The Historians' History of the World 03

Though the army immediately saluted him general, Alcibiades left the care of the troops to his colleagues Thrasybulus and Thrasyllus, and withdrew himself from the applauses of his admiring countrymen, on pretence of concerting with Tissaphernes the system of their future operations. But his principal motive was to show himself to the Persian, in the new and illustrious character with which he was invested; for having raised his authority among the Athenians by his influence with the satrap, he expected to strengthen this influence by the support of that authority. Before he returned to the camp, ambassadors had been sent by the tyrants, to attempt a negotiation with the partisans of democracy, who, inflamed by continual reports of the indignities and cruelties committed in Athens, prepared to sail thither to protect their friends and take vengeance on their enemies. Alcibiades judiciously opposed this rash resolution which must have left the Hellespont, Ionia, and the islands, at the mercy of the hostile fleet. But he commanded the ambassadors to deliver to their masters a short but pithy message: “That they must divest themselves of their illegal power, and restore the ancient constitution. If they delayed obedience, he would sail to the Piræus, and deprive them of their authority and their lives.”

When this message was reported at Athens, it added to the disorder and confusion in which that unhappy city was involved. The Four Hundred who had acted with unanimity in usurping the government, soon disagreed about the administration, and split into factions, which persecuted each other as furiously as both had persecuted the people. Theramenes and Aristocrates condemned and opposed the tyrannical measures of their colleagues. The perfidious Phrynichus was slain: both parties prepared for taking arms; and the horrors of a Corcyrean sedition were ready to be renewed in Athens, when the old men, the children, the women, and strangers, interposed for the safety of a city which had long been the ornament of Greece, the terror of Persia, and the admiration of the world.

Had the public enemy availed themselves of this opportunity to assault the Piræus, Athens could not have been saved from immediate destruction. But the Peloponnesian forces at Miletus, long clamorous and discontented, had broken out into open mutiny, when they heard of the recall of Alcibiades, and the hostile intentions of Tissaphernes. They destroyed the Persian fortifications in the neighbourhood of Miletus; they put the garrisons to the sword; their treacherous commander, Astyochus, saved his life by flying to an altar; nor was the tumult appeased until the guilty were removed from their sight, and Mindarus, an officer of approved valour and fidelity, arrived from Sparta to assume the principal command.

The dreadful consequences which must have resulted to the Athenians, if, during the fury of their sedition, the enemy had attacked them with a fleet of a hundred and fifty sail, may be conceived by the terror inspired by a much smaller Peloponnesian squadron of only forty-two vessels commanded by the Spartan Agesandridas. The friends of the constitution had assembled in the spacious theatre of Bacchus. The most important matters were in agitation, when the alarm was given that some Peloponnesian ships had been seen on the coast. All ranks of men hastened to the Piræus; and prepared thirty-six vessels for taking the sea. When Agesandridas perceived the ardent opposition which he must encounter in attempting to land, he doubled the promontory of Sunium, and sailed towards the fertile island of Eubœa, from which, since the fortification of Decelea, the Athenians had derived far more plentiful supplies than from the desolated territory of Attica. To defend a country which formed their principal resource, they sailed in pursuit of the enemy, and observed them next day near the shore of Eretria, the most considerable town in the island.

The Eubœans, who had long watched an opportunity to revolt, supplied the Peloponnesian squadron with all necessaries in abundance; but instead of furnishing a market to the Athenians, they retired from the coast on their approach. The commanders were obliged to weaken their strength by despatching several parties into the country to procure provisions; Agesandridas seized this opportunity to attack them: most of the ships were taken; the crews swam to land; many were cruelly murdered by the Eretrians, from whom they expected protection; and such only survived as took refuge in the Athenian garrisons scattered over the island.