him fell out
upon the following occasion.

In the fourth year of the reign of Archidamus, the son of Zeuxidamus,
king of Sparta, there happened in the country of Lacedaemon, the
greatest earthquake that was known in the memory of ma; the earth opened
into chasms, and the mountain Taygetus was so shaken that some of the
rocky points of it fell down, and except five houses, all the town of
Sparta was shattered to pieces. They say that a little before any
motion was perceived, as the young men and the boys just grown up were
exercising themselves together in the middle of the portico, a hare,
of a sudden, started out just by them, which the young men, though all
naked and daubed with oil, ran after for sport. No sooner were they
gone from the place, than the gymnasium fell down upon the boys who had
stayed behind, and killed them all. Their tomb is to this day called
Sismatias.* Archidamus, by the present danger made apprehensive of what
might follow, and seeing the citizens intent upon removing the most
valuable of their goods out of their houses, commanded an alarm to be
sounded, as if an enemy were coming upon them, in order that they should
collect about him in a body, with arms. It was this alone that saved
Sparta at that time, for the Helots had come together from the country
about, with design of surprising the Spartans, and overpowering
those whom the earthquake had spared. But finding them armed and well
prepared, they retired into the towns and openly made war with them,
gaining over a number of the Laconians of the country districts; while
at the same time the Messenians, also, made an attack upon the Spartans,
who therefore despatched Periclidas to Athens to solicit succor, of whom
Aristophanes says in mockery that he came and

In a red jacket, at the altars seated,
With a white face, for men and arms entreated.

This Ephialtes opposed, protesting that they ought not to raise up or
assist a city that was a rival to Athens; but that being down, it
were best to keep her so, and let the pride and arrogance of Sparta
be trodden under. But Cimon, as Critias says, preferring the safety of
Lacedaemon to the aggrandizement of his own country, so persuaded the
people, that he soon marched out with a large army to their relief. Ion
records, also, the most successful expression which he used to move the
Athenians. "They ought not to suffer Greece to be lamed, nor their own
city to be deprived of her yoke fel