Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/59

 Persia. Of course, many causes of dispute, public as well as private, must have arisen among these wide-spread islands and seaports of the Ægean, connected with each other by relations of fellow-feeling, of trade, and of common apprehensions. the synod of Delos, composed of the deputies of all, was the natural board of arbitration for such disputes, and a habit must thus have been formed, of recognizing a sort of federal tribunal, to decide peaceably how far each ally had faithfully discharged its duties, both towards the confederacy collectively, and towards other allies with their individual citizens separately, as well as to enforce its decisions and punish refractory members, pursuant to the right which Sparta and her confederacy claimed and exercised also. Now from the beginning, the Athenians were the guiding and enforcing presidents of this synod, and when it gradually died away, they were found occupying its place as well as clothed with its functions. It was in this manner that their judicial authority over the allies appears first to have begun, as the confederacy became changed into an Athenian empire, the judicial functions of the synod being transferred