Book 6
For they are not more able to do hurt unto us than we be unto them. Neither indeed is the greatness of their fleet without some advantage unto us; nay, it will be much the better for us in respect of the rest of the Sicilians. For being terrified by them, they will the rather league with us. And if we either vanquish or repulse them without obtaining what they came for (for I fear not at all the effecting of their purpose), verily it will be a great honour to us, and in my opinion not unlikely to come to pass. For in truth there have been few great fleets, whether of Grecians or barbarians, sent far from home that have not prospered ill.
Neither are these that come against us more in number than ourselves and the neighboring cities; for surely we shall all hold together upon fear. And if for want of necessaries in a strange territory they chance to miscarry, the honour of it will be left to us against whom they bend their councils, though the greatest cause of their overthrow should consist in their own errors.
Which was also the case of these very Athenians, who raised themselves by the misfortune of the Medes (though it happened for the most part contrary to reason); because in name they went only against the Athenians. And that the same shall now happen unto us is not without probability.
Let us therefore with courage put in readiness our own forces; let us send to the Siculi to confirm those we have, and to make peace and league with others; and let us send ambassadors to the rest of Sicily to show them that it is a common danger, and into Italy to get them into our league, or at least that they receive not the Athenians.
And in my judgment it were our best course to send also to Carthage, for even they are not without expectation of the same danger. Nay, they are in a continual fear that the Athenians will bring war upon them also, even to their city. So that upon apprehension that if they neglect us the trouble will come home to their own door, they will perhaps, either secretly or openly or some way assist us. And of all that now are, they are the best able to do it, if they please. For they have the most gold and silver, by which the wars and all things else are the best expedited.
Let us also send to Lacedaemon and to Corinth, praying them not only to send their succours hither with speed, but also to set on foot the war there.
But that which I think the best course of all, though through an habit of sitting still you will hardly be brought to it, I will nevertheless now tell you what it is. If the Sicilians all together, or if not all, yet if we and most of the rest, should draw together our whole navy, and with two months' provision go and meet the Athenians at Tarentum and the promontory of Iapygia, and let them see that they must fight for their passage over the Ionian gulf before they fight for Sicily, it would both terrify them the most and also put them into a consideration that we, as the watchmen of our country, come upon them out of an amicable territory (for we shall be received at Tarentum), whereas they themselves have a great deal of sea to pass with all their preparations and cannot keep themselves in their order for the length of the voyage; and that for us it will be an easy matter to assail them, coming up slowly as they do and thin.
Again, if lightening their galleys, they shall come up to us more nimbly and more close together, we shall charge upon them already wearied, or we may, if we please, retire again into Tarentum. Whereas they, if they come over but with a part of their provisions, as to fight at sea, shall be driven into want of victuals in those desert parts, and either staying be there besieged, or, attempting to go by, leave behind them the rest of their provision, and be dejected, as not assured of the cities whether they will receive them or not.
I am therefore of opinion that dismayed with this reckoning they will either not put over at all from Corcyra, or whilst they spend time in deliberating and in sending out to explore how many and in what place we are, the season will be lost and winter come; or deterred with our unlookedfor opposition, they will give over the voyage. And the rather for that as I hear the man of most experience amongst their commanders hath the charge against his will and would take a light occasion to return if he saw any considerable stop made by us in the way.
And I am very sure we should be voiced amongst them to the utmost. And as the reports are, so are men's minds; and they fear more such as they hear will begin with them than such as give out that they will no more but defend themselves, because then they think the danger equal.
Which would be now the case of the Athenians. For they come against us with an opinion that we will not fight, deservedly contemning us because we joined not with the Lacedaemonians to pull them down.
But if they should see us once bolder than they looked for, they would be terrified more with the unexpectedness than with the truth of our power itself. Be persuaded therefore, principally to dare to do this, or if not this, yet speedily to make yourselves otherwise ready for the war, and every man to remember that though to show contempt of the enemy be best in the heat of fight, yet those preparations are the surest that are made with fear and opinion of danger. As for the Athenians, they come; and I am sure are already in the way and want only that they are not now here.
Thus spake Hermocrates. But the people of Syracuse were at much strife amongst themselves, some contending that the Athenians would by no means come and that the reports were not true, and others that if they came they would do no more harm than they were likely again to receive. Some contemned and laughed at the matter; but some few there were that believed Hermocrates and feared the event.
But Athenagoras, who was chief magistrate of the people, and at that time most powerful with the commons, spake as followeth:
"He is either a coward or not well affected to the state, whosoever he be, that wishes the Athenians not to be so mad as coming hither to fall into our power. As for them that report such things as these and put you into fear, though I wonder not at their boldness, yet I wonder at their folly, if they think their ends not seen.
For they that are afraid of anything themselves will put the city into affright that they may shadow their own with the common fear. And this may the reports do at this time, not raised by chance, but framed on purpose by such as always trouble the state.
But if you mean to deliberate wisely, make not your reckoning by the reports of these men but by that which wise men and men of great experience, such as I hold the Athenians to be, are likely to do.
For it is not probable that, leaving the Peloponnesians and the war there not yet surely ended, they should willingly come hither to a new war no less the former, seeing, in my opinion, they may be glad that we invade not them, so many and so great cities as we are.
"And if indeed they come, as these men say they will, I think Sicily more sufficient to dispatch the war than Peloponnesus, as being in all respects better furnished, and that this our own city is much stronger than the army which they say is now coming, though it were twice as great as it is. For I know they neither bring horses with them nor can they get any here, save only a few from the Egestaeans, nor have men of arms so many as we, in that they are to bring them by sea. For it is a hard matter to come so far as this by sea, though they carried no men of arms in their galleys at all, if they carry with them all other their necessaries, which cannot be small against so great a city.
So that I am so far from the opinion of these others that I think the Athenians, though they had here another city as great as Syracuse, and confining on it, and should from thence make their war, yet should not be able to escape from being destroyed, every man of them, much less now, when all Sicily is their enemy. For in their camp, fenced with their galleys, they shall be cooped up and from their tents and forced munition never be able to stir far abroad without being cut off by our horsemen. In short, I think they shall never be able to get landing, so much above theirs do I value our own forces.
"But these things, as I said before, the Athenians, considering, I am very sure will look unto their own;
and our men talk here of things that neither are or ever will be, who I know have desired, not only now but ever, by such reports as these or by worse, or by their actions, to put the multitude in fear that they themselves might rule the state. And I am afraid, lest attempting it often, they may one day effect it; and for us, we are too poor-spirited either to foresee it ere it be done, or foreseeing to prevent it.
By this means our city is seldom quiet, but subject to sedition and contention, not so much against the enemy as within itself, and sometimes also to tyranny and usurpation. Which I will endeavour (if you will second me) so to prevent hereafter as nothing more of this kind shall befall you;
which must be done, first by gaining you the multitude, and then by punishing the authors of these plots, not only when I find them in the action (for it will be hard to take them so), but also for those things which they would and cannot do. For one must not only take revenge upon an enemy for what he hath already done, but strike him first for his evil purpose; for if a man strike not first, he shall first be stricken. And as for the few, I shall in somewhat reprove them, in somewhat have an eye to them, and in somewhat advise them. For this, I think, will be the best course to avert them from their bad intentions.
Tell me forsooth (I have asked this question often), you that are the younger sort, What would you have? Would you now bear office? The law allows it not; and the law was made because ye are not [now] sufficient for government, not to disgrace you when you shall be sufficient. But forsooth, you would not be ranked with the multitude! But what justice is it, that the same men should not have the same privileges?
"Some will say that the democracy is neither a well-governed nor a just state, and that the most wealthy are aptest to make the best government. But I answer first, democracy is a name of the whole, oligarchy but of a part. Next, though the rich are indeed fittest to keep the treasure, yet the wise are the best counsellors, and the multitude, upon hearing, the best judge. Now in a democracy all these, both jointly and severally, participate equal privileges.
But in the oligarchy they allow indeed to the multitude a participation of all dangers, but in matters of profit, they not only encroach upon the multitude, but take from them and keep the whole. Which is the thing that you the rich and the younger sort affect, but in a great city cannot possibly embrace. But yet, O ye the most unwise of all men, unless you know that what you affect is evil, and if you know not that, you are the most ignorant of all the Grecians I know; or, ye most wicked of all men, if knowing it you dare do this.
Yet I say, inform yourselves better or change your purpose and help to amplify the common good of the city, making account that the good amongst you shall not only have an equal but a greater share therein than the rest of the multitude; whereas if you will needs have all, you shall run the hazard of losing all. Away therefore with these rumours, as discovered and not allowed.
For this city, though the Athenians come, will be able to defend itself with honour. And we have generals to look to that matter. And if they come not (which I rather believe), it will not, upon the terror of your reports, make choice of you for commanders and cast itself into voluntary servitude; but taking direction of itself, it both judgeth your words virtually as facts, and will not upon words let go her present liberty, but endeavour to preserve it by not committing the same actually to your discretion.
Thus said Athenagoras. Then one of their generals, rising up, forbade any other to stand forth, and spake himself to the matter in hand to this effect:
It is no wisdom, neither for the speakers to utter such calumnies one against another, nor for the hearers to receive them. We should rather consider, in respect of these reports, how we may in the best manner, both every one in particular and the city in general, be prepared to resist them when they come.
And if there be no need, yet to furnish the city with horses and arms and other habiliments of war can do us no hurt.
As for the care hereof and the musters, we will look to it, and will send men abroad both to the cities and for spials, and do whatsoever else is requisite. Somewhat we have done already; and what more we shall hereafter find meet, we will from time to time report unto you. Which when the general had said, the Syracusians dissolved the assembly.
The Athenians were now all in Corcyra, both they and their confederates. And first the generals took a view of the whole army and put them into the order wherein they were to anchor and make their naval camp; and having divided them into three squadrons, to each squadron they assigned a captain by lot, to the end that being at sea they might not come into want of water or harbours or any other necessaries where they chanced to stay; and that they might otherwise be the more easy to be governed when every squadron had his proper commander.
After this they sent before them three galleys into Italy and Sicily to bring them word what cities in those parts would receive them, whom they appointed to come back and meet them that they might know whether they might be received or not before they put in.
This done, the Athenians with all their provisions put out from Corcyra towards Sicily, having with them in all one hundred and thirty-four galleys and two Rhodian long-boats of fifty oars a-piece. Of these, a hundred were of Athens itself, whereof sixty were expedite, the other forty for transportation of soldiers; the rest of the navy belonged to the Chians and other the confederates. Of men of arms they had in all five thousand one hundred. Of these, there were of the Athenians themselves fifteen hundred enrolled and seven hundred more [of the poorer sort, called] Thetes, hired for defence of the galleys. The rest were of their confederates, some of them being their subjects: of Argives there were five hundred; of Mantineans and mercenaries, two hundred and fifty. Their archers in all, four hundred and eighty, of which eighty were Cretans. Rhodian slingers they had seven hundred. Of lightarmed Megarean fugitives, one hundred and twenty; and in one vessel made for transportation of horses, thirty horsemen.
These were the forces that went over to the war at first. With these went also thirty ships carrying necessaries, wherein went also the bakers and masons and carpenters and all tools of use in fortification; and with these thirty ships went one hundred boats by constraint, and many other ships and boats that voluntarily followed the army for trade; which then passed all together from Corcyra over the Ionian gulf.
And the whole fleet being come to the promontory of Iapygia and to Tarentum and such other places as every one could recover, they went on by the coast of Italy, neither received of the states there into any city nor allowed any market, having only the liberty of anchorage and water (and that also at Tarentum and Locri denied them), till they were at Rhegium, where they all came together again and settled their camp in the temple of Diana (for neither there were they suffered to come in) without the city, where the Rhegians allowed them a market.
And when they had drawn their galleys to land, they lay still. Being here, they dealt with the Rhegians, who were Chalcideans, to aid the Leontines, Chalcideans likewise. To which was answered that they would take part with neither, but what the rest of the Italians should conclude, that also they would do.
So the Athenians lay still, meditating on their Sicilian business, how they might carry it the best, and withal expected the return from Egesta of the three galleys which they had sent before them, desiring to know if so much money were there or not, as was reported by their messengers at Athens.