|
B.C. 407. Pharnabazus and the ambassadors were passing the winter at
Gordium in Phrygia, when they heard of the occurrences at Byzantium.
Continuing their journey to the king's court in the commencement of
spring, they were met by a former embassy, which was now on its return
journey. These were the Lacedaemonian ambassadors, Boeotius and his
party, with the other envoys; who told them that the Lacedaemonians
had obtained from the king all they wanted. One of the company was
Cyrus, the new governor of all the seaboard districts, who was
prepared to co-operate with the Lacedaemonians in war. He was the
bearer, moreover, of a letter with the royal seal attached. It was
addressed to all the populations of Lower Asia, and contained the
following words: "I send down Cyrus as 'Karanos'"[22]--that is to say,
supreme lord--"over all those who muster at Castolus." The ambassadors
of the Athenians, even while listening to this announcement, and
indeed after they had seen Cyrus, were still desirous, if possible, to
continue their journey to the king, or, failing that, to return home.
Cyrus, however, urged upon Pharnabazus either to deliver them up to
himself, or to defer sending them home at present; his object being to
prevent the Athenians learning what was going on. Pharnabazus, wishing
to escape all blame, for the time being detained them, telling them,
at one time, that he would presently escort them up country to the
king, and at another time that he would send them safe home. But when
three years had elapsed, he prayed Cyrus to let them go, declaring
that he had taken an oath to bring them back to the sea, in default of
escorting them up to the king. Then at last they received safe conduct
to Ariobarzanes, with orders for their further transportation. The
latter conducted them a stage further, to Cius in Mysia; and from Cius
they set sail to join their main armament.
Alcibiades, whose chief desire was to return home to Athens with the
troops, immediately set sail for Samos; and from that island, taking
twenty of the ships, he sailed to the Ceramic Gulf of Caria, where he
collected a hundred talents, and so returned to Samos.
Thrasybulus had gone Thrace-wards with thirty ships. In this quarter
he reduced various places which had revolted to Lacedaemon, including
the island of Thasos, which was in a bad plight, the result of wars,
revolutions, and famine.
Thrasylus, with the rest of the army, sailed back straight to Athens.
On his arrival he found that the Athenians had already chosen as their
general Alcibiades, who was still in exile, and Thrasybulus, who was
also absent, and as a third, from among those at home, Conon.
Meanwhile Alcibiades, with the moneys lately collected and his fleet
of twenty ships, left Samos and visited Paros. From Paros he stood out
to sea across to Gytheum,[23] to keep an eye on the thirty ships of war
which, as he was informed, the Lacedaemonians were equipping in that
arsenal. Gytheum would also be a favourable point of observation from
which to gauge the disposition of his fellow-countrymen and the
prospects of his recall. When at length their good disposition seemed
to him established, not only by his election as general, but by the
messages of invitation which he received in private from his friends,
he sailed home, and entered Piraeus on the very day of the festival of
the Plunteria,[24] when the statue of Athena is veiled and screened
from public gaze. This was a coincidence, as some thought, of evil
omen, and unpropitious alike to himself and the State, for no Athenian
would transact serious business on such a day.
As he sailed into the harbour, two great crowds--one from the Piraeus,
the other from the city[25]--flocked to meet the vessels. Wonderment,
mixed with a desire to see Alcibiades, was the prevailing sentiment of
the multitude. Of him they spoke: some asserting that he was the best
of citizens, and that in his sole instance banishment had been ill-
deserved. He had been the victim of plots, hatched in the brains of
people less able than himself, however much they might excel in
pestilent speech; men whose one principle of statecraft was to look to
their private gains; whereas this man's policy had ever been to uphold
the common weal, as much by his private means as by all the power of
the State. His own choice, eight years ago, when the charge of impiety
in the matter of the mysteries was still fresh, would have been to
submit to trial at once. It was his personal foes, who had succeeded
in postponing that undeniably just procedure; who waited till his back
was turned, and then robbed him of his fatherland. Then it was that,
being made the very slave of circumstance, he was driven to court the
men he hated most; and at a time when his own life was in daily peril,
he must see his dearest friends and fellow-citizens, nay, the very
State itself, bent on a suicidal course, and yet, in the exclusion of
exile, be unable to lend a helping hand. "It is not men of this
stamp," they averred, "who desire changes in affairs and revolution:
had he not already guaranteed to him by the Democracy a position
higher than that of his equals in age, and scarcely if at all inferior
to his seniors? How different was the position of his enemies. It had
been the fortune of these, though they were known to be the same men
they had always been, to use their lately acquired power for the
destruction in the first instance of the better classes; and then,
being alone left surviving, to be accepted by their fellow-citizens in
the absence of better men."
Others, however, insisted that for all their past miseries and
misfortunes Alcibiades alone was responsible: "If more trials were
still in store for the State, here was the master mischief-maker ready
at his post to precipitate them."
When the vessels came to their moorings, close to the land,
Alcibiades, from fear of his enemies, was unwilling to disembark at
once. Mounting on the quarterdeck, he scanned the multitude,[26]
anxious to make certain of the presence of his friends. Presently his
eyes lit upon Euryptolemus, the son of Peisianax, who was his cousin,
and then on the rest of his relations and other friends. Upon this he
landed, and so, in the midst of an escort ready to put down any
attempt upon his person, made his way to the city.
In the Senate and Public Assembly[27] he made speeches, defending
himself against the charge of impiety, and asserting that he had been
the victim of injustice, with other like topics, which in the present
temper of the assembly no one ventured to gainsay.
He was then formally declared leader and chief of the State, with
irresponsible powers, as being the sole individual capable of
recovering the ancient power and prestige of Athens. Armed with this
authority, his first act was to institute anew the processional march
to Eleusis; for of late years, owing to the war, the Athenians had
been forced to conduct the mysteries by sea. Now, at the head of the
troops, he caused them to be conducted once again by land. This done,
his next step was to muster an armament of one thousand five hundred
heavy infantry, one hundred and fifty cavalry, and one hundred ships;
and lastly, within three months of his return, he set sail for Andros,
which had revolted from Athens.
The generals chosen to co-operate with him on land were Aristocrates
and Adeimantus, the son of Leucophilides. He disembarked his troops on
the island of Andros at Gaurium, and routed the Andrian citizens who
sallied out from the town to resist the invader; forcing them to
return and keep close within their walls, though the number who fell
was not large. This defeat was shared by some Lacedaemonians who were
in the place. Alcibiades erected a trophy, and after a few days set
sail himself for Samos, which became his base of operations in the
future conduct of the war.
|
|
