ing to surrender on certain conditions; one of which was, that all the free citizens should be permitted to retire whithersoever they pleased, with the clothes they then had on. These conditions were not approved; and Philip sent for answer, that the people of Abydos had only to choose whether they would surrender at discretion or continue to defend themselves gallantly as they had hitherto done.

When the citizens heard this, they assembled together to consider what they should do in so great an emergency; and here we have to record circumstances scarcely to be paralleled in all history. They are thus related by Rollin :

"They came to these resolutions; first, that the slaves should be set at liberty, to animate them to defend the city with the utmost vigour; secondly, that all the women should be shut up in the Temple of Diana, and all the children, with their nurses, in the Gymnasium; that this being done, they then should bring into the great square all the gold and silver in the city, and carry all the rest of the valuable effects into the quadrireme* of the Rhodians, and the trireme of the Cyzicenians. This resolution having passed unanimously, another assembly was called, in which they chose fifty of the wisest and most ancient of the citizens, but who, at the same time, had vigour enough left to execute what had been determined; and they were made to take an oath, in presence of all the inhabitants, that the instant they saw the enemy master of the inner wall, they would kill the women and children, set fire to the galleys laden with their effects, and throw into the sea all the gold and silver they had heaped together. Then, sending for their priests, they took an oath either to conquer or die, sword in hand; and,

* A galley with four banks of oars; that is, four rows of benches, one above another, on which the rowers sat. A trireme had three banks. Oars were used in propelling all the vessels of the ancients, whatever might be their size.-Am. Ed.

after having sacrificed the victims, they obliged the priests and priestesses to pronounce, before the altar, the greatest curses on those who should break their oath. This being done, they left off countermining, and resolved, the instant the wall should fall, to fly to the breach and fight to the last. Accordingly, the inward wall tumbling, the besieged, true to the oath they had taken, fought in the breach with such unparalleled bravery, that, though Philip perpetually sustained with fresh soldiers those who had mounted to the assault, yet, when night separated the combatants, he was still doubtful with regard to the success of the siege. Such Abydonians as marched first to the breach over the heaps of slain, fought with fury; and not only made use of their swords and javelins, but, after their arms were broken to pieces or forced from their hands, they rushed furiously upon the Macedonians, knocked down some, broke the long spears of others, and with the pieces struck their faces and such parts of their bodies as were uncovered, till they made them entirely despair of the event. When night put an end to the slaughter, the breach was quite covered with the dead bodies of the Abydonians; and those who had escaped were so prodigiously fatigued, and had received so many wounds, that they could scarcely support themselves. Things being brought to this frightful extremity, two of the principal citizens, unable to execute the dreadful resolution that had been taken, and which, at that time, displayed itself to their imaginations in all its horror, agreed that, to save their wives and children, they should send to Philip by daybreak all their priests and priestesses, clothed in pontificial habits, to implore his mercy, and open their gates to him. Accordingly, the next morning, the city, as had been agreed, was surrendered to Philip; during which, the greatest part of the Abydonians who had survived vented millions of imprecations against their fellow-citizens, and especially

against the priests and priestesses, for delivering up to the enemy those whom they themselves had devoted to death with the most dreadful oaths. Philip marched into the city, and seized, without the least opposition, all the rich effects which the Abydonians had heaped together in one place. But now he was greatly terrified with the spectacle he saw. Among these ill-fated citizens, whom despair had made furious and distracted, some were strangling their wives and children, and others cutting them to pieces with swords; some were running to murder them; some were plunging them into wells, while others were precipitating them from the tops of the houses; in a word, death appeared in every variety of horrors. Philip, pierced with grief, and seized with horror at the spectacle, stopped the soldiers who were greedy of plunder, and published a declaration, importing that he would allow three days to all who were resolved to lay violent hands on themselves. He was in hopes that during this interval they would change their resolution; but they had made their choice before. They thought it would be degenerating from those who had lost their lives in fighting for their country should they survive them. The individuals of every family killed each other; and none escaped this murderous tragedy but those whose hands were tied, or who were otherwise kept from destroying themselves."

Nothing now remains of this ancient city but a few insignificant ruins in the neighbourhood of the modern town.

ÆGINA.

"WE seated ourselves on a fallen column," says Mr. Williams," and could not but admire the scene before us: Attica, Peloponnesus, and the Gulf of

Egina, with their many points of attraction, addressing both the eye and the mind! While we were enjoying the splendid view, two shepherds stepped from the ruins, and, passing their crooks from their right hand to their left, pressed their hearts and foreheads, and kissed their hands in a manner than which nothing could be more graceful. Their eyes bespoke their curiosity to know what brought us there; and when we looked across the gulf, they both exclaimed 'Athena! Athenæ!' as if we were desirous to know the name of the distant spot that marked the site of Athens."

Servius Sulpitius mentions Ægina in a very agreeable manner to Cicero when grieving for the loss of his daughter Tullia: "Once," he says, "when I was in distress, I experienced a sensible alleviation of my sorrow from a circumstance which, in the hope of its having the same influence upon you, I will take this opportunity of relating. I was returning from Asia; and, as I was steering my course, I began to contemplate the surrounding country. Behind me was Ægina; Megara in the front; the Piræus occupied my right hand, and Corinth my left. These cities, once flourishing, were now reduced to irretrievable ruin. 'Alas!' said I, somewhat indignantly, 'shall man presume to complain of the shortness and the ills of-life, whose being in this world is necessarily short, when I see so many cities, at one view, totally destroyed? This reflection, my friend, relieved my sorrow."

Mr. Dodwell, when in Ægina, lodged at the house of the principal Greek, who was familiar with the leading particulars of its history; and when he spoke of its former grandeur, and compared it with its present abject condition, the tears came into his eyes, and he exclaimed, "Alas! where is Egina

now ?"

The island of Ægina lies between Attica and Argolis, eighteen miles distant from the coast of Athens,

and fourteen from Epidaurus. It does not exceed nine miles in its greatest length, nor six miles in its greatest breadth. Its interior is rough and mountainous, and the valleys, though they are made to bear corn, cotton, olive, and fruit trees, are stony and narrow. Notwithstanding this, in ancient days, through the blessings of commerce, this spot in the seas of Greece was the residence of a numerous and most thriving population, who created upon it such works as are still the admiration of the civilized world, though they are now in ruins.

The people of gina were the first who coined money to be subservient to the uses of life, agreeably to the advice of Phidon, who considered that a maritime commerce would best be promoted where exchanges were made easy between the vender and purchaser.

The place, too, had the advantage of security; an important point in the earlier ages of Greece, when piracy was a common, and considered an honourable profession. It lay deep within a gulf; Nature had made access to its shores difficult, by 'nearly encircling them with rocks and sandbanks; and its industrious population added artificial defences. Its port also was commodious. Here, therefore, the goods procured far and near by the enterprising inhabitants could be lodged without fear of pillage; and the Greeks resorted hither as to a general mart, where whatever they wanted might be purchased. Wealth thus flowed into the island; and its inhabitants, with an exquisite feeling for all that was beautiful, employed their treasures in cultivating the fine arts, and in covering their barren rocks with grand and graceful edifices; and this was shown by their introducing a style of sculpture superior to all that had preceded it, though inferior to the ultimate perfection of the Athenian school.

Ægina was originally subject to kings, but it afterward adopted a republican form of government.