To the imagination of the reader this passage in history presents a striking picture. We may behold the great assembly of that lively, high-souled, sensitive, and inflammable people. There is the Agora; there the half-built temple to Aeacus;--above, the citadel, where yet hang the chains of the captive enemy;--still linger in the ears of the populace, already vain of their prowess, and haughty in their freedom, the menace of the Persian--the words that threatened them with the restoration of the exiled tyrant; and at this moment, and in this concourse, we see the subtle Milesian, wise in the experience of mankind, popular with all free states, from having restored freedom to the colonies of Ionia--every advantage of foreign circumstance and intrinsic ability in his favour,--about to address the breathless and excited multitude. He rose: he painted, as he had done to Cleomenes, in lively colours, the wealth of Asia, the effeminate habits of its people--he described its armies fighting without spear or shield--he invoked the valour of a nation already successful in war against hardy and heroic foes--he appealed to old hereditary ties; the people of Miletus had been an Athenian colony--should not the parent protect the child in the greatest of all blessings--the right to liberty? Now he entreats--now he promises,--the sympathy of the free, the enthusiasm of the brave, are alike aroused. He succeeds: the people accede to his views. "It is easier," says the homely Herodotus, "to gain (or delude) a multitude than an individual; and the eloquence which had failed with Cleomenes enlisted thirty thousand Athenians." [265] IV. The Athenians agreed to send to the succour of their own colonists, the Ionians, twenty vessels of war. Melanthius, a man of amiable character and popular influence, was appointed the chief. This was the true commencement of the great Persian war. V. Thus successful, Aristagoras departed from Athens. Arriving at Miletus, he endeavoured yet more to assist his design, by attempting to arouse a certain colony in Phrygia, formed of Thracian captives [266] taken by Megabazus, the Persian general. A great proportion of these colonists seized the occasion to return to their native land-- baffled the pursuit of the Persian horse--reached the shore--and were transported in Ionian vessels to their ancient home on the banks of the Strymon. Meanwhile, the Athenian vessels arrived at Miletus, joined by five ships, manned by Eretrians of Euboea, mindful of former assistance from the Milesians in a war with their fellow-islanders, the Chalcidians, nor conscious, perhaps, of the might of the enemy they provoked.