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The History of the Peloponnesian War
By Thucydides
Translated by Richard Crawley
The Fourth Book.
CHAPTER XII.
Seventh Year of the War - Occupation of Pylos
- Surrender of the Spartan Army in Sphacteria
NEXT summer, about the time of the corn's
coming into ear, ten Syracusan and as many
Locrian vessels sailed to Messina, in Sicily,
and occupied the town upon the invitation
of the inhabitants; and Messina revolted
from the Athenians. The Syracusans contrived
this chiefly because they saw that the place
afforded an approach to Sicily, and feared
that the Athenians might hereafter use it
as a base for attacking them with a larger
force; the Locrians because they wished to
carry on hostilities from both sides of the
strait and to reduce their enemies, the people
of Rhegium. Meanwhile, the Locrians had invaded
the Rhegian territory with all their forces,
to prevent their succouring Messina, and
also at the instance of some exiles from
Rhegium who were with them; the long factions
by which that town had been torn rendering
it for the moment incapable of resistance,
and thus furnishing an additional temptation
to the invaders. After devastating the country
the Locrian land forces retired, their ships
remaining to guard Messina, while others
were being manned for the same destination
to carry on the war from thence. About the
same time in the spring, before the corn
was ripe, the Peloponnesians and their allies
invaded Attica under Agis, the son of Archidamus,
king of the Lacedaemonians, and sat down
and laid waste the country. Meanwhile the
Athenians sent off the forty ships which
they had been preparing to Sicily, with the
remaining generals Eurymedon and Sophocles;
their colleague Pythodorus having already
preceded them thither. These had also instructions
as they sailed by to look to the Corcyraeans
in the town, who were being plundered by
the exiles in the mountain. To support these
exiles sixty Peloponnesian vessels had lately
sailed, it being thought that the famine
raging in the city would make it easy for
them to reduce it. Demosthenes also, who
had remained without employment since his
return from Acarnania, applied and obtained
permission to use the fleet, if he wished
it, upon the coast of Peloponnese. Off Laconia
they heard that the Peloponnesian ships were
already at Corcyra, upon which Eurymedon
and Sophocles wished to hasten to the island,
but Demosthenes required them first to touch
at Pylos and do what was wanted there, before
continuing their voyage. While they were
making objections, a squall chanced to come
on and carried the fleet into Pylos. Demosthenes
at once urged them to fortify the place,
it being for this that he had come on the
voyage, and made them observe there was plenty
of stone and timber on the spot, and that
the place was strong by nature, and together
with much of the country round unoccupied;
Pylos, or Coryphasium, as the Lacedaemonians
call it, being about forty-five miles distant
from Sparta, and situated in the old country
of the Messenians. The commanders told him
that there was no lack of desert headlands
in Peloponnese if he wished to put the city
to expense by occupying them. He, however,
thought that this place was distinguished
from others of the kind by having a harbour
close by; while the Messenians, the old natives
of the country, speaking the same dialect
as the Lacedaemonians, could do them the
greatest mischief by their incursions from
it, and would at the same time be a trusty
garrison. After speaking to the captains
of companies on the subject, and failing
to persuade either the generals or the soldiers,
he remained inactive with the rest from stress
of weather; until the soldiers themselves
wanting occupation were seized with a sudden
impulse to go round and fortify the place.
Accordingly they set to work in earnest,
and having no iron tools, picked up stones,
and put them together as they happened to
fit, and where mortar was needed, carried
it on their backs for want of hods, stooping
down to make it stay on, and clasping their
hands together behind to prevent it falling
off; sparing no effort to be able to complete
the most vulnerable points before the arrival
of the Lacedaemonians, most of the place
being sufficiently strong by nature without
further fortifications. Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians
were celebrating a festival, and also at
first made light of the news, in the idea
that whenever they chose to take the field
the place would be immediately evacuated
by the enemy or easily taken by force; the
absence of their army before Athens having
also something to do with their delay. The
Athenians fortified the place on the land
side, and where it most required it, in six
days, and leaving Demosthenes with five ships
to garrison it, with the main body of the
fleet hastened on their voyage to Corcyra
and Sicily. As soon as the Peloponnesians
in Attica heard of the occupation of Pylos,
they hurried back home; the Lacedaemonians
and their king Agis thinking that the matter
touched them nearly. Besides having made
their invasion early in the season, and while
the corn was still green, most of their troops
were short of provisions: the weather also
was unusually bad for the time of year, and
greatly distressed their army. Many reasons
thus combined to hasten their departure and
to make this invasion a very short one; indeed
they only stayed fifteen days in Attica.
About the same time the Athenian general
Simonides getting together a few Athenians
from the garrisons, and a number of the allies
in those parts, took Eion in Thrace, a Mendaean
colony and hostile to Athens, by treachery,
but had no sooner done so than the Chalcidians
and Bottiaeans came up and beat him out of
it, with the loss of many of his soldiers.
On the return of the Peloponnesians from
Attica, the Spartans themselves and the nearest
of the Perioeci at once set out for Pylos,
the other Lacedaemonians following more slowly,
as they had just come in from another campaign.
Word was also sent round Peloponnese to come
up as quickly as possible to Pylos; while
the sixty Peloponnesian ships were sent for
from Corcyra, and being dragged by their
crews across the isthmus of Leucas, passed
unperceived by the Athenian squadron at Zacynthus,
and reached Pylos, where the land forces
had arrived before them. Before the Peloponnesian
fleet sailed in, Demosthenes found time to
send out unobserved two ships to inform Eurymedon
and the Athenians on board the fleet at Zacynthus
of the danger of Pylos and to summon them
to his assistance. While the ships hastened
on their voyage in obedience to the orders
of Demosthenes, the Lacedaemonians prepared
to assault the fort by land and sea, hoping
to capture with ease a work constructed in
haste, and held by a feeble garrison. Meanwhile,
as they expected the Athenian ships to arrive
from Zacynthus, they intended, if they failed
to take the place before, to block up the
entrances of the harbour to prevent their
being able to anchor inside it. For the island
of Sphacteria, stretching along in a line
close in front of the harbour, at once makes
it safe and narrows its entrances, leaving
a passage for two ships on the side nearest
Pylos and the Athenian fortifications, and
for eight or nine on that next the rest of
the mainland: for the rest, the island was
entirely covered with wood, and without paths
through not being inhabited, and about one
mile and five furlongs in length. The inlets
the Lacedaemonians meant to close with a
line of ships placed close together, with
their prows turned towards the sea, and,
meanwhile, fearing that the enemy might make
use of the island to operate against them,
carried over some heavy infantry thither,
stationing others along the coast. By this
means the island and the continent would
be alike hostile to the Athenians, as they
would be unable to land on either; and the
shore of Pylos itself outside the inlet towards
the open sea having no harbour, and, therefore,
presenting no point which they could use
as a base to relieve their countrymen, they,
the Lacedaemonians, without sea-fight or
risk would in all probability become masters
of the place, occupied as it had been on
the spur of the moment, and unfurnished with
provisions. This being determined, they carried
over to the island the heavy infantry, drafted
by lot from all the companies. Some others
had crossed over before in relief parties,
but these last who were left there were four
hundred and twenty in number, with their
Helot attendants, commanded by Epitadas,
son of Molobrus. Meanwhile Demosthenes, seeing
the Lacedaemonians about to attack him by
sea and land at once, himself was not idle.
He drew up under the fortification and enclosed
in a stockade the galleys remaining to him
of those which had been left him, arming
the sailors taken out of them with poor shields
made most of them of osier, it being impossible
to procure arms in such a desert place, and
even these having been obtained from a thirty-oared
Messenian privateer and a boat belonging
to some Messenians who happened to have come
to them. Among these Messenians were forty
heavy infantry, whom he made use of with
the rest. Posting most of his men, unarmed
and armed, upon the best fortified and strong
points of the place towards the interior,
with orders to repel any attack of the land
forces, he picked sixty heavy infantry and
a few archers from his whole force, and with
these went outside the wall down to the sea,
where he thought that the enemy would most
likely attempt to land. Although the ground
was difficult and rocky, looking towards
the open sea, the fact that this was the
weakest part of the wall would, he thought,
encourage their ardour, as the Athenians,
confident in their naval superiority, had
here paid little attention to their defences,
and the enemy if he could force a landing
might feel secure of taking the place. At
this point, accordingly, going down to the
water's edge, he posted his heavy infantry
to prevent, if possible, a landing, and encouraged
them in the following terms: "Soldiers
and comrades in this adventure, I hope that
none of you in our present strait will think
to show his wit by exactly calculating all
the perils that encompass us, but that you
will rather hasten to close with the enemy,
without staying to count the odds, seeing
in this your best chance of safety. In emergencies
like ours calculation is out of place; the
sooner the danger is faced the better. To
my mind also most of the chances are for
us, if we will only stand fast and not throw
away our advantages, overawed by the numbers
of the enemy. One of the points in our favour
is the awkwardness of the landing. This,
however, only helps us if we stand our ground.
If we give way it will be practicable enough,
in spite of its natural difficulty, without
a defender; and the enemy will instantly
become more formidable from the difficulty
he will have in retreating, supposing that
we succeed in repulsing him, which we shall
find it easier to do, while he is on board
his ships, than after he has landed and meets
us on equal terms. As to his numbers, these
need not too much alarm you. Large as they
may be he can only engage in small detachments,
from the impossibility of bringing to. Besides,
the numerical superiority that we have to
meet is not that of an army on land with
everything else equal, but of troops on board
ship, upon an element where many favourable
accidents are required to act with effect.
I therefore consider that his difficulties
may be fairly set against our numerical deficiencies,
and at the same time I charge you, as Athenians
who know by experience what landing from
ships on a hostile territory means, and how
impossible it is to drive back an enemy determined
enough to stand his ground and not to be
frightened away by the surf and the terrors
of the ships sailing in, to stand fast in
the present emergency, beat back the enemy
at the water's edge, and save yourselves
and the place." Thus encouraged by Demosthenes,
the Athenians felt more confident, and went
down to meet the enemy, posting themselves
along the edge of the sea. The Lacedaemonians
now put themselves in movement and simultaneously
assaulted the fortification with their land
forces and with their ships, forty-three
in number, under their admiral, Thrasymelidas,
son of Cratesicles, a Spartan, who made his
attack just where Demosthenes expected. The
Athenians had thus to defend themselves on
both sides, from the land and from the sea;
the enemy rowing up in small detachments,
the one relieving the other- it being impossible
for many to bring to at once- and showing
great ardour and cheering each other on,
in the endeavour to force a passage and to
take the fortification. He who most distinguished
himself was Brasidas. Captain of a galley,
and seeing that the captains and steersmen,
impressed by the difficulty of the position,
hung back even where a landing might have
seemed possible, for fear of wrecking their
vessels, he shouted out to them, that they
must never allow the enemy to fortify himself
in their country for the sake of saving timber,
but must shiver their vessels and force a
landing; and bade the allies, instead of
hesitating in such a moment to sacrifice
their ships for Lacedaemon in return for
her many benefits, to run them boldly aground,
land in one way or another, and make themselves
masters of the place and its garrison. Not
content with this exhortation, he forced
his own steersman to run his ship ashore,
and stepping on to the gangway, was endeavouring
to land, when he was cut down by the Athenians,
and after receiving many wounds fainted away.
Falling into the bows, his shield slipped
off his arm into the sea, and being thrown
ashore was picked up by the Athenians, and
afterwards used for the trophy which they
set up for this attack. The rest also did
their best, but were not able to land, owing
to the difficulty of the ground and the unflinching
tenacity of the Athenians. It was a strange
reversal of the order of things for Athenians
to be fighting from the land, and from Laconian
land too, against Lacedaemonians coming from
the sea; while Lacedaemonians were trying
to land from shipboard in their own country,
now become hostile, to attack Athenians,
although the former were chiefly famous at
the time as an inland people and superior
by land, the latter as a maritime people
with a navy that had no equal. After continuing
their attacks during that day and most of
the next, the Peloponnesians desisted, and
the day after sent some of their ships to
Asine for timber to make engines, hoping
to take by their aid, in spite of its height,
the wall opposite the harbour, where the
landing was easiest. At this moment the Athenian
fleet from Zacynthus arrived, now numbering
fifty sail, having been reinforced by some
of the ships on guard at Naupactus and by
four Chian vessels. Seeing the coast and
the island both crowded with heavy infantry,
and the hostile ships in harbour showing
no signs of sailing out, at a loss where
to anchor, they sailed for the moment to
the desert island of Prote, not far off,
where they passed the night. The next day
they got under way in readiness to engage
in the open sea if the enemy chose to put
out to meet them, being determined in the
event of his not doing so to sail in and
attack him. The Lacedaemonians did not put
out to sea, and having omitted to close the
inlets as they had intended, remained quiet
on shore, engaged in manning their ships
and getting ready, in the case of any one
sailing in, to fight in the harbour, which
is a fairly large one. Perceiving this, the
Athenians advanced against them by each inlet,
and falling on the enemy's fleet, most of
which was by this time afloat and in line,
at once put it to flight, and giving chase
as far as the short distance allowed, disabled
a good many vessels and took five, one with
its crew on board; dashing in at the rest
that had taken refuge on shore, and battering
some that were still being manned, before
they could put out, and lashing on to their
own ships and towing off empty others whosc
crews had fled. At this sight the Lacedaemonians,
maddened by a disaster which cut off their
men on the island, rushed to the rescue,
and going into the sea with their heavy armour,
laid hold of the ships and tried to drag
them back, each man thinking that success
depended on his individual exertions. Great
was the melee, and quite in contradiction
to the naval tactics usual to the two combatants;
the Lacedaemonians in their excitement and
dismay being actually engaged in a sea-fight
on land, while the victorious Athenians,
in their eagerness to push their success
as far as possible, were carrying on a land-fight
from their ships. After great exertions and
numerous wounds on both sides they separated,
the Lacedaemonians saving their empty ships,
except those first taken; and both parties
returning to their camp, the Athenians set
up a trophy, gave back the dead, secured
the wrecks, and at once began to cruise round
and jealously watch the island, with its
intercepted garrison, while the Peloponnesians
on the mainland, whose contingents had now
all come up, stayed where they were before
Pylos. When the news of what had happened
at Pylos reached Sparta, the disaster was
thought so serious that the Lacedaemonians
resolved that the authorities should go down
to the camp, and decide on the spot what
was best to be done. There, seeing that it
was impossible to help their men, and not
wishing to risk their being reduced by hunger
or overpowered by numbers, they determined,
with the consent of the Athenian generals,
to conclude an armistice at Pylos and send
envoys to Athens to obtain a convention,
and to endeavour to get back their men as
quickly as possible. The generals accepting
their offers, an armistice was concluded
upon the terms following: That the Lacedaemonians
should bring to Pylos and deliver up to the
Athenians the ships that had fought in the
late engagement, and all in Laconia that
were vessels of war, and should make no attack
on the fortification either by land or by
sea. That the Athenians should allow the
Lacedaemonians on the mainland to send to
the men in the island a certain fixed quantity
of corn ready kneaded, that is to say, two
quarts of barley meal, one pint of wine,
and a piece of meat for each man, and half
the same quantity for a servant. That this
allowance should be sent in under the eyes
of the Athenians, and that no boat should
sail to the island except openly. That the
Athenians should continue to the island same
as before, without however landing upon it,
and should refrain from attacking the Peloponnesian
troops either by land or by sea. That if
either party should infringe any of these
terms in the slightest particular, the armistice
should be at once void. That the armistice
should hold good until the return of the
Lacedaemonian envoys from Athens- the Athenians
sending them thither in a galley and bringing
them back again- and upon the arrival of
the envoys should be at an end, and the ships
be restored by the Athenians in the same
state as they received them. Such were the
terms of the armistice, and the ships were
delivered over to the number of sixty, and
the envoys sent off accordingly. Arrived
at Athens they spoke as follows: "Athenians,
the Lacedaemonians sent us to try to find
some way of settling the affair of our men
on the island, that shall be at once satisfactory
to our interests, and as consistent with
our dignity in our misfortune as circumstances
permit. We can venture to speak at some length
without any departure from the habit of our
country. Men of few words where many are
not wanted, we can be less brief when there
is a matter of importance to be illustrated
and an end to be served by its illustration.
Meanwhile we beg you to take what we may
say, not in a hostile spirit, nor as if we
thought you ignorant and wished to lecture
you, but rather as a suggestion on the best
course to be taken, addressed to intelligent
judges. You can now, if you choose, employ
your present success to advantage, so as
to keep what you have got and gain honour
and reputation besides, and you can avoid
the mistake of those who meet with an extraordinary
piece of good fortune, and are led on by
hope to grasp continually at something further,
through having already succeeded without
expecting it. While those who have known
most vicissitudes of good and bad, have also
justly least faith in their prosperity; and
to teach your city and ours this lesson experience
has not been wanting. "To be convinced
of this you have only to look at our present
misfortune. What power in Hellas stood higher
than we did? and yet we are come to you,
although we formerly thought ourselves more
able to grant what we are now here to ask.
Nevertheless, we have not been brought to
this by any decay in our power, or through
having our heads turned by aggrandizement;
no, our resources are what they have always
been, and our error has been an error of
judgment, to which all are equally liable.
Accordingly, the prosperity which your city
now enjoys, and the accession that it has
lately received, must not make you fancy
that fortune will be always with you. Indeed
sensible men are prudent enough to treat
their gains as precarious, just as they would
also keep a clear head in adversity, and
think that war, so far from staying within
the limit to which a combatant may wish to
confine it, will run the course that its
chances prescribe; and thus, not being puffed
up by confidence in military success, they
are less likely to come to grief, and most
ready to make peace, if they can, while their
fortune lasts. This, Athenians, you have
a good opportunity to do now with us, and
thus to escape the possible disasters which
may follow upon your refusal, and the consequent
imputation of having owed to accident even
your present advantages, when you might have
left behind you a reputation for power and
wisdom which nothing could endanger. "The
Lacedaemonians accordingly invite you to
make a treaty and to end the war, and offer
peace and alliance and the most friendly
and intimate relations in every way and on
every occasion between us; and in return
ask for the men on the island, thinking it
better for both parties not to stand out
to the end, on the chance of some favourable
accident enabling the men to force their
way out, or of their being compelled to succumb
under the pressure of blockade. Indeed if
great enmities are ever to be really settled,
we think it will be, not by the system of
revenge and military success, and by forcing
an opponent to swear to a treaty to his disadvantage,
but when the more fortunate combatant waives
these his privileges, to be guided by gentler
feelings conquers his rival in generosity,
and accords peace on more moderate conditions
than he expected. From that moment, instead
of the debt of revenge which violence must
entail, his adversary owes a debt of generosity
to be paid in kind, and is inclined by honour
to stand to his agreement. And men oftener
act in this manner towards their greatest
enemies than where the quarrel is of less
importance; they are also by nature as glad
to give way to those who first yield to them,
as they are apt to be provoked by arrogance
to risks condemned by their own judgment.
"To apply this to ourselves: if peace
was ever desirable for both parties, it is
surely so at the present moment, before anything
irremediable befall us and force us to hate
you eternally, personally as well as politically,
and you to miss the advantages that we now
offer you. While the issue is still in doubt,
and you have reputation and our friendship
in prospect, and we the compromise of our
misfortune before anything fatal occur, let
us be reconciled, and for ourselves choose
peace instead of war, and grant to the rest
of the Hellenes a remission from their sufferings,
for which be sure they will think they have
chiefly you to thank. The war that they labour
under they know not which began, but the
peace that concludes it, as it depends on
your decision, will by their gratitude be
laid to your door. By such a decision you
can become firm friends with the Lacedaemonians
at their own invitation, which you do not
force from them, but oblige them by accepting.
And from this friendship consider the advantages
that are likely to follow: when Attica and
Sparta are at one, the rest of Hellas, be
sure, will remain in respectful inferiority
before its heads." Such were the words
of the Lacedaemonians, their idea being that
the Athenians, already desirous of a truce
and only kept back by their opposition, would
joyfully accept a peace freely offered, and
give back the men. The Athenians, however,
having the men on the island, thought that
the treaty would be ready for them whenever
they chose to make it, and grasped at something
further. Foremost to encourage them in this
policy was Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, a popular
leader of the time and very powerful with
the multitude, who persuaded them to answer
as follows: First, the men in the island
must surrender themselves and their arms
and be brought to Athens. Next, the Lacedaemonians
must restore Nisaea, Pegae, Troezen, and
Achaia, all places acquired not by arms,
but by the previous convention, under which
they had been ceded by Athens herself at
a moment of disaster, when a truce was more
necessary to her than at present. This done
they might take back their men, and make
a truce for as long as both parties might
agree. To this answer the envoys made no
reply, but asked that commissioners might
be chosen with whom they might confer on
each point, and quietly talk the matter over
and try to come to some agreement. Hereupon
Cleon violently assailed them, saying that
he knew from the first that they had no right
intentions, and that it was clear enough
now by their refusing to speak before the
people, and wanting to confer in secret with
a committee of two or three. No, if they
meant anything honest let them say it out
before all. The Lacedaemonians, however,
seeing that whatever concessions they might
be prepared to make in their misfortune,
it was impossible for them to speak before
the multitude and lose credit with their
allies for a negotiation which might after
all miscarry, and on the other hand, that
the Athenians would never grant what they
asked upon moderate terms, returned from
Athens without having effected anything.
Their arrival at once put an end to the armistice
at Pylos, and the Lacedaemonians asked back
their ships according to the convention.
The Athenians, however, alleged an attack
on the fort in contravention of the truce,
and other grievances seemingly not worth
mentioning, and refused to give them back,
insisting upon the clause by which the slightest
infringement made the armistice void. The
Lacedaemonians, after denying the contravention
and protesting against their bad faith in
the matter of the ships, went away and earnestly
addressed themselves to the war. Hostilities
were now carried on at Pylos upon both sides
with vigour. The Athenians cruised round
the island all day with two ships going different
ways; and by night, except on the seaward
side in windy weather, anchored round it
with their whole fleet, which, having been
reinforced by twenty ships from Athens come
to aid in the blockade, now numbered seventy
sail; while the Peloponnesians remained encamped
on the continent, making attacks on the fort,
and on the look-out for any opportunity which
might offer itself for the deliverance of
their men. Meanwhile the Syracusans and their
allies in Sicily had brought up to the squadron
guarding Messina the reinforcement which
we left them preparing, and carried on the
war from thence, incited chiefly by the Locrians
from hatred of the Rhegians, whose territory
they had invaded with all their forces. The
Syracusans also wished to try their fortune
at sea, seeing that the Athenians had only
a few ships actually at Rhegium, and hearing
that the main fleet destined to join them
was engaged in blockading the island. A naval
victory, they thought, would enable them
to blockade Rhegium by sea and land, and
easily to reduce it; a success which would
at once place their affairs upon a solid
basis, the promontory of Rhegium in Italy
and Messina in Sicily being so near each
other that it would be impossible for the
Athenians to cruise against them and command
the strait. The strait in question consists
of the sea between Rhegium and Messina, at
the point where Sicily approaches nearest
to the continent, and is the Charybdis through
which the story makes Ulysses sail; and the
narrowness of the passage and the strength
of the current that pours in from the vast
Tyrrhenian and Sicilian mains, have rightly
given it a bad reputation. In this strait
the Syracusans and their allies were compelled
to fight, late in the day, about the passage
of a boat, putting out with rather more than
thirty ships against sixteen Athenian and
eight Rhegian vessels. Defeated by the Athenians
they hastily set off, each for himself, to
their own stations at Messina and Rhegium,
with the loss of one ship; night coming on
before the battle was finished. After this
the Locrians retired from the Rhegian territory,
and the ships of the Syracusans and their
allies united and came to anchor at Cape
Pelorus, in the territory of Messina, where
their land forces joined them. Here the Athenians
and Rhegians sailed up, and seeing the ships
unmanned, made an attack, in which they in
their turn lost one vessel, which was caught
by a grappling iron, the crew saving themselves
by swimming. After this the Syracusans got
on board their ships, and while they were
being towed alongshore to Messina, were again
attacked by the Athenians, but suddenly got
out to sea and became the assailants, and
caused them to lose another vessel. After
thus holding their own in the voyage alongshore
and in the engagement as above described,
the Syracusans sailed on into the harbour
of Messina. Meanwhile the Athenians, having
received warning that Camarina was about
to be betrayed to the Syracusans by Archias
and his party, sailed thither; and the Messinese
took this opportunity to attack by sea and
land with all their forces their Chalcidian
neighbour, Naxos. The first day they forced
the Naxians to keep their walls, and laid
waste their country; the next they sailed
round with their ships, and laid waste their
land on the river Akesines, while their land
forces menaced the city. Meanwhile the Sicels
came down from the high country in great
numbers, to aid against the Messinese; and
the Naxians, elated at the sight, and animated
by a belief that the Leontines and their
other Hellenic allies were coming to their
support, suddenly sallied out from the town,
and attacked and routed the Messinese, killing
more than a thousand of them; while the remainder
suffered severely in their retreat home,
being attacked by the barbarians on the road,
and most of them cut off. The ships put in
to Messina, and afterwards dispersed for
their different homes. The Leontines and
their allies, with the Athenians, upon this
at once turned their arms against the now
weakened Messina, and attacked, the Athenians
with their ships on the side of the harbour,
and the land forces on that of the town.
The Messinese, however, sallying out with
Demoteles and some Locrians who had been
left to garrison the city after the disaster,
suddenly attacked and routed most of the
Leontine army, killing a great number; upon
seeing which the Athenians landed from their
ships, and falling on the Messinese in disorder
chased them back into the town, and setting
up a trophy retired to Rhegium. After this
the Hellenes in Sicily continued to make
war on each other by land, without the Athenians.
Meanwhile the Athenians at Pylos were still
besieging the Lacedaemonians in the island,
the Peloponnesian forces on the continent
remaining where they were. The blockade was
very laborious for the Athenians from want
of food and water; there was no spring except
one in the citadel of Pylos itself, and that
not a large one, and most of them were obliged
to grub up the shingle on the sea beach and
drink such water as they could find. They
also suffered from want of room, being encamped
in a narrow space; and as there was no anchorage
for the ships, some took their meals on shore
in their turn, while the others were anchored
out at sea. But their greatest discouragement
arose from the unexpectedly long time which
it took to reduce a body of men shut up in
a desert island, with only brackish water
to drink, a matter which they had imagined
would take them only a few days. The fact
was that the Lacedaemonians had made advertisement
for volunteers to carry into the island ground
corn, wine, cheese, and any other food useful
in a siege; high prices being offered, and
freedom promised to any of the Helots who
should succeed in doing so. The Helots accordingly
were most forward to engage in this risky
traffic, putting off from this or that part
of Peloponnese, and running in by night on
the seaward side of the island. They were
best pleased, however, when they could catch
a wind to carry them in. It was more easy
to elude the look-out of the galleys, when
it blew from the seaward, as it became impossible
for them to anchor round the island; while
the Helots had their boats rated at their
value in money, and ran them ashore, without
caring how they landed, being sure to find
the soldiers waiting for them at the landing-places.
But all who risked it in fair weather were
taken. Divers also swam in under water from
the harbour, dragging by a cord in skins
poppyseed mixed with honey, and bruised linseed;
these at first escaped notice, but afterwards
a look-out was kept for them. In short, both
sides tried every possible contrivance, the
one to throw in provisions, and the other
to prevent their introduction. At Athens,
meanwhile, the news that the army was in
great distress, and that corn found its way
in to the men in the island, caused no small
perplexity; and the Athenians began to fear
that winter might come on and find them still
engaged in the blockade. They saw that the
convoying of provisions round Peloponnese
would be then impossible. The country offered
no resources in itself, and even in summer
they could not send round enough. The blockade
of a place without harbours could no longer
be kept up; and the men would either escape
by the siege being abandoned, or would watch
for bad weather and sail out in the boats
that brought in their corn. What caused still
more alarm was the attitude of the Lacedaemonians,
who must, it was thought by the Athenians,
feel themselves on strong ground not to send
them any more envoys; and they began to repent
having rejected the treaty. Cleon, perceiving
the disfavour with which he was regarded
for having stood in the way of the convention,
now said that their informants did not speak
the truth; and upon the messengers recommending
them, if they did not believe them, to send
some commissioners to see, Cleon himself
and Theagenes were chosen by the Athenians
as commissioners. Aware that he would now
be obliged either to say what had been already
said by the men whom he was slandering, or
be proved a liar if he said the contrary,
he told the Athenians, whom he saw to be
not altogether disinclined for a fresh expedition,
that instead of sending and wasting their
time and opportunities, if they believed
what was told them, they ought to sail against
the men. And pointing at Nicias, son of Niceratus,
then general, whom he hated, he tauntingly
said that it would be easy, if they had men
for generals, to sail with a force and take
those in the island, and that if he had himself
been in command, he would have done it. Nicias,
seeing the Athenians murmuring against Cleon
for not sailing now if it seemed to him so
easy, and further seeing himself the object
of attack, told him that for all that the
generals cared, he might take what force
he chose and make the attempt. At first Cleon
fancied that this resignation was merely
a figure of speech, and was ready to go,
but finding that it was seriously meant,
he drew back, and said that Nicias, not he,
was general, being now frightened, and having
never supposed that Nicias would go so far
as to retire in his favour. Nicias, however,
repeated his offer, and resigned the command
against Pylos, and called the Athenians to
witness that he did so. And as the multitude
is wont to do, the more Cleon shrank from
the expedition and tried to back out of what
he had said, the more they encouraged Nicias
to hand over his command, and clamoured at
Cleon to go. At last, not knowing how to
get out of his words, he undertook the expedition,
and came forward and said that he was not
afraid of the Lacedaemonians, but would sail
without taking any one from the city with
him, except the Lemnians and Imbrians that
were at Athens, with some targeteers that
had come up from Aenus, and four hundred
archers from other quarters. With these and
the soldiers at Pylos, he would within twenty
days either bring the Lacedaemonians alive,
or kill them on the spot. The Athenians could
not help laughing at his fatuity, while sensible
men comforted themselves with the reflection
that they must gain in either circumstance;
either they would be rid of Cleon, which
they rather hoped, or if disappointed in
this expectation, would reduce the Lacedaemonians.
After he had settled everything in the assembly,
and the Athenians had voted him the command
of the expedition, he chose as his colleague
Demosthenes, one of the generals at Pylos,
and pushed forward the preparations for his
voyage. His choice fell upon Demosthenes
because he heard that he was contemplating
a descent on the island; the soldiers distressed
by the difficulties of the position, and
rather besieged than besiegers, being eager
to fight it out, while the firing of the
island had increased the confidence of the
general. He had been at first afraid, because
the island having never been inhabited was
almost entirely covered with wood and without
paths, thinking this to be in the enemy's
favour, as he might land with a large force,
and yet might suffer loss by an attack from
an unseen position. The mistakes and forces
of the enemy the wood would in a great measure
conceal from him, while every blunder of
his own troops would be at once detected,
and they would be thus able to fall upon
him unexpectedly just where they pleased,
the attack being always in their power. If,
on the other hand, he should force them to
engage in the thicket, the smaller number
who knew the country would, he thought, have
the advantage over the larger who were ignorant
of it, while his own army might be cut off
imperceptibly, in spite of its numbers, as
the men would not be able to see where to
succour each other. The Aetolian disaster,
which had been mainly caused by the wood,
had not a little to do with these reflections.
Meanwhile, one of the soldiers who were compelled
by want of room to land on the extremities
of the island and take their dinners, with
outposts fixed to prevent a surprise, set
fire to a little of the wood without meaning
to do so; and as it came on to blow soon
afterwards, almost the whole was consumed
before they were aware of it. Demosthenes
was now able for the first time to see how
numerous the Lacedaemonians really were,
having up to this moment been under the impression
that they took in provisions for a smaller
number; he also saw that the Athenians thought
success important and were anxious about
it, and that it was now easier to land on
the island, and accordingly got ready for
the attempt, sent for troops from the allies
in the neighbourhood, and pushed forward
his other preparations. At this moment Cleon
arrived at Pylos with the troops which he
had asked for, having sent on word to say
that he was coming. The first step taken
by the two generals after their meeting was
to send a herald to the camp on the mainland,
to ask if they were disposed to avoid all
risk and to order the men on the island to
surrender themselves and their arms, to be
kept in gentle custody until some general
convention should be concluded. On the rejection
of this proposition the generals let one
day pass, and the next, embarking all their
heavy infantry on board a few ships, put
out by night, and a little before dawn landed
on both sides of the island from the open
sea and from the harbour, being about eight
hundred strong, and advanced with a run against
the first post in the island. The enemy had
distributed his force as follows: In this
first post there were about thirty heavy
infantry; the centre and most level part,
where the water was, was held by the main
body, and by Epitadas their commander; while
a small party guarded the very end of the
island, towards Pylos, which was precipitous
on the sea-side and very difficult to attack
from the land, and where there was also a
sort of old fort of stones rudely put together,
which they thought might be useful to them,
in case they should be forced to retreat.
Such was their disposition. The advanced
post thus attacked by the Athenians was at
once put to the sword, the men being scarcely
out of bed and still arming, the landing
having taken them by surprise, as they fancied
the ships were only sailing as usual to their
stations for the night. As soon as day broke,
the rest of the army landed, that is to say,
all the crews of rather more than seventy
ships, except the lowest rank of oars, with
the arms they carried, eight hundred archers,
and as many targeteers, the Messenian reinforcements,
and all the other troops on duty round Pylos,
except the garrison on the fort. The tactics
of Demosthenes had divided them into companies
of two hundred, more or less, and made them
occupy the highest points in order to paralyse
the enemy by surrounding him on every side
and thus leaving him without any tangible
adversary, exposed to the cross-fire of their
host; plied by those in his rear if he attacked
in front, and by those on one flank if he
moved against those on the other. In short,
wherever he went he would have the assailants
behind him, and these light-armed assailants,
the most awkward of all; arrows, darts, stones,
and slings making them formidable at a distance,
and there being no means of getting at them
at close quarters, as they could conquer
flying, and the moment their pursuer turned
they were upon him. Such was the idea that
inspired Demosthenes in his conception of
the descent, and presided over its execution.
Meanwhile the main body of the troops in
the island (that under Epitadas), seeing
their outpost cut off and an army advancing
against them, serried their ranks and pressed
forward to close with the Athenian heavy
infantry in front of them, the light troops
being upon their flanks and rear. However,
they were not able to engage or to profit
by their superior skill, the light troops
keeping them in check on either side with
their missiles, and the heavy infantry remaining
stationary instead of advancing to meet them;
and although they routed the light troops
wherever they ran up and approached too closely,
yet they retreated fighting, being lightly
equipped, and easily getting the start in
their flight, from the difficult and rugged
nature of the ground, in an island hitherto
desert, over which the Lacedaemonians could
not pursue them with their heavy armour.
After this skirmishing had lasted some little
while, the Lacedaemonians became unable to
dash out with the same rapidity as before
upon the points attacked, and the light troops
finding that they now fought with less vigour,
became more confident. They could see with
their own eyes that they were many times
more numerous than the enemy; they were now
more familiar with his aspect and found him
less terrible, the result not having justified
the apprehensions which they had suffered,
when they first landed in slavish dismay
at the idea of attacking Lacedaemonians;
and accordingly their fear changing to disdain,
they now rushed all together with loud shouts
upon them, and pelted them with stones, darts,
and arrows, whichever came first to hand.
The shouting accompanying their onset confounded
the Lacedaemonians, unaccustomed to this
mode of fighting; dust rose from the newly
burnt wood, and it was impossible to see
in front of one with the arrows and stones
flying through clouds of dust from the hands
of numerous assailants. The Lacedaemonians
had now to sustain a rude conflict; their
caps would not keep out the arrows, darts
had broken off in the armour of the wounded,
while they themselves were helpless for offence,
being prevented from using their eyes to
see what was before them, and unable to hear
the words of command for the hubbub raised
by the enemy; danger encompassed them on
every side, and there was no hope of any
means of defence or safety. At last, after
many had been already wounded in the confined
space in which they were fighting, they formed
in close order and retired on the fort at
the end of the island, which was not far
off, and to their friends who held it. The
moment they gave way, the light troops became
bolder and pressed upon them, shouting louder
than ever, and killed as many as they came
up with in their retreat, but most of the
Lacedaemonians made good their escape to
the fort, and with the garrison in it ranged
themselves all along its whole extent to
repulse the enemy wherever it was assailable.
The Athenians pursuing, unable to surround
and hem them in, owing to the strength of
the ground, attacked them in front and tried
to storm the position. For a long time, indeed
for most of the day, both sides held out
against all the torments of the battle, thirst,
and sun, the one endeavouring to drive the
enemy from the high ground, the other to
maintain himself upon it, it being now more
easy for the Lacedaemonians to defend themselves
than before, as they could not be surrounded
on the flanks. The struggle began to seem
endless, when the commander of the Messenians
came to Cleon and Demosthenes, and told them
that they were losing their labour: but if
they would give him some archers and light
troops to go round on the enemy's rear by
a way he would undertake to find, he thought
he could force the approach. Upon receiving
what he asked for, he started from a point
out of sight in order not to be seen by the
enemy, and creeping on wherever the precipices
of the island permitted, and where the Lacedaemonians,
trusting to the strength of the ground, kept
no guard, succeeded after the greatest difficulty
in getting round without their seeing him,
and suddenly appeared on the high ground
in their rear, to the dismay of the surprised
enemy and the still greater joy of his expectant
friends. The Lacedaemonians thus placed between
two fires, and in the same dilemma, to compare
small things with great, as at Thermopylae,
where the defenders were cut off through
the Persians getting round by the path, being
now attacked in front and behind, began to
give way, and overcome by the odds against
them and exhausted from want of food, retreated.
The Athenians were already masters of the
approaches when Cleon and Demosthenes perceiving
that, if the enemy gave way a single step
further, they would be destroyed by their
soldiery, put a stop to the battle and held
their men back; wishing to take the Lacedaemonians
alive to Athens, and hoping that their stubbornness
might relax on hearing the offer of terms,
and that they might surrender and yield to
the present overwhelming danger. Proclamation
was accordingly made, to know if they would
surrender themselves and their arms to the
Athenians to be dealt at their discretion.
The Lacedaemonians hearing this offer, most
of them lowered their shields and waved their
hands to show that they accepted it. Hostilities
now ceased, and a parley was held between
Cleon and Demosthenes and Styphon, son of
Pharax, on the other side; since Epitadas,
the first of the previous commanders, had
been killed, and Hippagretas, the next in
command, left for dead among the slain, though
still alive, and thus the command had devolved
upon Styphon according to the law, in case
of anything happening to his superiors. Styphon
and his companions said they wished to send
a herald to the Lacedaemonians on the mainland,
to know what they were to do. The Athenians
would not let any of them go, but themselves
called for heralds from the mainland, and
after questions had been carried backwards
and forwards two or three times, the last
man that passed over from the Lacedaemonians
on the continent brought this message: "The
Lacedaemonians bid you to decide for yourselves
so long as you do nothing dishonourable";
upon which after consulting together they
surrendered themselves and their arms. The
Athenians, after guarding them that day and
night, the next morning set up a trophy in
the island, and got ready to sail, giving
their prisoners in batches to be guarded
by the captains of the galleys; and the Lacedaemonians
sent a herald and took up their dead. The
number of the killed and prisoners taken
in the island was as follows: four hundred
and twenty heavy infantry had passed over;
three hundred all but eight were taken alive
to Athens; the rest were killed. About a
hundred and twenty of the prisoners were
Spartans. The Athenian loss was small, the
battle not having been fought at close quarters.
The blockade in all, counting from the fight
at sea to the battle in the island, had lasted
seventy-two days. For twenty of these, during
the absence of the envoys sent to treat for
peace, the men had provisions given them,
for the rest they were fed by the smugglers.
Corn and other victual was found in the island;
the commander Epitadas having kept the men
upon half rations. The Athenians and Peloponnesians
now each withdrew their forces from Pylos,
and went home, and crazy as Cleon's promise
was, he fulfilled it, by bringing the men
to Athens within the twenty days as he had
pledged himself to do. Nothing that happened
in the war surprised the Hellenes so much
as this. It was the opinion that no force
or famine could make the Lacedaemonians give
up their arms, but that they would fight
on as they could, and die with them in their
hands: indeed people could scarcely believe
that those who had surrendered were of the
same stuff as the fallen; and an Athenian
ally, who some time after insultingly asked
one of the prisoners from the island if those
that had fallen were men of honour, received
for answer that the atraktos- that is, the
arrow- would be worth a great deal if it
could tell men of honour from the rest; in
allusion to the fact that the killed were
those whom the stones and the arrows happened
to hit. Upon the arrival of the men the Athenians
determined to keep them in prison until the
peace, and if the Peloponnesians invaded
their country in the interval, to bring them
out and put them to death. Meanwhile the
defence of Pylos was not forgotten; the Messenians
from Naupactus sent to their old country,
to which Pylos formerly belonged, some of
the likeliest of their number, and began
a series of incursions into Laconia, which
their common dialect rendered most destructive.
The Lacedaemonians, hitherto without experience
of incursions or a warfare of the kind, finding
the Helots deserting, and fearing the march
of revolution in their country, began to
be seriously uneasy, and in spite of their
unwillingness to betray this to the Athenians
began to send envoys to Athens, and tried
to recover Pylos and the prisoners. The Athenians,
however, kept grasping at more, and dismissed
envoy after envoy without their having effected
anything. Such was the history of the affair
of Pylos. CHAPTER XIII. Seventh and Eighth
Years of the War - End of Corcyraean Revolution
- Peace of Gela - Capture of Nisaea THE same
summer, directly after these events, the
Athenians made an expedition against the
territory of Corinth with eighty ships and
two thousand Athenian heavy infantry, and
two hundred cavalry on board horse transports,
accompanied by the Milesians, Andrians, and
Carystians from the allies, under the command
of Nicias, son of Niceratus, with two colleagues.
Putting out to sea they made land at daybreak
between Chersonese and Rheitus, at the beach
of the country underneath the Solygian hill,
upon which the Dorians in old times established
themselves and carried on war against the
Aeolian inhabitants of Corinth, and where
a village now stands called Solygia. The
beach where the fleet came to is about a
mile and a half from the village, seven miles
from Corinth, and two and a quarter from
the Isthmus. The Corinthians had heard from
Argos of the coming of the Athenian armament,
and had all come up to the Isthmus long before,
with the exception of those who lived beyond
it, and also of five hundred who were away
in garrison in Ambracia and Leucadia; and
they were there in full force watching for
the Athenians to land. These last, however,
gave them the slip by coming in the dark;
and being informed by signals of the fact
the Corinthians left half their number at
Cenchreae, in case the Athenians should go
against Crommyon, and marched in all haste
to the rescue. Battus, one of the two generals
present at the action, went with a company
to defend the village of Solygia, which was
unfortified; Lycophron remaining to give
battle with the rest. The Corinthians first
attacked the right wing of the Athenians,
which had just landed in front of Chersonese,
and afterwards the rest of the army. The
battle was an obstinate one, and fought throughout
hand to hand. The right wing of the Athenians
and Carystians, who had been placed at the
end of the line, received and with some difficulty
repulsed the Corinthians, who thereupon retreated
to a wall upon the rising ground behind,
and throwing down the stones upon them, came
on again singing the paean, and being received
by the Athenians, were again engaged at close
quarters. At this moment a Corinthian company
having come to the relief of the left wing,
routed and pursued the Athenian right to
the sea, whence they were in their turn driven
back by the Athenians and Carystians from
the ships. Meanwhile the rest of the army
on either side fought on tenaciously, especially
the right wing of the Corinthians, where
Lycophron sustained the attack of the Athenian
left, which it was feared might attempt the
village of Solygia. After holding on for
a long while without either giving way, the
Athenians aided by their horse, of which
the enemy had none, at length routed the
Corinthians, who retired to the hill and,
halting, remained quiet there, without coming
down again. It was in this rout of the right
wing that they had the most killed, Lycophron
their general being among the number. The
rest of the army, broken and put to flight
in this way without being seriously pursued
or hurried, retired to the high ground and
there took up its position. The Athenians,
finding that the enemy no longer offered
to engage them, stripped his dead and took
up their own and immediately set up a trophy.
Meanwhile, the half of the Corinthians left
at Cenchreae to guard against the Athenians
sailing on Crommyon, although unable to see
the battle for Mount Oneion, found out what
was going on by the dust, and hurried up
to the rescue; as did also the older Corinthians
from the town, upon discovering what had
occurred. The Athenians seeing them all coming
against them, and thinking that they were
reinforcements arriving from the neighbouring
Peloponnesians, withdrew in haste to their
ships with their spoils and their own dead,
except two that they left behind, not being
able to find them, and going on board crossed
over to the islands opposite, and from thence
sent a herald, and took up under truce the
bodies which they had left behind. Two hundred
and twelve Corinthians fell in the battle,
and rather less than fifty Athenians. Weighing
from the islands, the Athenians sailed the
same day to Crommyon in the Corinthian territory,
about thirteen miles from the city, and coming
to anchor laid waste the country, and passed
the night there. The next day, after first
coasting along to the territory of Epidaurus
and making a descent there, they came to
Methana between Epidaurus and Troezen, and
drew a wall across and fortified the isthmus
of the peninsula, and left a post there from
which incursions were henceforth made upon
the country of Troezen, Haliae, and Epidaurus.
After walling off this spot, the fleet sailed
off home. While these events were going on,
Eurymedon and Sophocles had put to sea with
the Athenian fleet from Pylos on their way
to Sicily and, arriving at Corcyra, joined
the townsmen in an expedition against the
party established on Mount Istone, who had
crossed over, as I have mentioned, after
the revolution and become masters of the
country, to the great hurt of the inhabitants.
Their stronghold having been taken by an
attack, the garrison took refuge in a body
upon some high ground and there capitulated,
agreeing to give up their mercenary auxiliaries,
lay down their arms, and commit themselves
to the discretion of the Athenian people.
The generals carried them across under truce
to the island of Ptychia, to be kept in custody
until they could be sent to Athens, upon
the understanding that, if any were caught
running away, all would lose the benefit
of the treaty. Meanwhile the leaders of the
Corcyraean commons, afraid that the Athenians
might spare the lives of the prisoners, had
recourse to the following stratagem. They
gained over some few men on the island by
secretly sending friends with instructions
to provide them with a boat, and to tell
them, as if for their own sakes, that they
had best escape as quickly as possible, as
the Athenian generals were going to give
them up to the Corcyraean people. These representations
succeeding, it was so arranged that the men
were caught sailing out in the boat that
was provided, and the treaty became void
accordingly, and the whole body were given
up to the Corcyraeans. For this result the
Athenian generals were in a great measure
responsible; their evident disinclination
to sail for Sicily, and thus to leave to
others the honour of conducting the men to
Athens, encouraged the intriguers in their
design and seemed to affirm the truth of
their representations. The prisoners thus
handed over were shut up by the Corcyraeans
in a large building, and afterwards taken
out by twenties and led past two lines of
heavy infantry, one on each side, being bound
together, and beaten and stabbed by the men
in the lines whenever any saw pass a personal
enemy; while men carrying whips went by their
side and hastened on the road those that
walked too slowly. As many as sixty men were
taken out and killed in this way without
the knowledge of their friends in the building,
who fancied they were merely being moved
from one prison to another. At last, however,
someone opened their eyes to the truth, upon
which they called upon the Athenians to kill
them themselves, if such was their pleasure,
and refused any longer to go out of the building,
and said they would do all they could to
prevent any one coming in. The Corcyraeans,
not liking themselves to force a passage
by the doors, got up on the top of the building,
and breaking through the roof, threw down
the tiles and let fly arrows at them, from
which the prisoners sheltered themselves
as well as they could. Most of their number,
meanwhile, were engaged in dispatching themselves
by thrusting into their throats the arrows
shot by the enemy, and hanging themselves
with the cords taken from some beds that
happened to be there, and with strips made
from their clothing; adopting, in short,
every possible means of self-destruction,
and also falling victims to the missiles
of their enemies on the roof. Night came
on while these horrors were enacting, and
most of it had passed before they were concluded.
When it was day the Corcyraeans threw them
in layers upon wagons and carried them out
of the city. All the women taken in the stronghold
were sold as slaves. In this way the Corcyraeans
of the mountain were destroyed by the commons;
and so after terrible excesses the party
strife came to an end, at least as far as
the period of this war is concerned, for
of one party there was practically nothing
left. Meanwhile the Athenians sailed off
to Sicily, their primary destination, and
carried on the war with their allies there.
At the close of the summer, the Athenians
at Naupactus and the Acarnanians made an
expedition against Anactorium, the Corinthian
town lying at the mouth of the Ambracian
Gulf, and took it by treachery; and the Acarnanians
themselves, sending settlers from all parts
of Acarnania, occupied the place. Summer
was now over. During the winter ensuing,
Aristides, son of Archippus, one of the commanders
of the Athenian ships sent to collect money
from the allies, arrested at Eion, on the
Strymon, Artaphernes, a Persian, on his way
from the King to Lacedaemon. He was conducted
to Athens, where the Athenians got his dispatches
translated from the Assyrian character and
read them. With numerous references to other
subjects, they in substance told the Lacedaemonians
that the King did not know what they wanted,
as of the many ambassadors they had sent
him no two ever told the same story; if however
they were prepared to speak plainly they
might send him some envoys with this Persian.
The Athenians afterwards sent back Artaphernes
in a galley to Ephesus, and ambassadors with
him, who heard there of the death of King
Artaxerxes, son of Xerxes, which took place
about that time, and so returned home. The
same winter the Chians pulled down their
new wall at the command of the Athenians,
who suspected them of meditating an insurrection,
after first however obtaining pledges from
the Athenians, and security as far as this
was possible for their continuing to treat
them as before. Thus the winter ended, and
with it ended the seventh year of this war
of which Thucydides is the historian. In
first days of the next summer there was an
eclipse of the sun at the time of new moon,
and in the early part of the same month an
earthquake. Meanwhile, the Mitylenian and
other Lesbian exiles set out, for the most
part from the continent, with mercenaries
hired in Peloponnese, and others levied on
the spot, and took Rhoeteum, but restored
it without injury on the receipt of two thousand
Phocaean staters. After this they marched
against Antandrus and took the town by treachery,
their plan being to free Antandrus and the
rest of the Actaean towns, formerly owned
by Mitylene but now held by the Athenians.
Once fortified there, they would have every
facility for ship-building from the vicinity
of Ida and the consequent abundance of timber,
and plenty of other supplies, and might from
this base easily ravage Lesbos, which was
not far off, and make themselves masters
of the Aeolian towns on the continent. While
these were the schemes of the exiles, the
Athenians in the same summer made an expedition
with sixty ships, two thousand heavy infantry,
a few cavalry, and some allied troops from
Miletus and other parts, against Cythera,
under the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus,
Nicostratus, son of Diotrephes, and Autocles,
son of Tolmaeus. Cythera is an island lying
off Laconia, opposite Malea; the inhabitants
are Lacedaemonians of the class of the Perioeci;
and an officer called the judge of Cythera
went over to the place annually from Sparta.
A garrison of heavy infantry was also regularly
sent there, and great attention paid to the
island, as it was the landing-place for the
merchantmen from Egypt and Libya, and at
the same time secured Laconia from the attacks
of privateers from the sea, at the only point
where it is assailable, as the whole coast
rises abruptly towards the Sicilian and Cretan
seas. Coming to land here with their armament,
the Athenians with ten ships and two thousand
Milesian heavy infantry took the town of
Scandea, on the sea; and with the rest of
their forces landing on the side of the island
looking towards Malea, went against the lower
town of Cythera, where they found all the
inhabitants encamped. A battle ensuing, the
Cytherians held their ground for some little
while, and then turned and fled into the
upper town, where they soon afterwards capitulated
to Nicias and his colleagues, agreeing to
leave their fate to the decision of the Athenians,
their lives only being safe. A correspondence
had previously been going on between Nicias
and certain of the inhabitants, which caused
the surrender to be effected more speedily,
and upon terms more advantageous, present
and future, for the Cytherians; who would
otherwise have been expelled by the Athenians
on account of their being Lacedaemonians
and their island being so near to Laconia.
After the capitulation, the Athenians occupied
the town of Scandea near the harbour, and
appointing a garrison for Cythera, sailed
to Asine, Helus, and most of the places on
the sea, and making descents and passing
the night on shore at such spots as were
convenient, continued ravaging the country
for about seven days. The Lacedaemonians
seeing the Athenians masters of Cythera,
and expecting descents of the kind upon their
coasts, nowhere opposed them in force, but
sent garrisons here and there through the
country, consisting of as many heavy infantry
as the points menaced seemed to require,
and generally stood very much upon the defensive.
After the severe and unexpected blow that
had befallen them in the island, the occupation
of Pylos and Cythera, and the apparition
on every side of a war whose rapidity defied
precaution, they lived in constant fear of
internal revolution, and now took the unusual
step of raising four hundred horse and a
force of archers, and became more timid than
ever in military matters, finding themselves
involved in a maritime struggle, which their
organization had never contemplated, and
that against Athenians, with whom an enterprise
unattempted was always looked upon as a success
sacrificed. Besides this, their late numerous
reverses of fortune, coming close one upon
another without any reason, had thoroughly
unnerved them, and they were always afraid
of a second disaster like that on the island,
and thus scarcely dared to take the field,
but fancied that they could not stir without
a blunder, for being new to the experience
of adversity they had lost all confidence
in themselves. Accordingly they now allowed
the Athenians to ravage their seaboard, without
making any movement, the garrisons in whose
neighbourhood the descents were made always
thinking their numbers insufficient, and
sharing the general feeling. A single garrison
which ventured to resist, near Cotyrta and
Aphrodisia, struck terror by its charge into
the scattered mob of light troops, but retreated,
upon being received by the heavy infantry,
with the loss of a few men and some arms,
for which the Athenians set up a trophy,
and then sailed off to Cythera. From thence
they sailed round to Epidaurus Limera, ravaged
part of the country, and so came to Thyrea
in the Cynurian territory, upon the Argive
and Laconian border. This district had been
given by its Lacedaemonian owners to the
expelled Aeginetans to inhabit, in return
for their good offices at the time of the
earthquake and the rising of the Helots;
and also because, although subjects of Athens,
they had always sided with Lacedaemon. While
the Athenians were still at sea, the Aeginetans
evacuated a fort which they were building
upon the coast, and retreated into the upper
town where they lived, rather more than a
mile from the sea. One of the Lacedaemonian
district garrisons which was helping them
in the work, refused to enter here with them
at their entreaty, thinking it dangerous
to shut themselves up within the wall, and
retiring to the high ground remained quiet,
not considering themselves a match for the
enemy. Meanwhile the Athenians landed, and
instantly advanced with all their forces
and took Thyrea. The town they burnt, pillaging
what was in it; the Aeginetans who were not
slain in action they took with them to Athens,
with Tantalus, son of Patrocles, their Lacedaemonian
commander, who had been wounded and taken
prisoner. They also took with them a few
men from Cythera whom they thought it safest
to remove. These the Athenians determined
to lodge in the islands: the rest of the
Cytherians were to retain their lands and
pay four talents tribute; the Aeginetans
captured to be all put to death, on account
of the old inveterate feud; and Tantalus
to share the imprisonment of the Lacedaemonians
taken on the island. The same summer, the
inhabitants of Camarina and Gela in Sicily
first made an armistice with each other,
after which embassies from all the other
Sicilian cities assembled at Gela to try
to bring about a pacification. After many
expressions of opinion on one side and the
other, according to the griefs and pretensions
of the different parties complaining, Hermocrates,
son of Hermon, a Syracusan, the most influential
man among them, addressed the following words
to the assembly: "If I now address you,
Sicilians, it is not because my city is the
least in Sicily or the greatest sufferer
by the war, but in order to state publicly
what appears to me to be the best policy
for the whole island. That war is an evil
is a proposition so familiar to every one
that it would be tedious to develop it. No
one is forced to engage in it by ignorance,
or kept out of it by fear, if he fancies
there is anything to be gained by it. To
the former the gain appears greater than
the danger, while the latter would rather
stand the risk than put up with any immediate
sacrifice. But if both should happen to have
chosen the wrong moment for acting in this
way, advice to make peace would not be unserviceable;
and this, if we did but see it, is just what
we stand most in need of at the present juncture.
"I suppose that no one will dispute
that we went to war at first in order to
serve our own several interests, that we
are now, in view of the same interests, debating
how we can make peace; and that if we separate
without having as we think our rights, we
shall go to war again. And yet, as men of
sense, we ought to see that our separate
interests are not alone at stake in the present
congress: there is also the question whether
we have still time to save Sicily, the whole
of which in my opinion is menaced by Athenian
ambition; and we ought to find in the name
of that people more imperious arguments for
peace than any which I can advance, when
we see the first power in Hellas watching
our mistakes with the few ships that she
has at present in our waters, and under the
fair name of alliance speciously seeking
to turn to account the natural hostility
that exists between us. If we go to war,
and call in to help us a people that are
ready enough to carry their arms even where
they are not invited; and if we injure ourselves
at our own expense, and at the same time
serve as the pioneers of their dominion,
we may expect, when they see us worn out,
that they will one day come with a larger
armament, and seek to bring all of us into
subjection. "And yet as sensible men,
if we call in allies and court danger, it
should be in order to enrich our different
countries with new acquisitions, and not
to ruin what they possess already; and we
should understand that the intestine discords
which are so fatal to communities generally,
will be equally so to Sicily, if we, its
inhabitants, absorbed in our local quarrels,
neglect the common enemy. These considerations
should reconcile individual with individual,
and city with city, and unite us in a common
effort to save the whole of Sicily. Nor should
any one imagine that the Dorians only are
enemies of Athens, while the Chalcidian race
is secured by its Ionian blood; the attack
in question is not inspired by hatred of
one of two nationalities, but by a desire
for the good things in Sicily, the common
property of us all. This is proved by the
Athenian reception of the Chalcidian invitation:
an ally who has never given them any assistance
whatever, at once receives from them almost
more than the treaty entitles him to. That
the Athenians should cherish this ambition
and practise this policy is very excusable;
and I do not blame those who wish to rule,
but those who are over-ready to serve. It
is just as much in men's nature to rule those
who submit to them, as it is to resist those
who molest them; one is not less invariable
than the other. Meanwhile all who see these
dangers and refuse to provide for them properly,
or who have come here without having made
up their minds that our first duty is to
unite to get rid of the common peril, are
mistaken. The quickest way to be rid of it
is to make peace with each other; since the
Athenians menace us not from their own country,
but from that of those who invited them here.
In this way instead of war issuing in war,
peace quietly ends our quarrels; and the
guests who come hither under fair pretences
for bad ends, will have good reason for going
away without having attained them. "So
far as regards the Athenians, such are the
great advantages proved inherent in a wise
policy. Independently of this, in the face
of the universal consent, that peace is the
first of blessings, how can we refuse to
make it amongst ourselves; or do you not
think that the good which you have, and the
ills that you complain of, would be better
preserved and cured by quiet than by war;
that peace has its honours and splendours
of a less perilous kind, not to mention the
numerous other blessings that one might dilate
on, with the not less numerous miseries of
war? These considerations should teach you
not to disregard my words, but rather to
look in them every one for his own safety.
If there be any here who feels certain either
by right or might to effect his object, let
not this surprise be to him too severe a
disappointment. Let him remember that many
before now have tried to chastise a wrongdoer,
and failing to punish their enemy have not
even saved themselves; while many who have
trusted in force to gain an advantage, instead
of gaining anything more, have been doomed
to lose what they had. Vengeance is not necessarily
successful because wrong has been done, or
strength sure because it is confident; but
the incalculable element in the future exercises
the widest influence, and is the most treacherous,
and yet in fact the most useful of all things,
as it frightens us all equally, and thus
makes us consider before attacking each other.
"Let us therefore now allow the undefined
fear of this unknown future, and the immediate
terror of the Athenians' presence, to produce
their natural impression, and let us consider
any failure to carry out the programmes that
we may each have sketched out for ourselves
as sufficiently accounted for by these obstacles,
and send away the intruder from the country;
and if everlasting peace be impossible between
us, let us at all events make a treaty for
as long a term as possible, and put off our
private differences to another day. In fine,
let us recognize that the adoption of my
advice will leave us each citizens of a free
state, and as such arbiters of our own destiny,
able to return good or bad offices with equal
effect; while its rejection will make us
dependent on others, and thus not only impotent
to repel an insult, but on the most favourable
supposition, friends to our direst enemies,
and at feud with our natural friends. "For
myself, though, as I said at first, the representative
of a great city, and able to think less of
defending myself than of attacking others,
I am prepared to concede something in prevision
of these dangers. I am not inclined to ruin
myself for the sake of hurting my enemies,
or so blinded by animosity as to think myself
equally master of my own plans and of fortune
which I cannot command; but I am ready to
give up anything in reason. I call upon the
rest of you to imitate my conduct of your
own free will, without being forced to do
so by the enemy. There is no disgrace in
connections giving way to one another, a
Dorian to a Dorian, or a Chalcidian to his
brethren; above and beyond this we are neighbours,
live in the same country, are girt by the
same sea, and go by the same name of Sicilians.
We shall go to war again, I suppose, when
the time comes, and again make peace among
ourselves by means of future congresses;
but the foreign invader, if we are wise,
will always find us united against him, since
the hurt of one is the danger of all; and
we shall never, in future, invite into the
island either allies or mediators. By so
acting we shall at the present moment do
for Sicily a double service, ridding her
at once of the Athenians, and of civil war,
and in future shall live in freedom at home,
and be less menaced from abroad." Such
were the words of Hermocrates. The Sicilians
took his advice, and came to an understanding
among themselves to end the war, each keeping
what they had- the Camarinaeans taking Morgantina
at a price fixed to be paid to the Syracusans-
and the allies of the Athenians called the
officers in command, and told them that they
were going to make peace and that they would
be included in the treaty. The generals assenting,
the peace was concluded, and the Athenian
fleet afterwards sailed away from Sicily.
Upon their arrival at Athens, the Athenians
banished Pythodorus and Sophocles, and fined
Eurymedon for having taken bribes to depart
when they might have subdued Sicily. So thoroughly
had the present prosperity persuaded the
citizens that nothing could withstand them,
and that they could achieve what was possible
and impracticable alike, with means ample
or inadequate it mattered not. The secret
of this was their general extraordinary success,
which made them confuse their strength with
their hopes. The same summer the Megarians
in the city, pressed by the hostilities of
the Athenians, who invaded their country
twice every year with all their forces, and
harassed by the incursions of their own exiles
at Pegae, who had been expelled in a revolution
by the popular party, began to ask each other
whether it would not be better to receive
back their exiles, and free the town from
one of its two scourges. The friends of the
emigrants, perceiving the agitation, now
more openly than before demanded the adoption
of this proposition; and the leaders of the
commons, seeing that the sufferings of the
times had tired out the constancy of their
supporters, entered in their alarm into correspondence
with the Athenian generals, Hippocrates,
son of Ariphron, and Demosthenes, son of
Alcisthenes, and resolved to betray the town,
thinking this less dangerous to themselves
than the return of the party which they had
banished. It was accordingly arranged that
the Athenians should first take the long
walls extending for nearly a mile from the
city to the port of Nisaea, to prevent the
Peloponnesians coming to the rescue from
that place, where they formed the sole garrison
to secure the fidelity of Megara; and that
after this the attempt should be made to
put into their hands the upper town, which
it was thought would then come over with
less difficulty. The Athenians, after plans
had been arranged between themselves and
their correspondents both as to words and
actions, sailed by night to Minoa, the island
off Megara, with six hundred heavy infantry
under the command of Hippocrates, and took
post in a quarry not far off, out of which
bricks used to be taken for the walls; while
Demosthenes, the other commander, with a
detachment of Plataean light troops and another
of Peripoli, placed himself in ambush in
the precinct of Enyalius, which was still
nearer. No one knew of it, except those whose
business it was to know that night. A little
before daybreak, the traitors in Megara began
to act. Every night for a long time back,
under pretence of marauding, in order to
have a means of opening the gates, they had
been used, with the consent of the officer
in command, to carry by night a sculling
boat upon a cart along the ditch to the sea,
and so to sail out, bringing it back again
before day upon the cart, and taking it within
the wall through the gates, in order, as
they pretended, to baffle the Athenian blockade
at Minoa, there being no boat to be seen
in the harbour. On the present occasion the
cart was already at the gates, which had
been opened in the usual way for the boat,
when the Athenians, with whom this had been
concerted, saw it, and ran at the top of
their speed from the ambush in order to reach
the gates before they were shut again, and
while the cart was still there to prevent
their being closed; their Megarian accomplices
at the same moment killing the guard at the
gates. The first to run in was Demosthenes
with his Plataeans and Peripoli, just where
the trophy now stands; and he was no sooner
within the gates than the Plataeans engaged
and defeated the nearest party of Peloponnesians
who had taken the alarm and come to the rescue,
and secured the gates for the approaching
Athenian heavy infantry. After this, each
of the Athenians as fast as they entered
went against the wall. A few of the Peloponnesian
garrison stood their ground at first, and
tried to repel the assault, and some of them
were killed; but the main body took fright
and fled; the night attack and the sight
of the Megarian traitors in arms against
them making them think that all Megara had
gone over to the enemy. It so happened also
that the Athenian herald of his own idea
called out and invited any of the Megarians
that wished, to join the Athenian ranks;
and this was no sooner heard by the garrison
than they gave way, and, convinced that they
were the victims of a concerted attack, took
refuge in Nisaea. By daybreak, the walls
being now taken and the Megarians in the
city in great agitation, the persons who
had negotiated with the Athenians, supported
by the rest of the popular party which was
privy to the plot, said that they ought to
open the gates and march out to battle. It
had been concerted between them that the
Athenians should rush in, the moment that
the gates were opened, while the conspirators
were to be distinguished from the rest by
being anointed with oil, and so to avoid
being hurt. They could open the gates with
more security, as four thousand Athenian
heavy infantry from Eleusis, and six hundred
horse, had marched all night, according to
agreement, and were now close at hand. The
conspirators were all ready anointed and
at their posts by the gates, when one of
their accomplices denounced the plot to the
opposite party, who gathered together and
came in a body, and roundly said that they
must not march out- a thing they had never
yet ventured on even when in greater force
than at present- or wantonly compromise the
safety of the town, and that if what they
said was not attended to, the battle would
have to be fought in Megara. For the rest,
they gave no signs of their knowledge of
the intrigue, but stoutly maintained that
their advice was the best, and meanwhile
kept close by and watched the gates, making
it impossible for the conspirators to effect
their purpose. The Athenian generals seeing
that some obstacle had arisen, and that the
capture of the town by force was no longer
practicable, at once proceeded to invest
Nisaea, thinking that, if they could take
it before relief arrived, the surrender of
Megara would soon follow. Iron, stone-masons,
and everything else required quickly coming
up from Athens, the Athenians started from
the wall which they occupied, and from this
point built a cross wall looking towards
Megara down to the sea on either side of
Nisaea; the ditch and the walls being divided
among the army, stones and bricks taken from
the suburb, and the fruit-trees and timber
cut down to make a palisade wherever this
seemed necessary; the houses also in the
suburb with the addition of battlements sometimes
entering into the fortification. The whole
of this day the work continued, and by the
afternoon of the next the wall was all but
completed, when the garrison in Nisaea, alarmed
by the absolute want of provisions, which
they used to take in for the day from the
upper town, not anticipating any speedy relief
from the Peloponnesians, and supposing Megara
to be hostile, capitulated to the Athenians
on condition that they should give up their
arms, and should each be ransomed for a stipulated
sum; their Lacedaemonian commander, and any
others of his countrymen in the place, being
left to the discretion of the Athenians.
On these conditions they surrendered and
came out, and the Athenians broke down the
long walls at their point of junction with
Megara, took possession of Nisaea, and went
on with their other preparations. Just at
this time the Lacedaemonian Brasidas, son
of Tellis, happened to be in the neighbourhood
of Sicyon and Corinth, getting ready an army
for Thrace. As soon as he heard of the capture
of the walls, fearing for the Peloponnesians
in Nisaea and the safety of Megara, he sent
to the Boeotians to meet him as quickly as
possible at Tripodiscus, a village so called
of the Megarid, under Mount Geraneia, and
went himself, with two thousand seven hundred
Corinthian heavy infantry, four hundred Phliasians,
six hundred Sicyonians, and such troops of
his own as he had already levied, expecting
to find Nisaea not yet taken. Hearing of
its fall (he had marched out by night to
Tripodiscus), he took three hundred picked
men from the army, without waiting till his
coming should be known, and came up to Megara
unobserved by the Athenians, who were down
by the sea, ostensibly, and really if possible,
to attempt Nisaea, but above all to get into
Megara and secure the town. He accordingly
invited the townspeople to admit his party,
saying that he had hopes of recovering Nisaea.
However, one of the Megarian factions feared
that he might expel them and restore the
exiles; the other that the commons, apprehensive
of this very danger, might set upon them,
and the city be thus destroyed by a battle
within its gates under the eyes of the ambushed
Athenians. He was accordingly refused admittance,
both parties electing to remain quiet and
await the event; each expecting a battle
between the Athenians and the relieving army,
and thinking it safer to see their friends
victorious before declaring in their favour.
Unable to carry his point, Brasidas went
back to the rest of the army. At daybreak
the Boeotians joined him. Having determined
to relieve Megara, whose danger they considered
their own, even before hearing from Brasidas,
they were already in full force at Plataea,
when his messenger arrived to add spurs to
their resolution; and they at once sent on
to him two thousand two hundred heavy infantry,
and six hundred horse, returning home with
the main body. The whole army thus assembled
numbered six thousand heavy infantry. The
Athenian heavy infantry were drawn up by
Nisaea and the sea; but the light troops
being scattered over the plain were attacked
by the Boeotian horse and driven to the sea,
being taken entirely by surprise, as on previous
occasions no relief had ever come to the
Megarians from any quarter. Here the Boeotians
were in their turn charged and engaged by
the Athenian horse, and a cavalry action
ensued which lasted a long time, and in which
both parties claimed the victory. The Athenians
killed and stripped the leader of the Boeotian
horse and some few of his comrades who had
charged right up to Nisaea, and remaining
masters of the bodies gave them back under
truce, and set up a trophy; but regarding
the action as a whole the forces separated
without either side having gained a decisive
advantage, the Boeotians returning to their
army and the Athenians to Nisaea. After this
Brasidas and the army came nearer to the
sea and to Megara, and taking up a convenient
position, remained quiet in order of battle,
expecting to be attacked by the Athenians
and knowing that the Megarians were waiting
to see which would be the victor. This attitude
seemed to present two advantages. Without
taking the offensive or willingly provoking
the hazards of a battle, they openly showed
their readiness to fight, and thus without
bearing the burden of the day would fairly
reap its honours; while at the same time
they effectually served their interests at
Megara. For if they had failed to show themselves
they would not have had a chance, but would
have certainly been considered vanquished,
and have lost the town. As it was, the Athenians
might possibly not be inclined to accept
their challenge, and their object would be
attained without fighting. And so it turned
out. The Athenians formed outside the long
walls and, the enemy not attacking, there
remained motionless; their generals having
decided that the risk was too unequal. In
fact most of their objects had been already
attained; and they would have to begin a
battle against superior numbers, and if victorious
could only gain Megara, while a defeat would
destroy the flower of their heavy soldiery.
For the enemy it was different; as even the
states actually represented in his army risked
each only a part of its entire force, he
might well be more audacious. Accordingly,
after waiting for some time without either
side attacking, the Athenians withdrew to
Nisaea, and the Peloponnesians after them
to the point from which they had set out.
The friends of the Megarian exiles now threw
aside their hesitation, and opened the gates
to Brasidas and the commanders from the different
states- looking upon him as the victor and
upon the Athenians as having declined the
battle- and receiving them into the town
proceeded to discuss matters with them; the
party in correspondence with the Athenians
being paralysed by the turn things had taken.
Afterwards Brasidas let the allies go home,
and himself went back to Corinth, to prepare
for his expedition to Thrace, his original
destination. The Athenians also returning
home, the Megarians in the city most implicated
in the Athenian negotiation, knowing that
they had been detected, presently disappeared;
while the rest conferred with the friends
of the exiles, and restored the party at
Pegae, after binding them under solemn oaths
to take no vengeance for the past, and only
to consult the real interests of the town.
However, as soon as they were in office,
they held a review of the heavy infantry,
and separating the battalions, picked out
about a hundred of their enemies, and of
those who were thought to be most involved
in the correspondence with the Athenians,
brought them before the people, and compelling
the vote to be given openly, had them condemned
and executed, and established a close oligarchy
in the town- a revolution which lasted a
very long while, although effected by a very
few partisans. CHAPTER XIV. Eighth and Ninth
Years of the War - Invasion of Boeotia -
Fall of Amphipolis - Brilliant Successes
of Brasidas THE same summer the Mitylenians
were about to fortify Antandrus, as they
had intended, when Demodocus and Aristides,
the commanders of the Athenian squadron engaged
in levying subsidies, heard on the Hellespont
of what was being done to the place (Lamachus
their colleague having sailed with ten ships
into the Pontus) and conceived fears of its
becoming a second Anaia-the place in which
the Samian exiles had established themselves
to annoy Samos, helping the Peloponnesians
by sending pilots to their navy, and keeping
the city in agitation and receiving all its
outlaws. They accordingly got together a
force from the allies and set sail, defeated
in battle the troops that met them from Antandrus,
and retook the place. Not long after, Lamachus,
who had sailed into the Pontus, lost his
ships at anchor in the river Calex, in the
territory of Heraclea, rain having fallen
in the interior and the flood coming suddenly
down upon them; and himself and his troops
passed by land through the Bithynian Thracians
on the Asiatic side, and arrived at Chalcedon,
the Megarian colony at the mouth of the Pontus.
The same summer the Athenian general, Demosthenes,
arrived at Naupactus with forty ships immediately
after the return from the Megarid. Hippocrates
and himself had had overtures made to them
by certain men in the cities in Boeotia,
who wished to change the constitution and
introduce a democracy as at Athens; Ptoeodorus,
a Theban exile, being the chief mover in
this intrigue. The seaport town of Siphae,
in the bay of Crisae, in the Thespian territory,
was to be betrayed to them by one party;
Chaeronea (a dependency of what was formerly
called the Minyan, now the Boeotian, Orchomenus)
to be put into their hands by another from
that town, whose exiles were very active
in the business, hiring men in Peloponnese.
Some Phocians also were in the plot, Chaeronea
being the frontier town of Boeotia and close
to Phanotis in Phocia. Meanwhile the Athenians
were to seize Delium, the sanctuary of Apollo,
in the territory of Tanagra looking towards
Euboea; and all these events were to take
place simultaneously upon a day appointed,
in order that the Boeotians might be unable
to unite to oppose them at Delium, being
everywhere detained by disturbances at home.
Should the enterprise succeed, and Delium
be fortified, its authors confidently expected
that even if no revolution should immediately
follow in Boeotia, yet with these places
in their hands, and the country being harassed
by incursions, and a refuge in each instance
near for the partisans engaged in them, things
would not remain as they were, but that the
rebels being supported by the Athenians and
the forces of the oligarchs divided, it would
be possible after a while to settle matters
according to their wishes. Such was the plot
in contemplation. Hippocrates with a force
raised at home awaited the proper moment
to take the field against the Boeotians;
while he sent on Demosthenes with the forty
ships above mentioned to Naupactus, to raise
in those parts an army of Acarnanians and
of the other allies, and sail and receive
Siphae from the conspirators; a day having
been agreed on for the simultaneous execution
of both these operations. Demosthenes on
his arrival found Oeniadae already compelled
by the united Acarnanians to join the Athenian
confederacy, and himself raising all the
allies in those countries marched against
and subdued Salynthius and the Agraeans;
after which he devoted himself to the preparations
necessary to enable him to be at Siphae by
the time appointed. About the same time in
the summer, Brasidas set out on his march
for the Thracian places with seventeen hundred
heavy infantry, and arriving at Heraclea
in Trachis, from thence sent on a messenger
to his friends at Pharsalus, to ask them
to conduct himself and his army through the
country. Accordingly there came to Melitia
in Achaia Panaerus, Dorus, Hippolochidas,
Torylaus, and Strophacus, the Chalcidian
proxenus, under whose escort he resumed his
march, being accompanied also by other Thessalians,
among whom was Niconidas from Larissa, a
friend of Perdiccas. It was never very easy
to traverse Thessaly without an escort; and
throughout all Hellas for an armed force
to pass without leave through a neighbour's
country was a delicate step to take. Besides
this the Thessalian people had always sympathized
with the Athenians. Indeed if instead of
the customary dose oligarchy there had been
a constitutional government in Thessaly,
he would never have been able to proceed;
since even as it was, he was met on his march
at the river Enipeus by certain of the opposite
party who forbade his further progress, and
complained of his making the attempt without
the consent of the nation. To this his escort
answered that they had no intention of taking
him through against their will; they were
only friends in attendance on an unexpected
visitor. Brasidas himself added that he came
as a friend to Thessaly and its inhabitants,
his arms not being directed against them
but against the Athenians, with whom he was
at war, and that although he knew of no quarrel
between the Thessalians and Lacedaemonians
to prevent the two nations having access
to each other's territory, he neither would
nor could proceed against their wishes; he
could only beg them not to stop him. With
this answer they went away, and he took the
advice of his escort, and pushed on without
halting, before a greater force might gather
to prevent him. Thus in the day that he set
out from Melitia he performed the whole distance
to Pharsalus, and encamped on the river Apidanus;
and so to Phacium and from thence to Perrhaebia.
Here his Thessalian escort went back, and
the Perrhaebians, who are subjects of Thessaly,
set him down at Dium in the dominions of
Perdiccas, a Macedonian town under Mount
Olympus, looking towards Thessaly. In this
way Brasidas hurried through Thessaly before
any one could be got ready to stop him, and
reached Perdiccas and Chalcidice. The departure
of the army from Peloponnese had been procured
by the Thracian towns in revolt against Athens
and by Perdiccas, alarmed at the successes
of the Athenians. The Chalcidians thought
that they would be the first objects of an
Athenian expedition, not that the neighbouring
towns which had not yet revolted did not
also secretly join in the invitation; and
Perdiccas also had his apprehensions on account
of his old quarrels with the Athenians, although
not openly at war with them, and above all
wished to reduce Arrhabaeus, king of the
Lyncestians. It had been less difficult for
them to get an army to leave Peloponnese,
because of the ill fortune of the Lacedaemonians
at the present moment. The attacks of the
Athenians upon Peloponnese, and in particular
upon Laconia, might, it was hoped, be diverted
most effectually by annoying them in return,
and by sending an army to their allies, especially
as they were willing to maintain it and asked
for it to aid them in revolting. The Lacedaemonians
were also glad to have an excuse for sending
some of the Helots out of the country, for
fear that the present aspect of affairs and
the occupation of Pylos might encourage them
to move. Indeed fear of their numbers and
obstinacy even persuaded the Lacedaemonians
to the action which I shall now relate, their
policy at all times having been governed
by the necessity of taking precautions against
them. The Helots were invited by a proclamation
to pick out those of their number who claimed
to have most distinguished themselves against
the enemy, in order that they might receive
their freedom; the object being to test them,
as it was thought that the first to claim
their freedom would be the most high-spirited
and the most apt to rebel. As many as two
thousand were selected accordingly, who crowned
themselves and went round the temples, rejoicing
in their new freedom. The Spartans, however,
soon afterwards did away with them, and no
one ever knew how each of them perished.
The Spartans now therefore gladly sent seven
hundred as heavy infantry with Brasidas,
who recruited the rest of his force by means
of money in Peloponnese. Brasidas himself
was sent out by the Lacedaemonians mainly
at his own desire, although the Chalcidians
also were eager to have a man so thorough
as he had shown himself whenever there was
anything to be done at Sparta, and whose
after-service abroad proved of the utmost
use to his country. At the present moment
his just and moderate conduct towards the
towns generally succeeded in procuring their
revolt, besides the places which he managed
to take by treachery; and thus when the Lacedaemonians
desired to treat, as they ultimately did,
they had places to offer in exchange, and
the burden of war meanwhile shifted from
Peloponnese. Later on in the war, after the
events in Sicily, the present valour and
conduct of Brasidas, known by experience
to some, by hearsay to others, was what mainly
created in the allies of Athens a feeling
for the Lacedaemonians. He was the first
who went out and showed himself so good a
man at all points as to leave behind him
the conviction that the rest were like him.
Meanwhile his arrival in the Thracian country
no sooner became known to the Athenians than
they declared war against Perdiccas, whom
they regarded as the author of the expedition,
and kept a closer watch on their allies in
that quarter. Upon the arrival of Brasidas
and his army, Perdiccas immediately started
with them and with his own forces against
Arrhabaeus, son of Bromerus, king of the
Lyncestian Macedonians, his neighbour, with
whom he had a quarrel and whom he wished
to subdue. However, when he arrived with
his army and Brasidas at the pass leading
into Lyncus, Brasidas told him that before
commencing hostilities he wished to go and
try to persuade Arrhabaeus to become the
ally of Lacedaemon, this latter having already
made overtures intimating his willingness
to make Brasidas arbitrator between them,
and the Chalcidian envoys accompanying him
having warned him not to remove the apprehensions
of Perdiccas, in order to ensure his greater
zeal in their cause. Besides, the envoys
of Perdiccas had talked at Lacedaemon about
his bringing many of the places round him
into alliance with them; and thus Brasidas
thought he might take a larger view of the
question of Arrhabaeus. Perdiccas however
retorted that he had not brought him with
him to arbitrate in their quarrel, but to
put down the enemies whom he might point
out to him; and that while he, Perdiccas,
maintained half his army it was a breach
of faith for Brasidas to parley with Arrhabaeus.
Nevertheless Brasidas disregarded the wishes
of Perdiccas and held the parley in spite
of him, and suffered himself to be persuaded
to lead off the army without invading the
country of Arrhabaeus; after which Perdiccas,
holding that faith had not been kept with
him, contributed only a third instead of
half of the support of the army. The same
summer, without loss of time, Brasidas marched
with the Chalcidians against Acanthus, a
colony of the Andrians, a little before vintage.
The inhabitants were divided into two parties
on the question of receiving him; those who
had joined the Chalcidians in inviting him,
and the popular party. However, fear for
their fruit, which was still out, enabled
Brasidas to persuade the multitude to admit
him alone, and to hear what he had to say
before making a decision; and he was admitted
accordingly and appeared before the people,
and not being a bad speaker for a Lacedaemonian,
addressed them as follows: "Acanthians,
the Lacedaemonians have sent out me and my
army to make good the reason that we gave
for the war when we began it, viz., that
we were going to war with the Athenians in
order to free Hellas. Our delay in coming
has been caused by mistaken expectations
as to the war at home, which led us to hope,
by our own unassisted efforts and without
your risking anything, to effect the speedy
downfall of the Athenians; and you must not
blame us for this, as we are now come the
moment that we were able, prepared with your
aid to do our best to subdue them. Meanwhile
I am astonished at finding your gates shut
against me, and at not meeting with a better
welcome. We Lacedaemonians thought of you
as allies eager to have us, to whom we should
come in spirit even before we were with you
in body; and in this expectation undertook
all the risks of a march of many days through
a strange country, so far did our zeal carry
us. It will be a terrible thing if after
this you have other intentions, and mean
to stand in the way of your own and Hellenic
freedom. It is not merely that you oppose
me yourselves; but wherever I may go people
will be less inclined to join me, on the
score that you, to whom I first came- an
important town like Acanthus, and prudent
men like the Acanthians- refused to admit
me. I shall have nothing to prove that the
reason which I advance is the true one; it
will be said either that there is something
unfair in the freedom which I offer, or that
I am in insufficient force and unable to
protect you against an attack from Athens.
Yet when I went with the army which I now
have to the relief of Nisaea, the Athenians
did not venture to engage me although in
greater force than I; and it is not likely
they will ever send across sea against you
an army as numerous as they had at Nisaea.
And for myself, I have come here not to hurt
but to free the Hellenes, witness the solemn
oaths by which I have bound my government
that the allies that I may bring over shall
be independent; and besides my object in
coming is not by force or fraud to obtain
your alliance, but to offer you mine to help
you against your Athenian masters. I protest,
therefore, against any suspicions of my intentions
after the guarantees which I offer, and equally
so against doubts of my ability to protect
you, and I invite you to join me without
hesitation. "Some of you may hang back
because they have private enemies, and fear
that I may put the city into the hands of
a party: none need be more tranquil than
they. I am not come here to help this party
or that; and I do not consider that I should
be bringing you freedom in any real sense,
if I should disregard your constitution,
and enslave the many to the few or the few
to the many. This would be heavier than a
foreign yoke; and we Lacedaemonians, instead
of being thanked for our pains, should get
neither honour nor glory, but, contrariwise,
reproaches. The charges which strengthen
our hands in the war against the Athenians
would on our own showing be merited by ourselves,
and more hateful in us than in those who
make no pretensions to honesty; as it is
more disgraceful for persons of character
to take what they covet by fair-seeming fraud
than by open force; the one aggression having
for its justification the might which fortune
gives, the other being simply a piece of
clever roguery. A matter which concerns us
thus nearly we naturally look to most jealously;
and over and above the oaths that I have
mentioned, what stronger assurance can you
have, when you see that our words, compared
with the actual facts, produce the necessary
conviction that it is our interest to act
as we say? "If to these considerations
of mine you put in the plea of inability,
and claim that your friendly feeling should
save you from being hurt by your refusal;
if you say that freedom, in your opinion,
is not without its dangers, and that it is
right to offer it to those who can accept
it, but not to force it on any against their
will, then I shall take the gods and heroes
of your country to witness that I came for
your good and was rejected, and shall do
my best to compel you by laying waste your
land. I shall do so without scruple, being
justified by the necessity which constrains
me, first, to prevent the Lacedaemonians
from being damaged by you, their friends,
in the event of your nonadhesion, through
the moneys that you pay to the Athenians;
and secondly, to prevent the Hellenes from
being hindered by you in shaking off their
servitude. Otherwise indeed we should have
no right to act as we propose; except in
the name of some public interest, what call
should we Lacedaemonians have to free those
who do not wish it? Empire we do not aspire
to: it is what we are labouring to put down;
and we should wrong the greater number if
we allowed you to stand in the way of the
independence that we offer to all. Endeavour,
therefore, to decide wisely, and strive to
begin the work of liberation for the Hellenes,
and lay up for yourselves endless renown,
while you escape private loss, and cover
your commonwealth with glory." Such
were the words of Brasidas. The Acanthians,
after much had been said on both sides of
the question, gave their votes in secret,
and the majority, influenced by the seductive
arguments of Brasidas and by fear for their
fruit, decided to revolt from Athens; not
however admitting the army until they had
taken his personal security for the oaths
sworn by his government before they sent
him out, assuring the independence of the
allies whom he might bring over. Not long
after, Stagirus, a colony of the Andrians,
followed their example and revolted. Such
were the events of this summer. It was in
the first days of the winter following that
the places in Boeotia were to be put into
the hands of the Athenian generals, Hippocrates
and Demosthenes, the latter of whom was to
go with his ships to Siphae, the former to
Delium. A mistake, however, was made in the
days on which they were each to start; and
Demosthenes, sailing first to Siphae, with
the Acarnanians and many of the allies from
those parts on board, failed to effect anything,
through the plot having been betrayed by
Nicomachus, a Phocian from Phanotis, who
told the Lacedaemonians, and they the Boeotians.
Succours accordingly flocked in from all
parts of Boeotia, Hippocrates not being yet
there to make his diversion, and Siphae and
Chaeronea were promptly secured, and the
conspirators, informed of the mistake, did
not venture on any movement in the towns.
Meanwhile Hippocrates made a levy in mass
of the citizens, resident aliens, and foreigners
in Athens, and arrived at his destination
after the Boeotians had already come back
from Siphae, and encamping his army began
to fortify Delium, the sanctuary of Apollo,
in the following manner. A trench was dug
all round the temple and the consecrated
ground, and the earth thrown up from the
excavation was made to do duty as a wall,
in which stakes were also planted, the vines
round the sanctuary being cut down and thrown
in, together with stones and bricks pulled
down from the houses near; every means, in
short, being used to run up the rampart.
Wooden towers were also erected where they
were wanted, and where there was no part
of the temple buildings left standing, as
on the side where the gallery once existing
had fallen in. The work was begun on the
third day after leaving home, and continued
during the fourth, and till dinnertime on
the fifth, when most of it being now finished
the army removed from Delium about a mile
and a quarter on its way home. From this
point most of the light troops went straight
on, while the heavy infantry halted and remained
where they were; Hippocrates having stayed
behind at Delium to arrange the posts, and
to give directions for the completion of
such part of the outworks as had been left
unfinished. During the days thus employed
the Boeotians were mustering at Tanagra,
and by the time that they had come in from
all the towns, found the Athenians already
on their way home. The rest of the eleven
Boeotarchs were against giving battle, as
the enemy was no longer in Boeotia, the Athenians
being just over the Oropian border, when
they halted; but Pagondas, son of Aeolidas,
one of the Boeotarchs of Thebes (Arianthides,
son of Lysimachidas, being the other), and
then commander-in-chief, thought it best
to hazard a battle. He accordingly called
the men to him, company after company, to
prevent their all leaving their arms at once,
and urged them to attack the Athenians, and
stand the issue of a battle, speaking as
follows: "Boeotians, the idea that we
ought not to give battle to the Athenians,
unless we came up with them in Boeotia, is
one which should never have entered into
the head of any of us, your generals. It
was to annoy Boeotia that they crossed the
frontier and built a fort in our country;
and they are therefore, I imagine, our enemies
wherever we may come up with them, and from
wheresoever they may have come to act as
enemies do. And if any one has taken up with
the idea in question for reasons of safety,
it is high time for him to change his mind.
The party attacked, whose own country is
in danger, can scarcely discuss what is prudent
with the calmness of men who are in full
enjoyment of what they have got, and are
thinking of attacking a neighbour in order
to get more. It is your national habit, in
your country or out of it, to oppose the
same resistance to a foreign invader; and
when that invader is Athenian, and lives
upon your frontier besides, it is doubly
imperative to do so. As between neighbours
generally, freedom means simply a determination
to hold one's own; and with neighbours like
these, who are trying to enslave near and
far alike, there is nothing for it but to
fight it out to the last. Look at the condition
of the Euboeans and of most of the rest of
Hellas, and be convinced that others have
to fight with their neighbours for this frontier
or that, but that for us conquest means one
frontier for the whole country, about which
no dispute can be made, for they will simply
come and take by force what we have. So much
more have we to fear from this neighbour
than from another. Besides, people who, like
the Athenians in the present instance, are
tempted by pride of strength to attack their
neighbours, usually march most confidently
against those who keep still, and only defend
themselves in their own country, but think
twice before they grapple with those who
meet them outside their frontier and strike
the first blow if opportunity offers. The
Athenians have shown us this themselves;
the defeat which we inflicted upon them at
Coronea, at the time when our quarrels had
allowed them to occupy the country, has given
great security to Boeotia until the present
day. Remembering this, the old must equal
their ancient exploits, and the young, the
sons of the heroes of that time, must endeavour
not to disgrace their native valour; and
trusting in the help of the god whose temple
has been sacrilegiously fortified, and in
the victims which in our sacrifices have
proved propitious, we must march against
the enemy, and teach him that he must go
and get what he wants by attacking someone
who will not resist him, but that men whose
glory it is to be always ready to give battle
for the liberty of their own country, and
never unjustly to enslave that of others,
will not let him go without a struggle."
By these arguments Pagondas persuaded the
Boeotians to attack the Athenians, and quickly
breaking up his camp led his army forward,
it being now late in the day. On nearing
the enemy, he halted in a position where
a hill intervening prevented the two armies
from seeing each other, and then formed and
prepared for action. Meanwhile Hippocrates
at Delium, informed of the approach of the
Boeotians, sent orders to his troops to throw
themselves into line, and himself joined
them not long afterwards, leaving about three
hundred horse behind him at Delium, at once
to guard the place in case of attack, and
to watch their opportunity and fall upon
the Boeotians during the battle. The Boeotians
placed a detachment to deal with these, and
when everything was arranged to their satisfaction
appeared over the hill, and halted in the
order which they had determined on, to the
number of seven thousand heavy infantry,
more than ten thousand light troops, one
thousand horse, and five hundred targeteers.
On their right were the Thebans and those
of their province, in the centre the Haliartians,
Coronaeans, Copaeans, and the other people
around the lake, and on the left the Thespians,
Tanagraeans, and Orchomenians, the cavalry
and the light troops being at the extremity
of each wing. The Thebans formed twenty-five
shields deep, the rest as they pleased. Such
was the strength and disposition of the Boeotian
army. On the side of the Athenians, the heavy
infantry throughout the whole army formed
eight deep, being in numbers equal to the
enemy, with the cavalry upon the two wings.
Light troops regularly armed there were none
in the army, nor had there ever been any
at Athens. Those who had joined in the invasion,
though many times more numerous than those
of the enemy, had mostly followed unarmed,
as part of the levy in mass of the citizens
and foreigners at Athens, and having started
first on their way home were not present
in any number. The armies being now in line
and upon the point of engaging, Hippocrates,
the general, passed along the Athenian ranks,
and encouraged them as follows: "Athenians,
I shall only say a few words to you, but
brave men require no more, and they are addressed
more to your understanding than to your courage.
None of you must fancy that we are going
out of our way to run this risk in the country
of another. Fought in their territory the
battle will be for ours: if we conquer, the
Peloponnesians will never invade your country
without the Boeotian horse, and in one battle
you will win Boeotia and in a manner free
Attica. Advance to meet them then like citizens
of a country in which you all glory as the
first in Hellas, and like sons of the fathers
who beat them at Oenophyta with Myronides
and thus gained possession of Boeotia."
Hippocrates had got half through the army
with his exhortation, when the Boeotians,
after a few more hasty words from Pagondas,
struck up the paean, and came against them
from the hill; the Athenians advancing to
meet them, and closing at a run. The extreme
wing of neither army came into action, one
like the other being stopped by the water-courses
in the way; the rest engaged with the utmost
obstinacy, shield against shield. The Boeotian
left, as far as the centre, was worsted by
the Athenians. The Thespians in that part
of the field suffered most severely. The
troops alongside them having given way, they
were surrounded in a narrow space and cut
down fighting hand to hand; some of the Athenians
also fell into confusion in surrounding the
enemy and mistook and so killed each other.
In this part of the field the Boeotians were
beaten, and retreated upon the troops still
fighting; but the right, where the Thebans
were, got the better of the Athenians and
shoved them further and further back, though
gradually at first. It so happened also that
Pagondas, seeing the distress of his left,
had sent two squadrons of horse, where they
could not be seen, round the hill, and their
sudden appearance struck a panic into the
victorious wing of the Athenians, who thought
that it was another army coming against them.
At length in both parts of the field, disturbed
by this panic, and with their line broken
by the advancing Thebans, the whole Athenian
army took to flight. Some made for Delium
and the sea, some for Oropus, others for
Mount Parnes, or wherever they had hopes
of safety, pursued and cut down by the Boeotians,
and in particular by the cavalry, composed
partly of Boeotians and partly of Locrians,
who had come up just as the rout began. Night
however coming on to interrupt the pursuit,
the mass of the fugitives escaped more easily
than they would otherwise have done. The
next day the troops at Oropus and Delium
returned home by sea, after leaving a garrison
in the latter place, which they continued
to hold notwithstanding the defeat. The Boeotians
set up a trophy, took up their own dead,
and stripped those of the enemy, and leaving
a guard over them retired to Tanagra, there
to take measures for attacking Delium. Meanwhile
a herald came from the Athenians to ask for
the dead, but was met and turned back by
a Boeotian herald, who told him that he would
effect nothing until the return of himself
the Boeotian herald, and who then went on
to the Athenians, and told them on the part
of the Boeotians that they had done wrong
in transgressing the law of the Hellenes.
Of what use was the universal custom protecting
the temples in an invaded country, if the
Athenians were to fortify Delium and live
there, acting exactly as if they were on
unconsecrated ground, and drawing and using
for their purposes the water which they,
the Boeotians, never touched except for sacred
uses? Accordingly for the god as well as
for themselves, in the name of the deities
concerned, and of Apollo, the Boeotians invited
them first to evacuate the temple, if they
wished to take up the dead that belonged
to them. After these words from the herald,
the Athenians sent their own herald to the
Boeotians to say that they had not done any
wrong to the temple, and for the future would
do it no more harm than they could help;
not having occupied it originally in any
such design, but to defend themselves from
it against those who were really wronging
them. The law of the Hellenes was that conquest
of a country, whether more or less extensive,
carried with it possession of the temples
in that country, with the obligation to keep
up the usual ceremonies, at least as far
as possible. The Boeotians and most other
people who had turned out the owners of a
country, and put themselves in their places
by force, now held as of right the temples
which they originally entered as usurpers.
If the Athenians could have conquered more
of Boeotia this would have been the case
with them: as things stood, the piece of
it which they had got they should treat as
their own, and not quit unless obliged. The
water they had disturbed under the impulsion
of a necessity which they had not wantonly
incurred, having been forced to use it in
defending themselves against the Boeotians
who first invaded Attica. Besides, anything
done under the pressure of war and danger
might reasonably claim indulgence even in
the eye of the god; or why, pray, were the
altars the asylum for involuntary offences?
Transgression also was a term applied to
presumptuous offenders, not to the victims
of adverse circumstances. In short, which
were most impious- the Boeotians who wished
to barter dead bodies for holy places, or
the Athenians who refused to give up holy
places to obtain what was theirs by right?
The condition of evacuating Boeotia must
therefore be withdrawn. They were no longer
in Boeotia. They stood where they stood by
the right of the sword. All that the Boeotians
had to do was to tell them to take up their
dead under a truce according to the national
custom. The Boeotians replied that if they
were in Boeotia, they must evacuate that
country before taking up their dead; if they
were in their own territory, they could do
as they pleased: for they knew that, although
the Oropid where the bodies as it chanced
were lying (the battle having been fought
on the borders) was subject to Athens, yet
the Athenians could not get them without
their leave. Besides, why should they grant
a truce for Athenian ground? And what could
be fairer than to tell them to evacuate Boeotia
if they wished to get what they asked? The
Athenian herald accordingly returned with
this answer, without having accomplished
his object. Meanwhile the Boeotians at once
sent for darters and slingers from the Malian
Gulf, and with two thousand Corinthian heavy
infantry who had joined them after the battle,
the Peloponnesian garrison which had evacuated
Nisaea, and some Megarians with them, marched
against Delium, and attacked the fort, and
after divers efforts finally succeeded in
taking it by an engine of the following description.
They sawed in two and scooped out a great
beam from end to end, and fitting it nicely
together again like a pipe, hung by chains
a cauldron at one extremity, with which communicated
an iron tube projecting from the beam, which
was itself in great part plated with iron.
This they brought up from a distance upon
carts to the part of the wall principally
composed of vines and timber, and when it
was near, inserted huge bellows into their
end of the beam and blew with them. The blast
passing closely confined into the cauldron,
which was filled with lighted coals, sulphur
and pitch, made a great blaze, and set fire
to the wall, which soon became untenable
for its defenders, who left it and fled;
and in this way the fort was taken. Of the
garrison some were killed and two hundred
made prisoners; most of the rest got on board
their ships and returned home. Soon after
the fall of Delium, which took place seventeen
days after the battle, the Athenian herald,
without knowing what had happened, came again
for the dead, which were now restored by
the Boeotians, who no longer answered as
at first. Not quite five hundred Boeotians
fell in the battle, and nearly one thousand
Athenians, including Hippocrates the general,
besides a great number of light troops and
camp followers. Soon after this battle Demosthenes,
after the failure of his voyage to Siphae
and of the plot on the town, availed himself
of the Acarnanian and Agraean troops and
of the four hundred Athenian heavy infantry
which he had on board, to make a descent
on the Sicyonian coast. Before however all
his ships had come to shore, the Sicyonians
came up and routed and chased to their ships
those that had landed, killing some and taking
others prisoners; after which they set up
a trophy, and gave back the dead under truce.
About the same time with the affair of Delium
took place the death of Sitalces, king of
the Odrysians, who was defeated in battle,
in a campaign against the Triballi; Seuthes,
son of Sparadocus, his nephew, succeeding
to the kingdom of the Odrysians, and of the
rest of Thrace ruled by Sitalces. The same
winter Brasidas, with his allies in the Thracian
places, marched against Amphipolis, the Athenian
colony on the river Strymon. A settlement
upon the spot on which the city now stands
was before attempted by Aristagoras, the
Milesian (when he fled from King Darius),
who was however dislodged by the Edonians;
and thirty-two years later by the Athenians,
who sent thither ten thousand settlers of
their own citizens, and whoever else chose
to go. These were cut off at Drabescus by
the Thracians. Twenty-nine years after, the
Athenians returned (Hagnon, son of Nicias,
being sent out as leader of the colony) and
drove out the Edonians, and founded a town
on the spot, formerly called Ennea Hodoi
or Nine Ways. The base from which they started
was Eion, their commercial seaport at the
mouth of the river, not more than three miles
from the present town, which Hagnon named
Amphipolis, because the Strymon flows round
it on two sides, and he built it so as to
be conspicuous from the sea and land alike,
running a long wall across from river to
river, to complete the circumference. Brasidas
now marched against this town, starting from
Arne in Chalcidice. Arriving about dusk at
Aulon and Bromiscus, where the lake of Bolbe
runs into the sea, he supped there, and went
on during the night. The weather was stormy
and it was snowing a little, which encouraged
him to hurry on, in order, if possible, to
take every one at Amphipolis by surprise,
except the party who were to betray it. The
plot was carried on by some natives of Argilus,
an Andrian colony, residing in Amphipolis,
where they had also other accomplices gained
over by Perdiccas or the Chalcidians. But
the most active in the matter were the inhabitants
of Argilus itself, which is close by, who
had always been suspected by the Athenians,
and had had designs on the place. These men
now saw their opportunity arrive with Brasidas,
and having for some time been in correspondence
with their countrymen in Amphipolis for the
betrayal of the town, at once received him
into Argilus, and revolted from the Athenians,
and that same night took him on to the bridge
over the river; where he found only a small
guard to oppose him, the town being at some
distance from the passage, and the walls
not reaching down to it as at present. This
guard he easily drove in, partly through
there being treason in their ranks, partly
from the stormy state of the weather and
the suddenness of his attack, and so got
across the bridge, and immediately became
master of all the property outside; the Amphipolitans
having houses all over the quarter. The passage
of Brasidas was a complete surprise to the
people in the town; and the capture of many
of those outside, and the flight of the rest
within the wall, combined to produce great
confusion among the citizens; especially
as they did not trust one another. It is
even said that if Brasidas, instead of stopping
to pillage, had advanced straight against
the town, he would probably have taken it.
In fact, however, he established himself
where he was and overran the country outside,
and for the present remained inactive, vainly
awaiting a demonstration on the part of his
friends within. Meanwhile the party opposed
to the traitors proved numerous enough to
prevent the gates being immediately thrown
open, and in concert with Eucles, the general,
who had come from Athens to defend the place,
sent to the other commander in Thrace, Thucydides,
son of Olorus, the author of this history,
who was at the isle of Thasos, a Parian colony,
half a day's sail from Amphipolis, to tell
him to come to their relief. On receipt of
this message he at once set sail with seven
ships which he had with him, in order, if
possible, to reach Amphipolis in time to
prevent its capitulation, or in any case
to save Eion. Meanwhile Brasidas, afraid
of succours arriving by sea from Thasos,
and learning that Thucydides possessed the
right of working the gold mines in that part
of Thrace, and had thus great influence with
the inhabitants of the continent, hastened
to gain the town, if possible, before the
people of Amphipolis should be encouraged
by his arrival to hope that he could save
them by getting together a force of allies
from the sea and from Thrace, and so refuse
to surrender. He accordingly offered moderate
terms, proclaiming that any of the Amphipolitans
and Athenians who chose, might continue to
enjoy their property with full rights of
citizenship; while those who did not wish
to stay had five days to depart, taking their
property with them. The bulk of the inhabitants,
upon hearing this, began to change their
minds, especially as only a small number
of the citizens were Athenians, the majority
having come from different quarters, and
many of the prisoners outside had relations
within the walls. They found the proclamation
a fair one in comparison of what their fear
had suggested; the Athenians being glad to
go out, as they thought they ran more risk
than the rest, and further, did not expect
any speedy relief, and the multitude generally
being content at being left in possession
of their civic rights, and at such an unexpected
reprieve from danger. The partisans of Brasidas
now openly advocated this course, seeing
that the feeling of the people had changed,
and that they no longer gave ear to the Athenian
general present; and thus the surrender was
made and Brasidas was admitted by them on
the terms of his proclamation. In this way
they gave up the city, and late in the same
day Thucydides and his ships entered the
harbour of Eion, Brasidas having just got
hold of Amphipolis, and having been within
a night of taking Eion: had the ships been
less prompt in relieving it, in the morning
it would have been his. After this Thucydides
put all in order at Eion to secure it against
any present or future attack of Brasidas,
and received such as had elected to come
there from the interior according to the
terms agreed on. Meanwhile Brasidas suddenly
sailed with a number of boats down the river
to Eion to see if he could not seize the
point running out from the wall, and so command
the entrance; at the same time he attempted
it by land, but was beaten off on both sides
and had to content himself with arranging
matters at Amphipolis and in the neighbourhood.
Myrcinus, an Edonian town, also came over
to him; the Edonian king Pittacus having
been killed by the sons of Goaxis and his
own wife Brauro; and Galepsus and Oesime,
which are Thasian colonies, not long after
followed its example. Perdiccas too came
up immediately after the capture and joined
in these arrangements. The news that Amphipolis
was in the hands of the enemy caused great
alarm at Athens. Not only was the town valuable
for the timber it afforded for shipbuilding,
and the money that it brought in; but also,
although the escort of the Thessalians gave
the Lacedaemonians a means of reaching the
allies of Athens as far as the Strymon, yet
as long as they were not masters of the bridge
but were watched on the side of Eion by the
Athenian galleys, and on the land side impeded
by a large and extensive lake formed by the
waters of the river, it was impossible for
them to go any further. Now, on the contrary,
the path seemed open. There was also the
fear of the allies revolting, owing to the
moderation displayed by Brasidas in all his
conduct, and to the declarations which he
was everywhere making that he sent out to
free Hellas. The towns subject to the Athenians,
hearing of the capture of Amphipolis and
of the terms accorded to it, and of the gentleness
of Brasidas, felt most strongly encouraged
to change their condition, and sent secret
messages to him, begging him to come on to
them; each wishing to be the first to revolt.
Indeed there seemed to be no danger in so
doing; their mistake in their estimate of
the Athenian power was as great as that power
afterwards turned out to be, and their judgment
was based more upon blind wishing than upon
any sound prevision; for it is a habit of
mankind to entrust to careless hope what
they long for, and to use sovereign reason
to thrust aside what they do not fancy. Besides
the late severe blow which the Athenians
had met with in Boeotia, joined to the seductive,
though untrue, statements of Brasidas, about
the Athenians not having ventured to engage
his single army at Nisaea, made the allies
confident, and caused them to believe that
no Athenian force would be sent against them.
Above all the wish to do what was agreeable
at the moment, and the likelihood that they
should find the Lacedaemonians full of zeal
at starting, made them eager to venture.
Observing this, the Athenians sent garrisons
to the different towns, as far as was possible
at such short notice and in winter; while
Brasidas sent dispatches to Lacedaemon asking
for reinforcements, and himself made preparations
for building galleys in the Strymon. The
Lacedaemonians however did not send him any,
partly through envy on the part of their
chief men, partly because they were more
bent on recovering the prisoners of the island
and ending the war. The same winter the Megarians
took and razed to the foundations the long
walls which had been occupied by the Athenians;
and Brasidas after the capture of Amphipolis
marched with his allies against Acte, a promontory
running out from the King's dike with an
inward curve, and ending in Athos, a lofty
mountain looking towards the Aegean Sea.
In it are various towns, Sane, an Andrian
colony, close to the canal, and facing the
sea in the direction of Euboea; the others
being Thyssus, Cleone, Acrothoi, Olophyxus,
and Dium, inhabited by mixed barbarian races
speaking the two languages. There is also
a small Chalcidian element; but the greater
number are Tyrrheno-Pelasgians once settled
in Lemnos and Athens, and Bisaltians, Crestonians,
and Edonians; the towns being all small ones.
Most of these came over to Brasidas; but
Sane and Dium held out and saw their land
ravaged by him and his army. Upon their not
submitting, he at once marched against Torone
in Chalcidice, which was held by an Athenian
garrison, having been invited by a few persons
who were prepared to hand over the town.
Arriving in the dark a little before daybreak,
he sat down with his army near the temple
of the Dioscuri, rather more than a quarter
of a mile from the city. The rest of the
town of Torone and the Athenians in garrison
did not perceive his approach; but his partisans
knowing that he was coming (a few of them
had secretly gone out to meet him) were on
the watch for his arrival, and were no sooner
aware of it than they took it to them seven
light-armed men with daggers, who alone of
twenty men ordered on this service dared
to enter, commanded by Lysistratus an Olynthian.
These passed through the sea wall, and without
being seen went up and put to the sword the
garrison of the highest post in the town,
which stands on a hill, and broke open the
postern on the side of Canastraeum. Brasidas
meanwhile came a little nearer and then halted
with his main body, sending on one hundred
targeteers to be ready to rush in first,
the moment that a gate should be thrown open
and the beacon lighted as agreed. After some
time passed in waiting and wondering at the
delay, the targeteers by degrees got up close
to the town. The Toronaeans inside at work
with the party that had entered had by this
time broken down the postern and opened the
gates leading to the market-place by cutting
through the bar, and first brought some men
round and let them in by the postern, in
order to strike a panic into the surprised
townsmen by suddenly attacking them from
behind and on both sides at once; after which
they raised the fire-signal as had been agreed,
and took in by the market gates the rest
of the targeteers. Brasidas seeing the signal
told the troops to rise, and dashed forward
amid the loud hurrahs of his men, which carried
dismay among the astonished townspeople.
Some burst in straight by the gate, others
over some square pieces of timber placed
against the wall (which has fallen down and
was being rebuilt) to draw up stones; Brasidas
and the greater number making straight uphill
for the higher part of the town, in order
to take it from top to bottom, and once for
all, while the rest of the multitude spread
in all directions. The capture of the town
was effected before the great body of the
Toronaeans had recovered from their surprise
and confusion; but the conspirators and the
citizens of their party at once joined the
invaders. About fifty of the Athenian heavy
infantry happened to be sleeping in the market-place
when the alarm reached them. A few of these
were killed fighting; the rest escaped, some
by land, others to the two ships on the station,
and took refuge in Lecythus, a fort garrisoned
by their own men in the corner of the town
running out into the sea and cut off by a
narrow isthmus; where they were joined by
the Toronaeans of their party. Day now arrived,
and the town being secured, Brasidas made
a proclamation to the Toronaeans who had
taken refuge with the Athenians, to come
out, as many as chose, to their homes without
fearing for their rights or persons, and
sent a herald to invite the Athenians to
accept a truce, and to evacuate Lecythus
with their property, as being Chalcidian
ground. The Athenians refused this offer,
but asked for a truce for a day to take up
their dead. Brasidas granted it for two days,
which he employed in fortifying the houses
near, and the Athenians in doing the same
to their positions. Meanwhile he called a
meeting of the Toronaeans, and said very
much what he had said at Acanthus, namely,
that they must not look upon those who had
negotiated with him for the capture of the
town as bad men or as traitors, as they had
not acted as they had done from corrupt motives
or in order to enslave the city, but for
the good and freedom of Torone; nor again
must those who had not shared in the enterprise
fancy that they would not equally reap its
fruits, as he had not come to destroy either
city or individual. This was the reason of
his proclamation to those that had fled for
refuge to the Athenians: he thought none
the worse of them for their friendship for
the Athenians; he believed that they had
only to make trial of the Lacedaemonians
to like them as well, or even much better,
as acting much more justly: it was for want
of such a trial that they were now afraid
of them. Meanwhile he warned all of them
to prepare to be staunch allies, and for
being held responsible for all faults in
future: for the past, they had not wronged
the Lacedaemonians but had been wronged by
others who were too strong for them, and
any opposition that they might have offered
him could be excused. Having encouraged them
with this address, as soon as the truce expired
he made his attack upon Lecythus; the Athenians
defending themselves from a poor wall and
from some houses with parapets. One day they
beat him off; the next the enemy were preparing
to bring up an engine against them from which
they meant to throw fire upon the wooden
defences, and the troops were already coming
up to the point where they fancied they could
best bring up the engine, and where place
was most assailable; meanwhile the Athenians
put a wooden tower upon a house opposite,
and carried up a quantity of jars and casks
of water and big stones, and a large number
of men also climbed up. The house thus laden
too heavily suddenly broke down with a loud
crash; at which the men who were near and
saw it were more vexed than frightened; but
those not so near, and still more those furthest
off, thought that the place was already taken
at that point, and fled in haste to the sea
and the ships. Brasidas, perceiving that
they were deserting the parapet, and seeing
what was going on, dashed forward with his
troops, and immediately took the fort, and
put to the sword all whom he found in it.
In this way the place was evacuated by the
Athenians, who went across in their boats
and ships to Pallene. Now there is a temple
of Athene in Lecythus, and Brasidas had proclaimed
in the moment of making the assault that
he would give thirty silver minae to the
man first on the wall. Being now of opinion
that the capture was scarcely due to human
means, he gave the thirty minae to the goddess
for her temple, and razed and cleared Lecythus,
and made the whole of it consecrated ground.
The rest of the winter he spent in settling
the places in his hands, and in making designs
upon the rest; and with the expiration of
the winter the eighth year of this war ended.
In the spring of the summer following, the
Lacedaemonians and Athenians made an armistice
for a year; the Athenians thinking that they
would thus have full leisure to take their
precautions before Brasidas could procure
the revolt of any more of their towns, and
might also, if it suited them, conclude a
general peace; the Lacedaemonians divining
the actual fears of the Athenians, and thinking
that after once tasting a respite from trouble
and misery they would be more disposed to
consent to a reconciliation, and to give
back the prisoners, and make a treaty for
the longer period. The great idea of the
Lacedaemonians was to get back their men
while Brasidas's good fortune lasted: further
successes might make the struggle a less
unequal one in Chalcidice, but would leave
them still deprived of their men, and even
in Chalcidice not more than a match for the
Athenians and by no means certain of victory.
An armistice was accordingly concluded by
Lacedaemon and her allies upon the terms
following: 1. As to the temple and oracle
of the Pythian Apollo, we are agreed that
whosoever will shall have access to it, without
fraud or fear, according to the usages of
his forefathers. The Lacedaemonians and the
allies present agree to this, and promise
to send heralds to the Boeotians and Phocians,
and to do their best to persuade them to
agree likewise. 2. As to the treasure of
the god, we agree to exert ourselves to detect
all malversators, truly and honestly following
the customs of our forefathers, we and you
and all others willing to do so, all following
the customs of our forefathers. As to these
points the Lacedaemonians and the other allies
are agreed as has been said. 3. As to what
follows, the Lacedaemonians and the other
allies agree, if the Athenians conclude a
treaty, to remain, each of us in our own
territory, retaining our respective acquisitions:
the garrison in Coryphasium keeping within
Buphras and Tomeus: that in Cythera attempting
no communication with the Peloponnesian confederacy,
neither we with them, nor they with us: that
in Nisaea and Minoa not crossing the road
leading from the gates of the temple of Nisus
to that of Poseidon and from thence straight
to the bridge at Minoa: the Megarians and
the allies being equally bound not to cross
this road, and the Athenians retaining the
island they have taken, without any communication
on either side: as to Troezen, each side
retaining what it has, and as was arranged
with the Athenians. 4. As to the use of the
sea, so far as refers to their own coast
and to that of their confederacy, that the
Lacedaemonians and their allies may voyage
upon it in any vessel rowed by oars and of
not more than five hundred talents tonnage,
not a vessel of war. 5. That all heralds
and embassies, with as many attendants as
they please, for concluding the war and adjusting
claims, shall have free passage, going and
coming, to Peloponnese or Athens by land
and by sea. 6. That during the truce, deserters
whether bond or free shall be received neither
by you, nor by us. 7. Further, that satisfaction
shall be given by you to us and by us to
you according to the public law of our several
countries, all disputes being settled by
law without recourse to hostilities. The
Lacedaemonians and allies agree to these
articles; but if you have anything fairer
or juster to suggest, come to Lacedaemon
and let us know: whatever shall be just will
meet with no objection either from the Lacedaemonians
or from the allies. Only let those who come
come with full powers, as you desire us.
The truce shall be for one year. Approved
by the people. The tribe of Acamantis had
the prytany, Phoenippus was secretary, Niciades
chairman. Laches moved, in the name of the
good luck of the Athenians, that they should
conclude the armistice upon the terms agreed
upon by the Lacedaemonians and the allies.
It was agreed accordingly in the popular
assembly that the armistice should be for
one year, beginning that very day, the fourteenth
of the month of Elaphebolion; during which
time ambassadors and heralds should go and
come between the two countries to discuss
the bases of a pacification. That the generals
and prytanes should call an assembly of the
people, in which the Athenians should first
consult on the peace, and on the mode in
which the embassy for putting an end to the
war should be admitted. That the embassy
now present should at once take the engagement
before the people to keep well and truly
this truce for one year. On these terms the
Lacedaemonians concluded with the Athenians
and their allies on the twelfth day of the
Spartan month Gerastius; the allies also
taking the oaths. Those who concluded and
poured the libation were Taurus, son of Echetimides,
Athenaeus, son of Pericleidas, and Philocharidas,
son of Eryxidaidas, Lacedaemonians; Aeneas,
son of Ocytus, and Euphamidas, son of Aristonymus,
Corinthians; Damotimus, son of Naucrates,
and Onasimus, son of Megacles, Sicyonians;
Nicasus, son of Cecalus, and Menecrates,
son of Amphidorus, Megarians; and Amphias,
son of Eupaidas, an Epidaurian; and the Athenian
generals Nicostratus, son of Diitrephes,
Nicias, son of Niceratus, and Autocles, son
of Tolmaeus. Such was the armistice, and
during the whole of it conferences went on
on the subject of a pacification. In the
days in which they were going backwards and
forwards to these conferences, Scione, a
town in Pallene, revolted from Athens, and
went over to Brasidas. The Scionaeans say
that they are Pallenians from Peloponnese,
and that their first founders on their voyage
from Troy were carried in to this spot by
the storm which the Achaeans were caught
in, and there settled. The Scionaeans had
no sooner revolted than Brasidas crossed
over by night to Scione, with a friendly
galley ahead and himself in a small boat
some way behind; his idea being that if he
fell in with a vessel larger than the boat
he would have the galley to defend him, while
a ship that was a match for the galley would
probably neglect the small vessel to attack
the large one, and thus leave him time to
escape. His passage effected, he called a
meeting of the Scionaeans and spoke to the
same effect as at Acanthus and Torone, adding
that they merited the utmost commendation,
in that, in spite of Pallene within the isthmus
being cut off by the Athenian occupation
of Potidaea and of their own practically
insular position, they had of their own free
will gone forward to meet their liberty instead
of timorously waiting until they had been
by force compelled to their own manifest
good. This was a sign that they would valiantly
undergo any trial, however great; and if
he should order affairs as he intended, he
should count them among the truest and sincerest
friends of the Lacedaemonians, and would
in every other way honour them. The Scionaeans
were elated by his language, and even those
who had at first disapproved of what was
being done catching the general confidence,
they determined on a vigorous conduct of
the war, and welcomed Brasidas with all possible
honours, publicly crowning him with a crown
of gold as the liberator of Hellas; while
private persons crowded round him and decked
him with garlands as though he had been an
athlete. Meanwhile Brasidas left them a small
garrison for the present and crossed back
again, and not long afterwards sent over
a larger force, intending with the help of
the Scionaeans to attempt Mende and Potidaea
before the Athenians should arrive; Scione,
he felt, being too like an island for them
not to relieve it. He had besides intelligence
in the above towns about their betrayal.
In the midst of his designs upon the towns
in question, a galley arrived with the commissioners
carrying round the news of the armistice,
Aristonymus for the Athenians and Athenaeus
for the Lacedaemonians. The troops now crossed
back to Torone, and the commissioners gave
Brasidas notice of the convention. All the
Lacedaemonian allies in Thrace accepted what
had been done; and Aristonymus made no difficulty
about the rest, but finding, on counting
the days, that the Scionaeans had revolted
after the date of the convention, refused
to include them in it. To this Brasidas earnestly
objected, asserting that the revolt took
place before, and would not give up the town.
Upon Aristonymus reporting the case to Athens,
the people at once prepared to send an expedition
to Scione. Upon this, envoys arrived from
Lacedaemon, alleging that this would be a
breach of the truce, and laying claim to
the town upon the faith of the assertion
of Brasidas, and meanwhile offering to submit
the question to arbitration. Arbitration,
however, was what the Athenians did not choose
to risk; being determined to send troops
at once to the place, and furious at the
idea of even the islanders now daring to
revolt, in a vain reliance upon the power
of the Lacedaemonians by land. Besides the
facts of the revolt were rather as the Athenians
contended, the Scionaeans having revolted
two days after the convention. Cleon accordingly
succeeded in carrying a decree to reduce
and put to death the Scionaeans; and the
Athenians employed the leisure which they
now enjoyed in preparing for the expedition.
Meanwhile Mende revolted, a town in Pallene
and a colony of the Eretrians, and was received
without scruple by Brasidas, in spite of
its having evidently come over during the
armistice, on account of certain infringements
of the truce alleged by him against the Athenians.
This audacity of Mende was partly caused
by seeing Brasidas forward in the matter
and by the conclusions drawn from his refusal
to betray Scione; and besides, the conspirators
in Mende were few, and, as I have already
intimated, had carried on their practices
too long not to fear detection for themselves,
and not to wish to force the inclination
of the multitude. This news made the Athenians
more furious than ever, and they at once
prepared against both towns. Brasidas, expecting
their arrival, conveyed away to Olynthus
in Chalcidice the women and children of the
Scionaeans and Mendaeans, and sent over to
them five hundred Peloponnesian heavy infantry
and three hundred Chalcidian targeteers,
all under the command of Polydamidas. Leaving
these two towns to prepare together against
the speedy arrival of the Athenians, Brasidas
and Perdiccas started on a second joint expedition
into Lyncus against Arrhabaeus; the latter
with the forces of his Macedonian subjects,
and a corps of heavy infantry composed of
Hellenes domiciled in the country; the former
with the Peloponnesians whom he still had
with him and the Chalcidians, Acanthians,
and the rest in such force as they were able.
In all there were about three thousand Hellenic
heavy infantry, accompanied by all the Macedonian
cavalry with the Chalcidians, near one thousand
strong, besides an immense crowd of barbarians.
On entering the country of Arrhabaeus, they
found the Lyncestians encamped awaiting them,
and themselves took up a position opposite.
The infantry on either side were upon a hill,
with a plain between them, into which the
horse of both armies first galloped down
and engaged a cavalry action. After this
the Lyncestian heavy infantry advanced from
their hill to join their cavalry and offered
battle; upon which Brasidas and Perdiccas
also came down to meet them, and engaged
and routed them with heavy loss; the survivors
taking refuge upon the heights and there
remaining inactive. The victors now set up
a trophy and waited two or three days for
the Illyrian mercenaries who were to join
Perdiccas. Perdiccas then wished to go on
and attack the villages of Arrhabaeus, and
to sit still no longer; but Brasidas, afraid
that the Athenians might sail up during his
absence, and of something happening to Mende,
and seeing besides that the Illyrians did
not appear, far from seconding this wish
was anxious to return. While they were thus
disputing, the news arrived that the Illyrians
had actually betrayed Perdiccas and had joined
Arrhabaeus; and the fear inspired by their
warlike character made both parties now think
it best to retreat. However, owing to the
dispute, nothing had been settled as to when
they should start; and night coming on, the
Macedonians and the barbarian crowd took
fright in a moment in one of those mysterious
panics to which great armies are liable;
and persuaded that an army many times more
numerous than that which had really arrived
was advancing and all but upon them, suddenly
broke and fled in the direction of home,
and thus compelled Perdiccas, who at first
did not perceive what had occurred, to depart
without seeing Brasidas, the two armies being
encamped at a considerable distance from
each other. At daybreak Brasidas, perceiving
that the Macedonians had gone on, and that
the Illyrians and Arrhabaeus were on the
point of attacking him, formed his heavy
infantry into a square, with the light troops
in the centre, and himself also prepared
to retreat. Posting his youngest soldiers
to dash out wherever the enemy should attack
them, he himself with three hundred picked
men in the rear intended to face about during
the retreat and beat off the most forward
of their assailants, Meanwhile, before the
enemy approached, he sought to sustain the
courage of his soldiers with the following
hasty exhortation: "Peloponnesians,
if I did not suspect you of being dismayed
at being left alone to sustain the attack
of a numerous and barbarian enemy, I should
just have said a few words to you as usual
without further explanation. As it is, in
the face of the desertion of our friends
and the numbers of the enemy, I have some
advice and information to offer, which, brief
as they must be, will, I hope, suffice for
the more important points. The bravery that
you habitually display in war does not depend
on your having allies at your side in this
or that encounter, but on your native courage;
nor have numbers any terrors for citizens
of states like yours, in which the many do
not rule the few, but rather the few the
many, owing their position to nothing else
than to superiority in the field. Inexperience
now makes you afraid of barbarians; and yet
the trial of strength which you had with
the Macedonians among them, and my own judgment,
confirmed by what I hear from others, should
be enough to satisfy you that they will not
prove formidable. Where an enemy seems strong
but is really weak, a true knowledge of the
facts makes his adversary the bolder, just
as a serious antagonist is encountered most
confidently by those who do not know him.
Thus the present enemy might terrify an inexperienced
imagination; they are formidable in outward
bulk, their loud yelling is unbearable, and
the brandishing of their weapons in the air
has a threatening appearance. But when it
comes to real fighting with an opponent who
stands his ground, they are not what they
seemed; they have no regular order that they
should be ashamed of deserting their positions
when hard pressed; flight and attack are
with them equally honourable, and afford
no test of courage; their independent mode
of fighting never leaving any one who wants
to run away without a fair excuse for so
doing. In short, they think frightening you
at a secure distance a surer game than meeting
you hand to hand; otherwise they would have
done the one and not the other. You can thus
plainly see that the terrors with which they
were at first invested are in fact trifling
enough, though to the eye and ear very prominent.
Stand your ground therefore when they advance,
and again wait your opportunity to retire
in good order, and you will reach a place
of safety all the sooner, and will know for
ever afterwards that rabble such as these,
to those who sustain their first attack,
do but show off their courage by threats
of the terrible things that they are going
to do, at a distance, but with those who
give way to them are quick enough to display
their heroism in pursuit when they can do
so without danger." With this brief
address Brasidas began to lead off his army.
Seeing this, the barbarians came on with
much shouting and hubbub, thinking that he
was flying and that they would overtake him
and cut him off. But wherever they charged
they found the young men ready to dash out
against them, while Brasidas with his picked
company sustained their onset. Thus the Peloponnesians
withstood the first attack, to the surprise
of the enemy, and afterwards received and
repulsed them as fast as they came on, retiring
as soon as their opponents became quiet.
The main body of the barbarians ceased therefore
to molest the Hellenes with Brasidas in the
open country, and leaving behind a certain
number to harass their march, the rest went
on after the flying Macedonians, slaying
those with whom they came up, and so arrived
in time to occupy the narrow pass between
two hills that leads into the country of
Arrhabaeus. They knew that this was the only
way by which Brasidas could retreat, and
now proceeded to surround him just as he
entered the most impracticable part of the
road, in order to cut him off. Brasidas,
perceiving their intention, told his three
hundred to run on without order, each as
quickly as he could, to the hill which seemed
easiest to take, and to try to dislodge the
barbarians already there, before they should
be joined by the main body closing round
him. These attacked and overpowered the party
upon the hill, and the main army of the Hellenes
now advanced with less difficulty towards
it- the barbarians being terrified at seeing
their men on that side driven from the height
and no longer following the main body, who,
they considered, had gained the frontier
and made good their escape. The heights once
gained, Brasidas now proceeded more securely,
and the same day arrived at Arnisa, the first
town in the dominions of Perdiccas. The soldiers,
enraged at the desertion of the Macedonians,
vented their rage on all their yokes of oxen
which they found on the road, and on any
baggage which had tumbled off (as might easily
happen in the panic of a night retreat),
by unyoking and cutting down the cattle and
taking the baggage for themselves. From this
moment Perdiccas began to regard Brasidas
as an enemy and to feel against the Peloponnesians
a hatred which could not be congenial to
the adversary of the Athenians. However,
he departed from his natural interests and
made it his endeavour to come to terms with
the latter and to get rid of the former.
On his return from Macedonia to Torone, Brasidas
found the Athenians already masters of Mende,
and remained quiet where he was, thinking
it now out of his power to cross over into
Pallene and assist the Mendaeans, but he
kept good watch over Torone. For about the
same time as the campaign in Lyncus, the
Athenians sailed upon the expedition which
we left them preparing against Mende and
Scione, with fifty ships, ten of which were
Chians, one thousand Athenian heavy infantry
and six hundred archers, one hundred Thracian
mercenaries and some targeteers drawn from
their allies in the neighbourhood, under
the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus,
and Nicostratus, son of Diitrephes. Weighing
from Potidaea, the fleet came to land opposite
the temple of Poseidon, and proceeded against
Mende; the men of which town, reinforced
by three hundred Scionaeans, with their Peloponnesian
auxiliaries, seven hundred heavy infantry
in all, under Polydamidas, they found encamped
upon a strong hill outside the city. These
Nicias, with one hundred and twenty light-armed
Methonaeans, sixty picked men from the Athenian
heavy infantry, and all the archers, tried
to reach by a path running up the hill, but
received a wound and found himself unable
to force the position; while Nicostratus,
with all the rest of the army, advancing
upon the hill, which was naturally difficult,
by a different approach further off, was
thrown into utter disorder; and the whole
Athenian army narrowly escaped being defeated.
For that day, as the Mendaeans and their
allies showed no signs of yielding, the Athenians
retreated and encamped, and the Mendaeans
at nightfall returned into the town. The
next day the Athenians sailed round to the
Scione side, and took the suburb, and all
day plundered the country, without any one
coming out against them, partly because of
intestine disturbances in the town; and the
following night the three hundred Scionaeans
returned home. On the morrow Nicias advanced
with half the army to the frontier of Scione
and laid waste the country; while Nicostratus
with the remainder sat down before the town
near the upper gate on the road to Potidaea.
The arms of the Mendaeans and of their Peloponnesian
auxiliaries within the wall happened to be
piled in that quarter, where Polydamidas
accordingly began to draw them up for battle,
encouraging the Mendaeans to make a sortie.
At this moment one of the popular party answered
him factiously that they would not go out
and did not want a war, and for thus answering
was dragged by the arm and knocked about
by Polydamidas. Hereupon the infuriated commons
at once seized their arms and rushed at the
Peloponnesians and at their allies of the
opposite faction. The troops thus assaulted
were at once routed, partly from the suddenness
of the conflict and partly through fear of
the gates being opened to the Athenians,
with whom they imagined that the attack had
been concerted. As many as were not killed
on the spot took refuge in the citadel, which
they had held from the first; and the whole,
Athenian army, Nicias having by this time
returned and being close to the city, now
burst into Mende, which had opened its gates
without any convention, and sacked it just
as if they had taken it by storm, the generals
even finding some difficulty in restraining
them from also massacring the inhabitants.
After this the Athenians told the Mendaeans
that they might retain their civil rights,
and themselves judge the supposed authors
of the revolt; and cut off the party in the
citadel by a wall built down to the sea on
either side, appointing troops to maintain
the blockade. Having thus secured Mende,
they proceeded against Scione. The Scionaeans
and Peloponnesians marched out against them,
occupying a strong hill in front of the town,
which had to be captured by the enemy before
they could invest the place. The Athenians
stormed the hill, defeated and dislodged
its occupants, and, having encamped and set
up a trophy, prepared for the work of circumvallation.
Not long after they had begun their operations,
the auxiliaries besieged in the citadel of
Mende forced the guard by the sea-side and
arrived by night at Scione, into which most
of them succeeded in entering, passing through
the besieging army. While the investment
of Scione was in progress, Perdiccas sent
a herald to the Athenian generals and made
peace with the Athenians, through spite against
Brasidas for the retreat from Lyncus, from
which moment indeed he had begun to negotiate.
The Lacedaemonian Ischagoras was just then
upon the point of starting with an army overland
to join Brasidas; and Perdiccas, being now
required by Nicias to give some proof of
the sincerity of his reconciliation to the
Athenians, and being himself no longer disposed
to let the Peloponnesians into his country,
put in motion his friends in Thessaly, with
whose chief men he always took care to have
relations, and so effectually stopped the
army and its preparation that they did not
even try the Thessalians. Ischagoras himself,
however, with Ameinias and Aristeus, succeeded
in reaching Brasidas; they had been commissioned
by the Lacedaemonians to inspect the state
of affairs, and brought out from Sparta (in
violation of all precedent) some of their
young men to put in command of the towns,
to guard against their being entrusted to
the persons upon the spot. Brasidas accordingly
placed Clearidas, son of Cleonymus, in Amphipolis,
and Pasitelidas, son of Hegesander, in Torone.
The same summer the Thebans dismantled the
wall of the Thespians on the charge of Atticism,
having always wished to do so, and now finding
it an easy matter, as the flower of the Thespian
youth had perished in the battle with the
Athenians. The same summer also the temple
of Hera at Argos was burnt down, through
Chrysis, the priestess, placing a lighted
torch near the garlands and then falling
asleep, so that they all caught fire and
were in a blaze before she observed it. Chrysis
that very night fled to Phlius for fear of
the Argives, who, agreeably to the law in
such a case, appointed another priestess
named Phaeinis. Chrysis at the time of her
flight had been priestess for eight years
of the present war and half the ninth. At
the close of the summer the investment of
Scione was completed, and the Athenians,
leaving a detachment to maintain the blockade,
returned with the rest of their army. During
the winter following, the Athenians and Lacedaemonians
were kept quiet by the armistice; but the
Mantineans and Tegeans, and their respective
allies, fought a battle at Laodicium, in
the Oresthid. The victory remained doubtful,
as each side routed one of the wings opposed
to them, and both set up trophies and sent
spoils to Delphi. After heavy loss on both
sides the battle was undecided, and night
interrupted the action; yet the Tegeans passed
the night on the field and set up a trophy
at once, while the Mantineans withdrew to
Bucolion and set up theirs afterwards. At
the close of the same winter, in fact almost
in spring, Brasidas made an attempt upon
Potidaea. He arrived by night, and succeeded
in planting a ladder against the wall without
being discovered, the ladder being planted
just in the interval between the passing
round of the bell and the return of the man
who brought it back. Upon the garrison, however,
taking the alarm immediately afterwards,
before his men came up, he quickly led off
his troops, without waiting until it was
day. So ended the winter and the ninth year
of this war of which Thucydides is the historian.
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