Page:History of Greece Vol VII.djvu/378

360 SGO HISTORY OF GREECE. affairs in Sicily were proceeding badly ; but the closing series of calamities, down to the final catastrophe, would only come to theit knowledge indirectly ; partly through the triumphant despatches transmitted from Syracuse to Sparta, Corinth, and Thebes, partly through individual soldiers of their own armament who escaped, According to the tale of Plutarch, the news was first made known at Athens through a stranger, who, arriving at Peincus, went into a barber's shop and began to converse about it, as upon a theme which must of course be uppermost in every one's mind. The astonished barber, hearing for the first time such fearful tidings, ran up to Athens to communicate it to the archons as well as to the public in the market-place. The public assembly being forthwith convoked, he was brought before it, and called upon to produce his authority, which he was unable to do, as the stranger had disappeared. He was consequently treated as a fabricator of uncertified rumors for the disturbance of the public tranquillity, and even put to the torture. 1 How much of this improbable tale may be true, we cannot determine ; but we may easily believe that neutrals, passing from Corinth or Megara to Peiraeus, were the earliest communicants of the misfortunes of Nikias and De- mosthenes in Sicily during the months of July and August. Presently came individual soldiers of the armament, who had got away from the defeat and found a passage home ; so that the bad news was but too fully confirmed. But the Athenians were long before they could bring themselves to believe, even upon the testimony of these fugitives, how entire had been the destruc- tion of their two splendid armaments, without even a feeble rem- nant left to console them. 2 As soon as the full extent of their loss was at length forced upon their convictions, the city presented a scene of the deepest afflic- tion, dismay, and terror. Over and above the extent of private mourning, from the loss of friends and relatives, which overspread nearly the whole city, there prevailed utter despair as to the public safety. Not merely was the empire of Athens apparently lost, but Athens herself seemed utterly defenceless. Her treasury was empty, her docks nearly destitute of triremes, the flower of 1 riutarch, Nikias, c. 30. lie gives the story without much confidence, 'Ad?)va;oyf (5c ao i, etc. " Tliucytl. viii, 1.