ATHENS. 



25 



Athens. 



A.C.460. 

 Expedition 

 into iigypt. 



Death of 

 <_'i:non. 



Peace with 

 Per.ia. 



A. C. 449. 



Dissensions 

 with Spar- 

 ta. 



A. C. 44G. 



pletely rivetted the maritime supremacy of Athens. 

 All these enterprises had been carried on by the con- 

 federate fleet of Greece, under Athenian commanders. 

 But the allies grew weary of furnishing ships and 

 men ; and Athens gladly consented to take this upon 

 herself, on condition of their paying a composition in 

 money. The sum was at first moderate; but Athens, 

 now enjoying the whole maritime power of Greece, 

 raised it at her will. 



The Egyptians having revolted against the king of 

 Persia, the Athenians, always ready for any adven- 

 ture, undertook to aid them. The army which they 

 sent was at first successful, defeated the Persian 

 forces, and laid siege to Memphis. When they were 

 worn down, however, by'the fatigue of this siege, a 

 IN army, commanded by Megabazus, advanced up- 

 on them, compelled them to raise it, and to evacuate 

 Egypt. The greater part perished in their retreat 

 through the Lybian desert. Part of their fleet also 

 was surrounded, and cut off by the Phoenicians. 



These disasters deterred the Athenians, for seven 

 years, from any farther enterprises. On the recal of 

 Cimon, however, he was sent with a fleet to Cyprus, 

 which had been recovered by the Persians. He was 

 proceeding to execute this commission with his usual 

 success, when he received, at the siege of Citium, a 

 wound, of which he died. 



Artaxerxes, at length, foreseeing nothing but dis- 

 aster from the prosecution of an Athenian war, made 

 proposals of peace. Athens obtained the most ho- 

 nourable conditions: the independence of the Gre- 

 cian colonies in Asia Minor, and the exclusion of all 

 Persian ships from the Grecian seas. Such was the 

 glorious termination of a war, which had lasted, with 

 little interval, for upwards of fifty years. 



While Greece was thus triumphing over the com- 

 mon enemy, the flame of discord began to rage in her 

 own bosom. Sparta beheld, with a jealous eye, a 

 power formerly so inferior, carrying off all the prizes 

 of glory and ambition. She had been thwarted be- 

 sides in two measures supported by her after the re- 

 treat of Xerxes ; one, that all those states which had 

 assisted the Persians, should be excluded from the 

 common council of Greece ; and the other, that the Io- 

 nians should be stransported into Europe, where they 

 would be secure from Persian resentment. Justice 

 seemed to sanction the one measure, and generosity 

 the other. Both, however, were successfully oppo- 

 sed by Themistocles ; who conceived that the first 

 would give Sparta too great a preponderance, and 

 that the last would raise up a powerful commercial 

 riwu to Athens. These discontents, silently ferment- 

 ing, would probably have broken out sooner, had not 

 Sparta been occupied at home by a dreadful insur- 

 rection of her slaves. The Athenians generously 

 sent troops to her aid, and were highly offended when 

 they found that these had been dismissed, while the 

 troops of the other allies were retained. They took 

 a most extraordinary method of revenging this slight. 

 The Lacedemonians having undertaken an expedition 

 into Phocis, Athens sent a body of troops to the 

 isthm us to cut off their retreat. The Lacedemonians 

 then marched into Bccotia, and threatened Attica. 



An army being brought to oppose them, a battle 

 was fought at Tanagra, in which the Athenians were 



VOJ.. III. part I. 



defeated. In consequence of this success, the The- Athens, 



bans were encouraged to apply to Sparta for aid r~ / 



against the smaller towns of Boeotia,which had thrown 



off their authority, and were protected by Athens. 



The Spartans accordingly sent a powerful army to 



their support ; but the Athenians, under the conduct 



of Myronides, an active and able officer, attacked 



the confederates, though greatly superior in number, 



and gained a complete victory, which placed all 



Boeotia at their disposal. 



The Athenians, some time after, had another dif- 

 ference with the Lacedemonians, on the subject of 

 Megara. Plistonax, king of Sparta, marched with an 

 army into Attica ; but Pericles, by a bribe of ten ta- 

 lents, persuaded him to return. Pericles, in account- 

 ing for this sum to the people, is said to have stated 

 it as " laid out in a fit manner on a proper occasion :" 

 the first notice we find in history of secret-service 

 money. 



About this time the Athenians being applied to 

 for assistance by the Sybarites against the Crotoniats, 

 sent an expedition, which restored the former to their 

 city. 



Megara was not the only city which threw off the A. C- 440. 

 yoke of Athens ; a number of the maritime states, who 

 groaned under her exactions, endeavoured to retrieve 

 the fatal error they had committed, of commuting 

 naval service for money. Pericles, however, with a 

 fleet and army, sailing to each successively, reduced 

 them, and rendered their bondage still heavier than 

 before. He particularly distinguished himself in the 

 expeditions to Eubcea and Samos. 



The train of dissension, however, was now laid on A. C. 436. 

 the Grecian continent, and required only a spark to Origin of 

 produce a mighty conflagration. That spark was not ' 1C " e " 

 wanting. A quarrel arising between the Corinthians ^ rar- 

 and Corcyreans, both sides sent ambassadors to re- 

 quest assistance from Athens. An assembly of the 

 people being called, and having heard the argu- 

 ments of both parties, decided at first in favour of 

 the Corinthians, but afterwards, with characteristic 

 levity, changed to the side of the Corcyreans, whose 

 alliance, as a naval power, appeared likely to be 

 more useful. A squadron was accordingly sent to 

 the aid of the latter people, and assisted them in an 

 obstinate engagement which they maintained against 

 their adversaries. The Corinthians, anxious to find 

 out other employment for the Athenian arms, con- 

 trived to excite a rebellion in Chalcidice, one of 

 their finest dependencies, bordering on Thrace and 

 Macedonia. The Potideans, who took the lead in 

 this affair, being attacked by an Athenian fleet and 

 army, received from Corinth an aid of 2000 men, 

 who threw themselves into their city ; notwithstand- 

 ing which, after an obstinate defence, they were re- 

 duced to extremity. 



The Corinthians, finding themselves thus deeply 

 involved with so formidable an adversary, saw no re- 

 source but in the great rival of Athens. They sent 

 ambassadors to Sparta, representing the imminent 

 danger to which that state exposed itself and all 

 Greece, by suffering the Athenians to make such ra- 

 pid advances ill dominion. After an obstinate de- 

 bate, the Spartans determined to espouse their cause, 

 which was then quickly joined by many other states, 



D 



