A ciples conhbearens. Dubpreten, make it 
. regular Grecian troops, now opposed 
Persians, were not much less. than 20,000, with 
an number of armed slaves. With this army, 
fearfully inferior to the invading host, the genius 
of Miltiades, who was well acquainted with the nature 
of the Persiart tr by the determined bra- 
__very of his soldiers, gained, on the plain of Marathon, 
a most decisive vi , and drove the routed Persians 
to their ships with great slaughter. But this distin- 
guished commander, having failed in a subsequent ex- 
edition against the gean islands, which had submit- 
ted to the Persians, was, by the base machinations of 
ner spirit, condemned to py a fine of 50 talents, and 
died in prison of the wounds which he had received. 
et- The death of Darius, the revolt of Egypt, and the 
fhva- disputes which arose about the right of succession to 
2), the throne of Persia, procured to the Greeks a respite 
_ of several years from any farther attempts against their 
La uae pe But Xerxes, the young Persian mo- 
, was sufficiently ardent to revenge the disgrace, 
which the arms of his nation had sustained, and to pro- 
secute those schemes of conquest, which his predeces- 
mae ed. tea Rage are said to have been 
explo yed in preparations for the punishment of Athens, 
_and the reduction of Greece ; pi an army was collect- 
ed, more numerous than had ever before, or than has ever 
since been known in the annals of the world. To pre- 
vent the disasters, which might attend the conveyance 
of the armament by sea, as well as to provide for 
the future m8 gd the intended conquest, a canal, 
'_nayigable for the largest galleys, was, (according to the 
united testimony of all the Greek historians and geo- 
_graphers, ) actually formed across the isthmus, which 
_ joins mount Athos to the continent of Thrace. Two 
bridges of boats also, the one to withstand the winds 
and the other the current, were extended across the 
Hellespont nearly between Abydos and Sestos, where 
the street is about seven furlongs in breadth. Early in 
the spring, the army moved from Sardis, the principal 
place of rendezvous; and seven days and nights are 
said to have been occupied in passjng the bridges of the 
a mt. The land and sea forces met at Doriscus 
_ near the mouth of the Hebrus, where, according to He- 
-_ rodotus, the Persian monarch reviewed his enormous 
_ army, which is said to have been composed of twenty- 
; nine different nations. This historian (whose testi- 
ng mony, as he lived so near the time of the expedition, 
_ ought to be most worthy of credit, but whose-detail of 
-many incredible concomitant circumstances casts a 
gee oves. a whole narration) estimates the effective 
strength of the infantry at 1,700,000 fighting men, and 
_the cavalry at 80,000, exclusive of om an Nit fol- 
lowers, whose number defied calculation. “The fleet 
consisted of 1207 galleys of war, carrying about 277,600 
men ; besides transports, store-ships, and a variety of 
smaller vessels, amounting, at a calculation, to 
3000, and their crews to240,000. The land forces march- 
ed from Doriscus in three columns, every where adding 
to their numbers, by compelling the youth of the coun- 
tries through which they passed, to followtheir standards. 
They met again at Acanthus, where they were joined 
the fleet, which then proceeded through the canal 
+ age into ~~ bay of Therme, where the whole 
coming up, formed an encampment, extendi 
Rs Therme and the borders of Mygdonia to the wher 
; Haliacmon, near the confines of Thessaly. The Greeks, 
a 
VOL, X, PART 11, 
GREECE. 
465 
in the mean time, were slow in concerting any measures —Greeee. 
for their common defence ; and many of the smaller res “"v—"—" 
publics readily made the required submission to the Per- Tardy mea- 
sian monarch, whose sway had been experienced by many sures of the 
Grecian states to be much less oppressive than that of &reek* 
the domineering rule of the Spartan oligarchy, to which 
the greater part of them had long been subjected, The Resolute 
determined resistance of the Athenian people first arrest- resistance of 
ed the progress of the Asiatic host} and to them chief. Ate». 
ly belongs the honour of having preserved Greece from 
a foreign yoke. To this daring resolution they were 
tage ea not entirely by the love of freedom, but by 
the d ,of certain punishment. The whole arma- 
ment was ostensively prepared for their destruction, 
and their courage therefore was nearly that of despair. 
Their success at Marathon may have thrown a ray of 
hope through the gloomy prospect before thsm; and, 
at this critical moment, they happily possessed in The- 
mistocles a leader of extraordinary talents, peculiarly 
fitted for conducting the arduous contest. Deputies 
from the confederated states at length assembled at 
Corinth, to consult respecting the conduct of the war ; 
and an attempt was at first made to defend the 
into Thessaly. An army of 10,000 men from the dif- - 
ferent states, joined by all the Thessalian cavalry, was 
actually sent to occupy the vale of Tempe; and was 
competent to have defended the pass against any num- 
ber of assailants. But the Grecian leaders, alarmed by 
the accounts which they received of the multitude of 
their invaders, and understanding that there was ano- 
ther opening into Thessaly, which they did not think 
themselves strong enough to occupy, were struck with 
a sudden panic, and, embarking their troops, returned 
to the Corinthian isthmus; while the Thessalians, now 
left to their fate, made an immediate submission to the 
demands of Xerxes. It was next resolved to make a 
stand at the pass of Thermopyle, which afforded every 
possible advantage to an inferior force ; but their mu- 
tual jealousies and selfish anxiety to reserve their 
strength for their proper defence, prevented the assem- 
bling of a sufficient body of troops ; and not more than 
4000 men, most of them Arcadian mountaineers, were 
collected to dispute the passage with the whole Persian 
army. 
Seed having ors uae pe at tear to Baaile of 
re pro intelligence an ides, resolved to Thermo- 
ena by pene Mace tanis into Thessaly, and reach- pyle, 
ed the neighbourhood of Thermopyle without opposi- ~~ 
tion. His fleet, after suffering immense loss by a storm 
in the bay of Casthanea, entered the Pelasgian gulf; 
and the Grecian fleet, which was stationed off Arte- 
misium to support the army at Thermopylae, succeeded 
in capturing fifteen galleys, which been dispersed 
by the tempest. This favourable event at once revived 
their spirits, and added greatly to the strength, of their 
little navy. Xerxes, in the mean time, having fixed 
his head quarters-at the town of Traches, in the Malian 
plain, waited four days, in expectation that the Greeks 
would yield to his numbers, and leave him an uninter- 
rupted . A herald also was dispatched to Leo- 
nidas, who commanded at Thermopyle, requiring him 
to deliver up his arms; to whom the S replied, 
with laconic brevity, “ Come and take them,” The 
Persian monarch, therefore, on the fifth day, ordered 
the Medes and Cissians of his army to bring Leonidas 
and his Greeks into his presence. These being quickly 
repulsed, the Persian guards, called “ the immortal 
“ * See a very satisfactory statement in support of this opinion in Mitford’s History of Greece. 
3N 
