A Victor of Salamis; A Tale of the Days of Xerxes, Leonidas, and Themistocles

General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1915 Original Publisher: The Macmillan Company Subjects: Greece Fiction / Historical History / Ancient / Greece History / Europe / Greece Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER II THE ATHLETE There was ceaseless coming and going outside the Precinct of Poseidon. Following much the same path just taken by Simonides and his new friends, two other men were walking, so deep in talk that they hardly heeded how many made respectful way for them, or how many greeted them. The taller and younger man, to be sure, returned every salute with a graceful flourish of his hands, but in a mechanical way, and with eye fixed on his companion. The pair were markedly contrasted. The younger was in his early prime, strong, well developed, and daintily dressed. His gestures were quick and eloquent. His brown beard and hair were trimmed short to reveal a clear olive face -- hardly regular, but expressive and tinged with an extreme subtilty. When he laughed, in a strange, silent way, it was to reveal fine teeth, while his musical tongue ran on, never waiting for answer. His comrade, however, answered little. He barely rose to the other's shoulder, but he had the chest and sinews of an ox. Graces there were none. His face was a scarred ravine, half covered by scanty stubble. The forehead was low. The eyes, gray and wise, twinkled from tufted eyebrows. The long gray hair was tied about his forehead in a braid and held by a golden circlet. The chlamys around hiships was purple but dirty. To his companion's glib Attic he returned only Doric monosyllables. Thus I have explained: if my plans prosper; if Corcyra and Syracuse send aid; if Xerxes has trouble ...