of Euboea by a narrow strait two miles wide. On
the northern part of the island, near the town of Histiaea, the coast was
called Artemisium, and here the fleet was mustered, to co-operate with the
land forces, and oppose, in a narrow strait, the progress of the Persian
fleet. The defile of Thermopylae itself, at the south of Thessaly, was
between Mount OEta and an impassable morass on the Maliac Gulf. Nature had
thus provided a double position of defense--a narrow defile on the land,
and a narrow strait on the water, through which the army and the fleet
must need pass if they would co-operate.

(M434) While the congress resolved to avail themselves of the double
position, by sea and land, the Olympic games, and the great Dorian, of the
Carneia, were at hand. These could not be dispensed with, even in the most
extraordinary crisis to which the nation could be exposed. While,
therefore, the Greeks assembled to keep the national festivals, probably
from religious and superstitious motives, auguring no good if they were
disregarded, Leonidas, king of Sparta, with three hundred Spartans, two
thousand one hundred and twenty Arcadians, four hundred Corinthians, two
hundred men from Philius, and eighty from Mycenae--in all three thousand one
hundred hoplites, besides Helots and light troops, was sent to defend the
pass against the Persian hosts. On the march through Boeotia one thousand
men from Thebes and Thespiae joined them, though on the point of submission
to Xerxes. The Athenians sent their whole force on board their ships,
joined by the Plataeans.

(M435) It was in the summer of 480 B.C. when Xerxes reached Therma, about
which time the Greeks arrived at their allotted posts. Leonidas took his
position in the middle of the Pass--a mile in length, with two narrow
openings. He then repaired the old wall built across the Pass by the
Phocians, and awaited the coming of the enemy, for it was supposed his
force was sufficient to hold it till the games were over. It was also
thought that this narrow pass was the only means of access possible to the
invading army; but it was soon discovered that there was also a narrow
mountain path from the Phocian territory to Thermopylae. The Phocians
agreed to guard this path, and leave the defense of the main pass to the
Peloponnesian troops. But Leonidas painfully felt that his men were
insufficient in number, and found it necessary to send envoys to the
different States for immediate re-en