History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides (free ebooks for android .txt) 📕

more dismayed by the surprise than they could ever be by our actual

power. I could wish to persuade you to show this courage; but if

this cannot be, at all events lose not a moment in preparing generally

for the war; and remember all of you that contempt for an assailant is

best shown by bravery in action, but that for the present the best

course is to accept the preparations which fear inspires as giving the

surest promise of safety, and to act as if the danger was real. That

the Athenians are coming to attack us, and are already upon the

voyage, and all but here—this is what I am sure of.”

Thus far spoke Hermocrates. Meanwhile the people of Syracuse were at

great strife among themselves; some contending that the Athenians

had no idea of coming and that there was no truth in what he said;

some asking if they did come what harm they could do that would not be

repaid them tenfold in return; while others made light of the whole

affair and turned it into ridicule. In short, there were few that

believed Hermocrates and feared for the future. Meanwhile Athenagoras,

the leader of the people and very powerful at that time with the

masses, came forward and spoke as follows:

“For the Athenians, he who does not wish that they may be as

misguided as they are supposed to be, and that they may come here to

become our subjects, is either a coward or a traitor to his country;

while as for those who carry such tidings and fill you with so much

alarm, I wonder less at their audacity than at their folly if they

flatter themselves that we do not see through them. The fact is that

they have their private reasons to be afraid, and wish to throw the

city into consternation to have their own terrors cast into the

shade by the public alarm. In short, this is what these reports are

worth; they do not arise of themselves, but are concocted by men who

are always causing agitation here in Sicily. However, if you are

well advised, you will not be guided in your calculation of

probabilities by what these persons tell you, but by what shrewd men

and of large experience, as I esteem the Athenians to be, would be

likely to do. Now it is not likely that they would leave the

Peloponnesians behind them, and before they have well ended the war in

Hellas wantonly come in quest of a new war quite as arduous in Sicily;

indeed, in my judgment, they are only too glad that we do not go and

attack them, being so many and so great cities as we are.

“However, if they should come as is reported, I consider Sicily

better able to go through with the war than Peloponnese, as being at

all points better prepared, and our city by itself far more than a

match for this pretended army of invasion, even were it twice as large

again. I know that they will not have horses with them, or get any

here, except a few perhaps from the Egestaeans; or be able to bring

a force of heavy infantry equal in number to our own, in ships which

will already have enough to do to come all this distance, however

lightly laden, not to speak of the transport of the other stores

required against a city of this magnitude, which will be no slight

quantity. In fact, so strong is my opinion upon the subject, that I do

not well see how they could avoid annihilation if they brought with

them another city as large as Syracuse, and settled down and carried

on war from our frontier; much less can they hope to succeed with

all Sicily hostile to them, as all Sicily will be, and with only a

camp pitched from the ships, and composed of tents and bare

necessaries, from which they would not be able to stir far for fear of

our cavalry.

“But the Athenians see this as I tell you, and as I have reason to

know are looking after their possessions at home, while persons here

invent stories that neither are true nor ever will be. Nor is this the

first time that I see these persons, when they cannot resort to deeds,

trying by such stories and by others even more abominable to

frighten your people and get into their hands the government: it is

what I see always. And I cannot help fearing that trying so often they

may one day succeed, and that we, as long as we do not feel the smart,

may prove too weak for the task of prevention, or, when the

offenders are known, of pursuit. The result is that our city is rarely

at rest, but is subject to constant troubles and to contests as

frequent against herself as against the enemy, not to speak of

occasional tyrannies and infamous cabals. However, I will try, if

you will support me, to let nothing of this happen in our time, by

gaining you, the many, and by chastising the authors of such

machinations, not merely when they are caught in the act—a difficult

feat to accomplish—but also for what they have the wish though not

the power to do; as it is necessary to punish an enemy not only for

what he does, but also beforehand for what he intends to do, if the

first to relax precaution would not be also the first to suffer. I

shall also reprove, watch, and on occasion warn the few—the most

effectual way, in my opinion, of turning them from their evil courses.

And after all, as I have often asked, what would you have, young men?

Would you hold office at once? The law forbids it, a law enacted

rather because you are not competent than to disgrace you when

competent. Meanwhile you would not be on a legal equality with the

many! But how can it be right that citizens of the same state should

be held unworthy of the same privileges?

“It will be said, perhaps, that democracy is neither wise nor

equitable, but that the holders of property are also the best fitted

to rule. I say, on the contrary, first, that the word demos, or

people, includes the whole state, oligarchy only a part; next, that if

the best guardians of property are the rich, and the best

counsellors the wise, none can hear and decide so well as the many;

and that all these talents, severally and collectively, have their

just place in a democracy. But an oligarchy gives the many their share

of the danger, and not content with the largest part takes and keeps

the whole of the profit; and this is what the powerful and young among

you aspire to, but in a great city cannot possibly obtain.

“But even now, foolish men, most senseless of all the Hellenes

that I know, if you have no sense of the wickedness of your designs,

or most criminal if you have that sense and still dare to pursue

them—even now, if it is not a case for repentance, you may still

learn wisdom, and thus advance the interest of the country, the common

interest of us all. Reflect that in the country’s prosperity the men

of merit in your ranks will have a share and a larger share than the

great mass of your fellow countrymen, but that if you have other

designs you run a risk of being deprived of all; and desist from

reports like these, as the people know your object and will not put up

with it. If the Athenians arrive, this city will repulse them in a

manner worthy of itself; we have moreover, generals who will see to

this matter. And if nothing of this be true, as I incline to

believe, the city will not be thrown into a panic by your

intelligence, or impose upon itself a self-chosen servitude by

choosing you for its rulers; the city itself will look into the

matter, and will judge your words as if they were acts, and, instead

of allowing itself to be deprived of its liberty by listening to

you, will strive to preserve that liberty, by taking care to have

always at hand the means of making itself respected.”

Such were the words of Athenagoras. One of the generals now stood up

and stopped any other speakers coming forward, adding these words of

his own with reference to the matter in hand: “It is not well for

speakers to utter calumnies against one another, or for their

hearers to entertain them; we ought rather to look to the intelligence

that we have received, and see how each man by himself and the city as

a whole may best prepare to repel the invaders. Even if there be no

need, there is no harm in the state being furnished with horses and

arms and all other insignia of war; and we will undertake to see to

and order this, and to send round to the cities to reconnoitre and

do all else that may appear desirable. Part of this we have seen to

already, and whatever we discover shall be laid before you.” After

these words from the general, the Syracusans departed from the

assembly.

In the meantime the Athenians with all their allies had now

arrived at Corcyra. Here the generals began by again reviewing the

armament, and made arrangements as to the order in which they were

to anchor and encamp, and dividing the whole fleet into three

divisions, allotted one to each of their number, to avoid sailing

all together and being thus embarrassed for water, harbourage, or

provisions at the stations which they might touch at, and at the

same time to be generally better ordered and easier to handle, by each

squadron having its own commander. Next they sent on three ships to

Italy and Sicily to find out which of the cities would receive them,

with instructions to meet them on the way and let them know before

they put in to land.

After this the Athenians weighed from Corcyra, and proceeded to

cross to Sicily with an armament now consisting of one hundred and

thirty-four galleys in all (besides two Rhodian fifty-oars), of

which one hundred were Athenian vessels—sixty men-of-war, and forty

troopships—and the remainder from Chios and the other allies; five

thousand and one hundred heavy infantry in all, that is to say,

fifteen hundred Athenian citizens from the rolls at Athens and seven

hundred Thetes shipped as marines, and the rest allied troops, some of

them Athenian subjects, and besides these five hundred Argives, and

two hundred and fifty Mantineans serving for hire; four hundred and

eighty archers in all, eighty of whom were Cretans, seven hundred

slingers from Rhodes, one hundred and twenty light-armed exiles from

Megara, and one horse-transport carrying thirty horses.

Such was the strength of the first armament that sailed over for the

war. The supplies for this force were carried by thirty ships of

burden laden with corn, which conveyed the bakers, stone-masons, and

carpenters, and the tools for raising fortifications, accompanied by

one hundred boats, like the former pressed into the service, besides

many other boats and ships of burden which followed the armament

voluntarily for purposes of trade; all of which now left Corcyra and

struck across the Ionian Sea together. The whole force making land

at the Iapygian promontory and Tarentum, with more or less good

fortune, coasted along the shores of Italy, the cities shutting

their markets and gates against them, and according them nothing but

water and liberty to anchor, and Tarentum and Locri not even that,

until they arrived at Rhegium, the extreme point of Italy. Here at

length they reunited, and