Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/405

 BCE01 IAN MUSTER. 333 us supports to them, were cut to obtain wood ; the houses adjoin- ing furnished bricks and stone : the outer temple-buildings them- eelves also, on some of the sides, served as they stood to facilitate and strengthen the defence ; but there was one side on which Jie annexed building, once a portico, had fallen down : and here the Athenians constructed some wooden towers as a help to the defenders. By the middle of the fifth day after leaving Athens, the work was so nearly completed, that the army quitted Delium, and began its march homeward, out of Boeotia ; halting, after it had proceeded about a mile and a quarter, within the Athenian territory of Oropus. It was here that the hoplites awaited the coming of Hippokrates, who still remainefl at Delium, stationing the garrison, and giving his final orders about future defence ; while the greater number of the light-armed and unarmed, sep- arating from the hoplites, and seemingly without any anticipation of the coming danger, continued their return-march to Athens. 1 Their position was probably about the western extremity of the plain of Oropus, on the verge of the low heights between that plain and Delium. 2 During these five days, however, the forces from all parts of Boeotia had time to muster at Tanagra : and their number was just completed as the Athenians were beginning their march the excellence of the wine drunk at Tanag, and of the abundant olive- plantations on the road between Oropus and Tanagra. Since tools and masons were brought from Athens to fortify Nisaea about three months before (Thucyd. iv, 69), we may be pretty sure that similar apparatus was carried to Delium, though Thucydids does not state it. 1 Thucyd. iv, 90. That the vines round the temple had supporting-stakes, which furnished the aravpoiif used by the Athenians, we may reasonably presume : the same as those x"P aK C which are spoken of in Korkyra, iii, 70 : compare Pollux, i, 162. angle at Orop6 towards the mouth of the Asopns, and stretches about five miles along the shore, from the foot of the hills of Markopulo on the east to the village of Khalkuki on the west, where begin some heights extend- ing westward towards Dhilisi, the ancient Delinm." " The plain of Oro pus is separated from the more inland plain of Tanagra by rocky gorges through which the Asopus flows." (Leake, Athens and the Deroi ef Attica vol. ii, sect-iv, p. 112.)
 * " The plain of Oropus (observes Col. Leake) expands from its upper