Volume 10 — CHAPTER LXXVII. FROM THE SUBJUGATION OF OLYNTHUS BY THE LACEDÆMONIANS DOWN TO THE CONGRESS AT SPARTA, AND PARTIAL PEACE, IN 371 B.C.

At the beginning of 379 B.C., the empire of the Lacedæmonians on land had reached a pitch never before paralleled. On the sea, their fleet was but moderately powerful, and they seem to have held divided empire with Athens over the smaller islands; while the larger islands (so far as we can make out) were independent of both. But the whole of inland Greece, both within and without Peloponnesus,—except Argos, Attica, and perhaps the more powerful Thessalian cities,—was now enrolled in the confederacy dependent on Sparta. Her occupation of Thebes, by a Spartan garrison and an oligarchy of local partisans, appeared to place her empire beyond all chance of successful attack; while the victorious close of the war against Olynthus carried everywhere an intimidating sense of her far-reaching power. Her allies, too,—governed as they were in many cases by Spartan harmosts, and by oligarchies whose power rested on Sparta,—were much more dependent upon her than they had been during the time of the Peloponnesian war.

Such a position of affairs rendered Sparta an object of the same mingled fear and hatred (the first preponderant) as had been felt towards imperial Athens fifty years before, when she was designated as the “despot city.[160]” And this sentiment was farther aggravated by the recent peace of Antalkidas, in every sense the work of Sparta; which she had first procured, and afterwards carried into execution. That peace was disgraceful enough, as being dictated by the king of Persia, enforced in his name, and surrendering to him all the Asiatic Greeks. But it became yet more disgraceful when the universal autonomy which it promised was seen to be so executed, as to mean nothing better than subjection to Sparta. Of all the acts yet committed by Sparta, not only in perversion of the autonomy promised to every city, but in violation of all the acknowledged canons of right dealing between city and city,—the most flagrant was, her recent seizure and occupation of the Kadmeia at Thebes. Her subversion (in alliance with, and partly for the benefit of, Amyntas king of Macedonia) of the free Olynthian confederacy was hardly less offensive to every Greek of large or Pan-hellenic patriotism. She appeared as the confederate of the Persian king on one side, of Amyntas the Macedonian, on another, of the Syracusan despot Dionysius on a third,—as betraying the independence of Greece to the foreigner, and seeking to put down, everywhere within it, that free spirit which stood in the way of her own harmosts and partisan oligarchies.

Unpopular as Sparta was, however, she stood out incontestably as the head of Greece. No man dared to call into question her headship, or to provoke resistance against it. The tone of patriotic and free-spoken Greeks at this moment is manifested in two eminent residents at Athens,—Lysias and Isokrates. Of these two rhetors, the former composed an oration which he publicly read at Olympia during the celebration of the 99th Olympiad, B.C. 384, three years after the peace of Antalkidas. In this oration (of which unhappily only a fragment remains, preserved by Dionysius of Halikarnassus), Lysias raises the cry of danger to Greece, partly from the Persian king, partly from the despot Dionysius of Syracuse.[161] He calls upon all Greeks to lay aside hostility and jealousies one with the other, and to unite in making head against these two really formidable enemies, as their ancestors had previously done, with equal zeal for putting down despots and for repelling the foreigner. He notes the number of Greeks (in Asia) handed over to the Persian king, whose great wealth would enable him to hire an indefinite number of Grecian soldiers, and whose naval force was superior to anything which the Greeks could muster; while the strongest naval force in Greece was that of the Syracusan Dionysius. Recognizing the Lacedæmonians as chiefs of Greece, Lysias expresses his astonishment that they should quietly permit the fire to extend itself from one city to another. They ought to look upon the misfortunes of those cities which had been destroyed, both by the Persians and by Dionysius, as coming home to themselves; not to wait patiently, until the two hostile powers had united their forces to attack the centre of Greece, which yet remained independent.

Of the two common enemies,—Artaxerxes and Dionysius,—whom Lysias thus denounces, the latter had sent to this very Olympic festival a splendid Theôry, or legation to offer solemn sacrifice in his name; together with several chariots to contend in the race, and some excellent rhapsodes to recite poems composed by himself. The Syracusan legation, headed by Thearides, brother of Dionysius, were clothed with rich vestments, and lodged in a tent of extraordinary magnificence, decorated with gold and purple; such, probably, as had not been seen since the ostentatious display made by Alkibiades[162] in the ninetieth Olympiad (B.C. 420). While instigating the spectators present to exert themselves as Greeks for the liberation of their fellow-Greeks enslaved by Dionysius, Lysias exhorted them to begin forthwith their hostile demonstration against the latter, by plundering the splendid tent before them, which insulted the sacred plain of Olympia with the spectacle of wealth extorted from Grecian sufferers. It appears that this exhortation was partially, but only partially, acted upon.[163] Some persons assailed the tents, but were, probably, restrained by the Eleian superintendents without difficulty. Yet the incident, taken in conjunction with the speech of Lysias, helps us to understand the apprehensions and sympathies which agitated the Olympic crowd in B.C. 384. This was the first Olympic festival after the peace of Antalkidas; a festival memorable, not only because it again brought thither Athenians, Bœotians, Corinthians, and Argeians, who must have been prevented by the preceding war from coming either in B.C. 388 or in B.C. 392,—but also as it exhibited the visitors and Theôries from the Asiatic Greeks, for the first time since they had been handed over by Sparta to the Persians,—and the like also from those numerous Italians and Sicilian Greeks whom Dionysius had enslaved. All these sufferers, especially the Asiatics, would doubtless be full of complaints respecting the hardships of their new lot, and against Sparta as having betrayed them; complaints, which would call forth genuine sympathy in the Athenians, Thebans, and all others who had submitted reluctantly to the peace of Antalkidas. There was thus a large body of sentiment prepared to respond to the declamations of Lysias. And many a Grecian patriot, who would be ashamed to lay hands on the Syracusan tents or envoys, would yet yield a mournful assent to the orator’s remark, that the free Grecian world was on fire[164] at both sides; that Asiatics, Italians, and Sicilians, had already passed into the hands of Artaxerxes and Dionysius; and that, if these two formidable enemies should coalesce, the liberties even of central Greece would be in great danger.

It is easy to see how much such feeling of grief and shame would tend to raise antipathy against Sparta. Lysias, in that portion of his speech which we possess, disguises his censure against her under the forms of surprise. But Isokrates, who composed an analogous discourse four years afterwards (which may perhaps have been read at the next Olympic festival of B.C. 380), speaks out more plainly. He denounces the Lacedæmonians as traitors to the general security and freedom of Greece, and as seconding foreign kings as well as Grecian despots to aggrandize themselves at the cost of autonomous Grecian cities,—all in the interest of their own selfish ambition. No wonder (he says) that the free and self-acting Hellenic world was every day becoming contracted into a narrower space, when the presiding city Sparta assisted Artaxerxes, Amyntas, and Dionysius to absorb it,—and herself undertook unjust aggressions against Thebes, Olynthus, Phlius, and Mantinea.[165]

The preceding citations, from Lysias and Isokrates, would be sufficient to show the measure which intelligent contemporaries took, both of the state of Greece and of the conduct of Sparta, during the eight years succeeding the peace of Antalkidas (387-379 B.C.). But the philo-Laconian Xenophon is still more emphatic in his condemnation of Sparta. Having described her triumphant and seemingly unassailable position after the subjugation of Olynthus and Phlius, he proceeds to say,[166]—“I could produce numerous other incidents, both in and out of Greece, to prove that the gods take careful note of impious men and of evil-doers; but the events which I am now about to relate are quite sufficient. The Lacedæmonians, who had sworn to leave each city autonomous, having violated their oaths by seizing the citadel of Thebes, were punished by the very men whom they had wronged,—though no one on earth had ever before triumphed over them. And the Theban faction who had introduced them into the citadel, with the deliberate purpose that their city should be enslaved to Sparta in order that they might rule despotically themselves,—were put down by no more than seven assailants, among the exiles whom they had banished.”

What must have been the hatred, and sense of abused ascendency, entertained towards Sparta by neutral or unfriendly Greeks, when Xenophon, alike conspicuous for his partiality to her and for his dislike of Thebes, could employ these decisive words in ushering in the coming phase of Spartan humiliation, representing it as a well-merited judgment from the gods? The sentence which I have just translated marks, in the commonplace manner of the Xenophontic Hellenica, the same moment of pointed contrast and transition,—past glory suddenly and unexpectedly darkened by supervening misfortune,—which is foreshadowed in the narrative of Thucydides by the dialogue between the Athenian envoys and the Melian[167] council; or in the Œdipus and Antigonê of Sophokles,[168] by the warnings of the prophet Teiresias.

The government of Thebes had now been for three years (since the blow struck by Phœbidas) in the hands of Leontiades and his oligarchical partisans, upheld by the Spartan garrison in the Kadmeia. Respecting the details of its proceedings we have scarce any information. We can only (as above remarked) judge of it by the analogy of the Thirty tyrants at Athens, and of the Lysandrian Dekarchies, to which it was exactly similar in origin, position, and interests. That the general spirit of it must have been cruel, oppressive, and rapacious,—we cannot doubt; though in what degree we have no means of knowing. The appetites of uncontrolled rulers, as well as those of a large foreign garrison, would ensure such a result; besides which, those rulers must have been in constant fear of risings or conspiracies amidst a body of high-spirited citizens who saw their city degraded, from being the chief of the Bœotian federation, into nothing better than a captive dependency of Sparta. Such fear was aggravated by the vicinity of a numerous body of Theban exiles, belonging to the opposite or anti-Spartan party; three or four hundred of whom had fled to Athens at the first seizure of their leader Ismenias, and had been doubtless joined subsequently by others. So strongly did the Theban rulers apprehend mischief from these exiles, that they hired assassins to take them off by private murder at Athens; and actually succeeded in thus killing Androkleidas, chief of the band and chief successor of the deceased Ismenias,—though they missed their blows at the rest.[169] And we may be sure that they made the prison in Thebes subservient to multiplied enormities and executions, when we read not only that one hundred and fifty prisoners were found in it when the government was put down,[170] but also that in the fervor of that revolutionary movement, the slain gaoler was an object of such fierce antipathy, that his corpse was trodden and spit upon by a crowd of Theban women.[171] In Thebes, as in other Grecian cities, the women not only took no part in political disputes, but rarely even showed themselves in public;[172] so that this furious demonstration of vindictive sentiment must have been generated by the loss or maltreatment of sons, husbands, and brothers.

The Theban exiles found at Athens not only secure shelter, but genuine sympathy with their complaints against Lacedæmonian injustice. The generous countenance which had been shown by the Thebans, twenty-four years before, to Thrasybulus and the other Athenian refugees, during the omnipotence of the Thirty, was now gratefully requited under this reversal of fortune to both cities;[173] and requited too in defiance of the menaces of Sparta, who demanded that the exiles should be expelled,—as she had in the earlier occasion demanded that the Athenian refugees should be dismissed from Thebes. To protect these Theban exiles, however, was all that Athens could do. Their restoration was a task beyond her power,—and seemingly yet more beyond their own. For the existing government of Thebes was firmly seated, and had the citizens completely under control. Administered by a small faction, Archias, Philippus, Hypatês, and Leontiades (among whom the first two were at this moment polemarchs, though the last was the most energetic and resolute)—it was at the same time sustained by the large garrison of fifteen hundred Lacedæmonians and allies,[174] under Lysanoridas and two other harmosts, in the Kadmeia,—as well as by the Lacedæmonian posts in the other Bœotian cities around,—Orchomenus, Thespiæ, Platæa, Tanagra, etc. Though the general body of Theban sentiment in the city was decidedly adverse to the government, and though the young men while exercising in the palæstra (gymnastic exercises being more strenuously prosecuted at Thebes than anywhere else except at Sparta) kept up by private communication the ardor of an earnest, but compressed, patriotism,—yet all manifestation or assemblage was forcibly kept down, and the commanding posts of the lower town, as well as the citadel, were held in vigilant occupation by the ruling minority.[175]

For a certain time the Theban exiles at Athens waited in hopes of some rising at home, or some positive aid from the Athenians. At length, in the third winter after their flight, they began to despair of encouragement from either quarter, and resolved to take the initiative upon themselves. Among them were numbered several men of the richest and highest families at Thebes, proprietors of chariots, jockeys, and training establishments, for contending at the various festivals: Pelopidas, Mellon, Damokleidas, Theopompus, Pherenikus, and others.[176]

Of these the most forward in originating aggressive measures, though almost the youngest, was Pelopidas; whose daring and self-devotion, in an enterprise which seemed utterly desperate, soon communicated itself to a handful of his comrades. The exiles, keeping up constant private correspondence with their friends in Thebes, felt assured of the sympathy of the citizens generally, if they could once strike a blow. Yet nothing less would be sufficient than the destruction of the four rulers, Leontiades and his colleagues,—nor would any one within the city devote himself to so hopeless a danger. It was this conspiracy which Pelopidas, Mellon, and five or ten other exiles (the entire band is differently numbered, by some as seven, by others, twelve[177]) undertook to execute. Many of their friends in Thebes came in as auxiliaries to them, who would not have embarked in the design as primary actors. Of all auxiliaries, the most effective and indispensable was Phyllidas, the secretary of the polemarchs; next to him, Charon, an eminent and earnest patriot. Phyllidas, having been despatched to Athens on official business, entered into secret conference with the conspirators, concerted with them the day for their coming to Thebes, and even engaged to provide for them access to the persons of the polemarchs. Charon not only promised them concealment in his house, from their first coming within the gates until the moment of striking their blow should have arrived,—but also entered his name to share in the armed attack. Nevertheless, in spite of such partial encouragements, the plan still appeared desperate to many who wished heartily for its success. Epaminondas, for example,—who now for the first time comes before us,—resident at Thebes, and not merely sympathizing with the political views of Pelopidas, but also bound to him by intimate friendship,—dissuaded others from the attempt, and declined participating in it. He announced distinctly that he would not become an accomplice in civil bloodshed. It appears that there were men among the exiles whose violence made him fear that they would not, like Pelopidas, draw the sword exclusively against Leontiades and his colleagues, but would avail themselves of success to perpetrate unmeasured violence against other political enemies.[178]

The day for the enterprise was determined by Phyllidas the secretary, who had prepared an evening banquet for Archias and Philippus, in celebration of the period when they were going out of office as polemarchs,—and who had promised on that occasion to bring into their company some women remarkable for beauty, as well as of the best families in Thebes.[179] In concert with the general body of Theban exiles at Athens, who held themselves ready on the borders of Attica, together with some Athenian sympathizers, to march to Thebes the instant that they should receive intimation,—and in concert also with two out of the ten Stratêgi of Athens, who took on themselves privately to countenance the enterprise, without any public vote,—Pelopidas and Mellon, and their five companions,[180] crossed Kithæron from Athens to Thebes. It was wet weather, about December B.C. 379; they were disguised as rustics or hunters, with no other arms than a concealed dagger; and they got within the gates of Thebes one by one at nightfall, just when the latest farming men were coming home from their fields. All of them arrived safe at the house of Charon, the appointed rendezvous.

It was, however, by mere accident that they had not been turned back, and the whole scheme frustrated. For a Theban named Hipposthenidas, friendly to the conspiracy, but faint-hearted, who had been let into the secret against the will of Phyllidas,—became so frightened as the moment of execution approached, that he took upon himself, without the knowledge of the rest, to despatch Chlidon, a faithful slave of Mellon, ordering him to go forth on horseback from Thebes, to meet his master on the road, and to desire that he and his comrades would go back to Attica, since circumstances had happened to render the project for the moment impracticable. Chlidon, going home to fetch his bridle, but not finding it in its usual place, asked his wife where it was. The woman, at first pretending to look for it, at last confessed that she had lent it to a neighbor. Chlidon became so irritated with this delay, that he got into a loud altercation with his wife, who on her part wished him ill luck with his journey. He at last beat her, until neighbors ran in to interpose. His departure was thus accidentally frustrated, so that the intended message of countermand never reached the conspirators on their way.[181]

In the house of Charon they remained concealed all the ensuing day, on the evening of which the banquet of Archias and Philippus was to take place. Phyllidas had laid his plan for introducing them at that banquet, at the moment when the two polemarchs had become full of wine, in female attire, as being the women whose visit was expected. The hour had nearly arrived, and they were preparing to play their parts, when an unexpected messenger knocked at the door, summoning Charon instantly into the presence of the polemarchs. All within were thunderstruck with the summons, which seemed to imply that the plot had been divulged, perhaps by the timid Hipposthenidas. It was agreed among them that Charon must obey at once. Nevertheless, he himself, even in the perilous uncertainty which beset him, was most of all apprehensive lest the friends whom he had sheltered should suspect him of treachery towards themselves and their cause. Before departing, therefore, he sent for his only son, a youth of fifteen, and of conspicuous promise in every way. This youth he placed in the hands of Pelopidas, as a hostage for his own fidelity. But Pelopidas and the rest, vehemently disclaiming all suspicion, entreated Charon to put his son away, out of the reach of that danger in which all were now involved. Charon, however, could not be prevailed on to comply, and left his son among them to share the fate of the rest. He went into the presence of Archias and Philippus; whom he found already half-intoxicated, but informed, by intelligence from Athens, that some plot, they knew not by whom, was afloat. They had sent for him to question him, as a known friend of the exiles; but he had little difficulty, aided by the collusion of Phyllidas, in blinding the vague suspicions of drunken men, anxious only to resume their conviviality.[182] He was allowed to retire and rejoin his friends. Nevertheless, soon after his departure,—so many were the favorable chances which befel these improvident men,—a fresh message was delivered to Archias the polemarch, from his namesake Archias the Athenian Hierophant, giving an exact account of the names and scheme of the conspirators, which had become known to the philo-Laconian party at Athens. The messenger who bore this despatch delivered it to Archias with an intimation, that it related to very serious matters. “Serious matters for to-morrow,” said the polemarch, as he put the despatch, unopened and unread, under the pillow of the couch on which he was reclining.[183]

Returning to their carousal, Archias and Philippus impatiently called upon Phyllidas to introduce the women according to his promise. Upon this the secretary retired, and brought the conspirators, clothed in female attire, into an adjoining chamber; then going back to the polemarchs, he informed them that the women would not come in unless all the domestics were first dismissed. An order was forthwith given that these latter should depart, while Phyllidas took care that they should be well provided with wine at the lodging of one among their number. The polemarchs were thus left only with one or two friends at table, half-intoxicated as well as themselves; among them Kabeirichus, the archon of the year, who always throughout his term kept the consecrated spear of office in actual possession, and had it at that moment close to his person. Phyllidas now conducted the pretended women into the banqueting-room; three of them attired as ladies of distinction, the four others following as female attendants. Their long veils, and ample folds of clothing, were quite sufficient as disguise,—even had the guests at table been sober,—until they sat down by the side of the polemarchs; and the instant of lifting their veils was the signal for using their daggers. Archias and Philippus were slain at once and with little resistance; but Kabeirichus with his spear tried to defend himself, and thus perished with the others, though the conspirators had not originally intended to take his life.[184]

Having been thus far successful, Phyllidas conducted three of the conspirators,—Pelopidas, Kephisodôrus, and Damokleidas,—to the house of Leontiades, into which he obtained admittance by announcing himself as the bearer of an order from the polemarchs. Leontiades was reclining after supper, with his wife sitting spinning wool by his side, when they entered his chamber. Being a brave and powerful man, he started up, seized his sword, and mortally wounded Kephisodôrus in the throat; a desperate struggle then ensued between him and Pelopidas in the narrow doorway, where there was no room for a third to approach. At length, however, Pelopidas overthrew and killed him, after which they retired, enjoining the wife with threats to remain silent, and closing the door after them with peremptory commands that it should not be again opened. They then went to the house of Hypatês, whom they slew while he attempted to escape over the roof.[185]

The four great rulers of the philo-Laconian party in Thebes having been now put to death, Phyllidas proceeded with the conspirators to the prison. Here the gaoler, a confidential agent in the oppressions of the deceased governors, hesitated to admit him; but was slain by a sudden thrust with his spear, so as to ensure free admission to all. To liberate the prisoners, probably, for the most part men of kindred politics with the conspirators,—to furnish them with arms taken from the battle-spoils hanging up in the neighboring porticos,—and to range them in battle order near the temple of Amphion,—were the next proceedings; after which they began to feel some assurance of safety and triumph.[186] Epaminondas and Gorgidas, apprised of what had occurred, were the first who appeared in arms with a few friends to sustain the cause; while proclamation was everywhere made aloud, through heralds, that the despots were slain,—that Thebes was free,—and that all Thebans who valued freedom should muster in arms in the market-place. There were at that moment in Thebes many trumpeters who had come to contend for the prize at the approaching festival of the Herakleia. Hipposthenidas engaged these men to blow their trumpets in different parts of the city, and thus everywhere to excite the citizens to arms.[187]

Although during the darkness surprise was the prevalent feeling, and no one knew what to do,—yet so soon as day dawned, and the truth became known, there was but one feeling of joy and patriotic enthusiasm among the majority of the citizens.[188] Both horsemen and hoplites hastened in arms to the agora. Here for the first time since the seizure of the Kadmeia by Phœbidas, a formal assembly of the Theban people was convened, before which Pelopidas and his fellow-conspirators presented themselves. The priests of the city crowned them with wreaths, and thanked them in the name of the local gods; while the assembly hailed them with acclamations of delight and gratitude, nominating with one voice Pelopidas, Mellon, and Charon, as the first renewed Bœotarchs.[189] The revival of this title, which had been dropped since the peace of Antalkidas, was in itself an event of no mean significance; implying not merely that Thebes had waked up again into freedom, but that the Bœotian confederacy also had been, or would be, restored.

Messengers had been forthwith despatched by the conspirators to Attica to communicate their success; upon which all the remaining exiles, with the two Athenian generals privy to the plot, and a body of Athenian volunteers, or corps francs, all of whom were ready on the borders awaiting the summons,—flocked to Thebes to complete the work. The Spartan generals, on their side also, sent to Platæa and Thespiæ for aid. During the whole night, they had been distracted and alarmed by the disturbance in the city; lights showing themselves here and there, with trumpets sounding and shouts for the recent success.[190] Apprised speedily of the slaughter of the polemarchs, from whom they had been accustomed to receive orders, they knew not whom to trust or to consult, while they were doubtless beset by affrighted fugitives of the now defeated party, who would hurry up the Kadmeia for safety. They reckoned at first on a diversion in their favor from the forces at Platæa and Thespiæ. But these forces were not permitted even to approach the city gate; being vigorously charged, as soon as they came in sight, by the newly-mustered Theban cavalry, and forced to retreat with loss. The Lacedæmonians in the citadel were thus not only left without support, but saw their enemies in the city reinforced by the other exiles, and by the auxiliary volunteers.[191]

Meanwhile, Pelopidas and the other new Bœotarchs found themselves at the head of a body of armed citizens, full of devoted patriotism and unanimous in hailing the recent revolution. They availed themselves of this first burst of fervor to prepare for storming the Kadmeia without delay, knowing the importance of forestalling all aid from Sparta. And the citizens were already rushing up to the assault,—proclamation being made of large rewards to those who should first force their way in,—when the Lacedæmonian commander sent proposals for a capitulation.[192] Undisturbed egress from Thebes, with the honors of war, being readily guaranteed to him by oath, the Kadmeia was then surrendered. As the Spartans were marching out of the gates, many Thebans of the defeated party came forth also. But against these latter the exasperation of the victors was so ungovernable, that several of the most odious were seized as they passed, and put to death; in some cases, even their children along with them. And more of them would have been thus despatched, had not the Athenian auxiliaries, with generous anxiety, exerted every effort to get them out of sight and put them into safety.[193] We are not told,—nor is it certain,—that these Thebans were protected under the capitulation. Even had they been so, however, the wrathful impulse might still have prevailed against them. Of the three harmosts who thus evacuated the Kadmeia without a blow, two were put to death, the third was heavily fined and banished, by the authorities at Sparta.[194] We do not know what the fortifications of the Kadmeia were, nor how far it was provisioned. But we can hardly wonder that these officers were considered to have dishonored the Lacedæmonian arms, by making no attempt to defend it; when we recollect that hardly more than four or five days would be required to procure adequate relief from home,—and that forty-three years afterwards, the Macedonian garrison in the same place maintained itself against the Thebans in the city for more than fourteen days, until the return of Alexander from Illyria.[195] The first messenger who brought news to Sparta of the conspiracy and revolution at Thebes, appears to have communicated at the same time that the garrison had evacuated the Kadmeia and was in full retreat, with a train of Theban exiles from the defeated party.[196]

This revolution at Thebes came like an electric shock upon the Grecian world. With a modern reader, the assassination of the four leaders, in their houses and at the banquet, raises a sentiment of repugnance which withdraws his attention from the other features of this memorable deed. Now an ancient Greek not only had no such repugnance, but sympathized with the complete revenge for the seizure of the Kadmeia and the death of Ismenias; while he admired, besides, the extraordinary personal daring of Pelopidas and Mellon,—the skilful forecast of the plot,—and the sudden overthrow, by a force so contemptibly small, of a government which the day before seemed unassailable.[197] It deserves note that we here see the richest men in Thebes undertaking a risk, single-handed and with their own persons, which must have appeared on a reasonable estimate little less than desperate. From the Homeric Odysseus and Achilles down to the end of free Hellenism, the rich Greek strips in the Palæstra,[198] and exposes his person in the ranks as a soldier like the poorest citizens; being generally superior to them in strength and bodily efficiency.

As the revolution in Thebes acted forcibly on the Grecian mind from the manner in which it was accomplished, so by its positive effects it altered forthwith the balance of power in Greece. The empire of Sparta, far from being undisputed and nearly universal over Greece, is from henceforward only maintained by more or less effort, until at length it is completely overthrown.[199]

The exiles from Thebes, arriving at Sparta, inflamed both the ephors, and the miso-Theban Agesilaus, to the highest pitch. Though it was then the depth of winter,[200] an expedition was decreed forthwith against Thebes, and the allied contingents were summoned. Agesilaus declined to take the command of it, on the ground that he was above sixty years of age, and therefore no longer liable to compulsory foreign service. But this (says Xenophon[201]) was not his real reason. He was afraid that his enemies at Sparta would say,—“Here is Agesilaus again putting us to expense, in order that he may uphold despots in other cities,”—as he had just done, and had been reproached with doing, at Phlius; a second proof that the reproaches against Sparta (which I have cited a few pages above from Lysias and Isokrates) of allying herself with Greek despots as well as with foreigners to put down Grecian freedom, found an echo even in Sparta herself. Accordingly Kleombrotus, the other king of Sparta, took the command. He had recently succeeded his brother Agesipolis, and had never commanded before.

Kleombrotus conducted his army along the Isthmus of Corinth through Megara to Platæa, cutting to pieces an outpost of Thebans, composed chiefly of the prisoners set free by the recent revolution, who had been placed for the defence of the intervening mountain-pass. From Platæa he went forward to Thespiæ, and from thence to Kynoskephalæ in the Theban territory, where he lay encamped for sixteen days; after which he retreated to Thespiæ. It appears that he did nothing, and that his inaction was the subject of much wonder in his army, who are said to have even doubted whether he was really and earnestly hostile to Thebes. Perhaps the exiles, with customary exaggeration, may have led him to hope that they could provoke a rising in Thebes, if he would only come near. At any rate the bad weather must have been a serious impediment to action; since in his march back to Peloponnesus through Kreusis and Ægosthenæ the wind blew a hurricane, so that his soldiers could not proceed without leaving their shields and coming back afterwards to fetch them. Kleombrotus did not quit Bœotia, however, without leaving Sphodrias as harmost at Thespiæ, with one third of the entire army, and with a considerable sum of money to employ in hiring mercenaries and acting vigorously against the Thebans.[202]

The army of Kleombrotus, in its march from Megara to Platæa, had passed by the skirts of Attica; causing so much alarm to the Athenians, that they placed Chabrias with a body of peltasts, to guard their frontier and the neighboring road through Eleutheræ into Bœotia. This was the first time that a Lacedæmonian army had touched Attica (now no longer guarded by the lines of Corinth, as in the war between 394 and 388 B.C.) since the retirement of king Pausanias in 404 B.C.; furnishing a proof of the exposure of the country, such as to revive in the Athenian mind all the terrible recollections of Dekeleia and the Peloponnesian war. It was during the first prevalence of this alarm,—and seemingly while Kleombrotus was still with his army at Thespiæ or Kynoskephalæ, close on the Athenian frontier,—that three Lacedæmonian envoys, Etymoklês and two others, arrived at Athens to demand satisfaction for the part taken by the two Athenian generals and the Athenian volunteers, in concerting and aiding the enterprise of Pelopidas and his comrades. So overpowering was the anxiety in the public mind to avoid giving offence to Sparta, that these two generals were both of them accused before the dikastery. The first of them was condemned and executed; the second, profiting by this warning (since, pursuant to the psephism of Kannônus,[203] the two would be put on trial separately), escaped, and a sentence of banishment was passed against him.[204] These two generals had been unquestionably guilty of a grave abuse of their official functions. They had brought the state into public hazard, not merely without consulting the senate or assembly, but even without taking the sense of their own board of Ten. Nevertheless the severity of the sentence pronounced indicates the alarm, as well as the displeasure, of the general body of Athenians; while it served as a disclaimer in fact, if not in form, of all political connection with Thebes.[205]

Even before the Lacedæmonian envoys had quitted Athens, however, an incident, alike sudden and memorable, completely altered the Athenian temper. The Lacedæmonian harmost Sphodrias (whom Kleombrotus had left at Thespiæ to prosecute the war against Thebes), being informed that Peiræus on its land side was without gates or night watch,—since there was no suspicion of attack,—conceived the idea of surprising it by a night-march from Thespiæ, and thus of mastering at one stroke the commerce, the wealth, and the naval resources of Athens. Putting his troops under march one evening after an early supper, he calculated on reaching the Peiræus the next morning before daylight. But his reckoning proved erroneous. Morning overtook him when he had advanced no farther than the Thriasian plain near Eleusis; from whence, as it was useless to proceed farther, he turned back and retreated to Thespiæ; not, however, without committing various acts of plunder against the neighboring Athenian residents.

This plan against Peiræus appears to have been not ill conceived. Had Sphodrias been a man competent to organize and execute movements as rapid as those of Brasidas, there is no reason why it might not have succeeded; in which case the whole face of the war would have been changed, since the Lacedæmonians, if once masters of Peiræus, both could and would have maintained the place. But it was one of those injustices, which no one ever commends until it has been successfully consummated,—“consilium quod non potest laudari nisi peractum.[206]” As it failed, it has been considered, by critics as well as by contemporaries, not merely as a crime but as a fault, and its author Sphodrias as a brave man, but singularly weak and hot-headed.[207] Without admitting the full extent of this censure, we may see that his present aggression grew out of an untoward emulation of the glory which Phœbidas, in spite of the simulated or transient displeasure of his countrymen, had acquired by seizing the Kadmeia. That Sphodrias received private instructions from Kleombrotus (as Diodorus states) is not sufficiently proved; while the suspicion, intimated by Xenophon as being abroad, that he was wrought upon by secret emissaries and bribes from his enemies the Thebans, for the purpose of plunging Athens into war with Sparta, is altogether improbable;[208] and seems merely an hypothesis suggested by the consequences of the act,—which were such, that if his enemies had bribed him, he could not have served them better.

The presence of Sphodrias and his army in the Thriasian plain was communicated shortly after daybreak at Athens, where it excited no less terror than surprise. Every man instantly put himself under arms for defence; but news soon arrived that the invader had retired. When thus reassured, the Athenians passed from fear to indignation. The Lacedæmonian envoys, who were lodging at the house of Kallias the proxenus of Sparta, were immediately put under arrest and interrogated. But all three affirmed that they were not less astonished, and not less exasperated, by the march of Sphodrias, than the Athenians themselves; adding, by way of confirmation, that had they been really privy to any design of seizing the Peiræus, they would have taken care not to let themselves be found in the city, and in their ordinary lodging at the house of the proxenus, where of course their persons would be at once seized. They concluded by assuring the Athenians, that Sphodrias would not only be indignantly disavowed, but punished capitally, at Sparta. And their reply was deemed so satisfactory, that they were allowed to depart; while an Athenian embassy was sent to Sparta, to demand the punishment of the offending general.[209]

The Ephors immediately summoned Sphodrias home to Sparta, to take his trial on a capital charge. So much did he himself despair of his case, that he durst not make his appearance; while the general impression was, both at Sparta and elsewhere, that he would certainly be condemned. Nevertheless, though thus absent and undefended, he was acquitted, purely through private favor and esteem for his general character. He was of the party of Kleombrotus, so that all the friends of that prince espoused his cause, as a matter of course. But as he was of the party opposed to Agesilaus, his friends dreaded that the latter would declare against him, and bring about his condemnation. Nothing saved Sphodrias except the peculiar intimacy between his son Kleonymus and Archidamus son of Agesilaus. The mournful importunity of Archidamus induced Agesilaus, when this important cause was brought before the Senate of Sparta, to put aside his judicial conviction, and give his vote in the following manner: “To be sure, Sphodrias is guilty; upon that there cannot be two opinions. Nevertheless, we cannot put to death a man like him, who, as boy, youth, and man, has stood unblemished in all Spartan honor. Sparta cannot part with soldiers like Sphodrias.[210]” The friends of Agesilaus, following this opinion and coinciding with those of Kleombrotus, ensured a favorable verdict. And it is remarkable, that Etymoklês himself, who as envoy at Athens had announced as a certainty that Sphodrias would be put to death,—as senator and friend of Agesilaus voted for his acquittal.[211]

This remarkable incident (which comes to us from a witness not merely philo-Laconian, but also personally intimate with Agesilaus) shows how powerfully the course of justice at Sparta was overruled by private sympathy and interests,—especially, those of the two kings. It especially illustrates what has been stated in a former chapter respecting the oppressions exercised by the Spartan harmosts and the dekadarchies, for which no redress was attainable at Sparta. Here was a case where not only the guilt of Sphodrias stood confessed, but in which also his acquittal was sure to be followed by a war with Athens. If, under such circumstances, the Athenian demand for redress was overruled by the favor of the two kings, what chance was there of any justice to the complaint of a dependent city, or an injured individual, against the harmost? The contrast between Spartan and Athenian proceeding is also instructive. Only a few days before, the Athenians condemned, at the instance of Sparta, their two generals who had without authority lent aid to the Theban exiles. In so doing, the Athenian dikastery enforced the law against clear official misconduct,—and that, too, in a case where their sympathies went along with the act, though their fear of a war with Sparta was stronger. But the most important circumstance to note is, that at Athens there is neither private influence, nor kingly influence, capable of overruling the sincere judicial conscience of a numerous and independent dikastery.

The result of the acquittal of Sphodrias must have been well known beforehand to all parties at Sparta. Even by the general voice of Greece, the sentence was denounced as iniquitous.[212] But the Athenians, who had so recently given strenuous effect to the remonstrances of Sparta against their own generals, were stung by it to the quick; and only the more stung, in consequence of the extraordinary compliments to Sphodrias on which the acquittal was made to turn. They immediately contracted hearty alliance with Thebes, and made vigorous preparations for war against Sparta both by land and sea. After completing the fortifications of Peiræus, so as to place it beyond the reach of any future attempt, they applied themselves to the building of new ships of war, and to the extension of their naval ascendency, at the expense of Sparta.[213]

From this moment, a new combination began in Grecian politics. The Athenians thought the moment favorable to attempt the construction of a new confederacy, analogous to the Confederacy of Delos, formed a century before; the basis on which had been reared the formidable Athenian empire, lost at the close of the Peloponnesian war. Towards such construction there was so far a tendency, that Athens had already a small body of maritime allies; while rhetors like Isokrates (in his Panegyrical Discourse, published two years before) had been familiarizing the public mind with larger ideas. But the enterprise was now pressed with the determination and vehemence of men smarting under recent insult. The Athenians had good ground to build upon; since, while the discontent against the ascendency of Sparta was widely spread, the late revolution in Thebes had done much to lessen that sentiment of fear upon which such ascendency chiefly rested. To Thebes, the junction with Athens was preëminently welcome, and her leaders gladly enrolled their city as a constituent member of the new confederacy.[214] They cheerfully acknowledged the presidency of Athens,—reserving, however, tacitly or expressly, their own rights as presidents of the Bœotian federation, as soon as that could be reconstituted; which reconstitution was at this moment desirable even for Athens, seeing that the Bœotian towns were now dependent allies of Sparta under harmosts and oligarchies.

The Athenians next sent envoys round to the principal islands and maritime cities in the Ægean, inviting all of them to an alliance on equal and honorable terms. The principles were in the main the same as those upon which the confederacy of Delos had been formed against the Persians, almost a century before. It was proposed that a congress of deputies should meet at Athens, one from each city, small as well as great, each with one vote; that Athens should be president, yet each individual city autonomous; that a common fund should be raised, with a common naval force, through assessment imposed by this congress upon each, and applied as the same authority might prescribe; the general purpose being defined to be, maintenance of freedom and security from foreign aggression, to each confederate, by the common force of all. Care was taken to banish as much as possible those associations of tribute and subjection which rendered the recollection of the former Athenian empire unpopular.[215] And as there were many Athenian citizens, who, during those times of supremacy, had been planted out as kleruchs or out-settlers in various dependencies, but had been deprived of their properties at the close of the war,—it was thought necessary to pass a formal decree,[216] renouncing and barring all revival of these suspended rights. It was farther decreed that henceforward no Athenian should on any pretence hold property, either in house or land, in the territory of any one of the confederates; neither by purchase, nor as security for money lent, nor by any other mode of acquisition. Any Athenian infringing this law, was rendered liable to be informed against before the synod; who, on proof of the fact, were to deprive him of the property,—half of it going to the informer, half to the general purposes of the confederacy.

Such were the liberal principles of confederacy now proposed by Athens,—who, as a candidate for power, was straightforward and just, like the Herodotean Deiokês,[217]—and formally ratified, as well by the Athenians as by the general voice of the confederate deputies assembled within their walls. The formal decree and compact of alliance was inscribed on a stone column and placed by the side of the statue of Zeus Eleutherius or the Liberator; a symbol, of enfranchisement from Sparta accomplished, as well as of freedom to be maintained against Persia and other enemies.[218] Periodical meetings of the confederate deputies were provided to be held (how often, we do not know) at Athens, and the synod was recognized as competent judge of all persons, even Athenian citizens, charged with treason against the confederacy. To give fuller security to the confederates generally, it was provided in the original compact, that if any Athenian citizen should either speak, or put any question to the vote, in the Athenian assembly, contrary to the tenor of that document,—he should be tried before the synod for treason; and that, if found guilty, he might be condemned by them to the severest punishment.

Three Athenian leaders stood prominent as commissioners in the first organization of the confederacy, and in the dealings with those numerous cities whose junction was to be won by amicable inducement,—Chabrias, Timotheus son of Konon, and Kallistratus.[219]

The first of the three is already known to the reader. He and Iphikrates were the most distinguished warriors whom Athens numbered among her citizens. But not having been engaged in any war, since the peace of Antalkidas in 387 B.C., she had had no need of their services; hence both of them had been absent from the city during much of the last nine years, and Iphikrates seems still to have been absent. At the time when that peace was concluded, Iphikrates was serving in the Hellespont and Thrace, Chabrias with Evagoras in Cyprus; each having been sent thither by Athens at the head of a body of mercenary peltasts. Instead of dismissing their troops, and returning to Athens as peaceful citizens, it was not less agreeable to the military tastes of these generals, than conducive to their importance and their profit, to keep together their bands, and to take foreign service. Accordingly, Chabrias had continued in service first in Cyprus, next with the native Egyptian king Akoris. The Persians, against whom he served, found his hostility so inconvenient, that Pharnabazus demanded of the Athenians to recall him, on pain of the Great King’s displeasure; and requested at the same time that Iphikrates might be sent to aid the Persian satraps in organizing a great expedition against Egypt. The Athenians, to whom the goodwill of Persia was now of peculiar importance, complied on both points; recalled Chabrias, who thus became disposable for the Athenian service,[220] and despatched Iphikrates to take command along with the Persians.

Iphikrates, since the peace of Antalkidas, had employed his peltasts in the service of the kings of Thrace: first of Seuthes, near the shores of the Propontis, whom he aided in the recovery of certain lost dominions,—next of Kotys, whose favor he acquired, and whose daughter he presently married.[221] Not only did he enjoy great scope for warlike operations and plunder, among the “butter-eating Thracians,”[222]—but he also acquired, as dowry, a large stock of such produce as Thracian princes had at their disposal, together with a boon even more important,—a seaport village not far from the mouth of the Hebrus, called Drys, where he established a fortified post, and got together a Grecian colony dependent on himself.[223] Miltiades, Alkibiades, and other eminent Athenians had done the same thing before him; though Xenophon had refused a similar proposition when made to him by the earlier Seuthes.[224] Iphikrates thus became a great man in Thrace, yet by no means abandoning his connection with Athens, but making his position in each subservient to his importance in the other. While he was in a situation to favor the projects of Athenian citizens for mercantile and territorial acquisitions in the Chersonese and other parts of Thrace,—he could also lend the aid of Athenian naval and military art, not merely to princes in Thrace, but to others even beyond those limits,—since we learn that Amyntas king of Macedonia became so attached or indebted to him as to adopt him for his son.[225] When sent by the Athenians to Persia, at the request of Pharnabazus (about 378 B.C. apparently), Iphikrates had fair ground for anticipating that a career yet more lucrative was opening before him.[226]

Iphikrates being thus abroad, the Athenians joined with Chabrias, in the mission and measures for organizing their new confederacy, two other colleagues, of whom we now hear for the first time—Timotheus son of Konon, and Kallistratus the most celebrated orator of his time.[227] The abilities of Kallistratus were not military at all; while Timotheus and Chabrias were men of distinguished military merit. But in acquiring new allies and attracting deputies to her proposed congress, Athens stood in need of persuasive appeal, conciliatory dealing, and substantial fairness in all her propositions, not less than of generalship. We are told that Timotheus, doubtless as son of the liberator Konon, from the recollections of the battle of Knidus—was especially successful in procuring new adhesions; and probably Kallistratus,[228] going round with him to the different islands, contributed by his eloquence not a little to the same result. On their invitation, many cities entered as confederates.[229] At this time (as in the earlier confederacy of Delos) all who joined must have been unconstrained members. And we may understand the motives of their junction, when we read the picture drawn by Isokrates (in 380 B.C.) of the tyranny of the Persians on the Asiatic mainland, threatening, to absorb the neighboring islands. Not only was there now a new basis of imposing force, presented by Athens and Thebes in union—but there was also a wide-spread hatred of imperial Sparta, aggravated since her perversion of the pretended boon of autonomy, promised by the peace of Antalkidas; and the conjunction of these sentiments caused the Athenian mission of invitation to be extremely successful. All the cities in Eubœa (except Histiæa, at the north of the island)—as well as Chios, Mitylênê, Byzantium, and Rhodes—the three former of whom had continued favorably inclined to Athens ever since the peace of Antalkidas,[230]—all entered into the confederacy. An Athenian fleet under Chabrias, sailing among the Cyclades and the other islands of the Ægean, aided in the expulsion of the Lacedæmonian harmosts,[231] together with their devoted local oligarchies, wherever they still subsisted; and all the cities thus liberated became equal members of the newly-constituted congress at Athens. After a certain interval, there came to be not less than seventy cities, many of them separately powerful, which sent deputies to it;[232] an aggregate sufficient to intimidate Sparta, and even to flatter Athens with the hope of restoration to something like her former lustre.

The first votes both of Athens herself, and of the newly-assembled congress, threatened war upon the largest scale. A resolution was passed to equip twenty thousand hoplites, five hundred horsemen, and two hundred triremes.[233] Probably the insular and Ionic deputies promised each a certain contribution of money, but nothing beyond. We do not, however, know how much,—nor how far the engagements, large or small, were realized,—nor whether Athens was authorized to enforce execution against defaulters,—or was in circumstances to act upon such authority, if granted to her by the congress. It was in this way (as the reader will recollect from my fifth volume) that Athens had first rendered herself unpopular in the confederacy of Delos,—by enforcing the resolutions of the confederate synod against evasive or seceding members. It was in this way that what was at first a voluntary association had ultimately slid into an empire by constraint. Under the new circumstances of 378 B.C., we may presume that the confederates, though ardent and full of promises on first assembling at Athens, were even at the outset not exact, and became afterwards still less exact, in performance; yet that Athens was forced to be reserved in claiming, or in exercising, the right of enforcement. To obtain a vote of contribution by the majority of deputies present, was only the first step in the process; to obtain punctual payment, when the Athenian fleet was sent round for the purpose of collecting,—yet without incurring dangerous unpopularity,—was the second step, but by far the most doubtful and difficult.

It must, however, be borne in mind that at this moment, when the confederacy was first formed, both Athens and the other cities came together from a spontaneous impulse of hearty mutuality and coöperation. A few years afterwards, we shall find this changed; Athens selfish, and the confederates reluctant.[234] Inflamed, as well by their position of renovated headship, as by fresh animosity against Sparta, the Athenians made important efforts of their own, both financial and military. Equipping a fleet, which for the time was superior in the Ægean, they ravaged the hostile territory of Histiæa in Eubœa, and annexed to their confederacy the islands of Peparêthus and Skiathus. They imposed upon themselves also a direct property-tax; to what amount, however, we do not know.

It was on the occasion of this tax that they introduced a great change in the financial arrangements and constitution of the city; a change conferring note upon the archonship of Nausinikus, (B.C. 378-377). The great body of substantial Athenian citizens as well as metics were now classified anew for purposes of taxation. It will be remembered that even from the time of Solon[235] the citizens of Athens had been distributed into four classes,—Pentakosiomedimni, Hippeis, Zeugitæ, Thêtes,—distinguished from each other by the amount of their respective properties. Of these Solonian classes, the fourth, or poorest, paid no direct taxes; while the three former were taxed according to assessments representing a certain proportion of their actual property. The taxable property of the richest (or Pentakosiomedimni, including all at or above the minimum income of five hundred medimni of corn per annum) was entered in the tax-book at a sum equal to twelve times their income; that of the Hippeis (comprising all who possessed between three hundred and five hundred medimni of annual income) at ten times their income; that of the Zeugitæ (or possessors of an annual income between two hundred and three hundred medimni) at five times their income. A medimnus of corn was counted as equivalent to a drachma; which permitted the application of this same class-system to movable property as well as to land. So that, when an actual property-tax (or eisphora) was imposed, it operated as an equal or proportional tax, so far as regarded all the members of the same class; but as a graduated or progressive tax, upon all the members of the richer class as compared with those of the poorer.

The three Solonian property-classes above named appear to have lasted, though probably not without modifications, down to the close of the Peloponnesian war; and to have been in great part preserved, after the renovation of the democracy in B.C. 403, during the archonship of Eukleides.[236] Though eligibility to the great offices of state had before that time ceased to be dependent on pecuniary qualification, it was still necessary to possess some means of distinguishing the wealthier citizens, not merely in case of direct taxation being imposed, but also because the liability to serve in liturgies or burdensome offices was consequent on a man’s enrolment as possessor of more than a given minimum of property. It seems, therefore, that the Solonian census, in its main principles of classification and graduation, was retained. Each man’s property being valued, he was ranged in one of three or more classes according to its amount. For each of the classes, a fixed proportion of taxable capital to each man’s property was assumed, and each was entered in the schedule, not for his whole property, but for the sum of taxable capital corresponding to his property, according to the proportion assumed. In the first or richest class, the taxable capital bore a greater ratio to the actual property than in the less rich; in the second, a greater ratio than in the third. The sum of all these items of taxable capital, in all the different classes, set opposite to each man’s name in the schedule, constituted the aggregate census of Attica; upon which all direct property-tax was imposed, in equal proportion upon every man.

Respecting the previous modifications in the register of taxable property, or the particulars of its distribution into classes, which had been introduced in 403 B.C. at the archonship of Eukleides, we have no information. Nor can we make out how large or how numerous were the assessments of direct property-tax, imposed at Athens between that archonship and the archonship of Nausinikus in 378 B.C. But at this latter epoch the register was again considerably modified, at the moment when Athens was bracing herself up for increased exertions. A new valuation was made of the property of every man possessing property to the amount of twenty-five minæ (or twenty-five hundred drachmæ) and upwards. Proceeding upon this valuation, every one was entered in the schedule for a sum of taxable capital equal to a given fraction of what he possessed. But this fraction was different in each of the different classes. How many classes there were, we do not certainly know; nor can we tell, except in reference to the lowest class taxed, what sum was taken as the minimum for any one of them. There could hardly have been less, however, than three classes, and there may probably have been four. But respecting the first or richest class, we know that each man was entered in the schedule for a taxable capital equal to one-fifth of his estimated property; and that possessors of fifteen talents were included in it. The father of Demosthenes died in this year, and the boy Demosthenes was returned by his guardians to the first class, as possessor of fifteen talents; upon which his name was entered on the schedule with a taxable capital of three talents set against him; being one-fifth of his actual property. The taxable capital of the second class was entered at a fraction less than one-fifth of their actual property (probably enough, one-sixth, the same as all the registered metics); that of the third, at a fraction still smaller; of the fourth (if there was a fourth), even smaller than the third. This last class descended down to the minimum of twenty-five minæ, or twenty-five hundred drachmæ; below which no account was taken.[237]

Besides the taxable capitals of the citizens, thus graduated, the schedule also included those of the metics or resident aliens; who were each enrolled (without any difference of greater or smaller property, above twenty-five minæ) at a taxable capital equal to one-sixth of his actual property;[238] being a proportion less than the richest class of citizens, and probably equal to the second class in order of wealth. All these items summed up amounted to five thousand seven hundred and fifty or six thousand talents,[239] forming the aggregate schedule of taxable property; that is, something near about six thousand talents. A property-tax was no part of the regular ways and means of the state. It was imposed only on special occasions; and whenever it was imposed, it was assessed upon this schedule,—every man, rich or poor, being rated equally according to his taxable capital as there entered. A property-tax of one per cent. would thus produce sixty talents; two per cent., one hundred and twenty talents, etc. It is highly probable that the exertions of Athens during the archonship of Nausinikus, when this new schedule was first prepared, may have caused a property-tax to be then imposed, but we do not know to what amount.[240]

Along with this new schedule of taxable capital, a new distribution of the citizens now took place into certain bodies called Symmories. As far as we can make out, on a very obscure subject, it seems that these Symmories were twenty in number, two to each tribe; that each contained sixty citizens, thus making one thousand two hundred in all; that these one thousand two hundred were the wealthiest citizens of the schedule,—containing, perhaps, the two first out of the four classes enrolled. Among these one thousand two hundred, however, the three hundred wealthiest stood out as a separate body; thirty from each tribe. These three hundred were the wealthiest men in the city, and were called “the leaders or chiefs of the Symmories.” The three hundred and the twelve hundred corresponded, speaking roughly, to the old Solonian classes of Pentakosiomedimni and Hippeis; of which latter class there had also been twelve hundred, at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war.[241] The liturgies, or burdensome and costly offices, were discharged principally by the Three Hundred, but partly also by the Twelve Hundred. It would seem that the former was a body essentially fluctuating, and that after a man had been in it for some time, discharging the burdens belonging to it, the Stratêgi or Generals suffered him to be mingled with the Twelve Hundred, and promoted one of the latter body to take his place in the Three Hundred. As between man and man, too, the Attic law always admitted the process called Antidosis, or Exchange of Property. Any citizen who believed himself to have been overcharged with costly liturgies, and that another citizen, as rich or richer than himself, had not borne his fair share,—might, if saddled with a new liturgy, require the other to undertake it in his place; and in case of refusal, might tender to him an exchange of properties, under an engagement that he would undertake the new charge, if the property of the other were made over to him.

It is to be observed, that besides the twelve hundred wealthiest citizens who composed the Symmories, there were a more considerable number of less wealthy citizens not included in them, yet still liable to the property-tax; persons who possessed property from the minimum of twenty-five minæ, up to some maximum that we do not know, at which point the Symmories began,—and who corresponded, speaking loosely, to the third class or Zeugitæ of the Solonian census. The two Symmories of each tribe (comprising its one hundred and twenty richest members) superintended the property-register of each tribe, and collected the contributions due from its less wealthy registered members. Occasionally, when the state required immediate payment, the thirty richest men in each tribe (making up altogether the three hundred) advanced the whole sum of tax chargeable upon the tribe, having their legal remedy of enforcement against the other members for the recovery of the sum chargeable upon each. The richest citizens were thus both armed with rights and charged with duties, such as had not belonged to them before the archonship of Nausinikus. By their intervention (it was supposed) the schedule would be kept nearer to the truth as respects the assessment on each individual, while the sums actually imposed would be more immediately forthcoming, than if the state directly interfered by officers of its own. Soon after, the system of the Symmories was extended to the trierarchy; a change which had not at first been contemplated. Each Symmory had its chiefs, its curators, its assessors, acting under the general presidency of the Stratêgi. Twenty-five years afterwards, we also find Demosthenes (then about thirty years of age) recommending a still more comprehensive application of the same principle, so that men, money, ships, and all the means and forces of the state, might thus be parcelled into distinct fractions, and consigned to distinct Symmories, each with known duties of limited extent for the component persons to perform, and each exposed not merely to legal process, but also to loss of esteem, in the event of non-performance. It will rather appear, however, that, in practice, the system of Symmories came to be greatly abused, and to produce pernicious effects never anticipated.

At present, however, I only notice this new financial and political classification introduced in 378 B.C., as one evidence of the ardor with which Athens embarked in her projected war against Sparta. The feeling among her allies, the Thebans, was no less determined. The government of Leontiades and the Spartan garrison had left behind it so strong an antipathy, that the large majority of citizens, embarking heartily in the revolution against them, lent themselves to all the orders of Pelopidas and his colleagues; who, on their part, had no other thought but to repel the common enemy. The Theban government now became probably democratical in form; and still more democratical in spirit, from the unanimous ardor pervading the whole mass. Its military force was put under the best training; the most fertile portion of the plain north of Thebes, from which the chief subsistence of the city came, was surrounded by a ditch and a palisade,[242] to repel the expected Spartan invasion; and the memorable Sacred Band was now for the first time organized. This was a brigade of three hundred hoplites, called the Lochus, or regiment of the city, as being consecrated to the defence of the Kadmeia, or acropolis.[243] It was put under constant arms and training, at the public expense, like the Thousand at Argos, of whom mention was made in my seventh volume.[244] It consisted of youthful citizens from the best families, distinguished for their strength and courage amidst the severe trials of the palæstra in Thebes, and was marshalled in such manner, that each pair of neighboring soldiers were at the same time intimate friends; so that the whole band were thus kept together by ties which no dangers could sever. At first its destination, under Gorgidas its commander (as we see by the select Three Hundred who fought in 424 B.C. at the battle of Delium),[245] was to serve as front rank men, for the general body of hoplites to follow. But from a circumstance to be mentioned presently, it came to be employed by Pelopidas and Epaminondas as a regiment by itself, and in a charge was then found irresistible.[246]

We must remark that the Thebans had always been good soldiers, both as hoplites and as cavalry. The existing enthusiasm, therefore, with the more sustained training, only raised good soldiers into much better. But Thebes was now blessed with another good fortune, such as had never yet befallen her. She found among her citizens a leader of the rarest excellence. It is now for the first time that Epaminondas, the son of Polymnis, begins to stand out in the public life of Greece. His family, poor rather than rich, was among the most ancient in Thebes, belonging to those Gentes called Sparti, whose heroic progenitors were said to have sprung from the dragon’s teeth sown by Kadmus.[247] He seems to have been now of middle age; Pelopidas was younger, and of a very rich family; yet the relations between the two were those of equal and intimate friendship, tested in a day of battle, wherein the two were ranged side by side as hoplites, and where Epaminondas had saved the life of his wounded friend, at the cost of several wounds, and the greatest possible danger, to himself.[248]

Epaminondas had discharged, with punctuality, those military and gymnastic duties which were incumbent on every Theban citizen. But we are told that in the gymnasia he studied to acquire the maximum of activity rather than of strength; the nimble movements of a runner and wrestler,—not the heavy muscularity, purchased in part by excessive nutriment, of the Bœotian pugilist.[249] He also learned music, vocal and instrumental, and dancing; by which, in those days, was meant, not simply the power of striking the lyre or blowing the flute, but all that belonged to the graceful, expressive, and emphatic management, either of the voice or of the body; rhythmical pronunciation, exercised by repetition of the poets,—and disciplined movements, for taking part in a choric festival with becoming consonance amidst a crowd of citizen performers. Of such gymnastic and musical training, the combination of which constituted an accomplished Grecian citizen, the former predominated at Thebes, the latter at Athens. Moreover, at Thebes the musical training was based more upon the flute (for the construction of which, excellent reeds grew near the Lake Kopaïs); at Athens more upon the lyre, which admitted of vocal accompaniment by the player. The Athenian Alkibiades[250] was heard to remark, when he threw away his flute in disgust, that flute-playing was a fit occupation for the Thebans, since they did not know how to speak; and in regard to the countrymen of Pindar[251] generally, the remark was hardly less true than contemptuous. On this capital point, Epaminondas formed a splendid exception. Not only had he learnt the lyre[252] as well as the flute from the best masters, but also, dissenting from his brother Kapheisias and his friend Pelopidas, he manifested from his earliest years an ardent intellectual impulse, which would have been remarkable even in an Athenian. He sought with eagerness the conversation of the philosophers within his reach, among whom were the Theban Simmias and the Tarentine Spintharus, both of them once companions of Sokrates; so that the stirring influence of the Sokratic method would thus find its way, partially and at second-hand, to the bosom of Epaminondas. As the relations between Thebes and Athens, ever since the close of the Peloponnesian war, had become more and more friendly, growing at length into alliance and joint war against the Spartans,—we may reasonably presume that he profited by teachers at the latter city as well as at the former. But the person to whom he particularly devoted himself, and whom he not only heard as a pupil, but tended almost as a son, during the close of an aged life,—was a Tarentine exile, named Lysis; a member of the Pythagorean brotherhood, who, from causes which we cannot make out, had sought shelter at Thebes, and dwelt there until his death.[253] With him, as well as with other philosophers, Epaminondas discussed all the subjects of study and inquiry then afloat. By perseverance in this course for some years, he not only acquired considerable positive instruction, but also became practised in new and enlarged intellectual combinations; and was, like Perikles,[254] emancipated from that timorous interpretation of nature, which rendered so many Grecian commanders the slaves of signs and omens. His patience as a listener, and his indifference to showy talk on his own account, were so remarkable, that Spintharus (the father of Aristoxenus), after numerous conversations with him, affirmed that he had never met with any one who understood more, or talked less.[255]

Nor did such reserve proceed from any want of ready powers of expression. On the contrary, the eloquence of Epaminondas, when he entered upon his public career, was shown to be not merely preëminent among Thebans, but effective even against the best Athenian opponents.[256] But his disposition was essentially modest and unambitious, combined with a strong intellectual curiosity and a great capacity; a rare combination amidst a race usually erring on the side of forwardness and self-esteem. Little moved by personal ambition, and never cultivating popularity by unworthy means, Epaminondas was still more indifferent on the score of money. He remained in contented poverty to the end of his life, not leaving enough to pay his funeral expenses, yet repudiating not merely the corrupting propositions of foreigners, but also the solicitous tenders of personal friends;[257] though we are told that, when once serving the costly office of choregus, he permitted his friend Pelopidas to bear a portion of the expense.[258] As he thus stood exempt from two of the besetting infirmities which most frequently misguided eminent Greek statesmen, so there was a third characteristic not less estimable in his moral character; the gentleness of his political antipathies,—his repugnance to harsh treatment of conquered enemies,—and his refusal to mingle in intestine bloodshed. If ever there were men whose conduct seemed to justify unmeasured retaliation, it was Leontiades and his fellow-traitors. They had opened the doors of the Kadmeia to the Spartan Phœbidas, and had put to death the Theban leader Ismenias. Yet Epaminondas disapproved of the scheme of Pelopidas and the other exiles to assassinate them, and declined to take part in it; partly on prudential grounds, but partly, also, on conscientious scruples.[259] None of his virtues was found so difficult to imitate by his subsequent admirers, as this mastery over the resentful and vindictive passions.[260]

Before Epaminondas could have full credit for these virtues, however, it was necessary that he should give proof of the extraordinary capacities for action with which they were combined, and that he should achieve something to earn that exclamation of praise which we shall find his enemy Agesilaus afterwards pronouncing, on seeing him at the head of the invading Theban army near Sparta,—“Oh! thou man of great deeds!”[261] In the year B.C. 379, when the Kadmeia was emancipated, he was as yet undistinguished in public life, and known only to Pelopidas with his other friends; among whom, too, his unambitious and inquisitive disposition was a subject of complaint as keeping him unduly in the background.[262] But the unparalleled phenomena of that year supplied a spur which overruled all backwardness, and smothered all rival inclinations. The Thebans, having just recovered their city by an incredible turn of fortune, found themselves exposed single-handed to the full attack of Sparta and her extensive confederacy. Not even Athens had yet declared in their favor, nor had they a single other ally. Under such circumstances, Thebes could only be saved by the energy of all her citizens,—the unambitious and philosophical as well as the rest. As the necessities of the case required such simultaneous devotion, so the electric shock of the recent revolution was sufficient to awaken enthusiasm in minds much less patriotic than that of Epaminondas. He was among the first to join the victorious exiles in arms, after the contest had been transferred from the houses of Archias and Leontiades to the open market-place; and he would probably have been among the first to mount the walls of the Kadmeia, had the Spartan harmost awaited an assault. Pelopidas being named Bœotarch, his friend Epaminondas was naturally placed among the earliest and most forward organizers of the necessary military resistance against the common enemy; in which employment his capacities speedily became manifest. Though at this moment almost an unknown man, he had acquired, in B.C. 371, seven years afterwards, so much reputation both as speaker and as general, that he was chosen as the expositor of Theban policy at Sparta, and trusted with the conduct of the battle of Leuktra, upon which the fate of Thebes hinged. Hence we may fairly conclude, that the well-planned and successful system of defence, together with the steady advance of Thebes against Sparta, during the intermediate years, was felt to have been in the main his work.[263]

The turn of politics at Athens which followed the acquittal of Sphodrias was an unspeakable benefit to the Thebans, in seconding as well as encouraging their defence; and the Spartans, not unmoved at the new enemies raised up by their treatment of Sphodrias, thought it necessary to make some efforts on their side. They organized on a more systematic scale the military force of their confederacy, and even took some conciliatory steps with the view of effacing the odium of their past misrule.[264] The full force of their confederacy,—including, as a striking mark of present Spartan power, even the distant Olynthians,[265]—was placed in motion against Thebes in the course of the summer under Agesilaus; who contrived, by putting in sudden requisition a body of mercenaries acting in the service of the Arcadian town Kleitor against its neighbor the Arcadian Orchomenus, to make himself master of the passes of Kithæron, before the Thebans and Athenians could have notice of his passing the Lacedæmonian border.[266] Then crossing Kithæron into Bœotia, he established his head-quarters at Thespiæ, a post already under Spartan occupation. From thence he commenced his attacks upon the Theban territory, which he found defended partly by a considerable length of ditch and palisade—partly by the main force of Thebes, assisted by a division of mixed Athenians and mercenaries, sent from Athens under Chabrias. Keeping on their own side of the palisade, the Thebans suddenly sent out their cavalry, and attacked Agesilaus by surprise, occasioning some loss. Such sallies were frequently repeated, until, by a rapid march at break of day, he forced his way through an opening in the breastwork into their inner country, which he laid waste nearly to the city walls.[267] The Thebans and Athenians, though not offering him battle on equal terms, nevertheless kept the field against him, taking care to hold positions advantageous for defence. Agesilaus on his side did not feel confident enough to attack them against such odds. Yet on one occasion he had made up his mind to do so; and was marching up to the charge, when he was daunted by the firm attitude and excellent array of the troops of Chabrias. They had received orders to await his approach, on a high and advantageous ground, without moving until signal should be given; with their shields resting on the knee, and their spears protended. So imposing was their appearance, that Agesilaus called off his troops without daring to complete the charge.[268] After a month or more of devastations on the lands of Thebes, and a string of desultory skirmishes in which he seems to have lost rather than gained, Agesilaus withdrew to Thespiæ; the fortifications of which he strengthened, leaving Phœbidas with a considerable force in occupation, and then leading back his army to Peloponnesus.

Phœbidas,—the former captor of the Kadmeia,—thus stationed at Thespiæ, carried on vigorous warfare against Thebes; partly with his own Spartan division, partly with the Thespian hoplites, who promised him unshrinking support. His incursions soon brought on reprisals from the Thebans; who invaded Thespiæ, but were repulsed by Phœbidas with the loss of all their plunder. In the pursuit, however, hurrying incautiously forward, he was slain by a sudden turn of the Theban cavalry;[269] upon which all his troops fled, chased by the Thebans to the very gates of Thespiæ. Though the Spartans, in consequence of this misfortune, despatched by sea another general and division to replace Phœbidas, the cause of the Thebans was greatly strengthened by their recent victory. They pushed their success not only against Thespiæ, but against the other Bœotian cities, still held by local oligarchies in dependence on Sparta. At the same time, these oligarchies were threatened by the growing strength of their own popular or philo-Theban citizens, who crowded in considerable numbers as exiles to Thebes.[270]

A second expedition against Thebes, undertaken by Agesilaus in the ensuing summer with the main army of the confederacy, was neither more decisive nor more profitable than the preceding. Though he contrived, by a well-planned stratagem, to surprize the Theban palisade, and lay waste the plain, he gained no serious victory; and even showed, more clearly than before, his reluctance to engage except upon perfectly equal terms.[271] It became evident that the Thebans were not only strengthening their position in Bœotia, but also acquiring practice in warfare and confidence against the Spartans; insomuch that Antalkidas and some other companions remonstrated with Agesilaus, against carrying on the war so as only to give improving lessons to his enemies in military practice,—and called upon him to strike some decisive blow. He quitted Bœotia, however, after the summer’s campaign, without any such step.[272] In his way he appeased an intestine conflict which was about to break out in Thespiæ. Afterwards, on passing to Megara, he experienced a strain or hurt, which grievously injured his sound leg, (it has been mentioned already that he was lame of one leg,) and induced his surgeon to open a vein in the limb for reducing the inflammation. When this was done, however, the blood could not be stopped until he swooned. Having been conveyed home to Sparta in great suffering, he was confined to his couch for several months; and he remained during a much longer time unfit for active command.[273]

The functions of general now devolved upon the other king Kleombrotus, who in the next spring conducted the army of the confederacy to invade Bœotia anew. But on this occasion, the Athenians and Thebans had occupied the passes of Kithæron, so that he was unable even to enter the country, and was obliged to dismiss his troops without achieving anything.[274]

His inglorious retreat excited such murmurs among the allies when they met at Sparta, that they resolved to fit out a large naval force, sufficient both to intercept the supplies of imported corn to Athens, and to forward an invading army by sea against Thebes, to the Bœotian port of Kreusis in the Krissæan Gulf. The former object was attempted first. Towards midsummer, a fleet of sixty triremes, fitted out under the Spartan admiral Pollis, was cruising in the Ægean; especially round the coast of Attica, near Ægina, Keos, and Andros. The Athenians, who, since their recently renewed confederacy, had been undisturbed by any enemies at sea, found themselves thus threatened, not merely with loss of power, but also with loss of trade and even famine; since their corn-ships from the Euxine, though safely reaching Geræstus (the southern extremity of Eubœa), were prevented from doubling Cape Sunium. Feeling severely this interruption, they fitted out at Peiræus a fleet of eighty triremes,[275] with crews mainly composed of citizens; who, under the admiral Chabrias, in a sharply contested action near Naxos, completely defeated the fleet of Pollis, and regained for Athens the mastery of the sea. Forty-nine Lacedæmonian triremes were disabled or captured, eight with their entire crews.[276] Moreover, Chabrias might have destroyed all or most of the rest, had he not suspended his attack, having eighteen of his own ships disabled, to pick up both the living men and the dead bodies on board, as well as all Athenians who were swimming for their lives. He did this (we are told[277]), from distinct recollection of the fierce displeasure of the people against the victorious generals after the battle of Arginusæ. And we may thus see, that though the proceedings on that memorable occasion were stained both by illegality and by violence, they produced a salutary effect upon the public conduct of subsequent commanders. Many a brave Athenian (the crews consisting principally of citizens) owed his life, after the battle of Naxos, to the terrible lesson administered by the people to their generals in 406 B.C., thirty years before.

This was the first great victory (in September, 376 B.C.[278]) which the Athenians had gained at sea since the Peloponnesian war; and while it thus filled them with joy and confidence, it led to a material enlargement of their maritime confederacy. The fleet of Chabrias,—of which a squadron was detached under the orders of Phokion, a young Athenian now distinguishing himself for the first time and often hereafter to be mentioned,—sailed victorious round the Ægean, made prize of twenty other triremes in single ships, brought in three thousand prisoners with one hundred and ten talents in money, and annexed seventeen new cities to the confederacy, as sending deputies to the synod and furnishing contributions. The discreet and conciliatory behavior of Phokion, especially obtained much favor among the islanders, and determined several new adhesions to Athens.[279] To the inhabitants of Abdêra in Thrace, Chabrias rendered an inestimable service, by aiding them to repulse a barbarous horde of Triballi, who quitting their abode from famine, had poured upon the sea-coast, defeating the Abderites and plundering their territory. The citizens, grateful for a force left to defend their town, willingly allied themselves with Athens, whose confederacy thus extended itself to the coast of Thrace.[280]

Having prosperously enlarged their confederacy to the east of Peloponnesus, the Athenians began to aim at the acquisition of new allies in the west. The fleet of sixty triremes, which had recently served under Chabrias, was sent, under the command of Timotheus, the son of Konon, to circumnavigate Peloponnesus and alarm the coast of Laconia; partly at the instance of the Thebans, who were eager to keep the naval force of Sparta occupied, so as to prevent her from conveying troops across the Krissæan Gulf from Corinth to the Bœotian port of Kreusis.[281] This Periplus of Peloponnesus,—the first which the fleet of Athens had attempted since her humiliation at Ægospotami,—coupled with the ensuing successes, was long remembered by the countrymen of Timotheus. His large force, just dealing, and conciliatory professions, won new and valuable allies. Not only Kephallenia, but the still more important island of Korkyra, voluntarily accepted his propositions; and as he took care to avoid all violence or interference with the political constitution, his popularity all around augmented every day. Alketas, prince of the Molossi,—the Chaonians with other Epirotic tribes,—and the Akarnanians on the coast,—all embraced his alliance.[282] While near Alyzia and Leukas on this coast, he was assailed by the Peloponnesian ships under Nikolochus, rather inferior in number to his fleet. He defeated them, and being shortly afterwards reinforced by other triremes from Korkyra, he became so superior in those waters, that the hostile fleet did not dare to show itself. Having received only thirteen talents on quitting Athens, we are told that he had great difficulty in paying his fleet; that he procured an advance of money, from each of the sixty trierarchs in his fleet, of seven minæ towards the pay of their respective ships; and that he also sent home requests for large remittances from the public treasury;[283] measures which go to bear out that honorable repugnance to the plunder of friends or neutrals, and care to avoid even the suspicion of plunder, which his panegyrist Isokrates ascribes to him.[284] This was a feature unhappily rare among the Grecian generals on both sides, and tending to become still rarer, from the increased employment of mercenary bands.

The demands of Timotheus on the treasury of Athens were not favorably received. Though her naval position was now more brilliant and commanding than it had been since the battle of Ægospotami,—though no Lacedæmonian fleet showed itself to disturb her in the Ægean,[285]—yet the cost of the war began to be seriously felt. Privateers from the neighboring island of Ægina annoyed her commerce, requiring a perpetual coast-guard; while the contributions from the deputies to the confederate synod were not sufficient to dispense with the necessity of a heavy direct property tax at home.[286]

In this synod the Thebans, as members of the confederacy, were represented.[287] Application was made to them to contribute towards the cost of the naval war; the rather, as it was partly at their instance that the fleet had been sent round to the Ionian Sea. But the Thebans declined compliance,[288] nor were they probably in any condition to furnish pecuniary aid. Their refusal occasioned much displeasure at Athens, embittered by jealousy at the strides which they had been making during the two last years, partly through the indirect effect of the naval successes of Athens. At the end of the year 377 B.C., after the two successive invasions of Agesilaus, the ruin of two home crops had so straitened the Thebans, that they were forced to import corn from Pagasæ in Thessaly; in which enterprise their ships and seamen were at first captured by the Lacedæmonian harmost at Oreus in Eubœa, Alketas. His negligence, however, soon led not only to an outbreak of their seamen who had been taken prisoners, but also to the revolt of the town from Sparta, so that the communication of Thebes with Pagasæ became quite unimpeded. For the two succeeding years, there had been no Spartan invasion of Bœotia; since, in 376 B.C., Kleombrotus could not surmount the heights of Kithæron,—while in 375 B.C., the attention of Sparta had been occupied by the naval operations of Timotheus in the Ionian Sea. During these two years, the Thebans had exerted themselves vigorously against the neighboring cities of Bœotia, in most of which a strong party, if not the majority of the population, was favorable to them, though the government was in the hands of the philo-Spartan oligarchy, seconded by Spartan harmosts and garrison.[289] We hear of one victory gained by the Theban cavalry near Platæa, under Charon; and of another near Tanagra, in which Panthöides, the Lacedæmonian harmost in that town, was slain.[290]

But the most important of all their successes was that of Pelopidas near Tegyra. That commander, hearing that the Spartan harmost, with his two (moræ or) divisions in garrison at Orchomenus, had gone away on an excursion into the Lokrian territory, made a dash from Thebes with the Sacred Band and a few cavalry, to surprise the place. It was the season in which the waters of the Lake Kopaïs were at the fullest, so that he was obliged to take a wide circuit to the north-west, and to pass by Tegyra, on the road between Orchomenus and the Opuntian Lokris. On arriving near Orchomenus, he ascertained that there were still some Lacedæmonians in the town, and that no surprise could be effected; upon which he retraced his steps. But on reaching Tegyra, he fell in with the Lacedæmonian commanders, Gorgoleon and Theopompus, returning with their troops from the Lokrian excursion. As his numbers were inferior to theirs by half, they rejoiced in the encounter; while the troops of Pelopidas were at first dismayed, and required all his encouragement to work them up. But in the fight that ensued, closely and obstinately contested in a narrow pass, the strength, valor, and compact charge of the Sacred Band proved irresistible. The two Lacedæmonian commanders were both slain; their troops opened, to allow the Thebans an undisturbed retreat; but Pelopidas, disdaining this opportunity, persisted in the combat until all his enemies dispersed and fled. The neighborhood of Orchomenus forbade any long pursuit, so that Pelopidas could only erect his trophy, and strip the dead, before returning to Thebes.[291]

This combat, in which the Lacedæmonians were for the first time beaten in fair field by numbers inferior to their own, produced a strong sensation in the minds of both the contending parties. The confidence of the Thebans, as well as their exertion, was redoubled; so that by the year 374 B.C., they had cleared Bœotia of the Lacedæmonians, as well as of the local oligarchies which sustained them; persuading or constraining the cities again to come into union with Thebes, and reviving the Bœotian confederacy. Haliartus, Korôneia, Lebadeia, Tanagra, Thespiæ, Platæa, and the rest, thus became again Bœotian;[292] leaving out Orchomenus alone, (with its dependency Chæroneia,) which was on the borders of Phokis, and still continued under Lacedæmonian occupation. In most of these cities, the party friendly to Thebes was numerous, and the change, on the whole, popular; though in some the prevailing sentiment was such, that adherence was only obtained by intimidation. The change here made by Thebes, was not to absorb these cities into herself, but to bring them back to the old federative system of Bœotia; a policy which she had publicly proclaimed on surprising Platæa in 431 B.C.[293] While resuming her own ancient rights and privileges as head of the Bœotian federation, she at the same time guaranteed to the other cities,—by convention, probably express, but certainly implied,—their ancient rights, their security, and their qualified autonomy, as members; the system which had existed down to the peace of Antalkidas.

The position of the Thebans was materially improved by this reconquest or reconfederation of Bœotia. Becoming masters of Kreusis, the port of Thespiæ,[294] they fortified it, and built some triremes to repel any invasion from Peloponnesus by sea across the Krissæan Gulf. Feeling thus secure against invasion, they began to retaliate upon their neighbors and enemies the Phokians, allies of Sparta, and auxiliaries in the recent attacks on Thebes,—yet also, from ancient times, on friendly terms with Athens.[295] So hard pressed were the Phokians,—especially as Jason of Pheræ in Thessaly was at the same time their bitter enemy,[296]—that unless assisted, they would have been compelled to submit to the Thebans, and along with them Orchomenus, including the Lacedæmonian garrison then occupying it; while the treasures of the Delphian Temple would also have been laid open, in case the Thebans should think fit to seize them. Intimation being sent by the Phokians to Sparta, King Kleombrotus was sent to their aid, by sea across the Gulf, with four Lacedæmonian divisions of troops, and an auxiliary body of allies.[297] This reinforcement, compelling the Thebans to retire, placed both Phokis and Orchomenus in safety. While Sparta thus sustained them, even Athens looked upon the Phokian cause with sympathy. When she saw that the Thebans had passed from the defensive to the offensive,—partly by her help, yet nevertheless refusing to contribute to the cost of her navy,—her ancient jealousy of them became again so powerful, that she sent envoys to Sparta, to propose terms of peace. What these terms were, we are not told; nor does it appear that the Thebans even received notice of the proceeding. But the peace was accepted at Sparta, and two of the Athenian envoys were despatched at once from thence, without even going home, to Korkyra, for the purpose of notifying the peace to Timotheus, and ordering him forthwith to conduct his fleet back to Athens.[298]

This proposition of the Athenians, made seemingly in a moment of impetuous dissatisfaction, was made to the advantage of Sparta, and served somewhat to countervail a mortifying revelation which had reached the Spartans a little before from a different quarter.

Polydamas, an eminent citizen of Pharsalus in Thessaly, came to Sparta to ask for aid. He had long been on terms of hospitality with the Lacedæmonians; while Pharsalus had not merely been in alliance with them, but was for some time occupied by one of their garrisons.[299] In the usual state of Thessaly, the great cities Larissa, Pheræ, Pharsalus, and others, each holding some smaller cities in a state of dependent alliance, were in disagreement with each other,—often even in actual war. It was rare that they could be brought to concur in a common vote for the election of a supreme chief or Tagus. At his own city of Pharsalus, Polydamas was now in the ascendant, enjoying the confidence of all the great family factions who usually contended for predominance; to such a degree, indeed, that he was entrusted with the custody of the citadel and the entire management of the revenues, receipts as well as disbursements. Being a wealthy man, “hospitable and ostentatious in the Thessalian fashion,” he advanced money from his own purse to the treasury whenever it was low, and repaid himself when public funds came in.[300]