nd has continued the basis of political divisions.

Setting aside the old division of the Attic people into tribes and
clans, founded on birth or descent, he separated the people into ten new
tribes, founded on land. Attica was divided by him into districts or
parishes, like modern townships and wards, which were called Demes, and
each tribe was made up of several demes at a distance from each other.
Every man became a citizen of the deme in which he lived, without regard
to his clan, the new people were made citizens, and thus every freeborn
inhabitant of Attica gained full rights of suffrage and citizenship, and
the old clan aristocracy was at an end. The clans kept up their ancient
organization and religious ceremonies, but they lost their political
control. It must be said here, however, that many of the people of
Attica were slaves, and that the new commonwealth of freemen was very
far from including the whole population.

One of the most curious of the new laws made by Cleisthenes was that
known as "ostracism," by which any citizen who showed himself dangerous
to the state could be banished for ten years if six thousand votes were
cast against him. This was intended as a means of preventing the rise of
future despots.

The people of Athens developed wonderfully in public spirit under their
new constitution. Each of them had now become the equal politically of
the richest and noblest in the state, and all took a more vital interest
in their country than had ever been felt before. It was this that made
them so earnest and patriotic in the Persian war. The poorest citizen
fought as bravely as the richest for the freedom of his beloved state.

Each tribe, under the new laws, chose its own war-leader, or general, so
that there were ten generals of equal power, and in war each of these
was given command of the army for a day; and one of the archons, or
civil heads of the state, was made general of the state, or war archon,
so that there were eleven generals in all.

The leading man in each tribe was usually chosen its general, and of
these we have the stories of three to tell,--Miltiades, the hero of
Marathon; Themistocles, who saved Greece at Salamis; and Aristides,
known as "the Just."

We have already told how two of these men gained great glory. We have
now to tell how they gained great disgrace. Ambition, the bane of the
leaders of states, led them both to ruin.

Miltiades was of noble birth, and succeeded h