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Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History, a non-fiction book by Charlotte M. Yonge |
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Chapter 31. The Last Struggles Of Athens. B.C. 334-311 |
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_ CHAPTER XXXI. THE LAST STRUGGLES OF ATHENS. B.C. 334-311 The generals of Alexander met in dismay and grief the morning after his death at Babylon, and Perdiccas sadly laid the ring on the empty throne. There was no one to go on with what he had begun, for though he had a brother named Arridaeus, the poor youth was weak in mind; and Alexander's own son was a little, helpless infant. These two were joined together as Kings of Macedon and Shahs of Persia, and four guardians were appointed for them, who really only used their names as a means of getting power for themselves. The Greek cities had always hated the yoke of Macedon, and hoped that Alexander would be lost in the East. They had been restless all this time, and had only been kept down by the threats and the bribes of Antipater, the governor of Macedon. When the news of Alexander's death first came to Athens, the people were ready to make a great outbreak, but the more cautious would not believe it, and Phocion advised them to wait, "for," he said, "if he is dead to-day, he will still be dead to-morrow and the next day, so that we may take council at our leisure." Phocion was a good and honest man, but low-spirited, and he thought quiet the only hope for Athens. When he found that the citizens were making a great boasting, and were ready to rush into a war without counting the cost, he said he would advise one only "whenever he saw the young men ready to keep their ranks, the old men to pay the money, and the orators to abstain from taking it for themselves." However, the Athenians made a league with the Thessalians and other Greeks against Macedon, and put their army under the command of Leosthenes, a young man to whom Phocion said, "Your speeches are like cypress trees, stately and lofty, but bearing no fruit." Leosthenes defeated Antipater and the Macedonians at Lamia, and besieged them; but still Phocion had no hope, and when asked whether he could wish for better success, he said, "No, but better counsels." Demosthenes had in the meantime been banished by the spite of some of his secret enemies. He was very angry and bitter, and as he lived in AEgina, whence he could still see the Acropolis and temple of Pallas Athene, he exclaimed, "Goddess, what favourites thou halt chosen--the owl, the ass, and the Athenians;" but in these days of joy a ship was sent by the State to bring him home, and fifty talents were granted to him. But Leosthenes was killed by a stone from the walls of Lamia, and some Macedonian troops came home from the East to the help of Antipater. They were defeated by land, but they beat the Athenians by sea; and in a second battle such a defeat was given to the Greeks that their league against Macedon was broken up, and each city was obliged to make peace for itself separately. Antipater made it a condition of granting peace that all who had favoured resistance to Macedon should be treated as rebels. Demosthenes and his friends fled from Athens, and took refuge at the temples of different gods; but the cruel Macedonian was resolved that they should all be put to death, and took a set of ruffians into his pay, who were called the Exile-hunters, because they were to search out and kill all who had been sent away from their cities for urging them to free themselves. Demosthenes was in the temple of Neptune at Calaurea. When the exile-hunters came thither, he desired time to write a letter to his friends, spread a roll of parchment before him, and bit the top of the reed he was writing with; after which he bowed his head, and covered it with his robe. There was poison hidden in the top of the reed, and presently he rose up and said, "Act the part of Creon, and throw my body to the dogs. I quit thy sanctuary, Neptune, still breathing, though Antipater and the Macedonians have not spared it from pollution." He tried to reach the door, but as he passed the altar, fell, and died with one groan. Poor Athens was quite struck down, and the affairs were chiefly managed by Phocion, who was a thoroughly honest, upright man, but submitted to let the Macedonians dictate to the city, because he did not think the Athenians could make head against them. Antipater could never persuade him to take any reward for himself, though others who were friends of Macedon could never be satisfied with bribes. Meantime, Perdiccas was coming home, bringing with him the two young kings, uncle and nephew, and meaning to put Antipater down; but he turned aside on his way to attack Ptolemy, the ablest of all Alexander's generals, who was commanding in Egypt, and in trying to cross the Nile a great part of his army was cut off, and multitudes were eaten by the crocodiles. The few who were left rose against him and murdered him in his tent, then offered the command and guardianship of the kings to Ptolemy; but he would not take it, and chose rather to stay and make himself king of Egypt, where his family reigned at Alexandria for three hundred years, all the kings being called Ptolemy. Antipater was by this time an old man, and he died a little after; and his son Cassander expected to take the government of Macedon, but, to his surprise, found that his father had appointed the old general Polysperchon in his stead. This he would not endure, and a war arose between the two. One of Cassander's friends took possession of the Piraeus, to hold it for him; and Phocion was accused of having advised it, and was obliged to flee with his friends into a village in Phocis, where they were made prisoners by Polysperchon, who thought to please the Athenians by sending them in waggons to Athens to be tried. A mob of the worst sort came together, and would not hear their defence, but sentenced them to die by taking hemlock. When Phocion was asked whether he had any message for his son, he said, "Only that he bear no grudge against the Athenians." There was not enough hemlock to poison all, and more was sent for. The jailer desired to be paid, and Phocion said, "Give the man his money. One cannot even die for nothing in Athens." Phocion is sometimes called the last of the Athenians, but it was a sad kind of greatness, for he could not give them freedom, and only tried to keep them from the misery of war by submission to Macedon. The Spartans would give no help; and though the little city of Megalopolis held bravely out against Cassander, it was taken and horribly punished; and it was plain that the old spirit of the Greeks was gone, and that they could no longer band together to keep out the enemy; so they all remained in subjection to Macedon, most of them with a garrison of Macedonian soldiers in their citadel. But Athens was as full of philosophers as ever, and became a sort of college, where people sent their sons to study learning, oratory, and poetry, and hear the disputes of the Stoic and Epicurean philosophers. In the meantime Alexander's embalmed body had been buried at Alexandria, and the two young kings, his son Alexander AEgos and his half-brother Arridaeus, had been brought to Macedon. His mother Olympias put poor Arridaeus to death as soon as she could get him into her power. She had always hated Antipater, and now took part with Polysperchon against Cassander; but this was the losing side. Polysperchon was beaten, and driven out of Macedon: and she, with her grandson and his mother, the Persian princess Roxana, shut themselves up in Pydna, where Cassander besieged them till he had starved them out, and Olympias surrendered on condition that her life was spared; but Cassander did not keep his word, and sent soldiers to put her to death. The young king and his mother were kept at Amphipolis till the boy was sixteen years old; and then, growing afraid that he would try to win his father's throne, Cassander had them both slain. So the great empire of Alexander was broken up among four chief powers, Cassander in Macedon, Lysimachus in Thrace, Seleucus in Syria, Ptolemy in Egypt. _ |
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