Stories From Thucydides by H. L. Havell

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II

The second invasion of the Peloponnesians was prolonged for forty
days, and the whole Attic territory was laid waste. Pericles again
refused to venture a pitched battle against them, knowing well that
the Athenian army was no match for them in the open field. But a
powerful fleet was sent to cruise round Peloponnesus, which inflicted
much damage on the coast districts. It was a welcome relief to the
Athenians selected for this service to escape for a time from the
plague-stricken city; but unhappily they carried the infection with
them, and the crews were decimated by the same disease. Nor did the
evil stop here: for the same armament being afterwards despatched to
Potidaea, to reinforce the blockading army and fleet, caused a
virulent outbreak of the plague among the forces stationed there,
which up till then had been healthy. After some fruitless operations
against the town this second armament was withdrawn, and returned to
Athens with the loss of more than a thousand men.

After all these disasters the reaction against Pericles, which had
begun with the first invasion of Attica, reached a climax, and on all
sides he was loudly decried by the Athenians, as the author of all
their miseries. Envoys were sent with overtures of peace to Sparta,
and when these returned with no favourable answer, the storm of
popular fury grew more violent than ever. Pericles, who knew the
temper of his people, and had foreseen that some such outbreak would
occur, remained calm and unmoved. But wishing to allay the general
excitement, and bring back the citizens to a more reasonable view of
their prospects, he summoned an assembly, and addressed the multitude
in terms of grave and dignified rebuke. He reminded them that they
themselves had voted for war, and remonstrated against the unfairness
of making him responsible for their own decision. If war could have
been avoided without imperilling the very existence of their city,
then that decision was wrong; but if, as was the fact, peace could
only have been preserved by ruinous concessions, then his advice had
been good, and they had been right in following it. The welfare of the
individual citizen depended on the welfare of the community to which
he belonged; as long as that was secured, private losses could always
be made good, but public disaster meant private ruin. On this
principle they had acted two years before, when they determined to
reject the demands of Sparta. Why, then, were they now indulging in
weak regrets, and turning against him whom they had appointed as their
chosen guide and adviser? Was there anything in his character, any
fact in his whole life, which justified them in suspecting him of
unworthy motives? Was he the man to lead them astray, in order to save
some selfish end--he, the great Pericles, whose loyalty, eloquence,
clear-sightedness, and incorruptibility, had been proved in a public
career of more than thirty years? If any other course had been open to
them, he would have been to blame in counselling war; but the
alternative was between that and degradation. The immediate pressure
of private calamity was blinding them to the magnitude of the
interests at stake--Athens, with all her fond traditions, and all the
lustre of her name. That they were sure of victory he had already
declared to them on many infallible grounds. But seeing them so sunk
in despair, he would speak in a tone of loud assurance, and boldly
assert a fact which they seemed to have overlooked. They were lords of
the sea, absolute masters, that was to say, of half the world! Let
them keep a firm grasp on this empire, and they would soon recover
those pretty ornaments of empire--their gardens and their vineyards--
which they held so dear: but, that once relinquished, they would lose
all. Surely this knowledge should inspire them with a lofty contempt
of their foes, a contempt grounded, not on ignorance or shallow
enthusiasm, but on rational calculation. They could not now descend
from the eminence on which they stood. Athens, who had blazed so long
in unrivalled splendour before the eyes of the world, dared not suffer
her lustre to be abated: for her, obscurity meant extinction. Let them
keep this in mind, and not listen to counsels of seeming prudence and
moderation, which were suicidal in a ruling state. All their
calamities, except the plague, were the foreseen results of their own
decision. Now was the time to display their known courage and
patience. Let them think of the glory of Athens, and her imperial
fame.

This memorable speech, the last recorded utterance of Pericles, had
the desired effect. It was resolved to continue the war, and no
further embassies were sent to Sparta. But resentment still smouldered
in the hearts of the Athenians against their great statesman. How
fearful was the contrast between the high hopes with which they had
embarked in this struggle, and the scenes of horror and desolation
which lay around them! From the walls they could see their trampled
fields, their ravaged plantations, and the blackened ruins of their
homes. Within, the pestilence still raged undiminished, and the city
was filled with sounds and sights of woe. Under the pressure of these
calamities the ascendency of Pericles went through a brief period of
eclipse, and he was condemned to pay a fine. Soon, however, he
recovered all his influence, and remained at the head of affairs until
his death, which occurred in the autumn of the following year.

Pericles is the representative figure in the golden age of Athenian
greatness, the most perfect example of that equable and harmonious
development in every faculty of body and mind which was the aim of
Greek civic life at its best. As an orator, he was probably never
equalled, and the effect of his eloquence has found immortal
expression in the lines of his contemporary Eupolis. Persuasion, we
are told, sat enthroned on his lips; like a strong athlete, he
overtook and outran all other orators; his words struck home like the
lightning, while he held his audience enchained, as by a powerful
spell; and among all the masters of eloquence, he was the only one who
left his sting behind him. As a statesman, it was his object to admit
every freeborn Athenian to a share of public duties and privileges;
and for this purpose he introduced the system of payment, which
enabled the poorer citizens to perform their part in the service of
the state. His military talents, though never employed for conquest or
aggression, were of no mean order; and on two occasions of supreme
peril to Athens, the revolt of Euboea, and the revolt of Samos, it was
his energy and promptitude which saved his city from ruin.

But it is as the head of the great intellectual movement which
culminated in this epoch, as the friend of poets, philosophers, and
artists, that Pericles has won his most enduring fame. By his liberal
and enlightened policy the surplus of the Athenian revenues was
devoted to the creation of those wonders of architecture and
sculpture, whose fragments still serve as unapproachable models to the
mind of modern Europe. And under his rule Athens became the school of
Greece, the great centre for every form of intellectual activity, a
position which she maintained until the later period of the Roman
Empire.

If, however, we would understand the character of Pericles, and the
spirit of the age which he represents, we must never forget that this
aspect of Athenian greatness, to us by far the most important, was not
the aspect which awoke the highest enthusiasm in him and his
contemporaries. Those things which have made the name of Athens
immortal, her art and her literature, were matters of but secondary
importance to the Athenian of that age. He worshipped his city as a
beloved mistress, and, like a lover, he delighted to adorn her with
outward dignity and splendour. But to lavish all his thought and care
on these external embellishments would have been, in his estimation, a
senseless waste of his highest faculties, as if a lover should make
the robes and jewels of his mistress the objects of his highest
adoration. To make Athens the mightiest state in Greece, to build up
the fabric of her material greatness--these were the objects for which
he was ready to devote the best energies of heart and brain, and if
need were, to lay down his life. He might be skilled in every elegant
accomplishment, an acute reasoner, an orator, a musician, a poet; and
to some extent he was all of these. But before all else he was in the
highest sense a practical man, finding in strenuous action his chief
glory and pride. And such a man was the last to melt into ecstasies
over the high notes of a singer, or dream away his life in the
fairyland of poetry.

We have dwelt at some length on the work and character of Pericles, as
his death marks a turning point in Athenian history. From that day
onward the policy of Athens takes a downward direction, denoting a
corresponding decline in Athenian character and aspiration. Pericles
had been able, by his commanding talents and proved integrity, to
exercise a salutary check on the restless energies and soaring
ambition of his countrymen. He had been a true father and ruler of his
people, in evil times and in good, curbing them in the insolence of
prosperity, comforting and exalting them in the dark hour of disaster.
But the government now passed into the hands of weaker men, who, since
they were incapable of leading the people, were compelled to follow
it, and to maintain their position by pandering to the worst vices of
the Athenian character. Rash where they should have been cautious,
yielding where they should have been resolute, they squandered the
immense resources of Athens, and led her on, step by step, to
humiliation and defeat. The course of our narrative will show how
easily the Athenians might have emerged triumphant from the struggle
with their enemies, if they had followed the line of conduct marked
out by Pericles. They might, indeed, have avoided the occasion of
offence which led immediately to the war, and thus have escaped the
necessity of fighting altogether; and this, as we have seen, was the
one fatal mistake made by Pericles. But, once launched in the
conflict, they were sure of an easy victory, if they had only shown a
very moderate degree of prudence and self-restraint. And we need not
blame the great statesmen too harshly for not foreseeing the wild
excesses of folly and extravagance which we shall have to record in
the following pages.

INVESTMENT OF PLATAEA

In the third year of the war the usual invasion of Attica was omitted,
and the Peloponnesian army under Archidamus marched against Plataea.
Having pitched their camp before the walls they prepared to lay waste
the territory; but before the work of havoc began, the Plataeans sent
envoys to remonstrate. "Unrighteous are your deeds," said the
spokesman of the embassy, "ye men of Sparta, and unworthy of the men
whose sons ye are. After the victory of Plataea, which ended the
struggle against Persia, Pausanias, the chief captain of the
confederate Greeks, offered sacrifice and thanksgiving at Plataea to
Zeus the Liberator, and swore a solemn oath, both he, and all the
Greeks whom he led, to maintain the independence of our city against
all who should assail it. This they did as a recompense for our valour
and devotion in our country's service. But ye, in direct violation of
that oath, have made common cause with our worst enemies, the Thebans,
and have come hither to enslave us. In the name of the gods who
witnessed that covenant, in the name of every power worshipped alike
at Plataea and at Sparta, we adjure you not to commit this sacrilege,
but to leave us in peaceful possession of the privileges vouchsafed to
us on that memorable day."

Such were the words of the Plataeans, to which Archidamus replied as
follows: "Ye say well, men of Plataea, if ye act in the spirit of the
compact to which ye have appealed. The oath which Pausanias swore was
taken in defence of the common liberties of Greece. Against those
liberties a new enemy has arisen, Athens, who holds half our nation in
bondage, and threatens to lay her yoke upon us all. To put down that
tyranny has this great coalition been called together, and if ye are
true men, ye will enlist in the same cause, and take up arms for the
relief of your distressed countrymen. Or at least, if ye cannot do
this, then stand apart from this conflict, helping neither one side
nor the other; and with this we shall be satisfied."

Having heard the answer of Archidamus, the Plataean envoys went back,
and reported his words to their fellow-townsmen. But the Plataeans
replied that, without the consent of the Athenians, they dare not
accept his proposal, as their wives and children had been removed to
Athens. Moreover, they feared that if they remained neutral the
Thebans would seize the opportunity to make another attempt on their
town. "Well, then," answered Archidamus, "we make you this second
offer: Hand over your town and your dwellings to us, the Spartans;
keep a strict account of all your trees, [Footnote: Vines and olive-
trees] and of all else that can be numbered, and retire yourselves to
some safe retreat, as long as the war continues. When it is over, we
will restore all your property, and meanwhile keep the land in
cultivation, and pay you a fixed rent, such as may suffice you."

The offer was fair, and even generous; but the Plataeans were
powerless to act, without the consent of the Athenians, who held their
families as hostages. Accordingly they asked for a truce, to enable
them to lay the proposal before the authorities at Athens, and this
being granted, they sent envoys to Athens, who speedily returned with
this answer: "We have never left you at the mercy of your enemies in
the past, since ye became our allies, nor will we do so now, but will
help you to the best of our power; and we charge you by the oath which
your fathers swore not to depart from your allegiance to Athens."

It was a cruel alternative which was offered to the hapless Plataeans:
either they must leave their wives and children to the vengeance of
Athens, or face the whole power of the confederates, led by Sparta.
True to their character, they chose the nobler part, and determined to
stand by the Athenian alliance. Henceforth no one was allowed to leave
the town, and their final answer was delivered from the walls. They
were unable, they said, to accept the terms offered by Archidamus.

On hearing their decision, the Spartan king made a last solemn appeal
to the powers who presided over the territory of Plataea, a hallowed
precinct, now about to be given up to plunder and ravage: "Ye gods and
heroes, who keep the land of Plataea, bear witness that we had just
cause from the first for marching hither, since the Plataeans had
forsaken the alliance, and that if we do aught against them, we shall
still be justified. For we have made them the fairest offers, but they
would not be persuaded. Therefore let those with whom the guilt lies
be punished, and prosper ye the cause of righteous vengeance."

The siege of Plataea now began in earnest. First the town was
surrounded with a palisade, to prevent anyone from escaping, the
materials being taken from the plantations in the neighbourhood of the
town. Then they raised a mound against the wall, expecting that with
so large a force as theirs they would easily carry the place by storm.
Timber was brought from Cithaeron, and with this they set up two stout
buttresses of cross-beams, at right angles to the town-wall, to serve
as a support on either side of the mound. Within this framework they
piled up fascines, stones, earth, and whatever else was at hand. The
whole army was employed in this task, which was continued for seventy
days and nights without intermission, the men working in regular
spells.

Meanwhile the Plataeans had not been idle. First they built a wall of
bricks and timber opposite to the point where the mound was rising,
and resting on the ramparts, in order to raise the height of their
defences. The new wall was covered with hides, raw and dressed, to
protect the timber and the workmen from being injured by burning
arrows. And while this structure was in progress, they made a breach
in the old wall, and carted away the earth from the bottom of the
mound. To prevent this, the Peloponnesians filled up the space thus
caused with heavy masses of clay, rammed tightly into baskets of
osier, which made a solid structure, much harder to remove than the
loose earth. Then the Plataeans had recourse to another device:
marking carefully the position of the mound, they ran a mine from the
city under it, and as fast as the earth fell in, they carried it away.
This continued for a long time, for the Peloponnesians, who saw their
mound rising no higher, for all their labour, but rather growing less,
did not guess the cause, but went on heaping up materials, which were
swallowed up as fast as they were brought.

Still the Plataeans feared that in spite of these counterworks they
would at length be overpowered by numbers, unless they contrived some
better means of defence. So they left off building the wall of bricks
and timber, and beginning at either end of it, they built a crescent-
shaped wall, curving inwards towards the city. Thus the
Peloponnesians, if they succeeded in carrying the first wall, would
find themselves confronted by a second line of defence, and would have
all their work to do over again, besides being exposed to a cross-
fire.

While the Plataeans were thus vigorously defending themselves, and
before the mound was completed, the Peloponnesians brought siege-
engines to bear on the wall, one of which greatly alarmed the besieged
garrison, by severely shaking their wall of timber and bricks. But
this new mode of attack was frustrated, like the rest, by the
ingenuity of the Plataeans, who dropped nooses over the ends of the
battering-rams, and drew them up just before the moment of impact.
Moreover they suspended heavy beams of wood at intervals along the
wall, each beam hanging by long chains from two cranes which rested on
the wall and projected outwards from it; and whenever a ram was being
brought up, they drew up the beam at right angles to it, and then,
letting go the chains, dropped the ponderous timber, which came
crashing down on the ram, and broke off its head.

Thus baffled at every point, the Peloponnesians began to despair of
taking the town by assault, and thought that they would be compelled
to form a blockade. But before being driven to this costly and tedious
operation, they determined to try and set fire to the place, which
seemed possible, as it was but small in extent. So they waited till
the wind was in the right direction, and then brought vast quantities
of faggots, and threw them into the space between the mound and the
wall; and this being soon filled up, they piled up more faggots as far
as they could reach within the city itself, and then throwing in
lighted torches, with brimstone and pitch, they set fire to the whole
mass. Then arose a great sheet of flame, such as had never been raised
by human hands, though not, of course, to be compared to the vast
forest-fires, produced by natural means; yet it was sufficient to
cause a panic among the Plataeans, and bring their town to the verge
of destruction. The heat was so intense that a whole quarter of the
place was cleared of its defenders, and if a wind had arisen to drive
the flame inwards, nothing could have saved the whole town from
destruction. [Footnote: Thucydides seems to imply that there was a
wind, though a slight one.] But fortunately the breeze was but slight,
and it is said also that a heavy fall of rain came on, and quenched
the conflagration.

Having failed in their last attempt, the Peloponnesians sent away part
of their army, and employed those who remained in building a
blockading wall round Plataea. The work was completed towards the end
of September, and they then disbanded their army, leaving a force
sufficient to guard half the wall; for the Thebans, relentless in
their zeal against Plataea, took charge of the other half. The number
of the besieged was four hundred and eighty, of whom eighty were
Athenians, and a hundred and ten women to make bread for the garrison.

NAVAL VICTORIES OF PHORMIO

I

During the last half-century the art of naval warfare had made great
progress in Greece. The Greek war-galley, or trireme, a vessel
propelled by three banks of oars, had always been furnished with a
sharp-pointed prow, for the purpose of ramming an opponent's ship; but
many years elapsed before the Greeks attained genuine skill in the use
of this formidable weapon. According to the ordinary method of
fighting, after the first shock of collision the affair was decided by
the hoplites, or heavy-armed infantry, stationed on the decks of the
two contending ships; and in this manner was fought the engagement
between the Corcyraean and Corinthian. fleets which occurred in the
year before the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. There the ship was
simply a vehicle, which served to bring the antagonists together, and
the rest was left to the prowess of the hoplites.

The Athenians were the first to abandon this crude and clumsy style of
fighting, and in the course of two generations their seamen had become
renowned throughout Greece for the unrivalled skill which they showed
in working and manoeuvring the trireme. A few hoplites were still
carried, to serve in cases of emergency; but by far the most important
part in the encounter was played by the trireme itself, with its long,
tapering, sharp-pointed prow. To use this deadly but delicate
instrument with effect required great coolness, dexterity, and
judgment, on the part of the steersman, and a crew under perfect
command. The tactics usually employed were as follows: watching his
opportunity, the captain gave the order "full speed ahead!" and
darting rapidly through the enemy's line, wheeled suddenly round, and
drove the beak of his galley with terrible force against the stern or
side of the vessel selected for attack. One blow from the long lance-
like point, propelled by the whole weight and impetus of the trireme,
was sufficient to sink or disable an enemy's ship, and the attacking
galley was then backed away from the wreck, and directed against
another victim.

The incessant practice of nearly half a century had enabled the
Athenians to attain consummate mastery in this new method of naval
warfare; and they were now to give signal proof of their immense
superiority over the other maritime powers of Greece.

In the same summer which witnessed the investment of Plataea, the
Spartans planned an expedition against Acarnania, the westernmost
province of Greece, which they wished to detach from the Athenian
alliance. A Spartan officer, named Cnemus, was sent off in advance,
with a thousand hoplites, to raise the wild mountain tribes, and led
an attack against Stratus, the capital of Acarnania; and in the
meantime orders were sent round to equip a numerous fleet, which was
to support the operations of Stratus by harassing the coast districts.

The attack on Stratus failed altogether, chiefly in consequence of the
impetuosity of the rude mountaineers serving under Cnemus, who
advanced unsupported against the town, and meeting with a severe
repulse embarrassed the movements of their Greek allies. About the
same time the Peloponnesian fleet, consisting of forty-seven ships,
was sailing down the Corinthian Gulf to co-operate with Cnemus. It was
known that Phormio, the Athenian admiral, was stationed at Naupactus
with a squadron of twenty vessels; but the Peloponnesian captains
never dreamed that he would venture to attack them with so small a
force, and they pursued their voyage along the southern shore of the
gulf, without making any preparations for a battle. Phormio, however,
had other intentions: keeping close to the opposite shore, he followed
their movements, and allowed them to pass through the narrow strait
which divides the inner from the outer gulf, wishing to avoid an
engagement until they reached the open water. The Peloponnesians
dropped anchor for the night at Patrae in Achaia, and Phormio took up
his station at Chalcis, a harbour-town of Aetolia, at the mouth of the
Evenus. Being now convinced that Phormio meditated an encounter, for
which they had little inclination, the Peloponnesian admirals made an
attempt [Footnote: I have adopted the reading of Bloomfield, approved
by Classen (4th Edition).] to steal across under cover of darkness.
But this manoeuvre was detected, and they found their way barred by
the Athenian squadron in the middle of the channel. Being thus driven
to bay the Peloponnesians drew up their ships in a circle, with their
prows turned outwards, like a flock of sheep assailed by a dog. Within
the circle were placed the smaller vessels accompanying the fleet, and
five of the swiftest galleys, which were intended to lend assistance
against any attack of the enemy.

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