The presence of Pharnabazus and Konon with their commanding force in the Saronic Gulf, and the liberality with which the former furnished pecuniary aid to the latter for rebuilding the full fortifications of Athens, as well as to the Corinthians for the prosecution of the war,—seem to have given preponderance to the confederates over Sparta for that year. The plans of Konon[622] were extensive. He was the first to organize for the defence of Corinth, a mercenary force which was afterwards improved and conducted with greater efficiency by Iphikrates; and after he had finished the fortifications of Peiræus with the Long Walls, he employed himself in showing his force among the islands, for the purpose of laying the foundations of renewed maritime power for Athens. We even hear that he caused an Athenian envoy to be despatched to Dionysius at Syracuse, with the view of detaching that despot from Sparta, and bringing him into connection with Athens. Evagoras, despot of Salamis in Cyprus, the steady friend of Konon, was a party to this proposition, which he sought to strengthen by offering to Dionysius his sister in marriage.[623] There was a basis of sympathy between them arising from the fact that Evagoras was at variance with the Phœnicians both in Phœnicia and Cyprus, while Dionysius was in active hostilities with the Carthaginians (their kinsmen and Colonists) in Sicily. Nevertheless, the proposition met with little or no success. We find Dionysius afterwards still continuing to act as an ally of Sparta.

Profiting by the aid received from Pharnabazus, the Corinthians strengthened their fleet at Lechæum (their harbor in the Corinthian Gulf) so considerably, as to become masters of the Gulf, and to occupy Rhium, one of the two opposite capes which bound its narrow entrance. To oppose them, the Lacedæmonians on their side were driven to greater maritime effort. More than one naval action seems to have taken place, in those waters where the prowess and skill of the Athenian admiral Phormion had been so signally displayed at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war. At length the Lacedæmonian admiral Herippidas, who succeeded to the command of the fleet after his predecessor Polemarchus had been slain in battle, compelled the Corinthians to abandon Rhium, and gradually recovered his ascendency in the Corinthian Gulf; which his successor Teleutias, brother of Agesilaus, still farther completed.[624]

While these transactions were going on (seemingly during the last half of 393 B.C. and the full year of 392 B.C.), so as to put an end to the temporary naval preponderance of the Corinthians,—the latter were at the same time bearing the brunt of a desultory, but continued, land-warfare against the garrison of Lacedæmonians and Peloponnesians established at Sikyon. Both Corinth and Lechæum were partly defended by the presence of confederate troops, Bœotians, Argeians, Athenians, or mercenaries paid by Athens. But this did not protect the Corinthians against suffering great damage, in their lands and outlying properties, from the incursions of the enemy.

The plain between Corinth and Sikyon,—fertile and extensive (speaking by comparison with Peloponnesus generally), and constituting a large part of the landed property of both cities, was rendered uncultivable during 393 and 392 B.C.; so that the Corinthian proprietors were obliged to withdraw their servants and cattle to Peiræum[625] (a portion of the Corinthian territory without the Isthmus properly so called, north-east of the Akrokorinthus, in a line between that eminence and the Megarian harbor of Pegæ). Here the Sikyonian assailants could not reach them, because of the Long Walls of Corinth, which connected that city by a continuous fortification of twelve stadia (somewhat less than a mile and a half) with its harbor of Lechæum. Nevertheless, the loss to the proprietors of the deserted plain was still so great, that two successive seasons of it were quite enough to inspire them with a strong aversion to the war;[626] the more so, as the damage fell exclusively upon them—their allies in Bœotia, Athens, and Argos, having as yet suffered nothing. Constant military service for defence, with the conversion of the city into a sort of besieged post, aggravated their discomfort. There was another circumstance also, doubtless not without influence. The consequences of the battle of Knidus had been, first, to put down the maritime empire of Sparta, and thus to diminish the fear which she inspired to the Corinthians; next, to rebuild the fortifications, and renovate the shipping, commercial as well as warlike, of Athens;—a revival well calculated to bring back a portion of that anti-Athenian jealousy and apprehension which the Corinthians had felt so strongly a few years before. Perhaps some of the trade at Corinth may have been actually driven away by the disturbance of the war, to the renewed fortifications and greater security of Peiræus.

Fostered by this pressure of circumstances, the discontented philo-Laconian or peace-party which had always existed at Corinth, presently acquired sufficient strength, and manifested itself with sufficient publicity to give much alarm to the government. The Corinthian government had always been, and still was, oligarchical. In what manner the administrators or the council were renovated, or how long individuals continued in office, indeed, we do not know. But of democracy, with its legal, popular assemblies, open discussions and authoritative resolves, there was nothing.[627] Now the oligarchical persons actually in power were vehemently anti-Laconian, consisting of men who had partaken of the Persian funds and contracted alliance with Persia, besides compromising themselves irrevocably (like Timolaus) by the most bitter manifestations of hostile sentiment towards Sparta. These men found themselves menaced by a powerful opposition party, which had no constitutional means for making its sentiments predominant, and for accomplishing peaceably either a change of administrators or a change of public policy. It was only by an appeal to arms and violence that such a consummation could be brought about; a fact notorious to both parties,—so that the oligarchical administrators, informed of the meetings and conversations going on, knew well that they had to expect nothing less than the breaking out of a conspiracy. That such anticipations were well-founded, we gather even from the partial recital of Xenophon; who states that Pasimêlus, the philo-Laconian leader, was on his guard and in preparation,[628]—and counts it to him as a virtue that shortly afterwards he opened the gates to the Lacedæmonians.

Anticipating such conspiracy, the government resolved to prevent it by a coup d’état. They threw themselves upon the assistance of their allies, invited in a body of Argeians, and made their blow the more sure by striking it on the last day of the festival called Eukleia, when it was least expected. Their proceeding, though dictated by precaution, was executed with the extreme of brutal ferocity aggravated by sacrilege; in a manner very different from the deep-laid artifices recently practised by the Spartan ephors when they were in like manner afraid of the conspiracy of Kinadon,—and more like the oligarchical conspirators at Korkyra (in the third year of the Peloponnesian war) when they broke into the assembled Senate, and massacred Peithias, with sixty others in the senate-house.[629] While the choice performers at Corinth were contending for the prize in the theatre, with judges formally named to decide,—and while the market-place around was crowded with festive spectators,—a number of armed men were introduced, probably Argeians, with leaders designating the victims whom they were to strike. Some of these select victims were massacred in the market-place, others in the theatre, and one even while sitting as a judge in the theatre. Others again fled in terror to embrace the altars or statues in the market-place,—which sanctuary, nevertheless, did not save their lives. Nor was such sacrilege arrested,—repugnant as it was to the feelings of the assembled spectators and to Grecian feelings generally,—until one hundred and twenty persons had perished.[630] But the persons slain were chiefly elderly men; for the younger portion of the philo-Laconian party, suspecting some mischief, had declined attending the festival, and kept themselves separately assembled under their leader Pasimêlus in the gymnasium and cyprus-grove called Kranium, just without the city-gates. We find, too, that they were not only assembled, but actually in arms. For the moment that they heard the clamor in the market-place, and learned from some fugitives what was going on, they rushed up at once to the Akrokorinthus (or eminence and acropolis overhanging the city) and got possession of the citadel,—which they maintained with such force and courage that the Argeians and the Corinthians, who took part with the government, were repulsed in the attempt to dislodge them. This circumstance, indirectly revealed in the one-sided narrative of Xenophon, lets us into the real state of the city, and affords good ground for believing that Pasimêlus and his friends were prepared beforehand for an armed outbreak, but waited to execute it, until the festival was over,—a scruple which the government, in their eagerness to forestall the plot, disregarded,—employing the hands and weapons of Argeians who were comparatively unimpressed by solemnities peculiar to Corinth.[631]

Though Pasimêlus and his friends were masters of the citadel, and had repulsed the assault of their enemies, yet the coup d’état had been completely successful in overawing their party in the city, and depriving them of all means of communicating with the Lacedæmonians at Sikyon. Feeling unable to maintain themselves, they were besides frightened by menacing omens, when they came to offer sacrifice, in order that they might learn whether the gods encouraged them to fight or not. The victims were found so alarming, as to drive them to evacuate the post and prepare for voluntary exile. Many of them (according to Diodorus five hundred)[632] actually went into exile; while others, and among them Pasimêlus himself, were restrained by the entreaties of their friends and relatives, combined with solemn assurances of peace and security from the government; who now, probably, felt themselves victorious, and were anxious to mitigate the antipathies which their recent violence had inspired. These pacific assurances were faithfully kept, and no farther mischief was done to any citizen.

But the political condition of Corinth was materially altered, by an extreme intimacy of alliance and communion now formed with Argos; perhaps combined with reciprocal rights of intermarriage, and of purchase and sale. The boundary pillars or hedges which separated the two territories, were pulled up, and the city was entitled Argos instead of Corinth (says Xenophon); such was probably the invidious phrase in which the opposition party described the very close political union now formed between the two cities; upheld by a strong Argeian force in the city and acropolis, together with some Athenian mercenaries under Iphikrates, and some Bœotians as a garrison in the port of Lechæum. Most probably the government remained still Corinthian, and still oligarchical, as before. But it now rested upon Argeian aid, and was therefore dependent chiefly upon Argos, though partly also upon the other two allies.

To Pasimêlus and his friends such a state of things was intolerable. Though personally they had no ill-usage to complain of, yet the complete predominance of their political enemies was quite sufficient to excite their most vehement antipathies. They entered into secret correspondence with Praxitas, the Lacedæmonian commander at Sikyon, engaging to betray to him one of the gates in the western Long Wall between Corinth and Lechæum. The scheme being concerted, Pasimêlus and his partisans got themselves placed,[633] partly by contrivance and partly by accident, on the night-watch at this gate; an imprudence, which shows that the government not only did not maltreat them, but even admitted them to trust. At the moment fixed, Praxitas,—presenting himself with a Lacedæmonian mora or regiment, a Sikyonian force, and the Corinthian exiles,—found the treacherous sentinels prepared to open the gates. Having first sent in a trusty soldier to satisfy him that there was no deceit,[634] he then conducted all his force within the gates, into the mid-space between the two Long Walls. So broad was this space, and so inadequate did his numbers appear to maintain it, that he took the precaution of digging a cross-ditch with a palisade to defend himself on the side towards the city; which he was enabled to do undisturbed, since the enemy (we are not told why) did not attack him all the next day. On the ensuing day, however, Argeians, Corinthians, and Athenian mercenaries under Iphikrates, all came down from the city in full force; the latter stood on the right of the line, along the eastern wall, opposed to the Corinthian exiles on the Lacedæmonian left; while the Lacedæmonians themselves were on their own right, opposed to the Corinthians from the city; and the Argeians, opposed to the Sikyonians, in the centre.

It was here that the battle began; the Argeians, bold from superior numbers, attacked and broke the Sikyonians, tearing up the palisade, and pursuing them down to the sea with much slaughter;[635] upon which Pasimachus the Lacedæmonian commander of cavalry, coming to their aid, caused his small body of horsemen to dismount and tie their horses to trees, and then armed them with shields taken from the Sikyonians, inscribed on the outside with the letter Sigma (Σ). With these he approached on foot to attack the Argeians, who, mistaking them for Sikyonians, rushed to the charge with alacrity; upon which Pasimachus exclaimed,—“By the two gods, Argeians, these Sigmas which you see here will deceive you;” he then closed with them resolutely, but his number was so inferior that he was soon overpowered and slain. Meanwhile, the Corinthian exiles on the left had driven back Iphikrates with his mercenaries (doubtless chiefly light troops) and pursued them even to the city gates; while the Lacedæmonians, easily repelling the Corinthians opposed to them, came out of their palisade, and planted themselves with their faces towards the eastern wall, but at a little distance from it, to intercept the Argeians on their return. The latter were forced to run back as they could, huddling close along the eastern wall, with their right or unshielded side exposed, as they passed, to the spears of the Lacedæmonians. Before they could get to the walls of Corinth, they were met and roughly handled by the victorious Corinthian exiles. And even when they came to the walls, those within, unwilling to throw open the gates for fear of admitting the enemy, contented themselves with handing down ladders, over which the defeated Argeians clambered with distress and difficulty. Altogether, their loss in this disastrous retreat was frightful. Their dead (says Xenophon) lay piled up like heaps of stones or wood.[636]

This victory of Praxitas and the Lacedæmonians, though it did not yet make them masters of Lechæum,[637] was, nevertheless, of considerable importance. Shortly afterwards they received reinforcements which enabled them to turn it to still better account. The first measure of Praxitas was to pull down a considerable breadth of the two walls, leaving a breach which opened a free passage for any Lacedæmonian army from Sikyon to reach and pass the isthmus. He then marched his troops through the breach, forward on the road to Megara, capturing the two Corinthian dependencies of Krommyon and Sidus on the Saronic gulf, in which he placed garrisons. Returning back by the road south of Corinth, he occupied Epieikia on the frontier of Epidaurus, as a protection to the territory of the latter against incursions from Corinth,—and then disbanded his army.

A desultory warfare was carried on during the ensuing winter and spring between the opposite garrisons in Corinth and Sikyon. It was now that the Athenian Iphikrates, in the former place, began to distinguish himself at the head of his mercenary peltasts whom, after their first organization by Konon, he had trained to effective tactics under the strictest discipline, and whose movements he conducted with consummate skill. His genius introduced improvements both in their armor and in their clothing. He lengthened by one half both the light javelin and the short sword, which the Thracian peltasts habitually carried; he devised a species of leggings, known afterwards by the name of Iphikratides; and he thus combined, better than had ever been done before, rapid motion,—power of acting in difficult ground and open order,—effective attack, either by missiles or hand to hand, and dexterous retreat in case of need.[638] As yet, he was but a young officer, in the beginning of his military career.[639] We must therefore presume that these improvements were chiefly of later date, the suggestions of his personal experience; but even now, the successes of his light troops were remarkable. Attacking Phlius, he entrapped the Phliasians into an ambuscade, and inflicted on them a defeat so destructive that they were obliged to invoke the aid of a Lacedæmonian garrison for the protection of their city. He gained a victory near Sikyon, and carried his incursions over all Arcadia, to the very gates of the cities; damaging the Arcadian hoplites so severely, that they became afraid to meet him in the field. His own peltasts, however, though full of confidence against these Peloponnesian hoplites, still retained their awe and their reluctance to fight against Lacedæmonians;[640] who, on their side, despised them, but despised their own allies still more. “Our friends fear these peltasts, as children fear hobgoblins,”—said the Lacedæmonians, sarcastically, endeavoring to set the example of courage by ostentatious demonstrations of their own around the walls of Corinth.[641]

The breach made in the Long Walls of Corinth by Praxitas had laid open the road for a Peloponnesian army to march either into Attica or Bœotia.[642] Fortunately for the Athenians, they had already completed the rebuilding of their own Long Walls; but they were so much alarmed by the new danger, that they marched with their full force, and with masons and carpenters accompanying,[643] to Corinth. Here, with that celerity of work for which they were distinguished,[644] they in a few days reëstablished completely the western wall; the more important of the two, since it formed the barrier against the incursions of the Lacedæmonians from Sikyon. They had then a secure position, and could finish the eastern wall at their leisure; which they accordingly did, and then retired, leaving it to the confederate troops in Corinth to defend.

This advantage, however,—a very material one,—was again overthrown by the expedition of the Lacedæmonian king, Agesilaus, during the same summer. At the head of a full Lacedæmonian and Peloponnesian force, he first marched into the territory of Argos, and there spent some time in ravaging all the cultivated plain. From hence he passed over the mountain-road, by Tenea,[645] into the plain of Corinth, to the foot of the newly-repaired Long Walls. Here his brother Teleutias, who had recently superseded Herippidas as admiral in the Corinthian Gulf, came to coöperate with him in a joint attack, by sea and land, on the new walls and on Lechæum.[646] The presence of this naval force rendered the Long Walls difficult to maintain, since troops could be disembarked in the interval between them, where the Sikyonians in the previous battle had been beaten and pursued down to the sea. Agesilaus and Teleutias were strong enough to defeat the joint force of the four confederated armies, and to master not only the Long Walls, but also the port of Lechæum,[647] with its docks, and the ships within them; thus breaking up the naval power of Corinth in the Krissæan Gulf. Lechæum now became a permanent post of hostility against Corinth, occupied by a Lacedæmonian garrison, and occasionally by the Corinthian exiles, while any second rebuilding of the Corinthian Long Walls by the Athenians became impossible. After this important success, Agesilaus returned to Sparta. Neither he nor his Lacedæmonian hoplites, especially the Amyklæans, were ever willingly absent from the festival of the Hyakinthia; nor did he now disdain to take his station in the chorus,[648] under the orders of the choric conductor, for the pæan in honor of Apollo.

It was thus that the Long Walls, though rebuilt by the Athenians in the preceding year, were again permanently overthrown, and the road for Lacedæmonian armies to march beyond the isthmus once more laid open. So much were the Athenians and the Bœotians alarmed at this new success, that both appear to have become desirous of peace, and to have sent envoys to Sparta. The Thebans are said to have offered to recognize Orchomenus (which was now occupied by a Lacedæmonian garrison) as autonomous and disconnected from the Bœotian federation; while the Athenian envoys seem to have been favorably received at Sparta, and to have found the Lacedæmonians disposed to make peace on better terms than those which had been proposed during the late discussions with Tiribazus (hereafter to be noticed;) recognizing the newly built Athenian walls, restoring Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros to Athens, and guaranteeing autonomy to each separate city in the Grecian world. The Athenian envoys at Sparta having provisionally accepted these terms, forty days were allowed for reference to the people of Athens; to which place Lacedæmonian envoys were sent as formal bearers of the propositions. The Argeians and Corinthians, however, strenuously opposed the thoughts of peace, urging the Athenians to continue the war; besides which, it appears that many Athenian citizens thought that large restitution ought to have been made of Athenian property forfeited at the end of the late war, and that the Thracian Chersonese ought to have been given back as well as the three islands. On these and other grounds, the Athenian people refused to sanction the recommendation of their envoys; though Andokides, one of those envoys, in a discourse still extant, earnestly advised that they should accept the peace.[649]

The war being thus continued, Corinth, though defended by a considerable confederate force, including Athenian hoplites under Kallias, and peltasts under Iphikrates, became much pressed by the hostile posts at Lechæum as well as at Krommyon and Sidus,—and by its own exiles as the most active of all enemies. Still, however, there remained the peninsula and the fortification of Peiræum as an undisturbed shelter for the Corinthian servants and cattle, and a source of subsistence for the city. Peiræum was an inland post north-east of Corinth, in the centre of that peninsula which separates the two innermost recesses of the Krissæan Gulf,—the bay of Lechæum on its south-west, the bay called Alkyonis, between Kreusis and Olmiæ (now Psatho Bay), on its north-east. Across this latter bay Corinth communicated easily, through Peiræum and the fortified port of Œnoê, with Kreusis the port of Thespiæ in Bœotia.[650] The Corinthian exiles now prevailed upon Agesilaus to repeat his invasion of the territory, partly in order that they might deprive the city of the benefits which it derived from Peiræum,—partly in order that they might also appropriate to themselves the honor of celebrating the Isthmian games, which were just approaching. The Spartan king accordingly marched forth, at the head of a force composed of Lacedæmonians and of the Peloponnesian allies, first to Lechæum, and thence to the Isthmus, specially so called; that is, the sacred precinct of Poseidon near Schœnus on the Saronic Gulf, at the narrowest breadth of the Isthmus, where the biennial Isthmian festival was celebrated.

It was the month of April, or beginning of May, and the festival had actually begun, under the presidency of the Corinthians from the city who were in alliance with Argos; a body of Argeians being present as guards.[651] But on the approach of Agesilaus, they immediately retired to the city by the road to Kenchreæ, leaving their sacrifices half-finished. Not thinking fit to disturb their retreat, Agesilaus proceeded first to offer sacrifice himself, and then took a position close at hand, in the sacred ground of Poseidon, while the Corinthian exiles went through the solemnities in due form, and distributed the parsley wreaths to the victors. After remaining three days, Agesilaus marched away to attack Peiræum. He had no sooner departed, than the Corinthians from the city came forth, celebrated the festival and distributed the wreaths a second time.

Peiræum was occupied by so numerous a guard, comprising Iphikrates and his peltasts, that Agesilaus, instead of directly attacking it, resorted to the stratagem of making a sudden retrograde march directly towards Corinth. Probably, many of the citizens were at that moment absent for the second celebration of the festival; so that those remaining within, on hearing of the approach of Agesilaus, apprehended a plot to betray the city to him, and sent in haste to Peiræum to summon back Iphikrates with his peltasts. Having learned that these troops had passed by in the night, Agesilaus forthwith again turned his course and marched back to Peiræum, which he himself approached by the ordinary road, coasting round along the bay of Lechæum, near the Therma, or warm springs, which are still discernible;[652] while he sent a mora or division of troops to get round the place by a mountain-road more in the interior, ascending some woody heights commanding the town, and crowned by a temple of Poseidon.[653] The movement was quite effectual. The garrison and inhabitants of Peiræum, seeing that the place had become indefensible, abandoned it the next day with all their cattle and property, to take refuge in the Heræum, or sacred ground of Hêrê Akræa near the western cape of the peninsula. While Agesilaus marched thither towards the coast in pursuit of them, the troops descending from the heights attacked and captured Œnoê,[654]—the Corinthian town of that name situated near the Alkyonian bay over against Kreusis in Bœotia. A large booty here fell into their hands, which was still farther augmented by the speedy surrender of all in the Heræum to Agesilaus, without conditions. Called upon to determine the fate of the prisoners, among whom were included men, women, and children,—freemen and slaves,—with cattle and other property,—Agesilaus ordered that all those who had taken part in the massacre at Corinth, in the market-place, should be handed over to the vengeance of the exiles; and that all the rest should be sold as slaves.[655] Though he did not here inflict any harder measure than was usual in Grecian warfare, the reader who reflects that this sentence, pronounced by one on the whole more generous than most contemporary commanders, condemned numbers of free Corinthian men and women to a life of degradation, if not of misery,—will understand by contrast the encomiums with which in my last volume I set forth the magnanimity of Kallikratidas after the capture of Methymna; when he refused, in spite of the importunity of his allies, to sell either the Methymnæan or the Athenian captives,—and when he proclaimed the exalted principle, that no free Greek should be sold into slavery by any permission of his.[656]

As the Lacedæmonians had been before masters of Lechæum, Krommyon, and Sidus, this last success shut up Corinth on its other side, and cut off its communication with Bœotia. The city not being in condition to hold out much longer, the exiles already began to lay their plans for surprising it by aid of friends within.[657] So triumphant was the position of Agesilaus, that his enemies were all in alarm, and the Thebans, as well as others, sent fresh envoys to him to solicit peace. His antipathy towards the Thebans was so vehement, that it was a great personal satisfaction to him to see them thus humiliated. He even treated their envoys with marked contempt, affecting not to notice them when they stood close by, though Pharax, the proxenus of Thebes at Sparta, was preparing to introduce them.

Absorbed in this overweening pride and exultation over conquered enemies, Agesilaus was sitting in a round pavilion, on the banks of the lake adjoining the Heræum,[658]—with his eyes fixed on the long train of captives brought out under the guard of armed Lacedæmonian hoplites, themselves the object of admiration to a crowd of spectators,[659]—when news arrived, as if under the special intervention of retributive Nemesis, which changed unexpectedly the prospect of affairs.[660] A horseman was seen galloping up, his horse foaming with sweat. To the many inquiries addressed, he returned no answer, nor did he stop until he sprang from his horse at the feet of Agesilaus; to whom, with sorrowful tone and features, he made his communication. Immediately Agesilaus started up, seized his spear, and desired the herald to summon his principal officers. On their coming near, he directed them, together with the guards around, to accompany him without a moment’s delay; leaving orders with the general body of the troops to follow as soon as they should have snatched some rapid refreshment. He then immediately put himself in march; but he had not gone far when three fresh horsemen met and informed him, that the task which he was hastening to perform had already been accomplished. Upon this he ordered a halt and returned to the Heræum; where on the ensuing day, to countervail the bad news, he sold all his captives by auction.[661]

This bad news,—the arrival of which has been so graphically described by Xenophon, himself probably among the bystanders and companions of Agesilaus,—was nothing less than the defeat and destruction of a Lacedæmonian mora or military division by the light troops under Iphikrates. As it was an understood privilege of the Amyklæan hoplites in the Lacedæmonian army always to go home, even when on actual service, to the festival of the Hyakinthia, Agesilaus had left all of them at Lechæum. The festival day being now at hand, they set off to return. But the road from Lechæum to Sikyon lay immediately under the walls of Corinth, so that their march was not safe without an escort. Accordingly the polemarch commanding at Lechæum, leaving that place for the time under watch by the Peloponnesian allies, put himself at the head of the Lacedæmonian mora which formed the habitual garrison, consisting of six hundred hoplites, and of a mora of cavalry (number unknown)—to protect the Amyklæans until they were out of danger from the enemy at Corinth. Having passed by Corinth, and reached a point within about three miles of the friendly town of Sikyon, he thought the danger over, and turned back with his mora of hoplites to Lechæum; still, however, leaving the officer of cavalry with orders to accompany the Amyklæans as much farther as they might choose, and afterwards to follow him on the return march.[662]

Though the Amyklæans (probably not very numerous) were presumed to be in danger of attack from Corinth in their march, and though the force in that town was known to be considerable, it never occurred to the Lacedæmonian polemarch that there was any similar danger for his own mora of six hundred hoplites; so contemptuous was his estimate of the peltasts, and so strong was the apprehension which these peltasts were known to entertain of the Lacedæmonians. But Iphikrates, who had let the whole body march by undisturbed, when he now saw from the walls of Corinth the six hundred hoplites returning separately, without either cavalry or light troops, conceived the idea,—perhaps, in the existing state of men’s minds, no one else would have conceived it,—of attacking them with his peltasts as they repassed near the town. Kallias, the general of the Athenian hoplites in Corinth, warmly seconding the project, marched out his troops, and arrayed them in battle order not far from the gates; while Iphikrates with his peltasts began his attack upon the Lacedæmonian mora in flanks and rear. Approaching within missile distance, he poured upon them a shower of darts and arrows, which killed or wounded several, especially on the unshielded side. Upon this the polemarch ordered a halt, directed the youngest soldiers to drive off the assailants, and confided the wounded to the care of attendants to be carried forward to Lechæum.[663] But even the youngest soldiers, encumbered by their heavy shields, could not reach their nimbler enemies, who were trained to recede before them. And when, after an unavailing pursuit, they sought to resume their places in the ranks, the attack was renewed, so that nine or ten of them were slain before they could get back. Again did the polemarch give orders to march forward; again the peltasts renewed their attack, forcing him to halt; again he ordered the younger soldiers (this time, all those between eighteen and thirty-three years of age, whereas on the former occasion, it had been those between eighteen and twenty-eight) to rush out and drive them off.[664] But the result was just the same: the pursuers accomplished nothing, and only suffered increased loss of their bravest and most forward soldiers, when they tried to rejoin the main body. Whenever the Lacedæmonians attempted to make progress, these circumstances were again repeated, to their great loss and discouragement; while the peltasts became every moment more confident and vigorous.

Some relief was now afforded to the distressed mora by the coming up of their cavalry, which had finished the escort of the Amyklæans. Had this cavalry been with them at the beginning, the result might have been different; but it was now insufficient to repress the animated assaults of the peltasts. Moreover, the Lacedæmonian horsemen were at no time very good, nor did they on this occasion venture to push their pursuit to a greater range than the younger hoplites could keep up with them. At length, after much loss in killed and wounded, and great distress to all, the polemarch contrived to get his detachment as far as an eminence about a quarter of a mile from the sea and about two miles from Lechæum. Here, while Iphikrates still continued to harass them with his peltasts, Kallias also was marching up with his hoplites to charge them hand to hand,—when the Lacedæmonians, enfeebled in numbers, exhausted in strength, and too much dispirited for close fight with a new enemy, broke and fled in all directions. Some took the road to Lechæum, which place a few of them reached, along with the cavalry; the rest ran towards the sea at the nearest point, and observing that some of their friends were rowing in boats from Lechæum along the shore to rescue them, threw themselves into the sea, to wade or swim towards this new succor. But the active peltasts, irresistible in the pursuit of broken hoplites, put the last hand to the destruction of the unfortunate mora. Out of its full muster of six hundred, a very small proportion survived to reënter Lechæum.[665]

The horseman who first communicated the disaster to Agesilaus, had started off express immediately from Lechæum, even before the bodies of the slain had been picked up for burial. The hurried movement of Agesilaus had been dictated by the desire of reaching the field in time to contend for the possession of the bodies, and to escape the shame of soliciting the burial-truce. But the three horsemen who met him afterwards, arrested his course by informing him that the bodies had already been buried, under truce asked and obtained; which authorized Iphikrates to erect his well-earned trophy on the spot where he had first made the attack.[666]

Such a destruction of an entire division of Lacedæmonian hoplites, by light troops who stood in awe of them and whom they despised, was an incident, not indeed of great political importance, but striking in respect of military effect and impression upon the Grecian mind. Nothing at all like it had occurred since the memorable capture of Sphakteria, thirty-five years before; a disaster less considerable in one respect, that the number of hoplites beaten was inferior by one-third,—but far more important in another respect, that half the division had surrendered as prisoners; whereas in the battle near Corinth, though the whole mora (except a few fugitives) perished, it does not seem that a single prisoner was taken. Upon the Corinthians, Bœotians, and other enemies of Sparta, the event operated as a joyous encouragement, reviving them out of all their previous despondency. Even by the allies of Sparta, jealous of her superiority and bound to her by fear more than by attachment, it was welcomed with ill-suppressed satisfaction. But upon the army of Agesilaus (and doubtless upon the Lacedæmonians at home) it fell like a sudden thunderbolt, causing the strongest manifestations of sorrow and sympathy. To these manifestations there was only one exception,—the fathers, brothers, or sons of the slain warriors; who not only showed no sorrow, but strutted about publicly with cheerful and triumphant countenances, like victorious athletes.[667] We shall find the like phenomenon at Sparta a few years subsequently, after the far more terrible defeat at Leuktra; the relatives of the slain were joyous and elate,—those of the survivors, downcast and mortified;[668] a fact strikingly characteristic both of the intense mental effect of the Spartan training, and of the peculiar associations which it generated. We may understand how terrible was the contempt which awaited a Spartan who survived defeat, when we find fathers positively rejoicing that their sons had escaped such treatment by death.

Sorely was Agesilaus requited for his supercilious insult towards the Theban envoys. When he at last consented to see them, after the news of the battle, their tone was completely altered. They said not a word about peace, but merely asked permission to pass through and communicate with their countrymen in Corinth. “I understand your purpose (said Agesilaus, smiling),—you want to witness the triumph of your friends, and see what it is worth. Come along with me, and I will teach you.” Accordingly, on the next day, he caused them to accompany him while he marched his army up to the very gates of Corinth,—defying those within to come out and fight. The lands had been so ravaged, that there remained little to destroy. But wherever there were any fruit-trees yet standing, the Lacedæmonians now cut them down. Iphikrates was too prudent to compromise his recent advantage by hazarding a second battle; so that Agesilaus had only the satisfaction of showing that he was master of the field, and then retired to encamp at Lechæum; from whence he sent back the Theban envoys by sea to Kreusis. Having then left a fresh mora or division at Lechæum, in place of that which had been defeated, he marched back to Sparta. But the circumstances of the march betrayed his real feelings, thinly disguised by the recent bravado of marching up to the gates of Corinth. He feared to expose his Lacedæmonian troops even to the view of those allies through whose territory he was to pass; so well was he aware that the latter (especially the Mantineians) would manifest their satisfaction at the recent defeat. Accordingly, he commenced his day’s march before dawn, and did not halt for the night till after dark; at Mantineia, he not only did not halt at all, but passed by, outside of the walls, before day had broken.[669] There cannot be a more convincing proof of the real dispositions of the allies towards Sparta, and of the sentiment of compulsion which dictated their continued adherence; a fact which we shall see abundantly illustrated as we advance in the stream of the history.

The retirement of Agesilaus was the signal for renewed enterprise on the part of Iphikrates; who retook Sidus and Krommyon, which had been garrisoned by Praxitas,—as well as Peiræum and Œnoê, which had been left under occupation by Agesilaus. Corinth was thus cleared of enemies on its eastern and north-eastern sides. And though the Lacedæmonians still carried on a desultory warfare from Lechæum, yet such was the terror impressed by the late destruction of their mora, that the Corinthian exiles at Sikyon did not venture to march by land from that place to Lechæum, under the walls of Corinth,—but communicated with Lechæum only by sea.[670] In truth, we hear of no farther serious military operations undertaken by Sparta against Corinth, before the peace of Antalkidas. And the place became so secure, that the Corinthian leaders and their Argeian allies were glad to dispense with the presence of Iphikrates. That officer had gained so much glory by his recent successes, which the Athenian orators[671] even in the next generation never ceased to extol, that his temper, naturally haughty, became domineering; and he tried to procure, either for Athens or for himself, the mastery of Corinth,—putting to death some of the philo-Argeian leaders. We know these circumstances only by brief and meagre allusion; but they caused the Athenians to recall Iphikrates with a large portion of his peltasts, and to send Chabrias to Corinth in his place.[672]

It was either in the ensuing summer,—or perhaps immediately afterwards during the same summer,—390 B.C., that Agesilaus undertook an expedition into Akarnania; at the instance of the Achæans, who threatened, if this were not done, to forsake the Lacedæmonian alliance. They had acquired possession of the Ætolian district of Kalydon, had brought the neighboring villagers into a city residence, and garrisoned it as a dependence of the Achæan confederacy. But the Akarnanians,—allies of Athens as well as Thebes, and aided by an Athenian squadron at Œniadæ,—attacked them there, probably at the invitation of a portion of the inhabitants, and pressed them so hard, that they employed the most urgent instances to obtain aid from Sparta. Agesilaus crossed the Gulf at Rhium with a considerable force of Spartans and allies, and the full muster of the Achæans. On his arrival the Akarnanians all took refuge in their cities, sending their cattle up into the interior highlands, to the borders of a remote lake. Agesilaus, having sent to Stratus to require them not merely to forbear hostilities against the Achæans, but to relinquish their alliance with Athens and Thebes, and to become allies of Sparta,—found his demands resisted, and began to lay waste the country. Two or three days of operations designedly slack, were employed to lull the Akarnanians into security; after which, by a rapid forced march, Agesilaus suddenly surprised the remote spot in which their cattle and slaves had been deposited for safety. He spent a day here to sell this booty; merchants, probably, accompanying his army. But he had considerable difficulty in his return march, from the narrow paths and high mountains through which he had to thread his way. By a series of brave and well-combined hill-movements,—which, probably, reminded Xenophon of his own operations against the Karduchians in the retreat of the Ten-Thousand,—he defeated and dispersed the Akarnanians, though not without suffering considerably from the excellence of their light troops. Yet he was not successful in his attack upon any one of their cities, nor would he consent to prolong the war until seed-time, notwithstanding earnest solicitation from the Achæans, whom he pacified by engaging to return the next spring. He was, indeed, in a difficult and dangerous country, had not his retreat been facilitated by the compliance of the Ætolians; who calculated (though vainly) on obtaining from him the recovery of Naupaktus, then held (as well as Kalydon) by the Achæans.[673] Partial as the success of this expedition had been, however, it inflicted sufficient damage on the Akarnanians to accomplish its purpose. On learning that it was about to be repeated in the ensuing spring, they sent envoys to Sparta to solicit peace; consenting to abstain from hostilities against the Achæans, and to enrol themselves as members of the Lacedæmonian confederacy.[674]

It was in this same year that the Spartan authorities resolved on an expedition against Argos, of which Agesipolis, the other king, took the command. Having found the border sacrifices favorable, and crossed the frontier, he sent forward his army to Phlius, where the Peloponnesian allies were ordered to assemble; but he himself first turned aside to Olympia, to consult the oracle of Zeus.

It had been the practice of the Argeians, seemingly on more than one previous occasion,[675] when an invading Lacedæmonian army was approaching their territory, to meet them by a solemn message, intimating that it was the time of some festival (the Karneian, or other) held sacred by both parties, and warning them not to violate the frontier during the holy truce. This was in point of fact nothing better than a fraud; for the notice was sent, not at the moment when the Karneian festival (or other, as the case might be) ought to come on according to the due course of seasons, but at any time when it might serve the purpose of arresting a Lacedæmonian invasion. But though the duplicity of the Argeians was thus manifest, so strong were the pious scruples of the Spartan king, that he could hardly make up his mind to disregard the warning. Moreover, in the existing confusion of the calendar, there was always room for some uncertainty as to the question, which was the true Karneian moon; no Dorian state having any right to fix it imperatively for the others, as the Eleians fixed the Olympic truce, and the Corinthians the Isthmian. It was with a view to satisfy his conscience on this subject that Agesipolis now went to Olympia, and put the question to the oracle of Zeus,—whether he might with a safe religious conscience refuse to accept the holy truce, if the Argeians should now tender it. The oracle, habitually dexterous in meeting a specific question with a general reply, informed him, that he might with a safe conscience decline a truce demanded wrongfully and for underhand purposes.[676] This was accepted by Agesipolis as a satisfactory affirmative. Nevertheless, to make assurance doubly sure, he went directly forward to Delphi, to put the same question to Apollo. As it would have been truly embarrassing, however, if the two holy replies had turned out such as to contradict each other, he availed himself of the præjudicium which he had already received at Olympia, and submitted the question to Apollo at Delphi in this form: “Is thine opinion on the question of the holy truce, the same as that of thy father (Zeus)?” “Most decidedly the same,” replied the god. Such double warranty, though the appeal was so drawn up as scarcely to leave to Apollo freedom of speech,[677] enabled Agesipolis to return with full confidence to Phlius, where his army was already mustered; and to march immediately into the Argeian territory by the road of Nemea. Being met on the frontier by two heralds with wreaths and in solemn attire, who warned him that it was a season of holy truce, he informed them that the gods authorized his disobedience to their summons, and marched on into the Argeian plain.

It happened that on the first evening after he had crossed the border, the supper and the consequent libation having been just concluded, an earthquake occurred; or, to translate the Greek phrase, “the god (Poseidon) shook.” To all Greeks, and to Lacedæmonians especially, this was a solemn event, and the personal companions of Agesipolis immediately began to sing the pæan in honor of Poseidon; the general impression among the soldiers being, that he would give orders for quitting the territory immediately, as Agis had acted in the invasion of Elis a few years before. Perhaps Agesipolis would have done the same here, construing the earthquake as a warning that he had done wrong, in neglecting the summons of the heralds,—had he not been fortified by the recent oracles. He now replied, that if the earthquake had occurred before he crossed the frontier, he should have considered it as a prohibition; but as it came after his crossing, he looked upon it as an encouragement to go forward.

So fully had the Argeians counted on the success of their warning transmitted by the heralds, that they had made little preparation for defence. Their dismay and confusion were very great; their property was still outlying, not yet removed into secure places, so that Agesipolis found much both to destroy and to appropriate. He carried his ravages even to the gates of the city, piquing himself on advancing a little farther than Agesilaus had gone in his invasion two years before. He was at last driven to retreat by the terror of a flash of lightning in his camp, which killed several persons. And a project which he had formed, of erecting a permanent fort on the Argeian frontier, was abandoned in consequence of unfavorable sacrifices.[678]

Besides these transactions in and near the isthmus of Corinth, the war between Sparta and her enemies was prosecuted during the same years both in the islands and on the coast of Asia Minor; though our information is so imperfect that we can scarcely trace the thread of events. The defeat near Knidus (394 B.C.),—the triumphant maritime force of Pharnabazus and Konon at the Isthmus of Corinth in the ensuing year (393 B.C.),—the restoration of the Athenian Long Walls and fortified port,—and the activity of Konon with the fleet among the islands,[679]—so alarmed the Spartans with the idea of a second Athenian maritime empire, that they made every effort to detach the Persian force from the side of their enemies.

The Spartan Antalkidas, a dexterous, winning and artful man,[680] not unlike Lysander, was sent as envoy to Tiribazus (392 B.C.); whom we now find as satrap of Ionia in the room of Tithraustes, after having been satrap of Armenia during the retreat of the Ten Thousand. As Tiribazus was newly arrived in Asia Minor, he had not acquired that personal enmity against the Spartans, which the active hostilities of Derkyllidas and Agesilaus had inspired to Pharnabazus and other Persians. Moreover, jealousy between neighboring satraps was an ordinary feeling, which Antalkidas now hoped to turn to the advantage of Sparta. To counteract his projects, envoys were also sent to Tiribazus, by the confederate enemies of Sparta, Athens, Thebes, Corinth, and Argos; and Konon, as the envoy of Athens, was incautiously despatched among the number. On the part of Sparta, Antalkidas offered, first, to abandon to the king of Persia all the Greeks on the continent of Asia; next, as to all the other Greeks, insular as well as continental, he required nothing more than absolute autonomy for each separate city, great and small.[681] The Persian king (he said) could neither desire anything more for himself, nor have any motive for continuing the war against Sparta, when he should once be placed in possession of all the towns on the Asiatic coast, and when he should find both Sparta and Athens rendered incapable of annoying him, through the autonomy and disunion of the Hellenic world. But to neither of the two propositions of Antalkidas would Athens, Thebes, or Argos, accede. As to the first, they repudiated the disgrace of thus formally abandoning the Asiatic Greeks;[682] as to the second proposition, guaranteeing autonomy to every distinct city of Greece, they would admit it only under special reserves, which it did not suit the purpose of Antalkidas to grant. In truth the proposition went to break up (and was framed with that view) both the Bœotian confederacy under the presidency of Thebes, and the union between Argos and Corinth; while it also deprived Athens of the chance of recovering Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros,[683]—islands which had been possessed and recognized by her since the first commencement of the confederacy of Delos; indeed the two former, even from the time of Miltiades the conqueror of Marathon.

Here commences a new era in the policy of Sparta. That she should abnegate all pretension to maritime empire, is noway difficult to understand—seeing that it had already been irrevocably overthrown by the defeat of Knidus. Nor can we wonder that she should abandon the Greeks on the Asiatic continent to Persian sway; since this was nothing more than she had already consented to do in her conventions with Tissaphernes and Cyrus during the latter years of the Peloponnesian war,[684]—and consented, let us add, not under any of that stringent necessity which at the same time pressed upon Athens, but simply with a view to the maximum of victory over an enemy already enfeebled. The events which followed the close of that war (recounted in a former chapter) had indeed induced her to alter her determination, and again to espouse their cause. But the real novelty now first exhibited in her policy, is, the full development of what had before existed in manifest tendency,—hostility against all the partial land-confederacies of Greece, disguised under the plausible demand of universal autonomy for every town, great or small. How this autonomy was construed and carried into act, we shall see hereafter; at present, we have only to note the first proclamation of it by Antalkidas in the name of Sparta.

On this occasion, indeed, his mission came to nothing, from the peremptory opposition of Athens and the others. But he was fortunate enough to gain the approbation and confidence of Tiribazus; who saw so clearly how much both propositions tended to promote the interests and power of Persia, that he resolved to go up in person to court, and prevail on Artaxerxes to act in concert with Sparta. Though not daring to support Antalkidas openly, Tiribazus secretly gave him money to reinforce the Spartan fleet. He at the same time rendered to Sparta the more signal service of arresting and detaining Konon, pretending that the latter was acting contrary to the interests of the king.[685] This arrest was a gross act of perfidy, since Konon not only commanded respect in his character of envoy,—but had been acting with the full confidence, and almost under the orders, of Pharnabazus. But the removal of an officer of so much ability,—the only man who possessed the confidence of Pharnabazus,—was the most fatal of all impediments to the naval renovation of Athens. It was fortunate that Konon had had time to rebuild the Long Walls, before his means of action were thus abruptly intercepted. Respecting his subsequent fate, there exist contradictory stories. According to one, he was put to death by the Persians in prison; according to another, he found means to escape and again took refuge with Evagoras in Cyprus, in which island he afterwards died of sickness.[686] The latter story appears undoubtedly to be the true one. But it is certain that he never afterwards had the means of performing any public service, and that his career was cut short by this treacherous detention, just at the moment when its promise was the most splendid for his country.

Tiribazus, on going up to the Persian court, teems to have been detained there for the purpose of concerting measures against Evagoras, prince of Salamis in Cyprus, whose revolt from Persia was now on the point of breaking out. But the Persian court could not yet be prevailed upon to show any countenance to the propositions of Sparta or of Antalkidas. On the contrary, Struthas, who was sent down to Ionia as temporary substitute for Tiribazus, full of anxiety to avenge the ravages of Agesilaus, acted with vigorous hostility against the Lacedæmonians, and manifested friendly dispositions towards Athens.

Thimbron (of whom we have before heard as first taking the command of the Cyreian army in Asia Minor, after their return from Thrace) received orders again to act as head of the Lacedæmonian forces in Asia against Struthas. The new commander, with an army estimated by Diodorus at eight thousand men,[687] marched from Ephesus into the interior, and began his devastation of the territory dependent on Persia. But his previous command, though he was personally amiable,[688] had been irregular and disorderly, and it was soon observed that the same defects were now yet more prominent, aggravated by too liberal indulgence in convivial pleasures. Aware of his rash, contemptuous, and improvident mode of attack, Struthas laid a snare for him by sending a detachment of cavalry to menace the camp, just when Thimbron had concluded his morning meal in company with the flute-player Thersander,—the latter not merely an excellent musician, but possessed of a full measure of Spartan courage. Starting from his tent at the news, Thimbron, with Thersander, waited only to collect the few troops immediately at hand, without even leaving any orders for the remainder, and hastened to repel the assailants; who gave way easily, and seduced him into a pursuit. Presently Struthas himself, appearing with a numerous and well-arrayed body of cavalry, charged with vigor the disorderly detachment of Thimbron. Both that general and Thersander, bravely fighting, fell among the first; while the army, deprived of their commander as well as ill-prepared for a battle, made but an ineffective resistance. They were broken, warmly pursued, and the greater number slain. A few who contrived to escape the active Persian cavalry, found shelter in the neighboring cities.[689]

This victory of Struthas, gained by the Persian cavalry, displays a degree of vigor and ability which, fortunately for the Greeks, was rarely seen in Persian operations. Our scanty information does not enable us to trace its consequences. We find Diphridas sent out soon after by the Lacedæmonians, along with the admiral Ekdikus, as successor of Thimbron to bring together the remnant of the defeated army, and to protect those cities which had contributed to form it. Diphridas,—a man with all the popular qualities of his predecessor, but a better and more careful officer,—is said to have succeeded to some extent in this difficult mission. Being fortunate enough to take captive the son-in-law of Struthas, with his wife, (as Xenophon had captured Asidates,) he obtained a sufficiently large ransom to enable him to pay his troops for some time.[690] But it is evident that his achievements were not considerable, and that the Ionian Greeks on the continent are now left to make good their position, as they can, against the satrap at Sardis.

The forces of Sparta were much required at Rhodes; which island (as has been mentioned already) had revolted from Sparta about five years before (a few months anterior to the battle of Knidus), dispossessed the Lysandrian oligarchy, and established a democratical government. But since that period, an opposition-party in the island had gradually risen up, acquired strength, and come into correspondence with the oligarchical exiles; who on their side warmly solicited aid from Sparta, representing that Rhodes would otherwise become thoroughly dependent on Athens. Accordingly, the Lacedæmonians sent eight triremes across the Ægean under the command of Ekdikus; the first of their ships of war which had crossed since the defeat of Knidus.[691] Though the Perso-Athenian naval force in the Ægean had been either dismissed or paralyzed since the seizure of Konon, yet the Rhodian government possessed a fleet of about twenty triremes, besides considerable force of other kinds; so that Ekdikus could not even land on the island, but was compelled to halt at Knidus. Fortunately, Teleutias the Lacedæmonian was now in the Corinthian Gulf with a fleet of twelve triremes, which were no longer required there; since Agesilaus and he had captured Lechæum a few months before, and destroyed the maritime force of the Corinthians in those waters. He was now directed to sail with his squadron out of the Corinthian Gulf across to Asia, to supersede Ekdikus, and take the command of the whole fleet for operations off Rhodes. On passing by Samos, he persuaded the inhabitants to embrace the cause of Sparta, and to furnish him with a few ships; after which he went onward to Knidus, where, superseding Ekdikus, he found himself at the head of twenty-seven triremes.[692] In his way from Knidus to Rhodes, he accidentally fell in with the Athenian admiral Philokrates, conducting ten triremes to Cyprus to the aid of Evagoras in his struggle against the Persians. He was fortunate enough to carry them all as prisoners into Knidus, where he sold the whole booty, and then proceeded with his fleet, thus augmented to thirty-seven sail, to Rhodes. Here he established a fortified post, enabling the oligarchical party to carry on an active civil war. But he was defeated in a battle,—his enemies being decidedly the stronger force in the island, and masters of all the cities.[693]

The alliance with Evagoras of Cyprus, in his contention against Artaxerxes, was at this moment an unfortunate and perplexing circumstance for Athens, since she was relying upon Persian aid against Sparta, and since Sparta was bidding against her for it. But the alliance was one which she could not lightly throw off. For Evagoras had not only harbored Konon with the remnant of the Athenian fleet after the disaster of Ægospotami, but had earned a grant of citizenship and the honor of a statue at Athens, as a strenuous auxiliary in procuring that Persian aid which gained the battle of Knidus, and as a personal combatant in that battle, before the commencement of his dissension with Artaxerxes.[694] It would have been every way advantageous to Athens at this moment to decline assisting Evagoras, since (not to mention the probability of offending the Persian court) she had more than enough to employ all her maritime force nearer home and for purposes more essential to herself. Yet in spite of these very serious considerations of prudence, the paramount feelings of prior obligation and gratitude, enforced by influential citizens who had formed connections in Cyprus, determined the Athenians to identify themselves with his gallant struggles[695] (of which I shall speak more fully presently). So little was fickleness, or instability, or the easy oblivion of past feelings, a part of their real nature,—though historians have commonly denounced it as among their prominent qualities.

The capture of their squadron under Philokrates, however, and the consequent increase of the Lacedæmonian naval force at Rhodes, compelled the Athenians to postpone further aid to Evagoras, and to arm forty triremes under Thrasybulus for the Asiatic coast; no inconsiderable effort, when we recollect that four years before there was scarcely a single trireme in Peiræus, and not even a wall of defence around the place. Though sent immediately for the assistance of Rhodes, Thrasybulus judged it expedient to go first to the Hellespont; probably from extreme want of money to pay his men. Derkyllidas was still in occupation of Abydos, yet there was no Lacedæmonian fleet in the strait; so that Thrasybulus was enabled to extend the alliances of Athens both on the European and the Asiatic side,—the latter being under the friendly satrap, Pharnabazus. Reconciling the two Thracian princes, Seuthes and Amadokus, whom he found at war, he brought both of them into amicable relations with Athens, and then moved forward to Byzantium. That city was already in alliance with Athens; but on the arrival of Thrasybulus, the alliance was still further cemented by the change of its government into a democracy. Having established friendship with the opposite city of Chalkêdon, and being thus master of the Bosphorus, he sold the tithe of the commercial ships sailing out of the Euxine;[696] leaving doubtless an adequate force to exact it. This was a striking evidence of revived Athenian maritime power, which seems also to have been now extended more or less to Samothrace, Thasus, and the coast of Thrace.[697]