Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/449

 ATHENS AND SPARTA IN MARCH- 423 n. c. 427 jo small degree by the miserable jealousy of some of their chio. men ; 1 who, feeling themselves cast into the shade, and looking upon his splendid career as an eccentric movement breaking loose from Spartan routine, were thus on personal as well as political grounds disposed to labor for peace. Such collateral motives, working upon the caution usual with Sparta, determined her to make use of the present fortune and realized conquests of Brasi das as a basis for negotiation and recovery of the prisoners ; with out opening the chance of ulterior enterprises, which though they might perhaps end in results yet more triumphant, would una- voidably put in risk that which was now secure. 2 The history of the Athenians during the past year might, indeed, serve as a warning to deter the Spartans from playing an adventurous game. 1 Thucyd. iv, 108. 'O <5e ef TT)V AaKsdaifiova tyiepevoc -arpaTuiv re irpoir- CTroaTE/l/lav EKtkeve . . . . Ol 6e AaKedaipovioi r /UEV Kal (p&ovtj) inrb TUM npuruv uvSpuv ovx vTTijpsTriaav avrti, etc. $ai, TV%i ' KOI efi.e7ih.ov, em fiel^ov x u P^ ffavT S avrov avriitaka. KaracfT^aavTOf, TUV /J.EV aripea-dai, rolf 6' etc TOV laov u Ktvdweveiv Kal Kpar^aetv. This is a perplexing passage, and the sense put upon it by the best com- mentators appears to me unsatisfactory. Dr. Arnold observes : " The sense required must be something of this sort. If Brasidas were still more successful, the consequence would be that they would lose their men taken at Sphakteria, and after all would run the risk of not being finally victorious." To the same purpose, substantially, Haack, Poppo, Goller, etc. But surely this is a meaning which cannot have been present to the mind of Thucydides. For how could the fact, of Bra ridas being more successful, cause the Lacedaemonians to lose the chance of regaining their prisoners ? The larger the acquisitions of Brasidas, the greater chance did the Lacedaemonians stand of getting back their prison- ers, because they would have more to give up in exchange for them. And the meaning proposed by the commentators, inadmissible under all circum- stances, is still more excluded by the very words immediately preceding in Thucydides : " The Lacedaemonians were above all things anxious to get back their prisoners, while Brasidas was yet in full success ;" (for of with In must mean substantially the same as euc.) It is impossible immedi- ately after this, that he can go on to say : " Yet if Brasidas became stUi- wore successful, they would Zose the chance of getting the prisoners back." Bauer and Poppo, who notice this contradiction, profess to solve it by say Ing, " that if Brasidas pushed his successes farther, the Athenians would b
 * Thucyd. iv, 117. Toi)f yap ST) uv6paf Trepl irfaiovoc k^oiovvTO KOfii