of the barbarians was rendered more equal to that of
the Greeks. Re-enforced by fifty-three ships from Athens the next
day, the Greeks proceeded at evening against that part of the hostile
navy possessed by the Cilicians. These they utterly defeated, and
returned joyfully to Artemisium.

Hitherto these skirmishes, made on the summer evenings, in order
probably to take advantage of the darkening night to break off before
any irremediable loss was sustained, seem rather to have been for the
sake of practice in the war--chivalric sorties as it were--than actual
and deliberate engagements. But the third day, the Persians,
impatient of conquest, advanced to Artemisium. These sea encounters
were made precisely on the same days as the conflicts at Thermopylae;
the object on each was the same--the gaining in one of the sea defile,
in the other of the land entrance into Greece. The Euripus was the
Thermopylae of the ocean.

IV. The Greeks remained in their station, and there met the shock;
the battle was severe and equal; the Persians fought with great valour
and firmness, and although the loss upon their side was far the
greatest, many of the Greek vessels also perished. They separated as
by mutual consent, neither force the victor. Of the Persian fleet the
Egyptians were the most distinguished--of the Grecian the Athenians;
and of the last none equalled in valour Clinias; his ship was manned
at his own expense. He was the father of that Alcibiades, afterward
so famous.

While the Greeks rested at Artemisium, counting the number of their
slain, and amid the wrecks of their vessels, they learned the fate of
Leonidas. [74] This determined their previous consultations on the
policy of retreat, and they abandoned the Euripus in steady and
marshalled order, the Corinthians first, the Athenians closing the
rear. Thus the Persians were left masters of the sea and land
entrance into Greece.

But even in retreat, the active spirit of Themistocles was intent upon
expedients. It was more than suspected that a considerable portion of
the Ionians now in the service of Xerxes were secretly friendly to the
Greeks. In the swiftest of the Athenian vessels Themistocles
therefore repaired to a watering-place on the coast, and engraved upon
the rocks these words, which were read by the Ionians the next day.

"Men of Ionia, in fighting against your ancestors, and assisting to
enslave Greece, you act unworthily. Come over to us;