Page:Greece from the Coming of the Hellenes to AD. 14.djvu/124

96 attack on Sardis had failed, the Ionian fleet was as yet untouched. Some time was required by the Persians to bring ships from Phoenicia capable of contending with the rebel fleet, which accordingly coasted along as far as Byzantium, successfully persuading the towns to join the revolt, and then returned southwards as far as Caria and Cyprus. The revolt thus begun lasted till B.C. 494. But after two years (500–498) it became chiefly a question of naval supremacy. The Persians having in the past two years recovered Cyprus and Caria, in spite of several disasters, left the fleet of the Ionians and their allies alone for a time and proceeded steadily to reduce the various towns, keeping up all the time a somewhat loose siege of Miletus. Aristagoras lost heart and fled to Myrcinus in Thrace, where he perished in combat with the natives. When Histiaeus came down to the coast, having persuaded Darius to send him to quiet the outbreak, he found that his part in promoting it was well known to Artaphernes, and that it was already almost hopeless of success. Finally, being refused admission to his own Miletus, he escaped to the Hellespont, where he maintained himself for some years and did not perish till the end of the revolt had come. That end was now inevitable. The Ionians in the allied fleet were ill-disciplined and averse to hardships, and though for a time they combined and submitted to the orders of an elected general, Dionysius of Phocaea, they soon resented his strictness and broke up into squadrons which went where they pleased. The Persians had now collected a fleet of 600 vessels,