[54] The character and power of Athens may be judged from the appeals which sundry people have in times past made to us for our help. Those of recent occurrence or for insignificant ends I shall omit; but long before the Trojan War (for it is only fair that those who dispute about immemorial rights should draw their arguments from that early time) there came to us the sons of Heracles[48] and, a little before them, Adrastus, Talaus’s son, king of Argos.