under an obligation to gratify
and submit to all the wishes of those who, from a fugitive and an exile,
had created him general of so great an army and given him the command of
such a fleet. But, as became a great captain, he opposed himself to
the precipitate resolutions which their rage led them to, and, by
restraining them from the great error they were about to commit,
unequivocally saved the commonwealth. For if they had then sailed to
Athens, all Ionia and the islands and the Hellespont would have fallen
into the enemies' hands without opposition, while the Athenians,
involved in civil war, would have been fighting with one another within
the circuit of their own walls. It was Alcibiades alone, or, at least,
principally, who prevented all this mischief; for he not only used
persuasion to the whole army, and showed them the danger, but applied
himself to them, one by one, entreating some, and constraining others.
He was much assisted, however, by Thrasybulus of Stiria, who, having the
loudest voice, as we are told, of all the Athenians, went along with
him and cried out to those who were ready to go. A second great service
which Alcibiades did for them was his undertaking that the Phoenician
fleet, which the Lacedaemonians expected to be sent to them by the king
of Persia, should either come in aid of the Athenians, or otherwise
should not come at all. And now the people in the city not only desired,
but commanded Alcibiades to return home from his exile. He, however,
desired not to owe his return to the mere grace and commiseration of the
people, and resolved to come back, not with empty hands, but with glory
and after some service done. To this end, he sailed from Samos with a
few ships, and cruised on the sea of Cnidos and about the isle of Cos;
but receiving intelligence there that Mindarus, the Spartan admiral, had
sailed with his whole army into the Hellespont, and that the Athenians
had followed him, he hurried back to succor the Athenian commanders,
and, by good fortune, arrived with eighteen galleys at a critical time.
For both the fleets having engaged near Abydos, the fight between them
had lasted till night, the one side having the advantage on one quarter,
and the other on another. Upon his first appearance, both sides formed a
false impression; the enemy was encouraged, and the Athenians terrified.
But Alcibiades suddenly raised the Athenian ensign in the admiral
ship, and fell upon those galleys of the