THE RECONQUEST OF MACEDON.
B.C. 273-272
Fatal deficiencies in Pyrrhus's character.--Fickleness of
Pyrrhus.--Consequences which resulted from it.--Examples of his want
of perseverance.--Reasons for the proposed invasion of Macedon.--In
the outset Pyrrhus is successful.--The country is disposed to submit
to him.--Combat in the mountain defile.--Account of the phalanx.--Its
terrible efficacy.--Impossibility of making any impression upon
it.--The elephants.--Order of battle.--The elephants overpowered.--The
phalanx.--Pyrrhus invites the enemy to join him.--Pyrrhus is victorious,
and becomes master of Macedon.--Complaints of the people.--Pyrrhus pays
little regard to them.--Pyrrhus receives an unexpected invitation.
It was the great misfortune of Pyrrhus's life, a misfortune resulting
apparently from an inherent and radical defect in his character, that
he had no settled plans or purposes, but embarked in one project after
another, as accident or caprice might incline him, apparently without
any forethought, consideration, or design. He seemed to form no plan,
to live for no object, to contemplate no end, but was governed by a
sort of blind and instinctive impulse, which led him to love danger,
and to take a wild and savage delight in the performance of military
exploits on their own account, and without regard to any ultimate end
or aim to be accomplished by them. Thus, although he evinced great
power, he produced no permanent effects. There was no steadiness or
perseverance in his action, and there could be none, for in his whole
course of policy there were no ulterior ends in view by which
perseverance could be sustained. He was, consequently, always ready
to abandon any enterprise in which he might be engaged as soon as it
began to be involved in difficulties requiring the exercise of
patience, endurance, and self-denial, and to embark in any new
undertaking, provided that it promised to bring him speedily upon a
field of battle. He was, in a word, the type and exemplar of that
large class of able men who waste their lives in a succession of
efforts, which, though they evince great talent in those who perform
them, being still without plan or aim, end without producing any
result. Such men often, like Pyrrhus, attain to a certain species of
greatness. They are famed among men for what they seem to have the
power to do, and not for any thing that they have actually done.
In accordance with this view of Pyrrhus's character, we see him
changing continually the sphere of his action from one country to
another, gaining great victories every where, and evincing in all his
operations--in the organizing and assembling of his armies, in his
marches, in his encampments, and in the disposition of his troops on
the field of battle, and especially in his conduct during the period
of actual conflict--the most indomitable energy and the most
consummate military skill. But when the battle was fought and the
victory gained, and an occasion supervened requiring a cool and
calculating deliberation in the forming of future plans, and a steady
adherence to them when formed, the character and resources of
Pyrrhus's mind were found woefully wanting. The first summons from any
other quarter, inviting him to a field of more immediate excitement
and action, was always sufficient to call him away. Thus he changed
his field of action successively from Macedon to Italy, from Italy to
Sicily, from Sicily back to Italy, and from Italy to Macedon again,
perpetually making new beginnings, but nowhere attaining any ends.
His determination to invade Macedon once more, on his return to Epirus
from Italy, was prompted, apparently, by the mere accident that the
government was unsettled, and that Antigonus was insecure in his
possession of the throne. He had no intention, when he first embarked
in this scheme, of attempting the conquest of Macedon, but only
designed to make a predatory incursion into the country for the
purpose of plunder, its defenseless condition affording him, as he
thought, a favorable opportunity of doing this. The plea on which he
justified this invasion was, that Antigonus was his enemy. Ptolemy
Ceraunus had made a treaty of alliance with him, and had furnished him
with troops for recruiting and re-enforcing his armies in Italy, as
has already been stated; but Antigonus, when called upon, had refused
to do this. This, of course, gave Pyrrhus ample justification, as he
imagined, for his intended incursion into the Macedonian realms.
Besides this, however, there was another justification, namely, that
of necessity. Although Pyrrhus had been compelled to withdraw from
Italy, he had not returned by any means alone, but had brought quite a
large army with him, consisting of many thousands of men, all of whom
must now be fed and paid. All the resources of his own kingdom had
been wellnigh exhausted by the drafts which he had made upon them to
sustain himself in Italy, and it was now necessary, he thought, to
embark in some war, as a means of finding employment and subsistence
for these troops. He determined, therefore, on every account, to make
a foray into Macedon.
Before setting off on his expedition, he contrived to obtain a
considerable force from among the Gauls as auxiliaries. Antigonus,
also, had Gauls in his service, for they themselves were divided, as
it would seem, in respect both to their policy and their leaders, as
well as the Macedonians; and Antigonus, taking advantage of their
dissensions, had contrived to enlist some portion of them in his
cause, while the rest were the more easily, on that very account,
induced to join the expedition of Pyrrhus. Things being in this state,
Pyrrhus, after completing his preparations, commenced his march, and
soon crossed the Macedonian frontier.
As was usually the case with the enterprises which he engaged in, he
was, in the outset, very successful. He conquered several cities and
towns as he advanced, and soon began to entertain higher views in
respect to the object of his expedition than he had at first formed.
Instead of merely plundering the frontier, as he had at first
intended, he began to think that it would be possible for him to
subdue Antigonus entirely, and reannex the whole of Macedon to his
dominions. He was well known in Macedon, his former campaigns in that
country having brought him very extensively before the people and the
army there. He had been a general favorite, too, among them at the
time when he had been their ruler; the people admired his personal
qualities as a soldier, and had been accustomed to compare him with
Alexander, whom, in his appearance and manners, and in a certain air
of military frankness and generosity which characterized him, he was
said strongly to resemble. Pyrrhus now found, as he advanced into the
country of Macedonia, that the people were disposed to regard him with
the same sentiments of favor which they had formerly entertained for
him. Several of the garrisons of the cities joined his standard; and
the detachments of troops which Antigonus sent forward to the frontier
to check his progress, instead of giving him battle, went over to him
in a body and espoused his cause. In a word, Pyrrhus found that,
unexpectedly to himself, his expedition, instead of being merely an
incursion across the frontiers on a plundering foray, was assuming the
character of a regular invasion. In short, the progress that he made
was such, that it soon became manifest that to meet Antigonus in one
pitched battle, and to gain one victory, was all that was required to
complete the conquest of the country.
He accordingly concentrated his forces more and more, strengthened
himself by every means in his power, and advanced further and further
into the interior of the country. Antigonus began to retire,
desirous, perhaps, of reaching some ground where he could post himself
advantageously. Pyrrhus, acting with his customary energy, soon
overtook the enemy. He came up with the rear of Antigonus's army in a
narrow defile among the mountains; at least, the place is designated
as a narrow defile by the ancient historian who narrates these events,
though, from the number of men that were engaged in the action which
ensued, as well as from the nature of the action itself, as a
historian describes it, it would seem that there must have been a
considerable breadth of level ground in the bottom of the gorge.
The main body of Antigonus's troops was the phalanx. The Macedonian
phalanx is considered one of the most extraordinary military
contrivances of ancient times. The invention of it was ascribed to
Philip, the father of Alexander the Great, though it is probable that
it was only improved and perfected, and brought into general use, but
not really originated by him. The single phalanx was formed of a body
of about four thousand men. These men were arranged in a compact form,
the whole body consisting of sixteen ranks, and each rank of two
hundred and fifty-six men. These men wore each a short sword, to be
used in cases of emergency, and were defended by large shields. The
main peculiarity, however, of their armor, and the one on which the
principal power of the phalanx depended as a military body, was in the
immensely long spears which they carried. These spears were generally
twenty-one, and sometimes twenty-four feet long. The handles were
slender, though strong, and the points were tipped with steel. The
spears were not intended to be thrown, but to be held firmly in the
hands, and pointed toward the enemy; and they were so long, and the
ranks of the men were so close together, that the spears of the fifth
rank projected several feet before the men who stood in the front
rank. Thus each man in the front rank had five steel-pointed spears
projecting to different distances before him, while the men who stood
in ranks further behind rested their spears upon the shoulders of
those who were before them, so as to elevate the points into the air.
The men were protected by large shields, which, when the phalanx was
formed in close array, just touched each other, and formed an
impregnable defense. In a word, the phalanx, as it moved slowly over
the plain, presented the appearance of a vast monster, covered with
scales, and bristling with points of steel--a sort of military
porcupine, which nothing could approach or in any way injure. Missiles
thrown toward it were intercepted by the shields, and fell harmless to
the ground. Darts, arrows, javelins, and every other weapon which
could be projected from a distance, were equally ineffectual, and no
one could come near enough to men thus protected to strike at them
with the sword. Even cavalry were utterly powerless in attacking such
_chevaux de frise_ as the phalanx presented. No charge, however
furious, could break its serrated ranks; an onset upon it could only
end in impaling the men and the horses that made it together on the
points of the innumerable spears.
To form a phalanx, and to maneuver it successfully, required a special
training, both on the part of the officers and men, and in the
Macedonian armies the system was carried to very high perfection. When
foreign auxiliaries, however, served under Macedonian generals, they
were not generally formed in this way, but were allowed to fight under
their own leaders, and in the accustomed manner of their respective
nations. The army of Antigonus, accordingly, as he was retiring
before Pyrrhus, consisted of two portions. The phalanx was in advance,
and large bodies of Gauls, armed and arrayed in their usual manner,
were in the rear. Of course, Pyrrhus, as he came up with this force in
the ravine or valley, encountered the Gauls first. Their lines, it
would seem, filled up the whole valley at the place where Pyrrhus
overtook them, so that, at the outset of the contest, Pyrrhus had them
only to engage. There was not space sufficient for the phalanx to come
to their aid.
Besides the phalanx and the bodies of Gauls, there was a troop of
elephants in Antigonus's army. Their position, as it would seem, was
between the phalanx and the Gauls. This being the state of things, and
Pyrrhus coming up to the attack in the rear, would, of course,
encounter first the Gauls, then the elephants, and, lastly, the most
formidable of all, the phalanx itself.
Pyrrhus advanced to the attack of the Gauls with the utmost fury, and,
though they made a very determined resistance, they were soon
overpowered and almost all cut to pieces. The troop of elephants came
next. The army of Pyrrhus, flushed with their victory over the Gauls,
pressed eagerly on, and soon so surrounded the elephants and hemmed
them in, that the keepers of them perceived that all hope of
resistance was vain. They surrendered without an effort to defend
themselves. The phalanx now remained. It had hastily changed its
front, and it stood on the defensive. Pyrrhus advanced toward it with
his forces, bringing his men up in array in front of the long lines of
spears, and paused. The bristling monster remained immovable, evincing
no disposition to advance against its enemy, but awaiting, apparently,
an attack. Pyrrhus rode out in front of his lines and surveyed the
body of Macedonians before him. He found that he knew the officers
personally, having served with them before in the wars in which he had
been engaged in Macedon in former years. He saluted them, calling them
by name. They were pleased with being thus remembered and recognized
by a personage so renowned. Pyrrhus urged them to abandon Antigonus,
who had, as he maintained, no just title to the crown, and whose
usurped power he was about to overthrow, and invited them to enter
into his service, as the ancient and rightful sovereign of their
country. The officers seemed much disposed to listen to these
overtures; in fine, they soon decided to accede to them. The phalanx
went over to Pyrrhus's side in a body, and Antigonus, being thus
deprived of his last remaining support, left the field in company with
a few personal followers, and fled for his life.
Of course, Pyrrhus found himself at once in complete possession of the
Macedonian kingdom. Antigonus did not, indeed, entirely give up the
contest. He retreated toward the coast, where he contrived to hold
possession, for a time, of a few maritime towns; but his power as King
of Macedon was gone. Some few of the interior cities attempted, for a
time, to resist Pyrrhus's rule, but he soon overpowered them. Some of
the cities that he thus conquered he garrisoned with Gauls.
Of course, after such a revolution as this, a great deal was required
to be done to settle the affairs of the government on their new
footing, and to make the kingdom secure in the hands of the conqueror;
but no one in the least degree acquainted with the character and
tendencies of Pyrrhus's mind could expect that he would be at all
disposed to attend to these duties. He had neither the sagacity to
plan nor the steadiness of purpose to execute such measures. He could
conquer, but that was all. To secure the results of his conquests was
utterly beyond his power.
In fact, far from making such a use of his power as to strengthen his
position, and establish a permanent and settled government, he so
administered the affairs of state, or, rather, he so neglected them,
that very soon an extended discontent and disaffection began to
prevail. The Gauls, whom he had left as garrisons in the conquered
cities, governed them in so arbitrary a manner, and plundered them so
recklessly, as to produce extreme irritation among the people. They
complained earnestly to Pyrrhus. Pyrrhus paid little attention to
their representations. To fight a battle with an open enemy on the
field was always a pleasure to him; but to meet and grapple with
difficulties of this kind--to hear complaints, and listen to evidence,
and discuss and consider remedies, was all weariness and toil to him.
What he would have done, and what would have been the end of his
administration in Macedon, had he been left to himself, can not now be
known; for, very fortunately, as he deemed it, he was suddenly
relieved of all the embarrassment in which he was gradually getting
involved, as he had often been relieved in similar circumstances
before, by an invitation which came to him just at this time to embark
in a new military enterprise, which would draw him away from the
country altogether. It is scarcely necessary to say that Pyrrhus
accepted the invitation with the most eager alacrity. The
circumstances of the case will be explained in the next chapter.