It is under these circumstances, so untoward for defence, that the aggressor from Macedonia arises.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
SICILIAN AFFAIRS AFTER THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ATHENIAN ARMAMENT BEFORE SYRACUSE.
In the sixtieth chapter of this work, I brought down the history of the Grecian communities in Sicily to the close of the Athenian siege of Syracuse, where Nikias and Demosthenes with nearly their entire armament perished by so lamentable a fate. I now resume from that point the thread of Sicilian events, which still continues so distinct from those of Peloponnesus and Eastern Greece, that it is inconvenient to include both in the same chapters.
If the destruction of the great Athenian armament (in September 413 B.C.) excited the strongest sensation throughout every part of the Grecian world, we may imagine the intoxication of triumph with which it must have been hailed in Sicily. It had been achieved (Gylippus and the Peloponnesian allies aiding) by the united efforts of nearly all the Grecian cities in the island,—for all of them had joined Syracuse as soon as her prospects became decidedly encouraging; except Naxos and Katana, which were allied with the Athenians,—and Agrigentum, which remained neutral.[835] Unfortunately we know little or nothing of the proceedings of the Syracusans, immediately following upon circumstances of so much excitement and interest. They appear to have carried on war against Katana, where some fugitives from the vanquished Athenian army contributed to the resistance against them.[836] But both this city and Naxos, though exposed to humiliation and danger as allies of the defeated Athenians, contrived to escape without the loss of their independence. The allies of Syracuse were probably not eager to attack them, and thereby to aggrandize that city farther; while the Syracusans themselves also would be sensible of great exhaustion, arising from the immense efforts through which alone their triumph had been achieved. The pecuniary burdens to which they had been obliged to submit—known to Nikias during the last months of the siege,[837] and fatally misleading his judgment,—were so heavy as to task severely their powers of endurance. After paying, and dismissing with appropriate gratitude, the numerous auxiliaries whom they had been obliged to hire,—after celebrating the recent triumph, and decorating the temples, in a manner satisfactory to the exuberant joy of the citizens[838]—there would probably be a general disposition to repose rather than to aggressive warfare. There would be much destruction to be repaired throughout their territory, poorly watched or cultivated during the year of the siege.
In spite of such exhaustion, however, the sentiment of exasperation and vengeance against Athens, combined with gratitude towards the Lacedæmonians, was too powerful to be balked. A confident persuasion reigned throughout Greece that Athens[839] could not hold out for one single summer after her late terrific disaster; a persuasion, founded greatly on the hope of a large auxiliary squadron to act against her from Syracuse and her other enemies in Sicily and Italy. In this day of Athenian distress, such enemies of course became more numerous. Especially the city of Thurii in Italy,[840] which had been friendly to Athens and had furnished aid to Demosthenes in his expedition to Sicily, now underwent a change, banished three hundred of the leading philo-Athenian citizens (among them the rhetor Lysias), and espoused the Peloponnesian cause with ardor. The feeling of reaction at Thurii, and of vengeance at Syracuse, stimulated the citizens of both places to take active part in an effort promising to be easy and glorious, for the destruction of Athens and her empire. And volunteers were doubtless the more forward, as the Persian satraps of the sea-board were now competing with each other in invitations to the Greeks, with offers of abundant pay.
Accordingly, in the summer of the year 412 B.C. (the year following the catastrophe of the Athenian armament,) a Sicilian squadron of twenty triremes from Syracuse and two from Selinus, under the command of Hermokrates, reached Peloponnesus and joined the Lacedæmonian fleet in its expedition across the Ægean to Miletus. Another squadron of ten triremes from Thurii, under the Rhodian Dorieus, and a farther reinforcement from Tarentum, and Lokri, followed soon after. It was Hermokrates who chiefly instigated his countrymen to this effort.[841] Throughout the trying months of the siege, he had taken a leading part in the defence of Syracuse, seconding the plans of Gylippus with equal valor and discretion. As commander of the Syracusan squadron in the main fleet now acting against Athens in the Ægean (events already described in my sixty-first chapter), his conduct was not less distinguished. He was energetic in action, and popular in his behavior towards those under his command; but what stood out most conspicuously as well as most honorably, was his personal incorruptibility. While the Peloponnesian admiral and trierarchs accepted the bribes of Tissaphernes, conniving at his betrayal of the common cause and breach of engagement towards the armament, with indifference to the privations of their own unpaid seamen,—Hermokrates and Dorieus were strenuous in remonstrance, even to the extent of drawing upon themselves the indignant displeasure of the Peloponnesian admiral Astyochus, as well as of the satrap himself.[842] They were the more earnest in performing this duty, because the Syracusan and Thurian triremes were manned by freemen in larger proportion than the remaining fleet.[843]
The sanguine expectation, however, entertained by Hermokrates and his companions in crossing the sea from Sicily,—that one single effort would gloriously close the war,—was far from being realized. Athens resisted with unexpected energy; the Lacedæmonians were so slack and faint-hearted, that they even let slip the golden opportunity presented to them by the usurpation of the Athenian Four Hundred. Tissaphernes was discovered to be studiously starving and protracting the war for purposes of his own, which Hermokrates vainly tried to counter-work by a personal visit and protest at Sparta.[844] Accordingly, the war trailed on with fluctuating success, and even renovated efficiency on the part of Athens; so that the Syracusans at home, far from hearing announced the accomplishment of those splendid anticipations under which their squadron had departed, received news generally unfavorable, and at length positively disastrous. They were informed that their seamen were ill-paid and distressed; while Athens, far from striking her colors, had found means to assemble a fleet at Samos competent still to dispute the mastery of the Ægean. They heard of two successive naval defeats, which the Peloponnesian and Syracusan fleets sustained in the Hellespont[845] (one at Kynossema,—411 B.C.,—a second between Abydos and Dardanus,—410 B.C.); and at length of a third, more decisive and calamitous than the preceding,—the battle of Kyzikus (409 B.C.), wherein the Lacedæmonian admiral Mindarus was slain, and the whole of his fleet captured or destroyed. In this defeat the Syracusan squadron were joint sufferers. Their seamen were compelled to burn all their triremes without exception, in order to prevent them from falling into the hands of the enemy; and were left destitute, without clothing or subsistence, on the shores of the Propontis amidst the satrapy of Pharnabazus.[846] That satrap, with generous forwardness, took them into his pay, advanced to them clothing and provision for two months, and furnished them with timber from the woods of Mount Ida to build fresh ships. At Antandrus (in the Gulf of Adramyttium, one great place of export for Idæan timber), where the reconstruction took place, the Syracusans made themselves so acceptable and useful to the citizens, that a vote of thanks and a grant of citizenship was passed to all of them who chose to accept it.[847]
In recounting this battle, I cited the brief and rude despatch, addressed to the Lacedæmonians by Hippokrates, surviving second officer of the slain Mindarus, describing the wretched condition of the defeated armament—“Our honor is gone. Mindarus is slain. The men are hungry. We know not what to do.”[848] This curious despatch has passed into history, because it was intercepted by the Athenians, and never reached its destination. But without doubt the calamitous state of facts, which it was intended to make known, flew rapidly, under many different forms of words, both to Peloponnesus and to Syracuse. Sad as the reality was, the first impression made by the news would probably be yet sadder; since the intervention of Pharnabazus, whereby the sufferers were so much relieved, would hardly be felt or authenticated until after some interval. At Syracuse, the event on being made known excited not only powerful sympathy with the sufferers, but also indignant displeasure against Hermokrates and his colleagues; who, having instigated their countrymen three years before, by sanguine hopes and assurances, to commence a foreign expedition for the purpose of finally putting down Athens, had not only achieved nothing, but had sustained a series of reverses, ending at length in utter ruin, from the very enemy whom they had pronounced to be incapable of farther resistance.
It was under such sentiment of displeasure, shortly after the defeat of Kyzikus, that a sentence of banishment was passed at Syracuse against Hermokrates and his colleagues. The sentence was transmitted to Asia, and made known by Hermokrates himself to the armament, convoked in public meeting. While lamenting and protesting against its alleged injustice and illegality, he entreated the armament to maintain unabated good behavior for the future, and to choose new admirals for the time, until the successors nominated at Syracuse should arrive. The news was heard with deep regret by the trierarchs, the pilots, and the maritime soldiers or marines; who, attached to Hermokrates from his popular manner, his constant openness of communication with them, and his anxiety to collect their opinions, loudly proclaimed that they would neither choose, nor serve under, any other leaders.[849] But the admirals repressed this disposition, deprecating any resistance to the decree of the city. They laid down their command, inviting any man dissatisfied with them to prefer his complaint at once publicly, and reminding the soldiers of the many victories and glorious conflicts, both by land and sea, which had knit them together by the ties of honorable fellowship. No man stood forward to accuse them; and they consented, on the continued request of the armament, to remain in command, until their three successors arrived—Demarchus, Myskon, and Potamis. They then retired amidst universal regret; many of the trierarchs even binding themselves by oath, that on returning to Syracuse they would procure their restoration. The change of commanders took place at Miletus.[850]