[280] Herodot. viii, 112; Plutarch, Themistoklês, c. 21,—who cites a few bitter lines from the contemporary poet Timokreon.
[281] Herodot. viii, 112-121.
[282] Herodot. viii, 114-126.
[283] The account given by Æschylus of this retiring march appears to me exaggerated, and in several points incredible (Persæ, 482-513). That they suffered greatly during the march from want of provisions, is doubtless true, and that many of them died of hunger. But we must consider in deduction: 1. That this march took place in the months of October and November, therefore not very long after the harvest. 2. That Mardonius maintained a large army in Thessaly all the winter, and brought them out in fighting condition in the spring. 3. That Artabazus also, with another large division, was in military operation in Thrace all the winter, after having escorted Xerxes into safety.
When we consider these facts, it will seem that the statements of Æschylus, even as to the sufferings by famine, must be taken with great allowance. But his statement about the passage of the Strymon appears to me incredible, and I regret to find myself on this point differing from Dr. Thirlwall, who considers it an undoubted fact. (Hist. Greece, ch. xv, p. 351, 2d ed.) “The river had been frozen in the night hard enough to bear those who arrived first. But the ice suddenly gave way under the morning sun, and numbers perished in the waters,”—so Dr. Thirlwall states, after Æschylus,—adding, in a note, “It is a little surprising that Herodotus, when he is describing the miseries of the retreat, does not notice this disaster, which is so prominent in the narrative of the Persian messenger in Æschylus. There can, however, be no doubt as to the fact: and perhaps it may furnish a useful warning, not to lay too much stress on the silence of Herodotus, as a ground for rejecting even important and interesting facts which are only mentioned by later writers,” etc.
That a large river, such as the Strymon, near its mouth (180 yards broad, and in latitude about N. 40° 50′), at a period which could not have been later than the beginning of November, should have been frozen over in one night so hardly and firmly as to admit of a portion of the army marching over it at daybreak, before the sun became warm,—is a statement which surely requires a more responsible witness than Æschylus to avouch it. In fact, he himself describes it as a “frost out of season,” (χειμῶν’ ἄωρον,) brought about by a special interposition of the gods. If he is to be believed, none of the fugitives were saved, except such as were fortunate enough to cross the Strymon on the ice during the interval between break of day and the sun’s heat. One would imagine that there was a pursuing enemy on their track, leaving them only a short time for escape: whereas in fact, they had no enemy to contend with,—nothing but the difficulty of finding subsistence. During the advancing march of Xerxes, a bridge of boats had been thrown over the Strymon: nor can any reason be given why that bridge should not still have been subsisting: Artabazus must have recrossed it after he had accompanied the monarch to the Hellespont. I will add, that the town and fortress of Eion, which commanded the mouth of the Strymon, remained as an important strong-hold of the Persians some years after this event, and was only captured, after a desperate resistance, by the Athenians and their confederates under Kimon.
The Athenian auditors of the Persæ would not criticize nicely, the historical credibility of that which Æschylus told them about the sufferings of their retreating foe, nor his geographical credibility when he placed Mount Pangæus on the hither side of the Strymon, to persons marching out of Greece (Persæ, 494). But I must confess that, to my mind, his whole narrative of the retreat bears the stamp of the poet and the religious man, not of the historical witness. And my confidence in Herodotus is increased when I compare him on this matter with Æschylus,—as well in what he says as in what he does not say.
[284] Juvenal, Satir. x, 178.
Ille tamen qualis rediit, Salamine relictâ,
In Caurum atque Eurum solitus sævire flagellis, etc.