Tides of War, a Novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War

XXVIII

Twice he began and twice his voice miscarried, so overcome was he by the sight which now enlarged before him. When he failed a third time, a cry burst from those pressed in ranks to the immediate fore. “Again! Again!” men called, this summons reinforced at once by the thousands packing the bowl, the roar of men approving what they see. When the tumult had subsided, Alcibiades recommenced, so softly at first that the heralds, stationed at intervals to relay his words to those higher on the slope, must turn laterally and address their compatriots beside and even below.

“I am not…” Alcibiades began, and, when his voice once more faltered, the heralds picked up that portion and relayed it as is.

“I am not…”

“…not the man I was…”

“…not the man I was…”

“…moments ago, mounting this platform.”

Again the heralds flung the phrase up the amphitheater. At last Alcibiades found his voice and, gesturing his seconds to mount farther, resumed.

“I had meant to cast myself in the role of savior. To present myself before you as one who brings with him, for your deliverance, alliance with that nation whose treasure and naval might will bring the victory which, unaided, you have thus far been unable to achieve. I had planned to address you as a commander and to wring from you a pledge of fidelity for the effort we must now make. But the sight of you…” Again his voice failed. “…the sight of you, my countrymen, breaks my heart. I am struck through with shame. It is not you who must pledge, but I. Not you who must serve, but I. That Athens which exiled me…”

Once more he must re-collect himself, a hand upon the platform stanchion, to recapture his self-command.

“That Athens which exiled me…that Athens I no longer recall.

You are my Athens. You and this.” He gestured to the fleet and the sea and sky. “To you and to this I pledge my allegiance.”

A cheer that was half sob and half cry of approbation ascended from the centered ranks to the outer peripheries. Intended or not, Alcibiades had set in words that grief and affliction that the men, too, felt for their nation, which to them as to their recalled leader seemed remote as Oceanus and dissevered not just from these, her sons, but from her own misplaced and misremembered soul.

“If I have offended the gods, and I have, before you I entreat now their pardon. By their clemency, and to you who have honored me with your faith, I vow that no constraint of heaven or earth, nor the armies of hell itself, will stay me from spending for you and for our country all I possess. My blood, my life, all that I am and own, I pledge to you.”

He stepped back and receded into the press of officers upon the platform.

The amphitheater rang with fire and approbation.

Thrasybulus now spoke, followed by the generals Diomedon and Leon. Individuals among the nautai and infantry addressed the assembly as well. The blood of all was still up from the coup and countercoup which had racked Samos itself just days past, in mirrored requital of the overthrows of state at home. At Athens, all knew, the democracy had been deposed. Acts of terror and assassination had cowed the demos, and that government styling itself the Four Hundred stood in command of the Assembly and the people, having proscribed from political participation all but themselves. Rumors of outrages inflamed the fleet, of violations inflicted upon free citizens, lawless arrests and executions, properties confiscated, the constitution of Cleisthenes and Solon overturned. The men on Samos feared for their families at home and for the nation herself which these tyrants, fresh reports testified, plotted to sell out to the foe to drive a deal to save their own skins.

Now in the flush of Alcibiades' reaccession, the men cried for action and blood. Sail on Athens! Butcher the autocrats! Restore the democracy!

Men of the infantry began to pound their thighs and stamp their soles; sailors on the ships beat their decks and timbers; on the quays the marines' stomping feet made the harbor resound; and even the boys and women set up such a racket of yip-yipping ululation that none could be heard who sought to quell them. Two of the taxiarchs arose; the men cried them down. Diomedon boomed in his great voice and even Thrasybulus, though the men, who loved him, let him speak, could not stanch their frenzy.

Infantrymen rose and advanced upon the stacked arms. A press swelled toward the ships, as if on the instant of embarkation. As one they clamored for Alcibiades. Lead us! Take us home!

The folly of this course, self-apparent to the cooler heads of command, yet held such passionate appeal for the men that no commander could dissuade them or dared try. Now Alcibiades must confront this derangement, not out of a base of the men's trust earned over time, of shared victories and attained respect, but on the instant and on his own.

“If we sail, men, we will easily overturn our enemies at home and establish a government obedient to our whims and gratifying to our vanity.”

The men cheered and rallied. He signed for silence and bade them ring him in.

“But what mischief will we have left behind here in the Aegean?

Let us consider this, brothers, and if we find the course you champion wise, not another hour shall expire before we sail, you and I, to depose the usurpers.”

More salutes and cries of acclamation.

Alcibiades called the Assembly to order. This was the phrase he used, and it had the effect intended. He commanded each individual to impose upon his ungoverned heart that self-dominion which differentiates free men from slaves and recall himself to what he was-a man of reason, capable of reflection and deliberation. Now, he directed, let us as an exercise place ourselves in the position of our enemies.

“Imagine we are Mindarus, Spartan commander at Miletus, learning of our resolve to sail for home. Recall, friends, that spies among us will report to him before nightfall all we debate here this day…”

Coolly and rationally Alcibiades instructed the men on those opportunities the fleet's withdrawal would present to the foe and how the enemy must and would pounce upon them. He addressed his hearers not as a general his troops, but as an officer in counsel with brother officers or a statesman in discourse before the ekklesia.

The Aegean undefended, the Spartans will seize the Hellespont, and with that cut off all grain for us and for Athens. The enemy holds Lampsacus and Cyzicus. Byzantium has revolted to him. He will overthrow Ionia and seize every strategic choke point on the straits. We must turn about from home at once, merely to preserve from starvation the very prize we have just won. And what will await us here on our return? Not an enemy as at present, on the sea where we hold advantage, but dug in on land, from which fortifications we must then dislodge him. He inquired of the men if they were ready to fight Spartans on land, on their own terms. And what base will we employ? The first place the enemy will seize will be Samos, the very stones and timbers upon which we now stand.

Now he presented the most ruinous consequence of withdrawal: its effect upon the Persian. How will he, our benefactor upon whom all depends, respond to this unadvertised decampment? Will he perceive us as reliable allies in whom he may place trust? Tissaphernes will dump us, as an eagle an asp, and re-ally himself with Sparta. He must, if only from fear of their new power, no longer checked by us, that they may turn upon and overrun him.

“Remember this, brothers. Athens is ours anytime we choose to take her. But Athens is not her bricks and stones, or even the land itself. We are Athens. This is Athens. The enemy lies there,” he proclaimed, gesturing to the east and south, the occupied cities of Ionia and the Lacedaemonian bastion at Miletus. ul came to fight Spartans and Peloponnesians, not my own countrymen. And by the gods, I will make you fight them too!”

A murmur of self-chastisement swept the host, who at last perceived not only their own folly, in contrast to the sense of their new commander, but his dexterity in deflecting them from this course of calamity. Already in the first hour of his recall he had preserved the state. More so, the men now reckoned, he had displayed such iron temerity to face them down, single-handed, as no other would or could. One felt a sea change as the men came to themselves at last, perceiving the sureness of their principal's hand and the slenderness of the margin by which he had steered them from ruin.

“But if your hearts remain set on this course, brothers, sail for home now. But look first there, to that arm of the breakwater the Samians call the Hook. For I will station my ship at its shoulder, and this I swear by Nike and Athena Protectress, that I will strike as thunder the first vessel that seeks to pass me outbound, and the next and the next after that, until you slay me upon the site. He will sail for Athens, he that will, over my cold corpse.”

Such a shout greeted this as eclipsed even the tumult that had preceded it. At once Thrasybulus stepped to the fore, dismissing the assembly, ordering the men to disperse to their duties and all trierarchs and squadron commanders to report to fleet command.

This headquarters was situated in what had been the old Customs House, which filled now with the swarming officers, above four hundred counting ship's masters, infantry commanders, and captains of marines. The overflow, including Thrasybulus, Thrasyllus, Alcibiades, and the taxiarchs, settled after some confusion in the hall adjacent, employed formerly for storage of contraband and now serving as collection site for spare masts and sail, hull girdles and sundry hanging and wooden gear of the fleet.

A number of commanders spoke, addressing the requirements of the hour. Protomachus set as paramount the need for cash; the men must be paid; they are demoralized and have been for months.

Lysias professed the imperative for further training; Erasinides spoke to the ships and their seaworthiness. Others clamored to follow; it seemed the deficiencies of vessels and men must mount to infinity, each more pressing than the next. Alcibiades shifted upon his feet, a move so subtle as barely to merit notice. At once all hubbub stilled. The officers, gone silent as one, turned unprompted toward him who, though technically holding a third only of the tripartite command, the congress now acknowledged by its deferral as supreme commander.

“I approve all you say, gentlemen. The fleet's needs are many and urgent. One, however, must take precedence. This item the men need before all, and we must get it for them without fail and without deferral.”

Alcibiades drew up, as a poet or actor upon the stage, drawing by his silence his hearers more raptly to attend.

“We must get the men a victory.”