e country breezes to which they were accustomed. The cause of this,
they said, was the man who, when the war began, admitted the masses of
the country people into the city, and then made no use of them, but
allowed them to be penned up together like cattle, and transmit the
contagion from one to another, without devising any remedy or
alleviation of their sufferings.

XXXV. Hoping to relieve them somewhat, and also to annoy the enemy,
Perikles manned a hundred and fifty ships, placed on board, besides the
sailors, many brave infantry and cavalry soldiers, and was about to put
to sea. The Athenians conceived great hopes, and the enemy no less
terror from so large an armament. When all was ready, and Perikles
himself had just embarked in his own trireme, an eclipse of the sun took
place, producing total darkness, and all men were terrified at so great
a portent. Perikles, observing that his helmsman was alarmed and knew
not what to do, held his cloak over the man's eyes and asked him if he
thought that a terrible portent. As he answered that he did not,
Perikles said: "What is the difference, then, between it and an eclipse
of the sun, except that the eclipse is caused by something larger than
my cloak?" This subject is discussed by the philosophers in their
schools.

Perikles sailed with the fleet, but did nothing worthy of so great a
force. He besieged the sacred city of Epidaurus, but, although he had
great hopes of taking it, he failed on account of the plague, which
destroyed not only his own men, but every one who came in contact with
them. After this he again endeavoured to encourage the Athenians, to
whom he had become an object of dislike. However, he did not succeed in
pacifying them, but they condemned him by a public vote to be general no
more, and to pay a fine which is stated at the lowest estimate to have
been fifteen talents, and at the highest fifty. This was carried,
according to Idomeneus, by Kleon, but according to Theophrastus by
Simmias; whilst Herakleides of Pontus says that it was effected by
Lakrateides.

XXXVI. He soon regained his public position, for the people's outburst
of anger was quenched by the blow they had dealt him, just as a bee
leaves its sting in the wound; but his private affairs were in great
distress and disorder, as he had lost many of his relatives during the
plague, while others were estranged from him on political grounds.
Xanthippus too, the eldest of his legitimate sons,