It will be obferved alfo, that these were levied from a * much fmaller district than the armament against Troy, and at a time when many States of Greece were divided from the league by

Therefore Mr. Bryant's statement of 72,500 is inaccurate even on his own principles. Herodot. b. ix, p. 597.

* Lift of the Districts which furnished Troops for the Siege of Troy :

Boeotia, Phocis, Locris, Euboea, Athens, Salamis, Argolis, Mycena, Sicyon and Corinth, Achaia, Laconia, Meffenia, Arcadia, Elis, Iflands on the Weft Coafts, Acarnania and Etolia, Crete, Rhodes, Islands on the South of the Egean, and Theffaly.

their politics, or weakened by intestine divifions. It seems strange to Mr. Bryant " that an army like that at Platæa should be thought an extraordinary exertion, at a time when Greece abounded both in wealth and men; and yet that she should be able in the rude ages described by * Thucydides, to levy and fupport fo extraordinary an armament as that under Agamemnon." But our astonishment will ceafe when we reflect that the barbarous and uncivilifed ages of the world have ever furnished armies whose numbers in civilifed times are almost deemed fabulous. To produce fome inftances of this: We find in Paufanias, that when the Celtæ invaded Greece, under Brennus, the numbers of the Barbarian army amounted to no less than 152,000 foot and 61,200 horsemen, in all to 213,200 effective men. The Cimbri and Teutones, whom Marius conquered, brought into the field against him 300,000 effective men, according to Plutarch, an army which would be hardly levied in modern Germany, with every advantage of wealth and civilifation. The Gauls, who in the time of the Republic facked and burnt the City of Rome, and the Huns, Goths, and Vandals, of later times, affembled troops which astonish almost to incredulity, those who compare them with the modern population of Northern Europe. The very circumstances of rudeness and barbarifm which form the ground work of Mr. Bryant's argument, are in reality the proofs of its futility. Armies are much sooner levied in barbarous and uncivilifed countries, where no commerce employs the in

NOTE.

Thucydides himfelf thought fo differently upon this fubject, that he exprefsly tells us the armies of the Greeks under Agamemnon were less than might be expected from the extent and population of the districts which levied them; a circumftance he attributes to the difficulty of victualling a larger army in thofe days. Thucyd. 1. i. c. 10, 11.

Concerning the ships mentioned. BRYANT, page 18,

duftry of mankind, no agriculture attaches them to their native foil, and where in confequence the whole population confists of roving adventurers, ever ready to affemble from defire of military fame, or the stronger inducements of plunder. We must also allow for the amplification of tradition, and we must naturally fuppofe the Greek Poet would endeavour to enhance the glory of his country by adopting the greatest number which that tradition afforded. If he candidly confider all this, I believe the reader will hardly acquiefce in Mr. Bryant's conclufion against the possibility of the expedition.

The next objection which Mr. Bryant makes to Homer's hiftory, is founded on the incredibility of fo great a number of fhips being fitted out for the Trojan expedition, by States which contributed fo few to the battles of Salamis and Artemifium. In the first place we will observe that the analogy between either of these instances and the Trojan armament, is not fufficiently close any way to justify Mr. Bryant's conclufion relative to the comparative force of the States at these different æras. The fhips which tranfported Homer's heroes to Phrygia, were fuch as in those times were made use of indifferently for the purposes of See Thucydides, l.i. commerce, piracy, and war, and fuch as the numerous Sea Ports and Islands of Greece might be very well fuppofed to poffefs; but the veffels which were oppofed to the naval force of Perfia, were armed Triremes and Pentecontores, built for the exprefs purposes of war, and furnished not by individuals as in the cafe of Troy, but by the separate States, moft of which, if we except Attica, were as yet nearly unprovided with a public naval force. It is then very poffible that the ports of the Peloponnefus might poffefs at this early period 430 veffels fit for the purposes of transports, and yet not be able to equip above 89 fhips of

ch. 9, 10, and II.

war

war for the fea fight of Artemisium * and Salamis. What renders this still more probable is the fluctuating nature of commerce, and of maritime force in confequence. In fact we find that Athens which had alone attended carefully to her naval establishment, fitted out no fewer than 147 veffels to the fea fight at Artemifium, 20 of which were manned by Chalcidians, and afterwards at Salamis furnished 180 Triremes, befides 20 which were lent to the Chalcidians. Athens therefore furnished more veffels than double the whole force of the Peloponnefus, fo little did the shipping of the ancients depend upon the comparative population of the country. In Homer's time or rather in Agamemnon's, † My

+ Mr. Bryant denies the accounts given us by the ancient writers concerning Mycena. I fhall discuss his objections in their turn. The reader ought to be apprized that the accounts here dwelt upon are from Strabo, Paufanias, and Diodorus Siculus.

cenæ

cena and Argos were at the head of a flourishing country, which at the time of the Persian war had declined, from the predominance of Sparta and Athens. The great Legiflator of Sparta had not as yet forbid the Lacedemonians to engage in commerce, and it is probable that their maritime affairs were at this time on a much more confiderable scale than they were for centuries after the Legislation of Lycurgus. We fee then that a partial comparison between the forces of the Peloponnefus at two periods fo effentially different, is extremely fallacious; and if we extend the list to the forces of the Greeks in general we shall find that at Artemifium they had no fewer than 265 Triremes, and 368 at Salamis. These form a force more than equal in maritime strength to Agamemnon's fleet of transports, and as far as the argument rests upon the number of men, it is I apprehend answered in the last section.

In the concluding paragraph of this chapter, Mr. Bryant, difmiffing the confideration of these comparative forces, brings another argument against the poffibility of the expedition. It was a long time, he says, before the Greeks ventured to traverse the Ægean, and quotes Libanius* to prove that they never ventured farther than Delos. Whatever might be the state of Greece afterwards, we have the strongest ground for believing this affertion to be falfe at the time when Homer wrote. In fact how can we fuppofe that a nation was thus entirely ignorant of sea affairs, who were themselves imported into Greece and Afia, by Tyrian and Egyptian fleets, confiderably prior to the Trojan expedition. The early intercourfe with the latter, to which Mr. Bryant refers even the story of the Iliad, and

NOTE.

* Libanius was tutor to Julian, and his authority therefore refpecting the ftate of early Greece, is entitled to very little attention (if any) when controverted by the ancient hiftorians.

the