But it was not only his master’s eloquence that Alcibiades praised before the gay company of revellers, it was his deeds as well.
During the Peloponnesian War both Socrates and Alcibiades were present at the siege of Potidæa.
‘There we messed together,’ said Alcibiades, ‘and I had the opportunity of observing his extraordinary power of sustaining fatigue and going without food. In the faculty of endurance he was superior not only to me, but to everybody; there was no one to be compared to him, yet at a festival he was the only person who had any real power of enjoyment.’
‘Cold, too,’ Alcibiades said, ‘Socrates could bear without flinching. The winter at Potidæa was severe, the frost intense. The Athenian soldiers stayed indoors when they could; when they were forced to be out they put on as many extra clothes as they could find, their feet they swathed in felt and fleeces.’
But Socrates, ‘with his bare feet on the ice and in his ordinary dress, marched better than the other soldiers who had shoes, and they looked daggers at him, because he seemed to despise them.’
Yet another tale of his endurance Alcibiades told to the listening company.
‘One morning,’ he said, ‘Socrates was thinking about something which he could not resolve; he would not give it up, but continued thinking from early dawn until noon—there he stood, fixed in thought; and at noon attention was drawn to him, and the rumour ran through the wondering crowd that Socrates had been standing and thinking about something ever since the break of day. At last, in the evening, after supper, some Ionians out of curiosity (it was now summer) brought out their mats and slept in the open air that they might watch him, and see whether he would stand all night. There he stood all night until the following morning, and with the return of light he offered up a prayer to the sun and went his way.’
Not even yet had Alcibiades exhausted the praises of his master, and the gay company listened spell-bound and bewildered to the young noble. They had not guessed how well he loved, how gravely he had studied the words and ways of Socrates. Now it was of the courage of his master that he wished to tell, for Socrates had saved his life in battle.
‘This was,’ said Alcibiades, ‘the engagement in which I received the prize of valour; for I was wounded and he would not leave me, but he rescued me and my arms; and he ought to have received the prize of valour which the generals wanted to confer on me, partly on account of my rank, and I told them so (this Socrates will not impeach or deny), but he was more eager than the general that I and not he should have the prize.’
When the Athenians fled after the defeat of Delium, the young nobleman was on horseback, and being himself safe, he watched Socrates, who was among the foot-soldiers.