Note 275 — Chapter XLI · BATTLE OF SALAMIS. — RETREAT OF XERXES.

Herodot. viii, 97-107. Such was the terror of these retreating seamen, that they are said to have mistaken the projecting cliffs of Cape Zôstêr (about half-way between Peiræus and Sunium) for ships, and redoubled the haste of their flight as if an enemy were after them,—a story which we can treat as nothing better than silly exaggeration in the Athenian informants of Herodotus.

Ktesias, Pers. c. xxvi; Strabo, ix, p. 395; the two latter talk about the intention to carry a mole across from Attica to Salamis, as if it had been conceived before the battle.