Book 4
And this change of government, made by a few upon sedition, did nevertheless continue for a long time after.
The same summer, when Antandros was to be furnished by the Mytilenaeans as they intended, Demodicus and Aristides, captains of certain galleys set forth by the Athenians to fetch in tribute, being then about Hellespont (for Lamachus that was the third in that commission, was gone with ten galleys into Pontus), having notice of the preparation made in that place, and thinking it would be dangerous to have it happen there as it had done in Anaea over against Samos, in which the Samian outlaws having settled themselves, aided the Peloponnesians in matters of the sea by sending them steersmen, and both bred trouble within the city and entertained such as fled out of it, levied an army amongst the confederates, and marched to it; and having overcome in fight those that came out of Antandros against them, recovered the place again.
And not long after, Lamachus that was gone into Pontus, as he lay at anchor in the river Calex in the territory of Heracleia, much rain having fallen above in the country and the stream of a land flood coming suddenly down, lost all his galleys and came himself and his army through the territory of the Bithynians (who are Thracians dwelling in Asia on the other side) to Chalcedon, a colony of the Megareans in the mouth of Pontus Euxinus, by land.
The same summer likewise Demosthenes, general of the Athenians, with forty galleys, presently after his departure out of Megaris, sailed to Naupactus.
For certain men in the cities thereabouts, desiring to change the form of the Boeotian government and to turn it into a democracy according to the government of Athens, practised with him and Hippocrates to betray unto him the estates of Boeotia, induced thereunto principally by Ptoeodorus, a Theban outlaw; and they ordered the design thus:
Some had undertaken to deliver up Siphae (Siphae is a city of the territory of Thespiae, standing upon the seaside in the Crissaean gulf); and Chaeroneia, which was a town that paid duties to Orchomenus (called heretofore Orchomenus in Minyeia, but now Orchomenus in Boeotia), some others of Orchomenus were to surrender into their hands. And the Orchomenian outlaws had a principal hand in this and were hiring soldiers to that end out of Peloponnesus. This Chaeroneia is the utmost town of Boeotia towards Phanotis in the country of Phocis; and some Phoceans also dwelt in it.
[On the other side], the Athenians were to seize on Delium, a place consecrated to Apollo in the territory of Tanagra, on the part toward Euboea. All this ought to have been done together upon a day appointed, to the end that the Boeotians might not oppose them with their forces united, but might be troubled every one to defend his own.
And if the attempt succeeded, and that they once fortified Delium, they easily hoped, though no change followed in the state of the Boeotians for the present, yet being possessed of those places, and by that means continually fetching in prey out of the country, because there was for every one a place at hand to retire unto, that it could not stand long at a stay; but that the Athenians joining with such of them as rebelled, and the Boeotians not having their forces united, they might in time order the state to their own liking. Thus was the plot laid.
And Hippocrates himself, with the forces of the city, was ready when time should serve to march; but sent Demosthenes before with forty galleys to Naupactus, to the end that he should levy an army of Acarnanians and other their confederates in these quarters, and sail to Siphae to receive it by treason. And a day was set down betwixt them on which these things should have been done together.
Demosthenes, when he arrived and found the Oeniades by compulsion of the rest of Acarnania entered into the Athenian confederation and had himself raised all the confederates thereabouts, made war first upon Salynthius and the Agraeans, and having taken in other places thereabouts, stood ready, when the time should require, to go to Siphae.
About the same time of this summer, Brasidas, marching towards the cities upon Thrace with seventeen hundred men of arms, when he came to Heracleia in Trachinia, sent a messenger before him to his friends at Pharsalus, requiring them to be guides unto him and to his army. And when there were come unto him Panaerus and Dorus and Hippolochidas and Torylaus and Strophacus, who was the public host of the Chalcideans, all which met him at Melitia, a town of Achaia, he marched on.
There were other of the Thessalians also that convoyed him; and from Larissa he was convoyed by Niconidas, a friend of Perdiccas. For it had been hard to pass Thessaly without a guide howsoever, but especially with an army. And to pass through a neighbour territory without leave is a thing that all Grecians alike are jealous of. Besides, that the people of Thessaly had ever borne good affection to the Athenians.
Insomuch, as if by custom the government of that country had not been lordly rather than a commonwealth, he could never have gone on. For also now as he marched forward, there met him at the river Enipeus others, of a contrary mind to the former, that forbade him and told him that he did unjustly to go on without the common consent of all.
But those that convoyed him answered that they would not bring him through against their wills, but that coming to them on a sudden, they conducted him as friends. And Brasidas himself said he came thither a friend both to the country and to them; and that he bore arms, not against them, but against the Athenians their enemies; and that he never knew of any enmity between the Thessalians and Lacedaemonians whereby they might not use one another's ground;
and that even now he would not go on without their consent; for neither could he, but [only] entreated them not to stop him. When they heard this, they went their ways. And he, by the advice of his guides, before any greater number should unite to hinder him, marched on with all possible speed, staying nowhere by the way. And the same day he set forth from Melitia he reached Pharsalus and encamped by the river Apidanus;
from thence he went to Phacium; from thence into Peraebia. The Peraebians, though subject to the Thessalians, set him at Dion in the dominion of Perdiccas, a little city of the Macedonians situate at the foot of Olympus on the side towards Thessaly.
In this manner Brasidas ran through Thessaly before any there could put in readiness to stop him and came into the territory of the Chalcideans and to Perdiccas.
For Perdiccas and the Chalcideans, all that had revolted from the Athenians, when they saw the affairs of the Athenians prosper, had drawn this army out of Peloponnesus for fear; the Chalcideans, because they thought the Athenians would make war on them first, as having been also incited thereto by those cities amongst them that had not revolted; and Perdiccas, not that he was their open enemy, but because he feared the Athenians for ancient quarrels, but principally because he desired to subdue Arrhibaeus, king of the Lyncesteans.
And the ill success which the Lacedaemonians in these times had was a cause that they obtained an army from them the more easily.
For the Athenians vexing Peloponnesus, and their particular territory Laconia most of all, they thought the best way to divert them was to send an army to the confederates of the Athenians, so to vex them again. And the rather because Perdiccas and the Chalcideans were content to maintain the army, having called it thither to help the Chalcideans in their revolt.
And because also they desired a pretence to send away part of their Helotes, for fear they should take the opportunity of the present state of their affairs, the enemies lying now in Pylus, to innovate.
For they did also this further, fearing the youth and multitude of their Helotes, for the Lacedaemonians had ever many ordinances concerning how to look to themselves against the Helotes. They caused proclamation to be made that as many of them as claimed the estimation to have done the Lacedaemonians best service in their wars should be made free; feeling them in this manner and conceiving that, as they should every one out of pride deem himself worthy to be first made free, so they would soonest also rebel against them.
And when they had thus preferred about two thousand, which also with crowns on their heads went in procession about the temples as to receive their liberty, they not long after made them away; and no man knew how they perished. And now at this time, with all their hearts, they sent away seven hundred men of arms more of the same men along with Brasidas.
The rest of the army were mercenaries, hired by Brasidas out of Peloponnesus. [But] Brasidas himself the Lacedaemonians sent out, chiefly because it was his own desire;
notwithstanding the Chalcideans also longed to have him, as one esteemed also in Sparta every way an active man. And when he was out, he did the Lacedaemonians very great service.
For by showing himself at that present just and moderate towards the cities, he caused the most of them to revolt; and some of them he also took by treason. Whereby it came to pass that if the Lacedaemonians pleased to come to composition (as also they did), they might have towns to render and receive reciprocally. And also long after, after the Sicilian war, the virtue and wisdom which Brasidas showed now, to some known by experience, by others believed upon from report, was the principal cause that made the Athenian confederates affect the Lacedaemonians.
For being the first that went out, and esteemed in all points for a worthy man, he left behind him an assured hope that the rest also were like him.
Being now come into Thrace, the Athenians upon notice thereof declared Perdiccas an enemy, as imputing to him this expedition, and reinforced the garrisons in the parts thereabouts.
Perdiccas with Brasidas and his army, together with his own forces, marched presently against Arrhibaeus, the son of Bromerus, king of the Lyncesteans, a people of Macedonia, confining on Perdiccas his dominion, both for a quarrel they had against him and also as desiring to subdue him.
When he came with his army, and Brasidas with him, to the place where they were to have fallen in, Brasidas told him that he desired, before he made war, to draw Arrhibaeus by parley, if he could, to a league with the Lacedaemonians.
For Arrhibaeus had also made some proffer by a herald to commit the matter to Brasidas' arbitrement. And the Chalcidean ambassadors, being present, gave him likewise advice not to thrust himself into danger in favour of Perdiccas, to the end they might have him more prompt in their own affairs.
Besides, the ministers of Perdiccas, when they were at Lacedaemon, had spoken there as if they had meant to bring [as] many of the places about him [as they could] into the Lacedaemonian league. So that Brasidas favoured Arrhibaeus for the public good of their own state.
But Perdiccas said that he brought not Brasidas thither to be a judge of his controversies, but to destroy those enemies which he should show him; and that it will be an injury, seeing he pays the half of his army, for Brasidas to parley with Arrhibaeus.
Nevertheless Brasidas, whether Perdiccas would or not, and though it made a quarrel, had conference with Arrhibaeus, by whom also he was induced to withdraw his army. But from that time forward Perdiccas, instead of half, paid but a third part of his army, as conceiving himself to have been injured.
The same summer, a little before the vintage, Brasidas, having joined to his own the forces of the Chalcideans, marched to Acanthus, a colony of the Andrians.
And there arose sedition about receiving him between such as had joined with the Chalcideans in calling him thither and the common people. Nevertheless, for fear of their fruits, which were not yet gotten in, the multitude was won by Brasidas to let him enter alone, and then, after he had said his mind, to advise what to do amongst themselves. And presenting himself before the multitude (for he was not uneloquent, though a Lacedaemonian), he spake to this effect:
"Men of Acanthus, the reason why the Lacedaemonians have sent me and this army abroad is to make good what we gave out in the beginning for the cause of our war against the Athenians, which was that we meant to make a war for the liberties of Greece.
But if we be come late, as deceived by the war there in the opinion we had that we ourselves should soon have pulled the Athenians down without any danger of yours, no man hath reason therefore to blame us.
For we are come as soon as occasion served, and with your help will do our best to bring them under.
But I wonder why you shut me forth of your gates, and why I was not welcome. For we Lacedaemonians have undergone this great danger of passing many days' journey through the territory of strangers, and showed all possible zeal, because we imagined that we went to such confederates as before we came had us present in their hearts and were desirous of our coming.