Alkibiades, a tale of the Great Athenian War

by Charles Hamilton Bromby

This aid came just in time. As long as Lamachos lived some little energy was shown by the Athenians, in spite of the sluggishness and cowardice of Nikias. When the large force under the two remaining generals at length came upon Syrakuse, the citizens could hardly hope to hold out long against it. But Lamachos was killed in an engagement, and from that time Nikias did little but beg for more money, more ships and men from home. Syrakuse, however, was reduced by force of the numbers of its besiegers to the last extremity. It was on the point of surrendering when Gongylos, the Korinthian commander, who had been despatched to Sicily on the advice of Alkibiades, was allowed, by the negligence of Nikias, to enter the port of Syrakuse. He persuaded the people to remain firm a little longer, for a Korinthian fleet was on its way, and Gylippos, a Spartan general, was even now landing in Sicily. By the like negligence of the unfortunate Athenian commander, Gylippos was allowed to land on the north coast of Sicily, march unmolested through the island, and at length enter Syrakuse, almost surrounded, as it was, by the besiegers’ works.

Gylippos almost immediately took the field against the Athenians. Athens, entreated by the desponding Nikias, in the following autumn sent out to him a force even larger than the first, with seventy-five ships and two more generals. All was of no avail. Disaster followed on disaster, relieved by few and, for the most part, unimportant gains. Before the summer of 413 was over Alkibiades heard that such of his late comrades as had not been either killed in battle or drowned in their shameful flight, lay starving and rotting in the Syrakusan quarries, into which they had been thrown by their victorious enemies. The splendid fleet with which two years before he had set out from Athens, together with its reinforcements, had been destroyed by his new-found friends, and his colleague Nikias, the unhappy cause of all the evil, had been taken prisoner and put to death.

So far his prophecy made to the Spartan assembly had come true. The rest was to be verified.

His other counsel had been acted on. The Spartans, under Agis, had taken and fortified Dekeleia, and were overrunning Attika. Athens could see from the Akropolis the rising walls threatening her with immediate danger. The citizens were forced to live prepared to fight at any moment. Their fields were ravaged, their commerce well-nigh ruined, the mines shut up, even the tribunals closed. The allied towns from which, by the terms of the confederation of Delos, she was to receive a great part of her revenues were falling from her or growing luke-warm in her cause. The neutral states were looking to her more successful rival, and yet the vengeance of Alkibiades was not satisfied.

In the autumn embassies came to Sparta from Tissaphernes, satrap of the Persian King in Ionia, and from Pharnabazos, satrap of the country near the Hellespont, offering alliance against Athens. Alkibiades advised the Spartans to postpone all thought of carrying their arms to the Hellespont, but he saw of what advantage an alliance with Tissaphernes would be in carrying out his present plans. An alliance was therefore concluded between Lakedaimôn and the satrap of Ionia. By the terms of this treaty, which was soon after ratified by both parties, the Persian was to bring a large fleet to aid the Spartans, and to pay the wages of those employed on board the Spartan fleet.

At the same time an offer of alliance came from Chios, the richest and most important of the Grecian islands, near the continent of Asia Minor. Chios was still nominally a member of the confederation of Delos, in alliance with, and bound to pay an annual tribute to, Athens. The Spartans knew the strength it would give them if they could cut away this strong support from their opponents. They promised to send a fleet of forty triremes to aid Chios in her revolt, and to act in concert with her new ally and ancient enemy, the Persian. In the spring of 412 these ships, with those of others of the Spartan allies, reached Lechaion, the western port of Korinth, and were hauled over the isthmus to Kenchreia, the eastern port, where they lay, ready to start for Chios as soon as the Isthmian games were over.

In the meantime the Euböians had made the like offer of alliance to Agis, the Spartan king, at Dekeleia, and asked for the same assistance against Athens. The required help was promised. Before this aid could be given, and while Agis waited for reinforcements for that purpose, Lesbos revolted, and prayed the same aid from Agis. A small force arrived at this time from Sparta, and was sent on at once by Agis to help the Lesbians.

But while this conspiracy was going on against her Athens was not idle. Like a lion brought to bay, she roused herself as dangers quickened round her. Her army gone, her great fleets sunk or burnt at Syrakuse, her food-supplies diminished, her revenues almost destroyed, without money or allies on whom she could depend, the whole state in mourning for the sons who never could return to her again from that sad Sicilian expedition, the islands and the tributary towns which she had rescued from the Persians, and guarded from their other enemies, revolting from her, or gone right over to a foe who was plotting with those very Persians to destroy her utterly, she rose majestic in her grief; the word ‘surrender’ was not so much as named—never breathed by any citizen; the idea of compromise was never for a moment entertained. Each blow as it came quick upon her roused her to fresh vigour. The ingratitude, the shameless ingratitude, of those small states, of which for nearly sixty years she had been the constant safeguard, might burn into her soul, but it did not shake her. In the past, perhaps, she sometimes domineered over them in her pride, and taken large tribute from them in the days of her power. But she protected them from ever-prowling enemies, and gave them back more than she took from them. And now—now in her distress—they were deserting her, going over to an enemy who, for his own immediate and selfish purpose, was not unwilling to undo what the pan-Hellenic federation had done, and it seemed that Marathon and Salamis had been fought in vain.

Well, let them go if they must go; she, to her last ship, to her last timber, to her last man, to her last drachma, she would still fight, and, if the gods decreed it, she would die fighting. As long as her liberty should last and her democracy should remain, she would never lose her courage.

That was a country to be proud of, a race to boast about. Did her great son far away in Lakedaimôn, while he was counselling, directing all the movements of her foes against her—did he ever in his heart feel a secret pride that he was sprung from her? Was his just wrath ever so little cooling, or did it still burn so fiercely that he could not see her glory?