Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/495

 ROUT OF THE ATHENIANS 47i man right had probably seen the previous movement of Brasidaa against the other division, and though astonished at the sudden danger, had thus a moment's warning, before they were them- selves assailed, to halt and take close rank on the hill. Klearidas here found a considerable resistance, in spite of the desertion of Kleon ; who, more astonished than any man in his army by a catastrophe so unlocked for, lost his presence of mind and fled at once ; but was overtaken by a Thracian peltast from Myrkmus suid slain. His soldiers on the right wing, however, repelled two or three attacks in front from Klearidas, and maintained their ground, until at length the Chalkidian cavalry and the peltasts from Myrkinus, having come forth out of the gates, assailed them with missiles in flank and rear so as to throw them into disorder. The whole Athenian army was thus put to flight ; the left hurry- ing to Eion, the men of the right dispersing and seeking safety among the hilly grounds of Pangasus in their rear. Their suffer- ings and loss in the flight, from the hands of the pursuing peltasts and cavalry, were most severe : and when they at last again mus- tered at Eion, not only the commander Kleon, but six hundred Athenian hoplites, half of the force sent out, were found missing. 1 So admirably had the attack been concerted, and so entire was its success, that only seven men perished on the side of the vic- tors. But of those seven, one was the gallant Brasidas himself, who being carried into Amphipolis, lived just long enough to learn the complete victory of his troops and then expired. Great and bitter was the sorrow which his death occasioned throughout Thrace, especially among the Amphipolitans. He received, by special decree, the distinguished honor of interment within their city, the universal habit being to inter even the most eminent deceased persons in a suburb without the walls. All the allies attended his funeral in arms and with military honors : his tomb was encircled by a railing, and the space immediately fronting it 1 It is almost painful to read the account given by Diodoras (xii, 73, 74) ?f the battle of Amphipolis, when one's mind is full of the distinct and aimirable narrative of Thucydides, only defective by being too brief. It ig difficult to believe that Diodorus is describing the same event ; so totally different are all the circumstances, except that the Lacedaemonians at last gain the victory. To say, with "Wesseling in his ncte, " Haec non usquequa </iie conveniunt Thucydideis," is prodigiously below the truth