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Having sailed through the Euboean strait, the fleet doubled the promontory of Sunium, and did not stop till it reached the island of Salamis. Meanwhile the Peloponnesians had abandoned Attica and the adjoining states to their fate, whilst they strained every nerve to secure themselves by fortifying the isthmus of Corinth.
The autumnal equinox now approached, and the Euboean gulf, called Coela, is reckoned dangerous by mariners. Choosing, therefore, to remove thence before the winter storms came on, they returned to Piraeus, from whence they had set out for the campaign. Apustius, leaving there thirty ships, sailed by Malea to Corcyra.
While fighting was in progress at Thermopylae, a Greek fleet, under the command of the Spartan Eurybi'ades, that had been sent to guard the Euboean Sea, encountered the Persian ships at Artemis'ium.
So he sailed away without stop or tack until, a little before nightfall, Mount Ocha was seen upreared against the sky, and the pilot reported the Euboean coast. At a signal the fleet rested upon its oars.
It may be supposed, however, that the motley contributions of an idle and predatory multitude, or of Greeks compelled, not by affection, but fear, ill supplied to Xerxes the devoted thousands, many of them his own gallant Persians, who fell at Thermopylae or perished in the Euboean seas. XIII. Mardonius and the leaders generally were for immediate battle.
Although the Greeks were virtually the victors in these engagements, at least one-half of their vessels were disabled; and, hearing of the defeat of Leonidas at Thermopylae, they resolved to retreat. Having sailed through the Euboean Sea, the fleet kept on its way until it reached the Island of Salamis, in the Saron'ic Gulf.
We ourselves and the Lacedaemonians, although at the outset we could not allege any natural injuries, thought proper to make war for the injustice that we saw done to our neighbors. But what is the condition of Thessaly? Are not the Euboean states governed now by despots, and that in an island near to Thebes and Athens?
He himself proceeded to Chalcis; and, after sending away the garrisons, not only from that city, but likewise from Oreum and Eretria, he held there a congress of the Euboean states, whom he reminded of the condition in which he had found their affairs, and of that in which he was leaving them; and then dismissed the assembly. He then proceeded to Demetrias, and removed the garrison.
Then a weary day with the oars had brought him close to the Euboean shore, when a freshet of storm drove him seaward again. Now at last in this northerly creek of Sciathos he had found shelter and a spring.
They took Chaeronea, and made slaves of the inhabitants, and, leaving a garrison, commenced their return. On their road they were attacked at Coronea by the Boeotian exiles from Orchomenus, with some Locrians and Euboean exiles, and others who were of the same way of thinking, were defeated in battle, and some killed, others taken captive.
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