throne on the hillside, thought it was a Greek ship that the
Amazon had destroyed and exclaimed: "This woman is playing the man while my
men are acting like women!"

Two Persian ships in flight from the pursuing Greeks drove ashore at the
base of Mount AEgaleos. Xerxes, in his anger at the disaster to his fleet,
ordered the troops stationed on the beach to behead every officer and man
of their crews, and the sentence was at once executed. The closing scene of
the battle was, indeed, a time of unmitigated horrors, for while this
massacre of the defeated crews was being carried out by the Persian
guardsmen, the victorious Greeks were slaying all the fugitives who fell
into their hands. The Admiral of the Persian fleet, Ariabignes, brother of
Xerxes, was among the dead.

The pursuit was not continued far beyond the straits. The Greeks hesitated
to venture into open waters where numbers might tell against them if the
Persians rallied, and they drew back to their morning anchorage. The
remnant of the Persian fleet anchored off the coast near Phalerum, the port
of Athens, or took refuge in the small harbour. They were rejoined by a
detachment which had been sent to round the south side of Salamis to attack
the western entrance of the straits, but which for some reason had never
been engaged during the day.

The victorious Greeks did not realize the full extent of their triumph.
They expected to be attacked again next morning, and hoped to repeat the
manoeuvre which had been so far successful, of engaging the enemy in the
narrows with each flank protected by the shore, and no room for a superior
force to form in the actual line of fighting contact. But though they did
not yet realize the fact, they had won a decisive victory. Xerxes had been
so impressed by the failure of his great armada to force the narrows of
Salamis that he had changed all his plans.

In the night after the battle he held a council of war. It was decided that
the attack should not be renewed, for there was no prospect of a second
attempt giving better results. Artemisia was directed to convey Prince
Artaxerxes, the heir of the Empire, back to Asia. Xerxes himself would lead
back to the bridge of the Hellespont the main body of his immense army, for
to attempt to maintain it in Greece during the winter would have meant
famine in its camps. The fleet was to sail at once for the northern
Archipelago, and limit its operations to guarding the bridge of the