Untitled - 24grammata.com

THE ARMY AND NAVY. 157known that he trusted rather in the Persian subsidies thanin himself.More could then have been expectedfrom Athens,Buthere, as our preceding remarks have made apparent, thearmy was subordinate to the navy. From the commencement of the splendid periodof that republic,itspolitical greatness rested on the latter, This to itpreservedthe ascendency;its allies were maritime cities, and assistedwith shipsrather than with troops and the;destiny of Athenswas decided on the sea, gloriously at Salanris, and tragically1on the Hellespont.In Athens, therefore, no strong motivecould exist, to perfectthe art of war by landSuch were tiie obstacles in generalothers lay in the;manner in which the military affairs of the Grecians wereorganized.We mention first the situation of the commanders ;at least in Athens and in several other cities ;~inwhich not one, but several generalsshared the chief command with one another, and even that usually for u shortperiodof time.Where a militia exists, the divisions are political usuallymilitary in their origin*Such was the case with the tribesin Rome and in Athens. 3 The ten wards of this last cityhad cacli its own leader ;and these togetherwere the generals. 4 So it was in the Persian, so in the Peloponnesianwar, 5 That a similar regulationexisted in Boeotia, is evidentfrom the number of their commanders ;and we learn thesame respecting Syracuse,as well from the historyof its warwith Athens/ as from the elevation of Dionysius.InAthens, a kind of destiny secured in the decisive momentthe preponderanceto a superior mind, a Miltiades ;jbutwhere the command was shared by so it ismany, obviousthat existinginstitutions could receive but littleimprovement*Another still greater obstacle layin the circumstance,that the troops were not paid. Before the Peloponnesianwar, or at least before the administration of Pericles, no pay1In the year 406 B. C,, near JEgospotamos,*As, e, g, in Thebes and in Syracuse,8These were called tribw in Borne, ^Xat in Athena,*The