; and lastly, that the Athenians should acknowledge the headship
of Sparta in peace and war, leaving to her the choice of friends and
foes, and following her lead by land and sea." Such were the terms which
Theramenes and the rest who acted with him were able to report on their
return to Athens. As they entered the city, a vast crowd met them,
trembling lest their mission have proved fruitless. For indeed delay
was no longer possible, so long already was the list of victims daily
perishing from starvation. On the day following, the ambassadors
delivered their report, stating the terms upon which the Lacedaemonians
were willing to make peace. Theramenes acted as spokesman, insisting
that they ought to obey the Lacedaemonians and pull down the walls. A
small minority raised their voice in opposition, but the majority were
strongly in favour of the proposition, and the resolution was passed to
accept the peace. After that, Lysander sailed into the Piraeus, and the
exiles were readmitted. And so they fell to levelling the fortifications
and walls with much enthusiasm, to the accompaniment of female
flute-players, deeming that day the beginning of liberty to Greece.

Thus the year drew to its close (8)--during its middle months took place
the accession of Dionysius, the son of Hermocrates the Syracusan, to
the tyranny of Syracuse; an incident itself preceded by a victory gained
over the Carthaginians by the Syracusans; the reduction of Agrigentum
through famine by the Carthaginians themselves; and the exodus of the
Sicilian Greeks from that city.

(8) For the puzzling chronology of this paragraph see Grote, "Hist. of
Greece," vol. x. p 619 (2d ed.) If genuine, the words may perhaps
have slipt out of their natural place in chapter i. above, in
front of the words "in the following year Lysander arrived," etc.
L. Dindorf brackets them as spurious. Xen., "Hist. Gr." ed.
tertia, Lipsiae, MDCCCLXXII. For the incidents referred to see
above; Grote, "Hist. of Greece," vol. x. pp. 582, 598 (2d ed.)

III

B.C. 404. In the following year (1) the people passed a resolution
to choose thirty men who were to draft a constitution based on the
ancestral laws of the State. The following were chosen to act on this
committee:--Polychares, Critias, Melobius, Hippolochus, Eucleides,
Hiero, Mnesilochus, Chremo, Theramenes, Aresias, Diocles, Phaedrias,
Chaereleos, Anaetius, Piso, Sophocles, Erastosthenes, Charicles,