410 HISTORY OF GREECE that the Athenian envoys at length administered the cath both to Philip and to his allies.! This was done the last thing before they returned to Athens; which city they reached on the 13th of the month Skirrophorion ; 2 after an absence of seventy days, com" prising all the intervening month Thargelion, and the remnant (from the third day) of the month Munychion. They accepted, as representatives of the alh'ed cities, all whom Philip sent to thsm ; though Demosthenes remarks that their instructions di- rected them to administer the oath to the chief magistrate in each city respectively. 3 And among the cities whom they admitted to
- ake the oath as Philip's allies, was comprised Kardia, on the bor-
ders of the Thracian Chersonese. The Athenians considered Kardia as within the limits of the Chersonese, and therefore as belonging to them. 4 It was thus that the envoys postponed both the execution of their special mission, and their return, until the last moment, when Philip was within three days' march of Thermopylae. That they so postponed it, in corrupt connivance with him, is the allegation of Demosthenes, sustained by all the probabilities of the case. Philip was anxious to come upon Thermopylae by surprise, 5 and was one) and the persons around them, marching along with Philip ; the oaths not having been yet taken. 1 Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 390. The oath was administered in the inn in front of the chapel of the Dioskuri, near Pherae. 2 Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 359. In more than one passage, he states their absence from Athens to have lasted three entire months (p. 390 ; also De Corona, p. 235). But this is an exaggeration of the time. The decree of the Senate, which constrained them to depart, was passed on the third of Munychion. Assuming that they set out on that very day (though it is more probable that they did not set out until the ensuing day), their absence would only have lasted seventy days. 3 Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 430. The Magnesian and Achaean cities round the Pagassean Gulf, all except Halus, were included in the oath as allies of Philip (Epistola Philippi ap. Demosthen. p. 159). 4 Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 395. Compare Pseudo-Demosth. De Halon- neso, p. 87. s Demosth. Fals. Leg. p. 351. r/v yap TOVTO npu-ov UTTUVTUV r&v u6iKij- UUTUV, rb TOV 4v?.i7j"?rov iTiorr/ffai rotf irpdyfiaai. rovroif, KOI 6iov v/tiit axovaai nepl ruv Ti-paypuTuv, elra Bovfavaacr&ai, fiera ravra 6e irparreit 6,Ti dcfa., <i(ta UKOVSIV KUKEIVOV Trapelvai, Kai prj6' O,TI xpn irotelv ptpdioi slvat. Compare Demosth. DC Coron4, p. 236. roAtw uvelrai TTOII
