Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/175

 BATTLE OF XOTIUM. 15^ raand of his favorite pilot Antiochus, but with express orders on no account to fight until his return. While employed in this visit to Phoka?a and Klazomenze, Al kibiades, perhaps hard-pressed for money, conceived the unwar- rantable project of enriching his men by the plunder of the neighboring territory of Kyme, an allied dependency of Athens. Landing on this territory unexpectedly, after fabricating some frivolous calumnies against the Kymoeans, he at first seized much property and a considerable number of prisoners. But the in- habitants assembled in arms, bravely defended their possessions, and repelled his men to their ships ; recovering the plundered property, and lodging it in safety within their walls. Stung with this miscarriage, Alkibiades sent for a reinforcement of hoplites from Mitylene, and marched up to the walls of Kyme, where he in vain challenged the citizens to come forth and fight. He then ravaged the territory at pleasure : nor had the Kynifeans any other resource, except to send envoys to Athens, to complain of so gross an outrage, inflicted by the Athenian general upon an unoffending Athenian dependency. 1 This was a grave charge, nor was it the only charge which Al- kibiades had to meet at Athens. During his absence at Phoka:a and Kyme, Antiochus the pilot, whom he had left in command, disobeying the express order pronounced against fighting a battle, first sailed across from Samos to Notium, the harbor of Kolophon, and from thence to the mouth of the harbor of Ephesus, where the Peloponnesian fleet lay. Entering that harbor with his own ship and another, he passed close in front of the prows of the Peloponnesian triremes, insulting them scornfully and defying them to combat. Lysander detached some ships to pursue him, and an action gradually ensued, which was exactly that which Antiochus desired. But the Athenian ships were all in disorder, 1 Diodor. xiii, 73. I follow Diodorus in respect to this story about Kym which he probably copied from the Kymaean historian Ephorus. Cornelius Nepos (Alcib. c. 7) briefly glances at it. Xenophon (Hcllen. i, 5, 11} as well as Plutarch (Ly>and. c. 5) mention the visit of Alkibiades to Thrasybulus at Phoktea. They do not namo Kyme, however : according to them, the visit to Phokoea has no assignable purpose or consequences. But the plunder of Kyme is a circumstance botfc sufficiently probable in itself, and suitable to the occasion. 7*