Death of Paches. 239 service of the state, that he was equally reckless in his private capacity. But on the other hand we should be as little at liberty to presume, that, if he was capable of being transported by the heat of his passions into an outrage against humanity, he must therefore have been a monster of cruelty, who could find pleasure in executing a commission to massacre the po- pulation of a whole city in cold blood. We do not want the light of Profane History to assure us that this would be a very erroneous inference. No conclusion therefore can be drawn as to this point from the character of Paches, so far as it is known to us from history. The story of Agathias considered by itself contains no improbable circumstance, un- less it be that Paches committed two crimes of the same kind. Otherwise there is nothing in it that presents any appearance even of exaggeration. It sounds like a simple unvarnished narrative of a fact which was likely to live long in the re- collection of the Lesbians. The legitimate course therefore would seem to be, to inquire whether this fact is inconsistent with any other, which has been transmitted to us on better authority. Mr Mitford'^s description of the end of Paches would lead the reader to suppose that we have only to choose between Agathias and Plutarch ; and this would certainly reduce us to a painful perplexity. But the passages to which Mr Mitford refers in his margin, do not contain quite so much as he has stated in his text. Neither in the life of Aristides, c. 26, nor in that of Nicias, c. 6, where he alludes to the death of Paches, does Plutarch mention the specific charge brought against him. This deficiency Mr Mitford has sup- plied by relating that Paches was '^called upon to answer a charge of peculation ."^"^ This term is undoubtedly well adapted to raise a strong suspicion of sycophancy on the part of the accusers, and of levity and ingratitude on the part of the judges, who, perhaps on very slight evidence, were excited by " the virulent orators who conducted the ac- cusation^ against the honest plainspeaking soldier, and by their credulity " so raised his indignation, that he stabbed himself to the heart in their presence. Plutarch however only relates the issue of the cause : the rest of the scene is from the hand of Mr Mitford. I do not mean by this to impute to him a wilful fabrication, but only an oversight, into which
