Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/360

J42 HISTORY OF GREECE. last quarter before the full moon ; but after the full they engaged to march without delay. Five days' delay at this critical mo- ment might prove the utter ruin of the endangered city ; yet the reason assigned seems to have been no pretence on the part of the Spartans. It was mere blind tenacity of ancient habit, which we shall find to abate, though never to disappear, as we advance in their history. 1 Indeed, their delay in inarching to rescue Attica from Mardonius, eleven years afterwards, at the imminent hazard of alienating Athens and ruining the Hellenic cause, marks the same selfish dulness. But the reason now given certainly looked very like a pretence, so that the Athenians could indulge no certain assurance that the Spartan trcops would start even when the full moon arrived. In this respect the answer brought by Pheidippides was mis- chievous, as it tended to increase that uncertainty and indecision which already prevailed among the ten generals, as to the proper steps for meeting the invaders. Partly, perhaps, in reliance on this expected Spartan help, five out of the ten generals were decidedly averse to an immediate engagement with the Persians ; while Miltiades with the remaining four strenuously urged that not a moment should be lost in bringing the enemy to action, without leaving time to the timid and the treacherous to establish correspondence with Hippias, and to take some active step for paralyzing all united action on the part of the citizens. This most momentous debate, upon which the fate of Athens hung, is represented by Herodotus to have occurred at Marathon, after the army had marched out and taken post there within sight of the Persians ; while Cornelius Kepos describes it as having been raised before the army quitted the city, upon the question, whether it was prudent to meet the enemy at all in the field, or to confine the defence to the city and the sacred rock. Inaccu- rate as this latter author generally is, his statement seems more probable here than that of Herodotus. For the ten generals would scarcely march out of Athens to Marathon without having previously resolved to fight: moreover, the question between fighting in the field or resisting behind the walls, which had al- ready been raised at Eretria, seems the natural point on which 1 Herodot. ix, 7-10