The Historians' History of the World 03

After having ravaged Laconia for seven days with impunity, Nicias returned to Thyrea in Cynuria, where the Spartans had established the Æginetans. He took the city despite the proximity of a Lacedæmonian army which did not venture to aid it, and his prisoners were sent to Athens and there put to death. This new-born national greatness, if such a return to savagery can merit the name, increased constantly in power: the foe was a criminal meriting punishment and his defeat equivalent to a sentence of death. In just this period occurred a tragedy, the story of which we would refuse to receive were it not for Thucydides’ direct affirmation; the massacre of two thousand of the bravest helots for the sole purpose of weakening the corps and of frightening those of their companions to whom the success of Athens might have given the idea of revolt. Overwhelmed by so many reverses and fearful of seeing war established permanently around Laconia, at Pylos, Cythera, and Cynuria, the Spartans shrank from further action. Whatever step they took might lead them into error and having never learned the lessons of misfortune, they remained irresolute and timid. The Athenians, on the contrary, were full of confidence in their good fortune. The Greeks in Sicily having brought their wars to a close by a general reconciliation, the generals sent to that country by the Athenians allowed themselves to be included in the treaty. On their return the people condemned two of them to exile and one to a heavy fine, on the pretext that they had it in their power to subjugate Sicily but had been bought off by presents. The Athenian people believed themselves to be irresistible, and in the loftiness of their aspirations denied to any enterprise, whether practicable or not, the possibility of defeat. This was the forerunner of the fatal madness that seized them when Alcibiades planned the unfortunate expedition into Sicily.

Athens was thus taking everywhere the offensive, and Sparta, paralysed, had entirely ceased to act; she had recourse again to Darius, begging aid more insistently than ever, thus betraying the cause of all Greece and dimming the glory of their deeds at Thermopylæ. The Athenians intercepted the Persian Artaphernes in Thrace. In the letter this envoy bore, the king set forth that not being able to grasp the meaning of the Spartans—no two of their envoys delivering to him the same message—he had thought best in order to come to a clear understanding, to send them a deputy. Athens at once took steps to neutralise Sparta’s measures; perhaps even to supplant her in the favour of the Great King, and sent Artaphernes back honourably accompanied by ambassadors. From now on Greece was to witness the shameful spectacle offered by the descendants of the victors of Salamis and Platæa bowing down to the successors of Xerxes. At Ephesus the embassy learnt of the death of the Great King and went no further; but Athens had none the less been false, in intent if not in deed, to all the traditions of her past, and was to expiate her sin without delay.

A CHECK TO ATHENS; BRASIDAS BECOMES AGGRESSIVE

[424 B.C.]

Demosthenes’ able plan had succeeded; the Peloponnesus was encircled by hostile posts; there now remained but to shut off the isthmus and imprison the Spartans in their retreat. One way of doing this was to occupy Megara, but a still better method would be to obtain an alliance with Bœotia. The attempt on Megara having failed, Demosthenes turned his attention to Bœotia. He held secret communication with the inhabitants of Chæronea, who promised to deliver over the city to a body of Athenians who were to leave Naupactus unseen, aided by the Phocians, while he himself was to storm Siphæ on the Gulf of Crissa, the Athenian general Hippocrates being charged with the capture of Delium, on the Eubœan side. These three enterprises were to be executed the same day, and if they succeeded, Bœotia, like the Peloponnesus, would be encircled by a hostile ring, and Thebes would be separated from Lacedæmon. But too many were in the secret to allow of its being kept, the enemy was warned and the three Athenian forces, failing to act in concert, lost the advantage that would have lain in a simultaneous attack.