fe is entirely
free from blame, it becomes our duty to relate their noble actions
with minute exactitude, regarding them as illustrative of true
character, whilst, whenever either a man's personal feelings or
political exigencies may have led him to commit mistakes and crimes,
we must regard his conduct more as a temporary lapse from virtue than
as disclosing any innate wickedness of disposition, and we must not
dwell with needless emphasis on his failings, if only to save our
common human nature from the reproach of being unable to produce a man
of unalloyed goodness and virtue.

III. It appears to me that the life of Lucullus furnishes a good
parallel to that of Kimon. Both were soldiers, and distinguished
themselves against the barbarians; both were moderate politicians and
afforded their countrymen a brief period of repose from the violence
of party strife, and both of them won famous victories. No Greek
before Kimon, and no Roman before Lucullus, waged war at such a
distance from home, if we except the legends of Herakles and Dionysus,
and the vague accounts which we have received by tradition of the
travels and exploits of Perseus in Ethiopia, Media, and Armenia, and
of the expedition of Jason to recover the Golden Fleece.

Another point in which they agree is the incomplete nature of the
success which they obtained, for they both inflicted severe losses on
their enemies, but neither completely crushed them. Moreover we find
in each of them the same generous hospitality, and the same luxurious
splendour of living. Their other points of resemblance the reader may
easily discover for himself by a comparison of their respective lives.

IV. Kimon was the son of Miltiades by his wife Hegesipyle, a lady of
Thracian descent, being the daughter of King Olorus, as we learn from
the poems addressed to Kimon himself by Archelaus and Melanthius.
Thucydides the historian also was connected with Kimon's family, as
the name of Olorus had descended to his father,[306] who also
inherited gold mines in Thrace from his ancestors there. Thucydides is
said to have died at Skapte Hyle, a small town in Thrace, near the
gold mines. His remains were conveyed to Athens and deposited in the
cemetery belonging to the family of Kimon, where his tomb is now to be
seen, next to that of Elpinike, Kimon's sister. However, Thucydides
belonged to the township of Halimus, and the family of Miltiades to
that of Lakia.

Miltiades was condemned by