282 HISTORICAL TALES.

passed like a holiday, and songs of joy and triumph
made their work light.

The Bastile of Syracuse down, Timoleon ordered
that the materials should be used to build courts of
justice,—for justice was henceforth to replace despot-
ism in that tyrant-ridden city. But he had more to
do. So long had oppression and suffering lasted that
the city was half deserted and the very market-place
turned into a horse pasture. The same was the case
with other cities of Sicily. Even the fields were but
half cultivated. Ruin had swept over that fertile
island far and wide.

Timoleon now sent invitations everywhere, in-
viting exiles to return and new colonists to come
and people theisland. To make them sure that they
would not be oppressed, a new constitution was
formed, giving all the power to the people. The in-
vitation was accepted. From all quarters colonists
came, while ten thousand exiles and others sailed
from Corinth. In the end no fewer than sixty thou-
sand new citizens were added to Syracuse.

Meanwhile Timoleon put down the other despots
of Sicily and set the cities free. Hicetas, his old
enemy, was forced to give up his control of Leontini,
to which he had retired on the loss of Syracuse.
But the snake retained his venom. The Carthagin-
ians were furious at the flight of their fleet. Hicetas
stirred them up to another invasion of the liberated
island.

How long they were in preparing for this expe-
dition we do not know, but it was made on a large
scale. An army of seventy thousand men landed