possessed two equally powerful ones, Poverty and Helplessness, by
whom they were prevented from supplying him with money. The poet,
Timokreon of Rhodes, in one of his songs, writes bitterly of
Themistokles, saying that he was prevailed upon by the bribes which he
received from exiles to restore them to their native country, but
abandoned himself, who was his guest and friend. The song runs as
follows:

"Though ye may sing Pausanias or Xanthippus in your lays,
Or Leotychides, 'tis Aristeides whom I praise,
The best of men as yet produced by holy Athens' State,
Since thus upon Themistokles has fall'n Latona's hate:
That liar and that traitor base, who for a bribe unclean,
Refused to reinstate a man who his own guest had been.
His friend too, in his native Ialysus, but who took
Three silver talents with him, and his friend forsook.
Bad luck go with the fellow, who unjustly some restores
From exile, while some others he had banished from our shores,
And some he puts to death; and sits among us gorged with pelf.
He kept an ample table at the Isthmian games himself,
And gave to every guest that came full plenty of cold meat,
The which they with a prayer did each and every of them eat,
But their prayer was 'Next year be there no Themistokles to meet.'"

And after the exile and condemnation of Themistokles, Timokreon wrote
much more abusively about him in a song which begins,

"Muse, far away,
Sound this my lay,
For it both meet and right is."

It is said that Timokreon was exiled from home for having dealings with
the Persians, and that Themistokles confirmed his sentence. When, then,
Themistokles was charged with intriguing with the Persians, Timokreon
wrote upon him,

"Timokreon is not the only Greek
That turned a traitor, Persian gold to seek;
I'm not the only fox without a tail,
But others put their honour up for sale."

XXII. As the Athenians, through his unpopularity, eagerly listened to
any story to his discredit, he was obliged to weary them by constantly
repeating the tale of his own exploits to them. In answer to those who
were angry with him, he would ask, "Are you weary of always receiving
benefits from the same hand?" He also vexed the people by building the
Temple of Artemis of Good Counsel, as he called her, hinting that he had
taken good counsel for the Greeks. This temple he placed close to his
own house in Meli