CHAPTER IX.
CONFLICTS AND VICTORIES.
Pericles, accompanied by his friend Sophocles, entered the Agora early in the morning just as the gloomy Euripides came up with the truth-seeker. Somewhat surprised at the sight of the luggage several slaves were carrying behind him, both stood still and asked the poet the cause of his departure, and where he intended to go.
“I am about to sail for Salamis,” replied Euripides. “On the quiet island I hope at last to find the seclusion and peace I need. The grotto on the shore, where I first saw the light, I will henceforth make my favorite resting-place and give myself up to my thoughts undisturbed.”
“Doesn’t your country-house afford you sufficient quiet and seclusion?” asked Pericles.
“Don’t talk to me of the country-house!” replied the poet rudely. “I’ve become thoroughly disgusted with it by the constant increase of the frogs, who croak all night in the neighboring ponds, and still more so by the swarms of crickets, whose incessant chirping night and day disturbs my thoughts and interrupts me in composing. The old bachelor, Anacreon, praised the ‘clear-voiced cicadas,’ but I curse them. My head is sore, and I’ve been driven half crazy by the shrill noise of these tormenting spirits, these chirping evil demons. In vain my friend Socrates helped me catch and kill them for several days. Do you smile, lamb-hearted Sophocles? You are doubtless capable of giving us, without delay, an enthusiastic eulogy on the frogs and crickets.”
“Why not?” replied Sophocles, smiling. “All nature rejoices in sound, and sings. The waves, the winds, the pine-trees sing, the stone sings when touched by the foot of the pedestrian. And sound is so fond of hearing itself that, a second Narcissus, it ogles its own image in the mirror of the echo. Therefore, worthy Euripides, leave us the frogs and crickets.”
“There it is!” Euripides angrily interrupted. “Oh, these wits, these ‘beauty-blessed,’ ‘beauty-living’ people, or whatever else they choose to call themselves. They understand how to cover everything, even the most accursed, with the varnish of pretty figures of speech, never do they look seriously at the serious affairs of life. I tell you, crickets are insufferable insects, whatever old Anacreon and pious Sophocles may poetically write about them. Besides, as you know, it’s not only the frogs and crickets that disgust me with living on the soil of Attica. I no longer like Athens. People don’t care to endure the jeers of the street urchins about a runaway wife, however well they may be spiced with Attic wit. This life isn’t to my taste, and there are all sorts of threatening things in the air. What is the use of being more enlightened, if morals degenerate? Farewell! I am going to Salamis at once.”
“Must our happiness be dependent on place?” objected Sophocles. “We must remain at our posts. It ought to be the pride of a Greek, I think, to remain unchanged amid everything stern and gloomy that may assail him, and live on in undisturbed cheerfulness and beauty, as one who realizes, in the beautiful harmony of his own nature, the best and highest portion of human existence, and will allow nothing to disturb him in the noblest enjoyment of life.”
“And when age approaches, with shaking knees, and the sources of pleasure are exhausted?” observed Euripides.
“Then I will renounce the pleasure whose sources are dry,” replied Sophocles, “but only to seize, instead of the glad enjoyment of manhood, always connected with a certain uneasiness, the far more beautiful, divine repose and cheerfulness, the halcyon peace glorified by beauty, of age.”
“You speak like a son of the good old time,” answered Euripides, “and do not consider that we have gradually become too thoughtful to live in beautiful idyllic cheerfulness.”
“As for me,” Socrates now began, “I think what Sophocles has said about being obliged to preserve a beautiful harmony in our own natures very singular. I should like to learn, and some impulse urges me to ask him explicitly, whether in speaking of ‘beautiful harmony’ he has morality in view, or whether he thinks of harmony as beautiful, in the sense in which we call women or works of sculpture beautiful, charming, and pleasant to the eye? Whether, to express it differently, he places special importance on goodness, or what in the ordinary sense is called beautiful? Whereby we are brought back to the old question so often raised between us, but never settled, whether beauty should take precedence of goodness, or goodness of beauty?”
The truth-seeker gazed eagerly into the poet’s face, while awaiting his reply.
At the same moment a tumult arose in the throng, which meantime had assembled in the Agora. The signal for a popular assembly on the Pnyx had been given, and everybody was moving towards it.
Pericles, also preparing to take the same direction, said smiling:
“Nor can we settle your favorite question to-day, worthy son of Sophroniscus, for the Athenians are summoned to the Pnyx, and there are more urgent matters to be decided there.”
Socrates stood silent and perplexed, like a person who has been interrupted just at the wrong time.
“Myrmecides,” said an Athenian citizen to his neighbor, as he was in the act of leaving the Agora and ascending to the Pnyx with the rest of the excited crowd, “whatever we may decide up there to-day, I have a presentiment of evil, evil for Hellas. There are oracles—oracles of ill; there are also oracles of Bacis in circulation, now suddenly becoming intelligible. But the most ominous thing—you know Delos, sacred Delos, the island of the Ionian god Apollo, was never visited by an earthquake—”
“Never!” replied Myrmecides; “every boy knows from infancy that sacred Delos is fastened with brazen chains to the bottom of the sea, and cannot be shaken by subterranean storms like the other islands of the Archipelago.”
“So it was believed till yesterday,” continued Cynogenes; “but yesterday the news came that the ground trembled for a minute, and the subterranean storm passed beneath it with a hollow, threatening roar.”
“Delos shaken?” cried Myrmecides; “then there is nothing firm in Hellas.”
Other men joined Myrmecides and Cynogenes, mingling in their conversation. But they were soon interrupted and induced to turn by a loud tumult behind them on the Agora.
“A Megarian dog!” was the cry, “a Megarian dog! Kill him, stone him!”
A shrieking throng had hastily assembled around a man, who had been seized by several Athenians, and was now firmly held amid loud exclamations of anger.
It was not the first time a Megarian had been involved in a dangerous fray at Athens. Even before the Athenian market and harbor were prohibited to the Dorian city, many a citizen of the latter, when bringing a fat sucking-pig or other article to market, had been jeered, reviled, or rudely pulled about.
But the ill-will against the Megarians had risen to fury since the latter, with barbarous cruelty, had ventured to kill the herald sent from Athens to Megara. Since that day the Athenian people had sworn to stone any Megarian, who allowed himself to be caught in Athens.
The man thus assailed begged for his life, swearing by all the gods that he was no Megarian, but came from Eleusis.
“Don’t believe it!” cried the man who had first seized him and still held him with an iron grasp. “Don’t believe it! I know him. He’s a Megarian dog—a Megarian dog!”
At this moment several archons passed who, after inquiring into the affair, prevented the man’s murder, summoned several of the Scythian archers, and ordered him to be taken away as a prisoner.
On the Pnyx, a little apart from the place of the popular assembly, three men were whispering together in low, eager tones. These were Cleon, the tanner, Lysicles, the sheep dealer, and Pamphilus, the sausage-maker. They did not seem to agree.
The ambassadors of the Lacedemonians now came up the Pnyx to join the popular assembly of the Athenians. They had arrived to demand satisfaction for their ally, Megara, and measured the Athenians, who surrounded them, with scornful eyes.
One of the oligarchs whispered into the ear of another: “Shall we desire war or peace?”
“It might perhaps be profitable,” replied the other, “if the Peloponnesians would come and clear a little in the country.”
A few hours later, the Athenians came down from the Pnyx in a more excited mood than they had gone up. Numerous groups formed on the Agora.
“I think Pericles never spoke so admirably!” cried Myrmecides. “Oh, that fox with the lion’s face! How moderately he behaved, how quietly, how full of apparent compliance! How ready he seemed for any possible concession! Only he made counter demands, which he well knew would never be granted. What a master-stroke, when he said Athens was ready to restore perfect liberty to her allies, only Sparta must first do the same with hers.”
“I scent the smell of tar, the creak of oars, the shouts of trierarchs, the gilding of statues of Pallas at the Piræeus,” said Sporgilus thoughtfully.
“Why not, you coward?” cried the others. “Have you no fancy for a merry naval expedition?”
“Well, the sea is such a salt, bitter thing!” replied Sporgilus.
“Feed yourself on garlic,” echoed around him, “on garlic, you coward, like the fighting-cocks, that you may grow more ardent and get courage.”
The voice of the notorious tanner, Cleon, was now heard in another dense group. “I want war, but without Pericles!” he exclaimed. “The war ought not to be allowed to make Pericles greater. How shall we demand an account from him, how shall we get at him, if he is at the head of a fleet or army? So away with Pericles! The Spartans’ demand that he should be banished from Athens as an Alcmæonid, ought to have been granted. Banish Pericles! Banish Pericles!”
Thus Cleon shouted amid clumsy, vehement gestures, for he always flung his whole body about and did not remain a moment in the same place.
“War, but without Pericles!” he repeated incessantly.
Pamphilus was of the same opinion, but vying with the other in the loudness of his shrieks, added that Pericles ought not to be banished, but called to account for his management of public affairs and thrown into prison.
Old Cratinus now came up with Hermippus and a third companion, a youth, who had the “Attic glance” to a still higher degree than the other two, and it was said would soon come forward with a comedy.
“Are you for war or peace, old satyr?” shouted one of the crowd.
“I’m for roast hares, wine in the jar, silver in the strong-box, figs in the storehouses, garlanded goats, Dionysian festivals, new wine, beakers tilted upside down, gay dancing-girls—”
“So you’re for peace?”
“Yes indeed, and against having the Megarians shut out from the Athenian market. Be sensible, you violet-wreathed Athenians! Cease suspecting that every quean, who appears in the market, is a disguised Megarian. Since you excluded the Megarians there’s not a good sucking-pig, such as the old victors of Marathon deserve, to be had. We shall soon come to eating roasted crickets. Besides, why are you quarrelling about war and peace? Did the Spartans leave the popular assembly with any other answer, than the one Pericles proposed? Let Pericles rule and others of his stamp, the tanners, wool-dealers, and sausage-makers, who comb your beards, fan the flies from your heads, clean the dust from your shoes, and brush the specks from your clothes.”
These jibes made Cleon’s blood boil. “In one point,” said he, “Pericles has done right—in trying to muzzle the spiteful, disorderly little mob of comic writers, the curs, who snap at every man’s shanks.”
“Why, see Cleon!” exclaimed Cratinus; “Cleon, the fearless! I shouldn’t have ventured to come here, if I had known the greedy-toothed, horrible man with the rolling eyes was present. The smell of leather ought to have told me better.”
Cleon was furious. Myrmecides held him back, while Cratinus continued:
“You call us disorderly because we swing the whip over our heads, careless whom it hits? If it doesn’t always strike the right man, perhaps it does the right thing! Does Zeus, when he sends the lightning, ask where it strikes? It is enough for him if it purifies the air.”
“Old driveller!” cried Cleon, “are not you the man, who is said to draw his inspiration from the wine-cask?”
“And are not you,” retorted Cratinus, “a man swollen with venom, of whom it is said that a serpent lately bit him and—died? But no matter. We don’t fear. We’ll wage war with the stench of leather, the furious glances of the rolling blear eyes, with a hundred red-haired Cerberus heads. And when we have once got the better of the woman-hero Pericles, we’ll remember the knavish buffoons, sausage-makers, wool-dealers, and tanners, and rid ourselves of all the ‘violet-wreathed Athenians.’”
A shrill, jeering laugh suddenly rang out from behind a column. People looked around and saw mad Menon crouching there.
“Look at Menon!” cried the youngest of the three comic poets. “The fellow is so ragged and dirty, that Euripides will soon doubtless make him the hero of some touching drama.”
The Athenians laughed. Menon gnashed his teeth, exclaiming: “Scoundrels! violet-wreathed scoundrels!”
They wanted to beat him, but he set his dog on them.
The people then took up stones to throw them at his head, but at this moment Socrates passed, pitied the man, and led him out of the throng.
The crowd dispersed. Pamphilus, walking angrily away, saw Pericles, followed him and pursued him all day long with insults, whenever he caught sight of him.
Again he followed him. “You are a tyrant, like Pisistratus!” said he. “You only pretend to support democracy. In reality it is you alone, who hold the reins of Athens.”
Pericles was silent.
“You want to plunge the Athenians into a war,” continued Pamphilus, “that you may not be compelled to render any account.”
Pericles made no reply.
“You won’t recognize the merits of other men, who are no less fitted for orators and leaders of the people than you!” raved Pamphilus.
Pericles remained silent.
“You learned your art of government through intercourse with sophists and hetæræ. You have allowed the power of the Athenians to be stifled by increasing wantonness and effeminacy.”
As Pamphilus uttered these words Pericles reached home. The streets were very dark. According to Athenian custom, the statesman had a slave bearing a lighted torch behind him.
The slave knocked, and the porter opened the door. Pamphilus was still standing there.
“Go and light this man through the streets with your torch, it has grown dark!” said Pericles, and quietly entered the house.
Socrates, sometimes with and sometimes without his bosom friend, Euripides, went in and out of Pericles’ house. He still visited Aspasia, still liked to talk to her, but his own words constantly sounded more confused, mysterious and oracular.
A few days after the last meeting on the Pnyx, Socrates again entered Aspasia’s house and was soon engaged in eager conversation with her. Aspasia spoke with joyful courage of the impending conflict with the Dorians, but indignantly of the schisms in the Agora, the hostile designs of Diopeithes, the conduct of the friends of Laconia, the coarseness of the demagogues. “For the sake of these rude men,” she said, “we shall perhaps soon behold the fading flower of Hellas.”
“The fading flower of Hellas?” cried Socrates. “How could that be possible? Surely you are mistaken. How long is it since it was said that Hellas was approaching her most perfect bloom? Since the day when we stood joyously on the Acropolis before the completed Parthenon, and I thought the moment of that finest bloom had come, but you said that though our art had grown almost divine, many things were still lacking to thoroughly transform our lives and render them beautiful in every respect—since that day I have been very eager for the promised moment of perfect bloom, and waited impatiently for it. As I had heard of Eastern flowers, which secretly illumined by the eyes of Zeus, open their wondrous calixes only at midnight, I thought the flowering time of mortals might be similar, and the idea gave me no rest even at night; for I was always fearing I might lose the most beautiful moment while asleep. Above all else, I have constantly kept in view the new strange bond of love and marriage you and Pericles formed before my statue of the Graces; for it seemed to me that its success would secure the fairest bloom of Hellenic life. So, as you then expressly summoned us by-standers to be witnesses, I have faithfully discharged my office; for I undertook it in solemn earnest and thought myself summoned to be, not merely for a moment, but forever an attentive witness of that strange compact. But as in the garden we daily visit a particularly rare little tree, that promises to bear abundant fruit, always fearing to find it broken by some rude hand, touched by the frost or withered, and forever rejoice anew in its unimpaired freshness, I come to you, no longer to hear as formerly, but to see what love is, how it develops, from what point it emanates, and to what goal it tends. It is certainly an important matter when Ionians and Dorians are preparing for a decisive struggle; but almost more important to me is the history of your love-bond, and the final issue of the conflict going on beyond and within you. Nations are immortal, or at least long-lived, and their destiny may be constantly transformed and arranged anew; but a human fate is confined within a narrow circle, as it results it is generally fixed, for the Fates grant no time for renewal and readjustment. I watch the internal and external history of your love, so strangely founded on liberty. However light may be the steps with which it advances, my senses are not too dull to perceive them.”
“So, from a lover, you have become a spectator and witness of the love of others?” said Aspasia.
“From the day in the Lyceum, when, while hurrying away you called to me to sacrifice to the Graces, I have done so, but apparently in vain,” replied Socrates. “My lips have not become more delicate, nor my features more pleasing. And I have since comprehended that, to grasp the idea of beauty with the mind and at the same time enjoy it with the senses, is rarely, or never, allotted to one and the same mortal.”
Aspasia doubted whether the ardor, which had then blazed uncontrolled for a moment in the young sculptor’s soul was wholly extinguished.
The time for executing the little plan of vengeance, with which she had long intended to humiliate and shame the philosopher, seemed to have come.
She craftily began:
“That moment in the Lyceum, which you now recall after so long a time, has not vanished from my memory and, to be frank, I have often secretly regretted that unnecessarily and under a mistaken impression, I offended you by calling as I ran away, that you must sacrifice to the Graces, an exclamation you interpreted to mean that in order to be loved, you must first try to gain those qualities that render people lovable. I ought to have considered that you are a sage, who could not seriously yearn for my love. Since that time, Socrates, I have always felt that I owed you some satisfaction.”
“You to me?” said Socrates, with a mournful smile. “No, I had no satisfaction to ask of you; but ever since that moment I have thought I owed one to myself.”
“I was foolish in those days!” said Aspasia. “Now I could lean my head innocently on your breast, for I know—”
Aspasia and Socrates were sitting in a room very pleasantly and luxuriously furnished, and pervaded with delicate intoxicating perfumes, which seemed to exhale from Aspasia herself; for like the gods and goddesses of Olympus, she was always surrounded by an exquisite fragrance. She shone with fadeless charms, and a bewitching gayety animated her features. She seemed to be in the best possible mood—if anything so trivial as moods existed for Aspasia.
A dove was fluttering about the room. It was Aspasia’s favorite, a pretty creature, with lustrous white plumage and a bluish circle round its neck.
The bird often perched on Aspasia’s shoulder, seeking its usual dainties from the beauty’s lips, but frequently alighted also on Socrates’ head, settling there so pertinaciously, that the Milesian was often compelled to release her guest, and in so doing could not avoid coming into close proximity to him.
When she succeeded in driving the dove from Socrates’ head, it fluttered off and settled elsewhere, first uttering its low “gru, gru.”
“If the universal verdict of mankind had not decided that the cooing of doves sounded tender and affectionate,” said Socrates, “I should, according to my own taste, consider it disagreeable. I should call it a subdued neighing.”
“What?” cried Aspasia, “do you revile Aphrodite’s birds? Take care, lest the doves or the goddess herself seek vengeance upon you.”
“They have done it in advance!” replied Socrates.
“The ways of the gods are incalculable,” said Aspasia; “sometimes they are envious and withhold their gifts, then become favorably disposed and grant tenfold as much as they formerly denied. But Aphrodite is the most whimsical of all the goddesses. She requires any one who asks a favor of her to await the right moment and the right mood, and to return again and again. Whoever tries his fortune with her but once is foolish. Are you ignorant of this, Socrates? And does it not perhaps apply to beauties, as well as goddesses?”
“I don’t know,” replied Socrates, “for I haven’t tried.”
“There you did wrong!” said Aspasia. “It is your own fault, if you do not know whether Aphrodite and women are favorable to you.”
Aspasia made many similar bantering speeches, while caressing the dove and exchanging kisses with it. Socrates did not remember ever having seen her so extravagantly gay. The more coquettish she appeared, the more silent, grave, and thoughtful he became.
Again the dove, with a coo that was almost like a titter, perched on Socrates’ head; but this time entangled its tiny claws so closely in his hair, that it could not release them. Aspasia hastened to his assistance. He felt her fingers in his hair. The close proximity of a perfumed, charming woman thrilled him—her bosom was heaving close beside him. No sea heaves so maliciously, with such peril of hopelessly swallowing up its victim, as a woman’s breast.
The slightest movement—and Socrates would have received a fresh rebuff far more humiliating than the former one in the Lyceum, afforded his secret foe, the crafty beauty, another triumph by the hasty impulse of the heart and senses.
What thoughts passed through Socrates’ mind at that moment?
He rose quietly, saying calmly:
“Never mind the dove, Aspasia! I don’t think I have escaped the revengeful bird at too great a cost, by leaving a lock of my hair in its claws.
“I understand,” replied Aspasia, in an altered and somewhat haughty tone, “I understand that you don’t fear baldness. It is closely allied to wisdom, and you are a philosopher. You have grown so wise and perfect, that you deserve to be plucked perfectly bald by the talons of Aphrodite’s birds.”
“Baldness may suit the sage,” replied Socrates, “but know that I have renounced everything, even the fame of wisdom, and at this moment am thinking only of doing my duty as a citizen. I am going to-morrow, with others who have drawn the lot, to the camp before Potidæa. Alcibiades is going too.”
“So you don’t seem to have resigned that, after having as you say, given up everything else?” replied Aspasia.
“We obey the call of our native land,” replied Socrates. “Don’t you approve of it? Isn’t it to fight the Dorians?”
“Do you mean to fight the Dorians?” cried Aspasia. “Why, you have become a Dorian yourself.”
“No!” replied Socrates, “I believe I am a true son of thoughtful Pallas Athena.”
“In truth,” said Aspasia smiling, “you have turned from Eros and the Graces to cold, masculine Athena. What has become of the fervor that animated your soul, when you questioned me in the Lyceum about the nature of love?”
“My ardor,” replied Socrates, “has undergone the same change as your beauty, since Phidias apotheosized it in the Lemnian Aphrodite. As, in that statue, your charms have been elevated above all earthly and temporal things, so my love has been matured, deified, I might almost say petrified. The glowing coal has become a star.”
At this moment the fluttering dove again settled on Aspasia’s shoulder.
What fiend, what saucy Eros was concealed beneath the form of the bird?
It began to pull with its claws at the spot where a clasp confined the narrow edges of the chiton.
The bird’s feet moved restlessly, till the clasp opened and the garment fell back disclosing the gleaming white shoulder.
“Sacrifice that dove to the Graces!” said Socrates, covering with his cloak the bare shoulder of the beautiful woman, and taking his leave.
The proud Milesian turned pale, seized a silver mirror in one trembling hand, and for the first time was startled by a disfiguring shadow that swept over her features.
Was beauty no longer invincible? Was there something that ventured to defy it?
A thrill of fear ran through her limbs.
Alcibiades was greatly delighted, when the wish to appear in the field of martial honor, which he had expressed to Pericles, was at last fulfilled. Fate had numbered him, as well as Socrates, among the Athenian citizens who were to be sent to the seige of the rebellious city of Potidæa.
Up to this time the youth had continued his reckless mode of life, and never failed to supply material for the loquacity of the Athenians.
He had founded the society of Ithyphallians, which included the boldest and most reckless young men, who yielded to the most unbridled caprices, as might be expected from a society named for the unclean demon Ithyphallus. The initiation was wanton and whimsical to the most audacious degree. Only those were admitted, who thought themselves specially entitled to boast of this demon’s favor.
To deride the custom which prohibited carousing before noon, Alcibiades and his companions instituted a morning drinking-bout. He named a dog, of which he was very fond, “Demon,” and it was droll to hear him, like Socrates, speak of “his demon.”
Yet, though the wantonness with which the youth was constantly overflowing, thus seemed to strike Socrates, it did not prevent him from calling the same man the best and dearest of his friends. He really still cherished an almost mysterious affection for the truth-seeker, but apparently without granting him any influence over his conduct.
Even when Alcibiades set out for Potidæa, there were circumstances which afforded food for gossip. He ordered weapons of a special kind to be made, and had a shield of gold and ivory. On this shield, like a coat of arms, was an Eros, armed with the thunder-bolt of Zeus.
Eros with the thunder-bolt! A brilliant idea, worthy of a Hellenic brain. It really seemed at that time, as if the thunder-bolt of Zeus was about to pass into the hands of the winged boy.
Some of Alcibiades’ companions also went to the field, and sought to follow the example of their model in procuring costly and peculiar arms. Callias, Hipponicus’ son, is said to have gone to the war in a coat made of a lion’s skin.
There was one woman in Athens, who was filled with grief when Alcibiades was about to leave the city; a woman who had long known neither pain nor love, who not only despised the bonds of Hymen, but also derided the fetters of Eros, a woman who had said of herself: “I am not the priestess of love, but of pleasure.”
This woman was Theodota. It was she, as has already been mentioned, whom young Alcibiades considered his teacher, when he rushed into the whirlpool of pleasure and youthful extravagance. His vanity made him desire to call his own the most beautiful and famous hetæra in Athens, Theodota, who, though at that time no longer in the highest bloom of her beauty, was at the summit of her renown. Theodota was also proud of possessing Alcibiades, and the fact of his devotion no little increased her fame.
For some time Alcibiades enjoyed no woman’s society more than the dark-eyed Corinthian’s, and often invited his friends to merry revels in Theodota’s house. Her gayety, no less than her beauty, spiced the beaker of pleasure to her lover and his companions.
But Theodota was not always so joyous as she had been during the first part of her intercourse with Alcibiades. The youth was too beautiful for a woman’s heart, even though it had never loved and foresworn love forever, not to at last pay for the pleasure of his society with its freedom.
She had at first cared little, when her young friend smiled at other women and hetæræ; nay when Demos and Callias banqueted with him at her house, herself assembled young and charming women around her.
But the young Ithyphallian prince soon began to notice with dissatisfaction, that the Corinthian’s nature was changing. She appeared thoughtful and grave, sighed frequently, and her gay tenderness seemed impaired by a sort of passion and restlessness. Sometimes she clasped her favorite in a close embrace, as if to hold him forever, many a tear mingled with her kisses, and if Alcibiades smiled upon any other woman before her eyes, she turned pale and her lips quivered with a spasm of jealousy.
This change in Theodota did not please the reckless youth, who everywhere filled the cup of joy to the brim, drained it, and went on again.
Theodota’s charm and spell had vanished. She now seemed dismal to the gay young fellow.
At times, when she gave full vent to her jealousy, she aroused his anger; but he was more ready to forgive this, than the excess of tearful tenderness with which she annoyed him.
She vowed to love him only, to be his alone. This was a matter of indifference to him. The sole possession of one woman, the highest need of the mature man, is worthless and troublesome to the young rake.
He answered:
“You are commencing to become intolerable, since you began to torment me with your tearful complaints. You don’t know how ugly a woman is who, instead of bewitching by her radiant gayety and charming grace, allows her face to be disfigured by traces of jealousy, wets her own cheeks or even her lover’s with the hot, salt torrent of tears and, transformed into a fury, bursts into passionate accusations. You no longer amuse me, Theodota! You weary me! You will never bind me by dismal lamentations and passionate violence—you only foster and increase what I dislike. If I am to be what I was, become what you once were!”
She strove to seem gay, but usually failed. If Alcibiades left her in anger, she humbled herself, overwhelmed him with messengers and letters, hurried to him, loaded him with entreaties, allowed herself to be ill-treated by the insolent fellow.
One day Socrates came to his young friend’s house and found her lying, dissolved in tears, before the threshold of the pitiless youth.
She looked at him and recognized the man, who had once uttered so strange an eulogy of the gay “self-sacrifice,” of which she was no longer capable. She wanted what she then willingly dispensed with—to love and to be loved. Theodota bewailed her suffering to Socrates, who consoled and led her away.
He then intended to return to Alcibiades, to act as mediator for the woman; but was so lost in thought, that on reaching his door, he stood still, and when the youth came out, he found his friend on the threshold.
“What are you pondering over?” he asked.
“I just fancied that I was on the trace of the real nature of love. I believed for a moment I had found that it consists in either shedding tears or extorting them—abusing or being abused—trampling or being trampled upon—but in an instant I have grown doubtful again—”
When Alcibiades went to the camp at Potidæa, he thanked the gods for having escaped the love of the woman, who with bitter lamentations was tearing her hair in her grief at his departure.
After some time, Alcibiades wrote to Aspasia from the camp, as follows:
“You wished to learn from me how our friend Socrates proves himself in his new calling. Well, he is precisely the same in the camp before Potidæa, that he was years ago in Phidias’ studio. Sometimes he is animated with the greatest zeal, sometimes lost in idle reverie. In clear, starry nights when every one in the tents is sleeping, Socrates wanders about and watches, and thinks—and questions—and seeks—of course in vain. He is always renouncing knowledge, but it constantly urges him again to ponder, seek, and question.
“Long ago, when I was a boy and you, for a day, a Spartan youth who entered Pericles’ house, you told me of the friendships of the young Spartans, friendships which unite the younger and older men, making them inseparable companions in battle. A similar partnership has now been formed between me and Socrates. And certainly the worthy man always has enough to do, to prove himself my friend. I often quarrel with the people in the neighboring tents, who don’t like to hear me drink and sing with my friends at night, because, they say, we disturb their sleep. Nay, they even object to our being gay in the daytime, and turn up their noses if we drink a little after breakfast. They complain to the strategi and taxiarchs that, while pretending to be drunk, we play all sorts of insolent tricks on them and their slaves. So there is frequent quarrelling, and sometimes a little skirmish. In such cases the strategi and taxiarchs are powerless, and only Socrates’ intercession saves one or another from being stretched on the sand, or well beaten according to the rules of the gymnasium.
“I like Socrates, because he has not the pretentious character which renders other sophists, philosophers, and preachers of morality unbearable to me. He has a nobility of soul and quiet excellence, which no man in all Hellas is farther from possessing than myself. But we most admire what we have not, and contrasts apparently attract men to each other. At times something emanates from his usually unassuming nature, like the flash of a divine inspiration, and this has become more effective in the course of years. I have often noticed that any one struck by this flash seemed illumined and warmed—he blushed and his blood stirred as if in the presence of a lovely woman.
“A short time ago I planned a little nocturnal trick with Callias. Homer’s magnificent lines about the nocturnal expedition of Diomedes and Ulysses, and the capture of the steeds of Rhesus haunted our brains, and though the Potidæans hardly had steeds of that kind to steal, we intended to have a little adventure on our own account. We knew that small bodies of Potidæan troops often passed around the walls at night, and meant to attack one of these bands, slay them, and bring back their weapons as a prize. So towards midnight we quietly left the camp, and on arriving near the walls of Potidæa actually encountered a little troop of armed men, making their rounds. We rushed upon these fellows and killed a few of them, but the rest took flight and raised an alarm, which brought others to their aid, and thus reinforced they turned back and attacked us in greatly superior numbers. We made a brave stand, but I don’t know what would have become of us, if a man had not mingled in the fray as suddenly as if he had sprung from the earth. He rushed upon the Potidæans so boldly and with such eagerness, that the latter, after losing some of their best men, again found it advisable to give up the fight and fly to the shelter of the walls. The assistant was no other than Socrates, who had been accidentally lured out by the beautiful night, not in quest of adventure, but pursuing some thought, and wandering about outside of the camp, was attracted by the noise of our weapons and interfered just at the right time. On this occasion I saw what this man could do, if he were wholly a warrior. He rushed upon the Potidæans just as he used to attack the blocks of marble with his chisel in Phidias’ studio. And as, when a stone-cutter, the blocks of marble suffered when the thought-problem that occupied his mind presented special difficulties, on that starry night the heads of the Potidæans atoned for Socrates’ having again vainly endeavored to solve the mystery of the world. He is capable of listening to a bird’s song in the midst of a battle, or, when on duty as sentinel, fixing his eyes on the stars instead of the Potidæans’ movements. He is still in the habit of considering the most ordinary matter important, and if people doubt it, says things seem ghostly to him because he cannot understand them and they will not reveal their nature.
“At present he is brooding over a plan for rendering war unnecessary, and when he isn’t fighting the enemy himself, explains to us how horrible this alternate murdering of men is, how at some future time people who kill each other in battle will be talked of as we now speak of cannibals, and that a day will come when people will scarcely be able to understand that the human race was once so rude and savage. He says a league must be formed among the nations and a supreme court instituted, before which all disputes can be settled, and thinks something of the kind might be attained, if one or two countries would publicly declare that henceforth, in every war, they would take the part of the nation assailed or wronged. Dreams worthy of an original! The wings of men’s energy ought not to be clipped, and the world, without hate, contention, or war, would be as wearisome as without love.
“As for me, military employment seems to suit me. I believe I have already grown better.
“But these are things which must weary you. Farewell, Aspasia, and tell me how the rest of the city fares without Alcibiades.”
A small community can never possess a large army, but may have a great navy. Athens was in this situation, when King Archidamus of Sparta entered Attica with sixty thousand Peloponnesians. Most of her allies could also render aid only on the sea.
While the fleet was being prepared, the people from the rural districts overrun by Archidamus, flocked into the city. Those who found no shelter within the walls encamped in the open air, especially between the long walls, and managed as best they could. The whole space between the city and the Piræeus swarmed with these guests, and gradually a city of tents arose there. The poorer refugees found shelter in the huge butts used in Athens. From the city walls the inhabitants could see the watch-fires of the Peloponnesians encamped in the fields and vineyards; but, thanks to the fortifications Pericles’ zeal had long since provided, were secure from any assault. Faithful to his original plan, from which he would not allow himself to be diverted by the eager impatience of the Athenians, Pericles sent only horsemen out of the gates to guard the environs.
When Archidamus, from the heights of Attica, saw a proud fleet of a hundred vessels emerge from the Piræeus and steer towards the Peloponnesus, the event Pericles had foreseen instantly occurred. Seeing before them the impregnably-fortified city, and at the same time knowing that the unprotected cities of their native land were exposed to the powerful hostile fleet and the army it conveyed, the Peloponnesians departed, left Attica, and marched towards home across the isthmus.
Pericles had been obliged to relinquish the personal command of the navy, for he seemed indispensable in Athens, so long as the Peloponnesians still remained on Attic soil.
But when the latter retreated, his first enterprise was to march with a small, but admirably equipped army to Megara. The enraged Athenians imperatively demanded a settlement of their account with the hated city.
The statesman’s absence from Athens was again eagerly desired by many.
The owls on the Acropolis awoke and fluttered their wings.
Diopeithes, eager to execute his long-cherished plan of ruining the sculptor, availed himself of Menon’s services against Phidias.
A notorious sycophant, named Stephaniscus, appeared at the priest’s instigation as Phidias’ accuser. This man had married a hetæra, who, it was said, continued her profession in his house, while he sought a livelihood as a sycophant. In his bold indictment, he asserted that Phidias had laid aside and appropriated part of the gold given him to make the statue of Athena Parthenos. He also reproached him with having shown vanity incompatible with reverence for the gods and their sanctuaries, by carving his own likeness and that of Pericles in the representation of the battle of the Amazons on the goddess’ shield, and produced Menon as witness of the stealing of the gold. The latter had formerly been very frequently in Phidias’ rooms, rendering trifling services for such gifts as fell to the lot of beggars. During this time, he now asserted, he had once watched from a dark corner and seen Phidias, when he believed himself unobserved, take part of the gold given him for the statue and hide it, evidently to appropriate it himself.
The germs of calumny, long industriously sown by Diopeithes’ adherents, had grown luxuriantly, and Stephaniscus found well-prepared soil in the Athenian people.
The venerable sculptor, who had just arrived in Athens again, was thrown into prison at this accusation of Stephaniscus.
The creator of the most beautiful monument in the world, which, as Pericles said, the Athenian people had erected to itself for all futurity, was taken to prison under a disgraceful accusation.
As Diopeithes had availed himself of Pericles’ departure, the base, ambitious agitators also endeavored to extend their influence among the people during the absence of the only man who could restrain them.
The number of the common people in the city had been largely increased by the influx of the rural population, during the invasion of the Peloponnesians. Moreover, this throng had become accustomed to a certain idleness, and many remained in Athens after Archidamus’ departure, because their lands had been laid waste by the foe. Thus, as the number of impoverished citizens increased, the class called the rabble was gradually formed. These very starvelings, however, flocked most eagerly to the popular assemblies, because they received two obols there, and the councils on the Pnyx therefore became more crowded and noisy than ever. Cleon, Lysicles, and Pamphilus ventured forth more openly, and the Athenian nation gradually became accustomed to see people of this stamp ascend the orator’s platform.
Of these three men, Pamphilus was most positive in the opinion that an attempt to overthrow Pericles should be made. One day he stood in the Agora, surrounded by a large number of Athenian citizens, and explained to them for what reasons Pericles might be accused. He reviled him as a coward, who had allowed Attica to be ravaged by the enemy, tyrannically prescribed to the citizens the manner in which they should defend themselves, and during the whole time the Peloponnesians were on Attic soil, permitted no popular assembly to take place on the Pnyx, in order to be able to rule according to his own will.
There were many among the throng who shared Pamphilus’ opinion, a certain Crespilus in particular pressed forward, trying to surpass the sausage-maker in furious outcries against Pericles and showing the necessity of instantly arraigning him before the people.
Suddenly Sporgilus the barber came running up. “Good news!” he shouted. “A string of cracknels for the bearer of good tidings! Pericles is on the way home from Megara! He is already in Eleusis with his troops. He has chastised the Megarians properly, and will reach Athens to-day.”
Pamphilus turned green with rage. “Do you ask a string of cracknels?” he replied in a hollow tone. “Your tongue ought to be cut out for your news, you dog!”
The tidings produced a very depressing effect on the rest of the conspirators, and though Pamphilus still strove to stir up the throng, one after another stole away, believing it would be difficult to accomplish anything against the victorious Pericles, and the affair must be deferred until a more favorable opportunity.
As Crespilus, shrugging his shoulders, also turned to depart, the enraged Pamphilus seized him by the garment, shrieking:
“Coward! Deserter! Are you not ashamed to basely take to flight at the mere words: ‘Pericles is here!’ Look at me! I don’t fear meeting Pericles personally at any moment! I have courage. I was born on the day of the battle of Marathon!”
“I wasn’t!” replied Crespilus. “I was one of the children prematurely born in the theatre of Athens, of mothers shrieking with terror at the performance of Æschylus’ Eumenides.”
With this apology Crespilus wrenched his robe from Pamphilus’ hands, and ran away.
“They have gone,” cried the demagogue, gnashing his teeth, “scattered as if a pail of dish-water had been emptied on their heads.”
Just at that moment mad Menon came up and asked the cause of his wrath.
The latter bewailed his trouble.
“Fool!” said Menon grinning. “Do you want to overthrow a wall and vainly brace your shoulder against it? Lie down under it and go to sleep—at the right time it will fall on your head of its own accord.”