pily for the Ionians, an exploit performed by the Greeks of a Samothrakian vessel gave instant and conclusive proof of their fidelity, and Xerxes in towering rage commanded the heads of the Phenicians to be struck off. The general character of Phenician seamen may well warrant the suspicion that their charge against the Ionians, if really made, was not altogether groundless. But as at Marathon, whatever may have been the incidents of the battle, the issue was clear enough. The Persian fleet was ruined. On the Greek side not many were killed. Unlike the Greeks, the barbarians were for the most part unable to swim; and the greatest slaughter took place just when their ships first turned to flee. In the midst of the frightful confusion thus caused Aristeides landed a large number of hoplites on the islet of Psyttaleia and slew every one of the Persians who were upon it. The Greeks drew up all the disabled ships on the shore of Salamis, and made ready for another fight, thinking that the king would order the ships still remaining to him to advance against them. But their fears were not to be realised. The fancy of Xerxes that under his own eye his seamen would be invincible had been displaced by a conviction that no faith whatever was to be put in the subject tribes or nations which manned his navy, and that all hope of carrying on the war by sea was at an end. For such fragments of his fleet as might yet remain Xerxes had a more immediate task in guarding the bridges across the Hellespont. The messenger had already set out with the news which was to change the songs and shouts of triumph at Sousa into cries of grief for the king and of indignation against the stirrer-up of the mischief. This issue Mardonios clearly foresaw; and at once his mind was made up to carry on the war and either to succeed in it or die. He pledged himself, therefore, to subjugate Hellas, if Xerxes would leave him three hundred thousand men, while he took all the rest away to Asia. Such a proposal was not likely to be rejected by a tyrant quaking in abject terror; but the historian adds that Xerxes submitted it to Artemisia, queen of Halikarnassos, the only woman who had accompanied him as the sovereign of an independent city. Her counsel agreed with his If Mardonios succeeded, the glory would go to his master: if he and his men were all slain, it would be but the loss of a horde of useless slaves. Such is said to have been her own. advice; we may at the least be sure that she never gave this reason for it. Xerxes knew well that in leaving with Mardonios his native Persian troops he was leaving behind him the hardy soldiers on whom the very foundations of his empire rested; and the tale throws doubt on the narration of some other scenes, in which Artemisia appears as an actor. That very night the fleet sailed from the scene of its disaster, to guard the bridge across the Hellespont for the passage of the king and his army. The discovery of its flight was followed by immediate pursuit as far as Andros, where a council was called. To the intreaty of Themistokles that they should sail at once to the Hellespont and there destroy the bridge Eurybiades replied by pointing out the folly of driving a defeated enemy to bay. In his retreat he might turn with something like the spirit of Cyrus, and take an ample vengeance for his recent disasters. Silenced by this rejoinder, if not convinced, Themistokles made a virtue of necessity, and repeating to his countrymen the advice of Eurybiades besought them to turn their minds to the more pressing need of rebuilding their houses and sowing the seed for the next harvest. Having given this counsel, he dispatched Sikinnos, it is said, on a second embassy: but this time his message was addressed to Xerxes, not to his generals. It informed him briefly that the Greeks had wished to pursue his fleet and break up the bridge at the Hellespont, but that Themistokles had turned them from their purpose and insured to the tyrant, if he wished to go home, a peaceful and leisurely retreat. A few days later Mardonios chose out on the plains of Thessaly the forces with which he had resolved to conquer or to die. Here he took up his quarters for the winter, while Xerxes hurried onwards. But before they parted not to meet again, a messenger from Sparta had come to bid the King of the Medes stand his trial for the murder of Leonidas and make atonement for that crime. The atonement shall be made by Mardonios,' answered Xerxes with a laugh, pointing to the general by his side; and the Spartan taking him at his word went his way. In the narrative of Herodotos the summons of the Spartans is followed by a sudden plunge into utter misery. For five-and-forty days, we are told, the hordes rejected by Mardonios struggled onwards over their road to the Hellespont, thousands and tens of thousands falling as they went from hunger, thirst, and cold. Disease came quickly in the track of famine; humiliation followed on humiliation; and when Xerxes reached the Hellespont just eight months after he had crossed over it to Sestos, the bridge over which he had passed in the plenitude of pride had been shattered by storms. Boats conveyed across the strait the lord of all Asia with the scanty remnant of his guards and followers: but the sudden change from starvation to plenty was not less deadly than the worst of the evils against which they had thus far had to struggle, and the multitude so fearfully thinned in Europe dwindled more rapidly away. Such, in the belief of Herodotos, was the true story of the retreat of Xerxes: but he mentions another account which asserted that at Eion on the Strymon he embarked on board a Phenician ship. The vessel was soon overtaken by a storm; and the king in dismay asked the pilot if there was any hope of safety. 'None,' was the answer, 'unless we can ease the ship of the crowd within it.' Xerxes turned to his Persians, telling them simply that his life depended on them. In an instant they had done obeisance and leaped into the sea; and the ship thus lightened reached Asia in safety. On landing, Xerxes gave the pilot a golden crown for saving the king's life, and then cut off his head for losing the lives of his men. This story Herodotos rejects on the ground that, even if the pilot had so spoken, Xerxes would assuredly have saved his Persians and cast out into the sea a corresponding number of Phenicians. With equal decision probably he rejected the marvellous story of the crossing of the Strymon as related by Eschylos in his drama of the Persians. A frost unusual for the season of the year had frozen firmly the whole surface of a river nearly two hundred yards in width; and on this frozen surface the army crossed in safety until the heat of the sun thawed the ice and the crowds were plunged into the water. The formation, in a single night, of ice capable of bearing multitudes, in the latitude and climate of the mouth of the Strymon, is an impossibility. The story rests on the supposition that the Persians were hurrying away in frantic haste from an enemy almost at their heels but there was, in fact, no pursuit, and for many years later Eion remained a Persian fortress. We have then the significant fact that there were traditions relating to this time, to which Herodotos gave no credit; we are bound, therefore, to see whether his own story has the merit of likelihood. : If the account given by Eschylos is obviously impossible, there are difficulties fully as great in following the story of Herodotos. When Xerxes journeyed westwards, he unquestionably contemplated a speedy return to his own land, with a long line of Athenian and Spartan slaves in addition to the hosts which he was driving on to conquest. His need of food would be increased by the measure of his success; but on the other hand, in proportion to the fewness of his attendants would be the ease of maintaining them from the vast magazines which had been stored up before he set out from Sousa. Yet, as though submitting to an ordinary necessity, he leaves his army to subsist by plunder or to die by famine, in a land where, as it would seem, not a single arm was raised against him in spite of all this robbery and pillage, and where he could leave his sick not without confidence in the kindly feeling of the inhabitants. Still, with this friendliness or at least neutrality of the people, perplexing though it be, his passage is more disastrous than that of Artabazos who, as we shall see, fought his way after the battle of Plataia through the wild tribes of the Thrakian highlands. This officer attended Xerxes as far as the Hellespont with 60,000 men, and from the moment that he dismisses his master he appears as a man well able to hold his ground against all efforts of his enemies. So completely is he master of his position and his movements that he determines to attack the Greek colonies which had dared to revolt after the fight at Salamis. Having taken Olynthos, he turned his arms against Potidaia. His plans were here foiled by an accident, which, however, scarcely affected the efficiency of his troops. In short, his history conclusively proves that the followers of Xerxes in his retreat were not reduced to the hard lot of an Arabian caravan in lack of food and water. The alleged operations of the Greek fleet after the battle of Salamis seem to show that the aim of the commanders was not to dissipate their strength by expeditions to the Hellespont, but to repair their losses whether by the forced or the voluntary contributions of Hellenic cities. Themistokles was acting as spokesman for the Greeks generally, when he told the Andrians that the Athenians had come to them under the guidance of two very mighty deities, Faith and Necessity, and therefore pay they must. The rejoinder of the Andrians that they likewise had two deities, Poverty and Helplessness, which made it impossible for them to pay anything, was followed by a blockade. The result verified their words; and the Greeks, compelled to abandon the siege, ravaged the lands of Karystos at the southern extremity of Euboia and then sailed back to Salamis. The work of a memorable year was now ended. It only remained to dedicate to the gods the thank-offerings due to them for their guardianship and active aid, and to distribute the rewards and honours which the conduct of the confederates might deserve. Their first act was to consecrate three Phenician ships, one to the honour of Aias at Salamis, another at Sounion, and the third at the isthmus. At the isthmus the question of personal merit in the war was decided, it is said, by the written votes of the generals, each of whom claimed the first place for himself, while most of them (Plutarch says, all) assigned the second to Themistokles. The vanity which thus deprived the Athenian general of his formal pre-eminence had no effect on the Spartans, who paid him honours such as they had never bestowed on any before. Eurybiades, as comThe same prize was mander-in chief, received a silver crown. bestowed on Themistokles for his unparalleled wisdom and dexterity, and the most beautiful chariot in Sparta, the gift of the citizens, conveyed him from that city, three hundred chosen Spartiatai being his escort as far as the boundaries of Tegea. CHAPTER VI. THE BATTLES OF PLATAIA AND MYKALÊ. THE efforts of Mardonios to redeem the pledge given to Xerxes ended in terrible disasters. If the Greeks could be brought to unite in a firm resistance, it was impossible that they could end otherwise; and the people of two cities at least were now fully alive to the need of vigorous action. That Mardonios on his side saw not less clearly the hindrances in the way of his success, and that he did his best to remove them, is clear from the whole course of the narrative. He was convinced that the real obstruction in his path was Athens; and the conviction led him to take a step which must have involved a painful selfsacrifice. The desire of vengeance against Athens was the main motive of Xerxes for the invasion of Europe; but it was no time now to follow the dictates of blind passion, and the Makedonian chief, Alexandros, was sent to tell the Athenians |