From Byzantium, Thrasybulus sailed to Mitylênê, which was already in friendship with Athens,—though Methymna and the other cities in the island were still maintained by a force under the Lacedæmonian harmost, Therimachus. With the aid of the Mitylenæans, and of the exiles from other Lesbian cities, Thrasybulus marched to the borders of Methymna, where he was met by Therimachus; who had also brought together his utmost force, but was now completely defeated and slain. The Athenians thus became masters of Antissa and Eresus, where they were enabled to levy a valuable contribution, as well as to plunder the refractory territory of Methymna. Nevertheless, Thrasybulus, in spite of farther help from Chios and Mitylênê, still thought himself not in a situation to go to Rhodes with advantage. Perhaps he was not sure of pay in advance, and the presence of unpaid troops in an exhausted island might be a doubtful benefit. Accordingly, he sailed from Lesbos along the western and southern coast of Asia Minor, levying contributions at Halikarnassus[698] and other places, until he came to Aspendus in Pamphylia; where he also obtained money and was about to depart with it, when some misdeeds committed by his soldiers so exasperated the inhabitants, that they attacked him by night unprepared in his tent, and slew him.[699]

Thus perished the citizen to whom, more than to any one else, Athens owed not only her renovated democracy, but its wise, generous, and harmonious working, after renovation. Even the philo-Laconian and oligarchical Xenophon bestows upon him a marked and unaffected eulogy.[700] His devoted patriotism in commencing and prosecuting the struggle against the Thirty, at a time when they not only were at the height of their power, but had plausible ground for calculating on the full auxiliary strength of Sparta, deserves high admiration. But the feature which stands yet more eminent in his character,—a feature infinitely rare in the Grecian character, generally,—is, that the energy of a successful leader was combined with complete absence both of vindictive antipathies for the past, and of overbearing ambition for himself. Content to live himself as a simple citizen under the restored democracy, he taught his countrymen to forgive an oligarchical party from whom they had suffered atrocious wrongs, and set the example himself of acquiescing, in the loss of his own large property. The generosity of such a proceeding ought not to count for less, because it was at the same time dictated by the highest political prudence. We find in an oration of Lysias against Ergokles (a citizen who served in the Athenian fleet on this last expedition), in which the latter is accused of gross peculation,—insinuations against Thrasybulus, of having countenanced the delinquency, though coupled with praise of his general character. Even the words as they now stand are so vague as to carry little evidence; but when we reflect that the oration was spoken after the death of Thrasybulus, they are entitled to no weight at all.[701]

The Athenians sent Agyrrhius to succeed Thrasybulus. After the death of the latter, we may conclude that the fleet went to Rhodes, its original destination,—though Xenophon does not expressly say so,—the rather, as neither Teleutias nor any subsequent Lacedæmonian commander appears to have become master of the island, in spite of the considerable force which they had there assembled.[702] The Lacedæmonians, however, on their side, being also much in want of money, Teleutias was obliged (in the same manner as the Athenians), to move from island to island, levying contributions as he could.[703]

When the news of the successful proceedings of Thrasybulus at Byzantium and the Hellespont, again establishing a toll for the profit of Athens, reached Sparta, it excited so much anxiety, that Anaxibius, having great influence with the ephors of the time, prevailed on them to send him out as harmost to Abydos, in the room of Derkyllidas, who had now been in that post for several years. Having been the officer originally employed to procure the revolt of the place from Athens (in 411 B.C.),[704] Derkyllidas had since rendered service not less essential in preserving it to Sparta, during the extensive desertion which followed the battle of Knidus. But it was supposed that he ought to have checked the aggressive plans of Thrasybulus; moreover, Anaxibius promised, if a small force were entrusted to him, to put down effectually the newly-revived Athenian influence. He was supposed to know well, those regions in which he had once already been admiral, at the moment when Xenophon and the Cyreian army first returned; the harshness, treachery, and corruption, which he displayed in his dealing with that gallant body of men, have been already recounted in a former chapter.[705] With three triremes, and funds for the pay of a thousand mercenary troops, Anaxibius accordingly went to Abydos. He began his operations with considerable vigor, both against Athens and Pharnabazus. While he armed a land-force, which he employed in making incursions on the neighboring cities in the territory of that satrap,—he at the same time reinforced his little squadron by three triremes out of the harbor of Abydos, so that he became strong enough to seize the merchant vessels passing along the Hellespont to Athens or to her allies.[706] The force which Thrasybulus had left at Byzantium to secure the strait revenues, was thus inadequate to its object without farther addition.

Fortunately, Iphikrates was at this moment disengaged at Athens, having recently returned from Corinth with his body of peltasts, for whom doubtless employment was wanted. He was accordingly sent with twelve hundred peltasts and eight triremes, to combat Anaxibius in the Hellespont; which now became again the scene of conflict, as it had been in the latter years of the Peloponnesian war; the Athenians from the European side, the Lacedæmonians from the Asiatic. At first the warfare consisted of desultory privateering, and money-levying excursions, on both sides.[707] But at length, the watchful genius of Iphikrates discovered opportunity for a successful stratagem. Anaxibius, having just drawn the town of Antandrus into his alliance, had marched thither for the purpose of leaving a garrison in it, with his Lacedæmonian and mercenary forces, as well as two hundred hoplites from Abydos itself. His way lay across the mountainous region of Ida, southward to the coast of the gulf of Adramyttium. Accordingly, Iphikrates, foreseeing that he would speedily return, crossed over in the night from the Chersonese, and planted himself in ambush on the line of return march; at a point where it traversed the desert and mountainous extremities of the Abydene territory, near the gold mines of Kremastê. The triremes which carried him across were ordered to sail up the strait on the next day, in order that Anaxibius must be apprised of it, and might suppose Iphikrates to be employed on his ordinary money-levying excursion.

The stratagem was completely successful. Anaxibius returned on the next day, without the least suspicion of any enemy at hand, marching in careless order and with long-stretched files, as well from the narrowness of the mountain path as from the circumstance that he was in the friendly territory of Abydos. Not expecting to fight, he had unfortunately either omitted the morning sacrifice, or taken no pains to ascertain that the victims were favorable; so Xenophon informs us,[708] with that constant regard to the divine judgments and divine warnings which pervades both the Hellenica and the Anabasis. Iphikrates having suffered the Abydenes who were in the van to pass, suddenly sprang from his ambush, to assault Anaxibius with the Lacedæmonians and the mercenaries, as they descended the mountain-pass into the plain of Kremastê. His appearance struck terror and confusion into the whole army; unprepared in its disorderly array for stedfast resistance,—even if the minds of the soldiers had been ever so well strung,—against well-trained peltasts, who were sure to prevail over hoplites not in steady rank. To Anaxibius himself, the truth stood plain at once. Defeat was inevitable, and there remained no other resource for him except to die like a brave man. Accordingly, desiring his shield-bearer to hand to him his shield, he said to those around him,—“Friends, my honor commands me to die here; but do you hasten away, and save yourselves, before the enemy close with us.” Such order was hardly required to determine his panic-stricken troops, who fled with one accord towards Abydos; while Anaxibius himself awaited firmly the approach of the enemy, and fell gallantly fighting on the spot. No less than twelve Spartan harmosts, those who had been expelled from their various governments by the defeat of Knidus, and who had remained ever since under Derkyllidas at Abydos, stood with the like courage and shared his fate. Such disdain of life hardly surprises us in conspicuous Spartan citizens, to whom preservation by flight was “no true preservation” (in the language of Xenophon),[709] but simply prolongation of life under intolerable disgrace at home. But what deserves greater remark is, that the youth to whom Anaxibius was tenderly attached and who was his constant companion, could not endure to leave him, stayed fighting by his side, and perished by the same honorable death.[710] So strong was the mutual devotion which this relation between persons of the male sex inspired in the ancient Greek mind. With these exceptions, no one else made any attempt to stand. All fled, and were pursued by Iphikrates as far as the gates of Abydos, with the slaughter of fifty out of the two hundred Abydene hoplites, and two hundred of the remaining troops.

This well-planned and successful exploit, while it added to the reputation of Iphikrates, rendered the Athenians again masters of the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, ensuring both the levy of the dues and the transit of their trading vessels. But while the Athenians were thus carrying on naval war at Rhodes and the Hellespont, they began to experience annoyance nearer home, from Ægina.

That island (within sight as the eyesore of Peiræus, as Perikles was wont to call it) had been occupied fifty years before by a population eminently hostile to Athens, afterwards conquered and expelled by her,—at last again captured in the new abode which they had obtained in Laconia,—and put to death by her order. During the Peloponnesian war, Ægina had been tenanted by Athenian citizens as outsettlers or kleruchs; all of whom had been driven in after the battle of Ægospotami. The island was then restored by Lysander to the remnant of the former population,—as many of them at least as he could find.

These new Æginetans, though doubtless animated by associations highly unfavorable to Athens, had nevertheless remained not only at peace, but also in reciprocal commerce, with her, until a considerable time after the battle of Knidus and the rebuilding of her Long Walls. And so they would have continued, of their own accord,—since they could gain but little, and were likely to lose all the security of their traffic, by her hostility,—had they not been forced to commence the war by Eteonikus, the Lacedæmonian harmost in the island;[711] one amidst many examples of the manner in which the smaller Grecian states were dragged into war, without any motive of their own, by the ambition of the greater,—by Sparta as well as by Athens.[712] With the concurrence of the ephors, Eteonikus authorized and encouraged all Æginetans to fit out privateers for depredation on Attica; which aggression the Athenians resented, after suffering considerable inconvenience by sending a force of ten triremes to block up Ægina from the sea, with a body of hoplites under Pamphilus to construct and occupy a permanent fort in the island. This squadron, however, was soon driven off (though Pamphilus still continued to occupy the fort) by Teleutias, who came to Ægina on hearing of the blockade; having been engaged, with the fleet which he commanded at Rhodes, in an expedition among the Cyclades, for the purpose of levying contributions. He seems to have been now at the term of his year of command, and while he was at Ægina, his successor, Hierax, arrived from Sparta, on his way to Rhodes, to supersede him. The fleet was, accordingly, handed over to Hierax at Ægina, while Teleutias went directly home to Sparta. So remarkable was his popularity among the seamen, that numbers of them accompanied him down to the water-edge, testifying their regret and attachment by crowning him with wreaths, or pressing his hand. Some, who came down too late, when he was already under weigh, cast their wreaths on the sea, uttering prayers for his health and happiness.[713]

Hierax, while carrying back to Rhodes the remaining fleet which Teleutias had brought from that island, left his subordinate Gorgôpas as harmost at Ægina with twelve triremes; a force which protected the island completely, and caused the fortified post occupied by the Athenians under Pamphilus to be itself blocked up, insomuch that after an interval of four months, a special decree was passed at Athens to send a numerous squadron and fetch away the garrison. As the Æginetan privateers, aided by the squadron of Gorgôpas, now recommenced their annoyances against Attica, thirteen Athenian triremes were put in equipment under Eunomus as a guard-squadron against Ægina. But Gorgôpas and his squadron were now for the time withdrawn, to escort Antalkidas, the new Lacedæmonian admiral sent to Asia chiefly for the purpose of again negotiating with Tiribazus. On returning back, after landing Antalkidas at Ephesus, Gorgôpas fell in with Eunomus, whose pursuit, however, he escaped, landing at Ægina just before sunset. The Athenian admiral, after watching for a short time until he saw the Lacedæmonian seamen out of their vessels and ashore, departed as it grew dark to Attica, carrying a light to prevent his ships from parting company. But Gorgôpas, causing his men to take a hasty meal, immediately reëmbarked and pursued; keeping on the track by means of the light, and taking care not to betray himself either by the noise of oars or by the chant of the Keleustês. Eunomus had no suspicion of the accompanying enemy. Just after he had touched land near cape Zostêr in Attica, when his men were in the act of disembarking, Gorgôpas gave signal by trumpet to attack. After a short action by moonlight, four of the Athenian squadrons were captured, and carried off to Ægina; with the remainder, Eunomus escaped to Peiræus.[714]

This victory, rendering both Gorgôpas and the Æginetans confident, laid them open to a stratagem skilfully planned by the Athenian Chabrias. That officer, who seems to have been dismissed from Corinth as Iphikrates had been before him, was now about to conduct a force of ten triremes and eight hundred peltasts to the aid of Evagoras; to whom the Athenians were thus paying their debt of gratitude, though they could ill-spare any of their forces from home. Chabrias, passing over from Peiræus at night, landed without being perceived in a desert place of the coast of Ægina, and planted himself in ambush with his peltasts at some little distance inland of the Herakleion or temple of Hêraklês, amidst hollow ground suitable for concealment. He had before made agreement with another squadron and a body of hoplites under Demænetus; who arrived at daybreak and landed at Ægina at a point called Tripyrgia, about two miles distant from the Herakleion, but farther removed from the city. As soon as their arrival became known, Gorgôpas hastened out of the city to repel them, with all the troops he could collect, Æginetans as well as marines out of the ships of war,—and eight Spartans who happened to be his companions in the island. In their march from the city to attack the new comers, they had to pass near the Herakleion, and therefore near the troops in ambush; who, as soon as Gorgôpas and those about him had gone by, rose up suddenly and attacked them in the rear. The stratagem succeeded not less completely than that of Iphikrates at Abydos against Anaxibius. Gorgôpas and the Spartans near him were slain, the rest were defeated, and compelled to flee with considerable loss back to the city.[715]

After this brilliant success, Chabrias pursued his voyage to Cyprus, and matters appeared so secure on the side of Ægina, that Demænetus also was sent to the Hellespont to reinforce Iphikrates. For some time indeed, the Lacedæmonian ships at Ægina did nothing. Eteonikus, who was sent as successor to Gorgôpas,[716] could neither persuade nor constrain the seamen to go aboard, since he had no funds, while their pay was in arrears; so that Athens with her coast and her trading-vessels remained altogether unmolested. At length the Lacedæmonians were obliged to send again to Ægina Teleutias, the most popular and best-beloved of all their commanders, whom the seamen welcomed with the utmost delight. Addressing them under the influence of this first impression, immediately after he had offered sacrifice, he told them plainly that he had brought with him no money, but that he had come to put them in the way of procuring it; that he should himself touch nothing until they were amply provided, and should require of them to bear no more hardship or fatigue than he went through himself; that the power and prosperity of Sparta had all been purchased by willingly braving danger, as well as toil, in the cause of duty; that it became valiant men to seek their pay, not by cringing to any one, but by their own swords at the cost of enemies. And he engaged to find them the means of doing this, provided they would now again manifest the excellent qualities which he knew them by experience to possess.[717]

This address completely won over the seamen, who received it with shouts of applause; desiring Teleutias to give his orders forthwith, and promising ready obedience. “Well, (said he), now go and get your suppers, as you were intending to do; and then come immediately on shipboard, bringing with you provisions for one day. Advance me thus much out of your own means, that we may, by the will of the gods, make an opportune voyage.”[718]

In spite of the eminent popularity of Teleutias, the men would probably have refused to go on board, had he told them beforehand his intention of sailing with his twelve triremes straight into the harbor of Peiræus. At first sight, the enterprise seemed insane, for there were triremes in it more than sufficient to overwhelm him. But he calculated on finding them all unprepared, with seamen as well as officers in their lodgings ashore, so that he could not only strike terror and do damage, but even realize half an hour’s plunder before preparations could be made to resist him. Such was the security which now reigned there, especially since the death of Gorgôpas, that no one dreamt of an attack. The harbor was open, as it had been forty years before, when Brasidas (in the third year of the Peloponnesian war) attempted the like enterprise from the port of Megara.[719] Even then, at the maximum of the Athenian naval power, it was an enterprise possible, simply because every one considered it to be impossible; and it only failed because the assailants became terrified, and flinched in the execution.

A little after dark, Teleutias quitted the harbor of Ægina, without telling any one whither he was going. Rowing leisurely, and allowing his men alternate repose on their oars, he found himself before morning within half a mile of Peiræus, where he waited until day was just dawning, and then led his squadron straight into the harbor. Everything turned out as he expected; there was not the least idea of being attacked, nor the least preparation for defence. Not a single trireme was manned or in fighting condition, but several were moored without their crews, together with merchant-vessels, loaded as well as empty. Teleutias directed the captains of his squadron to drive against the triremes, and disable them; but by no means to damage the beaks of their own ships by trying to disable the merchant-ships. Even at that early hour, many Athenians were abroad, and the arrival of the unexpected assailants struck every one with surprise and consternation. Loud and vague cries transmitted the news through all Peiræus, and from Peiræus up to Athens, where it was believed that their harbor was actually taken. Every man having run home for his arms, the whole force of the city rushed impetuously down thither, with one accord,—hoplites as well as horsemen. But before such succors could arrive, Teleutias had full time to do considerable mischief. His seamen boarded the larger merchant-ships, seizing both the men and the portable goods which they found aboard. Some even jumped ashore on the quay (called the Deigma), laid hands on the tradesmen, ship-masters, and pilots, whom they saw near, and carried them away captive. Various smaller vessels with their entire cargoes were also towed away; and even three or four triremes. With all these Teleutias sailed safely out of Peiræus, sending some of his squadron to escort the prizes to Ægina, while he himself with the remainder sailed southward along the coast. As he was seen to come out of Peiræus, his triremes were mistaken for Athenian, and excited no alarm; so that he thus captured several fishing-boats, and passage-boats coming with passengers from the islands to Athens,—together with some merchantmen carrying corn and other goods, at Sunium. All were carried safely into Ægina.[720]

The enterprise of Teleutias, thus admirably concerted and executed without the loss of a man, procured for him a plentiful booty, of which, probably not the least valuable portion consisted in the men seized as captives. When sold at Ægina, it yielded so large a return that he was enabled to pay down at once a month’s pay to his seamen; who became more attached to him than ever, and kept the triremes in animated and active service under his orders.[721] Admonished by painful experience, indeed, the Athenians were now, doubtless, careful both in guarding and in closing Peiræus; as they had become forty years before after the unsuccessful attack of Brasidas. But in spite of the utmost vigilance, they suffered an extent of damage from the indefatigable Teleutias, and from the Æginetan privateers, quite sufficient to make them weary of the war.[722]

We cannot doubt, indeed, that the prosecution of the war must have been a heavy financial burthen upon the Athenians, from 395 B.C. downward to 387 B.C. How they made good the cost, without any contributory allies, or any foreign support, except what Konon obtained during one year from Pharnabazus,—we are not informed. On the revival of the democracy in 403 B.C., the poverty of the city, both public and private, had been very great, owing to the long previous war, ending with the loss of all Athenian property abroad. At a period about three years afterwards, it seems that the Athenians were in arrears, not merely for the tribute-money which they then owed to Sparta as her subject allies, but also for debts due to the Bœotians on account of damage done; that they were too poor to perform in full the religious sacrifices prescribed for the year, and were obliged to omit some even of the more ancient; that the docks as well as the walls were in sad want of repair.[723] Even the pay to those citizens who attended the public assemblies and sat as dikasts in the dikasteries,—pay essential to the working of the democracy,—was restored only by degrees; beginning first at one obolus, and not restored to three oboli, at which it had stood before the capture, until after an interval of some years.[724] It was at this time too that the Theôric Board, or Paymasters for the general expenses of public worship and sacrifice, was first established; and when we read how much the Athenians were embarrassed for the means of celebrating the prescribed sacrifices, there was, probably, great necessity for the formation of some such office. The disbursements connected with this object had been effected, before 403 B.C., not by any special Board, but by the Hellenotamiæ, or treasurers of the tribute collected from the allies, who were not renewed after 403 B.C. as the Athenian empire had ceased to exist.[725] A portion of the money disbursed by the Theôric Board for the religious festivals, was employed in the distribution of two oboli per head, called the diobely, to all present citizens, and actually received by all,—not merely by the poor, but by persons in easy circumstances also.[726] This distribution was made at several festivals, having originally begun at the Dionysia, for the purpose of enabling the citizens to obtain places at the theatrical representations in honor of Dionysus; but we do not know either the number of the festivals, or the amount of the total sum. It was, in principle, a natural corollary of the religious idea connected with the festival; not simply because the comfort and recreation of each citizen, individually taken, was promoted by his being enabled to attend the festival,—but because the collective effect of the ceremony, in honoring and propitiating the god, was believed to depend in part upon a multitudinous attendance and lively manifestations.[727] Gradually, however, this distribution of Theôric or festival-money came to be pushed to an abusive and mischievous excess, which is brought before our notice forty years afterwards, during the political career of Demosthenes. Until that time, we have no materials for speaking of it; and what I here notice is simply the first creation of the Theôric Board.

The means of Athens for prosecuting the war, and for paying her troops sent as well to Bœotia as to Corinth, must have been derived mainly from direct assessments on property, called eisphoræ. And some such assessments we find alluded to generally as having taken place during these years; though we know no details either as to frequency or amount.[728] But the restitution of the Long Walls and of the fortifications of Peiræus by Konon, was an assistance not less valuable to the finances of Athens than to her political power. That excellent harbor, commodious as a mercantile centre, and now again safe for the residence of metics and the importations of merchants, became speedily a scene of animated commerce, as we have seen it when surprised by Teleutias. The number of metics, or free resident non-citizens, became also again large, as it had been before the time of her reverses, and including a number of miscellaneous non-Hellenic persons, from Lydia, Phrygia, and Syria.[729] Both the port-duties, and the value of fixed property at Athens, was thus augmented so as in part to countervail the costs of war. Nevertheless these costs, continued from year to year, and combined with the damage done by Æginetan privateers, were seriously felt, and contributed to dispose the Athenians to peace.

In the Hellespont also, their prospects were not only on the decline, but had become seriously menacing. After going from Ægina to Ephesus in the preceding year, and sending back Gorgôpas with the Æginetan squadron, Antalkidas had placed the remainder of his fleet under his secretary, Nikolochus, with orders to proceed to the Hellespont for the relief of Abydos. He himself landed, and repaired to Tiribazus, by whom he was conducted up to the court of Susa. Here he renewed the propositions for the pacification of Greece,—on principles of universal autonomy, abandoning all the Asiatic Greeks as subject absolutely to the Persian king,—which he had tried in vain to carry through two years before. Though the Spartans generally were odious to Artaxerxes, Antalkidas behaved with so much dexterity[730] as to gain the royal favor personally, while all the influence of Tiribazus was employed to second his political views. At length they succeeded in prevailing upon the king formally to adopt the peace, and to proclaim war against any Greeks who should refuse to accede to it, empowering the Spartans to enforce it everywhere as his allies and under his sanction. In order to remove one who would have proved a great impediment to this measure, the king was farther induced to invite the satrap Pharnabazus up to court, and to honor him with his daughter in marriage; leaving the satrapy of Daskylium under the temporary administration of Ariobarzanes, a personal friend and guest of Antalkidas.[731] Thus armed against all contingencies, Antalkidas and Tiribazus returned from Susa to the coast of Asia Minor in the spring of 387 B.C., not only bearing the formal diploma ratified by the king’s seal, but commanding ample means to carry it into effect; since, in addition to the full forces of Persia, twenty additional triremes were on their way from Syracuse and the Greco-Italian towns, sent by the despot Dionysius to the aid of the Lacedæmonians.[732]

On reaching the coast, Antalkidas found Nikolochus with his fleet of twenty-five sail blocked up in Abydos by the Athenians under Iphikrates; who with thirty-two sail were occupying the European side of the Hellespont. He immediately repaired to Abydos by land, and took an early opportunity of stealing out by night with his fleet up the strait towards the Propontis; spreading the rumor that he was about to attack Chalkêdon, in concert with a party in the town. But he stopped at Perkôtê, and lay hid in that harbor until he saw the Athenian fleet (which had gone in pursuit of him upon the false scent laid out) pass by towards Prokonnêsus. The strait being now clear, Antalkidas sailed down it again to meet the Syracusan and Italian ships, whom he safely joined. Such junction, with a view to which his recent manœuvre had been devised, rendered him more than a match for his enemies. He had further the good fortune to capture a detached Athenian squadron of eight triremes, which Thrasybulus (a second Athenian citizen of that name) was conducting from Thrace to join the main Athenian fleet in the Hellespont. Lastly, additional reinforcements also reached Antalkidas from the zealous aid of Tiribazus and Ariobarzanes, insomuch that he found himself at the head of no less than eighty triremes, besides a still greater number which were under preparation in the various ports of Ionia.[733]

Such a fleet, the greatest which had been seen in the Hellespont since the battle of Ægospotami, was so much superior to anything which could be brought to meet it, and indicated so strongly the full force of Persia operating in the interests of Sparta,—that the Athenians began to fear a repetition of the same calamitous suffering which they had already undergone from Lysander. A portion of such hardship they at once began to taste. Not a single merchant-ship reached them from the Euxine, all being seized and detained by Antalkidas; so that their main supply of imported corn was thus cut off. Moreover, in the present encouraging state of affairs, the Æginetan privateers became doubly active in harassing the coasting trade of Attica; and this combination, of actual hardship with prospective alarm, created a paramount anxiety at Athens to terminate the war. Without Athens, the other allies would have no chance of success through their own forces; while the Argeians also, hitherto the most obstinate, had become on their own account desirous of peace, being afraid of repeated Lacedæmonian invasions of their territory. That Sparta should press for a peace, when the terms of it were suggested by herself, is not wonderful. Even to her, triumphant as her position now seemed, the war was a heavy burden.[734]

Such was the general state of feeling in the Grecian world, when Tiribazus summoned the contending parties into his presence, probably at Sardis, to hear the terms of the convention which had just come down from Susa. He produced the original edict, and having first publicly exhibited the regal seal, read aloud as follows:—

“King Artaxerxes thinks it just that the cities in Asia, and the islands of Klazomenæ and Cyprus, shall belong to him. He thinks it just also, to leave all the other Hellenic cities autonomous, both small and great,—except Lemnos, Imbros, and Skyros, which are to belong to Athens, as they did originally. Should any parties refuse to accept this peace, I will make war upon them, along with those who are of the same mind, by land as well as by sea, with ships and with money.”[735]

Instructions were given to all the deputies to report the terms of this edict to their respective cities, and to meet again at Sparta for acceptance or rejection. When the time of meeting arrived,[736] all the cities, in spite of their repugnance to the abandonment of the Asiatic Greeks, and partly also to the second condition, nevertheless felt themselves overruled by superior force, and gave a reluctant consent. On taking the oaths, however, the Thebans tried indirectly to make good an exception in their own case, by claiming to take the oath not only on behalf of themselves, but on behalf of the Bœotian cities generally; a demand which Agesilaus in the name of Sparta repudiated, as virtually cancelling that item in the pacification whereby the small cities were pronounced to be autonomous as well as the great. When the Theban deputy replied that he could not relinquish his claim without fresh instructions from home, Agesilaus desired him to go at once and consult his countrymen. “You may tell them (said he) that if they do not comply, they will be shut out from the treaty.”

It was with much delight that Agesilaus pronounced this peremptory sentence, which placed Thebes in so humiliating a dilemma. Antipathy towards the Thebans was one of his strongest sentiments, and he exulted in the hope that they would persist in their refusal so that he would thus be enabled to bring an overwhelming force to crush their isolated city. So eagerly did he thirst for the expected triumph, that immediately on the departure of the Theban deputies, and before their answer could possibly have been obtained, he procured the consent of the ephors, offered the border-sacrifice, and led the Spartan force out as far as Tegea. From that city he not only despatched messengers in all directions to hasten the arrival of the Periœki, but also sent forth the officers called xenâgi to the cities of the Peloponnesian allies, to muster and bring together the respective contingents. But in spite of all injunctions to despatch, his wishes were disappointed. Before he started from Tegea, the Theban deputies returned with the intimation that they were prepared to take the oath for Thebes alone, recognizing the other Bœotian cities as autonomous. Agesilaus and the Spartans were thus obliged to be satisfied with the minor triumph, in itself very serious and considerable, of having degraded Thebes from her federal headship, and isolated her from the Bœotian cities.[737]

The unmeasured and impatient miso-Theban bitterness of Agesilaus, attested here by his friend and panegyrist, deserves especial notice; for it will be found to explain much of the misconduct of Sparta and her officers during the ensuing years.

There yet remained one compliance for Agesilaus to exact. The Argeian auxiliaries were not yet withdrawn from Corinth; and the Corinthian government might probably think that the terms of the peace, leaving their city autonomous, permitted them to retain or dismiss these auxiliaries at their own discretion. But it was not so that Agesilaus construed the peace; and his construction, right or wrong, was backed by the power of enforcement. He sent to inform both Argeians and Corinthians, that if the auxiliaries were not withdrawn, he would march his army forthwith into both territories. No resistance could be offered to his peremptory mandate. The Argeians retired from Corinth; and the vehement philo-Argeian Corinthians,—especially those who had been concerned in the massacre at the festival of the Eukleia,—retired at the same time into voluntary exile, thinking themselves no longer safe in the town. They found a home partly at Argos, partly at Athens,[738] where they were most hospitably received. Those Corinthians who had before been in exile, and who, in concert with the Lacedæmonian garrison at Lechæum and Sikyon, had been engaged in bitter hostility against their countrymen in Corinth,—were immediately readmitted into the city. According to Xenophon, their readmission was pronounced by the spontaneous voice of the Corinthian citizens.[739] But we shall be more correct in affirming, that it was procured by the same intimidating summons from Agesilaus which had extorted the dismissal of the Argeians.[740] The restoration of the exiles from Lechæum on the present occasion was no more voluntary than that of the Athenian exiles had been eighteen years before, at the Peloponnesian war,—or than that of the Phliasian exiles was, two or three years afterwards.[741]