Meanwhile the prudence of Gylippus profited by the fame of his victory, to draw a powerful reinforcement from the Sicilian cities; and the transports, so long expected from Peloponnesus, finally arrived in the harbour of Ortygia. This squadron formed the last assistance sent to either of the contending parties, and nothing further was required to complete the actors in the scene; for by the accession of the Cyrenians, Syracuse was either attacked or defended by all the various divisions of the Grecian name, which formed, in that age, the most civilised portion of the inhabitants of Asia, Africa, and Europe. The arrival of such powerful auxiliaries to the besieged, and the increasing force of the malady, totally disconcerted the Athenians. Even Nicias agreed to set sail. Every necessary preparation was made for this purpose, and the cover of night was chosen, as most proper for concealing their own disgrace, and for eluding the vengeance of the enemy. But the night appointed for their departure was distinguished by an inauspicious eclipse of the moon. The voyage was deferred till the mystical number of thrice nine days. But before the expiration of that time it was no longer practicable; for the design was soon discovered to the Syracusans, and this discovery, added to the encouragement derived from the circumstances of which we have already taken notice, increased their eagerness to attack the enemy by sea and land. Their attempts failed to destroy, by fire-ships, the Athenian fleet. They were more successful in employing superior numbers to divide the strength and to weaken the resistance of an enfeebled and dejected foe. During three days there was a perpetual succession of military and naval exploits. On the first day fortune hung in suspense; the second deprived the Athenians of a considerable squadron commanded by Eurymedon; and this misfortune was embittered on the third day, by the loss of eighteen galleys, with their crews.
A design, suggested by the wisdom of Hermocrates, was eagerly adopted by the active zeal of his fellow-citizens, who strove, with unremitting ardour, to throw a chain of vessels across the mouth of the Great Harbour, about a mile in breadth. The labour was complete before Nicias, totally occupied by other objects, attempted to interrupt it. After repeated defeats, and although he was so miserably tormented by the stone, that he had frequently solicited his recall, that virtuous commander, whose courage rose in adversity, used the utmost diligence to retrieve the affairs of his country. The shattered galleys were speedily refitted, and again prepared, to the number of a hundred and ten, to risk the event of a battle. As they had suffered greatly, on former occasions, by the hardness and massive solidity of the Syracusan prows, Nicias provided them with grappling-irons, fitted to prevent the recoil of their opponents, and the repetition of the hostile stroke. The decks were crowded with armed men, and the contrivance to which the enemy had hitherto chiefly owed their success, of introducing the firmness and stability of a military, into a naval engagement, was adopted in its full extent by the Athenians. When Gylippus and the Syracusan commanders were apprised of the designs of the enemy, they hastened to the defence of the bar which had been thrown across the entrance of the harbour. Even the Athenian grappling-irons had not been overlooked; to elude the dangerous grasp of these instruments, the prows of the Syracusan vessels were covered with wet and slippery hides.
The first impression of the Athenians was irresistible; they burst through the passage of the bar, and repelled the squadrons on either side. As the entrance widened, the Syracusans, in their turn, rushed into the harbour, which was more favourable than the open sea to their mode of fighting. Thither the foremost of the Athenians returned, either compelled by superior force, or that they might assist their companions. The engagement became general in the mouth of the harbour; and in this narrow space two hundred galleys fought, during the greatest part of the day, with an obstinate and persevering valour. It would require the expressive energy of Thucydides, and the imitative, though inimitable, sounds and expressions of the Grecian tongue, to describe the noise, the tumult, and the ardour of the contending squadrons. The battle was not long confined to the shock of adverse prows, and to the distant hostility of darts and arrows. The nearest vessels grappled, and closed with each other, and their decks were soon converted into a field of blood. While the heavy-armed troops boarded the enemy’s ships, they left their own exposed to a similar misfortune; the fleets were divided into massive clusters of adhering galleys; and the confusion of their mingled shouts overpowered the voice of authority. The singular and tremendous spectacle of an engagement more fierce and obstinate than any that had ever been beheld in the Grecian seas, totally suspended the powers of the numerous and adverse battalions which encircled the coast.
Hope, fear, the shouts of victory, the shrieks of despair, the anxious solicitude of doubtful success, animated the countenances, the voice, and the gestures of the Athenians, whose whole reliance centred in their fleet. When at length their galleys evidently gave way on every side, the contrast of alternate, and the rapid tumult of successive passions, subsided in a melancholy calm. This dreadful pause of astonishment and terror was followed by the disordered trepidation of flight and fear; many escaped to the camp; others ran, uncertain whither to direct their steps; while Nicias, with a small, but undismayed band, remained on the shore to protect the landing of their unfortunate galleys. But the retreat of the Athenians could not probably have been effected, had it not been favoured by the actual circumstances of the enemy, as well as by the peculiar prejudices of ancient superstition. In this well-fought battle, the vanquished had lost fifty and the victors forty vessels. It was incumbent on the latter to employ their immediate and most strenuous efforts to recover the dead bodies of their friends, that they might be honoured with the sacred and indispensable rites of funeral. The day was far spent; the strength of the sailors had been exhausted by a long continuance of unremitting labour; and both they and their companions on shore were more desirous to return to Syracuse to enjoy the fruits of victory, than to irritate the dangerous despair of the vanquished Athenians.
It is observed by the Roman orator Cicero, with no less truth than elegance, that not only the navy of Athens, but the glory and the empire of that republic, suffered shipwreck in the fatal harbour of Syracuse. The despondent degeneracy which immediately followed this ever memorable engagement was testified in the neglect of a duty which the Athenians had never neglected before, and in denying a part of their national character, which it had hitherto been their greatest glory to maintain. They abandoned to insult and indignity the bodies of the slain; and when it was proposed to them by their commanders to prepare next day for a second engagement, since their vessels were still more numerous than those of the enemy, they, who had seldom avoided a superior, and who had never declined the encounter of an equal force, declared, that no motive could induce them to withstand the weaker armament of Syracuse. Their only desire was to escape by land, under cover of the night, from a foe whom they had not courage to oppose, and from a place where every object was offensive to their sight, and most painful to their reflection.
The behaviour of the Syracusans might have proved extremely favourable to this design. The coincidence of a festival and a victory demanded an accumulated profusion of such objects as soothe the senses and please the fancy. Amidst these giddy transports, the Syracusans lost all remembrance of an enemy whom they despised; even the soldiers on guard joined the dissolute or frivolous amusements of their companions; and, during the greatest part of the night, Syracuse presented a mixed scene of secure gayety, of thoughtless jollity, and of mad and dangerous disorder.
The firm and vigilant mind of Hermocrates alone withstood, but was unable to divert, the general current. It was impossible to rouse to the fatigues of war men buried in wine and pleasure, and intoxicated with victory; and, as he could not intercept by force, he determined to retard by stratagem, the intended retreat of the Athenians, whose numbers and resentment would still render them formidable to whatever part of Sicily they might remove their camp. A select band of horsemen, assuming the character of traitors, fearlessly approached the hostile ramparts, and warned the Athenians of the danger of departing that night, as many ambuscades lurked in the way, and all the most important passes were occupied by the enemy. The frequency of treason gained credit to the perfidious advice; and the Athenians, having changed their first resolution, were persuaded by Nicias to wait two days longer, that such measures might be taken as seemed best adapted to promote the safety and celerity of their march.
The superior rank of Nicias entitled him to a pre-eminence of toil and of woe; and he deserves the regard of posterity by his character and sufferings, and still more by the melancholy firmness of his conduct.[j]
Few pages of history are more eloquent than those wherein Thucydides describes the epic miseries of the defeated host of Athens. They have furthermore the merit of great accuracy. The rest of this chapter may therefore be given over to his vivid and tragic picture of the retreat.[a]