Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/274

 g>6 HISTORY OF GREECE. who followed him, was enriched by merely picking up the piece* which dropped on the floor. Nor was this all. Darius gave him a splendid house and furniture, made him the companion of his table, and showed him every description of favor. He was about to crucify the Egyptian surgeons who had been so unsuccessful in their attempts to cure him ; but Demokedes had the happiness of preserving their lives, as well as of rescuing an unfortunate companion of his imprisonment, an Eleian prophet, who had followed the fortunes of Polykrates. But there was one favor which Darius would on no account grant ; yet upon this one Dvmokedes had set his heart, the liberty of returning to Greece. At length accident, combined with his own surgical skill, enabled him to escape from the splen- dor of his second detention, as it had before extricated him from the misery of the first. A tumor formed upon the breast of Atossa ; at first, she said nothing to any one, but as it became too bad for concealment, she was forced to consult Demokedes. He promised to cure her, but required from her a solemn oath that she would afterwards do for him anything which he should ask, pledging himself at the same time to ask nothing indecent. 1 The cure was successful, and Atossa was required to repay it by procuring his liberty. He knew that the favor would be re- fused, even to her, if directly solicited, but he taught her a strat- agem for obtaining under false pretences the consent of Darius. She took an early opportunity, Herodotus tells us, 2 in bed, of reminding Darius that the Persians expected from him some positive addition to the power and splendor of the empire ; and when Darius, in answer, acquainted her that he contemplated a speedy expedition against the Scythians, she entreated him to postpone it, and to turn his forces first against Greece : " I have The ladies in a Persian harem appear to have been less unapproachable and invisible than those in modern Turkey ; in spite of the observation of Plutarch, Artaxerxes, c. 27. 1 Herodot. iii, 133. SeTjaeadai 6i ov&evbs ruv ova ala^vvrjv eari QepovTa. Another Greek physician at the court of Susa, alxmt seventy years after- wards, Apollonides of Kos, in attendance on a Persian princess, did n rt impose upon himself the same restraint : his intrigue was divulged, and ha Jra put to death miserably (Ktesia?, Persica, c. 42). 1 Herodot. iii, 134.