Page:History of Greece Vol VII.djvu/41

23 SKIONJIAH CAPTIVES SLAIN. 23 subjects revolted and reconquered. Skione and its territory was made over to the Plataean refugees. The native population of Delos, also, who had been removed from that sacred spot during the preceding year, under the impression that they were too impure for the discharge of the sacerdotal functions, were now restored to their island. The subsequent defeat of AmphSpolis had created a belief at Athens that this removal had offended the gods ; under which impression, confirmed by the Delphian oracle, the Athenians now showed their repentance by restoring the Delian exiles. 1 They farther lost the towns of Thyssus on the peninsula of Athos, and Mekyberna on the Sithonian gulf, which were captured by the Chalkidians of Thrace.' 2 Meanwhile the political relations throughout the powerful Grecian states remained all provisional and undetermined. The alliance still subsisted between Sparta and Athens, yet with con- tinual complaints on the part of the latter that the prior treaty remained unfulfilled. The members of the Spartan confederacy were discontented ; some had seceded, and others seemed likely to do the same ; while Argos, ambitious to supplant Sparta, was trying to put herself at the head of a new confederacy, though as yet with very partial success. Hitherto, however, the author- ities of Sparta king Pleistoanax as well as the ephors of the year had been sincerely desirous to maintain the Athenian alliance, so far as it could be done without sacrifice, and without the real employment of force against recusants, of which they had merely talked in order to amuse the Athenians. Moreover, the prodigious advantage which they had gained by recovering the prisoners, doubtless making them very popular at home, would attach them the more firmly to their own measure. But at the close of the summer seemingly about the end of Sep- tember or beginning of October, B.C. 421 the year of these ephors expired, and new ephors were nominated for the ensuing year. Under the existing state of things this was an important revolution : for out of the five new ephors, two Kleobulus and Xenares were decidedly hostile to peace with Athens, and 1 Thucyd. v, 3-2. 2 Thucyd. v, 35-39. I agree with Dr. Thirl wall and Dr. Arnold i'i pre ferrin the