Alcibiades saw plainly that this manoeuvre was contrived to get
him out of the way, to remove his adherents from Athens, and leave his
enemies free to pursue their machinations during his absence. But it
was in vain that he exposed the malicious motives of the last
speakers, and pleaded earnestly for an immediate trial. The Athenians
were still possessed by their daring scheme of conquest, and they
decreed that Alcibiades should keep his command, and sail at once to
Sicily.
IV
At last the great day arrived, and in the first light of a mid-summer
dawn, a vast multitude was seen pouring along the broad highway which
led, between the Long Walls, from Athens to Peiraeus. The Upper City
was almost deserted by its inhabitants, for there was hardly one
Athenian who had not some cherished comrade, or some near relation,
enrolled for service in Sicily, and the crowd was swelled by thousands
of strangers, who came as spectators of that memorable scene. Little
now appeared of that sanguine and joyous temper which had prevailed
among the Athenians when they first voted for the expedition. Their
feelings had lately been fearfully harrowed by the mutilation of the
Hermae, and now that the moment of parting was at hand, all the perils
and uncertainties of their grand enterprise rose up vividly before
them.
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