Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/224

 202 HISTORY OF GREECE, of Elis. They were here soon afterwards joined by Knemu?, who passed over with his squadron from Leukas. 1 These two incidents, just recounted, with their details, the repulse of Knemus and his army from Stratus, and the defeat of the Peloponnesian fleet by Phormio, afford ground for some interesting remarks. The first of the two displays the great inferiority of the Epirots to the Greeks, and even to the less advanced portion of the Greeks, in the qualities of order, dis- cipline, steadiness, and power of cooperation for a joint purpose. Confidence of success with them is exaggerated into childish rashness, so that they despise even the commonest precautions either in march or attack ; while the Greek divisions on then right and on their left are never so elate as to omit either. If, on land, we thus discover the inherent superiority of Greeks over Epirots involuntarily breaking out, so in the sea-fight we are no less impressed with the astonishing superiority of the Athe- nians over their opponents ; a superiority, indeed, noway inherent, such as that of Greeks over P^pirots, but depending in this case on previous toil, training, and inventive talent, on the one side, compared with neglect and old-fashioned routine on the other. Nowhere does the extraordinary value of that seamanship, which the Athenians had been gaining by years of improved practice, stand so clearly marked as in these first battles of Phormio. It gradually becomes less conspicuous as we advance in the war, since the Peloponnesians improve, learning seamanship as the Russians, under Peter the Great, learned the art of war from the Swedes, under Charles the Twelfth, while the Athenian tri- remes and their crews seem to become less choice and effective, even before the terrible disaster at Syracuse, and are irreparably deteriorated after that misfortune. To none did the circumstances of this memorable sea-fight seem so incomprehensible as to the Lacedaemonians. They had heard, indeed, of the seamanship of Athens, but had never felt it, and could not understand what it meant: so they imputed the defeat to nothing but disgraceful cowardice, and sent indignant orders to Knemus at Kyllene, to take the command, equip a larger and better fleet, and repair the dishonor. Three Spartan 1 Thucyd. ii, 84.