
-the cargo on shore; for ample compensation was insured to them,
-together with emancipation to every Helot who succeeded in reaching
-the island with a supply. Though the Athenians redoubled their
-vigilance, and intercepted many of these daring smugglers, still,
-there were others who eluded them: moreover, the rations supplied to
-the island by stipulation during the absence of the envoys in their
-journey to Athens had been so ample, that Epitadas the commander had
-been able to economize, and thus to make the stock hold out longer.
-Week after week passed without any symptoms of surrender, and the
-Athenians not only felt the present sufferings of their own position,
-but also became apprehensive for their own supplies, all brought by
-sea round Peloponnesus to this distant and naked shore. They began
-even to mistrust the possibility of thus indefinitely continuing the
-blockade against the contingencies of such violent weather, as would
-probably ensue at the close of summer. In this state of weariness
-and uncertainty, the active Demosthenês began to organize a descent
-upon the island, with the view of carrying it by force. He not only
-sent for forces from the neighboring allies, Zakynthus and Naupaktus,
-but also transmitted an urgent request to Athens that reinforcements
-might be furnished to him for the purpose, making known explicitly
-both the uncomfortable condition of the armament, and the unpromising
-chances of simple blockade.<a id="FNanchor_535" href="#Footnote_535"
-class="fnanchor">[535]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_335">[p. 335]</span></p>
-
-<p>The arrival of these envoys caused infinite mortification to
-the Athenians at home. Having expected to hear, long before, that
-Sphakteria had surrendered, they were now taught to consider even
-the ultimate conquest as a matter of doubt: they were surprised that
-the Lacedæmonians sent no fresh envoys to solicit peace, and began
-to suspect that such silence was founded upon well-grounded hopes of
-being able to hold out. But the person most of all discomposed was
-Kleon, who observed that the people now regretted their insulting
-repudiation of the Lacedæmonian message, and were displeased with him
-as the author of it; while, on the contrary, his numerous political
-enemies were rejoiced at the turn which events had taken, as it
-opened a means of effecting his ruin. At first, Kleon contended
-that the envoys had misrepresented the state of facts; to which
-the latter replied by entreating, that if their accuracy were
-mistrusted, commissioners of inspection might be sent to verify it;
-and Kleon himself, along with Theogonês, was forthwith named for this
-function.</p>
-
-<p>But it did not suit Kleon’s purpose to go as commissioner to
-Pylus, since his mistrust of the statement was a mere general
-suspicion, not resting on any positive evidence: moreover, he saw
-that the dispositions of the assembly tended to comply with the
-request of Demosthenês, and to despatch a reinforcing armament. He
-accordingly altered his tone at once: “If ye really believe the story
-(he said), do not waste time in sending commissioners, but sail at
-once to capture the men. It would be easy with a proper force, if
-our generals were <i>men</i> (here he pointed reproachfully to his enemy
-Nikias, then stratêgus<a id="FNanchor_536" href="#Footnote_536"
-class="fnanchor">[536]</a>), to sail and take the soldiers in the
-island. That is what <i>I</i> at least would do, if <i>I</i> were general.”
-His words instantly provoked a hostile murmur from a portion of
-the assembly: “Why do you not sail then at once, if you think
-the matter so easy?” while Nikias, taking<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_336">[p. 336]</span> up this murmur, and delighted to have
-caught his political enemy in a trap, stood forward in person, and
-pressed him to set about the enterprise without delay; intimating
-the willingness of himself and his colleagues to grant him any
-portion of the military force of the city which he chose to ask
-for. Kleon at first closed with this proposition, believing it to
-be a mere stratagem of debate and not seriously intended: but so
-soon as he saw that what was said was really meant, he tried to
-back out, and observed to Nikias: “It is your place to sail: <i>you</i>
-are general, not I.”<a id="FNanchor_537" href="#Footnote_537"
-class="fnanchor">[537]</a> Nikias only replied by repeating his
-exhortation, renouncing formally the command against Sphakteria,
-and calling upon the Athenians to recollect what Kleon had said,
-as well as to hold him to his engagement. The more Kleon tried
-to evade the duty, the louder and more unanimous did the cry of
-the assembly become that Nikias should surrender it to him, and
-that <i>he</i> should undertake it. At last, seeing that there was no
-possibility of receding, Kleon reluctantly accepted the charge, and
-came forward to announce his intention in a resolute address: “I
-am not at all afraid of the Lacedæmonians (he said): I shall sail
-without even taking with me any of the hoplites from the regular
-Athenian muster-roll, but only the Lemnian and Imbrian hoplites who
-are now here (that is, Athenian kleruchs or out-citizens who had
-properties in Lemnos and Imbros, and habitually resided there),
-together with some peltasts, brought from Ænos, in Thrace, and
-four hundred bowmen. With this force, added to what is already
-at Pylos, I engage in the space of twenty days either to bring
-the Lacedæmonians in Sphakteria hither as prisoners, or to kill
-them in the island.” The Athenians—observes Thucydidês—laughed
-somewhat at Kleon’s looseness of tongue; but<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_337">[p. 337]</span> prudent men had pleasure in reflecting
-that one or other of the two advantages was now certain: either
-they would get rid of Kleon, which they anticipated as the issue
-at once most probable and most desirable,—or, if mistaken on this
-point, the Lacedæmonians in the island would be killed or taken.<a
-id="FNanchor_538" href="#Footnote_538" class="fnanchor">[538]</a> The
-vote was accordingly passed for the immediate departure of Kleon, who
-caused Demosthenês to be named as his colleague in command, and sent
-intelligence to Pylus at once that he was about to start with the
-reinforcement solicited.</p>
-
-<p>This curious scene, interesting as laying open the interior
-feeling of the Athenian assembly, suggests, when properly considered,
-reflections very different from those which have been usually
-connected with it. It seems to be conceived by most historians as
-a mere piece of levity or folly in the Athenian people, who are
-supposed to have enjoyed the excellent joke of putting an incompetent
-man against his own will at the head of this enterprise, in order
-that they might amuse themselves with his blunders: Kleon is thus
-contemptible, and the Athenian people ridiculous. Certainly, if that
-people had been disposed to conduct their public business upon such
-childish fancies as are here implied, they would have made a very
-different figure from that which history actually presents to us.
-The truth is, that in regard to Kleon’s alleged looseness of tongue,
-which excited more or less of laughter among the persons present,
-there was no one really ridiculous except the laughers themselves:
-for the announcement which he made was so far from being extravagant,
-that it was realized to the letter, and realized, too, let us
-add, without any peculiar aid from unforeseen favorable accident.
-To show how much this is the case, we have only to contrast the
-jesters before the fact with the jesters after it. While the former
-deride Kleon as a promiser of extravagant and impossible results,
-we find Aristophanês, in his comedy of the Knights, about six<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_338">[p. 338]</span> months afterwards,<a
-id="FNanchor_539" href="#Footnote_539" class="fnanchor">[539]</a>
-laughing at him as having achieved nothing at all,—as having
-cunningly put himself into the shoes of Demosthenês, and stolen away
-from that general the glory of taking Sphakteria, after all the
-difficulties of the enterprise had been already got over, and “the
-cake ready baked,”—to use the phrase of the comic poet. Both of the
-jests are exaggerations in opposite directions; but the last in order
-of time, if it be good at all against Kleon, is a galling sarcasm
-against those who derided Kleon as an extravagant boaster.</p>
-
-<p>If we intend fairly to compare the behavior of Kleon with that
-of his political adversaries, we must distinguish between the two
-occasions: first, that in which he had frustrated the pacific
-mission of the Lacedæmonian envoys; next, the subsequent delay and
-dilemma which has been recently described. On the first occasion,
-his advice appears to have been mistaken in policy, as well as
-offensive in manner: his opponents, proposing a discussion by special
-commissioners as a fair chance for honorable terms of peace, took
-a juster view of the public interests. But the case was entirely
-altered when the mission for peace (wisely or unwisely) had been
-broken up, and when the fate of Sphakteria had been committed to the
-chances of war. There were then imperative reasons for prosecuting
-the war vigorously, and for employing all the force requisite to
-insure the capture of that island. And looking to this end, we shall
-find that there was nothing in the conduct of Kleon either to blame
-or to deride; while his political adversaries, Nikias among them, are
-deplorably<span class="pagenum" id="Page_339">[p. 339]</span> timid,
-ignorant, and reckless of the public interest; seeking only to turn
-the existing disappointment and dilemma into a party opportunity for
-ruining him.</p>
-
-<p>To grant the reinforcement asked for by Demosthenês was obviously
-the proper measure, and Kleon saw that the people would go along
-with him in proposing it: but he had at the same time good grounds
-for reproaching Nikias, and the other stratêgi, whose duty it was
-to originate that proposition, with their backwardness in remaining
-silent, and in leaving the matter to go by default, as if it were
-Kleon’s affair and not theirs. His taunt: “This is what <i>I</i> would
-have done, if <i>I</i> were general,” was a mere phrase of the heat of
-debate, such as must have been very often used, without any idea
-on the part of the hearers of construing it as a pledge which the
-speaker was bound to realize: nor was it any disgrace to Kleon to
-decline a charge which he had never sought, and to confess his
-incompetence to command. The reason why he was forced into the
-post, in spite of his own unaffected reluctance, was not, as some
-historians would have us believe, because the Athenian people loved
-a joke, but from two feelings, both perfectly serious, which divided
-the assembly,—feelings opposite in their nature, but coinciding
-on this occasion to the same result. His enemies loudly urged him
-forward, anticipating that the enterprise under him would miscarry,
-and that he would thus be ruined: his friends, perceiving this
-manœuvre, but not sharing in such anticipations, and ascribing
-his reluctance to modesty, pronounced themselves so much the more
-vehemently on behalf of their leader, and repaid the scornful cheer
-by cheers of sincere encouragement. “Why do you not try your hand at
-this enterprise, Kleon, if you think it so easy? You will soon find
-that it is too much for you;” was the cry of his enemies: to which
-his friends would reply: “Yes, to be sure, try, Kleon: by all means,
-try: do not be backward; we warrant that you will come honorably out
-of it, and we will stand by you.” Such cheer and counter-cheer is
-precisely in the temper of an animated multitude, as Thucydidês<a
-id="FNanchor_540" href="#Footnote_540" class="fnanchor">[540]</a>
-states it, divided in feeling; and friends as well as enemies thus
-concurred to impose upon Kleon a compulsion not to be eluded. Of all
-the parties<span class="pagenum" id="Page_340">[p. 340]</span> here
-concerned those whose conduct is the most unpardonably disgraceful
-are Nikias and his oligarchical friends; who force a political enemy
-into a supreme command against his own strenuous protest, persuaded
-that he will fail so as to compromise the lives of many soldiers, and
-the destinies of the state on an important emergency,—but satisfying
-themselves with the idea that they shall bring him to disgrace and
-ruin.</p>
-
-<p>It is to be remarked, that Nikias and his fellow stratêgi were
-backward on this occasion, partly because they were really afraid of
-the duty. They anticipated a resistance to the death at Sphakteria,
-such as that at Thermopylæ: in which case, though victory might
-perhaps be won by a superior assailant force, it would not be won
-without much bloodshed and peril, besides an inexpiable quarrel with
-Sparta. If Kleon took a more correct measure of the chances, he ought
-to have credit for it, as one “bene ausus vana contemnere.” And it
-seems probable, that if he had not been thus forward in supporting
-the request of Demosthenês for reinforcement,—or rather, if he had
-not been so placed that he was compelled to be forward,—Nikias and
-his friends would have laid aside the enterprise, and reopened
-negotiations for peace, under circumstances neither honorable nor
-advantageous to Athens. Kleon was in this manner one main author of
-the most important success which Athens obtained throughout the whole
-war.</p>
-
-<p>On joining Demosthenês with his reinforcement, Kleon found every
-preparation for attack made by that general, and the soldiers at
-Pylus eager to commence such aggressive measures as would relieve
-them from the tedium of a blockade. Sphakteria had become recently
-more open to assault in consequence of an accidental conflagration
-of the wood, arising from a fire kindled by the Athenian seamen,
-while landing at the skirt of the island, and cooking their food:
-under the influence of a strong wind, most of the wood in the island
-had thus caught fire and been destroyed. To Demosthenês this was an
-accident especially welcome; for the painful experience of his defeat
-in the forest-covered hills of Ætolia had taught him how difficult
-it was for assailants to cope with an enemy whom they could not
-see, and who knew all the good points of defence in the country.<a
-id="FNanchor_541" href="#Footnote_541" class="fnanchor">[541]</a>
-The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_341">[p. 341]</span> island being
-thus stripped of its wood, he was enabled to survey the garrison, to
-count their number, and to lay his plan of attack on certain data. He
-now, too, for the first time, discovered that he had underrated their
-real number, having before suspected that the Lacedæmonians had sent
-in rations for a greater total than was actually there. The island
-was occupied altogether by four hundred and twenty Lacedæmonian
-hoplites, out of whom more than one hundred and twenty were native
-Spartans, belonging to the first families in the city. The commander,
-Epitadas, with the main body, occupied the centre of the island,
-near the only spring of water which it afforded:<a id="FNanchor_542"
-href="#Footnote_542" class="fnanchor">[542]</a> an advanced guard
-of thirty hoplites was posted not far from the sea-shore, in the
-end of the island farthest from Pylus; while the end immediately
-fronting Pylus, peculiarly steep and rugged, and containing even a
-rude circuit of stones, of unknown origin, which served as a sort
-of defence, was held as a post of reserve.<a id="FNanchor_543"
-href="#Footnote_543" class="fnanchor">[543]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the prey which Kleon and Demosthenês were anxious to
-grasp. On the very day of the arrival of the former, they sent a
-herald to the Lacedæmonian generals on the mainland, inviting the
-surrender of the hoplites on the island, on condition of being simply
-detained under guard without any hardship, until a final pacification
-should take place. Of course the summons was refused; after which,
-leaving only one day for repose, the two generals took advantage of
-the night to put all their hoplites aboard a few triremes, making
-show as if they were merely commencing the ordinary nocturnal
-circumnavigation, so as to excite no suspicion in the occupants of
-the island. The entire body of Athenian hoplites, eight hundred in
-number, were thus disembarked in two divisions, one on each side
-of the island, a little before daybreak: the advanced guard of
-thirty Lacedæmonians, completely unprepared, were surprised even in
-their sleep and all slain.<a id="FNanchor_544" href="#Footnote_544"
-class="fnanchor">[544]</a> At the point of day, the entire remaining
-force from the seventy-two triremes was also disembarked, leaving
-on board only the thalamii, or lowest tier of rowers, and<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_342">[p. 342]</span> reserving only a
-sufficient number to man the walls of Pylus. Altogether, there
-could not have been less than ten thousand troops employed in the
-attack of the island,—men of all arms: eight hundred hoplites, eight
-hundred peltasts, eight hundred bowmen; the rest armed with javelins,
-slings, and stones. Demosthenês kept his hoplites in one compact
-body, but distributed the light-armed into separate companies of
-about two hundred men each, with orders to occupy the rising grounds
-all round, and harass the flanks and rear of the Lacedæmonians.<a
-id="FNanchor_545" href="#Footnote_545" class="fnanchor">[545]</a></p>
-
-<p>To resist this large force, the Lacedæmonian commander Epitadas
-had only three hundred and sixty hoplites around him; for his
-advanced guard of thirty men had been slain, and as many more must
-have been held in reserve to guard the rocky station in his rear:
-of the Helots who were with him, Thucydidês says nothing, during
-the whole course of the action. As soon as he saw the numbers and
-disposition of his enemies, Epitadas placed his men in battle
-array, and advanced to encounter the main body of hoplites whom
-he saw before him. But the Spartan march was habitually slow:<a
-id="FNanchor_546" href="#Footnote_546" class="fnanchor">[546]</a>
-moreover, the ground was rough and uneven, obstructed with stumps,
-and overlaid with dust and ashes, from the recently burnt wood, so
-that a march at once rapid and orderly was hardly possible: and he
-had to traverse the whole intermediate space, since the Athenian
-hoplites remained immovable in their position. No sooner had his
-march commenced, than he found himself assailed both in rear and
-flanks, especially in the right or unshielded flank, by the numerous
-companies of light-armed.<a id="FNanchor_547" href="#Footnote_547"
-class="fnanchor">[547]</a> Notwithstanding their extraordinary
-superiority of number, these men were at first awe-stricken at
-finding themselves in actual contest with Lacedæmonian hoplites:<a
-id="FNanchor_548" href="#Footnote_548" class="fnanchor">[548]</a>
-still, they began the fight, poured in their missile weapons, and
-so annoyed the march that the hoplites were obliged to halt, while
-Epitadas ordered the most active among them to spring out of their
-ranks and repel the assailants. But pursuers with spear and shield
-had little chance of overtaking men lightly clad and armed, who
-always retired, in whatever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_343">[p.
-343]</span> direction the pursuit was commenced, had the advantage
-of difficult ground, redoubled their annoyance against the rear of
-the pursuers as soon as the latter retreated to resume their place
-in the ranks, and always took care to get round to the rear of the
-hoplites.</p>
-
-<p>After some experience of the inefficacy of Lacedæmonian pursuit,
-the light-armed, becoming far bolder than at first, closed upon them
-nearer and more universally, with arrows, javelins, and stones,
-raising shouts and clamor that rent the air, rendering the word of
-command inaudible by the Lacedæmonian soldiers, who at the same time
-were almost blinded by the thick clouds of dust, kicked up from the
-recently spread wood-ashes.<a id="FNanchor_549" href="#Footnote_549"
-class="fnanchor">[549]</a> Such method of fighting was one for which
-the Lykurgean drill made no provision, and the longer it continued
-the more painful did the embarrassment of the exposed hoplites
-become: their repeated efforts to destroy or even to reach nimble
-and ever-returning enemies, all proved abortive, whilst their own
-numbers were incessantly diminished by wounds which they could not
-return. Their only offensive arms consisted of the long spear and
-short sword usual to the Grecian hoplite, without any missile weapons
-whatever; nor could they even pick up and throw back the javelins
-of their enemies, since the points of these javelins commonly broke
-off and stuck in the shields, or sometimes even in the body which
-they had wounded. Moreover, the bows of the archers, doubtless
-carefully selected before starting from Athens, were powerfully
-drawn, so that their arrows may sometimes have pierced and inflicted
-wounds even through the shield or the helmet,—but at any rate, the
-stuffed doublet, which formed the only defence of the hoplite on his
-unshielded side, was a very inadequate protection against them.<a
-id="FNanchor_550" href="#Footnote_550" class="fnanchor">[550]</a>
-Under this trying distress<span class="pagenum" id="Page_344">[p.
-344]</span> did the Lacedæmonians continue for a long time, poorly
-provided for defence, and altogether helpless for aggression,—without
-being able to approach at all nearer to the Athenian hoplites. At
-length the Lacedæmonian commander, seeing that his position grew
-worse and worse, gave orders to close the ranks and retreat to the
-last redoubt in the rear: but this movement was not accomplished
-without difficulty, for the light-armed assailants became doubly
-clamorous and forward, and many wounded men, unable to move, or at
-least to keep in rank, were overtaken and slain.<a id="FNanchor_551"
-href="#Footnote_551" class="fnanchor">[551]</a></p>
-
-<p>A diminished remnant, however, reached the last post in safety,
-and they were here in comparative protection, since the ground was
-so rocky and impracticable that their enemies could not attack them
-either in flank or rear: though the position at any rate could not
-have been long tenable separately, inasmuch as the only spring of
-water in the island was in the centre, which they had just been
-compelled to abandon. The light-armed being now less available,
-Demosthenês and Kleon brought up their eight hundred Athenian
-hoplites, who had not before been engaged; but the Lacedæmonians
-were here at home<a id="FNanchor_552" href="#Footnote_552"
-class="fnanchor">[552]</a> with their weapons, and enabled to display
-their well-known superiority against opposing hoplites, especially
-as they had the advantage<span class="pagenum" id="Page_345">[p.
-345]</span> of higher ground against enemies charging from beneath.
-Although the Athenians were double their own numbers and withal yet
-unexhausted, they were repulsed in many successive attacks. The
-besieged maintained their ground in spite of all their previous
-fatigue and suffering, harder to be borne from the scanty diet on
-which they had recently subsisted. The struggle lasted so long
-that heat and thirst began to tell even upon the assailants, when
-the commander of the Messenians came to Kleon and Demosthenês, and
-intimated that they were now laboring in vain; promising at the same
-time that if they would confide to him a detachment of light troops
-and bowmen, he would find his way round to the higher cliffs, in the
-rear of the assailants.<a id="FNanchor_553" href="#Footnote_553"
-class="fnanchor">[553]</a> He accordingly stole away unobserved from
-the rear, scrambling round over pathless crags, and by an almost
-impracticable footing on the brink of the sea, amidst approaches
-which the Lacedæmonians had left unguarded, never imagining that they
-could be molested in that direction. He suddenly appeared with his
-detachment on the higher peak above them, so that their position was
-thus commanded, and they found themselves, as at Thermopylæ, between
-two fires, without any hope of escape. Their enemies in front,
-encouraged by the success of the Messenians, pressed forward with
-increased ardor, until at length the courage of the Lacedæmonians
-gave way, and the position was carried.<a id="FNanchor_554"
-href="#Footnote_554" class="fnanchor">[554]</a></p>
-
-<p>A few moments more, and they would have been all overpowered and
-slain, when Kleon and Demosthenês, anxious to carry them as prisoners
-to Athens, constrained their men to halt, and proclaimed by herald
-an invitation to surrender, on condition of delivering up their
-arms and being held at the disposal of the Athenians. Most of them,
-incapable of farther effort, closed with the proposition forthwith,
-signifying compliance by dropping their shields and waving both
-hands above their heads. The battle being thus ended, Styphon the
-commander—originally only third in command, but now chief, since
-Epitadas had been slain, and the second in command, Hippagretês,
-was lying disabled by wounds on the field—entered into conference
-with Kleon and Demosthenês, and entreated permission to send across
-for orders to the Lacedæmonians on the mainland. The Athe<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_346">[p. 346]</span>nian commanders, though
-refusing this request, sent themselves and invited Lacedæmonian
-heralds over from the mainland, through whom communications were
-exchanged twice or three times between Styphon and the chief
-Lacedæmonian authorities. At length the final message came: “The
-Lacedæmonians direct you to take counsel for yourselves, but to
-do nothing disgraceful.”<a id="FNanchor_555" href="#Footnote_555"
-class="fnanchor">[555]</a> Their counsel was speedily taken; they
-surrendered themselves and delivered up their arms; two hundred and
-ninety-two in number, the survivors of the original total of four
-hundred and twenty. And out of these, no less than one hundred and
-twenty were native Spartans, some of them belonging to the first
-families in the city.<a id="FNanchor_556" href="#Footnote_556"
-class="fnanchor">[556]</a> They were kept under guard during that
-night, and distributed on the morrow among the Athenian trierarchs
-to be conveyed as prisoners to Athens; while a truce was granted
-to the Lacedæmonians on shore, in order that they might carry
-across the dead bodies for burial. So careful had Epitadas been
-in husbanding the provisions, that some food was yet found in the
-island; though the garrison had subsisted for fifty-two days upon
-casual supplies, aided by such economies as had been laid by during
-the twenty days of the armistice, when food of a stipulated quantity
-was regularly furnished. Seventy-two days had thus elapsed, from the
-first imprisonment in the island to the hour of their surrender.<a
-id="FNanchor_557" href="#Footnote_557" class="fnanchor">[557]</a></p>
-
-<p>The best troops in modern times would neither incur reproach,
-nor occasion surprise, by surrendering, under circumstances in all
-respects similar to this gallant remnant in Sphakteria. Yet in
-Greece the astonishment was prodigious and universal, when it was
-learned that the Lacedæmonians had consented to become prisoners:<a
-id="FNanchor_558" href="#Footnote_558" class="fnanchor">[558]</a> for
-the terror inspired by their name, and the deep-struck impression
-of Thermopylæ, had created a belief that they would endure any
-extremity of famine, and perish in the midst of any superiority
-of hostile force, rather than dream of giving up their arms and
-surviving as captives. The events of Sphak<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_347">[p. 347]</span>teria, shocking as they did this
-preconceived idea, discredited the military prowess of Sparta in the
-eyes of all Greece, and especially in those of her own allies. Even
-in Sparta itself, too, the same feeling prevailed,—partially revealed
-in the answer transmitted to Styphon from the generals on shore,
-who did not venture to forbid surrender, yet discountenanced it by
-implication: and it is certain that the Spartans would have lost less
-by their death than by their surrender. But we read with disgust
-the spiteful taunt of one of the allies of Athens (not an Athenian)
-engaged in the affair, addressed in the form of a question to one of
-the prisoners: “Have your best men then been all slain?” The reply
-conveyed an intimation of the standing contempt entertained by the
-Lacedæmonians for the bow and its chance-strokes in the line: “That
-would be a capital arrow which could single out the best man.” The
-language which Herodotus puts into the mouth of Demaratus, composed
-in the early years of the Peloponnesian war, attests this same belief
-in Spartan valor: “The Lacedæmonians die, but never surrender.”<a
-id="FNanchor_559" href="#Footnote_559" class="fnanchor">[559]</a>
-Such impression was from henceforward, not indeed effaced, but
-sensibly enfeebled, and never again was it restored to its former
-pitch.</p>
-
-<p>But the general judgment of the Greeks respecting the capture
-of Sphakteria, remarkable as it is to commemorate, is far less
-surprising than that pronounced by Thucydidês himself. Kleon and
-Demosthenês returning with a part of the squadron and carrying all
-the prisoners, started from Sphakteria on the next day but one after
-the action, and reached Athens within twenty days after Kleon had
-left it. Thus, “the promise of Kleon, <i>insane as it was</i>, came true,”
-observes the historian.<a id="FNanchor_560" href="#Footnote_560"
-class="fnanchor">[560]</a></p> <p><span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_348">[p. 348]</span></p> <p>Men with arms in their hands
-have always the option between death and imprisonment, and Grecian
-opinion was only mistaken<span class="pagenum" id="Page_349">[p.
-349]</span> in assuming as a certainty that the Lacedæmonians would
-choose the former. But Kleon had never promised to bring them home as
-prisoners: his promise was disjunctive,—that they should be either
-so brought home, or slain, within twenty days: and no sentence
-throughout the whole of Thucydidês astonishes me so much as that
-in which he stigmatizes such an expectation as “insane.” Here are
-four hundred and twenty Lacedæmonian hoplites, without any other
-description of troops to aid them,—without the possibility of being
-reinforced,—without any regular fortification,—without any narrow
-pass, such as that of Thermopylæ,—without either a sufficient or
-a certain supply of food,—cooped up in a small open island less
-than two miles in length. Against them are brought ten thousand
-troops of diverse arms, including eight hundred fresh hoplites from
-Athens, and marshalled by Demosthenês, a man alike enterprising and
-experienced: for the talents as well as the presence and preparations
-of Demosthenês are a part of the data of the case, and the personal
-competence of Kleon to command alone, is foreign to the calculation.
-Now if, under such circumstances, Kleon engaged that this forlorn
-company of brave men should be either slain or taken prisoners, how
-could he be looked upon, I will not say as indulging in an insane
-boast, but even as overstepping the most cautious and mistrustful
-estimate of probability? Even to doubt of this result, much more
-to pronounce such an opinion as that of Thucydidês, implies an
-idea not only of superhuman power in the Lacedæmonian hoplites,
-but of disgraceful cowardice on the part of Demosthenês and the
-assailants. Nor was the interval of twenty days, named by Kleon, at
-all extravagantly narrow, considering the distance of Athens from
-Pylus: for the attack of this petty island could not possibly occupy
-more than one or two days at the utmost, though the blockade of
-it might by various accidents have been prolonged, or might even,
-by some terrible storm, be altogether broken off. If, then, we
-carefully consider this promise made by Kleon in the assembly, we
-shall find that so far from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_350">[p.
-350]</span> deserving the sentence pronounced upon it by Thucydidês,
-of being a mad boast which came true by accident, it was a reasonable
-and even a modest anticipation of the future:<a id="FNanchor_561"
-href="#Footnote_561" class="fnanchor">[561]</a> reserving the only
-really doubtful point in the case, whether the garrison of the island
-would be ultimately slain or made prisoners. Demosthenês, had he been
-present at Athens instead of being at Pylus, would willingly have set
-his seal to the engagement taken by Kleon.</p>
-
-<p>I repeat with reluctance, though not without belief, the statement
-made by one of the biographers of Thucydidês,<a id="FNanchor_562"
-href="#Footnote_562" class="fnanchor">[562]</a> that Kleon was the
-cause of the banishment of the latter as a general, and has therefore
-received from him harder measure than was due in his capacity
-of historian. But though this sentiment is not probably without
-influence in dictating the unaccountable judgment which I have just
-been criticizing,—as well as other opinions relative to Kleon, on
-which I shall say more in a future chapter,—I nevertheless look upon
-that judgment not as peculiar to Thucydidês, but as common to him
-with Nikias and those whom we must call, for want of a better name,
-the oligarchical party of the time at Athens. And it gives us some
-measure of the prejudice and narrowness of vision which prevailed
-among that party at the present memorable crisis; so pointedly
-contrasting with the clear-sighted and resolute calculations, and the
-judicious conduct in action, of Kleon, who, when forced against his
-will into the post of general, did the very best which could be done
-in his situation,—he selected Demosthenês as colleague and heartily
-seconded his operations. Though the military attack of Sphakteria,
-one of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_351">[p. 351]</span> ablest
-specimens of generalship in the whole war, and distinguished not less
-by the dextrous employment of different descriptions of troops, than
-by care to spare the lives of the assailants,—belongs altogether
-to Demosthenês, yet if Kleon had not been competent to stand up
-in the Athenian assembly and defy those gloomy predictions which
-we see attested in Thucydidês, Demosthenês would never have been
-reinforced nor placed in condition to land on the island. The glory
-of the enterprise, therefore, belongs jointly to both: and Kleon,
-far from stealing away the laurels of Demosthenês (as Aristophanês
-represents, in his comedy of the Knights), was really the means of
-placing them on his head, though he at the same time deservedly
-shared them. It has hitherto been the practice to look at Kleon only
-from the point of view of his opponents, through whose testimony
-we know him: but the real fact is, that this history of the events
-of Sphakteria, when properly surveyed, is a standing disgrace to
-those opponents and no inconsiderable honor to him; exhibiting them
-as alike destitute of political foresight and of straightforward
-patriotism,—as sacrificing the opportunities of war, along with the
-lives of their fellow-citizens and soldiers, for the purpose of
-ruining a political enemy. It was the duty of Nikias, as stratêgus,
-to propose, and undertake in person if necessary, the reduction of
-Sphakteria: if he thought the enterprise dangerous, that was a good
-reason for assigning to it a larger military force, as we shall find
-him afterwards reasoning about the Sicilian expedition,—but not for
-letting it slip or throwing it off upon others.<a id="FNanchor_563"
-href="#Footnote_563" class="fnanchor">[563]</a></p>
-
-<p>The return of Kleon and Demosthenês to Athens, within the twenty
-days promised, bringing with them near three hundred Lacedæmonian
-prisoners, must have been by far the most triumphant and exhilarating
-event which had occurred to the Athenians throughout the whole war.
-It at once changed the prospects, position, and feelings of both
-the contending parties. Such a number of Lacedæmonian prisoners,
-especially one hundred and twenty Spartans, was a source of
-almost stupefaction to the general body of Greeks, and a prize of
-inestimable value to the captors. The return of Demosthenês in the
-preceding year from the Ambrakian gulf, when he brought with him
-three hun<span class="pagenum" id="Page_352">[p. 352]</span>dred
-Ambrakian panoplies, had probably been sufficiently triumphant;
-but the entry into Peiræus on this occasion from Sphakteria, with
-three hundred Lacedæmonian prisoners, must doubtless have occasioned
-emotions transcending all former experience; and it is much to be
-regretted that no description is preserved to us of the scene, as
-well as of the elate manifestations of the people when the prisoners
-were marched up from Peiræus to Athens. We should be curious, also,
-to read some account of the first Athenian assembly held after this
-event,—the overwhelming cheers heaped upon Kleon by his joyful
-partisans, who had helped to invest him with the duties of general,
-in confidence that he would discharge them well,—contrasted with the
-silence or retraction of Nikias, and the other humiliated political
-enemies. But all such details are unfortunately denied to us, though
-they constitute the blood and animation of Grecian history, now lying
-before us only in its skeleton.</p>
-
-<p>The first impulse of the Athenians was to regard the prisoners as
-a guarantee to their territory against invasion:<a id="FNanchor_564"
-href="#Footnote_564" class="fnanchor">[564]</a> they resolved to
-keep them securely guarded until the peace, but if, at any time
-before that event, the Lacedæmonian army should enter Attica, to
-bring forth the prisoners and put them to death in sight of the
-invaders. They were at the same time full of spirits in regard to
-the prosecution of the war, and became farther confirmed in the
-hope, not merely of preserving their power undiminished, but even
-of recovering much of what they had lost before the thirty years’
-truce. Pylus was placed in an improved state of defence, with the
-adjoining island of Sphakteria, doubtless as a subsidiary occupation:
-the Messenians, transferred thither from Naupaktus, and overjoyed to
-find themselves once more masters even of an outlying rock of their
-ancestorial territory, began with alacrity to overrun and ravage
-Laconia, while the Helots, shaken by the recent events, manifested
-inclination to desert to them. The Lacedæmonian authorities,
-experiencing evils before unfelt and unknown, became sensibly alarmed
-lest such desertions should spread through the country. Reluctant
-as they were to afford obvious evidence of their embarrassments,
-they nevertheless brought themselves, probably under the pressure
-of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_353">[p. 353]</span> friends
-and relatives of the Sphakterian captives, to send to Athens several
-missions for peace; but all proved abortive.<a id="FNanchor_565"
-href="#Footnote_565" class="fnanchor">[565]</a> We are not told what
-they offered, but it did not come up to the expectations which the
-Athenians thought themselves entitled to indulge.</p>
-
-<p>We, who now review these facts with a knowledge of the subsequent
-history, see that the Athenians could have concluded a better bargain
-with the Lacedæmonians during the six or eight months succeeding
-the capture of Sphakteria, than it was ever open to them to make
-afterwards; and they had reason to repent that they let slip the
-opportunity. Perhaps also Periklês, had he been still alive, might
-have taken the same prudent measure of the future, and might have had
-ascendency enough over his countrymen to be able to arrest the tide
-of success at its highest point, before it began to ebb again. But if
-we put ourselves back into the situation of Athens during the autumn
-which succeeded the return of Kleon and Demosthenês from Sphakteria,
-we shall easily enter into the feelings under which the war was
-continued. The actual possession of the captives now placed Athens
-in a far better position than she had occupied at a time when they
-were only blocked up in Sphakteria, and when the Lacedæmonian envoys
-first arrived to ask for peace. She was now certain of being able to
-command peace with Sparta on terms at least tolerable, whenever she
-chose to invite it,—she had also a fair certainty of escaping the
-hardship of invasion. Next, and this was perhaps the most important
-feature of the case, the apprehension of Lacedæmonian prowess was now
-greatly lowered, and the prospects of success to Athens considered
-as prodigiously improved,<a id="FNanchor_566" href="#Footnote_566"
-class="fnanchor">[566]</a> even in the estimation of impartial
-Greeks; much more in the eyes of the Athenians themselves. Moreover,
-the idea of a tide of good fortune, of the favor of the gods, now
-begun and likely to continue, of future success as a corollary
-from past, was one which powerfully affected Grecian calculations
-generally. Why not push the present good fortune, and try to regain
-the most important points lost before and by the thirty years’ truce,
-especially in Megara and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_354">[p.
-354]</span> Bœotia,—points which Sparta could not concede by
-negotiation, since they were not in her possession? Though these
-speculations failed, as we shall see in the coming chapter, yet there
-was nothing unreasonable in undertaking them. Probably, the almost
-universal sentiment of Athens was at this moment warlike,—and even
-Nikias, humiliated as he must have been by the success in Sphakteria,
-would forget his usual caution in the desire of retrieving his own
-personal credit by some military exploit. That Demosthenês, now in
-full measure of esteem, would be eager to prosecute the war, with
-which his prospects of personal glory were essentially associated,
-just as Thucydidês<a id="FNanchor_567" href="#Footnote_567"
-class="fnanchor">[567]</a> observes about Brasidas on the
-Lacedæmonian side, can admit of no doubt. The comedy of Aristophanês,
-called the Acharnians, was acted about six months before the affair
-of Sphakteria, when no one could possibly look forward to such an
-event,—the comedy of the Knights, about six months after it.<a
-id="FNanchor_568" href="#Footnote_568" class="fnanchor">[568]</a>
-Now, there is this remarkable difference between the two,—that
-while the former breathes the greatest sickness of war, and presses
-in every possible way the importance of making peace, although at
-that time Athens had an opportunity of coming even to a decent
-accommodation,—the latter, running down Kleon with unmeasured scorn
-and ridicule, talks in one or two places only of the hardships of
-war, and drops altogether that emphasis and repetition with which
-peace had been dwelt upon in the Acharnians,—although coming out at a
-time when peace was within the reach of the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p>To understand properly the history of this period, therefore,
-we must distinguish various occasions which are often confounded.
-At the moment when Sphakteria was first blockaded, and when the
-Lacedæmonians first sent to solicit peace, there was a considerable
-party at Athens disposed to entertain the offer, and the ascendency
-of Kleon was one of the main causes why it was<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_355">[p. 355]</span> rejected. But after the captives
-were brought home from Sphakteria, the influence of Kleon, though
-positively greater than it had been before, was no longer required
-to procure the dismissal of Lacedæmonian pacific offers and the
-continuance of the war: the general temper of Athens was then
-warlike, and there were very few to contend strenuously for an
-opposite policy. During the ensuing year, however, the chances of war
-turned out mostly unfavorable to Athens, so that by the end of that
-year she had become much more disposed to peace.<a id="FNanchor_569"
-href="#Footnote_569" class="fnanchor">[569]</a> The truce for one
-year was then concluded,—but even after that truce was expired,
-Kleon still continued eager, and on good grounds, as will be shown
-hereafter, for renewing the war in Thrace, at a time when a large
-proportion of the Athenian public had grown weary of it. He was
-one of the main causes of that resumption of warlike operations,
-which ended in the battle of Amphipolis, fatal both to himself and
-to Brasidas. There were thus two distinct occasions on which the
-personal influence and sanguine character of Kleon seems to have been
-of sensible moment in determining the Athenian public to war instead
-of peace. But at the moment which we have now reached, that is, the
-year immediately following the capture of Sphakteria, the Athenians
-were all sufficiently warlike without him; probably Nikias himself as
-well as the rest.</p>
-
-<p>It was one of the earliest proceedings of Nikias, immediately
-after the inglorious exhibition which he had made in reference
-to Sphakteria, to conduct an expedition, in conjunction with two
-colleagues, against the Corinthian territory: he took with him eighty
-triremes, two thousand Athenian hoplites, two hundred horsemen aboard
-of some horse transports, and some additional hoplites from Milêtus,
-Andros, and Karystus.<a id="FNanchor_570" href="#Footnote_570"
-class="fnanchor">[570]</a> Starting from Peiræus in the evening, he
-arrived a little before daybreak on a beach at the foot of the hill
-and village of Solygeia,<a id="FNanchor_571" href="#Footnote_571"
-class="fnanchor">[571]</a> about seven miles from Corinth, and
-two or three miles south of the isthmus.<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_356">[p. 356]</span> The Corinthian troops, from all the
-territory of Corinth, within the isthmus, were already assembled at
-the isthmus itself to repel him; for intelligence of the intended
-expedition had reached Corinth some time before from Argos, with
-which latter place the scheme of the expedition may have been in
-some way connected. The Athenians having touched the coast during
-the darkness, the Corinthians were only apprized of the fact by
-fire-signals from Solygeia. Not being able to hinder the landing,
-they despatched forthwith half their forces, under Battus and
-Lykophron, to repel the invader, while the remaining half were left
-at the harbor of Kenchreæ, on the northern side of Mount Oneion, to
-guard the port of Krommyon, outside of the isthmus, in case it should
-be attacked by sea. Battus with one lochus of hoplites threw himself
-into the village of Solygeia, which was unfortified, while Lykophron
-conducted the remaining troops to attack the Athenians. The battle
-was first engaged on the Athenian right, almost immediately after its
-landing, on the point called Chersonesus. Here the Athenian hoplites,
-together with their Karystian allies, repelled the Corinthian attack,
-after a stout and warmly disputed hand-combat of spear and shield:
-but the Corinthians, retreating up to a higher point of ground,
-returned to the charge, and with the aid of a fresh lochus, drove
-the Athenians back to the shore and to their ships: from hence the
-latter again turned, and again recovered a partial advantage.<a
-id="FNanchor_572" href="#Footnote_572" class="fnanchor">[572]</a>
-The battle was no less severe on the left wing of the Athenians:
-but here, after a contest of some length, the latter gained a more
-decided victory, greatly by the aid of their cavalry,—pursuing the
-Corinthians, who fled in some disorder to a neighboring hill and
-there took up a position.<a id="FNanchor_573" href="#Footnote_573"
-class="fnanchor">[573]</a> The Athenians were thus victorious
-throughout the whole line, with the loss of about forty-seven men,
-while the Corinthians had lost two hundred and twelve, together with
-the general Lykophron. The victors erected their trophy, stripped the
-dead bodies, and buried their own dead.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_357">[p. 357]</span></p>
-
-<p>The Corinthian detachment left at Kenchreæ could not see the
-battle, in consequence of the interposing ridge of Mount Oneium:
-but it was at last made known to them by the dust of the fugitives,
-and they forthwith hastened to help. Reinforcements also came both
-from Corinth and from Kenchreæ, and as it seemed, too, from the
-neighboring Peloponnesian cities, so that Nikias thought it prudent
-to retire aboard his ships, and halt upon some neighboring islands.
-It was here first discovered that two of the Athenians slain had
-not been picked up for burial; upon which he immediately sent a
-herald to solicit a truce, in order to procure these two missing
-bodies. We have here a remarkable proof of the sanctity attached
-to that duty; for the mere sending of the herald was tantamount
-to confession of defeat.<a id="FNanchor_574" href="#Footnote_574"
-class="fnanchor">[574]</a></p>
-
-<p>From hence Nikias sailed to Krommyon, where he ravaged the
-neighborhood for a few hours and rested for the night. On the
-next day he reëmbarked, sailed along the coast of Epidaurus, upon
-which he inflicted some damage in passing, and stopped at last
-on the peninsula of Methana, between Epidaurus and Trœzen.<a
-id="FNanchor_575" href="#Footnote_575" class="fnanchor">[575]</a>
-On this peninsula he established a permanent garrison, drawing a
-fortification across the narrow neck of land which joined it to the
-Epidaurian peninsula. This was his last exploit, and he then sailed
-home: but the post at Methana long remained as a centre for pillaging
-the neighboring regions of Epidaurus, Trœzen, and Halieis.</p>
-
-<p id="Istone">While Nikias was engaged in this expedition,
-Eurymedon and Sophoklês had sailed forward from Pylus with a
-considerable portion of that fleet which had been engaged in the
-capture of Sphakteria, to the island of Korkyra. It has been
-already stated that the democratical government at Korkyra had
-been suffering severe pressure and privation from the oligarchical
-fugitives, who had come back into the island with a body of
-barbaric auxiliaries, and established themselves upon Mount Istônê,
-not far from the city.<a id="FNanchor_576" href="#Footnote_576"
-class="fnanchor">[576]</a> Eurymedon and the Athenians joining
-the Korkyræans in the city, attacked and stormed the post on
-Mount Istônê; while the vanquished, retiring first to a lofty and
-inaccessible peak, were forced to surrender themselves on terms
-to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_358">[p. 358]</span> the Athenians.
-They abandoned their mercenary auxiliaries altogether, and only
-stipulated that they should themselves be sent to Athens, and left
-to the discretion of the Athenian people. Eurymedon, assenting to
-these terms, deposited the disarmed prisoners in the neighboring
-islet of Ptychia, under the distinct condition that, if a single man
-tried to escape, the whole capitulation should be null and void.<a
-id="FNanchor_577" href="#Footnote_577" class="fnanchor">[577]</a></p>
-
-<p>Unfortunately for these prisoners, the orders given to Eurymedon
-carried him onward straight to Sicily. It was irksome, therefore, to
-him to send away a detachment of his squadron to convey these men to
-Athens,—while the honors of delivering them there would be reaped,
-not by himself, but by the officer to whom they might be confided:
-and the Korkyræans in the city, on their part, were equally anxious
-that the prisoners should not be sent to Athens; for their animosity
-against them was bitter in the extreme, and they were afraid that the
-Athenians might spare their lives, so that their hostility against
-the island might be again resumed. And thus a mean jealousy on the
-part of Eurymedon, combined with revenge and insecurity on the part
-of the victorious Korkyræans, brought about a cruel catastrophe,
-paralleled nowhere else in Greece, though too well in keeping with
-the previous acts of the bloody drama enacted in this island.</p>
-
-<p>The Korkyræan leaders, seemingly not without the privity of
-Eurymedon, sent across to Ptychia fraudulent emissaries under the
-guise of friends to the prisoners. These emissaries—assuring the
-prisoners that the Athenian commanders, in spite of the convention
-signed, were about to hand them over to the Korkyræan people for
-destruction—induced some of them to attempt escape in a boat
-prepared for the purpose. By concert, the boat was seized in the
-act of escaping, so that the terms of the capitulation were really
-violated: upon which Eurymedon handed over the prisoners to their
-enemies in the island, who imprisoned them all together in one vast
-building, under guard of hoplites. From this building they were drawn
-out in companies of twenty men each, chained together in couples,
-and compelled to march between two lines of hoplites marshalled
-on each side of the road.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_359">[p.
-359]</span> Those who loitered in the march were hurried on by whips
-from behind: as they advanced, their private enemies on both sides
-singled them out, striking and piercing them until at length they
-miserably perished. Three successive companies were thus destroyed,
-ere the remaining prisoners in the interior, who thought merely that
-their place of detention was about to be changed, suspected what was
-passing: at length they found it out, and one and all then refused
-either to quit the building or to permit any one else to enter.
-They at the same time piteously implored the intervention of the
-Athenians, if it were only to kill them, and thus preserve them from
-the cruelties of their merciless countrymen. The latter abstained
-from attempts to force the door of the building, but made an aperture
-in the roof, from whence they shot down arrows, and poured showers
-of tiles, upon the prisoners within; who sought at first to protect
-themselves, but at length abandoned themselves to despair, and
-assisted with their own hands in the work of destruction. Some of
-them pierced their throats with the arrows shot down from the roof:
-others hung themselves, either with cords from some bedding which
-happened to be in the building, or with strips torn and twisted from
-their own garments. Night came on, but the work of destruction,
-both from above and within, was continued without intermission,
-so that before morning all these wretched men perished, either
-by the hands of their enemies or by their own. At daybreak, the
-Korkyræans entered the building, piled up the dead bodies on carts,
-and transported them out of the city: the exact number we are not
-told, but seemingly it cannot have been less than three hundred.
-The women who had been taken at Istônê along with these prisoners,
-were all sold as slaves.<a id="FNanchor_578" href="#Footnote_578"
-class="fnanchor">[578]</a></p>
-
-<p>Thus finished the bloody dissensions in this ill-fated island:
-for the oligarchical party were completely annihilated, the
-democracy was victorious, and there were no farther violences
-throughout the whole war.<a id="FNanchor_579" href="#Footnote_579"
-class="fnanchor">[579]</a> It will be recollected that these deadly
-feuds began with the return of the oligarchical prisoners from
-Corinth, bringing along with them projects both of treason and
-of revolution: they ended with the annihilation of that party,
-in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_360">[p. 360]</span> the manner
-above described; the interval being filled by mutual atrocities and
-retaliation, wherein of course the victors had most opportunity
-of gratifying their vindictive passions. Eurymedon, after the
-termination of these events, proceeded onward with the Athenian
-squadron to Sicily: what he did there will be described in a future
-chapter devoted to Sicilian affairs exclusively.</p>
-
-<p>The complete prostration of Ambrakia during the campaign of the
-preceding year had left Anaktorium without any defence against the
-Akarnanians and Athenian squadron from Naupaktus. They besieged and
-took it during the course of the present summer;<a id="FNanchor_580"
-href="#Footnote_580" class="fnanchor">[580]</a> expelling the
-Corinthian proprietors, and repeopling the town and its territory
-with Akarnanian settlers from all the townships in the country.</p>
-
-<p>Throughout the maritime empire of Athens matters continued
-perfectly tranquil, except that the inhabitants of Chios, during
-the course of the autumn, incurred the suspicion of the Athenians
-from having recently built a new wall to their city, as if it were
-done with the intention of taking the first opportunity to revolt.<a
-id="FNanchor_581" href="#Footnote_581" class="fnanchor">[581]</a>
-They solemnly protested their innocence of any such designs, but
-the Athenians were not satisfied without exacting the destruction
-of the obnoxious wall. The presence on the opposite continent of an
-active band of Mitylenæan exiles, who captured both Rhœteium and
-Antandrus during the ensuing spring, probably made the Athenians more
-anxious and vigilant on the subject of Chios.<a id="FNanchor_582"
-href="#Footnote_582" class="fnanchor">[582]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Athenian regular tribute-gathering squadron circulated among
-the maritime subjects, and captured, during the course of the present
-autumn, a prisoner of some importance and singularity. It was a
-Persian ambassador, Artaphernes, seized at Eion on the Strymon, in
-his way to Sparta with despatches from the Great King. He was brought
-to Athens, and his despatches, which were at some length, and written
-in the Assyrian character, were translated and made public. The
-Great King told the Lacedæmonians, in substance, that he could not
-comprehend what they meant; for that among the numerous envoys whom
-they had sent, no two told the same story. Accordingly he desired
-them, if they wished to make themselves understood, to send some
-envoys<span class="pagenum" id="Page_361">[p. 361]</span> with fresh
-and plain instructions to accompany Artaphernes.<a id="FNanchor_583"
-href="#Footnote_583" class="fnanchor">[583]</a> Such was the
-substance of the despatch, conveying a remarkable testimony as to
-the march of the Lacedæmonian government in its foreign policy. Had
-any similar testimony existed respecting Athens, demonstrating that
-her foreign policy was conducted with half as much unsteadiness
-and stupidity, ample inferences would have been drawn from it to
-the discredit of democracy. But there has been no motive generally
-to discredit Lacedæmonian institutions, which included kingship in
-double measure,—two parallel lines of hereditary kings: together
-with an entire exemption from everything like popular discussion.
-The extreme defects in the foreign management of Sparta, revealed by
-the despatch of Artaphernes, seem traceable partly to an habitual
-faithlessness often noted in the Lacedæmonian character, partly to
-the annual change of ephors, so frequently bringing into power men
-who strove to undo what had been done by their predecessors, and
-still more to the absence of everything like discussion or canvass
-of public measures among the citizens. We shall find more than
-one example, in the history about to follow, of this disposition
-on the part of ephors, not merely to change the policy of their
-predecessors, but even to subvert treaties sworn and concluded by
-them: and such was the habitual secrecy of Spartan public business,
-that in doing this they had neither criticism nor discussion to
-fear. Brasidas, when he started from Sparta on the expedition
-which will be described in the coming chapter, could not trust the
-assurances of the Lacedæmonian executive without binding them by
-the most solemn oaths.<a id="FNanchor_584" href="#Footnote_584"
-class="fnanchor">[584]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Athenians sent back Artaphernes in a trireme to Ephesus, and
-availed themselves of this opportunity for procuring access to the
-Great King. They sent envoys along with him, with the intention that
-they should accompany him up to Susa: but on reaching Asia, the
-news had just arrived that King Artaxerxes<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_362">[p. 362]</span> had recently died. Under such
-circumstances, it was not judged expedient to prosecute the mission,
-and the Athenians dropped their design.<a id="FNanchor_585"
-href="#Footnote_585" class="fnanchor">[585]</a></p>
-
-<p>Respecting the great monarchy of Persia, during this long
-interval of fifty-four years since the repulse of Xerxes from
-Greece, we have little information before us except the names of the
-successive kings. In the year 465 <small>B.C.</small>
-Xerxes was assassinated by Artabanus and Mithridates, through
-one of those plots of great household officers, so frequent in
-oriental palaces. He left two sons, or at least two sons present
-and conspicuous among a greater number, Darius and Artaxerxes. But
-Artabanus persuaded Artaxerxes that Darius had been the murderer
-of Xerxes, and thus prevailed upon him to revenge his father’s
-death by becoming an accomplice in killing his brother Darius: he
-next tried to assassinate Artaxerxes himself, and to appropriate
-the crown. Artaxerxes however, apprized beforehand of the scheme,
-either slew Artabanus with his own hand or procured him to be slain
-and then reigned (known under the name of Artaxerxes Longimanus)
-for forty years, down to the period at which we are now arrived.<a
-id="FNanchor_586" href="#Footnote_586" class="fnanchor">[586]</a></p>
-
-<p>Mention has already been made of the revolt of Egypt from the
-dominion of Artaxerxes, under the Libyan prince Inanes, actively
-aided by the Athenians. After a few years of success, this revolt
-was crushed and Egypt again subjugated, by the energy of the Persian
-general Megabyzus, with severe loss to the Athenian forces engaged.
-After the peace of Kallias, erroneously called the Kimonian peace,
-between the Athenians and the king of Persia, war had not been since
-resumed. We read in Ktesias, amidst various anecdotes seemingly
-collected at the court of Susa, romantic adventures ascribed to
-Megabyzus, his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_363">[p. 363]</span>
-wife Amytis, his mother Amestris, and a Greek physician of Kos,
-named Apollonides. Zopyrus son of Megabyzus, after the death of
-his father, deserted from Persia and came as an exile to Athens.<a
-id="FNanchor_587" href="#Footnote_587" class="fnanchor">[587]</a></p>
-
-<p>At the death of Artaxerxes Longimanus, the family violences
-incident to a Persian succession were again exhibited. His son Xerxes
-succeeded him, but was assassinated, after a reign of a few weeks or
-months. Another son, Sogdianus, followed, who perished in like manner
-after a short interval.<a id="FNanchor_588" href="#Footnote_588"
-class="fnanchor">[588]</a> Lastly, a third son, Ochus (known under
-the name of Darius Nothus), either abler or more fortunate, kept his
-crown and life between nineteen and twenty years. By his queen, the
-savage Parysatis, he was father to Artaxerxes Mnemon and Cyrus the
-younger, both names of interest in reference to Grecian history, to
-whom we shall hereafter recur.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_53">
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER LIII.<br />
-    EIGHTH YEAR OF THE WAR.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">The</span> eighth year of the
-war, on which we now touch, presents events of a more important
-and decisive character than any of the preceding. In reviewing the
-preceding years, we observe that though there is much fighting, with
-hardship and privation inflicted on both sides, yet the operations
-are mostly of a desultory character, not calculated to determine the
-event of the war. But the capture of Sphakteria and its prisoners,
-coupled with the surrender of the whole Lacedæmonian fleet, was an
-event full of consequences and imposing in the eyes of all Greece.
-It stimulated the Athenians to a series of operations, larger and
-more ambitious than anything which they had yet conceived;<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_364">[p. 364]</span> directed, not merely
-against Sparta in her own country, but also to the reconquest of that
-ascendency in Megara and Bœotia which they had lost on or before the
-thirty years’ truce. On the other hand, it intimidated so much both
-the Lacedæmonians, the revolted Chalkidic allies of Athens in Thrace,
-and Perdikkas, king of Macedonia, that between them the expedition
-of Brasidas, which struck so serious a blow at the Athenian empire,
-was concerted. This year is thus the turning-point of the war. If the
-operations of Athens had succeeded, she would have regained nearly as
-great a power as she enjoyed before the thirty years’ truce: but it
-happened that Sparta, or rather the Spartan Brasidas, was successful,
-gaining enough to neutralize all the advantages derived by Athens
-from the capture of Sphakteria.</p>
-
-<p>The first enterprise undertaken by the Athenians in the course
-of the spring was against the island of Kythêra, on the southern
-coast of Laconia. It was inhabited by Lacedæmonian Periœki, and
-administered by a governor, and garrison of hoplites, annually sent
-thither. It was the usual point of landing for merchantmen from
-Libya and Egypt; and as it lay very near to Cape Malea, immediately
-over against the gulf of Gythium,—the only accessible portion of the
-generally inhospitable coast of Laconia,—the chance that it might
-fall into the hands of an enemy was considered as so menacing to
-Sparta, that some politicians are said to have wished the island
-at the bottom of the sea.<a id="FNanchor_589" href="#Footnote_589"
-class="fnanchor">[589]</a> Nikias, in conjunction with Nikostratus
-and Autoklês,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_365">[p. 365]</span>
-conducted thither a fleet of sixty triremes, with two thousand
-Athenian hoplites, some few horsemen, and a body of allies, mainly
-Milesians. There were in the island two towns,—Kythêra and Skandeia:
-the former having a lower town close to the sea, fronting Cape Malea,
-and an upper town on the hill above; the latter, seemingly, on the
-south or west coast. Both were attacked at the same time by order
-of Nikias; ten triremes and a body of Milesian<a id="FNanchor_590"
-href="#Footnote_590" class="fnanchor">[590]</a> hoplites disembarked
-and captured Skandeia; while the Athenians landed at Kythêra, and
-drove the inhabitants out of the lower town into the upper, where
-they speedily capitulated. A certain party among them had indeed
-secretly invited the coming of Nikias, through which intrigue easy
-terms were obtained for the inhabitants. Some few men, indicated
-by the Kytherians in intelligence with Nikias, were carried away
-as prisoners to Athens: but the remainder were left undisturbed,
-and enrolled among the tributary allies under obligation to
-pay four talents per annum; an Athenian garrison being placed
-at Kythêra for the protection of the island. From hence Nikias
-employed seven days in descents and inroads upon the coast, near
-Helos, Asinê, Aphrodisia, Kotyrta, and elsewhere. The Lacedæmonian
-force was disseminated in petty garrisons,<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_366">[p. 366]</span> which remained each for the defence of
-its own separate post, without uniting to repel the Athenians, so
-that there was only one action, and that of little importance, which
-the Athenians deemed worthy of a trophy.</p>
-
-<p>In returning home from Kythêra, Nikias first ravaged the small
-strip of cultivated land near Epidaurus Limêra, on the rocky eastern
-coast of Laconia, and then attacked the Æginetan settlement at
-Thyrea, the frontier strip between Laconia and Argolis. This town
-and district had been made over by Sparta to the Æginetans, at the
-time when they were expelled from their own island by Athens, in
-the first year of the war. The new inhabitants, finding the town
-too distant from the sea<a id="FNanchor_591" href="#Footnote_591"
-class="fnanchor">[591]</a> for their maritime habits, were now
-employed in constructing a fortification close on the shore; in which
-work a Lacedæmonian detachment under Tantalus, on guard in that
-neighborhood, was assisting them. When the Athenians landed, both
-Æginetans and Lacedæmonians at once abandoned the new fortification.
-The former, with the commanding officer, Tantalus, occupied the upper
-town of Thyrea; but the Lacedæmonian troops, not thinking it tenable,
-refused to take part in the defence, and retired to the neighboring
-mountains, in spite of urgent entreaty from the Æginetans. The
-Athenians, immediately after landing, marched up to the town of
-Thyrea, and carried it by storm, burning or destroying everything
-within it: all the Æginetans were either killed or made prisoners,
-and even Tantalus, disabled by his wounds, became prisoner also. From
-hence the armament returned to Athens, where a vote was taken as
-to the disposal of the prisoners. The Kytherians brought home were
-distributed for safe custody among the dependent islands: Tantalus
-was retained along with the prisoners from Sphakteria; but a harder
-fate was reserved for the Æginetans; they were<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_367">[p. 367]</span> all put to death, victims to the
-long-standing apathy between Athens and Ægina. This cruel act was
-nothing more than a strict application of admitted customs of war
-in those days: had the Lacedæmonians been the victors, there can
-be little doubt that they would have acted with equal rigor.<a
-id="FNanchor_592" href="#Footnote_592" class="fnanchor">[592]</a></p>
-
-<p>The occupation of Kythêra, in addition to Pylus, by an Athenian
-garrison, following so closely upon the capital disaster in
-Sphakteria, produced in the minds of the Spartans feelings of alarm
-and depression such as they had never before experienced. Within
-the course of a few short months their position had completely
-changed from superiority and aggression abroad to insult and
-insecurity at home. They anticipated nothing less than incessant
-foreign attacks on all their weak points, with every probability of
-internal defection, from the standing discontent of the Helots: nor
-was it unknown to them, probably, that even Kythêra itself had been
-lost partly through betrayal. The capture of Sphakteria had caused
-peculiar sensations among the Helots, to whom the Lacedæmonians had
-addressed both appeals and promises of emancipation, in order to
-procure succor for their hoplites while blockaded in the island; and
-if the ultimate surrender of these hoplites had abated the terrors
-of Lacedæmonian prowess throughout all Greece, this effect had been
-produced to a still greater degree among the oppressed Helots. A
-refuge at Pylus, and a nucleus which presented some possibility of
-expanding into regenerated Messenia, were now before their eyes;
-while the establishment of an Athenian garrison at Kythêra opened a
-new channel of communication with the enemies of Sparta, so as to
-tempt all the Helots of daring temper to stand forward as liberators
-of their enslaved race.<a id="FNanchor_593" href="#Footnote_593"
-class="fnanchor">[593]</a> The Lacedæmonians, habitually cautious at
-all times, felt now as if the tide of fortune had turned decidedly
-against them, and acted with confirmed mistrust and dismay, confining
-themselves to measures strictly defensive, and organizing a force of
-four hundred cavalry, together with a body of bowmen, beyond their
-ordinary establishment.</p>
-
-<p>But the precaution which they thought it necessary to take in
-regard to the Helots, affords the best measure of their apprehensions
-at the moment, and exhibits, indeed, a refinement of fraud<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_368">[p. 368]</span> and cruelty rarely
-equalled in history. Wishing to single out from the general body such
-as were most high-couraged and valiant, the ephors made proclamation,
-that those Helots, who conceived themselves to have earned their
-liberty by distinguished services in war, might stand forward to
-claim it. A considerable number obeyed the call; probably many who
-had undergone imminent hazards during the preceding summer, in order
-to convey provisions to the blockaded soldiers in Sphakteria.<a
-id="FNanchor_594" href="#Footnote_594" class="fnanchor">[594]</a>
-They were examined by the government, and two thousand of them
-were selected as fully worthy of emancipation; which was forthwith
-bestowed upon them in public ceremonial, with garlands, visits
-to the temples, and the full measure of religious solemnity. The
-government had now made the selection which it desired; presently
-every man among these newly-enfranchized Helots was made away
-with, no one knew how.<a id="FNanchor_595" href="#Footnote_595"
-class="fnanchor">[595]</a> A stratagem at once<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_369">[p. 369]</span> so perfidious in the contrivance, so
-murderous in the purpose, and so complete in the execution, stands
-without parallel in Grecian history,—we might almost say, without a
-parallel in any history. It implies a depravity far greater than the
-rigorous execution of a barbarous customary law against prisoners of
-war or rebels, even in large numbers. The ephors must have employed
-numerous instruments, apart from each other, for the performance of
-this bloody deed; yet it appears that no certain knowledge could
-be obtained of the details; a striking proof of the mysterious
-efficiency of this Council of Five, surpassing even that of the
-Council of Ten at Venice, as well as of the utter absence of public
-inquiry or discussion.</p>
-
-<p>It was while the Lacedæmonians were in this state of uneasiness
-at home, that envoys reached them from Perdikkas of Macedonia
-and the Chalkidians of Thrace, entreating aid against Athens;
-who was considered likely, in her present tide of success, to
-resume aggressive measures against them. There were, moreover,
-other parties, in the neighboring cities<a id="FNanchor_596"
-href="#Footnote_596" class="fnanchor">[596]</a> subject to Athens,
-who secretly favored the application, engaging to stand forward in
-open revolt as soon as any auxiliary force should arrive to warrant
-their incurring the hazard. Perdikkas (who had on his hands a dispute
-with his kinsman Arrhibæus, prince of the Lynkestæ-Macedonians,
-which he was anxious to be enabled to close successfully) and
-the Chalkidians offered at the same time to provide the pay and
-maintenance, as well as to facilitate the transit, of the troops
-who might be sent to them; and what was of still greater importance
-to the success of the enterprise, they specially requested that
-Brasidas might be invested with the command.<a id="FNanchor_597"
-href="#Footnote_597" class="fnanchor">[597]</a> He had now
-recovered from his wounds received at Pylus, and his reputation for
-adventurous valor, great as it was from positive desert, stood out
-still more conspicuously, because not a single other Spartan had
-as yet distinguished him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_370">[p.
-370]</span>self. His other great qualities, apart from personal
-valor, had not yet been shown, for he had never been in any supreme
-command. But he burned with impatience to undertake the operation
-destined for him by the envoys; although at this time it must have
-appeared so replete with difficulty and danger, that probably no
-other Spartan except himself would have entered upon it with the
-smallest hopes of success. To raise up embarrassments for Athens,
-in Thrace, was an object of great consequence to Sparta, while
-she also obtained an opportunity of sending away another large
-detachment of her dangerous Helots. Seven hundred of these latter
-were armed as hoplites and placed under the orders of Brasidas, but
-the Lacedæmonians would not assign to him any of their own proper
-forces. With the sanction of the Spartan name, with seven hundred
-Helot hoplites, and with such other hoplites as he could raise in
-Peloponnesus by means of the funds furnished from the Chalkidians,
-Brasidas prepared to undertake this expedition, alike adventurous and
-important.</p>
-
-<p>Had the Athenians entertained any suspicion of his design, they
-could easily have prevented him from ever reaching Thrace. But they
-knew nothing of it until he had actually joined Perdikkas, nor did
-they anticipate any serious attack from Sparta, in this moment of
-her depression, much less an enterprise far bolder than any which
-she had ever been known to undertake. They were now elate with hopes
-of conquests to come on their own part, their affairs being so
-prosperous and promising that parties favorable to their interests
-began to revive, both in Megara and in Bœotia; while Hippokratês and
-Demosthenês, the two chief stratêgi for the year, were men of energy,
-well qualified both to project and execute military achievements.</p>
-
-<p>The first opportunity presented itself in regard to Megara. The
-inhabitants of that city had been greater sufferers by the war
-than any other persons in Greece: they had been the chief cause
-of bringing down the war upon Athens, and the Athenians revenged
-upon them all the hardships which they themselves endured from
-the Lacedæmonian invasion. Twice in every year they laid waste
-the Megarid, which bordered upon their own territory; and that
-too with such destructive hands throughout its limited extent,
-that they intercepted all subsistence from the lands near the
-town, at the same time keeping the harbor<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_371">[p. 371]</span> of Nisæa closely blocked up. Under such
-hard conditions the Megarians found much difficulty in supplying even
-the primary wants of life.<a id="FNanchor_598" href="#Footnote_598"
-class="fnanchor">[598]</a> But their case had now, within the last
-few months, become still more intolerable by an intestine commotion
-in the city, ending in the expulsion of a powerful body of exiles,
-who seized and held possession of Pegæ, the Megarian port in the
-gulf of Corinth. Probably imports from Pegæ had been their chief
-previous resource against the destruction which came on them from
-the side of Athens; so that it became scarcely possible to sustain
-themselves, when the exiles in Pegæ not only deprived them of this
-resource, but took positive part in harassing them. These exiles
-were oligarchical, and the government in Megara had now become more
-or less democratical: but the privations in the city presently
-reached such a height, that several citizens began to labor for a
-compromise, whereby the exiles in Pegæ might be readmitted. It was
-evident to the leaders in Megara that the bulk of the citizens could
-not long sustain the pressure of enemies from both sides, but it was
-also their feeling that the exiles in Pegæ, their bitter political
-rivals, were worse enemies than the Athenians, and that the return of
-these exiles would be a sentence of death to themselves. To prevent
-this counter-revolution, they opened a secret correspondence with
-Hippokratês and Demosthenês, engaging to betray both Megara and Nisæa
-to the Athenians; though Nisæa, the harbor of Megara, about one mile
-from the city, was a separate fortress occupied by a Peloponnesian
-garrison, and by them exclusively, as well as the Long Walls, for the
-purpose of holding Megara fast to the Lacedæmonian confederacy.<a
-id="FNanchor_599" href="#Footnote_599" class="fnanchor">[599]</a></p>
-
-<p>The scheme for surprise was concerted, and what is more
-remarkable, in the extreme publicity of all Athenian affairs, and
-in a matter to which many persons must have been privy, was kept
-secret, until the instant of execution. A large Athenian<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_372">[p. 372]</span> force, four thousand
-hoplites and six hundred cavalry, was appointed to march at night
-by the high road through Eleusis to Megara: but Hippokratês and
-Demosthenês themselves went on shipboard from Peiræus to the island
-of Minôa, which was close against Nisæa, and had been for some time
-under occupation by an Athenian garrison. Here Hippokratês concealed
-himself with six hundred hoplites, in a hollow space out of which
-brick earth had been dug, on the mainland opposite to Minôa, and not
-far from the gate in the Long Wall which opened near the junction
-of that wall with the ditch and wall surrounding Nisæa; while
-Demosthenês, with some light-armed Platæans and a detachment of
-active young Athenians, called Peripoli, and serving as the movable
-guard of Attica, in their first or second year of military service,
-placed himself in ambush in the sacred precinct of Arês, still closer
-to the same gate.</p>
-
-<p>To procure that the gate should be opened, was the task of the
-conspirators within. Amidst the shifts to which the Megarians had
-been reduced in order to obtain supplies, especially since the
-blockade of Minôa, predatory exit by night was not omitted. Some
-of these conspirators had been in the habit, before the intrigue
-with Athens was projected, of carrying out a small sculler-boat
-by night upon a cart, through this gate, by permission of the
-Peloponnesian commander of Nisæa and the Long Walls. The boat, when
-thus brought out, was carried down to the shore along the hollow
-of the dry ditch which surrounded the wall of Nisæa, then put to
-sea for some nightly enterprise, and was brought back again along
-the ditch before daylight in the morning; the gate being opened,
-by permission, to let it in. This was the only way by which any
-Megarian vessel could get to sea, since the Athenians at Minôa were
-complete masters of the harbor. On the night fixed for the surprise,
-this boat was carried out and brought back at the usual hour. But
-the moment that the gate in the Long Wall was opened to readmit it,
-Demosthenês and his comrades sprang forward to force their way in;
-the Megarians along with the boat at the same time setting upon
-and killing the guards, in order to facilitate his entrance. This
-active and determined band were successful in mastering the gate,
-and keeping it open until the six hundred hoplites under Hippokratês
-came up, and got into the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_373">[p.
-373]</span> interior space between the Long Walls. They immediately
-mounted the walls on each side, every man as he came in, with
-little thought of order, to drive off or destroy the Peloponnesian
-guards; who, taken by surprise, and fancying that the Megarians
-generally were in concert with the enemy against them,—confirmed,
-too, in such belief by hearing the Athenian herald proclaim aloud
-that every Megarian who chose might take his post in the line
-of Athenian hoplites,<a id="FNanchor_600" href="#Footnote_600"
-class="fnanchor">[600]</a>—made at first some resistance, but were
-soon discouraged, and fled into Nisæa. By a little after daybreak,
-the Athenians found themselves masters of all the line of the Long
-Walls, and under the very gates of Megara,—reinforced by the larger
-force which, having marched by land through Eleusis, arrived at the
-concerted moment.</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, the Megarians within the city were in the greatest
-tumult and consternation. But the conspirators, prepared with their
-plan, had resolved to propose that the gates should be thrown
-open, and that the whole force of the city should be marched out
-to fight the Athenians: when once the gates should be open, they
-themselves intended to take part with the Athenians, and facilitate
-their entrance,—and they had rubbed their bodies over with oil in
-order to be visibly distinguished in the eyes of the latter. Their
-plan was only frustrated the moment before it was about to be put
-in execution, by the divulgation of one of their own comrades.
-Their opponents in the city, apprized of what was in contemplation,
-hastened to the gate, and intercepted the men rubbed with oil as
-they were about to open it. Without betraying any knowledge of the
-momentous secret which they had just learned, these opponents loudly
-protested against opening the gate and going out to fight an enemy
-for whom they had never conceived themselves, even in moments of
-greater strength, to be a match in the open field. While insisting
-only<span class="pagenum" id="Page_374">[p. 374]</span> on the
-public mischiefs of the measure, they at the same time planted
-themselves in arms against the gate, and declared that they would
-perish before they would allow it to be opened. For this obstinate
-resistance the conspirators were not prepared, so that they were
-forced to abandon their design and leave the gate closed.</p>
-
-<p>The Athenian generals, who were waiting in expectation that it
-would be opened, soon perceived by the delay that their friends
-within had been baffled, and immediately resolved to make sure of
-Nisæa, which lay behind them; an acquisition important not less in
-itself, than as a probable means for the mastery of Megara. They set
-about the work with the characteristic rapidity of Athenians. Masons
-and tools in abundance were forthwith sent for from Athens, and the
-army distributed among themselves the wall of circumvallation round
-Nisæa in distinct parts. First, the interior space between the Long
-Walls themselves was built across, so as to cut off the communication
-with Megara; next, walls were carried out from the outside of both
-the Long Walls down to the sea, so as completely to inclose Nisæa,
-with its fortifications and ditch. The scattered houses which formed
-a sort of ornamented suburb to Nisæa, furnished bricks for this
-inclosing circle, or were sometimes even made to form a part of it as
-they stood, with the parapets on their roofs; while the trees were
-cut down to supply material wherever palisades were suitable. In a
-day and a half the work of circumvallation was almost completed,
-so that the Peloponnesians in Nisæa saw before them nothing but a
-hopeless state of blockade. Deprived of all communication, they not
-only fancied that the whole city of Megara had joined the Athenians,
-but they were moreover without any supply of provisions, which
-had been always furnished to them in daily rations from the city.
-Despairing of any speedy relief from Peloponnesus, they accepted easy
-terms of capitulation offered to them by the Athenian generals.<a
-id="FNanchor_601" href="#Footnote_601" class="fnanchor">[601]</a>
-After delivering up their arms, each man among them was to be
-ransomed for a stipulated price; we are not told how much, but
-doubtless a moderate sum. The Lacedæmonian commander, and such other
-Lacedæmonians as might be in Nisæa, were, however, required<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_375">[p. 375]</span> to surrender themselves
-as prisoners to the Athenians, to be held at their disposal. On
-these terms Nisæa was surrendered to the Athenians, who cut off
-its communication with Megara, by keeping the intermediate space
-between the Long Walls effectively blocked up,—walls, of which
-they had themselves, in former days, been the original authors.<a
-id="FNanchor_602" href="#Footnote_602" class="fnanchor">[602]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such interruption of communication by the Long Walls indicated in
-the minds of the Athenian generals a conviction that Megara was now
-out of their reach. But the town in its present distracted state,
-would certainly have fallen into their hands,<a id="FNanchor_603"
-href="#Footnote_603" class="fnanchor">[603]</a> had it not been
-snatched from them by the accidental neighborhood and energetic
-intervention of Brasidas. That officer, occupied in the levy of
-troops for his Thracian expedition, was near Corinth and Sikyon, when
-he first learned the surprise and capture of the Long Walls. Partly
-from the alarm which the news excited among these Peloponnesian
-towns, partly from his own personal influence, he got together a
-body of two thousand seven hundred Corinthian hoplites, six hundred
-Sikyonian and four hundred Phliasian, besides his own small army,
-and marched with this united force to Tripodiskus, in the Megarid,
-half-way between Megara and Pegæ, on the road over Mount Geraneia;
-having first despatched a pressing summons to the Bœotians to request
-that they would meet him at that point with reinforcements. He
-trusted by a speedy movement to preserve Megara, and perhaps<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_376">[p. 376]</span> even Nisæa; but on
-reaching Tripodiskus in the night, he learned that the latter
-place had already surrendered. Alarmed for the safety of Megara,
-he proceeded thither by a night-march without delay. Taking with
-him only a chosen band of three hundred men, he presented himself,
-without being expected, at the gates of the city; entreating to be
-admitted, and offering to lend his immediate aid for the recovery
-of Nisæa. One of the two parties in Megara would have been glad to
-comply; but the other, knowing well that in that case the exiles in
-Pegæ would be brought back upon them, was prepared for a strenuous
-resistance, in which case the Athenian force, still only one
-mile off, would have been introduced as auxiliaries. Under these
-circumstances the two parties came to a compromise, and mutually
-agreed to refuse admittance to Brasidas. They expected that a
-battle would take place between him and the Athenians, and each
-calculated that Megara would follow the fortunes of the victor.<a
-id="FNanchor_604" href="#Footnote_604" class="fnanchor">[604]</a></p>
-
-<p>Returning back without success to Tripodiskus, Brasidas was
-joined there early in the morning by two thousand Bœotian hoplites
-and six hundred cavalry; for the Bœotians had been put in motion
-by the same news as himself, and had even commenced their march,
-before his messenger arrived, with such celerity as to have
-already reached Platæa.<a id="FNanchor_605" href="#Footnote_605"
-class="fnanchor">[605]</a> The total force under Brasidas was thus
-increased to six thousand hoplites and six hundred cavalry, with
-whom he marched straight to the neighborhood of Megara. The Athenian
-light troops, dispersed over the plain, were surprised and driven in
-by the Bœotian cavalry; but the Athenian cavalry, coming to their
-aid, maintained a sharp action with the assailants, wherein, after
-some loss on both sides, a slight advantage remained on the side of
-the Athenians. They granted a truce for the burial of the Bœotian
-officer of cavalry, who was slain with some others. After this
-indecisive cavalry skirmish, Brasidas advanced with his main force
-into the plain, between Megara and the sea, taking up a position
-near to the Athenian hoplites, who were drawn up in battle array,
-hard by Nisæa and the Long Walls. He thus offered them battle if
-they chose it; but each party expected that the other would attack
-and each was unwilling to begin the attack on his own side,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_377">[p. 377]</span> Brasidas was well aware
-that, if the Athenians refused to fight, Megara would be preserved
-from falling into their hands,—which loss it was his main object to
-prevent, and which had in fact been prevented only by his arrival. If
-he attacked and was beaten, he would forfeit this advantage,—while,
-if victorious, he could hardly hope to gain much more. The Athenian
-generals on their side reflected, that they had already secured a
-material acquisition in Nisæa, which cut off Megara from their sea;
-that the army opposed to them was not only superior in number of
-hoplites, but composed of contingents from many different cities, so
-that no one city hazarded much in the action; while their own force
-was all Athenian, and composed of the best hoplites in Athens, which
-would render a defeat severely ruinous to the city: nor did they
-think it worth while to encounter this risk, even for the purpose
-of gaining possession of Megara. With such views in the leaders on
-both sides, the two armies remained for some time in position, each
-waiting for the other to attack: at length the Athenians, seeing
-that no aggressive movement was contemplated by their opponents,
-were the first to retire into Nisæa. Thus left master of the
-field, Brasidas retired in triumph to Megara, the gates of which
-were now opened without reserve to admit him.<a id="FNanchor_606"
-href="#Footnote_606" class="fnanchor">[606]</a></p>
-
-<p>The army of Brasidas, having gained the chief point for which
-it was collected, speedily dispersed,—he himself resuming his
-preparations for Thrace; while the Athenians on their side also
-returned home, leaving an adequate garrison for the occupation both
-of Nisæa and of the Long Walls. But the interior of Megara underwent
-a complete and violent revolution. While the leaders friendly to
-Athens, not thinking it safe to remain, fled forthwith and sought
-shelter with the Athenians,<a id="FNanchor_607" href="#Footnote_607"
-class="fnanchor">[607]</a> the opposite party opened communication
-with the exiles at Pegæ and readmitted them into the city; binding
-them however, by the most solemn pledges, to observe absolute amnesty
-of the past and to study nothing but the welfare of the common
-city. The new-comers only kept their pledge during the interval
-which elapsed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_378">[p. 378]</span>
-until they acquired power to violate it with effect. They soon
-got themselves placed in the chief commands of state, and found
-means to turn the military force to their own purposes. A review
-and examination of arms, of the hoplites in the city, having been
-ordered, the Megarian lochi were so marshalled and tutored as to
-enable the leaders to single out such victims as they thought
-expedient. They seized many of their most obnoxious enemies, some
-of them suspected as accomplices in the recent conspiracy with
-Athens: the men thus seized were subjected to the forms of a public
-trial, before that which was called a public assembly; wherein each
-voter, acting under military terror, was constrained to give his
-suffrage openly. All were condemned to death and executed, to the
-number of one hundred.<a id="FNanchor_608" href="#Footnote_608"
-class="fnanchor">[608]</a> The constitution of Megara was then shaped
-into an oligarchy of the closest possible kind, a few of the most
-violent men taking complete possession of the government. But they
-must probably have conducted it with vigor and prudence for their
-own purposes, since Thucydidês remarks that it was rare to see a
-revolution accomplished by so small a party, and yet so durable.
-How long it lasted, he does not mention. A few months after these
-incidents, the Megarians regained possession of their Long Walls, by
-capture from the Athenians,<a id="FNanchor_609" href="#Footnote_609"
-class="fnanchor">[609]</a> to whom indeed they could have been of no
-material service, and levelled the whole line of them to the ground:
-but the Athenians still retained Nisæa. We may remark, as explaining
-in part the durability of this new government, that the truce
-concluded at the beginning of the ensuing year must have greatly
-lightened the difficulties of any government, whether oligarchical or
-democratical, in Megara.</p>
-
-<p>The scheme for surprising Megara had been both laid and executed
-with skill, and only miscarried through an accident to which such
-schemes are always liable, as well as by the unexpected celerity of
-Brasidas. It had, moreover, succeeded so far<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_379">[p. 379]</span> as to enable the Athenians to carry
-Nisæa,—one of the posts which they had surrendered by the thirty
-years’ truce, and of considerable positive value to them: so
-that it counted on the whole as a victory, leaving the generals
-with increased encouragement to turn their activity elsewhere.
-Accordingly, very soon after the troops had been brought back
-from the Megarid,<a id="FNanchor_610" href="#Footnote_610"
-class="fnanchor">[610]</a> Hippokratês and Demosthenês concerted a
-still more extensive plan for the invasion of Bœotia, in conjunction
-with some malcontents in the Bœotian towns, who desired to break
-down and democratize the oligarchical governments, and especially
-through the agency of a Theban exile named Ptœodôrus. Demosthenês,
-with forty triremes, was sent round Peloponnesus to Naupaktus, with
-instructions to collect an Akarnanian force, to sail into the inmost
-recess of the Corinthian or Krissæan gulf, and to occupy Siphæ, a
-maritime town belonging to the Bœotian Thespiæ, where intelligences
-had been already established. On the same day, determined beforehand,
-Hippokratês engaged to enter Bœotia, with the main force of Athens,
-at the southeastern corner of the territory near Tanagra, and to
-fortify Delium, the temple of Apollo, on the coast of the Eubœan
-strait: while at the same time it was concerted that some Bœotian
-and Phocian malcontents should make themselves masters of Chæroneia
-on the borders of Phocis. Bœotia would thus be assailed on three
-sides at the same moment, so that the forces of the country would be
-distracted and unable to coöperate. Internal movements were farther
-expected to take place in some of the cities, such as perhaps to
-establish democratical governments and place them at once in alliance
-with the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p>Accordingly, about the month of August, Demosthenês sailed
-from Athens to Naupaktus, where he collected his Akarnanian
-allies,—now stronger and more united than ever, since the refractory
-inhabitants of Œniadæ had been at length compelled to join their
-Akarnanian brethren: moreover, the neighboring Agræans with their
-prince Salynthius were also brought into the Athenian alliance. On
-the appointed day, seemingly about the beginning of October, he
-sailed with a strong force of these allies<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_380">[p. 380]</span> up to Siphæ, in full expectation that
-it would be betrayed to him.<a id="FNanchor_611" href="#Footnote_611"
-class="fnanchor">[611]</a> But the execution of this enterprise
-was less happy than that against Megara. In the first place, there
-was a mistake as to the day understood between Hippokratês and
-Demosthenês: in the next place, the entire plot was discovered and
-betrayed by a Phocian of Phanoteus (bordering on Chæroneia) named
-Nicomachus,—communicated first to the Lacedæmonians and through
-them to the bœotarchs. Siphæ and Chæroneia were immediately placed
-in a state of defence, and Demosthenês, on arriving at the former
-place, found not only no party within it favorable to him, but a
-formidable Bœotian force which rendered attack unavailing: moreover,
-Hippokratês had not yet begun his march, so that the defenders had
-nothing to distract their attention from Siphæ.<a id="FNanchor_612"
-href="#Footnote_612" class="fnanchor">[612]</a> Under these
-circumstances, not only was Demosthenês obliged to withdraw without
-striking a blow, and to content himself with an unsuccessful
-descent upon the territory of Sikyon,<a id="FNanchor_613"
-href="#Footnote_613" class="fnanchor">[613]</a> but all the expected
-internal movements in Bœotia were prevented from breaking out.</p>
-
-<p>It was not till after the Bœotian troops, having repelled the
-attack by sea, had retired from Siphæ, that Hippokratês commenced his
-march from Athens to invade the Bœotian territory near Tanagra. He
-was probably encouraged by false promises from the Bœotian exiles,
-otherwise it seems remarkable that he should have persisted in
-executing his part of the scheme alone, after the known failure of
-the other part. It was, however, executed in a manner which implies
-unusual alacrity and confidence. The whole military population of
-Athens was marched into Bœotia, to the neighborhood of Delium,
-the eastern coast-extremity of the territory belonging to the
-Bœotian town of Tanagra; the expedition comprising all classes,
-not merely citizens, but also metics or resident non-freemen, and
-even non-resident strangers then by accident at Athens. Of course
-this statement must be understood with the reserve of ample guards
-left behind for the city: but besides the really effective force
-of seven thousand hoplites, and several hundred horsemen, there
-appear to have been not less than twenty-five thousand light-armed,
-half-armed,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_381">[p. 381]</span>
-or unarmed attendants accompanying the march.<a id="FNanchor_614"
-href="#Footnote_614" class="fnanchor">[614]</a> The number of
-hoplites is here prodigiously great; brought together by general
-and indiscriminate proclamation, not selected by a special choice
-of the stratêgi out of the names on the muster-roll, as was
-usually the case for any distant expedition.<a id="FNanchor_615"
-href="#Footnote_615" class="fnanchor">[615]</a> As to light-armed,
-there was at this time no trained force of that description at
-Athens, except a small body of archers. No pains had been taken to
-organize either darters or slingers: the hoplites, the horsemen,
-and the seamen, constituted the whole effective force of the
-city. Indeed, it appears that the Bœotians also were hardly less
-destitute than the Athenians of native darters and slingers, since
-those which they employed in the subsequent siege of Delium were
-in great part hired from the Malian gulf.<a id="FNanchor_616"
-href="#Footnote_616" class="fnanchor">[616]</a> To employ at one and
-the same time heavy-armed and light-armed, was not natural to any
-Grecian community, but was a practice which grew up with experience
-and necessity. The Athenian feeling, as manifested in the Persæ of
-Æschylus a few years after the repulse of Xerxes, proclaims exclusive
-pride in the spear and shield, with contempt for the bow: and it was
-only during this very year, when alarmed by the Athenian occupation
-of Pylus and Kythêra, that the Lacedæmonians, contrary to their
-previous<span class="pagenum" id="Page_382">[p. 382]</span> custom,
-had begun to organize a regiment of archers.<a id="FNanchor_617"
-href="#Footnote_617" class="fnanchor">[617]</a> The effective manner
-in which Demosthenês had employed the light-armed in Sphakteria
-against the Lacedæmonian hoplites, was well calculated to teach an
-instructive lesson as to the value of the former description of
-troops.</p>
-
-<p>The Bœotian Delium,<a id="FNanchor_618" href="#Footnote_618"
-class="fnanchor">[618]</a> which Hippokratês now intended to
-occupy and fortify, was a temple of Apollo, strongly situated and
-overhanging the sea, about five miles from Tanagra, and somewhat
-more than a mile from the border territory of Orôpus,—a territory
-originally Bœotian, but at this time dependent on Athens, and even
-partly incorporated in the political community of Athens, under the
-name of the Deme of Græa.<a id="FNanchor_619" href="#Footnote_619"
-class="fnanchor">[619]</a> Orôpus itself was about a day’s march
-from Athens, by the road which led through Dekeleia and Sphendalê,
-between the mountains Parnês and Phelleus: so that as the distance to
-be traversed was so inconsiderable, and the general feeling of the
-time was that of confidence, it is probable that men of all ages,
-arms, and dispositions crowded to join the march, in part from mere
-curiosity and excitement. Hippokratês reached Delium on the day after
-he had started from Athens: on the succeeding day he began his work
-of fortification, which was completed, all hands aiding, and tools as
-well as workmen having been brought along with the army from Athens,
-in two days and a half. Having dug a ditch all round the sacred
-ground, he threw up the earth in a bank alongside of the ditch,
-planting stakes, throwing in fascines, and adding layers of stone
-and brick, to keep the work together, and make it into a rampart
-of tolerable height and firmness. The vines<a id="FNanchor_620"
-href="#Footnote_620" class="fnanchor">[620]</a> round the temple,
-together with the stakes which served<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_383">[p. 383]</span> as supports to them, were cut to obtain
-wood; the houses adjoining furnished bricks and stone: the outer
-temple-buildings themselves also, on some of the sides, served as
-they stood to facilitate and strengthen the defence; but there was
-one side on which the annexed building, once a portico, had fallen
-down: and here the Athenians constructed some wooden towers as a
-help to the defenders. By the middle of the fifth day after leaving
-Athens, the work was so nearly completed, that the army quitted
-Delium, and began its march homeward, out of Bœotia; halting, after
-it had proceeded about a mile and a quarter, within the Athenian
-territory of Orôpus. It was here that the hoplites awaited the
-coming of Hippokratês, who still remained at Delium, stationing the
-garrison, and giving his final orders about future defence; while
-the greater number of the light-armed and unarmed, separating from
-the hoplites, and seemingly without any anticipation of the coming
-danger, continued their return-march to Athens.<a id="FNanchor_621"
-href="#Footnote_621" class="fnanchor">[621]</a> Their position
-was probably about the western extremity of the plain of Orôpus,
-on the verge of the low heights between that plain and Delium.<a
-id="FNanchor_622" href="#Footnote_622" class="fnanchor">[622]</a></p>
-
-<p>During these five days, however, the forces from all parts
-of Bœotia had time to muster at Tanagra: and their number was
-just completed as the Athenians were beginning their march<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_384">[p. 384]</span> homeward from Delium.
-Contingents had arrived, not only from Thebes and its dependent
-townships around, but also from Haliartus, Korôneia, Orchomenus,
-Kôpæ, and Thespiæ: that of Tanagra joined on the spot. The government
-of the Bœotian confederacy at this time was vested in eleven
-bœotarchs,—two chosen from Thebes, the rest in unknown proportion
-by the other cities, immediate members of the confederacy,—and in
-four senates, or councils, the constitution of which is not known.
-Though all the bœotarchs, now assembled at Tanagra, formed a sort
-of council of war, yet the supreme command was vested in Pagondas
-and Aranthidês, the bœotarchs from Thebes; either in Pagondas
-as the senior of the two, or perhaps in both, alternating with
-each other day by day.<a id="FNanchor_623" href="#Footnote_623"
-class="fnanchor">[623]</a> As the Athenians were evidently in
-full retreat, and had already passed the border, all the other
-bœotarchs, except Pagondas, were unwilling to hazard a battle<a
-id="FNanchor_624" href="#Footnote_624" class="fnanchor">[624]</a> on
-soil not Bœotian, and were disposed to let them return home without
-obstruction. Such reluctance is not surprising, when we reflect that
-the chances of defeat were considerable, and that probably some of
-these bœotarchs were afraid of the increased power which a victory
-would lend to the oppressive tendencies of Thebes. But Pagondas
-strenuously opposed this proposition, and carried the soldiers of the
-various cities along with him, even in opposition to the sentiments
-of their separate leaders, in favor of immediately fighting. He
-called them apart and addressed them by separate divisions, in order
-that all might<span class="pagenum" id="Page_385">[p. 385]</span>
-not quit their arms at one and the same moment.<a id="FNanchor_625"
-href="#Footnote_625" class="fnanchor">[625]</a> He characterized
-the sentiment of the other bœotarchs as an unworthy manifestation
-of weakness, which, when properly considered, had not even the
-recommendation of superior prudence. For the Athenians had just
-invaded the country, and built a fort for the purpose of continuous
-devastation; nor were they less enemies on one side of the border
-than on the other. Moreover, they were the most restless and
-encroaching of all enemies; and the Bœotians, who had the misfortune
-to be their neighbors, could only be secure against them by the most
-resolute promptitude in defending themselves, as well as in returning
-the blows first given. If they wished to protect their autonomy and
-their property against the condition of slavery under which their
-neighbors in Eubœa had long suffered, as well as so many other
-portions of Greece, their only chance was to march onward and beat
-these invaders, following the glorious example of their fathers and
-predecessors in the field of Korôneia. The sacrifices were favorable
-to an advancing movement, and Apollo, whose temple the Athenians
-had desecrated by converting it into a for<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_386">[p. 386]</span>tified place, would lend his cordial
-aid to the Bœotian defence.<a id="FNanchor_626" href="#Footnote_626"
-class="fnanchor">[626]</a></p>
-
-<p>Finding his exhortations favorably received, Pagondas conducted
-the army by a rapid march to a position close to the Athenians.
-He was anxious to fight them before they should have retreated
-farther; and, moreover, the day was nearly spent,—it was already
-late in the afternoon. Having reached a spot where he was only
-separated from the Athenians by a hill, which prevented either army
-from seeing the other, he marshalled his troops in the array proper
-for fighting. The Theban hoplites, with their dependent allies,
-ranged in a depth of not less than twenty-five shields, occupied
-the right wing: the hoplites of Haliartus, Korôneia, Kôpæ, and its
-neighborhood, were in the centre: those of Thespiæ, Tanagra, and
-Orchomenus, on the left; for Orchomenus, being the second city
-in Bœotia next to Thebes, obtained a second post of honor at the
-opposite extremity of the line. Each contingent adopted its own mode
-of marshalling the hoplites, and its own depth of files: on this
-point there was no uniformity, a remarkable proof of the prevalence
-of dissentient custom in Greece, and how much each town, even among
-confederates, stood apart as a separate unit.<a id="FNanchor_627"
-href="#Footnote_627" class="fnanchor">[627]</a> Thucydidês specifies
-only the prodigious depth of the Theban hoplites; respecting the
-rest, he merely intimates that no common rule was followed. There
-is another point also which he does not specify, but which, though
-we learn it only on the inferior authority of Diodorus, appears
-both true and important. The front ranks of the Theban heavy-armed
-were filled by three hundred select warriors, of distinguished
-bodily strength, valor, and discipline, who were accustomed to fight
-in pairs, each man being attached to his neighbor by a peculiar
-tie of intimate friendship. These pairs<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_387">[p. 387]</span> were termed the heniochi and parabatæ,
-charioteers and companions; a denomination probably handed down
-from the Homeric times, when the foremost heroes really combated
-in chariots in front of the common soldiers, but now preserved
-after it had outlived its appropriate meaning.<a id="FNanchor_628"
-href="#Footnote_628" class="fnanchor">[628]</a> This band, composed
-of the finest men in the various palæstræ of Thebes, and enjoying a
-peculiar training for the defence of the kadmeia, or citadel, was
-in after-days detached from the front ranks of the phalanx, and
-organized into a separate regiment under the name of the Sacred
-Lochus, or Band: we shall see how much it contributed to the
-short-lived military ascendency of Thebes. On both flanks of this
-mass of Bœotian hoplites, about seven thousand in total number, were
-distributed one thousand cavalry, five hundred peltasts, and ten
-thousand light-armed or unarmed. The language of the historian seems
-to imply that the light-armed on the Bœotian side were something more
-effective than the mere multitude who followed the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the order in which Pagondas marched his army over
-the hill, halting them for a moment in front and sight of the
-Athenians, to see that the ranks were even, before he gave the
-word for actual charge.<a id="FNanchor_629" href="#Footnote_629"
-class="fnanchor">[629]</a> Hippokratês, on his side, apprized<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_388">[p. 388]</span> while still at Delium,
-that the Bœotians had moved from Tanagra, first sent orders to his
-army to place themselves in battle array, and presently arrived
-himself to command them; leaving three hundred cavalry at Delium,
-partly as garrison, partly for the purpose of acting on the rear of
-the Bœotians during the battle. The Athenian hoplites were ranged
-eight deep along the whole line,—with the cavalry, and such of the
-light-armed as yet remained, placed on each flank. Hippokratês, after
-arriving on the spot, and surveying the ground occupied, marched
-along the front of the line briefly encouraging his soldiers; who,
-as the battle was just on the Orôpian border, might fancy that
-they were not in their own country, and that they were therefore
-exposed without necessity. He, too, in a strain similar to that
-adopted by Pagondas, reminded the Athenians, that on either side of
-the border they were alike fighting for the defence of Attica, to
-keep the Bœotians out of it; since the Peloponnesians would never
-dare to enter the country without the aid of the Bœotian horse.<a
-id="FNanchor_630" href="#Footnote_630" class="fnanchor">[630]</a>
-He farther called to their recollection the great name of Athens,
-and the memorable victory of Myronidês, at Œnophyta, whereby their
-fathers had acquired possession of all Bœotia. But he had scarcely
-half-finished his progress along the line, when he was forced to
-desist by the sound of the Bœotian pæan. Pagondas, after a few
-additional sentences of encouragement, had given the word: the
-Bœotian hoplites were seen charging down the hill; and the Athenian
-hoplites, not less eager, advanced to meet them at a running step.<a
-id="FNanchor_631" href="#Footnote_631" class="fnanchor">[631]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_389">[p. 389]</span></p>
-
-<p>At the extremity of the line on each side, the interposition
-of ravines prevented the actual meeting of the two armies: but
-throughout all the rest of the line, the clash was formidable and the
-conduct of both sides resolute. Both armies, maintaining their ranks
-compact and unbroken, came to the closest quarters; to the contact
-and pushing of shields against each other.<a id="FNanchor_632"
-href="#Footnote_632" class="fnanchor">[632]</a> On the left half
-of the Bœotian line, consisting of hoplites from Thespiæ, Tanagra,
-and Orchomenus, the Athenians were victorious. The Thespians, who
-resisted longest, even after their comrades had given way, were
-surrounded and sustained the most severe loss from the Athenians;
-who in the ardor of success, while wheeling round to encircle the
-enemy, became disordered and came into conflict even with their own
-citizens, not recognizing them at the moment: some loss of life was
-the consequence.</p>
-
-<p>While the left of the Bœotian line was thus worsted and driven
-back for protection to the right, the Thebans on that side gained
-decided advantage. Though the resolution and discipline of the
-Athenians was noway inferior, yet as soon as the action came
-to close quarters and to propulsion with shield and spear, the
-prodigious depth of the Theban column (more than triple of the
-depth of the Athenians, twenty-five against eight) enabled them to
-bear down their enemies by mere superiority of weight and mass.
-Moreover, the Thebans appear to have been superior to the Athenians
-in gymnastic training and acquired bodily force, as they were
-inferior both in speech and in intelligence. The chosen Theban
-warriors in the front rank were especially superior: but apart
-from such superiority, if we assume simple equality of individual
-strength and resolution on both sides,<a id="FNanchor_633"
-href="#Footnote_633" class="fnanchor">[633]</a> it is plain that
-when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_390">[p. 390]</span> the two
-opposing columns came into conflict, shield against shield, the
-comparative force of forward pressure would decide the victory.
-This motive is sufficient to explain the extraordinary depth of the
-Theban column, which was increased by Epameinondas, half a century
-afterwards, at the battle of Leuktra, from a depth of twenty-five men
-to the still more astonishing depth of fifty: nor need we suspect the
-correctness of the text, with some critics, or suppose, with others,
-that the great depth of the Theban files arose from the circumstance
-that the rear ranks were too poor to provide themselves with armor.<a
-id="FNanchor_634" href="#Footnote_634" class="fnanchor">[634]</a>
-Even in a depth of eight, which was that of the Athenian column in
-the present engagement,<a id="FNanchor_635" href="#Footnote_635"
-class="fnanchor">[635]</a> and seemingly the usual depth in a battle,
-the spears of the four rear ranks could hardly have protruded
-sufficiently beyond the first line to do any mischief. The great use
-of all the ranks behind the first four, was partly to take the place
-of such of the foremost lines as might be slain, partly, to push
-forward the lines before them from behind. The greater the depth of
-the files, the more irresistible did this propelling force become:
-hence the Thebans at Delium, as well as at Leuktra, found their
-account in deepening the column to so remarkable a degree, to which
-we may fairly presume that their hoplites were trained beforehand.</p>
-
-<p>The Thebans on the right thus pushed back<a id="FNanchor_636"
-href="#Footnote_636" class="fnanchor">[636]</a> the troops on the
-left of the Athenian line, who retired at first slowly, and for a
-short space, maintaining their order unbroken, so that the victory of
-the Athenians on their own right would have restored the battle, had
-not Pagondas detached from the rear two squad<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_391">[p. 391]</span>rons of cavalry; who, wheeling unseen
-round the hill behind, suddenly appeared to the relief of the Bœotian
-left, and produced upon the Athenians on that side, already deranged
-in their ranks by the ardor of pursuit, the intimidating effect of
-a fresh army arriving to reinforce the Bœotians. And thus, even on
-the right, the victorious portion of their line, the Athenians lost
-courage and gave way; while on the left, where they were worsted
-from the beginning, they found themselves pressed harder and harder
-by the pursuing Thebans: so that in the end, the whole Athenian army
-was broken, dispersed, and fled. The garrison of Delium, reinforced
-by three hundred cavalry, whom Hippokratês had left there to assail
-the rear of the Bœotians during the action, either made no vigorous
-movement, or were repelled by a Bœotian reserve stationed to watch
-them. Flight having become general among the Athenians, the different
-parts of their army took different directions: the right sought
-refuge at Delium, the centre fled to Orôpus, and the left took a
-direction towards the high lands of Parnês. The pursuit of the
-Bœotians was vigorous and destructive: they had an efficient cavalry,
-strengthened by some Lokrian horse who had arrived even during the
-action: their peltasts also, and their light-armed, would render
-valuable service against retreating hoplites.<a id="FNanchor_637"
-href="#Footnote_637" class="fnanchor">[637]</a> Fortunately for the
-vanquished, the battle had begun very late in the afternoon, leaving
-no long period of daylight: this important circumstance saved the
-Athenian army from almost total destruction.<a id="FNanchor_638"
-href="#Footnote_638" class="fnanchor">[638]</a> As it was, however,
-the general Hippokratês, together with nearly one thousand hoplites,
-and a considerable number of light-armed and attendants, were
-slain; while the loss of the Bœotians, chiefly on their defeated
-left wing, was rather under five hundred hoplites. Some prisoners<a
-id="FNanchor_639" href="#Footnote_639" class="fnanchor">[639]</a>
-seem to have been made, but we hear little about them. Those who had
-fled to Delium and Orôpus were conveyed back by sea to Athens.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_392">[p. 392]</span></p>
-
-<p>The victors retired to Tanagra, after erecting their trophy,
-burying their own dead, and despoiling those of their enemies. An
-abundant booty of arms from the stripped warriors, long remained
-to decorate the temples of Thebes, and the spoil in other ways is
-said to have been considerable. Pagondas also resolved to lay siege
-to the newly-established fortress at Delium: but before commencing
-operations,—which might perhaps prove tedious, since the Athenians
-could always reinforce the garrison by sea,—he tried another means of
-attaining the same object. He despatched to the Athenians a herald,
-who, happening in his way to meet the Athenian herald, coming to ask
-the ordinary permission for burial of the slain, warned him that no
-such request would be entertained until the message of the Bœotian
-general had first been communicated, and thus induced him to come
-back to the Athenian commanders. The Bœotian herald was instructed
-to remonstrate against the violation of holy custom committed by the
-Athenians in seizing and fortifying the temple of Delium; wherein
-their garrison was now dwelling, performing numerous functions
-which religion forbade to be done in a sacred place, and using as
-their common drink the water especially consecrated to sacrificial
-purposes. The Bœotians therefore solemnly summoned them in the name
-of Apollo, and the gods inmates along with him, to evacuate the
-place, carrying away all that belonged to them: and the herald gave
-it to be understood, that, unless this summons were complied with, no
-permission would be granted to bury the dead.</p>
-
-<p>Answer was returned by the Athenian herald, who now went to
-the Bœotian commanders, to the following effect: “The Athenians
-did not admit that they had hitherto been guilty of any wrong in
-reference to the temple, and protested that they would persist in
-respecting it for the future as much as possible. Their object in
-taking possession of it had been no evil sentiment towards the holy
-place, but the necessity of avenging the repeated invasions of Attica
-by the Bœotians. Possession of the territory, according to the
-received maxims of Greece, always carried along with it possession of
-temples therein situated, under obligation to fulfil all customary
-obligations to the resident god, as far as circumstances permitted.
-It was upon this maxim that the Bœotians had themselves acted when
-they took possession of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_393">[p.
-393]</span> their present territory, expelling the prior occupants
-and appropriating the temples: it was upon the same maxim that
-the Athenians would act in retaining so much of Bœotia as they
-had now conquered, and in conquering more of it, if they could.
-Necessity compelled them to use the consecrated water—a necessity
-not originating in the ambition of Athens, but in prior Bœotian
-aggressions upon Attica,—a necessity which they trusted that the
-gods would pardon, since their altars were allowed as a protection
-to the involuntary offender, and none but he who sinned without
-constraint experienced their displeasure. The Bœotians were guilty
-of far greater impiety in refusing to give back the dead, except
-upon certain conditions connected with the holy ground, than the
-Athenians, who merely refused to turn the duty of sepulture into an
-unseemly bargain. Tell us unconditionally (concluded the Athenian
-herald) that we may bury our dead under truce, pursuant to the maxims
-of our forefathers. Do not tell us that we may do so on condition of
-going out of Bœotia, for we are no longer in Bœotia; we are in our
-own territory, won by the sword.”</p>
-
-<p>The Bœotian generals dismissed the herald with a reply short and
-decisive: “If you are in Bœotia, you may take away all that belongs
-to you, but only on condition of going out of it. If on the other
-hand you are in your own territory, you can take your own resolution
-without asking us.”<a id="FNanchor_640" href="#Footnote_640"
-class="fnanchor">[640]</a></p>
-
-<p>In this debate, curious as an illustration of Grecian manners
-and feelings, there seems to have been special pleading and evasion
-on both sides. The final sentence of the Bœotians was good as a
-reply to the incidental argument raised by the Athenian herald,
-who had rested the defence of Athens in regard to the temple of
-Delium on the allegation that the territory was Athenian, not
-Bœotian, Athenian by conquest and by the right of the strongest,
-and had concluded by affirming the same thing about Oropia, the
-district to which the battle-field belonged. It was only this same
-argument, of actual superior force, which the Bœotians retorted,
-when they said: “If the territory to which your application refers
-is yours by right of conquest (<i>i. e.</i> if you are <i>de facto</i> masters
-of it, and are strongest within it), you can of course<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_394">[p. 394]</span> do what you think best
-in it: you need not ask any truce at our hands; you can bury your
-dead without a truce.”<a id="FNanchor_641" href="#Footnote_641"
-class="fnanchor">[641]</a> The Bœotians knew that at this moment the
-field of battle was under guard by a detachment of their army,<a
-id="FNanchor_642" href="#Footnote_642" class="fnanchor">[642]</a>
-and that the Athenians could not obtain the dead bodies without
-permission; but since the Athenian herald had asserted the reverse
-as a matter of fact, we can hardly wonder that they resented the
-production of such an argument; meeting it by a reply sufficiently
-pertinent in mere diplomatic fencing.</p>
-
-<p>But if the Athenian herald, instead of raising the incidental
-point of territorial property, combined with an incautious definition
-of that which constituted territorial property, as a defence against
-the alleged desecration of the temple of Delium, had confined himself
-to the main issue, he would have put the Bœotians completely in the
-wrong. According to principles universally respected in Greece, the
-victor, if solicited, was held bound to grant to the vanquished
-a truce for burying his dead; to grant and permit it absolutely,
-without annexing any conditions. On this, the main point in debate,
-the Bœotians sinned against the most sacred international law of
-Greece, when they exacted the evacuation of the temple at Delium
-as a condition for consenting to permit the burial of the Athenian
-dead. Ultimately, after they had taken Delium, we shall find that
-they did grant it unconditionally; and we may doubt whether they
-would have ever persisted in refusing it, if the Athenian herald had
-pressed this one important principle separately and exclusively;
-and if he had not, by an unskilful plea in vindication of the right
-to occupy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_395">[p. 395]</span> and
-live at Delium, both exasperated their feelings, and furnished them
-with a collateral issue as a means of evading the main demand.<a
-id="FNanchor_643" href="#Footnote_643" class="fnanchor">[643]</a></p>
-
-<p>To judge this curious debate with perfect impartiality, we ought
-to add, in reference to the conduct of the Athenians in occupying
-Delium, that for an enemy to make special choice of a temple, as
-a post to be fortified and occupied, was a proceeding certainly
-rare, perhaps hardly admissible, in Grecian warfare. Nor does the
-vindication offered by the Athenian herald meet the real charge
-preferred. It is one thing for an enemy of superior force to overrun
-a country, and to appropriate everything within it, sacred as well
-as profane: it is another thing for a border enemy, not yet in
-sufficient force for conquering the whole, to convert a temple of
-convenient site into a regular garrisoned fortress, and make it
-a base of operations against the neighboring population. On this
-ground, the Bœotians might reasonably complain of the seizure
-of Delium: though I apprehend that no impartial interpreter of
-Grecian international custom would have thought them warranted in
-attaching it as a condition to their grant of the burial-truce when
-solicited.</p>
-
-<p>All negotiation being thus broken off, the Bœotian generals
-prepared to lay siege to Delium, aided by two thousand Corinthian
-hoplites, together with some Megarians and the late Peloponnesian
-garrison of Nisæa, who joined after the news of the battle. Though
-they sent for darters and slingers, probably Œtæans and Ætolians,
-from the Maliac gulf, yet their direct attacks were at first all
-repelled by the garrison, aided by an Athenian squadron off the
-coast, in spite of the hasty and awkward defences by which alone the
-fort was protected. At length<span class="pagenum" id="Page_396">[p.
-396]</span> they contrived a singular piece of fire-mechanism, which
-enabled them to master the place. They first sawed in twain a thick
-beam, pierced a channel through it long-ways from end to end, coated
-most part of the channel with iron, and then joined the two halves
-accurately together. From the farther end of this hollowed beam they
-suspended by chains a boiler, full of pitch, brimstone, and burning
-charcoal; lastly, an iron tube projected from the end of the interior
-channel of the beam, in a direction so as to come near to the boiler.
-Such was the machine, which, constructed at some distance, was
-brought on carts and placed close to the wall, near the palisading
-and the wooden towers. The Bœotians then applied great bellows to
-their own end of the beam, blowing violently with a close current
-of air through the interior channel, so as to raise an intense fire
-in the boiler at the other end. The wooden portions of the wall,
-soon catching fire, became untenable for the defenders, who escaped
-in the best way they could, without attempting farther resistance.
-Two hundred of them were made prisoners and a few slain; but the
-greater number got safely on shipboard. This recapture of Delium
-took place on the seventeenth day after the battle, during all which
-interval the Athenians slain had remained on the field unburied.
-Presently, however, arrived the Athenian herald to make fresh
-application for the burial-truce; which was now forthwith granted,
-and granted unconditionally.<a id="FNanchor_644" href="#Footnote_644"
-class="fnanchor">[644]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the memorable expedition and battle of Delium, a fatal
-discouragement to the feeling of confidence and hope which had
-previously reigned at Athens, besides the painful immediate loss
-which it inflicted on the city. Among the hoplites who took part in
-the vigorous charge and pushing of shields, the philosopher Sokratês
-is to be numbered. His bravery both in the battle and the retreat was
-much extolled by his friends, and doubtless with good reason: he had
-before served with credit in the ranks of the hoplites at Potidæa,
-and he served also at Amphipolis: his patience under hardship and
-endurance of heat and cold being not less remarkable than his
-personal bravery. He and his friend Lachês were among those hoplites,
-who, in the retreat from Delium, instead of flinging away their
-arms and taking to flight,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_397">[p.
-397]</span> kept their ranks, their arms, and their firmness of
-countenance; insomuch that the pursuing cavalry found it dangerous
-to meddle with them, and turned to an easier prey in the disarmed
-fugitives. Alkibiadês also served at Delium in the cavalry, and
-helped to protect Sokratês in the retreat. The latter was thus
-exposing his life at Delium nearly at the same time when Aristophanês
-was exposing him to derision in the comedy of the Clouds, as
-a dreamer alike morally worthless and physically incapable.<a
-id="FNanchor_645" href="#Footnote_645" class="fnanchor">[645]</a></p>
-
-<p>Severe as the blow was which the Athenians suffered at Delium,
-their disasters in Thrace about the same time, or towards the close
-of the same summer and autumn, were yet more calamitous. I have
-already mentioned the circumstances which led to the preparation of a
-Lacedæmonian force intended to act against the Athenians in Thrace,
-under Brasidas, in concert with the Chalkidians, revolted subjects of
-Athens, and with Perdikkas of Macedon. Having frustrated the Athenian
-designs against Megara (as described above),<a id="FNanchor_646"
-href="#Footnote_646" class="fnanchor">[646]</a> Brasidas completed
-the levy of his division,—seventeen hundred hoplites, partly Helots,
-partly Dorian Peloponnesians,—and conducted them, towards the close
-of the summer, to the Lacedæmonian colony of Herakleia, in the
-Trachinian territory near the Maliac gulf. To reach Macedonia and
-Thrace, it was necessary for him to pass through Thessaly, which was
-no easy task; for the war had now lasted so long that every state in
-Greece had become mistrustful of the transit of armed foreigners.
-Moreover, the mass of the Thessalian population were decidedly
-friendly to Athens, nor had he any sufficient means to force a
-passage: while, should he wait to apply for formal permission,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_398">[p. 398]</span> there was much doubt
-whether it would be granted, and perfect certainty of such delay
-and publicity as would put the Athenians on their guard. But though
-such was the temper of the Thessalian people, yet the Thessalian
-governments, all oligarchical, sympathized with Lacedæmon; and the
-federal authority or power of the tagus, which bound together the
-separate cities, was generally very weak. What was of still greater
-importance, the Macedonian Perdikkas, as well as the Chalkidians, had
-in every city powerful guests and partisans, whom they prevailed upon
-to exert themselves actively in forwarding the passage of the army.<a
-id="FNanchor_647" href="#Footnote_647" class="fnanchor">[647]</a></p>
-
-<p>To these men Brasidas sent a message at Pharsalus, as soon as he
-reached Herakleia; and Nikonidas, of Larissa, with other Thessalian
-friends of Perdikkas, assembling at Melitæa, in Achaia Phthiôtis,
-undertook to escort him through Thessaly. By their countenance
-and support, combined with his own boldness, dexterity, and rapid
-movements, he was enabled to accomplish the seemingly impossible
-enterprise of running through the country, not only without the
-consent but against the feeling of its inhabitants, simply by
-such celerity as to forestall opposition. After traversing Achaia
-Phthiôtis, a territory dependent on the Thessalians, Brasidas
-began his march from Melitæa through Thessaly itself, along with
-his powerful native guides. Notwithstanding all possible secrecy
-and celerity, his march became so far divulged, that a body of
-volunteers from the neighborhood, offended at the proceeding, and
-unfriendly to Nikonidas, assembled to oppose his progress down the
-valley of the river Enipeus. Reproaching him with wrongful violation
-of an independent territory, by the introduction of armed forces
-without permission from the general government, they forbade him to
-proceed farther. His only chance of making progress lay in disarming
-their opposition by fair words. His guides excused themselves by
-saying that the suddenness of his arrival had imposed upon them
-as his guests the obligation of conducting him through, without
-waiting to ask for formal permission: to offend their countrymen,
-however, was the farthest thing from their thoughts and they would
-renounce the enterprise if the persons now assembled persisted in
-their requisition. The same conciliatory<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_399">[p. 399]</span> tone was adopted by Brasidas himself.
-“He protested his strong feeling of respect and friendship for
-Thessaly and its inhabitants: his arms were directed against the
-Athenians, not against them: nor was he aware of any unfriendly
-relation subsisting between the Thessalians and Lacedæmonians,
-such as to exclude either of them from the territory of the other.
-Against the prohibition of the parties now before him, he could
-not possibly march forward, nor would he think of attempting it;
-but he put it to their good feeling whether they ought to prohibit
-him.” Such conciliatory language was successful in softening the
-opponents and inducing them to disperse. But so afraid were his
-guides of renewed opposition in other parts, that they hurried him
-forward still more rapidly,<a id="FNanchor_648" href="#Footnote_648"
-class="fnanchor">[648]</a> and he “passed through the country at a
-running pace without halting.” Leaving Melitæa in the morning, he
-reached Pharsalus on the same night, encamping on the river Apidanus:
-thence he proceeded on the next day to Phakium, and on the day
-afterwards into Perrhæbia,<a id="FNanchor_649" href="#Footnote_649"
-class="fnanchor">[649]</a> a territory adjoining to and dependent
-on Thessaly, under the mountain range of Olympus. Here he was in
-safety, so that his Thessalian guides left him; while the Perrhæbians
-conducted him over the pass of Olympus—the same over which the army
-of Xerxes had marched—to Dium, in Macedonia, in the territory of
-Perdikkas, on the northern edge of the mountain.<a id="FNanchor_650"
-href="#Footnote_650" class="fnanchor">[650]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_400">[p. 400]</span></p>
-
-<p>The Athenians were soon apprized of this stolen passage, so ably
-and rapidly executed, in a manner which few other Greeks, certainly
-no other Lacedæmonian, would have conceived to be possible. Aware
-of the new enemy thus brought within reach of their possessions
-in Thrace, they transmitted orders thither for greater vigilance,
-and at the same time declared open war against Perdikkas;<a
-id="FNanchor_651" href="#Footnote_651" class="fnanchor">[651]</a> but
-unfortunately without sending any efficient force, at the moment when
-timely defensive intervention was imperiously required. Perdikkas
-immediately invited Brasidas to join him in the attack of Arrhibæus,
-prince of the Macedonians, called Lynkestæ, or of Lynkus; a summons
-which the Spartan could not decline, since Perdikkas provided half
-of the pay and maintenance of the army,—but which he obeyed with
-reluctance, anxious as he was to commence operations against the
-allies of Athens. Such reluctance was still farther strengthened by
-envoys from the Chalkidians of Thrace, who, as zealous enemies of
-Athens, joined him forthwith, but discouraged any vigorous efforts
-to relieve Perdikkas from embarrassing enemies in the interior,
-in order that the latter might be under more pressing motives to
-conciliate and assist them. Accordingly Brasidas, though he joined
-Perdikkas, and marched along with the Macedonian army towards the
-territory of the Lynkestæ, was not only averse to active military
-operations, but even entertained with favor propositions from
-Arrhibæus, wherein the latter expressed his wish to become the ally
-of Lacedæmon, and offered to refer all his differences with Perdikkas
-to the arbitration of the Spartan general himself. Communicating
-these propositions to Perdikkas, Brasidas invited him to listen to
-an equitable compromise, admitting Arrhibæus into the alliance of
-Lacedæmon. But Perdikkas indignantly refused: “He had not called
-in Brasidas as a judge, to decide disputes between him and his
-enemies, but as an auxiliary, to put them down wherever he might
-point them out: and he protested against the iniquity of Brasidas in
-entering into terms with Arrhibæus, while the Lacedæmonian army was
-half paid and maintained by him,” (Perdikkas.<a id="FNanchor_652"
-href="#Footnote_652" class="fnanchor">[652]</a>) Notwithstanding
-such remonstrances, and even a hostile protest, Brasidas persisted
-in his intended conference with Arrhi<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_401">[p. 401]</span>bæus, and was so far satisfied with
-the propositions made that he withdrew his troops without marching
-over the pass into Lynkus. Too feeble to act alone, Perdikkas
-loudly complained, and contracted his allowance for the future so
-as to provide for only one-third of the army of Brasidas instead of
-one-half.</p>
-
-<p>To this inconvenience, however, Brasidas submitted, in haste to
-begin his march into Chalkidikê, and his operations jointly with
-the Chalkidians, for seducing or subduing the subject-allies of
-Athens. His first operation was against Akanthus, on the isthmus
-of the peninsula of Athos, the territory of which he invaded a
-little before the vintage, probably about the middle of September;
-when the grapes were ripe, but still out, and the whole crop of
-course exposed to ruin at the hands of an enemy superior in force:
-so important was it to Brasidas to have escaped the necessity of
-wasting another month in conquering the Lynkestæ. There was within
-the town of Akanthus a party in concert with the Chalkidians,
-anxious to admit him, and to revolt openly from Athens. But the
-mass of the citizens were averse to this step: and it was only by
-dwelling on the terrible loss from exposure of the crop without,
-that the anti-Athenian party could persuade them even to grant the
-request of Brasidas to be admitted singly,<a id="FNanchor_653"
-href="#Footnote_653" class="fnanchor">[653]</a> so as to explain his
-purposes formally before the public assembly, which would take its
-own decision afterwards. “For a Lacedæmonian (says Thucydidês) he
-was no mean speaker:” and if he is to have credit for that which we
-find written in Thucydidês, such an epithet would be less than his
-desert. Doubtless, however, the substance of the speech is genuine:
-and it is one of the most interesting in Grecian history; partly
-as a manifesto of professed Lacedæmonian policy, partly because
-it had a great practical effect in determining, on an occasion of
-paramount importance, a multitude which, though unfavorably inclined
-to him, was not beyond the reach of argu<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_402">[p. 402]</span>ment. I give the chief points of the
-speech, without binding myself to the words.</p>
-
-<p>“Myself and my soldiers have been sent, Akanthians, to realize
-the purpose which we proclaimed on beginning the war; that we took
-arms to liberate Greece from the Athenians. Let no man blame us for
-having been long in coming, or for the mistake which we made at the
-outset in supposing that we should quickly put down the Athenians by
-operations against Attica, without exposing you to any risk. Enough,
-that we are now here on the first opportunity, resolved to put them
-down if you will lend us your aid. To find myself shut out of your
-town, nay, to find that I am not heartily welcomed, astonishes me.
-We, Lacedæmonians, undertook this long and perilous march, in the
-belief that we were coming to friends eagerly expecting us; and
-it would indeed be terrible if you should now disappoint us, and
-stand out against your own freedom as well as that of other Greeks.
-Your example, standing high as you do both for prudence and power,
-will fatally keep back other Greeks, and make them suspect that I
-am wanting either in power to protect them against Athens, or in
-honest purpose. Now, in regard to power, my own present army was
-one which the Athenians, though superior in number, were afraid to
-fight near Nisæa; nor are they at all likely to send an equal force
-hither against me by sea. And in regard to my purpose, it is not
-one of mischief, but of liberation, the Lacedæmonian authorities
-having pledged themselves to me by the most solemn oaths, that every
-city which joins me shall retain its autonomy. You have therefore
-the best assurance both as to my purposes and as to my power; still
-less need you apprehend that I am come with factious designs, to
-serve the views of any particular men among you, and to remodel your
-established constitution to the disadvantage either of the many or
-of the few. That would be worse than foreign subjugation, so that
-we Lacedæmonians should be taking all this trouble to earn hatred
-instead of gratitude. We should play the part of unworthy traitors,
-worse even than that high-handed oppression of which we accuse the
-Athenians: we should at once violate our oaths and sin against our
-strongest political interests. Perhaps you may say, that though you
-wish me well, you desire for your parts to be let alone, and to
-stand aloof from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_403">[p. 403]</span>
-a dangerous struggle. You will tell me to carry my propositions
-elsewhere, to those who can safely embrace them, but not to thrust
-my alliance upon any people against their own will. If this should
-be your language, I shall first call your local gods and heroes to
-witness that I have come to you with a mission of good, and have
-employed persuasion in vain; I shall then proceed to ravage your
-territory and extort your consent, thinking myself justly entitled
-to do so, on two grounds. First, that the Lacedæmonians may not
-sustain actual damage from these good wishes which you profess
-towards me without actually joining,—damage in the shape of that
-tribute which you annually send to Athens. Next, that the Greeks
-generally may not be prevented by you from becoming free. It is only
-on the ground of common good, that we Lacedæmonians can justify
-ourselves for liberating any city against its own will; but as we
-are conscious of desiring only extinction of the empire of others,
-not acquisition of empire for ourselves, we should fail in our duty
-if we suffered you to obstruct that liberation which we are now
-carrying to all. Consider well my words, then: take to yourselves
-the glory of beginning the era of emancipation for Greece, save your
-own properties from damage, and attach an ever-honorable name to the
-community of Akanthus.”<a id="FNanchor_654" href="#Footnote_654"
-class="fnanchor">[654]</a></p>
-
-<p>Nothing could be more plausible or judicious than this language
-of Brasidas to the Akanthians, nor had they any means of detecting
-the falsity of the assertion, which he afterwards repeated in
-other places besides,<a id="FNanchor_655" href="#Footnote_655"
-class="fnanchor">[655]</a> that he had braved the forces of
-Athens at Nisæa with the same army as that now on the outside
-of the walls. Perhaps the simplicity of his speech and manner
-may even have lent strength to his assurances. As soon as he
-had retired, the subject was largely discussed in the assembly,
-with much difference of opinion among the speakers, and perfect
-freedom on both sides: and the decision, not called for until
-after a long debate, was determined partly by the fair promises
-of Brasidas, partly by the certain loss which the ruin of the
-vine-crop would entail. The votes of the citizens present being
-taken secretly, a majority resolved to accede to the proposi<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_404">[p. 404]</span>tions of Brasidas
-and revolt from Athens.<a id="FNanchor_656" href="#Footnote_656"
-class="fnanchor">[656]</a> Exacting the renewal of his pledge and
-that of the Lacedæmonian authorities, for the preservation of full
-autonomy to every city which should join him, they received his army
-into the town. The neighboring city of Stageirus, a colony of Andros,
-as Akanthus also was, soon followed the example.<a id="FNanchor_657"
-href="#Footnote_657" class="fnanchor">[657]</a></p>
-
-<p>There are few acts in history wherein Grecian political reason
-and morality appear to greater advantage than in this proceeding of
-the Akanthians. The habit of fair, free, and pacific discussion;
-the established respect to the vote of the majority; the care to
-protect individual independence of judgment by secret suffrage; the
-deliberate estimate of reasons on both sides by each individual
-citizen, all these main laws and conditions of healthy political
-action appear as a part of the confirmed character of the Akanthians.
-We shall not find Brasidas entering other towns in a way so
-creditable or so harmonious.</p>
-
-<p>But there is another inference which the scene just described
-irresistibly suggests. It affords the clearest proof that the
-Akanthians had little to complain of as subject-allies of Athens, and
-that they would have continued in that capacity, if left to their
-own choice, without the fear of having their crop destroyed. Such is
-the pronounced feeling of the mass of the citizens: the party who
-desire otherwise are in a decided minority. It is only the combined
-effect of severe impending loss, and of tempting assurances held out
-by the worthiest representative whom Sparta ever sent out, which
-induces them to revolt from Athens: nor even then is the resolution
-taken without long opposition, and a large dissentient minority, in
-a case where secret suffrage insured free and genuine expression
-of preference from every individual. Now, it is impossible that
-the scene in Akanthus at this critical moment could have been of
-such a character, had the empire of Athens been practically odious
-and burdensome to the subject-allies, as it is commonly depicted.
-Had such been the fact; had the Akanthians felt that the imperial
-ascendency of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_405">[p. 405]</span>
-Athens oppressed them with hardship or humiliation, from which their
-neighbors, the revolted Chalkidians in Olynthus and elsewhere, were
-exempt, they would have hailed the advent of Brasidas with that
-cordiality which he himself expected and was surprised not to find.
-The sense of present grievance, always acute and often excessive,
-would have stood out as their prominent impulse: nor would they have
-needed either intimidation or cajolery to induce them to throw open
-their gates to the liberator, who, in his speech within the town,
-finds no actual suffering to appeal to, but is obliged to gain over
-an audience evidently unwilling by alternate threats and promises.</p>
-
-<p>As in Akanthus, so in most of the other Thracian subjects of
-Athens, the bulk of the citizens, though strongly solicited by
-the Chalkidians, manifest no spontaneous disposition to revolt
-from Athens. We shall find the party who introduce Brasidas to be
-a conspiring minority, who not only do not consult the majority
-beforehand, but act in such a manner as to leave no free option to
-the majority afterwards, whether they will ratify or reject: bring in
-a foreign force to overawe them and compromise them without their own
-consent in hostility against Athens. Now that which makes the events
-of Akanthus so important as an evidence, is, that the majority is not
-thus entrapped and compressed, but pronounces its judgment freely
-after ample discussion: the grounds of that judgment are clearly set
-forth to us, so as to show that hatred of Athens, if even it exists
-at all, is in no way a strong or determining feeling. Had there
-existed any such strong feeling among the subject-allies of Athens in
-the Chalkidic peninsula, there was no Athenian force now present to
-hinder them all from opening their gates to the liberator Brasidas
-by spontaneous majorities, as he himself, encouraged by the sanguine
-promises of the Chalkidians, evidently expected that they would do.
-But nothing of this kind happened.</p>
-
-<p>That which I before remarked in recounting the revolt of Mitylênê,
-a privileged ally of Athens, is now confirmed in the revolt of
-Akanthus, a tributary and subject-ally. The circumstances of both
-prove that imperial Athens inspired no hatred, and occasioned no
-painful grievance, to the population of her subject-cities generally:
-the movements against her arose from party-minorities, of the same
-character as that Platæan<span class="pagenum" id="Page_406">[p.
-406]</span> party which introduced the Theban assailants into Platæa
-at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war. There are of course
-differences of sentiment between one town and another; but the
-conduct of the towns generally demonstrates that the Athenian empire
-was not felt by them to be a scheme of plunder and oppression, as
-Mr. Mitford and others would have us believe. It is indeed true that
-Athens managed her empire with reference to her own feelings and
-interests, and that her hold was rather upon the prudence than upon
-the affection of her allies, except in so far as those among them
-who were democratically governed sympathized with her democracy:
-it is also true that restrictions in any form on the autonomy of
-each separate city were offensive to the political instincts of the
-Greeks: moreover, Athens took less and less pains to disguise or
-soften the real character of her empire, as one resting simply on
-established fact and superior force. But this is a different thing
-from the endurance of practical hardship and oppression, which,
-had it been real, would have inspired strong positive hatred among
-the subject-allies, such as Brasidas expected to find universal in
-Thrace, but did not really find, in spite of the easy opening which
-his presence afforded.</p>
-
-<p>The acquisition of Akanthus and Stageirus enabled Brasidas in no
-very long time to extend his conquests; to enter Argilus, and from
-thence to make the capital acquisition of Amphipolis.</p>
-
-<p>Argilus was situated between Stageirus and the river Strymon,
-along the western bank of which river its territory extended. Along
-the eastern bank of the same river,—south of the lake which it
-forms under the name of Kerkinitis, and north of the town of Eion
-at its mouth, was situated the town and territory of Amphipolis,
-communicating with the lands of Argilus by the important bridge there
-situated. The Argilians were colonists from Andros, like Akanthus
-and Stageirus, and the adhesion of those two cities to Brasidas gave
-him opportunity to cultivate intelligences in Argilus, wherein there
-had existed a standing discontent against Athens, ever since the
-foundation of the neighboring city of Amphipolis.<a id="FNanchor_658"
-href="#Footnote_658" class="fnanchor">[658]</a> The latter city had
-been established<span class="pagenum" id="Page_407">[p. 407]</span>
-by the Athenian Agnon, at the head of a numerous body of colonists,
-on a spot belonging to the Edonian Thracians, called Ennea Hodoi,
-or Nine Ways, about five years prior to the commencement of the war
-(<small>B.C.</small> 437), after two previous attempts to colonize
-it,—one by Histiæus and Aristagoras, at the period of the Ionic
-revolt, and a second by the Athenians about 465 <small>B.C.</small>,
-both of which lamentably failed. So valuable, however, was the
-site, from its vicinity to the gold and silver mines near Mount
-Pangæus and to large forests of ship-timber, as well as for command
-of the Strymon, and for commerce with the interior of Thrace and
-Macedonia, that the Athenians had sent a second expedition under
-Agnon, who founded the city and gave it the name of Amphipolis. The
-resident settlers there, however, were only in small proportion
-Athenian citizens; the rest of mixed origin, some of them Argilian,
-a considerable number Chalkidians. The Athenian general Euklês was
-governor in the town, though seemingly with no paid force under his
-command.</p>
-
-<p>Among these mixed inhabitants a conspiracy was organized to
-betray the town to Brasidas, the inhabitants of Argilus as well
-as the Chalkidians each of them tampering with those of the same
-race who resided in Amphipolis; and the influence of Perdikkas,
-not inconsiderable, in consequence of the commerce of the place
-with Macedonia, was employed to increase the number of partisans.
-Of all the instigators, however, the most strenuous as well as the
-most useful were the inhabitants of Argilus. Amphipolis, together
-with the Athenians as its founders, had been odious to them from
-its commencement; and its foundation had doubtless abridged their
-commerce and importance as masters of the lower course of the
-Strymon. They had been long laying snares against the city, and the
-arrival of Brasidas now presented to them an unexpected chance of
-success. It was they who enabled him to accomplish the surprise,
-deferring proclamation of their own defection from Athens until they
-could make it subservient to his conquest of Amphipolis.</p>
-
-<p>Starting with his army from Arnê in the Chalkidic peninsula,
-Brasidas arrived in the afternoon at Aulon and Bromiskus, near the
-channel whereby the lake Bolbê is connected with the sea: from hence,
-after his men had supped, he began his night-march to Amphipolis,
-on a cold and snowy night of November, or<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_408">[p. 408]</span> the beginning of December. He reached
-Argilus in the middle of the night, where the leaders at once
-admitted him, proclaiming their revolt from Athens. With their
-aid and guidance, he then hastened forward without delay to the
-bridge across the Strymon, which he reached before break of day.<a
-id="FNanchor_659" href="#Footnote_659" class="fnanchor">[659]</a>
-It was guarded only by a feeble piquet,—the town of Amphipolis
-itself being situated on the hill at some little distance
-higher up the river;<a id="FNanchor_660" href="#Footnote_660"
-class="fnanchor">[660]</a> so that Brasidas, preceded by the Argilian
-conspirators, surprised and overpowered the guard without difficulty.
-Thus master of this important communication, he crossed with his army
-forthwith into the territory of Amphipolis, where his arrival spread
-the utmost dismay and terror. The governor Euklês, the magistrates,
-and the citizens, were all found wholly unprepared: the lands
-belonging to the city were occupied by residents, with their families
-and property around them, calculating upon undisturbed security, as
-if there had been no enemy within reach. Such of these as were close
-to the city succeeded in running thither with their families, though
-leaving their property exposed,—but the more distant became in person
-as well as in property at the mercy of the invader. Even within
-the town, filled with the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_409">[p.
-409]</span> friends and relatives of these victims without,
-indescribable confusion reigned, of which the conspirators within
-tried to avail themselves in order to get the gates thrown open. And
-so complete was the disorganization, that if Brasidas had marched
-up without delay to the gates and assaulted the town, many persons
-supposed that he would have carried it at once. Such a risk, however,
-was too great even for his boldness, the rather as repulse would
-have been probably his ruin. Moreover, confiding in the assurances
-of the conspirators that the gates would be thrown open, he thought
-it safer to seize as many persons as he could from the out-citizens,
-as a means of working upon the sentiments of those within the walls;
-lastly, this process of seizure and plunder was probably more to the
-taste of his own soldiers, and could not well be hindered.</p>
-
-<p>But he waited in vain for the opening of the gates. The
-conspirators in the city, in spite of the complete success of their
-surprise and the universal dismay around them, found themselves
-unable to carry the majority along with them. As in Akanthus, so
-in Amphipolis, those who really hated Athens and wished to revolt
-were only a party-minority; the greater number of citizens, at this
-critical moment, stood by Euklês and the few native Athenians around
-him in resolving upon defence, and in sending off an express to
-Thucydidês (the historian) at Thasos, the colleague of Euklês, as
-general in the region of Thrace, for immediate aid. This step, of
-course immediately communicated to Brasidas from within, determined
-him to make every effort for enticing the Amphipolitans to surrender
-before the reinforcement should arrive; the rather, as he was
-apprized that Thucydidês, being a large proprietor and worker of
-gold mines in the neighboring region, possessed extensive personal
-influence among the Thracian tribes, and would be able to bring them
-together for the relief of the place, in conjunction with his own
-Athenian squadron. He therefore sent in propositions for surrender
-on the most favorable terms, guaranteeing to every citizen who chose
-to remain, Amphipolitan or even Athenian, continued residence with
-undisturbed property and equal political rights, and granting to
-every one who chose to depart, five days for the purpose of carrying
-away his property.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_410">[p. 410]</span></p>
-
-<p>Such easy conditions, when made known in the city, produced
-presently a sensible change of opinion among the citizens,
-proving acceptable both to Athenians and Amphipolitans, though
-on different grounds.<a id="FNanchor_661" href="#Footnote_661"
-class="fnanchor">[661]</a> The properties of the citizens without, as
-well as many of their relatives, were all in the hands of Brasidas:
-no one counted upon the speedy arrival of reinforcement; and even
-if it did arrive, the city might be preserved, but the citizens
-without would still be either slain or made captive: a murderous
-battle would ensue, and perhaps, after all, Brasidas, assisted by
-the party within, might prove victorious. The Athenian citizens in
-Amphipolis, knowing themselves to be exposed to peculiar danger, were
-perfectly well pleased with his offer, as extricating them from a
-critical position and procuring for them the means of escape, with
-comparatively little loss; while the non-Athenian citizens, partakers
-in the same relief from peril, felt little reluctance in accepting a
-capitulation which preserved both their rights and their properties
-inviolate, and merely severed them from Athens, towards which city
-they felt, not hatred, but indifference. Above all, the friends and
-relatives of the citizens exposed in the out-region were strenuous in
-urging on the capitulation, so that the conspirators soon became bold
-enough to proclaim themselves openly, insisting upon the moderation
-of Brasidas and the prudence of admitting him. Euklês found that the
-tone of opinion, even among his own Athenians, was gradually turned
-against him, nor could he prevent the acceptance of the terms, and
-the admission of the enemy into the city, on that same day.</p>
-
-<p>No such resolution would have been adopted, had the citizens
-been aware how near at hand Thucydidês and his forces were. The
-message despatched early in the morning from Amphipolis found him
-at Thasos with seven triremes; with which he instantly put to sea,
-so as to reach Eion at the mouth of the Strymon, within three
-miles of Amphipolis, on the same evening.<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_411">[p. 411]</span> He hoped to be in time for saving
-Amphipolis, but the place had surrendered a few hours before. He
-arrived, indeed, only just in time to preserve Eion; for parties
-in that town were already beginning to concert the admission of
-Brasidas, who would probably have entered it at daybreak the next
-morning. Thucydidês, putting the place in a condition of defence,
-successfully repelled an attack which Brasidas made both by land and
-by boats on the river. He at the same time received and provided
-for the Athenian citizens who were retiring from Amphipolis.<a
-id="FNanchor_662" href="#Footnote_662" class="fnanchor">[662]</a></p>
-
-<p>The capture of this city, perhaps the most important of all the
-foreign possessions of Athens, and the opening of the bridge over the
-Strymon, by which even all her eastern allies became approachable by
-land, occasioned prodigious emotion throughout all the Grecian world.
-The dismay felt at Athens<a id="FNanchor_663" href="#Footnote_663"
-class="fnanchor">[663]</a> was greater than had been ever before
-experienced: hope and joy prevailed among her enemies, and excitement
-and new aspirations became widely spread among her subject-allies.
-The bloody defeat at Delium, and the unexpected conquests of
-Brasidas, now again lowered the <i>prestige</i> of Athenian success,
-sixteen months after it had been so powerfully exalted by the capture
-of Sphakteria. The loss of reputation which Sparta had then incurred,
-was now compensated by a reaction against the unfounded terrors
-since conceived about the probable career of her enemy. It was not
-merely the loss of Amphipolis, serious as that was, which distressed
-the Athenians, but also their insecurity respecting the maintenance
-of their whole empire: they knew not which of their subject-allies
-might next revolt, in contemplation of aid from Brasidas, facilitated
-by the newly-acquired Strymonian bridge. And as the proceedings
-of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_412">[p. 412]</span> that general
-counted in part to the credit of his country, it was believed
-that Sparta, now for the first time shaking off her languor,<a
-id="FNanchor_664" href="#Footnote_664" class="fnanchor">[664]</a> had
-taken to herself the rapidity and enterprise once regarded as the
-exclusive characteristic of Athens. But besides all these chances
-of evil to the Athenians, there was another yet more threatening,
-the personal ascendency and position of Brasidas himself. It was not
-merely the boldness, the fertility of aggressive resource, the quick
-movements, the power of stimulating the minds of soldiers, which
-lent efficiency to that general; but also his incorruptible probity,
-his good faith, his moderation, his abstinence from party-cruelty or
-jobbing, and from all intermeddling with the internal constitutions
-of the different cities, in strict adherence to that manifesto
-whereby Sparta had proclaimed herself the liberator of Greece. Such
-talents and such official worth had never before been seen combined.
-Set off as they were by the full brilliancy of successes such as
-were deemed incredible before they actually occurred, they inspired
-a degree of confidence and turned a tide of opinion towards this
-eminent man which rendered him personally one of the first powers in
-Greece. Numerous solicitations were transmitted to him at Amphipolis
-from parties among the subject-allies of Athens, in their present
-temper of large hopes from him and diminished fear of the Athenians:
-the anti-Athenian party in each was impatient to revolt, the rest
-of the population less restrained by fear.<a id="FNanchor_665"
-href="#Footnote_665" class="fnanchor">[665]</a></p>
-
-<p>Of those who indulged in these sanguine calculations, many had
-yet to learn by painful experience that Athens was still but little
-abated in power: but her inaction during this important autumn had
-been such as may well explain their mistake. It might have been
-anticipated that, on hearing the alarming news of the junction of
-Brasidas with the Chalkidians, and Perdikkas so close upon their
-dependent allies, they would forthwith have sent a competent force
-to Thrace, which, if despatched at that time, would probably have
-obviated all the subsequent disasters.<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_413">[p. 413]</span> So they would have acted at any
-other time, and perhaps even then, if Periklês had been alive.
-But the news arrived just at the period when Athens was engaged
-in the expedition against Bœotia, which ended very shortly in the
-ruinous defeat of Delium. Under the discouragement arising from the
-death of the stratêgus, Hippokratês, and one thousand citizens,
-the idea of a fresh expedition to Thrace would probably have been
-intolerable to Athenian hoplites: the hardships of a winter service
-in Thrace, as experienced a few years before in the blockade of
-Potidæa, would probably also aggravate their reluctance. In Grecian
-history, we must steadfastly keep in mind that we are reading about
-citizen soldiers, not about professional soldiers; and that the
-temper of the time, whether of confidence or dismay, modifies to an
-unspeakable degree all the calculations of military and political
-prudence. Even after the rapid successes of Brasidas, not merely
-at Akanthus and Stageirus, but even at Amphipolis, they sent only
-a few inadequate guards<a id="FNanchor_666" href="#Footnote_666"
-class="fnanchor">[666]</a> to the points most threatened, thus
-leaving to their enterprising enemy the whole remaining winter for
-his operations, without hindrance. Without depreciating the merits
-of Brasidas, we may see that his extraordinary success was in great
-part owing to the no less extraordinary depression which at that time
-pervaded the Athenian public: a feeling encouraged by Nikias and
-other leading men of the same party, who were building upon it in
-order to get the Lacedæmonian proposals for peace accepted.</p>
-
-<p>But while we thus notice the short-comings of Athens, in not
-sending timely forces against Brasidas, we must at the same time
-admit, that the most serious and irreparable loss which she
-sustained, that of Amphipolis, was the fault of her officers more
-than her own. Euklês, and the historian Thucydidês, the two joint
-Athenian commanders in Thrace, to whom she had confided the defence
-of that important town, had means amply sufficient to place it
-beyond all risk of capture, if they had employed the most ordinary
-vigilance and precaution beforehand. That Thucydidês became an
-exile immediately after this event, and<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_414">[p. 414]</span> remained so for twenty years, is
-certain from his own statement: and we hear, upon what in this case
-is quite sufficient authority, that the Athenians condemned him,
-probably Euklês also, to banishment, on the proposition of Kleon.<a
-id="FNanchor_667" href="#Footnote_667" class="fnanchor">[667]</a></p>
-
-<p>In considering this sentence, historians<a id="FNanchor_668"
-href="#Footnote_668" class="fnanchor">[668]</a> commonly treat
-Thucydidês as an innocent man, and find nothing to condemn except
-the calumnies of the demagogue along with the injustice of the
-people. But this view of the case cannot be sustained, when we bring
-together all the facts even as indicated by Thucydidês himself. At
-the moment when Brasidas surprised Amphipolis, Thucydidês was at
-Thasos; and the event is always discussed as if he was there by
-necessity or duty; as if Thasos was his special mission. Now we know
-from his own statement that his command was not special or confined
-to Thasos: he was sent as joint commander along with Euklês generally
-to Thrace, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_415">[p. 415]</span>
-especially to Amphipolis.<a id="FNanchor_669" href="#Footnote_669"
-class="fnanchor">[669]</a> Both of them were jointly and severally
-responsible for the proper defence of Amphipolis, with the Athenian
-empire and interests in that quarter such nomination of two or more
-officers, coördinate and jointly responsible, being the usual habit
-of Athens, wherever the scale or the area of military operations was
-considerable, instead of naming one supreme responsible commander,
-with subordinate officers acting under him and responsible to him.
-If, then, Thucydidês “was stationed at Thasos,” to use the phrase of
-Dr. Thirlwall, this was because he chose to station himself there, in
-the exercise of his own discretion.</p>
-
-<p>Accordingly, the question which we have to put is, not whether
-Thucydidês did all that could be done, after he received the alarming
-express at Thasos, which is the part of the case that <i>he</i> sets
-prominently before us, but whether he and Euklês jointly took the
-best general measures for the security of the Athenian empire in
-Thrace; especially for Amphipolis, the first jewel of her empire.
-They suffer Athens to be robbed of that jewel, and how? Had they
-a difficult position to defend? Were they<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_416">[p. 416]</span> overwhelmed by a superior force? Were
-they distracted by simultaneous revolts in different places, or
-assailed by enemies unknown or unforeseen? Not one of these grounds
-for acquittal can be pleaded. First, their position was of all others
-the most defensible: they had only to keep the bridge over the
-Strymon adequately watched and guarded, or to retain the Athenian
-squadron at Eion, and Amphipolis was safe. Either one or the other
-of these precautions would have sufficed; both together would have
-sufficed so amply, as probably to prevent the scheme of attack from
-being formed. Next, the force under Brasidas was in noway superior,
-not even adequate to the capture of the inferior place Eion, when
-properly guarded, much less to that of Amphipolis. Lastly, there
-were no simultaneous revolts to distract attention, nor unknown
-enemies to confound a well-laid scheme of defence. There was but
-one enemy, in one quarter, having one road by which to approach; an
-enemy of surpassing merit, indeed, and eminently dangerous to Athens,
-but without any chance of success except from the omissions of the
-Athenian officers.</p>
-
-<p>Now Thucydidês and Euklês both knew that Brasidas had prevailed
-upon Akanthus and Stageirus to revolt, and that too in such a way
-as to extend his own personal influence materially: they knew that
-the population of Argilus was of Andrian origin,<a id="FNanchor_670"
-href="#Footnote_670" class="fnanchor">[670]</a> like that of
-Akanthus and Stageirus, and therefore peculiarly likely to be
-tempted by the example of those two towns. Lastly, they knew, and
-Thucydidês himself tells us,<a id="FNanchor_671" href="#Footnote_671"
-class="fnanchor">[671]</a> that this Argilian population—whose
-territory bordered on the Strymon and the western foot of the bridge,
-and who had many connections in Amphipolis—had been long disaffected
-to Athens, and especially to the Athenian possession of that city.
-Yet, having such foreknowledge, ample warning for the necessity of a
-vigilant defence, Thucydidês and Euklês withdraw, or omit, both the
-two precau<span class="pagenum" id="Page_417">[p. 417]</span>tions
-upon which the security of Amphipolis rested; precautions both of
-them obvious, either of them sufficient. The one leaves the bridge
-under a feeble guard,<a id="FNanchor_672" href="#Footnote_672"
-class="fnanchor">[672]</a> and is caught so unprepared everywhere,
-that one might suppose Athens to be in profound peace; the other is
-found with his squadron, not at Eion, but at Thasos; an island out
-of all possible danger, either from Brasidas, who had no ships, or
-any other enemy. The arrival of Brasidas comes on both of them like a
-clap of thunder. Nothing more is required than this plain fact, under
-the circumstances, to prove their improvidence as commanders.</p>
-
-<p>The presence of Thucydidês on the station of Thrace was important
-to Athens, partly because he possessed valuable family connections,
-mining property, and commanding influence among the continental
-population round Amphipolis.<a id="FNanchor_673" href="#Footnote_673"
-class="fnanchor">[673]</a> This was one main reason why he was named;
-the Athenian people confiding partly in his private influence, over
-and above the public force under his command, and looking to him,
-even more than to his colleague Euklês, for the continued security of
-the town: instead of which they find that not even their own squadron
-under him is at hand near the vulnerable point, at the moment when
-the enemy comes. Of the two, perhaps, the conduct of Euklês admits of
-conceivable explanation more easily than that of Thucydidês. For it
-seems that Euklês had no paid force in Amphipolis; only the citizen
-hoplites, partly Athenian, partly of other lineage. Doubtless,
-these men found it irksome to keep guard through the winter on the
-Strymonian bridge: and Euklês might fancy that, by enforcing a
-large perpetual guard, he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_418">[p.
-418]</span> ran the risk of making Athens unpopular: moreover, strict
-constancy of watch, night after night, when no actual danger comes,
-with an unpaid citizen force, is not easy to maintain. This is an
-insufficient excuse, but it is better than anything which can be
-offered on behalf of Thucydidês; who had with him a paid Athenian
-force, and might just as well have kept it at Eion as at Thasos. We
-may be sure that the absence of Thucydidês with his fleet, at Thasos,
-was one essential condition in the plot laid by Brasidas with the
-Argilians.</p>
-
-<p>To say, with Dr. Thirlwall, that “human prudence and activity
-could not have accomplished more than Thucydidês did, <i>under the
-same circumstances</i>,” is true as matter of fact, and creditable as
-far as it goes. But it is wholly inadmissible as a justification,
-and meets only one part of the case. An officer in command is
-responsible, not only for doing most “under the circumstances,” but
-also for the circumstances themselves, in so far as they are under
-his control; and nothing is more under his control than the position
-which he chooses to occupy. If the emperor Napoleon, or the duke of
-Wellington, had lost, by surprise of an enemy not very numerous, a
-post of supreme importance which they thought adequately protected,
-would they be satisfied to hear from a responsible officer in
-command: “Having no idea that the enemy would attempt any surprise,
-I thought that I might keep my force half a day’s journey off from
-the post exposed, at another post which it was physically impossible
-for the enemy to reach; but, the moment I was informed that the
-surprise had occurred, I hastened to the scene, did all that human
-prudence and activity could do to repel the enemy; and though I found
-that he had already mastered the capital post of all, yet I beat
-him back from a second post which he was on the point of mastering
-also?” Does any one imagine that these illustrious chiefs, smarting
-under the loss of an inestimable position which alters the whole
-prospects of a campaign, would be satisfied with such a report, and
-would dismiss the officer with praises for his vigor and bravery,
-“under the circumstances?” They would most assuredly reply, that he
-had done right in coming back, that his conduct after coming back
-had been that of a brave man, and that there was no impeachment on
-his courage. But they would at the same time add, that his want of
-judgment and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_419">[p. 419]</span>
-foresight, in omitting to place the valuable position really exposed
-under sufficient guard beforehand, and leaving it thus open to the
-enemy, while he himself was absent in another place which was out of
-danger, and his easy faith that there would be no dangerous surprise,
-at a time when the character of the enemy’s officer, as well as the
-disaffection of the neighbors (Argilus), plainly indicated that there
-<i>would</i> be, if the least opening were afforded, that these were
-defects meriting serious reproof, and disqualifying him from any
-future command of trust and responsibility. Nor can we doubt that the
-whole feeling of the respective armies, who would have to pay with
-their best blood the unhappy miscalculation of this officer, would go
-along with such a sentence; without at all suspecting themselves to
-be guilty of injustice, or of “directing the irritation produced by
-the loss against an innocent object.”</p>
-
-<p>The vehement leather-seller in the Pnyx, at Athens, when he
-brought forward what are called “his calumnies” against Thucydidês
-and Euklês, as having caused, through culpable omission, a fatal
-and irreparable loss to their country, might perhaps state his case
-with greater loudness and acrimony; but it may be doubted whether he
-would say anything more really galling than would be contained in
-the dignified rebuke of an esteemed modern general to a subordinate
-officer under similar circumstances. In my judgment, not only the
-accusation against these two officers—I assume Euklês to have been
-included—was called for on the fairest <i>presumptive</i> grounds, which
-would be sufficient as a justification of the leather-sell Kleon,
-but the positive verdict of guilty against them was fully merited.
-Whether the banishment inflicted was a greater penalty than the case
-warranted, I will not take upon me to pronounce. Every age has its
-own standard of feeling for measuring what is a proper intensity of
-punishment: penalties which our grandfathers thought right and meet,
-would in the present day appear intolerably rigorous. But when I
-consider the immense value of Amphipolis to Athens, combined with the
-conduct whereby it was lost, I cannot think that there was a single
-Athenian, or a single Greek, who would deem the penalty of banishment
-too severe.</p>
-
-<p>It is painful to find such strong grounds of official
-censure<span class="pagenum" id="Page_420">[p. 420]</span> against
-a man who, as an historian, has earned the lasting admiration of
-posterity,—my own, among the first and warmest. But in criticizing
-the conduct of Thucydidês the officer, we are bound in common
-justice to forget Thucydidês the historian. He was not known in the
-latter character, at the time when this sentence was passed: perhaps
-he never would have been so known, like the Neapolitan historian
-Colletta, if exile had not thrown him out of the active duties and
-hopes of a citizen. It may be doubted whether he ever went home from
-Eion to encounter the grief, wrath, and alarm, so strongly felt
-at Athens after the loss of Amphipolis. Condemned, either with or
-without appearance, he remained in banishment for twenty years;<a
-id="FNanchor_674" href="#Footnote_674" class="fnanchor">[674]</a>
-nor did he return to Athens until after the conclusion of the
-Peloponnesian war. Of this long exile, much is said to have been
-spent on his property in Thrace: yet he also visited most parts of
-Greece, enemies of Athens as well as neutral states. However much
-we may deplore such a misfortune on his account, mankind in general
-have, and ever will have, the strongest reason to rejoice at it. To
-this compulsory leisure we owe the completion, or rather the near
-approach to completion, of his history: nor is it less certain that
-the opportunities which an exile enjoyed of personally consulting
-neutrals and enemies, contributed much to form that impartial,
-comprehensive, Pan-Hellenic spirit, which reigns generally throughout
-his immortal work.</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, Brasidas, installed in Amphipolis about the beginning
-of December, 424 <small>B.C.</small>, employed his
-increased power only the more vigorously against Athens. His first
-care was to reconstitute Amphipolis; a task wherein the Macedonian
-Perdikkas, whose intrigues had contributed to the capture, came
-and personally assisted. That city was going through a partial
-secession and renovation of inhabitants, and was now moreover cut
-off from the port of Eion and the mouth of the river, which remained
-in the hands of the Athenians. Many new arrangements must have
-been required, as well for its internal polity as for its external
-defence. Brasidas took measures for building ships of war, in the
-lake above the city, in order to force the lower part of the river:<a
-id="FNanchor_675" href="#Footnote_675" class="fnanchor">[675]</a>
-but his most important step was to construct a<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_421">[p. 421]</span> palisade work,<a id="FNanchor_676"
-href="#Footnote_676" class="fnanchor">[676]</a> connecting the
-walls of the city with the bridge. He thus made himself permanently
-master of the crossing of the Strymon, so as to shut the door by
-which he himself had entered, and at the same time to keep an easy
-communication with Argilus and the western bank of the Strymon.
-He also made some acquisitions on the eastern side of the river.
-Pittakus, prince of the neighboring Edonian-Thracian township of
-Myrkinus, had been recently assassinated by his wife Brauro, and by
-some personal enemies: he had probably been the ally of Athens, and
-his assassins now sought to strengthen themselves by courting the
-alliance of the new conqueror of Amphipolis. The Thasian continental
-colonies of Galêpsus and Œsymê also declared their adhesion to
-him.</p>
-
-<p>While he sent to Lacedæmon, communicating his excellent position
-as well as his large hopes, he at the same time, without waiting
-for the answer, began acting for himself, with all the allies whom
-he could get together. He marched first against the peninsula
-called Aktê,—the narrow tongue of land which stretches out from
-the neighborhood of Akanthus to the mighty headland called Mount
-Athos,—near thirty miles long, and between four and five miles for
-the most part in breadth.<a id="FNanchor_677" href="#Footnote_677"
-class="fnanchor">[677]</a> The long, rugged, woody ridge,—covering
-this peninsula so as to leave but narrow spaces for dwelling or
-cultivation, or feeding of cattle,—was at this time occupied by
-many distinct petty communities, some of them divided in race
-and language. Sanê, a colony from Andros, was situated in the
-interior gulf, called the Singitic gulf, between Athos and the
-Sithonian peninsula, near the Xerxeian canal: the rest of the
-Aktê was distributed among Bisaltians, Krestônians, and Edonians,
-all fractions of the Thracian name; Pelasgians, or Tyrrhenians,
-of the race which had once occupied Lemnos and Imbros, and some
-Chalkidians. Some of these little communities spoke habitually two
-languages. Thyssus, Kleône, Olophyxus, and others, all submitted on
-the arrival<span class="pagenum" id="Page_422">[p. 422]</span> of
-Brasidas; but Sanê and Dion held out, nor could he bring them to
-terms even by ravaging their territory.</p>
-
-<p>He next marched into the Sithonian peninsula, to attack Torônê,
-situated near the southern extremity of that peninsula, opposite to
-Cape Kanastræum, the extreme headland of the peninsula of Pallênê.<a
-id="FNanchor_678" href="#Footnote_678" class="fnanchor">[678]</a></p>
-
-<p>Torônê was inhabited by a Chalkidic population, but had not
-partaken in the revolt of the neighboring Chalkidians against Athens.
-A small Athenian garrison had been sent there, probably since the
-recent dangers, and were now defending it, as well as repairing
-the town-wall in various parts where it had been so neglected as
-to crumble down. They occupied as a sort of distinct citadel the
-outlying cape called Lêkythus, joining by a narrow isthmus the hill
-on which the city stood, and forming a port wherein lay two Athenian
-triremes as guard-ships. A small party in Torônê, without privity<a
-id="FNanchor_679" href="#Footnote_679" class="fnanchor">[679]</a>
-or even suspicion of the rest, entered into correspondence with
-Brasidas, and engaged to provide for him the means of entering and
-mastering the town. Accordingly, he advanced by a night-march to the
-temple of the Dioskuri, Kastor and Pollux, within about a quarter of
-a mile of the town-gates, which he reached a little before daybreak,
-sending forward one hundred peltasts to be still nearer, and to rush
-upon the gate at the instant when signal was made from within. His
-Torônæan partisans, some of whom were already concealed on the spot,
-awaiting his arrival, made their final arrangements with him, and
-then returned into the town, conducting with them seven determined
-men from his army, armed only with daggers, and having Lysistratus
-of Olynthus as their chief: twenty men had been originally named
-for this service, but the danger appeared so extreme, that only
-seven of them were bold enough to go. This forlorn hope, enabled to
-creep in, through a small aperture in the wall towards the sea, were
-conducted silently up to the topmost watch-tower on the city hill,
-where they surprised and slew the guards, and set open a neighboring
-postern<span class="pagenum" id="Page_423">[p. 423]</span> gate,
-looking towards Cape Kanastræum, as well as the great gate leading
-towards the agora. They then brought in the peltasts from without,
-who, impatient with the delay, had gradually stolen closely under
-the walls: some of these peltasts kept possession of the great
-gate, others were led round to the postern at the top, while the
-fire-signal was forthwith lighted to invite Brasidas himself. He and
-his men hastened forward towards the city at their utmost speed and
-with loud shouts, a terror-striking notice of his presence to the
-unprepared citizens. Admission was easy through the open gates, but
-some also clambered up by means of beams or a sort of scaffolding,
-which was lying close to the wall as a help to the workmen repairing
-it. And while the assailants were thus active in every direction,
-Brasidas himself conducted a portion of them, to assure himself of
-the high and commanding parts of the city.</p>
-
-<p>So completely were the Torônæans surprised and thunderstruck,
-that hardly any attempt was made to resist. Even the fifty Athenian
-hoplites who occupied the agora, being found still asleep,
-were partly slain, and partly compelled to seek refuge in the
-separately-garrisoned cape of Lêkythus, whither they were followed by
-a portion of the Torônæan population; some from attachment to Athens,
-others from sheer terror. To these fugitives Brasidas addressed a
-proclamation, inviting them to return, and promising them perfect
-security, for person, property, and political rights; while at the
-same time he sent a herald with a formal summons to the Athenians
-in Lêkythus, requiring them to quit the place as belonging to the
-Chalkidians, but permitting them to carry away their property. They
-refused to evacuate the place, but solicited a truce of one day for
-the purpose of burying their slain. Brasidas granted them two days,
-which were employed both by them and by him in preparations for the
-defence and attack of Lêkythus; each party fortifying the houses on
-or near the connecting isthmus.</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time he convened a general assembly of the Torônæan
-population, whom he addressed in the same conciliating and equitable
-language as he had employed elsewhere. “He had not come to harm
-either the city, or any individual citizen. Those who had let him
-in, ought not to be regarded as bad men or traitors, for they had
-acted with a view to the benefit and the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_424">[p. 424]</span> liberation of their city, not in
-order to enslave it, or to acquire profit for themselves. On the
-other hand, he did not think the worse of those who had gone over
-to Lêkythus, for their liking towards Athens: he wished them to
-come back freely; and he was sure that the more they knew the
-Lacedæmonians the better they would esteem them. He was prepared to
-forgive and forget previous hostility, but while he invited all of
-them to live for the future as cordial friends and fellow-citizens,
-he should also for the future hold each man responsible for his
-conduct, either as friend or as enemy.”</p>
-
-<p>On the expiration of the two days’ truce, Brasidas attacked
-the Athenian garrison in Lêkythus, promising a recompense of
-thirty minæ to the soldier who should first force his way into it.
-Notwithstanding very poor means of defence, partly a wooden palisade,
-partly houses with battlements on the roof, this garrison repelled
-him for one whole day: on the next morning he brought up a machine,
-for the same purpose as that which the Bœotians had employed at
-Delium, to set fire to the woodwork. The Athenians on their side,
-seeing this fire-machine approaching, put up, on a building in
-front of their position, a wooden scaffolding, upon which many of
-them mounted, with casks of water and large stones to break it or
-to extinguish the flames. At last, the weight accumulated becoming
-greater than the scaffolding could support, it broke down with a
-prodigious noise; so that all the persons and things upon it rolled
-down in confusion. Some of these men were hurt, yet the injury was
-not in reality serious; had not the noise, the cries, and strangeness
-of the incident alarmed those behind, who could not see precisely
-what had occurred, to such a degree, that they believed the enemy
-to have already forced the defences. Many of them accordingly took
-to flight, and those who remained were insufficient to prolong
-the resistance successfully; so that Brasidas, perceiving the
-disorder and diminished number of the defenders, relinquished his
-fire-machine, and again renewed his attempt to carry the place by
-assault, which now fully succeeded. A considerable proportion of
-the Athenians and others in the fort escaped across the narrow gulf
-to the peninsula of Pallênê, by means of the two triremes and some
-merchant-vessels at hand: but every man found in it was put to death.
-Brasidas, thus master of the fort, and con<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_425">[p. 425]</span>sidering that he owed his success to the
-sudden rupture of the Athenian scaffolding, regarded this incident as
-a divine interposition, and presented the thirty minæ, which he had
-promised as a reward to the first man who broke in, to the goddess
-Athênê, for her temple at Lêkythus. He moreover consecrated to her
-the entire cape of Lêkythus; not only demolishing the defences,
-but also dismantling the private residences which it contained,<a
-id="FNanchor_680" href="#Footnote_680" class="fnanchor">[680]</a>
-so that nothing remained except the temple, with its ministers and
-appurtenances.</p>
-
-<p>What proportion of the Torônæans who had taken refuge at Lêkythus
-had been induced to return by the proclamation of Brasidas, alike
-generous and politic, we are not informed. His language and conduct
-were admirably calculated to set this little community again in
-harmonious movement, and to obliterate the memory of past feuds.
-And above all, it inspired a strong sentiment of attachment and
-gratitude towards himself personally; a sentiment which gained
-strength with every successive incident in which he was engaged,
-and which enabled him to exercise a greater ascendency than could
-ever be acquired by Sparta, and in some respects greater than had
-ever been possessed by Athens. It is this remarkable development of
-commanding individuality, animated throughout by straightforward
-public purposes, and binding together so many little communities who
-had few other feelings in common, which lends to the short career of
-this eminent man a romantic and even an heroic interest.</p>
-
-<p>During the remainder of the winter Brasidas employed himself
-in setting in order the acquisitions already made, and in laying
-plans for farther conquests in the spring.<a id="FNanchor_681"
-href="#Footnote_681" class="fnanchor">[681]</a> But the beginning of
-spring—or the close of the eighth year, and beginning of the ninth
-year of the war, as Thucydidês reckons—brought with it a new train of
-events, which will be recounted in the following chapter.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3" id="Chap_54">
-  <p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_426">[p. 426]</span></p>
-  <h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER LIV.<br />
-    TRUCE FOR ONE YEAR.—RENEWAL OF WAR AND BATTLE OF
-    AMPHIPOLIS.—PEACE OF NIKIAS.</h2>
-</div>
-
-<p class="ti0"><span class="smcap">The</span> eighth year of the war,
-described in the last chapter, had opened with sanguine hopes for
-Athens, and with dark promise for Sparta, chiefly in consequence of
-the memorable capture of Sphakteria towards the end of the preceding
-summer. It included, not to mention other events, two considerable
-and important enterprises on the part of Athens, against Megara and
-against Bœotia; the former plan, partially successful, the latter,
-not merely unsuccessful, but attended with a ruinous defeat. Lastly,
-the losses in Thrace, following close upon the defeat at Delium,
-together with the unbounded expectations everywhere entertained
-from the future career of Brasidas, had again seriously lowered the
-impression entertained of Athenian power. The year thus closed amidst
-humiliations the more painful to Athens, as contrasted with the
-glowing hopes with which it had begun.</p>
-
-<p>It was now that Athens felt the full value of those prisoners
-whom she had taken at Sphakteria. With those prisoners, as Kleon and
-his supporters had said truly, she might be sure of making peace
-whenever she desired it.<a id="FNanchor_682" href="#Footnote_682"
-class="fnanchor">[682]</a> Having such a certainty to fall back
-upon, she had played a bold game, and aimed at larger acquisitions
-during the past year; and this speculation, though not in itself
-unreasonable, had failed: moreover, a new phenomenon, alike
-unexpected by all, had occurred, when Brasidas broke open and cut up
-her empire in Thrace. Still, so great was the anxiety of the Spartans
-to regain their captives, who had powerful friends and relatives at
-home, that they considered the victories of Brasidas chiefly as a
-stepping-stone towards that object, and as a means of prevailing upon
-Athens to make peace. To his animated representations sent home from
-Amphipolis, setting forth the prospects of still farther success and
-entreating reinforcements, they had returned a discouraging reply,
-dictated in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_427">[p. 427]</span> no
-small degree by the miserable jealousy of some of their chief men;<a
-id="FNanchor_683" href="#Footnote_683" class="fnanchor">[683]</a>
-who, feeling themselves cast into the shade, and looking upon
-his splendid career as an eccentric movement breaking loose from
-Spartan routine, were thus on personal as well as political grounds
-disposed to labor for peace. Such collateral motives, working upon
-the caution usual with Sparta, determined her to make use of the
-present fortune and realized conquests of Brasidas as a basis for
-negotiation and recovery of the prisoners; without opening the
-chance of ulterior enterprises, which though they might perhaps
-end in results yet more triumphant, would unavoidably put in risk
-that which was now secure.<a id="FNanchor_684" href="#Footnote_684"
-class="fnanchor">[684]</a> The history of the Athenians during the
-past year might, indeed, serve as a warning to deter the Spartans
-from playing an adventurous game.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_428">[p. 428]</span></p>
-
-<p>Ever since the capture of Sphakteria, the Lacedæmonians had been
-attempting, directly or indirectly, negotiations for peace<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_429">[p. 429]</span> and the recovery
-of the prisoners; their pacific dispositions being especially
-instigated by king Pleistoanax, whose peculiar<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_430">[p. 430]</span> circumstances gave him a strong motive
-to bring the war to a close. He had been banished from Sparta,
-fourteen years before the commencement of the war, and a little
-before the thirty years’ truce, under the charge of having taken
-bribes from the Athenians on occasion of invading Attica. For more
-than eighteen years, he lived in banishment, close to the temple of
-Zeus Lykæus, in Arcadia; in such constant fear of the Lacedæmonians,
-that his dwelling-house was half within the consecrated ground.<a
-id="FNanchor_685" href="#Footnote_685" class="fnanchor">[685]</a>
-But he never lost the hope of procuring restoration, through the
-medium of the Pythian priestess at Delphi, whom he and his brother
-Aristoklês kept in their pay. To every sacred legation which went
-from Sparta to Delphi, she repeated the same imperative injunction:
-“They must bring back the seed of (Hêraklês) the demi-god son of
-Zeus, from foreign land to their own: if they did not, it would be
-their fate to plough with a silver ploughshare.” The command of the
-god, thus incessantly repeated and backed by the influence of those
-friends who supported Pleistoanax at home, at length produced an
-entire change of sentiment at Sparta. In the fourth or fifth year
-of the Peloponnesian war, the exile was recalled; and not merely
-recalled, but welcomed with unbounded honors, received with the same
-sacrifices and choric shows as those which were said to have been
-offered to the primitive kings, on the first settlement of Sparta.</p>
-
-<p>As in the case of Kleomenês and Demaratus, however, it was
-not long before the previous intrigue came to be detected, or at
-least generally suspected and believed; to the great discredit of
-Pleistoanax, though he could not be again banished. Every successive
-public calamity which befell the state, the miscarriages of
-Alkidas, the defeat of Eurylochus in Amphilochia, and above<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_431">[p. 431]</span> all, the unprecedented
-humiliation in Sphakteria, were imputed to the displeasure of
-the gods in consequence of the impious treachery of Pleistoanax.
-Suffering under such an imputation, this king was most eager to
-exchange the hazards of war for the secure march of peace, so
-that he was thus personally interested in opening every door for
-negotiation with Athens, and in restoring himself to credit by
-regaining the prisoners.<a id="FNanchor_686" href="#Footnote_686"
-class="fnanchor">[686]</a></p>
-
-<p>After the battle of Delium,<a id="FNanchor_687"
-href="#Footnote_687" class="fnanchor">[687]</a> the pacific
-dispositions of Nikias, Lachês, and the philo-Laconian party,
-began to find increasing favor at Athens;<a id="FNanchor_688"
-href="#Footnote_688" class="fnanchor">[688]</a> while the unforeseen
-losses in Thrace, coming thick upon each other, each successive
-triumph of Brasidas apparently increasing his means of achieving
-more, tended to convert the discouragement of the Athenians into
-positive alarm. Negotiations appear to have been in progress
-throughout great part of the winter: and the continual hope that
-these might be brought to a close, combined with the impolitic
-aversion of Nikias and his friends to energetic military action, help
-to explain the unwonted apathy of Athens, under the pressure of such
-disgraces. But so much did her courage flag, towards the close of
-the winter, that she came to look upon a truce as her only means<a
-id="FNanchor_689" href="#Footnote_689" class="fnanchor">[689]</a>
-of preservation against the victorious progress of Brasidas. What
-the tone of Kleon now was, we are not directly informed: he would
-probably still continue opposed to the propositions of peace, at
-least indirectly, by insisting on terms more favorable than could
-be obtained. On this point, his political counsels would be wrong;
-but on another point, they would be much sounder and more judicious
-than those of his rival Nikias: for he would recommend a strenuous
-prosecution of hostilities by Athenian force against Brasidas in
-Thrace. At the present moment this was the most urgent political
-necessity of Athens, whether she entertained or rejected the views
-of peace: and the policy of Nikias, who cradled up the existing
-depression of the citizens by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_432">[p.
-432]</span> encouraging them to rely on the pacific inclinations of
-Sparta, was ill-judged and disastrous in its results, as the future
-will hereafter show.</p>
-
-<p>Attempts were made by the peace-party both at Athens and Sparta
-to negotiate at first for a definitive peace: but the conditions
-of such a peace were not easy to determine, so as to satisfy both
-parties, and became more and more difficult, with every success
-of Brasidas. At length the Athenians, eager above all things to
-arrest his progress, sent to Sparta to propose a truce for one year,
-desiring the Spartans to send to Athens envoys with full powers to
-settle the terms: the truce would allow time and tranquillity for
-settling the conditions of a definitive treaty. The proposition of
-the truce for one year,<a id="FNanchor_690" href="#Footnote_690"
-class="fnanchor">[690]</a> together with the first two articles ready
-prepared, came from Athens, as indeed we might have presumed even
-without proof; since the interest of Sparta was rather against it, as
-allowing to the Athenians the fullest leisure for making preparations
-against farther losses in Thrace. But her main desire was, not so
-much to put herself in condition to make the best possible peace,
-as to insure some peace which would liberate her captives: and she
-calculated that when once the Athenians had tasted the sweets of
-peace for one year, they would not again voluntarily impose upon
-themselves the rigorous obligations of war.<a id="FNanchor_691"
-href="#Footnote_691" class="fnanchor">[691]</a></p>
-
-<p>In the month of March, 423 <small>B.C.</small>,
-on the fourteenth day of the month Elaphebolion at Athens, and
-on the twelfth day of the month Gerastius at Sparta, a truce for
-one year was concluded and sworn, between Athens on one side, and
-Sparta, Corinth, Sikyon, Epidaurus, and Megara, on the other.<a
-id="FNanchor_692" href="#Footnote_692" class="fnanchor">[692]</a> The
-Spartans, instead of merely despatching plenipotentiaries to Athens
-as the Athenians had desired, went a step farther: in concurrence
-with the Athenian envoys, they drew up a form of truce, approved
-by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_433">[p. 433]</span> themselves
-and their allies, in such manner that it only required to be adopted
-and ratified by the Athenians. The general principle of the truce
-was <i>uti possidetis</i>, and the conditions were in substance as
-follows:—</p>
-
-<p>1. Respecting the temple at Delphi, every Greek shall have
-the right to make use of it honestly and without fear, pursuant
-to the customs of his particular city. The main purpose of this
-stipulation, prepared and sent verbatim from Athens, was to
-allow Athenian visitors to go thither, which had been impossible
-during the war, in consequence of the hostility of the Bœotians<a
-id="FNanchor_693" href="#Footnote_693" class="fnanchor">[693]</a>
-and Phocians: the Delphian authorities also were in the interest of
-Sparta, and doubtless the Athenians received no formal invitation
-to the Pythian games. But the Bœotians and Phocians were no parties
-to the truce: accordingly the Lacedæmonians, while accepting the
-article and proclaiming the general liberty in principle, do not
-pledge themselves to enforce it by arms as far as the Bœotians
-and Phocians are concerned, but only to try and persuade them by
-amicable representations. The liberty of sacrificing at Delphi was
-at this moment the more welcome to the Athenians, as they seem
-to have fancied themselves under the displeasure of Apollo.<a
-id="FNanchor_694" href="#Footnote_694" class="fnanchor">[694]</a></p>
-
-<p>2. All the contracting parties will inquire out and punish, each
-according to its own laws, such persons as may violate the property
-of the Delphian god.<a id="FNanchor_695" href="#Footnote_695"
-class="fnanchor">[695]</a> This article also is prepared at Athens,
-for the purpose seemingly of conciliating the favor of<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_434">[p. 434]</span> Apollo and the
-Delphians. The Lacedæmonians accept the article literally, of
-course.</p>
-
-<p>3. The Athenian garrisons at Pylus, Kythêra, Nisæa, and Minôa, and
-Methana in the neighborhood of Trœzen, are to remain as at present.
-No communication to take place between Kythêra and any portion of
-the mainland belonging to the Lacedæmonian alliance. The soldiers
-occupying Pylus shall confine themselves within the space between
-Buphras and Tomeus; those in Nisæa and Minôa, within the road which
-leads from the chapel of the hero Nisus to the temple of Poseidon,
-without any communication with the population beyond that limit.
-In like manner, the Athenians in the peninsula of Methana near
-Trœzen, and the inhabitants of the latter city, shall observe the
-special convention concluded between them respecting boundaries.<a
-id="FNanchor_696" href="#Footnote_696" class="fnanchor">[696]</a></p>
-
-<p>4. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall make use of the sea
-for trading purposes, on their own coasts, but shall not have liberty
-to sail in any ship of war, nor in any rowed merchant-vessel of
-tonnage equal to five hundred talents. [All war-ships were generally
-impelled by oar: they sometimes used sails, but never when wanted for
-fighting. Merchant-vessels seem generally to have sailed, but were
-sometimes rowed: the limitation of size is added, to insure that the
-Lacedæmonians shall not, under color of merchantmen, get up a warlike
-navy.]</p>
-
-<p>5. There shall be free communication by sea as well as by land
-between Peloponnesus and Athens for herald or embassy with suitable
-attendants, to treat for a definitive peace or for the adjustment of
-differences.</p>
-
-<p>6. Neither side shall receive deserters from the other, whether
-free or slave. [This article was alike important to both parties.
-Athens had to fear the revolt of her subject-allies, Sparta the
-desertion of Helots.]</p>
-
-<p>7. Disputes shall be amicably settled, by both parties, according
-to their established laws and customs.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the substance of the treaty prepared at Sparta, seemingly
-in concert with Athenian envoys, and sent by the Spartans to Athens
-for approval, with the following addition:<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_435">[p. 435]</span> “If there be any provision which occurs
-to you, more honorable or just than these, come to Lacedæmon and tell
-us: for neither the Spartans nor their allies will resist any just
-suggestions. But let those who come, bring with them full powers to
-conclude, in the same manner as you desire of us. The truce shall be
-for one year.”</p>
-
-<p>By the resolution which Lachês proposed in the Athenian public
-assembly, ratifying the truce, the people farther decreed that
-negotiations should be open for a definitive treaty, and directed
-the stratêgi to propose to the next ensuing assembly, a scheme and
-principles for conducting the negotiations. But at the very moment
-when the envoys between Sparta and Athens were bringing the truce to
-final adoption, events happened in Thrace which threatened to cancel
-it altogether. Two days<a id="FNanchor_697" href="#Footnote_697"
-class="fnanchor">[697]</a> after the important fourteenth of
-Elaphebolion, but before the truce could be made known in Thrace,
-Skiônê revolted from Athens to Brasidas.</p>
-
-<p>Skiônê was a town calling itself Achæan, one of the numerous
-colonies which, in the want of an acknowledged mother city, traced
-its origin to warriors returning from Troy. It was situated in the
-peninsula of Pallênê (the westernmost of those three narrow tongues
-of land into which Chalkidikê branches out); conterminous with the
-Eretrian colony Mendê. The Skiônæans, not without considerable
-dissent among themselves, proclaimed their revolt from Athens, under
-concert with Brasidas. He immediately crossed the gulf into Pallênê,
-himself in a little boat, but with a trireme close at his side;
-calculating that she would protect him against any small Athenian
-vessel,—while any Athenian trireme which he might encounter would
-attack his trireme, paying no attention to the little boat in which
-he himself was. The revolt of Skiônê was, from the position of the
-town, a more striking defiance of Athens than any of the preceding
-events. For the isthmus connecting Pallênê with the mainland was
-occupied by the town of Potidæa, a town assigned at the period of
-its capture seven years before to Athenian settlers, though probably
-containing some other residents besides. Moreover, the isthmus was
-so narrow, that the wall of Potidæa barred<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_436">[p. 436]</span> it across completely from sea to
-sea: Pallênê was therefore a quasi-island, not open to the aid of
-land-force from the continent, like the towns previously acquired
-by Brasidas. The Skiônæans thus put themselves, without any foreign
-aid, into conflict against the whole force of Athens, bringing into
-question her empire not merely over continental towns, but over
-islands.</p>
-
-<p>Even to Brasidas himself their revolt appeared a step of
-astonishing boldness. On being received into the city, he convened a
-public assembly, and addressed to them the same language which he had
-employed at Akanthus and Torônê, disavowing all party preferences as
-well as all interference with the internal politics of the town, and
-exhorting them only to unanimous efforts against the common enemy.
-He bestowed upon them at the same time the warmest praise for their
-courage. “They, though exposed to all hazards of islanders, had stood
-forward of their own accord to procure freedom,<a id="FNanchor_698"
-href="#Footnote_698" class="fnanchor">[698]</a> without waiting like
-cowards to be driven on by a foreign force towards what was clearly
-their own good. He considered them capable of any measure of future
-heroism, if the danger now impending from Athens should be averted,
-and he should assign to them the very first post of honor among the
-faithful allies of Lacedæmon.” This generous, straightforward, and
-animating tone of exhortation, appealing to the strongest political
-instinct of the Greek mind, the love of complete city autonomy,
-and coming from the lips of one whose whole conduct had hitherto
-been conformable to it, had proved highly efficacious in all the
-previous towns. But in Skiônê it roused the population to the highest
-pitch of enthusiasm:<a id="FNanchor_699" href="#Footnote_699"
-class="fnanchor">[699]</a> it worked even upon the feelings of the
-dissentient minority, bringing them round to partake heartily in the
-movement: it produced a unanimous and exalted confidence which made
-them look forward cheerfully to all the desperate chances in which
-they had engaged themselves; and it produced at the same time, in
-still more unbounded manifestation, the same personal attachment and
-admiration as Brasidas inspired elsewhere. The Skiônæans not only
-voted to him publicly a golden crown, as the liberator of Greece,
-but when it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_437">[p. 437]</span> was
-placed on his head, the burst of individual sentiment and sympathy
-was the strongest of which the Grecian bosom was capable. “They
-crowded round him individually, and encircled his head with fillets,
-like a victorious athlete,”<a id="FNanchor_700" href="#Footnote_700"
-class="fnanchor">[700]</a> says the historian. This remarkable
-incident illustrates what I observed before, that the achievements,
-the self-relying march, the straightforward politics and probity
-of this illustrious man, who in character was more Athenian than
-Spartan, yet with the good qualities of Athens predominant, inspired
-a personal emotion towards him such as rarely found its way into
-Grecian political life. The sympathy and admiration felt in Greece
-towards a victorious athlete was not merely an intense sentiment
-in the Grecian mind, but was, perhaps of all others, the most
-wide-spread and Pan-Hellenic. It was connected with the religion,
-the taste, and the love of recreation, common to the whole nation,
-while politics tended rather to disunite the separate cities: it was
-farther a sentiment at once familiar and exclusively personal. Of
-its exaggerated intensity throughout Greece the philosophers often
-complained, not without good reason; but Thucydidês cannot convey a
-more lively idea of the enthusiasm and unanimity with which Brasidas
-was welcomed at Skiônê, just after the desperate resolution taken by
-the citizens, than by using this simile.</p>
-
-<p>The Lacedæmonian commander knew well how much the utmost
-resolution of the Skiônæans was needed, and how speedily their
-insular position would draw upon them the vigorous invasion of
-Athens. He accordingly brought across to Pallênê a considerable
-portion of his army, not merely with a view to the defence of Skiônê,
-but also with the intention of surprising both Mendê and Potidæa, in
-both which places there were small parties of conspirators prepared
-to open the gates.</p>
-
-<p>It was in this position that he was found by the commissioners
-who came to announce formally the conclusion of the truce for one
-year, and to enforce its provisions: Athenæus from Sparta,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_438">[p. 438]</span> one of the three
-Spartans who had sworn to the treaty: Aristonymus, from Athens.
-The face of affairs was materially altered by this communication;
-much to the satisfaction of the newly acquired allies of Sparta in
-Thrace, who accepted the truce forthwith, but to the great chagrin
-of Brasidas, whose career was thus suddenly arrested. But he could
-not openly refuse obedience, and his army was accordingly transferred
-from the peninsula of Pallênê to Torônê.</p>
-
-<p>The case of Skiônê, however, immediately raised an obstruction,
-doubtless very agreeable to him. The commissioners who had come in
-an Athenian trireme, had heard nothing of the revolt of that place,
-and Aristonymus was astonished to find the enemy in Pallênê. But on
-inquiring into the case, he discovered that the Skiônæans had not
-revolted until two days after the day fixed for the commencement
-of the truce: accordingly, while sanctioning the truce for all the
-other cities in Thrace, he refused to comprehend Skiônê in it,
-sending immediate news home to Athens. Brasidas, protesting loudly
-against this proceeding, refused on his part to abandon Skiônê,
-which was peculiarly endeared to him by the recent scenes; and
-even obtained the countenance of the Lacedæmonian commissioners,
-by falsely asseverating that the city had revolted before the day
-named in the truce. Violent was the burst of indignation when the
-news sent home by Aristonymus reached Athens: nor was it softened,
-when the Lacedæmonians, acting upon the version of the case sent to
-them by Brasidas and Athenæus, despatched an embassy hither to claim
-protection for Skiônê, or at any rate to procure the adjustment
-of the dispute by arbitration or pacific decision. Having the
-terms of the treaty on their side, the Athenians were least of all
-disposed to relax from their rights in favor of the first revolting
-islanders. They resolved at once to undertake an expedition for the
-reconquest of Skiônê; and farther, on the proposition of Kleon,
-to put to death all the adult male inhabitants of that place as
-soon as it should have been reconquered. At the same time, they
-showed no disposition to throw up the truce generally; and the
-state of feeling on both sides tended to this result, that, while
-the war continued in Thrace, it was suspended everywhere else.<a
-id="FNanchor_701" href="#Footnote_701" class="fnanchor">[701]</a></p>
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_439">[p. 439]</span></p>
-<p>Fresh intelligence soon arrived, carrying exasperation at
-Athens yet farther, of the revolt of Mendê, the adjoining town to
-Skiônê. Those Mendæans, who had laid their measures for secretly
-introducing Brasidas, were at first baffled by the arrival of the
-truce-commissioners; but they saw that he retained his hold on
-Skiônê, in spite of the provisions of the truce, and they ascertained
-that he was willing still to protect them if they revolted, though
-he could not be an accomplice, as originally projected, in the
-surprise of the town. Being, moreover, only a small party, with the
-sentiment of the population against them, they were afraid, if they
-now relinquished their scheme, of being detected and punished for the
-partial steps already taken, when the Athenians should come against
-Skiônê. They therefore thought it on the whole the least dangerous
-course to persevere. They proclaimed their revolt from Athens,
-constraining the reluctant citizens to obey them:<a id="FNanchor_702"
-href="#Footnote_702" class="fnanchor">[702]</a> the government seems
-before to have been democratical, but they now found means to bring
-about an oligarchical revolution along with the revolt. Brasidas
-immediately accepted their adhesion, and willingly undertook to
-protect them, professing to think that he had a right to do so,
-because they had revolted openly after the truce had been proclaimed.
-But the truce upon this point was clear, which he himself virtually
-admitted, by setting up as justification certain alleged matters in
-which the Athenians had themselves violated it. He immediately made
-preparation for the defence both of Mendê and Skiônê against the
-attack, which was now rendered more certain than before, conveying
-the women and children of those two towns across to the Chalkidic
-Olynthus, and sending thither as garrison<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_440">[p. 440]</span> five hundred Peloponnesian hoplites
-with three hundred Chalkidic peltasts; the commander of which
-force, Polydamidas, took possession of the acropolis with his
-own troops separately.<a id="FNanchor_703" href="#Footnote_703"
-class="fnanchor">[703]</a> Brasidas then withdrew himself with the
-greater part of his army, to accompany Perdikkas on an expedition
-into the interior against Arrhibæus and the Lynkêstæ. On what ground,
-after having before entered into terms with Arrhibæus, he now became
-his active enemy, we are left to conjecture: probably his relations
-with Perdikkas, whose alliance was of essential importance, were
-such that this step was forced upon him against his will, or he may
-really have thought that the force under Polydamidas was adequate
-to the defence of Mendê and Skiônê; an idea which the unaccountable
-backwardness of Athens for the last six or eight months might well
-foster. Had he even remained, indeed, he could hardly have saved
-them, considering the situation of Pallênê and the superiority
-of Athens at sea; but his absence made their ruin certain.<a
-id="FNanchor_704" href="#Footnote_704" class="fnanchor">[704]</a></p>
-
-<p>While Brasidas was thus engaged far in the interior, the
-Athenian armament under Nikias and Nikostratus reached Potidæa:
-fifty triremes, ten of them Chian; one thousand hoplites and six
-hundred bowmen from Athens; one thousand mercenary Thracians, with
-some peltasts from Methônê and other towns in the neighborhood.
-From Potidæa, they proceeded by sea to Cape Poseidonium, near which
-they landed for the purpose of attacking Mendê. Polydamidas, the
-Peloponnesian commander in the town, took post with his force of
-seven hundred hoplites, including three hundred Skiônæans, upon
-an eminence near the city, strong and difficult of approach: upon
-which the Athenian generals divided their forces; Nikias, with
-sixty Athenian chosen hoplites, one hundred and twenty Methonean
-peltasts, and all the bowmen, tried to march up the hill by a side
-path and thus turn the position; while Nikostratus with the main
-army attacked it in front. But such were the extreme difficulties
-of the ground that both were repulsed: Nikias was himself wounded,
-and the division of Nikostratus was thrown into great disorder,
-narrowly escaping a destructive defeat. The Mendæans, however,
-evacuated the position in the night and retired into the city; while
-the Athe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_441">[p. 441]</span>nians,
-sailing round on the morrow to the suburb on the side of Skiônê,
-ravaged the neighboring lands; and Nikias on the ensuing day carried
-his devastations still farther, even to the border of the Skiônæan
-territory.</p>
-
-<p>But dissensions had already commenced within the walls, and the
-Skiônæan auxiliaries, becoming mistrustful of their situation, took
-advantage of the night to return home. The revolt of Mendê had been
-brought about against the will of the citizens by the intrigues and
-for the benefit of an oligarchical faction: moreover, it does not
-appear that Brasidas personally visited the town, as he had visited
-Skiônê and the other revolted towns: had he come, his personal
-influence might have done much to soothe the offended citizens, and
-create some disposition to adopt the revolt as a fact accomplished,
-after they had once been compromised with Athens. But his animating
-words had not been heard, and the Peloponnesian troops whom he had
-sent to Mendê, were mere instruments to sustain the newly erected
-oligarchy and keep out the Athenians. The feelings of the citizens
-generally towards them were soon unequivocally displayed. Nikostratus
-with half of the Athenian force was planted before that gate of
-Mendê which opened towards Potidæa: in the neighborhood of that
-gate, within the city, was the place of arms and the chief station
-both of the Peloponnesians and of the citizens; and Polydamidas,
-intending to make a sally forth, was marshalling both of them in
-battle order, when one of the Mendæan Demos, manifesting with angry
-vehemence a sentiment common to most of them, told him, “that he
-would not sally forth, and did not choose to take part in the
-contest.” Polydamidas seized hold of the man to punish him, when
-the mass of the armed Demos, taking part with their comrade, made
-a sudden rush upon the Peloponnesians. The latter, unprepared for
-such an onset, sustained at first some loss, and were soon forced
-to retreat into the acropolis; the rather, as they saw some of the
-Mendæans open the gates to the besiegers without, which induced
-them to suspect a preconcerted betrayal. No such concert, however,
-existed, though the besieging generals, when they saw the gates thus
-suddenly opened, soon comprehended the real position of affairs.
-But they found it impossible to restrain their soldiers, who pushed
-in forthwith, from plunder<span class="pagenum" id="Page_442">[p.
-442]</span>ing the town; and they had even some difficulty in saving
-the lives of the citizens.<a id="FNanchor_705" href="#Footnote_705"
-class="fnanchor">[705]</a></p>
-
-<p>Mendê being thus taken, the Athenian generals desired the body
-of the citizens to resume their former government, leaving it to
-them to single out and punish the authors of the late revolt. What
-use was made of this permission, we are not told; but probably most
-of the authors had already escaped into the acropolis along with
-Polydamidas. Having erected a wall of circumvallation round the
-acropolis, joining the sea at both ends, and left a force to guard
-it, the Athenians moved away to begin the siege of Skiônê, where
-they found both the citizens and the Peloponnesian garrison posted
-on a strong hill, not far from the walls. As it was impossible to
-surround the town without being masters of this hill, the Athenians
-attacked it at once, and were more fortunate than they had been
-before Mendê; for they carried it by assault, compelling the
-defenders to take refuge in the town. After erecting their trophy,
-they commenced the wall of circumvallation. Before it was finished,
-the garrison who had been shut up in the acropolis of Mendê, got
-into Skiônê at night, having broken out by a sudden sally where the
-blockading wall around them joined the sea. But this did not hinder
-Nikias from prosecuting his operations, so that Skiônê was in no
-long time completely inclosed, and a division placed to guard the
-wall of circumvallation.<a id="FNanchor_706" href="#Footnote_706"
-class="fnanchor">[706]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the state of affairs which Brasidas found on returning
-from the inland Macedonia. Unable either to recover Mendê or to
-relieve Skiônê, he was forced to confine himself to the protection
-of Torônê. Nikias, however, without attacking Torônê, returned
-soon afterwards with his armament to Athens, leaving Skiônê under
-blockade.</p>
-
-<p>The march of Brasidas into Macedonia had been unfortunate in
-every way, and nothing but his extraordinary gallantry rescued him
-from utter ruin. The joint force of himself and Perdikkas consisted
-of three thousand Grecian hoplites, Peloponnesian, Akanthian, and
-Chalkidian, with one thousand Macedonian and Chalkidian horse, and a
-considerable number of non-Hellenic auxiliaries. As soon as they had
-got beyond the mountain-pass<span class="pagenum" id="Page_443">[p.
-443]</span> into the territory of the Lynkêstæ, they were met by
-Arrhibæus, and a battle ensued, in which that prince was completely
-worsted. They halted here for a few days, awaiting—before they pushed
-forward to attack the villages in the territory of Arrhibæus—the
-arrival of a body of Illyrian mercenaries, with whom Perdikkas
-had concluded a bargain.<a id="FNanchor_707" href="#Footnote_707"
-class="fnanchor">[707]</a> At length Perdikkas became impatient to
-advance without them; while Brasidas, on the contrary, apprehensive
-for the fate of Mendê during his absence, was bent on returning back.
-The dissension between them becoming aggravated, they parted company
-and occupied separate encampments at some distance from each other,
-when both received unexpected intelligence which made Perdikkas as
-anxious to retreat as Brasidas. The Illyrians, having broken their
-compact, had joined Arrhibæus, and were now in full march to attack
-the invaders. The untold number of these barbarians was reported as
-overwhelming, and such was their reputation for ferocity as well
-as for valor, that the Macedonian army of Perdikkas, seized with a
-sudden panic, broke up in the night and fled without orders, hurrying
-Perdikkas himself along with them, and not even sending notice to
-Brasidas, with whom nothing had been concerted about the retreat. In
-the morning, the latter found Arrhibæus and the Illyrians close upon
-him, while the Macedonians were already far advanced in their journey
-homeward.</p>
-
-<p>The contrast between the man of Hellas and of Macedonia, general
-as well as soldiers, was never more strikingly exhibited than on this
-critical occasion. The soldiers of Brasidas, though surprised as
-well as deserted, lost neither their courage nor their discipline:
-the commander preserved not only his presence of mind, but his full
-authority. His hoplites were directed to form in a hollow square, or
-oblong, with the light-armed and attendants in the centre, for the
-retreating march: youthful soldiers were posted either in the outer
-ranks, or in convenient stations, to run out swiftly and repel the
-assailing enemy; while Brasidas himself, with three hundred chosen
-men, formed the rear-guard.<a id="FNanchor_708" href="#Footnote_708"
-class="fnanchor">[708]</a></p>
-
-<p>The short harangue which, according to a custom universal with
-Grecian generals, he addressed to his troops immediately before
-the enemy approached, is in many respects remarkable.<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_444">[p. 444]</span> Though some were
-Akanthians, some Chalkidians, some Helots, he designates all by the
-honorable title of “Peloponnesians.” Reassuring them against the
-desertion of their allies, as well as against the superior numbers
-of the advancing enemy, he invokes their native, homebred courage.<a
-id="FNanchor_709" href="#Footnote_709" class="fnanchor">[709]</a>
-“<i>Ye</i> do not require the presence of allies to inspire you with
-bravery, nor do ye fear superior numbers of an enemy; for ye belong
-not to those political communities in which the larger number
-governs the smaller, but to those in which a few men rule subjects
-more numerous than themselves, having acquired their power by no
-other means than by superiority in battle.” Next, Brasidas tried to
-dissipate the <i>prestige</i> of the Illyrian name; his army had already
-vanquished the Lynkêstæ, and these other barbarians were noway
-better. A nearer acquaintance would soon show that they were only
-formidable from the noise, the gestures, the clashing of arms, and
-the accompaniments of their onset; and that they were incapable of
-sustaining the reality of close combat, hand to hand. “They have
-no regular order (said he) such as to impress them with shame for
-deserting their post: flight and attack are with them in equally
-honorable esteem, so that there is nothing to test the really
-courageous man: their battle, wherein every man fights as he chooses,
-is just the thing to furnish each with a decent pretence for running
-away.” “Repel ye their onset whenever it comes; and so soon as
-opportunity offers, resume your retreat in rank and order. Ye will
-soon arrive in a place of safety; and ye will be convinced that such
-crowds, when their enemy has stood to defy the first onset, keep
-aloof with empty menace and a parade of courage which never strikes;
-while if their enemy gives way, they show themselves smart and bold
-in running after him where there is no danger.”<a id="FNanchor_710"
-href="#Footnote_710" class="fnanchor">[710]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_445">[p. 445]</span></p>
-
-<p>The superiority of disciplined and regimented force over
-disorderly numbers, even with equal undivided courage, is now a
-truth so familiar, that we require an effort of imagination to put
-ourselves back into the fifth century before the Christian era, when
-this truth was recognized only among the Hellenic communities; when
-the practice of all their neighbors—Illyrians, Thracians, Asiatics,
-Epirots, and even Macedonians—implied ignorance or contradiction of
-it. In respect to the Epirots, the difference between their military
-habits and those of the Greeks has been already noticed, having been
-pointedly manifested in the memorable joint attack on the Akarnanian
-town of Stratus, in the second year of the war.<a id="FNanchor_711"
-href="#Footnote_711" class="fnanchor">[711]</a> Both Epirots and
-Macedonians, however, are a step nearer to the Greeks than either
-Thracians, or these Illyrian barbarians against whom Brasidas was now
-about to contend, and in whose case the contrast comes out yet more
-forcibly. Nor is it merely the contrast between two modes of fighting
-which the Lacedæmonian commander impresses upon his soldiers: he
-gives what may be called a moral theory of the principles on which
-that contrast is founded,—a theory of large range and going to
-the basis of Grecian social life, in peace as well as in war. The
-sentiment in each individual man’s bosom,<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_446">[p. 446]</span> of a certain place which he has to
-fill and duties which he has to perform, combined with fear of the
-displeasure of his neighbors as well as of his own self-reproach
-if he shrinks back, but at the same time essentially bound up
-and reciprocating with the feeling that his neighbors are under
-corresponding obligations towards him,—this sentiment, which Brasidas
-invokes as the settled military creed of his soldiers in their ranks,
-was not less the regulating principle of their intercourse in peace
-as citizens of the same community. Simple as this principle may seem,
-it would have found no response in the army of Xerxes, or of the
-Thracian Sitalkês, or of the Gaul Brennus. The Persian soldier rushes
-to death by order of the Great King, perhaps under terror of a whip
-which the Great King commands to be administered to him: the Illyrian
-or the Gaul scorns such a stimulus, and obeys only the instigation of
-his own pugnacity, or vengeance, or love of blood, or love of booty,
-but recedes as soon as that individual sentiment is either satisfied
-or overcome by fear. It is the Greek soldier alone who feels himself
-bound to his comrades by ties reciprocal and indissoluble,<a
-id="FNanchor_712" href="#Footnote_712" class="fnanchor">[712]</a>—who
-obeys neither the will of a king, nor his own individual impulse, but
-a common and imperative sentiment of obligation,—whose honor or shame
-is attached to his own place in the ranks, never to be abandoned nor
-overstepped. Such conceptions of military duty, established in the
-minds of these soldiers whom Brasidas addressed, will come to be
-farther illustrated when we describe the memorable Retreat of the
-Ten Thousand: at present, I merely indicate them as forming a part
-of that general scheme of morality, social and political as well as
-military, wherein the Greeks stood exalted above the nations who
-surrounded them.</p>
-
-<p>But there is another point in the speech of Brasidas which
-deserves notice. He tells his soldiers: “Courage is your homebred
-property; for ye belong to communities wherein the small<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_447">[p. 447]</span> number governs
-the larger, simply by reason of superior prowess in themselves
-and conquest by their ancestors.” First, it is remarkable that
-a large proportion of the Peloponnesian soldiers, whom Brasidas
-thus addresses, consisted of Helots, the conquered race, not the
-conquerors: yet so easily does the military or regimental pride
-supplant the sympathies of race, that these men would feel flattered
-by being addressed as if they were themselves sprung from the race
-which had enslaved their ancestors. Next, we here see the right of
-the strongest invoked as the legitimate source of power, and as
-an honorable and ennobling recollection, by an officer of Dorian
-race, oligarchical politics, unperverted intellect, and estimable
-character: and we shall accordingly be prepared, when we find a
-similar principle hereafter laid down by the Athenian envoys at
-Melos, to disallow the explanation of those who treat it merely as
-a theory invented by demagogues and sophists, upon one or other of
-whom it is common to throw the blame of all that is objectionable in
-Grecian politics or morality.</p>
-
-<p>Having finished his harangue, Brasidas gave orders for retreat.
-As soon as his march began, the Illyrians rushed upon him with
-all the confidence and shouts of pursuers against a flying enemy,
-believing that they should completely destroy his army. But wherever
-they approached near, the young soldiers specially stationed for
-the purpose, turned upon and beat them back with severe loss; while
-Brasidas himself, with his rear-guard of three hundred, was present
-everywhere rendering vigorous aid. When the Lynkêstæ and Illyrians
-attacked, the army halted and repelled them, after which it resumed
-its retreating march. The barbarians found themselves so rudely
-handled, and with such unwonted vigor,—for they probably had had
-no previous experience of Grecian troops,—that after a few trials
-they desisted from meddling with the army in its retreat along the
-plain. They ran forward rapidly, partly in order to overtake the
-Macedonians under Perdikkas, who had fled before, partly to occupy
-the narrow pass, with high hills on each side, which formed the
-entrance into Lynkêstis, and which lay in the road of Brasidas.
-When the latter approached this narrow pass, he saw the barbarians
-masters of it; several of them were already on the summits, and
-more were ascending to reinforce them; while a portion of<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_448">[p. 448]</span> them were moving down
-upon his rear. Brasidas immediately gave orders to his chosen three
-hundred, to charge up the most assailable of the two hills, with
-their best speed, before it became more numerously occupied, not
-staying to preserve compact ranks. This unexpected and vigorous
-movement disconcerted the barbarians, who fled, abandoning the
-eminence to the Greeks, and leaving their own men in the pass exposed
-on one of their flanks.<a id="FNanchor_713" href="#Footnote_713"
-class="fnanchor">[713]</a> The retreating army, thus master of one
-of the side hills, was enabled to force its way through the middle
-pass, and to drive away the Lynkêstian and Illyrian occupants. Having
-got through this narrow outlet, Brasidas found himself on the higher
-ground, nor did his enemies dare to attack him farther: so that he
-was enabled to reach, even in that day’s march, the first town or
-village in the kingdom of Perdikkas, called Arnissa. So incensed
-were his soldiers with the Macedonian subjects of Perdikkas, who had
-fled on the first news of danger without giving them any notice,
-that they seized and appropriated all the articles of baggage,
-not inconsiderable in number, which happened to have been dropped
-in the disorder of a nocturnal flight; and they even unharnessed
-and slew the oxen out of the baggage carts.<a id="FNanchor_714"
-href="#Footnote_714" class="fnanchor">[714]</a></p>
-
-<p>Perdikkas keenly resented this behavior of the troops of
-Brasidas, following as it did immediately upon his own quarrel
-with that general, and upon the mortification of his repulse from
-Lynkêstis. From this moment he broke off his alliance with the
-Peloponnesians, and opened negotiations with Nikias, then engaged
-in constructing the wall of blockade round Skiônê. Such was the
-general faithlessness of this prince, however, that Nikias<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_449">[p. 449]</span> required as a
-condition of the alliance, some manifest proof of the sincerity of
-his intentions; and Perdikkas was soon enabled to afford a proof of
-considerable importance.<a id="FNanchor_715" href="#Footnote_715"
-class="fnanchor">[715]</a></p>
-
-<p>The relations between Athens and Peloponnesus, since the
-conclusion of the truce in the preceding March, had settled into
-a curious combination. In Thrace, war was prosecuted by mutual
-understanding, and with unabated vigor; but everywhere else the
-truce was observed. The main purpose of the truce, however, that of
-giving time for discussions preliminary to a definitive peace, was
-completely frustrated; nor does the decree of the Athenian people,
-which stands included in their vote sanctioning the truce, for
-sending and receiving envoys to negotiate such a peace, ever seem to
-have been executed.</p>
-
-<p>Instead of this, the Lacedæmonians despatched a considerable
-reinforcement by land to join Brasidas; probably at his own
-request, and also instigated by hearing of the Athenian armament
-now under Nikias in Pallênê. But Ischagoras, the commander of the
-reinforcement, on reaching the borders of Thessaly, found all
-farther progress impracticable, and was compelled to send back his
-troops. For Perdikkas, by whose powerful influence alone Brasidas
-had been enabled to pass through Thessaly, now directed his
-Thessalian guests to keep the new-comers off; which was far more
-easily executed, and was gratifying to the feelings of Perdikkas
-himself, as well as an essential service to the Athenians.<a
-id="FNanchor_716" href="#Footnote_716" class="fnanchor">[716]</a>
-Ischagoras, however, with a few companions, but without his army,
-made his way to Brasidas, having been particularly directed by the
-Lacedæmonians to inspect and report upon the state of affairs. He
-numbered among his companions a few select Spartans of the military
-age, intended to be placed as harmosts or governors in the cities
-reduced by Brasidas: this was among the first violations, apparently
-often repeated afterwards, of the ancient Spartan custom, that none
-except elderly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_450">[p. 450]</span>
-men, above the military age, should be named to such posts. Indeed,
-Brasidas himself was an illustrious departure from the ancient rule.
-The mission of these officers was intended to guard against the
-appointment of any but Spartans to such posts, for there were no
-Spartans in the army of Brasidas. One of the new-comers, Klearidas,
-was made governor of Amphipolis; another, Pasitelidas, of Torônê.<a
-id="FNanchor_717" href="#Footnote_717" class="fnanchor">[717]</a> It
-is probable that these inspecting commissioners may have contributed
-to fetter the activity of Brasidas: and the newly-declared hostility
-of Perdikkas, together with disappointment in the non-arrival of
-the fresh troops intended to join him, much abridged his means. We
-hear of only one exploit performed by him at this time, and that too
-more than six months after the retreat from Macedonia, about January
-or February 422 <small>B.C.</small> Having established
-intelligence with some parties in the town of Potidæa, in the view
-of surprising it, he contrived to bring up his army in the night
-to the foot of the walls, and even to plant his scaling ladders,
-without<span class="pagenum" id="Page_451">[p. 451]</span> being
-discovered. The sentinel carrying and ringing the bell had just
-passed by on the wall, leaving for a short interval an unguarded
-space (the practice apparently being, to pass this bell round along
-the walls from one sentinel to another throughout the night), when
-some of the soldiers of Brasidas took advantage of the moment to
-try and mount. But before they could reach the top of the wall,
-the sentinel came back, alarm was given, and the assailants were
-compelled to retreat.<a id="FNanchor_718" href="#Footnote_718"
-class="fnanchor">[718]</a></p>
-
-<p>In the absence of actual war between the ascendent powers in and
-near Peloponnesus, during the course of this summer, Thucydidês
-mentions to us some incidents which perhaps he would have omitted had
-there been great warlike operations to describe. The great temple of
-Hêrê, between Mykenæ and Argos (nearer to the former, and in early
-times more intimately connected with it, but now an appendage of the
-latter, Mykenæ itself having been subjected and almost depopulated
-by the Argeians), enjoyed an ancient Pan-Hellenic reputation; the
-catalogue of its priestesses, seemingly with a statue or bust of
-each, was preserved or imagined through centuries of past time, real
-and mythical, beginning with the goddess herself or her immediate
-nominees. Chrysis, an old woman, who had been priestess there for
-fifty-six years, happened to fall asleep in the temple with a burning
-lamp near to her head: the fillet encircling her head took fire, and
-though she herself escaped unhurt, the temple itself, very ancient,
-and perhaps built of wood, was consumed. From fear of the wrath of
-the Argeians, Chrysis fled to Phlius, and subsequently thought it
-necessary to seek protection as a suppliant in the temple of Athênê
-Alea, at Tegea: Phaeinis was appointed priestess in her place.<a
-id="FNanchor_719" href="#Footnote_719" class="fnanchor">[719]</a>
-The temple was rebuilt on an adjoining spot by<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_452">[p. 452]</span> Eupolemus, of Argos, continuing as
-much as possible the antiquities and traditions of the former, but
-with greater splendor and magnitude: Pausanias, the traveller,
-who describes this temple as a visitor, near six hundred years
-afterwards, saw near it the remnant of the old temple which had been
-burned.</p>
-
-<p>We hear farther of a war in Arcadia, between the two important
-cities of Mantineia and Tegea, each attended by its Arcadian allies,
-partly free, partly subject. In a battle fought between them at
-Laodikion, the victory was disputed: each party erected a trophy,
-each sent spoils to the temple of Delphi. We shall have occasion soon
-to speak farther of these Arcadian dissensions.</p>
-
-<p>The Bœotians had been no parties to the truce sworn between
-Sparta and Athens in the preceding month of March; but they seem to
-have followed the example of Sparta in abstaining from hostilities
-<i>de facto</i>: and we may conclude that they acceded to the request
-of Sparta so far as to allow the transit of Athenian visitors and
-sacred envoys through Bœotia to the Delphian temple. The only actual
-incident which we hear of in Bœotia during this interval, is one
-which illustrates forcibly the harsh and ungenerous ascendency of
-the Thebans over the inferior Bœotian cities.<a id="FNanchor_720"
-href="#Footnote_720" class="fnanchor">[720]</a> The Thebans destroyed
-the walls of Thespiæ, and condemned the city to remain unfortified,
-on the charge of <i>atticizing</i> tendencies. How far this suspicion
-was well founded we have no means of judging: but the Thespians,
-far from being dangerous at this moment, were altogether helpless,
-having lost the flower of their military force at the battle of
-Delium, where their station was on the defeated wing. It was this
-very helplessness, brought upon them by their services to Thebes
-against Athens, which now both impelled and enabled the Thebans to
-enforce the rigorous sentence above mentioned.<a id="FNanchor_721"
-href="#Footnote_721" class="fnanchor">[721]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_453">[p. 453]</span></p>
-
-<p>But the month of March, or the Attic Elaphebolion, 422
-<small>B.C.</small>, the time prescribed for expiration of the one
-year’s truce, had now arrived. It has already been mentioned that
-this truce had never been more than partially observed: Brasidas
-in Thrace had disregarded it from the beginning, and both the
-contracting powers had tacitly acquiesced in the anomalous condition,
-of war in Thrace coupled with peace elsewhere. Either of them had
-thus an excellent pretext for breaking the truce altogether; and as
-neither acted upon this pretext, we plainly see that the paramount
-feeling and ascendent parties, among both, tended to peace of their
-own accord, at that time. Nor was there anything except the interest
-of Brasidas, and of those revolted subjects of Athens to whom he
-had bound himself, which kept alive the war in Thrace. Under such a
-state of feeling, the oath taken to maintain the truce still seemed
-imperative on both parties, always excepting Thracian affairs.
-Moreover, the Athenians were to a certain degree soothed by their
-success at Mendê and Skiônê, and by their acquisition of Perdikkas as
-an ally, during the summer and autumn of 423 <small>B.C.</small> But
-the state of sentiment between the contracting parties was not such
-as to make it possible to treat for any longer peace, or to conclude
-any new agreement, though neither were disposed to depart from that
-which had been already concluded.</p>
-
-<p>The mere occurrence of the last day of the truce made no practical
-difference at first in this condition of things. The truce had
-expired: either party might renew hostilities; but neither actually
-did renew them. To the Athenians, there was this additional motive
-for abstaining from hostilities for a few months longer: the
-great Pythian festival would be celebrated at Delphi in July or
-the beginning of August, and as they had been excluded from that
-holy spot during all the interval between the beginning of the war
-and the conclusion of the one year’s truce, their pious feelings
-seem now to have taken a peculiar longing towards the visits,
-pilgrimages, and festivals connected with it. Though the truce,
-therefore, had really ceased, no actual warfare took place until the
-Pythian games were over.<a id="FNanchor_722" href="#Footnote_722"
-class="fnanchor">[722]</a></p> <p><span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_454">[p. 454]</span></p> <p>But though the actions of
-Athens remained unaltered, the talk at Athens became very different.
-Kleon and his supporters<span class="pagenum" id="Page_455">[p.
-455]</span> renewed their instances to obtain a vigorous prosecution
-of the war, and renewed them with great additional strength of
-argument; the question being now open to considerations of political
-prudence, without any binding obligation.</p>
-
-<p>“At this time (observes Thucydidês)<a id="FNanchor_723"
-href="#Footnote_723" class="fnanchor">[723]</a> the great enemies
-of peace were, Brasidas on one side, and Kleon on the other: the
-former, because he was in full success and rendered illustrious by
-the war; the latter, because he thought that if peace were concluded,
-he should be detected in his dishonest politics, and be less easily
-credited in his criminations of others.” As to Brasidas, the remark
-of the historian is indisputable: it would be wonderful, indeed,
-if he, in whom so many splendid qualities were brought out by the
-war, and who had moreover contracted obligations with the Thracian
-towns which gave him hopes and fears of his own, entirely apart from
-Lacedæmon,—it would be wonderful if the war and its continuance were
-not in his view the paramount object. In truth, his position in
-Thrace constituted an insurmountable obstacle to any solid or steady
-peace, independently of the dispositions of Kleon.</p>
-
-<p>But the coloring which Thucydidês gives to Kleon’s support of the
-war is open to much greater comment. First, we may well raise the
-question, whether Kleon had any real interest in war,—whether his
-personal or party consequence in the city was at all enhanced by
-it. He had himself no talent or competence for warlike operations,
-which tended infallibly to place ascendency in the hands of others,
-and to throw him into the shade. As to his power of carrying on
-dishonest intrigues with success, that must depend on the extent of
-his political ascendency; while matter of crimination against others,
-assuming him to be careless of truth or falsehood, could hardly
-be wanting either in war or peace; and if the war brought forward
-unsuc<span class="pagenum" id="Page_456">[p. 456]</span>cessful
-generals open to his accusations, it would also throw up successful
-generals who would certainly outshine him, and would probably put
-him down. In the life which Plutarch has given us of Phokion, a
-plain and straightforward military man, we read that one of the
-frequent and criminative speakers of Athens, of character analogous
-to that which is ascribed to Kleon, expressed his surprise on
-hearing Phokion dissuade the Athenians from embarking in a new war:
-“Yes (said Phokion), I think it right to dissuade them; though I
-know well, that if there be war, I shall have command over you; if
-there be peace, you will have command over me.”<a id="FNanchor_724"
-href="#Footnote_724" class="fnanchor">[724]</a> This is surely
-a more rational estimate of the way in which war affects the
-comparative importance of the orator and the military officer, than
-that which Thucydidês pronounces in reference to the interests of
-Kleon. Moreover, when we come to follow the political history of
-Syracuse, we shall find the demagogue Athenagoras ultra-pacific, and
-the aristocrat Hermokratês far more warlike:<a id="FNanchor_725"
-href="#Footnote_725" class="fnanchor">[725]</a> the former is afraid,
-not without reason, that war will raise into consequence energetic
-military leaders dangerous to the popular constitution. We may add,
-that Kleon himself had not been always warlike: he commenced his
-political career as an opponent of Periklês, when the latter was
-strenuously maintaining the necessity and prudence of beginning
-the Peloponnesian war.<a id="FNanchor_726" href="#Footnote_726"
-class="fnanchor">[726]</a></p>
-
-<p>But farther, if we should even grant that Kleon had a separate
-party-interest in promoting the war, it will still remain to be
-considered, whether, at this particular crisis, the employment of
-energetic warlike measures in Thrace was not really the sound and
-prudent policy for Athens. Taking Periklês as the best judge of
-that policy, we shall find him at the outset of the war inculcating
-emphatically two important points: 1. To stand vigorously upon the
-defensive, maintaining unimpaired their maritime empire, “keeping
-their subject-allies well in hand,” submitting patiently even to
-see Attica ravaged. 2. To abstain from trying to enlarge their
-empire or to make new conquests during the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_457">[p. 457]</span> war.<a id="FNanchor_727"
-href="#Footnote_727" class="fnanchor">[727]</a> Consistently with
-this well-defined plan of action, Periklês, had he lived, would
-have taken care to interfere vigorously and betimes to prevent
-Brasidas from making his conquests: had such interference been
-either impossible or accidentally frustrated, he would have thought
-no efforts too great to recover them. To maintain undiminished the
-integrity of the empire, as well as that impression of Athenian force
-upon which the empire rested, was his cardinal principle. Now it is
-impossible to deny that in reference to Thrace, Kleon adhered more
-closely than his rival Nikias to the policy of Periklês. It was to
-Nikias, more than to Kleon, that the fatal mistake made by Athens in
-not interfering speedily after Brasidas first broke into Thrace is
-to be imputed: it was Nikias and his partisans, desirous of peace at
-almost any price, and knowing that the Lacedæmonians also desired it,
-who encouraged his countrymen, at a moment of great public depression
-of spirit, to leave Brasidas unopposed in Thrace, and rely on the
-chance of negotiation with Sparta for arresting his progress. The
-peace-party at Athens carried their point of the truce for a year,
-with the promise and for the express purpose of checking the farther
-conquests of Brasidas; also with the farther promise of maturing that
-truce into a permanent peace, and obtaining under the peace even the
-restoration of Amphipolis.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the policy of Nikias and his party, the friends
-of peace and opponents of Kleon. And the promises which they
-thus held out might perhaps appear plausible in March 422 <small>B.C.</small>, at the moment when the truce for one
-year was concluded. But the subsequent events had frustrated them
-in the most glaring manner, and had even shown the best reason for
-believing that no such expectations could possibly be realized while
-Brasidas was in unbroken and unopposed action. For the Lacedæmonians,
-though seemingly sincere in concluding the truce on the basis of
-<i>uti possidetis</i>, and desiring to extend it to Thrace as well as
-elsewhere, had been unable to enforce the observance of it upon
-Brasidas, or to restrain him even from making new acquisitions,<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_458">[p. 458]</span> so that Athens never
-obtained the benefit of the truce, exactly in that region where she
-most stood in need of it. Only by the despatch of her armament to
-Skiônê and Mendê had she maintained herself in possession even of
-Pallênê. Now what was the lesson to be derived from this experience,
-when the Athenians came to discuss their future policy, after the
-truce was at an end? The great object of all parties at Athens was
-to recover the lost possessions in Thrace, especially Amphipolis.
-Nikias, still urging negotiations for peace, continued to hold out
-hopes that the Lacedæmonians would be willing to restore that place,
-as the price of their captives now at Athens; and his connection
-with Sparta would enable him to announce her professions even upon
-authority. But to this Kleon might make, and doubtless did make, a
-complete reply, grounded upon the most recent experience: “If the
-Lacedæmonians consent to the restitution of Amphipolis (he would
-say), it will probably be only with the view of finding some means
-to escape performance, and yet to get back their prisoners. But
-granting that they are perfectly sincere, they will never be able to
-control Brasidas, and those parties in Thrace who are bound up with
-him by community of feeling and interest; so that after all, you will
-give them back their prisoners on the faith of an equivalent beyond
-their power to realize. Look at what has happened during the truce!
-So different are the views and obligations of Brasidas in Thrace
-from those of the Lacedæmonians, that he would not even obey their
-order when they directed him to stand as he was, and to desist from
-farther conquest: much less will he obey them when they direct him
-to surrender what he has already got: least of all, if they enjoin
-the surrender of Amphipolis, his grand acquisition and his central
-point for all future effort. Depend upon it, if you desire to regain
-Amphipolis, you will only regain it by energetic employment of force,
-as has happened with Skiônê and Mendê: and you ought to put forth
-your strength for this purpose immediately, while the Lacedæmonian
-prisoners are yet in your hands, instead of waiting until after you
-shall have been deluded into giving them up, thereby losing all your
-hold upon Lacedæmon.”</p>
-
-<p>Such anticipations were fully verified by the result: for
-subsequent history will show that the Lacedæmonians, when they had
-bound themselves by treaty to give up Amphipolis, either would<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_459">[p. 459]</span> not, or could not,
-enforce performance of their stipulation, even after the death of
-Brasidas: much less could they have done so during his life, when
-there was his great personal influence, strenuous will, and hopes
-of future conquest, to serve as increased obstruction to them. Such
-anticipations were also plainly suggested by the recent past: so that
-in putting them into the mouth of Kleon, we are only supposing him to
-read the lesson open before his eyes.</p>
-
-<p>Now since the war-policy of Kleon, taken at this moment after
-the expiration of the one year’s truce, may be thus shown to be not
-only more conformable to the genius of Periklês, but also founded
-on a juster estimate of events both past and future, than the
-peace-policy of Nikias, what are we to say to the historian, who,
-without refuting such presumptions, every one of which is deduced
-from his own narrative, nay, without even indicating their existence,
-merely tells us that “Kleon opposed the peace in order that he might
-cloke dishonest intrigues and find matter for plausible crimination?”
-We cannot but say of this criticism, with profound regret that such
-words must be pronounced respecting any judgment of Thucydidês, that
-it is harsh and unfair towards Kleon, and careless in regard to truth
-and the instruction of his readers. It breathes not that same spirit
-of honorable impartiality which pervades his general history: it is
-an interpolation by the officer whose improvidence had occasioned to
-his countrymen the fatal loss of Amphipolis, retaliating upon the
-citizen who justly accused him: it is conceived in the same tone as
-his unaccountable judgment in the matter of Sphakteria.</p>
-
-<p>Rejecting on this occasion the judgment of Thucydidês, we may
-confidently affirm that Kleon had rational public grounds for urging
-his countrymen to undertake with energy the reconquest of Amphipolis.
-Demagogue and leather-seller though he was, he stands here honorably
-distinguished, as well from the tameness and inaction of Nikias,
-who grasped at peace with hasty credulity through sickness of the
-efforts of war, as from the restless movement and novelties, not
-merely unprofitable but ruinous, which we shall presently find
-springing up under the auspices of Alkibiadês. Periklês had said to
-his countrymen, at a time when they were enduring all the miseries of
-pestilence, and were in a state of despondency even greater than that
-which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_460">[p. 460]</span> prevailed
-in <small>B.C.</small> 422: “You hold your empire and
-your proud position, by the condition of being willing to encounter
-cost, fatigue, and danger: abstain from all views of enlarging the
-empire, but think no effort too great to maintain it unimpaired.
-To lose what we have once got is more disgraceful than to fail in
-attempts at acquisition.”<a id="FNanchor_728" href="#Footnote_728"
-class="fnanchor">[728]</a> The very same language was probably held
-by Kleon when exhorting his countrymen to an expedition for the
-reconquest of Amphipolis. But when uttered by him, it would have
-a very different effect from that which it had formerly produced
-when held by Periklês, and different also from that which it would
-now have produced if held by Nikias. The entire peace-party would
-repudiate it when it came from Kleon; partly out of dislike to the
-speaker, partly from a conviction, doubtless felt by every one, that
-an expedition against Brasidas would be a hazardous and painful
-service to all concerned in it, general as well as soldiers; partly
-also from a persuasion, sincerely entertained at the time, though
-afterwards proved to be illusory by the result, that Amphipolis might
-really be got back through peace with the Lacedæmonians.</p>
-
-<p>If Kleon, in proposing the expedition, originally proposed himself
-as the commander, a new ground of objection, and a very forcible
-ground, would thus be furnished. Since everything which Kleon does is
-understood to be a manifestation of some vicious or silly attribute,
-we are told that this was an instance of his absurd presumption,
-arising out of the success of Pylus, and persuading him that he was
-the only general who could put down Brasidas. But if the success at
-Pylus had really filled him with such overweening military conceit,
-it is most unaccountable that he should not have procured for himself
-some command during the year which immediately succeeded the affair
-at Sphakteria, the eighth year of the war: a season of most active
-warlike enterprise, when his presumption and influence arising out of
-the Sphakterian victory must have been fresh and glowing. As he<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_461">[p. 461]</span> obtained no command
-during this immediately succeeding period we may fairly doubt whether
-he ever really conceived such excessive personal presumption of his
-own talents for war, and whether he did not retain after the affair
-of Sphakteria the same character which he had manifested in that
-affair, reluctance to engage in military expeditions himself, and a
-disposition to see them commanded as well as carried on by others.
-It is by no means certain that Kleon, in proposing the expedition
-against Amphipolis, originally proposed to take the command of it
-himself: I think it at least equally probable, that his original
-wish was to induce Nikias or the stratêgi to take the command of
-it, as in the case of Sphakteria. Nikias, doubtless, opposed the
-expedition as much as he could: when it was determined by the people,
-in spite of his opposition, he would peremptorily decline the command
-for himself, and would do all he could to force it upon Kleon, or
-at least would be better pleased to see it under his command than
-under that of any one else. He would be not less glad to exonerate
-himself from a dangerous service than to see his rival entangled in
-it; and he would have before him the same alternative which he and
-his friends had contemplated with so much satisfaction in the affair
-of Sphakteria: either the expedition would succeed, in which case
-Amphipolis would be taken, or it would fail, and the consequence
-would be the ruin of Kleon. The last of the two was really the more
-probable at Amphipolis, as Nikias had erroneously imagined it to be
-at Sphakteria.</p>
-
-<p>It is easy to see, however, that an expedition proposed under
-these circumstances by Kleon, though it might command a majority in
-the public assembly, would have a large proportion of the citizens
-unfavorable to it, and even wishing that it might fail. Moreover,
-Kleon had neither talents nor experience for commanding an army,
-and the being engaged under his command in fighting against the
-ablest officer of the time, could inspire no confidence to any
-man in putting on his armor. From all these circumstances united,
-political as well as military, we are not surprised to hear that
-the hoplites whom he took out with him went with much reluctance.<a
-id="FNanchor_729" href="#Footnote_729" class="fnanchor">[729]</a>
-An ignorant general, with unwilling<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_462">[p. 462]</span> soldiers, many of them politically
-disliking him, stood little chance of wresting Amphipolis from
-Brasidas: but had Nikias or the stratêgi done their duty, and carried
-the entire force of the city under competent command to the same
-object, the issue would probably have been different as to gain and
-loss; certainly very different as to dishonor.</p>
-
-<p>Kleon started from Peiræus, apparently towards the beginning
-of August, with twelve hundred Athenian, Lemnian, and Imbrian
-hoplites, and three hundred horsemen, troops of excellent quality and
-condition: besides an auxiliary force of allies, number not exactly
-known, and thirty triremes. This armament was not of magnitude at all
-equal to the taking of Amphipolis; for Brasidas had equal numbers,
-besides all the advantages of the position. But it was a part of
-the scheme of Kleon, on arriving at Eion, to procure Macedonian and
-Thracian reinforcements before he commenced his attack. He first
-halted in his voyage near Skiônê, from which place he took away
-such of the hoplites as could be spared from the blockade. He next
-sailed across the gulf from Pallênê to the Sithonian peninsula,
-to a place called the Harbor of the Kolophonians, near Torônê.<a
-id="FNanchor_730" href="#Footnote_730" class="fnanchor">[730]</a>
-Having here learned that neither Brasidas himself, nor any
-considerable Peloponnesian garrison were present in Torônê, he landed
-his forces and marched to attack the town, sending ten triremes at
-the same time round a promontory which separated the harbor of the
-Kolophonians from Torônê, to assail the latter place from seaward. It
-happened that Brasidas, desiring to enlarge the fortified circle of
-Torônê, had broken down a portion of the old wall, and employed the
-materials in building a new and larger wall inclosing the proasteion,
-or suburb: this new wall appears to have been still incomplete
-and in an imperfect state of defence. Pasi<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_463">[p. 463]</span>telidas, the Peloponnesian commander,
-resisted the attack of the Athenians as long as he could; but when
-already beginning to give way, he saw the ten Athenian triremes
-sailing into the harbor, which was hardly guarded at all. Abandoning
-the defence of the suburb, he hastened to repel these new assailants,
-but came too late, so that the town was entered from both sides at
-once. Brasidas, who was not far off, rendered aid with the utmost
-celerity, but was yet at five miles’ distance from the city when
-he learned the capture, and was obliged to retire unsuccessfully.
-Pasitelidas the commander, with the Peloponnesian garrison and
-the Torônæan male population, were despatched as prisoners to
-Athens; while the Torônæan women and children, by a fate but too
-common in those days, were sold as slaves.<a id="FNanchor_731"
-href="#Footnote_731" class="fnanchor">[731]</a></p>
-
-<p>After this not unimportant success, Kleon sailed round the
-promontory of Athos to Eion at the mouth of the Strymon, within three
-miles of Amphipolis. From hence, in execution of his original scheme,
-he sent envoys to Perdikkas, urging him to lend effective aid as the
-ally of Athens in the attack of Amphipolis, with his whole forces;
-and to Pollês the king of the Thracian Odomantes, inviting him also
-to come with as many Thracian mercenaries as could be levied. The
-Edonians, the Thracian tribe nearest to Amphipolis, took part with
-Brasidas: and the local influence of the banished Thucydidês would
-no longer be at the service of Athens, much less at the service of
-Kleon. Awaiting the expected reinforcements, Kleon employed himself,
-first in an attack upon Stageirus in the Strymonic gulf, which was
-repulsed; next upon Galêpsus, on the coast opposite the island of
-Thasos, which was successful. But the reinforcements did not at
-once arrive, and being too weak to attack Amphipolis without them,
-he was obliged to remain inactive at Eion; while Brasidas on his
-side made no movement out of Amphipolis, but contented himself with
-keeping constant watch over the forces of Kleon, the view of which he
-commanded from his station on the hill of Kerdylion, on the western
-bank of the river-communication with Amphipolis by the bridge.
-Some days elapsed in such inaction on both sides; but the Athenian
-hoplites, becoming impatient of doing nothing, soon began to give
-vent to those feelings of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_464">[p.
-464]</span> dislike which they had brought out from Athens against
-their general, “whose ignorance and cowardice (says the historian)
-they contrasted with the skill and bravery of his opponent.”<a
-id="FNanchor_732" href="#Footnote_732" class="fnanchor">[732]</a>
-Athenian hoplites, if they felt such a sentiment, were not likely
-to refrain from manifesting it; and Kleon was presently made aware
-of the fact in a manner sufficiently painful to force him against
-his will into some movement; which, however, he did not intend to be
-anything else than a march for the purpose of surveying the ground
-all round the city, and a demonstration to escape the appearance of
-doing nothing, being aware that it was impossible to attack the place
-with any effect before his reinforcements arrived.</p>
-
-<p>To comprehend the important incidents which followed, it is
-necessary to say a few words on the topography of Amphipolis, as far
-as we can understand it on the imperfect evidence before us. That
-city was placed on the left bank of the Strymon, on a conspicuous
-hill around which the river makes a bend, first in a southwesterly
-direction, then, after a short course to the southward, back in a
-southeasterly direction. Amphipolis had for its only artificial
-fortification one long wall, which began near the point northeast
-of the town, where the river narrows again into a channel, after
-passing through the lake Kerkinitis, ascended along the eastern
-side of the hill, crossing the ridge which connects it with Mount
-Pangæus, and then descended so as to touch the river again at another
-point south of the town; thus being, as it were, a string to the
-highly-bent bow formed by the river. On three sides therefore, north,
-west, and south, the city was defended only by the Strymon, and was
-thus visible without any intervening wall to spectators from the
-side of the sea (south), as well as from the side of the continent
-(or west and north).<a id="FNanchor_733" href="#Footnote_733"
-class="fnanchor">[733]</a> At some<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_465">[p. 465]</span> little distance below the point where
-the wall touched the river south of the city, was the bridge,<a
-id="FNanchor_734" href="#Footnote_734" class="fnanchor">[734]</a>
-a communication of great importance for the whole country,
-which connected the territory of Amphip<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_466">[p. 466]</span>olis with that of Argilus. On the
-western or right bank of the river, bordering it, and forming an
-outer bend corresponding to the bend of the river, was situated Mount
-Kerdylium: in fact, the course of the Strymon is here determined by
-these two steep eminences, Kerdylium on the west, and the hill of
-Amphipolis on the east, between which it flows. At the time when
-Brasidas first took the place, the bridge was totally unconnected
-with the long city wall; but during the intervening eighteen months,
-he had erected a palisade work—probably an earthen bank topped
-with a palisade—connecting the two. By means of this palisade, the
-bridge was thus at the time of Kleon’s expedition comprehended
-within the fortifications of the city; and Brasidas, while keeping
-watch on Mount Kerdylium, could pass over whenever he chose into
-the city, without any fear of impediment.<a id="FNanchor_735"
-href="#Footnote_735" class="fnanchor">[735]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_467">[p. 467]</span></p>
-
-<p>In the march which Kleon now undertook, he went up to the top of
-the ridge which runs nearly in an easterly direction from Amphipolis
-to Mount Pangæus, in order to survey the city and its adjoining
-ground on the northern and northeastern side which he had not yet
-seen; that is, the side towards the lake, and towards Thrace,<a
-id="FNanchor_736" href="#Footnote_736" class="fnanchor">[736]</a>
-which was not visible from the lower ground near Eion. The road
-which he was to take from Eion lay at a small distance eastward
-of the city long wall, and from the palisade which connected that
-wall with the bridge. But he had no expectation of being attacked
-in his march, the rather as Brasidas with the larger portion of
-his force was visible on Mount Kerdylium: moreover, the gates of
-Amphipolis were all shut, not a man was on the wall, nor were any
-symptoms<span class="pagenum" id="Page_468">[p. 468]</span> of
-movement to be detected. As there was no evidence before him of
-intention to attack, he took no precautions, and marched in careless
-and disorderly array.<a id="FNanchor_737" href="#Footnote_737"
-class="fnanchor">[737]</a> Having reached the top of the ridge,
-and posted his army on the strong eminence fronting the highest
-portion of the Long Wall, he surveyed at leisure the lake before
-him, and the side of the city which lay towards Thrace, or towards
-Myrkinus, Drabêskus, etc., thus viewing all the descending portion
-of the Long Wall northward towards the Strymon. The perfect
-quiescence of the city imposed upon and even astonished him: it
-seemed altogether undefended, and he almost fancied that, if he
-had brought battering-engines, he could have taken it forthwith.<a
-id="FNanchor_738" href="#Footnote_738" class="fnanchor">[738]</a>
-Impressed with the belief that<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_469">[p. 469]</span> there was no enemy prepared to fight,
-he took his time to survey the ground; while his soldiers became more
-and more relaxed and careless in their trim, some even advancing
-close up to the walls and gates.</p>
-
-<p>But this state of affairs was soon materially changed. Brasidas
-knew that the Athenian hoplites would not long endure the tedium
-of absolute inaction, and he calculated that by affecting extreme
-backwardness and apparent fear, he should seduce Kleon into some
-incautious movement of which advantage might be taken. His station on
-Mount Kerdylium enabled him to watch the march of the Athenian army
-from Eion, and when he saw them pass up along the road outside of the
-Long Wall of Amphipolis,<a id="FNanchor_739" href="#Footnote_739"
-class="fnanchor">[739]</a> he immediately crossed the river with
-his forces and entered the town. But it was not his intention to
-march out and offer them open battle; for his army, though equal in
-number to theirs, was extremely inferior in arms and equipment;<a
-id="FNanchor_740" href="#Footnote_740" class="fnanchor">[740]</a>
-in which points the Athenian force now present was so admirably
-provided, that his own men would not think themselves a match for
-it, if the two armies faced each other in open field. He relied
-altogether on the effect of sudden sally and well-timed surprise,
-when the Athenians should have been thrown into a feeling of
-contemptuous security by an exaggerated show of impotence in their
-enemy.</p>
-
-<p>Having offered the battle sacrifice at the temple of Athênê,
-Brasidas called his men together to address to them the usual
-encouragements prior to an engagement. After appealing to the Dorian
-pride of his Peloponnesians, accustomed to triumph over Ionians,
-he explained to them his design of relying upon a bold and sudden
-movement with comparatively small numbers, against the Athenian army
-when not prepared for it,<a id="FNanchor_741" href="#Footnote_741"
-class="fnanchor">[741]</a> when their courage<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_470">[p. 470]</span> was not wound up to battle pitch, and
-when, after carelessly mounting the hill to survey the ground, they
-were thinking only of quietly returning to quarters. He himself at
-the proper moment would rush out from one gate, and be foremost in
-conflict with the enemy: Klearidas, with that bravery which became
-him as a Spartan, would follow the example by sallying out from
-another gate: and the enemy, taken thus unawares, would probably make
-little resistance. For the Amphipolitans, this day and their own
-behavior would determine whether they were to be allies of Lacedæmon,
-or slaves of Athens, perhaps sold into captivity or even put to death
-as a punishment for their recent revolt.</p>
-
-<p>These preparations, however, could not be completed in secrecy;
-for Brasidas and his army were perfectly visible while descending
-the hill of Kerdylium, crossing the bridge and entering Amphipolis,
-to the Athenian scouts without: moreover, so conspicuous was the
-interior of the city to spectators without, that the temple of
-Athênê, and Brasidas with its ministers around him, performing the
-ceremony of sacrifice, was distinctly recognized. The fact was made
-known to Kleon as he stood on the high ridge taking his survey, while
-at the same time those who had gone near to the gates reported that
-the feet of many horses and men were beginning to be seen under them,
-as if preparing for a sally.<a id="FNanchor_742" href="#Footnote_742"
-class="fnanchor">[742]</a> He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_471">[p.
-471]</span> himself went close to the gate, and satisfied himself of
-this circumstance: we must recollect that there was no defender on
-the walls, and no danger from missiles. Anxious to avoid coming to
-any real engagement before his reinforcements should arrive, he at
-once gave orders for retreat, which he thought might be accomplished
-before the attack from within could be fully organized; for he
-imagined that a considerable number of troops would be marched out,
-and ranged in battle order, before the attack was actually begun,
-not dreaming that the sally would be instantaneous, made with a mere
-handful of men. Orders having been proclaimed to wheel to the left,
-and retreat in column on the left flank towards Eion, Kleon, who was
-himself on the top of the hill with the right wing, waited only to
-see his left and centre actually in march on the road to Eion, and
-then directed his right also to wheel to the left and follow them.</p>
-
-<p>The whole Athenian army were thus in full retreat, marching in
-a direction nearly parallel to the Long Wall of Amphipolis, with
-their right or unshielded side exposed to the enemy, when Brasidas,
-looking over the southernmost gates of the Long Wall with his small
-detachment ready marshalled near him, burst out into contemptuous
-exclamations on the disorder of their array.<a id="FNanchor_743"
-href="#Footnote_743" class="fnanchor">[743]</a> “These men will not
-stand us; I see it by the quivering of their spears and of their
-heads. Men who reel about in that way, never stand an assailing
-enemy. Open the gates for me instantly, and let us sally out with
-confidence.”</p>
-
-<p>With that, both the gate of the Long Wall nearest to the palisade,
-and the adjoining gate of the palisade itself, were suddenly thrown
-open, and Brasidas with his one hundred and fifty chosen<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_472">[p. 472]</span> soldiers issued out
-through them to attack the retreating Athenians. Running rapidly
-down the straight road which joined laterally the road towards Eion
-along which the Athenians were marching, he charged their central
-division on the right flank:<a id="FNanchor_744" href="#Footnote_744"
-class="fnanchor">[744]</a> their left wing had already got beyond him
-on the road towards Eion. Taken completely unprepared, conscious of
-their own disorderly array, and astounded at the boldness of their
-enemy, the Athenians of the centre were seized with panic, made not
-the least resistance, and presently fled. Even the Athenian left,
-though not attacked at all, instead of halting to lend assistance,
-shared the panic and fled in disorder. Having thus disorganized this
-part of the army, Brasidas passed along the line to press his attack
-on the Athenian right: but in this movement he was mortally wounded
-and carried off the field, unobserved by his enemies. Meanwhile
-Klearidas, sallying forth from the Thracian gate, had attacked the
-Athenian right on the ridge opposite to him, immediately after it
-began its retreat. But the soldiers on the Athe<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_473">[p. 473]</span>nian right had probably seen the
-previous movement of Brasidas against the other division, and though
-astonished at the sudden danger, had thus a moment’s warning, before
-they were themselves assailed, to halt and take close rank on the
-hill. Klearidas here found a considerable resistance, in spite of the
-desertion of Kleon; who, more astonished than any man in his army by
-a catastrophe so unlooked for, lost his presence of mind and fled
-at once; but was overtaken by a Thracian peltast from Myrkinus and
-slain. His soldiers on the right wing, however, repelled two or three
-attacks in front from Klearidas, and maintained their ground, until
-at length the Chalkidian cavalry and the peltasts from Myrkinus,
-having come forth out of the gates, assailed them with missiles in
-flank and rear so as to throw them into disorder. The whole Athenian
-army was thus put to flight; the left hurrying to Eion, the men of
-the right dispersing and seeking safety among the hilly grounds of
-Pangæus in their rear. Their sufferings and loss in the flight, from
-the hands of the pursuing peltasts and cavalry, were most severe:
-and when they at last again mustered at Eion, not only the commander
-Kleon, but six hundred Athenian hoplites, half of the force sent
-out, were found missing.<a id="FNanchor_745" href="#Footnote_745"
-class="fnanchor">[745]</a></p>
-
-<p>So admirably had the attack been concerted, and so entire was its
-success, that only seven men perished on the side of the victors.
-But of those seven, one was the gallant Brasidas himself, who being
-carried into Amphipolis, lived just long enough to learn the complete
-victory of his troops and then expired. Great and bitter was the
-sorrow which his death occasioned throughout Thrace, especially among
-the Amphipolitans. He received, by special decree, the distinguished
-honor of interment within their city, the universal habit being to
-inter even the most eminent deceased persons in a suburb without
-the walls. All the allies attended his funeral in arms and with
-military honors: his tomb was encircled by a railing, and the space
-immediately fronting it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_474">[p.
-474]</span> was consecrated as the great agora of the city, which was
-remodelled accordingly. He was also proclaimed œkist, or founder, of
-Amphipolis, and as such, received heroic worship with annual games
-and sacrifices to his honor.<a id="FNanchor_746" href="#Footnote_746"
-class="fnanchor">[746]</a> The Athenian Agnon, the real founder and
-originally recognized œkist of the city, was stripped of all his
-commemorative honors and expunged from the remembrance of the people:
-his tomb and the buildings connected with it, together with every
-visible memento of his name, being destroyed. Full of hatred as the
-Amphipolitans now were towards Athens,—and not merely of hatred,
-but of fear, since the loss which they had just sustained of their
-saviour and protector,—they felt repugnance to the idea of rendering
-farther worship to an Athenian œkist. Nor was it convenient to keep
-up such a religious link with Athens, now that they were forced to
-look anxiously to Lacedæmon for assistance. Klearidas, as governor
-of Amphipolis, superintended those numerous alterations in the city
-which this important change required, together with the erection of
-the trophy, just at the spot where Brasidas had first charged the
-Athenians; while the remaining armament of Athens, having obtained
-the usual truce and buried their dead, returned home without farther
-operations.</p>
-
-<p>There are few battles recorded in history wherein the
-disparity and contrast of the two generals opposed has been so
-manifest,—consummate skill and courage on the one side against
-ignorance and panic on the other. On the singular ability and
-courage of Brasidas there can be but one verdict of unqualified
-admiration: but the criticism passed by Thucydidês on Kleon, here
-as elsewhere, cannot be adopted without reserves. He tells us that
-Kleon undertook his march, from Eion up to the hill in front of
-Amphipolis, in the same rash and confident spirit with which he
-had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_475">[p. 475]</span> embarked
-on the enterprise against Pylus, in the blind confidence that no
-one would resist him.<a id="FNanchor_747" href="#Footnote_747"
-class="fnanchor">[747]</a> Now I have already, in a former chapter,
-shown grounds for concluding that the anticipations of Kleon
-respecting the capture of Sphakteria, far from being marked by any
-spirit of unmeasured presumption, were sober and judicious, realized
-to the letter without any unlooked-for aid from fortune. Nor are the
-remarks, here made by Thucydidês on that affair, more reasonable
-than the judgment on it in his former chapter; for it is not true,
-as he here implies, that Kleon expected no resistance in Sphakteria:
-he calculated on resistance, but knew that he had force sufficient
-to overcome it. His fault even at Amphipolis, great as that fault
-was, did not consist in rashness and presumption. This charge at
-least is rebutted by the circumstance, that he himself wished to
-make no aggressive movement until his reinforcements should arrive,
-and that he was only constrained, against his own will, to abandon
-his intended temporary inactivity during that interval, by the angry
-murmurs of his soldiers, who reproached him with ignorance and
-backwardness, the latter quality being the reverse of that with which
-he is branded by Thucydidês.</p>
-
-<p>When Kleon was thus driven to do something, his march up to the
-top of the hill, for the purpose of reconnoitring the ground, was
-not in itself unreasonable, and might have been accomplished in
-perfect safety, if he had kept his army in orderly array, prepared
-for contingencies. But he suffered himself to be completely
-out-generalled and overreached by that simulated consciousness of
-impotence and unwillingness to fight, which Brasidas took care to
-present to him. Among all military stratagems, this has perhaps been
-the most frequently practised with success against inexperienced
-generals, who are thrown off their guard and induced to neglect
-precaution, not because they are naturally more rash or presumptuous
-than ordinary men, but because nothing except either a high order
-of intellect, or special practice and training, will enable a
-man to keep steadily present to his mind<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_476">[p. 476]</span> liabilities even real and serious, when
-there is no discernible evidence to suggest their approach; much more
-when there <i>is</i> positive evidence, artfully laid out by a superior
-enemy, to create belief in their absence. A fault substantially the
-same had been committed by Thucydidês himself and his colleague
-Euklês a year and a half before, when they suffered Brasidas to
-surprise the Strymonian bridge and Amphipolis: not even taking common
-precautions, nor thinking it necessary to keep the fleet at Eion.
-They were not men peculiarly rash and presumptuous, but ignorant and
-unpractised, in a military sense; incapable of keeping before them
-dangerous contingencies which they perfectly knew, simply because
-there was no present evidence of approaching explosion.</p>
-
-<p>This military incompetence, which made Kleon fall into the trap
-laid for him by Brasidas, also made him take wrong measures against
-the danger, when he unexpectedly discovered at last that the enemy
-within were preparing to attack him. His fatal error consisted in
-giving instant order for retreat, under the vain hope that he could
-get away before the enemy’s attack could be brought to bear.<a
-id="FNanchor_748" href="#Footnote_748" class="fnanchor">[748]</a> An
-abler officer, before he commenced the retreating march so close to
-the hostile walls, would have taken care to marshal his men in proper
-array, to warn and address them with the usual harangue, and to wind
-up their courage to the fighting-point: for up to that moment they
-had no idea of being called upon to fight; and the courage of Grecian
-hoplites, taken thus unawares while hurrying to get away in disorder
-visible both to themselves and their enemies, without any of the
-usual preliminaries of battle, was but too apt to prove deficient.
-To turn the right or unshielded flank to the enemy, was unavoidable
-from the direction of the retreating movement; nor is it reasonable
-to blame Kleon for this, as some historians have done, or for causing
-his right wing to move too soon in following the lead of the left, as
-Dr. Arnold seems to think. The grand fault seems to have consisted in
-not waiting to marshal his men and prepare them for standing fight
-during their retreat. Let us add, however, and the remark, if it
-serves to explain Kleon’s idea of being able to get away before he
-was actually assailed, counts<span class="pagenum" id="Page_477">[p.
-477]</span> as a double compliment to the judgment as well as
-boldness of Brasidas, that no other Lacedæmonian general of that
-day perhaps, not even Demosthenês, the most enterprising general of
-Athens, would have ventured upon an attack with so very small a band,
-relying altogether upon the panic produced by his sudden movement.</p>
-
-<p>But the absence of military knowledge and precaution is not the
-worst of Kleon’s faults on this occasion. His want of courage at the
-moment of conflict is yet more lamentable, and divests his end of
-that personal sympathy which would otherwise have accompanied it.
-A commander who has been out-generalled is under a double force of
-obligation to exert and expose himself, to the uttermost, in order to
-retrieve the consequences of his own mistakes. He will thus at least
-preserve his own personal honor, whatever censure he may deserve on
-the score of deficient knowledge and judgment.<a id="FNanchor_749"
-href="#Footnote_749" class="fnanchor">[749]</a></p>
-
-<p>What is said about the disgraceful flight of Kleon himself, must
-be applied, with hardly less severity of criticism, to the Athenian
-hoplites under him. They behaved in a manner altogether unworthy of
-the reputation of their city; especially the left wing, which seems
-to have broken and run away without waiting to be attacked. And when
-we read in Thucydidês, that the men who thus disgraced themselves
-were among the best, and the best-armed hoplites in Athens; that they
-came out unwillingly under Kleon; that they began their scornful
-murmurs against him before he had committed any fault, despising
-him for backwardness when he was yet not strong enough to attempt
-anything serious, and was only manifesting a reasonable prudence in
-waiting the arrival of expected reinforcements; when we read this,
-we shall be led to compare the expedition against Amphipolis with
-former manœuvres respecting the attack of Sphakteria, and to discern
-other causes for its failure besides the military incompetence of
-the commander. These hoplites brought out with them from Athens
-the feelings prevalent among the political adversaries of Kleon.
-The expedition was proposed and carried by him, contrary to their
-wishes: they could not prevent it, but<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_478">[p. 478]</span> their opposition enfeebled it from the
-beginning, kept within too narrow limits the force assigned to it,
-and was one main reason which frustrated its success.</p>
-
-<p>Had Periklês been alive, Amphipolis might perhaps still have been
-lost, since its capture was the fault of the officers employed to
-defend it. But if lost, it would probably have been attacked and
-recovered with the same energy as the revolted Samos had been, with
-the full force and the best generals that Athens could furnish.
-With such an armament under good officers, there was nothing at
-all impracticable in the reconquest of the place; especially as at
-that time it had no defence on three sides except the Strymon, and
-might thus be approached by Athenian ships on that navigable river.
-The armament of Kleon,<a id="FNanchor_750" href="#Footnote_750"
-class="fnanchor">[750]</a> even if his reinforcements had arrived,
-was hardly sufficient for the purpose. But Periklês would have been
-able to concentrate upon it the whole strength of the city, without
-being paralyzed by the contentions of political party: he would have
-seen as clearly as Kleon, that the place could only be recovered by
-force, and that its recovery was the most important object to which
-Athens could devote her energies.</p>
-
-<p>It was thus that the Athenians, partly from political intrigue,
-partly from the incompetence of Kleon, underwent a disastrous
-defeat instead of carrying Amphipolis. But the death of Brasidas
-converted their defeat into a substantial victory. There remained
-no Spartan either like or second to that eminent man, either as a
-soldier or a conciliating politician; none who could replace him
-in the confidence and affection of the allies of Athens in Thrace;
-none who could prosecute those enterprising plans against Athens on
-her unshielded side, which he had first shown<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_479">[p. 479]</span> to be practicable. The fears of Athens,
-and the hopes of Sparta, in respect to the future, disappeared alike
-with him. The Athenian generals, Phormio and Demosthenês, had both
-of them acquired among the Akarnanians an influence personal to
-themselves, apart from their post and from their country: but the
-career of Brasidas, exhibited an extent of personal ascendency and
-admiration, obtained as well as deserved, such as had never before
-been paralleled by any military chieftain in Greece: and Plato
-might well select him as the most suitable historical counterpart
-to the heroic Achilles.<a id="FNanchor_751" href="#Footnote_751"
-class="fnanchor">[751]</a> All the achievements of Brasidas were
-his own individually, with nothing more than bare encouragement,
-sometimes even without encouragement, from his country. And when we
-recollect the strict and narrow routine in which as a Spartan he
-had been educated, so fatal to the development of everything like
-original thought or impulse, and so completely estranged from all
-experience of party or political discussion, we are amazed at his
-resource and flexibility of character, his power of adapting himself
-to new circumstances and new persons, and his felicitous dexterity
-in making himself the rallying-point of opposite political parties
-in each of the various cities which he acquired. The combination “of
-every sort of practical excellence,” valor, intelligence, probity,
-and gentleness of dealing, which his character presented, was never
-forgotten among the subject-allies of Athens, and procured for other
-Spartan officers in subsequent years favorable presumptions, which
-their conduct was seldom found to realize.<a id="FNanchor_752"
-href="#Footnote_752" class="fnanchor">[752]</a> At the time when
-Brasidas perished, in the flower of his age, he was unquestionably
-the first man in Greece; and though it is not given to us to predict
-what he would have become had he lived, we may be sure that the
-future course of the war would have been sensibly modified; perhaps
-even to the advantage of Athens, since she might have had sufficient
-occupation at home to keep her from the disastrous enterprise in
-Sicily.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês seems to take pleasure in setting forth the gallant
-exploits of Brasidas, from the first at Methônê to the last at
-Amphipolis, not less than the dark side of Kleon; both, though in
-different senses, the causes of his banishment. He never<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_480">[p. 480]</span> mentions the latter
-except in connection with some proceeding represented as unwise
-or discreditable. The barbarities which the offended majesty of
-empire thought itself entitled to practise in ancient times against
-dependencies revolted and reconquered, reach their maximum in the
-propositions against Mitylênê and Skiônê: both of them are ascribed
-to Kleon by name as their author. But when we come to the slaughter
-of the Melians, equally barbarous, and worse in respect to grounds of
-excuse, inasmuch as the Melians had never been subjects of Athens, we
-find Thucydidês mentioning the deed without naming the proposer.<a
-id="FNanchor_753" href="#Footnote_753" class="fnanchor">[753]</a></p>
-
-<p>Respecting the foreign policy of Kleon, the facts already narrated
-will enable the reader to form an idea of it as compared with that
-of his opponents. I have shown grounds for believing that Thucydidês
-has forgotten his usual impartiality in criticizing this personal
-enemy; that in regard to Sphakteria, Kleon was really one main
-and indispensable cause of procuring for his country the greatest
-advantage which she obtained throughout the whole war; and that in
-regard to his judgment as advocating the prosecution of war, three
-different times must be distinguished: 1. After the first blockade
-of the hoplites in Sphakteria; 2. After the capture of the island;
-3. After the expiration of the one year truce. On the earliest of
-those three occasions he was wrong, for he seems to have shut the
-door on all possibilities of negotiation, by his manner of dealing
-with the Lacedæmonian envoys. On the second occasion, he had fair and
-plausible grounds to offer on behalf of his opinion, though it turned
-out unfortunate: moreover, at that time, all Athens was warlike, and
-Kleon is not to be treated as the peculiar adviser of that policy.
-On the third and last occasion, after the expiration of the truce,
-the political counsel of Kleon was right, judicious, and truly
-Periklêan, much surpassing in wisdom that of his opponents. We shall
-see in the coming chapters how those opponents managed the affairs
-of the state after his death; how Nikias threw away the interests
-of Athens in the enforcement of the conditions of peace; how Nikias
-and Alkibiadês together shipwrecked the power of their country on
-the shores of Syracuse. And when we judge the demagogue Kleon in
-this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_481">[p. 481]</span> comparison,
-we shall find ground for remarking that Thucydidês is reserved and
-even indulgent towards the errors and vices of other statesmen, harsh
-only towards those of his accuser.</p>
-
-<p>As to the internal policy of Kleon, and his conduct as a
-politician in Athenian constitutional life, we have but little
-trustworthy evidence. There exists, indeed, a portrait of him, drawn
-in colors broad and glaring, most impressive to the imagination, and
-hardly effaceable from the memory; the portrait in the “Knights”
-of Aristophanês. It is through this representation that Kleon has
-been transmitted to posterity, crucified by a poet who admits
-himself to have had a personal grudge against him, just as he has
-been commemorated in the prose of an historian whose banishment he
-had proposed. Of all the productions of Aristophanês, so replete
-with comic genius throughout, the “Knights” is the most consummate
-and irresistible; the most distinct in its character, symmetry,
-and purpose. Looked at with a view to the object of its author,
-both in reference to the audience and to Kleon, it deserves the
-greatest possible admiration, and we are not surprised to learn
-that it obtained the first prize. It displays the maximum of that
-which wit combined with malice can achieve, in covering an enemy
-with ridicule, contempt, and odium. Dean Swift would have desired
-nothing worse, even for Ditton and Winston. The old man, Demos
-of Pnyx, introduced on the stage as personifying the Athenian
-people,—Kleon, brought on as his newly-bought Paphlagonian slave,
-who by coaxing, lying, impudent and false denunciation of others,
-has gained his master’s ear, and heaps ill-usage upon every one
-else, while he enriches himself,—the Knights, or chief members
-of what we may call the Athenian aristocracy, forming the Chorus
-of the piece as Kleon’s pronounced enemies,—the sausage-seller
-from the market-place, who, instigated by Nikias find Demosthenês
-along with these Knights, overdoes Kleon in all his own low arts,
-and supplants him in the favor of Demos; all this, exhibited with
-inimitable vivacity of expression, forms the masterpiece and glory
-of libellous comedy. The effect produced upon the Athenian audience
-when this piece was represented at the Lenæan festival, January
-<small>B.C.</small> 424, about six months after the
-capture of Sphakteria, with Kleon himself and most of the real<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_482">[p. 482]</span> Knights present, must
-have been intense beyond what we can now easily imagine. That Kleon
-could maintain himself after this humiliating exposure, is no small
-proof of his mental vigor and ability. It does not seem to have
-impaired his influence, at least not permanently; for not only do
-we see him the most effective opponent of peace during the next two
-years, but there is ground for believing that the poet himself found
-it convenient to soften his tone towards this powerful enemy.</p>
-
-<p>So ready are most writers to find Kleon guilty, that they are
-satisfied with Aristophanês as a witness against him: though no other
-public man, of any age or nation, has ever been condemned upon such
-evidence. No man thinks of judging Sir Robert Walpole, or Mr. Fox, or
-Mirabeau, from the numerous lampoons put in circulation against them:
-no man will take measure of a political Englishman from Punch, or of
-a Frenchman from the Charivari. The unrivalled comic merit of the
-“Knights” of Aristophanês is only one reason the more for distrusting
-the resemblance of its picture to the real Kleon. We have means too
-of testing the candor and accuracy of Aristophanês by his delineation
-of Sokratês, whom he introduced in the comedy of “Clouds” in the year
-after that of the “Knights.” As a comedy, the “Clouds” stands second
-only to the “Knights”: as a picture of Sokratês, it is little better
-than pure fancy: it is not even a caricature, but a totally different
-person. We may indeed perceive single features of resemblance; the
-bare feet, and the argumentative subtlety, belong to both; but the
-entire portrait is such, that if it bore a different name, no one
-would think of comparing it with Sokratês, whom we know well from
-other sources. With such an analogy before us, not to mention what we
-know generally of the portraits of Periklês by these authors, we are
-not warranted in treating the portrait of Kleon as a likeness, except
-on points where there is corroborative evidence. And we may add, that
-some of the hits against him, where we can accidentally test their
-pertinence, are decidedly not founded in fact; as, for example, where
-the poet accuses Kleon of having deliberately and cunningly robbed
-Demosthenês of his laurels in the enterprise against Sphakteria.<a
-id="FNanchor_754" href="#Footnote_754" class="fnanchor">[754]</a></p>
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_483">[p. 483]</span></p> <p>In
-the prose of Thucydidês, we find Kleon described as a dishonest
-politician, a wrongful accuser of others, the most violent of
-all the citizens:<a id="FNanchor_755" href="#Footnote_755"
-class="fnanchor">[755]</a> throughout the verse of Aristophanês,
-these same charges are set forth with his characteristic emphasis,
-but others are also superadded; Kleon practises the basest artifices
-and deceptions to gain favor with the people, steals the public
-money, receives bribes, and extorts compositions from private persons
-by wholesale, and thus enriches himself under pretence of zeal for
-the public treasury. In the comedy of the Acharnians, represented
-one year earlier than the Knights, the poet alludes with great
-delight to a sum of five talents, which Kleon had been compelled
-“to disgorge”: a present tendered to him by the insular subjects of
-Athens, if we may believe Theopompus, for the purpose of procuring
-a remission of their tribute, and which the Knights, whose evasions
-of military service he had exposed, compelled him to relinquish.<a
-id="FNanchor_756" href="#Footnote_756" class="fnanchor">[756]</a></p>
-
-<p>But when we put together the different heads of indictment
-accumulated by Aristophanês, it will be found that they are not
-easily reconcilable one with the other; for an Athenian, whose temper
-led him to violent crimination of others, at the inevitable price
-of multiplying and exasperating personal enemies, would find it
-peculiarly dangerous, if not impossible, to carry on peculation for
-his own account. If, on the other hand, he took the latter turn, he
-would be inclined to purchase connivance from others even by winking
-at real guilt on their part, far from making himself conspicuous
-as a calumniator of innocence. We must therefore discuss the side
-of the indictment which is indicated in Thucydidês; not Kleon, as
-truckling to the people and cheating for his own pecuniary profit
-(which is certainly not the character implied in his speech about
-the Mitylenæans, as given<span class="pagenum" id="Page_484">[p.
-484]</span> to us by the historian),<a id="FNanchor_757"
-href="#Footnote_757" class="fnanchor">[757]</a> but Kleon as a man of
-violent temper and fierce political antipathies, a bitter speaker,
-and sometimes dishonest in his calumnies against adversaries. These
-are the qualities which, in all countries of free debate, go to
-form what is called a great opposition speaker. It was thus that
-the elder Cato, “the universal biter, whom Persephonê was afraid
-even to admit into Hades after his death,” was characterized at
-Rome, even by the admission of his admirers to some extent, and in
-a still stronger manner by those who were unfriendly to him, as
-Thucydidês was to Kleon.<a id="FNanchor_758" href="#Footnote_758"
-class="fnanchor">[758]</a> In Cato, such a temper was not<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_485">[p. 485]</span> inconsistent with
-a high sense of public duty. And Plutarch recounts an anecdote
-respecting Kleon, that, on first beginning his political career,
-he called his friends together, and dissolved his intimacy with
-them, conceiving that private friendships would distract him
-from his paramount duty to the commonwealth.<a id="FNanchor_759"
-href="#Footnote_759" class="fnanchor">[759]</a></p>
-
-<p>Moreover, the reputation of Kleon as a frequent and unmeasured
-accuser of others, may be explained partly by a passage of his enemy
-Aristophanês: a passage the more deserving of confidence as a just
-representation of fact, since it appears in a comedy (the “Frogs”)
-represented (405 <small>B.C.</small>) fifteen years after
-the death of Kleon, and five years after that of Hyperbolus, when
-the poet had less motive for misrepresentations against either. In
-the “Frogs,” the scene is laid in Hades, whither the god Dionysus
-goes, in the attire of Hêraklês and along with his slave Xanthias,
-for the purpose of bringing up again to earth the deceased poet
-Euripidês. Among the incidents, Xanthias, in the attire which his
-master had worn, is represented as acting with violence and insult
-towards two hostesses of eating-houses; consuming their substance,
-robbing them, refusing to pay when called upon, and even threatening
-their lives with a drawn sword. Upon which the women, having no other
-redress left, announce their resolution of calling, the one upon her
-protector Kleon, the other on Hyperbolus, for the purpose of bringing
-the offender to justice before the dikastery.<a id="FNanchor_760"
-href="#Footnote_760" class="fnanchor">[760]</a> This passage shows
-us, if inferences on comic evidence are to be held as admissible,
-that Kleon and Hyperbolus became involved in accusations partly
-by helping poor persons who had been wronged to obtain justice
-before the dikastery. A rich man who had suffered injury might
-apply<span class="pagenum" id="Page_486">[p. 486]</span> to Antipho
-or some other rhetor for paid advice and aid as to the conduct
-of his complaint; but a poor man or woman would think themselves
-happy to obtain the gratuitous suggestion, and sometimes the
-auxiliary speech, of Kleon or Hyperbolus; who would thus extend
-their own popularity, by means very similar to those practised by
-the leading men in Rome.<a id="FNanchor_761" href="#Footnote_761"
-class="fnanchor">[761]</a></p>
-
-<p>But besides lending aid to others, doubtless Kleon was often also
-a prosecutor, in his own name, of official delinquents, real or
-alleged. That some one should undertake this duty was indispensable
-for the protection of the city; otherwise, the responsibility to
-which official persons were subjected after their term of office
-would have been merely nominal: and we have proof enough that
-the general public morality of these official persons, acting
-individually, was by no means high. But the duty was at the same
-time one which most persons would and did shun. The prosecutor,
-while obnoxious to general dislike, gained nothing even by the
-most complete success; and if he failed so much as not to procure
-a minority of votes among the dikasts, equal to one-fifth of the
-numbers present, he was condemned to pay a fine of one thousand
-drachms. What was still more serious, he drew upon himself a
-formidable mass of private hatred, from the friends, partisans, and
-the political club, of the accused party, extremely menacing to his
-own future security and comfort, in a community like Athens. There
-was therefore little motive to accept, and great motive to decline,
-the task of prosecuting on public grounds. A prudent politician at
-Athens would undertake it occasionally, and against special rivals,
-but he would carefully guard himself against the reputation of doing
-it frequently or by inclination, and the orators constantly do so
-guard themselves in those speeches which yet remain.</p>
-
-<p>It is this reputation which Thucydidês fastens upon Kleon, and
-which, like Cato the censor at Rome, he probably merited; from native
-acrimony of temper, from a powerful talent for invective<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_487">[p. 487]</span> and from his position,
-both inferior and hostile to the Athenian knights, or aristocracy,
-who overshadowed him by their family importance. But in what
-proportion of cases his accusations were just or calumnious, the
-real question upon which a candid judgment turns, we have no
-means of deciding, either in his case or that of Cato. “To lash
-the wicked (observes Aristophanês himself<a id="FNanchor_762"
-href="#Footnote_762" class="fnanchor">[762]</a>) is not only no
-blame, but is even a matter of honor to the good.” It has not been
-common to allow to Kleon the benefit of this observation, though he
-is much more entitled to it than Aristophanês. For the attacks of a
-poetical libeller admit neither of defence nor retaliation; whereas a
-prosecutor before the dikastery found his opponent prepared to reply
-or even to retort, and was obliged to specify his charge, as well
-as to furnish proof of it; so that there was a fair chance for the
-innocent man not to be confounded with the guilty.</p>
-
-<p>The quarrel of Kleon with Aristophanês is said to have arisen
-out of an accusation which he brought against that poet<a
-id="FNanchor_763" href="#Footnote_763" class="fnanchor">[763]</a>
-in the Senate of Five Hundred, on the subject of his second comedy,
-the “Babylonians,” exhibited <small>B.C.</small> 426, at
-the festival of the urban Dionysia in the month of March. At that
-season many strangers were present at Athens, and especially many
-visitors and deputies from the subject-allies, who were bringing
-their annual tribute: and as the “Babylonians,” (now lost), like
-so many other productions of Aristophanês, was full of slashing
-ridicule, not only against individual citizens but against the
-functionaries and institutions of the city,<a id="FNanchor_764"
-href="#Footnote_764" class="fnanchor">[764]</a> Kleon instituted a
-complaint against it in the senate, as an exposure dangerous to the
-public<span class="pagenum" id="Page_488">[p. 488]</span> security
-before strangers and allies. We have to recollect that Athens was
-then in the midst of an embarrassing war; that the fidelity of her
-subject-allies was much doubted; that Lesbos, the greatest of her
-allies, had been reconquered only in the preceding year, after a
-revolt both troublesome and perilous to the Athenians. Under such
-circumstances, Kleon had good reason for thinking that a political
-comedy of the Aristophanic vein and talent tended to degrade the
-city in the eyes of strangers, even granting that it was innocuous
-when confined to the citizens themselves. The poet complains<a
-id="FNanchor_765" href="#Footnote_765" class="fnanchor">[765]</a>
-that Kleon summoned him before the senate, with terrible threats
-and calumny: but it does not appear that any penalty was inflicted.
-Nor, indeed, had the senate competence to find him guilty or punish
-him except to the extent of a small fine: they could only bring him
-to trial before the dikastery, which in this case plainly was not
-done. He himself, however, seems to have felt the justice of the
-warning: for we find that three out of his four next following plays,
-before the Peace of Nikias,—the Acharnians, the Knights, and the
-Wasps,—were represented at the Lenæan festival,<a id="FNanchor_766"
-href="#Footnote_766" class="fnanchor">[766]</a> in the month of
-January, a season when no strangers nor allies were present. Kleon
-was doubtless much incensed with the play of the Knights, and seems
-to have annoyed the poet either by bringing an indictment against him
-for exercising freemen’s rights without being duly qualified, since
-none but citizens were allowed to appear and<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_489">[p. 489]</span> act in the dramatic exhibitions, or by
-some other means which are not clearly explained. Nor can we make
-out in what way the poet met him, though it appears that finding
-less public sympathy than he thought himself entitled to, he made
-an apology without intending to be bound by it.<a id="FNanchor_767"
-href="#Footnote_767" class="fnanchor">[767]</a> Certain it is, that
-his remaining plays subsequent to the Knights, though containing some
-few bitter jests against Kleon, manifest no second deliberate set
-against him.</p>
-
-<p>The battle of Amphipolis removed at once the two most pronounced
-individual opponents of peace, Kleon and Brasidas. Athens too was
-more than ever discouraged and averse to prolonged fighting; for the
-number of hoplites slain at Amphipolis doubtless filled the city
-with mourning, besides the unparalleled disgrace now tarnishing
-Athenian soldiership. The peace-party under the auspices of Nikias
-and Lachês, relieved at once from the internal opposition of Kleon,
-as well as from the foreign enterprise of Brasidas, were enabled
-to resume their negotiations with Sparta in a spirit promising
-success. King Pleistoanax, and the Spartan ephors of the year, were
-on their side equally bent on terminating the war, and the deputies
-of all the allies were convoked at Sparta for discussion with the
-envoys of Athens. Such discussion was continued during the whole
-autumn and winter after the battle of Amphipolis, without any actual
-hostilities on either side. At first, the pretensions advanced were
-found very conflicting; but at length, after several debates, it was
-agreed to treat upon the basis of each party surrendering what had
-been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_490">[p. 490]</span> acquired by
-war. The Athenians insisted at first on the restoration of Platæa;
-but the Thebans replied that Platæa was theirs neither by force
-nor by treason, but by voluntary capitulation and surrender of the
-inhabitants. This distinction seems to our ideas somewhat remarkable,
-since the capitulation of a besieged town is not less the result
-of force than capture by storm. But it was adopted in the present
-treaty; and under it the Athenians, while foregoing their demand
-of Platæa, were enabled to retain Nisæa, which they had acquired
-from the Megarians, and Anaktorium and Sollium,<a id="FNanchor_768"
-href="#Footnote_768" class="fnanchor">[768]</a> which they had taken
-from Corinth. To insure accommodating temper on the part of Athens,
-the Spartans held out the threat of invading Attica in the spring,
-and of establishing a permanent fortification in the territory: and
-they even sent round proclamation to their allies, enjoining all the
-details requisite for this step. Since Attica had now been exempt
-from invasion for three years, the Athenians were probably not
-insensible to this threat of renewal under a permanent form.</p>
-
-<p>At the beginning of spring, about the end of March, 421
-<small>B.C.</small>, shortly after the urban Dionysia at Athens,
-the important treaty was concluded for the term of fifty years. The
-following were its principal conditions:—</p>
-
-<p>1. All shall have full liberty to visit all the public temples of
-Greece, for purposes of private sacrifice, consultation of oracle,
-or public sacred mission. Every man shall be undisturbed both in
-going and coming. [The value of this article will be felt, when we
-recollect that the Athenians and their allies had been unable to
-visit the Olympic or Pythian festival since the beginning of the
-war.]</p>
-
-<p>2. The Delphians shall enjoy full autonomy and mastery of their
-temple and their territory. [This article was intended to exclude the
-ancient claim of the Phocian confederacy to the<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_491">[p. 491]</span> management of the temple; a claim which
-the Athenians had once supported, before the thirty years’ truce: but
-they had now little interest in the matter, since the Phocians were
-in the ranks of their enemies.]</p>
-
-<p>3. There shall be peace for fifty years, between Athens and Sparta
-with their respective allies, with abstinence from mischief, either
-overt or fraudulent, by land as well as by sea.</p>
-
-<p>4. Neither party shall invade for purposes of mischief the
-territory of the other, not by any artifice or under any pretence.</p>
-
-<p>Should any subject of difference arise, it shall be settled by
-equitable means, and by oaths tendered and taken, in form to be
-hereafter agreed on.</p>
-
-<p>5. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall restore Amphipolis to
-the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p>They shall farther <i>relinquish</i> to the Athenians Argilus,
-Stageirus, Akanthus, Skôlus, Olynthus, and Spartôlus. But these
-cities shall remain autonomous, on condition of paying tribute to
-Athens according to the assessment of Aristeidês. Any of their
-citizens who may choose to quit them shall be at liberty to do so,
-and to carry away his property. Nor shall the cities be counted
-hereafter either as allies of Athens or of Sparta, unless Athens
-shall induce them by amicable persuasions to become her allies, which
-she is at liberty to do if she can.</p>
-
-<p>The inhabitants of Mekyberna, Sanê, and Singê, shall dwell
-independently in their respective cities, just as much as the
-Olynthians and Akanthians. [These were towns which adhered to Athens,
-and were still numbered as her allies; though they were near enough
-to be molested by Olynthus<a id="FNanchor_769" href="#Footnote_769"
-class="fnanchor">[769]</a> and Akanthus, against which this clause
-was intended to insure them.]</p> <p><span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_492">[p. 492]</span></p> <p>The Lacedæmonians and their
-allies shall also restore Panaktum to the Athenians.</p>
-
-<p>6. The Athenians shall restore to Sparta Koryphasium, Kythêra,
-Methônê, Pteleum, Atalantê, with all the captives in their hands from
-Sparta or her allies. They shall farther release all Spartans or
-allies of Sparta now blocked up in Skiônê.</p>
-
-<p>7. The Lacedæmonians and their allies shall also restore all the
-captives in their hands, from Athens or her allies.</p>
-
-<p>8. Respecting Skiônê, Torônê, Sermylus, or any other town in the
-possession of Athens, the Athenians may take their own measures.</p>
-
-<p>9. Oaths shall be exchanged between the contracting parties,
-according to the solemnities held most binding in each city
-respectively, and in the following words: “I will adhere to this
-convention and truce sincerely and without fraud.” The oaths shall
-be annually renewed, and the terms of peace shall be inscribed on
-columns at Olympia, Delphi, and the Isthmus, as well as at Sparta and
-Athens.</p>
-
-<p>10. Should any matter have been forgotten in the present
-convention, the Athenians and Lacedæmonians may alter it by mutual
-understanding and consent, without being held to violate their
-oaths.</p>
-
-<p>These oaths were accordingly exchanged: they were taken by
-seventeen principal Athenians, and as many Spartans, on behalf of
-their respective countries, on the 26th day of the month Artemisius
-at Sparta, and on the 24th day of Elaphebolion at Athens, immediately
-after the urban Dionysia; Pleistolas being ephor eponymus at
-Sparta, and Alkæus archon eponymus at Athens.<span class="pagenum"
-id="Page_493">[p. 493]</span> Among the Lacedæmonians swearing, are
-included the two kings Agis and Pleistoanax, the ephor Pleistolas,
-and perhaps other ephors, but this we do not know, and Tellis, the
-father of Brasidas. Among the Athenians sworn, are comprised Nikias,
-Lachês, Agnon, Lamachus, and Demosthenês.<a id="FNanchor_770"
-href="#Footnote_770" class="fnanchor">[770]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such was the peace—commonly known by the name of the Peace of
-Nikias—concluded in the beginning of the eleventh spring of the
-war, which had just lasted ten full years. Its conditions were
-put to the vote at Sparta, in the assembly of deputies from the
-Lacedæmonian allies, the majority of whom accepted them: which,
-according to the condition adopted and sworn to by every member
-of the confederacy,<a id="FNanchor_771" href="#Footnote_771"
-class="fnanchor">[771]</a> made it binding upon all. There was,
-indeed, a special reserve allowed to any particular state in case
-of religious scruple, arising out of the fear of offending some of
-their gods or heroes, but, saving this reserve, the peace had been
-formally acceded to by the decision of the confederates. But it soon
-appeared how little the vote of the majority was worth, even when
-enforced by the strong pressure of Lacedæmon herself, when the more
-powerful members were among the dissentient minority. The Bœotians,
-Megarians, and Corinthians, all refused to accept it; nor does it
-seem that any deputies from the allies took the oath along with the
-Lacedæmonian envoys; though the truce for a year, two years before,<a
-id="FNanchor_772" href="#Footnote_772" class="fnanchor">[772]</a> had
-been sworn to by Lacedæmonian, Corinthian, Megarian, Sikyonian, and
-Epidaurian envoys.</p>
-
-<p>The Corinthians were displeased because they did not recover
-Sollium and Anaktorium; the Megarians, because they did not regain
-Nisæa; the Bœotians, because they were required to surrender
-Panaktum. In spite of the urgent solicitations of Sparta, the
-deputies of all these powerful states not only denounced the<span
-class="pagenum" id="Page_494">[p. 494]</span> peace as unjust,
-and voted against it in the general assembly of allies, but
-refused to accept it when the vote was carried, and went home to
-their respective cities for instructions.<a id="FNanchor_773"
-href="#Footnote_773" class="fnanchor">[773]</a></p>
-
-<p>Such were the conditions, and such the accompanying circumstances,
-of the Peace of Nikias, which terminated, or professed to terminate,
-the great Peloponnesian war, after a duration of ten years.
-Its consequences and fruits, in many respects such as were not
-anticipated by either of the concluding parties, will be seen in my
-next volume.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="footnotes">
-
-<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_1"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_1">[1]</a></span> Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 5, 18.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_2"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_2">[2]</a></span> Thucyd. v. 30: about the Spartan
-confederacy,—εἰρημένον, κύριον εἶναι, ὅ,τι ἂν τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ξυμμάχων
-ψηφίσηται, ἢν μή τι θεῶν ἢ ἡρώων κώλυμα ᾖ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_3"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_3">[3]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 63. τῆς τε πόλεως ὑμᾶς
-εἰκὸς τῷ τιμωμένῳ ἀπὸ τοῦ ἄρχειν, ᾧπερ ἅπαντες ἀγάλλεσθε, βοηθεῖν,
-καὶ μὴ φεύγειν τοὺς πόνους, ἢ μηδὲ τὰς τιμὰς διώκειν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_4"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_4">[4]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 12.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_5"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_5">[5]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_6"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_6">[6]</a></span> Aristophan. Vesp. 707.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_7"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_7">[7]</a></span> The island of Kythêra was conquered
-by the Athenians from Sparta in 425 <small>B.C.</small>,
-and the annual tribute then imposed upon it was four talents (Thucyd.
-iv, 57). In the Inscription No. 143, ap. Boeckh, Corp. Inscr., we
-find some names enumerated of tributary towns, with the amount of
-tribute opposite to each, but the stone is too much damaged to give
-us much information. Tyrodiza, in Thrace, paid one thousand drachms:
-some other towns, or junctions of towns, not clearly discernible,
-are rated at one thousand, two thousand, three thousand drachms, one
-talent, and even ten talents. This inscription must be anterior to
-415 <small>B.C.</small>, when the tribute was converted
-into a five per cent. duty upon imports and exports: see Boeckh,
-Public Econ. of Athens, and his Notes upon the above-mentioned
-Inscription.</p>
-
-<p>It was the practice of Athens not always to rate each tributary
-city separately, but sometimes to join several in one collective
-rating; probably each responsible for the rest. This seems to have
-provoked occasional remonstrances from the allies, in some of which
-the rhetor, Antipho, was employed to furnish the speech which the
-complainants pronounced before the dikastery: see Antipho ap.
-Harpokration, v. Ἀπόταξις—Συντελεῖς. It is greatly to be lamented
-that the orations composed by Antipho, for the Samothrakians and
-Lindians,—the latter inhabiting one of the three separate towns in
-the island of Rhodes,—have not been preserved.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_8"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_8">[8]</a></span> Xenophon, Anab. vii, 1, 27. οὐ
-μεῖον χιλίων ταλάντων: compare Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, b.
-iii, ch. 7, 15, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_9"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_9">[9]</a></span> Aristophan. Vesp. 660. τάλαντ᾽
-ἐγγὺς δισχίλια.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_10"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_10">[10]</a></span> Very excellent writers on
-Athenian antiquity (Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, c. 15, 19, b.
-iii; Schömann, Antiq. J. P. Att. sect. lxxiv; K. F. Hermann, Gr.
-Staatsalterthümer, sect. 157: compare, however, a passage in Boeckh,
-ch. 17, p. 421, Eng. transl., where he seems to be of an opposite
-opinion) accept this statement, that the tribute levied by Athenians
-upon her allies was doubled some years after the commencement of the
-Peloponnesian war,—at which time it was six hundred talents,—and
-that it came to amount to twelve hundred talents. Nevertheless, I
-cannot follow them, upon the simple authority of Æschinês, and the
-Pseudo-Andokidês (Æschin. De Fals. Legat. c. 54, p. 301; Andokidês,
-De Pace, c. 1, and the same orator cont. Alkibiad. c. 4). For we
-may state pretty confidently, that neither of the two orations here
-ascribed to Andokidês is genuine: the oration against Alkibiadês
-most decidedly not genuine. There remains, therefore, as an original
-evidence, only the passage of Æschinês, which has, apparently, been
-copied by the author of the Oration De Pace, ascribed to Andokidês.
-Now the chapter of Æschinês, which professes to furnish a general
-but brief sketch of Athenian history for the century succeeding
-the Persian invasion, is so full of historical and chronological
-inaccuracies, that we can hardly accept it, when standing alone,
-as authority for any matter of fact. In a note on the chapter
-immediately preceding, I have already touched upon its extraordinary
-looseness of statement,—pointed out by various commentators, among
-them particularly by Mr. Fynes Clinton: see above, chap. xlv, note
-<sup>2</sup>, pp. 409-411, in the preceding volume.</p>
-
-<p>The assertion, therefore, that the tribute from the Athenian
-allies was raised to the sum of twelve hundred talents annually,
-comes to us only from the orator Æschinês as an original witness: and
-in him it forms part of a tissue of statements alike confused and
-incorrect. But against it we have a powerful negative argument,—the
-perfect silence of Thucydidês. Is it possible that that historian
-would have omitted all notice of a step so very important in
-its effects, if Athens had really adopted it? He mentions to us
-the commutation by Athens of the tribute from her allies into
-a duty of five per cent. payable by them on their exports and
-imports (vii, 28)—this was in the nineteenth year of the war, 413
-<small>B.C.</small> But anything like the duplication of the tribute
-all at once, would have altered much more materially the relations
-between Athens and her allies and would have constituted in the
-minds of the latter a substantive grievance, such as to aggravate
-the motive for revolt in a manner which Thucydidês could hardly
-fail to notice. The orator Æschinês refers the augmentation of the
-tribute, up to twelve hundred talents, to the time succeeding the
-peace of Nikias: M. Boeckh (Public Econ. of Athens, b. iii, ch.
-15-19, pp. 400-434) supposes it to have taken place earlier than the
-representation of the Vespæ of Aristophanês, that is, about three
-years before that peace, or 423 <small>B.C.</small> But this would
-have been just before the time of the expedition of Brasidas into
-Thrace, and his success in exciting revolt among the dependencies of
-Athens: if Athens had doubled her tribute upon all the allies, just
-before that expedition, Thucydidês could not have omitted to mention
-it, as increasing the chances of success to Brasidas, and helping to
-determine the resolutions of the Akanthians and others, which were by
-no means adopted unanimously or without hesitation, to revolt.</p>
-
-<p>In reference to the oration called that of Andokidês against
-Alkibiadês, I made some remarks in the fourth volume of this History
-(vol. iv, ch. xxxi, p. 151), tending to show it to be spurious and of
-a time considerably later than that to which it purports to belong. I
-will here add one other remark, which appears to me decisive, tending
-to the same conclusion.</p>
-
-<p>The oration professes to be delivered in a contest of ostracism
-between Nikias, Alkibiadês, and the speaker: one of the three,
-he says, must necessarily be ostracized, and the question is, to
-determine which of the three: accordingly, the speaker dwells upon
-many topics calculated to raise a bad impression of Alkibiadês, and a
-favorable impression of himself.</p>
-
-<p>Among the accusations against Alkibiadês, one is, that after
-having recommended, in the assembly of the people, that the
-inhabitants of Melos should be sold as slaves, he had himself
-purchased a Melian woman among the captives, and had had a son by
-her: it was criminal, argues the speaker, to beget offspring by a
-woman whose relations he had contributed to cause to be put to death,
-and whose city he had contributed to ruin (c. 8).</p>
-
-<p>Upon this argument I do not here touch, any farther than to bring
-out the point of chronology. The speech, if delivered at all, must
-have been delivered, at the earliest, nearly a year after the capture
-of Melos by the Athenians: it may be of later date, but it <i>cannot
-possibly be earlier</i>.</p>
-
-<p>Now Melos surrendered in the winter immediately preceding
-the great expedition of the Athenians to Sicily in 415
-<small>B.C.</small>, which expedition sailed about midsummer (Thucyd.
-v, 116; vi, 30). Nikias and Alkibiadês both went as commanders of
-that expedition: the latter was recalled to Athens for trial on the
-charge of impiety about three months afterwards, but escaped in the
-way home, was condemned and sentenced to banishment in his absence,
-and did not return to Athens until 407 <small>B.C.</small>, long
-after the death of Nikias, who continued in command of the Athenian
-armament in Sicily, enjoying the full esteem of his countrymen, until
-its complete failure and ruin before Syracuse,—and perished himself
-afterwards as a Syracusan prisoner.</p>
-
-<p>Taking these circumstances together, it will at once be seen
-that there never can have been any time, ten months or more
-after the capture of Melos, when Nikias and Alkibiadês <i>could</i>
-have been exposed to a vote of ostracism at Athens. The thing is
-absolutely impossible: and the oration in which such historical and
-chronological incompatibilities are embodied, must be spurious:
-furthermore, it must have been composed long after the pretended
-time of delivery, when the chronological series of events had been
-forgotten.</p>
-
-<p>I may add that the story of this duplication of the tribute by
-Alkibiadês is virtually contrary to the statement of Plutarch,
-probably borrowed from Æschinês, who states that the demagogues
-<i>gradually</i> increased (κατὰ μικρὸν) the tribute to thirteen hundred
-talents (Plutarch, Aristeid. c. 24).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_11"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_11">[11]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 13.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_12"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_12">[12]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 80. The foresight of
-the Athenian people, in abstaining from immediate use of public money
-and laying it up for future wants, would be still more conspicuously
-demonstrated, if the statement of Æschinês, the orator, were true,
-that they got together seven thousand talents between the peace
-of Nikias and the Sicilian expedition. M. Boeckh believes this
-statement, and says: “It is not impossible that one thousand talents
-might have been laid by every year, as the amount of tribute received
-was so considerable.” (Public Economy of Athens, ch. xx. p. 446, Eng.
-Trans.) I do not believe the statement: but M. Boeckh and others, who
-do admit it, ought in fairness to set it against the many remarks
-which they pass in condemnation of the democratical prodigality.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_13"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_13">[13]</a></span> Thucyd. i. 122-143; ii, 13. The
-πεντηκοστὴ, or duty of two per cent. upon imports and exports at
-the Peiræus, produced to the state a revenue of thirty-six talents
-in the year in which it was farmed by Andokidês, somewhere about
-400 <small>B.C.</small>, after the restoration of the
-democracy at Athens from its defeat and subversion at the close of
-the Peloponnesian war (Andokidês de Mysteriis, c. 23, p. 65). This
-was at a period of depression in Athenian affairs, and when trade was
-doubtless not near so good as it had been during the earlier part of
-the Peloponnesian war.</p>
-
-<p>It seems probable that this must have been the most considerable
-permanent source of Athenian revenue next to the tribute; though we
-do not know what rate of customs-duty was imposed at the Peiræus
-during the Peloponnesian war. Comparing together the two passages
-of Xenophon (Republ. Ath. 1, 17, and Aristophan. Vesp. 657), we may
-suppose that the regular and usual rate of duty was one per cent. or
-one ἑκατοστὴ,—while in case of need this may have been doubled or
-tripled.—τὰς πολλὰς ἑκατοστάς, (see Boeckh, b. iii, chs. 1-4, pp.
-298-318, Eng. Trans.) The amount of revenue derived even from this
-source, however, can have borne no comparison to the tribute.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_14"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_14">[14]</a></span> By Periklês, Thucyd. ii, 63. By
-Kleon, Thucyd. iii, 37. By the envoys at Melos, v, 89. By Euphemus,
-vi, 85. By the hostile Corinthians, i, 124 as a matter of course.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_15"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_15">[15]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês. c. 20.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_16"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_16">[16]</a></span> Plutarch, Kimon. c. 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_17"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_17">[17]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 19, 20.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_18"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_18">[18]</a></span> Xenophon, Rep. Ath. ii, 16. τὴν
-μὲν οὐσίαν ταῖς νήσοις παρατίθενται, πιστεύοντες τῇ ἀρχῇ τῇ κατὰ
-θάλασσαν· τὴν δὲ Ἀττικὴν γῆν περιορῶσι τεμνομένην, γιγνώσκοντες
-ὅτι εἰ αὐτὴν ἐλεήσουσιν, ἑτέρων ἀγαθῶν μειζόνων στερήσονται.</p>
-
-<p>Compare also Xenophon (Memorabil. ii, 8, 1, and Symposion, iv,
-31).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_19"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_19">[19]</a></span> See the case of the free laborer
-and the husbandman at Naxos, Plato, Euthyphro, c. 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_20"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_20">[20]</a></span> Thucyd. i. 100.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_21"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_21">[21]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 105; Marcellinus,
-Vit. Thucyd. c. 19. See Rotscher, Leben des Thukydides, ch. i, 4, p.
-96, who gives a genealogy of Thucydidês, as far as it can be made
-out with any probability. The historian was connected by blood with
-Miltiadês and Kimon, as well as with Olorus, king of one of the
-Thracian tribes, whose daughter Hegesipylê was wife of Miltiadês, the
-conqueror of Marathon. In this manner, therefore, he belonged to one
-of the ancient heroic families of Athens, and even of Greece, being
-an Ækid through Ajax and Philæus (Marcellin. c. 2).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_22"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_22">[22]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 102; v, 6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_23"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_23">[23]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 35.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_24"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_24">[24]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 11, 12; Strabo. vi,
-264: Plutarch, Periklês, c. 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_25"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_25">[25]</a></span> The Athenians pretended to no
-subject allies beyond the Ionian gulf, Thucyd. vi, 14: compare
-vi, 45, 104; vii, 34. Thucydidês does not even mention Thurii,
-in his catalogue of the allies of Athens at the beginning of the
-Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. ii, 15).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_26"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_26">[26]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_27"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_27">[27]</a></span> Compare the speech of Nikias, in
-reference to the younger citizens and partisans of Alkibiadês sitting
-together near the latter in the assembly,—οὓς ἐγὼ ὁρῶν νῦν ἐνθάδε
-τῷ αὐτῷ ἀνδρὶ <em class="gesperrt">παρακελευστοὺς καθημένους</em>
-φοβοῦμαι, καὶ τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις ἀντιπαρακελεύομαι μὴ καταισχυνθῆναι,
-εἴ τῴ τις παρακάθηται τῶνδε, etc. (Thucyd. vi, 13.) See also
-Aristophanês, Ekklesiaz. 298, <i>seq.</i>, about partisans sitting near
-together.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_28"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_28">[28]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 8. Ὅταν
-ἐγὼ καταβάλω παλαίων, ἐκεῖνος ἀντιλέγων ὡς οὐ πέπτωκε, νικᾷ, καὶ
-μεταπείθει τοὺς ὁρῶντας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_29"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_29">[29]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11. ἡ δ᾽
-ἐκείνων ἅμιλλα καὶ φιλοτιμία τῶν ἀνδρῶν βαθυτάτην τομὴν τεμοῦσα τῆς
-πόλεως, τὸ μὲν δῆμον, τὸ δ᾽ ὀλίγους ἐποίησε καλεῖσθαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_30"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_30">[30]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 12.
-διέβαλλον ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις βοῶντες, ὡς ὁ μὲν δῆμος ἀδοξεῖ καὶ κακῶς
-ἀκούει τὰ κοινὰ τῶν Ἑλλήνων χρήματα πρὸς αὑτὸν ἐκ Δήλου μεταγαγών,
-ἣ δ᾽ ἔνεστιν αὐτῷ πρὸς τοὺς ἐγκαλοῦντας εὐπρεπεστάτη τῶν προφάσεων,
-δείσαντα τοὺς βαρβάρους ἐκεῖθεν ἀνελέσθαι καὶ φυλάττειν ἐν ὀχυρῷ τὰ
-κοινά, ταύτην ἀνῄρηκε Περικλῆς, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Compare the speech of the Lesbians, and their complaints against
-Athens, at the moment of their revolt in the fourth year of the
-Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. iii, 10); where a similar accusation is
-brought forward,—ἐπειδὴ δὲ ἑωρῶμεν αὐτοὺς (the Athenians) τὴν μὲν
-τοῦ Μήδου ἔχθραν ἀνιέντας, τὴν δὲ τῶν ξυμμάχων δούλωσιν ἐπαγομένους,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_31"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_31">[31]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 20.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_32"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_32">[32]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 10.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_33"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_33">[33]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11-14.
-Τέλος δὲ πρὸς τὸν Θουκυδίδην <em class="gesperrt">εἰς ἀγῶνα</em> περὶ
-τοῦ ὀστράκου καταστὰς <em class="gesperrt">καὶ διακινδυνεύσας</em>,
-ἐκεῖνον μὲν ἐξέβαλε, κατέλυσε δὲ τὴν ἀντιτεταγμένην ἑταιρείαν. See,
-in reference to the principle of the ostracism, a remarkable incident
-at Magnesia, between two political rivals, Krêtinês and Hermeias:
-also the just reflections of Montesquieu, Esprit des Loix, xxvi, c.
-17; xxix, c. 7.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_34"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_34">[34]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 16: the
-indication of time, however, is vague.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_35"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_35">[35]</a></span> Plato, Gorgias, p. 455, with
-Scholia; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13: Forchhammer, Topographie von
-Athen, in Kieler Philologische Studien, pp. 279-282.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_36"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_36">[36]</a></span> Isokratês, Orat. vii: Areopagit.
-p. 153. c. 27.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_37"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_37">[37]</a></span> See Dikæarchus, Vit. Græciæ,
-Fragm. ed. Fuhr. p. 140: compare the description of Platæa in
-Thucydidês, ii, 3.</p>
-
-<p>All the older towns now existing in the Grecian islands are put
-together in this same manner,—narrow, muddy, crooked ways,—few
-regular continuous lines of houses: see Ross, Reisen in den
-Griechischen Inseln, Letter xxvii, vol. ii, p. 20.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_38"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_38">[38]</a></span> Aristotle, Politic. ii, 5, 1;
-Xenophon, Hellen. ii, 4, 1; Harpokration, v, Ἱπποδάμεια.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_39"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_39">[39]</a></span> Diodor, xii, 9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_40"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_40">[40]</a></span> Leake, Topography of Athens,
-Append. ii and iii, pp. 328-336, 2d edit.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_41"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_41">[41]</a></span> See Leake, Topography of Athens,
-2d ed. p. 111, Germ. transl. O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, p. 18)
-mentions no less than eight celebrated statues of Athênê, by the hand
-of Pheidias,—four in the acropolis of Athens.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_42"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_42">[42]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13-15;
-O. Müller, De Phidiæ Vitâ, pp 34-60, also his work, Archäologie der
-Kunst, sects. 108-113.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_43"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_43">[43]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 80. καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις
-ἅπασιν ἄριστα ἐξήρτυνται, πλούτῳ τε ἰδίῳ καὶ δημοσίῳ καὶ ναυσὶ καὶ
-ἵπποις καὶ ὅπλοις, καὶ ὄχλῳ ὅσος οὐκ ἐν ἄλλῳ ἑνί γε χωρίῳ Ἑλληνικῷ
-ἐστὶν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_44"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_44">[44]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 13.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_45"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_45">[45]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 10.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_46"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_46">[46]</a></span> See Leake, Topography of Athens,
-Append. iii, p. 329, 2d ed. Germ. transl. Colonel Leake, with much
-justice, contends that the amount of two thousand and twelve talents,
-stated by Harpokration out of Philochorus as the cost of the Propylæa
-alone, must be greatly exaggerated. Mr. Wilkins (Atheniensia, p. 84)
-expresses the same opinion; remarking that the transport of marble
-from Pentelikus to Athens is easy and on a descending road.</p>
-
-<p>Demetrius Phalereus (ap. Cicer. de Officiis, ii, 17) blamed
-Periklês for the large sum expended upon the Propylæa; nor is it
-wonderful that he uttered this censure, if he had been led to rate
-the cost of them at two thousand and twelve talents.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_47"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_47">[47]</a></span> Valer. Maxim. i, 7, 2.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_48"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_48">[48]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 13.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_49"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_49">[49]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 17.
-Plutarch gives no precise date, and O. Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, p. 9)
-places these steps for convocation of a congress before the first
-war between Sparta and Athens and the battle of Tanagra,—<i>i. e.</i>,
-before 460 <small>B.C.</small> But this date seems to me
-improbable: Thebes was not yet renovated in power, nor had Bœotia
-as yet recovered from the fruits of her alliance with the Persians;
-moreover, neither Athens nor Periklês himself seem to have been at
-that time in a situation to conceive so large a project; which suits
-in every respect much better for the later period, after the thirty
-years’ truce, but before the Peloponnesian war.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_50"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_50">[50]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 115; viii, 76;
-Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_51"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_51">[51]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 115; Plutarch,
-Periklês, c. 25. Most of the statements which appear in this chapter
-of Plutarch—over and above the concise narrative of Thucydidês—appear
-to be borrowed from exaggerated party stories of the day. We need
-make no remark upon the story, that Periklês was induced to take
-the side of Milêtus against Samos, by the fact that Aspasia was a
-native of Milêtus. Nor is it at all more credible that the satrap
-Pissuthnês, from good-will towards Samos, offered Periklês ten
-thousand golden staters as an inducement to spare Samos. It may
-perhaps be true however, that the Samian oligarchy, and those wealthy
-men whose children were likely to be taken as hostages, tried the
-effect of large bribes upon the mind of Periklês, to prevail upon him
-not to alter the government.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_52"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_52">[52]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 114, 115.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_53"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_53">[53]</a></span> Strabo, xiv, p. 638; Schol.
-Aristeidês, t. iii, p. 485, Dindorf.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_54"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_54">[54]</a></span> See the interesting particulars
-recounted respecting Sophoklês by the Chian poet, Ion, who met and
-conversed with him during the course of this expedition (Athenæus,
-xiii, p. 603). He represents the poet as uncommonly pleasing and
-graceful in society, but noway distinguished for active capacity.
-Sophoklês was at this time in peculiar favor, from the success of
-his tragedy, Antigonê, the year before. See the chronology of these
-events discussed and elucidated in Boeckh’s preliminary Dissertation
-to the Antigonê, c. 6-9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_55"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_55">[55]</a></span> Diodor. xi, 27.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_56"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_56">[56]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 26.
-Plutarch seems to have had before him accounts respecting this
-Samian campaign, not only from Ephorus, Stesimbrotus, and Duris,
-but also from Aristotle: and the statements of the latter must have
-differed thus far from Thucydidês, that he affirmed Melissus the
-Samian general to have been victorious over Periklês himself, which
-is not to be reconciled with the narrative of Thucydidês. </p> <p>
-The Samian historian, Duris, living about a century after this siege,
-seems to have introduced many falsehoods respecting the cruelties of
-Athens: see Plutarch, <i>l. c.</i></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_57"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_57">[57]</a></span> It appears very improbable that
-this Thucydidês can be the historian himself. If it be Thucydidês son
-of Melêsias, we must suppose him to have been restored from ostracism
-before the regular time,—a supposition indeed noway inadmissible in
-itself, but which there is nothing else to countenance. The author of
-the Life of Sophoklês, as well as most of the recent critics, adopt
-this opinion. </p> <p> On the other hand, it may have been a third
-person named Thucydidês; for the name seems to have been common, as
-we might guess from the two words of which it is compounded. We find
-a third Thucydidês mentioned viii, 92—a native of Pharsalus: and the
-biographer, Marcellinus seems to have read of many persons so called
-(Θουκύδιδαι πολλοὶ, p. xvi, ed. Arnold). The subsequent history of
-Thucydidês son of Melêsias, is involved in complete obscurity. We do
-not know the incident to which the remarkable passage in Aristophanês
-(Acharn. 703) alludes,—compare Vespæ, 946: nor can we confirm the
-statement which the Scholiast cites from Idomeneus, to the effect
-that Thucydidês was banished and fled to Artaxerxes: see Bergk.
-Reliq. Com. Att. p. 61.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_58"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_58">[58]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 117; Diodor. xii, 27,
-28; Isokratês, De Permutat. Or. xv, sect. 118; Cornel. Nepos, Vit.
-Timoth. c. 1.</p>
-
-<p>The assertion of Ephorus (see Diodorus, xii, 28, and Ephori Fragm.
-117 ed. Marx, with the note of Marx) that Periklês employed battering
-machines against the town, under the management of the Klazomenian
-Artemon, was called in question by Herakleidês Ponticus, on the
-ground that Artemon was a contemporary of Anakreon, near a century
-before: and Thucydidês represents Periklês to have captured the town
-altogether by blockade.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_59"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_59">[59]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 40, 41.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_60"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_60">[60]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 21.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_61"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_61">[61]</a></span> Compare Wachsmuth, Hellenische
-Alterthumskunde, sect. 58, vol. ii, p. 82.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_62"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_62">[62]</a></span> See Westermann, Geschichte der
-Beredsamkeit in Griechenland und Rom; Diodor. xi, 33; Dionys. Hal.
-A. R. v, 17. </p> <p> Periklês, in the funeral oration preserved by
-Thucydidês (ii, 35-40), begins by saying—Οἱ μὲν πολλοὶ τῶν ἐνθάδε
-εἰρηκότων ἤδη ἐπαινοῦσι <em class="gesperrt">τὸν προσθέντα</em> τῷ
-νόμῳ τὸν λόγον τόνδε, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The Scholiast, and other commentators—K. F. Weber and Westermann
-among the number—make various guesses as to <i>what</i> celebrated man
-is here designated as the introducer of the custom of a funeral
-harangue. The Scholiast says, Solon: Weber fixes on Kimon:
-Westermann, on Aristeidês: another commentator on Themistoklês.
-But we may reasonably doubt whether <i>any one</i> very celebrated man
-is specially indicated by the words τὸν προσθέντα. To commend the
-introducer of the practice, is nothing more than a phrase for
-commending the practice itself.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_63"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_63">[63]</a></span> Some fragments of it seem to
-have been preserved, in the time of Aristotle: see his treatise De
-Rhetoricâ, i, 7; iii, 10, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_64"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_64">[64]</a></span> Compare the enthusiastic
-demonstrations which welcomed Brasidas at Skiônê (Thucyd. iv,
-121).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_65"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_65">[65]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28;
-Thucyd. ii, 34.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_66"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_66">[66]</a></span> A short fragment remaining from
-the comic poet Eupolis (Κόλακες, Fr. xvi, p. 493, ed. Meineke),
-attests the anxiety at Athens about the Samian war, and the great joy
-when the island was reconquered: compare Aristophan. Vesp. 283.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_67"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_67">[67]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 37; ii, 63. See
-the conference, at the island of Melos in the sixteenth year of the
-Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. v, 89, <i>seq.</i>), between the Athenian
-commissioners and the Melians. I think, however, that this conference
-is less to be trusted as based in reality, than the speeches in
-Thucydidês generally,—of which more hereafter.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_68"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_68">[68]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 47. Νῦν μὲν γὰρ ὑμῖν
-ὁ δῆμος ἐν ἁπάσαις ταῖς πόλεσιν εὔνους ἐστὶ, καὶ ἢ οὐ ξυναφίσταται
-τοῖς ὀλίγοις, ἢ ἐὰν βιασθῇ, ὑπάρχει τοῖς ἀποστήσασι πολέμιος εὐθὺς,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_69"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_69">[69]</a></span> See the striking observations of
-Thucydidês, iii, 82, 83; Aristotel. Politic. v, 6, 9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_70"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_70">[70]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 27.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_71"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_71">[71]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 9-14. He observes,
-also, respecting the Thasian oligarchy just set up in lieu of the
-previous democracy by the Athenian oligarchical conspirators who were
-then organizing the revolution of the Four Hundred at Athens,—that
-they immediately made preparations for revolting from Athens,—ξυνέβη
-οὖν αὐτοῖς μάλιστα ἃ ἐβούλοντο, τὴν πόλιν τε ἀκινδύνως ὀρθοῦσθαι,
-καὶ <em class="gesperrt">τὸν ἐναντιωσόμενον δῆμον καταλελύσθαι</em>
-(viii, 64).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_72"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_72">[72]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 86, 88, 106, 123.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_73"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_73">[73]</a></span> See the important passage,
-Thucyd. viii, 48.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_74"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_74">[74]</a></span> Xenophon. Repub. Athen. iii, 5.
-πλὴν αἱ τάξεις τοῦ φόρου· τοῦτο δὲ γίγνεται ὡς τὰ πολλὰ δι᾽ ἔτους
-πέμπτου.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_75"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_75">[75]</a></span> Xenophon. Repub. Athen. i, 14.
-Περὶ δὲ τῶν συμμάχων, οἱ ἐκπλέοντες συκοφαντοῦσιν, ὡς δοκοῦσι, καὶ
-μισοῦσι τοὺς χρηστοὺς, etc. </p> <p> Who are the persons designated
-by the expression οἱ ἐκπλέοντες, appears to be specified more
-particularly a little farther on (i, 18); it means the generals, the
-officers, the envoys, etc. sent forth by Athens.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_76"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_76">[76]</a></span> See the expression in Thucydidês
-(v, 27) describing the conditions required when Argos was about
-to extend her alliances in Peloponnesus. The conditions were two.
-1. That the city should be autonomous. 2. Next, that it should
-be willing to submit its quarrels to equitable arbitration,—ἥτις
-αὐτόνομός τέ ἐστι, καὶ δίκας ἴσας καὶ ὁμοίας δίδωσι.</p>
-
-<p>In the oration against the Athenians, delivered by the Syracusan
-Hermokratês at Kamarina, Athens is accused of having enslaved her
-allies partly on the ground that they neglected to perform their
-military obligations, partly because they made war upon each other
-(Thucyd. vi, 76), partly also on other specious pretences. How far
-this charge against Athens is borne out by the fact, we can hardly
-say; in all those particular examples which Thucydidês mentions of
-subjugation of allies by Athens, there is a cause perfectly definite
-and sufficient,—not a mere pretence devised by Athenian ambition.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_77"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_77">[77]</a></span> According to the principle laid
-down by the Corinthians shortly before the Peloponnesian war,—τοὺς
-προσήκοντας ξυμμάχους αὐτόν τινα κολάζειν (Thucyd. i, 40-43).</p>
-
-<p>The Lacedæmonians, on preferring their accusation of treason
-against Themistoklês, demanded that he should be tried at Sparta,
-before the common Hellenic synod which held its sitting there, and of
-which Athens was then a member: that is, the Spartan confederacy, or
-alliance,—ἐπὶ τοῦ κοινοῦ συνεδρίου τῶν Ἑλλήνων (Diodor. xi, 55).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_78"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_78">[78]</a></span> Antipho, De Cæde Herôdis,
-c. 7, p. 135. ὃ οὐδὲ πόλει ἔξεστιν, ἄνευ Ἀθηναίων οὐδένα θανάτῳ
-ζημιῶσαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_79"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_79">[79]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 48. Τούς τε
-καλοὺς κἀγαθοὺς ὀνομαζομένους οὐκ ἐλάσσω αὐτοὺς (that is, the
-subject-allies) νομίζειν σφίσι πράγματα παρέξειν τοῦ δήμου,
-ποριστὰς ὄντας καὶ ἐσηγητὰς τῶν κακῶν τῷ δήμῳ, ἐξ ὧν τὰ πλείω
-αὐτοὺς ὠφελεῖσθαι· καὶ τὸ μὲν ἐπ᾽ ἐκείνοις εἶναι καὶ ἄκριτοι ἂν καὶ
-βιαιότερον ἀποθνήσκειν, τὸν δὲ δῆμον σφῶν τε καταφυγὴν εἶναι καὶ
-ἐκείνων σωφρονιστήν. Καὶ ταῦτα παρ᾽ αὐτῶν τῶν ἔργων ἐπισταμένας τὰς
-πόλεις σαφῶς αὐτὸς εἰδέναι, ὅτι οὕτω νομίζουσιν. This is introduced
-as the deliberate judgment of the Athenian commander Phrynichus, whom
-Thucydidês greatly commends for his sagacity, and with whom he seems
-in this case to have concurred.</p>
-
-<p>Xenophon (Rep. Ath. i. 14, 15) affirms that the Athenian officers
-on service passed many unjust sentences upon the oligarchical party
-in the allied cities,—fines, sentences of banishment, capital
-punishments; and that the Athenian people, though they had a strong
-public interest in the prosperity of the allies, in order that their
-tribute might be larger, nevertheless thought it better that any
-individual citizen of Athens should pocket what he could out of the
-plunder of the allies, and leave to the latter nothing more than
-was absolutely necessary for them to live and work, without any
-superfluity, such as might tempt them to revolt.</p>
-
-<p>That the Athenian officers on service may have succeeded too often
-in unjust peculation at the cost of the allies, is probable enough:
-but that the Athenian people were pleased to see their own individual
-citizens so enriching themselves is certainly not true. The large
-jurisdiction of the dikasteries was intended, among other effects,
-to open to the allies a legal redress against such misconduct on
-the part of the Athenian officers: and the passage above cited from
-Thucydidês proves that it really produced such an effect.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_80"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_80">[80]</a></span> Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 20;
-Plutarch, Amator. Narrat. c. 3, p. 773.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_81"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_81">[81]</a></span> See <i>infra</i>, <a
-href="#Page_258">chap. 49</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_82"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_82">[82]</a></span> Xenophon, Rep. Athen, i, 18. Πρὸς
-δὲ τούτοις, εἰ μὲν μὴ ἐπὶ δίκας ᾔεσαν οἱ σύμμαχοι, τοὺς ἐκπλέοντας
-Ἀθηναίων ἐτίμων ἂν μόνους, τούς τε στρατηγοὺς καὶ τοὺς τριηράρχους
-καὶ πρέσβεις· νῦν δ᾽ ἠνάγκασται τὸν δῆμον κολακεύειν τῶν Ἀθηναίων εἷς
-ἕκαστος τῶν συμμάχων, γιγνώσκων ὅτι δεῖ μὲν ἀφικόμενον Ἀθήναζε δίκην
-δοῦναι καὶ λαβεῖν, οὐκ ἐν ἄλλοις τισὶν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν τῷ δήμῳ, ὅς ἐστι δὴ
-νόμος Ἀθήνῃσι. Καὶ ἀντιβολῆσαι ἀναγκάζεται ἐν τοῖς δικαστηρίοις, καὶ
-εἰσιόντος του, ἐπιλαμβάνεσθαι τῆς χειρός. Διὰ τοῦτο οὖν οἱ σύμμαχοι
-δοῦλοι τοῦ δήμου τῶν Ἀθηναίων καθεστᾶσι μᾶλλον.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_83"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_83">[83]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 76, 77. Ἄλλους
-γ᾽ ἂν οὖν οἰόμεθα τὰ ἡμέτερα λαβόντας δεῖξαι ἂν μάλιστα εἴ τι
-μετριάζομεν· ἡμῖν δὲ καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἐπιεικοῦς ἀδοξία τὸ πλέον ἢ ἔπαινος
-οὐκ εἰκότως περιέστη. Καὶ ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς
-τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις, καὶ παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις
-ποιήσαντες τὰς κρίσεις, φιλοδικεῖν δοκοῦμεν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>I construe ξυμβολαίαις δίκαις as connected in meaning with
-ξυμβόλαια and not with ξύμβολα—following Duker and Bloomfield in
-preference to Poppo and Göller: see the elaborate notes of the
-two latter editors. Δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων indicated the arrangements
-concluded by special convention between two different cities, by
-consent of both, for the purpose of determining controversies between
-their respective citizens: they were something essentially apart
-from the ordinary judicial arrangements of either state. Now what
-the Athenian orator here insists upon is exactly the contrary of
-this idea: he says, that the allies were admitted to the benefit of
-Athenian trial and Athenian laws, in like manner with the citizens
-themselves. The judicial arrangements by which the Athenian allies
-were brought before the Athenian dikasteries cannot, with propriety,
-be said to be δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων; unless the act of original
-incorporation into the confederacy of Delos is to be regarded as a
-ξύμβολον, or agreement,—which in a large sense it might be, though
-not in the proper sense in which δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων are commonly
-mentioned. Moreover. I think that the passage of Antipho (De Cæde
-Herôdis, p. 745) proves that it was the citizens of places <i>not in
-alliance with Athens</i>, who litigated with Athenians according to
-δίκαι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων,—not the allies of Athens while they resided in
-their own native cities; for I agree with the interpretation which
-Boeckh puts upon this passage, in opposition to Platner and Schömann
-(Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, book iii, ch. xvi, p. 403, Eng.
-transl.; Schömann, Der Attisch. Prozess, p. 778; Platner, Prozess und
-Klagen bei den Attikern, ch. iv, 2, pp. 110-112, where the latter
-discusses both the passages of Antipho and Thucydidês).</p>
-
-<p>The passages in Demosthenês Orat. de Halones. c. 3, pp. 98, 99;
-and Andokidês cont. Alkibiad. c. 7, p. 121 (I quote this latter
-oration, though it is undoubtedly spurious, because we may well
-suppose the author of it to be conversant with the nature and
-contents of ξύμβολα), give us a sufficient idea of these judicial
-conventions, or ξύμβολα,—special and liable to differ in each
-particular case. They seem to me essentially distinct from that
-systematic scheme of proceeding whereby the dikasteries of Athens
-were made cognizant of all, or most, important controversies among or
-between the allied cities, as well as of political accusations.</p>
-
-<p>M. Boeckh draws a distinction between the <i>autonomous</i> allies
-(Chios and Lesbos, at the time immediately before the Peloponnesian
-war) and the <i>subject</i>-allies: “the former class (he says) retained
-possession of unlimited jurisdiction, whereas the latter were
-compelled to try all their disputes in the courts of Athens.”
-Doubtless this distinction would prevail to a certain degree, but
-how far it was pushed we can hardly say. Suppose that a dispute
-took place between Chios and one of the subject islands, or between
-an individual Chian and an individual Thasian; would not the Chian
-plaintiff sue, or the Chian defendant be sued, before the Athenian
-dikastery? Suppose that an Athenian citizen or officer became
-involved in dispute with a Chian, would not the Athenian dikastery
-be the competent court, whichever of the two were plaintiff or
-defendant? Suppose a Chian citizen or magistrate to be suspected of
-fomenting revolt, would it not be competent to any accuser, either
-Chian or Athenian, to indict him before the dikastery at Athens?
-Abuse of power, or peculation, committed by Athenian officers at
-Chios, must of course be brought before the Athenian dikasteries,
-just as much as if the crime had been committed at Thasos or Naxos.
-We have no evidence to help us in regard to these questions; but
-I incline to believe that the difference in respect to judicial
-arrangement, between the autonomous and the subject-allies, was
-less in degree than M. Boeckh believes. We must recollect that the
-arrangement was not all pure hardship to the allies,—the liability to
-be prosecuted was accompanied with the privilege of prosecuting for
-injuries received.</p>
-
-<p>There is one remark, however, which appears to me of importance
-for understanding the testimonies on this subject. The Athenian
-empire, properly so called, which began by the confederacy of Delos
-after the Persian invasion, was completely destroyed at the close of
-the Peloponnesian war, when Athens was conquered and taken. But after
-some years had elapsed, towards the year 377 <small>B.C.</small>,
-Athens again began to make maritime conquests, to acquire allies,
-to receive tribute, to assemble a synod, and to resume her footing
-of something like an imperial city. But her power over her allies,
-during this second period of empire, was nothing like so great as
-it had been during the first, between the Persian and Peloponnesian
-wars: nor can we be at all sure that what is true of the second
-is also true of the first. Now I think it probable, that those
-statements of the grammarians, which represent the allies as carrying
-on δίκας ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων in ordinary practice with the Athenians,
-may really be true about the second empire or alliance. Bekker
-Anecdota, p. 436. Ἀθηναῖοι ἀπὸ ξυμβόλων ἐδίκαζον τοῖς ὑπηκόοις·
-οὕτως Ἀριστοτέλης. Pollux, viii. 63. Ἀπὸ συμβόλων δὲ δίκη ἦν, ὅτε
-οἱ σύμμαχοι ἐδικάζοντο. Also Hesychius, i, 489. The statement here
-ascribed to Aristotle may very probably be true about the second
-alliance, though it cannot be held true for the first. In the second,
-the Athenians may really have had σύμβολα, or special conventions for
-judicial business, with many of their principal allies, instead of
-making Athens the authoritative centre, and heir to the Delian synod,
-as they did during the first. It is to be remarked, however, that
-Harpokration, in the explanation which he gives of σύμβολα treats
-them in a perfectly general way, as contentions for settlement of
-judicial controversy between city and city, without any particular
-allusion to Athens and her allies. Compare Heffter, Athenäische
-Gerichtsverfassung, iii, 1, 3, p. 91.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_84"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_84">[84]</a></span> Thucyd. i. 77. Οἱ δὲ (the allies)
-<em class="gesperrt">εἰθισμένοι πρὸς ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ ἴσου ὁμιλεῖν</em>,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_85"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_85">[85]</a></span> Compare Isokratês, Or. iv,
-Panegyric. pp. 62-66, sects. 116-138; and Or. xii, Panathenaic.
-pp. 247-254, sects. 72-111; Or. viii, De Pace, p. 178, sect. 119,
-<i>seqq.</i>; Plutarch, Lysand. c. 13; Cornel. Nepos, Lysand. c. 2, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_86"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_86">[86]</a></span> Xenophon, Repub. Ath. i, 17.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_87"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_87">[87]</a></span> Xenophon, Repub. Ath. i, 16. He
-states it as one of the advantageous consequences, which induced
-the Athenians to bring the suits and complaints of the allies to
-Athens for trial—that the prytaneia, or fees paid upon entering a
-cause for trial, became sufficiently large to furnish all the pay
-for the dikasts throughout the year. </p> <p> But in another part of
-his treatise (iii, 2, 3), he represents the Athenian dikasteries as
-overloaded with judicial business, much more than they could possibly
-get through; insomuch that there were long delays before causes
-could be brought on for trial. It could hardly be any great object,
-therefore, to multiply complaints artificially, in order to make fees
-for the dikasts.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_88"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_88">[88]</a></span> See his well-known comments on
-the seditions at Korkyra, iii, 82, 83.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_89"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_89">[89]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 11-14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_90"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_90">[90]</a></span> So the Athenian orator Diodotus
-puts it in his speech deprecating the extreme punishment about to
-be inflicted on Mitylênê—ἤν τινα ἐλεύθερον καὶ βίᾳ ἀρχόμενον <em
-class="gesperrt">εἰκότως πρὸς αὐτονομίαν ἀποστάντα χειρωσώμεθα</em>,
-etc. (Thucyd. iii, 46.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_91"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_91">[91]</a></span> It is to be recollected that
-the Athenian empire was essentially <i>a government of dependencies</i>;
-Athens, as an imperial state, exercising authority over subordinate
-governments. To maintain beneficial relations between two
-governments, one supreme, the other subordinate, and to make the
-system work to the satisfaction of the people in the one as well
-as of the people in the other, has always been found a problem of
-great difficulty. Whoever reads the instructive volume of Mr. G.
-C. Lewis (Essay on the Government of Dependencies), and the number
-of instances of practical misgovernment in this matter which are
-set forth therein, will be inclined to think that the empire of
-Athens over her allies makes comparatively a creditable figure. It
-will, most certainly, stand full comparison with the government of
-England, over dependencies, in the last century; as illustrated by
-the history of Ireland, with the penal laws against the Catholics; by
-the Declaration of Independence, published in 1776, by the American
-colonies, setting forth the grounds of their separation; and by the
-pleadings of Mr. Burke against Warren Hastings.</p>
-
-<p>A statement and legal trial alluded to by Mr. Lewis (p. 367),
-elucidates, farther, two points not unimportant on the present
-occasion: 1. The illiberal and humiliating vein of sentiment which
-is apt to arise in citizens of the supreme government towards those
-of the subordinate. 2. The protection which English jury-trial,
-nevertheless, afforded to the citizens of the dependency against
-oppression by English officers.</p>
-
-<p>“An action was brought, in the court of Common Pleas, in 1773, by
-Mr. Anthony Fabrigas, a native of Minorca, against General Mostyn,
-the governor of the island. The facts proved at the trial were, that
-Governor Mostyn had arrested the plaintiff, imprisoned him, and
-transported him to Spain, without any form of trial, on the ground
-that the plaintiff had presented to him a petition for redress of
-grievances, in a manner which he deemed improper. Mr. Justice Gould
-left it to the jury to say, whether the plaintiff’s behavior was
-such as to afford a just conclusion that he was about to stir up
-sedition and mutiny in the garrison, or whether he meant no more than
-earnestly to press his suit and obtain a redress of grievances. If
-they thought the latter, the plaintiff was entitled to recover in
-the action. The jury gave a verdict for the plaintiff <i>with</i> £3,000
-<i>damages</i>. In the following term, an application was made for a new
-trial, which was refused by the whole court.</p>
-
-<p>“The following remarks of the counsel for Governor Mostyn, on
-this trial, contain a plain and <i>naïve</i> statement of the doctrine,
-<i>that a dependency is to be governed, not for its own interest,
-but for that of the dominant state</i>. ‘Gentlemen of the jury,’ said
-the counsel, ‘it will be time for me now to take notice of another
-circumstance, notorious to all the gentlemen who have been settled in
-the island, that the natives of Minorca are but ill-affected to the
-English, and to the English government. It is not much to be wondered
-at. They are the descendants of Spaniards; and they consider Spain
-as the country to which they ought naturally to belong: it is not
-at all to be wondered at that they are indisposed to the English,
-whom they consider as their conquerors.—Of all the Minorquins in the
-island, the plaintiff perhaps stands singularly and eminently the
-most seditious, turbulent, and dissatisfied subject to the crown of
-Great Britain that is to be found in Minorca. Gentlemen, <i>he is, or
-chooses to be called, the patriot of Minorca</i>. Now patriotism is a
-very pretty thing among ourselves, and we owe much to it: we owe
-our liberties to it; but we should have but little to value, and we
-should have but little of what we now enjoy, were it not for our
-trade. <i>And for the sake of our trade, it is not fit that we should
-encourage patriotism in Minorca</i>; for it is there destructive of
-our trade, and there is an end to our trade in the Mediterranean,
-if it goes there. But <i>here it is very well</i>; for the body of the
-people in this country will have it: they have demanded it,—and in
-consequence of their demands, they have enjoyed liberties which they
-will transmit to their posterity,—and it is not in the power of
-this government to deprive them of it. But they will take care of
-all our conquests abroad. If that spirit prevailed in Minorca, the
-consequence would be the loss of that country, and of course of our
-Mediterranean trade. We should be sorry to set all our slaves free in
-our plantations.’”</p>
-
-<p>The prodigious sum of damages awarded by the jury, shows the
-strength of their sympathy with this Minorquin plaintiff against
-the English officer. I doubt not that the feeling of the dikastery
-at Athens was much of the same kind, and often quite as strong;
-sincerely disposed to protect the subject-allies against misconduct
-of Athenian trierarchs, or inspectors.</p>
-
-<p>The feelings expressed in the speech above cited would also often
-find utterance from Athenian orators in the assembly; and it would
-not be difficult to produce parallel passages, in which these orators
-imply discontent on the part of the allies to be the natural state
-of things, such as Athens could not hope to escape. The speech here
-given shows that such feelings arise, almost inevitably, out of
-the uncomfortable relation of two governments, one supreme and the
-other subordinate. They are not the product of peculiar cruelty and
-oppression on the part of the Athenian democracy, as Mr. Mitford and
-so many others have sought to prove.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_92"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_92">[92]</a></span> See the important passage already
-adverted to in a prior note.</p>
-
-<p>Thucyd. i, 40. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἡμεῖς Σαμίων ἀποστάντων ψῆφον προσεθέμεθα
-ἐναντίαν ὑμῖν, τῶν ἄλλων Πελοποννησίων δίχα ἐψηφισμένων εἰ χρὴ αὐτοῖς
-ἀμύνειν, <em class="gesperrt">φανερῶς δὲ ἀντείπομεν τοὺς προσήκοντας
-ξυμμάχους αὐτόν τινα κολάζειν</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_93"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_93">[93]</a></span> Thucyd. i. 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_94"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_94">[94]</a></span> Thucyd. i. 42.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_95"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_95">[95]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 38. ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι
-καὶ τὰ εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_96"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_96">[96]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 24, 25.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_97"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_97">[97]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 26. ἦλθον γὰρ ἐς τὴν
-Κέρκυραν οἱ τῶν Ἐπιδαμνίων φυγάδες, τάφους τε ἀποδεικνύντες καὶ
-ξυγγένειαν ἣν προϊσχόμενοι ἐδέοντο σφᾶς κατάγειν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_98"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_98">[98]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 26.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_99"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_99">[99]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 28.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_100"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_100">[100]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 29, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_101"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_101">[101]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 31-46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_102"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_102">[102]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 35-40.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_103"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_103">[103]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 33. Τοὺς
-Λακεδαιμονίους φόβῳ τῷ ὑμετέρῳ πολεμησείοντας, καὶ τοὺς Κορινθίους
-δυναμένους παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς καὶ ὑμῖν ἐχθροὺς ὄντας καὶ προκαταλαμβάνοντας
-ἡμᾶς νῦν ἐς τὴν ὑμετέραν ἐπιχείρησιν, ἵνα μὴ τῷ κοινῷ ἔχθει κατ᾽
-αὐτῶν μετ᾽ ἀλλήλων στῶμεν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_104"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_104">[104]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 32-36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_105"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_105">[105]</a></span> The description given by
-Herodotus (vii, 168: compare Diodor. xi. 15), of the duplicity of the
-Korkyræans when solicited to aid the Grecian cause at the time of the
-invasion of Xerxes, seems to imply that the unfavorable character of
-them, given by the Corinthians, coincided with the general impression
-throughout Greece.</p>
-
-<p>Respecting the prosperity and insolence of the Korkyræans, see
-Aristotle apud Zenob. Proverb. iv, 49.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_106"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_106">[106]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 38. ἄποικοι δὲ ὄντες
-ἀφεστᾶσί τε διὰ παντὸς καὶ νῦν πολεμοῦσι, λέγοντες ὡς οὐκ ἐπὶ τῷ
-κακῶς πάσχειν ἐκπεμφθείησαν· ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί φαμεν ἐπὶ τῷ ὑπὸ
-τούτων ὑβρίζεσθαι κατοικίσαι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπὶ τῷ ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι καὶ τὰ
-εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι· αἱ γοῦν ἄλλαι ἀποικίαι τιμῶσιν ἡμᾶς, καὶ μάλιστα
-ὑπὸ ἀποίκων στεργόμεθα.</p>
-
-<p>This is a remarkable passage in illustration of the position of
-the metropolis in regard to her colony. The relation was such as
-to be comprised under the general word <i>hegemony</i>: superiority and
-right to command on the one side, inferiority with duty of reverence
-and obedience on the other,—limited in point of extent, though we do
-not know where the limit was placed, and varying probably in each
-individual case. The Corinthians sent annual magistrates to Potidæa,
-called Epidemiurgi (Thucyd. i, 56).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_107"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_107">[107]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 40. φανερῶς δὲ
-ἀντείπομεν <em class="gesperrt">τοὺς προσήκοντας ξυμμάχους αὐτόν τινα
-κολάζειν</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_108"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_108">[108]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 37-43.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_109"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_109">[109]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 44. Ἀθηναῖοι δὲ
-ἀκούσαντες ἀμφοτέρων, γενομένης καὶ δὶς ἐκκλησίας, τῇ μὲν προτέρᾳ
-οὐχ ἧσσον τῶν Κορινθίων ἀπεδέξαντο τοὺς λόγους, ἐν δὲ τῇ ὑστεραίᾳ
-μετέγνωσαν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Οὐχ ἧσσον, in the language of Thucydidês, usually has the positive
-meaning of <i>more</i>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_110"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_110">[110]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 44. Plutarch
-(Periklês, c. 29) ascribes the smallness of the squadron despatched
-under Lacedæmonius to a petty spite of Periklês against that
-commander, as the son of his old political antagonist, Kimon. From
-whomsoever he copied this statement, the motive assigned seems quite
-unworthy of credit.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_111"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_111">[111]</a></span> Πεζομαχεῖν ἀπὸ νεῶν—to turn
-the naval battle into a land-battle on shipboard, was a practice
-altogether repugnant to Athenian feeling, as we see remarked also in
-Thucyd. iv, 14: compare also vii, 61. </p> <p> The Corinthian and
-Syracusan ships ultimately came to counteract the Athenian manœuvring
-by constructing their prows with increased solidity and strength, and
-forcing the Athenian vessel to a direct shock, which its weaker prow
-was unable to bear (Thucyd. vii, 36).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_112"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_112">[112]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 51. διὰ τῶν νεκρῶν
-καὶ ναυαγίων προσκομισθεῖσαι κατέπλεον ἐς τὸ στρατόπεδον.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_113"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_113">[113]</a></span> See the geographical Commentary
-of Gatterer upon Thrace, embodied in Poppo, Prolegg. ad Thucyd. vol.
-ii, ch. 29. </p> <p> The words τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης—τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης χωρία
-(Thucyd. ii, 29) denote generally the towns in Chalkidikê,—places
-<i>in the direction or in the skirts of</i> Thrace, rather than parts of
-Thrace itself.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_114"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_114">[114]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 57; ii, 100.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_115"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_115">[115]</a></span> See two remarkable passages
-illustrating this difference, Thucyd. iv, 120-122.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_116"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_116">[116]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 29-98. Isokratês
-has a remarkable passage on this subject in the beginning of Or.
-v, ad Philippum, sects. 5-7. After pointing out the imprudence of
-founding a colony on the skirts of the territory of a powerful
-potentate, and the excellent site which had been chosen far Kyrênê,
-as being near only to feeble tribes,—he goes so far as to say
-that the possession of Amphipolis would be injurious rather than
-beneficial to Athens, because it would render her dependent upon
-Philip, from his power of annoying her colonists,—just as she had
-been dependent before upon Mêdokus, the Thracian king, in consequence
-of her colonists in the Chersonese,—ἀναγκασθησόμεθα τὴν αὐτὴν
-εὔνοιαν ἔχειν τοῖς σοῖς πράγμασι διὰ τοὺς ἐνταῦθα (at Amphipolis)
-κατοικοῦντας, οἵαν περ εἴχομεν Μηδόκῳ τῷ παλαιῷ διὰ τοὺς ἐν Χεῤῥονήσῳ
-γεωργοῦντας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_117"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_117">[117]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 56, 57.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_118"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_118">[118]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_119"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_119">[119]</a></span> Kallias was a young Athenian
-of noble family, who had paid the large sum of one hundred minæ to
-Zeno of Elea, the philosopher, for rhetorical, philosophical, and
-sophistical instruction (Plato, Alkibiadês, i, c. 31, p. 119).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_120"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_120">[120]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 61. The statement of
-Thucydidês presents some geographical difficulties which the critics
-have not adequately estimated. Are we to assume as certain, that the
-<i>Berœa</i> here mentioned must be the Macedonian town of that name,
-afterwards so well known, distant from the sea westward one hundred
-and sixty stadia, or nearly twenty English miles (see Tafel, Historia
-Thessalonicæ, p. 58), on a river which flows into the Haliakmon, and
-upon one of the lower ridges of Mount Bermius?</p>
-
-<p>The words of Thucydidês here are—Ἔπειτα δὲ ξύμβασιν
-ποιησάμενοι καὶ ξυμμαχίαν ἀναγκαίαν πρὸς τὸν Περδίκκαν, ὡς
-αὐτοὺς κατήπειγεν ἡ Ποτίδαια καὶ ὁ Ἀριστεὺς παρεληλυθὼς, <em
-class="gesperrt">ἀπανίστανται ἐκ τῆς Μακεδονίας</em>, καὶ ἀφικόμενοι
-ἐς Βέροιαν κἀκεῖθεν ἐπιστρέψαντες, καὶ πειράσαντες πρῶτον τοῦ χωρίου
-καὶ οὐχ ἑλόντες, ἐπορεύοντο κατὰ γῆν πρὸς τὴν Ποτίδαιαν—ἅμα δὲ νῆες
-παρέπλεον ἑβδομήκοντα.</p>
-
-<p>“The natural route from Pydna to Potidæa (observes Dr. Arnold in
-his note) lay along the coast; and Berœa was <i>quite out of the way</i>,
-at some <i>distance to the westward</i>, near the fort of the Bermian
-mountains. But the hope of surprising Berœa induced the Athenians to
-deviate from their direct line of march; then, after the failure of
-this treacherous attempt, they returned again to the sea-coast, and
-continued to follow it till they arrived at Gigônus.”</p>
-
-<p>I would remark upon this: 1. The words of Thucydidês imply that
-Berœa was <i>not in</i> Macedonia, but <i>out</i> of it (see Poppo, Proleg.
-ad Thucyd. vol. ii, pp. 408-418). 2. He uses no expression which
-in the least implies that the attempt on Berœa on the part of the
-Athenians was <i>treacherous</i>, that is, contrary to the convention just
-concluded; though, had the fact been so, he would naturally have been
-led to notice it, seeing that the deliberate breach of the convention
-was the very first step which took place after it was concluded. 3.
-What can have induced the Athenians to leave their fleet and march
-near twenty miles inland to Mount Bermius and Berœa, to attack a
-Macedonian town which they could not possibly hold,—when they cannot
-even stay to continue the attack on Pydna, a position maritime,
-useful, and tenable,—in consequence of the pressing necessity of
-taking immediate measures against Potidæa? 4. If they were compelled
-by this latter necessity to patch up a peace on any terms with
-Perdikkas, would they immediately endanger this peace by going out of
-their way to attack one of his forts? Again, Thucydidês says, “that,
-proceeding by slow land-marches, they reached Gigônus, and encamped
-<i>on the third day</i>,”—κατ᾽ ὀλίγον δὲ προϊόντες τριταῖοι ἀφίκοντο ἐς
-Γίγωνον καὶ ἐστρατοπεδεύσαντο. The computation of time must here be
-made either from Pydna or from Berœa; and the reader who examines the
-map will see that neither from the one nor the other—assuming the
-Berœa on Mount Bermius—would it be possible for an army to arrive
-at Gigônus on the third day, marching round the head of the gulf,
-with easy days’ marches; the more so, as they would have to cross
-the rivers Lydias, Axius. and Echeidôrus, all not far from their
-mouths,—or, if these rivers could not be crossed, to get on board the
-fleet and reland on the other side.</p>
-
-<p>This clear mark of time laid down by Thucydidês,—even apart
-from the objections which I have just urged in reference to Berœa
-on Mount Bermius,—made me doubt whether Dr. Arnold and the other
-commentators have correctly conceived the operations of the Athenian
-troops between Pydna and Gigônus. The <i>Berœa</i> which Thucydidês means
-cannot be more distant from Gigônus, at any rate, than a third day’s
-easy march, and therefore cannot be the Berœa on Mount Bermius. But
-there was another town named Berœa, either in Thrace or in Emathia,
-though we do not know its exact site (see Wassi ad Thucyd. i, 61;
-Steph. Byz. v, Βέρης; Tafel, Thessalonica, Index). This other Berœa,
-situated somewhere between Gigônus and Therma, and out of the limits
-of that Macedonia which Perdikkas governed, may probably be the place
-which Thucydidês here indicates. The Athenians, raising the siege of
-Pydna, crossed the gulf <i>on shipboard</i> to Berœa, and after vainly
-trying to surprise that town, marched along <i>by land</i> to Gigônus.
-Whoever inspects the map will see that the Athenians would naturally
-employ their large fleet to transport the army by the short transit
-across the gulf from Pydna (see Livy, xliv, 10), and thus avoid
-the fatiguing land-march round the head of the gulf. Moreover, the
-language of Thucydidês would seem to make the land-march <i>begin at
-Berœa</i> and not at Pydna,—<em class="gesperrt">ἀπανίστανται</em> ἐκ
-τῆς Μακεδονίας, καὶ <em class="gesperrt">ἀφικόμενοι ἐς Βέροιαν</em>
-κἀκεῖθεν ἐπιστρέψαντες, καὶ πειράσαντες πρῶτον τοῦ χωρίου καὶ
-οὐχ ἑλόντες, <em class="gesperrt">ἐπορεύοντο κατὰ γῆν</em> πρὸς
-Ποτίδαιαν—ἅμα δὲ νῆες παρέπλεον ἑβδομήκοντα. Κατ᾽ ὀλίγον δὲ προϊόντες
-τριταῖοι ἀφίκοντο ἐς Γίγωνον καὶ ἐστρατοπεδεύσαντο. The change of
-tense between ἀπανίστανται and ἐπορεύοντο,—and the connection of the
-participle ἀφικόμενοι with the latter verb,—seems to divide the whole
-proceeding into two distinct parts; first, departure from Macedonia
-to Berœa, as it would seem, by sea,—next, a land-march from Berœa to
-Gigônus, of three short days.</p>
-
-<p>This is the best account, as it strikes me, of a passage, the real
-difficulties of which are imperfectly noticed by the commentators.</p>
-
-<p>The site of Gigônus cannot be exactly determined, since all that
-we know of the towns on the coast between Potidæa and Æneia, is
-derived from their enumerated names in Herodotus (vii, 123); nor can
-we be absolutely certain that he has enumerated them all in the exact
-order in which they were placed. But I think that both Col. Leake
-and Kiepert’s map place Gigônus too far from Potidæa; for we see,
-from this passage of Thucydidês, that it formed the camp from which
-the Athenian general went forth immediately to give battle to an
-enemy posted between Olynthus and Potidæa; and the Scholiast says of
-Gigônus,—οὐ πολὺ ἄπεχον Ποτιδαίας: and Stephan. Byz. Γίγωνος, πόλις
-Θρᾴκης <em class="gesperrt">προσεχὴς τῇ Παλλήνῃ</em>.</p>
-
-<p>See Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch.
-xxxi, p. 452. That excellent observer calculates the march, from
-Berœa on Mount Bermius to Potidæa, as being one of four days, about
-twenty miles each day. Judging by the map, this seems lower than
-the reality; but admitting it to be correct, Thucydidês would never
-describe such a march as <em class="gesperrt">κατ᾽ ὀλίγον</em> δὲ
-προϊόντες τριταῖοι ἀφίκοντο ἐς Γίγωνον: it would be a march rather
-rapid and fatiguing, especially as it would include the passage of
-the rivers. Nor is it likely, from the description of this battle
-in Thucydidês (i, 62), that Gigônus could be anything like a full
-day’s march from Potidæa. According to his description, the Athenian
-army advanced by three very easy marches; then arriving at Gigônus,
-they encamp, being now near the enemy, who on their side are
-already encamped, expecting them,—προσδεχόμενοι τοὺς Ἀθηναίους <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐστρατοπεδεύοντο</em> πρὸς Ὀλύνθου ἐν τῷ ἰσθμῷ: the
-imperfect tense indicates that they were already there at the time
-when the Athenians took camp at Gigônus; which would hardly be the
-case if the Athenians had come by three successive marches from Berœa
-on Mount Bermius.</p>
-
-<p>I would add, that it is no more wonderful that there should be one
-Berœa in Thrace and another in Macedonia, than that there should be
-one Methônê in Thrace and another in Macedonia (Steph. B. Μεθώνη).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_121"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_121">[121]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 62, 63.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_122"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_122">[122]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 65.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_123"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_123">[123]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 2-13. This
-proposition of the Lesbians at Sparta must have been made before the
-collision between Athens and Corinth at Korkyra.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_124"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_124">[124]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 139. ἐπικαλοῦντες
-ἐπεργασίαν Μεγαρεῦσι τῆς γῆς τῆς ἱερᾶς καὶ τῆς ἀορίστου, etc.
-Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30; Schol. ad Aristophan. Pac. 609.</p>
-
-<p>I agree with Göller that two distinct violations of right are
-here imputed to the Megarians: the one, that they had cultivated
-land, the property of the goddesses at Eleusis,—the other, that they
-had appropriated and cultivated the unsettled pasture land on the
-border. Dr. Arnold’s note takes a different view, less correct, in
-my opinion: “The land on the frontier was consecrated to prevent it
-from being inclosed: in which case the boundaries might have been a
-subject of perpetual dispute between the two countries,” etc. Compare
-Thucyd. v, 42, about the border territory round Panaktum.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_125"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_125">[125]</a></span> Thucydidês (i, 139), in
-assigning the reasons of this sentence of exclusion passed by
-Athens against the Megarians, mentions only the two allegations
-here noticed,—wrongful cultivation of territory, and reception of
-runaway slaves. He does not allude to the herald, Anthemokritus:
-still less does he notice that gossip of the day, which Aristophanês
-and other comedians of this period turn to account in fastening the
-Peloponnesian war upon the personal sympathies of Periklês, namely,
-that first, some young men of Athens stole away the courtezan,
-Simætha, from Megara: next, the Megarian youth revenged themselves
-by stealing away from Athens “two engaging courtezans,” one of whom
-was the mistress of Periklês; upon which the latter was so enraged
-that he proposed the sentence of exclusion against the Megarians
-(Aristoph. Acharn. 501-516; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30).</p>
-
-<p>Such stories are chiefly valuable as they make us acquainted with
-the political scandal of the time. But the story of the herald,
-Anthemokritus, and his death, cannot be altogether rejected. Though
-Thucydidês, not mentioning the fact, did not believe that the
-herald’s death had really been occasioned by the Megarians; yet
-there probably was a popular belief at Athens to that effect, under
-the influence of which the deceased herald received a public burial
-near the Thriasian gate of Athens, leading to Eleusis: see Philippi
-Epistol. ad Athen. ap. Demosthen. p. 159, R.; Pausan. i, 36, 3;
-iii, 4, 2. The language of Plutarch (Periklês, c. 30) is probably
-literally correct,—“the herald’s death <i>appeared</i> to have been caused
-by the Megarians,”—αἰτίᾳ τῶν Μεγαρέων ἀποθανεῖν ἔδοξε. That neither
-Thucydidês, nor Periklês himself, believed that the Megarians had
-really caused his death, is pretty certain: otherwise, the fact
-would have been urged when the Lacedæmonians sent to complain of the
-sentence of exclusion,—being a deed so notoriously repugnant to all
-Grecian feeling.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_126"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_126">[126]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 67. Μεγαρῆς,
-δηλοῦντες μὲν καὶ ἕτερα οὐκ ὀλίγα διάφορα, μάλιστα δὲ, λιμένων τε
-εἴργεσθαι τῶν ἐν τῇ Ἀθηναίων ἀρχῇ, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_127"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_127">[127]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 67. λέγοντες οὐκ
-εἶναι αὐτόνομοι κατὰ τὰς σπονδάς. O. Müller (Æginet. p. 180) and
-Göller in his note, think that the <i>truce</i> (or <i>covenant</i> generally)
-here alluded to is, not the thirty years’ truce, concluded fourteen
-years before the period actually present, but the ancient alliance
-against the Persians, solemnly ratified and continued after the
-victory of Platæa. Dr. Arnold, on the contrary, thinks that the
-thirty years’ truce is alluded to, which the Æginetans interpreted
-(rightly or not) as entitling them to independence.</p>
-
-<p>The former opinion might seem to be countenanced by the allusion
-to Ægina in the speech of the Thebans (iii, 64): but on the other
-hand, if we consult i, 115, it will appear possible that the wording
-of the thirty years’ truce may have been general, as,—Ἀποδοῦναι δὲ
-Ἀθηναίους ὅσα ἔχουσι Πελοποννησίων: at any rate, the Æginetans may
-have pretended that, by the same rule as Athens gave up Nisæa, Pegæ,
-etc., she ought also to renounce Ægina.</p>
-
-<p>However, we must recollect that the one plea does not exclude the
-other: the Æginetans may have taken advantage of <i>both</i> in enforcing
-their prayer for interference. This seems to have been the idea of
-the Scholiast, when he says—κατὰ τὴν συμφωνίαν τῶν σπονδῶν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_128"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_128">[128]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 67. κατεβόων
-ἐλθόντες τῶν Ἀθηναίων ὅτι σπονδάς τε λελυκότες εἶεν καὶ ἀδικοῖεν
-τὴν Πελοπόννησον. The change of tense in these two verbs is to be
-noticed.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_129"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_129">[129]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 68. οὐ γὰρ ἂν
-Κέρκυράν τε ὑπολαβόντες βίᾳ ἡμῶν εἶχον, καὶ Ποτίδαιαν ἐπολιόρκουν,
-ὧν τὸ μὲν ἐπικαιρότατον χωρίον πρὸς τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης ἀποχρῆσθαι, ἡ δὲ
-ναυτικὸν ἂν μέγιστον παρέσχε Πελοποννησίοις.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_130"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_130">[130]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 68. ἐν οἷς προσήκει
-ἡμᾶς οὐχ ἥκιστα εἰπεῖν, ὅσῳ καὶ μέγιστα ἐγκλήματα ἔχομεν, ὑπὸ μὲν
-Ἀθηναίων ὑβριζόμενοι, ὑπὸ δὲ ὑμῶν ἀμελούμενοι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_131"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_131">[131]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_132"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_132">[132]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 69. ἡσυχάζετε
-γὰρ μόνοι Ἑλλήνων, ὦ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, οὐ τῇ δυνάμει τινὰ ἀλλὰ τῇ
-μελλήσει ἀμυνόμενοι, καὶ μόνοι οὐκ ἀρχομένην τὴν αὔξησιν τῶν ἐχθρῶν,
-διπλασιουμένην δὲ, καταλύοντες. Καίτοι ἐλέγεσθε ἀσφαλεῖς εἶναι, ὧν
-ἄρα ὁ λόγος τοῦ ἔργου ἐκράτει· τόν τε γὰρ Μῆδον, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_133"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_133">[133]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 70. Οἱ μέν γε
-νεωτεροποιοὶ, καὶ ἐπιχειρῆσαι ὀξεῖς καὶ ἐπιτελέσαι ἔργῳ ὃ ἂν γνῶσιν·
-ὑμεῖς δὲ τὰ ὑπάρχοντά τε σώζειν, καὶ ἐπιγνῶναι μηδὲν, καὶ ἔργῳ οὐδὲ
-τἀναγκαῖα ἐξικέσθαι.</p>
-
-<p>The meaning of the word ὀξεῖς—<i>sharp</i>—when applied to the latter
-half of the sentence, is in the nature of a sarcasm. But this is
-suitable to the character of the speech. Göller supposes some such
-word as ἱκανοὶ, instead of ὀξεῖς, to be understood: but we should
-thereby both depart from the more obvious syntax, and weaken the
-general meaning.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_134"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_134">[134]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 70. ἔτι δὲ τοῖς
-μὲν σώμασιν ἀλλοτριωτάτοις ὑπὲρ τῆς πόλεως χρῶνται, τῇ γνώμῃ δὲ
-οἰκειοτάτῃ ἐς τὸ πράσσειν τι ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς.</p>
-
-<p>It is difficult to convey, in translation, the antithesis between
-ἀλλοτριωτάτοις and οἰκειοτάτῃ—not without a certain conceit, which
-Thucydidês is occasionally fond of.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_135"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_135">[135]</a></span> Thucyd. <i>l. c.</i> καὶ ταῦτα
-μετὰ πόνων πάντα καὶ κινδύνων δι᾽ ὅλου τοῦ αἰῶνος μοχθοῦσι, καὶ
-ἀπολαύουσιν ἐλάχιστα τῶν ὑπαρχόντων, διὰ τὸ ἀεὶ κτᾶσθαι καὶ μήτε
-ἑορτὴν ἄλλο τι ἡγεῖσθαι ἢ τὸ τὰ δέοντα πρᾶξαι, ξυμφορὰν δὲ οὐχ ἧσσον
-ἡσυχίαν ἀπράγμονα ἢ ἀσχολίαν ἐπίπονον· ὥστε εἴ τις αὐτοὺς ξυνελὼν
-φαίη πεφυκέναι ἐπὶ τῷ μήτε αὐτοὺς ἔχειν ἡσυχίαν μήτε τοὺς ἄλλους
-ἀνθρώπους ἐᾷν, ὀρθῶς ἂν εἴποι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_136"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_136">[136]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 71. ἀρχαιότροπα
-ὑμῶν τὰ ἐπιτηδεύματα πρὸς αὐτούς ἐστιν. Ἀνάγκη δ᾽, ὥσπερ τέχνης,
-ἀεὶ τὰ ἐπιγιγνόμενα κρατεῖν· καὶ ἡσυχαζούσῃ μὲν πόλει τὰ ἀκίνητα
-νόμιμα ἄριστα, πρὸς πολλὰ δὲ ἀναγκαζομένοις ἰέναι, πολλῆς καὶ τῆς
-ἐπιτεχνήσεως δεῖ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_137"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_137">[137]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 71.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_138"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_138">[138]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 72.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_139"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_139">[139]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 73. ῥηθήσεται δὲ οὐ
-παραιτήσεως μᾶλλον ἕνεκα ἢ μαρτυρίου, καὶ δηλώσεως πρὸς οἵαν ὑμῖν
-πόλιν μὴ εὖ βουλευομένοις ὁ ἀγὼν καταστήσεται.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_140"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_140">[140]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 75. Ἆρ᾽ ἄξιοί
-ἐσμεν, ὦ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, καὶ προθυμίας ἕνεκα τῆς τότε καὶ γνώμης
-συνέσεως, ἀρχῆς γε ἧς ἔχομεν τοῖς Ἕλλησι μὴ οὕτως ἄγαν ἐπιφθόνως
-διακεῖσθαι; καὶ γὰρ αὐτὴν τήνδε ἐλάβομεν οὐ βιασάμενοι, ἀλλ᾽ ὑμῶν μὲν
-οὐκ ἐθελησάντων παραμεῖναι πρὸς τὰ ὑπόλοιπα τοῦ βαρβάρου, ἡμῖν δὲ
-προσελθόντων τῶν ξυμμάχων, καὶ αὐτῶν δεηθέντων ἡγεμόνας καταστῆναι·
-ἐξ αὐτοῦ δὲ τοῦ ἔργου κατηναγκάσθημεν τὸ πρῶτον προαγαγεῖν αὐτὴν
-ἐς τόδε, μάλιστα μὲν ὑπὸ δέους, ἔπειτα δὲ καὶ τιμῆς, ὕστερον καὶ
-ὠφελείας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_141"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_141">[141]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 77.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_142"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_142">[142]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 78. ἡμεῖς δὲ ἐν
-οὐδεμίᾳ πω τοιαύτῃ ἁμαρτίᾳ ὄντες, οὔτ᾽ αὐτοὶ οὔτε ὑμᾶς ὁρῶντες,
-λέγομεν ὑμῖν, ἕως ἔτι αὐθαίρετος ἀμφοτέροις ἡ εὐβουλία, σπονδὰς μὴ
-λύειν μηδὲ παραβαίνειν τοὺς ὅρκους, τὰ δὲ διάφορα δίκῃ λύεσθαι κατὰ
-τὴν ξυνθήκην· ἢ θεοὺς τοὺς ὁρκίους μάρτυρας ποιούμενοι, πειρασόμεθα
-ἀμύνεσθαι πολέμου ἄρχοντας ταύτῃ ᾗ ἂν ὑφηγῆσθε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_143"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_143">[143]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 79. καὶ τῶν μὲν
-πλειόνων ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτὸ αἱ γνῶμαι ἔφερον, ἀδικεῖν τε Ἀθηναίους ἤδη, καὶ
-πολεμητέα εἶναι ἐν τάχει.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_144"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_144">[144]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_145"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_145">[145]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 80. πρὸς δὲ ἄνδρας,
-οἳ γῆν τε ἑκὰς ἔχουσι καὶ προσέτι πολέμου ἐμπειρότατοί εἰσι, καὶ
-τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασιν ἄριστα ἐξήρτυνται, πλούτῳ τε ἰδίῳ καὶ δημοσίῳ καὶ
-ναυσὶ καὶ ἵπποις καὶ ὅπλοις, καὶ ὄχλῳ, ὅσος οὐκ ἐν ἄλλῳ ἑνί γε χωρίῳ
-Ἑλληνικῷ ἐστὶν, ἔτι δὲ καὶ ξυμμάχους πολλοὺς φόρου ὑποτελεῖς ἔχουσι,
-πῶς χρὴ πρὸς τούτους ῥᾳδίως πόλεμον ἄρασθαι, καὶ τίνι πιστεύσαντας
-ἀπαρασκεύους ἐπειχθῆναι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_146"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_146">[146]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 81. δέδοικα δὲ
-μᾶλλον μὴ καὶ τοῖς παισὶν αὐτὸν ὑπολίπωμεν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_147"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_147">[147]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 82, 83.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_148"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_148">[148]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 84. Πολεμικοί τε
-καὶ εὔβουλοι διὰ τὸ εὔκοσμον γιγνόμεθα, τὸ μὲν, ὅτι αἰδὼς σωφροσύνης
-πλεῖστον μετέχει, αἰσχύνης δὲ εὐψυχία· εὔβουλοι δὲ, ἀμαθέστερον τῶν
-νόμων τῆς ὑπεροψίας παιδευόμενοι, καὶ ξὺν χαλεπότητι σωφρονέστερον ἢ
-ὥστε αὐτῶν ἀνηκουστεῖν· καὶ μὴ, τὰ ἀχρεῖα ξυνετοὶ ἄγαν ὄντες, τὰς τῶν
-πολεμίων παρασκευὰς λόγῳ καλῶς μεμφόμενοι, ἀνομοίως ἔργῳ ἐπεξιέναι,
-νομίζειν δὲ τάς τε διανοίας τῶν πέλας παραπλησίους εἶναι, καὶ τὰς
-προσπιπτούσας τύχας οὐ λόγῳ διαιρετάς.</p>
-
-<p>In the construction of the last sentence, I follow Haack and
-Poppo, in preference to Göller and Dr. Arnold.</p>
-
-<p>The wording of this part of the speech of Archidamus is awkward
-and obscure, though we make out pretty well the general sense.
-It deserves peculiar attention, as coming from a king of Sparta,
-personally, too, a man of superior judgment. The great points of the
-Spartan character are all brought out. 1. A narrow, strictly-defined,
-and uniform range of ideas. 2. Compression of all other impulses and
-desires, but an increased sensibility to their own public opinion. 3.
-Great habits of endurance as well as of submission.</p>
-
-<p>The way in which the features of Spartan character are deduced
-from Spartan institutions, as well as the pride which Archidamus
-expresses in the ignorance and narrow mental range of his countrymen,
-are here remarkable. A similar championship of ignorance and
-narrow-mindedness is not only to be found among those who deride
-the literary and oratorical tastes of the Athenian democracy (see
-Aristophanês, Ran. 1070: compare Xenophon, Memorab. i, 2, 9-49), but
-also in the speech of Kleon (Thucyd. iii, 37).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_149"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_149">[149]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 84, 85.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_150"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_150">[150]</a></span> Compare a similar sentiment in
-the speech of the Thebans against the Platæans (Thucyd. iii, 67).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_151"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_151">[151]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 86. ἡμεῖς δὲ
-ὁμοῖοι καὶ τότε καὶ νῦν ἐσμὲν, καὶ τοὺς ξυμμάχους, ἢν σωφρονῶμεν,
-οὐ περιοψόμεθα ἀδικουμένους, οὐδὲ μελλήσομεν τιμωρεῖν· οἱ δὲ οὐκέτι
-μέλλουσι κακῶς πάσχειν. </p> <p> There is here a play upon the word
-μέλλειν, which it is not easy to preserve in a translation.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_152"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_152">[152]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 87. βουλόμενος
-αὐτοὺς φανερῶς ἀποδεικνυμένους τὴν γνώμην ἐς τὸ πολεμεῖν μᾶλλον
-ὁρμῆσαι, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_153"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_153">[153]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 118. ὁ δὲ ἀνεῖλεν
-αὐτοῖς, <em class="gesperrt">ὡς λέγεται</em>, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_154"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_154">[154]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 120, 121. Κατὰ πολλὰ
-δὲ ἡμᾶς εἰκὸς ἐπικρατῆσαι, πρῶτον μὲν πλήθει προὔχοντας καὶ ἐμπειρίᾳ
-πολεμικῇ, ἔπειτα <em class="gesperrt">ὁμοίως</em> πάντας ἐς τὰ
-παραγγελλόμενα ἰόντας.</p>
-
-<p>I conceive that the word <em class="gesperrt">ὁμοίως</em> here
-alludes to the equal interest of all the confederates in the quarrel,
-as opposed to the Athenian power, which was composed partly of
-constrained subjects, partly of hired mercenaries: to both of which
-points, as weaknesses in the enemy, the Corinthian orator goes on to
-allude. The word ὁμοίως here designates the same fact as Periklês,
-in his speech at Athens (i, 141), mentions under the words πάντες
-ἰσόψηφοι: the Corinthian orator treats it as an advantage to have
-all confederates equal and hearty in the cause: Periklês, on the
-contrary, looking at the same fact from the Athenian point of view,
-considers it as a disadvantage, since it prevented unity of command
-and determination.</p>
-
-<p>Poppo’s view of this passage seems to me erroneous.</p>
-
-<p>The same idea is reproduced, c. 124. εἴπερ βεβαιότατον τὸ ταὐτὰ
-ξυμφέροντα καὶ πόλεσι καὶ ἰδιώταις εἶναι, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_155"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_155">[155]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 123, 124.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_156"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_156">[156]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 125. καὶ τὸ πλῆθος
-ἐψηφίσαντο πολεμεῖν. It seems that the decision was not absolutely
-unanimous.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_157"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_157">[157]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 88. Ἐψηφίσαντο
-δὲ οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι τὰς σπονδὰς λελύσθαι καὶ πολεμητέα εἶναι, <em
-class="gesperrt">οὐ τοσοῦτον τῶν ξυμμάχων πεισθέντες τοῖς λόγοις,
-ὅσον φοβούμενοι τοὺς Ἀθηναίους</em>, μὴ ἐπὶ μεῖζον δυνηθῶσιν, ὁρῶντες
-αὐτοῖς τὰ πολλὰ τῆς Ἑλλάδος ὑποχείρια ἤδη ὄντα: compare also c. 23
-and 118.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_158"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_158">[158]</a></span> Plutarch’s biography of
-Periklês is very misleading, from its inattention to chronology,
-ascribing to an earlier time feelings and tendencies which really
-belong to a later. Thus he represents (c. 20) the desire for
-acquiring possession of Sicily, and even of Carthage and the
-Tyrrhenian coast, as having become very popular at Athens even before
-the revolt of Megara and Eubœa, and before those other circumstances
-which preceded the thirty years’ truce: and he gives much credit
-to Periklês for having repressed such unmeasured aspirations. But
-ambitious hopes directed towards Sicily could not have sprung up in
-the Athenian mind until after the beginning of the Peloponnesian war.
-It was impossible that they could make any step in that direction
-until they had established their alliance with Korkyra, and this was
-only done in the year before the Peloponnesian war,—done too, even
-then, in a qualified manner, and with much reserve. At the first
-outbreak of the Peloponnesian war, the Athenians had nothing but
-fears, while the Peloponnesians had large hopes of aid, from the
-side of Sicily. While it is very true, therefore, that Periklês was
-eminently useful in discouraging rash and distant enterprises of
-ambition generally, we cannot give him the credit of keeping down
-Athenian desires of acquisition in Sicily, or towards Carthage,—if,
-indeed, this latter ever was included in the catalogue of Athenian
-hopes,—for such desires were hardly known until after his death, in
-spite of the assertion again repeated by Plutarch, Alkibiadês, c.
-17.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_159"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_159">[159]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 33-36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_160"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_160">[160]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 40, 41.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_161"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_161">[161]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 8.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_162"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_162">[162]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 45; Plutarch,
-Periklês. c. 8.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_163"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_163">[163]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 126. ἐν
-τούτῳ δὲ ἐπρεσβεύοντο τῷ χρόνῳ πρὸς τοὺς Ἀθηναίους <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐγκλήματα ποιούμενοι, ὅπως σφίσιν ὅτι μεγίστη
-πρόφασις εἴη τοῦ πολεμεῖν, ἢν μή τι ἐσακούωσι</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_164"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_164">[164]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 125.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_165"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_165">[165]</a></span> See the account of the Kylonian
-troubles, and the sacrilege which followed, in vol. iii, of this
-History, ch. x, p. 110.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_166"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_166">[166]</a></span> See Herodot. v, 70: compare
-vi, 131; Thucyd. i, 126; and vol. iv, ch. xxxi, p. 163 of this
-History.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_167"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_167">[167]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 126. ἐκέλευον τοὺς
-Ἀθηναίους τὸ ἄγος ἐλαύνειν τῆς θεοῦ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_168"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_168">[168]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 127.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_169"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_169">[169]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 24.
-Respecting Aspasia, see Plato, Menexenus, c. 3, 4; Xenophon, Memorab.
-ii, 6, 36; Harpokration, v, Ἀσπασία. Aspasia was, doubtless, not an
-uncommon name among Grecian women; we know of one Phokæan girl who
-bore it, the mistress of Cyrus the younger (Plutarch, Artaxer. c.
-26). The story about Aspasia having kept slave-girls for hire, is
-stated by both Plutarch and Athenæus (xiii, p. 570); but we may well
-doubt whether there is any better evidence for it than that which is
-actually cited by the latter, the passage in Aristophanês, Acharn.
-497-505:—</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Κἀθ᾽ οἱ Μεγαρῆς ὀδύναις πεφυσιγγωμένοι</p>
-<p class="i0">Ἀντεξέκλεψαν Ἀσπασίας <em class="gesperrt">πόρνα δύο</em> or <em class="gesperrt">πόρνας δύο</em>.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="mt1">Athenæus reads the latter, but the reading πόρνα δύο
-appears in the received text of Aristophanês. Critics differ, whether
-Ἀσπασίας is the genitive case singular of Ἀσπασία, or the accusative
-plural of the adjective ἀσπάσιος. I believe that it is the latter;
-but intended as a play on the word, capable of being understood
-either as a substantive or as an adjective—ἀσπασίας πόρνας δύο, or
-Ἀσπασίας πόρνας δύο. There is a similar play on the word, in a line
-of Kratinus, quoted by Plutarch, Periklês, c. 24.</p>
-
-<p>At the time, if ever, when this theft of the Megarian youth took
-place, Aspasia must have been the beloved mistress and companion
-of Periklês; and it is inconceivable that she should have kept
-slave-girls for hire <i>then</i>, whatever she may have done before.</p>
-
-<p>That reading and construction of the verse above cited, which
-I think the least probable of the two, has been applied by the
-commentators of Thucydidês to explain a line of his history, and
-applied in a manner which I am persuaded is erroneous. When the
-Lacedæmonians desired the Athenians to repeal the decree excluding
-the Megarians from their ports, the Athenians refused, alleging that
-the Megarians had appropriated some lands which were disputed between
-the two countries, and some which were even sacred property,—and
-also, that “<i>they had received runaway slaves from Athens</i>,”—καὶ
-ἀνδραπόδων ὑποδοχὴν τῶν ἀφισταμένων (i, 139). The Scholiast gives a
-perfectly just explanation of these last words—ὡς ὅτι δούλους αὐτῶν
-ἀποφεύγοντας ἐδέχοντο. But Wasse puts a note to the passage to this
-effect—“<i>Aspasiæ servos</i>, v, Athenæum, p. 570; Aristoph. Acharn.
-525, et Schol.” This note of Wasse is adopted and transcribed by the
-three best and most recent commentators on Thucydidês,—Poppo, Göller,
-and Dr. Arnold. Yet, with all respect to their united authority,
-the supposition is neither natural, as applied to the words, nor
-admissible, as regards the matter of fact. Ἀνδράποδα ἀφιστάμενα mean
-naturally (not <i>Aspasiæ servos</i>, or more properly <i>servas</i>, for the
-very gender ought to have made Wasse suspect the correctness of his
-interpretation,—but) the runaway slaves of proprietors generally in
-Attica; of whom the Athenians lost so prodigious a number after the
-Lacedæmonian garrison was established at Dekeleia (Thucyd. vii, 28:
-compare i, 142; and iv, 118, about the ἀυτόμολοι). Periklês might
-well set forth the reception of such runaway slaves as a matter of
-complaint against the Megarians, and the Athenian public assembly
-would feel it so likewise: moreover, the Megarians are charged, not
-with having <i>stolen away</i> the slaves, but with <i>harboring</i> them
-(ὑποδοχὴν). But to suppose that Periklês, in defending the decree
-of exclusion against the Megarians, would rest the defence on the
-ground that some Megarian youth had run away with two girls of the
-<i>cortège</i> of Aspasia, argues a strange conception both of him and of
-the people. If such an incident ever really happened, or was even
-supposed to have happened, we may be sure that it would be cited
-by his opponents, as a means of bringing contempt upon the real
-accusation against the Megarians,—the purpose for which Aristophanês
-produces it. This is one of the many errors in respect to Grecian
-history, arising from the practice of construing passages of comedy
-as if they were serious and literal facts.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_170"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_170">[170]</a></span> The visit of Sokratês with
-some of his friends to Theodotê, his dialogue with her, and the
-description of her manner of living, is among the most curious
-remnants of Grecian antiquity, on a side very imperfectly known to us
-(Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 11).</p>
-
-<p>Compare the citations from Eubulus and Antiphanês, the comic
-writers, apud Athenæum, xiii, p. 571, illustrating the differences of
-character and behavior between some of these hetæræ and others,—and
-Athenæ. xiii, p. 589.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_171"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_171">[171]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 24 Εἶτα
-τῆς συμβιώσεως οὐκ οὔσης αὐτοῖς ἀρεστῆς, ἐκείνην μὲν ἑτέρῳ βουλομένην
-συνεξέδωκεν, αὐτὸς δὲ Ἀσπασίαν λαβὼν ἔστερξε διαφερόντως.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_172"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_172">[172]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-13-36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_173"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_173">[173]</a></span> This seems the more probable
-story: but there are differences of statement and uncertainties upon
-many points: compare Plutarch, Periklês, c. 16-32; Plutarch, Nikias,
-c. 23; Diogen. Laërt. ii, 12, 13. See also Schaubach, Fragment.
-Anaxagoræ, pp. 47-52.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_174"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_174">[174]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_175"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_175">[175]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 7,
-36-39.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_176"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_176">[176]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 60, 61: compare
-also his striking expressions, c. 65; Dionys. Halikarn. De Thucydid.
-Judic. c. 44, p. 924.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_177"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_177">[177]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31.
-Φειδίας—ἐργολάβος τοῦ ἀγάλματος. </p> <p> This tale, about protecting
-Pheidias under the charge of embezzlement, was the story most widely
-in circulation against Periklês—ἡ χειρίστη μὲν αἰτία πασῶν, ἔχουσα δὲ
-πλείστους μάρτυρας (Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_178"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_178">[178]</a></span> See the Dissertation of O.
-Müller (De Phidiæ Vitâ, c. 17, p. 35), who lays out the facts in the
-order in which I have given them.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_179"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_179">[179]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-13-32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_180"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_180">[180]</a></span> Aristophan. Pac. 587-603:
-compare Acharn. 512; Ephorus, ap. Diodor. xii, 38-40; and the Scholia
-on the two passages of Aristophanês; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 32.</p>
-
-<p>Diodorus (as well as Plutarch, Alkibiad. c. 7) relates another
-tale, that Alkibiadês once approached Periklês when he was in
-evident low spirits and embarrassment, and asked him the reason:
-Periklês told him that the time was near at hand for rendering his
-accounts, and that he was considering how this could be done: upon
-which Alkibiadês advised him to consider rather how he could evade
-doing it. The result of this advice was that Periklês plunged Athens
-into the Peloponnesian war: compare Aristophan. Nub. 855, with the
-Scholia,—and Ephorus, Fragm. 118, 119, ed. Marx, with the notes of
-Marx.</p>
-
-<p>It is probable enough that Ephorus copied the story, which
-ascribes the Peloponnesian war to the accusations against Pheidias
-and Periklês, from Aristophanês or other comic writers of the
-time. But it deserves remark, that even Aristophanês is not to be
-considered as certifying it. For if we consult the passage above
-referred to in his comedy <i>Pax</i>, we shall find that, first, Hermês
-tells the story about Pheidias, Periklês, and the Peloponnesian war;
-upon which both Trygæus, and the Chorus, remark that <i>they never
-heard a word of it before</i>: that it is quite <i>new</i> to them.</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Tryg.&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Ταῦτα τοίνυν, μὰ τὸν Ἀπόλλω, ᾽γὼ ᾽πεπύσμην οὐδενὸς,</p>
-<p class="i8">&nbsp;Οὐδ᾽ ὅπως αὐτῇ (Εἰρήνῃ) προσήκοι Φειδίας ἠκηκόη.</p>
-<p class="i0">Chorus.&nbsp; &nbsp; Οὐδ᾽ ἔγωγε πλήν γε νυνί.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="mt1">If Aristophanês had stated the story ever so plainly,
-his authority could only have been taken as proving that it was a
-part of the talk of the time: but the lines just cited make him as
-much a contradicting as an affirming witness.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_181"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_181">[181]</a></span> It would appear that not
-only Aspasia and Anaxagoras, but also the musician and philosopher
-Damon, the personal friend and instructor of Periklês, must have
-been banished at a time when Periklês was old,—perhaps somewhere
-near about this time. The passage in Plato, Alkibiadês, i, c.
-30, p. 118, proves that Damon was in Athens, and intimate with
-Periklês, when the latter was of considerable age—καὶ νῦν ἔτι <em
-class="gesperrt">τηλικοῦτος</em> ὢν Δάμωνι σύνεστιν αὐτοῦ τούτου
-ἕνεκα.</p>
-
-<p>Damon is said to have been ostracized,—perhaps he was tried and
-condemned to banishment: for the two are sometimes confounded.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_182"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_182">[182]</a></span> See Thucyd. v, 43; vi, 89.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_183"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_183">[183]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 128, 135, 139.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_184"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_184">[184]</a></span> Plutarch, Perikl. c. 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_185"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_185">[185]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 39. It rather
-appears, from the words of Thucydidês, that these various demands of
-the Lacedæmonians were made by <i>one</i> embassy, joined by new members
-arriving with fresh instructions, but remaining during a month or six
-weeks, between January and March 431 <small>B.C.</small>,
-installed in the house of the proxenus of Sparta at Athens: compare
-Xenophon Hellenic. v, 4, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_186"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_186">[186]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 139; Plutarch,
-Periklês, c. 31.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_187"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_187">[187]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 140. ἐνδέχεται
-γὰρ τὰς ξυμφορὰς τῶν πραγμάτων οὐχ ἧσσον ἀμαθῶς χωρῆσαι ἢ καὶ τὰς
-διανοίας τοῦ ἀνθρώπου· διόπερ καὶ τὴν τύχην ὅσα ἂν παρὰ λόγον ξυμβῇ,
-εἰώθαμεν αἰτιᾶσθαι. I could have wished, in the translation, to
-preserve the play upon the words ἀμαθῶς χωρῆσαι, which Thucydidês
-introduces into this sentence, and which seems to have been agreeable
-to his taste. Ἀμαθῶς, when referred to ξυμφορὰς, is used in a passive
-sense by no means common,—“in a manner which cannot be learned,
-departing from all reasonable calculation.” Ἀμαθῶς, when referred to
-διανοίας, bears its usual meaning,—“ignorant, deficient in learning
-or in reason.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_188"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_188">[188]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 140.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_189"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_189">[189]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 141. αὐτουργοί τε
-γάρ εἰσι Πελοποννήσιοι, καὶ οὔτε ἰδίᾳ οὔτε ἐν κοινῷ χρήματά ἐστιν
-αὐτοῖς· ἔπειτα χρονίων πολέμων καὶ διαποντίων ἄπειροι, διὰ τὸ βραχέως
-αὐτοὶ ἐπ᾽ ἀλλήλους ὑπὸ πενίας ἐπιφέρειν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_190"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_190">[190]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 143. εἴτε καὶ
-κινήσαντες τῶν Ὀλυμπίασιν ἢ Δελφοῖς χρημάτων μισθῷ μείζονι πειρῷντο
-ἡμῶν ὑπολαβεῖν τοὺς ξένους τῶν ναυτῶν, μὴ ὄντων μὲν ἡμῶν ἀντιπάλων,
-ἐσβάντων αὐτῶν τε καὶ τῶν μετοίκων, δεινὸν ἂν ἦν· νῦν δὲ τόδε τε
-ὑπάρχει, καὶ, ὅπερ κράτιστον, κυβερνήτας ἔχομεν πολίτας καὶ τὴν ἄλλην
-ὑπηρεσίαν πλείους καὶ ἀμείνους ἢ πᾶσα ἡ ἄλλη Ἑλλάς.</p>
-
-<p>This is in reply to those hopes which we know to have been
-conceived by the Peloponnesian leaders, and upon which the Corinthian
-speaker in the Peloponnesian congress had dwelt (i, 121). Doubtless
-Periklês would be informed of the tenor of all these public
-demonstrations at Sparta.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_191"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_191">[191]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 141, 142, 143.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_192"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_192">[192]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 143. τήν τε
-ὀλόφυρσιν μὴ οἰκιῶν καὶ γῆς ποιεῖσθαι, ἀλλὰ τῶν σωμάτων· οὐ γὰρ τάδε
-τοὺς ἄνδρας, ἀλλ᾽ οἱ ἄνδρες ταῦτα κτῶνται.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_193"><span class="label"><a href="#FNanchor_193">[193]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 144. πολλὰ δὲ καὶ ἄλλα ἔχω ἐς ἐλπίδα τοῦ περιέσεσθαι, ἢν
-ἐθέλητε ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι ἅμα πολεμοῦντες, καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους
-μὴ προστίθεσθαι· μᾶλλον γὰρ πεφόβημαι τὰς οἰκείας ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίας ἢ τὰς
-τῶν ἐναντίων διανοίας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_194"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_194">[194]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 143, 144.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_195"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_195">[195]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 145. καὶ τοῖς
-Λακεδαιμονίοις ἀπεκρίναντο τῇ ἐκείνου γνώμῃ, καθ᾽ ἕκαστά τε ὡς
-ἔφρασε, καὶ τὸ ξύμπαν οὐδὲν κελευόμενοι ποιήσειν, δίκῃ δὲ κατὰ τὰς
-ξυνθήκας ἑτοῖμοι εἶναι διαλύεσθαι περὶ τῶν ἐγκλημάτων ἐπὶ ἴσῃ καὶ
-ὁμοίᾳ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_196"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_196">[196]</a></span> In spite of the contrary view
-taken by Plutarch, Periklês, c. 31: comparison of Perikl. and Fab.
-Max. c. 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_197"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_197">[197]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 21. Οἱ μὲν οὖν
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι τοσαῦτα εἶπον, νομίζοντες τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἐν τῷ πρὶν
-χρόνῳ σπονδῶν ἐπιθυμεῖν, σφῶν δὲ ἐναντιουμένων κωλύεσθαι, διδομένης
-δὲ εἰρήνης ἀσμένως δέξεσθαί τε καὶ τοὺς ἄνδρας ἀποδώσειν.</p>
-
-<p>See also an important passage (vii, 18) about the feelings of the
-Spartans. The Spartans thought, says Thucydidês, ἐν τῷ προτέρῳ πολέμῳ
-(the beginning of the Peloponnesian war) σφέτερον τὸ παρανόμημα
-μᾶλλον γενέσθαι, ὅτι τε ἐς Πλάταιαν ἦλθον Θηβαῖοι ἐν σπονδαῖς, καὶ
-εἰρημένον ἐν ταῖς πρότερον ξυνθήκαις ὅπλα μὴ ἐπιφέρειν ἢν δίκας
-θέλωσι διδόναι, αὐτοὶ οὐχ ὑπήκουον ἐς δίκας προκαλουμένων τῶν
-Ἀθηναίων· καὶ διὰ τοῦτο εἰκότως δυστυχεῖν τε ἐνόμιζον, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_198"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_198">[198]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 126. ὅπως σφίσιν ὅτι
-μεγίστη πρόφασις εἴη τοῦ πολεμεῖν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_199"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_199">[199]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 146. ἐπεμίγνυντο δ᾽
-ὅμως ἐν αὐταῖς καὶ παρ᾽ ἀλλήλους ἐφοίτων, ἀκηρύκτως μὲν, ἀνυπόπτως
-δ᾽ οὔ· σπονδῶν γὰρ ξύγχυσις τὰ γιγνόμενα ἦν, καὶ πρόφασις τοῦ
-πολεμεῖν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_200"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_200">[200]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 2. βουλόμενοι
-ἰδίας ἕνεκα δυνάμεως ἄνδρας τε τῶν πολιτῶν τοὺς σφίσιν ὑπεναντίους
-διαφθεῖραι, καὶ τὴν πόλιν τοῖς Θηβαίοις προσποιῆσαι: also iii, 65.
-ἄνδρες οἱ πρῶτοι καὶ χρήμασι καὶ γένει, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_201"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_201">[201]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 56.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_202"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_202">[202]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 2. ἅμα ἦρι
-ἀρχομένῳ—seems to indicate a period rather before than after the
-first of April: we may consider the bisection of the Thucydidean
-year into θέρος and χείμων as marked by the equinoxes. His summer
-and winter are each a half of the year (Thucyd. v, 20), though Poppo
-erroneously treats the Thucydidean winter as only four months (Poppo,
-Proleg. i, c. v, p. 72, and ad Thucyd. ii, 2: see F. W. Ullrich,
-Beiträge zur Erklärung des Thukydidês, p. 32, Hamburg, 1846).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_203"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_203">[203]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 2-5. <em
-class="gesperrt">θέμενοι δὲ ἐς τὴν ἀγορὰν τὰ ὅπλα</em> ... καὶ
-ἀνεῖπεν ὁ κήρυξ, εἴτις βούλεται κατὰ τὰ πάτρια τῶν πάντων Βοιωτῶν
-ξυμμαχεῖν, <em class="gesperrt">τίθεσθαι παρ᾽ αὑτοὺς τὰ ὅπλα</em>.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold has a note upon this passage, explaining τίθεσθαι, or
-θέσθαι τὰ ὅπλα, to mean, “piling the arms,” or getting rid of their
-spears and shields by piling them all in one or more heaps. He says:
-“The Thebans, therefore, as usual on a halt, proceeded to pile their
-arms, and by inviting the Platæans to come and pile theirs with
-them, they meant that they should come in arms from their several
-houses to join them, and thus naturally pile their spears and shields
-with those of their friends, to be taken up together with theirs,
-whenever there should be occasion either to march or to fight.” The
-same explanation of the phrase had before been given by Wesseling
-and Larcher, ad Herodot. ix, 52; though Bähr on the passage is more
-satisfactory.</p>
-
-<p>Both Poppo and Göller also sanction Dr. Arnold’s explanation: yet
-I cannot but think that it is unsuitable to the passage before us, as
-well as to several other passages in which τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα occurs:
-there may be other passages in which it will suit, but as a general
-explanation it appears to me inadmissible. In most cases, the words
-mean “<i>armati consistere</i>,”—to ground arms,—to maintain rank, resting
-the spear and shield (see Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 4, 12) upon the ground.
-In the incident now before us, the Theban hoplites enter Platæa,
-a strange town, with the population decidedly hostile, and likely
-to be provoked more than ever by this surprise, add to which, that
-it is pitch dark, and a rainy night. Is it likely, that the first
-thing which they do will be to pile their arms? The darkness alone
-would render it a slow and uncertain operation to resume the arms:
-so that when the Platæans attacked them, as they did, quite suddenly
-and unexpectedly, and while it was yet dark, the Thebans would
-have been—upon Dr. Arnold’s supposition—altogether defenceless and
-unarmed (see ii, 3. <em class="gesperrt">προσέβαλόν τε εὐθὺς</em>—οἱ
-Πλαταιῆς—καὶ ἐς χεῖρας ᾔεσαν <em class="gesperrt">κατὰ τάχος</em>)
-which certainly they were not. Dr. Arnold’s explanation may suit
-the case of the soldier in camp, but certainly not that of the
-soldier in presence of an enemy, or under circumstances of danger:
-the difference of the two will be found illustrated in Xenophon,
-Hellenic. ii, 4, 5, 6.</p> <p>Nor do the passages referred to by Dr.
-Arnold himself bear out his interpretation of the phrase τίθεσθαι τὰ
-ὅπλα. That interpretation is, moreover, not conveniently applicable
-either to Thucyd. vii, 3, or viii, 25,—decidedly inapplicable to iv,
-68 (θησόμενον τὰ ὅπλα), in the description of the night attack on
-Megara, very analogous to this upon Platæa,—and not less decidedly
-inapplicable to two passages of Xenophon’s Anabasis, i, 5, 14; iv, 3,
-7.</p>
-
-<p>Schneider, in the Lexicon appended to his edition of Xenophon’s
-Anabasis, has a long but not very distinct article upon τίθεσθαι τὰ
-ὅπλα.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_204"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_204">[204]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 3. ἐδόκει οὖν
-ἐπιχειρητέα εἶναι, καὶ ξυνελέγοντο διορύσσοντες τοὺς κοινοὺς τοίχους
-παρ᾽ ἀλλήλους, ὅπως μὴ διὰ τῶν ὁδῶν φανεροὶ ὦσιν ἰόντες, ἁμάξας δὲ
-ἄνευ τῶν ὑποζυγίων ἐς τὰς ὁδοὺς καθίστασαν, ἵν᾽ ἀντὶ τείχους ᾖ, καὶ
-τἄλλα ἐξήρτυον, etc.</p>
-
-<p>I may be permitted to illustrate this by a short extract from
-the letter of M. Marrast, mayor of Paris, to the National Assembly,
-written during the formidable insurrection of June 25, 1848, in that
-city, and describing the proceedings of the insurgents: “Dans la
-plupart des rues longues, étroites et couvertes de barricades qui
-vont de l’Hôtel de Ville à la Rue St. Antoine, la garde nationale
-mobile, et la troupe de ligne, ont dû faire le siège de chaque
-maison; et ce qui rendait l’œuvre plus périlleuse, c’est que les
-insurgés avaient établi, de chaque maison à chaque maison, des
-communications intérieures qui reliaient les maisons entre elles,
-en sorte qu’ils pouvaient se rendre, comme par une allée couverte,
-d’un point éloigné jusqu’au centre d’une suite de barricades qui les
-protégeaient.” (Lettre publiée dans le journal, le National, June 26,
-1848).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_205"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_205">[205]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 3, 4.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_206"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_206">[206]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 5, 6; Herodot.
-vii, 233. Demosthenês (cont. Neæram, c. 25, p. 1379) agrees with
-Thucydidês in the statement that the Platæans slew their prisoners.
-From whom Diodorus borrowed his inadmissible story, that the Platæans
-gave up their prisoners to the Thebans, I cannot tell (Diodor. xii,
-41, 42).</p>
-
-<p>The passage in this oration against Neæra is also curious, both
-as it agrees with Thucydidês on many points, and as it differs from
-him on several others: in some sentences, even the words agree
-with Thucydidês (ὁ γὰρ Ἀσωπὸς ποταμὸς μέγας ἐῤῥύη, καὶ διαβῆναι οὐ
-ῥᾴδιον ἦν, etc.: compare Thucyd. ii, 2); while on other points there
-is discrepancy. Demosthenês—or the Pseudo-Demosthenês—states that
-Archidamus, king of Sparta, planned the surprise of Platæa,—that
-the Platæans only discovered, when morning dawned, the small real
-number of the Thebans in the town,—that the larger body of Thebans,
-when they at last did arrive near Platæa after the great delay in
-their march, were forced to retire by the numerous force arriving
-from Athens, and that the Platæans then destroyed their prisoners in
-the town. Demosthenês mentions nothing about any convention between
-the Platæans and the Thebans without the town, respecting the Theban
-prisoners within.</p>
-
-<p>On every point on which the narrative of Thucydidês differs from
-that of Demosthenês, that of the former stands out as the most
-coherent and credible.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_207"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_207">[207]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 66.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_208"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_208">[208]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 1-6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_209"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_209">[209]</a></span> Thucyd. ii. 7, 8. ἥ τε ἄλλη
-Ἑλλὰς <em class="gesperrt">πᾶσα μετέωρος ἦν</em>, ξυνιουσῶν τῶν
-πρώτων πόλεων.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_210"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_210">[210]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 23.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_211"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_211">[211]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 13. ἅπερ καὶ
-πρότερον, etc., ἔλεγε δὲ καὶ ἄλλα, <em class="gesperrt">οἷάπερ
-εἰώθει</em>, Περικλῆς ἐς ἀπόδειξιν τοῦ περιέσεσθαι τῷ πολέμῳ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_212"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_212">[212]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 7, 22, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_213"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_213">[213]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 68. The time at
-which this expedition of Phormio and the capture of Argos happened,
-is not precisely marked by Thucydidês. But his words seem to
-imply that it was before the commencement of the war, as Poppo
-observes. Phormio was sent to Chalkidikê about October or November
-432 <small>B.C.</small> (i, 64); and the expedition against Argos
-probably occurred between that event and the naval conflict of
-Korkyræans and Athenians against Corinthians with their allies,
-Ambrakiots included,—which conflict had happened in the preceding
-spring.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_214"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_214">[214]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_215"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_215">[215]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 13; Xenophon,
-Anabas. vii, 4.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_216"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_216">[216]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 7. ὡς βεβαίως πέριξ
-τὴν Πελοπόννησον καταπολεμήσοντες. vi, 90. πέριξ τὴν Πελοπόννησον
-πολιορκοῦντες.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_217"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_217">[217]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65. τοσοῦτον τῷ
-Περικλεῖ ἐπερίσσευσε τότε ἀφ᾽ ὧν αὐτὸς προέγνω, καὶ πάνυ ἂν ῥᾳδίως
-περιγενέσθαι τῶν Πελοποννησίων αὐτῶν τῷ πολέμῳ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_218"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_218">[218]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 144. ἢν ἐθέλητε
-ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι ἅμα πολεμοῦντες, καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους μὴ
-προστίθεσθαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_219"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_219">[219]</a></span> Thucyd. vii, 28. ὅσον κατ᾽
-ἀρχὰς τοῦ πολέμου, οἱ μὲν ἐνιαυτὸν, οἱ δὲ δύο, οἱ δὲ τριῶν γε
-ἐτῶν, <em class="gesperrt">οὐδεὶς πλείω χρόνον ἐνόμιζον περιοίσειν
-αὐτοὺς</em> (the Athenians), <em class="gesperrt">εἰ οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι
-ἐσβάλοιεν ἐς τὴν χώραν</em>: compare v, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_220"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_220">[220]</a></span> Thucyd. vi, 11. διὰ τὸ <em
-class="gesperrt">παρὰ γνώμην αὐτῶν, πρὸς ἃ ἐφοβεῖσθε τὸ πρῶτον,
-περιγεγενῆσθαι</em>, καταφρονήσαντες ἤδη καὶ τῆς Σικελίας ἐφίεσθε.
-It is Nikias, who, in dissuading the expedition against Syracuse,
-reminds the Athenians of their past despondency at the beginning of
-the war.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_221"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_221">[221]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 7. Diodorus says
-that the Italian and Sicilian allies were required to furnish two
-hundred triremes (xii, 41). Nothing of the kind seems to have been
-actually furnished.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_222"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_222">[222]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 10-12.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_223"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_223">[223]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 11. ὥστε χρὴ καὶ
-πάνυ ἐλπίζειν διὰ μάχης ἰέναι αὐτοὺς, εἰ μὴ καὶ νῦν ὥρμηνται, ἐν
-ᾧ οὔπω πάρεσμεν, ἀλλ᾽ ὅταν ἐν τῇ γῇ ὁρῶσιν ἡμᾶς δῃοῦντάς τε καὶ
-τἀκείνων φθείροντας.</p>
-
-<p>These reports of speeches are of great value as preserving a
-record of the feelings and expectations of actors, apart from the
-result of events. What Archidamus so confidently anticipated, did
-<i>not</i> come to pass.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_224"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_224">[224]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 12.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_225"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_225">[225]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 18. πᾶσαν ἰδέαν
-πειράσαντες οὐκ ἐδύναντο ἑλεῖν. The situation of Œnoê is not exactly
-agreed upon by topographical inquirers: it was near Eleutheræ, and
-on one of the roads from Attica into Bœotia (Harpokration, v, Οἰνόη;
-Herodot. v, 74). Archidamus marched, probably, from the isthmus over
-Geraneia, and fell into this road in order to receive the junction of
-the Bœotian contingent after it had crossed Kithæron.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_226"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_226">[226]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 82; ii, 18.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_227"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_227">[227]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 13: compare
-Tacitus, Histor. v, 23. “Cerealis, insulam Batavorum hostiliter
-populatus, agros Civilis, <i>notâ arte ducum</i>, intactos sinebat.” Also
-Livy, ii, 39. </p> <p> Justin affirms that the Lacedæmonian invaders
-actually did leave the lands of Periklês uninjured, and that he made
-them over to the people (iii, 7). Thucydidês does not say whether the
-case really occurred: see also Polyænus, i, 36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_228"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_228">[228]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 15, 16.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_229"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_229">[229]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_230"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_230">[230]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 17. καὶ τὸ
-Πελασγικὸν καλούμενον τὸ ὑπὸ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν, ὃ καὶ ἐπάρατόν τε ἦν μὴ
-οἰκεῖν καί τι καὶ Πυθικοῦ μαντείου ἀκροτελεύτιον τοιόνδε διεκώλυε,
-λέγον ὡς <em class="gesperrt">τὸ Πελασγικὸν ἀργὸν ἄμεινον</em>, ὅμως
-ὑπὸ τῆς παραχρῆμα ἀνάγκης ἐξῳκήθη.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês then proceeds to give an explanation of his own for
-this ancient prophecy, intended to save its credit, as well as to
-show that his countrymen had not, as some persons alleged, violated
-any divine mandate by admitting residents into the Pelasgikon. When
-the oracle said: “The Pelasgikon is better unoccupied,” it did not
-mean to interdict the occupation of that spot, but to foretell that
-it would never be occupied until a time of severe calamity arrived.
-The necessity of occupying it grew only out of national suffering.
-Such is the explanation suggested by Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_231"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_231">[231]</a></span> Aristophanês, Equites, 789.
-οἰκοῦντ᾽ ἐν ταῖς πιθάκναισι κἀν γυπαρίοις καὶ πυργιδίοις. The
-philosopher Diogenês, in taking up his abode in a tub, had thus
-examples in history to follow.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_232"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_232">[232]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_233"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_233">[233]</a></span> See the Acharneis of
-Aristophanês, represented in the sixth year of the Peloponnesian war,
-v, 34, 180, 254, etc.</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i16">πρεσβῦταί τινες</p>
-<p class="i0">Ἀχαρνικοὶ, στιπτοὶ γέροντες, πρίνινοι,</p>
-<p class="i0">ἀτεράμονες, Μαραθωνομάχαι, σφενδάμνινοι, etc.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_234"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_234">[234]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 20.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_235"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_235">[235]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 21. κατὰ ξυστάσεις
-δὲ γιγνόμενοι ἐν πολλῇ ἔριδι ἦσαν: compare Euripidês, Herakleidæ,
-416; and Andromachê, 1077.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_236"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_236">[236]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 21. παντί τε
-τρόπῳ ἀνηρέθιστο ἡ πόλις καὶ τὸν Περικλέα ἐν ὀργῇ εἶχον, καὶ ὧν
-παρῄνεσε πρότερον ἐμέμνηντο οὐδὲν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐκάκιζον ὅτι στρατηγὸς ὢν οὐκ
-ἐπεξάγοι, αἴτιόν τε σφίσιν ἐνόμιζον πάντων ὧν ἔπασχον.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_237"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_237">[237]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_238"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_238">[238]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_239"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_239">[239]</a></span> See Schömann, De Comitiis, c.
-iv, p. 62. The prytanes (<i>i. e.</i> the fifty senators belonging to
-that tribe whose turn it was to preside at the time), as well as the
-stratêgi, had the right of convoking the ekklesia: see Thucyd. iv,
-118, in which passage, however, they are represented as convoking it
-in conjunction with the stratêgi: probably a discretion on the point
-came gradually to be understood as vested in the latter.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_240"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_240">[240]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 22. The funeral
-monument of these slain Thessalians, was among those seen by
-Pausanias near Athens, on the side of the Academy (Pausan. i, 29,
-5).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_241"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_241">[241]</a></span> Diodorus (xii, 42) would have
-us believe, that the expedition sent out by Periklês, ravaging the
-Peloponnesian coast, induced the Lacedæmonians to hurry away their
-troops out of Attica. Thucydidês gives no countenance to this,—nor is
-it at all credible.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_242"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_242">[242]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 23. The reading
-Γραϊκὴν, belonging to Γραία, seems preferable to Πειραϊκὴν. Poppo
-and Göller adopt the former, Dr. Arnold the latter. Græa was a small
-maritime place in the vicinity of Orôpus (Aristotel. ap. Stephan.
-Byz. v. Τάναγρα),—known also now as an Attic deme belonging to the
-tribe Pandionis: this has been discovered for the first time by an
-inscription published in Professor Ross’s work (Ueber die Demen von
-Attika, pp. 3-5). Orôpus was not an Attic deme; the Athenian citizens
-residing in it were probably enrolled as Γραῆς.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_243"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_243">[243]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 25; Plutarch,
-Periklês, c. 34; Justin, iii, 7, 5.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_244"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_244">[244]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 25-30; Diodor. xii,
-43, 44.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_245"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_245">[245]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 26-32; Diodor. xii,
-44.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_246"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_246">[246]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 27.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_247"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_247">[247]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 31; Diodor. xii,
-44.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_248"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_248">[248]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_249"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_249">[249]</a></span> See the striking picture in
-the Acharneis of Aristophanês (685-781) of the distressed Megarian
-selling his hungry children into slavery with their own consent: also
-Aristoph. Pac. 432.</p>
-
-<p>The position of Megara, as the ally of Sparta and enemy of Athens,
-was uncomfortable in the same manner,—though not to the same intense
-pitch of suffering,—in the war which preceded the battle of Leuktra,
-near fifty years after this (Demosthen. cont. Neær., p. 1357, c.
-12).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_250"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_250">[250]</a></span> Pausan. i, 40, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_251"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_251">[251]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 24.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_252"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_252">[252]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 15.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_253"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_253">[253]</a></span> Mitford, Hist. of Greece,
-ch. xiv, sect. 1, vol. iii, p. 100. “Another measure followed,
-which, taking place at the time when Thucydidês wrote and Periklês
-spoke, and while Periklês held the principal influence in the
-administration, strongly marks both the inherent weakness and
-the indelible barbarism of democratical government. A decree of
-the people directed.... But so little confidence was placed in a
-decree so important, sanctioned only by the present will of that
-giddy tyrant, the multitude of Athens, against whose caprices,
-since the depression of the court of Areopagus, no balancing power
-remained,—that the denunciation of capital punishment was proposed
-against whosoever should propose, and whosoever should <i>concur in</i>
-(?) any decree for the disposal of that money to any other purpose,
-or in any other circumstances.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_254"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_254">[254]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 15. τὰ δὲ χίλια
-τάλαντα, ὧν διὰ παντὸς τοῦ πολέμου ἐγλίχοντο μὴ ἅψεσθαι, εὐθὺς ἔλυσαν
-τὰς ἐπικειμένας ζημίας τῷ εἰπόντι ἢ ἐπιψηφίσαντι, ὑπὸ τῆς παρούσης
-ἐκπλήξεως, καὶ ἐψηφίσαντο κινεῖν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_255"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_255">[255]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 29.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_256"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_256">[256]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_257"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_257">[257]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 34-45. Sometimes,
-also, the allies of Athens, who had fallen along with her citizens in
-battle, had a part in the honors of the public burial (Lysias, Orat.
-Funebr. c. 13).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_258"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_258">[258]</a></span> The critics, from Dionysius of
-Halikarnassus downward, agree, for the most part, in pronouncing the
-feeble Λόγος Ἐπιτάφιος, ascribed to Demosthenês, to be not really
-his. Of those ascribed to Plato and Lysias also, the genuineness has
-been suspected, though upon far less grounds. The Menexenus, if it
-be really the work of Plato, however, does not add to his fame: but
-the harangue of Lysias, a very fine composition, may well be his,
-and may, perhaps, have been really delivered,—though probably not
-delivered by him, as he was not a qualified citizen.</p>
-
-<p>See the general instructions, in Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhetoric. c.
-6, pp. 258-268, Reisk, on the contents and composition of a funeral
-discourse,—Lysias is said to have composed several,—Plutarch, Vit. x,
-Orator. p. 836.</p>
-
-<p>Compare, respecting the funeral discourse of Periklês, K.
-F. Weber, Über die Stand-Rede des Periklês (Darmstadt, 1827);
-Westermann, Geschichte der Beredsamkeit in Griechenland und Rom.
-sects. 35, 63, 64; Kutzen, Perikles, als Staatsman, p. 158, sect. 12
-(Grimma, 1834).</p>
-
-<p>Dahlmann (Historische Forschungen, vol. i, p. 23) seems to think
-that the original oration of Periklês contained a large sprinkling
-of mythical allusions and stories out of the antiquities of Athens,
-such as we now find in the other funeral orations above alluded to;
-but that Thucydidês himself deliberately left them out in his report.
-But there seems no foundation for this suspicion. It is much more
-consonant to the superior tone of dignity which reigns throughout all
-this oration, to suppose that the mythical narratives, and even the
-previous historical glories of Athens, never found any special notice
-in the speech of Periklês,—nothing more than a general recognition,
-with an intimation that he does not dwell upon them at length because
-they were well known to his audience,—μακρηγορεῖν ἐν εἰδόσιν οὐ
-βουλόμενος ἐάσω (ii, 36).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_259"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_259">[259]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 35.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_260"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_260">[260]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 36. Ἀπὸ δὲ οἵας τε
-ἐπιτηδεύσεως ἤλθομεν ἐπ᾽ αὐτὰ, καὶ μεθ᾽ οἵας πολιτείας, καὶ τρόπων ἐξ
-οἵων μεγάλα ἐγένετο, ταῦτα δηλώσας πρῶτον εἶμι, etc.</p>
-
-<p>In the Demosthenic or pseudo-Demosthenic Orat. Funebris, c. 8, p.
-1397—χρηστῶν ἐπιτηδευμάτων συνήθεια, τῆς ὅλης πολιτείας ὑπόθεσις,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_261"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_261">[261]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 37. οὐδ᾽ αὖ κατὰ
-πενίαν, ἔχων δέ τι ἀγαθὸν δρᾶσαι τὴν πόλιν, ἀξιώματος ἀφανείᾳ
-κεκώλυται: compare Plato, Menexenus, c. 8.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_262"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_262">[262]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 37. ἐλευθέρως δὲ
-τά τε πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν πολιτεύομεν, καὶ ἐς τὴν πρὸς ἀλλήλους τῶν καθ᾽
-ἡμέραν ἐπιτηδευμάτων ὑποψίαν, οὐ δι᾽ ὀργῆς τὸν πέλας, εἰ καθ᾽ ἡδονήν
-τι δρᾷ, ἔχοντες, οὐδὲ ἀζημίους μὲν, λυπηρὰς δὲ, τῇ ὄψει ἀχθηδόνας
-προστιθέμενοι. Ἀνεπαχθῶς δὲ τὰ ἴδια προσομιλοῦντες τὰ δημόσια διὰ
-δέος μάλιστα οὐ παρανομοῦμεν, τῶν τε ἀεὶ ἐν ἀρχῇ ὄντων ἀκροάσει καὶ
-τῶν νόμων, καὶ μάλιστα αὐτῶν ὅσοι τε ἐπ᾽ ὠφελείᾳ τῶν ἀδικουμένων
-κεῖνται, καὶ ὅσοι ἄγραφοι ὄντες αἰσχύνην ὁμολογουμένην φέρουσι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_263"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_263">[263]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 40. φιλοκαλοῦμεν
-γὰρ μετ᾽ εὐτελείας, καὶ φιλοσοφοῦμεν ἄνευ μαλακίας· πλούτῳ τε ἔργου
-μᾶλλον καιρῷ ἢ λόγου κόμπῳ χρώμεθα, καὶ τὸ πένεσθαι οὐχ ὁμολογεῖν
-τινὶ αἰσχρὸν, ἀλλὰ μὴ διαφεύγειν ἔργῳ αἴσχιον.</p>
-
-<p>The first strophe of the Chorus in Euripid. Medea, 824-841, may be
-compared with the tenor of this discourse of Periklês: the praises
-of Attica are there dwelt upon, as a country too good to receive the
-guilty Medea.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_264"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_264">[264]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 41. ξυνελών τε
-λέγω, τήν τε πᾶσαν πόλιν τῆς Ἑλλάδος παίδευσιν εἶναι, καὶ καθ᾽
-ἕκαστον δοκεῖν ἄν μοι τὸν αὐτὸν ἄνδρα παρ᾽ ἡμῶν ἐπὶ πλεῖστ᾽ ἂν
-εἴδη καὶ μετὰ χαρίτων μάλιστ᾽ ἂν εὐτραπέλως τὸ σῶμα αὔταρκες
-παρέχεσθαι.</p>
-
-<p>The abstract word παίδευσιν, in place of the concrete παιδευτρία,
-seems to soften the arrogance of the affirmation.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_265"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_265">[265]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 41. μόνη γὰρ τῶν
-νῦν ἀκοῆς κρείσσων ἐς πεῖραν ἔρχεται, καὶ μόνη οὔτε τῷ πολεμίῳ
-ἐπελθόντι ἀγανάκτησιν ἔχει ὑφ᾽ οἵων κακοπαθεῖ, οὔτε τῷ ὑπηκόῳ
-κατάμεμψιν ὡς οὐχ ὑπ᾽ ἀξίων ἄρχεται.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_266"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_266">[266]</a></span> Thucyd. ii. 42. περὶ τοιαύτης
-οὖν πόλεως οἵδε τε γενναίως δικαιοῦντες μὴ ἀφαιρεθῆναι αὐτὴν
-μαχόμενοι ἐτελεύτησαν, καὶ τῶν λειπομένων πάντα τινὰ εἰκὸς ἐθέλειν
-ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς κάμνειν.</p>
-
-<p>I am not sure that I have rightly translated δικαιοῦντες μὴ
-ἀφαιρεθῆναι αὐτὴν,—but neither Poppo, nor Göller, nor Dr. Arnold, say
-anything about these words, which yet are not at all clear.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_267"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_267">[267]</a></span> Thucyd. ii. 43. τὴν τῆς πόλεως
-δύναμιν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἔργῳ θεωμένους καὶ ἐραστὰς γιγνομένους αὐτῆς,
-καὶ ὅταν ὑμῖν μεγάλη δόξῃ εἶναι, ἐνθυμουμένους ὅτι τολμῶντες καὶ
-γιγνώσκοντες τὰ δέοντα, καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις αἰσχυνόμενοι ἄνδρες αὐτὰ
-ἐκτήσαντο, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Αἰσχυνόμενοι: compare Demosthen. Orat. Funebris, c. 7, p. 1396.
-Αἱ μὲν γὰρ διὰ τῶν ὀλίγων δυναστεῖαι δέος μὲν ἐνεργάζονται τοῖς
-πολίταις, αἰσχύνην δ᾽ οὐ παριστᾶσιν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_268"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_268">[268]</a></span> Compare the sentiment of
-Xenophon, the precise reverse of that which is here laid down by
-Periklês, extolling the rigid discipline of Sparta, and denouncing
-the laxity of Athenian life (Xenophon, Memorab. iii, 5, 15; iii, 12,
-5). It is curious that the sentiment appears in this dialogue as put
-in the mouth of the younger Periklês (illegitimate son of the great
-Periklês) in a dialogue with Sokratês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_269"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_269">[269]</a></span> Euripidês, Medea, 824. ἱερᾶς
-χώρας ἀπορθήτου τ᾽, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_270"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_270">[270]</a></span> The remarks of Dionysius
-Halikarnassus, tending to show that the number of dead buried on
-this occasion was so small, and the actions in which they had
-been slain so insignificant, as to be unworthy of so elaborate an
-harangue as this of Periklês,—and finding fault with Thucydidês on
-that ground,—are by no means well-founded or justifiable. He treats
-Thucydidês like a dramatic writer putting a speech into the mouth of
-one of his characters, and he considers that the occasion chosen for
-this speech was unworthy. But though this assumption would be correct
-with regard to many ancient historians, and to Dionysius himself in
-his Roman history,—it is not correct with reference to Thucydidês.
-The speech of Periklês was a real speech, heard, reproduced, and
-doubtless dressed up, by Thucydidês: if therefore more is said than
-the number of the dead or the magnitude of the occasion warranted,
-this is the fault of Periklês, and not of Thucydidês. Dionysius says
-that there were many other occasions throughout the war much more
-worthy of an elaborate funeral harangue,—especially the disastrous
-loss of the Sicilian army. But Thucydidês could not have heard any
-of them, after his exile in the eighth year of the war: and we may
-well presume that none of them would bear any comparison with this of
-Periklês. Nor does Dionysius at all appreciate the full circumstances
-of this first year of the war,—which, when completely felt, will
-be found to render the splendid and copious harangue of the great
-statesman eminently seasonable. See Dionys. H. de Thucyd. Judic. pp.
-849-851.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_271"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_271">[271]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 47-55.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_272"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_272">[272]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 52; Diodor. xii,
-45; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 34. It is to be remarked, that the
-Athenians, though their persons and movable property were crowded
-within the walls, had not driven in their sheep and cattle also,
-but had transported them over to Eubœa and the neighboring islands
-(Thucyd. ii, 14). Hence they escaped a serious aggravation of their
-epidemic: for in the accounts of the epidemics which desolated Rome
-under similar circumstances, we find the accumulation of great
-numbers of cattle, along with human beings, specified as a terrible
-addition to the calamity (see Livy, iii, 66; Dionys. Hal. Ant. Rom.
-x, 53: compare Niebuhr, Römisch. Gesch. vol. ii, p. 90).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_273"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_273">[273]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 49. Τὸ μὲν γὰρ
-ἔτος, ὡς ὡμολογεῖτο, ἐκ πάντων μάλιστα δὴ ἐκεῖνο ἄνοσον ἐς τὰς ἄλλας
-ἀσθενείας ἐτύγχανεν ὄν. Hippokratês, in his description of the
-epidemic fever at Thasos, makes a similar remark on the absence of
-all other disorders at the time (Epidem. i, 8, vol. ii, p. 640, ed.
-Littré).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_274"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_274">[274]</a></span> “La description de Thucydide
-(observes M. Littré, in his introduction to the works of Hippokratês,
-tom. i, p. 122), est tellement bonne qu’elle suffit pleinement pour
-nous faire comprendre ce que cette ancienne maladie a été: et il
-est fort à regretter que des médecins tels qu’Hippocrate et Galien
-n’aient rien écrit sur les grandes épidémies, dont ils ont été les
-spectateurs. Hippocrate a été témoin de cette peste racontée par
-Thucydide, et il ne nous en a pas laissé la description. Galien vit
-également la fièvre éruptive qui désola le monde sous Marc Aurèle, et
-qu’il appelle lui-même la longue peste. Cependant excepté quelques
-mots épars dans ses volumineux ouvrages, excepté quelques indications
-fugitives, il ne nous a rien transmis sur un événement médical
-aussi important; à tel point que si nous n’avions pas le récit de
-Thucydide, il nous seroit fort difficile de nous faire une idée de
-celle qu’a vue Galien, et qui est la même (comme M. Hecker s’est
-attaché à le démontrer) que la maladie connue sous le nom de Peste
-d’Athènes. C’était une fièvre éruptive différente de la variole, et
-éteinte aujourdhui. On a cru en voir les traces dans les <i>charbons</i>
-(ἄνθρακες) des livres Hippocratiques.”</p>
-
-<p>Both Krauss (Disquisitio de naturâ morbi Atheniensium. Stuttgard,
-1831, p. 38) and Hæser (Historisch. Patholog. Untersuchungen. Dresden
-1839, p. 50) assimilate the pathological phenomena specified by
-Thucydidês to different portions of the Ἐπιδημίαι of Hippokratês.
-M. Littré thinks that the resemblance is not close or precise, so
-as to admit of the one being identified with the other. “Le tableau
-si frappant qu’en a tracé ce grand historien ne se réproduit pas
-certainement avec une netteté suffisante dans les brefs détails
-donnés par Hippocrate. La maladie d’Athènes avoit un type si tranché,
-que tous ceux qui en ont parlé ont du le réproduire dans ses parties
-essentielles.” (Argument aux 2<sup>me</sup> Livre des Epidémies,
-Œuvres d’Hippocrate, tom. v. p. 64.) There appears good reason to
-believe that the great epidemic which prevailed in the Roman world
-under Marcus Aurelius—the Pestis Antoniniana—was a renewal of what is
-called the Plague of Athens.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_275"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_275">[275]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 48. λεγέτω μὲν
-οὖν περὶ αὐτοῦ, ὡς ἕκαστος γιγνώσκει, καὶ ἰατρὸς καὶ ἰδιώτης, ἀφ᾽
-ὅτου εἰκὸς ἦν γενέσθαι αὐτὸ, καὶ τὰς αἰτίας ἅστινας νομίζει τοσαύτης
-μεταβολῆς ἱκανὰς εἶναι δύναμιν ἐς τὸ μεταστῆσαι σχεῖν· ἐγὼ δὲ οἷόν τε
-ἐγίγνετο λέξω, καὶ ἀφ᾽ ὧν ἄν τις σκοπῶν, εἴ ποτε καὶ αὖθις ἐπιπέσοι,
-μάλιστ᾽ ἂν ἔχοι τι προειδὼς μὴ ἀγνοεῖν, ταῦτα δηλώσω, αὐτός τε
-νοσήσας καὶ αὐτὸς ἰδὼν ἄλλους πάσχοντας.</p>
-
-<p>Demokritus, among others, connected the generation of these
-epidemics with his general system of atoms, atmospheric effluvia,
-and εἴδωλα: see Plutarch, Symposiac. viii, 9, p. 733; Demokriti
-Fragment., ed. Mullach, lib. iv, p. 409.</p>
-
-<p>The causes of the Athenian epidemic as given by Diodorus (xii,
-58)—unusual rains, watery quality of grain, absence of the Etesian
-winds, etc., may perhaps be true of the revival of the epidemic
-in the fifth year of the war, but can hardly be true of its first
-appearance; since Thucydidês states that the year in other respects
-was unusually healthy, and the epidemic was evidently brought from
-foreign parts to Peiræus.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_276"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_276">[276]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_277"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_277">[277]</a></span> See the words of Thucydidês.
-ii, 49. καὶ ἀποκαθάρσεις χολῆς πᾶσαι, <em class="gesperrt">ὅσαι ὑπὸ
-ἰατρῶν ὠνομασμέναι εἰσὶν</em>, ἐπῄεσαν,—which would seem to indicate a
-familiarity with the medical terminology: compare also his allusion
-to the speculations of the physicians, cited in the previous note;
-and c. 51—<em class="gesperrt">τὰ πάσῃ διαίτῃ θεραπευόμενα</em>,
-etc.</p>
-
-<p>In proof how rare the conception was, in ancient times, of the
-importance of collecting and registering particular medical facts,
-I transcribe the following observations from M. Littré (Œuvres
-d’Hippocrate, tom. iv, p. 646, Remarques Retrospectives).</p>
-
-<p>“Toutefois ce qu’il importe ici de constater, ce n’est pas
-qu’Hippocrate a observé de telle ou telle manière, mais c’est qu’il
-a eu l’idée de recueillir et de consigner des faits particuliers.
-En effet, rien, dans l’antiquité, n’a été plus rare que ce soin:
-outre Hippocrate, je ne connois qu’Erasistrate qui se soit occupé de
-relater sous cette forme les résultats de son expérience clinique.
-Ni Galien lui-même, ni Arétée, ni Soranus, ni les autres qui sont
-arrivés jusqu’à nous, n’ont suivi un aussi louable exemple. Les
-observations consignées dans la collection Hippocratique constituent
-la plus grande partie, à beaucoup près, de ce que l’antiquité a
-possédé en ce genre: et si, en commentant le travail d’Hippocrate, on
-l’avait un peu imité, nous aurions des matériaux à l’aide desquels
-nous prendrions une idée bien plus précise de la pathologie de
-ces siècles reculés.... Mais tout en exprimant ce regret et en
-reconnaissant cette utilité relative à nous autres modernes et
-véritablement considérable, il faut ajouter que l’antiquité avoit
-dans les faits et la doctrine Hippocratiques un aliment qui lui a
-suffi—et qu’une collection, même étendue, d’histoires particulières
-n’auroit pas alors modifié la médecine, du moins la médecine
-scientifique, essentiellement et au delà de la limite que comportoit
-la physiologie. Je pourrai montrer ailleurs que la doctrine
-d’Hippocrate et de l’école de Cos a été la seule solide, la seule
-fondée sur un aperçu vrai de la nature organisée; et que les sectes
-postérieures, méthodisme et pneumatisme, n’ont bâti leurs théories
-que sur des hypothèses sans consistance. Mais ici je me contente de
-remarquer, que la pathologie, en tant que science, ne peut marcher
-qu’à la suite de la physiologie, dont elle n’est qu’une des faces: et
-d’Hippocrate à Galien inclusivement, la physiologie ne fit pas assez
-de progrès pour rendre insuffisante la conception Hippocratique. Il
-en résulte, nécessairement, que la pathologie, toujours considérée
-comme science, n’auroit pu, par quelque procédé que ce fût, gagner
-que des corrections et des augmentations de détail.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_278"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_278">[278]</a></span> Compare the story of Thalêtas
-appeasing an epidemic at Sparta by his music and song (Plutarch, De
-Musicâ, p. 1146).</p>
-
-<p>Some of the ancient physicians were firm believers in the efficacy
-of these charms and incantations. Alexander of Tralles says, that
-having originally treated them with contempt, he had convinced
-himself of their value by personal observation, and altered his
-opinion (ix, 4)—ἔνιοι γοῦν οἴονται τοῖς τῶν γραῶν μύθοις ἐοικέναι
-τὰς ἐπῳδὰς, ὥσπερ κἀγὼ μέχρι πολλοῦ· τῷ χρόνῳ δὲ ὑπὸ τῶν ἐναργῶς
-φαινομένων ἐπείσθην εἶναι δύναμιν ἐν αὐταῖς. See an interesting
-and valuable dissertation, Origines Contagii, by Dr. C. F. Marx
-(Stuttgard, 1824, p. 129).</p>
-
-<p>The suffering Hêraklês, in his agony under the poisoned tunic,
-invokes the ἀοιδὸς along with the χειροτέχνης ἰατοριάς (Sophoklês,
-Trachin. 1005).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_279"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_279">[279]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 54.</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Φάσκοντες οἱ πρεσβύτεροι πάλαι ᾄδεσθαι—</p>
-<p class="i0">Ἥξει Δωριακὸς πόλεμος, καὶ λοιμὸς ἅμ᾽ αὐτῷ.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="mt1">See also the first among the epistles ascribed to the
-orator Æschinês, respecting a λοιμὸς in Delos.</p>
-
-<p>It appears that there was a debate whether, in this Hexameter
-verse, λιμὸς (famine) or λοιμὸς (pestilence) was the correct reading:
-and the probability is, that it had been originally composed with
-the word λιμὸς,—for men might well fancy beforehand that <i>famine</i>
-would be a sequel of the Dorian war, but they would not be likely
-to imagine <i>pestilence</i> as accompanying it. Yet, says Thucydidês,
-the reading λοιμὸς was held decidedly preferable, as best fitting to
-the actual circumstances (οἱ γὰρ ἄνθρωποι πρὸς ἃ ἔπασχον τὴν μνήμην
-ἐποιοῦντο). And “if (he goes on to say) there should ever hereafter
-come another Dorian war, and famine along with it, the oracle will
-probably be reproduced with the word λιμὸς as part of it.”</p>
-
-<p>This deserves notice, as illustrating the sort of admitted license
-with which men twisted the oracles or prophecies, so as to hit the
-feelings of the actual moment.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_280"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_280">[280]</a></span> Compare Diodor. xiv, 70, who
-mentions similar distresses in the Carthaginian army besieging
-Syracuse, during the terrible epidemic with which it was attacked in
-395 <small>B.C.</small>; and Livy, xxv, 26, respecting
-the epidemic at Syracuse when it was besieged by Marcellus and the
-Romans.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_281"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_281">[281]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 52. Οἰκιῶν γὰρ
-οὐχ ὑπαρχουσῶν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν καλύβαις πνιγηραῖς ὥρᾳ ἔτους διαιτωμένων,
-ὁ φθόρος ἐγίγνετο οὐδενὶ κόσμῳ, ἀλλὰ καὶ νεκροὶ ἐπ᾽ ἀλλήλοις
-ἀποθνήσκοντες ἔκειντο, καὶ ἐν ταῖς ὁδοῖς ἐκαλινδοῦντο καὶ περὶ τὰς
-κρήνας ἁπάσας ἡμιθνῆτες, τοῦ ὕδατος ἐπιθυμίᾳ. Τά τε ἱερὰ ἐν οἷς
-ἐσκήνηντο, νεκρῶν πλέα ἦν, αὐτοῦ ἐναποθνῃσκόντων· ὑπερβιαζομένου
-γὰρ τοῦ κακοῦ οἱ ἄνθρωποι, οὐκ ἔχοντες, ὅ,τι γένωνται, ἐς ὀλιγωρίαν
-ἐτράποντο καὶ ἱερῶν καὶ ὁσίων ὁμοίως.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_282"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_282">[282]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 50: compare Livy,
-xli, 21, describing the epidemic at Rome in 174 <small>B.C.</small>
-“Cadavera, intacta à canibus et vulturibus, tabes absumebat: satisque
-constabat, nec illo, nec priore anno in tantâ strage boum hominumque
-vulturium usquam visum.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_283"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_283">[283]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 52. From the
-language of Thucydidês, we see that this was regarded at Athens as
-highly unbecoming. Yet a passage of Plutarch seems to show that it
-was very common, in his time, to burn several bodies on the same
-funeral pile (Plutarch, Symposiac. iii, 4, p. 651).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_284"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_284">[284]</a></span> The description in the sixth
-book of Lucretius, translated and expanded from Thucydidês,—that of
-the plague at Florence in 1348, with which the Decameron of Boccacio
-opens,—and that of Defoe, in his History of the Plague in London, are
-all well known.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_285"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_285">[285]</a></span> “Carthaginienses, cum inter
-cetera mala etiam peste laborarent, cruentâ sacrorum religione, et
-scelere pro remedio, usi sunt: quippe homines ut victimas immolabant;
-pacem deorum sanguine eorum exposcentes, pro quorum vitâ Dii rogari
-maximè solent.” (Justin, xviii, 6.)</p>
-
-<p>For the facts respecting the plague of Milan and the Untori, see
-the interesting novel of Manzoni, Promessi Sposi, and the historical
-work of the same author, Storia della Colonna Infame.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_286"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_286">[286]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 87. τοῦ δὲ ἄλλου
-ὄχλου ἀνεξεύρετος ἀριθμός. Diodorus makes them above 10,000 (xii,
-58) freemen and slaves together, which must be greatly beneath the
-reality.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_287"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_287">[287]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 54. τῶν ἄλλων
-χωρίων τὰ πολυανθρωπότατα. He does not specify what places these
-were: perhaps Chios, but hardly Lesbos, otherwise the fact would have
-been noticed when the revolt of that island occurs.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_288"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_288">[288]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 57.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_289"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_289">[289]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 56-58.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_290"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_290">[290]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 59. ἠλλοίωντο τὰς
-γνώμας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_291"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_291">[291]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 45; Ister ap.
-Schol. ad Soph. Œdip. Colon. 689; Herodot. ix.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_292"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_292">[292]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65. Ὁ μὲν δῆμος,
-ὅτι ἀπ᾽ ἐλασσόνων ὁρμώμενος, ἐστέρητο καὶ τούτων· οἱ δὲ δυνατοὶ, καλὰ
-κτήματα κατὰ τὴν χώραν οἰκοδομίαις τε καὶ πολυτελέσι κατασκευαῖς
-ἀπολωλεκότες.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_293"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_293">[293]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 140.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_294"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_294">[294]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 60. καίτοι ἐμοὶ
-τοιούτῳ ἀνδρὶ ὀργίζεσθε, ὃς οὐδενὸς οἴομαι ἥσσων εἶναι γνῶναί τε τὰ
-δέοντα, καὶ ἑρμηνεῦσαι ταῦτα, φιλόπολίς τε καὶ χρημάτων κρείσσων.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_295"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_295">[295]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 62. δηλώσω δὲ
-καὶ τόδε, ὅ μοι δοκεῖτε οὔτ᾽ αὐτοὶ πώποτε ἐνθυμηθῆναι ὑπάρχον
-ὑμῖν μεγέθους πέρι ἐς τὴν ἀρχὴν, οὔτ᾽ ἐγὼ ἐν τοῖς πρὶν λόγοις·
-οὐδ᾽ ἂν νῦν ἐχρησάμην κομπωδεστέραν ἔχοντι τὴν προσποίησιν, εἰ
-μὴ καταπεπληγμένους ὑμᾶς παρὰ τὸ εἰκὸς ἑώρων. Οἴεσθε μὲν γὰρ τῶν
-ξυμμάχων μόνον ἄρχειν—ἐγὼ δὲ ἀποφαίνω δύο μερῶν τῶν ἐς χρῆσιν
-φανερῶν, γῆς καὶ θαλάττης, τοῦ ἑτέρου ὑμᾶς παντὸς κυριωτάτους ὄντας,
-ἐφ᾽ ὅσον τε νῦν νέμεσθε, καὶ ἢν ἐπιπλέον βουληθῆτε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_296"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_296">[296]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 60-64. I give a
-general summary of this memorable speech, without setting forth its
-full contents, still less the exact words.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_297"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_297">[297]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65: Plato, Gorgias,
-p. 515, c. 71: Plutarch, Periklês, c. 35; Diodor. xii, c. 38-45.
-About Simmias, as the vehement enemy of Periklês, see Plutarch,
-Reipub. Ger. Præcept. p. 805.</p>
-
-<p>Plutarch and Diodorus both state that Periklês was not only fined,
-but also removed from his office of stratêgus. Thucydidês mentions
-the fine, but not the removal: and his silence leads me to doubt
-the reality of the latter event altogether. For with such a man as
-Periklês, a vote of removal would have been a penalty more marked and
-cutting than the fine; moreover, removal from office, though capable
-of being pronounced by vote of the public assembly, would hardly be
-inflicted as penalty by the dikastery.</p>
-
-<p>I imagine the events to have passed as follows: The stratêgi, with
-most other officers of the commonwealth, were changed or reëlected at
-the beginning of Hekatombæon, the first month of the Attic year; that
-is, somewhere about midsummer. Now the Peloponnesian army, invading
-Attica about the end of March or beginning of April, and remaining
-forty days, would leave the country about the first week in May.
-Periklês returned from his expedition against Peloponnesus shortly
-after they left Attica; that is, about the middle of May (Thucyd. ii,
-57): there still remained, therefore, a month or six weeks before his
-office of stratêgus naturally expired, and required renewal. It was
-during this interval (which Thucydidês expresses by the words ἔτι δ᾽
-ἐστρατήγει, ii, 59) that he convoked the assembly and delivered the
-harangue recently mentioned.</p>
-
-<p>But when the time for a new election of stratêgi arrived, the
-enemies of Periklês opposed his reëlection, and brought a charge
-against him, in that trial of accountability to which every
-magistrate at Athens was exposed, after his period of office.
-They alleged against him some official misconduct in reference to
-the public money, and the dikastery visited him with a fine. His
-reëlection was thus prevented, and with a man who had been so often
-reëlected, this might be loosely called “taking away the office
-of general:” so that the language of Plutarch and Diodorus, as
-well as the silence of Thucydidês, would, on this supposition, be
-justified.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_298"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_298">[298]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_299"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_299">[299]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_300"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_300">[300]</a></span> See Plutarch, Demosthen. c. 27,
-about the manner of bringing about such an evasion of a fine: compare
-also the letter of M. Boeckh, in Meineke, Fragment. Comic. Græcor. ad
-Fragm. Eupolid. ii, 527.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_301"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_301">[301]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 37.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_302"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_302">[302]</a></span> Plutarch (Perik. c. 38) treats
-the slow disorder under which he suffered as one of the forms of
-the epidemic: but this can hardly be correct, when we read the very
-marked character of the latter, as described by Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_303"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_303">[303]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 38.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_304"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_304">[304]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 4, 8,
-13, 16; Eupolis. Δῆμοι, Fragm. vi. p. 459, ed. Meineke. Cicero (De
-Orator. iii, 34; Brutus, 9-11) and Quintilian (ii, 16, 19; x, 1, 82)
-count only as witnesses at second-hand.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_305"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_305">[305]</a></span> Plato, Gorgias, c. 71, p. 516;
-Phædrus, c. 54. p. 270. Περικλέα, τὸν οὕτω μεγαλοπρεπῶς σοφὸν ἄνδρα.
-Plato, Mens. p. 94, B.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_306"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_306">[306]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-10-39.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_307"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_307">[307]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 5.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_308"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_308">[308]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 11.
-Διὸ καὶ τότε μάλιστα τῷ δήμῳ τὰς ἡνίας ἀνεὶς ὁ Περικλῆς ἐπολιτεύετο
-πρὸς χάριν—ἀεὶ μέν τινα θέαν πανηγυρικὴν ἢ ἑστίασιν ἢ πομπὴν εἶναι
-μηχανώμενος ἐν ἄστει, καὶ διαπαιδαγωγῶν οὐκ ἀμούσοις ἡδοναῖς τὴν
-πόλιν—ἑξήκοντα δὲ τριήρεις καθ᾽ ἕκαστον ἐνιαυτὸν ἐκπέμπων, ἐν αἷς
-πολλοὶ τῶν πολιτῶν ἔπλεον ὀκτὼ μῆνας ἔμμισθοι, μελετῶντες ἅμα καὶ
-μανθάνοντες τὴν ναυτικὴν ἐμπειρίαν.</p>
-
-<p>Compare c. 9, where Plutarch states that Periklês, having no other
-means of contending against the abundant private largesses of his
-rival, Kimon, resorted to the expedient of distributing the public
-money among the citizens, in order to gain influence; acting in this
-matter upon the advice of his friend, Demonidês, according to the
-statement of Aristotle.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_309"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_309">[309]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65. Ἐκεῖνος μὲν
-(Περικλῆς) δυνατὸς ὢν τῷ <em class="gesperrt">τε ἀξιώματι</em>
-καὶ τῇ γνώμῃ, <em class="gesperrt">χρημάτων τε διαφανῶς
-ἀδωρότατος γενόμενος, κατεῖχε τὸ πλῆθος ἐλευθέρως</em>, καὶ οὐκ
-ἤγετο μᾶλλον ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἢ αὐτὸς ἦγε, διὰ τὸ μὴ κτώμενος ἐξ οὐ
-προσηκόντων τὴν δύναμιν πρὸς ἡδονήν τι λέγειν, ἀλλ᾽ ἔχων ἐπ᾽ <em
-class="gesperrt">ἀξιώσει</em> καὶ πρὸς ὀργήν τι ἀντειπεῖν. Ὁπότε γοῦν
-αἴσθοιτό τι αὐτοὺς παρὰ καιρὸν ὕβρει θαρσοῦντας, λέγων κατέπλησσεν
-ἐπὶ τὸ φοβεῖσθαι· καὶ δεδιότας αὖ ἀλόγως ἀντικαθίστη πάλιν ἐπὶ τὸ
-θαρσεῖν. Ἐγίγνετο δὲ λόγῳ μὲν δημοκρατία, ἔργῳ δὲ ὑπὸ τοῦ πρώτου
-ἀνδρὸς ἀρχή. Οἱ δὲ ὕστερον ἴσοι μᾶλλον αὐτοὶ πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὄντες, καὶ
-ὀρεγόμενοι τοῦ πρῶτος ἕκαστος γίγνεσθαι, ἐτράποντο καθ᾽ ἡδονὰς τῷ
-δήμῳ καὶ τὰ πράγματα ἐνδιδόναι. Ἐξ ὧν, ἄλλα τε πολλά, ὡς ἐν μεγάλῃ
-πόλει καὶ ἀρχὴν ἐχούσῃ, ἡμαρτήθη, καὶ ὁ ἐς Σικελίαν πλοῦς· ὃς οὐ
-τοσοῦτον γνώμης ἁμάρτημα ἦν, etc. Compare Plutarch, Nikias, c. 3.</p>
-
-<p>Ἀξίωσις and ἀξίωμα, as used by Thucydidês seem to differ in this
-respect: Ἀξίωσις signifies, a man’s dignity, or pretensions to
-esteem and influence as felt and measured by himself; <i>his sense of
-dignity</i>; Ἀξίωμα means his <i>dignity</i>, properly so called; as felt and
-appreciated by others. See i, 37, 41, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_310"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_310">[310]</a></span> Boeckh, Public Economy of
-Athens, b. iii, ch. xv. p. 399, Eng. Trans.</p>
-
-<p>Kutzen, in the second Beylage to his treatise, Periklês als
-Staatsmann (pp. 169-200), has collected and inserted a list of
-various characters of Periklês, from twenty different authors,
-English, French, and German. That of Wachsmuth is the best of the
-collection,—though even he appears to think that Periklês is to blame
-for having introduced a set of institutions which none but himself
-could work well.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_311"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_311">[311]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 65. <em
-class="gesperrt">μετρίως ἐξηγεῖτο</em>. i, 144. δίκας δὲ ὅτι ἐθέλομεν
-δοῦναι κατὰ τὰς ξυνθήκας, πολέμου δὲ οὐκ ἄρξομεν, ἀρχομένους δὲ
-ἀμυνούμεθα.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_312"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_312">[312]</a></span> Herodotus (1, 170) mentions
-that previous to the conquest of the twelve Ionic cities in Asia by
-Crœsus, Thalês had advised them to consolidate themselves all into
-one single city government at Teos, and to reduce the existing cities
-to mere demes or constituent, fractional municipalities,—τὰς δὲ ἄλλας
-πόλιας οἰκεομένας μηδὲν ἧσσον νομίζεσθαι κατάπερ εἰ δῆμοι εἶεν. It is
-remarkable to observe that Herodotus himself bestows his unqualified
-commendation on this idea.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_313"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_313">[313]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 17.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_314"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_314">[314]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 68.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_315"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_315">[315]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_316"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_316">[316]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 51.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_317"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_317">[317]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 67-69; Herodot.
-vii, 137. Respecting the Lacedæmonian privateering during the
-Peloponnesian war, compare Thucyd. v, 115: compare also Xenophon,
-Hellen. v, 1, 29.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_318"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_318">[318]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 67. Οἱ
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι ὕπηρξαν, τοὺς ἐμπόρους οὓς ἔλαβον Ἀθηναίων καὶ τῶν
-ξυμμάχων ἐν ὁλκάσι περὶ Πελοπόννησον πλέοντας ἀποκτείναντες καὶ
-ἐς φάραγγας ἐσβαλόντες. Πάντας γὰρ δὴ κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς τοῦ πολέμου οἱ
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι, ὅσους λάβοιεν ἐν τῇ θαλάσσῃ, ὡς πολεμίους διέφθειρον,
-καὶ τοὺς μετὰ Ἀθηναίων ξυμπολεμοῦντας καὶ τοὺς μηδὲ μεθ᾽ ἑτέρων.</p>
-
-<p>The Lacedæmonian admiral Alkidas slew all the prisoners taken
-on board merchantmen off the coast of Ionia, in the ensuing year
-(Thucyd. iii, 32). Even this was considered extremely rigorous,
-and excited strong remonstrance; yet the mariners slain were not
-neutrals, but belonged to the subject-allies of Athens: moreover,
-Alkidas was in his flight, and obliged to make choice between killing
-his prisoners or setting them free.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_319"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_319">[319]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_320"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_320">[320]</a></span> Thucyd. ii. 67. Dr. Thirlwall
-(Hist. Greece, vol. iii, ch. 20, p. 129) says that “the envoys
-were sacrificed chiefly to give a decent color to the baseness” of
-killing Aristeus, from whom the Athenians feared subsequent evil,
-in consequence of his ability and active spirit. I do not think
-this is fairly contained in the words of Thucydidês. He puts in the
-foreground of Athenian motive, doubtless, fear from the future energy
-of Aristeus; but if that had been the only motive, the Athenians
-would probably have slain him singly without the rest: they would
-hardly think it necessary to provide themselves with “any decent
-color,” in the way that Dr. Thirlwall suggests. Thucydidês names the
-special feeling of the Athenians against Aristeus (in my judgment),
-chiefly in order to explain the extreme haste of the Athenian
-sentence of execution—αὐθήμερον—ἀκρίτους, etc.: they were under the
-influence of combined motives,—fear, revenge, retaliation.</p>
-
-<p>The envoys here slain were sons of Sperthiês and Bulis, former
-Spartan heralds who had gone up to Xerxes at Susa to offer their
-heads as atonement for the previous conduct of the Spartans in
-killing the heralds of Darius. Xerxes dismissed them unhurt,—so that
-the anger of Talthybius (the heroic progenitor of the family of
-heralds at Sparta) remained still unsatisfied: it was only satisfied
-by the death of their two sons, now slain by the Athenians. The fact
-that the two persons now slain were sons of those two (Sperthiês and
-Bulis) who had previously gone to Susa to tender their lives,—is
-spoken of as a “romantic and tragical coincidence.” But there
-surely is very little to wonder at. The functions of herald at
-Sparta, were the privilege of a particular gens, or family: every
-herald, therefore, was <i>ex officio</i> the son of a herald. Now when
-the Lacedæmonians, at the beginning of this Peloponnesian war, were
-looking out for two members of the heraldic gens to send up to Susa,
-upon whom would they so naturally fix as upon the sons of those two
-men who had been to Susa before? These sons had doubtless heard
-their fathers talk a great deal about it,—probably with interest and
-satisfaction, since they derived great glory from the unaccepted
-offer of their lives in atonement. There was a particular reason
-why these two men should be taken, in preference to any other
-heralds, to fulfil this dangerous mission: and doubtless when they
-perished in it, the religious imagination of the Lacedæmonians would
-group all the series of events as consummation of the judgment
-inflicted by Talthybius in his anger (Herodot. vii, 135—ὡς λέγουσι
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι).</p>
-
-<p>It appears that Anêristus, the herald here slain, had
-distinguished himself personally in that capture of fishermen on the
-coast of Peloponnesus by the Lacedæmonians, for which the Athenians
-were now retaliating (Herodot. vii, 137). Though this passage of
-Herodotus is not clear, yet the sense here put upon it is the natural
-one,—and clearer (in my judgment) than that which O. Müller would
-propose instead of it (Dorians, ii, p. 437).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_321"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_321">[321]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 70; iii, 17.
-However, the displeasure of the Athenians against the commanders
-cannot have been very serious, since Xenophon was appointed to
-command against the Chalkidians in the ensuing year.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_322"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_322">[322]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_323"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_323">[323]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 71, 72.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_324"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_324">[324]</a></span> This previous summons is
-again alluded to afterwards, on occasion of the slaughter of the
-Platæan prisoners (iii, 68): διότι <em class="gesperrt">τόν τε ἄλλον
-χρόνον</em> ἠξίουν δῆθεν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_325"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_325">[325]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 73, 74.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_326"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_326">[326]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 71-75.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_327"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_327">[327]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 68.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_328"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_328">[328]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 75.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_329"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_329">[329]</a></span> The various processes, such as
-those here described, employed both for offence and defence in the
-ancient sieges, are noticed and discussed in Æneas Poliorketic. c.
-33, <i>seq.</i></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_330"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_330">[330]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 76.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_331"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_331">[331]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 77.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_332"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_332">[332]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 78. καὶ ἐπειδὴ
-πᾶν ἐξείργαστο περὶ Ἀρκτούρου ἐπιτολάς, etc. at the period of the
-year when the star Arcturus rises immediately before sunrise,—that
-is, sometime between the 12th and 17th of September: see Göller’s
-note on the passage. Thucydidês does not often give any fixed marks
-to discriminate the various periods of the year, as we find it
-here done. The Greek months were all lunar months, or nominally
-so: the names of months, as well as the practice of intercalation
-to rectify the calendar, varied from city to city; so that if
-Thucydidês had specified the day of the Attic month Boêdromion
-(instead of specifying the rising of Arcturus) on which this work was
-finished, many of his readers would not have distinctly understood
-him. Hippokratês also, in indications of time for medical purposes,
-employs the appearance of Arcturus and other stars.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_333"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_333">[333]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 78; iii, 21. From
-this description of the double wall and covered quarters provided
-for what was foreknown as a long blockade, we may understand the
-sufferings of the Athenian troops (who probably had no double wall),
-in the two years’ blockade of Potidæa,—and their readiness to grant
-an easy capitulation to the besieged: <a href="#Page_183">see a few
-pages above</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_334"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_334">[334]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 79.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_335"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_335">[335]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_336"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_336">[336]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 82; Diodor. xii,
-48.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_337"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_337">[337]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 83. οὐχ ὡς ἐπὶ
-ναυμαχίαν, ἀλλὰ στρατιωτικώτερον παρεσκευασμένοι: compare the speech
-of Knêmus, c. 87. The unskilfulness of the rowers is noticed (c.
-84).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_338"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_338">[338]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 88. πρότερον
-μὲν γὰρ <em class="gesperrt">ἀεὶ αὐτοῖς ἔλεγε</em> (Phormio) καὶ
-προπαρεσκεύαζε τὰς γνώμας, ὡς οὐδὲν αὐτοῖς πλῆθος νεῶν τοσοῦτον,
-ἢν ἐπιπλέῃ, ὅ,τι οὐχ ὑπομενετέον αὐτοῖς ἐστί· καὶ οἱ στρατιῶται
-ἐκ πολλοῦ ἐν σφίσιν αὐτοῖς τὴν ἀξίωσιν ταύτην εἰλήφεσαν, <em
-class="gesperrt">μηδένα ὄχλον Ἀθηναῖοι ὄντες Πελοποννησίων νεῶν
-ὑποχωρεῖν</em>.</p>
-
-<p>This passage is not only remarkable as it conveys the striking
-persuasion entertained by the Athenians of their own naval
-superiority, but also as it discloses the frank and intimate
-communication between the Athenian captain and his seamen,—so
-strongly pervading and determining the feelings of the latter.
-Compare what is told respecting the Syracusan Hermokratês, Xenoph.
-Hellen. i, 1, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_339"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_339">[339]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 83. Ἐπειδὴ μέντοι
-ἀντιπαραπλέοντάς τε ἑώρων αὐτοὺς (that is, when the Corinthians
-saw the Athenian ships) παρὰ γῆν σφῶν κομιζομένων, καὶ ἐκ Πατρῶν
-τῆς Ἀχαΐας πρὸς τὴν ἀντιπέρας ἤπειρον διαβαλλόντων ἐπὶ Ἀκαρνανίας
-κατεῖδον τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἀπὸ τῆς Χαλκίδος καὶ τοῦ Εὐήνου ποταμοῦ
-προσπλέοντας σφίσι, <em class="gesperrt">καὶ οὐκ ἔλαθον νυκτὸς
-ὐφορμισάμενοι</em>, οὕτω δὴ ἀναγκάζονται ναυμαχεῖν κατὰ μέσον τὸν
-πορθμόν.</p>
-
-<p>There is considerable difficulty in clearly understanding what
-was here done, especially what is meant by the words οὐκ ἔλαθον
-νυκτὸς ὐφορμισάμενοι, which words the Scholiast construed as if the
-nominative case to ἔλαθον were οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι, whereas the natural
-structure of the sentence, as well as the probabilities of fact, lead
-the best commentators to consider οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι as the nominative
-case to that verb. The remark of the Scholiast, however, shows us,
-that the difficulty of understanding the sentence dates from ancient
-times.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold—whose explanation is adopted by Poppo and Göller—says:
-“The two fleets were moving parallel to one another along the
-opposite shores of the Corinthian gulf. But even when they had sailed
-out of the strait at Rhium, the opposite shores were still so near,
-that the Peloponnesians hoped to cross over without opposition,
-if they could so far deceive the Athenians, as to the spot where
-they brought to for the night, as to induce them either to stop
-too soon, or to advance too far, that they might not be exactly
-opposite to them to intercept the passage. If they could lead the
-Athenians to think that they meant to advance in the night beyond
-Patræ, the Athenian fleet was likely to continue its own course along
-the northern shore, to be ready to intercept them when they should
-endeavor to run across to Acarnania. But the Athenians, aware that
-they had stopped at Patræ, stopped themselves at Chalkis, instead of
-proceeding further to the westward; and thus were so nearly opposite
-to them, that the Peloponnesians had not time to get more than
-half-way across, before they found themselves encountered by their
-watchful enemy.”</p>
-
-<p>This explanation seems to me not satisfactory, nor does it take
-account of all the facts of the case. The first belief of the
-Peloponnesians was, that Phormio would not dare to attack them at
-all: accordingly, having arrived at Patræ, they stretched from thence
-across the gulf to the mouth of the Euenus,—the natural way of
-proceeding according to ancient navigation,—going in the direction
-of Akarnania (ἐπὶ Ἀκαρνανίας). As they were thus stretching across,
-they perceived Phormio bearing down upon them from the Euenus: this
-was a surprise to them, and as they wished to avoid a battle in the
-mid-channel, they desisted from proceeding farther that day, in hopes
-to be able to deceive Phormio in respect of their night-station.
-They made a feint of taking night-station on the shore between Patræ
-and Rhium, near the narrow part of the strait; but, in reality, they
-“slipped anchor and put to sea during the night,” as Mr. Bloomfield
-says, in hopes of getting across the shorter passage under favor of
-darkness, before Phormio could come upon them. That they must have
-done this is proved by the fact, that the subsequent battle was
-fought on the morrow in the mid-channel <i>very little after daybreak</i>
-(we learn this from what Thucydidês says about the gulf-breeze,
-for which Phormio waited before he would commence his attack—ὅπερ
-ἀναμένων τε περιέπλει, καὶ εἰώθει γίγνεσθαι <em class="gesperrt">ἐπι
-τὴν ἕω</em>). If Phormio had returned to Chalkis, they would probably
-have succeeded; but he must have kept the sea all night, which would
-be the natural proceeding of a vigilant captain, determined not to
-let the Peloponnesians get across without fighting: so that he was
-upon them in the mid-channel immediately that day broke.</p>
-
-<p>Putting all the statements of Thucydidês together, we may be
-convinced that this is the way in which the facts occurred. But of
-the precise sense of ὐφορμισάμενοι, I confess I do not feel certain:
-Haack says, it means “clam appellere ad littus,” but here, I think,
-that sense will not do: for the Peloponnesians did not wish, and
-could indeed hardly hope, to conceal from Phormio the spot where
-they brought to for the night, and to make him suppose that they
-brought to at some point of the shore west of Patræ, when in reality
-they passed the night in Patræ,—which is what Dr. Arnold supposes.
-The shore west of Patræ makes a bend to the southwest,—forming the
-gulf of Patras,—so that the distance from the northern, or Ætolian
-and Akarnanian, side of the gulf becomes for a considerable time
-longer and longer, and the Peloponnesians would thus impose upon
-themselves a longer crossing, increasing the difficulty of getting
-over without a battle. But ὐφορμισάμενοι may reasonably be supposed
-to mean, especially in conjunction with οὐκ ἔλαθον, “taking up a
-simulated or imperfect night-station,” in which they did not really
-intend to stay all night, and which could be quitted at short notice
-and with ease. The preposition ὑπὸ, in composition, would thus have
-the sense, not of <i>secrecy</i> (<i>clam</i>) but of <i>sham-performance</i>, or
-of mere going through the forms of an act for the purpose of making
-a false impression (like ὑποφέρειν, Xenoph. Hell. iv, 72). Mr.
-Bloomfield proposes conjecturally ἀφορμισάμενοι, meaning, “that the
-Peloponnesians slipped their anchors in the night:” I place no faith
-in the conjecture, but I believe him to be quite right in supposing,
-that the Peloponnesians <i>did actually</i> slip their anchors in the
-night.</p>
-
-<p>Another point remains to be adverted to. The battle took place
-κατὰ μέσον τὸν πορθμόν. Now we need not understand this expression
-to allude to the narrowest part of the sea, or the strait, strictly
-and precisely; that is, the line of seven stadia between Rhium and
-Antirrhium. But I think we must understand it to mean a portion of
-sea not far westward of the strait, where the breadth, though greater
-than that of the strait itself, is yet not so great as it becomes in
-the line drawn northward from Patræ. We cannot understand πορθμὸς
-(as Mr. Bloomfield and Poppo do,—see the note of the latter on the
-Scholia) to mean <i>trajectus</i> simply, that is to say, the passage
-across even the widest portion of the gulf of Patras: nor does the
-passage cited out of c. 86 require us so to understand it. Πορθμὸς,
-in Thucydidês, means a strait, or narrow crossing of sea, and Poppo
-himself admits that Thucydidês always uses it so: nor would it be
-reasonable to believe that he would call the line of sea across the
-gulf, from Patræ to the mouth of the Euenus, a πορθμός. See the note
-of Göller, on this point.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_340"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_340">[340]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 86. μὴ δíδοντες
-διέκπλουν. The great object of the fast-sailing Athenian trireme
-was, to drive its beak against some weak part of the adversary’s
-ship: the stern, the side, or the oars,—not against the beak, which
-was strongly constructed as well for defence as for offence. The
-Athenian, therefore, rowing through the intervals of the adversary’s
-line, and thus getting in their rear, turned rapidly, and got the
-opportunity, before the ship of the adversary could change its
-position, of striking it either in the stern or some weak part. Such
-a manœuvre was called the <i>diekplus</i>. The success of it, of course,
-depended upon the extreme rapidity and precision of the movements of
-the Athenian vessel, so superior in this respect to its adversary,
-not only in the better construction of the ship, but the excellence
-of rowers and steersmen.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_341"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_341">[341]</a></span> See Dr. Arnold’s note upon this
-passage of Thucydidês, respecting the keleustês and his functions: to
-the passages which he indicates as reference, I will add two more of
-Plautus, Mercat. iv, 2, 5, and Asinaria, iii, 1, 15.</p>
-
-<p>When we conceive the structure of an ancient trireme, we shall at
-once see, first, how essential the keleustês was, to keep the rowers
-in harmonious action,—next, how immense the difference must have been
-between practised and unpractised rowers. The trireme had, in all,
-one hundred and seventy rowers, distributed into three tiers. The
-upper tier, called thranitæ, were sixty-two in number, or thirty-one
-on each side: the middle tier, or zygitæ, as well as the lowest
-tier, or thalamitæ, were each fifty-four in number, or twenty-seven
-on each side. Besides these, there were belonging to each trireme a
-certain number, seemingly about thirty, of supplementary oars (κῶπαι
-περινέω), to be used by the epibatæ, or soldiers, serving on board,
-in case of rowers being killed, or oars broken. Each tier of rowers
-was distributed along the whole length of the vessel, from head to
-stern, or at least along the greater part of it; but the seats of
-the higher tiers were not placed in the exact perpendicular line
-above the lower. Of course, the oars of the thranitæ, or uppermost
-tier, were the longest: those of the thalamitæ, or lowest tier, the
-shortest: those of the zygitæ, of a length between the two. Each
-oar was rowed only by one man. The thranitæ, as having the longest
-oars, were most hardly worked and most highly paid. What the length
-of the oars was, belonging to either tier, we do not know, but some
-of the supplementary oars appear to have been about fifteen feet in
-length.</p>
-
-<p>What is here stated, appears to be pretty well ascertained,
-chiefly from the inscriptions discovered at Athens a few years ago,
-so full of information respecting the Athenian marine,—and from the
-most instructive commentary appended to these inscriptions by M.
-Boeckh, Seewesen der Athener, ch. ix, pp. 94, 104, 115. But there is
-a great deal still, respecting the equipment of an ancient trireme,
-unascertained and disputed.</p>
-
-<p>Now there was nothing but the voice of the keleustês to keep these
-one hundred and seventy rowers all to good time with their strokes.
-With oars of different length, and so many rowers, this must have
-been no easy matter, and apparently quite impossible, unless the
-rowers were trained to act together. The difference between those
-who were so trained and those who were not, must have been immense.
-We may imagine the difference between the ships of Phormio and those
-of his enemies, and the difficulty of the latter in contending with
-the swell of the sea,—when we read this description of the ancient
-trireme.</p>
-
-<p>About two hundred men, that is to say, one hundred and seventy
-rowers and thirty supernumeraries, mostly epibatæ or hoplites
-serving on board, besides the pilot, the man at the ship’s bow,
-the keleustês, etc., probably some half dozen officers, formed the
-crew of a trireme: compare Herodot. viii, 17; vii, 184, where he
-calculates the thirty epibatæ over and above the two hundred. Dr.
-Arnold thinks that, at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, the
-epibatæ on board an Athenian trireme were no more than ten: but this
-seems not quite made out: see his note on Thucyd. iii, 95.</p>
-
-<p>The Venetian galleys in the thirteenth century were manned by
-about the same number of men. “Les galères Vénitiens du convoi de
-Flandre devaient être montées par deux cent hommes libres, dont 180
-rameurs, et 12 archers. Les arcs ou balistes furent préscrits en 1333
-pour toutes les galères de commerce armées.” (Depping, Histoire du
-Commerce entre le Levant et l’Europe, vol. i, p. 163.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_342"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_342">[342]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 84.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_343"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_343">[343]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 85.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_344"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_344">[344]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 144. Πολλὰ δὲ καὶ
-ἄλλα ἔχω ἐς ἐλπίδα τοῦ περιέσεσθαι, ἢν ἐθέλητε ἀρχήν τε μὴ ἐπικτᾶσθαι
-ἅμα πολεμοῦντες, καὶ κινδύνους αὐθαιρέτους μὴ προστίθεσθαι·
-μᾶλλον γὰρ πεφόβημαι τὰς οἰκείας ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίας ἢ τὰς τῶν ἐναντίων
-διανοίας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_345"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_345">[345]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 86-89: compare vii,
-36-49.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_346"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_346">[346]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 86.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_347"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_347">[347]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 87. Τῶν δὲ
-πρότερον ἡγεμόνων οὐ χεῖρον τὴν ἐπιχείρησιν ἡμεῖς παρασκευάσομεν,
-καὶ οὐκ ἐνδώσομεν πρόφασιν οὐδενὶ κακῷ γενέσθαι· ἢν δέ τις ἄρα καὶ
-βουληθῇ, κολασθήσεται τῇ πρεπούσῃ ζημίᾳ, οἱ δὲ ἀγαθοὶ τιμήσονται τοῖς
-προσήκουσιν ἄθλοις τῆς ἀρετῆς.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_348"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_348">[348]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 89. Καὶ ἐν τῷ ἔργῳ
-<em class="gesperrt">κόσμον καὶ σιγὴν</em> περὶ πλείστου ἡγεῖσθε,
-ὃ ἔς τε τὰ πολλὰ τῶν πολεμικῶν ξυμφέρει, καὶ ναυμαχίᾳ οὐχ ἥκιστα,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_349"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_349">[349]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 90. ἐπὶ τεσσάρων
-ταξάμενοι τὰς ναῦς. Matthiæ in his Grammar (sect. 584), states that
-ἐπὶ τεσσάρων means “four deep,” and cites this passage of Thucydidês
-as an instance of it. But the words certainly mean here <i>four
-abreast</i>; though it is to be recollected that a column four abreast,
-when turned into line, becomes four deep.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_350"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_350">[350]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 102.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_351"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_351">[351]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 90. Οἱ δὲ
-Πελοποννήσιοι, ἐπειδὴ αὐτοῖς οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι οὐκ ἐπέπλεον ἐς τὸν
-κόλπον καὶ τὰ στενὰ, βουλόμενοι ἄκοντας ἔσω προαγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς,
-ἀναγόμενοι ἅμα ἕῳ ἔπλεον, ἐπὶ τεσσάρων ταξάμενοι τὰς ναῦς, <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν ἔσω</em> ἐπὶ τοῦ κόλπου, δεξιῷ
-κέρᾳ ἡγουμένῳ, ὥσπερ καὶ ὥρμουν· ἐπὶ δ᾽ αὐτῷ εἴκοσι νῆας ἔταξαν τὰς
-ἄριστα πλεούσας, ὅπως, εἰ ἄρα νομίσας ἐπὶ τὴν Ναύπακτον αὐτοὺς πλεῖν
-ὁ Φορμίων καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπιβοηθῶν ταύτῃ παραπλέοι, μὴ διαφύγοιεν πλέοντα
-τὸν ἐπίπλουν σφῶν οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι <em class="gesperrt">ἔξω τοῦ ἑαυτῶν
-κέρως</em>, ἀλλ᾽ αὗται αἱ νῆες περικλῄσειαν.</p>
-
-<p>It will be seen that I have represented in the text the movement
-of the Peloponnesian fleet as directed ostensibly and to all
-appearance against Naupaktus: and I translate the words in the fourth
-line of the above passage—ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν ἔσω ἐπὶ τοῦ κόλπου—as
-meaning “<i>against the station of the Athenians up the gulf within</i>,”
-that is, against Naupaktus. Mr. Bloomfield gives that meaning to the
-passage, though not to the words; but the Scholiast, Dr. Arnold,
-Poppo, and Göller, all construe it differently, and maintain that the
-words τὴν ἐαυτῶν γῆν mean <i>the Peloponnesian shore</i>. To my view, this
-latter interpretation renders the whole scheme of the battle confused
-and unintelligible; while with the other meaning it is perfectly
-clear, and all the circumstances fit in with each other.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold does not seem even to admit that τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν can
-mean anything else but the coast of Peloponnesus. He says: “The
-Scholiast says that ἐπὶ is here used for παρά. It would be better
-to say that it has a mixed signification of motion towards a place
-and neighborhood to it: expressing that the Peloponnesians sailed
-<i>towards</i> their own land (<i>i. e.</i> towards Corinth, Sikyon, and
-Pellênê, to which places the greater number of the ships belonged),
-instead of standing over to the opposite coast, which belonged to
-their enemies: and at the same time kept close <i>upon</i> their own land,
-in the sense of ἐπὶ with a dative case.”</p>
-
-<p>It appears to me that Dr. Arnold’s supposition of Corinth and
-Sikyon as the meaning of τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν is altogether far-fetched
-and improbable. As a matter of fact, it would only be true of part
-of the confederate fleet; while it would be false with regard to
-ships from Elis, Leukas, etc. And if it had been true with regard
-to all, yet the distance of Corinth from the Peloponnesian station
-was so very great, that Thucydidês would hardly mark <i>direction</i> by
-referring to a city so very far off. Then again, both the Scholiast
-and Dr. Arnold do great violence to the meaning of the preposition
-ἐπὶ with an accusative case, and cite no examples to justify it. What
-the sense of ἐπὶ is with an accusative case signifying locality,
-is shown by Thucydidês in this very passage.—εἰ ἄρα νομίσας <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐπὶ τὴν Ναύπακτον</em> αὐτοὺς πλεῖν ὁ Φορμίων,
-etc. (again, c. 85. ἐπὶ Κυδωνίαν πλεῦσαι; and i. 29, ἐπὶ Ἐπίδαμνον,
-etc.—ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν αὐτοῦ of Perdikkas, i, 57), that is, against, or to
-go thither with a hostile purpose. So sensible does the Scholiast
-seem to be of this, that he affirms ἐπὶ to be used instead of παρά.
-This is a most violent supposition, for nothing can be more different
-than the two phrases ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν and παρὰ τὴν γῆν. Dr. Arnold again
-assigns to ἐπὶ with an accusative case another sense, which he
-himself admits that it only has with a dative.</p>
-
-<p>I make these remarks with a view to show that the sense which Dr.
-Arnold and others put upon the words of Thucydidês,—ἔπλεον ἐπὶ τὴν
-ἑαυτῶν γῆν,—departs from the usual, and even from the legitimate
-meaning of the words. But I have a stronger objection still. If
-that sense be admitted, it will be found quite inconsistent with
-the subsequent proceedings, as Thucydidês describes; and any one
-who will look at the map in reading this chapter, will see plainly
-that the fact is so. If, as Dr. Arnold supposes, the Peloponnesian
-fleet kept close along the shore of Peloponnesus, what was there in
-their movements to alarm Phormio for the safety of Naupaktus, or to
-draw him so reluctantly into the strait? Or if we even grant this,
-and suppose that Phormio construed the movement along the coast of
-Achaia to indicate designs against Naupaktus, and that he therefore
-came into the gulf and sailed along his own shore to defend the
-town,—still the Peloponnesians would be separated from him by the
-whole breadth of the gulf at that point; and as soon as they altered
-their line of direction for the purpose of crossing the gulf and
-attacking him, he would have the whole breadth of the gulf in which
-to take his measures for meeting them, so that instead of finding
-himself jammed up against the land, he would have been able to go
-out and fight them in the wide water, which he so much desired. The
-whole description given by Thucydidês, of the sudden wheeling of
-the Peloponnesian fleet, whereby Phormio’s ships were assailed, and
-nine of them cut off, shows that the two fleets must have been very
-close together when that movement was undertaken. If they had not
-been close,—if the Peloponnesians had had to row any considerable
-distance after wheeling,—all the Athenian ships might have escaped
-along shore without any difficulty. In fact, the words of Thucydidês
-imply that <i>both</i> the two fleets, at the time when the wheel of
-the Peloponnesians was made, <i>were sailing in parallel directions
-along the northern coast in the direction of Naupaktus</i>,—ὅπως
-εἰ ἄρα νομίσας ἐπὶ τὴν Ναύπακτον αὐτοὺς πλεῖν ὁ Φορμίων <em
-class="gesperrt">καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπιβοηθῶν</em> ταύτῃ παραπλέοι,—“if he
-<i>also</i>, with a view to defend the place, should sail along that
-coast,” (that is, if he, <i>as well as they</i>:) which seems to be the
-distinct meaning of the particle καὶ in this place.</p>
-
-<p>Now if we suppose the Peloponnesian fleet to have sailed from
-its original station towards Naupaktus, all the events which follow
-become thoroughly perspicuous and coherent. I apprehend that no one
-would ever have entertained any other idea, except from the words
-of Thucydidês,—ἔπλεον ἐπὶ τὴν <em class="gesperrt">ἑαυτῶν</em>
-γῆν ἔσω ἐπὶ τοῦ κόλπου. Since the subject or nominative case of
-the verb ἔπλεον is οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι, it has been supposed that
-the word <em class="gesperrt">ἑαυτῶν</em> must necessarily refer
-to the Peloponnesians; and Mr. Bloomfield, with whom I agree
-as to the signification of the passage, proposes to alter <em
-class="gesperrt">ἑαυτῶν</em> into <em class="gesperrt">αὐτῶν</em>. It
-appears to me that this alteration is not necessary, and that ἑαυτῶν
-may very well be construed so as to refer to the <i>Athenians</i>, not
-to the Lacedæmonians. The reflective meaning of the pronoun ἑαυτῶν
-is <i>not necessarily</i> thrown back upon the subject of the action
-<i>immediately</i> preceding it, in a complicated sentence where there is
-more than one subject and more than one action. Thus, for instance,
-in this very passage of Thucydidês which I have transcribed, we find
-the word ἑαυτῶν a second time used, and used so that its meaning is
-thrown back, not upon the subject immediately preceding, but upon a
-subject more distant from it,—ἐπὶ δ᾽ αὐτῷ (τῷ κέρατι) εἴκοσι ναῦς
-ἔταξαν τὰς ἄριστα πλεούσας, ὅπως, εἰ ἄρα..., μὴ διαφύγοιεν πλέοντα
-τὸν ἐπίπλουν σφῶν οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι <em class="gesperrt">ἔξω τοῦ ἑαυτῶν
-κέρως</em>, ἀλλ᾽ αὗται αἱ νῆες περικλῄσειαν. Now here the words
-τοῦ ἑαυτῶν κέρως, allude to the Peloponnesian fleet, not to the
-Athenians, which latter is the subject immediately preceding. Poppo
-and Göller both admit such to be the true meaning; and if this be
-admissible, there appears to me no greater difficulty in construing
-the words ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν to mean, “the land of the <i>Athenians</i>,”
-<i>not</i> “the land of the <i>Peloponnesians</i>.” Ἑαυτῶν might have been
-more unambiguously expressed by ἐκείνων αὑτῶν; for the reflective
-signification embodied in αὑτῶν is here an important addition to the
-meaning: “Since the Athenians did not sail into the interior of the
-gulf and the narrow waters, the Peloponnesians, wishing to bring them
-in even reluctantly, sailed <i>against the Athenians’ own land</i> in the
-interior.”</p>
-
-<p>Another passage may be produced from Thucydidês, in which
-the two words ἑαυτοῦ and ἐκείνου are both used in the same
-sentence and designate the same person, ii, 13. Περικλῆς,
-ὑποτοπήσας, ὅτι Ἀρχίδαμος αὐτῷ ξένος ὢν ἐτύγχανε, μὴ πολλάκις
-ἢ αὐτὸς ἰδίᾳ βουλόμενος χαρίζεσθαι τοὺς ἀγροὺς αὐτοῦ παραλίπῃ
-καὶ μὴ δῃώσῃ, ἢ καὶ Λακεδαιμονίων κελευσάντων ἐπὶ διαβολῇ τῇ
-<em class="gesperrt">ἑαυτοῦ</em> γένηται τοῦτο, ὥσπερ καὶ τὰ
-ἄγη ἐλαύνειν προεῖπον ἕνεκα <em class="gesperrt">ἐκείνου</em>·
-προηγόρευε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ ὅτι Ἀρχίδαμος μὲν οἱ ξένος
-εἴη, οὐ μέντοι ἐπὶ κακῷ γε τῆς πόλεως γένοιτο, τοὺς δ᾽ ἀγροὺς <em
-class="gesperrt">τοὺς ἑαυτοῦ</em> καὶ οἰκίας ἢν ἄρα μὴ δῃώσωσιν οἱ
-πολέμιοι ὥσπερ καὶ τὰ τῶν ἄλλων, ἀφίησιν αὐτὰ δημόσια εἶναι. Here
-ἑαυτοῦ and ἐκείνου (compare an analogous passage, Xenophon, Hellen.
-i, 1, 27) both refer to Periklês; and ἑαυτοῦ is twice used, so that
-it reflects back not upon the subject of the action immediately
-preceding it, but upon another subject farther behind. Again, iv, 99.
-Οἱ δὲ Βοιωτοὶ ἀπεκρίναντο, εἰ μὲν ἐν τῇ Βοιωτίᾳ εἰσίν (οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι),
-ἀπιόντας <em class="gesperrt">ἐκ τῆς ἑαυτῶν</em> ἀποφέρεσθαι τὰ
-σφέτερα· εἰ δ᾽ ἐν τῇ <em class="gesperrt">ἐκείνων</em>, αὐτοὺς
-γιγνώσκειν τὸ ποιητέον. Here the use of ἑαυτῶν and ἐκείνων is
-remarkable. Ἑαυτῶν refers to the Bœotians, though the Athenians
-are the subject of the action immediately preceding; while ἐκείνων
-refers to the Athenians, in another case where they are the subject
-of the action immediately preceding. We should almost have expected
-to find the position of the two words reversed. Again, in iv, 57,
-we have—Καὶ τούτους μὲν οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ἐβουλεύσαντο καταθέσθαι ἐς τὰς
-νήσους, καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους Κυθηρίους <em class="gesperrt">οἰκοῦντας τὴν
-ἑαυτῶν</em> φόρον τέσσαρα τάλαντα φέρειν. Here ἑαυτῶν refers to the
-subject of the action immediately preceding—that is, to Κυθηρίους,
-not to Ἀθηναῖοι: but when we turn to another chapter, iii, 78: οἱ δὲ
-Ἀθηναῖοι φοβούμενοι τὸ πλῆθος καὶ τὴν περικύκλωσιν, ἁθρόαις μέν οὐ
-προσέπιπτον οὐδὲ κατὰ μέσον <em class="gesperrt">ταῖς ἐφ᾽ ἑαυτοὺς
-τεταγμέναις</em> (ναυσὶ)—we find ἑαυτῶν thrown back upon the subject,
-<i>not</i> immediately preceding it. The same, iv, 47—εἴ πού τίς τινα
-ἴδοι ἐχθρὸν ἑαυτοῦ; and ii, 95. Ὁ γὰρ Περδίκκας αὐτῷ ὑποσχόμενος, εἰ
-Ἀθηναίοις τε διαλλάξειεν <em class="gesperrt">ἑαυτὸν</em> (<i>i. e.</i>
-Perdikkas), κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς τῷ πολέμῳ πιεζόμενον, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Compare also Homer, Odyss. xvii, 387. Πτωχὸν δ᾽ οὐκ ἄν τις καλέοι,
-τρύξοντα ἓ αὐτόν; and Xenophon, Memorab. iv, 2, 28; i, 6, 3; v, 2,
-24; Anabas. vii. 2, 10; 6, 43; Hellen. v, 2, 39.</p>
-
-<p>It appears to me, that when we study the use of the pronoun
-ἑαυτὸς, we shall see reason to be convinced that in the passage of
-Thucydidês now before us, the phrase οἱ Πελοποννήσιοι ἔπλεον ἐς τὴν
-ἑαυτῶν γῆν, need not necessarily be referred to the <i>Peloponnesian</i>
-land, but may in perfect conformity with analogy be understood to
-mean the <i>Athenian</i> land. I am sure that, in so construing it, we
-shall not put so much violence upon the meaning as the Scholiast and
-Dr. Arnold have put upon the preposition ἐπὶ, when the Scholiast
-states that ἐπὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν γῆν means the same thing as παρὰ τὴν
-ἑαυτῶν γῆν, and when Dr. Arnold admits this opinion, only adding a
-new meaning which does not usually belong to ἐπὶ with an accusative
-case.</p>
-
-<p>An objection to the meaning which I propose may possibly
-be grounded on the word νομίσας, applied to Phormio. If the
-Peloponnesian fleet was sailing directly towards Naupaktus, it may
-be urged, Phormio would not be said to <i>think</i> that they were going
-thither, but <i>to see</i> or <i>become aware</i> of it. But in reply to this
-we may observe, that the Peloponnesians never really intended to
-attack Naupaktus, though they directed their course towards it;
-they wished in reality to draw Phormio within the strait, and there
-to attack him. The historian, therefore, says with propriety, that
-Phormio would <i>believe</i>, and not that he would <i>perceive</i>, them to be
-going thither, since his belief would really be erroneous.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_352"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_352">[352]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 90. How narrow the
-escape was, is marked in the words of the historian—τῶν δὲ ἕνδεκα μὲν
-αἵπερ ἡγοῦντο <em class="gesperrt">ὑπεκφεύγουσι</em> τὸ κέρας τῶν
-Πελοποννησίων καὶ τὴν ἐπιστροφήν, ἐς τὴν εὐρυχωρίαν.</p>
-
-<p>The proceedings of the Syracusan fleet against that of the
-Athenians in the harbor of Syracuse, and the reflections of the
-historian upon them, illustrate this attack of the Peloponnesians
-upon the fleet of Phormio (Thucyd. vii. 36).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_353"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_353">[353]</a></span> Compare the like bravery on the
-part of the Lacedæmonian hoplites at Pylus (Thucyd. iv, 14).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_354"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_354">[354]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 92. It is
-sufficiently evident that the Athenians defeated and drove off
-not only the twenty Peloponnesian ships of the right or pursuing
-wing,—but also the left and centre. Otherwise, they would not have
-been able to recapture those Athenian ships which had been lost at
-the beginning of the battle. Thucydidês, indeed, does not expressly
-mention the Peloponnesian left and centre as following the right
-in their pursuit towards Naupaktus. But we may presume that they
-partially did so, probably careless of much order, as being at first
-under the impression that the victory was gained. They were probably,
-therefore, thrown into confusion without much difficulty, when the
-twenty ships of the right were beaten and driven back upon them,—even
-though the victorious Athenian triremes were no more than eleven in
-number.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_355"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_355">[355]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 102, 103.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_356"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_356">[356]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 93. ἐδόκει δὲ
-λαβόντα τῶν ναυτῶν ἕκαστον τὴν κώπην, καὶ τὸ ὑπηρέσιον, καὶ τὸν
-τροπωτῆρα, etc. On these words there is an interesting letter of Dr.
-Bishop’s published in the Appendix to Dr. Arnold’s Thucydidês, vol.
-i. His remarks upon ὑπηρέσιον are more satisfactory than those upon
-τροπωτήρ. Whether the fulcrum of the oar was formed by a thowell,
-or a notch, on the gunwale, or by a perforation in the ship’s side,
-there must in both cases have been required—since it seems to have
-had nothing like what Dr. Bishop calls a <i>nut</i>—a thong to prevent
-it from slipping down towards the water; especially with the oars
-of the thranitæ, or upper tier of rowers, who pulled at so great an
-elevation, comparatively speaking, above the water. Dr. Arnold’s
-explanation of τροπωτὴρ is suited to the case of a boat, but not
-to that of a trireme. Dr. Bishop shows that the explanation of the
-purpose of the ὑπηρέσιον, given by the Scholiast, is not the true
-one.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_357"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_357">[357]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 94.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_358"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_358">[358]</a></span> Xenophon, Hellen. v. 1, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_359"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_359">[359]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 29, 95, 96.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_360"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_360">[360]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 99.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_361"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_361">[361]</a></span> See Xenophon, Anabas. vii,
-3, 16; 4, 2. Diodorus (xii, 50) gives the revenue of Sitalkês as
-more than one thousand talents annually. This sum is not materially
-different from that which Thucydidês states to be the annual receipt
-of Seuthes, successor of Sitalkês,—revenue, properly so called, and
-presents, both taken together.</p>
-
-<p>Traders from Parium, on the Asiatic coast of the Propontis, are
-among those who come with presents to the Odrysian king, Mêdokus
-(Xenophon <i>ut supra</i>).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_362"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_362">[362]</a></span> Xenoph. Anabas. <i>l. c.</i></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_363"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_363">[363]</a></span> Herodot. iv, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_364"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_364">[364]</a></span> Xenophon, Anabas. vii, 2, 31;
-Thucyd. ii, 29; Aristophan. Aves, 366. Thucydidês goes out of his way
-to refute this current belief,—a curious exemplification of ancient
-legend applied to the convenience of present politics.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_365"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_365">[365]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 97. Φόρος δὲ
-ἐκ πάσης τῆς βαρβάρου καὶ τῶν Ἑλληνίδων πόλεων, ὅσον προσῆξαν
-ἐπὶ Σεύθου, ὃς ὕστερον Σιτάλκου βασιλεύσας πλεῖστον δὴ ἐποίησε,
-τετρακοσίων ταλάντων μάλιστα δύναμις, ἃ χρυσὸς καὶ ἄργυρος εἴη· καὶ
-δῶρα οὐκ ἐλάσσω τούτων χρυσοῦ τε καὶ ἀργύρου προσεφέρετο, χωρὶς δὲ
-ὅσα ὑφαντά τε καὶ λεῖα, καὶ ἡ ἄλλη κατασκευὴ, καὶ οὐ μόνον αὐτῷ ἀλλὰ
-καὶ τοῖς παραδυναστεύουσι καὶ γενναίοις Ὀδρυσῶν· κατεστήσαντο γὰρ
-τοὐναντίον τῆς Περσῶν βασιλείας τὸν νόμον, ὄντα μὲν καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις
-Θρᾳξὶ, λαμβάνειν μᾶλλον ἢ διδόναι, καὶ αἴσχιον ἦν αἰτηθέντα μὴ δοῦναι
-ἢ αἰτήσαντα μὴ τυχεῖν· ὅμως δὲ κατὰ τὸ δύνασθαι ἐπὶ πλέον αὐτῷ
-ἐχρήσαντο· οὐ γὰρ ἦν πρᾶξαι οὐδὲν μὴ διδόντα δῶρα· ὥστε ἐπὶ μέγα ἡ
-βασιλεία ἦλθεν ἰσχύος.</p>
-
-<p>This universal necessity of presents and bribes may be seen
-illustrated in the dealings of Xenophon and the Cyreian army with the
-Thracian prince Seuthes, described in the Anabasis, vii, chapters 1
-and 2. It appears that even at that time, <small>B.C.</small> 401,
-the Odrysian dominion, though it had passed through disturbances
-and had been practically enfeebled, still extended down to the
-neighborhood of Byzantium. In commenting upon the venality of the
-Thracians, the Scholiast has a curious comparison with his own
-time—καὶ οὐκ ἦν τι πρᾶξαι παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς τὸν μὴ διδόντα χρήματα· <em
-class="gesperrt">ὅπερ καὶ νῦν ἐν Ῥωμαίοις</em>. The Scholiast
-here tells us that the venality in his time as to public affairs,
-in the Roman empire, was not less universal: of what century of
-the Roman empire he speaks, we do not know: perhaps about 500-600
-<small>A.D.</small></p>
-
-<p>The contrast which Thucydidês here draws between the Thracians and
-the Persians is also illustrated by what Xenophon says respecting the
-habits of the younger Cyrus: (Anabas. i, 9, 22): compare also the
-romance of the Cyropædia, viii, 14, 31, 32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_366"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_366">[366]</a></span> See Gatterer (De Herodoti et
-Thucydidis Thraciâ), sects. 44-57; Poppo (Prolegom. ad Thucydidem),
-vol. ii, ch. 31, about the geography of this region, which is very
-imperfectly known, even in modern times. We can hardly pretend to
-assign a locality to these ancient names.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês, in his brief statements respecting this march of
-Sitalkês, speaks like one who had good information about the inland
-regions; as he was likely to have from his familiarity with the
-coasts, and resident proprietorship in Thrace (Thucyd. ii, 100;
-Herodot. v, 16).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_367"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_367">[367]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 100; Xenophon,
-Memorab. iii, 9, 2.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_368"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_368">[368]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 101. ἐπειδὴ οἱ
-Ἀθηναῖοι οὐ παρῆσαν ταῖς ναυσὶν, ἀπιστοῦντες αὐτὸν μὴ ἥξειν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_369"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_369">[369]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 101.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_370"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_370">[370]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 1.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_371"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_371">[371]</a></span> Aristotel. Politic. v, 2, 3.
-The fact respecting Doxander here mentioned is stated by Aristotle,
-and there is no reason to question its truth. But Aristotle states
-it in illustration of a general position,—that the private quarrels
-of principal citizens are often the cause of great misfortune to
-the commonwealth. He represents Doxander and his private quarrel as
-having brought upon Mitylênê the resentment of the Athenians and
-the war with Athens—Δόξανδρος—ἦρξε τῆς στάσεως, καὶ παρώξυνε τοὺς
-Ἀθηναίους, πρόξενος ὢν τῆς πόλεως.</p>
-
-<p>Having the account of Thucydidês before us, we are enabled to say
-that this is an incorrect conception, as far as concerns the <i>cause</i>
-of the war,—though the fact in itself may be quite true.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_372"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_372">[372]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 2.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_373"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_373">[373]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_374"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_374">[374]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 3, 4: compare
-Strabo, xiii, p. 617; and Plehn, Lesbiaca, pp. 12-18.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês speaks of the spot at the mouth of the northern harbor
-as being called Malea, which was also undoubtedly the name of the
-southeastern promontory of Lesbos. We must therefore presume that
-there were two places on the seaboard of Lesbos which bore that
-name.</p>
-
-<p>The easternmost of the two southern promontories of Peloponnesus
-was also called Cape Malea.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_375"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_375">[375]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_376"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_376">[376]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 18.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_377"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_377">[377]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_378"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_378">[378]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 10. μηδέ τῳ
-χείρους δόξωμεν εἶναι, εἰ <em class="gesperrt">ἐν τῇ εἰρήνῃ τιμώμενοι
-ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν</em> ἐν τοῖς δεινοῖς ἀφιστάμεθα.</p>
-
-<p>The language in which the Mitylenæan envoys describe the treatment
-which their city had received from Athens, is substantially as strong
-as that which Kleon uses afterwards in his speech at Athens, when
-he reproaches them with their ingratitude,—Kleon says (iii, 39),
-αὐτόνομοί τε οἰκοῦντες, καὶ <em class="gesperrt">τιμώμενοι ἐς τὰ πρῶτα
-ὑφ᾽ ἡμῶν</em>, τοιαῦτα εἰργάσαντο, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_379"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_379">[379]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 12. οὐ μέντοι
-ἐπὶ πολύ γ᾽ ἂν ἐδοκοῦμεν δυνηθῆναι (περιγίγνεσθαι), εἰ μὴ ὁ πόλεμος
-ὅδε κατέστη, παραδείγμασι χρώμενοι τοῖς ἐς τοὺς ἄλλους. Τίς οὖν
-αὐτὴ ἡ φιλία ἐγίγνετο ἢ ἐλευθερία πιστὴ, ἐν ᾗ παρὰ γνώμην ἀλλήλους
-ὑπεδεχόμεθα, καὶ οἱ μὲν ἡμᾶς ἐν τῷ πολέμῳ δεδιότες ἐθεράπευον, ἡμεῖς
-δὲ ἐκείνους ἐν τῇ ἡσυχίᾳ τὸ αὐτὸ ἐποιοῦμεν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_380"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_380">[380]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 11. Αὐτόνομοι
-δὲ ἐλείφθημεν οὐ δι᾽ ἄλλο τι ἢ ὅσον αὐτοῖς ἐς τὴν ἀρχὴν εὐπρεπείᾳ
-τε λόγου, καὶ γνώμης μᾶλλον ἐφόδῳ ἢ ἰσχύος, τὰ πράγματα
-ἐφαίνετο καταληπτά. Ἅμα μὲν γὰρ μαρτυρίῳ ἐχρῶντο, μὴ ἂν <em
-class="gesperrt">τούς γε ἰσοψήφους ἄκοντας</em>, εἰ μή τι ἠδίκουν οἷς
-ἐπῄεσαν, <em class="gesperrt">ξυστρατεύειν</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_381"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_381">[381]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 13.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_382"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_382">[382]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 13, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_383"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_383">[383]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 144. Καὶ ὅταν
-κἀκεῖνοι (the Lacedæmonians) ταῖς αὐτῶν ἀποδῶσι πόλεσι, μὴ <em
-class="gesperrt">σφίσι τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις ἐπιτηδείως αὐτονομεῖσθαι,
-ἀλλ᾽ αὐτοῖς ἑκάστοις, ὡς βούλονται</em>.</p>
-
-<p>About the hostages detained by Sparta for the fidelity of her
-allies, see Thucyd. v, 54, 61.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_384"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_384">[384]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 7-16.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_385"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_385">[385]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 15, 16.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_386"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_386">[386]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 7.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_387"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_387">[387]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 17. Καὶ κατὰ τὸν
-χρόνον τοῦτον, ὃν αἱ νῆες ἔπλεον, ἐν τοῖς πλεῖσται δὴ νῆες ἅμ᾽ αὐτοῖς
-ἐνεργοὶ κάλλει ἐγένοντο, παραπλήσιαι δὲ καὶ ἔτι πλείους ἀρχομένου
-τοῦ πολέμου. Τήν τε γὰρ Ἀττικὴν καὶ Εὔβοιαν καὶ Σαλαμῖνα ἑκατὸν
-ἐφύλασσον, καὶ περὶ Πελοπόννησον ἕτεραι ἑκατὸν ἦσαν, χωρὶς δὲ αἱ περὶ
-Ποτίδαιαν καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἄλλοις χωρίοις, ὥστε αἱ πᾶσαι ἅμα ἐγίγνοντο
-ἐν ἑνὶ θέρει διακόσιαι καὶ πεντήκοντα. Καὶ τὰ χρήματα τοῦτο μάλιστα
-ὑπανάλωσε μετὰ Ποτιδαίας, etc.</p>
-
-<p>I have endeavored to render as well as I can this obscure and
-difficult passage; difficult both as to grammar and as to sense,
-and not satisfactorily explained by any of the commentators,—if,
-indeed, it can be held to stand now as Thucydidês wrote it. In the
-preceding chapter, he had mentioned that this fleet of one hundred
-sail was manned largely from the hoplite class of citizens (iii,
-16). Now we know from other passages in his work (see v, 8; vi, 31)
-how much difference there was in the appearance and efficiency of
-an armament, according to the class of citizens who served on it.
-We may then refer the word κάλλος to the excellence of outfit hence
-arising: I wish, indeed, that any instance could be produced of
-κάλλος in this sense, but we find the adjective κάλλιστος (Thucyd.
-v, 60) στρατόπεδον γὰρ δὴ τοῦτο <em class="gesperrt">κάλλιστον</em>
-Ἑλληνικὸν τῶν μέχρι τοῦδε ξυνῆλθεν. In v, 8, Thucydidês employs the
-word ἀξίωμα to denote the same meaning; and in vi, 31, he says:
-παρασκευὴ γὰρ αὑτὴ πρώτη ἐκπλεύσασα μιᾶς πόλεως δυνάμει Ἑλληνικῇ
-πολυτελεστάτη δὴ καὶ εὐπρεπεστάτη τῶν εἰς ἐκεῖνον τὸν χρόνον ἐγένετο.
-It may be remarked that in that chapter too, he contrasts the
-expedition against Sicily with two other Athenian expeditions, equal
-to it in number, but inferior in equipment: the same comparison which
-I believe he means to take in this passage.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_388"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_388">[388]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_389"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_389">[389]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 20. Compare
-Xenophon, Hellen. ii, 4, 19; Herodot. ix, 37; Plutarch, Aratus, c.
-25.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_390"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_390">[390]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 22. Dr. Arnold, in
-his note, construes this passage as if the right or bare foot were
-the <i>least</i> likely to slip in the mud, and the left or shod foot the
-<i>most</i> likely. The Scholiast and Wasse maintain the opposite opinion,
-which is certainly the more obvious sense of the text, though the
-sense of Dr. Arnold would also be admissible. The naked foot is
-very liable to slip in the mud, and might easily be rendered less
-liable, by sandals, or covering particularly adapted to that purpose.
-Besides, Wasse remarks justly, that the warrior who is to use his
-<i>right</i> arm requires to have his <i>left</i> foot firmly planted.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_391"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_391">[391]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 22. φρυκτοί τε
-ᾔροντο ἐς τὰς Θήβας πολέμιοι, etc. It would seem by this statement
-that the blockaders must have been often in the habit of transmitting
-intelligence to Thebes by means of fire-signals; each particular
-combination of lights having more or less of a special meaning. The
-Platæans had observed this, and foresaw that the same means would be
-used on the night of the outbreak, to bring assistance from Thebes
-forthwith. If they had not observed it <i>before</i>, they could not have
-prepared for the moment when the new signal would be hoisted, so as
-to confound its meaning—ὅπως ἀσαφῆ τὰ σημεῖα ᾖ....</p>
-
-<p>Compare iii, 80. I agree with the general opinion stated in Dr.
-Arnold’s note respecting these fire-signals, and even think that it
-might have been sustained more strongly.</p>
-
-<p>“Non enim (observes Cicero, in the fifth oration against Verres,
-c. 36), sicut erat nuper consuetudo, prædonum adventum significabat
-<i>ignis è speculà sublatus aut tumulo</i>: sed flamma ex ipso incendio
-navium et calamitatem acceptam et periculum reliquum nuntiabat.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_392"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_392">[392]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 24. Diodorus (xii,
-56) gives a brief summary of these facts, without either novelty or
-liveliness.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_393"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_393">[393]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 25, 26.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_394"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_394">[394]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 27. ὁ Σάλαιθος,
-καὶ αὐτὸς οὐ προσδεχόμενος ἔτι τὰς ναῦς, ὁπλίζει τὸν δῆμον, πρότερον
-ψιλὸν ὄντα, ὡς ἐπεξιὼν τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_395"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_395">[395]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 28.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_396"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_396">[396]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 34. τῇ γνώμῃ
-δεδουλωμένοι ὡς ἐπὶ Λακεδαιμονίους.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_397"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_397">[397]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 75.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_398"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_398">[398]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 32, 33-69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_399"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_399">[399]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 56. Ἀργεῖοι
-δ᾽ ἐλθόντες παρ᾽ Ἀθηναίους ἐπεκάλουν ὅτι, γεγραμμένον ἐν ταῖς
-σπονδαῖς <em class="gesperrt">διὰ τῆς ἑαυτῶν</em> ἑκάστους μὴ ἐᾶν
-πολεμίους διιέναι, ἐάσειαν <em class="gesperrt">κατὰ θάλασσαν</em>
-(Λακεδαιμονίους) παραπλεῦσαι.</p>
-
-<p>We see that the sea is here reckoned as a portion of the Athenian
-territory; and even the portion of sea near to Peloponnesus,—much
-more, that on the coast of Ionia.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_400"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_400">[400]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_401"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_401">[401]</a></span> The dissensions between Notium
-and Kolophon are noticed by Aristot. Politic. v, 3, 2.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_402"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_402">[402]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 34.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_403"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_403">[403]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 34; C. A. Pertz,
-Colophoniaca, p. 36. (Göttingen, 1848.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_404"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_404">[404]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 43. Ἀλκιβιάδης—ἀνὴρ
-ἡλικίᾳ μὲν ὢν ἔτι τότε νέος, ὡς ἐν ἄλλῃ πόλει, ἀξιώματι δὲ προγόνων
-τιμώμενος. Compare Xenophon, Memorabil. i, 2, 25; iii, 6, 1.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_405"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_405">[405]</a></span> Aristophan. Equit. 130,
-<i>seqq.</i>, and Scholia; Eupolis, Demi, Fram. xv, p. 466, ed. Meineke.
-See the remarks in Ranck, Commentat. de Vitâ Aristophanis, p.
-cccxxxiv, <i>seqq.</i></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_406"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_406">[406]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 36. Κλέων—ὢν καὶ
-ἐς τὰ ἄλλα βιαιότατος τῶν πολιτῶν, καὶ τῷ δήμῳ παραπολὺ ἐν τῷ τότε
-πιθανώτατος.</p>
-
-<p>He also mentions Kleon a second time, two years afterwards, but
-in terms which also seem to imply a first introduction,—μάλιστα
-δὲ αὐτοὺς ἐνῆγε Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου, ἀνὴρ δημαγωγὸς κατ᾽ ἐκεῖνον
-τὸν χρόνον ὢν καὶ τῷ πλήθει πιθανώτατος, iv, 21-28, also v, 16.
-Κλέων—νομίζων καταφανέστερος ἂν εἶναι κακουργῶν, καὶ ἀπιστότερος
-διαβάλλων, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_407"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_407">[407]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c. 33.
-Ἐπεφύετο δὲ καὶ Κλέων, ἤδη διὰ τῆς πρὸς ἐκεῖνον ὀργῆς τῶν πολιτῶν
-πορευόμενος εἰς τὴν δημαγωγίαν.</p>
-
-<p>Periklês was δηχθεὶς αἴθωνι Κλέωνι—in the words of the comic
-author Hermippus.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_408"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_408">[408]</a></span> Aristophan. Equit. 750.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_409"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_409">[409]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 36. προσξυνεβάλετο
-οὐκ ἐλάχιστον τῆς ὁρμῆς, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_410"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_410">[410]</a></span> I infer this total number
-from the fact that the number sent to Athens by Pachês, as foremost
-instigators, was rather more than one thousand (Thucyd. iii, 50).
-The total of ἡβῶντες, or males of military age, must have been (I
-imagine) six times this number.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_411"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_411">[411]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_412"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_412">[412]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 36. Καὶ τῇ
-ὑστεραίᾳ μετάνοιά τις εὐθὺς ἦν αὐτοῖς καὶ ἀναλογισμὸς, ὠμὸν τὸ
-βούλευμα καὶ μέγα ἐγνῶσθαι, πόλιν ὅλην διαφθεῖραι μᾶλλον ἢ οὐ τοὺς
-αἰτίους.</p>
-
-<p>The feelings of the seamen, in the trireme appointed to carry the
-order of execution, are a striking point of evidence in this case:
-τῆς προτέρας νεὼς οὐ σπουδῇ πλεούσης ἐπὶ πρᾶγμα ἀλλόκοτον, etc. (iii,
-50).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_413"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_413">[413]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 36. As to the
-illegality, see Thucyd. vi, 14, which I think is good evidence to
-prove that there was illegality. I agree with Schömann on this point,
-in spite of the doubts of Dr. Arnold.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_414"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_414">[414]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 37. οἱ μὲν γὰρ
-τῶν τε νόμων σοφώτεροι βούλονται φαίνεσθαι, τῶν τε ἀεὶ λεγομένων
-ἐς τὸ κοινὸν περιγίγνεσθαι ... οἱ δ᾽ ἀπιστοῦντες τῇ ἐαυτῶν ξυνέσει
-ἀμαθέστεροι μὲν τῶν νόμων ἀξιοῦσιν εἶναι, ἀδυνατώτεροι δὲ τοῦ καλῶς
-εἰπόντος μέμψασθαι λόγον.</p>
-
-<p>Compare the language of Archidamus at Sparta in the congress,
-where he takes credit to the Spartans for being ἀμαθέστερον τῶν νόμων
-τῆς ὑπεροψίας παιδευόμενοι, etc. (Thucyd. i, 84)—very similar in
-spirit to the remarks of Kleon about the Athenians.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_415"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_415">[415]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 40. μηδὲ τρισὶ
-τοῖς ἀξυμφορωτάτοις τῇ ἀρχῇ, οἴκτῳ, καὶ ἡδονῇ λόγων, καὶ ἐπιεικείᾳ,
-ἁμαρτάνειν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_416"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_416">[416]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 40. πειθόμενοι
-δὲ ἐμοὶ τά τε δίκαια ἐς Μυτιληναίους καὶ τὰ ξύμφορα ἅμα ποιήσετε·
-ἄλλως δὲ γνόντες τοῖς μὲν οὐ χαριεῖσθε, ὑμᾶς δὲ αὐτοὺς μᾶλλον
-δικαιώσεσθε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_417"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_417">[417]</a></span> Thucyd. iii. 48: compare the
-speech of Kleon. iii, 40. ὑμεῖς δὲ γνόντες ἀμείνω τάδε εἶναι, καὶ
-μήτε οἴκτῳ πλέον νείμαντες μήτε ἐπιεικείᾳ, <em class="gesperrt">οἷς
-οὐδὲ ἐγὼ ἐῶ προσάγεσθαι</em>, ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν δὲ τῶν παραινουμένων, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold distinguishes οἶκτος (or ἔλεος) from ἐπιεικεία, by
-saying that “the former is a feeling, the latter a habit: οἶκτος,
-pity or compassion, may occasionally touch those who are generally
-very far from being ἐπιεικεῖς—mild or gentle. Ἐπιεικεία relates to
-all persons,—οἶκτος, to particular individuals.” The distinction
-here taken is certainly in itself just, and ἐπιεικὴς sometimes has
-the meaning ascribed to it by Dr. Arnold: but in this passage I
-believe it has a different meaning. The contrast between οἶκτος and
-ἐπιεικεία—as Dr. Arnold explains them—would be too feeble, and too
-little marked, to serve the purpose of Kleon and Diodotus. Ἐπιεικεία
-here rather means the disposition to stop short of your full rights;
-a spirit of fairness and adjustment; an abatement on your part likely
-to be requited by abatement on the part of your adversary: compare
-Thucyd. i, 76; iv, 19; v, 86; viii, 93.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_418"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_418">[418]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 44. ἐγὼ δὲ
-παρῆλθον οὔτε ἀντερῶν περὶ Μυτιληναίων οὔτε κατηγορήσων· οὐ γὰρ
-περὶ τῆς ἐκείνων ἀδικίας ἡμῖν ὁ ἀγὼν, εἰ σωφρονοῦμεν, ἀλλὰ περὶ τῆς
-ἡμετέρας εὐβουλίας ... <em class="gesperrt">δικαιότερος γὰρ ὢν αὐτοῦ
-(Κλέωνος) ὁ λόγος πρὸς τὴν νῦν ὑμετέραν ὀργὴν ἐς Μυτιληναίους</em>,
-τάχα ἂν ἐπισπάσαιτο· <em class="gesperrt">ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐ δικαζόμεθα πρὸς
-αὐτοὺς, ὥστε τῶν δικαίων δεῖν</em>, ἀλλὰ βουλευόμεθα περὶ αὐτῶν, ὅπως
-χρησίμως ἕξουσιν.</p>
-
-<p>So Mr. Burke, in his speech on Conciliation with America (Burke’s
-Works, vol. iii. pp. 69-74), in discussing the proposition of
-prosecuting the acts of the refractory colonies as criminal: “The
-thing seems a great deal too big for my ideas of jurisprudence. It
-should seem, to my way of conceiving such matters, that there is a
-wide difference in reason and policy, between the mode of proceeding
-on the irregular conduct of scattered individuals, or even of bands
-of men who disturb order within the state,—and the civil dissensions
-which may from time to time agitate the several communities which
-compose a great empire. It looks to me to be narrow and pedantic, to
-apply the ordinary ideas of criminal justice to this great public
-contest. I do not know the method of drawing up an indictment against
-a whole people,” etc.—“My consideration is narrow, confined, and
-wholly limited to the policy of the question.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_419"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_419">[419]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 42.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_420"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_420">[420]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 43.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_421"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_421">[421]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 45, 46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_422"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_422">[422]</a></span> Compare this speech of Diodotus
-with the views of punishment implied by Xenophon in his Anabasis,
-where he is describing the government of Cyrus the younger:—</p>
-
-<p>“Nor can any man contend, that Cyrus suffered criminals and
-wrong-doers to laugh at him: he punished them with the most
-unmeasured severity (ἀφειδέστατα πάντων ἐτιμωρεῖτο). And you might
-often see along the frequented roads men deprived of their eyes,
-their hands, and their feet: so that in his government either Greek
-or barbarian, if he had no criminal purpose, might go fearlessly
-through and carry whatever he found convenient.” (Anabasis, i, 9,
-13.)</p>
-
-<p>The severity of the punishment is, in Xenophon’s mind, the measure
-both of its effects in deterring criminals, and of the character of
-the ruler inflicting it.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_423"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_423">[423]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 47. Νῦν μὲν
-γὰρ ὑμῖν ὁ δῆμος ἐν πάσαις ταῖς πόλεσιν εὔνους ἐστὶ, καὶ ἢ οὐ
-ξυναφίσταται τοῖς ὀλίγοις, ἢ ἐὰν βιασθῇ, ὑπάρχει τοῖς ἀποστήσασι
-πολέμιος εὐθὺς, καὶ τῆς ἀντικαθισταμένης πόλεως τὸ πλῆθος ξύμμαχον
-ἔχοντες ἐς πόλεμον ἐπέρχεσθε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_424"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_424">[424]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 48.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_425"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_425">[425]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 49. ἐγένοντο ἐν τῇ
-χειροτονίᾳ ἀγχώμαλοι, ἐκράτησε δ᾽ ἡ τοῦ Διοδότου.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_426"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_426">[426]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 49. παρὰ τοσοῦτον
-μὲν ἡ Μυτιλήνη ἦλθε κινδύνου.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_427"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_427">[427]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 50.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_428"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_428">[428]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 50; iv, 52.
-About the Lesbian kleruchs, see Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens, B.
-iii, c. 18; Wachsmuth, Hell. Alt. i. 2, p. 36. These kleruchs must
-originally have gone thither as a garrison, as M. Boeckh remarks; and
-may probably have come back, either all or a part, when needed for
-military service at home, and when it was ascertained that the island
-might be kept without them. Still, however, there is much which is
-puzzling in this arrangement. It seems remarkable that the Athenians,
-at a time when their accumulated treasure had been exhausted, and
-when they were beginning to pay direct contributions from their
-private property, should sacrifice five thousand four hundred minæ
-(ninety talents) annual revenue capable of being appropriated by the
-state, unless that sum were required to maintain the kleruchs as
-resident garrison for the maintenance of Lesbos. And as it turned
-out afterwards that their residence was not necessary, we may doubt
-whether the state did not convert the kleruchic grants into a public
-tribute, wholly or partially.</p>
-
-<p>We may farther remark, that if the kleruch be supposed a citizen
-resident at Athens, but receiving rent from his lot of land in some
-other territory,—the analogy between him and the Roman colonist
-fails. The Roman colonists, though retaining their privileges as
-citizens, were sent out to reside on their grants of land, and to
-constitute a sort of resident garrison over the prior inhabitants,
-who had been despoiled of a portion of territory to make room for
-them.</p>
-
-<p>See, on this subject and analogy, the excellent Dissertation
-of Madwig: De jure et conditione coloniarum Populi Romani quæstio
-historica,—Madwig, Opuscul. Copenhag. 1834. Diss. viii, p. 246.</p>
-
-<p>M. Boeckh and Dr. Arnold contend justly that at the time of the
-expedition of Athens against Syracuse and afterwards (Thucyd. vii,
-57; viii, 23), there could have been but few, if any, Athenian
-kleruchs resident in Lesbos. We might even push this argument
-farther, and apply the same inference to an earlier period, the
-eighth year of the war (Thucyd. iv, 75), when the Mitylenæan exiles
-were so active in their aggressions upon Antandrus and the other
-towns, originally Mitylenæan possessions, on the opposite mainland.
-There was no force near at hand on the part of Athens to deal with
-these exiles except the ἀργυρόλογαι νῆες,—had there been kleruchs at
-Mitylênê, they would probably have been able to defeat the exiles in
-their first attempts, and would certainly have been among the most
-important forces to put them down afterwards,—whereas Thucydidês
-makes no allusion to them.</p>
-
-<p>Farther, the oration of Antipho (De Cæde Herod. c. 13) makes no
-allusion to Athenian kleruchs, either as resident in the island, or
-even as absentees receiving the annual rent mentioned by Thucydidês.
-The Mitylenæan citizen, father of the speaker of that oration, had
-been one of those implicated—as he says, unwillingly—in the past
-revolt of the city against Athens: since the deplorable termination
-of that revolt he had continued possessor of his Lesbian property,
-and continued also to discharge his obligations as well (choregic
-obligations—χορηγίας) towards Mitylênê as (his obligations of
-pecuniary payment—τέλη) towards Athens. If the arrangement mentioned
-by Thucydidês had been persisted in, this Mitylenæan proprietor
-would have paid nothing towards the city of Athens, but merely a
-rent of two minæ to some Athenian kleruch, or citizen; which can
-hardly be reconciled with the words of the speaker as we find them in
-Antipho.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_429"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_429">[429]</a></span> See the Epigram of Agathias,
-57, p. 377. Agathias, ed. Bonn.</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Ἑλλανὶς τριμάκαιρα, καὶ ἁ χαρίεσσα Λάμαξις,</p>
-<p class="i2">ἤστην μὲν πάτρας φέγγεα Λεσβιάδος.</p>
-<p class="i0">Ὅκκα δ᾽ Ἀθηναίῃσι σὺν ὅλκασιν ἔνθαδε κέλσας</p>
-<p class="i2">τὰν Μιτυληναίαν γᾶν ἀλάπαξε Πάχης,</p>
-<p class="i0">Τᾶν κουρᾶν αδίκως ἡράσσατο, τὼς δὲ συνεύνως</p>
-<p class="i2">ἔκτανεν, ὡς τήνας τῇδε βιησόμενος.</p>
-<p class="i0">Ταὶ δὲ κατ᾽ Αἰγαίοιο ῥόου πλατὺ λαῖτμα φερέσθην,</p>
-<p class="i2">καὶ ποτὶ τὰν κραναὰν Μοψοπίαν δραμέτην,</p>
-<p class="i0">Δάμῳ δ᾽ ἀγγελέτην ἀλιτήμονος ἔργα Πάχητος</p>
-<p class="i2">μέσφα μιν εἰς ὀλοὴν κῆρα συνηλασάτην.</p>
-<p class="i0">Τοῖα μὲν, ὦ κούρα, πεπονήκατον· ἄψ δ᾽ ἐπὶ πάτραν</p>
-<p class="i2">ἥκετον, ἐν δ᾽ αὐτᾷ κεῖσθον ἀποφθιμένα.</p>
-<p class="i0">Εὖ δὲ πόνων ἀπόνασθον, ἐπεὶ ποτὶ σᾶμα συνεύνων</p>
-<p class="i2">εὕδετον, ἐς κλεινᾶς μνᾶμα σαοφροσύνας·</p>
-<p class="i0">Ὑμνεῦσιν δ᾽ ἔτι πάντες ὁμόφρονας ἡρωΐνας,</p>
-<p class="i2">πάτρας καὶ ποσίων πήματα τισαμένας.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="mt1">Plutarch (Nikias, 6: compare Plutarch, Aristeidês,
-c. 26) states the fact of Pachês having slain himself before the
-dikastery on occasion of his trial of accountability. Πάχητα τὸν
-ἕλοντα Λέσβον, ὃς, εὐθύνας δίδους τῆς στρατηγίας, ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ
-δικαστηρίῳ σπασάμενος ξίφος ἀνεῖλεν ἑαυτὸν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The statement in Plutarch, and that in the Epigram, hang together
-so perfectly well, that each lends authority to the other, and I
-think there is good reason for crediting the Epigram. The suicide
-of Pachês, and that too before the dikasts, implies circumstances
-very different from those usually brought in accusation against a
-general on trial: it implies an intensity of anger in the numerous
-dikasts greater than that which acts of peculation would be likely
-to raise, and such as to strike a guilty man with insupportable
-remorse and humiliation. The story of Lamaxis and Hellânis would be
-just of a nature to produce this vehement emotion among the Athenian
-dikasts. Moreover, the words of the Epigram,—μέσφα μιν εἰς ὀλοὴν
-κῆρα συνηλασάτην,—are precisely applicable to a self-inflicted
-death. It would seem by the Epigram, moreover, that, even in the
-time of Agathias (<small>A.D.</small> 550—the reign of
-Justinian), there must have been preserved at Mitylênê a sepulchral
-monument commemorating this incident.</p>
-
-<p>Schneider (ad Aristotel. Politic. v, 3, 2) erroneously identifies
-this story with that of Doxander and the two ἐπίκληροι whom he wished
-to obtain in marriage for his two sons.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_430"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_430">[430]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_431"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_431">[431]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 52. προσπέμπει
-δ᾽ αὐτοῖς κήρυκα λέγοντα, εἰ βούλονται παραδοῦναι τὴν πόλιν <em
-class="gesperrt">ἑκόντες</em> τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις, καὶ δικασταῖς
-ἐκείνοις χρήσασθαι, τούς τε ἀδίκους κολάζειν, παρὰ δίκην δὲ
-οὐδένα.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_432"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_432">[432]</a></span> Pausan. iii, 9, 1.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_433"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_433">[433]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 60. ἐπειδὴ καὶ
-ἐκείνοις <em class="gesperrt">παρὰ γνώμην τὴν αὑτῶν</em> μακρότερος
-λόγος ἐδόθη τῆς πρὸς τὸ ἐρώτημα ἀποκρίσεως. αὑτῶν here means <i>the
-Thebans</i>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_434"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_434">[434]</a></span> See this point emphatically set
-forth in Orat. xiv, called Λόγος Πλαταϊκὸς, of Isokratês, p. 308,
-sect. 62.</p>
-
-<p>The whole of that oration is interesting to be read in
-illustration of the renewed sufferings of the Platæans near fifty
-years after this capture.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_435"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_435">[435]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 54-59. Dionysius
-of Halikarnassus bestows especial commendation on the speech of the
-Platæan orator (De Thucyd. Hist. Judic. p. 921). Concurring with him
-as to its merits, I do not concur in the opinion which he expresses
-that it is less artistically put together than those other harangues
-which he considers inferior.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Mitford doubts whether these two orations are to be taken as
-approximating to anything really delivered on the occasion. But it
-seems to me that the means possessed by Thucydidês for informing
-himself of what was actually said at this scene before the captured
-Platæa must have been considerable and satisfactory: I therefore
-place full confidence in them, as I do in most of the other harangues
-in his work, so far as <i>the substance</i> goes.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_436"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_436">[436]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 65.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_437"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_437">[437]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 66. τὰ πάντων
-Βοιωτῶν πάτρια—iii, 62. ἔξω τῶν ἄλλων Βοιωτῶν παραβαίνοντες τὰ
-πάτρια.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_438"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_438">[438]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 61-68. It is
-probable that the slaughter of the Theban prisoners taken in the town
-of Platæa was committed by the Platæans in breach of a convention
-concluded with the Thebans: and on this point, therefore, the
-Thebans had really ground to complain. Respecting this convention,
-however, there were two conflicting stories, between which Thucydidês
-does not decide: see Thucyd. ii, 3, 4, and this History, above, <a
-href="#two_views">chap. xlviii</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_439"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_439">[439]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 68; ii, 74. To
-construe the former of these passages (iii, 68) as it now stands, is
-very difficult, if not impossible; we can only pretend to give what
-seems to be its substantial meaning.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_440"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_440">[440]</a></span> Diodorus (xii, 56) in his
-meagre abridgment of the siege and fate of Platæa, somewhat amplifies
-the brevity and simplicity of the question as given by Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_441"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_441">[441]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 57. ὑμᾶς δὲ
-(you Spartans) καὶ ἐκ παντὸς τοῦ Ἑλληνικοῦ πανοικησίᾳ διὰ Θηβαίους
-(Πλάταιαν) <em class="gesperrt">ἐξαλεῖψαι</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_442"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_442">[442]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_443"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_443">[443]</a></span> Demosthenês—or the
-Pseudo-Demosthenês—in the oration against Neæra (p. 1380, c. 25),
-says that the blockade of Platæa was continued for ten years before
-it surrendered,—ἐπολιόρκουν αὐτοὺς διπλῷ τείχει περιτειχίσαντες δέκα
-ἔτη. That the real duration of the blockade was only <i>two</i> years, is
-most certain: accordingly, several eminent critics—Palmerius, Wasse,
-Duker, Taylor, Auger, etc., all with one accord confidently enjoin
-us to correct the text of Demosthenês from δέκα to δύο. “Repone
-<i>fidenter</i> δύο,” says Duker.</p>
-
-<p>I have before protested against corrections of the text of ancient
-authors grounded upon the reason which all these critics think so
-obvious and so convincing; and I must again renew the protest here.
-It shows how little the principles of historical evidence have been
-reflected upon, when critics can thus concur in forcing dissentient
-witnesses into harmony, and in substituting a true statement of their
-own in place of an erroneous statement which one of these witnesses
-gives them. And in the present instance, the principle adopted by
-these critics is the less defensible, because the Pseudo-Demosthenês
-introduces a great many other errors and inaccuracies respecting
-Platæa, besides his mistake about the duration of the siege. The ten
-years’ siege of Troy was constantly present to the imaginations of
-these literary Greeks.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_444"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_444">[444]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 59.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_445"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_445">[445]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 69. σχεδὸν δέ τι
-καὶ τὸ ξύμπαν περὶ Πλαταιῶν οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι οὕτως ἀποτετραμμένοι
-ἐγένοντο Θηβαίων ἕνεκα, νομίζοντες ἐς τὸν πόλεμον αὐτοὺς ἄρτι τότε
-καθιστάμενον ὠφελίμους εἶναι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_446"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_446">[446]</a></span> See above, <a
-href="#Chap_47">chap. xlvii</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_447"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_447">[447]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 55.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_448"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_448">[448]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 70: compare
-Diodor. xii, 57.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_449"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_449">[449]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 44.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_450"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_450">[450]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 25.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_451"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_451">[451]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 70. φάσκων τέμνειν
-χάρακας ἐκ τοῦ τε Διὸς τεμένους καὶ τοῦ Ἀλκίνου· ζημία δὲ καθ᾽
-ἑκάστην χάρακα ἐπέκειτο στατήρ.</p>
-
-<p>The present tense τέμνειν seems to indicate that they were going
-on habitually making use of the trees in the grove for this purpose.
-Probably it is this cutting and fixing of stakes to support the
-vines, which is meant by the word χαρακισμὸς in Pherekratês. Pers.
-ap. Athenæum, vi, p. 269.</p>
-
-<p>The Oration of Lysias (Or. vii), against Nikomachus, ὑπὲρ τοῦ
-σηκοῦ ἀπολογία, will illustrate this charge made by Peithias at
-Korkyra. There were certain ancient olive-trees near Athens,
-consecrated and protected by law, so that the proprietors of the
-ground on which they stood were forbidden to grub them up, or to dig
-so near as to injure the roots. The speaker in that oration defends
-himself against a charge of having grubbed up one of these and sold
-the wood. It appears that there were public visitors whose duty it
-was to watch over these old trees: see the note of Markland on that
-oration, p. 270.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_452"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_452">[452]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 71. ὡς δὲ εἶπον,
-καὶ <em class="gesperrt">ἐπικυρῶσαι ἠνάγκασαν τὴν γνώμην</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_453"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_453">[453]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 71. καὶ τοὺς ἐκεῖ
-καταπεφευγότας πείσοντας μηδὲν ἀνεπιτήδειον πράσσειν, ὅπως μή τις
-ἐπιστροφὴ γένηται.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_454"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_454">[454]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_455"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_455">[455]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 74, 75.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_456"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_456">[456]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 75, 76.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_457"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_457">[457]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 69-76.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_458"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_458">[458]</a></span> These two triremes had been
-with Pachês at Lesbos (Thucyd. iii, 33), immediately on returning
-from thence, they must have been sent round to join Nikostratus at
-Naupaktus. We see in what constant service they were kept.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_459"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_459">[459]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 77, 78, 79.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_460"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_460">[460]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_461"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_461">[461]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 80, 81. καὶ ἐκ τῶν
-νεῶν, ὅσους ἔπεισαν ἐσβῆναι, ἐκβιβάζοντες ἀπεχώρησαν. It is certain
-that the reading ἀπεχώρησαν here must be wrong: no satisfactory
-sense can be made out of it. The word substituted by Dr. Arnold is
-ἀνεχρῶντο; that preferred by Göller is ἀπεχρῶντο; others recommend
-ἀπεχρήσαντο; Hermann adopts ἀπεχώρισαν, and Dionysius, in his copy,
-read ἀνεχώρησαν. I follow the meaning of the words proposed by Dr.
-Arnold and Göller, which appear to be both equivalent to ἐκτεῖνον.
-This meaning is at least plausible and consistent; though I do not
-feel certain that we have the true sense of the passage.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_462"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_462">[462]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 81. οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ
-τῶν ἱκετῶν, ὅσοι οὐκ ἐπείσθησαν, <em class="gesperrt">ὡς ἑώρων τὰ
-γιγνόμενα</em>, διέφθειραν αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ ἀλλήλους, etc. The meagre
-abridgment of Diodorus (xii, 57) in reference to these events in
-Korkyra, is hardly worth notice.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_463"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_463">[463]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 85. Οἱ μὲν οὖν
-κατὰ τὴν πόλιν Κερκυραῖοι <em class="gesperrt">τοιαύταις ὀργαῖς ταῖς
-πρώταις</em> ἐς ἀλλήλους ἐχρήσαντο, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_464"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_464">[464]</a></span> In reading the account of the
-conduct of Nikostratus, as well as that of Phormio, in the naval
-battles of the preceding summer, we contract a personal interest
-respecting both of them. Thucydidês does not seem to have anticipated
-that his account would raise such a feeling in the minds of his
-readers, otherwise he probably would have mentioned something to
-gratify it. Respecting Phormio, his omission is the more remarkable;
-since we are left to infer, from the request made by the Akarnanians
-to have his son sent as commander, that he must have died or become
-disabled: yet the historian does not distinctly say so (iii, 7).</p>
-
-<p>The Scholiast on Aristophanês (Pac. 347) has a story that Phormio
-was asked for by the Akarnanians, but that he could not serve in
-consequence of being at that moment under sentence for a heavy fine,
-which he was unable to pay: accordingly, the Athenians contrived
-a means of evading the fine, in order that he might be enabled to
-serve. It is difficult to see how this can be reconciled with the
-story of Thucydidês, who says that the son of Phormio went instead of
-his father.</p>
-
-<p>Compare Meineke, Histor. Critic. Comicc. Græc. vol. i, p. 144,
-and Fragment. Eupolid. vol. ii, p. 527. Phormio was introduced as
-a chief character in the Ταξίαρχοι of Eupolis; as a brave, rough,
-straightforward soldier something like Lamachus in the Acharneis of
-Aristophanês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_465"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_465">[465]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 85.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_466"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_466">[466]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 82. γιγνόμενα
-μὲν καὶ ἀεὶ ἐσόμενα ἕως ἂν ἡ αὐτὴ φύσις ἀνθρώπων ᾖ, μᾶλλον δὲ καὶ
-ἡσυχαίτερα καὶ τοῖς εἴδεσι διηλλαγμένα, ὡς ἂν ἕκασται αἱ μεταβολαὶ
-τῶν ξυντυχιῶν ἐφιστῶνται, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The many obscurities and perplexities of construction which
-pervade these memorable chapters, are familiar to all readers of
-Thucydidês, ever since Dionysius of Halikarnassus, whose remarks
-upon them are sufficiently severe (Judic. de Thucyd. p. 883). To
-discuss difficulties which the best commentators are sometimes unable
-satisfactorily to explain, is no part of the business of this work:
-yet there is one sentence which I venture to notice as erroneously
-construed by most of them, following the Scholiast.</p>
-
-<p>Τὸ δ᾽ ἐμπλήκτως ὀξὺ ἀνδρὸς μοίρᾳ προσετέθη, ἀσφάλεια δὲ (Dr.
-Arnold and others read ἀσφαλείᾳ in the dative) τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι,
-ἀποτροπῆς πρόφασις εὔλογος.</p>
-
-<p>The Scholiast explains the latter half of this as follows: τὸ
-ἐπιπολὺ βουλεύσασθαι δι᾽ ἀσφάλειαν πρόφασις ἀποτροπῆς ἐνομίζετο,,—and
-this explanation is partly adopted by Poppo, Göller, and Dr. Arnold,
-with differences about ἀσφάλεια and ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, but all agreeing
-about the word ἀποτροπὴ so that the sentence is made to mean, in
-the words of Dr. Arnold: “But safely to concert measures against an
-enemy, was accounted but a decent pretence for <i>declining the contest
-with him altogether</i>.”</p>
-
-<p>Now the signification here assigned to ἀποτροπὴ is one which does
-not belong to it. Ἀποτροπὴ, in Thucydidês as well as elsewhere,
-does not mean “tergiversation, or declining the contest:” it has an
-active sense, and means, “the deterring, preventing, or dissuading
-another person from something which he might be disposed to do,—or
-the warding off of some threatening danger or evil:” the remarkable
-adjective ἀποτροπαῖος is derived from it, and προτροπὴ, in rhetoric,
-is its contrary term. In Thucydidês it is used in this active sense
-(iii, 45): compare also Plato, Legg. ix, c. 1, p. 853; Isokratês,
-Areopagatic. Or. vii, p. 143, sect. 17; Æschinês cont. Ktesiphon. c.
-68, p. 442: Æschyl. Pers. 217; nor do the commentators produce any
-passage to sustain the passive sense which they assign to it in the
-sentence here under discussion, whereby they would make it equivalent
-to ἀναχωρεῖν—ἀναχώρησις—or ἐξαναχωρεῖν (Thucyd. iv, 28; v, 65), “a
-backing out.”</p>
-
-<p>Giving the meaning which they do to ἀποτροπὴ, the commentators
-are farther unavoidably embarrassed how to construe ἀσφάλεια
-δὲ τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, as may be seen by the notes of Poppo,
-Göller, and Dr. Arnold. The Scholiast and Göller give to the word
-ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι the very unusual meaning of “repeated and careful
-deliberation,” instead of its common meaning of “laying snares for
-another, concerting secret measures of hostility:” and Poppo and
-Dr. Arnold alter ἀσφάλεια into the dative case ἀσφαλείᾳ, which, if
-it were understood to be governed by προσετέθη, might make a fair
-construction,—but which they construe along with τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι,
-though the position of the particle δὲ, upon that supposition,
-appears to me singularly awkward.</p>
-
-<p>The great difficulty of construing the sentence arises from
-the erroneous meaning attached to the word ἀποτροπὴ. But when we
-interpret that word “deterrence, or prevention,” according to the
-examples which I have cited, the whole meaning of the sentence
-will become clear and consistent. Of the two modes of hurting a
-party-enemy—1. violent and open attack; 2. secret manœuvre and
-conspiracy—Thucydidês remarks first, what was thought of the one;
-next, what was thought of the other, in the perverted state of
-morality which he is discussing.</p>
-
-<p>Τὸ δ᾽ ἐμπλήκτως ὀξὺ ἀνδρὸς μοίρᾳ προσετέθη—ἀσφάλεια δὲ τὸ
-ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι, ἀποτροπῆς πρόφασις εὔλογος.</p>
-
-<p>“Sharp and reckless attack was counted among the necessities of
-the manly character: secret conspiracy against an enemy was held to
-be safe precaution,—a specious pretence of preventing him from doing
-the like.”</p>
-
-<p>According to this construction, τὸ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι is the subject;
-ἀσφάλεια belongs to the predicate and the concluding words, ἀποτροπῆς
-πρόφασις εὔλογος, are an epexegesis, or explanatory comment, upon
-ἀσφάλεια. Probably we ought to consider some such word as ἐνομίζετο
-to be understood,—just as the Scholiast understands that word for his
-view of the sentence.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_467"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_467">[467]</a></span> See the valuable preliminary
-discourse, prefixed to Welcker’s edition of Theognis, page xxi, sect.
-9, <i>seq.</i></p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_468"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_468">[468]</a></span> Aristotel. Politic. v. 7, 19.
-Καὶ τῷ δήμῳ κακόνους ἔσομαι, καὶ βουλεύσω ὅ,τι ἂν ἔχω κακόν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_469"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_469">[469]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 51. See the note
-of Dr. Arnold, and the plan embodied in his work, for the topography
-of Minôa, which has now ceased to be an island, and is a hill on the
-mainland near the shore.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_470"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_470">[470]</a></span> Plutarch, Nikias, c. 2, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_471"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_471">[471]</a></span> Καίτοι ἔγωγε καὶ τιμῶμαι ἐκ τοῦ
-τοιούτου (says Nikias, in the Athenian assembly, Thucyd. vi, 9) <em
-class="gesperrt">καὶ ἧσσον ἑτέρων περὶ τῷ ἐμαυτοῦ σώματι ὀῤῥωδῶ</em>·
-νομίζων ὁμοίως ἀγαθὸν πολίτην εἶναι, ὃς ἂν καὶ τοῦ σώματός τι καὶ τῆς
-οὐσίας προνοῆται.</p>
-
-<p>The whole conduct of Nikias before Syracuse, under the most trying
-circumstances, more than bears out this boast.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_472"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_472">[472]</a></span> Thucyd. vii. 50; Plutarch,
-Nikias, c. 4, 5, 23. Τῷ μέντοι Νικίᾳ συνηνέχθη τότε μηδὲ μάντιν ἔχειν
-ἔμπειρον· ὁ γὰρ συνήθης αὐτοῦ καὶ τὸ πολὺ τῆς δεισιδαιμονίας ἀφαιρῶν
-Στιλβίδης ἐτεθνήκει μικρὸν ἔμπροσθεν. This is suggested by Plutarch
-as an excuse for mistakes on the part of Nikias.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_473"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_473">[473]</a></span> Xenophon, Memorab. ii, 5, 2;
-Xenophon, De Vectigalibus, iv, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_474"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_474">[474]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7; Plutarch,
-Alkibiadês, c. 21. Ὁ γὰρ Λάμαχος ἦν μὲν πολεμικὸς καὶ ἀνδρώδης,
-ἀξίωμα δ᾽ οὐ προσῆν οὐδ᾽ ὄγκος αὐτῷ διὰ πενίαν; compare Plutarch,
-Nikias, c. 15.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_475"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_475">[475]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 16. Νικίας πλεῖστα
-τῶν τότε εὖ φερόμενος ἐν στρατηγίαις,—Νικίας μὲν βουλόμενος, ἐν
-ᾧ ἀπαθὴς ἦν καὶ ἠξιοῦτο, διασώσασθαι <em class="gesperrt">τὴν
-εὐτυχίαν</em>, etc.—vi, 17. ἕως ἐγώ τε (Alkibiadês) ἔτι ἀκμάζω μετ᾽
-αὐτῆς καὶ ὁ Νικίας <em class="gesperrt">εὐτυχὴς</em> δοκεῖ εἶναι,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_476"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_476">[476]</a></span> Thucyd. viii, 54. Καὶ ὁ μὲν
-Πείσανδρος τάς τε ξυνωμοσίας, αἵπερ ἐτύγχανον πρότερον ἐν τῇ πόλει
-οὖσαι ἐπὶ δίκαις καὶ ἀρχαῖς, ἁπάσας ἐπελθὼν, καὶ παρακελευσάμενος
-ὅπως ξυστραφέντες καὶ κοινῇ βουλευσάμενοι καταλύσουσι τὸν δῆμον, καὶ
-τἆλλα παρασκευάσας, etc.</p>
-
-<p>After having thus organized the hetæries, and brought them into
-coöperation for his revolutionary objects against the democracy,
-Peisander departed from Athens to Samos: on his return, he finds
-that these hetæries have been very actively employed, and had made
-great progress towards the subversion of the democracy: they had
-assassinated the demagogue Androklês and various other political
-enemies,—οἱ δὲ ἀμφὶ τὸν Πείσανδρον—ἦλθον ἐς τὰς Ἀθήνας,—καὶ
-καταλαμβάνουσι τὰ πλεῖστα τοῖς ἑταίροις προειργασμένα, etc. (viii,
-65.)</p>
-
-<p>The political ἑταίρεια to which Alkibiadês belonged is mentioned
-in Isokratês, De Bigis, Or. xvi, p. 348, sect. 6. λέγοντες ὡς ὁ
-πατὴρ <em class="gesperrt">συνάγοι τὴν ἑταίρειαν ἐπὶ νεωτέροις
-πράγμασι</em>. Allusions to these ἑταιρεῖαι and to their well-known
-political and judicial purposes (unfortunately they are only
-allusions), are found in Plato, Theætet. c. 79, p. 173, σπουδαὶ δὲ
-ἑταιρειῶν ἐπ᾽ ἀρχὰς, etc.: also Plato, Legg. ix, c. 3, p. 856; Plato,
-Republic, ii, c. 8, p. 365, where they are mentioned in conjunction
-with συνωμοσίαι—ἐπὶ γὰρ τὸ λανθάνειν ξυνωμοσίας τε καὶ ἑταιρείας
-συνάξομεν—also in Pseudo-Andokidês cont. Alkibiad. c. 2, p. 112.
-Compare the general remarks of Thucydidês, iii, 82, and Demosthenês
-cont. Stephan. ii, p. 1157.</p>
-
-<p>Two Dissertations, by Messrs. Vischer and Büttner, collect the
-scanty indications respecting these hetæries, together with some
-attempts to enlarge and speculate upon them, which are more ingenious
-than trustworthy (Die Oligarchische Partei und die Hetairien in
-Athen, von W. Vischer, Basel, 1836; Geschichte der politischen
-Hetairien zu Athen, von Hermann Büttner, Leipsic, 1840).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_477"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_477">[477]</a></span> About the political workings of
-the Syssitia and Gymnasia, see Plato Legg. i, p. 636; Polybius, xx,
-6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_478"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_478">[478]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 87, 89, 90.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_479"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_479">[479]</a></span> Respecting this abundance of
-wood, as well as the site of Herakleia generally, consult Livy,
-xxxvi, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_480"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_480">[480]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 59. Not merely
-was Hêraklês the mythical progenitor of the Spartan kings, but the
-whole region near Œta and Trachis was adorned by legends and heroic
-incidents connected with him: see the drama of the Trachiniæ by
-Sophoklês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_481"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_481">[481]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 92, 93; Diodor xi,
-49; xii, 59.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_482"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_482">[482]</a></span> Horat. Sat. ii, 6, 8:—</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i8">O! si angulus iste</p>
-<p class="i0">Proximus accedat, qui nunc denormat agellum!</p>
-</div></div>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_483"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_483">[483]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 91.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_484"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_484">[484]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 95. Δημοσθένης
-δ᾽ ἀναπείθεται κατὰ τὸν χρόνον τοῦτον ὑπὸ Μεσσηνίων ὡς καλὸν αὐτῷ
-στρατιᾶς τοσαύτης ξυνειλεγμένης, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_485"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_485">[485]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 95. τὸ ἄλλο
-ἠπειρωτικὸν τὸ ταύτῃ. None of the tribes properly called Epirots,
-would be comprised in this expression: the name ἠπειρῶται is
-here a general name, not a proper name, as Poppo and Dr. Arnold
-remark. Demosthenês would calculate on getting under his orders the
-Akarnanians and Ætolians, and some other tribes besides; but <i>what</i>
-other tribes, it is not easy to specify: perhaps the Agræi, east of
-Amphilochia, among them.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_486"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_486">[486]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 98. The epibatæ,
-or soldiers serving on shipboard (marines), were more usually taken
-from the thetes, or the poorest class of citizens, furnished by the
-state with a panoply for the occasion,—not from the regular hoplites
-on the muster-roll. Maritime soldiery is, therefore, usually spoken
-of as something inferior: the present triremes of Demosthenês are
-noticed in the light of an exception (ναυτικῆς καὶ φαύλου στρατιᾶς,
-Thucyd. vi, 21).</p>
-
-<p>So among the Romans, service in the legions was accounted higher
-and more honorable than that of the classiarii milites (Tacit.
-Histor. i, 87).</p>
-
-<p>The Athenian epibatæ, though not forming a corps permanently
-distinct, correspond in function to the English marines, who seem to
-have been first distinguished permanently from other foot-soldiers
-about the year 1684. “It having been found necessary on many
-occasions to embark a number of soldiers on board our ships of
-war, and mere landsmen being at first extremely unhealthy,—and at
-first, until they had been accustomed to the sea, in a great measure
-unserviceable,—it was at length judged expedient to appoint certain
-regiments for that service, who were trained to the different modes
-of sea-fighting, and also made useful in some of those manœuvres of a
-ship where a great many hands were required. These, from the nature
-of their duty, were distinguished by the appellation of <i>maritime
-soldiers</i>, or marines.”—Grose’s Military Antiquities of the English
-Army, vol. i, p. 186. (London, 1786.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_487"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_487">[487]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 100. Προπέμψαντες
-πρότερον ἔς τε Κόρινθον καὶ ἐς Λακεδαίμονα πρέσβεις—πείθουσιν
-ὥστε σφίσι πέμψαι στρατιὰν ἐπὶ Ναύπακτον διὰ τὴν τῶν <em
-class="gesperrt">Ἀθηναίων ἐπαγωγήν</em>.</p>
-
-<p>It is not here meant, I think—as Göller and Dr. Arnold
-suppose—that the Ætolians sent envoys to Lacedæmon before there was
-any talk or thought of the invasion of Ætolia, simply in prosecution
-of the standing antipathy which they bore to Naupaktus: but that they
-had sent envoys immediately when they heard of the preparations for
-invading Ætolia,—yet before the invasion actually took place. The
-words διὰ τὴν τῶν Ἀθηναίων ἐπαγωγήν show that this is the meaning.</p>
-
-<p>The word ἐπαγωγὴ is rightly construed by Haack, against the
-Scholiast: “Because the Naupaktians were bringing in the Athenians to
-invade Ætolia.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_488"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_488">[488]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 98.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_489"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_489">[489]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 101, 102.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_490"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_490">[490]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 102-105.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_491"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_491">[491]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 105, 106, 107.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_492"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_492">[492]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 107, 108: compare
-Polyænus, iii, 1.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_493"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_493">[493]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 111.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_494"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_494">[494]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 112.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_495"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_495">[495]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 113.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_496"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_496">[496]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 113. πάθος γὰρ
-τοῦτο μιᾷ πόλει Ἑλληνίδι μέγιστον δὴ τῶν <em class="gesperrt">κατὰ
-τὸν πόλεμον τόνδε</em> ἐγένετο. Καὶ ἀριθμὸν οὐκ ἔγραψα τῶν
-ἀποθανόντων, διότι ἄπιστον τὸ πλῆθος λέγεται ἀπολέσθαι, ὡς πρὸς τὸ
-μέγεθος τῆς πόλεως. Ἀμπρακίαν μέντοι <em class="gesperrt">οἶδα</em>
-ὅτι, εἰ ἐβουλήθησαν Ἀκαρνᾶνες καὶ Ἀμφίλοχοι, Ἀθηναίοις καὶ Δημοσθένει
-πειθόμενοι, ἐξελεῖν, αὐτοβοεὶ ἂν εἷλον· νῦν δὲ ἔδεισαν, μὴ οἱ
-Ἀθηναῖοι ἔχοντες αὐτὴν χαλεπώτεροι σφίσι πάροικοι ὦσι.</p>
-
-<p>We may remark that the expression κατὰ τὸν πόλεμον τόνδε, when
-it occurs in the first, second, third, or first half of the fourth
-Book of Thucydidês, seems to allude to the first ten years of the
-Peloponnesian war, which ended with the peace of Nikias.</p>
-
-<p>In a careful dissertation, by Franz Wolfgang Ullrich, analyzing
-the structure of the history of Thucydidês, it is made to appear
-that the first, second, and third Books, with the first half of the
-fourth, were composed during the interval between the peace of Nikias
-and the beginning of the last nine years of the war, called the
-Dekeleian war; allowing for two passages in these early books which
-must have been subsequently introduced.</p>
-
-<p>The later books seem to have been taken up by Thucydidês as a
-separate work, continuing the former, and a sort of separate preface
-is given for them (v, 26), γέγραφε δὲ καὶ ταῦτα ὁ αὐτὸς Θουκυδίδης
-Ἀθηναῖος ἑξῆς, etc. It is in this later portion that he first takes
-up the view peculiar to him, of reckoning the whole twenty-seven
-years as one continued war only nominally interrupted (Ullrich,
-Beiträge zur Erklärung des Thukydidês, pp. 85, 125, 138, etc.
-Hamburgh, 1846).</p>
-
-<p>Compare ἐν τῷ πολέμῳ τῷδε (iii, 98), which in like manner means
-the war prior to the peace of Nikias.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_497"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_497">[497]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 114. Diodorus
-(xii, 60) abridges the narrative of Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_498"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_498">[498]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 114. Ἀκαρνᾶνες δὲ
-καὶ Ἀμφίλοχοι, ἀπελθόντων Ἀθηναίων καὶ Δημοσθένους, τοῖς ὡς Σαλύνθιον
-καὶ Ἀγραίους καταφυγοῦσιν Ἀμπρακιώταις καὶ Πελοποννησίοις ἀναχώρησιν
-ἐσπείσαντο ἐξ Οἰνιαδῶν, οἵπερ καὶ μετανέστησαν παρὰ Σαλυνθίον.</p>
-
-<p>This is a very difficult passage. Hermann has conjectured, and
-Poppo, Göller, and Dr. Arnold all approve, the reading παρὰ Σαλυνθίου
-instead of the two last words of this sentence. The passage might
-certainly be construed with this emendation, though there would
-still be an awkwardness in the position of the relative οἵπερ with
-regard to its antecedent, and in the position of the particle καὶ,
-which ought then properly to come after μετανέστησαν, and not
-before it. The sentence would then mean, that “the Ambrakiots and
-Peloponnesians, who had originally taken refuge with Salynthius, had
-moved away from his territory to Œniadæ,” from which place they were
-now to enjoy safe departure.</p>
-
-<p>I think, however, that the sentence would construe equally well,
-or at least with no greater awkwardness, without any conjectural
-alteration of the text, if we suppose Οἰνιαδῶν to be not merely the
-name of the place, but the name of the inhabitants: and the word
-seems to be used in this double sense (Thucyd. ii, 100). As the word
-is already in the patronymic form, it would be difficult to deduce
-from it a new <i>nomen gentile</i>. Several of the Attic demes, which
-are in the patronymic form, present this same double meaning. If
-this supposition be admitted, the sentence will mean, that “safe
-retreat was granted to Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians from the
-Œniade, who <i>also</i>—καὶ, that is, they as well as the Ambrakiots
-and Peloponnesians—went up to the territory of Salynthius.” These
-Œniadæ were enemies of the general body of Akarnanians (ii, 100), and
-they may well have gone thither to help in extricating the fugitive
-Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_499"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_499">[499]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 114.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_500"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_500">[500]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 114. Τὰ δὲ
-<em class="gesperrt">νῦν ἀνακείμενα ἐν τοῖς Ἀττικοῖς ἱεροῖς</em>
-Δημοσθένει ἐξῃρέθησαν, τριακόσιαι πανοπλίαι, καὶ ἄγων αὐτὰς
-κατέπλευσε. Καὶ ἐγένετο ἅμα αὐτῷ μετὰ τὴν ἐκ τῆς Αἰτωλίας ξυμφορὰν
-ἀπὸ ταύτης τῆς πράξεως ἀδεεστέρα ἡ κάθοδος.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_501"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_501">[501]</a></span> Thucyd. iii, 104; Plutarch,
-Nikias, c. 3, 4; Diodor. xii, 58.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_502"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_502">[502]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 2, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_503"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_503">[503]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 140; ii, 11.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_504"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_504">[504]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 26.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_505"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_505">[505]</a></span> Topography of Sphakteria
-and Pylus. The description given by Thucydidês, of the memorable
-incidents in or near Pylus and Sphakteria, is perfectly clear,
-intelligible, and consistent with itself, as to topography. But
-when we consult the topography of the scene as it stands now, we
-find various circumstances which cannot possibly be reconciled with
-Thucydidês. Both Colonel Leake (Travels in the Morea, vol. i, pp.
-402-415) and Dr. Arnold (Appendix to the second and third volume of
-his Thucydidês, p. 444) have given plans of the coast, accompanied
-with valuable remarks.</p>
-
-<p>The main discrepancy, between the statement of Thucydidês and
-the present state of the coast, is to be found in the breadth of
-the two channels between Sphakteria and the mainland. The southern
-entrance into the bay of Navarino is now between thirteen hundred
-and fourteen hundred yards, with a depth of water varying from five,
-seven, twenty-eight, thirty-three fathoms; whereas Thucydidês states
-it as being only a breadth adequate to admit eight or nine triremes
-abreast. The northern entrance is about one hundred and fifty yards
-in width, with a shoal or bar of sand lying across it on which there
-are not more than eighteen inches of water: Thucydidês tells us that
-it afforded room for no more than two triremes, and his narrative
-implies a much greater depth of water, so as to make the entrance for
-triremes perfectly unobstructed.</p>
-
-<p>Colonel Leake supposes that Thucydidês was misinformed as to the
-breadth of the southern passage; but Dr. Arnold has on this point
-given a satisfactory reply,—that the narrowness of the breadth is
-not merely affirmed in the numbers of Thucydidês, but is indirectly
-implied in his narrative, where he tells us that the Lacedæmonians
-intended to choke up both of them by triremes closely packed.
-Obviously, this expedient could not be dreamt of, except for a very
-narrow mouth. The same reply suffices against the doubts which
-Bloomfield and Poppo (Comment. p. 10) raise about the genuineness
-of the numerals ὀκτὼ or ἐννέα in Thucydidês; a doubt which merely
-transfers the supposed error from Thucydidês to the writer of the
-MS.</p>
-
-<p id="doubt">Dr. Arnold has himself raised a still graver doubt;
-whether the island now called Sphagia be really the same as Sphakteria,
-and whether the bay of Navarino be the real harbor of Pylus. He
-suspects that the Pale-Navarino which has been generally understood
-to be Pylus, was in reality the ancient Sphakteria, separated from
-the mainland in ancient times by a channel at the north as well as by
-another at the southeast,—though now it is not an island at all. He
-farther suspects that the lake or lagoon called Lake of Osmyn Aga,
-north of the harbor of Navarino, and immediately under that which he
-supposes to have been Sphakteria, was the ancient harbor of Pylus, in
-which the sea-fight between the Athenians and Lacedæmonians took place.
-He does not, indeed, assert this as a positive opinion, but leans to
-it as the most probable, admitting that there are difficulties either
-way.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold has stated some of the difficulties which beset this
-hypothesis (p. 447), but there was one which he has not stated, which
-appears to me the most formidable of all, and quite fatal to the
-admissibility of his opinion. If the Paleokastro of Navarino was the
-real ancient Sphakteria, it must have been a second island situated
-to the northward of Sphagia. There must therefore have been <i>two</i>
-islands close together off the coast and near the scene. Now if the
-reader will follow the account of Thucydidês, he will see that there
-certainly was no more than <i>one</i> island,—Sphakteria, without any
-other near or adjoining to it; see especially c. 13: the Athenian
-fleet under Eurymedon, on first arriving, was obliged to go back some
-distance to the island of Prôtê, because <i>the island</i> of Sphakteria
-was full of Lacedæmonian hoplites: if Dr. Arnold’s hypothesis were
-admitted, there would have been nothing to hinder them from landing
-on Sphagia itself,—the same inference may be deduced from c. 8. The
-statement of Pliny (H. N. iv, 12) that there were <i>tres Sphagiæ</i> off
-Pylus, unless we suppose with Hardouin that two of them were mere
-rocks, appears to me inconsistent with the account of Thucydidês.</p>
-
-<p>I think that there is no alternative except to suppose that a
-great alteration has taken place in the two passages which separate
-Sphagia from the mainland, during the interval of two thousand four
-hundred years which separates us from Thucydidês. The mainland to the
-south of Navarino must have been much nearer than it is now to the
-southern portion of Sphagia, while the northern passage also must
-have been then both narrower and clearer. To suppose a change in the
-configuration of the coast to this extent, seems noway extravagant:
-any other hypothesis which may be started will be found involved in
-much greater difficulty.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_506"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_506">[506]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 3. The account,
-alike meagre and inaccurate, given by Diodorus, of these interesting
-events in Pylus and Sphakteria, will be found in Diodor. xii,
-61-64.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_507"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_507">[507]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 4.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_508"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_508">[508]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 9. Demosthenês
-placed the <i>greater number</i> (τοὺς πολλοὺς) of his hoplites round the
-walls of his post, and selected <i>sixty</i> of them to march down to
-the shore. This implies a total which can hardly be less than two
-hundred.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_509"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_509">[509]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 8.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_510"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_510">[510]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 10.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_511"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_511">[511]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 8. τοὺς μὲν οὖν
-ἔσπλους ταῖς ναυσὶν ἀντιπρώροις βύζην κλῄσειν ἔμελλον.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_512"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_512">[512]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 11, 12; Diodor.
-xii. Consult an excellent note of Dr. Arnold on this passage, in
-which he contrasts the looseness and exaggeration of Diodorus with
-the modest distinctness of Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_513"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_513">[513]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 12. ἐπὶ πολὺ γὰρ
-ἐποίει τῆς δόξης <em class="gesperrt">ἐν τῷ τότε</em>, τοῖς μὲν
-ἠπειρώταις μάλιστα εἶναι καὶ τὰ πεζὰ κρατίστοις, τοῖς δὲ θαλασσίοις
-τε καὶ ταῖς ναυσὶ πλεῖστον προέχειν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_514"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_514">[514]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 13. ἐλπίζοντες τὸ
-κατὰ τὸν λιμένα τεῖχος ὕψος μὲν ἔχειν, ἀποβάσεως δὲ μάλιστα οὔσης
-ἑλεῖν μηχαναῖς. See Poppo’s note upon this passage.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_515"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_515">[515]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_516"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_516">[516]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 13. The
-Lacedæmonians παρεσκευάζοντο, ἢν ἐσπλέῃ τις, ὡς ἐν τῷ λιμένι ὄντι οὐ
-σμικρῷ ναυμαχήσοντες.</p>
-
-<p>The expression, “the harbor which was not small,” to designate the
-spacious bay of Navarino, has excited much remark from Mr. Bloomfield
-and Dr. Arnold, and was indeed one of the reasons which induced the
-latter to suspect that the harbor meant by Thucydidês was <i>not</i> the
-bay of Navarino, but the neighboring lake of Osmyn Aga.</p>
-
-<p>I have already discussed that supposition <a href="#doubt">in a
-former note</a>: but in reference to the expression οὐ σμικρῷ, we
-may observe, first, that the use of negative expressions to convey a
-positive idea would be in the ordinary manner of Thucydidês.</p>
-
-<p>But farther, I have stated in a previous note that it is
-indispensable, in my judgment, to suppose the island of Sphakteria to
-have touched the mainland much more closely in the time of Thucydidês
-than it does now. At that time, therefore, very probably, the basin
-of Navarino was not so large as we now find it.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_517"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_517">[517]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 14. <em
-class="gesperrt">ἔτρωσαν</em> μὲν πολλὰς, πέντε δ᾽ ἔλαβον. We cannot
-in English speak of <i>wounding</i> a trireme,—though the Greek word is
-both lively and accurate, to represent the blow inflicted by the
-impinging beak of an enemy’s ship.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_518"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_518">[518]</a></span> <a href="#Page_211">See
-above</a>, in this History, <a href="#Chap_49">chap. xlix</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_519"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_519">[519]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 13, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_520"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_520">[520]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 16. The chœnix was
-equivalent to about two pints, English dry measure: it was considered
-as the usual daily sustenance for a slave. Each Lacedæmonian soldier
-had, therefore, double of this daily allowance, besides meat, in
-weight and quantity not specified: the fact that the quantity of meat
-is not specified, seems to show that they did not fear abuse in this
-item.</p>
-
-<p>The kotyla contained about half a pint, English wine measure:
-each Lacedæmonian soldier had, therefore, a pint of wine daily. It
-was always the practice in Greece to drink the wine with a large
-admixture of water.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_521"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_521">[521]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 21: compare vii,
-18.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_522"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_522">[522]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 18. γνῶτε δὲ καὶ ἐς
-τὰς ἡμετέρας νῦν ξυμφορὰς ἀπιδόντες, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_523"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_523">[523]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_524"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_524">[524]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 20. ἡμῖν δὲ καλῶς,
-εἴπερ πότε, ἔχει ἀμφοτέροις ἡ ξυναλλαγὴ, πρίν τι ἀνήκεστον διὰ μέσου
-γενόμενον ἡμᾶς καταλαβεῖν, ἐν ᾧ ἀνάγκη ἀΐδιον ὑμῖν ἔχθραν πρὸς τῇ <em
-class="gesperrt">κοινῇ καὶ ἰδίαν</em> ἔχειν, ὑμᾶς δὲ στερηθῆναι ὧν
-νῦν προκαλούμεθα.</p>
-
-<p>I understand these words κοινὴ and ἰδία agreeably to the
-explanation of the Scholiast, from whom Dr. Arnold, as well as Poppo
-and Göller, depart, in my judgment erroneously. The whole war had
-been begun in consequence of the complaints of the Peloponnesian
-allies, and of wrongs alleged to have been done to <i>them</i> by Athens:
-Sparta herself had no ground of complaint,—nothing of which she
-desired redress.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold translates it: “We shall hate you not only nationally,
-for the wound you have inflicted on Sparta; but also individually,
-because so many of us will have lost our near relations from your
-inflexibility.” “The Spartan aristocracy (he adds) would feel it a
-personal wound to lose at once so many of its members, connected by
-blood or marriage with its principal families: compare Thucyd. v,
-15.”</p>
-
-<p>We must recollect, however, that the Athenians could not possibly
-know at this time that the hoplites inclosed in Sphakteria belonged
-in great proportion to the first families in Sparta. And the Spartan
-envoys would surely have the diplomatic prudence to abstain from any
-facts or arguments which would reveal, or even suggest, to them so
-important a secret.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_525"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_525">[525]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 20. ἡμῶν γὰρ καὶ
-ὑμῶν ταὐτὰ λεγόντων τό γε ἄλλο Ἑλληνικὸν ἴστε ὅτι ὑποδεέστερον ὂν τὰ
-μέγιστα τιμήσει.</p>
-
-<p>Aristophanês, Pac. 1048. Ἐξὸν σπεισαμένοις κοινῇ τῆς Ἑλλάδος
-ἄρχειν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_526"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_526">[526]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 21.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_527"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_527">[527]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 21. μάλιστα δὲ
-αὐτοὺς ἐνῆγε Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου, ἀνὴρ δημαγωγὸς κατ᾽ ἐκεῖνον τὸν
-χρόνον ὢν καὶ τῷ δήμῳ πιθανώτατος· καὶ ἔπεισεν ἀποκρίνασθαι, etc.</p>
-
-<p>This sentence reads like a first introduction of Kleon to the
-notice of the reader. It would appear that Thucydidês had forgotten
-that he had before introduced Kleon on occasion of the Mitylenæan
-surrender, and that too in language very much the same, iii, 36. καὶ
-Κλέων ὁ Κλεαινέτου,—ὢν καὶ ἐς τὰ ἄλλα βιαιότατος τῶν πολιτῶν, καὶ τῷ
-δήμῳ παρὰ πολὺ ἐν τῷ τότε πιθανώτατος, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_528"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_528">[528]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_529"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_529">[529]</a></span> Plutarch, Nikias, c. 7;
-Philochorus, Fragm. 105, ed. Didot.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_530"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_530">[530]</a></span> Let us read some remarks of Mr.
-Burke on the temper of England during the American war.</p>
-
-<p>“You remember that in the beginning of this American war, you
-were greatly divided: and a very strong body, if not the strongest,
-opposed itself to the madness which every art and every power were
-employed to render popular, in order that the errors of the rulers
-might be lost in the general blindness of the nation. This opposition
-continued until after our great, but most unfortunate, victory at
-Long Island. Then all the mounds and banks of our constancy were
-borne down at once; and the frenzy of the American war broke in upon
-us like a deluge. This victory, which seemed to put an immediate end
-to all difficulties, perfected in us that spirit of domination which
-our unparalleled prosperity had but too long nurtured. We had been
-so very powerful, and so very prosperous, that even the humblest of
-us were degraded into the devices and follies of kings. We lost all
-measure between means and ends; and our headlong desires became our
-politics and our morals. All men who wished for peace, or retained
-any sentiments of moderation, were overborne or silenced: and this
-city (Bristol) was led by every artifice (and probably with the more
-management, because <i>I</i> was one of your members) to distinguish
-itself by its zeal for that fatal cause.” Burke, Speech to the
-Electors of Bristol previous to the election (Works, vol. iii, p.
-365).</p>
-
-<p>Compare Mr. Burke’s Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, p. 174 of
-the same volume.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_531"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_531">[531]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 39.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_532"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_532">[532]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 23.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_533"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_533">[533]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 25. τῶν νεῶν οὐκ
-ἐχούσων ὅρμον. This does not mean (as some of the commentators seem
-to suppose, see Poppo’s note) that the Athenians had not plenty of
-sea-room in the harbor: it means, that they had no station ashore,
-except the narrow space of Pylus itself.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_534"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_534">[534]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 26.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_535"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_535">[535]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 27, 29, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_536"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_536">[536]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 27. Καὶ ἐς
-Νικίαν τὸν Νικηράτου στρατηγὸν ὄντα ἀπεσήμαινεν, ἐχθρὸς ὢν καὶ
-ἐπιτιμῶν—ῥᾴδιον εἶναι παρασκευῇ, εἰ ἄνδρες εἶεν οἱ στρατηγοὶ,
-πλεύσαντας λαβεῖν τοὺς ἐν τῇ νήσῳ· καὶ αὐτός γ᾽ ἂν, εἰ ἦρχε, ποιῆσαι
-τοῦτο. Ὁ δὲ Νικίας τῶν τε Ἀθηναίων τι ὑποθορυβησάντων ἐς τὸν Κλέωνα,
-ὅτι οὐ καὶ νῦν πλεῖ, εἰ ῥᾴδιόν γε αὐτῷ φαίνεται· καὶ ἅμα ὁρῶν αὐτὸν
-ἐπιτιμῶντα, ἐκέλευεν ἥντινα βούλεται δύναμιν λαβόντα τὸ ἐπὶ σφᾶς
-εἶναι, ἐπιχειρεῖν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_537"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_537">[537]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 28. ὁ δὲ (Κλέων)
-τὸ μὲν πρῶτον οἰόμενος αὐτὸν (Νικίαν) λόγῳ μόνον ἀφιέναι, ἑτοῖμος
-ἦν, γνοὺς δὲ τῷ ὄντι παραδωσείοντα ἀνεχώρει, καὶ οὐκ ἔφη αὐτὸς
-ἀλλ᾽ ἐκεῖνον στρατηγεῖν, δεδιὼς ἤδη καὶ οὐκ ἂν οἰόμενός οἱ αὐτὸν
-τολμῆσαι ὑποχωρῆσαι. Αὖθις δὲ ὁ Νικίας ἐκέλευε καὶ ἐξίστατο τῆς
-ἐπὶ Πύλῳ ἀρχῆς, καὶ μάρτυρας τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἐποιεῖτο. Οἱ δὲ, <em
-class="gesperrt">οἷον ὄχλος φιλεῖ ποιεῖν</em>, ὅσῳ μᾶλλον ὁ Κλέων
-ὑπέφευγε τὸν πλοῦν καὶ ἐξανεχώρει τὰ εἰρημένα, τόσῳ ἐπεκελεύοντο τῷ
-Νικίᾳ παραδιδόναι τὴν ἀρχὴν καὶ ἐκείνῳ ἐπεβόων πλεῖν. Ὥστε οὐκ ἔχων
-ὅπως τῶν εἰρημένων ἔτι ἐξαπαλλαγῇ, ὑφίσταται τὸν πλοῦν, καὶ παρελθὼν
-οὔτε φοβεῖσθαι ἔφη Λακεδαιμονίους, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_538"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_538">[538]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 28. Τοῖς δὲ
-Ἀθηναίοις ἐνέπεσε μέν τι καὶ γέλωτος τῇ κουφολογίᾳ αὐτοῦ· ἀσμένοις δ᾽
-ὅμως ἐγίγνετο τοῖς σώφροσι τῶν ἀνθρώπων, λογιζομένοις δυοῖν ἀγαθοῖν
-τοῦ ἑτέρου τεύξεσθαι—ἢ Κλέωνος ἀπαλλαγήσεσθαι, <em class="gesperrt">ὃ
-μᾶλλον ἤλπιζον, ἢ σφαλεῖσι γνώμης</em> Λακεδαιμονίους σφίσι
-χειρώσασθαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_539"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_539">[539]</a></span> Aristophanês, Equit. 54:—</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">... καὶ πρωήν γ᾽ ἐμοῦ</p>
-<p class="i0">Μᾶζαν μεμαχότος ἐν Πύλῳ Λακωνικὴν,</p>
-<p class="i0">Πανουργότατά πως περιδραμὼν ὑφαρπάσας</p>
-<p class="i0">Αὐτὸς παρέθηκε τὴν ὑπ᾽ ἐμοῦ μεμαγμένην.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="ti0 mt1">It is Demosthenês who speaks in reference to
-Kleon,—termed in that comedy the Paphlagonian slave of Demos.</p>
-
-<p>Compare v. 391,</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> <p class="i0">Κᾆτ᾽ ἀνὴρ ἔδοξεν
-εἶναι, τἀλλότριον ἀμὼν θέρος, etc.,</p> </div></div>
-
-<p class="ti0 mt1">and 740-1197.</p>
-
-<p>So far from cunningly thrusting himself into the post as general,
-Kleon did everything he possibly could to avoid the post, and was
-only forced into it by the artifices of his enemies. It is important
-to notice how little the jests of Aristophanês can be taken as any
-evidence of historical reality.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_540"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_540">[540]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 28. οἷον ὄχλος
-φιλεῖ ποιεῖν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_541"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_541">[541]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 30.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_542"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_542">[542]</a></span> Colonel Leake gives an
-interesting illustration of these particulars in the topography of
-the island which may even now be verified (Travels in Morea, vol. i,
-p. 408).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_543"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_543">[543]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 31.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_544"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_544">[544]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_545"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_545">[545]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_546"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_546">[546]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 71.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_547"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_547">[547]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 33.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_548"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_548">[548]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 33. ὥσπερ ὅτε
-πρῶτον ἀπέβαινον <em class="gesperrt">τῇ γνώμῃ δεδουλωμένοι</em> ὡς
-ἐπὶ Λακεδαιμονίους, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_549"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_549">[549]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 34: compare with
-this the narrative of the destruction of the Lacedæmonian mora near
-Lechæum, by Iphikratês and the Peltastæ (Xenophon. Hellen. iv, 5,
-11).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_550"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_550">[550]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 34. Τό τε ἔργον
-ἐνταῦθα χαλεπὸν τοῖς Λακεδαιμονίοις καθίστατο· οὔτε γὰρ οἱ πῖλοι
-ἔστεγον τὰ τοξεύματα, δοράτιά τε ἐναποκέκλαστο βαλλομένων, εἶχον δὲ
-οὐδὲν σφίσιν αὐτοῖς χρήσασθαι, ἀποκεκλῃμένοι μὲν τῇ ὄψει τοῦ προορᾷν,
-ὑπὸ δὲ τῆς μείζονος βοῆς τῶν πολεμίων τὰ ἐν αὐτοῖς παραγγελλόμενα
-οὐκ ἐσακούοντες, κινδύνου δὲ πανταχόθεν περιεστῶτος, καὶ οὐκ ἔχοντες
-ἐλπίδα καθ᾽ ὅ,τι χρὴ ἀμυνομένους σωθῆναι.</p>
-
-<p>There has been doubt and difficulty in this passage, even from
-the time of the Scholiasts. Some commentators have translated πῖλοι
-<i>caps</i> or <i>hats</i>,—others, <i>padded cuirasses</i> of wool or felt, round
-the breast and back: see the notes of Duker, Dr. Arnold, Poppo,
-and Göller. That the word πῖλος is sometimes used for the helmet,
-or head-piece, is unquestionable,—sometimes even (with or without
-χαλκοὺς) for a brazen helmet (see Aristophan. Lysis. 562; Antiphanês
-ap. Athenæ. xi, p. 503); but I cannot think that on this occasion
-Thucydidês would specially indicate the head of the Lacedæmonian
-hoplite as his chief vulnerable part. Dr. Arnold, indeed, offers a
-reason to prove that he might naturally do so; but in my judgment the
-reason is very insufficient.</p>
-
-<p>Πῖλοι means stuffed clothing of wool or felt, whether employed
-to protect head, body, or feet: and I conceive, with Poppo and
-others, that it here indicates the body-clothing of the Lacedæmonian
-hoplite; his body being the part most open to be wounded on the side
-undefended by the shield, as well as in the rear. That the word πῖλοι
-will bear this sense may be seen in Pollux, vii, 171; Plato, Timæus,
-p. 74; and Symposion, p. 220, c. 35: respecting πῖλος as applied to
-the foot-covering,—Bekker, Chariklês, vol. ii, p. 376.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_551"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_551">[551]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 35.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_552"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_552">[552]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 33. τῇ σφετέρᾳ
-ἐμπειρίᾳ χρήσασθαι, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_553"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_553">[553]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_554"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_554">[554]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 37.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_555"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_555">[555]</a></span> Thucyd. iv. 38. Οἱ
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι κελεύουσιν ὑμᾶς αὐτοὺς περὶ ὑμῶν αὐτῶν βουλεύεσθαι,
-μηδὲν αἰσχρὸν ποιοῦντας.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_556"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_556">[556]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 38; v, 15.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_557"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_557">[557]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 39.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_558"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_558">[558]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 40. παρὰ γνώμην τε
-δὴ μάλιστα τῶν κατὰ τὸν πόλεμον τοῦτο τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐγένετο, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_559"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_559">[559]</a></span> To adopt a phrase, the
-counterpart of that which has been ascribed to the Vieille Garde of
-the Emperor Napoleon’s army; compare Herodot. vii, 104.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_560"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_560">[560]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 39. Καὶ τοῦ Κλέωνος
-<em class="gesperrt">καίπερ μανιώδης οὖσα ἡ ὑπόσχεσις ἀπέβη</em>·
-ἐντὸς γὰρ εἴκοσιν ἡμερῶν ἤγαγε τοὺς ἄνδρας, ὥσπερ ὑπέστη.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Mitford, in recounting these incidents, after having said,
-respecting Kleon: “In a <i>very extraordinary train of circumstances</i>
-which followed, <i>his impudence and his fortune</i> (if, in the want of
-another, we may use that term) wonderfully favored him,” goes on to
-observe, two pages farther:—</p>
-
-<p>“It however soon appeared, that though for a man like Cleon,
-unversed in military command, the undertaking was rash and the
-bragging promise abundantly ridiculous, yet the business was not so
-desperate as it was in the moment generally imagined: and in fact
-the folly of the Athenian people, in committing such a trust to
-such a man, far exceeded that of the man himself, whose impudence
-seldom carried him beyond the control of his cunning. He had received
-intelligence that Demosthenês had already formed the plan and was
-preparing for the attempt, with the forces upon the spot and in
-the neighborhood. Hence, his apparent moderation in the demand for
-troops; which he judiciously accommodated to the gratification
-of the Athenian people, by avoiding to require any Athenians. He
-farther showed his judgment, when the decree was to be passed
-which was finally to direct the expedition, by a request which was
-readily granted, that Demosthenês might be joined with him in the
-command.” (Mitford, Hist. of Greece, vol. iii, ch. xv, sect. vii. pp.
-250-253.)</p>
-
-<p>It appears as if no historian could write down the name of
-Kleon without attaching to it some disparaging verb or adjective.
-We are here told in the same sentence that Kleon was an <i>impudent
-braggart</i> for <i>promising the execution of the enterprise</i>,—and yet
-that the enterprise itself was <i>perfectly feasible</i>. We are told in
-one sentence that he was rash and ridiculous for promising this,
-<i>unversed as he was in military command</i>: a few words farther, we
-are informed that he expressly requested that the most competent man
-to be found, Demosthenês, might be named his colleague. We are told
-of the <i>cunning of Kleon</i>, and that <i>Kleon had received intelligence
-from Demosthenês</i>,—as if this were some private communication to
-himself. But Demosthenês had sent no news to Kleon, nor did Kleon
-know anything which was not equally known to every man in the
-assembly. <i>The folly of the people in committing the trust to Kleon</i>
-is denounced,—as if Kleon had sought it himself, or as if his friends
-had been the first to propose it for him. If the folly of the people
-was thus great, what are we to say of the knavery of the oligarchical
-party, with Nikias at their head, who impelled the people into
-this folly, for the purpose of ruining a political antagonist, and
-who forced Kleon into the post against his own most unaffected
-reluctance? Against this manœuvre of the oligarchical party, neither
-Mr. Mitford nor any other historian says a word. When Kleon judges
-circumstances rightly, as Mr. Mitford allows that he did in this
-case, he has credit for nothing better than <i>cunning</i>.</p>
-
-<p>The truth is, that the people committed no folly in appointing
-Kleon, for he justified the best expectations of his friends. But
-Nikias and his friends committed great knavery in proposing it,
-since they fully believed that he would fail. And, even upon Mr.
-Mitford’s statement of the case, the opinion of Thucydidês which
-stands at the beginning of this note is thoroughly unjustifiable; not
-less unjustifiable than the language of the modern historian about
-the “extraordinary circumstances,” and the way in which Kleon was
-“favored by fortune.” Not a single incident can be specified in the
-narrative to bear out these invidious assertions.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_561"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_561">[561]</a></span> The jest of an unknown comic
-writer (probably Eupolis or Aristophanês, in one of the many lost
-dramas) against Kleon: “that he showed great powers of prophecy
-after the fact,” (Κλέων Προμηθεύς ἐστι μετὰ τὰ πράγματα, Lucian,
-Prometheus, c. 2), may probably have reference to his proceedings
-about Sphakteria: if so, it is certainly undeserved.</p>
-
-<p>In the letter which he sent to announce the capture of Sphakteria
-and the prisoners to the Athenians, it is affirmed that he began
-with the words—Κλέων Ἀθηναίων τῇ Βουλῇ καὶ τῷ Δήμῳ χαίρειν. This was
-derided by Eupolis, and is even considered as a piece of insolence,
-though it is difficult to see why (Schol. ad Aristophan. Plut. 322;
-Bergk, De Reliquiis Comœdiæ Antiquæ, p. 362).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_562"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_562">[562]</a></span> Vit. Thucydidis, p. xv, ed.
-Bekker.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_563"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_563">[563]</a></span> Plutarch, Nikias, c. 8; Thucyd.
-v, 7.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_564"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_564">[564]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 41.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_565"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_565">[565]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 41: compare
-Aristophan. Equit. 648 with Schol.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_566"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_566">[566]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 79.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_567"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_567">[567]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 16.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_568"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_568">[568]</a></span> The Acharneis was
-performed at the festival of the Lenæa, at Athens, January, 425
-<small>B.C.</small>: the Knights, at the same festival in the ensuing
-year, 424 <small>B.C.</small></p>
-
-<p>The capture of Sphakteria took place about July,
-<small>B.C.</small> 425: between the two dates above. See Mr.
-Clinton’s Fasti Hellenici, ad ann.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_569"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_569">[569]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 117; v, 14.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_570"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_570">[570]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 42. Τοῦ δ᾽ αὐτοῦ
-θέρους μετὰ ταῦτα <em class="gesperrt">εὐθὺς</em>, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_571"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_571">[571]</a></span> See the geographical
-illustrations of this descent in Dr. Arnold’s plan and note appended
-to the second volume of his Thucydidês,—and in Colonel Leake, Travels
-in Morea, ch. xxviii, p. 235; xxix, p. 309.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_572"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_572">[572]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 43.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_573"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_573">[573]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 44. ἔθεντο τὰ
-ὅπλα,—an expression which Dr. Arnold explains, here as elsewhere,
-to mean “piling the arms:” I do not think such an explanation is
-correct, even here: much less in several other places to which he
-alludes. See <a href="#Footnote_203">a note</a> on the surprise of
-Platæa by the Thebans, immediately before the Peloponnesian war.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_574"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_574">[574]</a></span> Plutarch, Nikias, c. 6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_575"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_575">[575]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 45.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_576"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_576">[576]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 2-45.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_577"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_577">[577]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_578"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_578">[578]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 47, 48.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_579"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_579">[579]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 48.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_580"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_580">[580]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 49.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_581"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_581">[581]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 51.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_582"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_582">[582]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 52.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_583"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_583">[583]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 50. ἐν αἷς πολλῶν
-ἄλλων γεγραμμένων κεφάλαιον ἦν, πρὸς Λακεδαιμονίους, οὐκ εἰδέναι ὅ,τι
-βούλονται· πολλῶν γὰρ ἐλθόντων πρέσβεων οὐδένα ταὐτὰ λέγειν· εἰ οὖν
-βούλονται σαφὲς λέγειν, πέμψαι μετὰ τοῦ Πέρσου ἄνδρας ὡς αὐτόν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_584"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_584">[584]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 86. ὅρκοις τε
-Λακεδαιμονίων καταλαβὼν τὰ τέλη τοῖς μεγίστοις, ἦ μὴν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_585"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_585">[585]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 50; Diodor. xii,
-64. The Athenians do not appear to have ever before sent envoys or
-courted alliance with the Great King; though the idea of doing so
-must have been noway strange to them, as we may see by the humorous
-scene of Pseudartabas in the Acharneis of Aristophanês, acted in the
-year before this event.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_586"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_586">[586]</a></span> Diodor. xi, 65; Aristotel.
-Polit. v, 8, 3; Justin, iii, 1; Ktesias, Persica, c. 29, 30. It is
-evident that there were contradictory stories current respecting
-the plot to which Xerxes fell a victim: but we have no means of
-determining what the details were.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_587"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_587">[587]</a></span> Ktesias, Persica, c. 38-43;
-Herodot. iii, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_588"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_588">[588]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 64-71; Ktesias,
-Persica, c. 44-46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_589"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_589">[589]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 54; Herodot. vii,
-235. The manner in which Herodotus alludes to the dangers which would
-arise to Sparta from the occupation of Kythêra by an enemy, furnishes
-one additional probability tending to show that his history was
-composed before the actual occupation of the island by Nikias, in the
-eighth year of the Peloponnesian war. Had he been cognizant of this
-latter event, he would naturally have made some allusion to it.</p>
-
-<p>The words of Thucydidês in respect to the island of Kythêra
-are, the Lacedæmonians πολλὴν ἐπιμέλειαν ἐποιοῦντο· ἦν γὰρ αὐτοῖς
-τῶν τε ἀπ᾽ Αἰγύπτου καὶ Λιβύης ὁλκάδων προσβολὴ, καὶ λῃσταὶ ἅμα
-τὴν Λακωνικὴν ἧσσον ἐλύπουν ἐκ θαλάσσης, ᾗπερ μόνον οἷον τ᾽ ἦν
-κακουργεῖσθαι· <em class="gesperrt">πᾶσα γὰρ ἀνέχει</em> πρὸς τὸ
-Σικελικὸν καὶ Κρητικὸν πέλαγος.</p>
-
-<p>I do not understand this passage, with Dr. Arnold and Göller, to
-mean, that Laconia was unassailable by land, but very assailable by
-sea. It rather means that the only portion of the coast of Laconia
-where a maritime invader could do much damage, was in the interior
-of the Laconic gulf, near Helos, Gythium, etc., which is in fact
-the only plain portion of the coast of Laconia. The two projecting
-promontories, which end, the one in Cape Malea, the other in Cape
-Tænarus, are high, rocky, harborless, and afford very little
-temptation to a disembarking enemy. “The whole Laconian coast is
-<i>high projecting cliff</i>, where it fronts the Sicilian and Kretan
-seas,”—<em class="gesperrt">πᾶσα ἀνέχει</em>. The island of Kythêra
-was particularly favorable for facilitating descents on the territory
-near Helos and Gythium. The ἀλιμενότης of Laconia is noticed in
-Xenophon, Hellen. iv, 8, 7, where he describes the occupation of the
-island by Konon and Pharnabazus.</p>
-
-<p>See Colonel Leake’s description of this coast, and the high cliffs
-between Cape Matapan—Tænarus—and Kalamata, which front the Sicilian
-sea, as well as those eastward of Cape St. Angelo, or Malea, which
-front the Kretan sea (Travels in Morea, vol. i, ch. vii, p. 261:
-“tempestuous, rocky, unsheltered coast of Mesamani,” ch. viii, p.
-320; ch. vi, p. 205; Strabo, viii, p. 368; Pausan. iii, c. xxvi,
-2).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_590"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_590">[590]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 54. δισχιλίοις
-Μιλησίων ὁπλίταις. It seems impossible to believe that there could
-have been so many as two thousand <i>Milesian</i> hoplites: but we cannot
-tell where the mistake lies.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_591"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_591">[591]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 56. He states that
-Thyrea was ten stadia, or about a mile and one-fifth, distant from
-the sea. But Colonel Leake (Travels in the Morea, vol. ii, ch. xxii,
-p. 492), who has discovered quite sufficient ruins to identify the
-spot, affirms “that it is at least three times that distance from the
-sea.”</p>
-
-<p>This explains to us the more clearly why the Æginetans thought it
-necessary to build their new fort.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_592"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_592">[592]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 58; Diodor. xii,
-65.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_593"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_593">[593]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 41, 55, 56.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_594"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_594">[594]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 80.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_595"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_595">[595]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 80. Καὶ
-προκρίναντες ἐς δισχιλίους, οἱ μὲν ἐστεφανώσαντό τε καὶ τὰ ἱερὰ
-περιῆλθον ὡς ἠλευθερωμένοι· οἱ δὲ οὐ πολλῷ ὕστερον ἠφάνισάν τε
-αὐτοὺς, καὶ οὐδεὶς ᾔσθετο ὅτῳ τρόπῳ ἕκαστος διεφθάρη: compare Diodor.
-xii, 67.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Thirlwall (History of Greece, vol. iii. ch. xxiii, p. 244,
-2d edit. <i>note</i>) thinks that this assassination of Helots by the
-Spartans took place at some other time unascertained, and not at the
-time here indicated. I cannot concur in this opinion. It appears
-to me, that there is the strongest probable reason for referring
-the incident to the time immediately following the disaster in
-Sphakteria, which Thucydidês so especially marks (iv, 41) by the
-emphatic words: Οἱ δὲ Λακεδαιμόνιοι ἀμαθεῖς ὄντες ἐν τῷ πρὶν χρόνῳ
-λῃστείας καὶ τοῦ τοιούτου πολέμου, τῶν τε Εἱλώτων αὐτομολούντων
-καὶ φοβούμενοι μὴ καὶ ἐπὶ μακρότερον σφίσι τι νεωτερισθῇ τῶν κατὰ
-τὴν χώραν, οὐ ῥᾳδίως ἔφερον. This was just after the Messenians
-were first established at Pylus, and began their incursions over
-Laconia, with such temptations as they could offer to the Helots to
-desert. And it was naturally just then that the fear, entertained
-by the Spartans of their Helots, became exaggerated to the maximum,
-leading to the perpetration of the act mentioned in the text. Dr.
-Thirlwall observes, “that the Spartan government would not order
-the massacre of the Helots at a time when it could employ them on
-foreign service.” But to this it may be replied, that the capture of
-Sphakteria took place in July or August, while the expedition under
-Brasidas was not organized until the following winter or spring.
-There was therefore an interval of some months during which the
-government had not yet formed the idea of employing the Helots on
-foreign service. And this interval is quite sufficient to give a full
-and distinct meaning to the expression καὶ τότε (Thucyd. iv, 80) on
-which Dr. Thirlwall insists; without the necessity of going back to
-any more remote point of antecedent time.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_596"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_596">[596]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 79.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_597"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_597">[597]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 80. προὐθυμήθησαν
-δὲ καὶ οἱ Χαλκιδῆς ἄνδρα ἔν τε τῇ Σπάρτῃ δοκοῦντα δραστήριον εἶναι ἐς
-τὰ πάντα, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_598"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_598">[598]</a></span> The picture drawn by
-Aristophanês (Acharn. 760) is a caricature, but of suffering probably
-but too real.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_599"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_599">[599]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 66. Strabo (ix, p.
-391) gives eighteen stadia as the distance between Megara and Nisæa;
-Thucydidês only eight. There appears sufficient reason to prefer the
-latter: see Reinganum, Das alte Megaris, pp. 121-180.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_600"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_600">[600]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 68. Ξυνέπεσε γὰρ
-καὶ τὸν τῶν Ἀθηναίων κήρυκα ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτοῦ γνώμης κηρύξαι, τὸν βουλόμενον
-ἰέναι Μεγαρέων μετὰ Ἀθηναίων θησόμενον τὰ ὅπλα.</p>
-
-<p>Here we have the phrase τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα employed in a case where
-Dr. Arnold’s explanation of it would be eminently unsuitable. There
-could be no thought of <i>piling arms</i> at a critical moment of actual
-fighting, with result as yet doubtful.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_601"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_601">[601]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 69.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_602"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_602">[602]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 103; iv, 69. Καὶ οἱ
-Ἀθηναῖοι, τὰ μακρὰ τείχη ἀποῤῥήξαντες ἀπὸ τῆς τῶν Μεγαρέων πόλεως καὶ
-τὴν Νίσαιαν παραλαβόντες, τἄλλα παρεσκευάζοντο.</p>
-
-<p>I cannot think, with Poppo and Göller, that the participle
-ἀποῤῥήξαντες is to be explained as meaning that the Athenians
-<small>PULLED DOWN</small> the portion of the Long Walls near Megara.
-This may have been done, but it would be an operation of no great
-importance; for to pull down a portion of the wall would not bar
-the access from the city, which it was the object of the Athenians
-to accomplish. “They broke off” the communication along the road
-between the Long Walls from the city to Nisæa, by building across
-or barricading the space between: similar to what is said a little
-above,—<em class="gesperrt">διοικοδομησάμενοι</em> τὸ πρὸς Μεγαρέας,
-etc. Diodorus (xii, 66) abridges Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_603"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_603">[603]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 73. εἰ μὲν γὰρ
-μὴ ὤφθησαν ἐλθόντες (Brasidas with his troops) οὐκ ἂν ἐν τύχῃ
-γίγνεσθαι σφίσιν, ἀλλὰ σαφῶς ἂν ὥσπερ ἡσσηθέντων στερηθῆναι εὐθὺς τῆς
-πόλεως.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_604"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_604">[604]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 71.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_605"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_605">[605]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 72.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_606"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_606">[606]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 73.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_607"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_607">[607]</a></span> We find some of them afterwards
-in the service of Athens, employed as light-armed troops in the
-Sicilian expedition (Thucyd. vi, 43).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_608"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_608">[608]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 74. οἱ δὲ
-ἐπειδὴ ἐν ταῖς ἀρχαῖς ἐγένοντο, καὶ ἐξέτασιν ὅπλων ἐποιήσαντο,
-διαστήσαντες τοὺς λόχους, ἐξελέξαντο τῶν τε ἐχθρῶν καὶ οἵ ἐδόκουν
-μάλιστα ξυμπρᾶξαι τὰ πρὸς τοὺς Ἀθηναίους, ἄνδρας ὡς ἑκατόν· καὶ <em
-class="gesperrt">τούτων πέρι ἀναγκάσαντες τὸν δῆμον ψῆφον φανερὰν
-διενεγκεῖν</em>, ὡς κατεγνώσθησαν, ἔκτειναν, καὶ ἐς ὀλιγαρχίαν
-τὰ μάλιστα κατέστησαν τὴν πόλιν. καὶ πλεῖστον δὴ χρόνον αὕτη ὑπ᾽
-ἐλαχίστων γενομένη ἐκ στάσεως μετάστασις ξυνέμεινεν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_609"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_609">[609]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 109.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_610"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_610">[610]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 76. εὐθὺς μετὰ τὴν
-ἐκ τῆς Μεγαρίδος ἀναχώρησιν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_611"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_611">[611]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 77.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_612"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_612">[612]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 89.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_613"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_613">[613]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 101.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_614"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_614">[614]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 93, 94. He states
-that the Bœotian ψιλοὶ were above ten thousand, and that the Athenian
-ψιλοὶ were πολλαπλάσιοι τῶν ἐναντίων. We can hardly take this number
-as less than twenty-five thousand ψιλῶν καὶ σκευοφόρων (iv, 101).</p>
-
-<p>The hoplites, as well as the horsemen, had their baggage and
-provision carried for them by attendants: see Thucyd. iii, 17; vii,
-75.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_615"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_615">[615]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 90. Ὁ δ᾽ Ἱπποκράτης
-ἀναστήσας Ἀθηναίους πανδημεὶ, αὐτοὺς καὶ τοὺς μετοίκους καὶ ξένων
-ὅσοι παρῆσαν, etc.: also πανστρατιᾶς (iv, 94).</p>
-
-<p>The meaning of the word πανδημεὶ is well illustrated by Nikias
-in his exhortation to the Athenian army near Syracuse, immediately
-antecedent to the first battle with the Syracusans,—levy <i>en masse</i>,
-as opposed to hoplites specially selected (vi, 66-68),—ἄλλως τε καὶ
-πρὸς ἄνδρας πανδημεί τε ἀμυνομένους, καὶ οὐκ ἀπολέκτους, ὥσπερ καὶ
-ἡμᾶς—καὶ προσέτι Σικελιώτας, etc.</p>
-
-<p>When a special selection took place, the names of the hoplites
-chosen by the generals to take part in any particular service were
-written on boards according to their tribes: each of these boards
-was affixed publicly against the statue of the Heros Eponymus of the
-tribe to which it referred: Aristophanês, Equites, 1369; Pac. 1184,
-with Scholiast; Wachsmuth, Hellen. Alterthumsk. ii, p. 312.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_616"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_616">[616]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 100.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_617"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_617">[617]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 55.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_618"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_618">[618]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 90; Livy, xxxv,
-51.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_619"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_619">[619]</a></span> Dikæarch. Βίος Ἑλλάδος. Fragm.
-ed. Fuhr, pp. 142-230; Pausan. i, 34, 2; Aristotle ap. Stephan. Byz.
-v, Ὠρωπός. See also Col. Leake, Athens and the Demi of Attica, vol.
-ii, sect. iv, p. 123; Mr. Finlay, Oropus and the Diakria, p. 38;
-Ross, Die Demen von Attika, p. 6, where the Deme of Græa is verified
-by an inscription, and explained for the first time.</p>
-
-<p>The road taken by the army of Hippokratês in the march to Delium,
-was the same as that by which the Lacedæmonian army in their first
-invasion of Attica had retired from Attica into Bœotia (Thucyd. ii,
-23).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_620"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_620">[620]</a></span> Dikæarchus (Βίος Ἑλλάδος, p.
-142, ed. Fuhr) is full of encomiums on the excellence of the wine
-drunk at Tanagra, and of the abundant olive-plantations on the road
-between Orôpus and Tanagra.</p>
-
-<p>Since tools and masons were brought from Athens to fortify Nisæa
-about three months before (Thucyd. iv, 69), we may be pretty sure
-that similar apparatus was carried to Delium, though Thucydidês does
-not state it.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_621"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_621">[621]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 90. That the vines
-round the temple had supporting-stakes, which furnished the σταυροὺς
-used by the Athenians, we may reasonably presume: the same as those
-χάρακες which are spoken of in Korkyra, iii, 70: compare Pollux, i,
-162.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_622"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_622">[622]</a></span> “The plain of Oropus (observes
-Col. Leake) expands from its upper angle at <i>Oropó</i> towards the
-mouth of the Asopus, and stretches about five miles along the
-shore, from the foot of the hills of Markópulo on the east to the
-village of Khalkúki on the west, where begin some heights extending
-westward towards Dhilisi, the ancient Delium.”—“The plain of Oropus
-is separated from the more inland plain of Tanagra by rocky gorges
-through which the Asopus flows.” (Leake, Athens and the Demi of
-Attica, vol. ii. sect. iv, p. 112.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_623"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_623">[623]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 93; v, 38.
-Akræphiæ may probably be considered as either a dependency of
-Thebes, or included in the general expression of Thucydidês, after
-the word Κωπαιῆς—οἱ περὶ τὴν λίμνην. Anthêdon and Lebadeia, which
-are recognized as separate autonomous townships in various Bœotian
-inscriptions, are not here named in Thucydidês. But there is no
-certain evidence respecting the number of immediate members of the
-Bœotian confederacy: compare the various conjectures in Boeckh, ad
-Corp. Inscript. tom. i, p. 727; O. Müller, Orchomenus, p. 402; Kruse,
-Hellas, tom. ii, p. 548.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_624"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_624">[624]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 91. τῶν ἄλλων
-Βοιωταρχῶν, οἵ <em class="gesperrt">εἰσιν ἕνδεκα</em>, οὐ
-ξυνεπαινούντων μάχεσθαι, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The use of the present tense εἰσιν marks the number eleven as that
-of <i>all the bœotarchs</i>; at this time, according to Boeckh’s opinion,
-ad Corp. Inscript. i, vol. i, p. 729. The number, however, appears to
-have been variable.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_625"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_625">[625]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 91. προσκαλῶν
-ἑκάστους κατὰ λόχους, ὅπως μὴ ἁθρόοι ἐκλίποιεν τὰ ὅπλα, ἔπειθε τοὺς
-Βοιωτοὺς ἰέναι ἐπὶ τοὺς Ἀθηναίους καὶ τὸν ἀγῶνα ποιεῖσθαι.</p>
-
-<p>Here Dr. Arnold observes: “This confirms and illustrates what has
-been said in the note on ii, 2, 5, as to the practice of the Greek
-soldiers piling their arms the moment they halted in a particular
-part of the camp, and always attending the speeches of their general
-without them.”</p>
-
-<p>In the case here before us, it appears that the Bœotians did
-come by separate lochi, pursuant to command, to hear the words of
-Pagondas, and also that each lochus left its arms to do so; though
-even here it is not absolutely certain that τὰ ὅπλα does not mean
-<i>the military station</i>, as Dukas interprets it. But Dr. Arnold
-generalizes too hastily from hence to a customary practice as between
-soldiers and their general. The proceeding of the Athenian general
-Hippokratês, on this very occasion, near Delium, to be noticed a page
-or two forward, exhibits an arrangement totally different. Moreover,
-the note on ii, 2, 5, to which Dr. Arnold refers, has no sort of
-analogy to the passage here before us, which does not include the
-words τίθεσθαι τὰ ὅπλα; whereas these words are the main matters in
-chapter ii, 2, 5. Whoever attentively compares the two, will see
-that Dr. Arnold, followed by Poppo and Göller, has stretched an
-explanation which suits the passage here before us to other passages
-where it is no way applicable.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_626"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_626">[626]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 92.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_627"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_627">[627]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 93. ἐπ᾽ ἀσπίδας
-δὲ πέντε μὲν καὶ εἴκοσι Θηβαῖοι ἐτάξαντο, οἱ δὲ ἄλλοι ὡς ἕκαστοι
-ἔτυχον.</p>
-
-<p>What is still more remarkable, in the battle of Mantincia, in 418
-<small>B.C.</small> between the Lacedæmonians on one side
-and the Athenians, Argeians, Mantincians, etc., on the other, the
-different lochi or divisions of the Lacedæmonian army were not all
-marshalled in the same depth of files. Each lochage, or commander
-of the lochus, directed the depth of his own division (Thucyd. v,
-68).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_628"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_628">[628]</a></span> Diodor. xii, 70. Προεμάχοντο
-δὲ πάντων οἱ παρ᾽ ἐκείνοις Ἡνίοχοι καὶ Παραβάται καλούμενοι, ἄνδρες
-ἐπίλεκτοι τριακόσιοι.... Οἱ δὲ Θηβαῖοι διαφέροντες ταῖς τῶν σωμάτων
-ῥώμαις, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Compare Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 18, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_629"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_629">[629]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 93. Καὶ ἐπειδὴ
-καλῶς αὐτοῖς εἶχεν, ὑπερεφάνησαν (the Bœotians) τοῦ λόφου καὶ <em
-class="gesperrt">ἔθεντο τὰ ὅπλα</em> τεταγμένοι ὥσπερ ἔμελλον,
-etc.</p>
-
-<p>I transcribe this passage for the purpose of showing how
-impossible it is to admit the explanation which Dr. Arnold, Poppo,
-and Göller give of these words ἔθεντο τὰ ὅπλα (see Notes ad Thucyd.
-ii, 2). They explain the words to mean, that the soldiers “piled
-their arms into a heap,” disarmed themselves for the time. But the
-Bœotians, in the situation here described, cannot possibly have
-parted with their arms, they were just on the point of charging the
-enemy: immediately afterwards, Pagondas gives the word, the pæan for
-charging is sung, and the rush commences. Pagondas had, doubtless,
-good reason for directing a momentary halt, to see that his ranks
-were in perfectly good condition before the charge began. But to
-command his troops to “pile their arms” would be the last thing that
-he would think of.</p>
-
-<p>In the interpretation of τεταγμένοι ὥσπερ ἔμελλον, I agree with
-the Scholiast, who understands μαχέσασθαι or μαχεῖσθαι after ἔμελλον
-(compare Thucyd. v, 66), dissenting from Dr. Arnold and Göller, who
-would understand τάσσεσθαι; which, as it seems to me, makes a very
-awkward meaning, and is not sustained by the passage produced as
-parallel (viii, 51).</p>
-
-<p>The infinitive verb, understood after ἔμελλον, need not
-necessarily be a verb actually occurring before: it may be a verb
-suggested by the general scope of the sentence: see ἐμέλλησαν, iv,
-123.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_630"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_630">[630]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 95.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_631"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_631">[631]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 95, 96. Καθεστώτων
-δ᾽ ἐς τὴν τάξιν καὶ ἤδη μελλόντων ξυνιέναι, Ἱπποκράτης ὁ στρατηγὸς
-ἐπιπαριὼν τὸ στρατόπεδον τῶν Ἀθηναίων παρεκελεύετό τε καὶ ἔλεγε
-τοιάδε.... Τοιαῦτα τοῦ Ἱπποκράτους παρακελευομένου, καὶ μέχρι μὲν
-μέσου τοῦ στρατοπέδου ἐπελθόντος, τὸ δὲ πλέον οὐκέτι φθάσαντος,
-οἱ Βοιωτοὶ, παρακελευσαμένου καὶ σφίσιν ὡς διὰ ταχέων καὶ ἐνταῦθα
-Παγώνδου, παιωνίσαντες ἐπῄεσαν ἀπὸ τοῦ λόφου, etc.</p>
-
-<p>This passage contradicts what is affirmed by Dr. Arnold, Poppo,
-and Göller, to have been a <i>general practice</i>, that the soldiers
-“piled their arms and <i>always</i> attended the speeches of their
-generals without them.” (See his note ad Thucyd. iv, 91.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_632"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_632">[632]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 96. καρτερᾷ μάχῃ
-καὶ ὠθισμῷ ἀσπίδων ξυνεστήκει, etc. Compare Xenophon, Cyropæd. vii,
-1, 32.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_633"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_633">[633]</a></span> The proverbial expression of
-Βοιωτίαν ὗν, “the Bœotian sow,” was ancient even in the town of
-Pindar (Olymp. vi, 90, with the Scholia and Boeckh’s note): compare
-also Ephorus, Fragment 67, ed. Marx: Dikæarchus, Βίος Ἑλλάδος,
-p. 143, ed. Fuhr; Plato, Legg. i, p. 636; and Symposion, p. 182,
-“pingues Thebani et valentes,” Cicero de Fato, iv, 7.</p>
-
-<p>Xenophon (Memorab. iii, 5, 2, 15; iii, 12, 5: compare Xenoph.
-de Athen. Republ. i, 13) maintains the natural bodily capacity of
-Athenians to be equal to that of Bœotians, but deplores the want of
-σωμασκία, or bodily training.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_634"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_634">[634]</a></span> See the notes of Dr. Arnold and
-Poppo, ad Thucyd. iv, 96.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_635"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_635">[635]</a></span> Compare Thucyd. v, 68; vi,
-67.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_636"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_636">[636]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 96. Τὸ δὲ
-δεξιὸν, ᾗ οἱ Θηβαῖοι ἦσαν, ἐκράτει τε τῶν Ἀθηναίων, καὶ <em
-class="gesperrt">ὠσάμενοι</em> κατὰ βραχὺ τὸ πρῶτον ἐπηκολούθουν.</p>
-
-<p>The word ὠσάμενοι (compare iv, 35; vi, 70), exactly expresses the
-forward pushing of the mass of hoplites with shield and spear.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_637"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_637">[637]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 96; Athenæus, v,
-p. 215. Diodorus (xii, 70) represents that the battle began with a
-combat of cavalry, in which the Athenians had the advantage. This is
-quite inconsistent with the narrative of Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_638"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_638">[638]</a></span> Diodorus (xii, 70) dwells upon
-this circumstance.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_639"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_639">[639]</a></span> Pyrilampês is spoken of as
-having been wounded and taken prisoner in the retreat by the Thebans
-(Plutarch, De Genio Socratis, c. 11, p. 581). See also Thucyd. v, 35,
-where allusion is made to some prisoners.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_640"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_640">[640]</a></span> See the two difficult chapters,
-iv, 98, 99, in Thucydidês.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_641"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_641">[641]</a></span> See the notes of Poppo, Göller,
-Dr. Arnold, and other commentators, on these chapters.</p>
-
-<p>Neither these notes, nor the Scholiast, seem to me in all parts
-satisfactory; nor do they seize the spirit of the argument between
-the Athenian herald and the Bœotian officers, which will be found
-perfectly consistent as a piece of diplomatic interchange.</p>
-
-<p>In particular, they do not take notice that it is the <i>Athenian</i>
-herald who first raises the question, what is Athenian territory and
-what is Bœotian: and that he defines Athenian territory to be that
-in which the force of Athens is superior. The retort of the Bœotians
-refers to that definition; not to the question of rightful claim to
-any territory, apart from actual superiority of force.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_642"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_642">[642]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 97.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_643"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_643">[643]</a></span> Thucydidês, in describing
-the state of mind of the Bœotians, does not seem to imply that
-they thought this a good and valid ground, upon which they could
-directly take their stand; but merely that they considered it a fair
-diplomatic way of meeting the alternative raised by the Athenian
-herald; for εὐπρεπὲς means nothing more than this.</p>
-
-<p>Οὐδ᾽ αὖ ἐσπένδοντο <em class="gesperrt">δῆθεν</em> ὑπὲρ
-τῆς ἐκείνων (Ἀθηναίων)· τὸ δὲ ἐκ τῆς ἑαυτῶν (Βοιωτῶν) <em
-class="gesperrt">εὐπρεπὲς</em> εἶναι ἀποκρίνασθαι, ἀπιόντας καὶ
-ἀπολαβεῖν ἃ ἀπαιτοῦσιν.</p>
-
-<p>The adverb δῆθεν also marks the reference to the special question,
-as laid out by the Athenian herald.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_644"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_644">[644]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 100, 101.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_645"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_645">[645]</a></span> See Plato (Symposion, c. 36,
-p. 221; Lachês, p. 181; Charmidês, p. 153; Apolog. Sokratis, p. 28),
-Strabo, ix, p. 403.</p>
-
-<p>Plutarch, Alkibiadês, c. 7. We find it mentioned among the stories
-told about Sokratês in the retreat from Delium, that his life was
-preserved by the inspiration of his familiar dæmon, or genius, which
-instructed him on one doubtful occasion which of two roads was the
-safe one to take (Cicero, de Divinat. i, 54; Plutarch, de Genio
-Sokratis, c. 11, p. 581).</p>
-
-<p>The skepticism of Athenæus (v, p. 215) about the military service
-of Sokratês is not to be defended, but it may probably be explained
-by the exaggerations and falsehoods which he had read, ascribing to
-the philosopher superhuman gallantry.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_646"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_646">[646]</a></span> See above, <a
-href="#Page_378">page 378</a>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_647"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_647">[647]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 78.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_648"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_648">[648]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 78. Ὁ δὲ,
-κελευόντων τῶν ἀγωγῶν, πρίν τι πλέον ξυστῆναι τὸ κωλῦσον, ἐχώρει
-οὐδὲν ἐπισχὼν δρόμῳ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_649"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_649">[649]</a></span> The geography of Thessaly is
-not sufficiently known to enable us to verify these positions with
-exactness. That which Thucydidês calls the Apidanus, is the river
-formed by the junction of the Apidanus and Enipeus. See Kiepert’s
-map of ancient Thessaly (Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece,
-ch. xlii, vol. iv, p. 470; and Dr. Arnold’s note on this chapter of
-Thucydidês).</p>
-
-<p>We must suppose that Brasidas was detained a considerable time in
-parleying with the opposing band of Thessalians. Otherwise, it would
-seem that the space between Melitæa and Pharsalus would not be a
-great distance to get over in an entire day’s march, considering that
-the pace was as rapid as the troops could sustain. The much greater
-distance between Larissa and Melitæa, was traversed in one night by
-Philip king of Macedon, the son of Demetrius, with an army carrying
-ladders and other aids for attacking a town, etc. (Polyb. v, 97.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_650"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_650">[650]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 78.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_651"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_651">[651]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 82.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_652"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_652">[652]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 83.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_653"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_653">[653]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 84. Οἱ δὲ <em
-class="gesperrt">περὶ τοῦ δέχεσθαι αὐτὸν κατ᾽ ἀλλήλους ἐστασίαζον,
-οἵ τε μετὰ τῶν Χαλκιδέων ξυνεπάγοντες καὶ ὁ δῆμος</em>· ὅμως δὲ, <em
-class="gesperrt">διὰ τοῦ καρποῦ τὸ δέος ἔτι ἔξω ὄντος</em>, πεισθὲν
-τὸ πλῆθος ὑπὸ τοῦ Βρασίδου δέξασθαί τε αὐτὸν μόνον καὶ ἀκούσαντας
-βουλεύσασθαι, δέχεται, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_654"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_654">[654]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 85, 86, 87.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_655"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_655">[655]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_656"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_656">[656]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 88. Οἱ δὲ Ἀκάνθιοι,
-πολλῶν λεχθέντων πρότερον ἐπ᾽ ἀμφότερα, κρύφα διαψηφισάμενοι, διά τε
-τὸ ἐπαγωγὰ εἰπεῖν τὸν Βρασίδαν καὶ περὶ τοῦ καρποῦ φόβῳ, ἔγνωσαν οἱ
-πλείους ἀφίστασθαι Ἀθηναίων.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_657"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_657">[657]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 88; Diodor. xii,
-67.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_658"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_658">[658]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 103. μάλιστα δὲ οἱ
-Ἀργίλιοι, ἐγγύς τε προσοικοῦντες καὶ ἀεί ποτε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ὄντες
-ὕποπτοι καὶ ἐπιβουλεύοντες τῷ χωρίῳ (Amphipolis).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_659"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_659">[659]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 104. Κατέστησαν τὸν
-στρατὸν πρὸ ἕω ἐπὶ τὴν γέφυραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ.</p>
-
-<p>Bekker’s reading of πρὸ ἕω appears to me preferable to πρόσω. The
-latter word really adds nothing to the meaning; whereas the fact
-that Brasidas got over the river before daylight is one both new and
-material: it is not necessarily implied in the previous words ἐκείνῃ
-τῇ νυκτί.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_660"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_660">[660]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 104. Ἀπέχει δὲ τὸ
-πόλισμα πλέον τῆς διαβάσεως, καὶ οὐ καθεῖτο τείχη ὥσπερ νῦν, φυλακὴ
-δέ τις βραχεῖα καθειστήκει, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold, with Dobree, Poppo, and most of the commentators,
-translates these words: “The town (of Amphipolis) is farther off
-(from Argilus) than the passage of the river.” But this must be of
-course true, and conveys no new information, seeing that Brasidas
-had to cross the river to reach the town. Smith and Bloomfield are
-right, I think, in considering τῆς διαβάσεως as governed by ἀπέχει
-and not by πλέον,—“the city is at some distance from the crossing:”
-and the objection which Poppo makes against them, that πλέον must
-necessarily imply a comparison with something, cannot be sustained:
-for Thucydidês often uses ἐκ πλείονος (iv, 103; viii, 83), as
-precisely identical with ἐκ πολλοῦ (i, 68; iv, 67; v, 69); also περὶ
-πλείονος.</p>
-
-<p>In the following chapter, on occasion of the battle of Amphipolis,
-some farther remarks will be found on the locality.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_661"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_661">[661]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 106. Οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ
-ἀκούσαντες <em class="gesperrt">ἀλλοιότεροι</em> ἐγένοντο τὰς γνώμας,
-etc.</p>
-
-<p>The word ἀλλοιότεροι seems to indicate both the change of view,
-compared with what had been before, and new divergence introduced
-among themselves.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_662"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_662">[662]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 105, 106; Diodor.
-xii, 68.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_663"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_663">[663]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108. Ἐχομένης δὲ
-τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως, οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ἐς μέγα δέος κατέστησαν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The prodigious importance of the site of Amphipolis, with its
-adjoining bridge forming the communication between the regions east
-and west of the Strymon, was felt not only by Philip of Macedon, as
-will hereafter appear, but also by the Romans after their conquest
-of Macedonia. Of the four regions into which the Romans distributed
-Macedonia, “pars prima (says Livy, xlv, 30) habet opportunitatem
-Amphipoleos; quæ objecta claudit omnes ab oriente sole in Macedoniam
-aditus.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_664"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_664">[664]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108. Τὸ
-δὲ μέγιστον, διὰ τὸ ἡδονὴν ἔχον ἐν τῷ αὐτίκα, καὶ ὅτι <em
-class="gesperrt">τὸ πρῶτον Λακεδαιμονίων ὀργώντων ἔμελλον
-πειρᾶσθαι</em>, κινδυνεύειν παντὶ τρόπῳ ἑτοῖμοι ἦσαν (the
-subject-allies of Athens).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_665"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_665">[665]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_666"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_666">[666]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108. Οἱ μὲν
-Ἀθηναῖοι φυλακὰς ὡς ἐξ ὀλίγου καὶ ἐν χειμῶνι, διέπεμπον ἐς τὰς πόλεις
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_667"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_667">[667]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 26. See the
-biography of Thucydidês by Marcellinus, prefixed to all the editions,
-p. 19, ed. Arnold.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_668"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_668">[668]</a></span> I transcribe the main features
-from the account of Dr. Thirlwall, whose judgment coincides on this
-occasion with what is generally given (Hist. of Greece, ch. xxiii,
-vol. iii, p. 268).</p>
-
-<p>“On the evening of the same day Thucydidês, with seven galleys
-which he happened to have with him at Thasos, when he received the
-despatch from Euklês, sailed into the mouth of the Strymon, and
-learning the fall of Amphipolis proceeded to put Eion in a state
-of defence. His timely arrival saved the place, which Brasidas
-attacked the next morning, both from the river and the land, without
-effect: and the refugees who retired by virtue of the treaty from
-Amphipolis, found shelter at Eion, and contributed to its security.
-<i>The historian rendered an important service to his country: and
-it does not appear that human prudence and activity could have
-accomplished anything more under the same circumstances.</i> Yet <i>his
-unavoidable failure</i> proved the occasion of a sentence, under which
-he spent twenty years of his life in exile: and he was only restored
-to his country in the season of her deepest humiliation by the
-public calamities. So much only can be gathered with certainty from
-his language: for he has not condescended to mention either the
-charge which was brought against him, or the nature of the sentence,
-which he may either have suffered, or avoided by a voluntary exile.
-A statement, very probable in itself, though resting on slight
-authority, attributes his banishment to Cleon’s calumnies: <i>that the
-irritation produced by the loss of Amphipolis should have been so
-directed against an innocent object, would perfectly accord with the
-character of the people and of the demagogue</i>. Posterity has gained
-by the injustice of his contemporaries,” etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_669"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_669">[669]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 104. Οἱ δ᾽ ἐναντίοι
-τοῖς προδιδοῦσι (that is, at Amphipolis) κρατοῦντες τῷ πλήθει
-ὥστε μὴ αὐτίκα τὰς πύλας ἀνοίγεσθαι, πέμπουσι μετὰ Εὐκλέους τοῦ
-στρατηγοῦ, ὃς ἐκ τῶν Ἀθηναίων παρῆν αὐτοῖς φύλαξ τοῦ χωρίου, <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐπὶ τὸν ἕτερον στρατηγὸν τῶν ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, Θουκυδίδην
-τὸν Ὀλόρου, ὃς τάδε ξυνέγραψεν, ὄντα περὶ Θάσον</em> (ἔστι δ᾽ ἡ
-νῆσος, Παρίων ἀποικία, ἀπέχουσα τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως ἡμισείας ἡμέρας
-μάλιστα πλοῦν) κελεύοντες σφίσι βοηθεῖν.</p>
-
-<p>Here Thucydidês describes himself as “the other general along
-with Euklês, of the region of or towards Thrace.” There cannot be
-a clearer designation of the extensive range of his functions and
-duties.</p>
-
-<p>I adopt here the reading τῶν ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, the genitive case of the
-well-known Thucydidean phrase τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης, in preference to τὸν
-ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης; which would mean in substance the same thing, though not
-so precisely, nor so suitably to the usual manner of the historian.
-Bloomfield, Bekker, and Göller have all introduced τῶν into the
-text, on the authority of various MSS.: Poppo and Dr. Arnold also
-both express a preference for it, though they still leave τὸν in the
-text.</p>
-
-<p>Moreover, the words of Thucydidês himself, in the passage where
-he mentions his own long exile, plainly prove that he was sent out
-as general, not to Thasos, but <i>to Amphipolis</i>: (v, 26) καὶ ξυνέβη
-μοι φεύγειν τὴν ἐμαυτοῦ ἔτη εἴκοσι <em class="gesperrt">μετὰ τὴν ἐς
-Ἀμφίπολιν στρατηγίαν</em>, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_670"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_670">[670]</a></span> Compare Thucyd. iv, 84, 88,
-103.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_671"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_671">[671]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 103. <em
-class="gesperrt">μάλιστα δὲ οἱ Ἀργίλιοι, ἐγγύς τε προσοικοῦντες
-καὶ ἀεί ποτε τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις ὄντες ὕποπτοι καὶ ἐπιβουλεύοντες τῷ
-χωρίῳ</em> (Amphipolis), ἐπειδὴ παρέτυχεν ὁ καιρὸς καὶ Βρασίδας
-ἦλθεν, ἔπραξάν τε <em class="gesperrt">ἐκ πλείονος</em> πρὸς τοὺς
-ἐμπολιτεύοντας σφῶν ἐκεῖ ὅπως ἐνδοθήσεται ἡ πόλις, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_672"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_672">[672]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 103. <em
-class="gesperrt">φυλακὴ δέ τις βραχεῖα καθειστήκει, ἣν βιασάμενος
-ῥᾳδίως</em> ὁ Βρασίδας, ἅμα μὲν τῆς προδοσίας οὔσης, ἅμα δὲ καὶ
-χειμῶνος ὄντος καὶ <em class="gesperrt">ἀπροσδοκήτος προσπεσὼν</em>,
-διέβη τὴν γέφυραν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_673"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_673">[673]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 105. καὶ ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ
-δύνασθαι ἐν τοῖς πρώτοις <em class="gesperrt">τῶν ἠπειρωτῶν</em>,
-etc.</p>
-
-<p>Rotscher, in his Life of Thucydidês (Leben des Thukydides,
-Göttingen, 1842, sect. 4, pp. 97-99), admits it to be the probable
-truth, that Thucydidês was selected for this command expressly in
-consequence of his private influence in the region around. Yet this
-biographer still repeats the view generally taken, that Thucydidês
-did everything which an able commander could do, and was most
-unjustly condemned.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_674"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_674">[674]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 26.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_675"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_675">[675]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 104-108.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_676"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_676">[676]</a></span> This is the σταύρωμα, mentioned
-(v, 10) as existing a year and a half afterwards, at the time of the
-battle of Amphipolis. I shall say more respecting the topography of
-Amphipolis, when I come to describe that battle.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_677"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_677">[677]</a></span> See Grisebach, Reise durch
-Rumelien und Brura, vol. i, ch. viii, p. 226.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_678"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_678">[678]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 109.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_679"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_679">[679]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 110. καὶ αὐτὸν <em
-class="gesperrt">ἄνδρες ὀλίγοι ἐπῆγον κρύφα</em>, ἑτοῖμοι ὄντες τὴν
-πόλιν παραδοῦναι, iv, 113. Τῶν δὲ Τορωναίων γιγνομένης τῆς ἁλώσεως
-<em class="gesperrt">τὸ μὲν πολὺ, οὐδὲν εἰδὸς, ἐθορυβεῖτο</em>,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_680"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_680">[680]</a></span> Thucyd. iv. 114, 115. νομίσας
-ἄλλῳ τινὶ τρόπῳ ἢ ἀνθρωπείῳ τὴν ἅλωσιν γενέσθαι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_681"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_681">[681]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 119.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_682"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_682">[682]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 21.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_683"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_683">[683]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 108. Ὁ δὲ ἐς τὴν
-Λακεδαίμονα ἐφιέμενος στρατιάν τε προσαποστέλλειν ἐκέλευε.... Οἱ δὲ
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι τὰ μὲν καὶ φθόνῳ ἀπὸ τῶν πρώτων ἀνδρῶν οὐχ ὑπηρέτησαν
-αὐτῷ, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_684"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_684">[684]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 117. Τοὺς γὰρ δὴ
-ἄνδρας περὶ πλέονος ἐποιοῦντο κομίσασθαι, ὡς ἔτι Βρασίδας εὐτύχει·
-καὶ ἔμελλον, ἐπὶ μεῖζον χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος,
-τῶν μὲν στέρεσθαι, τοῖς δ᾽ ἐκ τοῦ ἴσου ἀμυνόμενοι κινδυνεύειν καὶ
-κρατήσειν.</p>
-
-<p>This is a perplexing passage, and the sense put upon it by the
-best commentators appears to me unsatisfactory.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold observes: “The sense required must be something of this
-sort. If Brasidas were still more successful, the consequence would
-be that they would lose their men taken at Sphakteria, and after all
-would run the risk of not being finally victorious.” To the same
-purpose, substantially Haack, Poppo, Göller, etc. But surely this is
-a meaning which cannot have been present to the mind of Thucydidês.
-For how could the fact, of Brasidas being <i>more successful</i>, cause
-the Lacedæmonians to lose the chance of regaining their prisoners?
-The larger the acquisitions of Brasidas, the greater chance did the
-Lacedæmonians stand of getting back their prisoners, because they
-would have more to give up in exchange for them. And the meaning
-proposed by the commentators, inadmissible under all circumstances,
-is still more excluded by the very words immediately preceding in
-Thucydidês: “The Lacedæmonians were above all things anxious to
-get back their prisoners, while Brasidas was yet in full success;”
-(for ὡς with ἔτι must mean substantially the same as ἕως.) It is
-impossible immediately after this, that he can go on to say: “Yet
-if Brasidas became <i>still more successful</i>, they would <i>lose</i> the
-chance of getting the prisoners back.” Bauer and Poppo, who notice
-this contradiction, profess to solve it by saying, “that if Brasidas
-pushed his successes farther, the Athenians would be seized with
-such violence of hatred and indignation, that they would put the
-prisoners to death.” Poppo supports this by appealing to iv, 41,
-which passage, however, will be found to carry no proof in the case:
-and the hypothesis is in itself inadmissible, put up to sustain an
-inadmissible meaning.</p>
-
-<p>Next, as to the words ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος (ἐπὶ μεῖζον
-χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος); Göller translates
-these: “Postquam Brasidas in majus profecisset, et <i>sua arma cum
-potestate Atheniensium æquasset</i>.” To the same purpose also Haack and
-Poppo. But if this were the meaning, it would seem to imply, that
-Brasidas had, as yet, done nothing and gained nothing; that his gains
-were all to be made during the future. Whereas the fact is distinctly
-the reverse, as Thucydidês himself has told us in the line preceding:
-Brasidas had already made immense acquisitions,—so great and serious,
-that the principal anxiety of the Lacedæmonians was to make use
-of what he had already gained as a means of getting back their
-prisoners, before the tide of fortune could turn against him.</p>
-
-<p>Again, the last part of the sentence is considered by Dr. Arnold
-and other commentators as corrupt; nor is it agreed to what previous
-subject τοῖς δὲ is intended to refer.</p>
-
-<p>So inadmissible, in my judgment, is the meaning assigned by the
-commentators to the general passage, that, if no other meaning could
-be found in the words, I should regard the whole sentence as corrupt
-in some way or other. But I think another meaning may be found.</p>
-
-<p>I admit that the words ἐπὶ μεῖζον χωρήσαντος αὐτοῦ <i>might</i>
-signify, “if he should arrive at greater success;” upon the analogy
-of i, 17, and i, 118, ἐπὶ πλεῖστον ἐχώρησαν δυνάμεως—ἐπὶ μέγα
-ἐχώρησαν δυνάμεως. But they do not necessarily, nor even naturally,
-bear this signification. Χωρεῖν ἐπὶ (with accus. case) means to
-<i>march upon</i>, to <i>aim at</i>, to <i>go at</i> or <i>go for</i> (adopting an
-English colloquial equivalent), ἐχώρουν ἐπὶ τὴν ἀντικρὺς ἐλευθερίαν
-(Thucyd. viii, 64). The phrase might be used, whether the person of
-whom it was affirmed succeeded in his object or not. I conceive that
-in this place the words mean: “if Brasidas should go at something
-greater;” if he should aim at, “or march upon, greater objects;”
-without affirming the point, one way or the other, whether he would
-attain or miss what he aimed at.</p>
-
-<p>Next, the words ἀντίπαλα καταστήσαντος do not refer, in my
-judgment, to the future gains of Brasidas, or to their magnitude
-and comparative avail in negotiation. The words rather mean: “if
-he should set out in open contest and hostility that which he
-had already acquired,” (thus exposing it to the chance of being
-lost), “if he should put himself and his already-acquired gains
-in battle-front against the enemy.” The meaning would be then
-substantially the same as καταστήσαντος ἑαυτὸν ἀντίπαλον. The two
-words here discussed are essentially obscure and elliptical, and
-every interpretation must proceed by bringing into light those ideas
-which they imperfectly indicate. Now, the interpretation which I
-suggest keeps quite as closely to the meaning of the two words as
-that of Haack and Göller; while it brings out a general sense, making
-the whole sentence, of which these two words form a part, distinct
-and instructive. The substantive, which would be understood along
-with ἀντίπαλα, would be τὰ πράγματα; or perhaps τὰ εὐτυχήματα,
-borrowed from the verb εὐτύχει, which immediately precedes.</p>
-
-<p>In the latter part of the sentence, I think that τοῖς δὲ refers
-to the same subject as ἀντίπαλα: in fact, ἀπὸ τοῦ ἴσου ἀμυνόμενοι is
-only a fuller expression of the same general idea as ἀντίπαλα.</p>
-
-<p>The whole sentence would then be construed thus: “For they were
-most anxious to recover their captives while Brasidas was yet in good
-fortune; while they were likely, if he should go at more, and put
-himself as he now stood into hostile contention, to remain deprived
-of their captives; and even in regard to their successes, to take the
-chance of danger or victory in equal conflict.”</p>
-
-<p>The sense here brought out is distinct and rational; and I think
-it lies fairly in the words. Thucydidês does not intend to represent
-the Lacedæmonians as feeling, that if Brasidas should <i>really gain</i>
-more than he had gained already, such further acquisition would
-be a disadvantage to them, and prevent them from recovering their
-captives. He represents them as preferring <i>the certainty</i> of those
-acquisitions which Brasidas had already made, to <i>the chance and
-hazard</i> of his aiming at greater; which could not be done without
-endangering that which was now secure, and not only secure, but
-sufficient, if properly managed, to procure the restoration of the
-captives.</p>
-
-<p>Poppo refers τοῖς δὲ to the Athenians: Göller refers it to the
-remaining Spartan military force, apart from the captives who were
-detained at Athens. The latter reference seems to me inadmissible,
-for τοῖς δὲ must signify some persons or things which have been
-before specified or indicated; and that which Göller supposes it to
-mean has not been before indicated. To refer it to the Athenians,
-with Poppo and Haack, in his second edition, we should have to look a
-great way back for the subject, and there is, moreover, a difficulty
-in construing ἀμυνόμενοι with the dative case. Otherwise, this
-reference would be admissible; though I think it better to refer
-τοῖς δὲ to the same subject as ἀντίπαλα. In the phrase κινδυνεύειν,
-or κινδυνεύσειν, for there seems no sufficient reason why this old
-reading should be altered, <em class="gesperrt">καὶ</em> κρατήσειν,
-the particle <em class="gesperrt">καὶ</em> has a disjunctive sense,
-of which there are analogous examples; see Kühner, Griechische
-Grammmatik, sect. 726, signifying, substantially, the same as ἢ:
-and examples even in Thucydidês, in such phrases as τοιαῦτα καὶ
-παραπλήσια (i, 22, 143), τοιαύτη καὶ ὅτι ἐγγύτατα τούτων, v, 74; see
-Poppo’s note on i, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_685"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_685">[685]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17. ἥμισυ τῆς οἰκίας
-τοῦ ἱεροῦ τότε τοῦ Διὸς οἰκοῦντα φόβῳ τῶν Λακεδαιμονίων.</p>
-
-<p>“The reason was, that he might be in sanctuary at an instant’s
-notice, and yet might be able to perform some of the common offices
-of life without profanation, which could not have been the case had
-the whole dwelling been within the sacred precinct.” (Dr. Arnold’s
-note.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_686"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_686">[686]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17, 18.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_687"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_687">[687]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 15. σφαλέντων
-δ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τῷ Δηλίῳ <em class="gesperrt">παραχρῆμα</em> οἱ
-Λακεδαιμόνιοι, γνόντες νῦν μᾶλλον ἂν ἐνδεξομένους, ποιοῦνται τὴν
-ἐνιαύσιον ἐκεχειρίαν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_688"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_688">[688]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 118; v, 43.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_689"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_689">[689]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 117. νομίσαντες
-Ἀθηναῖοι μὲν οὐκ ἂν ἔτι τὸν Βρασίδαν σφῶν προσαποστῆσαι οὐδὲν πρὶν
-παρασκευάσαιντο καθ᾽ ἡσυχίαν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_690"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_690">[690]</a></span> This appears from the form
-of the truce in Thucyd. iv, 118; it is prepared at Sparta, in
-consequence of a previous proposition from Athens; in sect. 6. οἱ δὲ
-ἰόντες, τέλος ἔχοντες ἰόντων, ᾗπερ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἡμᾶς κελεύετε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_691"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_691">[691]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 117. καὶ γενομένης
-ἀνακωχῆς κακῶν καὶ ταλαιπωρίας μᾶλλον ἐπιθυμήσειν (τοὺς Ἀθηναίους)
-αὐτοὺς πειρασαμένους ξυναλλαγῆναι, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_692"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_692">[692]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 119. The fourteenth
-of Elaphebolion, and the twelfth of Gerastius, designate the same
-day. The truce went ready-prepared from Sparta to Athens, together
-with envoys Spartan, Corinthian, Megarian, Sikyonian, and Epidaurian.
-The truce was accepted by the Athenian assembly, and sworn to
-at once by all the envoys as well as by three Athenian stratêgi
-(σπείσασθαι δὲ <em class="gesperrt">αὐτίκα μάλα</em> τὰς πρεσβείας ἐν
-τῷ δήμῳ τὰς παρούσας, iv, 118, 119); that day being fixed on as the
-commencement.</p>
-
-<p>The lunar months in different cities were never in precise
-agreement.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_693"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_693">[693]</a></span> See Aristophan. Aves, 188.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_694"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_694">[694]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 1-32. They might
-perhaps believe that the occupation of Delium had given offence to
-Apollo.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_695"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_695">[695]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 118 Περὶ δὲ
-τῶν χρημάτων τοῦ θεοῦ ἐπιμελεῖσθαι ὅπως <em class="gesperrt">τοὺς
-ἀδικοῦντας</em> ἐξευρήσομεν, etc. Dr. Thirlwall (Hist. Gr. vol. iii.
-ch. xxiii, p. 273) thinks that this article has reference to past
-appropriation of the Delphian treasure by the Peloponnesian alliance,
-for warlike purposes. Had such a reference been intended, we should
-probably have found the past participle, τοὺς ἀδικήσαντας: whereas
-the present participle, as it now stands, is perfectly general,
-designating acts future and contingent.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_696"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_696">[696]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 118: see Poppo’s
-note.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_697"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_697">[697]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 122.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_698"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_698">[698]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 120. ὄντες οὐδὲν
-ἄλλο ἢ νησιῶται, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_699"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_699">[699]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 121. Καὶ οἱ μὲν
-Σκιωναῖοι ἐπῄρθησάν τε τοῖς λόγοις, καὶ θαρσήσαντες πάντες ὁμοίως,
-καὶ οἷς πρότερον μὴ ἤρεσκε τὰ πρασσόμενα, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_700"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_700">[700]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 121. Καὶ δημοσίᾳ
-μὲν χρυσῷ στεφάνῳ ἀνέδησαν ὡς ἐλευθεροῦντα τὴν Ἑλλάδα, ἰδίᾳ τε
-ἐταινίουν τε καὶ προσήρχοντο ὥσπερ ἀθλητῇ.</p>
-
-<p>Compare Plutarch, Periklês, c. 28: compare also Krause (Olympia),
-sect. 17, p. 162 (Wien, 1838). It was customary to place a fillet of
-cloth or linen on the head of the victors at Olympia, before putting
-on the olive wreath.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_701"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_701">[701]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 122, 123.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_702"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_702">[702]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 123. Διὸ καὶ
-οἱ Μενδαῖοι μᾶλλον ἐτόλμησαν, τήν τε τοῦ Βρασίδου γνώμην ὁρῶντες
-ἑτοίμην, καὶ ἅμα τῶν <em class="gesperrt">πρασσόντων σφίσιν ὀλίγων
-τε ὄντων</em>, καὶ ὡς τότε ἐμέλλησαν οὐκέτι ἀνέντων, ἀλλὰ <em
-class="gesperrt">καταβιασαμένων παρὰ γνώμην τοὺς πολλούς</em>,
-iv, 130. ὁ δῆμος εὐθὺς ἀναλαβὼν τὰ ὅπλα περιοργὴς ἐχώρει ἐπί τε
-Πελοποννησίους <em class="gesperrt">καὶ τοὺς τὰ ἐναντία σφίσι μετ᾽
-αὐτῶν πράξαντας</em>, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The Athenians, after the conquest of the place, desire the
-Mendæans πολιτεύειν ὥσπερ εἰωθέσαν.</p>
-
-<p>Mendê is another case in which the bulk of the citizens were
-averse to revolt from Athens, in spite of neighboring example.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_703"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_703">[703]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 130.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_704"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_704">[704]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 123, 124.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_705"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_705">[705]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 130; Diodor. xii,
-72.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_706"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_706">[706]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 131.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_707"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_707">[707]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 124.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_708"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_708">[708]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 125.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_709"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_709">[709]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 126. Ἀγαθοῖς γὰρ
-εἶναι ὑμῖν προσήκει τὰ πολέμια, οὐ διὰ ξυμμάχων παρουσίαν ἑκάστοτε,
-ἀλλὰ δι᾽ οἰκείαν ἀρετὴν, καὶ μηδὲν πλῆθος πεφοβῆσθαι ἑτέρων, οἵ
-γε (μηδὲ) ἀπὸ πολιτειῶν τοιούτων ἥκετε, ἐν αἷς οὐ πολλοὶ ὀλίγων
-ἄρχουσιν, ἀλλὰ πλειόνων μᾶλλον ἐλάσσους· <em class="gesperrt">οὐκ
-ἄλλῳ τινὶ κτησάμενοι τὴν δυναστείαν ἢ τῷ μαχόμενοι κρατεῖν</em>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_710"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_710">[710]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 126. Οὔτε γὰρ τάξιν
-ἔχοντες αἰσχυνθεῖεν ἂν λιπεῖν τινα χώραν βιαζόμενοι· ἥ τε φυγὴ αὐτῶν
-καὶ ἡ ἔφοδος ἴσην ἔχουσα δόξαν τοῦ καλοῦ ἀνεξέλεγκτον καὶ τὸ ἀνδρεῖον
-ἔχει· αὐτοκράτωρ δὲ μάχη μάλιστ᾽ ἂν καὶ πρόφασιν τοῦ σῴζεσθαί (se
-sauver) τινι πρεπόντως πορίσειε.</p>
-
-<p>Σαφῶς τε πᾶν τὸ προϋπάρχον δεινὸν ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν ὁρᾶτε, ἔργῳ μὲν βραχὺ
-ὂν, ὄψει δὲ καὶ ἀκοῇ κατάσπερχον. Ὃ ὑπομείναντες ἐπιφερόμενον, καὶ
-ὅταν καιρὸς ᾖ, κόσμῳ καὶ τάξει αὖθις ὑπαγαγόντες, ἔς τε τὸ ἀσφαλὲς
-θᾶσσον ἀφίξεσθε, καὶ γνώσεσθε τὸ λοιπὸν ὅτι οἱ τοιοῦτοι ὄχλοι τοῖς
-μὲν τὴν πρώτην ἔφοδον δεξαμένοις <em class="gesperrt">ἄποθεν ἀπειλαῖς
-τὸ ἀνδρεῖον μελλήσει ἐπικομποῦσιν</em>, οἳ δ᾽ ἂν εἴξωσιν αὐτοῖς, κατὰ
-πόδας τὸ εὔψυχον ἐν τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ ὀξεῖς ἐπιδείκνυνται.</p>
-
-<p>The word μέλλησις which occurs twice in this chapter in regard to
-the Illyrians, is very expressive and at the same time difficult to
-translate into any other language,—“what they seem on the point of
-doing, but never realize.” See also i, 69.</p>
-
-<p>The speech of the Roman consul Manlius, in describing the Gauls,
-deserves to be compared: “Procera corpora, promissæ et rutilatæ
-comæ, vasta scuta, prælongi gladii: ad hoc cantus ineuntium prælium,
-et ululatus et tripudia, et quatientium scuta in patrium quendam
-morem horrendus armorum crepitus: <i>omnia de industriâ composita ad
-terrorem</i>” (Livy, xxxviii, 17.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_711"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_711">[711]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 81. See above,
-<a href="#Chap_48">chap. xlviii</a>, of this History.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_712"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_712">[712]</a></span> See the memorable remarks of
-Hippokratês and Aristotle on the difference in respect of courage
-between Europeans and Asiatics, as well as between Hellens and
-non-Hellens (Hippokratês, De Aëre, Locis, et Aquis, c. 24, ed.
-Littré, sect. 116, <i>seq.</i>, ed. Petersen; Aristotel. Politic. vii, 6,
-1-5), and the conversation between Xerxes and Demaratus (Herodot.
-vii, 103, 104).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_713"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_713">[713]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 128. It is not
-possible clearly to understand this passage without some knowledge
-of the ground to which it refers. I presume that the regular road
-through the defile, along which the main army of Brasidas passed,
-was long and winding, making the ascent to the top very gradual, but
-at the same time exposed on both sides from the heights above. The
-detachment of three hundred scaled the steep heights on one side, and
-drove away the enemy, thus making it impossible for him to remain any
-longer even in the main road. But I do not suppose, with Dr. Arnold,
-that the main army of Brasidas followed the three hundred, and “broke
-out of the valley by scaling one of its sides:” they pursued the main
-road, as soon as it was cleared for them.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_714"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_714">[714]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 127, 128.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_715"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_715">[715]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 128-132. Some
-lines of the comic poet Hermippus are preserved (in the Φορμοφόροι,
-Meineke, Fragm. p. 407) respecting Sitalkês and Perdikkas. Among the
-presents brought home by Dionysus in his voyage, there is numbered
-“the itch from Sitalkês, intended for the Lacedæmonians, and many
-shiploads of lies from Perdikkas.” Καὶ παρὰ Περδίκκου ψεύδη ναυσὶν
-πάνυ πολλαῖς.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_716"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_716">[716]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 132.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_717"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_717">[717]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 132. Καὶ <em
-class="gesperrt">τῶν ἡβώντων αὐτῶν</em> παρανόμως ἄνδρας ἐξῆγον
-ἐκ Σπάρτης, ὥστε τῶν πόλεων ἄρχοντας καθιστάναι καὶ μὴ <em
-class="gesperrt">τοῖς ἐντυχοῦσιν</em> ἐπιτρέπειν.</p>
-
-<p>Most of the commentators translate ἡβώντων, “<i>young men</i>,” which
-is not the usual meaning of the word: it signifies, “<i>men of military
-age</i>,” which includes both young and middle-aged. If we compare iv,
-132 with iii, 36, v, 32, and v, 116, we shall see that ἡβῶντες really
-has this larger meaning: compare also μέχρι ἥβης (ii, 46), which
-means, “until the age of military service commenced.”</p>
-
-<p>It is not therefore necessary to suppose that the men taken out by
-Ischagoras were very young, for example that they were below the age
-of thirty, as Manso, O. Müller, and Göller would have us believe. It
-is enough that they were within the limits of the military age, both
-ways.</p>
-
-<p>Considering the extraordinary reverence paid to old age at Sparta,
-it is by no means wonderful that old men should have been thought
-exclusively fitted for such commands, in the ancient customs and
-constitution.</p>
-
-<p>The extensive operations, however, in which Sparta became involved
-through the Peloponnesian war, would render it impossible to maintain
-such a maxim in practice: but at this moment, the step was still
-recognized as a departure from a received maxim, and is characterized
-as such by Thucydidês under the term παρανόμως.</p>
-
-<p>I explain τοῖς ἐντυχοῦσιν to refer to the case of men <i>not
-Spartans</i> being named to these posts: see in reference to this point,
-the stress which Brasidas lays on the fact that Klearidas was a
-Spartan, Thucyd. v, 9.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_718"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_718">[718]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 135.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_719"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_719">[719]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 5; iv, 133; Pausan.
-ii, 17, 7; iii, 5, 6. Hellanikus (a contemporary of Thucydidês, but
-somewhat older, coming in point of age between him and Herodotus)
-had framed a chronological series of these priestesses of Hêrê, with
-a history of past events belonging to the supposed times of each.
-And such was the Pan-Hellenic importance of the temple at this time,
-that Thucydidês, when he describes accurately the beginning of the
-Peloponnesian war, tells us, as one of his indications of time, that
-Chrysis had then been forty-eight years priestess at the Heræum.
-To employ the series of Olympic prize-runners and Olympiads as a
-continuous distribution of time, was a practice which had not yet got
-footing.</p>
-
-<p>The catalogue of these priestesses of Hêrê, beginning with
-mythical and descending to historical names, is illustrated by the
-inscription belonging to the temple of Halikarnassus in Boeckh,
-Corpus Inscr. No. 2655: see Boeckh’s Commentary, and Preller,
-Hellanici Fragmenta, pp. 34, 46.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_720"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_720">[720]</a></span> Xenophon, Memorabil. iii, 5,
-6.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_721"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_721">[721]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 133.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_722"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_722">[722]</a></span> This seems to me the most
-reasonable sense to put upon the much-debated passage of Thucyd. v,
-1. Τοῦ δ᾽ ἐπιγιγνομένου θέρους αἱ μὲν ἐνιαύσιοι σπονδαὶ διελέλυντο
-μέχρι τῶν Πυθίων· καὶ ἐν τῇ <em class="gesperrt">ἐκεχειρίᾳ</em>
-Ἀθηναῖοι Δηλίους ἀνέστησαν ἐκ Δήλου; again, v, 2. Κλέων δὲ
-Ἀθηναίους πείσας ἐς τὰ ἐπὶ Θρᾴκης χωρία ἐξέπλευσε μετὰ τὴν <em
-class="gesperrt">ἐκεχειρίαν</em>, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Thucydidês says here, that “the truce was dissolved:” the bond
-imposed upon both parties was untied, and both resumed their natural
-liberty. But he does not say that “<i>hostilities recommenced</i>” before
-the Pythia, as Göller and other critics affirm that he says. The
-interval between the 14th of the month Elaphebolion and the Pythian
-festival was one in which there was no binding truce any longer in
-force, and yet no actual hostilities: it was an ἀνακωχὴ ἄσπονδος, to
-use the words of Thucydidês, when he describes the relations between
-Corinth and Athens in the ensuing year (v, 32).</p>
-
-<p>The word ἐκεχειρία here means, in my judgment, the truce
-proclaimed at the season of the Pythian festival,—quite distinct
-from the truce for one year which had expired a little while before.
-The change of the word in the course of one line from σπονδαὶ to
-ἐκεχειρία marks this distinction.</p>
-
-<p>I agree with Dr. Arnold, dissenting both from M. Boeckh and from
-Mr. Clinton, in his conception of the events of this year. Kleon
-sailed on his expedition to Thrace after the Pythian holy truce, in
-the beginning of August: between that date and the end of September,
-happened the capture of Torônê and the battle of Amphipolis. But
-the way in which Dr. Arnold defends his opinion is not at all
-satisfactory. In the Dissertation appended to his second volume of
-Thucydidês (p. 458), he says: “The words in Thucydidês αἱ ἐνιαύσιοι
-σπονδαὶ διελέλυντο μέχρι Πυθίων, mean, as I understand them, ‘that
-the truce for a year had <i>lasted on</i> till the Pythian games, and then
-ended:’ that is, instead of expiring on the 14th of Elaphebolion, it
-had been <i>tacitly continued</i> nearly four months longer, till after
-midsummer: and it was not till the middle of Hekatombæon that Cleon
-was sent out to recover Amphipolis.”</p>
-
-<p>Such a construction of the word διελέλυντο appears to me
-inadmissible, nor is Dr. Arnold’s defence of it, p. 454, of much
-value: σπονδὰς διαλύειν is an expression well known to Thucydidês
-(iv, 23; v, 36), “to dissolve the truce.” I go along with Boeckh and
-Mr. Clinton in construing the words, except that I strike out what
-they introduce from their own imagination. They say: “The truce was
-ended, and <i>the war again renewed</i>, up to the time of the Pythian
-games.” Thucydidês only says “that the truce was dissolved;” he does
-not say “<i>that the war was renewed</i>.” It is not at all necessary
-to Dr. Arnold’s conception of the facts that the words should be
-translated as he proposes. His remarks also (p. 460) upon the
-relation of the Athenians to the Pythian games, appear to me just:
-but he does not advert to the fact, which would have strengthened
-materially what he there says, that the Athenians had been excluded
-from Delphi and from the Pythian festival between the commencement
-of the war and the one year’s truce. I conceive that the Pythian
-games were celebrated about July or August. In an earlier part of
-this History (ch. xxviii, vol. iv, p. 67), I said that they were
-celebrated in <i>autumn</i>; it ought rather to be “towards the end of
-summer.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_723"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_723">[723]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 16. Κλέων τε καὶ
-Βρασίδας, οἵπερ ἀμφοτέρωθεν μάλιστα ἠναντιοῦντο τῇ εἰρήνῃ, ὁ μὲν, διὰ
-τὸ εὐτυχεῖν τε καὶ τιμᾶσθαι ἐκ τοῦ πολεμεῖν, ὁ δὲ, γενομένης ἡσυχίας
-καταφανέστερος νομίζων ἂν εἶναι κακουργῶν, καὶ ἀπιστότερος διαβάλλων,
-etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_724"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_724">[724]</a></span> Plutarch, Phokion, c. 16.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_725"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_725">[725]</a></span> See the speeches of Athenagoras
-and Hermokratês, Thucyd. vi, 33-36.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_726"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_726">[726]</a></span> Plutarch, Periklês, c.
-33-35.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_727"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_727">[727]</a></span> Thucyd. i, 142, 143,
-144; ii, 13. καὶ τὸ ναυτικὸν ᾗπερ ἰσχύουσιν ἐξαρτύεσθαι, <em
-class="gesperrt">τά τε τῶν ξυμμάχων διὰ χειρὸς ἔχειν</em>—λέγων τὴν
-ἰσχὺν αὐτοῖς ἀπὸ τούτων εἶναι τῶν χρημάτων τῆς προσόδου, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_728"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_728">[728]</a></span> Thucyd. ii, 63. Τῆς δὲ πόλεως
-ὑμᾶς εἰκὸς τῷ τιμωμένῳ ἀπὸ τοῦ ἄρχειν, ᾧπερ ἅπαντες ἀγάλλεσθε,
-βοηθεῖν, καὶ μὴ φεύγειν τοὺς πόνους ἢ μηδὲ τὰς τιμὰς διώκειν, etc. c.
-62, αἴσχιον δὲ, ἔχοντας ἀφαιρεθῆναι ἢ κτωμένους ἀτυχῆσαι. Contrast
-the tenor of the two speeches of Periklês (Thucyd. i, 140-144; ii,
-60-64) with the description which Thucydidês gives of the simple
-“avoidance of risk,” (τὸ ἀκίνδυνον), which characterized Nikias (v.
-16).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_729"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_729">[729]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7. καὶ οἴκοθεν ὡς
-ἄκοντες αὐτῷ ξυνῆλθον.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_730"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_730">[730]</a></span> The town of Torônê was situated
-near the extremity of the Sithonian peninsula, on the side looking
-towards Pallênê. But the territory belonging to the town comprehended
-all the extremity of the peninsula on both sides, including the
-terminating point Cape Ampelos,—Ἄμπελον τὴν Τορωναίην ἄκρην (Herodot.
-vii, 122). Herodotus calls the Singitic gulf θάλασσαν τὴν ἄντιον
-Τορώνης (vii, 122).</p>
-
-<p>The ruins of Torônê, bearing the ancient name, and Kufo, a
-land-locked harbor near it, are still to be seen (Leake, Travels in
-Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxiv, p. 119).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_731"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_731">[731]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 3.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_732"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_732">[732]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7. Ὁ δὲ Κλέων τέως
-μὲν ἡσύχαζεν, ἔπειτα δὲ <em class="gesperrt">ἠναγκάσθη</em> ποιῆσαι
-ὅπερ ὁ Βρασίδας προσεδέχετο. Τῶν γὰρ στρατιωτῶν ἀχθομένων μὲν τῇ
-ἕδρᾳ, ἀναλογιζομένων δὲ τὴν ἐκείνου ἡγεμονίαν, πρὸς οἵαν ἐμπειρίαν
-καὶ τόλμαν μεθ᾽ οἵας ἀνεπιστημοσύνης καὶ μαλακίας γενήσοιτο, καὶ
-οἴκοθεν ὡς ἄκοντες αὐτῷ ξυνῆλθον, αἰσθόμενος τὸν θροῦν, καὶ οὐ
-βουλόμενος αὐτοὺς διὰ τὸ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ καθημένους βαρύνεσθαι, ἀναλαβὼν
-ἦγε.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_733"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_733">[733]</a></span> Thucyd. iv, 102. Ἀπὸ τῆς νῦν
-πόλεως, ἣν Ἀμφίπολιν Ἅγνων ὠνόμασεν, ὅτι ἐπ᾽ ἀμφότερα περιῤῥέοντος
-τοῦ Στρύμονος, διὰ τὸ περιέχειν αὐτὴν, τείχει μακρῷ ἀπολαβὼν
-ἐκ ποταμοῦ ἐς ποταμὸν, περιφανῆ ἐς θάλασσάν τε καὶ τὴν ἤπειρον
-ᾤκισεν.</p>
-
-<p>Ὁ καλλιγέφυρος ποταμὸς Στρύμων, Euripid. Rhesus, 346.</p>
-
-<p>I annex a plan which will convey some idea of the hill of
-Amphipolis and the circumjacent territory: compare the plan in
-Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iii, ch. xxv, p.
-191, and that from Mr. Hawkins, which is annexed to the third volume
-of Dr. Arnold’s Thucydidês, combined with a Dissertation which
-appears in the second volume of the same work, p. 450. See also the
-remarks in Kutzen, De Atheniensium imperio circa Strymonem, ch.
-ii, pp. 18-21; Weissenborn, Beiträge zur genaueren Erforschung der
-alt-griechischen Geschichte, pp. 152-156; Cousinéry, Voyage dans la
-Macédoine, vol. i, ch. iv, p. 124, <i>seq.</i></p>
-
-<p>Colonel Leake supposes the ancient bridge to have been at the
-same point of the river as the modern bridge; that is, north of
-Amphipolis, and a little westward of the corner of the lake. On this
-point I differ from him, and have placed it, with Dr. Arnold, near
-the southeastern end of the reach of the Strymon, which flows round
-Amphipolis. But there is another circumstance, in which Col. Leake’s
-narrative corrects a material error in Dr. Arnold’s Dissertation.
-Colonel Leake particularly notices the high ridge which connects the
-hill of Amphipolis with Mount Pangæus to the eastward (pp. 182, 183,
-191-194), whereas Dr. Arnold represents them as separated by a deep
-ravine (p. 451): upon which latter supposition the whole account of
-Kleon’s march and survey appears to me unintelligible.</p>
-
-<p>The epithet which Thucydidês gives to Amphipolis, “conspicuous
-both towards the sea and towards the land,” which occasions some
-perplexity to the commentators, appears to me one of obvious
-propriety. Amphipolis was indeed situated on a hill; so were many
-other towns: but its peculiarity was, that on three sides it had no
-wall to interrupt the eye of the spectator: one of those sides was
-towards the sea.</p>
-
-<p>Kutzen and Cousinéry make the long wall to be the segment of a
-curve highly bent, touching the river at both ends. But I agree with
-Weissenborn that this is inadmissible; and that the words “long wall”
-imply something near a straight direction.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_734"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_734">[734]</a></span> Ἀπέχει δὲ τὸ πόλισμα πλέον τῆς
-διαβάσεως: see <a href="#Footnote_660">a note a few pages ago</a>
-upon these words. This does not necessarily imply that the bridge was
-at any considerable distance from the extreme point where the long
-wall touched the river to the south: but this latter point was a good
-way off from the town properly so called, which occupied the higher
-slope of the hill. We are not to suppose that the <i>whole</i> space
-between the long wall and the river was covered by buildings.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_735"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_735">[735]</a></span> Thucyd. v. 10. Καὶ ὁ μὲν
-(Brasidas) κατὰ τὰς ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλας, καὶ τὰς πρώτας τοῦ μακροῦ
-τείχους τότε ὄντος ἐξελθὼν, ἔθει δρόμῳ τὴν ὁδὸν ταύτην εὐθεῖαν, ᾗπερ
-νῦν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The explanation which I have here given to the word σταύρωμα
-is not given by any one else; but it appears to me the only one
-calculated to impart clearness and consistency to the whole
-narrative.</p>
-
-<p>When Brasidas surprised Amphipolis first, the bridge was
-completely unconnected with the Long Wall, and at a certain distance
-from it. But when Thucydidês wrote his history, there were a pair
-of <i>connecting walls</i> between the bridge and the fortifications of
-the city as they then stood—οὐ καθεῖτο τείχη ὥσπερ νῦν (iv, 103):
-the whole fortifications of the city had been altered during the
-intermediate period.</p>
-
-<p>Now the question is, was the Long Wall of Amphipolis connected
-or unconnected with the bridge, at the time of the conflict between
-Brasidas and Kleon? Whoever reads the narrative of Thucydidês
-attentively will see, I think, that they must have been connected,
-though Thucydidês does not in express terms specify the fact. For
-if the bridge had been detached from the wall, as it was when
-Brasidas surprised the place first, the hill of Kerdylium on the
-opposite side of the river would have been an unsafe position for
-him to occupy. He might have been cut off from Amphipolis by an
-enemy attacking the bridge. But we shall find him remaining quietly
-on the hill of Kerdylium with the perfect certainty of entering
-Amphipolis at any moment that he chose. If it be urged that the
-bridge, though unconnected with the Long Wall, might still be under
-a strong separate guard, I reply, that on that supposition an enemy
-from Eion would naturally attack the bridge first. To have to defend
-a bridge completely detached from the city, simply by means of a
-large constant guard, would materially aggravate the difficulties of
-Brasidas. If it had been possible to attack the bridge separately
-from the city, something must have been said about it in describing
-the operations of Kleon, who is represented as finding nothing to
-meddle with except the fortifications of the town.</p>
-
-<p>Assuming, then, that there was such a line of connection between
-the bridge and the Long Wall, added by Brasidas since the first
-capture of the place, I know no meaning so natural to give to the
-word σταύρωμα. No other distinct meaning is proposed by any one.
-There was, of course, a gate, or more than one, in the Long Wall,
-leading into the space inclosed by the palisade; through this gate
-Brasidas would enter the town when he crossed from Kerdylium. This
-gate is called by Thucydidês αἱ ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλαι. There must
-have been also a gate, or more than one, in the palisade itself,
-leading into the space without: so that passengers or cattle
-traversing the bridge from the westward and going to Myrkinus (<i>e.
-g.</i>) would not necessarily be obliged to turn out of their way and
-enter the town of Amphipolis.</p>
-
-<p>On the plan which I have here given, the line running nearly
-from north to south represents the Long Wall of Agnon, touching the
-river at both ends, and bounding as well as fortifying the town of
-Amphipolis on its eastern side.</p>
-
-<p>The shorter line, which cuts off the southern extremity of
-this Long Wall, and joins the river immediately below the bridge,
-represents the σταύρωμα, or palisade: probably it was an earthen
-mound and ditch, with a strong palisade at the top.</p>
-
-<p>By means of this palisade, the bridge was included in the
-fortifications of Amphipolis, and Brasidas could pass over from Mount
-Kerdylium into the city whenever he pleased.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_736"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_736">[736]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7; compare Colonel
-Leake, <i>l. c.</i> p. 182; αὐτὸς ἐθεᾶτο τὸ λιμνῶδες τοῦ Στρύμονος, καὶ
-τὴν θέσιν τῆς πόλεως ἐπὶ τῇ Θρᾴκῃ, ὡς ἔχοι.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_737"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_737">[737]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7. Κατὰ θέαν
-δὲ μᾶλλον ἔφη ἀναβαίνειν τοῦ χωρίου, καὶ τὴν μείζω παρασκευὴν
-περιέμενεν, οὐχ ὡς τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ, ἢν ἀναγκάζηται, περισχήσων, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς
-κύκλῳ περιστὰς βίᾳ αἱρήσων τὴν πόλιν.</p>
-
-<p>The words οὐχ ὡς τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ, etc. do not refer to μείζω
-παρασκευὴν, as the Scholiast, with whom Dr. Arnold agrees, considers
-them, but to the general purpose and dispositions of Kleon. “He
-marched up, not like one who is abundantly provided with means of
-safety, in case of being put on his defence; but like one who is
-going to surround the city and take it at once.”</p>
-
-<p>Nor do these last words represent any real design conceived in the
-mind of Kleon (for Amphipolis from its locality <i>could not be really
-surrounded</i>), but are merely given as illustrating the careless
-confidence of his march from Eion up to the ridge: in the same manner
-as Herodotus describes the forward rush of the Persians before
-the battle of Platæa, to overtake the Greeks whom they supposed
-to be running away—Καὶ οὗτοι μὲν βοῇ τε καὶ ὁμίλῳ ἐπήισαν, ὡς <em
-class="gesperrt">ἀναρπασόμενοι</em> τοὺς Ἕλληνας (ix, 59): compare
-viii, 28.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_738"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_738">[738]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7. ὥστε καὶ μηχανὰς
-ὅτι οὐκ κατῆλθεν ἔχων, ἁμαρτεῖν ἐδόκει· ἑλεῖν γὰρ ἂν τὴν πόλιν διὰ τὸ
-ἐρῆμον.</p>
-
-<p>I apprehend that the verb κατῆλθεν refers to the coming
-of the armament to Eion: analogous to what is said v, 2, <em
-class="gesperrt">κατέπλευσεν</em> ἐς τὸν Τορωναίων λιμένα: compare i,
-51; iii, 4, etc. The march from Eion up to the ridge could not well
-be expressed by the word κατῆλθεν: but the arrival of the expedition
-at the Strymon, the place of its destination, might be so described.
-Battering-engines would be brought from nowhere else but from
-Athens.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Arnold interprets the word κατῆλθεν to mean that Kleon
-had first marched up to a higher point, and then descended from
-this point upon Amphipolis. But I contest the correctness of this
-assumption, as a matter of topography: it does not appear to me that
-Kleon ever reached any point higher than the summit of the hill
-and wall of Amphipolis. Besides, even if he had reached a higher
-point of the mountain, he could not well talk of “bringing down
-battering-machines <i>from that point</i>.”</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_739"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_739">[739]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 6. Βρασίδας
-δὲ—ἀντεκάθητο καὶ αὐτὸς ἐπὶ τῷ Κερδυλίῳ· ἔστι δὲ τὸ χωρίον τοῦτο
-Ἀργιλίων, πέραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ, οὐ πολὺ ἀπέχον τῆς Ἀμφιπόλεως, καὶ
-<em class="gesperrt">κατεφαίνετο πάντα αὐτόθεν, ὥστε οὐκ ἂν ἔλαθεν
-αὐτόθεν ὁρμώμενος ὁ Κλέων τῷ στρατῷ</em>, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_740"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_740">[740]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 8.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_741"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_741">[741]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 9. Τοὺς γὰρ
-ἐναντίους εἰκάζω καταφρονήσει τε ἡμῶν καὶ οὐκ ἂν ἐλπίσαντας ὡς
-ἂν ἐπεξέλθοι τις αὐτοῖς ἐς μάχην, ἀναβῆναί τε πρὸς τὸ χωρίον, καὶ
-νῦν ἀτάκτως κατὰ θέαν τετραμμένους ὀλιγωρεῖν.... Ἕως οὖν ἔτι <em
-class="gesperrt">ἀπαράσκευοι θαρσοῦσι</em>, καὶ τοῦ ὑπαπιέναι
-πλέον ἢ τοῦ μένοντος, ἐξ ὧν ἐμοὶ φαίνονται, τὴν διάνοιαν ἔχουσιν,
-<em class="gesperrt">ἐν τῷ ἀνειμένῳ αὐτῶν τῆς γνώμης, καὶ πρὶν
-ξυνταχθῆναι μᾶλλον τὴν δόξαν</em>, ἐγὼ μὲν, etc.</p>
-
-<p>The words τὸ ἀνειμένον τῆς γνώμης are full of significance in
-regard to ancient military affairs. The Grecian hoplites, even the
-best of them, required to be peculiarly <i>wound up</i> for a battle;
-hence the necessity of the harangue from the general which always
-preceded. Compare Xenophon’s eulogy of the manœuvres of Epameinondas
-before the battle of Mantineia, whereby he made the enemy fancy that
-he was not going to fight, and took down the preparation in the minds
-of their soldiers for battle: ἔλυσε μὲν τῶν πλείστων πολεμίων τὴν
-ἐν ταῖς ψυχαῖς πρὸς μάχην παρασκευὴν, etc. (Xenoph. Hellen. vii, 5,
-22.)</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_742"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_742">[742]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 10. Τῷ δὲ Κλέωνι,
-φανεροῦ γενομένου αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ Κερδυλίου καταβάντος καὶ ἐν τῇ πόλει
-ἐπιφανεῖ οὔσῃ ἔξωθεν περὶ τὸ ἱεροῦ τῆς Ἀθηνᾶς θυομένου καὶ ταῦτα
-πράσσοντος, ἀγγέλλεται (προὐκεχωρήκει γὰρ τότε κατὰ τὴν θέαν) ὅτι ἥ
-τε στρατιὰ ἅπασα φανερὰ τῶν πολεμίων ἐν τῇ πόλει, etc.</p>
-
-<p>Kleon did not himself <i>see</i> Brasidas sacrificing, or see the
-enemy’s army within the city; others on the lower ground were better
-situated for seeing what was going on in Amphipolis, than he was
-while on the high ridge. Others saw it, and gave intimation to
-him.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_743"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_743">[743]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 10. Οἱ ἄνδρες ἡμᾶς
-οὐ μένουσι (q. μενοῦσι?)· δῆλοι δὲ τῶν τε δοράτων τῇ κινήσει καὶ
-τῶν κεφαλῶν· οἷς γὰρ ἂν τοῦτο γίγνηται, οὐκ εἰώθασι μένειν τοὺς
-ἐπιόντας.</p>
-
-<p>This is a remarkable illustration of the regular movement of
-heads and spears, which characterized a well-ordered body of Grecian
-hoplites.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_744"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_744">[744]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 10. Καὶ ὁ μὲν, κατὰ
-τὰς ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλας, καὶ τὰς πρώτας τοῦ μακροῦ τείχους τότε
-ὄντος ἐξελθὼν, ἔθει δρόμῳ τὴν ὁδὸν ταύτην εὐθεῖαν, ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ
-καρτερώτατον τοῦ χωρίου ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε.</p>
-
-<p>Brasidas and his men sallied forth by two different gates at the
-same time. One was the first gate in the Long Wall, which would be
-the first gate in order, to a person coming from the southward. The
-other was the <i>gate upon the palisade</i> (αἱ ἐπὶ τὸ σταύρωμα πύλαι),
-that is, the gate in the Long Wall which opened <i>from the town upon
-the palisade</i>. The persons who sallied out by this gate would get out
-to attack the enemy by the gate in the palisade itself.</p>
-
-<p>The gate in the Long Wall which opened from the town upon the
-palisade, would be that by which Brasidas himself with his army
-entered Amphipolis from Mount Kerdylium. It probably stood open at
-this moment when he directed the sally forth: that which had to be
-opened at the moment, was the gate in the palisade, together with the
-first gate in the Long Wall.</p>
-
-<p>The last words cited in Thucydidês—ᾗπερ νῦν κατὰ τὸ καρτερώτατον
-τοῦ χωρίου ἰόντι τὸ τροπαῖον ἕστηκε—are not intelligible without
-better knowledge of the topography than we possess. What Thucydidês
-means by “the strongest point in the place,” we cannot tell. We only
-understand that the trophy was erected in the road by which a person
-went up to that point. We must recollect that the expressions of
-Thucydidês here refer to the ground as it stood sometime afterwards,
-not as it stood at the time of the battle between Kleon and
-Brasidas.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_745"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_745">[745]</a></span> It is almost painful to
-read the account given by Diodorus (xii, 73, 74) of the battle of
-Amphipolis, when one’s mind is full of the distinct and admirable
-narrative of Thucydidês, only defective by being too brief. It is
-difficult to believe that Diodorus is describing the same event;
-so totally different are all the circumstances, except that the
-Lacedæmonians at last gain the victory. To say, with Wesseling in his
-note, “Hæc <i>non usquequaque</i> conveniunt Thucydideis,” is prodigiously
-below the truth.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_746"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_746">[746]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 11. Aristotle, a
-native of Stageirus near to Amphipolis, cites the sacrifices rendered
-to Brasidas as an instance of institutions established by special and
-local enactment (Ethic. Nikomach. v, 7).</p>
-
-<p>In reference to the aversion now entertained by the Amphipolitans
-to the continued worship of Agnon as their œkist, compare the
-discourse addressed by the Platæans to the Lacedæmonians, pleading
-for mercy. The Thebans, if they became possessors of the Platæid,
-would not continue the sacrifices to the gods who had granted victory
-at the great battle of Platæa, nor funereal mementos to the slain
-(Thucyd. iii, 58).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_747"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_747">[747]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 7. Καὶ ἐχρήσατο τῷ
-τρόπῳ ᾧπερ καὶ ἐς τὴν Πύλον εὐτυχήσας ἐπίστευσέ τι φρονεῖν· ἐς μάχην
-μὲν γὰρ οὐδὲ ἤλπισέν οἱ ἐπεξιέναι οὐδένα, κατὰ θέαν δὲ μᾶλλον ἔφη
-ἀναβαίνειν τοῦ χωρίου, καὶ τὴν μείζω παρασκευὴν περιέμενεν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_748"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_748">[748]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 10. Οἰόμενος
-φθήσεσθαι ἀπελθὼν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_749"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_749">[749]</a></span> Contrast the brave death of the
-Lacedæmonian general Anaxibius, when he found himself out-generalled
-and surprised by the Athenian Iphikratês (Xenoph. Hellen. iv, 8,
-38).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_750"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_750">[750]</a></span> Amphipolis was actually thus
-attacked by the Athenians eight years afterwards, by ships on the
-Strymon, Thucyd. vii, 9. Εὐετίων στρατηγὸς Ἀθηναίων, μετὰ Περδίκκου
-στρατεύσας ἐπ᾽ Ἀμφίπολιν Θρᾳξὶ πολλοῖς, τὴν μὲν πόλιν οὐχ εἷλεν,
-ἐς δὲ τὸν Στρύμονα περικομίσας τριήρεις ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ ἐπολιόρκει,
-ὁρμώμενος ἐξ Ἱμεραίου. (In the eighteenth year of the war.) But the
-fortifications of the place seem to have been materially altered
-during the interval. Instead of one long wall, with three sides open
-to the river, it seems to have acquired a curved wall, only open to
-the river on a comparatively narrow space near to the lake; while
-this curved wall joined the bridge southerly by means of a parallel
-pair of long walls with road between.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_751"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_751">[751]</a></span> Plato, Symp. c. 36, p. 221.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_752"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_752">[752]</a></span> Thuc. iv, 81. δόξας εἶναι κατὰ
-πάντα ἀγαθὸς, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_753"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_753">[753]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 116.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_754"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_754">[754]</a></span> Aristophan. Equit. 55,
-391, 740, etc. In one passage of the play, Kleon is reproached
-with pretending to be engaged at Argos in measures for winning
-the alliance of that city, but in reality, under cover of this
-proceeding, carrying on clandestine negotiations with the
-Lacedæmonians (464). In two other passages, he is denounced as
-being the person who obstructs the conclusion of peace with the
-Lacedæmonians (790, 1390).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_755"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_755">[755]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17; iii,
-45. καταφανέστερος μὲν εἶναι κακουργῶν, καὶ ἀπιστότερος
-διαβάλλων—βιαιότατος τῶν πολιτῶν.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_756"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_756">[756]</a></span> Aristophan. Acharn. 8, with the
-Scholiast, who quotes from Theopompus. Theopompus, Fragment, 99, 100,
-101, ed. Didot.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_757"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_757">[757]</a></span> The public speaking of Kleon
-was characterized by Aristotle and Theopompus (see Schol. ad Lucian.
-Timon, c. 30), not as wheedling, but as full of arrogance; in this
-latter point too like that of the elder Cato at Rome (Plutarch,
-Cato, c. 14). The derisory tone of Cato in his public speaking, too,
-is said to have been impertinent and disgusting (Plutarch, Reipub.
-Gerend. Præcept. p. 803, c. 7).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_758"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_758">[758]</a></span> An epigram which Plutarch
-(Cato, c. 1) gives us from a poet contemporary of Cato the Censor,
-describes him:—</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Πυῤῥὸν, <em class="gesperrt">πανδακέτην</em>, γλαυκόμματον, οὐδὲ θανόντα</p>
-<p class="i2">Πόρκιον εἰς Ἀΐδην Περσεφόνη δέχεται.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<p class="mt1">Livy says, in an eloquent encomium on Cato (xxxix,
-40): “Simultates nimio plures et exercuerunt eum, et ipse exercuit
-eas: nec facile dixeris utrum magis presserit eum nobilitas, an ille
-agitaverit nobilitatem. Asperi procul dubio animi, et linguæ acerbæ
-et immodice liberæ fuit: sed invicti a cupiditatibus animi et rigidæ
-innocentiæ: contemptor gratiæ, divitiarum.... Hunc sicut omni vitâ,
-tum censuram petentem premebat nobilitas; coierantque candidati omnes
-ad dejiciendum honore eum; non solum ut ipsi potius adipiscerentur,
-nec quia indignabantur novum hominem censorem videre; sed etiam
-quod tristem censuram, periculosamque multorum famæ, et <i>ab læso a
-plerisque et lædendi cupido</i>, expectabant.”</p>
-
-<p>See also Plutarch (Cato, c. 15, 16: his comparison between
-Aristeidês and Cato, c. 2) about the prodigious number of accusations
-in which Cato was engaged, either as prosecutor or as party
-prosecuted. His bitter feud with the <i>nobilitas</i> is analogous to that
-of Kleon against the Hippeis.</p>
-
-<p>I need hardly say that the comparison of Cato with Kleon applies
-only to domestic politics: in the military courage and energy for
-which Cato was distinguished, Kleon is utterly wanting, nor are we
-entitled to ascribe to him anything like the superiority of knowledge
-and general intelligence which we find recorded of Cato.</p>
-
-<p>The expression of Cicero respecting Kleon: “turbulentum quidem
-civem, sed tamen eloquentem,” (Cicero, Brutus, 7) appears to be
-a translation of the epithets of Thucydidês—βιαιότατος—τῷ δήμῳ
-πιθανώτατος (iii, 45).</p>
-
-<p>The remarks made too by Latin critics on the style and temper of
-Cato’s speeches, might almost seem to be a translation of the words
-of Thucydidês about Kleon. Fronto said about Cato: “Concionatur Cato
-<i>infeste</i>, Gracchus turbulente, Tullius copiose. Jam in judiciis
-<i>sævit</i> idem Cato, triumphat Cicero, tumultuatur Gracchus.” See
-Dübner’s edition of Meyer’s Oratorum Romanorum Fragmenta, p. 117
-(Paris, 1837).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_759"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_759">[759]</a></span> Plutarch, Reip. Ger. Præcept.
-p. 806. Compare two other passages in the same treatise, p. 805,
-where Plutarch speaks of the ἀπόνοια καὶ δεινότης of Kleon; and p.
-812, where he says, with truth, that Kleon was not at all qualified
-to act as general in a campaign.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_760"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_760">[760]</a></span> Aristophan. Ran. 566-576.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_761"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_761">[761]</a></span> Here again we find Cato the
-elder represented as constantly in the forum at Rome, lending aid
-of this kind, and espousing the cause of others who had grounds of
-complaint (Plutarch, Cato, c. 3), πρωῒ μὲν εἰς ἀγορὰν βαδίζει καὶ
-παρίσταται τοῖς δεομένοις—τοὺς μὲν θαυμαστὰς καὶ φίλους ἐκτᾶτο διὰ
-τῶν ξυνηγοριῶν, etc.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_762"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_762">[762]</a></span> Aristophan. Equit. 1271:—</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<p class="i0">Λοιδορῆσαι τοὺς πονηροὺς, οὐδέν ἐστ᾽ ἐπίφθονον,</p>
-<p class="i0">Ἀλλὰ τιμὴ τοῖσι χρηστοῖς, ὅστις εὖ λογίζεται.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_763"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_763">[763]</a></span> It appears that the complaint
-was made ostensibly against Kalistratus, in whose name the poet
-brought out the “Babylonians,” (Schol. ad Arist. Vesp. 1284), and
-who was of course the responsible party, though the real author
-was doubtless perfectly well known. The Knights was the first play
-brought out by the poet in his own name.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_764"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_764">[764]</a></span> See Acharn. 377, with the
-Scholia, and the anonymous biography of Aristophanês.</p>
-
-<p>Both Meineke (Aristoph. Fragm. Comic. Gr. vol. ii, p. 966) and
-Ranke (Commentat. de Aristoph. Vitâ, p. cccxxx) try to divine the
-plot of the “Babylonians;” but there is no sufficient information to
-assist them.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_765"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_765">[765]</a></span> Aristoph. Acharn. 355-475.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_766"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_766">[766]</a></span> See the Arguments prefixed to
-these three plays; and Acharn. 475, Equit. 881.</p>
-
-<p>It is not known whether the first comedy, entitled <i>The Clouds</i>
-(represented in the earlier part of <small>B.C.</small>
-423, a year after the Knights, and a year before the Wasps), appeared
-at the Lenæan festival of January, or at the urban Dionysia in
-March. It was unsuccessful, and the poet partially altered it with
-the view to a second representation. If it be true that this second
-representation took place during the year immediately following
-(<small>B.C.</small> 422: see Mr. Clinton’s Fasti
-Hellenici, ad ann. 422), it must have been at the urban Dionysia in
-March, just at the time when the truce for one year was coming to
-a close; for the Wasps was represented in that year at the Lenæan
-festival, and the same poet would hardly be likely to bring out two
-plays. The inference which Ranke draws from Nubes 310, that it was
-represented at the Dionysia, is not, however, very conclusive (Ranke,
-Commentat. de Aristoph. Vitâ, p. ccxxi, prefixed to his edition of
-the Plutus).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_767"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_767">[767]</a></span> See the obscure passage,
-Vespæ, 1285, <i>seqq.</i>; Aristoph. Vita Anonymi, p. xiii, ed. Bekker;
-Demosthen. cont. Meid. p. 532.</p>
-
-<p>It appears that Aristophanês was of Æginetan parentage (Acharn.
-629); so that the γραφὴ ξενίας (indictment for undue assumption
-of the rights of an Athenian citizen) was founded upon a real
-fact. Between the time of the conquest of Ægina by Athens, and
-the expulsion of the native inhabitants in the first year of the
-Peloponnesian war (an interval of about twenty years), probably
-no inconsiderable number of Æginetans became intermingled or
-intermarried with Athenian citizens. Especially men of poetical
-talent in the subject-cities would find it their interest to repair
-to Athens: Ion came from Chios, and Achæus from Eretria; both tragic
-composers.</p>
-
-<p>The comic author Eupolis seems also to have directed some taunts
-against the foreign origin of Aristophanês, if Meineke is correct
-in his interpretation of a passage (Historia Comicor. Græc. i, p.
-111).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_768"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_768">[768]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17-30. The statement
-in cap. 30 seems to show that this was the ground on which the
-Athenians were allowed to retain Sollium and Anaktorium. For if their
-retention of these two places had been distinctly and in terms at
-variance with the treaty, the Corinthians would doubtless have chosen
-this fact as the ostensible ground of their complaint: whereas they
-preferred to have recourse to a πρόσχημα, or sham plea.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_769"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_769">[769]</a></span> Compare v, 39 with v, 18, which
-seems to me to refute the explanation suggested by Dr. Arnold, and
-adopted by Poppo.</p>
-
-<p>The use of the word ἀποδόντων in regard to the restoration of
-Amphipolis to Athens, and of the word παρέδοσαν in regard to the
-<i>relinquishment</i> of the other cities, deserves notice. Those who drew
-up the treaty, which is worded in a very confused way, seem to have
-intended that the word παρέδοσαν should apply both to Amphipolis
-and the other cities, but that the word ἀποδόντων should apply
-exclusively to Amphipolis. The word παρέδοσαν is of course applicable
-to the restoration of Amphipolis, for that which is <i>restored</i>
-is of course <i>delivered up</i>. But it is remarkable that this word
-παρέδοσαν does not properly apply to the other cities: for they were
-not <i>delivered up</i> to Athens, they were only <i>relinquished</i>, as the
-clauses immediately following farther explain. Perhaps there is a
-little Athenian pride in the use of the word, first to intimate
-indirectly that the Lacedæmonians were to <i>deliver up</i> various cities
-to Athens, then to add words afterwards, which show that the cities
-were only to be <i>relinquished</i>, not surrendered to Athens.</p>
-
-<p>The provision, for guaranteeing liberty of retirement and
-carrying away of property, was of course intended chiefly for the
-Amphipolitans, who would naturally desire to emigrate, if the town
-had been actually restored to Athens.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_770"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_770">[770]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 19.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_771"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_771">[771]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 17-30. παραβήσεσθαί
-τε ἔφασαν (the Lacedæmonians said) αὐτοὺς (the Corinthians) τοὺς
-ὅρκους, καὶ ἤδη ἀδικεῖν ὅτι οὐ δέχονται τὰς Ἀθηναίων σπονδὰς,
-εἰρημένον, κύριον εἶναι ὅτι ἂν τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ξυμμάχων ψηφίσηται, ἢν
-μή τι θεῶν ἢ ἡρώων κώλυμα ᾖ.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_772"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_772">[772]</a></span> Compare Thucyd. iv, 119; v, 19.
-Though the words of the peace stand ὤμοσαν κατὰ πόλεις (v, 18), yet
-it seems that this oath was not <i>actually</i> taken by any of the allied
-cities; only by the Lacedæmonians themselves, upon the vote of the
-majority of the confederates (v, 17: compare v, 23).</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-
-<p id="Footnote_773"><span class="label"><a
-href="#FNanchor_773">[773]</a></span> Thucyd. v, 22.</p>
-
-</div>
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<div class="chapter pt3">
-<div class="transnote" id="tnote">
-  <p class="tnotetit">Transcriber's note</p>
-  <ul>
-    <li>The book cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in
-      the public domain.</li>
-    <li>Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end of the book.</li>
-    <li>Blank pages have been skipped.</li>
-    <li>Obvious printer errors have been silently corrected, after comparison
-      with a later edition of this work. Greek text has also been corrected
-      after checking with this later edition and with Perseus, when the
-      reference was found.</li>
-    <li>Original spelling, hyphenation and punctuation have been kept, but
-      variant spellings were made consistent when a predominant usage was
-      found.</li>
-  </ul>
-</div>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
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