Untitled - 24grammata.com

ANCIENT GREECE.[CHAP. xn.the commander, not only over the allies, but even over hisown xSpartans, we shall discover stillgreater difficulties,with which Pausanias had to contend. And yet the Grecians obtained a splendid victory but it was far more;theresult of the desperate attack made by the Tegeans.and theSpartans, than of artful evolutions. In the days which preceded the battle, Pausanias appears as a general of prudenceand sound judgment he;owed the victory not to himself,but to a part of his army and to fortune.Of the battles which the able and successful Cimon wonof the Persians, history has preserved no details ;but yetenough to show, that the science of tactics was not advancedby them. They were for the most part naval engagements ;those which took place on land, were only unexpected attacks. After his death, Plutarch tells us expressly, nothing2great or considerable was executed.The first campaigns of the Peloponnesian war show beyond dispute, that the art of war, in a higher sense, hadmade but little progress. They were only inroads followedby nothing decisive. We have already remarked, why, in theprogTess of that long and weary war, tactics gained so little.The case was changed, when, after this war, Sparta, contending for the rank she had won, found her Agesilaus, andwas yet obliged to yield the ascendency to Thebes. Herethe decision was made by armies and not by navies. In theview of those states, therefore, armies rose in importance.We will not refuse to Agesilaus any of the praises whichXenophon has lavished on him. He was a model not onlyof a Spartan, but of a Grecian general. In the Spartanmethod of war, he made one change ;in his wars againstthe Persians in Asia, he was the first to form a numerouscavalry ;and to show that he knew the use of it. 3 Exceptthis he made no essential alteration in tactics. The proof ofthis is found in the description which Xenophon has given 4of the battle of Coronea. The same usual position was taken ;1See in Herodotus, and Plutarch 11. cc. p. 517, the relation of the disobedience of Amompharetus, in confirmation of the remark which we made abo*ve,p. 233, on Pausanias.2 Plutarch, in Cimone, Op. iii. p. 217.* But that too was only temporary. The battle of Leuctra shows how hadthe Spartan cavalry was at a subsequent period. See Xenoph. Op* p. 696.*Xenoph. in AgesiL Op. p. 659.