ABSTRACT
It was a prison. There was no question about that. It was also disturbingly beautiful (as prisons sometimes are). From his hilltop palace, he could see nothing but the ancient, sea-beaten, Sicilian cliffs—a proud, mist-shrouded phalanx poised unceasingly against the Mediterranean’s cold blue. Had he been an artist and not a philosopher, he might have judged the view to be sufficient compensation for his confinement. By comparison, his native Greek coast was less stirring to the blood, but infinitely more practical. Nature wisely molded the mountains there to slope gently into the sea. Boats crowded every inch. Attica had made a profitable peace with Poseidon. Sicily stood in futile defiance of him.
