Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/179

 DISMISSAL OF ALKIBIADES. 157 "brining all the duties of a faithful, skilful, and enterprising commander, nevertheless failed, from obstacles beyond his own control, in realizing their hopes and his own promises. No such case occurred : that which did occur was materially different. Besides the absence of grand successes, he had farther been negligent and reckless in his primary duties ; he had exposed the Athenian arms to defeat, by his disgraceful selection of an un- worthy lieutenant ; 1 he had violated the territory and property of an allied dependency, at a moment when Athens had a para- mount interest in cultivating by every means the attachment of her remaining allies. The truth is, as I have before remarked, that he had really been spoiled by the intoxicating reception given to him so unexpectedly in the city. He had mistaken a hopeful public, determined, even by forced silence as to the past, to give him the full benefit of a meritorious future, but requiring as condition from him, that that future should really be meritori- ous, for a public of assured admirers, whose favor he had already sarned and might consider as his own. He became an altered man after that visit, like Miltiades after the battle of Marathon ; or, rather, the impulses of a character essentially dissolute and insolent, broke loose from that restraint under which they had before been partially controlled. At the time of the battle of Kyzikus, when Alkibiades was laboring to regain the favor of his injured countrymen, and was yet uncertain whether he should 1 Xi-noph. Ilcllen. i, 5, 16. Oi 'A&7)valoi, cjf Tjyye7.-&i> 'A?.Kiftiu6y, olofterot Jt' a ft e Tie tuv re ical uKpare lav airok- u^enivat rdf vai'f. The expression which Thncydides employs in reference to AlkibiadSs requires a few words of comment: (vi, 15) nal dripoaiq. KpuTiarc i ia-& evra T& T ov iro% fiov, ISia IKCHTTOI Totf eTriTTidevpaaiv airot i^eo-i?evrff, KOI u/.Aoif tirirptyavTes (the Athenians), ov 6tH paispov la$r, av TJ)V -KO'/.IV. The " strenuous and effective prosecution of warlike business ' here a- iribed to Alkibiades, is true of all the period between his exile and his last visit to Athens (about September B.C. 415 to September B.C. 407) During the first four years of that time, he was very effective against Athens ; during the last four, very effective in her service. But the assertion is certainly not true of his last command, which er.ded with the battle of Notium ; nor is it more than partially true at least, it ii an exaggeration of the truth, for the period before hh exile.