Page:History of Greece Vol VII.djvu/175

157 ENLARGEMEN1 OK 7 HE ARMAMENT. 157 risk and cost, but warmly extolled his frankness not less than his sagacity, as the only means of making success certain. They were ready to grant without reserve everything which he asked, with an enthusiasm and unanimity such as was rarely seen to reign in an Athenian assembly. In fact, the second speech of Nikias had brought the two dissentient veins of the assembly into a confluence and harmony, all the more welcome because unexpected. While his partisans seconded it as the best way of neutralizing the popular madness, his opponents Alkibiades, the Egesta^ans, and the Leontines caught at it with acclama- tion, as realizing more than they had hoped for, and more than they could ever have ventured to propose. If Alkibiades had demanded an armament on so vast a scale, the people would have turned a deaf ear. But such was their respect for Nikias on the united grounds of prudence, good fortune, piety, and favor with the gods that his opposition to their favorite scheme had really made them uneasy ; and when he made the same demand, they were delighted to purchase his concurrence by adopting all such conditions as he imposed. 1 It was thus that Nikias, quite contrary to his own purpose, not only imparted to the enterprise a gigantic magnitude which its projectors had never contemplated, but threw into it the whole soul of Athens, and roused a burst of ardor beyond all former example. Every man present, old as well as young, rich and poor, of all classes and professions, was eager to put down his name for personal service. Some were tempted by the love of gain, others by the curiosity of seeing so distant a region, others again by the pride and supposed safety of enlisting in so irre- sistible an armament. So overpowering was the popular voice in calling for the execution of the scheme, that the small minor- ity who retained their objections were afraid to hold up their hands, for fear of incurring the suspicion of want of patriot- ism. When the excitement had somewhat subsided, an orator named Demostratus, coming forward as spokesman of this sen- timent, urged Nikias to decT.are at once, without farther evasion, what force he required from the people. Disappointed as Nikias was, yet being left without any alternative, he sadly responded to the appeal ; saying, that he would take farther counsel witb 1 riutarch Compare Nikias and Crassus. c. 3.