Darius the Great Part 8

Histiaeus replied that he was satisfied, on the whole, with the position which he already enjoyed, which was that of king or governor of Miletus, an Ionian city, south of Sardis, and on the sh.o.r.es of the aegean Sea.[I] He should be pleased, however, he said, if the king would a.s.sign him a certain small territory in Thrace, or, rather, on the borders between Thrace and Macedonia, near the mouth of the River Strymon. He wished to build a city there. The king immediately granted this request, which was obviously very moderate and reasonable. He did not, perhaps, consider that this territory, being in Thrace, or in its immediate vicinity, came within the jurisdiction of Megabyzus, whom he had left in command there, and that the grant might lead to some conflict between the two generals. There was special danger of jealousy and disagreement between them, for Megabyzus was a Persian, and Histiaeus was a Greek.

[Footnote I: For these places, see the map at the commencement of the next chapter.]

Histiaeus organized a colony, and, leaving a temporary and provisional government at Miletus, he proceeded along the sh.o.r.es of the aegean Sea to the spot a.s.signed him, and began to build his city. As the locality was beyond the Thracian frontier, and at a considerable distance from the head-quarters of Megabyzus, it is very probable that the operations of Histiaeus would not have attracted the Persian general's attention for a considerable time, had it not been for a very extraordinary and peculiar train of circ.u.mstances, which led him to discover them. The circ.u.mstances were these:

There was a nation or tribe called the Paeonians, who inhabited the valley of the Strymon, which river came down from the interior of the country, and fell into the sea near the place where Histiaeus was building his city. Among the Paeonian chieftains there were two who wished to obtain the government of the country, but they were not quite strong enough to effect their object. In order to weaken the force which was opposed to them, they conceived the base design of betraying their tribe to Darius, and inducing him to make them captives. If their plan should succeed, a considerable portion of the population would be taken away, and they could easily, they supposed, obtain ascendency over the rest. In order to call the attention of Darius to the subject, and induce him to act as they desired, they resorted to the following stratagem. Their object seems to have been to lead Darius to undertake a campaign against their countrymen, by showing him what excellent and valuable slaves they would make.

These two chieftains were brothers, and they had a very beautiful sister; her form was graceful and elegant, and her countenance lovely.

They brought this sister with them to Sardis when Darius was there.

They dressed and decorated her in a very careful manner, but yet in a style appropriate to the condition of a servant; and then, one day, when the king was sitting in some public place in the city, as was customary with Oriental sovereigns, they sent her to pa.s.s along the street before him, equipped in such a manner as to show that she was engaged in servile occupations. She had a jar, such as was then used for carrying water, poised upon her head, and she was leading a horse by means of a bridle hung over her arm. Her hands, being thus not required either for the horse or for the vessel, were employed in spinning, as she walked along, by means of a distaff and spindle.

The attention of Darius was strongly attracted to the spectacle. The beauty of the maiden, the novelty and strangeness of her costume, the multiplicity of her avocations, and the ease and grace with which she performed them, all conspired to awaken the monarch's curiosity. He directed one of his attendants to follow her and see where she should go. The attendant did so. The girl went to the river. She watered her horse, filled her jar and placed it on her head, and then, hanging the bridle on her arm again, she returned through the same streets, and pa.s.sed the king's palace as before, spinning as she walked along.

The interest and curiosity of the king was excited more than ever by the reappearance of the girl and by the report of his messenger. He directed that she should be stopped and brought into his presence. She came; and her brothers, who had been watching the whole scene from a convenient spot near at hand, joined her and came too. The king asked them who they were. They replied that they were Paeonians. He wished to know where they lived. "On the banks of the River Strymon," they replied, "near the confines of Thrace." He next asked whether all the women of their country were accustomed to labor, and were as ingenious, and dexterous, and beautiful as their sister. The brothers replied that they were.

Darius immediately determined to make the whole people slaves. He accordingly dispatched a courier with the orders. The courier crossed the h.e.l.lespont, and proceeded to the encampment of Megabyzus in Thrace. He delivered his dispatches to the Persian general, commanding him to proceed immediately to Paeonia, and there to take the whole community prisoners, and bring them to Darius in Sardis. Megabyzus, until this time, had known nothing of the people whom he was thus commanded to seize. He, however, found some Thracian guides who undertook to conduct him to their territory; and then, taking with him a sufficient force, he set out on the expedition. The Paeonians heard of his approach. Some prepared to defend themselves; others fled to the mountains. The fugitives escaped, but those who attempted to resist were taken. Megabyzus collected the unfortunate captives, together with their wives and children, and brought them down to the coast to embark them for Sardis. In doing this, he had occasion to pa.s.s by the spot where Histiaeus was building his city, and it was then, for the first time, that Megabyzus became acquainted with the plan. Histiaeus was building a wall to defend his little territory on the side of the land. Ships and galleys were going and coming on the side of the sea. Every thing indicated that the work was rapidly and prosperously advancing.

Megabyzus did not interfere with the work; but, as soon as he arrived at Sardis with his captives, and had delivered them to the king, he introduced the subject of Histiaeus's city, and represented to Darius that it would be dangerous to the Persian interests to allow such an enterprise to go on. "He will establish a strong post there," said Megabyzus, "by means of which he will exercise a great ascendency over all the neighboring seas. The place is admirably situated for a naval station, as the country in the vicinity abounds with all the materials for building and equipping ships. There are also mines of silver in the mountains near, from which he will obtain a great supply of treasure. By these means he will become so strong in a short period of time, that, after you have returned to Asia, he will revolt from your authority, carrying with him, perhaps, in his rebellion, all the Greeks of Asia Minor."

The king said that he was sorry that he had made the grant, and that he would revoke it without delay.

Megabyzus recommended that the king should not do this in an open or violent manner, but that he should contrive some way to arrest the progress of the undertaking without any appearance of suspicion or displeasure.

Darius accordingly sent for Histiaeus to come to him at Sardis, saying that there was a service of great importance on which he wished to employ him. Histiaeus, of course, obeyed such a summons with eager alacrity. When he arrived, Darius expressed great pleasure at seeing him once more, and said that he had constant need of his presence and his counsels. He valued, above all price, the services of so faithful a friend, and so sagacious and trusty an adviser. He was now, he said, going to Susa, and he wished Histiaeus to accompany him as his privy counselor and confidential friend. It would be necessary, Darius added, that he should give up his government of Miletus, and also the city in Thrace which he had begun to build; but he should be exalted to higher honors and dignities at Susa in their stead. He should have apartments in the king's palace, and live in great luxury and splendor.

Histiaeus was extremely disappointed and chagrined at this announcement. He was obliged, however, to conceal his vexation and submit to his fate. In a few days after this, he set out, with the rest of Darius's court, for the Persian capital, leaving a nephew, whose name was Aristagoras, as governor of Miletus in his stead.

Darius, on the other hand, committed the general charge of the whole coast of Asia Minor to Artaphernes, one of his generals. Artaphernes was to make Sardis his capital. He had not only the general command of all the provinces extending along the sh.o.r.e, but also of all the ships, and galleys, and other naval armaments which belonged to Darius on the neighboring seas. Aristagoras, as governor of Miletus, was under his general jurisdiction. The two officers were, moreover, excellent friends. Aristagoras was, of course, a Greek, and Artaphernes a Persian.

Among the Greek islands situated in the aegean Sea, one of the most wealthy, important, and powerful at that time, was Naxos. It was situated in the southern part of the sea, and about midway between the sh.o.r.es of Asia Minor and Greece. It happened that, soon after Darius had returned from Asia Minor to Persia, a civil war broke out in that island, in which the common people were on one side and the n.o.bles on the other. The n.o.bles were overcome in the contest, and fled from the island. A party of them landed at Miletus, and called upon Aristagoras to aid them in regaining possession of the island.

Aristagoras replied that he would very gladly do it if he had the power, but that the Persian forces on the whole coast, both naval and military, were under the command of Artaphernes at Sardis. He said, however, that he was on very friendly terms with Artaphernes, and that he would, if the Naxians desired it, apply to him for his aid. The Naxians seemed very grateful for the interest which Aristagoras took in their cause, and said that they would commit the whole affair to his charge.

There was, however, much less occasion for grat.i.tude than there seemed, for Aristagoras was very far from being honest and sincere in his offers of aid. He perceived, immediately on hearing the fugitives'

story, that a very favorable opportunity was opening for him to add Naxos, and perhaps even the neighboring islands, to his own government. It is always a favorable opportunity to subjugate a people when their power of defense and of resistance is neutralized by dissensions with one another. It is a device as old as the history of mankind, and one resorted to now as often as ever, for ambitious neighbors to interpose in behalf of the weaker party, in a civil war waged in a country which they wish to make their own, and, beginning with a war against a part, to end by subjugating the whole. This was Aristagoras's plan. He proposed it to Artaphernes, representing to him that a very favorable occasion had occurred for bringing the Greek islands of the aegean Sea under the Persian dominion. Naxos once possessed, all the other islands around it would follow, he said, and a hundred ships would make the conquest sure.

Artaphernes entered very readily and very warmly into the plan. He said that he would furnish two hundred instead of one hundred galleys. He thought it was necessary, however, first to consult Darius, since the affair was one of such importance; and besides, it was not best to commence the undertaking until the spring. He would immediately send a messenger to Darius to ascertain his pleasure, and, in the mean time, as he did not doubt that Darius would fully approve of the plan, he would have all necessary preparations made, so that every thing should be in readiness as soon as the proper season for active operations should arrive.

Artaphernes was right in antic.i.p.ating his brother's approval of the design. The messenger returned from Susa with full authority from the king for the execution of the project. The ships were built and equipped, and every thing was made ready for the expedition. The intended destination of the armament was, however, kept a profound secret, as the invaders wished to surprise the people of Naxos when off their guard. Aristagoras was to accompany the expedition as its general leader, while an officer named Megabates, appointed by Artaphernes for this purpose, was to take command of the fleet as a sort of admiral. Thus there were two commanders--an arrangement which almost always, in such cases, leads to a quarrel. It is a maxim in war that _one_ bad general is better than two good ones.

The expedition sailed from Miletus; and, in order to prevent the people of Naxos from being apprised of their danger, the report had been circulated that its destination was to be the h.e.l.lespont.

Accordingly, when the fleet sailed, it turned its course to the northward, as if it were really going to the h.e.l.lespont. The plan of the commander was to stop after proceeding a short distance, and then to seize the first opportunity afforded by a wind from the north to come down suddenly upon Naxos, before the population should have time to prepare for defense. Accordingly, when they arrived opposite the island of Chios, the whole fleet came to anchor near the land. The ships were all ordered to be ready, at a moment's warning, for setting sail; and, thus situated, the commanders were waiting for the wind to change.

Megabates, in going his rounds among the fleet while things were in this condition, found one vessel entirely abandoned. The captain and crew had all left it, and had gone ash.o.r.e. They were not aware, probably, how urgent was the necessity that they should be every moment at their posts. The captain of this galley was a native of a small town called Cnydus, and, as it happened, was a particular friend of Aristagoras. His name was Syclax. Megabates, as the commander of the fleet, was very much incensed at finding one of his subordinate officers so derelict in duty. He sent his guards in pursuit of him; and when Syclax was brought to his ship, Megabates ordered his head to be thrust out through one of the small port-holes intended for the oars, in the side of the ship, and then bound him in that position--his head appearing thus to view, in the sight of all the fleet, while his body remained within the vessel. "I am going to keep him at his post," said Megabates, "and in such a way that every one can _see_ that he is there."

Aristagoras was much distressed at seeing his friend suffering so severe and disgraceful a punishment. He went to Megabates and requested the release of the prisoner, giving, at the same time, what he considered satisfactory reasons for his having been absent from his vessel. Megabates, however, was not satisfied, and refused to set Syclax at liberty. Aristagoras then told Megabates that he mistook his position in supposing that he was master of the expedition, and could tyrannize over the men in that manner, as he pleased. "I will have you understand," said he, "that I am the commander in this campaign, and that Artaphernes, in making you the sailing-master of the fleet, had no intention that you should set up your authority over mine." So saying, he went away in a rage, and released Syclax from his durance with his own hands.

It was now the turn of Megabates to be enraged. He determined to defeat the expedition. He sent immediately a secret messenger to warn the Naxians of their enemies' approach. The Naxians immediately made effectual preparations to defend themselves. The end of it was, that when the fleet arrived, the island was prepared to receive it, and nothing could be done. Aristagoras continued the siege four months; but inasmuch as, during all this time, Megabates did every thing in his power to circ.u.mvent and thwart every plan that Aristagoras formed, nothing was accomplished. Finally, the expedition was broken up, and Aristagoras returned home, disappointed and chagrined, all his hopes blasted, and his own private finances thrown into confusion by the great pecuniary losses which he himself had sustained. He had contributed very largely, from his own private funds, in fitting out the expedition, fully confident of success, and of ample reimburs.e.m.e.nt for his expenses as the consequence of it.

He was angry with himself, and angry with Megabates, and angry with Artaphernes. He presumed, too, that Megabates would denounce him to Artaphernes, and, through him, to Darius, as the cause of the failure of the expedition. A sudden order might come at any moment, directing that he should be beheaded. He began to consider the expediency of revolting from the Persian power, and making common cause with the Greeks against Darius. The danger of such a step was scarcely less than that of remaining as he was. While he was pondering these momentous questions in his mind, he was led suddenly to a decision by a very singular circ.u.mstance, the proper explaining of which requires the story to return, for a time, to Histiaeus at Susa.

Histiaeus was very ill at ease in the possession of his forced elevation and grandeur at Susa. He enjoyed great distinction there, it is true, and a life of ease and luxury, but he wished for independence and authority. He was, accordingly, very desirous to get back to his former sphere of activity and power in Asia Minor. After revolving in his mind the various plans which occurred to him for accomplishing this purpose, he at last decided on inducing Aristagoras to revolt in Ionia, and then attempting to persuade Darius to send him on to quell the revolt. When once in Asia Minor, he would join the rebellion, and bid Darius defiance.

The first thing to be done was to contrive some safe and secret way to communicate with Aristagoras. This he effected in the following manner: There was a man in his court who was afflicted with some malady of the eyes. Histiaeus told him that if he would put himself under _his_ charge he could effect a cure. It would be necessary, he said, that the man should have his head shaved and scarified; that is, punctured with a sharp instrument, previously dipped in some medicinal compound. Then, after some further applications should have been made, it would be necessary for the patient to go to Ionia, in Asia Minor, where there was a physician who would complete the cure.

The patient consented to this proposal. The head was shaved, and Histiaeus, while pretending to scarify it, p.r.i.c.ked into the skin--as sailors tattoo anchors on their arms--by means of a needle and a species of ink which had probably no great medicinal virtue, the words of a letter to Aristagoras, in which he communicated to him fully, though very concisely, the particulars of his plan. He urged Aristagoras to revolt, and promised that, if he would do so, he would come on, himself, as soon as possible, and, under pretense of marching to suppress the rebellion, he would really join and aid it.

As soon as he had finished p.r.i.c.king this treasonable communication into the patient's skin, he carefully enveloped the head in bandages, which, he said, must on no account be disturbed. He kept the man shut up, besides, in the palace, until the hair had grown, so as effectually to conceal the writing, and then sent him to Ionia to have the cure perfected. On his arrival at Ionia he was to find Aristagoras, who would do what further was necessary. Histiaeus contrived, in the mean time, to send word to Aristagoras by another messenger, that, as soon as such a patient should present himself, Aristagoras was to shave his head. He did so, and the communication appeared. We must suppose that the operations on the part of Aristagoras for the purpose of completing the cure consisted, probably, in p.r.i.c.king in more ink, so as to confuse and obliterate the writing.

Aristagoras was on the eve of throwing off the Persian authority when he received this communication. It at once decided him to proceed. He organized his forces and commenced his revolt. As soon as the news of this rebellion reached Susa, Histiaeus feigned great indignation, and earnestly entreated Darius to commission him to go and suppress it. He was confident, he said, that he could do it in a very prompt and effectual manner. Darius was at first inclined to suspect that Histiaeus was in some way or other implicated in the movement; but these suspicions were removed by the protestations which Histiaeus made, and at length he gave him leave to proceed to Miletus, commanding him, however, to return to Susa again as soon as he should have suppressed the revolt.

When Histiaeus arrived in Ionia he joined Aristagoras, and the two generals, leaguing with them various princes and states of Greece, organized a very extended and dangerous rebellion, which it gave the troops of Darius infinite trouble to subdue. We can not here give an account of the incidents and particulars of this war. For a time the rebels prospered, and their cause seemed likely to succeed; but at length the tide turned against them. Their towns were captured, their ships were taken and destroyed, their armies cut to pieces. Histiaeus retreated from place to place, a wretched fugitive, growing more and more distressed and dest.i.tute every day. At length, as he was flying from a battle field, he arrested the arm of a Persian, who was pursuing him with his weapon upraised, by crying out that he was Histiaeus the Milesian. The Persian, hearing this, spared his life, but took him prisoner, and delivered him to Artaphernes. Histiaeus begged very earnestly that Artaphernes would send him to Darius alive, in hopes that Darius would pardon him in consideration of his former services at the bridge of the Danube. This was, however, exactly what Artaphernes wished to prevent; so he crucified the wretched Histiaeus at Sardis, and then packed his head in salt and sent it to Darius.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GRECIAN EMPIRE.]

CHAPTER XI.

THE INVASION OF GREECE AND THE BATTLE OF MARATHON.

B.C. 512-490

Great battles.--Progress of the Persian empire.--Condition of the Persian empire.--Plans of Darius.--Persian power in Thrace.--Attempted negotiation with Macedon.--The seven commissioners.--Their rudeness at the feast.--Stratagem of Amyntas's son.--The commissioners killed.--Artifice of the prince.--Darius's anger against the Athenians.--Civil dissensions in Greece.--The tyrants.--Periander.--His message to a neighboring potentate.--Periander's intolerable tyranny.--His wife Melissa.--The ghost of Melissa.--A great sacrifice.--The reason of Periander's rudeness to the a.s.sembly of females.--Labda the cripple.--Prediction in respect to her progeny.--Conspiracy to destroy Labda's child.--Its failure.--The child secreted.--Fulfillment of the oracle.--Hippias of Athens.--His barbarous cruelty.--Hippias among the Persians.--Wars between the Grecian states.--Quarrel between Athens and aegina.--The two wooden statues.--Incursion of the aeginetans.--They carry off the statues.--Attempt to recover the statues.--They fall upon their knees.--The Athenian fugitive.--He is murdered by the women.--The Persian army.--Its commander, Datis.--Sailing of the fleet.--Various conquests.--Landing of the Persians.--State of Athens.--The Greek army.--Miltiades and his colleagues.--Position of the armies.--Miltiades's plan of attack.--Onset of the Greeks.--Rout of the Persians.--Results of the battle.--Numbers slain.--The field of Marathon.--The mound.--Song of the Greek.

In the history of a great military conqueror, there seems to be often some one great battle which in importance and renown eclipses all the rest. In the case of Hannibal it was the battle of Cannae, in that of Alexander the battle of Arbela. Caesar's great conflict was at Pharsalia, Napoleon's at Waterloo. Marathon was, in some respects, Darius's Waterloo. The place is a beautiful plain, about twelve miles north of the great city of Athens. The battle was the great final contest between Darius and the Greeks, which, both on account of the awful magnitude of the conflict, and the very extraordinary circ.u.mstances which attended it, has always been greatly celebrated among mankind.

The whole progress of the Persian empire, from the time of the first accession of Cyrus to the throne, was toward the westward, till it reached the confines of Asia on the sh.o.r.es of the aegean Sea. All the sh.o.r.es and islands of this sea were occupied by the states and the cities of Greece. The population of the whole region, both on the European and Asiatic sh.o.r.es, spoke the same language, and possessed the same vigorous, intellectual, and elevated character. Those on the Asiatic side had been conquered by Cyrus, and their countries had been annexed to the Persian empire. Darius had wished very strongly, at the commencement of his reign, to go on in this work of annexation, and had sent his party of commissioners to explore the ground, as is related in a preceding chapter. He had, however, postponed the execution of his plans, in order first to conquer the Scythian countries north of Greece, thinking, probably, that this would make the subsequent conquest of Greece itself more easy. By getting a firm foothold in Scythia, he would, as it were, turn the flank of the Grecian territories, which would tend to make his final descent upon them more effectual and sure.

This plan, however, failed; and yet, on his retreat from Scythia, Darius did not withdraw his armies wholly from the European side of the water. He kept a large force in Thrace, and his generals there were gradually extending and strengthening their power, and preparing for still greater conquests. They attempted to extend their dominion, sometimes by negotiations, and sometimes by force, and they were successful and unsuccessful by turns, whichever mode they employed.

One very extraordinary story is told of an attempted negotiation with Macedon, made with a view of bringing that kingdom, if possible, under the Persian dominion, without the necessity of a resort to force. The commanding general of Darius's armies in Thrace, whose name, as was stated in the last chapter, was Megabyzus, sent seven Persian officers into Macedon, not exactly to summon the Macedonians, in a peremptory manner, to surrender to the Persians, nor, on the other hand, to propose a voluntary alliance, but for something between the two. The communication was to be in the form of a proposal, and yet it was to be made in the domineering and overbearing manner with which the tyrannical and the strong often make proposals to the weak and defenseless.

The seven Persians went to Macedon, which, as will be seen from the map, was west of Thrace, and to the northward of the other Grecian countries. Amyntas, the king of Macedon, gave them a very honorable reception. At length, one day, at a feast to which they were invited in the palace of Amyntas, they became somewhat excited with wine, and asked to have the ladies of the court brought into the apartment. They wished "to see them," they said. Amyntas replied that such a procedure was entirely contrary to the usages and customs of their court; but still, as he stood somewhat in awe of his visitors, or, rather, of the terrible power which the delegation represented, and wished by every possible means to avoid provoking a quarrel with them, he consented to comply with their request. The ladies were sent for. They came in, reluctant and blushing, their minds excited by mingled feelings of indignation and shame.

The Persians, becoming more and more excited and imperious under the increasing influence of the wine, soon began to praise the beauty of these new guests in a coa.r.s.e and free manner, which overwhelmed the ladies with confusion, and then to accost them familiarly and rudely, and to behave toward them, in other respects, with so much impropriety as to produce great alarm and indignation among all the king's household. The king himself was much distressed, but he was afraid to act decidedly. His son, a young man of great energy and spirit, approached his father with a countenance and manner expressive of high excitement, and begged him to retire from the feast, and leave him, the son, to manage the affair. Amyntas reluctantly allowed himself to be persuaded to go, giving his son many charges, as he went away, to do nothing rashly or violently. As soon as the king was gone, the prince made an excuse for having the ladies retire for a short time, saying that they should soon return. The prince conducted them to their apartment, and then selecting an equal number of tall and smooth-faced boys, he disguised them to represent the ladies, and gave each one a dagger, directing him to conceal it beneath his robe. These counterfeit females were then introduced to the a.s.sembly in the place of those who had retired. The Persians did not detect the deception.

It was evening, and, besides, their faculties were confused with the effects of the wine. They approached the supposed ladies as they had done before, with rude familiarity; and the boys, at a signal made by the prince when the Persians were wholly off their guard, stabbed and killed every one of them on the spot.

Megabyzus sent an emba.s.sador to inquire what became of his seven messengers; but the Macedonian prince contrived to buy this messenger off by large rewards, and to induce him to send back some false but plausible story to satisfy Megabyzus. Perhaps Megabyzus would not have been so easily satisfied had it not been that the great Ionian rebellion, under Aristagoras and Histiaeus, as described in the last chapter, broke out soon after, and demanded his attention in another quarter of the realm.

The Ionian rebellion postponed, for a time, Darius's designs on Greece, but the effect of it was to make the invasion more certain and more terrible in the end; for Athens, which was at that time one of the most important and powerful of the Grecian cities, took a part in that rebellion against the Persians. The Athenians sent forces to aid those of Aristagoras and Histiaeus, and, in the course of the war, the combined army took and burned the city of Sardis. When this news reached Darius, he was excited to a perfect phrensy of resentment and indignation against the Athenians for coming thus into his own dominions to a.s.sist rebels, and there destroying one of his most important capitals. He uttered the most violent and terrible threats against them, and, to prevent his anger from getting cool before the preparations should be completed for vindicating it, he made an arrangement, it was said, for having a slave call out to him every day at table, "Remember the Athenians!"

It was a circ.u.mstance favorable to Darius's designs against the states of Greece that they were not united among themselves. There was no general government under which the whole naval and military force of that country could be efficiently combined, so as to be directed, in a concentrated and energetic form, against a common enemy. On the other hand, the several cities formed, with the territories adjoining them, so many separate states, more or less connected, it is true, by confederations and alliances, but still virtually independent, and often hostile to each other. Then, besides these external and international quarrels, there was a great deal of internal dissension.

The monarchical and the democratic principle were all the time struggling for the mastery. Military despots were continually rising to power in the various cities, and after they had ruled, for a time, over their subjects with a rod of iron, the people would rise in rebellion and expel them from their thrones. These revolutions were continually taking place, attended, often, by the strangest and most romantic incidents, which evinced, on the part of the actors in them, that extraordinary combination of mental sagacity and ac.u.men with childish and senseless superst.i.tion so characteristic of the times.

It is not surprising that the populace often rebelled against the power of these royal despots, for they seem to have exercised their power, when their interests or their pa.s.sions excited them to do it, in the most tyrannical and cruel manner. One of them, it was said, a king of Corinth, whose name was Periander, sent a messenger, on one occasion, to a neighboring potentate--with whom he had gradually come to entertain very friendly relations--to inquire by what means he could most certainly and permanently secure the continuance of his power. The king thus applied to gave no direct reply, but took the messenger out into his garden, talking with him by the way about the incidents of his journey, and other indifferent topics. He came, at length, to a field where grain was growing, and as he walked along, he occupied himself in cutting off, with his sword, every head of the grain which raised itself above the level of the rest. After a short time he returned to the house, and finally dismissed the messenger without giving him any answer whatever to the application that he had made. The messenger returned to Periander, and related what had occurred. "I understand his meaning," said Periander. "I must contrive some way to remove all those who, by their talents, their influence, or their power, rise above the general level of the citizens."

Periander began immediately to act on this recommendation. Whoever, among the people of Corinth, distinguished himself above the rest, was marked for destruction. Some were banished, some were slain, and some were deprived of their influence, and so reduced to the ordinary level, by the confiscation of their property, the lives and fortunes of all the citizens of the state being wholly in the despot's hands.