XVI. CHAP. of the Lacedæmonian government, as the want of ability to direct it. Descents upon the Lacedæmonian coast were expected, but where they would be attempted could not be foreseen. Their great legislator seems to have been well aware that a moving force may be more effectual for the protection of a country than any fortifications, since he forbad that Sparta itself should be fortified. In opposition to this maxim, they now divided their strength in forts and strong posts, through the length of their winding coast. The consequence was, that the Athenians could land anywhere without risk; they wasted the lands at pleasure; and having defeated the only small body of troops that rashly ventured to oppose them, they erected their trophy, and returned to Cythera. An Ionian trophy, in Laconia was a thing unknown before, since the establishment of the Dorians in the country; and tho the consequence of the defeat was otherwise trifling, the fame of the event made a strong impression through Greece, and the Lacedæmonians felt severely the injury to their reputa Thucyd. tion. The Athenians then sailing again from 1. 4. c. 56. Cythera, after ravaging a part of the Epidaurian coast, proceeded to take their last revenge of the unfortunate Æginetans, now established at Thyrea, within the territory and under the immediate protection of Lacedæmon. Thyrea was situated, like most of the older maritime towns of Greece, not upon the shore, but about a mile from it, on rising ground, fitter for defence. But the Æginetans, accustomed to affluence, derived, not from their lands, but from their maritime commerce, still directed their views to the sea; and were at this time busied in constructing a fort on the shore, for the protection of their shipping. On discovering the Athenian fleet they hastily retired into Thyrea; which was however itself so deficiently fortified, that a small band of Lacedæmonians of the bordering country, who had been appointed by their government to assist in raising and protecting the works, refused to share in the danger of its defence. The Æginetans, nevertheless, resolved to attempt the protection of the little property remaining to them. But Nicias, landing his whole force, quickly overpowered them; and all, who did not fall in the assault, became prisoners at discretion, together with their Lacedæmonian governer, Tantalus, who had been wounded. Thyrea, being stripped of everything valuable, was burnt, and the armament returned, with the booty and prisoners, to Athens. A despotic multitude was then to decide the fate of that miserable remnant of a Grecian people, once declared by an oracle, and confessed by all Greece, the most meritorious of the Greek nation, for their actions in its common defence against the most formidable enemy that ever assailed it. What few individual tyrants could have thought of without horror, the Athenian people directed by a deliberate decree. The law indeed established by the Lacedæmonians, and sealed with the blood of the unfortunate Platæans, was but too closely followed, and the Æginetans were all executed. Tantalus was added to the number of living pledges, obtained at Sphacteria, for the security of Attica. Another decision then waited the pleasure of the Athenian people, the fate of their new conquest of Cythera, and, particularly, that of some of the principal inhabitants, whom the generals had thought it unsafe to leave there. These were SECT. I. XVI. CHAP. distributed among the ilands of the Athenian dominion. The rest of the Cytherians, to whom the capitulation only assured their lives, were however left unmolested in their possessions; with a reserve only, from the whole iland, of four talents in yearly tribute to Athens. B.C. 424. Ol. 8. SECTION II. Effects of the Superiority gained by Athens in the War: Sedition of Megara: Distress of Lacedæmon: Movements in Thrace and Macedonia. Atrocious Conduct of the Lacedæmonian Government toward the Helots. Brasidas appointed to lead a Peloponnesian Army into Thrace: Lacedæmonian Interest secured at Megara. THE superiority now acquired by the Athenians in the war, began to appear decisive. Their fleets commanded the seas and the ilands, without a prospect of successful opposition from any quarter : their landforce was growing daily more formidable; while the Lacedæmonians, in a manner, imprisoned within Peloponnesus, and unable to defend even their own territory there, were yet more unable to extend protection to their still numerous allies beyond the peninsula. The extravagant views and wild presumption insuing among the Athenian people, which the vying flattery of interested orators contributed not a little to inflame, are marked by their own favorite poet, the admirable satirist of Aristoph. the age. 'A thousand cities,' says one, in his Vesp. comedy of The Wasps, 'pay tribute to Athens. 'Now were each ordered to furnish subsistence for only twenty Athenians, twenty thousand of us might live in all ease and luxury, in a manner ' worthy of the dignity of the republic, and of the ་ Av. II. 1,050. trophy of Marathon.' In another comedy, The SECT. Birds, the extravagance of their petulant and presumptuous haughtiness is jeered: It is intolera- Aristoph. ble,' says one of them, that we, an imperial v. 1,225. 'people, commanding many cities, should be treat'ed with an air of superiority by the gods, who ' ought to know how to respect us as their betters.' And in the same piece, the inordinate craving of v. 1,023their restless ambition, is ludicrously noted: report being spred of a new city founded in the air by the birds, the Athenians are represented as immediately earnest to send thither their superintendants and their decrees3. Indignation, hatred, animated and obstinate enmity, became of course mixed with the fear which the prevalence of their arms infused through a large portion of the Greek nation, and hence arose a fermentation which principally gave birth to the transactions now requiring attention. The circumstances of the little republic of Me- Thucyd. gara, the nearest neighbor to Athens, were peculiar. 1.4. c. 66. Tho the government was democratical, and the chiefs of the aristocratical party, with a large portion of their adherents, in exile, yet the antient animosity between Megara and Athens did not cease. Fear of the tyranny of the Athenian people kept even the democratical party connected with Lacedæmon. Meanwhile adversity inforcing moderation among the Lacedæmonians, against their usual practice, they allowed the Megarians to chuse their form of government, tho a Peloponnesian garrison, under a Lacedæmonian governor, held their port of Nisæa, a mile only 2 The French, in the paroxysm of their democratical mania, seem to have borrowed from this antique joke their idea of sending commissioners to fraternize all nations. from the city, with which, as Athens with Peiræus, it had a fortified communication. At the same time the ilet of Minoa, taken, as we have seen, by Nicias, close upon the mouth of the harbor, was occupied by an Athenian garrison; and twice in every year it had been as a rule for the Athenian forces to overrun and ravage the Megarian territory. Yet the aristocratical exiles, having possessed themselves of Pegæ, the Megarian port on the Corinthian gulph, were enemies to those in the city, exceeding the Athenians in animosity almost as much as they were inferior in power: their watchfulness for every opportunity of plunder, waste, and slaughter, was incessantly harassing. The distress which this complicated pressure brought upon Megara, rendering the lower people dissatisfied with their leaders, imboldened the remaining friends of aristocracy. Depending upon countenance from Lacedæmon, they ventured to propose a composition with the exiles, and to urge it as of indispensable necessity, to prevent impending ruin. The leaders of the democratical party, finding this proposal grow popular, and fearing that the fall of their power, and perhaps the necessity of seeking safety in exile, might follow, negotiated secretly with the Athenian generals, Hippocrates son of Ariphron, and Demosthenes son of Alcisthenes. Terms being settled, it was proposed to put the Athenians in possession of the`walls connecting the city with its port; and, communication between the Peloponnesian party in the former, and the Peloponnesian troops in the latter, being thus intercluded, both, it was hoped, must quickly fall. Matters then being prepared, Hippocrates conducted a squadron by night to Minoa, while De |