FOUR FAMOUS MEN OF ATHENS. 183

grew so arrogant and unjust that the people of
Athens found him unfit to live with. They sus-
pected him also of joining with Pausanias in his
schemes. So they banished him by ostracism, and
he went to Argos to live. While there it was proved
that he really had taken part in the treason of Pau-
sanias, and he was obliged to fly for his life.

The fugitive had many adventures in this flight.
He was pursued by envoys from Athens, and made
more than one narrow escape. While on shipboard
he was driven by storm to the island of Naxos, then
besieged by an Athenian fleet, and escaped only by
promising a large reward to the captain if he would
not land. Finally, after other adventures, he reached
Susa, the capital of Persia, where he found that
Xerxes was dead, and his son Artaxerxes was reign-
ing in his stead.

He was well received by the new king, to whom
he declared that be had been friendly to his father
Xerxes, and that he proposed now to use his powers
for the good of Persia. He formed schemes by
which Persia might conquer Greece, and gained
such favor with the new monarch that he gave him
a Persian wife and rich presents, sent him to Mag-
nesia, near the Ionian coast, and granted him the
revenues of the surrounding district. Here Themis-
tocles died, at the age of sixty-five, without having
kept one of his alluring promises to the Persian king.

And thus, through greed and ambition, the three
great leaders of Greece in the Persian war ended
their careers in disgrace and death. We have now
the story of a fourth great Athenian to tell, who