DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1755#0172
SALAMIS.
129
It appeared to them to be issuing from that city, and to arise from a proces-
sion which they supposed might amount in numbers to thirty thousand men.
ATHENIANS TAKING REFUGE IS THEIR HII1I'
Presently they heard a sound, as if uttered by a chorus of voices proceeding
from the same quarter. One of them who was acquainted with the strains used
on such occasions, declared to his companion that the sound which they then
heard was no other than the hymn which was usually sung in honour of the
mystic Bacchus, when his statue was carried—as it was on this anniversary—
from Athens to Eleusis, and again from Eleusis to Athens, at the time of the
celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries; and that this procession, from which
the dust now floated along the coast, and filled the air before them, and
whose united voices rose to the sky, was coming from the city of Ceres, on
its return from Athens, after the celebration of that ceremony. As Attica was
now abandoned by the Greeks, this appearance seemed more than human.
He foretold, at the same time, that if the dust and sound moved toward
Salamis, the Gods themselves were coming to fight against the Great King,
and that the destruction of his host was inevitable.
129
It appeared to them to be issuing from that city, and to arise from a proces-
sion which they supposed might amount in numbers to thirty thousand men.
ATHENIANS TAKING REFUGE IS THEIR HII1I'
Presently they heard a sound, as if uttered by a chorus of voices proceeding
from the same quarter. One of them who was acquainted with the strains used
on such occasions, declared to his companion that the sound which they then
heard was no other than the hymn which was usually sung in honour of the
mystic Bacchus, when his statue was carried—as it was on this anniversary—
from Athens to Eleusis, and again from Eleusis to Athens, at the time of the
celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries; and that this procession, from which
the dust now floated along the coast, and filled the air before them, and
whose united voices rose to the sky, was coming from the city of Ceres, on
its return from Athens, after the celebration of that ceremony. As Attica was
now abandoned by the Greeks, this appearance seemed more than human.
He foretold, at the same time, that if the dust and sound moved toward
Salamis, the Gods themselves were coming to fight against the Great King,
and that the destruction of his host was inevitable.