That a large river, such as the Strymon, near its mouth (180 yards broad, and in latitude about N. 40° 50′), at a period which could not have been later than the beginning of November, should have been frozen over in one night so hardly and firmly as to admit of a portion of the army marching over it at daybreak, before the sun became warm,—is a statement which surely requires a more responsible witness than Æschylus to avouch it. In fact, he himself describes it as a “frost out of season,” (χειμῶν’ ἄωρον,) brought about by a special interposition of the gods. If he is to be believed, none of the fugitives were saved, except such as were fortunate enough to cross the Strymon on the ice during the interval between break of day and the sun’s heat. One would imagine that there was a pursuing enemy on their track, leaving them only a short time for escape: whereas in fact, they had no enemy to contend with,—nothing but the difficulty of finding subsistence. During the advancing march of Xerxes, a bridge of boats had been thrown over the Strymon: nor can any reason be given why that bridge should not still have been subsisting: Artabazus must have recrossed it after he had accompanied the monarch to the Hellespont. I will add, that the town and fortress of Eion, which commanded the mouth of the Strymon, remained as an important strong-hold of the Persians some years after this event, and was only captured, after a desperate resistance, by the Athenians and their confederates under Kimon. The Athenian auditors of the Persæ would not criticize nicely, the historical credibility of that which Æschylus told them about the sufferings of their retreating foe, nor his geographical credibility when he placed Mount Pangæus on the hither side of the Strymon, to persons marching out of Greece (Persæ, 494). But I must confess that, to my mind, his whole narrative of the retreat bears the stamp of the poet and the religious man, not of the historical witness. And my confidence in Herodotus is increased when I compare him on this matter with Æschylus,—as well in what he says as in what he does not say. [284] Juvenal, Satir. x, 178. Ille tamen qualis rediit, Salamine relictâ, In Caurum atque Eurum solitus sævire flagellis, etc. [285] Herodot. viii, 130.