mentioned, as already stated, by Thucydides; but Herodotus here gives us to understand that it was only one of a string of enterprises, all unnoticed by Thucydides, against the Persians. Nay, it would seem from his language, that Maskamês main- tained himself in Doriskus during the whole reign of Xerxes, and perhaps longer, repelling successive Grecian assaults.
The valuable indication here cited from Herodotus would be of itself a sufficient proof that the first years of the Athenian hegemony were full of busy and successful hostility against the Persians. And in truth this is what we should expect: the battles of Salamis, Platæa, and Mykale, drove the Persians out of Greece, and overpowered their main armaments, but did not remove them at once from all the various posts which they occu- pied throughout the Ægean and Thrace. Without doubt, the Athenians had to clear the coasts and the islands of a great number of different Persian detachments: an operation never short nor easy, with the then imperfect means of siege, as we may see by the cases of Sestus and Eion; nor, indeed, always practicable, as the case of Doriskus teaches us. The fear of these Persians, yet remaining in the neighborhood[1], and even the chance of a renewed Persian invading armament, formed one pressing motive for Grecian cities to join the new confederacy: while the expulsion of the enemy added to it those places which he had occupied. It was by these years of active operations at sea against the common enemy, that the Athenians first established[2] that constant, systematic, and laborious training, among their own ships' crews, which transmitted itself with continual im-
- ↑ To these "remaining operations against the Persians" the Athenian envoy at Lacedæmon alludes, in his speech prior to the Peloponnesian war — ὑμῶν μὲν (rou Spartans) οὐκ ἐθελησάντων παραμεῖναι πρὸς τὰ ὑπό λοιπα τοῦ βαρβάρου, ἡμῖν δὲ προσελθόντων τῶν ξυμμάχων καὶ αὐτῶν denévtwv óvaç катασтйvat, etc. (Thucyd. i, 75 :) and again, iii, 11. τὰ ὑπόλοιπα τῶν ἔργων. Compare also Plato, Menexen. c. 11. αὐτὸς δὲ ἠγγέλλετο βασιλεὺς δια- νοεῖσθαι ὡς ἐπιχειρήσων πάλιν ἐπὶ τοὺς Ἕλληνας, etc.
- ↑ The Athenian nautical training begins directly after the repulse of the Persians. Τὸ δὲ τῆς θαλάσσης ἐπιστήμονες γενέσθαι (says Perikles respect ing the Peloponnesians, just at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war) οὐ ῥᾳδίως αὐτοῖς προσγενήσεται· οὐδὲ γὰρ ὑμεῖς, μελετῶντες αὐτὸ εὐθὺς ἀπὸ τῶν Μηδικῶν, ἐξείργασθέ πω (Thucyd. i, 142).
