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96 ANCIENT GREECE. [CHAP. YIH,its own strength, while it seemed to expect safety from all.^the battle ofHope was not disappointed in the result;Salamis gave a new impulse to the spirit of the Greeks ;and when in the following year1the battle of Platese gave adecision to the contest, the greater partof Hellas wasassembled in the field of battle. 2We would give no descriptionof those glorious days,,butonly of the consequences which they had for Greece. Inthe actions of men, greatness is seldom or never quite unmixed with meanness; and he who investigates the actionsof those times with care, will find many and various proofsof it. And yet in the whole compass of history,we can findno series of events, which deserve to be compared with thegrand spectacle then exhibited ;and with all the exaggerations of the orators and poets, the feeling of pride withwhich the Greek reflected on his achievements was a justone. A small country had withstood the attack of half acontinent ;it had not only saved the most costly possessions,which were endangered,its freedom, its independence ; itfelt itself strong enough to continue the contest, and did notlay aside its arms, till it was permitted to prescribe the conditions of peace.The price of that peace, was the emancipation of theGreek colonies in Asia from Persian supremacy. Twentyyears before the invasion of Xerxes, when those cities hadattempted to throw off the Persian yoke, the Athenians hadboldly ventured to send a squadron with troopsto reinforcethem ;and that expedition occasioned the burning of Sardis,which was the capital of the Persian dominions in Asia3Minor. "These "ships," says Herodotus, were theoriginof the wars between the Hellenes and the barbarians." ilnsinterference was deeply resented by the Persians andjtheirresentment would have been reasonable, if they had possessed the rightof reducing free cities to a state of dependence.Herodotus has given a copious narration of the ill successof the revolt, and of the manner in which Miletus sufferedfor it. Even in the subsequent expeditions of the Persiansagainst Europe, the ruling idea was the desire of taking revenge on Athens ;and when Xerxes reduced that city toashes, he may have found in it no small degree1In the year 479 B. C.2 Herod, ix. 28.8of satisfiic-Herod, v. 9jr,