rest were distributed around the harbour, in order to attack the Athenians from different sides as soon as they should approach. Moreover the surface of the harbour swarmed with the light craft of the Syracusans, in many of which embarked youthful volunteers, sons of the best families in the city'; boats of no mean service during the battle, saving or destroying the seamen cast overboard from disabled ships, as well as annoying the fighting Athenian triremes. The day was one sacred to Heraklês at Syracuse; and the prophets announced that the god would ensure victory to the Syracusans, provided they stood on the defensive, and did not begin the attack. Moreover the entire shore round the harbour, except the Athenian station and its immediate neighbourhood, was crowded with Syracusan soldiers and spectators; while the walls of Ortygia, immediately overhanging the water, were lined with the feebler population of the city, the old men, women, and children. From the Athenian station presently came forth 110 triremes, under Demosthenês, Menander, and Euthydêmuswith the customary pæan, its tone probably parta

1 Diodorus, xiii. 14. Plutarch has a similar statement, in reference to the previous battle: but I think he must have confused one battle with the other for his account can hardly be made to harmonise with Thucydidês (Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24).

It is to be recollected that both Plutarch and Diodorus had probably read the description of the battles in the Great Harbour of Syracuse, contained in Philistus; a better witness, if we had his account before us, even than Thucydidês; since he was probably at this time in Syracuse, and was perhaps actually engaged.

2 Plutarch, Nikias, c. 24, 25. Timæus reckoned the aid of Hêraklês as having been one of the great causes of Syracusan victory over the Athenians. He gave several reasons why the god was provoked against the Athenians: see Timæus, Fragm. 104, ed. Didot.

king of the general sadness of the camp. They steered across direct to the mouth of the harbour, beholding on all sides the armed enemies ranged along the shore, as well as the unarmed multitudes who were imprecating the vengeance of the gods upon their heads; while for them there was no sympathy, except among the fellow-sufferers within their own lines. Inside of this narrow basin, rather more than five English miles in circuit, 194 ships of war, each manned with more than 200 men, were about to join battle-in the presence of countless masses around, all with palpitating hearts, and near enough both to see and hear; the most picturesque battle (if we could abstract our minds from its terrible interest) probably in history, without smoke or other impediments to vision, and in the clear atmosphere of Sicily-a serious and magnified realization of those Naumachiæ which the Roman emperors used to exhibit with gladiators on the Italian lakes, for the recreation of the people.

The Athenian fleet made directly for that portion of the barrier where a narrow opening (perhaps closed by a moveable chain) had been left for merchant-vessels. Their first impetuous attack broke through the Syracusan squadron defending it, and they were already attempting to sever its connecting bonds, when the enemy from all sides crowded in upon them and forced them to desist. Presently the battle became general, and the combatants were distributed in various parts of the harbour. On both sides a fierce and desperate courage was displayed, even greater than had been shown on any of the former occasions. At the first onset, the skill and

tactics of the steersmen shone conspicuous, wellseconded by zeal on the part of the rowers and by their ready obedience to the voice of the Keleustês. As the vessels neared, the bowmen, slingers and throwers on the deck hurled clouds of missiles against the enemy-next was heard the loud crash of the two impinging metallic fronts, resounding all along the shore'. When the vessels were thus once in contact, they were rarely allowed to separate: a strenuous hand-fight then commenced by the hoplites in each, trying respectively to board and master their enemy's deck. It was not always however that each trireme had its own single and special enemy: sometimes one ship had two or three enemies to contend with at once-sometimes she fell aboard of one unsought, and became entangled. After a certain time, the fight still obstinately continuing, all sort of battle order became lost; the skill of the steersman was of little avail, and the voice of the Keleustês was drowned amidst the universal din and mingled cries from victors as well as vanquished. On both sides emulous exhortations were

1 The destructive impact of these metallic masses at the heads of the ships of war, as well as the periplus practised by a lighter ship to avoid direct collision against a heavier-is strikingly illustrated by a passage in Plutarch's Life of Lucullus, where a naval engagement between the Roman general, and Neoptolemus the admiral of Mithridatês, is described. 'Lucullus was on board a Rhodian quinquereme, commanded by Damagoras, a skilful Rhodian pilot; while Neoptolemus was approaching with a ship much heavier, and driving forward to a direct collision upon which Damagoras evaded the blow, rowed rapidly round, and struck the enemy in the stern."......deioas ó Daμayópas Tò βάρος τῆς βασιλικῆς, καὶ τὴν τραχύτητα τοῦ χαλκώματος, οὐκ ἐτόλ μησε συμπεσεῖν ἀντίπρωρος, ἀλλ ̓ ὀξέως ἐκ περιαγωγῆς ἀποστρέψας ἐκέλευσεν ἐπὶ πρύμναν ὤσασθαι· καὶ πιεσθείσης ἐνταῦθα τῆς νέως ἐδέξατο τὴν πληγὴν ἀβλαβῆ γενομένην, ἅτε δὴ τοῖς θαλαττεύουσι τῆς νέως μέρεσι πроσπεσоûσаν.-Plutarch, Lucull. c. 3.

poured forth, together with reproach and sarcasm addressed to any ship which appeared flinching from the contest; though factitious stimulus of this sort was indeed but little needed.

tinued and

intense

total defeat

of the Athe

nians.

Such was the heroic courage on both sides, that Long-confor a long time victory was altogether doubtful, desperate and the whole harbour was a scene of partial en- strugglecounters, wherein sometimes Syracusans, sometimes emotionAthenians, prevailed. According as success thus fluctuated, so followed the cheers or wailings of the spectators ashore. At one and the same time, every variety of human emotion might be witnessed; according as attention was turned towards a victorious or a defeated ship. It was among the spectators in the Athenian station, above all, whose entire life and liberty were staked in the combat, that this emotion might be seen exaggerated into agony, and overpassing the excitement even of the combatants themselves'. Those among them who looked towards a portion of the harbour where their friends seemed winning, were full of joy and thanksgiving to the gods: such of their neighbours as contemplated an Athenian ship in difficulty, gave vent to their feelings in shrieks and lamentation; while a third group, with their eyes fixed on some portion of the combat still disputed, were plunged in all the agitations of doubt, manifested even in the tremulous swing of their bodies, as hope or fear alternately predominated. During all the time that the combat remained undecided, the Athenians on shore were distracted by all these manifold varieties of intense sympathy. But at 1 Thucyd. vii. 71.

VOL. VII.

2 G

Military operations

times

length the moment came, after a long-protracted struggle, when victory began to declare in favour of the Syracusans, who, perceiving that their enemies were slackening, redoubled their shouts as well as their efforts, and pushed them back towards the land. All the Athenian triremes, abandoning farther resistance, were thrust ashore like shipwrecked vessels in or near their own station; a few being even captured before they could arrive there. The diverse manifestations of sympathy among the Athenians in the station itself were now exchanged for one unanimous shriek of agony and despair. The boldest of them rushed to rescue the ships and their crews from pursuit, others to man their walls in case of attack from land: many were even paralysed at the sight, and absorbed with the thoughts of their own irretrievable ruin. Their souls were doubtless still farther subdued by the wild and enthusiastic joy which burst forth in maddening shouts from the hostile crowds around the harbour, in response to their own victorious comrades on shipboard.

Such was the close of this awful, heart-stirring, of ancient and decisive combat. The modern historian strives strong emo- in vain to convey the impression of it which aptions which pears in the condensed and burning phrases of

accom

panied them.

Thucydidês. We find in his description of battles generally, and of this battle beyond all others, a depth and abundance of human emotion which has now passed out of military proceedings. The Greeks who fight, like the Greeks who look on, are not soldiers withdrawn from the community, and specialized as well as hardened by long professional