herodotus

come and invite me to be your ally against the Barbarian; whereas yeyourselves, when I in former time requested of you to join with me infighting against an army of Barbarians, contention having arisenbetween me and the Carthaginians, and when I charged you to exactvengeance of the men of Egesta for the death of Dorieos the son ofAnaxandrides,[148] while at the same time I offered to help in settingfree the trading-places, from which great advantages and gains havebeen reaped by you,--ye, I say, then neither for my own sake came tomy assistance, nor in order to exact vengeance for the death ofDorieos; and, so far as ye are concerned, all these parts are even nowunder the rule of Barbarians. But since it turned out well for us andcame to a better issue, now that the war has come round and reachedyou, there has at last arisen in your minds a recollection of Gelon.However, though I have met with contempt at your hands, I will not actlike you; but I am prepared to come to your assistance, supplying twohundred triremes and twenty thousand hoplites, with two thousandhorsemen, two thousand bowmen, two thousand slingers and two thousandlight-armed men to run beside the horsemen; and moreover I willundertake to supply corn for the whole army of the Hellenes, until wehave finished the war. These things I engage to supply on thiscondition, namely that I shall be commander and leader of the Hellenesagainst the Barbarian; but on any other condition I will neither comemyself nor will I send others." 159. Hearing this Syagros could notcontain himself but spoke these words: "Deeply, I trow, wouldAgamemnon son of Pelops lament,[149] if he heard that the Spartans hadhad the leadership taken away from them by Gelon and by theSyracusans. Nay, but make thou no further mention of this condition,namely that we should deliver the leadership to thee; but if thou artdesirous to come to the assistance of Hellas, know that thou wilt beunder the command of the Lacedemonians; and if thou dost indeed claimnot to be under command, come not thou to our help at all."160. To this Gelon, seeing that the speech of Syagros was adverse, setforth to them his last proposal thus: "Stranger from Sparta,reproaches sinking into the heart of a man are wont to rouse hisspirit in anger against them; thou however, though thou hast utteredinsults against me in thy speech, wilt not bring me to show myselfunseemly in my reply. But whereas ye so strongly lay claim to theleadership, it were fitting that I should lay claim to it more thanye, seeing that I am the leader of an army many times as large and ofships many more. Since however this condition is so distasteful toyou,[150] we will recede somewhat from our former proposal. Supposethat ye should be leaders of the land-army and I of the fleet; or ifit pleases you to lead the sea-forces, I am willing to be leader ofthose on land; and either ye must be contented with these terms or goaway without the alliance which I have to give." 161. Gelon, I say,