the same toils and privations with themselves. This is not the language of a man who dreads the physical dangers of war: but it is the language of one who even in the direst extremity cannot be brought to see that the misery which he is striving to alleviate is the result of his own folly in wasting a series of golden opportunities. The horrors of the march, for which they had chosen the road to Katanê, may be faintly imagined from the fact that in spite of fearful exertion, with little food and almost without water and without sleep, they accomplished in five days a distance which, if unhindered, they could have traversed easily in two hours. Convinced now that the northward journey was impracticable, they set forth at dead of night on the Helorine road leading to the southern coast. A panic separated the division of Nikias from that of Demosthenes, who, marching in the rear, had to think more of keeping his men in order of battle than of getting over ground. Thus constrained to mass his troops, he found himself presently hemmed in between walls in an olive garden intersected by a single road, where his men could be shot down by an enemy who needed not to expose himself to any danger. For hours the fearful carnage went on, until at length the Syracusans invited the surrender of Demosthenes and his troops under the covenant that none should be put to death either by open violence or by intolerable bonds or by starvation. The summons was obeyed, and four shields held upwards were filled with the money still possessed by the troops of Demosthenes, who were now led away to Syracuse. Nikias, five miles further to the south, had crossed the Erineos, when early on the following day Syracusan messengers informed him of the surrender of Demosthenes, and summoned him to follow his example. The counter-proposal of Nikias, that in exchange for the men under his command Athens should pay to the Syracusans the whole cost of the war, would have filled their treasury with money sorely needed; but the delight of trampling a fallen enemy under foot was more enticing. His proposals were rejected, and all day long the Athenians were worn down with the incessant attacks of their pursuers. In the dead of night they took up their arms, hoping that they might be able to cross the next stream before their flight was discovered; but the war-shout which instantly were. rose from the Syracusan camp showed the vanity of this hope, and with a feeling of blank dismay they remained where they On the following morning they reached the stream of the Assinaros. The sight of the sparkling and transparent water banished all thoughts of order and discipline, all prudence and caution. In an instant all was hopeless confusion and tumult; and the stream, fouled first by the trampling of thousands, was soon after reddened with their blood. To put an end to slaughter which had now become mere butchery, Nikias surrendered himself to Gylippos personally, in the hope that the Spartan might remember the enormous benefits which in times past Sparta had received from him. The number of prisoners finally got together was not great. By far the larger number were stolen and hidden away by private men, and the state was at once defrauded of wealth which an acceptance of the offers of Nikias would have insured to it. Forty thousand men had left the Athenian lines on the great harbour: a week later seven thousand marched as prisoners into Syracuse. What became of the sick and wounded who were left in the camp, we are not told: but we can scarcely doubt that all were murdered, and murder was mercy in comparison with the treatment of the 7,000 prisoners who were penned like cattle in the stone quarries of Epipolai. The Syracusans had promised to Demosthenes that no man belonging to his division should suffer a violent death or die from bonds or for lack of necessary food; and they insured the death of hundreds or of thousands as certainly as Suraj-ud-Doulah murdered the victims of the Black Hole of Calcutta. The Athenian generals were happily spared the sight of these prolonged and excruciating tortures. Unless the terms of the convention were to be kept, Demosthenes could, of course, expect no mercy. In flagrant violation of a distinct compact the doom of the victor at Sphakteria was sealed, and he died, as he had lived, without a stain on his military reputation, the victim of the superstition and the respectability of his colleague. CHAPTER VIII. THE PELOPONNESIAN (DEKELEIAN) WAR FROM THE CATA STROPHE AT SYRACUSE TO THE SUPPRESSION OF THE WHILE the walls of Dekeleia, daily gaining height and strength, showed that the enemy was permanently established on Attic soil, the Athenians still fed themselves on bright hopes of Sicilian conquest. There was, in truth, need of encouragement. Previous invasions had left the land at rest after a raid of five or six weeks at the utmost; now the whole country lay at the mercy of the enemy. Each day they felt the sting of the monster evil of slavery. Twenty thousand men, whom Greek philosophy delighted to regard as animated machines, deserted to the enemy and left Athens almost destitute of skilled workmen. Athens had, indeed, ceased to be a city. It was now nothing more than a garrison in which the defenders were worn out with harassing and incessant duty. Their expenses were daily rising at a ruinous rate, while their revenues were melting away, or proved themselves wholly inadequate to bear the strain put upon them. When at length after weeks of dreadful silence their hopes of success in Sicily were dashed to the ground, they turned in the first burst of despairing grief on the speakers who had urged on the expedition, and on the soothsayers and diviners who had augured success for the enterprise: but such revenge was a poor consolation for the utter failure of a scheme which they had themselves decreed. Their thoughts were soon drawn away to more practical matters. Their army had been cut off; their fleet was either burnt or in the enemy's hands: their docks were almost empty of ships, and their calamity had rendered their adversaries irresistible. But although the heavens seemed laden with their doom, one feeling only pervaded the people. The idea of submission crossed no man's mind. The struggle must be carried on vigorously and economically. They resolved at once to provide wood for ship-building, and to watch closely all movements among their subject allies. With the rapidity which had astonished the Syracusans the promontory of Sounion was strongly fortified to protect the passage of merchant vessels, while a further force was rendered available by abandoning the fort on the Peloponnesian coast facing the island of Kythera. The calamities which had thus strung the nerves of the Athenians to a pitch of desperate resolution roused in their enemies an enthusiasm which regarded the struggle as all but ended. One more blow only was needed; and if this blow should be struck quickly and firmly, Athens would experience the fate which she had designed for all the Hellenic tribes. The winter had not passed away before some of the allies of Athens made efforts to transfer their allegiance to Sparta. The first deputation came from Euboia: the second from Lesbos. After these came envoys from Chios and Erythrai, and with them ambassadors from Tissaphernes, the satrap of Lydia, who had received notice from the Persian king that the tributes due from the Hellenic cities within his jurisdiction must be paid into the treasury. The mere fact that the weakness of Athens should at once call forth such a claim might have taught the Asiatic Greeks that in seeking to be free of the Athenian yoke they were but wishing, like the frogs, to change king Log for king Stork. Tissaphernes at least knew that without Spartan aid he could not break up the Athenian empire, and that, until this result could be achieved, he must remain a debtor to the king for a sum the magnitude of which was every day increasing. While the envoys of Tissaphernes were pleading the cause of the Chians, the representatives of Pharnabazos, the viceroy of the Hellespont, came to ask that his satrapy might be made the scene of the first operations. That the satraps should each be anxious to win the royal favour by being foremost in pulling down the Athenian empire was perfectly natural; that the Spartans who in the day of need adjured the Athenians (p. 110) not to betray their kinsfolk to the barbarian should now deliberately reopen the way for Persian aggression was treason against the liberties not only of Hellas but of Europe. But looking merely to the mode in which treachery might be made to yield its fruits most readily, the Spartans were right in inclining rather to the side of Tissaphernes than to that of Pharnabazos. The contest was decided by Alkibiades, who with all his strength urged the claims of the Chians as being the highest bidders. So passed away the winter which ended the nineteenth year of the war. The spring had come (412 B.c); and the Chian con spirators still waited impatiently for the promised succour. They were in a fever of anxiety lest their secret devices should become known to the Athenians; and the refusal of the Corinthians to sail before the celebration of the Isthmian games gave the Athenians time to verify in some measure the suspicions which they had already formed. Aristokrates was accordingly sent to Chios, and on being assured by the government that they had no intention of revolting he demanded a contingent of ships by the terms of the alliance. The demand was complied with, we are told, only because the conspirators dared not to call the people into their council, and seven Chian triremes sailed for Athens. The defeat of a Peloponnesian squadron by the Athenians off the Epidaurian coast first made the Spartans think that the task before them might be less easy than they had anticipated; and they at once recalled Chalkideus and resolved on issuing orders for the return of some ships which had set out before him. In this resolution Alkibiades saw the deathblow to his whole scheme. Chios could be added to the Spartan confederacy only by the success of the oligarchic plot; and he was well aware that the conspirators who were ready to revolt from Athens were not at all ready to run the risk of ruining themselves. If these plotters should learn that Chalkideus had been recalled because the Athenians had won a victory, they would at once seek to pacify the Athenians by an increased profession of zeal for their service. He insisted that the original plan should be carried out, and pledged himself that, if once he reached the Ionian coast, he would bring about the revolt not only of Chios but of the other cities in alliance with Athens. His influence gained the day; but it was necessary now to hoodwink the conspirators at Chios not less than the Chian demos. The council was assembling when, to the dismay of the people, the Spartan triremes approached the landing-place; and Alkibiades, appearing at once before the senate, assured them that the little squadron now in their harbour was but the van of a larger fleet already on its way. The decisive step was taken. Chios revolted from Athens, and her example was followed first by Erythrai and then by Klazomenai. Thus had Alkibiades once again changed the history of his country; and the voyage of Chalkideus with his five ships bore its fruit in the final catastrophe of Aigospotamoi. |