The arrival of these envoys caused infinite mortification to the Athenians at home. Having expected to hear, long before, that Sphakteria had surrendered, they were now taught to consider even the ultimate conquest as a matter of doubt: they were surprised that the Lacedæmonians sent no fresh envoys to solicit peace, and began to suspect that such silence was founded upon well-grounded hopes of being able to hold out. But the person most of all discomposed was Kleon, who observed that the people now regretted their insulting repudiation of the Lacedæmonian message, and were displeased with him as the author of it; while, on the contrary, his numerous political enemies were rejoiced at the turn which events had taken, as it opened a means of effecting his ruin. At first, Kleon contended that the envoys had misrepresented the state of facts; to which the latter replied by entreating, that if their accuracy were mistrusted, commissioners of inspection might be sent to verify it; and Kleon himself, along with Theogonês, was forthwith named for this function.
But it did not suit Kleon’s purpose to go as commissioner to Pylus, since his mistrust of the statement was a mere general suspicion, not resting on any positive evidence: moreover, he saw that the dispositions of the assembly tended to comply with the request of Demosthenês, and to despatch a reinforcing armament. He accordingly altered his tone at once: “If ye really believe the story (he said), do not waste time in sending commissioners, but sail at once to capture the men. It would be easy with a proper force, if our generals were men (here he pointed reproachfully to his enemy Nikias, then stratêgus[536]), to sail and take the soldiers in the island. That is what I at least would do, if I were general.” His words instantly provoked a hostile murmur from a portion of the assembly: “Why do you not sail then at once, if you think the matter so easy?” while Nikias, taking up this murmur, and delighted to have caught his political enemy in a trap, stood forward in person, and pressed him to set about the enterprise without delay; intimating the willingness of himself and his colleagues to grant him any portion of the military force of the city which he chose to ask for. Kleon at first closed with this proposition, believing it to be a mere stratagem of debate and not seriously intended: but so soon as he saw that what was said was really meant, he tried to back out, and observed to Nikias: “It is your place to sail: you are general, not I.”[537] Nikias only replied by repeating his exhortation, renouncing formally the command against Sphakteria, and calling upon the Athenians to recollect what Kleon had said, as well as to hold him to his engagement. The more Kleon tried to evade the duty, the louder and more unanimous did the cry of the assembly become that Nikias should surrender it to him, and that he should undertake it. At last, seeing that there was no possibility of receding, Kleon reluctantly accepted the charge, and came forward to announce his intention in a resolute address: “I am not at all afraid of the Lacedæmonians (he said): I shall sail without even taking with me any of the hoplites from the regular Athenian muster-roll, but only the Lemnian and Imbrian hoplites who are now here (that is, Athenian kleruchs or out-citizens who had properties in Lemnos and Imbros, and habitually resided there), together with some peltasts, brought from Ænos, in Thrace, and four hundred bowmen. With this force, added to what is already at Pylos, I engage in the space of twenty days either to bring the Lacedæmonians in Sphakteria hither as prisoners, or to kill them in the island.” The Athenians—observes Thucydidês—laughed somewhat at Kleon’s looseness of tongue; but prudent men had pleasure in reflecting that one or other of the two advantages was now certain: either they would get rid of Kleon, which they anticipated as the issue at once most probable and most desirable,—or, if mistaken on this point, the Lacedæmonians in the island would be killed or taken.[538] The vote was accordingly passed for the immediate departure of Kleon, who caused Demosthenês to be named as his colleague in command, and sent intelligence to Pylus at once that he was about to start with the reinforcement solicited.
This curious scene, interesting as laying open the interior feeling of the Athenian assembly, suggests, when properly considered, reflections very different from those which have been usually connected with it. It seems to be conceived by most historians as a mere piece of levity or folly in the Athenian people, who are supposed to have enjoyed the excellent joke of putting an incompetent man against his own will at the head of this enterprise, in order that they might amuse themselves with his blunders: Kleon is thus contemptible, and the Athenian people ridiculous. Certainly, if that people had been disposed to conduct their public business upon such childish fancies as are here implied, they would have made a very different figure from that which history actually presents to us. The truth is, that in regard to Kleon’s alleged looseness of tongue, which excited more or less of laughter among the persons present, there was no one really ridiculous except the laughers themselves: for the announcement which he made was so far from being extravagant, that it was realized to the letter, and realized, too, let us add, without any peculiar aid from unforeseen favorable accident. To show how much this is the case, we have only to contrast the jesters before the fact with the jesters after it. While the former deride Kleon as a promiser of extravagant and impossible results, we find Aristophanês, in his comedy of the Knights, about six months afterwards,[539] laughing at him as having achieved nothing at all,—as having cunningly put himself into the shoes of Demosthenês, and stolen away from that general the glory of taking Sphakteria, after all the difficulties of the enterprise had been already got over, and “the cake ready baked,”—to use the phrase of the comic poet. Both of the jests are exaggerations in opposite directions; but the last in order of time, if it be good at all against Kleon, is a galling sarcasm against those who derided Kleon as an extravagant boaster.
If we intend fairly to compare the behavior of Kleon with that of his political adversaries, we must distinguish between the two occasions: first, that in which he had frustrated the pacific mission of the Lacedæmonian envoys; next, the subsequent delay and dilemma which has been recently described. On the first occasion, his advice appears to have been mistaken in policy, as well as offensive in manner: his opponents, proposing a discussion by special commissioners as a fair chance for honorable terms of peace, took a juster view of the public interests. But the case was entirely altered when the mission for peace (wisely or unwisely) had been broken up, and when the fate of Sphakteria had been committed to the chances of war. There were then imperative reasons for prosecuting the war vigorously, and for employing all the force requisite to insure the capture of that island. And looking to this end, we shall find that there was nothing in the conduct of Kleon either to blame or to deride; while his political adversaries, Nikias among them, are deplorably timid, ignorant, and reckless of the public interest; seeking only to turn the existing disappointment and dilemma into a party opportunity for ruining him.
To grant the reinforcement asked for by Demosthenês was obviously the proper measure, and Kleon saw that the people would go along with him in proposing it: but he had at the same time good grounds for reproaching Nikias, and the other stratêgi, whose duty it was to originate that proposition, with their backwardness in remaining silent, and in leaving the matter to go by default, as if it were Kleon’s affair and not theirs. His taunt: “This is what I would have done, if I were general,” was a mere phrase of the heat of debate, such as must have been very often used, without any idea on the part of the hearers of construing it as a pledge which the speaker was bound to realize: nor was it any disgrace to Kleon to decline a charge which he had never sought, and to confess his incompetence to command. The reason why he was forced into the post, in spite of his own unaffected reluctance, was not, as some historians would have us believe, because the Athenian people loved a joke, but from two feelings, both perfectly serious, which divided the assembly,—feelings opposite in their nature, but coinciding on this occasion to the same result. His enemies loudly urged him forward, anticipating that the enterprise under him would miscarry, and that he would thus be ruined: his friends, perceiving this manœuvre, but not sharing in such anticipations, and ascribing his reluctance to modesty, pronounced themselves so much the more vehemently on behalf of their leader, and repaid the scornful cheer by cheers of sincere encouragement. “Why do you not try your hand at this enterprise, Kleon, if you think it so easy? You will soon find that it is too much for you;” was the cry of his enemies: to which his friends would reply: “Yes, to be sure, try, Kleon: by all means, try: do not be backward; we warrant that you will come honorably out of it, and we will stand by you.” Such cheer and counter-cheer is precisely in the temper of an animated multitude, as Thucydidês[540] states it, divided in feeling; and friends as well as enemies thus concurred to impose upon Kleon a compulsion not to be eluded. Of all the parties here concerned those whose conduct is the most unpardonably disgraceful are Nikias and his oligarchical friends; who force a political enemy into a supreme command against his own strenuous protest, persuaded that he will fail so as to compromise the lives of many soldiers, and the destinies of the state on an important emergency,—but satisfying themselves with the idea that they shall bring him to disgrace and ruin.
It is to be remarked, that Nikias and his fellow stratêgi were backward on this occasion, partly because they were really afraid of the duty. They anticipated a resistance to the death at Sphakteria, such as that at Thermopylæ: in which case, though victory might perhaps be won by a superior assailant force, it would not be won without much bloodshed and peril, besides an inexpiable quarrel with Sparta. If Kleon took a more correct measure of the chances, he ought to have credit for it, as one “bene ausus vana contemnere.” And it seems probable, that if he had not been thus forward in supporting the request of Demosthenês for reinforcement,—or rather, if he had not been so placed that he was compelled to be forward,—Nikias and his friends would have laid aside the enterprise, and reopened negotiations for peace, under circumstances neither honorable nor advantageous to Athens. Kleon was in this manner one main author of the most important success which Athens obtained throughout the whole war.
On joining Demosthenês with his reinforcement, Kleon found every preparation for attack made by that general, and the soldiers at Pylus eager to commence such aggressive measures as would relieve them from the tedium of a blockade. Sphakteria had become recently more open to assault in consequence of an accidental conflagration of the wood, arising from a fire kindled by the Athenian seamen, while landing at the skirt of the island, and cooking their food: under the influence of a strong wind, most of the wood in the island had thus caught fire and been destroyed. To Demosthenês this was an accident especially welcome; for the painful experience of his defeat in the forest-covered hills of Ætolia had taught him how difficult it was for assailants to cope with an enemy whom they could not see, and who knew all the good points of defence in the country.[541] The island being thus stripped of its wood, he was enabled to survey the garrison, to count their number, and to lay his plan of attack on certain data. He now, too, for the first time, discovered that he had underrated their real number, having before suspected that the Lacedæmonians had sent in rations for a greater total than was actually there. The island was occupied altogether by four hundred and twenty Lacedæmonian hoplites, out of whom more than one hundred and twenty were native Spartans, belonging to the first families in the city. The commander, Epitadas, with the main body, occupied the centre of the island, near the only spring of water which it afforded:[542] an advanced guard of thirty hoplites was posted not far from the sea-shore, in the end of the island farthest from Pylus; while the end immediately fronting Pylus, peculiarly steep and rugged, and containing even a rude circuit of stones, of unknown origin, which served as a sort of defence, was held as a post of reserve.[543]
Such was the prey which Kleon and Demosthenês were anxious to grasp. On the very day of the arrival of the former, they sent a herald to the Lacedæmonian generals on the mainland, inviting the surrender of the hoplites on the island, on condition of being simply detained under guard without any hardship, until a final pacification should take place. Of course the summons was refused; after which, leaving only one day for repose, the two generals took advantage of the night to put all their hoplites aboard a few triremes, making show as if they were merely commencing the ordinary nocturnal circumnavigation, so as to excite no suspicion in the occupants of the island. The entire body of Athenian hoplites, eight hundred in number, were thus disembarked in two divisions, one on each side of the island, a little before daybreak: the advanced guard of thirty Lacedæmonians, completely unprepared, were surprised even in their sleep and all slain.[544] At the point of day, the entire remaining force from the seventy-two triremes was also disembarked, leaving on board only the thalamii, or lowest tier of rowers, and reserving only a sufficient number to man the walls of Pylus. Altogether, there could not have been less than ten thousand troops employed in the attack of the island,—men of all arms: eight hundred hoplites, eight hundred peltasts, eight hundred bowmen; the rest armed with javelins, slings, and stones. Demosthenês kept his hoplites in one compact body, but distributed the light-armed into separate companies of about two hundred men each, with orders to occupy the rising grounds all round, and harass the flanks and rear of the Lacedæmonians.[545]
To resist this large force, the Lacedæmonian commander Epitadas had only three hundred and sixty hoplites around him; for his advanced guard of thirty men had been slain, and as many more must have been held in reserve to guard the rocky station in his rear: of the Helots who were with him, Thucydidês says nothing, during the whole course of the action. As soon as he saw the numbers and disposition of his enemies, Epitadas placed his men in battle array, and advanced to encounter the main body of hoplites whom he saw before him. But the Spartan march was habitually slow:[546] moreover, the ground was rough and uneven, obstructed with stumps, and overlaid with dust and ashes, from the recently burnt wood, so that a march at once rapid and orderly was hardly possible: and he had to traverse the whole intermediate space, since the Athenian hoplites remained immovable in their position. No sooner had his march commenced, than he found himself assailed both in rear and flanks, especially in the right or unshielded flank, by the numerous companies of light-armed.[547] Notwithstanding their extraordinary superiority of number, these men were at first awe-stricken at finding themselves in actual contest with Lacedæmonian hoplites:[548] still, they began the fight, poured in their missile weapons, and so annoyed the march that the hoplites were obliged to halt, while Epitadas ordered the most active among them to spring out of their ranks and repel the assailants. But pursuers with spear and shield had little chance of overtaking men lightly clad and armed, who always retired, in whatever direction the pursuit was commenced, had the advantage of difficult ground, redoubled their annoyance against the rear of the pursuers as soon as the latter retreated to resume their place in the ranks, and always took care to get round to the rear of the hoplites.
After some experience of the inefficacy of Lacedæmonian pursuit, the light-armed, becoming far bolder than at first, closed upon them nearer and more universally, with arrows, javelins, and stones, raising shouts and clamor that rent the air, rendering the word of command inaudible by the Lacedæmonian soldiers, who at the same time were almost blinded by the thick clouds of dust, kicked up from the recently spread wood-ashes.[549] Such method of fighting was one for which the Lykurgean drill made no provision, and the longer it continued the more painful did the embarrassment of the exposed hoplites become: their repeated efforts to destroy or even to reach nimble and ever-returning enemies, all proved abortive, whilst their own numbers were incessantly diminished by wounds which they could not return. Their only offensive arms consisted of the long spear and short sword usual to the Grecian hoplite, without any missile weapons whatever; nor could they even pick up and throw back the javelins of their enemies, since the points of these javelins commonly broke off and stuck in the shields, or sometimes even in the body which they had wounded. Moreover, the bows of the archers, doubtless carefully selected before starting from Athens, were powerfully drawn, so that their arrows may sometimes have pierced and inflicted wounds even through the shield or the helmet,—but at any rate, the stuffed doublet, which formed the only defence of the hoplite on his unshielded side, was a very inadequate protection against them.[550] Under this trying distress did the Lacedæmonians continue for a long time, poorly provided for defence, and altogether helpless for aggression,—without being able to approach at all nearer to the Athenian hoplites. At length the Lacedæmonian commander, seeing that his position grew worse and worse, gave orders to close the ranks and retreat to the last redoubt in the rear: but this movement was not accomplished without difficulty, for the light-armed assailants became doubly clamorous and forward, and many wounded men, unable to move, or at least to keep in rank, were overtaken and slain.[551]