[58] Only one hundred and twenty ships of war are mentioned by Herodotus (vii, 185) as having joined afterwards from the seaports in Thrace. But four hundred were destroyed, if not more, in the terrible storm on the coast of Magnesia (vii, 190); and the squadron of two hundred sail, detached by the Persians round Eubœa, were also all lost (viii, 7); besides forty-five taken or destroyed in the various sea-fights near Artemisium (vii, 194; viii, 11). Other losses are also indicated (viii, 14-16).
As the statement of Æschylus for the number of the Persian triremes at Salamis appears well-entitled to credit, we must suppose either that the number of Doriskus was greater than Herodotus has mentioned, or that a number greater than that which he has stated joined afterwards.
See a good note of Amersfoordt, ad Demosthen. Orat. de Symmoriis, p. 88 (Leyden, 1821).
[59] See on this point Volney, Travels in Egypt and Syria, ch. xxiv, vol. ii, pp. 70, 71; ch. xxxii, p. 367; and ch. xxxix, p. 435, (Engl. transl.).
Kinneir, Geographical Memoir of the Persian Empire, pp. 22-23. Bernier, who followed the march of Aurungzebe from Delhi, in 1665, says that some estimated the number of persons in the camp at three hundred thousand, others at different totals, but that no one knew, nor had they ever been counted. He says: “You are, no doubt, at a loss to conceive how so vast a number both of men and animals can be maintained in the field. The best solution of the difficulty will be found in the temperance and simple diet of the Indians.” (Bernier, Travels in the Mogul Empire, translated by Brock, vol. ii, App. p. 118).
So also Petit de la Croix says, about the enormous host of Genghis-Khan: “Les hommes sont si sobres, qu’ils s’accommodent de toutes sortes d’alimens.”
That author seems to estimate the largest army of Genghis at seven hundred thousand men (Histoire de Genghis, liv. ii, ch. vi, p. 193).
[60] Thucydid. v, 68. Xenophon calls the host of Xerxes innumerable,—ἀναρίθμητον στρατιάν (Anabas. iii, 2, 13).
It seems not to be considered necessary for a Turkish minister to know the numbers of an assembled Turkish army. In the war between the Russians and Turks in 1770, when the Turkish army was encamped at Babadag near the Balkan, Baron de Tott tells us: “Le Visir me demanda un jour fort sérieusement si l’armée Ottomane étoit nombreuse. C’est à vous que je m’adresserois, lui dis-je, si j’étais curieux de le savoir. Je l’ignore, me repondit-il. Si vous l’ignorez, comment pourrois-je en être instruit? En lisant la Gazette de Vienna, me répliqua-t-il. Je restai confondu.”
The Duke of Ragusa (in his voyage en Hongrie, Turquie, etc.), after mentioning the prodigiously exaggerated statements current about the numbers slain in the suppressed insurrection of the Janissaries at Constantinople in 1826, observes: “On a dit et répété, que leur nombre s’étoit élévé a huit ou dix mille, et cette opinion s’est accréditée (it was really about five hundred). Mais les Orientaux en général, et les Turcs en particulier, n’ont aucune idée des nombres: ils les emploient sans exactitude, et ils sont par caractère portés à l’exagération. D’un autre coté, le gouvernement a dû favoriser cette opinion populaire, pour frapper l’imagination et inspirer une plus grande terreur.” (Vol. ii, p. 37.)