Page:History of Greece Vol VII.djvu/158

140 1 ]!> HISTORY OF GREECK. and the losses in Thrace. But at the present moment, it was probably not less astonishing than grievous to the three generals, who had all left Athens prior to the success in Sphakteria. The Ionic cities in Sicily were soon made to feel that they had been premature in sending away the Athenians. Dispute between Leontini and Syracuse, the same cause which had occasioned the invocation of Athens three years before, broke out afresh soon after the pacification of Gela. The democratical government of Leontini came to the resolution of strengthening their city by the enrolment of many new citizens ; and a redivision of the ter- ritorial property of the state was projected in order to provide lots of land for these new-comers. But the aristocracy of the town upon whom the necessity would thus be imposed of parting with a portion of their lands, forestalled the project, seemingly before it was even formally decided, by entering into a treasonable correspondence with Syracuse, bringing in a Syracusan army, and expelling the Demos. 1 While these exiles found shelter as 1 Thucyd. v, 4. A.EOVTIVOI yap, uireXdovruv 'A.&TJVO.IUV tic S -rrjv {;vfj.[3aaiv, Tro/Urac TE f-eypu-^avru Tro/l/lovf, nal 6 df/fiof TT/V yf/v ievoei 'iva6u.aa(r&ai. Ol 6e dvvarol ala&ofievoi Svpanoaiovc re inuyovrai KO.L c/c/3a?. lovcri ruv 6?j[ioi>. Kal oi [J.EV kx/MVTi'di)oav (if c/cacrot, etc. Upon this Dr. Arnold observes : " The principle on which this ava6aafib<; yr,r was redemanded. was this ; that every citizen was entitled to his portion, K/J/pof, of the land of the state, and that the admission of new citizens -o.ndercd a redivision of the property of the state a matter at once of neces sity and of justice. It is not probable that in any case the actual K?.qprH (properties) of the old citizens were required to be shared with the new members of the state ; but only, as at Rome, the ager publicns, or land "till remaining to the state itself, and not apportioned out to individuals. This land, however, being beneficially enjoyed by numbers of the old citi- zens, either as common pasture, or as being fanned by different individuals on very advantageous terms, a division of it among the newly-admitted citizen", although not, strictly speaking, a spoliation of private property, was yc t a serious shock to a great mass of existing interests, and was there- fore always regarded as a revolutionary measure." I transcribe this note of Dr. Arnold rather from its intrinsic worth than from any belief that analogy of agrarian relations existed between Rome und Losntini. The ager publicus at Rome was the product of successive conquests from foreign enemies of the city : there may, indeed, have been originally a similar ager publicus in the peculiar domain of Rome itself, anterior to all conquests ; but this must at any rate have been verv small