Page:History of Greece Vol VII.djvu/301

283 N1KIAS AND THE ATHENIANS. 283 vices which an officer ought to have rendered, but has not : instead of angry caj. tiousness, we discover an indulgence not merely gen- erous, but even culpable, in the midst of disappointment and humiliation : instead of a public assembly, wherein, as it is com- monly depicted, the criminative orators were omnipotent, and could bring to condemnation any unsuccessful general, however meritorious ; we see that even grave and well-founded accusations make no impression upon the people in opposition to preestab- lishcd personal esteem ; and personal esteem for a man who not only was no demagogue, but in every respect the opposite of a demagogue : an oligarch by taste, sentiment, and position ; who yielded to the democracy nothing more than sincere obedience, coupled with gentleness and munificence in his private bearing. If Kleon had committed but a small part of those capital blunders which discredit the military career of Nikias, he would have been irretrievably ruined. So much weaker was his hold upon his countrymen, by means of demagogic excellences, as compared with those causes which attracted confidence to Nikias ; his great family and position, his wealth dexterously expended, his known incorruptibility against bribes, and even comparative absence cf personal ambition, his personal courage combined with reputation for caution, his decorous private life and ultra-religious habit?. All this assemblage of negative merits, and decencies of daily life, in a citizen whose station might have enabled him to act with the insolence of Alkibiades, placed Nikias on a far firmer basis of public esteem than the mere power of accusatory speech in the public assembly or the dikastery could have done. It entitled him to have the most indulgent construction put upon all his short-comings, and spread a fatal varnish over his glaring incompetence for all grave and responsible command. The incident now before us is one of the most instructive in all history, as an illustration of the usual sentiment, and strongest causes of error, prevalent among the Athenian democracy, and as a refutation of that exaggerated mischief which it is common to impute to the person called a demagogue. Happy would it have been for Athens had she now had Kleon present, or any other demagogue of equal power, at that public assembly which took the melancholy resolution of sending fresh forces to Sicily and continuing JSikias in the command ! The case was one ki