Timoleon

having been removed betimes by a happy fortune, pure and unstained with blood, from the evils which were rife in the mother country, and having displayed ability and valour in his dealings with Barbarians and tyrants, as well as justice and gentleness in his dealings with the Greeks and his friends;

having set up most of the trophies of his contests without causing his fellow citizens either tears or mourning, and having in even less than eight years[*](346-338 B.C.) handed over to her inhabitants a Sicily purged of her perpetual intestine miseries and complaints;

at last, being now advanced in years, he began to lose his sight, and then, after a little, became completely blind. He had done nothing himself to occasion this, nor was he therein the sport and mockery of Fortune, but suffered from some congenital disease, as it would seem, which came upon him with his years;

for it is said that not a few of his kindred lost their sight in a similar way, when it was enfeebled by old age.

But Athanis says that while the war against Hippo and Mamercus was still in progress, in his camp at Mylae, his vision was obscured by a cataract in the eye, and it was plain to all that he was getting blind; he did not, however, desist from the siege on this account, but persisted in the war and captured the tyrants;

yet after his return to Syracuse, he at once laid aside the sole command and begged the citizens to excuse him from it, now that matters had reached the happiest conclusion.

Well, then, that he himself should bear his misfortune without repining is less a matter for wonder;

but the gratitude and honour which the Syracusans showed him in his blindness are worthy of admiration. They often went to visit him in person, and brought strangers who were sojourning in the city to his house and to his country seat to see their benefactor,

exulting and proud that he chose to end his days among them and thus made light of the brilliant return to Greece which had been prepared for him by reason of his successes.

And of the many great things decreed and done in his honour, nothing surpassed the vote passed by the people of Syracuse that whenever they went to war against alien peoples, they would employ a Corinthian as their general.

Moreover, the proceedings in their assemblies afforded a noble spectacle in his honour, since, while they decided other matters by themselves, for the more important deliberations they summoned him.

Then he would proceed to the theatre carried through the market place on a mule-car; and when the vehicle in which he sat was brought in, the people would greet him with one voice and call him by name, and he, after returning their greetings and allowing some time for their felicitations and praises, would then listen carefully to the matter under debate and pronounce opinion.