every meal an officer should repeat to him: "Master,
remember the Athenians." He sent to the Greek cities to demand earth
and water, a symbol in use among the Persians to indicate submission
to the Great King. Most of the Greeks were afraid and yielded. But the
Spartans cast the envoys into a pit, bidding them take thence earth
and water to carry to the king. This was the beginning of the Median
wars.

=Comparison of the Two Adversaries.=--The contrast between the two
worlds which now entered into conflict is well marked by Herodotus[73]
in the form of a conversation of King Xerxes with Demaratus, a Spartan
exile: "'I venture to assure you,' said Demaratus, 'that the Spartans
will offer you battle even if all the rest of the Greeks fight on your
side, and if their army should not amount to more than one thousand
men.' 'What!' said Xerxes, 'one thousand men attack so immense an army
as mine! I fear your words are only boasting; for although they be
five thousand, we are more than one thousand to one. If they had a
master like us, fear would inspire them with courage; they would march
under the lash against a larger army; but being free and independent,
they will have no more courage than that with which nature has endowed
them.' 'The Spartans,' replied Demaratus, 'are not inferior to anybody
in a hand-to-hand contest, and united in a phalanx they are the
bravest of all men. Yet, though free, they have an absolute master,
the Law, which they dread more than all your subjects do you; they
obey it, and this law requires them to stand fast to their post and
conquer or die.'" This is the difference between the two parties to
the conflict: on the one side, a multitude of subjects united by force
under a capricious master; on the other, little martial republics
whose citizens govern themselves according to laws which they respect.

=First Persian War.=--There were two Persian wars. The first was
simply an expedition against Athens; six hundred galleys sent by
Darius disembarked a Persian army on the little plain of Marathon,
seven hours distant from Athens.

Religious sentiment prevented the Spartans from taking the field
before the full moon, and it was still only the first quarter; the
Athenians had to fight alone.[74] Ten thousand citizens armed as
hoplites camped before the Persians. The Athenians had ten generals,
having the command on successive days; of these Miltiades, when his
turn came, drew up the army for battle