Chapter LX (2)

The situation of the last word ἰδίᾳ in this sentence is
perplexing, because it can hardly be construed except either with
ἀπολέσθαι or with αὐτός γε: for Nikias could not run any risk of
perishing _separately_ by the hands of the enemy, unless we are
to ascribe to him an absurd rhodomontade quite foreign to his
character. Compare Plutarch Nikias, c. 22.

[457] Thucyd. vii, 48. τρίβειν οὖν ἔφη χρῆναι προσκαθημένους, etc.

Both Demosthenês and Eurymedon protested in the strongest language against the proposition of Nikias. Especially they treated the plan of remaining in the Great Harbor as fraught with ruin, and insisted, at the very least, on quitting this position without a moment’s delay. Even admitting, for argument, the scruples of Nikias against abandoning the Syracusan war without formal authority from home, they still urged an immediate transfer of their camp from the Great Harbor to Thapsus or Katana. At either of these stations they could prosecute operations against Syracuse, with all the advantage of a wider range of country for supplies, a healthier spot, and above all, of an open sea, which was absolutely indispensable to the naval tactics of Athenians; escaping from that narrow basin which condemned them to inferiority even on their own proper element. At all events to remove, and remove forthwith, out of the Great Harbor, such was the pressing requisition of Demosthenês and Eurymedon.[458]

[458] Thucyd. vii, 49. Ὁ δὲ Δημοσθένης περὶ μὲν τοῦ ~προσκαθῆσθαι
οὐδ’ ὁπωσοῦν ἐνεδέχετο~—τὸ δὲ ξύμπαν εἰπεῖν, ~οὐδενὶ τρόπῳ οἱ ἔφη
ἀρέσκειν ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ ἔτι μένειν~, ἀλλ’ ~ὅτι τάχιστα ἤδη καὶ μὴ
μέλλειν ἐξανίστασθαι~. Καὶ ὁ Εὐρυμέδων αὐτῷ ταῦτα ξυνηγόρευεν.

But even to the modified motion of transferring the actual position to Thapsus or Katana, Nikias refused to consent. He insisted on remaining as they were; and it appears that Menander and Euthydemus[459]—colleagues named by the assembly at home, before the departure of the second armament—must have voted under the influence of his authority; whereby the majority became on his side. Nothing less than being in a minority, probably, would have induced Demosthenês and Eurymedon to submit, on a point of such transcendent importance.

[459] Thucyd. vii, 69; Diodor. xiii, 12.

It was thus that the Athenian armament remained without quitting the harbor, yet apparently quite inactive, during a period which cannot have been less than between three weeks and a month, until Gylippus returned to Syracuse with fresh reinforcements. Throughout the army, hope of success appears to have vanished, while anxiety for return had become general. The opinions of Demosthenês and Eurymedon were doubtless well known, and orders for retreat were expected, but never came. Nikias obstinately refused to give them, during the whole of this fatal interval; which plunged the army into the abyss of ruin, instead of mere failure in their aggressive enterprise.

So unaccountable did such obstinacy appear, that many persons gave Nikias credit for knowing more than he chose to reveal. Even Thucydidês thinks that he was misled by that party in Syracuse with whom he had always kept up a secret correspondence, seemingly apart from his colleagues, and who still urged him, by special messages, not to go away; assuring him that Syracuse could not possibly go on longer. Without fully trusting these intimations, he could not bring himself to act against them; and he therefore hung back from day to day, and refused to pronounce the decisive word.[460]

[460] Thucyd. vii, 48. ~Ἃ ἐπιστάμενος, τῷ μὲν ἔργῳ ἔτι ἐπ’
ἀμφότερα ἔχων καὶ διασκοπῶν ἀνεῖχε, τῷ δ’ ἐμφανεῖ τότε λόγῳ οὐκ
ἔφη ἀπάξειν τὴν στρατιάν.~

The insignificance of the party in Syracuse which corresponded
with Nikias may be reasonably inferred from Thucyd. vii, 55. It
consisted in part of those Leontines who had been incorporated
into the Syracusan citizenship (Diodor. xiii, 18).

Polyænus (i, 43, 1) has a tale respecting a revolt of the slaves
or villeins (οἰκέται) at Syracuse during the Athenian siege,
under a leader named Sosikratês, a revolt suppressed by the
stratagem of Hermokratês. That various attempts of this sort
took place at Syracuse during these two trying years, is by no
means improbable. In fact, it is difficult to understand how
the numerous predial slaves were kept in order during the great
pressure and danger, prior to the coming of Gylippus.

Nothing throughout the whole career of Nikias is so inexplicable as his guilty fatuity—for we can call it by no lighter name, seeing that it involved all the brave men around him in one common ruin with himself—at the present critical juncture. How can we suppose him to have really believed that the Syracusans, now in the flood-tide of success, and when Gylippus was gone forth to procure additional forces, would break down and be unable to carry on the war? Childish as such credulity seems, we are nevertheless compelled to admit it as real, to such an extent as to counterbalance all the pressing motives for departure, motives enforced by discerning colleagues as well as by the complaints of the army, and brought home to his own observation by the experience of the late naval defeat. At any rate, it served as an excuse for that fatal weakness of his character which made him incapable of taking resolutions founded on prospective calculations, and chained him to his actual position until he was driven to act by imminent necessity.

But we discern on the present occasion another motive, which counts for much in dictating his hesitation. The other generals think with satisfaction of going back to their country and rescuing the force which yet remained, even under circumstances of disappointment and failure. Not so Nikias: he knows too well the reception which he had deserved, and which might possibly be in store for him. Avowedly, indeed, he anticipates reproach from the Athenians against the generals, but only unmerited reproach, on the special ground of bringing away the army without orders from home; adding some harsh criticisms upon the injustice of the popular judgment and the perfidy of his own soldiers. But in the first place, we may remark, that Demosthenês and Eurymedon, though as much responsible as he was for this decision, had no such fear of popular injustice; or, if they had, saw clearly that the obligation of braving it was here imperative. And in the next place, no man ever had so little reason to complain of the popular judgment as Nikias. The mistakes of the people in regard to him had always been those of indulgence, over-esteem, and over-constancy. But Nikias foresaw too well that he would have more to answer for at Athens than the simple fact of sanctioning retreat under existing circumstances. He could not but remember the pride and sanguine hopes under which he had originally conducted the expedition out of Peiræus, contrasted with the miserable sequel and ignominious close, even if the account had been now closed, without worse. He could not but be conscious, more or less, how much of all this was owing to his own misjudgment; and under such impressions, the idea of meeting the free criticisms and scrutiny of his fellow-citizens—even putting aside the chance of judicial trial—must have been insupportably humiliating. To Nikias,—a perfectly brave man, and suffering withal under an incurable disease,—life at Athens had neither charm nor honor left. Hence, as much as from any other reason, he was induced to withhold the order for departure; clinging to the hope that some unforeseen boon of fortune might yet turn up, and yielding to the idlest delusions from correspondents in the interior of Syracuse.[461]

[461] Thucyd. vii, 49. Ἀντιλέγοντος δὲ τοῦ Νικίου, ὄκνος τις
καὶ μέλλησις ἐνεγένετο, καὶ ἅμα ὑπόνοια μή τι καὶ πλέον εἰδὼς ὁ
Νικίας ἰσχυρίζηται.

The language of Justin respecting this proceeding is just and
discriminating: “Nicias, seu pudore male actæ rei, seu metu
destitutæ spei civium, seu impellente fato, manere contendit.”
(Justin, iv, 5.)

Nearly a month after the night-battle on Epipolæ,[462] Gylippus and Sikanus both returned to Syracuse. The latter had been unsuccessful at Agrigentum, where the philo-Syracusan party had been sent into banishment before his arrival; but Gylippus brought with him a considerable force of Sicilian Greeks, together with those Peloponnesian hoplites who had started from Cape Tænarus in the early spring, and who had made their way from Kyrênê first along the coast of Africa, and then across to Selinus. Such increase of strength immediately determined the Syracusans to resume the aggressive both by land and by sea. In the Athenians, as they saw the new allies marching in over Epipolæ, it produced a deeper despondency, combined with bitter regret that they had not adopted the proposition of departing immediately after the battle of Epipolæ, when Demosthenês first proposed it. The late interval of lingering hopeless inaction with continued sickness, had farther weakened their strength, and Demosthenês now again pressed the resolution for immediate departure. Whatever fancies Nikias may have indulged about Syracusan embarrassments, were dissipated by the arrival of Gylippus; nor did he venture to persist in his former peremptory opposition, though even now he seems to have assented against his own conviction.[463] He however insisted, with good reason, that no formal or public vote should be taken on the occasion, but that the order should be circulated through the camp, as privately as possible, to be ready for departure at a given signal. Intimation was sent to Katana that the armament was on the point of coming away, with orders to forward no farther supplies.[464]

[462] This interval may be inferred (see Dodwell, Ann. Thucyd.
vii, 50) from the state of the moon at the time of the battle of
Epipolæ, compared with the subsequent eclipse.

[463] Thucyd. vii, 50. ὡς αὐτοῖς οὐδὲ ὁ Νικίας ~ἔτι ὁμοίως
ἠναντιοῦτο~, etc. Diodor. xiii, 12. Ὁ Νικίας ἠναγκάσθη
συγχωρῆσαι, etc.

[464] Thucyd. vii, 60.

This plan was proceeding successfully: the ships were made ready, much of the property of the army had already been conveyed aboard without awakening the suspicion of the enemy, the signal would have been hoisted on the ensuing morning, and within a few hours this fated armament would have found itself clear of the harbor, with comparatively small loss,[465] when the gods themselves—I speak in the language and feelings of the Athenian camp—interfered to forbid its departure. On the very night before, the 27th August, 413 B.C., which was full moon, the moon was eclipsed. Such a portent, impressive to the Athenians at all times, was doubly so under their present despondency, and many of them construed it as a divine prohibition against departure until a certain time should have elapsed, with expiatory ceremonies to take off the effect. They made known their wish for postponement to Nikias and his colleagues; but their interference was superfluous, for Nikias himself was more deeply affected than any one else. He consulted the prophets, who declared that the army ought not to decamp until thrice nine days, a full circle of the moon, should have passed over.[466] And Nikias took upon himself to announce, that until after the interval indicated by them, he would not permit even any discussion or proposition on the subject.

[465] Diodor. xiii, 12. Οἱ στρατιῶται τὰ σκεύη ἐνετίθεντο, etc.
Plutarch, Nikias, c. 23.

[466] The moon was totally eclipsed on this night, August 27, 413
B.C., from twenty-seven minutes past nine to thirty-four minutes
past ten P.M. (Wurm, De Ponderib. Græcor. sect. xciv, p. 184),
speaking with reference to an observer in Sicily.

Thucydidês states that Nikias adopted the injunction of the
prophets, to tarry _thrice nine_ days (vii, 50). Diodorus says
_three_ days. Plutarch intimates that Nikias went beyond the
injunction of the prophets, who only insisted on _three_ days,
while he resolved on remaining for an entire lunar period
(Plutarch, Nikias, c. 23).

I follow the statement of Thucydidês: there is no reason to
believe that Nikias would lengthen the time beyond what the
prophets prescribed.

The erroneous statement respecting this memorable event, in so
respectable an author as Polybius, is not a little surprising
(Polyb. ix, 19).

The decision of the prophets, which Nikias thus made his own, was a sentence of death to the Athenian army, yet it went along with the general feeling, and was obeyed without hesitation. Even Demosthenês, though if he had commanded alone, he might have tried to overrule it, found himself compelled to yield. Yet according to Philochorus, himself a professional diviner, skilful in construing the religious meaning of events, it was a decision decidedly wrong; that is, wrong according to the canonical principles of divination. To men planning escape, or any other operation requiring silence and secrecy, an eclipse of the moon, as hiding light and producing darkness, was, he affirmed, an encouraging sign, and ought to have made the Athenians even more willing and forward in quitting the harbor. We are told, too, that Nikias had recently lost by death Stilbidês, the ablest prophet in his service, and that he was thus forced to have recourse to prophets of inferior ability.[467] His piety left no means untried of appeasing the gods, by prayer, sacrifice, and expiatory ceremonies, continued until the necessity of actual conflict arrived.[468]

[467] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 22; Diodor. xiii, 12; Thucyd. vii,
50. Stilbidês was eminent in his profession of a prophet: see
Aristophan. Pac. 1029, with the citations from Eupolis and
Philochorus in the Scholia.

Compare the description of the effect produced by the eclipse of
the sun at Thebes, immediately prior to the last expedition of
Pelopidas into Thessaly (Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 31).

[468] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24.

The impediment thus finally and irreparably intercepting the Athenian departure, was the direct, though unintended, consequence of the delay previously caused by Nikias. We cannot doubt, however, that, when the eclipse first happened, he regarded it as a sign confirmatory of the opinion which he had himself before delivered, and that he congratulated himself upon having so long resisted the proposition for going away. Let us add, that all those Athenians who were predisposed to look upon eclipses as signs from heaven of calamity about to come, would find themselves strengthened in that belief by the unparalleled woes even now impending over this unhappy army.

What interpretation the Syracusans, confident and victorious, put on the eclipse, we are not told. But they knew well how to interpret the fact, which speedily came to their knowledge, that the Athenians had fully resolved to make a furtive escape, and had only been prevented by the eclipse. Such a resolution, amounting to an unequivocal confession of helplessness, emboldened the Syracusans yet farther, to crush them as they were in the harbor, and never to permit them to occupy even any other post in Sicily. Accordingly, Gylippus caused his triremes to be manned and practised for several days: he then drew out his land-force, and made a demonstration of no great significance against the Athenian lines. On the morrow, he brought out all his forces, both land and naval; with the former of which he beset the Athenian lines, while the fleet, seventy-six triremes in number, was directed to sail up to the Athenian naval station. The Athenian fleet, eighty-six triremes strong, sailed out to meet it, and a close, general, and desperate action took place. The fortune of Athens had fled. The Syracusans first beat the centre division of the Athenians; next, the right division under Eurymedon, who in attempting an evolution to outflank the enemy’s left, forgot those narrow limits of the harbor which were at every turn the ruin of the Athenian mariner, neared the land too much, and was pinned up against it, in the recess of Daskon, by the vigorous attack of the Syracusans. He was here slain, and his division destroyed: successively, the entire Athenian fleet was beaten and driven ashore.

Few of the defeated ships could get into their own station. Most of them were forced ashore or grounded on points without those limits; upon which Gylippus marched down his land-force to the water’s edge, in order to prevent the retreat of the crews as well as to assist the Syracusan seamen in hauling off the ships as prizes. His march, however, was so hurried and disorderly, that the Tyrrhenian troops, on guard at the flank of the Athenian station, sallied out against them as they approached, beat the foremost of them, and drove them away from the shore into the marsh called Lysimeleia. More Syracusan troops came to their aid; but the Athenians also, anxious above all things for the protection of their ships, came forth in greater numbers; and a general battle ensued in which the latter were victorious. Though they did not inflict much loss upon the enemy, yet they saved most of their own triremes which had been driven ashore, together with the crews, and carried them into the naval station. Except for this success on land, the entire Athenian fleet would have been destroyed: as it was, the defeat was still complete, and eighteen triremes were lost, all their crews being slain. This was probably the division of Eurymedon, which having been driven ashore in the recess of Daskon, was too far off from the Athenian station to receive any land assistance. As the Athenians were hauling in their disabled triremes, the Syracusans made a last effort to destroy them by means of a fireship, for which the wind happened to be favorable. But the Athenians found means to prevent her approach, and to extinguish the flames.[469]

[469] Thucyd. vii, 52, 53; Diodor. xiii, 13.

Here was a complete victory gained over Athens on her own element, gained with inferior numbers, gained even over the fresh and yet formidable fleet recently brought by Demosthenês. It told but too plainly on which side the superiority now lay, how well the Syracusans had organized their naval strength for the specialties of their own harbor, how ruinous had been the folly of Nikias in retaining his excellent seamen imprisoned within that petty and unwholesome lake, where land and water alike did the work of their enemies. It not only disheartened the Athenians, but belied all their past experience, and utterly confounded them. Sickness of the whole enterprise, and repentance for having undertaken it, now became uppermost in their minds: yet it is remarkable that we hear of no complaints against Nikias separately.[470] But repentance came too late. The Syracusans, fully alive to the importance of their victory, sailed round the harbor in triumph as again their own,[471] and already looked on the enemy within it as their prisoners. They determined to close up and guard the mouth of it, from Plemmyrium to Ortygia, so as to leave no farther liberty of exit.

[470] Thucyd. vii, 55. Οἱ μὲν Ἀθηναῖοι ἐν παντὶ δὴ ἀθυμίας ἦσαν,
καὶ ὁ παράλογος αὐτοῖς μέγας ἦν, πολὺ δὲ μείζων ἔτι τῆς στρατείας
ὁ μετάμελος.

[471] Thucyd. vii, 56. Οἱ δὲ Συρακόσιοι τόν τε λιμένα εὐθὺς
παρέπλεον ἀδεῶς, etc. This elate and visible manifestation of
feeling ought not to pass unnoticed, as an evidence of Grecian
character.

Nor were they insensible how vastly the scope of the contest was now widened, and the value of the stake before them enhanced. It was not merely to rescue their own city from siege, nor even to repel and destroy the besieging army, that they were now contending. It was to extinguish the entire power of Athens, and liberate the half of Greece from dependence; for Athens could never be expected to survive so terrific a loss as that of the entire double armament before Syracuse.[472] The Syracusans exulted in the thought that this great achievement would be theirs, that their city was the field, and their navy the chief instrument of victory: a lasting source of glory to them, not merely in the eyes of contemporaries, but even in those of posterity. Their pride swelled when they reflected on the Pan-Hellenic importance which the siege of Syracuse had now acquired, and when they counted up the number and variety of Greek warriors who were now fighting, on one side or the other, between Euryalus and Plemmyrium. With the exception of the great struggle between Athens and the Peloponnesian confederacy, never before had combatants so many and so miscellaneous been engaged under the same banners. Greeks, continental and insular, Ionic, Doric, and Æolic, autonomous and dependent, volunteers and mercenaries, from Miletus and Chios in the east to Selinus in the west, were all here to be found; and not merely Greeks, but also the barbaric Sikels, Egestæans, Tyrrhenians, and Iapygians. If the Lacædemonians, Corinthians, and Bœotians were fighting on the side of Syracuse, the Argeians and Mantineians, not to mention the great insular cities, stood in arms against her. The jumble of kinship among the combatants on both sides, as well as the cross action of different local antipathies, is put in lively antithesis by Thucydidês.[473] But amidst so vast an assembled number, of which they were the chiefs, the paymasters, and the centre of combination, the Syracusans might well feel a sense of personal aggrandizement, and a consciousness of the great blow which they were about to strike, sufficient to exalt them for the time above the level even of their great Dorian chiefs in Peloponnesus.

[472] Thucyd. vii, 56.

[473] Thucyd. vii, 57, 58.

It was their first operation, occupying three days, to close up the mouth of the Great Harbor, which was nearly one mile broad, with vessels of every description, triremes, traders, boats, etc., anchored in an oblique direction, and chained together.[474] They at the same time prepared their naval force with redoubled zeal for the desperate struggle which they knew to be coming. They then awaited the efforts of the Athenians, who watched their proceedings with sadness and anxiety.

[474] Thucyd. vii, 59; Diodor. xiii, 14.

Nikias and his colleagues called together the principal officers to deliberate what was to be done. As they had few provisions remaining, and had counter-ordered their farther supplies, some instant and desperate effort was indispensable; and the only point in debate was, whether they should burn their fleet and retire by land, or make a fresh maritime exertion to break out of the harbor. Such had been the impression left by the recent sea-fight, that many in the camp leaned to the former scheme.[475] But the generals resolved upon first trying the latter, and exhausted all their combinations to give to it the greatest possible effect. They now evacuated the upper portion of their lines, both on the higher ground of Epipolæ, and even on the lower ground, such portion as was nearest to the southern cliff; confining themselves to a limited fortified space close to the shore, just adequate for their sick, their wounded, and their stores; in order to spare the necessity for a large garrison to defend them, and thus leave nearly their whole force disposable for sea-service. They then made ready every trireme in the station, which could be rendered ever so imperfectly seaworthy, constraining every fit man to serve aboard them, without distinction of age, rank, or country. The triremes were manned with double crews of soldiers, hoplites as well as bowmen and darters, the latter mostly Akarnanians; while the hoplites, stationed at the prow with orders to board the enemy as quickly as possible, were furnished with grappling-irons to detain the enemy’s ship immediately after the moment of collision, in order that it might not be withdrawn and the collision repeated, with all its injurious effects arising from the strength and massiveness of the Syracusan epôtids. The best consultation was held with the steersmen as to arrangement and manœuvres of every trireme, nor was any precaution omitted which the scanty means at hand allowed. In the well-known impossibility of obtaining new provisions, every man was anxious to hurry on the struggle.[476] But Nikias, as he mustered them on the shore immediately before going aboard, saw but too plainly that it was the mere stress of desperation which impelled them; that the elasticity, the disciplined confidence, the maritime pride, habitual to the Athenians on shipboard, was extinct, or dimly and faintly burning.

[475] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24.

[476] Thucyd. vii, 60.

He did his best to revive them, by exhortations unusually emphatic and impressive. “Recollect (he said) that you too, not less than the Syracusans, are now fighting for your own safety and for your country; for it is only by victory in the coming struggle that any of you can ever hope to see his country again. Yield not to despair like raw recruits after a first defeat; you, Athenians and allies, familiar with the unexpected revolutions of war, will hope now for the fair turn of fortune, and fight with a spirit worthy of the great force which you see here around you. We generals have now made effective provision against our two great disadvantages, the narrow circuit of the harbor, and the thickness of the enemy’s prows.[477] Sad as the necessity is, we have thrown aside all our Athenian skill and tactics, and have prepared to fight under the conditions forced upon us by the enemy, a land-battle on shipboard.[478] It will be for you to conquer in this last desperate struggle, where there is no friendly shore to receive you if you give way. You, hoplites on the deck, as soon as you have the enemy’s trireme in contact, keep him fast, and relax not until you have swept away his hoplites and mastered his deck. You, seamen and rowers, must yet keep up your courage, in spite of this sad failure in our means, and subversion of our tactics. You are better defended on deck above, and you have more triremes to help you, than in the recent defeat. Such of you, as are not Athenian citizens, I entreat to recollect the valuable privileges which you have hitherto enjoyed from serving in the navy of Athens. Though not really citizens, you have been reputed and treated as such; you have acquired our dialect, you have copied our habits, and have thus enjoyed the admiration, the imposing station, and the security, arising from our great empire.[479] Partaking as you do freely in the benefits of that empire, do not now betray it to these Sicilians and Corinthians whom you have so often beaten. For such of you as _are_ Athenians, I again remind you that Athens has neither fresh triremes, nor fresh hoplites, to replace those now here. Unless you are now victorious, her enemies near home will find her defenceless; and our countrymen there will become slaves to Sparta, as you will to Syracuse. Recollect, every man of you, that you now going aboard here are the _all_ of Athens,—her hoplites, her ships, her entire remaining city, and her splendid name.[480] Bear up then and conquer, every man with his best mettle, in this one last struggle, for Athens as well as yourselves, and on an occasion which will never return.”

[477] Thucyd. vii, 62. Ἃ δὲ ἀρωγὰ ἐνείδομεν ἐπὶ τῇ τοῦ λιμένος
στενότητι πρὸς τὸν μέλλοντα ὄχλον τῶν νεῶν ἔσεσθαι, etc.

[478] Thucyd. vii, 62. Ἐς τοῦτο γὰρ δὴ ἠναγκάσμεθα, ὥστε
πεζομαχεῖν ἀπὸ τῶν νεῶν, καὶ τὸ μήτε αὐτοὺς ἀνακρούεσθαι, μήτε
ἐκείνους ἐᾷν, ὠφέλιμον φαίνεται.

[479] Thucyd. vii, 63. Τοῖς δὲ ναύταις παραινῶ, καὶ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ
τῷδε καὶ δέομαι, μὴ ἐκπεπλῆχθαί τι ταῖς ξυμφοραῖς ἄγαν ...
ἐκείνην τε τὴν ἡδονὴν ἐνθυμεῖσθαι, ὡς ἀξία ἐστὶ διασώσασθαι, ~οἱ
τέως Ἀθηναῖοι νομιζόμενοι καὶ μὴ ὄντες ὑμῶν~, τῆς τε φωνῆς τῇ
ἐπιστήμῃ καὶ τῶν τρόπων τῇ μιμήσει, ἐθαυμάζεσθε κατὰ τὴν Ἑλλάδα,
καὶ τῆς ἀρχῆς τῆς ἡμετέρας οὐκ ἔλασσον κατὰ τὸ ὠφελεῖσθαι, ἔς
τε τὸ φοβερὸν τοῖς ὑπηκόοις καὶ τὸ μὴ ἀδικεῖσθαι πολὺ πλεῖον,
μετείχετε, ὥστε κοινωνοὶ μόνοι ἐλευθέρως ἡμῖν τῆς ἀρχῆς ὄντες,
δικαίως αὐτὴν νῦν μὴ καταπροδίδοτε, etc.

Dr. Arnold (together with Göller and Poppo), following the
Scholiast, explain these words as having particular reference
to the metics in the Athenian naval service. But I cannot think
this correct. All persons in that service—who were freemen, but
yet not citizens of Athens—are here designated; partly metics,
doubtless, but partly also citizens of the islands and dependent
allies,—the ξένοι ναυβάται alluded to by the Corinthians and by
Periklês at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war (Thucyd. i,
121-143) as the ὠνητὴ δύναμις μᾶλλον ἢ οἰκεία of Athens. Without
doubt there were numerous foreign seamen in the warlike navy
of Athens, who derived great consideration as well as profit
from the service, and often passed themselves off for Athenian
citizens when they really were not so.

[480] Thucyd. vii, 64. Ὅτι οἱ ἐν ταῖς ναυσὶν ὑμῶν νῦν ἐσόμενοι,
καὶ πέζοι τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις εἰσὶ καὶ νῆες, καὶ ἡ ὑπόλοιπος πόλις,
καὶ τὸ μέγα ὄνομα τῶν Ἀθηνῶν....

If, in translating the despatch written home ten months before by Nikias to the people of Athens, we were compelled to remark, that the greater part of it was the bitterest condemnation of his own previous policy as commander, so we are here carried back, when we find him striving to palliate the ruinous effects of that confined space of water which paralyzed the Athenian seamen, to his own obstinate improvidence in forbidding the egress of the fleet when insisted on by Demosthenês. His hearers probably were too much absorbed with the terrible present, to revert to irremediable mistakes of the past. Immediately on the conclusion of his touching address, the order was given to go aboard, and the seamen took their places. But when the triremes were fully manned, and the trierarchs, after superintending the embarkation, were themselves about to enter and push off, the agony of Nikias was too great to be repressed. Feeling more keenly than any man the intensity of this last death-struggle, and the serious, but inevitable, shortcomings of the armament in its present condition, he still thought that he had not said enough for the occasion. He now renewed his appeal personally to the trierarchs, all of them citizens of rank and wealth at Athens. They were all familiarly known to him, and he addressed himself to every man separately by his own name, his father’s name, and his tribe, adjuring him by the deepest and most solemn motives which could touch the human feelings. Some he reminded of their own previous glories, others of the achievements of illustrious ancestors, imploring them not to dishonor or betray these precious titles: to all alike he recalled the charm of their beloved country, with its full political freedom and its unconstrained license of individual agency to every man: to all alike he appealed in the names of their wives, their children, and their paternal gods. He cared not for being suspected of trenching upon the common places of rhetoric: he caught at every topic which could touch the inmost affections, awaken the inbred patriotism, and rekindle the abated courage of the officers, whom he was sending forth to this desperate venture. He at length constrained himself to leave off, still fancying in his anxiety that he ought to say more, and proceeded to marshal the land-force for the defence of the lines, as well as along the shore, where they might render as much service and as much encouragement as possible to the combatants on shipboard.[481]

[481] See the striking chapter of Thucyd. vii, 69. Even the tame
style of Diodorus (xiii, 15) becomes animated in describing this
scene.

Very different was the spirit prevalent, and very opposite the burning words uttered, on the seaboard of the Syracusan station, as the leaders were mustering their men immediately before embarkation. They had been apprized of the grappling-irons now about to be employed by the Athenians, and had guarded against them in part by stretching hides along their bows, so that the “iron hand” might slip off without acquiring any hold. The preparatory movements even within the Athenian station being perfectly visible, Gylippus sent the fleet out with the usual prefatory harangue. He complimented them on the great achievements which they had already performed in breaking down the naval power of Athens, so long held irresistible.[482] He reminded them that the sally of their enemies was only a last effort of despair, seeking nothing but escape, undertaken without confidence in themselves, and under the necessity of throwing aside all their own tactics in order to copy feebly those of the Syracusans.[483] He called upon them to recollect the destructive purposes which the invaders had brought with them against Syracuse, to inflict with resentful hand the finishing stroke upon this half-ruined armament, and to taste the delight of satiating a legitimate revenge.[484]

[482] Thucyd. vii, 65.

[483] Thucyd. vii, 66, 67.

[484] Thucyd. vii, 68. πρὸς οὖν ἀταξίαν τε τοιαύτην ... ὀργῇ
προσμίξωμεν, καὶ νομίσωμεν ἅμα μὲν νομιμώτατον εἶναι πρὸς τοὺς
ἐναντίους, οἳ ἂν ὡς ἐπὶ τιμωρίᾳ τοῦ προσπεσόντος δικαιώσωσιν
ἀποπλῆσαι τῆς γνώμης τὸ θυμούμενον, ἅμα δὲ ἐχθροὺς ἀμύνασθαι
ἐγγενησόμενον ἡμῖν, καὶ (τὸ λεγόμενόν που) ἥδιστον εἶναι.

This plain and undisguised invocation of the angry and revengeful
passions should be noticed, as a mark of character and manners.

The Syracusan fleet—seventy-six triremes strong, as in the last battle—was the first to put off from shore; Pythen with the Corinthians in the centre, Sikanus and Agatharchus on the wings. A certain proportion of them were placed near the mouth of the harbor, in order to guard the barrier; while the rest were distributed around the harbor in order to attack the Athenians from different sides as soon as they should approach. Moreover, the surface of the harbor swarmed with the light craft of the Syracusans, in many of which embarked youthful volunteers, sons of the best families in the city;[485] boats of no mean service during the battle, saving or destroying the seamen cast overboard from disabled ships, as well as annoying the fighting Athenian triremes. The day was one sacred to Hêraklês at Syracuse; and the prophets announced that the god would insure victory to the Syracusans, provided they stood on the defensive, and did not begin the attack.[486] Moreover, the entire shore round the harbor, except the Athenian station and its immediate neighborhood, was crowded with Syracusan soldiers and spectators; while the walls of Ortygia, immediately overhanging the water, were lined with the feebler population of the city, the old men, women, and children. From the Athenian station presently came forth one hundred and ten triremes, under Demosthenês, Menander, and Euthydêmus, with the customary pæan, its tone probably partaking of the general sadness of the camp. They steered across direct to the mouth of the harbor, beholding on all sides the armed enemies ranged along the shore, as well as the unarmed multitudes who were imprecating the vengeance of the gods upon their heads; while for them there was no sympathy, except among the fellow-sufferers within their own lines. Inside of this narrow basin, rather more than five English miles in circuit, one hundred and ninety-four ships of war, each manned with more than two hundred men, were about to join battle, in the presence of countless masses around, all with palpitating hearts, and near enough both to see and hear; the most picturesque battle—if we could abstract our minds from its terrible interest —probably in history, without smoke or other impediments to vision, and in the clear atmosphere of Sicily, a serious and magnified realization of those naumachiæ which the Roman emperors used to exhibit with gladiators on the Italian lakes, for the recreation of the people.

The Athenian fleet made directly for that portion of the barrier where a narrow opening—perhaps closed by a movable chain—had been left for merchant-vessels. Their first impetuous attack broke through the Syracusan squadron defending it, and they were already attempting to sever its connecting bonds, when the enemy from all sides crowded in upon them and forced them to desist. Presently the battle became general, and the combatants were distributed in various parts of the harbor. On both sides a fierce and desperate courage was displayed, even greater than had been shown on any of the former occasions. At the first onset, the skill and tactics of the steersmen shone conspicuous, well seconded by zeal on the part of the rowers and by their ready obedience to the voice of the keleustês. As the vessels neared, the bowmen, slingers, and throwers on the deck, hurled clouds of missiles against the enemy; next, was heard the loud crash of the two impinging metallic fronts, resounding all along the shore.[487] When the vessels were thus once in contact, they were rarely allowed to separate: a strenuous hand-fight then commenced by the hoplites in each, trying respectively to board and master their enemy’s deck. It was not always, however, that each trireme had its own single and special enemy: sometimes one ship had two or three enemies to contend with at once, sometimes she fell aboard of one unsought, and became entangled. After a certain time, the fight still obstinately continuing, all sort of battle order became lost; the skill of the steersman was of little avail, and the voice of the keleustês was drowned amidst the universal din and mingled cries from victors as well as vanquished. On both sides emulous exhortations were poured forth, together with reproach and sarcasm addressed to any ship which appeared flinching from the contest; though factitious stimulus of this sort was indeed but little needed.

[485] Diodorus, xiii, 14. Plutarch has a similar statement,
in reference to the previous battle: but I think he must have
confused one battle with the other, for his account can hardly be
made to harmonize with Thucydidês (Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24).

It is to be recollected that both Plutarch and Diodorus had
probably read the description of the battles in the Great Harbor
of Syracuse, contained in Philistus; a better witness, if we
had his account before us, even than Thucydidês; since he was
probably at this time in Syracuse and was perhaps actually
engaged.

[486] Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24, 25. Timæus reckoned the aid of
Hêraklês as having been one of the great causes of Syracusan
victory over the Athenians. He gave several reasons why the god
was provoked against the Athenians: see Timæus, Fragm. 104, ed.
Didot.

[487] The destructive impact of these metallic masses at the
head of the ships of war, as well as the periplus practised by
a lighter ship to avoid direct collision against a heavier,
is strikingly illustrated by a passage in Plutarch’s Life of
Lucullus, where a naval engagement between the Roman general, and
Neoptolemus the admiral of Mithridates, is described. “Lucullus
was on board a Rhodian quinquerime, commanded by Damagoras, a
skilful Rhodian pilot; while Neoptolemus was approaching with a
ship much heavier, and driving forward to a direct collision:
upon which Damagoras evaded the blow, rowed rapidly round, and
struck the enemy in the stern.” ... δείσας ὁ Δαμαγόρας τὸ βάρος
τῆς βασιλικῆς, καὶ ~τὴν τραχύτητα τοῦ χαλκώματος~, οὐκ ἐτόλμησε
συμπεσεῖν ἀντίπρωρος, ἀλλ’ ὀξέως ἐκ περιαγωγῆς ἀποστρέψας
ἐκέλευσεν ἐπὶ πρύμναν ὤσασθαι· καὶ πιεσθείσης ἐνταῦθα τῆς νεώς
ἐδέξατο τὴν πληγὴν ἀβλαβῆ γενομένην, ἅτε δὴ τοῖς θαλαττεύουσι τῆς
νέως μέρεσι προσπεσοῦσαν.—Plutarch, Lucull. c. 3.

Such was the heroic courage on both sides, that for a long time victory was altogether doubtful, and the whole harbor was a scene of partial encounters, wherein sometimes Syracusans, sometimes Athenians, prevailed. According as success thus fluctuated, so followed the cheers or wailings of the spectators ashore. At one and the same time, every variety of human emotion might be witnessed; according as attention was turned towards a victorious or a defeated ship. It was among the spectators in the Athenian station above all, whose entire life and liberty were staked in the combat, that this emotion might be seen exaggerated into agony, and overpassing the excitement even of the combatants themselves.[488] Those among them who looked towards a portion of the harbor where their friends seemed winning, were full of joy and thanksgiving to the gods: such of their neighbors who contemplated an Athenian ship in difficulty, gave vent to their feelings in shrieks and lamentation; while a third group, with their eyes fixed on some portion of the combat still disputed, were plunged in all the agitations of doubt, manifested even in the tremulous swing of their bodies, as hope or fear alternately predominated. During all the time that the combat remained undecided, the Athenians ashore were distracted by all these manifold varieties of intense sympathy. But at length the moment came, after a long-protracted struggle, when victory began to declare in favor of the Syracusans, who, perceiving that their enemies were slackening, redoubled their shouts as well as their efforts, and pushed them all back towards the land. All the Athenian triremes, abandoning farther resistance, were thrust ashore like shipwrecked vessels in or near their own station; a few being even captured before they could arrive there. The diverse manifestations of sympathy among the Athenians in the station itself were now exchanged for one unanimous shriek of agony and despair. The boldest of them rushed to rescue the ships and their crews from pursuit, others to man their walls in case of attack from land: many were even paralyzed at the sight, and absorbed with the thoughts of their own irretrievable ruin. Their souls were doubtless still farther subdued by the wild and enthusiastic joy which burst forth in maddening shouts from the hostile crowds around the harbor, in response to their own victorious comrades on shipboard.

[488] Thucyd. vii, 71.

Such was the close of this awful, heart-stirring, and decisive combat. The modern historian strives in vain to convey the impression of it which appears in the condensed and burning phrases of Thucydidês. We find in his description of battles generally, and of this battle beyond all others, a depth and abundance of human emotion which has now passed out of military proceedings. The Greeks who fight, like the Greeks who look on, are not soldiers withdrawn from the community, and specialized as well as hardened by long professional training, but citizens with all the passions, instincts, sympathies, joys, and sorrows of domestic as well as political life. Moreover, the non-military population in ancient times had an interest of the most intense kind in the result of the struggle; which made the difference to them, if not of life and death, at least of the extremity of happiness and misery. Hence the strong light and shade, the Homeric exhibition of undisguised impulse, the tragic detail of personal motive and suffering, which pervades this and other military descriptions of Thucydidês. When we read the few but most vehement words which he employs to depict the Athenian camp under this fearful trial, we must recollect that these were not only men whose all was at stake, but that they were moreover citizens full of impressibility, sensitive and demonstrative Greeks; and, indeed, the most sensitive and demonstrative of all Greeks. To repress all manifestations of strong emotion was not considered in ancient times essential to the dignity of the human character.

Amidst all the deep pathos, however, which the great historian has imparted to the final battle at Syracuse, he has not explained the causes upon which its ultimate issue turned. Considering that the Athenians were superior to their enemies in number, as one hundred and ten to seventy-six triremes, that they fought with courage not less heroic, and that the action was on their own element, we might have anticipated for them, if not a victory, at least a drawn battle, with equal loss on both sides. But we may observe, 1. The number of one hundred and ten triremes was formed by including some hardly seaworthy.[489] 2. The crews were composed partly of men not used to sea-service; and the Akarnanian darters, especially, were for this reason unhandy with their missiles.[490] 3. Though the water had been hitherto the element favorable to Athens, yet her superiority in this respect was declining, and her enemies approaching nearer to her, even in the open sea. But the narrow dimensions of the harbor would have nullified her superiority at all times, and placed her even at great disadvantage,—without the means of twisting and turning her triremes so as to strike only at a vulnerable point of the enemy,—compared with the thick, heavy, straightforward butting of the Syracusans; like a nimble pugilist of light weight contending, in a very confined ring, against superior weight and muscle.[491] For the mere land-fight on shipboard, Athenians had not only no advantage, but had on the contrary the odds against them. 4. The Syracusans enjoyed great advantage from having nearly the whole harbor lined round with their soldiers and friends; not simply from the force of encouraging sympathy, no mean auxiliary, but because any of their triremes, if compelled to fall back before an Athenian, found protection on the shore, and could return to the fight at leisure; while an Athenian in the same predicament had no escape. 5. The numerous light craft of the Syracusans doubtless rendered great service in this battle, as they had done in the preceding, though Thucydidês does not again mention them. 6. Lastly, both in the Athenian and Syracusan characters, the pressure of necessity was less potent as a stimulus to action, than hopeful confidence and elation, with the idea of a flood-tide yet mounting. In the character of some other races, the Jews for instance, the comparative force of these motives appears to be the other way.

[489] Thucyd. vii, 60. τὰς ναῦς ἁπάσας ὅσαι ἦσαν καὶ δυναταὶ ~καὶ
ἀπλοώτεραι~.

[490] Thucyd. vii, 60. πάντα τινὰ ἐσβιβάζοντες
πληρῶσαι—ἀναγκάσαντες ἐσβαίνειν ὅστις καὶ ~ὁπωσοῦν ἐδόκει ἡλικίας
μετέχων ἐπιτήδειος~ εἶναι. Compare also the speech of Gylippus,
c. 67.

[491] The language of Theokritus, in describing the pugilistic
contest between Pollux and the Bebrykian Amykus, is not
inapplicable to the position of the Athenian ships and seamen
when cramped up in this harbor (Idyll. xxii, 91):—

.................... ἐκ δ’ ἑτέρωθεν
Ἥρωες κρατερὸν Πολυδεύκεα θαρσύνεσκον,
Δειδιότες μή πώς μιν ~ἐπιβρίσας δαμάσειεν,
Χώρῳ ἐνὶ στεινῷ~, Τιτύῳ ἐναλίγκιος ἀνήρ.

Compare Virgil’s picture of Entellus and Darês, Æneid, v, 430.

About sixty Athenian triremes, little more than half of the fleet which came forth, were saved as the wreck from this terrible conflict. The Syracusans on their part had suffered severely; only fifty triremes remaining out of seventy-six. The triumph with which, nevertheless, on returning to the city, they erected their trophy, and the exultation which reigned among the vast crowds encircling the harbor, was beyond all measure or precedent. Its clamorous manifestations were doubtless but too well heard in the neighboring camp of the Athenians, and increased, if anything could increase, the soul-subduing extremity of distress which paralyzed the vanquished. So utterly did the pressure of suffering, anticipated as well as actual, benumb their minds and extinguish their most sacred associations, that no man among them, not even the ultra-religious Nikias, thought of picking up the floating bodies or asking for a truce to bury the dead. This obligation, usually so serious and imperative upon the survivors after a battle, now passed unheeded amidst the sorrow, terror, and despair, of the living man for himself.

Such despair, however, was not shared by the generals, to their honor be it spoken. On the afternoon of this terrible defeat, Demosthenês proposed to Nikias that at daybreak the ensuing morning they should man all the remaining ships—even now more in number than the Syracusan—and make a fresh attempt to break out of the harbor. To this Nikias agreed, and both proceeded to try their influence in getting the resolution executed. But so irreparably was the spirit of the seamen broken, that nothing could prevail upon them to go again on shipboard: they would hear of nothing but attempting to escape by land.[492] Preparations were therefore made for commencing their march in the darkness of that very night. The roads were still open, and, had they so marched, a portion of them, at least, might even yet have been saved.[493] But there occurred one more mistake, one farther postponement, which cut off the last hopes of this gallant and fated remnant.

[492] Thucyd. vii, 72.

[493] Diodor. xiii, 18.

The Syracusan Hermokratês, fully anticipating that the Athenians would decamp that very night, was eager to prevent their retreat, because of the mischief which they might do if established in any other part of Sicily. He pressed Gylippus and the military authorities to send out forthwith, and block up the principal roads, passes, and fords, by which the fugitives would get off. Though sensible of the wisdom of his advice, the generals thought it wholly unexecutable. Such was the universal and unbounded joy which now pervaded the city, in consequence of the recent victory, still farther magnified by the circumstance that the day was sacred to Hêraklês,—so wild the jollity, the feasting, the intoxication, the congratulations, amidst men rewarding themselves after their recent effort and triumph, and amidst the necessary care for the wounded,—that an order to arm and march out would have been as little listened to as the order to go on shipboard was by the desponding Athenians. Perceiving that he could get nothing done until the next morning, Hermokratês resorted to a stratagem in order to delay the departure of the Athenians for that night. At the moment when darkness was beginning, he sent down some confidential friends on horseback to the Athenian wall. These men, riding up near enough to make themselves heard, and calling for the sentries, addressed them as messengers from the private correspondents of Nikias in Syracuse, who had sent to warn him, they affirmed, not to decamp during the night, inasmuch as the Syracusans had already beset and occupied the roads; but to begin his march quietly the next morning after adequate preparation.[494]

[494] Thucyd. vii, 73; Diodor. xiii, 18.

This fraud—the same as the Athenians had themselves practised two years before,[495] in order to tempt the Syracusans to march out against Katana—was perfectly successful: the sincerity of the information was believed, and the advice adopted. Had Demosthenês been in command alone, we may doubt whether he would have been so easily duped; for granting the accuracy of the fact asserted, it was not the less obvious that the difficulties, instead of being diminished, would be increased tenfold on the following day. We have seen, however, on more than one previous occasion, how fatally Nikias was misled by his treacherous advices from the philo-Athenians at Syracuse. An excuse for inaction was always congenial to his character; and the present recommendation, moreover, fell in but too happily with the temper of the army, now benumbed with depression and terror, like those unfortunate soldiers, in the Retreat of the Ten Thousand Greeks, who were yielding to the lethargy of extreme cold on the snows of Armenia, and whom Xenophon vainly tried to arouse.[496] Having remained over that night, the generals determined also to stay the next day,—in order that the army might carry away with them as much of their baggage as possible,—sending forward a messenger to the Sikels in the interior to request that they would meet the army, and bring with them a supply of provisions.[497] Gylippus and Hermokratês had thus ample time, on the following day, to send out forces and occupy all the positions convenient for obstructing the Athenian march. They at the same time towed into Syracuse as prizes all the Athenian triremes which had been driven ashore in the recent battle, and which now lay like worthless hulks, unguarded and unheeded,[498] seemingly even those within the station itself.

[495] Thucyd. vi, 64.

[496] Xenophon, Anab. iv, 5, 15, 19; v, 8, 15.

[497] Thucyd. vii, 77.

[498] Thucyd. vii, 74.

It was on the next day but one after the maritime defeat that Nikias and Demosthenês put their army in motion to attempt retreat. The camp had long been a scene of sickness and death from the prevalence of marsh fever; but since the recent battle the number of wounded men, and the unburied bodies of the slain, had rendered it yet more pitiable. Forty thousand miserable men—so prodigious was the total, including all ranks and functions—now set forth to quit it, on a march of which few could hope to see the end; like the pouring forth of the population of a large city starved out by blockade. Many had little or no provisions to carry, so low had the stock become reduced; but of those who had, every man carried his own, even the horsemen and hoplites, now for the first time either already left without slaves, by desertion, or knowing that no slave could now be trusted. But neither such melancholy equality of suffering, nor the number of sufferers, counted for much in the way of alleviation. A downcast stupor and sense of abasement possessed every man; the more intolerable, when they recollected the exit of the armament from Peiræus two years before, with prayers, and solemn pæans, and all the splendid dreams of conquest, set against the humiliation of the closing scene now before them, without a single trireme left out of two prodigious fleets.