S62 HISTORY OF GREECE. and fifty miles. They did not arrive, however, until the battle had been fought, and the Persians departed ; but curiosity led them to the field of Marathon to behold the dead bodies of the Persians, after which they returned home, bestowing well-merited praise on the victors. Datis and Artaphernes returned across the .2Egean with their Kretrian prisoners to Asia ; stopping for a short time at the island of Mykonos, where discovery was made of a gilt image of Apollo carried off as booty in a Phenician ship. Datis went himself to restore it to Delos, requesting the Delians to carry it back to the Delium, or temple of Apollo, on the eastern coast of Boeotia : the Delians, however, chose to keep the statue until it was re- claimed from them twenty years afterwards by the Thebans. On reaching Asia, the Persian generals conducted their prisoners up to the court of t Susa, and into the presence of Darius. Though he had been vehemently incensed against them, yet when he saw them in his power, his wrath abated, and he manifested no desire to kill or harm them. They were planted at a spot called Arderikka, in the Kissian territory, one of the resting-places on the road from Sardis to Susa, and about twenty-six miles distant from the latter place : Herodotus seems himself to have seen their descendants there on. his journey between the two capitals, of BoCdromion as the day of the battle of Marathon : for though the months of every Grecian city were professedly lunar, yet they never coincided with each other exactly or long together, because the systems of intercalation adopted in different cities were different : there was great irregularity and confusion (Plutarch, Aristeides, c. 19 ; Aristoxenus, Harmon, ii, p. 30 compare also K. F. Hermann, Ueber die Griechische Monatskunde, p. L6 27. Gottingen, 1844 ; and Boeckh, ad Corp. Inscript. t. i, p. 734). Granting, therefore, that the answer given by the Spartans to Pheidip- pides is to be construed, not as a general rule applicable to the whole year, but as referring to the particular month in which it was given. no infer- ence can be drawn from hence as to the day of the battle of Marathon, because either one of the two following suppositions is possible: 1. The Spartans may have had solemnities on the day of the full moon, or on the day before it, in other months besides Karneius ; 2. Or the full moon of the Spartan Karneius may actually have fallen, in the year 490 B.C., on the fifth or sixth of the Attic month Boedromion. Dr. Thirlwall appears to adopt the view of Boeckh, but does not add anything material to the reasons in its favor (Hist, of Gr. vol. ii, Append Bi, p. 488),
