Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/187

 CAPTURE OF EPIPOLAE. ] (J] The desertion of Magon explains of course a great deal of dis- couragement among the soldiers of Hiketas. But when we read the astonishing facility of the capture, it is evident that there must have been something more than discouragement. The soldiers on defence were really unwilling to use their arms for the purpose of repelling Timoleon, and keeping up the dominion of Hiketas in Syracuse. "When we find this sentiment so powerfully manifest- ed, we cannot but discern that the aversion of these men to serve, in what they looked upon as a Carthaginian cause, threw into the hands of Timoleon an easy victory, and that the mistrustful re- treat of Magon was not so absurd and cowardly as Plutarch re- presents. 1 The Grecian public, however, not minutely scrutinizing preli- minary events, heard the easy capture as a fact, and heard it with unbounded enthusiasm. From Sicily and Italy the news rapidly spread to Corinth and other parts of Greece. Everywhere the sentiment was the same ; astonishment and admiration, not mere- ly at the magnitude of the conquest, but also at the ease and ra- pidity with which it had been achieved. The arrival of the captive Dionysius at Corinth had been in itself a most impressive event. But now the Corinthians learnt the disappearance of the large Carthaginian host and the total capture of Syracuse, with- out the loss of a man ; and that too before they were even assured that their second reinforcement, which they knew to have been blocked up at Thurii, had been able to touch the Sicilian shore. Such transcendent novelties excited even in Greece, and much more in Sicily itself, a sentiment towards Timoleon such as hard- ly any Greek had ever yet drawn to himself. His bravery, his skilful plans, his quickness of movement, were indeed deservedly admired. But in this respect, others had equalled him before ; and we may remark that even the Corinthian Neon, in his cap- ture of Achradina, had rivalled anything performed by his supe- rior officer. But that which stood without like or second in Timo- leon that which set a peculiar stamp upon all his meritorious qualities was, his superhuman good fortune ; or what in the 1 Plutarch, Timoleon, c. 20, 21. Diodorus also implies the same verdict (xvi. 69), though his account is brief as well as obscure. H*