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HISTORY OF GREECE.

them away captive. Syloson was put in possession-of a desert: the solitude he had made passed into a proverb:* it was at length repeopled, but the sun of Samos never rose again with its pristine lustre. Mæandrius sailed with his treasures to Sparta, hoping to prevail on King Cleomenes to espouse his cause, and to aid him in expelling his rival. He drew the Spartan to his lodging, while his slaves were scouring the vessels of gold and silver displayed on the sideboard. Cleomenes gazed and coveted, and was immediately invited to choose the fairest; but his virtue or his fear shrank from the temptation, and he desired the ephors to banish the dangerous stranger from Sparta and from Peloponnesus.

slaves from domestic labours, in brutal unclean-
ness and vacant torpor. In their convivial sea-
of the juice of the vine or the barley-corn: the
sons an intoxicating vapour supplied the place
art by which the modern Tartars extract a spir-
ituous liquor from the milk of their mares was
unknown to them. The slaves who prepared
their ordinary food by a mechanical process
were deprived of their sight, that their masters
might be spared the trouble of watching them
The events that broke the uniform tenour of
this life arose out of war or the chase; for their
regular migrations could scarcely be said to
vary it: the face of their wilderness, except as
it shared the changes of the year, was eternally
skins and sculls of their slain enemies as tro-
the same. They carried about with them the
phies of their valour, and poured the blood of
their captives, as a libation, on the sword, which
they worshipped as the image or symbol of the
god of war.
eminence over the rest, as the royal or golden
One part of the nation had pre-
horde: its king was regarded with a kind of re-
ligious reverence: his tent contained the sa-
cred hearth by which the most solemn oaths
were sworn; and if he fell sick, the danger was
attributed to some secret perjury by which its

While these events were passing on the coast
of the Ægean, Darius was meditating an expe-
dition against the Scythians, which he made in
person about the same time that the satrap of
Egypt was engaged in the conquest of the
Greek settlements in Africa. We have al-
ready seen that, during the reign of the Median
king Cyaxares, a Scythian horde broke into the
civilized regions of Asia, and were only exter-
minated or expelled after they had ranged over
them as masters for eight-and-twenty years.
They had made this irruption through the Cas-sanctity had been profaned. The royal obse-
pian gates, as Herodotus believed, in pursuit
of the Cimmerians. But since we find that
the Cimmerians had gained a footing in the
west of Asia before the epoch of this supposed
flight, which, besides, would most probably
have led them over the plains into Europe,
rather than among the highlands of Caucasus,
it is more credible that the Scythians were at-
tracted, not by a flying enemy, but by the plun-
der of Asia. They had been themselves driven
from the northeast, from the steppes at the foot
of Mount Altai, by the Massagetæ, and were
now masters of the great level between the
Danube and the Don. They were, as Niebuhr
has shown, a Mongolian race, equally distinct
from the Getes and the Sarmatians.
Greeks, who only contemplated them through
The
a distance which concealed or softened their
genuine features, were apt to believe that, as
they were exempt from the vices peculiar to
civilized society, they also possessed the vir-
tues which the progress of civilization, after it
has reached a certain point, tends to weaken
and destroy. The better they were known, the
more clearly it appeared by their example that
the manners of a savage state may be as far
removed from the simplicity of a rational na-
ture as the last stage of luxurious corruption,
and that man, utterly uncultivated, may be al-
most as wretched and worthless as he can be-
come by artificial depravity. The persons of
the Scythians, naturally unsightly, were ren-
dered hideous by indolent habits, only occasion-
ally interrupted by violent exertion; and the
same cause subjected them to disgusting dis-
eases, in which they themselves revered the
finger of Heaven. The men from time to time
exchanged the backs of their horses, on which
they hung the greater part of the day, for the
cover of their wagons, in which the women and
children passed all their hours, relieved by their

quies were celebrated with human victims,
whose remains were stationed as guards round
the tomb of the deceased, after others of his
domestics had been buried with him, as : to
continue after death the offices they had ren-
dered to him during life.
have been relics of a forgotten creed: there
These rites may
there were diviners in abundance, who drew
were no priests to expound their import, but
their knowledge of the future from the position.
of staves thrown on the ground, or from strips
of bark twisted round their fingers, and pos-
sessed the privilege of pointing the vengeance
of the community against criminals who had
incurred the wrath of Heaven by hidden mis-
deeds.

"EKNTI Evλoo@vros cupuxwpin: which, however, Strabo, xiv., p. 638, supposes to have arisen out of the desola ting tyranny of Syloson himself.

the best informed among the Greek authors,
Such are the outlines of the picture which
Herodotus and Hippocrates, draw of the Scyth-
ian nomads. The agricultural tribe of the same
name, which supplied the Greek colony of Olbia
with corn for exportation, may have been only
their subjects, and have sprung from a different
race, which they had found in the country when
they first invaded it.
now about to seek in the midst of their deserts.
This people Darius was
His meditated expedition had been delayed by
a rebellion which broke out at Babylon in the
beginning of his reign. The ancient capital of
Assyria had been secretly preparing for revolt
during the troubles that followed the fall of the
Magian, and for nearly two years it defied the
power of Darius.
Zopyrus, a noble Persian, who sacrificed bis
At length the treachery of
person and his honour to the interest of his
master, is said to have opened its gates to him.
Zopyrus gained the confidence of the Babyloni-
ans by mutilating himself, and flying to them,
as one who had suffered from the king's cruel-
ty, and was bent on revenge.
to betray the city to Darius, who, after putting
He found means
cruel death, provided against new insurrections
three thousand of the principal inhabitants to a
by razing the walls. When he was freed from

H

this care he set out for the Scythian war. The Coes for his good counsel. But as he was not whole history of this expedition is involved in sure that he should take the same road on his great obscurity, so that scarcely any fact rela- march back, he fixed a term of sixty days for ting to it can be held absolutely certain, except his absence, after which the Greeks who guardthat it was made by Darius in person, and that ed the bridge were to quit their post and sail it failed. Herodotus ascribes it to his desire home. The method he used to assist them in of avenging the calamities which the Scythians keeping an account of time was one of surprihad anciently inflicted upon Asia, in other sing rudeness: he tied sixty knots in a leathern words, to his ambition. But we also hear from thong, and bade them unfasten one every day Ctesias that he had been provoked by a letter till the prescribed interval had expired. This or a message which he received from the King done, he moved forward in search of the Scythof the Scythians, and that he marched to chas-ians, whom he expected soon to find waiting tise his insolence. The occasion of this letter his approach in battle array.

is said to have been an inroad which the satrap So far the proceedings of Darius are intelliof Cappadocia had made into Scythia by com-gible; but his adventures in Scythia elude every mand of Darius for the purpose of carrying attempt to conceal their real nature and conaway captives, and in which he had protected a nexion. The description Herodotus has left of brother of the Scythian king in a family quarrel. them undoubtedly contains many genuine feaIt seems clear that the object Darius had in tures, but can scarcely be trusted for a correct view was not to conquer the country, but to historical outline. We may easily believe that weaken and humble the people; and he may the Scythians were wise enough to retreat behave looked upon this as a precaution indispen- fore the invader, that they removed their famisable for the security of his empire. The re- lies and their most valuable possessions to a membrance of ancient injuries may have been distant region, and laid the tracts over which revived by recent aggressions. It is, however, they were pursued by the enemy utterly waste. also possible that the subjugation of Thrace But this renders it the more difficult to underwas his principal aim, and that he only crossed stand how the myriads of the Persian host were the Danube to terrify the Scythians by the dis-supplied with food and forage in their march play of his gigantic power. The whole military from the Danube to the Don; and even if the force of the empire was put in motion, and the fleet, which, however, is not said to have atnumbers of the army are rated at seven or eight tended the motions of the army, could be suphundred thousand men. Orders had been given posed to solve this enigma, their subsequent for laying a bridge of boats over the Thracian wanderings in the track of the Scythians, when Bosporus, and the work was committed to a all communication with the coast must have Samian engineer named Mandrocles, who ac- been entirely cut off, would still be no less percomplished it so successfully that Darius re- plexing. We should therefore be unable to warded him with a royal present: a part of trace the movements of the hostile armies, even which the Samian applied to adorn the temple if they belonged to our subject, but we are only of Here, in his native city, with a picture rep- concerned with the result. The pursuit in resenting the passage of the Persian host. Da- which the Persians had wasted their strength rius himself commemorated the event by erect- was changed into a retreat, in which they were ing two pillars, inscribed, one with Greek, the pressed by the superior force of the Scythian other with Assyrian characters, recording the cavalry, and were compelled to abandon their names of the nations that composed his army. baggage and their sick. In the mean while the Six hundred ships waited his commands, fur- sixtieth knot had been untied; and the Scythnished by the subject Greek cities; and most ians had sent tidings to the Greeks who were of the tyrants who ruled under the protection guarding the bridge of the situation of Darius, of Persia along the coast of Asia, and that of and exhorted them to sail away and leave him Europe from the Hellespont to the Bosporus, to his fate. The commanders deliberated: a served in the fleet. They were ordered to sail fair opportunity seemed to present itself for reto the mouth of the Danube, and to proceed up covering their independence, and inflicting a the river to a point above the headland of its deep wound on the Persian power: they were delta, and there to prepare a bridge, and to wait urged to seize it by an Athenian named Miltifor the arrival of the land force. Darius slow- ades, whom chance had made master of the ly pursued his march through Thrace, raising Thracian Chersonesus; but Histiæus, the tymonuments on his road, and turning aside to rant of Miletus, was of a different mind; and subdue some Thracian tribes which refused his arguments were addressed to feelings which, submission; the greater part of those whose in most of his hearers, were more powerful seats he crossed on the southern skirts of than those to which Miltiades appealed. He Mount Hæmus yielded without resistance, and reminded them that the Persian power upheld joined the army. On coming to the Danube, he their own, and that no city which should have found the bridge laid, and, when his troops shaken off the sovereignty of its foreign master were safely landed on the left bank, he ordered would continue to endure a domestic tyrant. the Greeks to break it up, and to follow him All came over to his side, and resolved to deinto Scythia. But Coes, a Lesbian, who com-ceive the Scythians and to save Darius. They manded the contingent sent by Mitylene, per- began to break up the bridge on the left bank, ceived the danger of abandoning a pass which and the Scythians, persuaded that they had demight be needed when it could not be recover-prived their enemy of his only means of escape, ed, and advised the king to leave it in the care of the Greeks. Darius was struck with the prudence of his suggestion, and not only adopted it, but promised, on his return, to reward VOL. I.-G

made no attempt to cut him off from the river. Darius had reason to fear that, in obedience to his orders, or from their knowledge of his danger, the Greeks would by this time have left

their post: when he found their transports still waiting for him on the opposite side, his joy and gratitude were proportioned to the greatness of the evil from which he had been unexpectedly delivered.

Perinthus, and then proceeded to subdue all the Thracian tribes which had not yet submitted to his master. While he was thus employed he received an extraordinary commission, which turned his arms towards another quarter. While Darius was staying at Sardis, two Paonians, ambitious of greater power than they possessed in their own country, came over with their sister, in the hope of exciting the king's curiosity and admiration by the spectacle of their native manners exhibited by a beautiful woman, and of inducing him to annex Pæonia to his dominions, and suffer them to rule it in his name. Their scheme led to consequences which they did not expect. Darius, indeed, was struck with the sight of their sister, when, clad in her best dress, after the country fashion, she walked to the water's side, through the streets of Sardis, with a pitcher on her head, leading a horse, and twirling a distaff. eagerly inquired to what race she belonged; but when the seats of the Paonians were described to him, he sent an order to Megabazus to invade their land and transport them into Asia: so singular and industrious a people seemed worthy of living nearer his own presence. The Paonians were widely spread over the highlands in the north of Macedonia; the tribe which Darius had been invited to subdue was seated in the upper vale of the Strymoa. While the collected forces of the nation were guarding the passes nearest to the coast, Mega

He

If Darius had really traversed the regions which Herodotus describes, after they had been left bare and waste by the flying enemy, it would have been scarcely possible that he should have brought back with him more than a few emaciated followers. Yet it does not appear that he suffered severely from hunger, or that he lost any considerable part of his forces. The only difficulty he seems to experience is that of overtaking the Scythians, or of engaging them in battle: they endeavour to protract his stay by occasionally exposing booty to his foraging parties, as though his stores were not yet spent their kings send him a threatening present, a bird, a mouse, a frog, and five arrows; but the danger to which these symbols are believed to point is only that of being shut up in the country, and perishing by the Scythian arms; and when at length he hastens his retreat, it is through fear of being deserted by the Greeks. The army he brought back with him was still large enough to enable him to leave eighty thousand men in Europe, under the command of Megabazus, whom he commissioned to complete the conquest of Thrace and of the Greek cities on the Hellespont. We find, however, that these Greeks had ventured to annoy the Persian army on its retreat,* and that Dari-bazus took guides and led his army, by a more us was so apprehensive of invasion from the Scythians, who seem to have meditated one. and to have made an unsuccessful attempt, that he caused the Greek cities on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont (Abydos among them) to be burned down, to prevent them from affording means of transport to the enemy. He himself rested some time at Sardis. One of his first cares on his return to Asia was to reward the services of Coes and Histiæus. The former, at his own request, was made tyrant of Mitylene Histiæus asked and obtained a district on the Strymon, where he founded a town called Myrcinus. The neighbouring country abounded in timber, and contained silver mines: the position chosen by Histiæus commanded the navigation of the Strymon, and was well adapted for a great staple of commerce between the Thracian tribes of the interior and the Greek cities on the coast: Histiæus might expect here to raise a state more flourishing than Miletus itself, which he still retained, but committed to the charge of his cousin Aristagoras. Though his loyalty was so amply requited, we do not find that any measures were taken to punish the treason of Miltiades, who remained long unmolested in his Chersonesian government, and was driven from it by an inroad of the Scythians themselves three years before he was finally compelled to abandon it by the Persians; an impunity which reflects great doubt on the story of his defence, especially as it was no less glorious at Athens than it was dangerous to him while he was surrounded by the Persian arms.

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circuitous road, into the heart of their country, When the Pæonians heard that the Persian was master of their villages and families, they dispersed; a part of them submitted, and Megabazus transported the tribe against which his commission was principally directed into Asia, where Darius assigned a district in Phrygia for their habitation.

The territories of Amyntas, king of Macedonia, bordered on the region into which Megabazus had carried his arms; and before he led his forces away from Pæonia, he sent seven Persians of high rank to the Macedonian king, in the name of Darius, to demand earth and water, the customary symbols of subjection. The kingdom of Macedonia at this epoch did not extend far to the east of the Axius, and did not include the upper part of its course. To the south it reached the foot of the Cambunian hills; westward its boundaries were lost among the territories of Illyrian mountain tribes, which, as they were impelled by fluctuating causes, acknowledged or defied the authority of its sovereigns. It had gradually grown to its present extent by successive conquests of several small states, some of which still continued distinct, though generally subject to it, and ruled by princes of the royal blood, who were vassals or dependant allies of its king. The people appears to have been a mixed race, in which Illyrian conquerors were variously united with a more ancient Pelasgian population. But the re gning dynasty was of purely Hellenic origin. Two accounts of it were known to the ancients they agree in tracing it to the posterity of the Heracleid Temenus, but differ as to the date of its establishment in Macedonia. In one story, the founder, Perdiccas, is the youngest of three brothers of the house of Temenus,

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AFFAIRS OF MACEDONIA.

who fled from Argos to Illyria, and thence imparted his suspicions to his master, and awa passed into Macedonia, where the favour of kened his jealousy, and Darius resolved to keep the gods raised him from a servile condition to Histiæus harmless. He sent for him on prethe throne. The less romantic tradition refers tence of consulting him about some important the foundation of the monarchy to Caranus, a undertaking; but when he had come to Sardis, brother of the Argive prince or tyrant Pheidon; he informed him. that he could not bear to be and an expedition by which a member of his longer deprived of his company and conversafamily established himself in a distant country, tion: "Leave Miletus," he said, "and your new accords so well with all we know of that pow-city in Thrace, and follow me to Susa, where erful and ambitious man, that whether it be you shall share my table and my counsels." imagined part of a scheme of conquest which With the feelings of a man whose ambitious he may have formed, or, which seems more hopes are suddenly nipped just as they are beprobable, the result of a family quarrel which ginning to blossom, Histiæus attended the king forced Caranus into exile, it has quite the ap- to the splendid prison where he saw himself pearance of an historical fact. At the same doomed to spend the remainder of his days. time, it is not necessary to reject the more Before he returned to Susa, Darius appointed poetical adventure as a groundless fiction, or his half-brother Artaphernes satrap of the Asito deny that more than one band of Heracleids atic coast of the gean, and of the southern or Dorians may at different times have gained provinces of the kingdom of Croesus, whose a footing in the same country. At all events, capital, Sardis, still continued to be the seat of it was very early admitted as equally certain government for this part of Asia; and he left that the kings were Greeks and that the people Otanes in the room of Megabazus, to reduce the were barbarians. This latter point was never maritime cities which still held out on the coasts doubted; the former was proved by a solemn to the north of the Egean. Otanes, a different trial in the reign of the son of Amyntas, the person from the conspirator of the same name, same Alexander who will fill a conspicuous part vigorously prosecuted the work begun by his in the history of this period. He had present- predecessor. Among other towns in that reed himself, perhaps for the purpose of deciding gion, he took Byzantium and Chalcedon, and, the disputed question, as a candidate for one with the aid of a squadron furnished by the Lesof the prizes at the Olympic games. His com- bians, he subdued the islands of Imbros and petitors contested his right to enter into the Lemnos, which were still occupied by a Pelaslists, from which barbarians were excluded by gian population. Lemnos did not yield without the fundamental laws of the institution; but a sharp struggle, and was then consigned to a Alexander adduced such evidence of his Ar- brother of the Samian tyrant Mæandrius. The compensated for the check that Darius had regive descent as determined the judges in his success of these campaigns much more than favour. Amyntas consented to become the vassal of ceived in his Scythian expedition. The PerDarius, and, before the envoys set out on their sian Empire had never been so outwardly great, return to Megabazus, he entertained them at so inwardly prosperous. From the rising to his table. Sobriety was not one of the Persian the setting sun there appeared to be no power virtues. The guests grew heated with wine, that could rival its majesty; none from which, and, elated with the success of their mission, if worth the effort, it could not enforce submislost all respect for the laws of hospitality and sion. Towards the close of the sixth century decency. They forced Amyntas to break before our era (B.C. 505-501) the nations from through the usages of Greek society, and to the banks of the Indus to the borders of Thessend the women of his family into the banquet-saly rested under the shade of the monarchy, room at a time when, if custom had permitted their presence, prudence would have led them to withdraw. The consequences were such as might have been foreseen. The old king suppressed his anger at the insolence of the strangers, but Alexander's youthful spirit boiled with uncontrollable indignation. He found a pretext for introducing some armed youths, who quenched the lust of the Persians in their blood. But the resentment they had provoked did not rouse Amyntas to any farther resistance, nor did Darius ever avenge their death. A body of their countrymen, indeed, was soon after sent into Macedonia to inquire into their fate, for none of their attendants was left alive to carry back the tale; but Alexander was able to hush all up by bribing the Persian general who came in search of them with gold and with the hand of one of his sisters.

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The repose in which the world was hushed was disturbed by a contest between two factions in the little island of Naxos. The democratical party there had gained the ascendant, and their adversaries, the most opulent of the citizens, were forced to quit their country. They were united with Histiæus by political ties, such as parties in the Greek states who did not feel secure at home generally endeavoured to contract with some powerful foreigner. Aristagoras was still filling the place of his kinsmen at Miletus, and to him the Naxian exiles now applied for succour, Aristagoras was not unwilling to restore them: Naxos, ruled by his the undertaking surpassed his means. The creatures, would in effect become his own; but In the course of his expedition against the island was the largest of the Cyclades, and its Paonians, Megabazus had observed the use that fertility and the industry of its inhabitants had Histians had made of the generosity of Darius, made it rich and powerful. It maintained a and perceived that he was collecting at Myrci- considerable navy, and could bring eight thounus the elements of a formidable power, which sand men into the field. It was only with the ashe might in time wield to the detriment of Per-sistance of the Persians that he could attack it sia. When he carried his captives to Sardis he with any hope of success; but if he could en

HISTORY OF GREECE.

treasures of Aristagoras were exhausted, and, after erecting some forts, in which he left the Naxian exiles to infest their countrymen, he raised the siege and returned to Miletus.

He had relied on a prosperous issue for the made to Artaphernes, and the failure of the exmeans of fulfilling the splendid promises he had pedition put it out of his power to discharge the debt he had contracted with the Persian gov

gage Artaphernes, who was his personal friend, | sumed the whole fund allotted to the war; the in the enterprise, he had the fairest prospect not only of accomplishing his immediate purpose, but of doing an important service to the interests of Persia, which would raise his credit at court. The Naxians, equally confident in the support of such an ally, urged him to spare no promises to obtain it. He accordingly repaired to Sardis, and represented to Artaphernes the ease with which he might annex not only Naxos, but all the Cyclades, to the dominions of Da-ernment. rius, and directed his views to a still more of his affairs called for some desperate remedy, He was a ruined man. The state tempting conquest which lay only a little far- and he saw no way of extricating himself from ther off, that of the large and wealthy island of his embarrassment but by exciting his countryEuboea. The cost of the expedition to Naxos men to insurrection. he pledged himself to defray, and he promised this expedient in his mind, he received a mesWhile he was revolving. a large sum besides for the satrap's private cof- sage from Histiæus which fixed his resolution. fers. "A hundred ships would be sufficient to Histiæus likewise believed that a general comensure success." Artaphernes was taken with motion in Jonia, which might render his presthe scheme, and offered, as soon as he had pro- ence necessary or useful, would afford him his cured the king's consent, to place two hundred only chance of escaping from his irksome capships and a Persian force at the disposal of tivity. Aristagoras. As soon as a favourable answer traced some letters with a hot iron on his skin, He shaved the head of a trusty slave, arrived from Susa, he equipped the promised and when his hair had grown again, sent him armament, which he intrusted to the command off to Miletus. Aristagoras opened these sinof Megabates, a Persian of high quality, and or-gular credentials, and read an invitation to redered it to sail to Miletus and take on board volt. the Ionian force that had been raised by Aris- discontented with the form of government that In all the Ionian cities there were many tagoras. ready at any risk to shake off the yoke. Arishad been forced upon them by the Persians, and tagoras assembled some of the leading men to deliberate on a plan of action. Among those who met on this occasion was the historian Hecatæus of Miletus. He loved his country and prized independence as much as the most ardent and sanguine of his fellow-citizens; but he had read, travelled, and thought more than most men of the age. tent, the colossal strength of the Persian EmHe knew the vast expire, and dissuaded his friends from embarking was rejected, he next urged the necessity of in the hopeless struggle. But when this advice making themselves masters of the sea, and pointed out one of the resources of which they might avail themselves for this purpose. treasures that had been accumulated in the temple at Branchide by the piety of successive generations, and by the liberality of Croesus, would supply the means of raising a navy, with which they might hope to make a stand against the Persian power. These he exhorted them to my. seize before they fell into the hands of the enefirm; the treasure was sacred; they forgot that But they were rash without being bold or their cause was so too; they resolved on war, but neglected the fair opportunity of bracing its sinews. Another measure-less, perhaps, because it was politic than because it was agreeable to many private passions and views-was generally approved. one of their number should sail to the camp at It was determined that Myus, where the force that had returned from should make himself master of the persons of the siege of Naxos was still kept together, and the tyrants who had held commands in the Persian armament. it was the signal of a general insurrection This attempt succeeded, and Aristagoras, who knew that his safety depended on the strength and zeal of the democratical party, conciliated it by resigning his own authority, and by delivering up the prisoners taken at Myus to the cities over which they had ruled.

It was intended to lull the enemy into security by leading them to believe that the expedition was destined for a different and a remote quarter. Megabates therefore made towards the Hellespont, but off the coast of Chios he brought the fleet to anchor, meaning to take advantage of the first fair wind and run across to Naxos, and surprise the principal town. While he was in this station, he one day made the round of the fleet to inspect the discipline maintained by the inferior officers. On one ship, a Myndian, he found no watch, and the commander absent; he immediately sent for him, and ordered him to be fastened to the side of his own galley, with his head passing through one of the port-holes, which were opened in the ancient vessels for the oars, as in ours for the ordnance. While the Myndian officer was confined in this ignominious posture, word was brought of the occurrence to Aristagoras, who happened to be his friend. Perhaps he also thought that the severity of the Persian admiral, a stranger to the feelings of Greeks, was impolitic, and that it exceeded the bounds of his authority. When, therefore, on applying for the release of the prisoner, he met with a refusal, he went and set him at liberty. Megabates was indignant at this act of defiance, and was still more enraged when Aristagoras openly disclaimed obedience to him, and asserted his own right to the supreme command. To wound him in the tenderest side, Megabates resolved to defeat the expedition, on the issue of which he had staked so much. sent a message to the Naxians to warn them He privately of their danger; they forthwith began to make preparations for defence, transported their property from the country into the city, laid in stores, and strengthened their fortifications; so that when the Persian fleet at last appeared before their town, they were in a condition to sustain a long siege. At the end of four months the besiegers had made no progress, and had con

The

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