They were condemned to confinement in
the stone quarries, deep pits surrounded by high walls of cliff, under
the south-eastern edge of Epipolae. Penned together in these roofless
dungeons, they were exposed to the fierce heat of the sun by day, and
to the bitter cold of the autumn nights, and having scarcely room to
move, they were unable to preserve common decency, or common
cleanliness. Many died of their wounds, or of the diseases engendered
by exposure, and their bodies were left unburied, a sight of horror
and a source of infection to the survivors. To these frightful
miseries were added a perpetual burning thirst, and the lingering
torture of slow starvation, for each man received as his daily
allowance a poor half pint of water, and a mere pittance of food, just
enough to avoid breaking the letter of the conditions which
Demosthenes had made for his troops. In this state they were left
without relief for ten long weeks; then all except the Athenians
themselves, and their allies from the Greek cities of Sicily and
Italy, were taken out and sold as slaves.
EPILOGUE
Such was the end of the Sicilian Expedition, which ultimately decided
the issue of the Peloponnesian War. Forsaking the wise counsels of
their greatest statesman, and carried away by the mad sophistry of
Alcibiades, the Athenians had committed themselves, heart and soul, to
a wild game of hazard, in which they had little to win, and everything
to lose.
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