Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/114

 88 IIISTOlrt OF GREECE. leaders for not having before told them what was projected ; just as the Ten Thousand Greeks in the army of Cyrus, on reaching Tarsus, complained of Klearchus for having kept back the fact that they were marching against the Great King. It required all the eloquence of Dion, with his advanced age, 1 his dignified pre- sence, and the quantity of gold and silver plate in his possession, to remove their apprehensions. How widely these apprehensions were felt, is shown by the circumstance, that out of one thousand Syracusan exiles, only twenty-five or thirty dared to join him. 2 After a magnificent sacrifice to Apollo, and an ample banquet to the soldiers in the stadium at Zakynthus, Dion gave orders for embarkation in the ensuing morning. On that very night the moon was eclipsed. We have already seen what disastrous conse- quences turned upon the occurrence of this same phenomenon fifty-six years before, when Nikias was about to conduct the de- feated Athenian fleet away from the harbor of Syracuse. 3 Under the existing apprehensions of Dion's band, the eclipse might well have induced them to renounce the enterprise ; and so it probably would, under a general like Nikias. But Dion had learnt astro- mony ; and what was of not less consequence, Miltas, the prophet of the expedition, besides his gift of prophecy, had received instruction in the Academy also. When the affrighted soldiers inquired what new resolution was to be adopted in consequence of so grave a sign from the gods, Miltas arose and assured them that they had mistaken the import of the sign, which promised them good fortune and victory. By the eclipse of the moon, the gods intimated that something very brilliant was about to be darkened over : now there was nothing in Greece so brilliant as the despot- ism of Dionysius at Syracuse ; It was Dionysius who was about to suffer eclipse, to be brought on by the victory of Dion.4 Re- assured by such consoling words the soldiers got on board. They had good reason at first to believe that the favor of the gods waited upon them, for a gentle and steady Etesian breeze carried them across midsea without accident or suffering, in twelve 1 Plutarch, Dion, c. 23. uvr/p rraprjKftaKuf i]6ri, etc. ' Thucyd. vii. 50. See Volume VII. of this History, Chap. Ix. p. 314. 4 Plutarch, Dion, r. 24.
 * Plutarch, Dion, c. 22; Diodor. xvi. 10.