Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/329

 DEFEAT OF THE AMBRAKIOTS AT IDOMENE. 307 fhe pass on the next morning. On that same night, a detachment of Amphilochians, under direction from Demosthenes, seized the higher of the two peaks ; while that commander himself, dividing his forces into two divisions, started from his position at Olpce in the evening after supper. One of these divisions, having the advantage of Amphilochian guides in their own country, marched by an unfrequented mountain road to Idomene ; the other, under Demosthenes himself, went directly through the pass leading from Idomeng to Olpae. After marching all night, they reached the camp of the Ambrakiots a little before daybreak, Demosthenes himself with his Messenians in the van. The surprise was com- plete ; the Ambrakiots were found still lying down and asleep, while even the sentinels, uninformed of the recent battle, hear- ing themselves accosted in the Doric dialect by the Messenians, whom Demosthenes had placed in front for that express purpose, and not seeing very clearly in the morning twilight, mistook them for some of their own fellow-citizens coming back from the other camp. The Akarnanians and Messenians thus fell among the Ambrakiots sleeping and unarmed, and without any possibil ity of resistance. Large numbers of them were desti'oyed on the spot, and the remainder fled in all directions among the neighbor- ing mountains, none knowing the roads and the country ; it was the country of the Amphilochians, subjects of Ambrakia, but sub- jects averse to their condition, and now making use of their perfect local knowledge and light-armed equipment, to inflict a terrible revenge on their masters. Some of the Ambrakiots became entangled in ravines, others fell into ambuscades laid by the Amphilochians. Others again, dreading most of all to fall into the hands of the Amphilochians, barbaric in race as well as intensely hostile in feeling, and seeing no other possibility of escaping them, swam off to the Athenian ships cruising along the shore. There were but a small proportion of them who survived to return to Ambrakia. 1 The complete victory of Idomene, admirably prepared by Demosthenes, was achieved with scarce any loss : and the Akar- nanians, after erecting their trophy, despoiled the enemy's dead and carried off the arms thus taken to Argos. 1 Thucvd.iii. 112.