“I see you are a savage patriot, Glaucon,” said Themistocles, “despite your Adonis face. We are fairly upon the bay; our nearest eavesdroppers, yon fishermen, are a good five furlongs. Would you see something?” Glaucon rested on the oars, while the statesman fumbled in his breast. He drew out a papyrus sheet, which he passed to the rower, he in turn to Democrates.
“Look well, then, for I think no Persian spies are here. A month long have I wrought on this bit of papyrus. All my wisdom flowed out of my pen when I spread the ink. In short here is the ordering of the ships of the allied Greeks when we meet Xerxes in battle. Leonidas and our other chiefs gave me the task when we met at Corinth. To-day it is complete. Read it, for it is precious. Xerxes would give twenty talents for this one leaf from Egypt.”
The young men peered at the sheet curiously. The details and diagrams were few and easy to remember, the Athenian ships here, the Æginetan next, the Corinthian next, and so with the other allies. A few comments on the use of the light penteconters behind the heavy triremes. A few more comments on Xerxes’s probable naval tactics. Only the knowledge that Themistocles never committed himself in speech or writing without exhausting every expedient told the young men of the supreme importance of the paper. After due inspection the statesman replaced it in his breast.
“You two have seen this,” he announced, seemingly proud of his handiwork; “Leonidas shall see this, then Xerxes, and after that—” he laughed, but not in jest—“men will remember Themistocles, son of Neocles!”
The three lapsed into silence for a moment. The skiff was well out upon the sea. The shadows of the hills of Salamis and of Ægelaos, the opposing mountain of Attica, were spreading over them. Around the islet of Psyttaleia in the strait the brown fisher-boats were gliding. Beyond the strait opened the blue hill-girdled bay of Eleusis, now turning to fire in the evening sun. Everything was peaceful, silent, beautiful. Again Glaucon rested on his oars and let his eyes wander.
“How true is the word of Thales the Sage,” he spoke; “ ‘the world is the fairest of all fair things, because it is the [pg 93]work of God.’ It cannot be that, here, between these purple hills and the glistening sea, there will come that battle beside which the strife of Achilles and Hector before Troy shall pass as nothing!”
Themistocles shook his head.
“We do not know; we are dice in the high gods’ dice-boxes.
“ ‘Man all vainly shall scan the mind of the Prince of Olympus.’
“We can say nothing wiser than that. We can but use our Attic mother wit, and trust the rest to destiny. Let us be satisfied if we hope that destiny is not blind.”