From hence he proceeded to Syracuse, which he now revisited after an absence of (apparently) more than two years in Africa. During all this interval, the Syracusan harbor had been watched by a Carthaginian fleet, obstructing the entry of provisions, and causing partial scarcity.[1020] But there was no blockading army on land; nor had the dominion of Agathokles, upheld as it was by his brother Antander and his mercenary force, been at all shaken. His arrival inspired his partisans and soldiers with new courage, while it spread terror throughout most parts of Sicily. To contend with the Carthaginian blockading squadron, he made efforts to procure maritime aid from the Tyrrhenian ports in Italy;[1021] while on land, his forces were now preponderant—owing to the recent defeat, and broken spirit, of the Agrigentines. But his prospects were suddenly checked by the enterprising move of his old enemy—the Syracusan exile Deinokrates; who made profession of taking up that generous policy which the Agrigentines had tacitly let fall—announcing himself as the champion of autonomous city-government, and equal confederacy, throughout Sicily. Deinokrates received ready adhesion from most of the cities belonging to the Agrigentine confederacy—all of them who were alarmed by finding that the weakness or fears of their presiding city had left them unprotected against Agathokles. He was soon at the head of a powerful army—20,000 foot, and 1500 horse. Moreover a large proportion of his army were not citizen militia, but practised soldiers; for the most part exiles, driven from their homes by the distractions and violences of the Agathoklean æra.[1022] For military purposes, both he and his soldiers were far more strenuous and effective than the Agrigentines under Xenodokus had been. He not only kept the field against Agathokles, but several times offered him battle, which the despot did not feel confidence enough to accept. Agathokles could do no more than maintain himself in Syracuse, while the Sicilian cities generally were put in security against his aggressions.
Amidst this unprosperous course of affairs in Sicily, Agathokles received messengers from his son, reporting the defeats in Africa. Preparing immediately to revisit that country, he was fortunate enough to obtain a reinforcement of Tyrrhenian ships of war, which enabled him to overcome the Carthaginian blockading squadron at the mouth of the Syracusan harbor. A clear passage to Africa was thus secured for himself, together with ample supplies of imported provisions for the Syracusans.[1023] Though still unable to combat Deinokrates in the field, Agathokles was emboldened by his recent naval victory to send forth Leptines with a force to invade the Agrigentines—the jealous rivals, rather than the allies, of Deinokrates. The Agrigentine army—under the general Xenodokus, whom Leptines had before defeated—consisted of citizen militia mustered on the occasion; while the Agathoklean mercenaries, conducted by Leptines, had made arms a profession, and were used to fighting as well as to hardships.[1024] Here as elsewhere in Greece, we find the civic and patriotic energy trampled down by professional soldiership, and reduced to operate only as an obsequious instrument for administrative details.
Xenodokus, conscious of the inferiority of his Agrigentine force, was reluctant to hazard a battle. Driven to this imprudence by the taunts of his soldiers, he was defeated a second time by Leptines, and became so apprehensive of the wrath of the Agrigentines, that he thought it expedient to retire to Gela. After a period of rejoicing, for his recent victories by land as well as by sea, Agathokles passed over to Africa, where he found his son, with the army at Tunês in great despondency and privation, and almost mutiny for want of pay. They still amounted to 6000 Grecian mercenaries, 6000 Gauls, Samnites, and Tyrrhenians—1500 cavalry—and no less than 6000 (if the number be correct) Libyan war-chariots. There were also a numerous body of Libyan allies; faithless time-servers, watching for the turn of fortune. The Carthaginians, occupying strong camps in the vicinity of Tunês, and abundantly supplied, awaited patiently the destroying effects of privation and suffering on their enemies. So desperate was the position of Agathokles, that he was compelled to go forth and fight. Having tried in vain to draw the Carthaginians down into the plain, he at length attacked them in the full strength of their entrenchments. But in spite of the most strenuous efforts, his troops were repulsed with great slaughter, and driven back to their camp.[1025]
The night succeeding this battle was a scene of disorder and panic in both camps; even in that of the victorious Carthaginians. The latter, according to the ordinances of their religion, eager to return their heartfelt thanks to the gods for this great victory, sacrificed to them as a choice offering the handsomest prisoners captured.[1026] During this process, the tent or tabernacle consecrated to the gods, close to the altar as well as to the general’s tent, accidentally took fire. The tents being formed by mere wooden posts, connected by a thatch of hay or straw both on roof and sides,—the fire spread rapidly, and the entire camp was burnt, together with many soldiers who tried to arrest the conflagration. So distracting was the terror occasioned by this catastrophe, that the whole Carthaginian army for the time dispersed; and Agathokles, had he been prepared, might have destroyed them. But it happened that at the same hour, his own camp was thrown into utter confusion by a different accident, rendering his soldiers incapable of being brought into action.[1027]
His position at Tunês had now become desperate. His Libyan allies had all declared against him, after the recent defeat. He could neither continue to hold Tunês, nor carry away his troops to Sicily; for he had but few vessels, and the Carthaginians were masters at sea. Seeing no resource, he resolved to embark secretly with his younger son Herakleides; abandoning Archagathus and the army to their fate. But Archagathus and the other officers, suspecting his purpose, were thoroughly resolved that the man who had brought them into destruction should not thus slip away and betray them. As Agathokles was on the point of going aboard at night, he found himself watched, arrested, and held prisoner, by the indignant soldiery. The whole town now became a scene of disorder and tumult, aggravated by the rumor that the enemy were marching up to attack them. Amidst the general alarm, the guards who had been set over Agathokles, thinking his services indispensable for defence, brought him out with his fetters still on. When the soldiers saw him in this condition, their sentiment towards him again reverted to pity and admiration, notwithstanding his projected desertion; moreover they hoped for his guidance to resist the impending attack. With one voice they called upon the guards to strike off his chains and set him free. Agathokles was again at liberty. But insensible to everything except his own personal safety, he presently stole away, leaped unperceived into a skiff, with a few attendants, but without either of his sons,—and was lucky enough to arrive, in spite of stormy November weather, on the coast of Sicily.[1028]
So terrible was the fury of the soldiers, on discovering that Agathokles had accomplished his desertion, that they slew both his sons, Archagathus and Herakleides. No resource was left but to elect new generals, and make the best terms they could with Carthage. They were still a formidable body, retaining in their hands various other towns besides Tunês; so that the Carthaginians, relieved from all fear of Agathokles, thought it prudent to grant an easy capitulation. It was agreed that all the towns should be restored to the Carthaginians, on payment of 300 talents; that such soldiers as chose to enter into the African service of Carthage, should be received on full pay; but that such as preferred returning to Sicily should be transported thither, with permission to reside in the Carthaginian town of Solus (or Soluntum). On these terms the convention was concluded, and the army finally broken up. Some indeed among the Grecian garrisons, quartered in the outlying posts, being rash enough to dissent and hold out, were besieged and taken by the Carthaginian force. Their commanders were crucified, and the soldiers condemned to rural work as fettered slaves.[1029]
Thus miserably terminated the expedition of Agathokles to Africa, after an interval of four years from the time of his landing. By the vana mirantes,[1030] who looked out for curious coincidences (probably Timæus), it was remarked, that his ultimate flight, with the slaughter of his two sons, occurred exactly on the same day of the year following his assassination of Ophellas.[1031] Ancient writers extol, with good reason, the bold and striking conception of transferring the war to Africa, at the very moment when he was himself besieged in Syracuse by a superior Carthaginian force. But while admitting the military resource, skill, and energy, of Agathokles, we must not forget that his success in Africa was materially furthered by the treasonable conduct of the Carthaginian general Bomilkar—an accidental coincidence in point of time. Nor is it to be overlooked, that Agathokles missed the opportunity of turning his first success to account, at a moment when the Carthaginians would probably have purchased his evacuation of Africa by making large concessions to him in Sicily.[1032] He imprudently persisted in the war, though the complete conquest of Carthage was beyond his strength—and though it was still more beyond his strength to prosecute effective war, simultaneously and for a long time, in Sicily and in Africa. The African subjects of Carthage were not attached to her; but neither were they attached to him;—nor, on the long run, did they do him any serious good. Agathokles is a man of force and fraud—consummate in the use of both. His whole life is a series of successful adventures, and strokes of bold ingenuity to extricate himself from difficulties; but there is wanting in him all predetermined general plan, or measured range of ambition, to which these single exploits might be made subservient.
After his passage from Africa, Agathokles landed on the western corner of Sicily near the town of Egesta, which was then in alliance with him. He sent to Syracuse for a reinforcement. But he was hard pressed for money; he suspected, or pretended to suspect, the Egestæans of disaffection; accordingly, on receiving his new force, he employed it to commit revolting massacre and plunder in Egesta. The town is reported to have contained 10,000 citizens. Of these Agathokles caused the poorer men to be for the most part murdered; the richer were cruelly tortured, and even their wives tortured and mutilated, to compel revelations of concealed wealth; the children of both sexes were transported to Italy, and there sold as slaves to the Bruttians. The original population being thus nearly extirpated, Agathokles changed the name of the town to Dikæopolis, assigning it as a residence to such deserters as might join him.[1033] This atrocity, more suitable to Africa[1034] than Greece (where the mutilation of women is almost unheard of), was probably the way in which his savage pride obtained some kind of retaliatory satisfaction for the recent calamity and humiliation in Africa. Under the like sentiment, he perpetrated another deed of blood at Syracuse. Having learnt that the soldiers, whom he had deserted at Tunês, had after his departure put to death his two sons, he gave orders to Antander his brother (viceroy of Syracuse), to massacre all the relatives of those Syracusans who had served him in the African expedition. This order was fulfilled by Antander (we are assured) accurately and to the letter. Neither age or sex—grandsire or infant—wife or mother—were spared by the Agathoklean executioners. We may be sure that their properties were plundered at the same time; we hear of no mutilations.[1035]
Still Agathokles tried to maintain his hold on the Sicilian towns which remained to him; but his cruelties as well as his reverses had produced a strong sentiment against him, and even his general Pasiphilus revolted to join Deinokrates. That exile was now at the head of an army stated at 20,000 men, the most formidable military force in Sicily; so that Agathokles, feeling the inadequacy of his own means, sent to solicit peace, and to offer tempting conditions. He announced his readiness to evacuate Syracuse altogether, and to be content, if two maritime towns on the northern coast of the island—Therma and Kephaloidion—were assigned to his mercenaries and himself. Under this proposition, Deinokrates, and the other Syracusan exiles, had the opportunity of entering Syracuse, and reconstituting the free city-government. Had Deinokrates been another Timoleon, the city might now have acquired and enjoyed another temporary sunshine of autonomy and prosperity; but his ambition was thoroughly selfish. As commander of this large army, he enjoyed a station of power and license such as he was not likely to obtain under the reconstituted city-government of Syracuse. He therefore evaded the propositions of Agathokles, requiring still larger concessions; until at length the Syracusan exiles in his own army (partly instigated by emissaries from Agathokles himself) began to suspect his selfish projects, and to waver in their fidelity to him. Meanwhile Agathokles, being repudiated by Deinokrates, addressed himself to the Carthaginians, and concluded a treaty with them, restoring or guaranteeing to them all the possessions that they had ever enjoyed in Sicily. In return for this concession, he received from them a sum of money, and a large supply of corn.[1036]
Relieved from Carthaginian hostility, Agathokles presently ventured to march against the army of Deinokrates. The latter was indeed greatly superior in strength, but many of his soldiers were now lukewarm or disaffected, and Agathokles had established among them correspondences upon which he could rely. At a great battle fought near Torgium, many of them went over on the field to Agathokles, giving to him a complete victory. The army of Deinokrates was completely dispersed. Shortly afterwards a considerable body among them (4000 men, or 7000 men, according to different statements) surrendered to the victor on terms. As soon as they had delivered up their arms, Agathokles, regardless of his covenant, caused them to be surrounded by his own army, and massacred.[1037]