Stories from Thucydides

by Thucydides

As soon as spring arrived, the Spartans, true to their promise, sent off forty triremes, commanded by Alcidas, to raise the siege of Mytilene, and marched in full force into Attica, thinking thus to divert the attention of the Athenians, and prevent them from interfering with the voyage of Alcidas. They remained a long time in Attica, waiting for news from their fleet, and employing the time in a systematic ravage of the whole territory. But time passed, and no message arrived from Alcidas, who seemed to have disappeared with all his ships; so that at last, as their expectations were disappointed, and their supplies exhausted, they broke up their army and returned home.

The position of Mytilene was now growing desperate. Nothing more was heard of the relieving squadron, and the scanty store of provisions was rapidly failing; for, owing to the betrayal of their design, the Mytilenaeans had been hurried into revolt before their preparations were completed, and had had no time to lay up a sufficient stock of food. Salaethus, therefore, determined to make a sudden sally, and break out of the town; and the better to effect this purpose, he furnished the common people, who had hitherto served as light-armed soldiers, with the full equipment of heavy infantry. But this proceeding brought on a catastrophe, for the commons no sooner found themselves in possession of better weapons than they turned upon their masters, and accused them of secreting supplies of corn for their own use. "Bring out your corn," they cried, "and divide it equally, or we will go out and make terms with the Athenians for ourselves." Alarmed at this threat, which if carried out would leave them exposed as the sole objects of Athenian vengeance, the nobles sent a message to Paches, on behalf of the whole city, offering to surrender, on condition that their case should be tried by the tribunals at Athens, and stipulating that, while the decision was pending, no violence should be offered to any of the inhabitants. The proposal was accepted, and Paches marched his forces into the town. In spite of the convention, the leaders of the revolt took sanctuary in the temples, being in dread of summary execution. Paches reassured them, and sent them in safe custody to Tenedos.

We must now turn back a little, and follow the movements of Alcidas. The Spartan admiral, it would seem, had small stomach for the bold adventure on which he was bound—no less than to rob the Athenians of one of their most important possessions, and defy the redoubtable captains of Athens on their own element. After loitering for some time off the coast of Peloponnesus, he sailed on slowly as far as Delos, and then, touching at Icarus, he heard that Mytilene was already taken. Wishing, however, to inform himself with certainty, he pushed on as far as Erythrae, on the mainland of Asia, which he reached seven days after the fall of Mytilene. Being now assured that the report was true, he called a council of war to decide what was to be done. Then a certain Greek of Elis, named Teutiaplus, made a bold suggestion: "Let us," he said, "sail straight to Mytilene, and make an attempt to recapture the town by surprise. Most likely the Athenians, flushed with success, will be taken unawares, and we shall find the harbour open, and the land forces dispersed, and if we make a sudden onfall, under cover of darkness, we shall probably succeed."

The prudent Alcidas found this proposal little to his taste; nor was he better pleased by another plan, put forward by the Lesbian envoys who were returning on board the Peloponnesian fleet, and seconded by a party of exiles from the cities of Ionia. These men tried to persuade Alcidas to establish himself in some city of Asia Minor, and raise a revolt among the allies of Athens in these parts. He had, they said, every prospect of success, for his arrival was welcomed on all sides. Let him seize the opportunity of attacking the Athenians in their most mortal part, first by withdrawing the tribute of Ionia, and secondly by putting them to the expense of a blockade.

This daring scheme might have led to something important, if the fleet had been commanded by Brasidas. But Alcidas was a man of very different temper, and having arrived too late to save Mytilene, he had now but one thought,—to return to Peloponnesus as fast as he could, and get out of the reach of the terrible Athenian triremes. So he set his fleet in motion, and sailing along the coast in a southerly direction put in at Ephesus. On the voyage he showed himself to be as cruel as he was cowardly, by capturing and putting to death the crews of the vessels which came in his way. These were not a few, for the ships which crossed his path approached fearlessly, under the impression that his fleet was from Athens; for no one dreamed that a Peloponnesian squadron would dare to enter these waters. For this senseless barbarity he was severely rebuked by a deputation of Samian exiles, now living on the mainland, who met him at Ephesus. His was a strange method, they remarked with bitter irony, of helping the Ionians to recover their liberty—to butcher defenceless men, who had done him no harm, but looked to him for rescue from their bondage to Athens! If he continued to behave thus, he would make the name of Sparta detested throughout Ionia. Dull as he was, Alcidas could not but feel the justice of this reprimand, and he let the rest of his prisoners go.

The presence of a Peloponnesian fleet had caused great alarm among the inhabitants of Ionia, and urgent messages came in daily to Paches at Mytilene, summoning him to their aid. For even though Alcidas had declined to take up a permanent station on the coast, as the exiles had suggested, it was apprehended that he would pillage the sea-side towns, which were unfortified, on his homeward voyage. At last two state triremes, the Paralus and Salaminia, which had been sent on public business from Athens, came into Mytilene with the news that they had sighted the fleet of Alcidas lying at anchor off Clarus. [Footnote: A little town, north-west of Ephesus.] Thereupon Paches put to sea at once, and gave chase. But Alcidas had got wind of his danger, and was already on the high seas, making all speed for Peloponnesus. Paches pursued him as far as Patmos, and then turned back. He would gladly have caught the Peloponnesians in blue water, where he could have sent all their ships to the bottom; but as it was he thought himself fortunate to have escaped the necessity of forming a blockade, as he must have done if he had come up with them near land, and driven them ashore. As for Alcidas, he fled in wild haste, keeping the open sea, being resolved not to touch land, if he could help it, until he reached the shelter of a Peloponnesian harbour.

III

On his return to Lesbos, Paches despatched to Athens the prisoners who had been sent to Tenedos, among whom was the Spartan Salaethus. When they arrived the Athenians immediately put Salaethus to death, and then met in full assembly to decide on the fate of the rest. They had just been delivered from a fearful danger, and in the natural reaction of vindictive rage which had now set in they came to the horrible resolution of putting all the adult male population of Mytilene to the sword, and selling the women and children as slaves. The Mytilenaeans, they argued, were without excuse: they were not subjects of Athens, who might wish to escape from their burdens, but free and privileged allies. They had treacherously plotted against Athens, when she was sunk deep in calamity, and brought a Peloponnesian fleet within the sacred circle of her empire. For a long time past they had evidently been hatching a vile conspiracy against the very existence of Athens. Having once come to this decision, the Athenians lost no time, but sent off a trireme on the same day, with orders to Paches to carry the decree into effect.

But after a night of cool reflection they began to repent of their haste. It was a cruel and monstrous thing, they now thought, to butcher the population of a whole city, innocent and guilty alike. The Mytilenaean envoys, who had been sent to Athens on the surrender of the city, perceived that there was a change in the public temper, and acting in concert with influential Athenians who were in their interest, they induced the magistrates to summon a second assembly, and re-open the debate.

It is on this occasion that we first catch sight [Footnote: That is, in the narrative of Thucydides.] of the notorious demagogue Cleon, who for the next six years will be the most prominent figure in Athenian public life. This man belongs to a class of politicians who had begun to exercise great influence on the affairs of Athens after the death of Pericles. That great statesman had really led the people, checking their excesses, setting bounds to their ambition, and guiding all the moods of the stormy democracy. But the demagogues were lowborn upstarts, who, while seeming to lead the people, really followed it, and kept their position by pandering to the worst passions of the multitude. It must, however, be mentioned that the two contemporary writers from whom we draw our materials for the portrait of Cleon, the historian Thucydides and the comic poet Aristophanes, were both violently prejudiced against him. Aristophanes hated him as the representative of the new democracy, which was an object of abhorrence to the great comic genius; and Thucydides, a born aristocrat, of strong oligarchical sympathies, looked with cold scorn and aversion on the coarse mechanic, [Footnote: Cleon was a tanner by trade.] who presumed to usurp the place, and ape the style, of a true leader like Pericles.