These events excited strong sensation throughout Sicily. The valor of Hermokrates, who had restored Selinus and conquered the Carthaginians on the very ground where they had stood so recently in terrific force, was contrasted with the inglorious proceeding of Diokles at Himera. In the public assemblies of Syracuse, this topic, coupled with the unjust sentence whereby Hermokrates had been banished, was emphatically set forth by his partisans; producing some reaction in his favor, and a still greater effect in disgracing his rival Diokles. Apprised that the tide of Syracusan opinion was turning towards him, Hermokrates made renewed preparations for his return, and resorted to a new stratagem for the purpose of smoothing the difficulty. He marched from Selinus to the ruined site of Himera, informed himself of the spot where the Syracusan troops had undergone their murderous defeat, and collected together the bones of his slain fellow-citizens; which (or rather the unburied bodies) must have lain upon the field unheeded for about two years. Having placed these bones on cars richly decorated, he marched with his forces and conveyed them across the island from Himera to the Syracusan border. Here as an exile he halted; thinking it suitable now to display respect for the law,—though in his previous attempt he had gone up to the very gates of the city, without any similar scruples. But he sent forward some friends with the cars and the bones, tendering them to the citizens for the purpose of being honored with due funeral solemnities. Their arrival was the signal for a violent party discussion, and for an outburst of aggravated displeasure against Diokles, who had left the bodies unburied on the field of battle. “It was to Hermokrates (so his partisans urged) and to his valiant efforts against the Carthaginians, that the recovery of these remnants of the slain, and the opportunity of administering to them the funeral solemnities, was now owing. Let the Syracusans, after duly performing such obsequies, testify their gratitude to Hermokrates by a vote of restoration, and their displeasure against Diokles by a sentence of banishment.”[916] Diokles with his partisans was thus placed at great disadvantage. In opposing the restoration of Hermokrates, he thought it necessary also to oppose the proposition for welcoming and burying the bones of the slain citizens. Here the feelings of the people went vehemently against him; the bones were received and interred, amidst the respectful attendance of all; and so strong was the reactionary sentiment generally, that the partisans of Hermokrates carried their proposition for sentencing Diokles to banishment. But on the other hand, they could not so far prevail as to obtain the restoration of Hermokrates himself. The purposes of the latter had been so palpably manifested, in trying a few months before to force his way into the city by surprise, and in now presenting himself at the frontier with an armed force under his command,—that his readmission would have been nothing less than a deliberate surrender of the freedom of the city to a despot.[917]
Having failed in this well-laid stratagem for obtaining a vote of consent, Hermokrates saw that his return could not at that moment be consummated by open force. He therefore retired from the Syracusan frontier; yet only postponing his purposes of armed attack until his friends in the city could provide for him a convenient opportunity. We see plainly that his own party within had been much strengthened, and his opponents enfeebled, by the recent manœuvre. Of this a proof is to be found in the banishment of Diokles, who probably was not succeeded by any other leader of equal influence. After a certain interval, the partisans of Hermokrates contrived a plan which they thought practicable, for admitting him into the city by night. Forewarned by them, he marched from Selinus at the head of three thousand soldiers, crossed the territory of Gela,[918] and reached the concerted spot near the gate of Achradina during the night. From the rapidity of his advance, he had only a few troops along with him; the main body not having been able to keep up. With these few, however, he hastened to the gate, which he found already in possession of his friends, who had probably (like Pasimêlus at Corinth[919]) awaited a night on which they were posted to act as sentinels. Master of the gate, Hermokrates, though joined by his partisans within in arms, thought it prudent to postpone decisive attack until his own main force came up. But during this interval, the Syracusan authorities in the city, apprised of what had happened, mustered their full military strength in the agora, and lost no time in falling upon the band of aggressors. After a sharply contested combat, these aggressors were completely worsted, and Hermokrates himself slain with a considerable proportion of his followers. The remainder having fled, sentence of banishment was passed upon them. Several among the wounded, however, were reported by their relatives as slain, in order that they might escape being comprised in such a condemnation.[920]
Thus perished one of the most energetic of the Syracusan citizens; a man not less effective as a defender of his country against foreign enemies, than himself dangerous as a formidable enemy to her internal liberties. It would seem, as far as we can make out, that his attempt to make himself master of his country was powerfully seconded, and might well have succeeded. But it lacked that adventitious support arising from present embarrassment and danger in the foreign relations of the city, which we shall find so efficacious two years afterwards in promoting the ambitious projects of Dionysius.
Dionysius,—for the next coming generation the most formidable name in the Grecian world,—now appears for the first time in history. He was a young Syracusan of no consideration from family or position, described as even of low birth and low occupation; as a scribe or secretary, which was looked upon as a subordinate, though essential, function.[921] He was the son of Hermokrates,—not that eminent person whose death has been just described, but another person of the same name, whether related or not, we do not know.[922] It is highly probable that he was a man of literary ability and instruction, since we read of him in after-days as a composer of odes and tragedies; and it is certain that he stood distinguished in all the talents for military action,—bravery, force of will, and quickness of discernment. On the present occasion, he espoused strenuously the party of Hermokrates, and was one of those who took arms in the city on his behalf. Having distinguished himself in the battle, and received several wounds, he was among those given out for dead by his relations.[923] In this manner he escaped the sentence of banishment passed against the survivors. And when, in the course of a certain time, after recovering from his wounds, he was produced as unexpectedly living,—we may presume that his opponents and the leading men in the city left him unmolested, not thinking it worth while to reopen political inquisition in reference to matters already passed and finished. He thus remained in the city, marked out by his daring and address to the Hermokratæan party, as the person most fit to take up the mantle, and resume the anti-popular designs, of their late leader. It will presently be seen how the chiefs of this party lent their aid to exalt him.
Meanwhile the internal condition of Syracuse was greatly enfeebled by this division. Though the three several attempts of Hermokrates to penetrate by force or fraud into the city had all failed, yet they had left a formidable body of malcontents behind; while the opponents also, the popular government and its leaders, had been materially reduced in power and consideration by the banishment of Diokles. This magistrate was succeeded by Daphnæus and others, of whom we know nothing, except that they are spoken of as rich men and representing the sentiments of the rich,—and that they seem to have manifested but little ability. Nothing could be more unfortunate than the weakness of Syracuse at this particular juncture: for the Carthaginians, elate with their successes at Selinus and Himera, and doubtless also piqued by the subsequent retaliation of Hermokrates upon their dependencies at Motyê and Panormus, were just now meditating a second invasion of Sicily on a still larger scale. Not uninformed of their projects, the Syracusan leaders sent envoys to Carthage to remonstrate against them, and to make propositions for peace. But no satisfactory answer could be obtained, nor were the preparations discontinued.[924]
In the ensuing spring, the storm gathering from Africa burst with destructive violence upon this fated island. A mercenary force had been got together during the winter, greater than that which had sacked Selinus and Himera; three hundred thousand men, according to Ephorus,—one hundred and twenty thousand, according to Xenophon and Timæus. Hannibal was again placed in command; but his predominant impulses of family and religion having been satiated by the great sacrifice of Himera, he excused himself on the score of old age, and was only induced to accept the duty by having his relative Imilkon named as colleague. By their joint efforts, the immense host of Iberians, Mediterranean islanders, Campanians, Libyans, and Numidians, was united at Carthage, and made ready to be conveyed across, in a fleet of one hundred and twenty triremes, with no less than one thousand five hundred transports.[925] To protect the landing, forty Carthaginian triremes were previously sent over to the Bay of Motyê. The Syracusan leaders, with commendable energy and watchfulness, immediately despatched the like number of triremes to attack them, in hopes of thereby checking the farther arrival of the grand armament. They were victorious, destroying fifteen of the Carthaginian triremes, and driving the rest back to Africa; yet their object was not attained; for Hannibal himself, coming forth immediately with fifty fresh triremes, constrained the Syracusans to retire. Presently afterwards the grand armament appeared, disembarking its motley crowd of barbaric warriors near the western cape of Sicily.
Great was the alarm caused throughout Sicily by their arrival. All the Greek cities either now began to prepare for war, or pushed with a more vigorous hand equipments previously begun, since they seem to have had some previous knowledge of the purpose of the enemy. The Syracusans sent to entreat assistance both from the Italian Greeks and from Sparta. From the latter city, however, little was to be expected, since her whole efforts were now devoted to the prosecution of the war against Athens; this being the year wherein Kallikratidas commanded, and when the battle of Arginusæ was fought.
Of all Sicilian Greeks, the Agrigentines were both the most frightened and the most busily employed. Conterminous as they were with Selinus on their western frontier, and foreseeing that the first shock of the invasion would fall upon them, they immediately began to carry in their outlying property within the walls, as well as to accumulate a stock of provisions for enduring blockade. Sending for Dexippus, a Lacedæmonian then in Gela as commander of a body of mercenaries for the defence of that town, they engaged him in their service, with one thousand five hundred hoplites; reinforced by eight hundred of those Campanians who had served with Hannibal at Himera, but had quitted him in disgust.[926]
Agrigentum was at this time in the highest state of prosperity and magnificence; a tempting prize for any invader. Its population was very great; comprising, according to one account, twenty thousand citizens among an aggregate total of two hundred thousand males,—citizens, metics, and slaves; according to another account, an aggregate total of no less than eight hundred thousand persons;[927] numbers unauthenticated, and not to be trusted farther than as indicating a very populous city. Situated a little more than two miles from the sea, and possessing a spacious territory highly cultivated, especially with vines and olives, Agrigentum carried on a lucrative trade with the opposite coast of Africa, where at that time no such plantations flourished. Its temples and porticos, especially the spacious temple of Zeus Olympius,—its statues and pictures,—its abundance of chariots and horses,—its fortifications,—its sewers,—its artificial lake of near a mile in circumference, abundantly stocked with fish,—all these placed it on a par with the most splendid cities of the Hellenic world.[928] Of the numerous prisoners taken at the defeat of the Carthaginians near Himera seventy years before, a very large proportion had fallen to the lot of the Agrigentines, and had been employed by them in public works contributing to the advantage or ornament of the city.[929] The hospitality of the wealthy citizens,—Gellias, Antisthenes, and others,—was carried even to profusion. The surrounding territory was celebrated for its breed of horses,[930] which the rich Agrigentines vied with each other in training and equipping for the chariot-race. At the last Olympic games immediately preceding this fatal Carthaginian invasion (that is at the 93rd Olympiad,—408 B.C.), the Agrigentine Exænetus gained the prize in a chariot-race. On returning to Sicily after his victory, he was welcomed by many of his friends, who escorted him home in procession with three hundred chariots, each drawn by a pair of white horses, and all belonging to native Agrigentines. Of the festival by which the wealthy Antisthenes celebrated the nuptials of his daughter, we read an account almost fabulous. Amidst all this wealth and luxury, it is not surprising to hear that the rough duties of military exercise were imperfectly kept up, and that indulgences, not very consistent with soldier-like efficiency, were allowed to the citizens on guard.
Such was Agrigentum in May 406 B.C., when Hannibal and Imilkon approached it with their powerful army. Their first propositions, however, were not of a hostile character. They invited the Agrigentines to enter into alliance with Carthage; or if this were not acceptable, at any rate to remain neutral and at peace. Both propositions were declined.[931]