THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE 1821 TO 1833 BY W.ALISON PHILLIPS 1897

388 THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE
promptness, now issued a proclamation
to the Hellenes,
declaring the Government to be the enemies of
the country, the Assembly unconstitutional, and war
against them both just and necessary. At the same
time he summoned the Peloponnesians to arms, to aid
him in expelling the hordes of Grivas. His appeal met
with a ready and immediate response;
and the Moreot
captains crowded to his banner, to help in the expulsion
of the hated Rumeliots. Gennaios Kolokotrones
marched on Tripolitza, while Niketas raised the Messenians,
and did battle with the hillsmen of the Maina.
Kolettes endeavoured to take measures to suppress the
revolt; but, at this crisis, Zaimis and the other Capodistrian
members of the Committee of Government
withdrew, and the executive was thereby deprived of
all constitutional powers.
All was now complete anarchy.
verifying its
The Assembly at Argos began
powers,
the work of
while the Senate denounced it
as illegal and unconstitutional. The executive, paralysed
and impotent, depended entirely on the precarious
support of the mercenary bands, who upheld
it
only as an excuse for plundering
the Morea. The
Government, as a last expiring act of protest, issued a
ban against Kolokotrones, signed by four only of its
members.
The answer was a raid of Kallergis, with
his horsemen, into the plain of Argos;
and the As-