Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/210

 188 HISTORY OF QREECfc. Thucydides, illustrates forcibly the respectful reluctance uilli which the Lacedaemonians first brought themselves to assail this scene of the gloi'ies of their fathers. What deserves remark is, that their direct sentiment attaches itself, not at all to the Plataean people, but only to the Plataean territory ; it is purely local, though it becomes partially transferred to the people, as tenants of this spot, by secondary association. It was, however, nothing but the long-standing antipathy 1 of the Thebans which induced Archidamus to undertake the enterprise ; for the conquest of Platasa was of no avail towards the main objects of the war, though its exposed situation caused it to be crushed between the two great contending forces in Greece. Archidamus now commenced the siege forthwith, in full hopes that his numerous army, the entire strength of the Peloponnesian confederacy, would soon capture a place of no great size, and probably not very well fortified ; yet defended by a resolute gar- rison of four hundred native citizens, with eighty Athenians : there was no one else in the town except one hundred and ten female slaves for cooking. The fruit-trees, cut down in laying waste the cultivated land, sufficed to form a strong palisade all round the town, so as completely to block up the inhabitants. Next, Archidamus, having abundance of timber near at hand in the forests of Kithairon, began to erect a mound up against a portion of the town wall, so as to be able to march up by an inclined plane, and thus take the place by assault. Wood, stones, and earth, were piled up in a vast heap, cross palings of wood being carried on each side of it, in parallel lines at right angles to the town wall, for the purpose of keeping the loose mass of materials between them together. For seventy days and as many nights did the army labor at this work, without any inter- mission, taking turns for food and repose : and through such unremitting assiduity, the mound approached near to the height of the town wall. But as it gradually mounted up, the Pla- fceans were not idle on their side: they constructed an addi- tional wall of wood, which they planted on the top of their own town wall, so as to heighten the part over against the enemy's mound : sustaining it by brickwork behind, for which the neigh- 1 Thucvd. iii. 68.