At least he had done what in him lay to save his country. And, as Athens had dealt with him before, so her degenerate servants had dealt with him that day, treating him with contumely and insult. It seemed worse to them that he should gain the meed of glory by their acting on his counsel than that the state should come to ruin by their rejecting it. Five days afterwards, on the last day of September, at noon, the Athenian fleet lay unsuspectingly in the same position. The crews had gone to Sestos to buy food; the soldiers were dispersed foraging about the country. From his watch-tower Alkibiades beheld a single Lakedaimonian vessel leave the harbour of Lampsakos and cross the straits, followed at some distance by another ship. Then on a shield raised high upon her mast he saw the sunlight glisten. A similar flash was passed on, reflected in like way, by the second ship to those in port. He comprehended all its meaning. A sign had been sent that the Athenian fleet was left unguarded. He saw the Spartan ships come out silently and swiftly, and he saw Lysandros pounce upon his prey. Some of the deserted ships had one man on board, some two, some none at all. He saw the Spartans leap into them, cut their hawsers and their rigging, and move them away without resistance. Konon raised an alarm, and escaped with nine triremes. The sacred state ship, the _Paralos_, which was under better discipline and better guarded than the others, also escaped. That was all that was left out of a fleet of near two hundred vessels. The Spartan hoplites, in their red tunics, landed in the bay, took possession of the camp, and as the Athenian soldiers, hearing the trumpet-call, returned, they were taken, one by one, as in a trap. The Lakedaimonians lost not a single man. Thus an army of over three thousand soldiers fell into the hands of a remorseless enemy. The whole of those three thousand fighting men, taken as prisoners of war, were, by the orders of Lysandros, murdered deliberately in cold blood. From the scene of carnage we would fain turn away our eyes, as did the Athenian in his lofty tower, his heart bursting with helpless rage. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XXIX ‘Negli occhi era ciascuna oscura e cava, Pallida nella faccia, e tanto scema Che dall’ ossa la pelle s’informava. ‘Non credo che così a buccia strema Eresitone fosse fatto secco, Per digiunar, quando pin n’ebbe tema.’ DANTE: _Purg._, xxiii. ‘In eyes was each one hollow and obscure, Pallid in face, and oh! so meagre grown, That from their bones the skin took form. ‘I don’t believe that to such utter rind Erisichthon by famine was dried up, When he had greatest dread of it.’