A Victor of Salamis Part 47

Men were too strained for that. At last he sent the thousands forth.

"Go, then. Quit yourselves as h.e.l.lenes. That is all the task. And I say to you, in the after days this shall be your joy, to hear the greatest declare of you, 'Reverence this man, for he saved us all at Salamis.' "

The company dispersed, each man to his s.h.i.+p. Themistocles went to his pinnace, and a cheer uprose from sea and land as the boat shot out to the _Nausicaa_. Eurybiades might be chief in name; who did not know that Themistocles was the surest bulwark of h.e.l.las?

The son of Neocles, standing in the boat, uplifted his face to the now golden east.

"Be witness, Helios," he cried aloud, "be witness when thou comest, I have done all things possible. And do thou and thy fellow-G.o.ds on bright Olympus rule our battle now; the lot is in your hands!"

CHAPTER XXIX

SALAMIS

Sunrise. The _Nausicaa_ was ready. Ameinias the navarch walked the deck above the stern-cabin with nervous strides. All that human forethought could do to prepare the s.h.i.+p had long been done. The slim hull one hundred and fifty feet long had been stripped of every superfluous rope and spar.

The masts had been lowered. On the cat-heads hung the anchors weighted with stone to fend off an enemy, astern towed the pinnace ready to drag alongside and break the force of the hostile ram. The heavy-armed marines stood with their long boarding spears, to lead an attack or cast off grappling-irons. But the true weapon of the _Nausicaa_ was herself. To send the three-toothed beak through a foeman's side was the end of her being. To meet the shock of collision two heavy cables had been bound horizontally around the hull from stem to stern. The oarsmen,-the _thranites_ of the upper tier, the _zygites_ of the middle, the _thalamites_ of the lower,-one hundred and seventy swart, nervous-eyed men, sat on their benches, and let their hands close tight upon those oars which trailed now in the drifting water, but which soon and eagerly should spring to life. At the belt of every oarsman dangled a sword, for boarders' work was more than likely. Thirty spare rowers rested impatiently on the centre deck, ready to leap wherever needed. On the forecastle commanded the _proreus_, Ameinias's lieutenant, and with him the _keleustes_, the oar master who must give time on his sounding-board for the rowing, and never fail,-not though the s.h.i.+ps around reeled down to watery grave. And finally on the p.o.o.p by the captain stood the "governor,"-knotted, grizzled, and keen,-the man whose touch upon the heavy steering oars might give the _Nausicaa_ life or destruction when the s.h.i.+ps charged beak to beak.

"The trireme is ready, admiral," reported Ameinias, as Themistocles came up leisurely from the stern-cabin.

The son of Neocles threw back his helmet, that all might see his calm, untroubled face. He wore a cuira.s.s of silvered scale-armour over his purple chiton. At his side walked a young man, whom the s.h.i.+p's people imagined the deserter of the preceding night, but he had drawn his helmet close.

"This is Critias," said Themistocles, briefly, to the navarch; "he is a good caster. See that he has plenty of darts."

"One of Themistocles's secret agents," muttered the captain to the governor, "we should have guessed it." And they all had other things to think of than the whence and wherefore of this stranger.

It was a weary, nervous interval. Men had said everything, done everything, hoped and feared everything. They were in no mood even to invoke the G.o.ds. In desperation some jested riotously as they gripped the oars on the benches,-demonstrations which the _proreus_ quelled with a loud "Silence in the s.h.i.+p." The morning mist was breaking. A brisk wind was coming with the sun. Clear and strong sang the Notus, the breeze of the kindly south. It covered the blue bay with crisping whitecaps, it sent the surf foaming up along the Attic sh.o.r.e across the strait. Themistocles watched it all with silent eyes, but eyes that spoke of gladness. He knew the waves would beat with full force on the Persian prows, and make their swift movement difficult while the Greeks, taking the galloping surf astern, would suffer little.

"aeolus fights for us. The first omen and a fair one." The word ran in whispers down the benches, and every soul on the trireme rejoiced.

How long did they sit thus? An aeon? Would Eurybiades never draw out his line of battle? Would Adeimantus prove craven at the end? Would treachery undo h.e.l.las to-day, as once before at Lade when the Ionian Greeks had faced the Persian fleet in vain? Now as the vapour broke, men began to be able to look about them, and be delivered from their own thoughts. The sh.o.r.es of Salamis were alive,-old men, women, little children,-the fugitives from Attica were crowding to the marge in thousands to watch the deed that should decide their all. And many a bronze-cheeked oarsman arose from his bench to wave farewell to the wife or father or mother, and sank back again,-a clutching in his throat, a mist before his eyes, while his grip upon the oar grew like to steel.

As the _Nausicaa_ rode at her place in the long line of s.h.i.+ps spread up and down the sh.o.r.e of Salamis, it was easy to detect forms if not faces on the strand. And Glaucon, peering out from his helmet bars, saw Democrates himself standing on the sands and beckoning to Themistocles. Then other figures became clear to him out of the many, this one or that whom he had loved and clasped hands with in the sunlit days gone by. And last of all he saw those his gaze hungered for the most, Hermippus, Lysistra, and another standing at their side all in white, and in her arms she bore something he knew must be her child,-Hermione's son, his son, born to the lot of a free man of Athens or a slave of Xerxes according as his elders played their part this day. Only a glimpse,-the throng of strangers opened to disclose them closed again; Glaucon leaned on a capstan. All the strength for the moment was gone out of him.

"You rowed and wrought too much last night, Critias," spoke Themistocles, who had eyes for everything. "To the cabin, Sicinnus, bring a cup of Chian."

"No wine, for Athena's sake!" cried the outlaw, drawing himself together, "it is pa.s.sed. I am strong again."

A great shout from the sh.o.r.es and the waiting fleet made him forget even the sight of Hermione.

"They come! The Persians! The Persians!"

The fleet of the Barbarians was advancing from the havens of Athens.

The sun rose higher. He was far above Hymettus now, and shooting his bright javelins over mainland, islands, and waters. With his rising the southern breeze sang ever clearer, making the narrow channel betwixt Salamis and Attica white, and tossing each trireme merrily. Not a cloud hung upon Pentelicus, Hymettus, or the purple northern range of Parnes.

Over the desolate Acropolis hovered a thin mist,-smoke from the smouldering temple, the sight of which made every Attic sailor blink hard and think of the vengeance.

Yonder on the sh.o.r.e of the mainland the host of the Persian was moving: hors.e.m.e.n in gilded panoply, Hydarnes's spearmen in armour like suns. They stood by myriads in glittering ma.s.ses about a little spur of Mt. aegaleos, where a holy close of Heracles looked out upon the sea. To them were coming more hors.e.m.e.n, chariots, litters, and across the strait drifted the thunderous acclamation, "Victory to the king!" For here on the ivory throne, with his mighty men, his captains, his harem, about him, the "Lord of the World" would look down on the battle and see how his slaves could fight.

Now the Barbarians began to move forth by sea. From the havens of Peiraeus and their anchorages along the sh.o.r.e swept their galleys,-Phnician, Cilician, Egyptian, and, sorrow of sorrows, Ionian-Greek arrayed against Greek! Six hundred triremes and more they were, taller in p.o.o.p and prow than the h.e.l.lenes, and braver to look upon.

Each vied with each in the splendour of the scarlet, purple, and gold upon stern and fores.h.i.+p. Their thousands of white oars moved like the onward march of an army as they trampled down the foam. From the masts of their many admirals flew innumerable gay signal-flags. The commands shouted through trumpets in a dozen strange tongues-the shrill pipings of the oar masters, the hoa.r.s.e shouts of the rowers-went up to heaven in a clamorous babel. "Swallows' chatter," cried the deriding h.e.l.lenes, but hearts were beating quicker, breath was coming faster in many a breast by Salamis then,-and no shame. For now was the hour of trial, the wrestle of Olympian Zeus with Ahura-Mazda. Now would a mighty one speak from the heavens to h.e.l.las, and say to her "Die!" or "Be!"

The Barbarians' armadas were forming. Their black beaks, all pointing toward Salamis, stretched in two bristling lines from the islet of Psyttaleia-whence the s.h.i.+elds of the landing force glittered-to that brighter glitter on the promontory by aegaleos where sat the king. To charge their array seemed charging a moving hedge of spears, impenetrable in defence, invincible in attack. Slowly, rocked by the sea and rowing in steady order, the armament approached Salamis. And still the Greek s.h.i.+ps lay spread out along the sh.o.r.e, each trireme swinging at the end of the cable which moored her to the land, each mariner listening to the beatings of his own heart and straining his eyes on one s.h.i.+p now-Eurybiades's-which rode at the centre of their line and far ahead.

All could read the order of battle at last as squadron lay against squadron. On the west, under Xerxes's own eye, the Athenians must charge the serried Phnicians, at the centre the aeginetans must face the Cilicians, on the east Adeimantus and his fellows from Peloponnese must make good against the va.s.sal Ionians. But would the signal to row and strike never come? Had some G.o.d numbed Eurybiades's will? Was treachery doing its darkest work? With men so highly wrought moments were precious.

The bow strung too long will lose power. And wherefore did Eurybiades tarry?

Every soul in the _Nausicaa_ kept his curses soft, and waited-waited till that trailing monster, the Persian fleet, had crept halfway from Psyttaleia toward them, then up the shrouds of the Spartan admiral leaped a flag. Eager hands drew it, yet it seemed mounting as a snail, till at the masthead the clear wind blew it wide,-a plain red banner, but as it spread hundreds of axes were hewing the cables that bound the triremes to the sh.o.r.e, every Greek oar was biting the sea, the s.h.i.+ps were leaping away from Salamis. From the strand a shout went up, a prayer more than a cheer, mothers, wives, little ones, calling it together:-

"Zeus prosper you!"

A roar from the fleet, the tearing of countless blades on the thole-pins answered them. Eurybiades had spoken. There was no treason. All now was in the hand of the G.o.d.

Across the strait they went, and the Barbarians seemed springing to meet them. From the mainland a tumult of voices was rising, the myriads around Xerxes encouraging their comrades by sea to play the man. No indecisive, half-hearted battle should this be, as at Artemisium. Persian and h.e.l.lene knew that. The keen Phnicians, who had chafed at being kept from action so long, sent their line of s.h.i.+ps sweeping over the waves with furious strokes. The grudges, the commercial rivalries between Greek and Sidonian, were old. No Persian was hotter for Xerxes's cause than his Phnician va.s.sals that day.

And as they charged, the foemen's lines seemed so dense, their s.h.i.+ps so tall, their power so vast, that involuntarily hesitancy came over the Greeks. Their strokes slowed. The whole line lagged. Here an aeginetan galley dropped behind, yonder a Corinthian navarch suffered his men to back water. Even the _keleustes_ of the _Nausicaa_ slackened his beating on the sounding-board. Eurybiades's s.h.i.+p had drifted behind to the line of her sisters, as in defiance a towering Sidonian sprang ahead of the Barbarian line of battle, twenty trumpets from her p.o.o.p and fores.h.i.+p asking, "Dare you meet me?" The Greek line became almost stationary. Some s.h.i.+ps were backing water. It was a moment which, suffered to slip unchecked, leads to irreparable disaster. Then like a G.o.d sprang Themistocles upon the capstan on his p.o.o.p. He had torn off his helmet. The crews of scores of triremes saw him. His voice was like Stentor's, the herald whose call was strong as fifty common men.

In a lull amidst the howls of the Barbarians his call rang up and down the flagging s.h.i.+ps:-

"_O Sons of h.e.l.las! save your land,_ _Your children save, your altars and your wives!_ _Now dare and do, for ye have staked your all!_"

"Now dare and do, for ye have staked your all!"

Navarch shouted it to navarch. The cry went up and down the line of the h.e.l.lenes, "loud as when billows lash the beetling crags." The trailing oars beat again into the water, and even as the s.h.i.+ps once more gained way, Themistocles nodded to Ameinias, and he to the _keleustes_. The master oarsman leaped from his seat and crashed his gavel down upon the sounding-board.

"_Aru! Aru! Aru!_ Put it on, my men!"

The _Nausicaa_ answered with a leap. Men wrought at the oar b.u.t.ts, tugging like mad, their backs toward the foe, conscious only that duty bade them send the trireme across the waves as a stone whirls from the sling. Thus the men, but Themistocles, on the p.o.o.p, standing at the captain's and governor's side, never took his gaze from the great Barbarian that leaped defiantly to meet them.

"Can we risk the trick?" his swift question to Ameinias.

The captain nodded. "With this crew-yes."

Two stadia, one stadium, half a stadium, a s.h.i.+p's length, the triremes were charging prow to prow, rus.h.i.+ng on a common death, when Ameinias clapped a whistle to his lips and blew shrilly. As one man every rower on the port-side leaped to his feet and dragged his oar inward through its row-hole. The deed was barely done ere the Sidonian was on them. They heard the roaring water round her prow, the cracking of the whips as the petty officers ran up and down the gangways urging on the panting cattle at the oars. Then almost at the shock the governor touched his steering oar. The _Nausicaa_ swerved. The prow of the Sidonian rushed past them. A shower of darts pattered down on the deck of the h.e.l.lene, but a twinkling later from the Barbarians arose a frightful cry. Right across her triple oar bank, still in full speed, ploughed the Athenian. The Sidonian's oars were snapping like f.a.ggots. The luckless rowers were flung from their benches in heaps. In less time than the telling every oar on the Barbarian's port-side had been put out of play. The _diekplous_, favourite trick of the Grecian seamen, had never been done more fairly.

Now was Themistocles's chance. He used it. There was no need for him to give orders to the oar master. Automatically every rower on the port-tiers of the _Nausicaa_ had run out his blade again. The governor sent the head of the trireme around with a grim smile locked about his grizzled lips. It was no woman's task which lay before them. Exposing her whole broadside lay the long Sidonian; she was helpless, striving vainly to crawl away with her remaining oar banks. Her people were running to and fro, howling to Baal, Astarte, Moloch, and all their other foul G.o.ds, and stretching their hands for help to consorts too far away.

"_Aru! Aru! Aru!_" was the shout of the oar master; again the _Nausicaa_ answered with her leap. Straight across the narrow water she shot, the firm hand of the governor never veering now. The stroke grew faster, faster. Then with one instinct men dropped the oars, to trail in the rus.h.i.+ng water, and seized stanchions, beams, anything to brace themselves for the shock. The crash which followed was heard on the mainland and on Salamis. The side of the Phnician was beaten in like an egg-sh.e.l.l. From the _Nausicaa's_ p.o.o.p they saw her open hull reel over, saw the hundreds of upturned, frantic faces, heard the howls of agony, saw the waves leap into the gaping void.-

"Back water," thundered Ameinias, "clear the vortex, she is going down!"