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Ionia to be shut up by sea and

overrun and pillaged by land. There were more slaves at Chios than

in any one other city except Lacedaemon, and being also by reason of

their numbers punished more rigorously when they offended, most of

them, when they saw the Athenian armament firmly established in the

island with a fortified position, immediately deserted to the enemy,

and through their knowledge of the country did the greatest

mischief. The Chians therefore urged upon Astyochus that it was his

duty to assist them, while there was still a hope and a possibility of

stopping the enemy’s progress, while Delphinium was still in process

of fortification and unfinished, and before the completion of a higher

rampart which was being added to protect the camp and fleet of their

besiegers. Astyochus now saw that the allies also wished it and

prepared to go, in spite of his intention to the contrary owing to the

threat already referred to.

 

In the meantime news came from Caunus of the arrival of the

twenty-seven ships with the Lacedaemonian commissioners; and

Astyochus, postponing everything to the duty of convoying a fleet of

that importance, in order to be more able to command the sea, and to

the safe conduct of the Lacedaemonians sent as spies over his

behaviour, at once gave up going to Chios and set sail for Caunus.

As he coasted along he landed at the Meropid Cos and sacked the

city, which was unfortified and had been lately laid in ruins by an

earthquake, by far the greatest in living memory, and, as the

inhabitants had fled to the mountains, overran the country and made

booty of all it contained, letting go, however, the free men. From Cos

arriving in the night at Cnidus he was constrained by the

representations of the Cnidians not to disembark the sailors, but to

sail as he was straight against the twenty Athenian vessels, which

with Charminus, one of the commanders at Samos, were on the watch

for the very twenty-seven ships from Peloponnese which Astyochus was

himself sailing to join; the Athenians in Samos having heard from

Melos of their approach, and Charminus being on the lookout off Syme,

Chalce, Rhodes, and Lycia, as he now heard that they were at Caunus.

 

Astyochus accordingly sailed as he was to Syme, before he was

heard of, in the hope of catching the enemy somewhere out at sea.

Rain, however, and foggy weather encountered him, and caused his ships

to straggle and get into disorder in the dark. In the morning his

fleet had parted company and was most of it still straggling round the

island, and the left wing only in sight of Charminus and the

Athenians, who took it for the squadron which they were watching for

from Caunus, and hastily put out against it with part only of their

twenty vessels, and attacking immediately sank three ships and

disabled others, and had the advantage in the action until the main

body of the fleet unexpectedly hove in sight, when they were

surrounded on every side. Upon this they took to flight, and after

losing six ships with the rest escaped to Teutlussa or Beet Island,

and from thence to Halicarnassus. After this the Peloponnesians put

into Cnidus and, being joined by the twenty-seven ships from Caunus,

sailed all together and set up a trophy in Syme, and then returned

to anchor at Cnidus.

 

As soon as the Athenians knew of the sea-fight, they sailed with all

the ships at Samos to Syme, and, without attacking or being attacked

by the fleet at Cnidus, took the ships’ tackle left at Syme, and

touching at Lorymi on the mainland sailed back to Samos. Meanwhile the

Peloponnesian ships, being now all at Cnidus, underwent such repairs

as were needed; while the eleven Lacedaemonian commissioners conferred

with Tissaphernes, who had come to meet them, upon the points which

did not satisfy them in the past transactions, and upon the best and

mutually most advantageous manner of conducting the war in future. The

severest critic of the present proceedings was Lichas, who said that

neither of the treaties could stand, neither that of Chalcideus, nor

that of Therimenes; it being monstrous that the King should at this

date pretend to the possession of all the country formerly ruled by

himself or by his ancestors—a pretension which implicitly put back

under the yoke all the islands—Thessaly, Locris, and everything as

far as Boeotia—and made the Lacedaemonians give to the Hellenes

instead of liberty a Median master. He therefore invited Tissaphernes

to conclude another and a better treaty, as they certainly would not

recognize those existing and did not want any of his pay upon such

conditions. This offended Tissaphernes so much that he went away in

a rage without settling anything.

CHAPTER XXV

_Twentieth and Twenty-first Years of the War - Intrigues of

Alcibiades - Withdrawal of the Persian Subsidies - Oligarchical

Coup d’Etat at Athens - Patriotism of the Army at Samos_

 

The Peloponnesians now determined to sail to Rhodes, upon the

invitation of some of the principal men there, hoping to gain an

island powerful by the number of its seamen and by its land forces,

and also thinking that they would be able to maintain their fleet from

their own confederacy, without having to ask for money from

Tissaphernes. They accordingly at once set sail that same winter

from Cnidus, and first put in with ninety-four ships at Camirus in the

Rhodian country, to the great alarm of the mass of the inhabitants,

who were not privy to the intrigue, and who consequently fled,

especially as the town was unfortified. They were afterwards, however,

assembled by the Lacedaemonians together with the inhabitants of the

two other towns of Lindus and Ialysus; and the Rhodians were persuaded

to revolt from the Athenians and the island went over to the

Peloponnesians. Meanwhile the Athenians had received the alarm and set

sail with the fleet from Samos to forestall them, and came within

sight of the island, but being a little too late sailed off for the

moment to Chalce, and from thence to Samos, and subsequently waged war

against Rhodes, issuing from Chalce, Cos, and Samos.

 

The Peloponnesians now levied a contribution of thirty-two talents

from the Rhodians, after which they hauled their ships ashore and

for eighty days remained inactive. During this time, and even earlier,

before they removed to Rhodes, the following intrigues took place.

After the death of Chalcideus and the battle at Miletus, Alcibiades

began to be suspected by the Peloponnesians; and Astyochus received

from Lacedaemon an order from them to put him to death, he being the

personal enemy of Agis, and in other respects thought unworthy of

confidence. Alcibiades in his alarm first withdrew to Tissaphernes,

and immediately began to do all he could with him to injure the

Peloponnesian cause. Henceforth becoming his adviser in everything, he

cut down the pay from an Attic drachma to three obols a day, and

even this not paid too regularly; and told Tissaphernes to say to

the Peloponnesians that the Athenians, whose maritime experience was

of an older date than their own, only gave their men three obols,

not so much from poverty as to prevent their seamen being corrupted by

being too well off, and injuring their condition by spending money

upon enervating indulgences, and also paid their crews irregularly

in order to have a security against their deserting in the arrears

which they would leave behind them. He also told Tissaphernes to bribe

the captains and generals of the cities, and so to obtain their

connivance—an expedient which succeeded with all except the

Syracusans, Hermocrates alone opposing him on behalf of the whole

confederacy. Meanwhile the cities asking for money Alcibiades sent

off, by roundly telling them in the name of Tissaphernes that it was

great impudence in the Chians, the richest people in Hellas, not

content with being defended by a foreign force, to expect others to

risk not only their lives but their money as well in behalf of their

freedom; while the other cities, he said, had had to pay largely to

Athens before their rebellion, and could not justly refuse to

contribute as much or even more now for their own selves. He also

pointed out that Tissaphernes was at present carrying on the war at

his own charges, and had good cause for economy, but that as soon as

he received remittances from the king he would give them their pay

in full and do what was reasonable for the cities.

 

Alcibiades further advised Tissaphernes not to be in too great a

hurry to end the war, or to let himself be persuaded to bring up the

Phoenician fleet which he was equipping, or to provide pay for more

Hellenes, and thus put the power by land and sea into the same

hands; but to leave each of the contending parties in possession of

one element, thus enabling the king when he found one troublesome to

call in the other. For if the command of the sea and land were

united in one hand, he would not know where to turn for help to

overthrow the dominant power; unless he at last chose to stand up

himself, and go through with the struggle at great expense and hazard.

The cheapest plan was to let the Hellenes wear each other out, at a

small share of the expense and without risk to himself. Besides, he

would find the Athenians the most convenient partners in empire as

they did not aim at conquests on shore, and carried on the war upon

principles and with a practice most advantageous to the King; being

prepared to combine to conquer the sea for Athens, and for the King

all the Hellenes inhabiting his country, whom the Peloponnesians, on

the contrary, had come to liberate. Now it was not likely that the

Lacedaemonians would free the Hellenes from the Hellenic Athenians,

without freeing them also from the barbarian Mede, unless overthrown

by him in the meanwhile. Alcibiades therefore urged him to wear them

both out at first, and, after docking the Athenian power as much as he

could, forthwith to rid the country of the Peloponnesians. In the main

Tissaphernes approved of this policy, so far at least as could be

conjectured from his behaviour; since he now gave his confidence to

Alcibiades in recognition of his good advice, and kept the

Peloponnesians short of money, and would not let them fight at sea,

but ruined their cause by pretending that the Phoenician fleet would

arrive, and that they would thus be enabled to contend with the odds

in their favour, and so made their navy lose its efficiency, which had

been very remarkable, and generally betrayed a coolness in the war

that was too plain to be mistaken.

 

Alcibiades gave this advice to Tissaphernes and the King, with

whom he then was, not merely because he thought it really the best,

but because he was studying means to effect his restoration to his

country, well knowing that if he did not destroy it he might one day

hope to persuade the Athenians to recall him, and thinking that his

best chance of persuading them lay in letting them see that he

possessed the favour of Tissaphernes. The event proved him to be

right. When the Athenians at Samos found that he had influence with

Tissaphernes, principally of their own motion (though partly also

through Alcibiades himself sending word to their chief men to tell the

best men in the army that, if there were only an oligarchy in the

place of the rascally democracy that had banished him, he would be

glad to return to his country and to make Tissaphernes their

friend), the captains and chief men in the armament at once embraced

the idea of subverting

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