and then each made known to the other what he had selected. Agetus
gained some jewel, or costly garment, or perhaps a gilded and
embellished weapon, and lost forever his beautiful wife. Ariston
repudiated his own second wife, and put the prize which he had thus
surreptitiously acquired in her place as a third.

About seven or eight months after this time Demaratus was born. The
intelligence was brought to Ariston one day by a slave, when he was
sitting at a public tribunal. Ariston seemed surprised at the
intelligence, and exclaimed that the child was not his. He, however,
afterward retracted this disavowal, and owned Demaratus as his son. The
child grew up, and in process of time, when his father died, he
succeeded to the throne. The magistrates, however, who had heard the
declaration of his father at the time of his birth, remembered it, and
reported it to others; and when Ariston died and Demaratus assumed the
supreme power, the next heir denied his right to the succession, and in
process of time formed a strong party against him. A long series of
civil dissensions arose, and at length the claims of Demaratus were
defeated, his enemies triumphed, and he fled from the country to save
his life. He arrived at Susa near the close of Darius's reign, and it
was his counsel which led the king to decide the contest among his sons
for the right of succession, in favor of Xerxes, as described at the
close of the first chapter. Xerxes had remembered his obligations to
Demaratus for this interposition. He had retained him in the royal court
after his accession to the throne, and had bestowed upon him many marks
of distinction and honor.

Demaratus had decided to accompany Xerxes on his expedition into
Greece, and now, while the Persian officers were looking with so much
pride and pleasure on the immense preparations which they were making
for the subjugation of a foreign and hostile state, Demaratus, too, was
in the midst of the scene, regarding the spectacle with no less of
interest, probably, and yet, doubtless, with very different feelings,
since the country upon which this dreadful cloud of gloom and
destruction was about to burst was his own native land.

After the review was ended, Xerxes sent for Demaratus to come to the
castle. When he arrived, the king addressed him as follows:

"You are a Greek, Demaratus, and you know your countrymen well; and now,
as you have seen the fleet and the army that have been displayed h