confident that a mule would never be sovereign of the Medes, and that consequently he could have nothing to fear for himself or his posterity. His first object was to discover which were the most powerful of the Grecian states, and to obtain their alliance. The Lacedæmonians of Doric, and the Athenians of Ionian origin, seemed to claim his distinguished preference. These nations, always eminent, were formerly known by the appellation of Pelasgians and Hellenians". The former had never changed their place of residence; the latter often. Under the reign of Deucalion, the Hellenians possessed the region of Phthiotis; but under Dorus the son of Hellenus, they inhabited the country called Istiæotis, which borders upon Ossa and Olympus. They were driven from hence by the Cadmæans, and fixed themselves in Macednum, near mount Pindus: migrating from thence to Dryopis, and afterwards to the Peloponnesus, they were known by the name of Dorians.

LVII. What language the Pelasgians used, I cannot positively affirm: some probable conclusion may perhaps be formed, by attending to the dialect of the remnant of the Pelasgians, who now inhabit

73 Pelasgians and Hellenians.]—On this passage Mr. Bryant remarks, that the whole is exceedingly confused, and that by it one would imagine Herodotus excluded the Athenians from being Pelasgic. See Bryant's Mythology, vol. iii. P. 397.-T.

inhabit Crestona74 beyond the Tyrrhenians*, but who formerly dwelt in the country now called Thessaliotis, and were neighbours to those whom we at present name Dorians. Considering these with the above, who founded the cities of Placia and Scylace on the Hellespont, but once lived near the Athenians, together with the people of other Pelasgian towns who have since changed their names, it is upon the whole reasonable to affirm, that they formerly spoke a barbarous language. The Athenians, therefore, who were also of Pelasgian origin, must necessarily, when they came amongst the Hellenians, have learned their language. It is observable, that the inhabitants of Crestona and Placia speak in the same tongue, but are neither of them understood by the people

14 Crestona.]-It appears that Count Caylus has confounded Crestona of Thrace with Crotona of Magna Grecia; but as he has adduced no argument in proof of his opinion, I do not consider it of any importance.-Larcher.

*

Major Rennel thinks that this may be a mistake, and that it should be read Thermæans.-See his work on Herodotus, p. 45.

"It may be suspected that Tyrrhenian is a mistake, and that Thermæon should be substituted for it, as Therma, afterwards Thessalonia, agrees to the situation. Therma and its gulf are mentioned in Polym. 121, 123, 124. We have heard of no Tyrrhenians but those of Italy."

† We are informed in the 6th book, c. 137, that the Athenians expelled them from their habitations, because they offered violence to the young women who went to draw water at the nine fountains.

people about them. These circumstances induce me to believe, that their language has experienced no change.

LVIII. I am also of opinion, that the Hellenian tongue is not at all altered. When first they separated themselves from the Pelasgians, they were neither numerous nor powerful. They have since progressively increased; having incorporated many nations, Barbarians and others, with their own. The Pelasgians have always avoided this mode of increasing their importance; which may be one reason, probably, why they never have emerged from their original and barbarous condition.

LIX. Of these nations, Croesus had received information, that Athens suffered much from the oppression of Pisistratus the son of Hippocrates, who at this time possessed the supreme authority. The father of this man, when he was formerly private spectator of the Olympic games, beheld a wonderful prodigy: Having sacrificed a victim, the brazen vessels, which were filled with the flesh and with water, boiled up and overflowed without the intervention of fire. Chilon the Lacedæmonian, who was an accidental witness of the fact, advised Hippocrates, first of all, not to marry a woman likely to produce him children: secondly, if he was already married, to repudiate his wife;

but

but if he had then a son, by all means to expose him. Hippocrates was not at all disposed to follow this counsel, and had afterwards this son Pisistratus. A tumult happened betwixt those who dwelt on the sea-coast, and those who inhabited the plains of the former, Megacles the son of Alcmeon was leader, Lycurgus, son of Aristolaides, was at the head of the latter. Pisistratus took this opportunity of accomplishing the views of his ambition. Under pretence of defending those of the mountains, he assembled some factious adherents, and put in practice the following stratagem: He not only wounded himself, but his mules 75, which he drove into the forum, affecting to have made his escape from the enemy, who had attacked him in a country excursion. He claimed, therefore, the protection of the people, in return for the services which he had performed in his command against the Megarians 76, by his capture

of

75 Wounded himself, but his mules.]-Ulysses, Zopyrus, and others, availed themselves of similar artifices for the advantage of their country; but Pisistratus practised his, to depress and enslave his fellow-citizens. This occasioned Solon to say to him, "Son of Hippocrates, you ill apply the stratagem of Homer's Ulysses: he wounded his body, to delude the public enemies; you wound your's, to beguile your countrymen."-Larcher.

76. Command against the Megarians.]-The particulars of this affair are related by Plutarch, in his Life of Solon.-T. When the Athenians, tired out with a long and troublesome war against the Megarensians for the isle of Salamis, made a

law

of Nisæa, and by other memorable exploits. The Athenians were deluded by his artifice, and assigned

law that no one for the future, under pain of death, should, either by speech or writing, propose that the city should assert its claims to that island, Solon was very uneasy at so dishonourable a decree, and seeing a great part of the youth desirous to begin the war again, being restrained from it only by fear of the law, he feigned himself insane; and a report spread from his house into the city, that he was out of his senses. Privately, however, he had composed an elegy, and got it by heart in order to repeat it in public; thus prepared, he sallied out unexpectedly into the market-place with a cap upon his head. A great number of people flocking about him there, he got upon the herald's stone, and sung the elegy, which begins thus

Hear and attend: from Salamis I came

To shew your error

This composition is entitled Salamis, and consists of an hundred very beautiful lines. When Solon had done, his friends began to express their admiration, and Pisistratus, in particular, exerted himself in persuading the people to comply with his directions, whereupon they repealed the law, once more, undertook the war, and invested Solon with the command. The common account of his proceedings is this: he sailed with Pisistratus to Colias, and having seized the women, who, according to the custom of the country, were offering sacrifice to Ceres there, he sent a trusty person to Salamis, who was to pretend he was a deserter, and to advise the Megarensians, if they had a mind to seize the principal Athenian nations, to set sail immediately for Colias. The Megarensians readily embracing the proposal, and sending out a body of men, Solon discovered the ship as it put off from the island, and causing the women directly to withdraw, ordered a number of young men whose faces were yet smooth,

to