[ 178 ] 



told there to collect the required earth and water*. A sense of 

 the danger that now threatened all Greece put an end to the debates 

 which had previously, for many ages, agitated those rival republics, 

 and united them in one firm body against the common enemy. The 

 glory, however, of Marathon's proud day was reserved solely for 

 Miltiades and his daring Athenians, who, in number scarcely ten 

 thousand, defeated the Persian army, consisting, according to the 

 moderate computation of Cornelius Nepos, of one hundred thousand 

 foot and ten thousand cavalry-f-. The disgrace of this defeat from 

 so despised a power was severely felt at the court of Susa, and 

 stung Darius to the quick, who was then preparing to march 

 against Egypt, engaged in recent revolt. He immediately ordered 

 fresh forces to be levied throughout the whole extent of his empire, 

 and, resigning to able generals the conduct of the war in Egypt, 

 resolved to march in person against this rising competitor for mi- 

 litary glory. In the midst of these mighty preparations, he ex- 

 pired ; leaving his successor, whom the Greeks, we have seen, 

 called Xerxes, animated with the same resentment, and ardently 

 bent on the same means of accomplishing the deep-laid project of 

 revenge. 



The immense army, though doubtless greatly exaggerated, led 

 by this monarch into Greece; his cutting a passage through 

 Mount Athos, if ever, in reality, accomplished ; his celebrated 

 double bridge of boats thrown over the Hellespont to connect the 

 two continents of Asia and Europe; his repulse at Thermopylae 

 by the daring valour of Leonidas and his immortal comrades; 

 the plunder of Delphi ; and the completion of his revenge by the 

 capture and conflagration of Athens ; together with the disgraceful 

 defeat of his fleet at Salamis, and the final ignominious retreat of 



* Herodotus, lib. vi. cap. 49. t Cornelius Nepos, in Vita Miltiad. 



