Xerxes, Jacob Abbott [reading well .TXT] 📗
- Author: Jacob Abbott
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Sailing of the fleet.
From Therma—the last of the great stations at which the Persian army halted before its final descent upon Greece—the army commenced its march, and the fleet set sail, nearly at the same time, which was early in the summer. The army advanced slowly, meeting with the usual difficulties and delays, but without encountering any special or extraordinary occurrences, until, after having passed through Macedon into Thessaly, and through Thessaly to the northern frontier of Phocis, they began to approach the Straits of Thermopylæ. What took place at Thermopylæ will be made the subject of the next chapter. The movements of the fleet are to be narrated in this.
Eubœa.
Straits of Artemisium and Euripus.
In order distinctly to understand these movements, it is necessary that the reader should first have a clear conception of the geographical conformation of the coasts and seas along which the path of the expedition lay. By referring to the map of Greece, we shall see that the course which the fleet would naturally take from Therma to the southeastward, along the coast, was unobstructed and clear for about a hundred miles. We then come to a group of four islands, extending in a range at right angles to the coast. The only one of these islands with which we have particularly to do in this history is the innermost of them, which was named Sciathus. Opposite to these islands the line of the coast, having passed around the point of a mountainous and rocky promontory called Magnesia, turns suddenly to the westward, and runs in that direction for about thirty miles, when it again turns to the southward and eastward as before. In the sort of corner thus cut off by the deflection of the coast lies the long island of Eubœa, which may be considered, in fact, as almost a continuation of the continent, as it is a part of the same conformation of country, and is separated from the main land only by submerged valleys on the north and on the east. Into these sunken valleys the sea of course flows, forming straits or channels. The one on the north was, in ancient times, called Artemisium, and the one on the west, at its narrowest point, Euripus. All these islands and coasts were high and picturesque. They were also, in the days of Xerxes, densely populated, and adorned profusely with temples, citadels, and towns.
Saronic Gulf.
Island of Salamis.
On passing the southernmost extremity of the island of Eubœa, and turning to the westward, we come to a promontory of the main land, which constituted Attica, and in the middle of which the city of Athens was situated. Beyond this is a capacious gulf, called the Saronian Gulf. It lies between Attica and the Peloponnesus. In the middle of the Saronian Gulf lies the island of Ægina, and in the northern part of it the island of Salamis. The progress of the Persian fleet was from Therma down the coast to Sciathus, thence along the shores of Eubœa to its southern point, and so round into the Saronian Gulf to the island of Salamis. The distance of this voyage was perhaps two hundred and fifty miles. In accomplishing it the fleet encountered many dangers, and met with a variety of incidents and events, which we shall now proceed to describe.
Signals.
Sentinels.
The country, of course, was every where in a state of the greatest excitement and terror. The immense army was slowly coming down by land, and the fleet, scarcely less terrible, since its descents upon the coast would be so fearfully sudden and overwhelming when they were made, was advancing by sea. The inhabitants of the country were consequently in a state of extreme agitation. The sick and the infirm, who were, of course, utterly helpless in such a danger, exhibited every where the spectacle of silent dismay. Mothers, wives, maidens, and children, on the other hand, were wild with excitement and terror. The men, too full of passion to fear, or too full of pride to allow their fears to be seen, were gathering in arms, or hurrying to and fro with intelligence, or making hasty arrangements to remove their wives and children from the scenes of cruel suffering which were to ensue. They stationed watchmen on the hills to give warning of the approach of the enemy. They agreed upon signals, and raised piles of wood for beacon fires on every commanding elevation along the coast; while all the roads leading from the threatened provinces to other regions more remote from the danger were covered with flying parties, endeavoring to make their escape, and carrying, wearily and in sorrow, whatever they valued most and were most anxious to save. Mothers bore their children, men their gold and silver, and sisters aided their sick or feeble brothers to sustain the toil and terror of the flight.
All this time Xerxes was sitting in his war chariot, in the midst of his advancing army, full of exultation, happiness, and pride at the thoughts of the vast harvest of glory which all this panic and suffering were bringing him in.
The ten reconnoitering galleys.
The fleet, at length—which was under the command of Xerxes's brothers and cousins, whom he had appointed the admirals of it—began to move down the coast from Therma, with the intention of first sweeping the seas clear of any naval force which the Greeks might have sent forward there to act against them, and then of landing upon some point on the coast, wherever they could do so most advantageously for co-operation with the army on the land. The advance of the ships was necessarily slow. So immense a flotilla could not have been otherwise kept together. The admirals, however, selected ten of the swiftest of the galleys, and, after manning and arming them in the most perfect manner, sent them forward to reconnoiter. The ten galleys were ordered to advance rapidly, but with the greatest circumspection. They were not to incur any needless danger, but, if they met with any detached ships of the enemy, they were to capture them, if possible. They were, moreover, to be constantly on the alert, to observe every thing, and to send back to the fleet all important intelligence which they could obtain.
The ten galleys went on without observing any thing remarkable until they reached the island of Sciathus. Here they came in sight of three Greek ships, a sort of advanced guard, which had been stationed there to watch the movements of the enemy.
The Greek galleys immediately hoisted their anchors and fled; the Persian galleys manned their oars, and pressed on after them.
Barbarous ceremony.
They overtook one of the guard-ships very soon, and, after a short conflict, they succeeded in capturing it. The Persians made prisoners of the officers and crew, and then, selecting from among them the fairest and most noble-looking man, just as they would have selected a bullock from a herd, they sacrificed him to one of their deities on the prow of the captured ship. This was a religious ceremony, intended to signalize and sanctify their victory.
The second vessel they also overtook and captured. The crew of this ship were easily subdued, as the overwhelming superiority of their enemies appeared to convince them that all resistance was hopeless, and to plunge them into despair. There was one man, however, who, it seems, could not be conquered. He fought like a tiger to the last, and only ceased to deal his furious thrusts and blows at the enemies that surrounded him when, after being entirely covered with wounds, he fell faint and nearly lifeless upon the bloody deck. When the conflict with him was thus ended, the murderous hostility of his enemies seemed suddenly to be changed into pity for his sufferings and admiration of his valor. They gathered around him, bathed and bound up his wounds, gave him cordials, and at length restored him to life. Finally, when the detachment returned to the fleet, some days afterward, they carried this man with them, and presented him to the commanders as a hero worthy of the highest admiration and honor. The rest of the crew were made slaves.
The alarm spread.
The third of the Greek guard-ships contrived to escape, or, rather, the crew escaped, while the vessel itself was taken. This ship, in its flight, had gone toward the north, and the crew at last succeeded in running it on shore on the coast of Thessaly, so as to escape, themselves, by abandoning the vessel to the enemy. The officers and crew, thus escaping to the shore, went through Thessaly into Greece, spreading the tidings every where that the Persians were at hand. This intelligence was communicated, also, along the coast, by beacon fires which the people of Sciathus built upon the heights of the island as a signal, to give the alarm to the country southward of them, according to the preconcerted plan. The alarm was communicated by other fires built on other heights, and sentinels were stationed on every commanding eminence on the highlands of Eubœa toward the south, to watch for the first appearance of the enemy.
The monument of stones.
The Persian galleys that had been sent forward having taken the three Greek guard-ships, and finding the sea before them now clear of all appearances of an enemy, concluded to return to the fleet with their prizes and their report. They had been directed, when they were dispatched from the fleet, to lay up a monument of stones at the furthest point which they should reach in their cruise: a measure often resorted to in similar cases, by way of furnishing proof that a party thus sent forward have really advanced as far as they pretend on their return. The Persian detachment had actually brought the stones for the erection of their landmark with them in one of their galleys. The galley containing the stones, and two others to aid it, pushed on beyond Sciathus to a small rocky islet standing in a conspicuous position in the sea, and there they built their monument or cairn. The detachment then returned to meet the fleet. The time occupied by this whole expedition was eleven days.
The fleet was, in the mean time, coming down along the coast of Magnesia. The whole company of ships had advanced safely and prosperously thus far, but now a great calamity was about to befall them—the first of the series of disasters by which the expedition was ultimately ruined. It was a storm at sea.
The fleet had drawn up for the night in a long and shallow bay on the coast. There was a rocky promontory at one end of this bay and a cape on the other, with a long beach between them. It was a very good place of refuge and rest for the night in calm weather, but such a bay afforded very little shelter against a tempestuous wind, or even against the surf and swell of the sea, which were sometimes produced by a distant storm. When the fleet entered this bay in the evening, the sea was calm and the sky serene. The commanders expected to remain there for the night, and to proceed on the voyage on the following day.
The bay was not sufficiently extensive to allow of the drawing up of so large a fleet in a single line along the shore. The ships were accordingly arranged in several lines, eight in all. The innermost of these lines was close to
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