“No wine, for Athena’s sake!” cried the outlaw, drawing himself together, “it is passed. I am strong again.”
A great shout from the shores and the waiting fleet made him forget even the sight of Hermione.
“They come! The Persians! The Persians!”
The fleet of the Barbarians was advancing from the havens of Athens.
* * * * * * *
The sun rose higher. He was far above Hymettus now, and shooting his bright javelins over mainland, islands, and waters. With his rising the southern breeze sang ever clearer, making the narrow channel betwixt Salamis and Attica white, and tossing each trireme merrily. Not a cloud hung upon Pentelicus, Hymettus, or the purple northern range of Parnes. Over the desolate Acropolis hovered a thin mist,—smoke from the smouldering temple, the sight of which made every Attic sailor blink hard and think of the vengeance.
Yonder on the shore of the mainland the host of the Persian was moving: horsemen in gilded panoply, Hydarnes’s spearmen in armour like suns. They stood by myriads in glittering masses about a little spur of Mt. Ægaleos, where a holy close of Heracles looked out upon the sea. To them were coming more horsemen, chariots, litters, and across the strait drifted the thunderous acclamation, “Victory to the king!” For here on the ivory throne, with his mighty men, his captains, his harem, about him, the “Lord of the World” [pg 315]would look down on the battle and see how his slaves could fight.
Now the Barbarians began to move forth by sea. From the havens of Peiræus and their anchorages along the shore swept their galleys,—Phœnician, Cilician, Egyptian, and, sorrow of sorrows, Ionian—Greek arrayed against Greek! Six hundred triremes and more they were, taller in poop and prow than the Hellenes, and braver to look upon.
Each vied with each in the splendour of the scarlet, purple, and gold upon stern and foreship. Their thousands of white oars moved like the onward march of an army as they trampled down the foam. From the masts of their many admirals flew innumerable gay signal-flags. The commands shouted through trumpets in a dozen strange tongues—the shrill pipings of the oar masters, the hoarse shouts of the rowers—went up to heaven in a clamorous babel. “Swallows’ chatter,” cried the deriding Hellenes, but hearts were beating quicker, breath was coming faster in many a breast by Salamis then,—and no shame. For now was the hour of trial, the wrestle of Olympian Zeus with Ahura-Mazda. Now would a mighty one speak from the heavens to Hellas, and say to her “Die!” or “Be!”
The Barbarians’ armadas were forming. Their black beaks, all pointing toward Salamis, stretched in two bristling lines from the islet of Psyttaleia—whence the shields of the landing force glittered—to that brighter glitter on the promontory by Ægaleos where sat the king. To charge their array seemed charging a moving hedge of spears, impenetrable in defence, invincible in attack. Slowly, rocked by the sea and rowing in steady order, the armament approached Salamis. And still the Greek ships lay spread out along the shore, each trireme swinging at the end of the cable which moored her to the land, each mariner listening [pg 316]to the beatings of his own heart and straining his eyes on one ship now—Eurybiades’s—which rode at the centre of their line and far ahead.