in a little vessel; on his arrival, he informed the commanders of the shipwreck, and of the ships which had been sent round Euboea.

XI. The Greeks, as soon as the signal was given, turned their prows towards the Barbarians, collecting their sterns into one common centre. On a second signal, though compress

IX. Upon this the Greeks called a council: various opinions were delivered, but it was ul-ed within a narrow space, they attacked the timately determined to remain that day in their station, but to depart soon after midnight to meet that part of the enemy's fleet which had been sent round Euboea. As they perceived no one advancing against them, as soon as the twilight appeared, they proceeded towards the Barbarians, determined to make experiment of their skill in fighting and manoeuvring.

X. The commanders and forces of Xerxes seeing them approach in so small a body, conceived them to be actuated by extreme infatuation, and, drawing out their vessels, expected to find them an easy conquest. In this they were not unreasonable, for their fleet was superior to the Greeks, not only in number but swiftness; in contempt, therefore, they surrounded them. There were some of the Ionians who wished well to the Greeks, and served against them with the greatest reluctance; seeing them thus encircled, they were affected with much uneasiness concerning them, not supposing that any could escape, so insignificant did they appear. There were other Ionians, to whom the seeming distress of the Greeks gave great pleasure; these contended with all exertion who should take the first Athenian vessel, in hopes of a reward from the king. For among the Barbarians greater reputation' was allowed to the Athenians than to any other of the allies.

3 Shipwreck.]—See book vii. chap. 188.

4 Extreme infatuation.]—With the same contempt the French are represented to have considered the English army before the battle of Agincourt. This is expressed with the greatest possible animation by Shakspeare in his Life of Henry the Fifth.

His numbers are so few,
His soldiers sick, and famish'd in their march;
And I am sure, when he shall see our army,
He'll drop his heart into the sink of fear,
And for achievement, offer us his ransom.

To the Persians, as well as to the French, the noble answer of Henry to the French herald was happily applicable.

The man that once did sell the lion's skin

While the beast lived, was kill'd with hunting him. 5 Greater reputation.]-Notwithstanding what is here asserted in favour of the Athenians, their own historian remarks, that from the best conjectures he was able to form, his countrymen had done nothing worthy of being recorded, either at home or abroad, from the Trojan to the Persic and Peloponnesian wars. Thucydides, 1. i. As I have thrown together at the end of the preceding book some remarks on the Spartan policy and manners, the reader at the conclusion of this will find some relative to those of Athens.-T.

enemy in front. They soon took thirty of the Barbarian vessels, among whom was Philaon, son of Chersis, and brother of Gorgus, prince of Salamis, a man very highly esteemed in the army. The first enemy's ship was taken by an Athenian; his name was Lycomedes, the son of schreas, and he obtained the fame he merited. Victory alternately inclined to both parties, when they were separated by the night: the Greeks returned to Artemisium, the Barbarians to Aphetæ, the issue of the contest being very different from what they had expected. Of those Greeks who were in the service of the king, Antidorus the Lemnian was the only one who went over to his countrymen. The Athenians, in consideration of his conduct, assigned him some lands in Salamis.

XII. The above engagement took place in the middle of the summer. When night approached, there fell a heavy storm of rain attended with continued thunder from mount Pelion. The bodies of the dead, and the wrecks of the vessels floating to Aphetæ, were so involved among the prows of the ships, that the oars were hardly manageable; the forces on board were seized with a violent panic, expecting every moment to perish. They had hardly recovered themselves from the effect of the first storm and shipwreck off Pelion, when that severe battle at sea had succeeded. As soon as this last terminated, they had now been attacked again by violent rains, a tempestuous sea, and continued thunder.

XIII. This night, however, proved still more severe to those whose business it was to make a circuit round Euboea. The storm fell upon them with the greater violence, as they were remote from land, and they perished in a

6 Expecting every moment to perish.]—An example of terror very much like this, occurs in 1 Samuel xiv. 15. Though it must be acknowledged, that the confusion into which the camp of the Philistines was thrown, is expressly attributed to a divine cause, and was attended with an earthquake.

"And there was trembling in the host, in the field, and among the people; the garrison and the spoilers they also trembled, and the earth quaked; so it was a very great trembling.

"And the watchmen of Saul in Gibeah looked, and behold the multitude melted away, and they went on beating down one another."-T.

miserable manner.' It commenced when they were standing towards the sands of Euboea; ignorant of their course, they were driven before the wind, and dashed against the rocks. It seemed a divine interposition, that the Persian fleet should thus be rendered equal, or at least not much superior to that of the Greeks: in this manner they were destroyed on the Euboean sands.

XIV. The Barbarians at Aphetæ saw with joy the morning advance, and remained inactive, thinking it of no small moment, after their past calamities, to enjoy the present interval of tranquillity. At this juncture the Greeks were reinforced by fifty-three Athenian ships: animated by the arrival of their friends, they had still farther reason to exult in the fate of those Barbarians who had been ordered round Euboea, not one of whom escaped the violence of the storm. The Greeks taking the opportunity of the same hour, towards the evening advanced boldly against the Cilicians; these they totally defeated, and at night returned again to Artemisium.

were emulous to disperse the Greeks, and be come masters of these passages.

XVI. Whilst the forces of Xerxes advan ced in order of battle, the Greeks remained on their station at Artemisium: the Barbarians, as if to render themselves secure of them all, enclosed them in a semicircle. The Greeks met them, and a battle ensued, which was fought on both sides on equal terms. The fleet of Xerxes, from the size and number of its vessels, was much perplexed by their falling foul of each other; they fought however with firmness, and refused to give way, for they could not bear to be put to flight by so inferior a force. In the conflict many Grecian vessels perished, with a great number of men; but the loss of the Barbarians was much greater in both; they separated as by mutual consent.

XVII. Of all those in the fleet of Xerxes, the Egyptians performed the most important service; they distinguished themselves throughout, and took five Grecian vessels with all their men. Of the confederates, the Athemians were the most conspicuous, and of these the bravest was Clinias, son of Alcibiades. His ship, which carried two hundred men, was equipped and manned at his own expense.

XVIII. The two fleets eagerly retired to their respective stations. The Greeks retained the wrecks of their vessels which were damag

XV. On the third day the leaders of the Barbarians did not wait for the Greeks to commence the attack; they advanced about mid-day, mutually encouraging each other; they could not bear to be insulted by so inferior a number, and they feared the indignation of Xerxes. It happened that these engage-ed, and possessed the bodies of their dead; ments by sea took place precisely at the same periods as the conflicts at Thermopyla. The object of the sea-fights was the Euripus, as that of the battles by land was the passage of Thermopyla. The Greeks animated each other to prevent the entrance of the Barbarians into Greece; the Barbarians in like manner

1 Miserable manner.]-To TEλOS OȘI EYEVETO axagi. Longinus, section xliii. p, 160, Pearce's edition, censures this expression of axagi, as mean and feeble. Pearce does not vindicate our author, neither does Toup; Larcher does, and with considerable effect. Boileau, he says, has rendered the word axaçi, peu agreable. If this were admitted, the censure of Longinus would be reasonable enough; but in fact axag is a very strong term, and signifies something in the highest degree shocking. Herodotus has applied ovμpogn axagis, to the murder of a brother, book i. 42 ; and again to the murder of a son, vii. 190. Antoninus Liberalis calls the crime of incest between a father and his daughter, axagi nas afsoovigo, an action horrible and offensive to all laws. A similar mode of speaking was in use among the Romans: every one knows that Virgil applied the word iliaulatus to Busiris; and Horace calls Pythagoras,

Non sordidus auctor naturæ verique.

but as they had suffered severely, and particu larly the Athenians, the half of whose vessels were disabled, they deliberated about retiring to the remoter parts of Greece.

3

XIX. Themistocles had constantly believed that if he could detach from the Barbarians the Ionians and Carians, there would be no difficulty in overpowering the rest. Whilst the Euboeans were assembling their cattle on the sea-coast, he called the chiefs together, and

2 Clinias, son of Alcibiades.]-Upon this personage Valenaer has a very elaborate and learned note, but I do not see that it contains any thing particularly claiming the attention of the English reader, except that he was the father of the famous Alcibiades, afterwards so celebrated in Greece.-T.

3 Carians-Originally these people inhabited the islands lying near their own coasts, and so much only of the Egean sea as was called the Icarian, of which Icarus, the island of Caria, was the principal island; they were then named Leleges and Pelasgi-See Strabo 1. xii. 661-572. Afterwards removing to the continent, they seized upon a large tract of the sea-coast, as well as of the inland country; "This," says Strabo," was the opinion most generally allowed."-T.

XXII. Themistocles,s selecting the swiftest of the Athenian vessels, went with them to a watering place, and there engraved upon the rocks these words, which the Ionians, coming progress, and the fall of that empire. The first he names

4 The oracle of Bacis.]-There were three soothsayers of this name; the most ancient was of Eleus in Boeotia, the second of Athens, and the third of Caphya in Arcadia. This last was also called Cydus and Aletes, and wonder. ful things are related of him by Theopompus.-Larcher.|nance; for this reason the people round Dodona were

manner he contends with those foolish men, throw. Some years antecedent to this expediwho had hoped to overcome him."

tion of the king the Thessalians in a body, in conjunction with their allies, had attacked the Phoceans, but had been driven back and roughly handled. The Phoceans, being surrounded at Parnassus, happened to have with them Tellias' of Eleum, the soothsayer, at whose instigation they concerted the following strata

XXV. Immediately on this declaration, scarce a boat remained behind, so many were eager to see the spectacle coming to the spot, they beheld the bodies of the dead. Though a number of Helots' were among them, they supposed that all whom they saw were Lacedæmonians and Thespians. This subterfuge of Xer-gem: They selected six hundred of their bravxes did not deceive those who beheld it; it est men, whose persons and arms they made could not fail of appearing exceedingly ridicu- white with chalk; they thus sent them against lous, to see a thousand Persian bodies on the the Thessalians, under cover of the night, comfield, and four thousand Greeks crowded to-manding them to put every one to death who gether on one spot. After a whole day had been thus employed, the troops returned on the following one to the fleet at Histiæa, and Xerxes with his army proceeded on their march.

was not whited like themselves. The Thessalian out-posts, who first saw them, conceived them to be something supernatural. These communicated their panic to the body of the army, in consequence of which the Phoceans slew four thousand, and carried away their shields: half of these shields were consecrated at Abæ, and half at Delphi. A tenth part of the money which resulted from this victory was applied to erect the large statues which are to be seen round the tripod before the temple at Delphi: an equal number were erected at Abe.

constructed a wall, which checked their incursions. This

XXVI. A small number of Arcadians deserted to the Persian army: they were destitute of provisions, and wished to be employed. Being introduced to the royal presence, and interrogated by several Persians, and by one in particular, concerning the Greeks, and how they were then employed : " At present," they replied, "they are celebrating the Olympic games, and beholding gymnastic and equestrian exercises." Being a second time asked what the prize was for which they contended, they answered," An olive garland." On this occasion Tigranes, the son of Artabanus, having expressed himself in a manner which proved great generosity of soul, was accused by the king of cowardice. Hearing that the prize was 4 Tellias.]-He was the chief of the family of the not money, but a garland, he exclaimed before Telliada, in which the art of divination was hereditary. them all" What must those men be, O Mar-his means, the Phoceans made a statue of Tellias, which In gratitude for the victory which they obtained through donius, against whom you are conducting us, who contend not for wealth, but for virtue ?" XXVII. After the above calamity at Ther-Pausanias, 1. x. c. i. and the Stratagemata of Polyænus, mopylæ, the Thessalians sent a herald to the 1. vi. c. 18.-See also Plutarch on the virtues of women. Phoceans, with whom they had before been at enmity, but particularly so after their last over

1 Helots.]-I have in a preceding note spoke of the Helots; but for more particulars concerning them, I beg leave to refer the reader to a dissertation on the history and servitude of the Helots, by M. Capperonier, pub. lished in the Memoirs of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres.-T.

was the source of the hatred which these people bure each other, and which was carried to such extremities, that the Thessalians in one day cut the throats of all the beat to death two hundred and fifty hostages they had magistrates and princes of the Phoceans, who, in return, in their hands.-Larcher.

they sent to Delphi, with those of the chiefs and heroes of their country.-Larcher.

Compare the account here given by Herodotus with

To revenge the above-mentioned murder of their hos tages, the Thessalians marched against the Phoceans, determining to spare no men that were of age, and to sell the women and children for slaves. Diaphantus, gover. nor of Phocis, on hearing this, persuaded his countrymen to go and meet the Thessalians, and to collect their women and children in one place, round whom they were to pile combustible materials, and to place a watch, who, if the Phoceans should be defeated, were to set fire to the pile. To this one person objected, saying the 2 Tigranes.]-Many learned men are of opinion, that women ought to be consulted on the business. The this name is derived from the Togarmah of scripture, women hearing of this, assembled together, and not onand given to the chiefs of that house; see Eze. xxxviii,ly agreed to it, but highly applauded Diaphantus for pro. 6.-" Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands." posing it: it is also said, that the children also met to. Josephus writes Togarmah's name, vygas, Thy-gether and resolved on the same thing. The Phoceans grammis, which some copies render Thygran, neither of afterwards engaging the enemy at Cleon, a place in Hythem very unlike Tigranes.-T.

3 Enmity]-The Thessalians being natives of Thesprotia, had seized Eolia, afterwards called Thessaly, whence they attempted to penetrate iuto Phocen, by the passage of Thermopyla; but the Phoceans in this place

ampolis, were victorious. The Greeks called this resolution of the women aponoia, desperation. The greatest feast of the Phoceans is that which they celebrated at Hyampolis, and called Elaphebolia, in commemoration of this

XXVIII. The Phoceans thus treated the Thessalian foot, by whom they had been surrounded: their horse which had made incursions into their country, they effectually destroyed. At the entrance to Phocis near Hyampolis they sunk a deep trench, into which having thrown a number of empty casks, they covered them with earth to the level of the common ground. They then waited to receive the attack of the Thessalians: these advancing, as if to capture the Phoceans, fell in among the casks, by which the legs of their horses were broken.

here, and indeed the inhabitants had embraced the interest of the Medes.

XXXII. The Barbarians passed from Doris into Phocis, but did not make themselves masters of the persons of the inhabitants. Of these some had taken refuge on the summits of Parnassus, at a place called Tithorea, near the city Neon, capable of containing a great number of people. A greater number had fled to Amphissa, a town of the Ozola Locrians, beyond the plain of Crisæum.. The Barbarians effectually over-ran Phocis, to which the Thessalians conducted them; whatever they found they destroyed with fire and sword, and both the cities and sacred temples were burned.

XXXIII. Proceeding along the river Cephissus, they extended their violence through

XXIX. These two disasters had so much exasperated the Thessalians, that they sent a herald to say thus to the Phoceans: "As you are now, O Phoceans, rendered wiser by experience, it becomes you to acknowledge your-out Phocis. On one side they burned the selves our inferiors. When we formerly thought it consistent to be united with the Greeks, we were always superior to you; we have now so much influence with the Barbarians, that it is in our power to strip you of your country, and reduce you to slavery. We are nevertheless willing to forget past injuries, provided you will pay us fifty talents: on these terms we engage to avert the evils which threaten your country."

XXX. Such was the application of the Thessalians to the Phoceans, who alone of all the people of this district, did not side with the Medes, and for no other reason, as far as I am able to conjecture, than their hatred of the Thessalians. If the Thessalians had favoured the Greeks, the Phoceans I believe would have attached themselves to the Medes. The Phoceans in reply refused to give the money; they had the same opportunity, they added, of uniting with the Medes, as the Thessalians, if they wished to change their sentiments; but they expressed themselves unalterably reluctant to desert the cause of Greece.

city Drymos, on the other Charadra, Erochos, Tethronium, Amphicæa, Neon,* Pedieas, Triteas, Elatea, Hyampolis, Parapotamios, and Abæ. At this last place is an edifice sacred to Apollo, abounding in wealth, and full of various treasures,' and offerings. Here as now was an oracle. Having plundered this temple,

they set it on fire. They pursued the Phoceans, and overtook some of them near the mountains; many of their female captives died, from the

5 Parnassus.]-This celebrated mountain had a forked summit with two vertices; of these one was sacred to Apollo, the other to Bacchus. See Joddrel on Euripides, p. 19. Sir George Wheeler, in his Travels into Greece, has given an engraving of this poetical circumstance, so often celebrated by the Greek and Roman poets; and he observes, that the high cliffs seem to end in two points from the town of Delphi. He also adds, that there is a fountain with a very plentiful source of water continually flowing out from a cavity close to this mountain, which by the marble steps leading to it

should be the fountain Castalia. Lucan observes, that

at the time of the deluge Parnassus was the only moun-
tain, and that too with one of its tops only, which pro-
jected above the water, 1. v. 75.

Hoc solum fluctu terras mergente cacumen
Eminuit, pontoque fuit discrimen et astris.
Which lines are thus diffusively rendered by Rowe:
When o'er the world the deluge wide was spread,

This only mountain rear'd its lofty head;
One rising rock preserved, a bound was given
Between the vasty deep and ambient heaven.
L. v. ver. 17.

Sir George Wheeler says, "I esteem this mountain not only the highest in all Greece, but one of the highest in all the world, and not inferior to mount Cenis among the Alps."

XXXI. This answer of the Phoceans, so irritated the people of Thessaly, that they offered themselves as guides to the Barbarian army, which they conducted from Trachis to Doris. The passage of this district is not more than thirty stadia in extent, it is situate betwixt Melias and Phocis, and was before called Dryopis. The Dorians are the original and 6 Neon.]-M. Larcher thinks, and with great reason, principal people of the Peloponnese: the Bar-that the Neon in this passage should be read Cleon. barians penetrated into Doris, but without committing any devastations. The Thessalians did not wish them to commit any violence

7 Treasures.]-As the greater part of the Grecian cities sent their wealth to Delphi, it is very probable, says M. Larcher, that those of Phocis deposited theirs at Aba.