"Mary Renault - Greece 4 - The Last Of The Wine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Renault Mary)

Sostias to buy food in case of siege. But when dark fell and the troops were still standing by, I got tired
of sitting indoors; so I said, Father would be glad of some wine, I expect, since everything is quiet.

She gave me leave. I said she must keep Midas at hand, so, lighting a torch, I went up alone to the
Anakeion. The temple precinct was full of the smell of horses, and the sound of their treading and
snorting. High above the picket-lines I could see the Great Twin Brethren, the friends Of the horseman,
leading their bronze chargers against the stars. I put out my torch, for one could see by the light of the
watch-fires; and I asked for my father by his name, and his father's name, and the name of his deme.

Someone said he was standing guard at the northeast corner of the precinct; and going that way I saw
him on the wall, leaning upon his spear with firelight on his armour, like a warrior done in red on a black
vase. I went up and said, Sir, Mother has sent you some wine. He said he would be glad of it later; I put
it down, and was going to bid him goodnight when he said, You may stay for a while, and watch with me.

I climbed up and stood beside him. One could not see far, for the night was moonless. No one was very
near; as it got cooler, they were drawing round the fires or into the temple. I felt I should say something
to him; but we had never talked much together. At last I asked him if he expected an attack in the
morning. We shall see, he said. Confusion in a city breeds false alarms. Still they may be coming, in the
hope we have not enough men left to man the walls. He did not look round as he talked, keeping his eyes
on the dark, as men do on watch, lest the firelight dull them. Presently I asked, How long will it take the
Army, sir, to conquer Sicily? He answered, Only the gods know.

I was surprised and fell silent. After a moment he said, The Syracusans had not injured us, nor
threatened us. The war was with the Spartans. — But, I said, when we have beaten the Syracusans, and
have got their ships and harbour and the gold, shan't we finish the Spartans easily? — Maybe. But time
was when we fought only to hold off the barbarian, or to defend the City, or for justice's sake.

In most men I should have thought such words poor-spirited; for I was used to hearing that we fought to
make the City great, and leader of the Hellenes. But when I saw him standing in his armour, I knew not
what to think.

He said, In the third year of the war, when you were still at nurse, the Lesbians, our subject allies, rose
against us. They were reduced without much trouble; and the Assembly voting on their fate thought it
wise to make an example of them. The men of fighting age should be put to the sword, and the rest of the
people sold as slaves. So the galley set out for Lesbos with this decree. But that night we lay sleepless, or
started up from sleep, hearing the cries of the dying, the shrieks of women, and children's weeping, still in
our ears. In the morning we all returned to the Assembly; and when we had rescinded the decree, we
offered rewards to the rowers of the second galley to overtake the first. They did it; for the first had
laboured along as if sick men pulled the oars, so much their errand oppressed them. When they were
overhauled at Mytilene, the Athenians felt reprieved as much as the Lesbians; they rejoiced together and
shared their wine. But last year, the Melians, who owed us nothing, being Doric, chose to pay tribute to
their mother-city rather than to us. What we did, you know.

I took courage to say he had never related it to me. He answered, When you sacrifice, pray the gods
that it may never fall to your lot, either to suffer it, or to do it.

I had never guessed that such things were in his mind. It was Alkibiades who had moved the Melians'
punishment. The gods punish hubris in men, he said. So why should we think they praise it in cities?
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