Page:History of Greece Vol X.djvu/498

 476 HISTORY OF GKEECE. Messene. 1 He was anxious to conciliate then for the present, at all price, in order that the Carthaginians, when he came to exe cute his plans, might find no Grecian allies to cooperat ', with them in Sicily. He acquired an influence in Messene, by making tc the city large concessions of conterminous territory ; on which side of the border, or how acquired, we do not know. He farther endeavored to open an intimate connection with Rhegium by mar- rying a Rhegine wife ; Avith which view he sent a formal message to the citizens, asking permission to contract sach an alliance, ac- companied with a promise to confer upon them important benefits, both in territorial aggrandizement and in other ways. After a public debate, the Rhegines declined his proposition. The feeling in their city was decidedly hostile to Dionysius, as the recent de- stroyer of Naxus and Katana ; and it appears that some of the speakers expressed themselves with contemptuous asperity, re- marking that the daughter of the public executioner was the only fit wife for him. 2 Taken by itself, the refusal would be sufficiently galling to Dionysius. But when coupled with such insulting re- marks (probably made in public debate in the presence of his own envoys, for it seems not credible that the words should have been embodied in the formal reply or resolution of the assembly 3 ), it left the bitterest animosity; a feeling, which we shall hereafter find in full operation. Refused at Rhegium, Dionysius sent to prefer a similar request, with similar.offers, at the neighboring city of Lokri ; where it was favorably entertained. It is remarkable that Aristotle comments upon this acquiescence of the Lokrians as an act of grave impru- dence, and as dictated only by the anxiety of the principal citizens, in an oligarchical government, to seek for aggrandizement to them- selves out of such an alliance. The request would not have been granted (Aristotle observes) either in a democracy or in a well- regulated aristocracy. The marital connection now contracted by Dionysius with a Lokrian female, Doris, the daughter of a citizen of distinction named Xenetus, produced as an ultimate conse- 1 Diodor. xiv, 40. 2 Diodor. xiv, 44, 106, 107. 3 Diodorus, when he first mentions the answer, docs not give this remark as comprised in it: though he afterwards alludes to it as having been said to be (aal) so comprised (xix, 44-107).