The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [286]
32. Pericles, as soon as news was brought him of the disaster that had befallen his army, made all the haste he could to come in to their relief,
33. And having defeated Melissus, he immediately proceeded to hem them in with a wall, resolving to master them and take the town,
34. Rather with some cost and time than with the wounds and hazards of his citizens.
35. But as it was a hard matter to keep back the Athenians, who were vexed at the delay,
36. And were eagerly bent to fight, he divided the whole multitude into eight parts, and arranged by lot that that part which had the white bean should have leave to feast and take their ease while the other seven were fighting.
37. And this is the reason, they say, that people, when at any time they have been merry and enjoyed themselves, called it white day, in allusion to this white bean.
38. In the ninth month the Samians surrendered. Pericles pulled down their walls and seized their shipping,
39. And set a fine of a large sum of money upon them, part of which they paid down at once,
40. And they agreed to bring in the rest by a certain time, and gave hostages for security.
41. Duris the Samian makes a tragical drama out of these events, charging the Athenians and Pericles with a great deal of cruelty,
42. Probably with little regard to truth; for no other historians report such a thing.
43. Duris is likely to have exaggerated the calamities which befell his country, to create odium against the Athenians.
44. On his return to Athens Pericles took care that those who died in the war should be honourably buried,
45. And made a funeral harangue, as the custom is, in their commendation at their graves, for which he gained great admiration.
46. As he came down from the stage on which he spoke, the rest of the women came and complimented him, taking him by the hand, and crowning him with garlands and ribbons, like a victorious athlete in the games;
47. But Elpinice, coming near to him, said, ‘These are brave deeds, Pericles, that you have done, and such as deserve our chaplets;
48. ‘Who have lost us many a worthy citizen, not in a war with Phoenicians or Medes, like my brother Cimon, but for the overthrow of an allied and kindred city.’
49. As Elpinice spoke these words, Pericles, smiling quietly, replied with this verse: ‘Old women should not seek to be perfumed.’
50. Ion says that Pericles indulged very high and proud thoughts of himself for conquering the Samians,
51. Whereas Agamemnon was ten years taking a barbarous city, he had in nine months vanquished and taken the greatest and most powerful of the Ionians.
52. And indeed it was not without reason that he assumed this glory to himself, for, in real truth, there was much uncertainty and great hazard in this great war,
53. If so be, as Thucydides tells us, the Samian state was within a very little of wresting the whole power and dominion of the sea out of the Athenians’ hands.
Chapter 44
1. After this, the Peloponnesian war beginning to break out in full tide, Pericles advised the people to help the Corcyraeans, who were being attacked by the Corinthians,
2. And thereby to secure to themselves an island possessed of great naval resources, since the Peloponnesians were already all but in actual hostilities against Athens.
3. The people readily consented to this, so Pericles dispatched Lacedaemonius, Cimon’s son, with ten ships, as if out of a design to affront him;
4. For there was a great kindness and friendship betwixt Cimon’s family and the Lacedaemonians;
5. So, in order that Lacedaemonius might lie the more open to a charge, or suspicion at least, of favouring the Lacedaemonians and playing false,
6. If he performed no considerable exploit in this service, he allowed him a small number of ships, and sent him out against his will;
7. And indeed he made it somewhat his business to hinder Cimon’s sons from rising in the state,
8. Professing that by their very names they were not to be looked upon as native and true Athenians,
9. But foreigners and strangers,