w how to command is not any disgrace, but a noble and
useful act. By this means he was enabled to put an end to the
rivalries between the generals, and to strengthen Miltiades by
concentrating in him the power which had before been passed from hand
to hand. In the battle the Athenian centre was hard pressed, as the
Persians resisted longest in that part of their line which was opposed
to the tribes Leontis and Antiochis. Here Themistokles and Aristeides
each showed conspicuous valour, fighting side by side, for the former
was of the tribe Leontis, the latter of the tribe Antiochis. After the
victory was won, and the Persians forced into their ships, they were
observed not to sail towards the Archipelago, but to be proceeding in
the direction of Athens. Fearing that they might catch the city
defenceless, the Athenians determined to hurry back with nine tribes
to protect it, and they accomplished their march in one day.
Aristeides, with his own tribe, was left to guard the prisoners and
the plunder, and well maintained his reputation. Although gold and
silver was lying about in heaps, with all kinds of rich tapestry and
other countless treasures, he would neither touch them himself nor
allow the others to do so, though some helped themselves without his
knowledge. Among these was Kallias, the torch-bearer in the Eleusinian
mysteries. One of the prisoners, taking him for a king because of his
long hair and fillet, fell on his knees before him, and having
received his hand as a pledge for his safety pointed out to him a
great store of gold concealed in a pit. Kallias now acted most cruelly
and wickedly. He took the gold, and killed the poor man for fear that
he should tell it to the others. It is said that ever afterwards the
descendants of Kallias were jeered at by the comic poets, as being of
the family of the man who found the gold in the pit.

Immediately after those events, Aristeides was chosen as Archon
Eponymus, that is, the archon who gives his name to the year.
Demetrius of Phalerum says that he filled this office shortly before
his death, and after the battle of Plataea. But in the public records
of Athens one cannot find any archon of the name of Aristeides among
the many who filled the office after Xanthippides, in whose archonship
Mardonius was defeated at Plataea, whereas the name of Aristeides does
occur next to that of Phanippus, in whose archonship the victory at
Marathon was won.

VI. Of all the virtues