CHAPTER XX. THE BATTLES OF ARTEMISIUM AND SALAMIS

A king sate on the rocky brow

Which looks o’er sea-born Salamis;

And ships, by thousands, lay below,

And men in nations;--all were his,

He counted them at break of day,

And when the sun set where were they?

--BYRON.

[Sidenote: [480 B.C.]]

The days of battle at Thermopylæ had been not less actively employed by

the fleets at Aphetæ and Artemisium. It has already been mentioned that

the Greek ships, having abandoned their station at the latter place and

retired to Chalcis, were induced to return, by the news that the Persian

fleet had been nearly ruined by the recent storm, and that, on returning

to Artemisium, the Grecian commanders felt renewed alarm on seeing the

enemy’s fleet, in spite of the damage just sustained, still mustering

in overwhelming number at the opposite station of Aphetæ. Such was the

effect of this spectacle, and the impression of their own inferiority,

that they again resolved to retire without fighting, leaving the strait

open and undefended. Great consternation was caused by the news of their

determination among the inhabitants of Eubœa, who entreated Eurybiades

to maintain his position for a few days, until they could have time to

remove their families and their property. But even such postponement was

thought unsafe, and refused: and he was on the point of giving orders for

retreat, when the Eubœans sent their envoy, Pelagon, to Themistocles,

with the offer of thirty talents, on condition that the fleet should

keep its station and hazard an engagement in defence of the island.

Themistocles employed the money adroitly and successfully, giving five

talents to Eurybiades, with large presents besides to the other leading

chiefs: the most unmanageable among them was the Corinthian Adimantus,

who at first threatened to depart with his own squadron alone, if the

remaining Greeks were mad enough to remain. His alarm was silenced, if

not tranquillised, by a present of three talents.

However Plutarch may be scandalised at such inglorious revelations

preserved to us by Herodotus respecting the underhand agencies of this

memorable struggle, there is no reason to call in question the bribery

here described. But Themistocles doubtless was only tempted to do,

and enabled to do, by means of the Eubœan money, that which he would

have wished and had probably tried to accomplish without the money--to

bring on a naval engagement at Artemisium. It was absolutely essential

to the maintenance of Thermopylæ, and to the general plan of defence,

that the Eubœan strait should be defended against the Persian fleet,

nor could the Greeks expect a more favourable position to fight in. We

may reasonably presume that Themistocles, distinguished not less by

daring than by sagacity, and the great originator of maritime energies

in his country, concurred unwillingly in the projected abandonment of

Artemisium: but his high mental capacity did not exclude that pecuniary

corruption which rendered the presents of the Eubœans both admissible and

welcome--yet still more welcome to him perhaps, as they supplied means

of bringing over the other opposing chiefs and the Spartan admiral. It

was finally determined, therefore, to remain, and if necessary, to hazard

an engagement in the Eubœan strait: but at any rate to procure for the

inhabitants of the island a short interval to remove their families.

Had these Eubœans heeded the oracles, says Herodotus, they would have

packed up and removed long before; for a text of Bacis gave them express

warning; but, having neglected the sacred writings as unworthy of credit,

they were now severely punished for such presumption.

Among the Persian fleet at Aphetæ, on the other hand, the feeling

prevalent was one of sanguine hope and confidence in their superior

numbers, forming a strong contrast with the discouragement of the Greeks

at Artemisium. Had they attacked the latter immediately, when both fleets

first saw each other from their opposite stations, they would have gained

an easy victory, for the Greek fleet would have fled, as the admiral

was on the point of ordering, even without an attack. But this was not

sufficient for the Persians, who wished to cut off every ship among their

enemies even from flight and escape. Accordingly, they detached two

hundred ships to circumnavigate the island of Eubœa, and to sail up the

Eubœan strait from the south, in the rear of the Greeks,--and postponing

their own attack in front until this squadron should be in position to

intercept the retreating Greeks. But though the manœuvre was concealed

by sending the squadron round outside of the island of Sciathus, it

became known immediately among the Greeks, through a deserter--Scyllias

of Scione. This man, the best swimmer and diver of his time, and now

engaged like other Thracian Greeks in the Persian service, passed over to

Artemisium, and communicated to the Greek commanders both the particulars

of the late destructive storm and the despatch of the intercepting

squadron.

BATTLE OF ARTEMISIUM

It appears that his communications, respecting the effects of the storm

and the condition of the Persian fleet, somewhat reassured the Greeks,

who resolved during the ensuing night to sail from their station at

Artemisium for the purpose of surprising the detached squadron of two

hundred ships, and who even became bold enough, under the inspirations of

Themistocles, to go out and offer battle to the main fleet near Aphetæ.

Wanting to acquire some practical experience, which neither leaders nor

soldiers as yet possessed, of the manner in which Phœnicians and others

in the Persian fleet handled and manœuvred their ships, they waited

till a late hour of the afternoon, when little daylight remained. Their

boldness in thus advancing out, with inferior numbers and even inferior

ships, astonished the Persian admirals, and distressed the Ionians and

other subject Greeks who were serving them as unwilling auxiliaries: to

both it seemed that the victory of the Persian fleet, which was speedily

brought forth to battle, and was numerous enough to encompass the Greeks,

would be certain as well as complete. The Greek ships were at first

marshalled in a circle, with the sterns in the interior, and presenting

their prows in front at all points of the circumference; in this

position, compressed into a narrow space, they seemed to be awaiting the

attack of the enemy, who formed a larger circle around them: but on a

second signal given, their ships assumed the aggressive, rowed out from

the inner circle in direct impact against the hostile ships around, and

took or disabled no less than thirty of them; in one of which Philaon,

brother of Gorgus, despot of Salamis in Cyprus, was made prisoner. Such

unexpected forwardness at first disconcerted the Persians, who however

rallied and inflicted considerable damage and loss on the Greeks: but the

near approach of night put an end to the combat, and each fleet retired

to its former station--the Persians to Aphetæ, the Greeks to Artemisium.

The result of this first day’s combat, though indecisive in itself,

surprised both parties and did much to exalt the confidence of the

Greeks. But the events of the ensuing night did yet more. Another

tremendous storm was sent by the gods to aid them. Though it was the

middle of summer,--a season when rain rarely falls in the climate of

Greece,--the most violent wind, rain, and thunder prevailed during the

whole night, blowing right on shore against the Persians at Aphetæ,

and thus but little troublesome to the Greeks on the opposite side of

the strait. The seamen of the Persian fleet, scarcely recovered from

the former storm at Sepias Acte, were almost driven to despair by this

repetition of the same peril: the more so when they found the prows

of their ships surrounded, and the play of their oars impeded, by the

dead bodies and the spars from the recent battle, which the current

drove towards their shore. If this storm was injurious to the main

fleet at Aphetæ, it proved the entire ruin of the squadron detached to

circumnavigate Eubœa, who, overtaken by it near the dangerous eastern

coast of that island, called the Hollows of Eubœa, were driven upon the

rocks and wrecked. The news of this second conspiracy of the elements, or

intervention of the gods, against the schemes of the invaders, was highly

encouraging to the Greeks; and the seasonable arrival of fifty-three

fresh Athenian ships, which reinforced them the next day, raised them to

a still higher pitch of confidence. In the afternoon of the same day,

they sailed out against the Persian fleet at Aphetæ, and attacked and

destroyed some Cilician ships even at their moorings; the fleet having

been too much damaged by the storm of the preceding night to come out and

fight.

But the Persian admirals were not of a temper to endure such

insults,--still less to let their master hear of them. About noon on

the ensuing day, they sailed with their entire fleet near to the Greek

station at Artemisium, and formed themselves into a half moon; while the

Greeks kept near to the shore, so that they could not be surrounded,

nor could the Persians bring their entire fleet into action; the ships

running foul of each other, and not finding space to attack. The battle

raged fiercely all day, and with great loss and damage on both sides: the

Egyptians bore off the palm of valour among the Persians, the Athenians

among the Greeks. Though the positive loss sustained by the Persians was

by far the greater, and though the Greeks, being near their own shore,

became masters of the dead bodies as well as of the disabled ships

and floating fragments, still, they were themselves hurt and crippled

in greater proportion with reference to their inferior total: and the

Athenian vessels especially, foremost in the preceding combat, found

one-half of their number out of condition to renew it. The Egyptians

alone had captured five Grecian ships with their entire crews.

Under these circumstances, the Greek leaders--and Themistocles, as it

seems, among them--determined that they could no longer venture to

hold the position of Artemisium, but must withdraw the naval force

farther into Greece: though this was in fact a surrender of the pass

of Thermopylæ, and though the removal which the Eubœans were hastening

was still unfinished. These unfortunate men were forced to be satisfied

with the promise of Themistocles to give them convoy for their boats and

their persons; abandoning their sheep and cattle for the consumption of

the fleet, as better than leaving them to become booty for the enemy.

While the Greeks were thus employed in organising their retreat, they

received news which rendered retreat doubly necessary. The Athenian

Abronychus, stationed with his ship near Thermopylæ, in order to keep

up communication between the army and fleet, brought the disastrous

intelligence that Xerxes was already master of the pass, and that the

division of Leonidas was either destroyed or in flight. Upon this the

fleet abandoned Artemisium forthwith, and sailed up the Eubœan strait;

the Corinthian ships in the van, the Athenians bringing up the rear.

Themistocles, conducting the latter, stayed long enough at the various

watering-stations and landing-places to inscribe on some neighbouring

stones invitations to the Ionian contingents serving under Xerxes:

whereby the latter were conjured not to serve against their fathers, but

to desert, if possible--or at least, to fight as little and as backwardly

as they could. Themistocles hoped by this stratagem perhaps to detach

some of the Ionians from the Persian side, or, at any rate, to render

them objects of mistrust, and thus to diminish their efficiency. With no

longer delay than was requisite for such inscriptions, he followed the

remaining fleet, which sailed round the coast of Attica, not stopping

until it reached the island of Salamis.

The news of the retreat of the Greek fleet was speedily conveyed by a

citizen of Histiæa to the Persians at Aphetæ, who at first disbelieved

it, and detained the messenger until they had sent to ascertain the fact.

On the next day, their fleet passed across to the north of Eubœa, and

became master of Histiæa and the neighbouring territory: from whence

many of them, by permission and even invitation of Xerxes, crossed over

to Thermopylæ to survey the field of battle and the dead. Respecting the

number of the dead, Xerxes is asserted to have deliberately imposed upon

the spectators: he buried all his own dead, except one thousand, whose

bodies were left out--while the total number of Greeks who had perished

at Thermopylæ, four thousand in number, were all left exposed, and in

one heap, so as to create an impression that their loss had been much

more severe than their own. Moreover, the bodies of the slain helots were

included in the heap, all of them passing for Spartans or Thespians in

the estimation of the spectators. We are not surprised to hear, however,

that this trick, gross and public as it must have been, really deceived

very few.

The sentiment, alike durable and unanimous, with which the Greeks of

after-times looked back on the battle of Thermopylæ, and which they have

communicated to all subsequent readers, was that of just admiration

for the courage and patriotism of Leonidas and his band. But among the

contemporary Greeks that sentiment, though doubtless sincerely felt,

was by no means predominant: it was overpowered by the more pressing

emotions of disappointment and terror. So confident were the Spartans

and Peloponnesians in the defensibility of Thermopylæ and Artemisium,

that when the news of the disaster reached them, not a single soldier

had yet been put in motion: the season of the festival games had passed,

but no active step had yet been taken. Meanwhile the invading force,

army, and fleet, was in its progress towards Attica and the Peloponnesus,

without the least preparations--and, what was still worse, without any

combined and concerted plan--for defending the heart of Greece. The loss

sustained by Xerxes at Thermopylæ, insignificant in proportion to his

vast total, was more than compensated by the fresh Grecian auxiliaries

which he now acquired. Not merely the Malians, Locrians, and Dorians,

but also the great mass of the Bœotians, with their chief town Thebes,

all except Thespiæ and Platæa, now joined him. Demaratus, his Spartan

companion, moved forward to Thebes to renew an ancient tie of hospitality

with the Theban oligarchical leader, Attaginus, while small garrisons

were sent by Alexander of Macedon to most of the Bœotian towns, as well

to protect them from plunder as to insure their fidelity. The Thespians,

on the other hand, abandoned their city, and fled into the Peloponnesus;

while the Platæans, who had been serving aboard the Athenian ships

at Artemisium, were disembarked at Chalcis as the fleet retreated,

for the purpose of marching by land to their city, and removing their

families. Nor was it only the land-force of Xerxes which had been thus

strengthened; his fleet also had received some accessions from Carystus

in Eubœa, and from several of the Cyclades--so that the losses sustained

by the storm at Sepias and the fights at Artemisium, if not wholly made

up, were at least in part repaired, while the fleet remained still

prodigiously superior in number to that of the Greeks.

At the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, near fifty years after these

events, the Corinthian envoys reminded Sparta that she had allowed

Xerxes time to arrive from the extremity of the earth at the threshold

of the Peloponnesus, before she took any adequate precautions against

him; a reproach true almost to the letter. It was only when roused and

terrified by the news of the death of Leonidas, that the Lacedæmonians

and the other Peloponnesians began to put forth their full strength. But

it was then too late to perform the promise made to Athens, of taking up

a position in Bœotia so as to protect Attica. To defend the isthmus of

Corinth was all that they now thought of, and seemingly all that was now

open to them: thither they rushed with all their available population

under the conduct of Cleombrotus, king of Sparta (brother of Leonidas),

and began to draw fortifications across it, as well as to break up

the Scironian road from Megara to Corinth, with every mark of anxious

energy. The Lacedæmonians, Arcadians, Eleans, Corinthians, Sicyonians,

Epidaurians, Phliasians, Trœzenians, and Hermionians, were all present

here in full numbers; many myriads of men (bodies of ten thousand each)

working and bringing materials night and day. As a defence to themselves

against attack by land, this was an excellent position: they considered

it as their last chance, abandoning all hope of successful resistance at

sea. But they forgot that a fortified isthmus was no protection even to

themselves against the navy of Xerxes, while it professedly threw out

not only Attica, but also Megara and Ægina. And thus rose a new peril

to Greece from the loss of Thermopylæ: no other position could be found

which, like that memorable strait, comprehended and protected at once all

the separate cities. The disunion thus produced brought them within a

hair’s breadth of ruin.

ATHENS ABANDONED

If the causes of alarm were great for the Peloponnesians, yet more

desperate did the position of the Athenians appear. Expecting, according

to agreement, to find a Peloponnesian army in Bœotia ready to sustain

Leonidas, or at any rate to co-operate in the defence of Attica, they

had taken no measures to remove their families or property: but they

saw with indignant disappointment as well as dismay, on retreating from

Artemisium, that the conqueror was in full march from Thermopylæ, that

the road to Attica was open to him, and that the Peloponnesians were

absorbed exclusively in the defence of their own isthmus and their own

separate existence. The fleet from Artemisium had been directed to muster

at the harbour of Trœzen, there to await such reinforcements as could be

got together: but the Athenians entreated Eurybiades to halt at Salamis,

so as to allow them a short time for consultation in the critical state

of their affairs, and to aid them in the transport of their families.

While Eurybiades was thus staying at Salamis, several new ships which had

reached Trœzen came over to join him; and in this way Salamis became for

a time the naval station of the Greeks, without any deliberate intention

beforehand.

Meanwhile Themistocles and the Athenian seamen landed at Phalerum, and

made their mournful entry into Athens. Gloomy as the prospect appeared,

there was little room for difference of opinion, and still less room

for delay. The authorities and the public assembly at once issued a

proclamation, enjoining every Athenian to remove his family out of the

country in the best way he could. We may conceive the state of tumult and

terror which followed on this unexpected proclamation, when we reflect

that it had to be circulated and acted upon throughout all Attica, from

Sunium to Oropus, within the narrow space of less than six days; for no

longer interval elapsed before Xerxes actually arrived at Athens, where

indeed he might have arrived even sooner.

The whole Grecian fleet was doubtless employed in carrying out the

helpless exiles; mostly to Trœzen, where a kind reception and generous

support were provided for them,--the Trœzenian population being seemingly

semi-Ionic, and having ancient relations of religion as well as of

traffic with Athens,--but in part also to Ægina: there were, however,

many who could not, or would not, go farther than Salamis. Themistocles

impressed upon the sufferers that they were only obeying the oracle,

which had directed them to abandon the city and to take refuge behind

the wooden walls; and either his policy, or the mental depression of the

time, gave circulation to other stories, intimating that even the divine

inmates of the Acropolis were for a while deserting it. In the ancient

temple of Athene Polias on that rock, there dwelt, or was believed

to dwell, as guardian to the sanctuary and familiar attendant of the

goddess, a sacred serpent, for whose nourishment a honey cake was placed

once in the month. The honey cake had been hitherto regularly consumed;

but at this fatal moment the priestess announced that it remained

untouched: the sacred guardian had thus set the example of quitting the

acropolis, and it behooved the citizens to follow the example, confiding

in the goddess herself for future return and restitution.

The migration of so many ancient men, women, and children, was a scene

of tears and misery inferior only to that which would have ensued on the

actual capture of the city.[31] Some few individuals, too poor to hope

for maintenance, or too old to care for life elsewhere,--confiding,

moreover, in their own interpretation of the wooden wall which the

Pythian priestess had pronounced to be inexpugnable,--shut themselves up

in the Acropolis along with the administrators of the temple, obstructing

the entrance or western front with wooden doors and palisades. When we

read how great were the sufferings of the population of Attica near

half a century afterwards, compressed for refuge within the spacious

fortifications of Athens at the first outbreak of the Peloponnesian War,

we may form some faint idea of the incalculably greater misery which

overwhelmed an emigrant population, hurrying, they knew not whither, to

escape the long arm of Xerxes. Little chance did there seem that they

would ever revisit their homes except as his slaves.

In the midst of circumstances thus calamitous and threatening, neither

the warriors nor the leaders of Athens lost their energy--arm as well

as mind was strung to the loftiest pitch of human resolution. Political

dissensions were suspended: Themistocles proposed to the people a decree,

and obtained their sanction, inviting home all who were under sentence of

temporary banishment: moreover, he not only included but even specially

designated among them his own great opponent Aristides, now in the

third year of ostracism. Xanthippus the accuser, and Cimon, the son of

Miltiades, were partners in the same emigration: the latter, enrolled by

his scale of fortune among the horsemen of the state, was seen with his

companions cheerfully marching through the Ceramicus to dedicate their

bridles in the Acropolis, and to bring away in exchange some of the

sacred arms there suspended, thus setting an example of ready service on

shipboard, instead of on horseback. It was absolutely essential to obtain

supplies of money, partly for the aid of the poorer exiles, but still

more for the equipment of the fleet; there were no funds in the public

treasury--but the senate of Areopagus, then composed in large proportion

of men from the wealthier classes, put forth all its public authority

as well as its private contributions and example to others, and thus

succeeded in raising the sum of eight drachmæ for every soldier serving.

This timely help was indeed partly obtained by the inexhaustible resource

of Themistocles, who, in the hurry of embarkation, either discovered or

pretended that the Gorgon’s head from the statue of Athene was lost,

and directing upon this ground every man’s baggage to be searched,

rendered any treasures, which private citizens might be carrying out,

available to the public service. By the most strenuous efforts, these few

important days were made to suffice for removing the whole population

of Attica,--those of military competence to the fleet at Salamis,--the

rest to some place of refuge,--together with as much property as the case

admitted. So complete was the desertion of the country, that the host

of Xerxes, when it became master, could not seize and carry off more

than five hundred prisoners. Moreover, the fleet itself, which had been

brought home from Artemisium partially disabled, was quickly repaired, so

that, by the time the Persian fleet arrived, it was again in something

like fighting condition.

THE FLEET AT SALAMIS

The combined fleet which had now got together at Salamis consisted

of three hundred and sixty-six ships,--a force far greater than at

Artemisium. Of these, no less than two hundred were Athenian; twenty

among which, however, were lent to the Chalcidians, and manned by them.

Forty Corinthian ships, thirty Æginetan, twenty Megarian, sixteen

Lacedæmonian, fifteen Sicyonian, ten Epidaurian, seven from Ambracia, and

as many from Eretria, five from Trœzen, three from Hermione, and the same

number from Leucas; two from Ceos, two from Styra, and one from Cythnos;

four from Naxos, despatched as a contingent to the Persian fleet, but

brought by the choice of their captains and seamen to Salamis;--all these

triremes, together with a small squadron of the inferior vessels called

penteconters, made up the total. From the great Grecian cities in Italy

there appeared only one trireme, a volunteer, equipped and commanded by

an eminent citizen named Phaÿllus, thrice victor at the Pythian games.

The entire fleet was thus a trifle larger than the combined force, three

hundred and fifty-eight ships, collected by the Asiatic Greeks at Lade,

fifteen years earlier, during the Ionic revolt. We may doubt, however,

whether this total, borrowed from Herodotus, be not larger than that

which actually fought a little afterwards at the battle of Salamis, and

which Æschylus gives decidedly as consisting of three hundred sail, in

addition to ten prime and chosen ships. That great poet, himself one of

the combatants, and speaking in a drama represented only seven years

after the battle, is better authority on the point even than Herodotus.

Hardly was the fleet mustered at Salamis, and the Athenian population

removed, when Xerxes and his host overran the deserted country, his fleet

occupying the roadstead of Phalerum with the coast adjoining. His land

force had been put in motion under the guidance of the Thessalians, two

or three days after the battle of Thermopylæ, and he was assured by some

Arcadians who came to seek service, that the Peloponnesians were, even at

that moment, occupied with the celebration of the Olympic games. “What

prize does the victor receive?” he asked. Upon the reply made, that the

prize was a wreath of the wild olive, Tritantæchmes, son of the monarch’s

uncle Artabanus, is said to have burst forth, notwithstanding the

displeasure both of the monarch himself and of the bystanders: “Heavens,

Mardonius, what manner of men are these against whom thou hast brought us

to fight! men who contend not for money, but for honour!” Whether this be

a remark really delivered, or a dramatic illustration imagined by some

contemporary of Herodotus, it is not the less interesting as bringing to

view a characteristic of Hellenic life, which contrasts not merely with

the manners of contemporary Orientals, but even with those of the earlier

Greeks themselves during the Homeric times.

Among all the various Greeks between Thermopylæ and the borders

of Attica, there were none except the Phocians disposed to refuse

submission: and they refused only because the paramount influence of

their bitter enemies the Thessalians made them despair of obtaining

favourable terms. Nor would they even listen to a proposition of the

Thessalians, who, boasting that it was in their power to guide as they

pleased the terrors of the Persian host, offered to insure lenient

treatment to the territory of Phocis, provided a sum of fifty talents

were paid to them. The proposition being indignantly refused, they

conducted Xerxes through the little territory of Doris, which _medised_

and escaped plunder, into the upper valley of the Cephisus, among the

towns of the inflexible Phocians. All of them were found deserted; the

inhabitants having previously escaped either to the wide-spreading

summit of Parnassus, called Tithorea, or even still farther, across that

mountain into the territory of the Ozolian Locrians. Ten or a dozen small

Phocian towns, the most considerable of which were Elatea and Hyampolis,

were sacked and destroyed by the invaders, nor was the holy temple and

oracle of Apollo at Abæ better treated than the rest: all its treasures

were pillaged, and it was then burnt. From Panopeus Xerxes detached

a body of men to plunder Delphi, marching with his main army through

Bœotia, in which country he found all the towns submissive and willing,

except Thespiæ and Platæa: both were deserted by their citizens, and

both were now burnt. From hence he conducted his army into the abandoned

territory of Attica, reaching without resistance the foot of the

Acropolis at Athens.

XERXES AT DELPHI

Very different was the fate of that division which he had detached from

Panopeus against Delphi: Apollo defended his temple here more vigorously

than at Abæ. The cupidity of the Persian king was stimulated by accounts

of the boundless wealth accumulated at Delphi, especially the profuse

donations of Crœsus. The Delphians, in the extreme of alarm, while

they sought safety for themselves on the heights of Parnassus, and for

their families by transport across the gulf into Achaia, consulted the

oracle whether they should carry away or bury the sacred treasures.

Apollo directed them to leave the treasures untouched, saying that he

was competent himself to take care of his own property. Sixty Delphians

alone ventured to remain, together with Aceratus, the religious superior:

but evidences of superhuman aid soon appeared to encourage them. The

sacred arms suspended in the interior cell, which no mortal hand was

ever permitted to touch, were seen lying before the door of the temple;

and when the Persians, marching along the road called Schiste, up that

rugged path under the steep cliffs of Parnassus which conducts to Delphi,

had reached the temple of Athene Pronœa, on a sudden, dreadful thunder

was heard, two vast mountain crags detached themselves and rushed down

with deafening noise among them, crushing many to death, the war shout

was also heard from the interior of the temple of Athene. Seized with a

panic terror, the invaders turned round and fled; pursued not only by the

Delphians, but also, as they themselves affirmed, by two armed warriors

of superhuman stature and destructive arm. The triumphant Delphians

confirmed this report, adding that the two auxiliaries were the heroes

Phylacus and Autonoüs, whose sacred precincts were close adjoining:

and Herodotus himself when he visited Delphi, saw in the sacred ground

of Athene the identical masses of rock which had overwhelmed the

Persians.[32] Thus did the god repel these invaders from his Delphian

sanctuary and treasures, which remained inviolate until one hundred and

thirty years afterwards, when they were rifled by the sacrilegious hands

of the Phocian Philomelus. On this occasion, as will be seen presently,

the real protectors of the treasures were the conquerors at Salamis and

Platæa.

ATHENS TAKEN

Four months had elapsed since the departure from Asia when Xerxes reached

Athens, the last term of his advance. He brought with him the members of

the Pisistratid family, who doubtless thought their restoration already

certain, and a few Athenian exiles attached to their interest. Though

the country was altogether deserted, the handful of men collected in the

Acropolis ventured to defy him: nor could all the persuasions of the

Pisistratids, eager to preserve the holy place from pillage, induce them

to surrender.

The Athenian Acropolis--a craggy rock rising abruptly about one hundred

and fifty feet, with a flat summit of about one thousand feet long from

east to west, by five hundred feet broad from north to south--had no

practicable access except on the western side: moreover, in all parts

where there seemed any possibility of climbing up, it was defended by the

ancient fortification called the Pelasgic wall. Obliged to take the place

by force, the Persian army was posted around the northern and western

sides, and commenced their operations from the eminence immediately

adjoining on the northwest, called Areopagus: from whence they bombarded,

if we may venture upon the expression, with hot missiles, the woodwork

before the gates; that is, they poured upon it multitudes of arrows with

burning tow attached to them. The wooden palisades and boarding presently

took fire and were consumed: but when the Persians tried to mount to the

assault by the western road leading up to the gate, the undaunted little

garrison still kept them at bay, having provided vast stones, which they

rolled down upon them in the ascent.

For a time the Great King seemed likely to be driven to the slow process

of blockade; but at length some adventurous men among the besiegers tried

to scale the precipitous rock before them on its northern side, hard

by the temple or chapel of Aglaurus, which lay nearly in front of the

Persian position, but behind the gates and the western ascent. Here the

rock was naturally so inaccessible, that it was altogether unguarded,

and seemingly even unfortified: moreover, the attention of the little

garrison was all concentrated on the host which fronted the gates. Hence

the separate escalading party was enabled to accomplish their object

unobserved, and to reach the summit in the rear of the garrison; who,

deprived of their last hope, either cast themselves headlong from the

walls, or fled for safety to the inner temple. The successful escaladers

opened the gates to the entire Persian host, and the whole Acropolis was

presently in their hands. Its defenders were slain, its temples pillaged,

and all its dwellings and buildings, sacred as well as profane, consigned

to the flames. The citadel of Athens fell into the hands of Xerxes by a

surprise, very much the same as that which had placed Sardis in those of

Cyrus.

Thus was divine prophecy fulfilled: Attica passed entirely into the hands

of the Persians, and the conflagration of Sardis was retaliated upon the

home and citadel of its captors, as it also was upon their sacred temple

of Eleusis. Xerxes immediately despatched to Susa intelligence of the

fact, which is said to have excited unmeasured demonstrations of joy,

confuting, seemingly, the gloomy predictions of his uncle Artabanus.

On the next day but one, the Athenian exiles in his suite received his

orders, or perhaps obtained his permission, to go and offer sacrifice

amidst the ruins of the Acropolis, and atone, if possible, for the

desecration of the ground: they discovered that the sacred olive tree

near the chapel of Erechtheus, the special gift of the goddess Athene,

though burnt to the ground by the recent flames, had already thrown

out a fresh shoot of one cubit long,--at least the piety of restored

Athens afterwards believed this encouraging portent, as well as that

which was said to have been seen by Dicæus, an Athenian companion of the

Pisistratids, in the Thriasian plain.

It was now the day set apart for the celebration of the Eleusinian

mysteries; and though in this sorrowful year there was no celebration,

nor any Athenians in the territory, Dicæus still fancied that he

beheld the dust and heard the loud multitudinous chant, which was wont

to accompany in ordinary times the processional march from Athens to

Eleusis. He would even have revealed the fact to Xerxes himself, had

not Demaratus deterred him from doing so: but he as well as Herodotus

construed it as an evidence that the goddesses themselves were passing

over from Eleusis to help the Athenians at Salamis. But whatever may

have been received in after times, on that day certainly no man could

believe in the speedy resurrection of conquered Athens as a free

city: not even if he had witnessed the portent of the burnt olive

tree suddenly sprouting afresh with preternatural vigour. So hopeless

did the circumstances of the Athenians then appear, not less to their

confederates assembled at Salamis than to the victorious Persians.

About the time of the capture of the Acropolis, the Persian fleet also

arrived safely in the Bay of Phalerum, reinforced by ships from Carystus

as well as from various islands of the Cyclades, so that Herodotus

reckons it to have been as strong as before the terrible storm at Sepias

Acte--an estimate certainly not admissible.

XERXES INSPECTS HIS FLEET

Soon after their arrival, Xerxes himself descended to the shore to

inspect the fleet, as well as to take counsel with the various naval

leaders about the expediency of attacking the hostile fleet, now so near

him in the narrow strait between Salamis and the coasts of Attica. He

invited them all to take their seats in an assembly, wherein the king

of Sidon occupied the first place and the king of Tyre the second. The

question was put to each of them separately by Mardonius, and when we

learn that all pronounced in favour of immediate fighting, we may be

satisfied that the decided opinion of Xerxes himself must have been

well known to them beforehand. One exception alone was found to this

unanimity,--Artemisia, queen of Halicarnassus in Caria; into whose mouth

Herodotus puts a speech of some length, deprecating all idea of fighting

in the narrow strait of Salamis, predicting that if the land-force were

moved forwards to attack the Peloponnesus, the Peloponnesians in the

fleet at Salamis would return for the protection of their own homes,

and thus the fleet would disperse, the rather as there was little or no

food in the island, and intimating, besides, unmeasured contempt for the

efficacy of the Persian fleet and seamen as compared with the Greek,

as well as for the subject contingents of Xerxes generally. That Queen

Artemisia gave this prudent counsel, there is no reason to question; and

the historian of Halicarnassus may have had means of hearing the grounds

on which her opinion rested: but we find a difficulty in believing

that she can have publicly delivered any such estimate of the maritime

subjects of Persia--an estimate not merely insulting to all who heard

it, but at the time not just, though it had come to be nearer the truth

at the time when Herodotus wrote, and though Artemisia herself may have

lived to entertain the conviction afterwards. Whatever may have been

her reasons, the historian tells us that friends as well as rivals were

astonished at her rashness in dissuading the monarch from a naval battle,

and expected that she would be put to death. But Xerxes heard the advice

with perfect good temper, and even esteemed the Carian queen the more

highly: though he resolved that the opinion of the majority, or his own

opinion, should be acted upon: and orders were accordingly issued for

attacking the next day, while the land-force should move forwards towards

the Peloponnesus.

Whilst, on the shore of Phalerum, an omnipotent will compelled seeming

unanimity and precluded all real deliberation, great, indeed, was the

contrast presented by the neighbouring Greek armament at Salamis, among

the members of which unmeasured dissension had been reigning. It has

already been stated that the Greek fleet had originally got together at

that island, not with any view of making it a naval station, but simply

in order to cover and assist the emigration of the Athenians. This object

being accomplished, and Xerxes being already in Attica, Eurybiades

convoked the chiefs to consider what position was the fittest for a naval

engagement. Most of them, especially those from the Peloponnesus, were

averse to remaining at Salamis, and proposed that the fleet should be

transferred to the isthmus of Corinth, where it would be in immediate

communication with the Peloponnesian land-force, so that in case of

defeat at sea, the ships would find protection on shore, and the men

would join in the land service--while if worsted in a naval action near

Salamis, they would be inclosed in an island from whence there were no

hopes of escape. In the midst of the debate, a messenger arrived with

news of the capture and conflagration of Athens and her Acropolis by the

Persians: and such was the terror produced by this intelligence, that

some of the chiefs, without even awaiting the conclusion of the debate

and the final vote, quitted the council forthwith, and began to hoist

sail, or prepare their rowers, for departure. The majority came to a vote

for removing to the isthmus, but as night was approaching, actual removal

was deferred until the next morning.

Now was felt the want of a position like that of Thermopylæ, which had

served as a protection to all the Greeks at once, so as to check the

growth of separate fears and interests. We can hardly wonder that the

Peloponnesian chiefs--the Corinthian in particular, who furnished so

large a naval contingent, and within whose territory the land-battle

at the isthmus seemed about to take place--should manifest such an

obstinate reluctance to fight at Salamis, and should insist on removing

to a position where, in case of naval defeat, they could assist, and

be assisted by, their own soldiers on land. On the other hand, Salamis

was not only the most favourable position, in consequence of its narrow

strait, for the inferior numbers of the Greeks, but could not be

abandoned without breaking up the unity of the allied fleet; since Megara

and Ægina would thus be left uncovered, and the contingents of each would

immediately retire for the defence of their homes, while the Athenians

also, a large portion of whose expatriated families were in Salamis and

Ægina, would be in like manner distracted from combined maritime efforts

at the isthmus. If transferred to the latter place, probably not even

the Peloponnesians themselves would have remained in one body; for the

squadrons of Epidaurus, Trœzen, Hermione, etc., each fearing that the

Persian fleet might make a descent on one or other of these separate

ports, would go home to repel such a contingency, in spite of the efforts

of Eurybiades to keep them together. Hence the order for quitting

Salamis and repairing to the isthmus was nothing less than a sentence of

extinction for all combined maritime defence; and it thus became doubly

abhorrent to all those who, like the Athenians, Æginetans, and Megarians,

were also led by their own separate safety to cling to the defence of

Salamis. In spite of all such opposition, however, and in spite of the

protest of Themistocles, the obstinate determination of the Peloponnesian

leaders carried the vote for retreat, and each of them went to his ship

to prepare for it on the following morning.

SCHEMES OF THEMISTOCLES

When Themistocles returned to his ship, with the gloom of this melancholy

resolution full upon his mind, and with the necessity of providing for

removal of the expatriated Athenian families in the island as well as

for that of the squadron, he found an Athenian friend named Mnesiphilus,

who asked him what the synod of chiefs had determined. Concerning

this Mnesiphilus, who is mentioned generally as a sagacious practical

politician, we unfortunately have no particulars: but it must have been

no common man whom fame selected, truly or falsely, as the inspiring

genius of Themistocles. On learning what had been resolved, Mnesiphilus

burst out into remonstrance on the utter ruin which its execution would

entail: there would presently be neither any united fleet to fight,

nor any aggregate cause and country to fight for. He vehemently urged

Themistocles again to open the question, and to press by every means

in his power for a recall of the vote for retreat, as well as for a

resolution to stay and fight at Salamis.

Themistocles had already in vain tried to enforce the same view: but

disheartened as he was by ill success, the remonstrances of a respected

friend struck him so forcibly as to induce him to renew his efforts. He

went instantly to the ship of Eurybiades, asked permission to speak with

him, and being invited aboard, reopened with him alone the whole subject

of the past discussion, enforcing his own views as emphatically as he

could. In this private communication, all the arguments bearing upon the

case were more unsparingly laid open than it had been possible to do in

an assembly of the chiefs, who would have been insulted if openly told

that they were likely to desert the fleet when once removed from Salamis.

Speaking thus freely and confidentially, and speaking to Eurybiades

alone, Themistocles was enabled to bring him partially round, and even

prevailed upon him to convene a fresh synod. So soon as this synod had

assembled, even before Eurybiades had explained the object and formally

opened the discussion, Themistocles addressed himself to each of the

chiefs separately, pouring forth at large his fears and anxiety as to the

abandonment of Salamis: insomuch that the Corinthian Adimantus rebuked

him by saying, “Themistocles, those who in the public festival-matches

rise up before the proper signal, are scourged.” “True,” rejoined the

Athenian, “but those who lag behind the signal win no crowns.”

Eurybiades then explained to the synod that doubts had arisen in his

mind, and that he called them together to reconsider the previous

resolve: upon which Themistocles began the debate, and vehemently

enforced the necessity of fighting in the narrow sea of Salamis and

not in the open waters at the isthmus, as well as of preserving Megara

and Ægina: contending that a naval victory at Salamis would be not less

effective for the defence of the Peloponnesus than if it took place at

the isthmus, whereas, if the fleet were withdrawn to the latter point,

they would only draw the Persians after them. Nor did he omit to add,

that the Athenians had a prophecy assuring to them victory in this, their

own island. But his speech made little impression on the Peloponnesian

chiefs, who were even exasperated at being again summoned to reopen

a debate already concluded, and concluded in a way which they deemed

essential to their safety. In the bosom of the Corinthian Adimantus,

especially, this feeling of anger burst all bounds. He sharply denounced

the presumption of Themistocles, and bade him be silent as a man who had

now no free Grecian city to represent, Athens being in the power of the

enemy: nay, he went so far as to contend that Eurybiades had no right to

count the vote of Themistocles, until the latter could produce some free

city as accrediting him to the synod.

Such an attack, alike ungenerous and insane, upon the leader of more

than half of the whole fleet, demonstrates the ungovernable impatience

of the Corinthians to carry away the fleet to their isthmus: it provoked

a bitter retort against them from Themistocles, who reminded them

that while he had around him two hundred well-manned ships, he could

procure for himself anywhere both city and territory as good or better

than Corinth. But he now saw clearly that it was hopeless to think

of enforcing his policy by argument, and that nothing would succeed

except the direct language of intimidation. Turning to Eurybiades,

and addressing him personally, he said: “If thou wilt stay here, and

fight bravely here, all will turn out well: but if thou wilt not stay,

thou wilt bring Hellas to ruin. For with us, all our means of war are

contained in our ships. Be thou yet persuaded by me. If not, we Athenians

shall migrate with our families on board, just as we are, to Siris in

Italy, which is ours from of old, and which the prophecies announce that

we are one day to colonise. You chiefs then, when bereft of allies like

us, will hereafter recollect what I am now saying.”

Eurybiades had before been nearly convinced by the impressive pleading of

Themistocles. But this last downright menace clenched his determination,

and probably struck dumb even the Corinthian and Peloponnesian opponents:

for it was but too plain, that without the Athenians the fleet was

powerless. He did not, however, put the question again to vote, but took

upon himself to rescind the previous resolution and to issue orders for

staying at Salamis to fight. In this order all acquiesced, willing or

unwilling; the succeeding dawn saw them preparing for fight instead of

for retreat, and invoking the protection and companionship of the Æacid

heroes of Salamis,--Telamon and Ajax: they even sent a trireme to Ægina

to implore Æacus himself and the remaining Æacids. It seems to have been

on this same day, also, that the resolution of fighting at Salamis was

taken by Xerxes, whose fleet was seen in motion, towards the close of the

day, preparing for attack the next morning.

But the Peloponnesians, though not venturing to disobey the orders of

the Spartan admiral, still retained unabated their former fears and

reluctance, which began again after a short interval to prevail over

the formidable menace of Themistocles, and were further strengthened

by the advices from the isthmus. The messengers from that quarter

depicted the trepidation and affright of their absent brethren while

constructing their cross wall at that point, to resist the impending

land invasion. Why were they not there also, to join hands and to help

in the defence,--even if worsted at sea,--at least on land, instead of

wasting their efforts in defence of Attica, already in the hands of

the enemy? Such were the complaints which passed from man to man, with

many a bitter exclamation against the insanity of Eurybiades: at length

the common feeling broke out in public and mutinous manifestation, and

a fresh synod of the chiefs was demanded and convoked. Here the same

angry debate, and the same irreconcilable difference, was again renewed;

the Peloponnesian chiefs clamouring for immediate departure, while the

Athenians, Æginetans, and Megarians were equally urgent in favour of

staying to fight. It was evident to Themistocles that the majority of

votes among the chiefs would be against him, in spite of the orders

of Eurybiades; and the disastrous crisis, destined to deprive Greece

of all united maritime defence, appeared imminent, when he resorted

to one last stratagem to meet the desperate emergency, by rendering

flight impossible. Contriving a pretext for stealing away from the

synod, he despatched a trusty messenger across the strait with a secret

communication to the Persian generals. Sicinnus his slave--seemingly an

Asiatic Greek, who understood Persian, and had perhaps been sold during

the late Ionic revolt, but whose superior qualities are marked by the

fact that he had the care and teaching of the children of his master--was

instructed to acquaint them privately and in the name of Themistocles,

who was represented as wishing success at heart to the Persians, that

the Greek fleet was not only in the utmost alarm, meditating immediate

flight, but that the various portions of it were in such violent

dissension, that they were more likely to fight against each other than

against any common enemy. A splendid opportunity, it was added, was thus

opened to the Persians, if they chose to avail themselves of it without

delay, first, to inclose and prevent their flight, and then to attack a

disunited body, many of whom would, when the combat began, openly espouse

the Persian cause.

Such was the important communication despatched by Themistocles across

the narrow strait, only a quarter of a mile in breadth at the narrowest

part, which divides Salamis from the neighbouring continent on which the

enemy were posted. It was delivered with so much address as to produce

the exact impression which he intended, and the glorious success which

followed caused it to pass for a splendid stratagem: had defeat ensued,

his name would have been covered with infamy. What surprises us the

most is, that after having reaped signal honour from it in the eyes of

the Greeks, as a stratagem, he lived to take credit for it, during the

exile of his latter days, as a capital service rendered to the Persian

monarch: nor is it improbable, when we reflect upon the desperate

condition of Grecian affairs at the moment, that such facility of double

interpretation was in part his inducement for sending the message.

It appears to have been delivered to Xerxes shortly after he had issued

his orders for fighting on the next morning: and he entered so greedily

into the scheme, as to direct his generals to close up the strait of

Salamis on both sides during the night, to the north as well as to the

south of the town of Salamis, at the risk of their heads if any opening

were left for the Greeks to escape. The station of the numerous Persian

fleet was along the coast of Attica,--its headquarters were in the

Bay of Phalerum, but doubtless parts of it would occupy those three

natural harbours, as yet unimproved by art, which belonged to the deme

of Piræus,--and would perhaps extend besides to other portions of the

western coast southward of Phalerum: while the Greek fleet was in the

harbour of the town called Salamis, in the portion of the island facing

Mount Ægaleos, in Attica.

During the night, a portion of the Persian fleet, sailing from Piræus

northward along the western coast of Attica, closed round to the north

of the town and harbour of Salamis, so as to shut up the northern issue

from the strait on the side of Eleusis: while another portion blocked up

the other issue between Piræus and the southeastern corner of the island,

landing a detachment of troops on the desert island of Psyttalea, near to

that corner. These measures were all taken during the night, to prevent

the anticipated flight of the Greeks, and then to attack them in the

narrow strait close on their own harbour the next morning.

Meanwhile, that angry controversy among the Grecian chiefs, in the midst

of which Themistocles had sent over his secret envoy, continued without

abatement and without decision. It was the interest of the Athenian

general to prolong the debate, and to prevent any concluding vote until

the effect of his stratagem should have rendered retreat impossible: nor

was prolongation difficult in a case so critical, where the majority of

chiefs was on one side and that of naval force on the other--especially

as Eurybiades himself was favourable to the view of Themistocles.

Accordingly, the debate was still unfinished at nightfall, and either

continued all night, or was adjourned to an hour before daybreak on the

following morning, when an incident, interesting as well as important,

gave to it a new turn.

The ostracised Aristides arrived at Salamis from Ægina. Since the

revocation of his sentence, proposed by Themistocles himself, he had

had no opportunity of revisiting Athens, and he now for the first time

rejoined his countrymen in their exile at Salamis; not uninformed of the

dissensions raging, and of the impatience of the Peloponnesians to retire

to the isthmus. He was the first to bring the news that such retirement

had become impracticable from the position of the Persian fleet, which

his own vessel, in coming from Ægina, had only eluded under favour of

night. He caused Themistocles to be invited out from the assembled synod

of chiefs, and after a generous exordium, wherein he expressed his

hope that their rivalry would for the future be only a competition in

doing good to their common country, apprised him that the new movement

of the Persians excluded all hope of now reaching the isthmus and

rendered farther debate useless. Themistocles expressed his joy at the

intelligence, and communicated his own secret message whereby he had

himself brought the movement about, in order that the Peloponnesian

chiefs might be forced to fight at Salamis, even against their own

consent. He moreover desired Aristides to go himself into the synod, and

communicate the news: for if it came from the lips of Themistocles, the

Peloponnesians would treat it as a fabrication. So obstinate indeed was

their incredulity, that they refused to accept it as truth even on the

assertion of Aristides: nor was it until the arrival of a Tenian vessel,

deserting from the Persian fleet, that they at last brought themselves

to credit the actual posture of affairs and the entire impossibility of

retreat. Once satisfied of this fact, they prepared themselves at dawn

for the impending battle.

THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS

Having caused his land-force to be drawn up along the shore opposite to

Salamis, Xerxes had erected for himself a lofty seat, or throne, upon

one of the projecting declivities of Mount Ægaleos, near the Heracleum,

and immediately overhanging the sea, from whence he could plainly review

all the phases of the combat and the conduct of his subject troops. He

was persuaded himself that they had not done their best at Artemisium,

in consequence of his absence, and that his presence would inspire them

with fresh valour: moreover, his royal scribes stood ready by his side to

take the names both of the brave and of the backward combatants. On the

right wing of his fleet--which approached Salamis on the side of Eleusis,

and was opposed to the Athenians on the Grecian left--were placed the

Phœnicians and Egyptians; on his left wing the Ionians, approaching

from the side of Piræus, and opposed to the Lacedæmonians, Æginetans,

and Megarians. The seamen of the Persian fleet, however, had been on

shipboard all night, in making that movement which had brought them into

their actual position: while the Greek seamen now began without previous

fatigue, fresh from the animated harangues of Themistocles and the other

leaders: moreover, just as they were getting on board, they were joined

by the triremes which had been sent to Ægina to bring to their aid Æacus,

with the other Æacid heroes. Honoured with this precious heroic aid,

which tended so much to raise the spirits of the Greeks, the Æginetan

trireme now arrived just in time to take her post in the line, having

eluded pursuit from the intervening enemy.

The Greeks rowed forward from the shore to attack with the usual pæan,

or war-shout, which was confidently returned by the Persians; and the

latter were the most forward of the two to begin the fight: for the Greek

seamen, on gradually nearing the enemy, became at first disposed to

hesitate, and even backed water for a space, so that some of them touched

ground on their own shore: until the retrograde movement was arrested by

a supernatural feminine figure hovering over them, who exclaimed, with a

voice that rang through the whole fleet, “Ye worthies, how much farther

are ye going to back water?” The very circulation of this fable attests

the dubious courage of the Greeks at the commencement of the battle. The

brave Athenian captains Aminias and Lycomedes (the former, brother of

the poet Æschylus) were the first to obey either the feminine voice or

the inspirations of their own ardour: though according to the version

current at Ægina, it was the Æginetan ship, the carrier of the Æacid

heroes, which first set this honourable example. The Naxian Democritus

was celebrated by Simonides as the third ship in action. Aminias, darting

forth from the line, charged with the beak of his ship full against

a Phœnician, and the two became entangled so that he could not again

get clear; other ships came in aid on both sides, and the action thus

became general. Herodotus, with his usual candour, tells us that he

could procure few details about the action, except as to what concerned

Artemisia, the queen of his own city: so that we know hardly anything

beyond the general facts. But it appears that, with the exception of the

Ionic Greeks, many of whom--apparently a greater number than Herodotus

likes to acknowledge--were lukewarm, and some even averse, the subjects

of Xerxes conducted themselves generally with great bravery: Phœnicians,

Cyprians, Cilicians, Egyptians, vied with the Persians and Medes, serving

as soldiers on shipboard, in trying to satisfy the exigent monarch who

sat on shore watching their behaviour.

Their signal defeat was not owing to any want of courage, but, first,

to the narrow space which rendered their superior number a hindrance

rather than a benefit: next, to their want of orderly line and discipline

as compared with the Greeks: thirdly, to the fact that, when once

fortune seemed to turn against them, they had no fidelity or reciprocal

attachment, and each ally was willing to sacrifice or even to run down

others, in order to effect his own escape. Their numbers and absence of

concert threw them into confusion, and caused them to run foul of each

other: those in the front could not recede, nor could those in the rear

advance: the oar blades were broken by collision, the steersmen lost

control of their ships, and could no longer adjust the ship’s course

so as to strike that direct blow with the beak which was essential in

ancient warfare. After some time of combat, the whole Persian fleet was

driven back and became thoroughly unmanageable, so that the issue was no

longer doubtful, and nothing remained except the efforts of individual

bravery to protract the struggle.

While the Athenian squadron on the left, which had the greatest

resistance to surmount, broke up and drove before them the Persian right,

the Æginetans on the right intercepted the flight of the fugitives to

Phalerum: Democritus, the Naxian captain, was said to have captured

five ships of the Persians with his own single trireme. The chief

admiral, Ariabignes, brother of Xerxes, attacked at once by two Athenian

triremes, fell, gallantly trying to board one of them, and the number of

distinguished Persians and Medes who shared his fate was great: the more

so, as few of them knew how to swim, while among the Greek seamen who

were cast into the sea, the greater number were swimmers, and had the

friendly shore of Salamis near at hand. It appears that the Phœnician

seamen of the fleet threw the blame of defeat upon the Ionic Greeks;

and some of them, driven ashore during the heat of the battle under the

immediate throne of Xerxes, excused themselves by denouncing the others

as traitors. The heads of the Ionic leaders might have been endangered if

the monarch had not seen with his own eyes an act of surprising gallantry

by one of their number. An Ionic trireme from Samothrace charged and

disabled an Attic trireme, but was herself almost immediately run down

by an Æginetan. The Samothracian crew, as their vessel lay disabled on

the water, made such excellent use of their missile weapons, that they

cleared the decks of the Æginetan, sprung on board, and became masters of

her. This exploit, passing under the eyes of Xerxes himself, induced him

to treat the Phœnicians as dastardly calumniators, and to direct their

heads to be cut off: his wrath and vexation, Herodotus tells us, were

boundless, and he scarcely knew on whom to vent it.

In this disastrous battle itself, as in the debate before the battle,

the conduct of Artemisia of Halicarnassus was such as to give him full

satisfaction. It appears that this queen maintained her full part in

the battle until the disorder had become irretrievable; she then sought

to escape, pursued by the Athenian trierarch, Aminias, but found her

progress obstructed by the number of fugitive or embarrassed comrades

before her. In this dilemma, she preserved herself from pursuit by

attacking one of her own comrades; she charged the trireme of the Carian

prince, Damasithymus of Calynda, ran it down and sunk it, so that the

prince with all his crew perished. Had Aminias been aware that the vessel

which he was following was that of Artemisia, nothing would have induced

him to relax in the pursuit, for the Athenian captains were all indignant

at the idea of a female invader assailing their city; but knowing her

ship only as one among the enemy, and seeing her thus charge and destroy

another enemy’s ship, he concluded her to be a deserter, turned his

pursuit elsewhere, and suffered her to escape. At the same time, it so

happened that the destruction of the ship of Damasithymus happened under

the eyes of Xerxes and of the persons around him on shore, who recognised

the ship of Artemisia, but supposed the ship destroyed to be a Greek.

Accordingly they remarked to him, “Master, seest thou not how well

Artemisia fights, and how she has just sunk an enemy’s ship?” Assured

that it was really her deed, Xerxes is said to have replied, “My men have

become women; my women, men.” Thus was Artemisia not only preserved, but

exalted to a higher place in the esteem of Xerxes by the destruction of

one of his own ships, among the crew of which not a man survived to tell

the true story.

Of the total loss of either fleet, Herodotus gives us no estimate; but

Diodorus states the number of ships destroyed on the Grecian side as

forty, on the Persian side as two hundred; independent of those which

were made prisoners with all their crews. To the Persian loss is to be

added the destruction of all those troops whom they had landed before

the battle in the island of Psyttalea: as soon as the Persian fleet was

put to flight, Aristides carried over some Grecian hoplites to that

island, overpowered the enemy, and put them to death to a man. This loss

appears to have been much deplored, as they were choice troops; in great

proportion the native Persian guards.

THE RETREAT OF XERXES

Great and capital as the victory was, there yet remained after it a

sufficient portion of the Persian fleet to maintain even maritime war

vigorously, not to mention the powerful land-force, as yet unshaken. And

the Greeks themselves, immediately after they had collected in their

island, as well as could be done, the fragments of shipping and the

dead bodies, made themselves ready for a second engagement. But they

were relieved from this necessity by the pusillanimity of the invading

monarch, in whom the defeat had occasioned a sudden revulsion from

contemptuous confidence, not only to rage and disappointment, but to

the extreme of alarm for his own personal safety. He was possessed with

a feeling of mingled wrath and mistrust against his naval force, which

consisted entirely of subject nations--Phœnicians, Egyptians, Cilicians,

Cyprians, Pamphylians, Ionic Greeks, etc., with a few Persians and Medes

serving on board, in a capacity probably not well suited to them. None

of these subjects had any interest in the success of the invasion, or

any other motive for service except fear, while the sympathies of the

Ionic Greeks were even decidedly against it. Xerxes now came to suspect

the fidelity, or undervalue the courage, of all these naval subjects;

he fancied that they could make no resistance to the Greek fleet, and

dreaded lest the latter should sail forthwith to the Hellespont, so as to

break down the bridge and intercept his personal retreat; for, upon the

maintenance of that bridge he conceived his own safety to turn, not less

than that of his father Darius, when retreating from Scythia, upon the

preservation of the bridge over the Danube. Against the Phœnicians, from

whom he had expected most, his rage broke out in such fierce threats,

that they stole away from the fleet in the night, and departed homeward.

Such a capital desertion made future naval struggle still more hopeless,

and Xerxes, though at first breathing revenge, and talking about a vast

mole or bridge to be thrown across the strait to Salamis, speedily ended

by giving orders to the whole fleet to leave Phalerum in the night, not

without disembarking, however, the best soldiers who served on board.

They were to make straight for the Hellespont, and there to guard the

bridge against his arrival.

This resolution was prompted by Mardonius, who saw the real terror which

beset his master, and read therein sufficient evidence of danger to

himself. When Xerxes despatched to Susa intelligence of his disastrous

overthrow, the feeling at home was not simply that of violent grief for

the calamity, and fear for the personal safety of the monarch--it was

farther embittered by anger against Mardonius, as the instigator of this

ruinous enterprise. That general knew full well that there was no safety

for him in returning to Persia with the shame of failure on his head: it

was better for him to take upon himself the chance of subduing Greece,

which he had good hopes of being yet able to do, and to advise the return

of Xerxes himself to a safe and easy residence in Asia. Such counsel

was eminently palatable to the present alarm of the monarch, while it

opened to Mardonius himself a fresh chance not only of safety, but of

increased power and glory. Accordingly, he began to reassure his master,

by representing that the recent blow was after all not serious--that it

had only fallen upon the inferior part of his force, and upon worthless

foreign slaves, like Phœnicians, Egyptians, etc., while the native

Persian troops yet remained unconquered and unconquerable, fully adequate

to execute the monarch’s revenge upon Hellas; that Xerxes might now very

well retire with the bulk of his army if he were disposed; and that he,

Mardonius, would pledge himself to complete the conquest, at the head of

three hundred thousand chosen troops.

This proposition afforded at the same time consolation for the monarch’s

wounded vanity, and safety for his person: his confidential Persians, and

Artemisia herself, on being consulted, approved of the step. The latter

had acquired his confidence by the dissuasive advice which she had given

before the recent deplorable engagement, and she had every motive now to

encourage a proposition indicating solicitude for his person, as well as

relieving herself from the obligation of further service. “If Mardonius

desires to remain (she remarked, contemptuously), by all means let him

have the troops: should he succeed, thou wilt be the gainer: should he

even perish, the loss of some of thy slaves is trifling, so long as thou

remainest safe, and thy house in power. Thou hast already accomplished

the purpose of thy expedition, in burning Athens.” Xerxes, while

adopting this counsel, and directing the return of his fleet, showed his

satisfaction with the Halicarnassian queen, by entrusting her with some

of his children, directing her to transport them to Ephesus.

The Greeks at Salamis learned with surprise and joy the departure of the

hostile fleet from the Bay of Phalerum, and immediately put themselves

in pursuit; following as far as the island of Andros without success.

Themistocles and the Athenians are even said to have been anxious to push

on forthwith to the Hellespont, and there break down the bridge of boats,

in order to prevent the escape of Xerxes, had they not been restrained by

the caution of Eurybiades and the Peloponnesians, who represented that

it was dangerous to detain the Persian monarch in the heart of Greece.

Themistocles readily suffered himself to be persuaded, and contributed

much to divert his countrymen from the idea; while he at the same time

sent the faithful Sicinnus a second time to Xerxes, with the intimation

that he, Themistocles, had restrained the impatience of the Greeks to

proceed without delay and burn the Hellespontine bridge, and that he had

thus, from personal friendship to the monarch, secured for him a safe

retreat. Though this is the story related by Herodotus, we can hardly

believe that, with the great Persian land-force in the heart of Attica,

there could have been any serious idea of so distant an operation as that

of attacking the bridge at the Hellespont. It seems more probable that

Themistocles fabricated the intention, with a view of frightening Xerxes

away, as well as of establishing a personal claim upon his gratitude in

reserve for future contingencies.

Such crafty manœuvres and long-sighted calculations of possibility,

seem extraordinary: but the facts are sufficiently attested--since

Themistocles lived to claim as well as to receive fulfilment of the

obligation thus conferred--and though extraordinary, they will not

appear inexplicable, if we reflect, first, that the Persian game, even

now, after the defeat of Salamis, was not only not desperate, but might

perfectly well have succeeded, if it had been played with reasonable

prudence: next, that there existed in the mind of this eminent man an

almost unparalleled combination of splendid patriotism, long-sighted

cunning, and selfish rapacity. Themistocles knew better than any one

else that the cause of Greece had appeared utterly desperate, only a few

hours before the late battle; moreover, a clever man, tainted with such

constant guilt, might naturally calculate on being one day detected and

punished, even if the Greeks proved successful.

He now employed the fleet among the islands of the Cyclades, for the

purpose of levying fines upon them as a punishment for adherence to the

Persian. He first laid siege to Andros, telling the inhabitants that he

came to demand their money, bringing with him two great gods--Persuasion

and Necessity. To which the Andrians replied, that “Athens was a great

city, and blest with excellent gods: but that they were miserably poor,

and that there were two unkind gods who always stayed with them and

would never quit the island--Poverty and Helplessness. In these gods the

Andrians put their trust, refusing to deliver the money required; for the

power of Athens could never overcome their inability.” While the fleet

was engaged in contending against the Andrians with their sad protecting

deities, Themistocles sent round to various other cities, demanding from

them private sums of money on condition of securing them from attack.

From Carystus, Paros, and other places, he thus extorted bribes for

himself apart from the other generals, but it appears that Andros was

found unproductive, and after no very long absence the fleet was brought

back to Salamis.

The intimation sent by Themistocles perhaps had the effect of hastening

the departure of Xerxes, who remained in Attica only a few days after

the battle of Salamis, and then withdrew his army through Bœotia into

Thessaly, where Mardonius made choice of the troops to be retained

for his future operations. He retained all the Persians, Medes, Sacæ,

Bactrians, and Indians, horse as well as foot, together with select

detachments of the remaining contingents: making in all, according to

Herodotus, three hundred thousand men. But as it was now the beginning of

September, and as sixty thousand out of his forces, under Artabazus, were

destined to escort Xerxes himself to the Hellespont, Mardonius proposed

to winter in Thessaly, and to postpone further military operations until

the ensuing spring.

[Illustration: THE VICTORY OF SALAMIS (BY CORMOT)]

Having left most of these troops under the orders of Mardonius in

Thessaly, Xerxes marched away with the rest to the Hellespont, by the

same road as he had taken in his advance a few months before. Respecting

his retreat, a plentiful stock of stories were circulated, inconsistent

with each other, fanciful, and even incredible: Grecian imagination, in

the contemporary poet Æschylus, as well as in the Latin moralisers Seneca

or Juvenal, delighted in handling this invasion with the maximum of light

and shadow, magnifying the destructive misery and humiliation of the

retreat so as to form an impressive contrast with the superhuman pride

of the advance, and illustrating the antithesis with unbounded license

of detail. The sufferings from want of provision were doubtless severe,

and are described as frightful and death-dealing: the magazines stored

up for the advancing march had been exhausted, so that the retiring army

were now forced to seize upon the corn of the country through which they

passed--an insufficient maintenance, eked out by leaves, grass, the bark

of trees, and other wretched substitutes for food. Plague and dysentery

aggravated their misery, and occasioned many to be left behind among the

cities through whose territory the retreat was carried; strict orders

being left by Xerxes that these cities should maintain and tend them.

After forty-five days’ march from Attica, he at length found himself at

the Hellespont, whither his fleet, retreating from Salamis, had arrived

long before him. But the short-lived bridge had already been knocked to

pieces by a storm, so that the army was transported on shipboard across

to Asia, where it first obtained comfort and abundance, and where the

change from privation to excess engendered new maladies. In the time of

Herodotus, the citizens of Abdera still showed the gilt scimitar and

tiara, which Xerxes had presented to them when he halted there in his

retreat, in token of hospitality and satisfaction: and they even went the

length of affirming that never, since his departure from Attica, had he

loosened his girdle until he reached their city. So fertile was Grecian

fancy in magnifying the terror of the repulsed invader--who re-entered

Sardis, with a broken army and humbled spirit, only eight months after he

had left it as the presumed conqueror of the western world.

THE SPOILS OF VICTORY

Meanwhile the Athenians and Peloponnesians, liberated from the immediate

presence of the enemy either on land or sea, and passing from the extreme

of terror to sudden ease and security, indulged in the full delight and

self-congratulation of unexpected victory. On the day before the battle,

Greece had seemed irretrievably lost: she was now saved even against all

reasonable hope, and the terrific cloud impending over her was dispersed.

In the division of the booty, the Æginetans were adjudged to have

distinguished themselves most in the action, and to be entitled to the

choice lot; while various tributes of gratitude were also set apart for

the gods. Among them were three Phœnician triremes, which were offered

in dedication to Ajax at Salamis, to Athene at Sunium, and to Poseidon

at the Isthmus of Corinth; further presents were sent to Apollo at

Delphi, who, on being asked whether he was satisfied, replied, that all

had done their duty to him except the Æginetans: from them he required

additional munificence on account of the prize awarded to them, and they

were constrained to dedicate in the temple four golden stars upon a staff

of brass, which Herodotus himself saw there. Next to the Æginetans,

the second place of honour was awarded to the Athenians; the Æginetan

Polycritus, and the Athenians Eumenes and Aminias, being ranked first

among the individual combatants.

Besides the first and second prizes of valour, the chiefs at the isthmus

tried to adjudicate among themselves the first and second prizes of skill

and wisdom. Each of them deposited two names on the altar of Poseidon:

and when these votes came to be looked at, it was found that each man had

voted for himself as deserving the first prize, but that Themistocles

had a large majority of votes for the second. The result of such voting

allowed no man to claim the first prize, nor could the chiefs give a

second prize without it; so that Themistocles was disappointed of his

reward, though exalted so much the higher, perhaps, through that very

disappointment, in general renown. He went shortly afterwards to Sparta,

where he received from the Lacedæmonians honours such as were never paid

before or afterwards to any foreigner. A crown of olive was indeed given

to Eurybiades as the first prize, but a like crown was at the same time

conferred on Themistocles as a special reward for unparalleled sagacity;

together with a chariot, the finest which the city afforded. Moreover,

on his departure, the three hundred select youths called _hippeis_, who

formed the active guard and police of the country, all accompanied him in

a body as escort of honour to the frontiers of Tegea. Such demonstrations

were so astonishing, from the haughty and immovable Spartans, that they

were ascribed by some authors to their fear lest Themistocles should be

offended by being deprived of the general prize.[b]

SYRACUSAN VICTORY OVER CARTHAGE

On the very same day on which the Persians were defeated at Salamis,

another portion of the Hellenic race, the Sicilian Greeks, also obtained

a victory over an immense barbarian force. There is reason to believe

that the invasion of Sicily by the Carthaginians was concerted with

Xerxes, and that the simultaneous attack on two distinct Grecian peoples,

by two immense armaments, was not merely the result of chance. It was,

however, in the internal affairs of Sicily that the Carthaginians sought

the pretext and the opportunity for their invasion. About the year 481

B.C., Theron, despot of Agrigentum, a relative of Gelo, the powerful

ruler of Syracuse, expelled Terillus from Himera, and took possession of

that town. Terillus, backed by some Sicilian cities which formed a kind

of Carthaginian party, applied to the Carthaginians to restore him. The

Carthaginians complied with the invitation; and in the year 480 B.C.,

Hamilcar landed at Panormus with a force composed of various nations,

which is said to have amounted to the enormous sum of three hundred

thousand men. Having drawn up his vessels on the beach, and protected

them with a rampart, Hamilcar proceeded to besiege the Himeræans, who

on their part prepared for an obstinate defence. At the instance of

Theron, Gelo marched to the relief of the town with fifty thousand foot

and five thousand horse. An obstinate and bloody engagement ensued,

which, by a stratagem of Gelo’s, was at length determined in his favour.

The ships of the Carthaginians were fired, and Hamilcar himself slain.

According to the statement of Diodorus, one hundred and fifty thousand

Carthaginians fell in the engagement, while the greater part of the

remainder surrendered at discretion, twenty ships alone escaping with a

few fugitives. This account may justly be regarded as an exaggeration;

yet it cannot be doubted that the victory was a decisive one, and the

number very great of the prisoners and slain.

In Sicily, Greek taste made the sinews of the prisoners subserve the

purposes of art; and many of the public structures which adorned and

distinguished Agrigentum rose by the labour of the captive Carthaginians.

Thus were the arms of Greece victorious on all sides, and the outposts of

Europe maintained against the incursions of the semi-barbarous hordes of

Asia and Africa.[f]

FOOTNOTES

[31] In the years 1821 and 1822, during the struggle which preceded the

liberation of Greece, the Athenians were forced to leave their country

and seek refuge in Salamis three several times. These incidents are

sketched in a manner alike interesting and instructive by Dr. Waddington,

in his _Visit to Greece_ (London, 1825), Letters vi, vii, x. He states,

p. 92, “Three times have the Athenians emigrated in a body, and sought

refuge from the sabre among the houseless rocks of Salamis. Upon these

occasions, I am assured, that many have dwelt in caverns, and many in

miserable huts, constructed on the mountain-side by their own feeble

hands. Many have perished too, from exposure to an intemperate climate;

many, from diseases contracted through the loathsomeness of their

habitations; many, from hunger and misery. On the retreat of the Turks,

the survivors returned to their country. But to what a country did they

return? To a land of desolation and famine; and in fact, on the first

reoccupation of Athens, after the departure of Omer Brioni, several

persons are known to have subsisted for some time on grass, till a supply

of corn reached the Piræus from Syra and Hydra.” In the war between the

Turks and Venetians in 1688, the population of Attica was forced to

emigrate to Salamis, Ægina, and Corinth.

[32] Compare the account given in Pausanias (X, 23) of the subsequent

repulse of Brennus and the Gauls from Delphi: in his account, the repulse

is not so exclusively the work of the gods as in that of Herodotus:

there is a larger force of human combatants in defence of the temple,

though greatly assisted by divine intervention: there is also loss on

both sides. A similar descent of crags from the summit is mentioned.

Many great blocks of stone and cliff are still to be seen near the spot,

which have rolled down from the top, and which remind the traveller of

these passages. The attack here described to have been made by order of

Xerxes upon the Delphian temple seems not easy to reconcile with the

words of Mardonius: still less can it be reconciled with the statement of

Plutarch, who says that the Delphian temple was burnt by the Medes.

[Illustration]