was strong; Phocis weak. It was resolved to seize all its territory and
consecrate it to Apollo. This unjust sentence roused the Phocians. A
bold citizen, Philomelus by name, told them that they must now face war
or ruin. The district of Delphi had once been theirs, and had been taken
from them wrongfully. "Let us assert our lost rights and seize the
temple," he said. "The Thebans want it; let us anticipate them and take
back our own."
His words took fire. A strong force was raised, the town and temple were
attacked, and both, being practically undefended, were quickly captured.
Phocis had regained her own, for Delphi had been taken from her during
an older "Sacred War."
Philomelus now announced that the temple and its oracles would not be
meddled with. Its treasures would be safe. Visitors would be free to
come and go. He would give any security that Greece required that the
wealth of Apollo should be safe and all go on as before. But he
fortified the town, and invited mercenary soldiers till he had an army
of five thousand men. As for the priestess of Apollo, from whose lips
the oracles came, he demanded that she should continue to be inspired as
before, and should give an oracle in his favor. The priestess refused;
whereupon he seized her and sought to drag her to the holy tripod on
which she was accustomed to sit. The woman, scared by his violence,
cried out, "You may do what you choose!"
Philomelus at once proclaimed this as an oracle in his favor, and
published it widely. And it is interesting to learn that many of the
superstitious Greeks took his word for it. He certainly took the word of
the priestess,--for he did what he chose.
War at once began. Many of the Greek states rose at the call of the
condemned Amphictyonic Council. The Phocians were in imminent peril.
They were far from strong enough for the war they had invoked. Mercenary
troops--"soldiers of fortune"--must be hired; and to hire them money
must be had. The citizens of Delphi had already been taxed; the Phocian
treasury was empty; where was money to be obtained?
Philomelus settled this question by _borrowing_, with great reluctance,
a sum from the temple treasures,--to be paid back as soon as possible.
But as the war went on and more money was needed, he borrowed again and
again,--now without reluctance. And the practice of robbery once
started, he not only paid his troops, but enriched his friends and
adorned his wife from Apollo's hoarded wealth.
By this means Philomelus got together an army of ten thousand
men,--reckless, dissolute characters, the impious scum of Greece, for no
pious Greek would enlist in such a cause. The war was ferocious. The
allies put their prisoners to death. Philomelus followed their example.
This was a losing game, and both sides gave it up. At length Philomelus
and his army were caught in an awkward position, the army was dispersed,
and he driven to the verge of a precipice, where he must choose between
captivity or death. He chose the latter and leaped from the beetling
crags.
The Thebans and their allies foolishly believed that with the death of
Philomelus the war was at an end, and marched for their homes.
Onomarchus, another Phocian leader, took the opportunity thus afforded
to gather the scattered army together again, seized the temple once
more, and stood in defiance of all his foes.
In addition to gold and silver, the treasury contained many gifts in
brass and iron. The precious metals were melted and converted into
money; of the baser metals arms were made. Onomarchus went farther than
Philomelus; he not only paid his troops with the treasure, but bribed
the leaders of Grecian states, and thus gained powerful friends. He was
soon successfully at war, drove back his foes, and pressed his conquests
till he had captured Thermopylae and invaded Thessaly.
Here the Phocians came into contact with a foe dangerous to themselves
and to all Greece. This foe was the celebrated Philip of Macedonia, a
famous soldier who was to play a leading part in the subsequent game. He
had long been paving the way to the conquest of Greece, and the Sacred
War gave him just the opportunity he wanted.
Macedonia lay north of Greece. Its people were not Greeks, nor like
Greeks in their customs. They lived in the country, not in cities, and
had little or none of the culture of Greece. But they were the stuff
from which good soldiers are made. Hitherto this country had been hardly
thought of as an element in the Grecian problem. Its kings were despots
who had been kept busy with their foes at home. But now a king had
arisen of wider views and larger mould. Philip had spent his youth in
Thebes, where he had learned the art of war under Epaminondas. On coming
to the throne he quickly proved himself a great soldier and a keen and
cunning politician. By dint of war and trickery he rapidly spread his
dominions until all his home foes were subdued, Macedonia was greatly
extended, and Thessaly, the most northern state of Greece, was overrun.
Therefore the invasion of Thessaly by the Phocians brought them into
contact with the Macedonians. At first Onomarchus was successful. He won
two battles and drove Philip back to his native state. But another large
army was quickly in the field, and this time the army of Onomarchus was
utterly beaten and himself slain. As for Philip, although he probably
cared not an iota for the Delphian god, he shrewdly professed to be on a
crusade against the impious Phocians, and drowned all his prisoners as
guilty of sacrilege.
A third leader, Phayllus by name, now took command of the Phocians, and
the temple of Apollo was rifled still more freely than before. The
splendid gifts of King Croesus had not yet been touched. They were
held too precious to be meddled with. But Phayllus did not hesitate to
turn these into money. One hundred and seventeen ingots of gold and
three hundred and sixty golden goblets went to the melting-pot, and with
them a golden statue three cubits high and a lion of the same precious
metal. And what added to the horror of pious Greece was that much of the
proceeds of these precious treasures was lavished on favorites. The
necklaces of Helen and Eriphyle were given to dissolute women, and a
woman flute-player received a silver cup and a golden wreath from the
temple hoard.
All this gave Philip of Macedonia the desired pretence. He marched
against the Phocians, who held Thermopylae, while keeping his Athenian
enemies quiet by lies and bribes. The leader of the Phocian garrison,
finding that no aid came from the Athenian fleet, surrendered to
Philip, and that astute monarch won what he had long schemed for, the
Pass of Thermopylae, the Key of Greece.
The Sacred War was at an end, and with it virtually the independence of
Greece. Phocis was in the hands of Philip, who professed more than ever
to be the defender and guardian of Apollo. All the towns in Phocis were
broken up into villages, and the inhabitants were ordered to be fined
ten talents annually till they had paid back all they had stolen from
the temple. Philip gave back the temple to the Delphians, and was
himself voted into membership in the Amphictyonic assembly in place of
the discarded Phocians. And all this took place while a treaty of peace
tied the hands of the Greeks. The Sacred War had served as a splendid
pretext to carry out the ambitious plans of the Macedonian king.
We have now a long story to tell in a few words. Another people, the
Locrians, had also made an invasion on Delphian territory. The
Amphictyonic Council called on Philip to punish them, He at once marched
southward, but, instead of meddling with the Locrians, seized and
fortified a town in Phocis. At once Athens, full of alarm, declared war,
and Philip was as quick to declare war in return. Both sides sought the
support of Thebes, and Athens gained it. In August, 338 B.C., the
Grecian and Macedonian armies met and fought a decisive battle near
Chaeronea, a Boeotian town. In this great contest Alexander the Great
took part.
It was a hotly-contested fight, but in the end Philip triumphed, and
Greece was lost. Thebes was forced to yield. Athens, to regain the
prisoners held by Philip, acknowledged him to be the head of Greece. All
the other states did the same except Sparta, which defied him. He
ravaged Laconia, but left the city untouched.
Two years afterwards Philip, lord and master of Greece, was assassinated
at the marriage feast of his daughter. His son Alexander succeeded him.
Here seemed an opportunity for Greece to regain her freedom. This
untried young man could surely not retain what his able father had won.
Demosthenes, the celebrated orator, stirred up Athens to revolt. Thebes
sprang to arms and attacked the Macedonian garrison in the citadel.
They did not know the man with whom they had to deal. Alexander came
upon Thebes like an avalanche, took it by assault, and sold into slavery
all the inhabitants not slain in the assault. The city was razed to the
ground. This terrible example dismayed the rest of Greece.
Submission--with the exception of that of Sparta--was universal. The
independence of Greece was at an end. More than two thousand years were
to pass before that country would again be free.
_ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND DARIUS._
In the citadel of Gordium, an ancient town of Phrygia in Asia Minor, was
preserved an old wagon, rudely built, and very primitive in structure.
Tradition said that it had originally belonged to the peasant Gordius
and his son Midas, rustic chiefs who had been selected by the gods and
chosen by the people as the primitive kings of Phrygia. The cord which
attached the yoke of this wagon to the pole, composed of fibres from the
bark of the cornel tree, was tied into a knot so twisted and entangled
that it seemed as if the fingers of the gods themselves must have tied
it, so intricate was it and so impossible, seemingly, to untie.
An oracle had declared that the man who should untie this famous knot
would become lord and monarch of all Asia. As may well be imagined, many
ambitious men sought to perform the task, but all in vain. The Gordian
knot remained tied and Asia unconquered in the year 333 B.C., when
Alexander of Macedon, who the year before had invaded Asia, and so far
had swept all before him, entered Gordium with his victorious army. As
may be surmised, it was not long before he sought the citadel to view
this ancient relic, which contained within itself the promise of what he
had set out to accomplish. Numbers followed him, Phrygians and
Macedonians, curious to see if the subtle knot would yield to his
conquering hand, the Macedonians with hope, the Phrygians with doubt.
While the multitude stood in silent and curious expectation, Alexander
closely examined the knot, looking in vain for some beginning or end to
its complexity. The thing perplexed him. Was he who had never yet failed
in any undertaking to be baffled by this piece of rope, this twisted
obstacle in the way of success? At length, with that angry impatience
which was a leading element in his character, he drew his sword, and
with one vigorous stroke severed the cord in two.
At once a shout went up. The problem was solved; the knot was severed;
the genius of Alexander had led him to the only means. He had made good
his title to the empire of Asia, and was hailed as predestined conqueror
by his admiring followers. That night came a storm of thunder and
lightning which confirmed the belief, the superstitious Macedonians
taking it as the testimony of the gods that the oracle was fulfilled.
Had there been no Gordian knot and no oracle, Alexander would probably
have become lord of the empire of Asia all the same, and this not only
because he was the best general of his time and one of the best generals
of all time, but for two other excellent reasons. One was that his
father, Philip, had bequeathed to him the best army of the age. The
Greeks had proved, nearly two centuries before, that their military
organization and skill were far superior to those of the Persians.
During the interval there had been no progress in the army of Persia,
while Epaminondas had greatly improved the military art in Greece, and
Philip of Macedon, his pupil, had made of the Macedonian army a fighting
machine such as the world had never before known. This was the army
which, with still further improvements, Alexander was leading into Asia
to meet the multitudinous but poorly armed and disciplined Persian host.
The second reason was that Alexander, while the best captain of his age,
had opposed to him the worst. It was the misfortune of Persia that a new
king, Darius Codomannus by name, had just come to the throne, and was to
prove himself utterly incapable of leading an army, unless it was to
lead it in flight. It was not only Alexander's great ability, but his
marvellous good fortune, which led to his immense success.
The Persians had had a good general in Asia Minor,--Memnon, a Greek of
the island of Rhodes. But just at this time this able leader died, and
Darius took the command on himself. He could hardly have selected a man
from his ranks who would not have made a better commander-in-chief.
Gathering a vast army from his wide-spread dominions, a host six hundred
thousand strong, the Persian king marched to meet his foe. He brought
with him an enormous weight of baggage, there being enough gold and
silver alone to load six hundred mules and three hundred camels; and so
confident was he of success that he also brought his mother, wife, and
children, and his whole harem, that they might witness his triumph over
the insolent Macedonian.
Darius took no steps to guard any of the passes of Asia Minor. Why
should he seek to keep back this foe, who was marching blindly to his
fate? But instead of waiting for Alexander on the plain, where he could
have made use of his vast force, he marched into the defile of Issus,
where there was only a mile and a half of open ground between the
mountains and the sea, and where his vanguard alone could be brought
into action. In this defile the two armies met, the fighting part of
each being, through the folly of the Persian king, not greatly different
in numbers.
The blunder of Darius was soon made fatal by his abject cowardice. The
Macedonians having made a sudden assault on the Persian left wing, it
gave way and fled. Darius, who was in his chariot in the centre, seeing
himself in danger from this flight, suddenly lost his over-confidence,
and in a panic of terror turned his chariot and fled with wild haste
from the field. When he reached ground over which the chariot could not
pass, he mounted hastily on horseback, flung from him his bow, shield,
and royal mantle, and rode in mortal terror away, not having given a
single order or made the slightest effort to rally his flying troops.
Darius had been sole commander. His flight left the great army without a
leader. Not a man remained who could give a general order. Those who saw
him flying were infected with his terror and turned to flee also. The
vast host in the rear trampled one another down in their wild haste to
get beyond the enemy's reach. The Macedonians must have looked on in
amazement. The battle--or what ought to have been a battle--was over
before it had fairly begun. The Persian right wing, in which was a body
of Greeks, made a hard fight; but these Greeks, on finding that the king
had fled, marched in good order away. The Persian cavalry, also, fought
bravely until they heard that the king had disappeared, when they also
turned to fly. Never had so great a host been so quickly routed, and all
through the cowardice of a man who was better fitted by nature to turn a
spit than to command an army.
[Illustration: THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT.]
But Alexander was not the man to let his enemy escape unscathed. His
pursuit was vigorous. The slaughter of the fugitives was frightful.
Thousands were trodden to death in the narrow and broken pass. The camp
and the family of Darius were taken, together with a great treasure in
coin. The slain in all numbered more than one hundred thousand.
The panic flight of Darius and his utter lack of ability did more than
lose him a battle: it lost him an empire. Never was there a battle with
more complete and great results. During the next two years Alexander
went to work to conquer western Persia. Most of the cities yielded to
him. Tyre resisted, and was taken and destroyed. Gaza, another strong
city, was captured and its defenders slain. These two cities, which it
took nine months to capture, gave Alexander the hardest fighting he
ever had. He marched from Gaza to Egypt, which fell without resistance
into his hands, and where he built the great city of Alexandria, the
only existing memento of his name and deeds. Thence he marched to the
Euphrates, wondering where Darius was and what he meant to do. Nearly
two years had passed since the battle of Issus, and the kingly poltroon
had apparently contented himself with writing letters begging Alexander
to restore his family. But Alexander knew too well what a treasure he
held to consent. If Darius would acknowledge him as his lord and master
he could have back his wife and children, but not otherwise.
Finding that all this was useless, Darius began to collect another army.
He now got together a vaster host than before. It was said to contain
one million infantry, forty thousand cavalry, and two hundred chariots,
each of which had a projecting pole with a sharp point, while three
sword-blades stood out from the yoke on either side, and scythes
projected from the naves of the wheels. Darius probably expected to mow
down the Macedonians in swaths with these formidable implements of war.
The army which Alexander marched against this mighty host consisted of
forty thousand foot and seven thousand horse. It looked like the extreme
of foolhardiness, like a pigmy advancing against a giant; yet Darius
commanded one army, Alexander the other, and Issus had not been
forgotten.
The affair, in fact, proved but a repetition of that at Issus. The
chariots, on which Darius had counted to break the enemy's line, proved
useless. Some of the horses were killed; others refused to face the
Macedonian pikes; some were scared by the noise and turned back; the few
that reached the Greek lines found the ranks opened to let them pass.
The chariots thus disposed of, the whole Macedonian line charged.
Alexander, at the head of his cavalry, pushed straight for the person of
Darius. He could not get near the king, who was well protected, but he
got near enough to fill his dastard soul with terror. The sight of the
serried ranks of the Macedonian phalanx, the terrific noise of their
war-cries, the failure of the chariots, all combined to destroy his late
confidence and replace it by dread. As at Issus, he suddenly had his
chariot turned round and rushed from the field in full flight.
His attendants followed. The troops around him, the best in the army,
gave way. Soon the field was dense with fugitives. So thick was the
cloud of dust raised by the flying multitude that nothing could be seen.
Amid the darkness were heard a wild clamor of voices and the noise of
the whips of the charioteers as they urged their horses to speed. The
cloud of dust alone saved Darius from capture by the pursuing horsemen.
The left of the Persian army fought bravely, but at length it too gave
way. Everything was captured,--camp, treasure, the king's equipage,
everything but the king himself. How many were killed and taken is not
known, but the army, as an army, ceased to exist. As at Issus, so at
Arbela, it was so miserably managed that three-fourths of it had nothing
whatever to do with the battle. Its dispersal ended the Persian
resistance; the empire was surrendered to Alexander almost without
another blow.
Great a soldier as Alexander unquestionably was, he was remarkably
favored by fortune, and won the greatest empire the world had up to that
time known with hardly an effort, and with less loss of men than often
takes place in a single battle. The treasure gained was immense. Darius
seemed to have been heaping up wealth for his conqueror. Babylon and
Susa, the two great capitals of the Persian empire, contained vast
accumulations of money, part of which was used to enrich the soldiers of
the victorious army. At Persepolis, the capital of ancient Persia, a
still greater treasure was found, amounting to one hundred and twenty
thousand talents in gold and silver, or about one hundred and
twenty-five million dollars. It took five thousand camels and a host of
mules to transport the treasure away. The cruel conqueror rewarded the
Persians for this immense gift, kept through generations for his hands,
by burning the city and slaughtering its inhabitants, in revenge, as he
declared, for the harm which Xerxes had done to Greece a century and a
half before.
What followed must be told in a few words. The conqueror did not feel
that his work was finished while Darius remained free. The dethroned
king was flying eastward to Bactria. Alexander pursued him with such
speed that many of his men and animals fell dead on the road. He
overtook him at last, but did not capture him, as the companions of the
Persian king killed him and left only his dead body to the victor's
hands.
For years afterwards Alexander was occupied in war, subduing the eastern
part of the empire, and marching into India, where he conquered all
before him. War, incessant war, was all he cared for. No tribe or nation
he met was able to stand against his army. In all his career he never
met a reverse in the field. He was as daring as Darius had been
cowardly, exposed his life freely, and was more than once seriously
wounded, but recovered quickly from his hurts.
At length, after eleven years of almost incessant war, the conqueror
returned to Babylon, and here, while preparing for new wars in Arabia
and elsewhere, indulged with reckless freedom in that intoxication which
was his principal form of relaxation from warlike schemes and duties. As
a result he was seized with fever, and in a week's time died, just at
the time he had fixed to set out with army and fleet on another great
career of conquest. It was in June, 323 B.C., in his thirty-third year.
He had reigned only twelve years and eight months.
_THE WORLD'S GREATEST ORATOR._
During the days of the decline of Athens, the centre of thought to
Greece, there roamed about the streets of that city a delicate, sickly
lad, so feeble in frame that, at his mother's wish, he kept away from
the gymnasium, lest the severe exercises there required should do him
more harm than good. His delicate clothing and effeminate habits were
derided by his playmates, who nicknamed him Batalus, after, we are told,
a spindle-shanked flute-player. We do not know, however, just what
Batalus means.
As the boy was not fit for vigorous exercise, and never likely to make a
hardy soldier or sailor, it became a question for what he was best
fitted. If the body could not be exercised, the mind might be. At that
time Athens had its famous schools of philosophy and rhetoric, and the
art of oratory was diligently cultivated. It is interesting to know that
outside of Athens Greece produced no orators, if we except Epaminondas
of Thebes. The Boeotians, who dwelt north of Attica, were looked upon
as dull-brained and thick-witted. The Spartans prided themselves on
their few words and hard blows.
The Athenians, on the contrary, were enthusiastically fond of oratory,
and ardently cultivated fluency of speech. It was by this art that
Themistocles kept the fleet together for the great battle of Salamis. It
was by this art that Pericles so long held control of Athens. The
sophists, the philosophers, the leaders of the assembly, were all adepts
in the art of convincing by eloquence and argument, and oratory
progressed until, in the later days of Grecian freedom, Athens possessed
a group of public speakers who have never been surpassed, if equalled,
in the history of the world.