Thucydides, an Athenian, wrote the
 history of the war between the Peloponnesians and the Athenians,
 beginning at the moment that it broke out, and believing that it
 would be a great war, and more worthy of relation than any that had
 preceded it. This belief was not without its grounds. The
 preparations of both the combatants were in every department in the
 last state of perfection; and he could see the rest of the Hellenic
 race taking sides in the quarrel; those who delayed doing so at once
 having it in contemplation.

Indeed this was the greatest movement yet known in history, not only
 of the Hellenes, but of a large part of the barbarian world—I had
 almost said of mankind.

For though the events of remote antiquity, and even those that more
 immediately precede the war, could not from lapse of time be clearly
 ascertained, yet the evidences which an inquiry carried as far back
 as was practicable leads me to trust, all point to the conclusion
 that there was nothing on a great scale, either in war or in other
 matters.

For instance, it is evident that the
 country now called Hellas 
 had in ancient times no settled population; on the contrary,
 migrations were of frequent occurrence, the several tribes readily
 abandoning their homes under the pressure of superior numbers.

Without commerce, without freedom of communication either by land or
 sea, cultivating no more of their territory than the exigencies of
 life required, destitute of capital, never planting their land (for
 they could not tell when an invader might not come and take it all
 away, and when he did come they had no walls to stop him), thinking
 that the necessities of daily sustenance could be supplied at one
 place as well as another, they cared little for shifting their
 habitation, and consequently neither built large cities nor attained
 to any other form of greatness.

The richest soils were always most subject to this change of masters;
 such as the district now called Thessaly , Boeotia , most of the Peloponnese , Arcadia excepted, and the most fertile parts of the
 rest of Hellas .

The goodness of the land favoured the aggrandizement of particular
 individuals, and thus created faction which proved a fertile source
 of ruin. 
 It also invited invasion.

Accordingly Attica , from the
 poverty of its soil enjoying from a very remote period freedom from
 faction, never changed its inhabitants.

And here is no inconsiderable exemplification of my assertion, that
 the migrations were the cause of there being no correspondent growth
 in other parts. 
 The most powerful victims of war or faction from the rest of
 Hellas took refuge with
 the Athenians as a safe retreat; 
 and at an early period, becoming naturalized, swelled the already
 large population of the city to such a height that Attica became at last too small to
 hold them, and they had to send out colonies to Ionia .

There is also another circumstance
 that contributes not a little to my conviction of the weakness of
 ancient times. 
 Before the Trojan war there is no indication of any common action in
 Hellas ,

nor indeed of the universal prevalence of the name; on the contrary,
 before the time of Hellen, son of Deucalion, no such appellation
 existed, but the country went by the names of the different tribes,
 in particular of the Pelasgian. It was not till Hellen and his sons
 grew strong in Phthiotis ,
 and were invited as allies into the other cities, that one by one
 they gradually acquired from the connection the name of Hellenes;
 though a long time elapsed before that name could fasten itself upon
 all.

The best proof of this is furnished by Homer. 
 Born long after the Trojan war, he nowhere calls all of them by that
 name, nor indeed any of them except the followers of Achilles from
 Phthiotis, who were the original Hellenes: in his poems they are
 called Danaans, Argives, and Achaeans. 
 He does not even use the term barbarian, probably because the
 Hellenes had not yet been marked off from the rest of the world by
 one distinctive appellation.

It appears therefore that the several Hellenic communities,
 comprising not only those who first acquired the name, city by city,
 as they came to understand each other, but also those who assumed it
 afterwards as the name of the whole people, were before the Trojan
 war prevented by their want of strength and the absence of mutual
 intercourse from displaying any collective action. 
 
 Indeed, they could not unite for this expedition till they had gained
 increased familiarity with the sea.

And the first person known to us by tradition as having established a
 navy is Minos. 
 He made himself master of what is now called the Hellenic sea, 
 and ruled over the Cyclades ,
 into most of which he sent the first colonies, expelling the Carians
 and appointing his own sons governors; 
 and thus did his best to put down piracy in those waters, a necessary
 step to secure the revenues for his own use.

For in early times the Hellenes and
 the barbarians of the coast and islands, as communication by sea
 became more common, were tempted to turn pirates, under the conduct
 of their most powerful men; the motives being to serve their own
 cupidity and to support the needy. 
 They would fall upon a town unprotected by walls, and consisting of a
 mere collection of villages, and would plunder it; 
 indeed, this came to be the main source of their livelihood, no
 disgrace being yet attached to such an achievement, but even some
 glory.

An illustration of this is furnished by the honor with which some of
 the inhabitants of the continent still regard a successful marauder,
 and by the question we find the old poets everywhere representing
 the people as asking of voyagers—‘Are they pirates?’—as if those who
 are asked the question would have no idea of disclaiming the
 imputation, or their interrogators of reproaching them for it.

The same rapine prevailed also by land. 
 
 And even at the present day many parts of Hellas still follow the old
 fashion, the Ozolian Locrians, for instance, the Aetolians, the
 Acarnanians, and that region of the continent; 
 and the custom of carrying arms is still kept up among these
 continentals, from the old piratical habits.

The whole of Hellas used
 once to carry arms, their habitations being unprotected, and their
 communication with each other unsafe; 
 indeed, to wear arms was as much a part of everyday life with them as
 with the barbarians.

And the fact that the people in these parts of Hellas are still living in the old
 way points to a time when the same mode of life was once equally
 common to all.

The Athenians were the first to lay aside their weapons, 
 and to adopt an easier and more luxurious mode of life; 
 indeed, it is only lately that their rich old men left off the luxury
 of wearing undergarments of linen, and fastening a knot of their
 hair with a tie of golden grasshoppers, 
 a fashion which spread to their Ionian kindred, and long prevailed
 among the old men there.

On the contrary a modest style of dressing, more in conformity with
 modern ideas, was first adopted by the Lacedaemonians, 
 the rich doing their best to assimilate their way of life to that of
 the common people.

They also set the example of contending naked, publicly stripping and
 anointing themselves with oil in their gymnastic exercises. 
 Formerly, even in the Olympic contests, the athletes who contended
 wore belts across their middles; 
 and it is but a few years since that the practice ceased. 
 To this day among some of the barbarians, especially in Asia , when prizes for boxing and
 wrestling are offered, 
 belts are worn by the combatants.

And there are many other points in which a likeness might be shown
 between the life of the Hellenic world of old and the barbarian of
 to-day.

With respect to their towns, later
 on, at an era of increased facilities of navigation and a greater
 supply of capital, we find the shores becoming the site of walled
 towns, and the isthmuses being occupied for the purposes of
 commerce, and defence against a neighbor. 
 But the old towns, on account of the great prevalence of piracy, were
 built away from the sea, whether on the islands or the
 continent, 
 and still remain in their old sites. 
 For the pirates used to plunder one another, and indeed all coast
 populations, whether seafaring or not.

The islanders, too, were great
 pirates. These islanders were Carians and Phoenicians, 
 by whom most of the islands were colonized, 
 as was proved by the following fact. 
 During the purification of Delos by Athens in this war all the graves in the island
 were taken up, and it was found that above half their inmates were
 Carians: they were identified by the fashion of the arms buried with
 them, and by the method of interment, which was the same as the
 Carians still follow.

But as soon as Minos had formed his navy, communication by sea became
 easier, 
 as he colonized most of the islands, and thus expelled the
 malefactors.

The coast populations now began to apply themselves more closely to
 the acquisition of wealth, and their life became more settled; some
 even began to build themselves walls on the strength of their
 newly-acquired riches. 
 For the love of gain would reconcile the weaker to the dominion of
 the stronger, and the possession of capital enabled the more
 powerful to reduce the smaller towns to subjection.

And it was at a somewhat later stage of this development that they
 went on the expedition against Troy .

What enabled Agamemnon to raise the
 armament was more, in my opinion, his superiority in strength, than
 the oaths of Tyndareus, which bound the Suitors to follow him.

Indeed, the account given by those Peloponnesians who have been the
 recipients of the most credible tradition is this. First of all
 Pelops, arriving among a needy population from Asia with vast wealth, acquired
 such power that, stranger though he was, the country was called
 after him; and this power fortune saw fit materially to increase in
 the hands of his descendants. Eurystheus had been killed in
 Attica by the
 Heraclids. Atreus was his mother's brother; and to the hands of his
 relation, who had left his father on account of the death of
 Chrysippus, Eurystheus, when he set out on his expedition, had
 committed Mycenae and
 the government. As time went on and Eurystheus did not return,
 Atreus complied with the wishes of the Mycenaeans, who were
 influenced by fear of the Heraclids,—besides, his power seemed
 considerable, and he had not neglected to court the favour of the
 populace,—and assumed the sceptre of Mycenae and the rest of the
 dominions of Eurystheus. And so the power of the descendants of
 Pelops came to be greater than that of the descendants of
 Perseus.

To all this Agamemnon succeeded. He had also a navy far stronger than
 his contemporaries, so that, in my opinion, fear was quite as strong
 an element as love in the formation of the confederate
 expedition.

The strength of his navy is shown by the fact that his own was the
 largest contingent, and that of the Arcadians was furnished by him;
 this at least is what Homer says, if his testimony is deemed
 sufficient. 
 Besides, in his account of the transmission of the sceptre, he calls
 him 
 
 Of many an isle, and of all Argos king. 
 

 Hom. Il. 2.108 
 
 
 Now Agamemnon's was a continental power; and he could not have been
 master of any except the adjacent islands (and these would not be
 many), but through the possession of a fleet. 
 
 And from this expedition we may infer the character of earlier
 enterprises.

Now Mycenae may have
 been a small place, and many of the towns of that age may appear
 comparatively insignificant, but no exact observer would therefore
 feel justified in rejecting the estimate given by the poets and by
 tradition of the magnitude of the armament.

For I suppose if Lacedaemon 
 were to become desolate, and the temples and the foundations of the
 public buildings were left, that as time went on there would be a
 strong disposition with posterity to refuse to accept her fame as a
 true exponent of her power. 
 And yet they occupy two-fifths of Peloponnese and lead the whole, not to speak of
 their numerous allies without. 
 Still, as the city is neither built in a compact form nor adorned
 with magnificent temples and public edifices, but composed of
 villages after the old fashion of Hellas , there would be an impression of
 inadequacy. 
 Whereas, if Athens were
 to suffer the same misfortune, I suppose that any inference from the
 appearance presented to the eye would make her power to have been
 twice as great as it is.

We have therefore no right to be skeptical, nor to content ourselves
 with an inspection of a town to the exclusion of a consideration of
 its power; but we may safely conclude that the armament in question
 surpassed all before it, as it fell short of modern efforts; if we
 can here also accept the testimony of Homer's poems, in which,
 without allowing for the exaggeration which a poet would feel
 himself licensed to employ, 
 we can see that it was far from equalling ours.

He has represented it as consisting of twelve hundred vessels; the
 Boeotian complement of each ship being a hundred and twenty men,
 that of the ships of Philoctetes fifty. By this, I conceive, he
 meant to convey the maximum and the minimum complement: 
 at any rate he does not specify the amount of any others in his
 catalogue of the ships. 
 That they were all rowers as well as warriors we see from his account
 of the ships of Philoctetes, 
 in which all the men at the oar are bowmen. 
 Now it is improbable that many supernumeraries sailed if we except
 the kings and high officers; especially as they had to cross the
 open sea with munitions of war, in ships, moreover, that had no
 decks, but were equipped in the old piratical fashion.

So that if we strike the average of the largest and smallest ships,
 the number of those who sailed will appear inconsiderable,
 representing, as they did, the whole force of Hellas .

And this was due not so much to scarcity of men as of money. 
 Difficulty of subsistence made the invaders reduce the numbers of the
 army to a point at which it might live on the country during the
 prosecution of the war. Even after the victory they obtained on
 their arrival— 
 and a victory there must have been, or the fortifications of the
 naval camp could never have been built— 
 there is no indication of their whole force having been employed; on
 the contrary, they seem to have turned to cultivation of the
 Chersonese and to piracy from want of supplies. 
 This was what really enabled the Trojans to keep the field for ten
 years against them; the dispersion of the enemy making them always a
 match for the detachment left behind.

If they had brought plenty of supplies with them, and had persevered
 in the war without scattering for piracy and agriculture, they would
 have easily defeated the Trojans in the field; since they could hold
 their own against them with the division on service. 
 In short, if they had stuck to the siege, the capture of Troy would have cost them less
 time and less trouble. 
 But as want of money proved the weakness of earlier expeditions, so
 from the same cause even the one in question, more famous than its
 predecessors, may be pronounced on the evidence of what it effected
 to have been inferior to its renown and to the current opinion about
 it formed under the tuition of the poets.

Even after the Trojan war Hellas was still engaged in
 removing and settling, and thus could not attain to the quiet which
 must precede growth.

The late return of the Hellenes from Ilium caused many revolutions, 
 and factions ensued almost everywhere; and it was the citizens thus
 driven into exile who founded the cities.

Sixty years after the capture of Ilium the modern Boeotians were driven out of
 Arne by the
 Thessalians, and settled in the present Boeotia , the former Cadmeis; 
 though there was a division of them there before, some of whom joined
 the expedition to Ilium . 
 Twenty years later the Dorians and the Heraclids became masters of
 Peloponnese ; so that
 much had to be done

and many years had to elapse before Hellas could attain to a durable tranquillity
 undisturbed by removals, 
 and could begin to send out colonies, as Athens did to Ionia and most of the islands, and
 the Peloponnesians to most of Italy and Sicily and some places in the rest of Hellas . 
 All these places were founded subsequently to the war with Troy .

But as the power of Hellas grew, and the acquisition
 of wealth became more an object, the revenues of the states
 increasing, tyrannies were by their means established almost
 everywhere,— 
 the old form of government being hereditary monarchy with definite
 prerogatives,— 
 and Hellas began to fit out
 fleets and apply herself more closely to the sea.

It is said that the Corinthians were the first to approach the modern
 style of naval architecture, 
 and that Corinth was the
 first place in Hellas where
 galleys were built;

and we have Ameinocles, a Corinthian shipwright, making four ships
 for the Samians. 
 Dating from the end of this war, it is nearly three hundred years ago
 that Ameinocles went to Samos .

Again, the earliest sea-fight in history was between the Corinthians
 and Corcyraeans; 
 this was about two hundred and sixty years ago, dating from the same
 time.

Planted on an isthmus, Corinth had from time out of mind been a commercial
 emporium; 
 as formerly almost all communication between the Hellenes within and
 without Peloponnese was
 carried on overland, and the Corinthian territory was the highway
 through which it travelled. 
 She had consequently great money resources, as is shown by the
 epithet ‘wealthy’ bestowed by the old poets on the place, 
 and this enabled her, when traffic by sea became more common, to
 procure her navy and put down piracy; 
 and as she could offer a mart for both branches of the trade, she
 acquired for herself all the power which a large revenue
 affords.

Subsequently the Ionians attained to great naval strength in the
 reign of Cyrus, the first king of the Persians, and of his son
 Cambyses, 
 and while they were at war with the former commanded for a while the
 Ionian sea. 
 Polycrates also, the tyrant of Samos , had a powerful navy in the reign of Cambyses
 with which he reduced many of the islands, and among them Rhenea,
 which he consecrated to the Delian Apollo. 
 About this time also the Phocaeans, while they were founding
 Marseilles , defeated
 the Carthaginians in a sea-fight.

These were the most powerful navies. 
 And even these, although so many generations had elapsed since the
 Trojan war, seem to have been principally composed of the old
 fifty-oars and long-boats, and to have counted few galleys among
 their ranks.

Indeed it was only shortly before the Persian war and the death of
 Darius the successor of Cambyses, that the Sicilian tyrants and the
 Corcyraeans acquired any large number of galleys. 
 For after these there were no navies of any account in Hellas till the expedition of
 Xerxes;

Aegina , Athens , and others may have
 possessed a few vessels, but they were principally fifty-oars. 
 It was quite at the end of this period that the war with Aegina and the prospect of
 the barbarian invasion enabled Themistocles to persuade the
 Athenians to build the fleet with which they fought at Salamis ; 
 and even these vessels had not complete decks.

The navies, then, of the Hellenes
 during the period we have traversed were what I have described. 
 All their insignificance did not prevent their being an element of
 the greatest power to those who cultivated them, alike in revenue
 and in dominion. 
 They were the means by which the islands were reached and reduced,
 those of the smallest area falling the easiest prey.

Wars by land there were none, none at least by which power was
 acquired; 
 we have the usual border contests, 
 but of distant expeditions with conquest for object we hear nothing
 among the Hellenes. 
 There was no union of subject cities round a great state, 
 no spontaneous combination of equals for confederate expeditions; 
 what fighting there was consisted merely of local warfare between
 rival neighbors.

The nearest approach to a coalition took place in the old war between
 Chalcis and
 Eretria ; this was a
 quarrel in which the rest of the Hellenic name did to some extent
 take sides.

Various, too, were the obstacles
 which the national growth encountered in various localities. 
 The power of the Ionians was advancing with rapid strides, when it
 came into collision with Persia , under King Cyrus, who, after having
 dethroned Croesus and overrun everything between the Halys and the
 sea, stopped not till he had reduced the cities of the coast; the
 islands being only left to be subdued by Darius and the Phoenician
 navy.

Again, wherever there were tyrants, their habit of providing simply
 for themselves, of looking solely to their personal comfort and
 family aggrandizement, made safety the great aim of their
 policy, 
 and prevented anything great proceeding from them; though they would
 each have their affairs with their immediate neighbors. 
 All this is only true of the mother country, for in Sicily they attained to very great
 power. 
 Thus for a long time everywhere in Hellas do we find causes which make the states
 alike incapable of combination for great and national ends, or of
 any vigorous action of their own.

But at last a time came when the
 tyrants of Athens and
 the far older tyrannies of the rest of Hellas were, with the exception of those in
 Sicily , once and for
 all put down by Lacedaemon ; 
 for this city, though after the settlement of the Dorians, its
 present inhabitants, it suffered from factions for an unparalleled
 length of time, still at a very early period obtained good laws, and
 enjoyed a freedom from tyrants which was unbroken; 
 it has possessed the same form of government for more than four
 hundred years, reckoning to the end of the late war, 
 and has thus been in a position to arrange the affairs of the other
 states. 
 Not many years after the deposition of the tyrants, the battle of
 Marathon was fought between the Medes and the Athenians.

Ten years afterwards the barbarian returned with the armada for the
 subjugation of Hellas . 
 In the face of this great danger the command of the confederate
 Hellenes was assumed by the Lacedaemonians in virtue of their
 superior power; 
 and the Athenians having made up their minds to abandon their city,
 broke up their homes, threw themselves into their ships, and became
 a naval people. 
 This coalition, after repulsing the barbarian, soon afterwards split
 into two sections, which included the Hellenes who had revolted from
 the king, as well as those who had aided him in the war. 
 At the head of the one stood Athens , at the head of the other Lacedaemon , 
 one the first naval, the other the first military power in Hellas .

For a short time the league held together, 
 till the Lacedaemonians and Athenians quarrelled, and made war upon
 each other with their allies, 
 a duel into which all the Hellenes sooner or later were drawn, though
 some might at first remain neutral. 
 So that the whole period from the Median war to this, with some
 peaceful intervals, was spent by each power in war, either with its
 rival, or with its own revolted allies, and consequently afforded
 them constant practice in military matters, and that experience
 which is learnt in the school of danger.

The policy of Lacedaemon was not to exact
 tribute from her allies, but merely to secure their subservience to
 her interests by establishing oligarchies among them; 
 
 Athens , on the contrary,
 had by degrees deprived hers of their ships, and imposed instead
 contributions in money on all except Chios and Lesbos . 
 Both found their resources for this war separately to exceed the sum
 of their strength when the alliance flourished intact.

Having now given the result of my
 inquiries into early times, I grant that there will be a difficulty
 in believing every particular detail. 
 The way that most men deal with traditions, even traditions of their
 own country, is to receive them all alike as they are delivered,
 without applying any critical test whatever.

The general Athenian public fancy that Hipparchus was tyrant when he
 fell by the hands of Harmodius and Aristogiton; 
 not knowing that Hippias, the eldest of the sons of Pisistratus, was
 really supreme, and that Hipparchus and Thessalus were his brothers;
 and that Harmodius and Aristogiton suspecting, on the very day, nay
 at the very moment fixed on for the deed, that information had been
 conveyed to Hippias by their accomplices, concluded that he had been
 warned, and did not attack him, yet, not liking to be apprehended
 and risk their lives for nothing, fell upon Hipparchus near the
 temple of the daughters of Leos, and slew him as he was arranging
 the Panathenaic procession.

There are many other unfounded ideas
 current among the rest of the Hellenes, even on matters of
 contemporary history which have not been obscured by time. For
 instance, there is the notion that the Lacedaemonian kings have two
 votes each, the fact being that they have only one; and that there
 is a company of Pitane ,
 there being simply no such thing. 
 So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth,
 accepting readily the first story that comes to hand.

On the whole, however, the conclusions I have drawn from the proofs
 quoted may, I believe, safely be relied on. Assuredly they will not
 be disturbed either by the lays of a poet displaying the
 exaggeration of his craft, or by the compositions of the chroniclers
 that are attractive at truth's expense; the subjects they treat of
 being out of the reach of evidence, and time having robbed most of
 them of historical value by enthroning them in the region of legend.
 Turning from these, we can rest satisfied with having proceeded upon
 the clearest data, and having arrived at conclusions as exact as can
 be expected in matters of such antiquity.

To come to this war; despite the known disposition of the actors in a
 struggle to overrate its importance, and when it is over to return
 to their admiration of earlier events, yet an examination of the
 facts will show that it was much greater than the wars which
 preceded it.

With reference to the speeches in
 this history, some were delivered before the war began, others while
 it was going on; some I heard myself, others I got from various
 quarters; 
 it was in all cases difficult to carry them word for word in one's
 memory, so my habit has been to make the speakers say what was in my
 opinion demanded of them by the various occasions, of course
 adhering as closely as possible to the general sense of what they
 really said.

And with reference to the narrative of events, far from permitting
 myself to derive it from the first source that came to hand, I did
 not even trust my own impressions, but it rests partly on what I saw
 myself, partly on what others saw for me, the accuracy of the report
 being always tried by the most severe and detailed tests
 possible.

My conclusions have cost me some labour from the want of coincidence
 between accounts of the same occurrences by different eye-witnesses,
 arising sometimes from imperfect memory, sometimes from undue
 partiality for one side or the other.

The absence of romance in my history will, I fear, detract somewhat
 from its interest; 
 but if it be judged useful by those inquirers who desire an exact
 knowledge of the past as an aid to the interpretation of the future,
 which in the course of human things must resemble if it does not
 reflect it, I shall be content. 
 In fine, I have written my work, not as an essay which is to win the
 applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time.

The Median war, the greatest
 achievement of past times, yet found a speedy decision in two
 actions by sea and two by land. 
 The Peloponnesian war was prolonged to an immense length, and long as
 it was it was short without parallel for the misfortunes that it
 brought upon Hellas .

Never had so many cities been taken and laid desolate, here by the
 barbarians, here by the parties contending (the old inhabitants
 being sometimes removed to make room for others); never was there so
 much banishing and blood-shedding, now on the field of battle, now
 in the strife of action.

Old stories of occurrences handed down by tradition, but scantily
 confirmed by experience, suddenly ceased to be incredible; there
 were earthquakes of unparalleled extent and violence; eclipses of
 the sun occurred with a frequency unrecorded in previous history;
 there were great droughts in sundry places and consequent famines,
 and that most calamitous and awfully fatal visitation, the
 plague. 
 All this came upon them with the late war,

which was begun by the Athenians and Peloponnesians by the
 dissolution of the thirty years' truce made after the conquest of
 Euboea .

To the question why they broke the treaty, I answer by placing first
 an account of their grounds of complaint and points of difference,
 that no one may ever have to ask the immediate cause which plunged
 the Hellenes into a war of such magnitude.

The real cause I consider to be the one which was formally most kept
 out of sight. The growth of the power of Athens , and the alarm which
 this inspired in Lacedaemon , made war inevitable. 
 Still it is well to give the grounds alleged by either side, which
 led to the dissolution of the treaty and the breaking out of the
 war.

The city of Epidamnus stands on the
 right of the entrance of the Ionic gulf. 
 Its vicinity is inhabited by the Taulantians, an Illyrian people.

The place is a colony from Corcyra , 
 founded by Phalius, son of Eratocleides, of the family of the
 Heraclids, who had according to ancient usage been summoned for the
 purpose from Corinth ,
 the mother country. 
 The colonists were joined by some Corinthians, and others of the
 Dorian race.

Now, as time went on, the city of Epidamnus became great and populous;

but falling a prey to factions arising, it is said, from a war with
 her neighbors the barbarians, she became much enfeebled, and lost a
 considerable amount of her power.

The last act before the war was the expulsion of the nobles by the
 people. The exiled party joined the barbarians, and proceeded to
 plunder those in the city by sea and land;

and the Epidamnians finding themselves hard pressed, sent ambassadors
 to Corcyra 
 beseeching their mother country not to allow them to perish, but to
 make up matters between them and the exiles, and to rid them of the
 war with the barbarians.

The ambassadors seated themselves in the temple of Hera as
 suppliants, and made the above requests to the Corcyraeans. 
 But the Corcyraeans refused to accept their supplication, and they
 were dismissed without having effected anything.

When the Epidamnians found that no
 help could be expected from Corcyra , they were in a strait what to do next. 
 So they sent to Delphi 
 and inquired of the god, whether they should deliver their city to
 the Corinthians, and endeavor to obtain some assistance from their
 founders. 
 The answer he gave them was to deliver the city, and place themselves
 under Corinthian protection.

So the Epidamnians went to Corinth , and delivered over the colony in obedience
 to the commands of the oracle. 
 They showed that their founder came from Corinth , and revealed the
 answer of the god; and they begged them not to allow them to perish,
 but to assist them.

This the Corinthians consented to do. Believing the colony to belong
 as much to themselves as to the Corcyraeans, they felt it to be a
 kind of duty to undertake their protection. Besides, they hated the
 Corcyraeans for their contempt of the mother country.

Instead of meeting with the usual honors accorded to the parent city
 by every other colony at public assemblies, such as precedence at
 sacrifices, 
 
 Corinth found herself
 treated with contempt by a power, which in point of wealth could
 stand comparison with any even of the richest communities in
 Hellas , which possessed
 great military strength, 
 and which sometimes could not repress a pride in the high naval
 position of an island whose nautical renown dated from the days of
 its old inhabitants, the Phaeacians. 
 This was one reason of the care that they lavished on their
 fleet, 
 which became very efficient; indeed they began the war with a force
 of a hundred and twenty galleys.

All these grievances made Corinth eager to send the
 promised aid to Epidamnus . Advertisement was made for volunteer
 settlers, and a force of Ambraciots, Leucadians, and Corinthians was
 despatched.

They marched by land to Apollonia , a Corinthian colony, the route by sea
 being avoided from fear of Corcyraean interruption.

When the Corcyraeans heard of the arrival of the settlers and troops
 in Epidamnus , and the
 surrender of the colony to Corinth , they took fire. 
 Instantly putting to sea with five-and-twenty ships, which were
 quickly followed by others, they insolently commanded the
 Epidamnians to receive back the banished nobles— 
 (it must be premised that the Epidamnian exiles had come to
 Corcyra , and
 pointing to the sepulchres of their ancestors, had appealed to their
 kindred to restore them)— 
 and to dismiss the Corinthian garrison and settlers.

But to all this the Epidamnians turned a deaf ear. 
 Upon this the Corcyraeans commenced operations against them with a
 fleet of forty sail. They took with them the exiles, with a view to
 their restoration, and also secured the services of the
 Illyrians.

Sitting down before the city, they issued a proclamation to the
 effect that any of the natives that chose, and the foreigners, might
 depart unharmed, with the alternative of being treated as
 enemies. 
 On their refusal the Corcyraeans proceeded to besiege the city, 
 which stands on an isthmus;

and the Corinthians, receiving intelligence of the investment of
 Epidamnus , got
 together an armament 
 and proclaimed a colony to Epidamnus , perfect political equality being
 guaranteed to all who chose to go. 
 Any who were not prepared to sail at once, might by paying down the
 sum of fifty Corinthian drachmae have a share in the colony without
 leaving Corinth . 
 Great numbers took advantage of this proclamation, some being ready
 to start directly, others paying the requisite forfeit.

In case of their passage being disputed by the Corcyraeans, several
 cities were asked to lend them a convoy. 
 
 Megara prepared to
 accompany them with eight ships, Pale in Cephallonia with four; 
 
 Epidaurus furnished
 five, Hermione one,
 Troezen two, Leucas ten, and Ambracia eight. 
 The Thebans and Phliasians were asked for money, the Eleans for hulls
 as well; 
 while Corinth herself
 furnished thirty ships and three thousand heavy infantry.

When the Corcyraeans heard of their
 preparations they came to Corinth with envoys from Lacedaemon and Sicyon, whom they
 persuaded to accompany them, and bade her recall the garrison and
 settlers, as she had nothing to do with Epidamnus .

If, however, she had any claims to make, they were willing to submit
 the matter to the arbitration of such of the cities in Peloponnese as should be chosen by
 mutual agreement, 
 and that the colony should remain with the city to whom the
 arbitrators might assign it. 
 They were also willing to refer the matter to the oracle at
 Delphi .

If, in defiance of their protestations, war was appealed to, 
 they should be themselves compelled by this violence to seek friends
 in quarters where they had no desire to seek them, and to make even
 old ties give way to the necessity of assistance.

The answer they got from Corinth was, that if they would withdraw their
 fleet and the barbarians from Epidamnus negotiation might be possible; 
 but, while the town was still being besieged, going before
 arbitrators was out of the question.

The Corcyraeans retorted that if Corinth would withdraw her troops from Epidamnus they would
 withdraw theirs, 
 or they were ready to let both parties remain in status quo, an
 armistice being concluded till judgment could be given.

Turning a deaf ear to all these
 proposals, 
 when their ships were manned and their allies had come in, the
 Corinthians sent a herald before them to declare war, and getting
 under weigh with seventy-five ships and two thousand heavy infantry,
 sailed for Epidamnus 
 to give battle to the Corcyraeans.

The fleet was under the command of Aristeus, son of Pellichas
 Callicrates, son of Callias, and Timanor, son of Timanthes; the
 troops under that of Archetimus, son of Eurytimus, and Isarchidas,
 son of Isarchus.

When they had reached Actium in the territory of Anactorium, at the mouth
 of the gulf of Ambracia , where the temple of Apollo stands, the
 Corcyraeans sent on a herald in a light boat to warn them not to
 sail against them. 
 Meanwhile they proceeded to man their ships, all of which had been
 equipped for action, the old vessels being undergirded to make them
 seaworthy.

On the return of the herald without any peaceful answer from the
 Corinthians, their ships being now manned, they put out to sea to
 meet the enemy with a fleet of eighty sail>(forty were engaged in
 the siege of Epidamnus ), formed line and went into action,,

and gained a decisive victory and destroyed fifteen of the Corinthian
 vessels. 
 The same day had seen Epidamnus compelled by its besiegers to capitulate;
 the conditions being that the foreigners should be sold, and the
 Corinthians kept as prisoners of war, till their fate should be
 otherwise decided.

After the engagement the Corcyraeans
 set up a trophy on Leukimme, a headland of Corcyra , and slew all
 their captives except the Corinthians, whom they kept as prisoners
 of war.

Defeated at sea, the Corinthians and their allies repaired home, and
 left the Corcyraeans masters of all the sea about those parts. 
 Sailing to Leucas , a
 Corinthian colony, they ravaged their territory, 
 and burnt Cyllene, the harbor of the Eleans, because they had
 furnished ships and money to Corinth .

For almost the whole of the period that followed the battle they
 remained masters of the sea, and the allies of Corinth were harassed by
 Corcyraean cruisers. At last Corinth , roused by the sufferings of her allies,
 sent out ships and troops in the fall of the summer, who formed an
 encampment at Actium and about Chimerium, in Thesprotis, for the
 protection of Leucas and the rest of the friendly cities.

The Corcyraeans on their part formed a similar station on
 Leukimme. 
 Neither party made any movement, but they remained confronting each
 other till the end of the summer, and winter was at hand before
 either of them returned home.

Corinth , exasperated by the war with the
 Corcyraeans, spent the whole of the year after the engagement and
 that succeeding it in building ships, 
 and in straining every nerve to form an efficient fleet; rowers being
 drawn from Peloponnese and
 the rest of Hellas by the
 inducement of large bounties.

The Corcyraeans, alarmed at the news of their preparations, being
 without a single ally in Hellas 
 
 (for they had not enrolled themselves either in the Athenian or in
 the Lacedaemonian confederacy), 
 decided to repair to Athens in order to enter into alliance, and to
 endeavor to procure support from her.

Corinth also, hearing of
 their intentions, sent an embassy to Athens to prevent the Corcyraean navy being joined
 by the Athenian, and her prospect of ordering the war according to
 her wishes being thus impeded.

An assembly was convoked, and the rival advocates appeared: the
 Corcyraeans spoke as follows:—

Athenians! when a people that
 have not rendered any important service or support to their
 neighbors in times past, for which they might claim to be
 repaid, appear before them as we now appear before you to
 solicit their assistance, they may fairly be required to satisfy
 certain preliminary conditions. They should show, first, that it
 is expedient or at least safe to grant their request; next, that
 they will retain a lasting sense of the kindness. 
 But if they cannot clearly establish any of these points, they
 must not be annoyed if they meet with a rebuff.

Now the Corcyraeans believe that with their petition for
 assistance they can also give you a satisfactory answer on these
 points, and they have therefore despatched us hither.

It has so happened that our policy as regards you, with respect
 to this request, turns out to be inconsistent, and as regards
 our interests, to be at the present crisis inexpedient.

We say inconsistent, because a power which has never in the whole
 of her past history been willing to ally herself with any of her
 neighbors, is now found asking them to ally themselves with
 her. 
 And we say inexpedient, because in our present war with
 Corinth it has
 left us in a position of entire isolation, and what once seemed
 the wise precaution of refusing to involve ourselves in
 alliances with other powers, lest we should also involve
 ourselves in risks of their choosing, has now proved to be folly
 and weakness.

It is true that in the late naval engagement we drove back the
 Corinthians from our shores single-handed. 
 But they have now got together a still larger armament from
 Peloponnese and the
 rest of Hellas ; and we,
 seeing our utter inability to cope with them without foreign
 aid, and the magnitude of the danger which subjection to them
 implies, find it necessary to ask help from you and from every
 other power. 
 And we hope to be excused if we forswear our old principle of
 complete political isolation, a principle which was not adopted
 with any sinister intention, but was rather the consequence of
 an error in judgment.

Now there are many reasons why in
 the event of your compliance you will congratulate yourselves on
 this request having been made to you. 
 First, because your assistance will be rendered to a power which,
 herself inoffensive, is a victim to the injustice of others.
 Secondly, because all that we most value is at stake in the
 present contest, and your welcome of us under these
 circumstances will be a proof of good will which will ever keep
 alive the gratitude you will lay up in our hearts. 
 Thirdly, yourselves excepted, we are the greatest naval power in
 Hellas .

Moreover, can you conceive 
 a stroke of good fortune more rare in itself, or more
 disheartening to your enemies, than that the power whose
 adhesion you would have valued above much material and moral
 strength, should present herself self-invited, should deliver
 herself into your hands without danger and without expense, and
 should lastly put you in the way of gaining a high character in
 the eyes of the world, the gratitude of those whom you shall
 assist, and a great accession of strength for yourselves? 
 You may search all history without finding many instances of a
 people gaining all these advantages at once, or many instances
 of a power that comes in quest of assistance being in a position
 to give to the people whose alliance she solicits as much safety
 and honor as she will receive.

But it will be urged that it is only in the case of a war that we
 shall be found useful. 
 To this we answer that if any of you imagine that the war is far
 off, he is grievously mistaken, and is blind to the fact that
 Lacedaemon regards
 you with jealousy and desires war, and that Corinth is powerful
 there,—the same, remember, that is your enemy, and is even now
 trying to subdue us as a preliminary to attacking you. And this
 she does to prevent our becoming united by a common enmity, and
 her having us both on her hands, and also to insure getting the
 start of you in one of two ways, either by crippling our power
 or by making its strength her own.

Now it is our policy to be beforehand with her—that is, for
 Corcyra to
 make an offer of alliance and for you to accept it; in fact, we
 ought to form plans against her instead of waiting to defeat the
 plans she forms against us.

If she asserts that for you to
 receive a colony of hers into alliance is not right, let her
 know that every colony that is well treated honors its parent
 state, but becomes estranged from it by injustice. 
 For colonists are not sent forth on the understanding that they
 are to be the slaves of those that remain behind, but that they
 are to be their equals.

And that Corinth was
 injuring us is clear. 
 Invited to refer the dispute about Epidamnus to
 arbitration, they chose to prosecute their complaints by war
 rather than by a fair trial.

And let their conduct towards us who are their kindred be a
 warning to you not to be misled by their deceit, nor to yield to
 their direct requests; 
 concessions to adversaries only end in self-reproach, and the
 more strictly they are avoided the greater will be the chance of
 security.

If it be urged that your
 reception of us will be a breach of the treaty existing between
 you and Lacedaemon , the
 answer is that we are a neutral state,

and that one of the express provisions of that treaty is that it
 shall be competent for any Hellenic state that is neutral to
 join whichever side it pleases.

And it is intolerable for Corinth to be allowed to obtain men for her
 navy not only from her allies, but also from the rest of
 Hellas , no small
 number being furnished by your own subjects; while we are to be
 excluded both from the alliance left open to us by treaty, and
 from any assistance that we might get from other quarters, and
 you are to be accused of political immorality if you comply with
 our request.

On the other hand, we shall have much greater cause to complain
 of you, if you do not comply with it; 
 if we, who are in peril, and are no enemies of yours, meet with a
 repulse at your hands, 
 while Corinth, who is the aggressor and your enemy, not only
 meets with no hindrance from you, but is even allowed to draw
 material for war from your dependencies. 
 This ought not to be, but you should either forbid her enlisting
 men in your dominions, or you should lend us too what help you
 may think advisable.

But your real policy is to afford
 us avowed countenance and support. The advantages of this
 course, as we premised in the beginning of our speech, are many.
 We mention one that is perhaps the chief. Could there be a
 clearer guarantee of our good faith than is offered by the fact
 that the power which is at enmity with you, is also at enmity
 with us, and that that power is fully able to punish
 defection. 
 And there is a wide difference between declining the alliance of
 an inland and of a maritime power. 
 For your first endeavor should be to prevent, if possible, the
 existence of any naval power except your own; failing this, to
 secure the friendship of the strongest that does exist.

And if any of you believe that what we urge is expedient, but
 fear to act upon this belief, lest it should lead to a breach of
 the treaty, you must remember that on the one hand, whatever
 your fears, your strength will be formidable to your
 antagonists; on the other, whatever the confidence you derive
 from refusing to receive us, your weakness will have no terrors
 for a strong enemy. 
 You must also remember that your decision is for Athens no less than for
 Corcyra ,
 and that you are not making the best provision for her
 interests, if at a time when you are anxiously scanning the
 horizon that you may be in readiness for the breaking out of the
 war which is all but upon you, you hesitate to attach to your
 side a place whose adhesion or estrangement is alike pregnant
 with the most vital consequences.

For it lies conveniently for the coast-navigation in the
 direction of Italy and
 Sicily , being able
 to bar the passage of naval reinforcements from thence to
 Peloponnese , and
 from Peloponnese 
 thither; and it is in other respects a most desirable
 station.

To sum up as shortly as possible, embracing both general and
 particular considerations, let this show you the folly of
 sacrificing us. 
 Remember that there are but three considerable naval powers in
 Hellas , Athens , Corcyra , and
 Corinth , 
 and that if you allow two of these three to become one, and
 Corinth to
 secure us for herself, you will have to hold the sea against the
 united fleets of Corcyra and Peloponnese . 
 But if you receive us, you will have our ships to reinforce you
 in the struggle.

Such were the words of the
 Corcyraeans. 
 After they had finished, the Corinthians spoke as follows:—

‘These Corcyraeans in the speech
 we have just heard do not confine themselves to the question of
 their reception into your alliance. They also talk of our being
 guilty of injustice, and their being the victims of an
 unjustifiable war. It becomes necessary for us to touch upon
 both these points before we proceed to the rest of what we have
 to say, that you may have a more correct idea of the grounds of
 our claim, and have good cause to reject their petition.

According to them, their old policy of refusing all offers of
 alliance was a policy of moderation. 
 It was in fact adopted for bad ends, not for good; indeed their
 conduct is such as to make them by no means desirous of having
 allies present to witness it, or of having the shame of asking
 their concurrence.

Besides, their geographical situation makes them independent of
 others, and consequently the decision in cases where they injure
 any lies not with judges appointed by mutual agreement, but with
 themselves, because while they seldom make voyages to their
 neighbors, they are constantly being visited by foreign vessels
 which are compelled to put in to Corcyra .

In short, the object that they propose to themselves in their
 specious policy of complete isolation, is not to avoid sharing
 in the crimes of others, but to secure a monopoly of crime to
 themselves,—the license of outrage wherever they can compel, of
 fraud wherever they can elude, and the enjoyment of their gains
 without shame.

And yet if they were the honest men they pretend to be, the less
 hold that others had upon them, the stronger would be the light
 in which they might have put their honesty by giving and taking
 what was just.

But such has not been their
 conduct either towards others or towards us. 
 The attitude of our colony towards us has always been one of
 estrangement, and is now one of hostility; for, say they,
 We were not sent out to be ill-treated.

We rejoin that we did not found the colony to be insulted by
 them, but to be their head, and to be regarded with a proper
 respect.

At any rate, our other colonies honor us, 
 and we are very much beloved by our colonists;

and clearly, if the majority are satisfied with us, these can
 have no good reason for a dissatisfaction in which they stand
 alone, and we are not acting improperly in making war against
 them, nor are we making war against them without having received
 signal provocation.

Besides, if we were in the wrong, it would be honorable in them
 to give way to our wishes, and disgraceful for us to trample on
 their moderation; 
 but in the pride and license of wealth they have sinned again and
 again against us, and never more deeply than when Epidamnus , our
 dependency, which they took no steps to claim in its distress,
 upon our coming to relieve it, was by them seized, and is now
 held by force of arms.

As to their allegation that they
 wished the question to be first submitted to arbitration, it is
 obvious that a challenge coming from the party who is safe in a
 commanding position, cannot gain the credit due only to him who,
 before appealing to arms, in deeds as well as words, places
 himself on a level with his adversary.

In their case, it was not before they laid siege to the place,
 but after they at length understood that we should not tamely
 suffer it, that they thought of the specious word
 arbitration. 
 And not satisfied with their own misconduct there, they appear
 here now requiring you to join with them not in alliance, but in
 crime, and to receive them in spite of their being at enmity
 with us.

But it was when they stood firmest, that they should have made
 overtures to you, and not at a time when we have been wronged,
 and they are in peril; nor yet at a time when you will be
 admitting to a share in your protection those who never admitted
 you to a share in their power, and will be incurring an equal
 amount of blame from us with those in whose offences you had no
 hand. No, they should have shared their power with you before
 they asked you to share your fortunes with them.

So then the reality of the
 grievances we come to complain of and the violence and rapacity
 of our opponents have both been proved. 
 But that you cannot equitably receive them, this you have still
 to learn.

It may be true that one of the provisions of the treaty is that
 it shall be competent for any state, whose name was not down on
 the list, to join whichever side it pleases. But this agreement
 is not meant for those whose object in joining is the injury of
 other powers, but for those whose need of support does not arise
 from the fact of defection, and whose adhesion will not bring to
 the power that is mad enough to receive them war instead of
 peace; 
 which will be the case with you, if you refuse to listen to
 us.

For you cannot become their auxiliary and remain our friend; 
 if you join in their attack, you must share the punishment which
 the defenders inflict on them.

And yet you have the best possible right to be neutral, or
 failing this, you should on the contrary join us against them.
 Corinth is at
 least in treaty with you; with Corcyra you were
 never even in truce. But do not lay down the principle that
 defection is to be patronized.

Did we on the defection of the Samians record our vote against you,
 when the rest of the Peloponnesian powers were equally divided on
 the question whether they should assist them? 
 No, we told them to their face that every power has a right to punish
 its own allies.

Why, if you make it your policy to receive and assist all
 offenders, you will find that just as many of your dependencies
 will come over to us, and the principle that you establish will
 press less heavily on us than on yourselves.

This then is what Hellenic law
 entitles us to demand as a right. But we have also advice to
 offer and claims on your gratitude, which, since there is no
 danger of our injuring you, as we are not enemies, and since our
 friendship does not amount to very frequent intercourse, we say
 ought to be liquidated at the present juncture.

When you were in want of ships of war for the war against the
 Aeginetans, before the Persian invasion, Corinth supplied you with
 twenty vessels. 
 That good turn, and the line we took on the Samian question, when
 we were the cause of the Peloponnesians refusing to assist them,
 enabled you to conquer Aegina , and to punish Samos . 
 And we acted thus at crises when, if ever, men are wont in their
 efforts against their enemies to forget everything for the sake
 of victory,

regarding him who assists them then as a friend, even if thus far
 he has been a foe, and him who opposes them then as a foe, even
 if he has thus far been a friend; indeed they allow their real
 interests to suffer from their absorbing preoccupation in the
 struggle.

Weigh well these considerations,
 and let your youth learn what they are from their elders, and
 let them determine to do unto us as we have done unto you. 
 And let them not acknowledge the justice of what we say, but
 dispute its wisdom in the contingency of war.

Not only is the straightest path generally speaking the
 wisest; 
 but the coming of the war which the Corcyraeans have used as a
 bugbear to persuade you to do wrong, is still uncertain, and it
 is not worth while to be carried away by it into gaining the
 instant and declared enmity of Corinth . 
 It were, rather, wise to try and counteract the unfavorable
 impression which your conduct to Megara has created.

For kindness opportunely shown has a greater power of removing
 old grievances than the facts of the case may warrant.

And do not be seduced by the prospect of a great naval
 alliance. 
 Abstinence from all injustice to other first-rate powers is a
 greater tower of strength, than anything that can be gained by
 the sacrifice of permanent tranquillity for an apparent
 temporary advantage.

It is now our turn to benefit by the principle that we laid down
 at Lacedaemon , that
 every power has a right to punish her own allies. 
 We now claim to receive the same from you, and protest against
 your rewarding us for benefiting you by our vote by injuring us
 by yours.

On the contrary, return us like for like, remembering that this
 is that very crisis in which he who lends aid is most a friend,
 and he who opposes is most a foe.

And for these Corcyraeans—neither receive them into alliance in
 our despite, nor be their abettors in crime.

So do, and you will act as we have a right to expect of you, and
 at the same time best consult your own interest.

Such were the words of the
 Corinthians. When the Athenians
 had heard both out, two assemblies were held. 
 In the first there was a manifest disposition to listen to the
 representations of Corinth ; in the second, public feeling had changed,
 and an alliance with Corcyra was decided on, with certain
 reservations. 
 It was to be a defensive, not an offensive alliance. 
 It did not involve a breach of the treaty with Peloponnese : Athens could not be required to
 join Corcyra in
 any attack upon Corinth . 
 But each of the contracting parties had a right to the other's
 assistance against invasion, whether of his own territory, or that
 of an ally.

For it began now to be felt that the coming of the Peloponnesian war
 was only a question of time, and no one was willing to see a naval
 power of such magnitude as Corcyra sacrificed to Corinth ; 
 though if they could let them weaken each other by mutual conflict,
 it would be no bad preparation for the struggle which Athens might one day have to
 wage with Corinth and
 the other naval powers.

At the same time the island seemed to lie conveniently on the
 coasting passage to Italy 
 and Sicily .

With these views, Athens 
 received Corcyra 
 into alliance, 
 and on the departure of the Corinthians not long afterwards, sent ten
 ships to their assistance.

They were commanded by Lacedaemonius, the son of Cimon, Diotimus, the
 son of Strombichus, and Porteas, the son of Epicles.

Their instructions were to avoid collision with the Corinthian fleet
 except under certain circumstances. If it sailed to Corcyra and threatened a
 landing on her coast, or in any of her possessions, they were to do
 their utmost to prevent it. 
 These instructions were prompted by an anxiety to avoid a breach of
 the treaty.

Meanwhile the Corinthians completed
 their preparations, and sailed for Corcyra with a hundred
 and fifty ships. 
 Of these Elis furnished
 ten, Megara twelve,
 Leucas ten,
 Ambracia 
 twenty-seven, Anactorium one, and Corinth herself ninety.

Each of these contingents had its own admiral, 
 the Corinthian being under the command of Xenoclides, son of
 Euthycles, with four colleagues.

Sailing from Leucas ,
 they made land at the part of the continent opposite Corcyra .

They anchored in the harbor of Chimerium, in the territory of
 Thesprotis, above which, at some distance from the sea, lies the
 city of Ephyre, in the Elean district. 
 By this city the Acherusian lake pours its waters into the sea. 
 It gets its name from the river Acheron, which flows through
 Thesprotis, and falls into the lake. 
 There also the river Thyamis flows, forming the boundary between
 Thesprotis and Kestrine; and between these rivers rises the point of
 Chimerium.

In this part of the continent the Corinthians now came to anchor, and
 formed an encampment.

When the Corcyraeans saw them coming, they manned a hundred and ten
 ships, commanded by Meikiades, Aisimides, and Eurybatus, and
 stationed themselves at one of the Sybota isles; 
 the ten Athenian ships being present.

On point Leukimme they posted their land forces, and a thousand heavy
 infantry who had come from Zacynthus to their assistance.

Nor were the Corinthians on the mainland without their allies. The
 barbarians flocked in large numbers to their assistance, 
 the inhabitants of this part of the continent being old allies of
 theirs.

When the Corinthian preparations were
 completed they took three days' provisions, and put out from
 Chimerium by night, ready for action.

Sailing with the dawn, they sighted the Corcyraean fleet out at sea,
 and coming towards them.

When they perceived each other, both sides formed in order of
 battle. 
 On the Corcyraean right wing lay the Athenian ships, 
 the rest of the line being occupied by their own vessels formed in
 three squadrons, each of which was commanded by one of the three
 admirals.

Such was the Corcyraean formation. 
 The Corinthian was as follows: on the right wing lay the Megarian and
 Ambraciot ships, in the center the rest of the allies in order. 
 But the left was composed of the best sailors in the Corinthian navy,
 to encounter the Athenians and the right wing of the Corcyraeans.

As soon as the signals were raised on either side, they joined
 battle. Both sides had a large number of heavy infantry on their
 decks, and a large number of archers and darters, the old imperfect
 armament still prevailing.

The sea-fight was an obstinate one, though not remarkable for its
 science; indeed it was more like a battle by land.

Whenever they charged each other, the multitude and crush of the
 vessels made it by no means easy to get loose; besides, their hopes
 of victory lay principally in the heavy infantry on the decks, who
 stood and fought in order, the ships remaining stationary. 
 The manoeuvre of breaking the line was not tried: 
 in short, strength and pluck had more share in the fight than
 science.

Everywhere tumult reigned, the battle being one scene of
 confusion; 
 meanwhile the Athenian ships, by coming up to the Corcyraeans
 whenever they were pressed, served to alarm the enemy, 
 though their commanders could not join in the battle from fear of
 their instructions.

The right wing of the Corinthians suffered most. 
 The Corcyraeans routed it, and chased them in disorder to the
 continent with twenty ships, sailed up to their camp, and burnt the
 tents which they found empty, and plundered the stuff.

So in this quarter the Corinthians and their allies were defeated,
 and the Corcyraeans were victorious. 
 But where the Corinthians themselves were, on the left, they gained a
 decided success; the scanty forces of the Corcyraeans being further
 weakened by the want of the twenty ships absent on the pursuit.

Seeing the Corcyraeans hard pressed, the Athenians began at length to
 assist them more unequivocally. 
 At first, it is true, they refrained from charging any ships; but
 when the rout was becoming patent, and the Corinthians were pressing
 on, the time at last came when every one set to, and all distinction
 was laid aside, and it came to this point, that the Corinthians and
 Athenians raised their hands against each other.

After the rout, the Corinthians,
 instead of employing themselves in lashing fast and hauling after
 them the hulls of the vessels which they had disabled, 
 turned their attention to the men, whom they butchered as they sailed
 through, not caring so much to make prisoners. Some even of their
 own friends were slain by them, by mistake, in their ignorance of
 the defeat of the right wing.

For the number of the ships on both sides, and the distance to which
 they covered the sea, made it difficult after they had once joined,
 to distinguish between the conquering and the conquered; 
 this battle proving far greater than any before it, any at least
 between Hellenes, for the number of vessels engaged.

After the Corinthians had chased the Corcyraeans to the land, they
 turned to the wrecks and their dead, 
 most of whom they succeeded in getting hold of and conveying to
 Sybota, the rendezvous of the land forces furnished by their
 barbarian allies. 
 Sybota, it must be known, is a desert harbor of Thesprotis. 
 This task over, they mustered anew, and sailed against the
 Corcyraeans,

who on their part advanced to meet them with all their ships that
 were fit for service and remaining to them, accompanied by the
 Athenian vessels, fearing that they might attempt a landing in their
 territory.

It was by this time getting late, 
 and the paean had been sung for the attack, 
 when the Corinthians suddenly began to back water. They had observed
 twenty Athenian ships sailing up, which had been sent out afterwards
 to reinforce the ten vessels by the Athenians, who feared, as it
 turned out justly, the defeat of the Corcyraeans and the inability
 of their handful of ships to protect them.

These ships were thus seen by the Corinthians first. They suspected
 that they were from Athens , and that those which they saw were not all,
 but that there were more behind; they accordingly began to
 retire.

The Corcyraeans meanwhile had not sighted them, as they were
 advancing from a point which they could not so well see, 
 and were wondering why the Corinthians were backing water, when some
 caught sight of them, and cried out that there were ships in sight
 ahead. 
 Upon this they also retired; 
 for it was now getting dark, and the retreat of the Corinthians had
 suspended hostilities.

Thus they parted from each other, and the battle ceased with
 night.

The Corcyraeans were in their camp at Leukimme, when these twenty
 ships from Athens , under
 the command of Glaucon, the son of Leagrus, and Andocides, son of
 Leogoras, bore on through the corpses and the wrecks, and sailed up
 to the camp, not long after they were sighted.

It was now night, 
 and the Corcyraeans feared that they might be hostile vessels; 
 but they soon knew them, 
 and the ships came to anchor.

The next day the thirty Athenian
 vessels put out to sea, accompanied by all the Corcyraean ships that
 were seaworthy, and sailed to the harbor at Sybota, where the
 Corinthians lay, to see if they would engage.

The Corinthians put out from the land, and formed a line in the open
 sea, but beyond this made no further movement, having no intention
 of assuming the offensive. For they saw reinforcements arrived fresh
 from Athens , and
 themselves confronted by numerous difficulties, such as the
 necessity of guarding the prisoners whom they had on board, and the
 want of all means of refitting their ships in a desert place.

What they were thinking more about was how their voyage home was to
 be effected; they feared that the Athenians might consider that the
 treaty was dissolved by the collision which had occurred, and forbid
 their departure.

Accordingly they resolved to put some men on board a boat, and send
 them without a herald's wand to the Athenians, as an experiment. 
 Having done so, they spoke as follows:

You do wrong, Athenians, to begin war and break the treaty. 
 Engaged in chastising our enemies, we find you placing yourselves
 in our path in arms against us. 
 Now if your intentions are to prevent us sailing to Corcyra , or anywhere
 else that we may wish, and if you are for breaking the treaty,
 first take us that are here, and treat us as enemies.

Such was what they said, 
 and all the Corcyraean armament that were within hearing immediately
 called out to take them and kill them. 
 But the Athenians answered as follows:

Neither are we beginning war, Peloponnesians, nor are we breaking
 the treaty; but these Corcyraeans are our allies, and we are
 come to help them. 
 So if you want to sail anywhere else, we place no obstacle in
 your way; 
 but if you are going to sail against Corcyra , or any of
 her possessions, we shall do our best to stop you.’

Receiving this answer from the
 Athenians, the Corinthians commenced preparations for their voyage
 home, 
 and set up a trophy in Sybota, on the continent; 
 while the Corcyraeans took up the wrecks and dead that had been
 carried out to them by the current, and by a wind which rose in the
 night and scattered them in all directions, 
 and set up their trophy in Sybota, on the island, as victors.

The reasons each side had for claiming the victory were these. 
 The Corinthians had been victorious in the sea-fight until night; and
 having thus been enabled to carry off most wrecks and dead, they
 were in possession of no fewer than a thousand prisoners of war, and
 had sunk close upon seventy vessels. 
 The Corcyraeans had destroyed about thirty ships, and after the
 arrival of the Athenians had taken up the wrecks and dead on their
 side; they had besides seen the Corinthians retire before them,
 backing water on sight of the Athenian vessels, and upon the arrival
 of the Athenians refuse to sail out against them from Sybota.

Thus both sides claimed the victory. 
 
 The Corinthians on the voyage home took Anactorium, which stands at
 the mouth of the Ambracian gulf. 
 The place was taken by treachery, being common ground to the
 Corcyraeans and Corinthians. 
 After establishing Corinthian settlers there, they retired home. 
 Eight hundred of the Corcyraeans were slaves; these they sold; two
 hundred and fifty they retained in captivity, and treated with great
 attention, in the hope that they might bring over their country to
 Corinth on their
 return; 
 most of them being, as it happened, men of very high position in
 Corcyra .

In this way Corcyra 
 maintained her political existence in the war with Corinth , and the Athenian
 vessels left the island. 
 This was the first cause of the war that Corinth had against the
 Athenians, viz. that they had fought against them with the
 Corcyraeans in time of treaty.

Almost immediately after this, fresh
 differences arose between the Athenians and Peloponnesians, and
 contributed their share to the war.

Corinth was forming
 schemes for retaliation, and Athens suspected her hostility. The Potidaeans, who
 inhabit the isthmus of Pallene , being a Corinthian colony, but tributary
 allies of Athens , were
 ordered to raze the wall looking towards Pallene , to give hostages, to
 dismiss the Corinthian magistrates, and in future not to receive the
 persons sent from Corinth annually to succeed them. It was feared
 that they might be persuaded by Perdiccas and the Corinthians to
 revolt, and might draw the rest of the allies in the direction of
 Thrace to revolt with
 them.

These precautions against the Potidaeans were taken by the Athenians
 immediately after the battle at Corcyra .

Not only was Corinth at
 length openly hostile, but Perdiccas, son of Alexander, king of the
 Macedonians, had from an old friend and ally been made an enemy.

He had been made an enemy by the Athenians entering into alliance
 with his brother Philip and Derdas, who were in league against
 him.

In his alarm he had sent to Lacedaemon to try and involve the Athenians in a
 war with the Peloponnesians, 
 and was endeavoring to win over Corinth in order to bring about the revolt of
 Potidaea .

He also made overtures to the Chalcidians in the direction of
 Thrace , and to the
 Bottiaeans, to persuade them to join in the revolt; for he thought
 that if these places on the border could be made his allies, it
 would be easier to carry on the war with their co-operation.

Alive to all this, and wishing to anticipate the revolt of the
 cities, the Athenians acted as follows. They were just then sending
 off thirty ships and a thousand heavy infantry for his country under
 the command of Archestratus, son of Lycomedes, with four colleagues.
 They instructed the captains to take hostages of the Potidaeans, to
 raze the wall, and to be on their guard against the revolt of the
 neighboring cities.

Meanwhile the Potidaeans sent envoys
 to Athens on the chance
 of persuading them to take no new steps in their matters; they also
 went to Lacedaemon with the
 Corinthians to secure support in case of need. 
 Failing after prolonged negotiation to obtain anything satisfactory
 from the Athenians; being unable, for all they could say, to prevent
 the vessels that were destined for Macedonia from also sailing against them; and
 receiving from the Lacedaemonian government a promise to invade
 Attica , if the
 Athenians should attack Potidaea , the Potidaeans, thus favoured by the
 moment, at last entered into league with the Chalcidians and
 Bottiaeans, and revolted.

And Perdiccas induced the Chalcidians to abandon and demolish their
 towns on the seaboard, and settling inland at Olynthus , to make that one
 city a strong place: 
 meanwhile to those who followed his advice he gave a part of his
 territory in Mygdonia round Lake Bolbe as a place of abode while the
 war against the Athenians should last. 
 They accordingly demolished their towns, removed inland, and prepared
 for war.

The thirty ships of the Athenians,
 arriving before the Thracian places, 
 found Potidaea and the
 rest in revolt.

Their commanders considering it to be quite impossible with their
 present force to carry on war with Perdiccas, and with the
 confederate towns as well, turned to Macedonia , their original destination, 
 and having established themselves there, carried on war in
 co-operation with Philip, and the brothers of Derdas, who had
 invaded the country from the interior.

Meanwhile the Corinthians, with
 Potidaea in
 revolt, and the Athenian ships on the coast of Macedonia , alarmed for the safety
 of the place, and thinking its danger theirs, sent volunteers from
 Corinth , and
 mercenaries from the rest of Peloponnese , to the number of sixteen hundred heavy
 infantry in all, and four hundred light troops.

Aristeus, son of Adimantus, who was always a steady friend to the
 Potidaeans, took command of the expedition, and it was principally
 for love of him that most of the men from Corinth volunteered.

They arrived in Thrace forty
 days after the revolt of Potidaea .

The Athenians also immediately
 received the news of the revolt of the cities. 
 On being informed that Aristeus and his reinforcements were on their
 way, they sent two thousand heavy infantry of their own citizens and
 forty ships against the places in revolt, under the command of
 Callias, son of Calliades, and four colleagues.

They arrived in Macedonia 
 first, and found the force of a thousand men that had been first
 sent out, just become masters of Therme and besieging Pydna .

Accordingly they also joined in the investment, and besieged
 Pydna for a
 while. 
 Subsequently they came to terms and concluded a forced alliance with
 Perdiccas, hastened by the calls of Potidaea , and by the arrival
 of Aristeus at that place. 
 They withdrew from Macedonia ,

going to Beroea and thence to Strepsa, and,
 after a futile attempt on the latter place, they pursued by land
 their march to Potidaea with three thousand heavy infantry of
 their own citizens, besides a number of their allies, and six
 hundred Macedonian horsemen, the followers of Philip and
 Pausanias. 
 With these sailed seventy ships along the coast.

Advancing by short marches, on the third day they arrived at Gigonus,
 where they encamped.

Meanwhile the Potidaeans and the
 Peloponnesians with Aristeus were encamped on the side looking
 towards Olynthus on
 the isthmus, in expectation of the Athenians, 
 and had established their market outside the city.

The allies had chosen Aristeus general of all the infantry; while the
 command of the cavalry was given to Perdiccas, 
 who had at once left the alliance of the Athenians and gone back to
 that of the Potidaeans, having deputed Iolaus as his general.

The plan of Aristeus was to keep his own force on the isthmus, and
 await the attack of the Athenians; leaving the Chalcidians and the
 allies outside the isthmus, and the two hundred cavalry from
 Perdiccas in Olynthus 
 to act upon the Athenian rear, on the occasion of their advancing
 against him; and thus to place the enemy between two fires.

While Callias the Athenian general and his colleagues despatched the
 Macedonian horse and a few of the allies to Olynthus , to prevent any
 movement being made from that quarter, 
 the Athenians themselves broke up their camp and marched against
 Potidaea .

After they had arrived at the isthmus, and saw the enemy preparing
 for battle, they formed against him, 
 and soon afterwards engaged.

The wing of Aristeus, with the Corinthians and other picked troops
 round him, routed the wing opposed to it, and followed for a
 considerable distance in pursuit. 
 But the rest of the army of the Potidaeans and of the Peloponnesians
 was defeated by the Athenians, and took refuge within the
 fortifications.

Returning from the pursuit, Aristeus perceived the defeat of the rest
 of the army. 
 Being at a loss which of the two risks to choose, whether to go to
 Olynthus or to
 Potidaea , he at
 last determined to draw his men into as small a space as possible,
 and force his way with a run into Potidaea . 
 Not without difficulty, through a storm of missiles, he passed along
 by the breakwater through the sea, and brought off most of his men
 safe, though a few were lost.

Meanwhile the auxiliaries of the Potidaeans from Olynthus , which is about seven miles off, and in sight of Potidaea , when the battle began and the signals
 were raised, advanced a little way to render assistance; and the
 Macedonian horse formed against them to prevent it. 
 But on victory speedily declaring for the Athenians and the signals
 being taken down, they retired back within the wall; and the
 Macedonians returned to the Athenians. 
 Thus there were no cavalry present on either side.

After the battle the Athenians set up a trophy, and gave back their
 dead to the Potidaeans under truce. 
 The Potidaeans and their allies had close upon three hundred killed;
 the Athenians a hundred and fifty of their own citizens, and Callias
 their general.

The wall on the side of the isthmus
 had now works at once raised against it, and manned by the
 Athenians. 
 That on the side of Pallene had no works raised against it. 
 They did not think themselves strong enough at once to keep a
 garrison in the isthmus, and to cross over to Pallene and raise works there;
 they were afraid that the Potidaeans and their allies might take
 advantage of their division to attack them.

Meanwhile the Athenians at home learning that there were no works at
 Pallene , sometime
 afterwards sent off sixteen hundred heavy infantry of their own
 citizens under the command of Phormio, son of Asopius. 
 Arrived at Pallene , he
 fixed his headquarters at Aphytis , and led his army against Potidaea by short marches,
 ravaging the country as he advanced. 
 No one venturing to meet him in the field, he raised works against
 the wall on the side of Pallene .

So at length Potidaea 
 was strongly invested on either side, and from the sea by the ships
 cooperating in the blockade.

Aristeus, seeing its investment complete, and having no hope of its
 salvation, except in the event of some movement from the Peloponnese , or of some other
 improbable contingency, advised all except five hundred to watch for
 a wind, and sail out of the place, in order that their provisions
 might last the longer. 
 He was willing to be himself one of those who remained. 
 Unable to persuade them, and desirous of acting on the next
 alternative, and of having things outside in the best posture
 possible, he eluded the guardships of the Athenians and sailed
 out.

Remaining among the Chalcidians, he continued to carry on the war; in
 particular he laid an ambuscade near the city of the Sermylians, and
 cut off many of them; he also communicated with Peloponnese , and tried to contrive
 some method by which help might be brought. 
 Meanwhile, after the completion of the investment of Potidaea , Phormio next
 employed his sixteen hundred men in ravaging Chalcidice and Bottica: some of
 the towns also were taken by him.

The Athenians and Peloponnesians had
 these antecedent grounds of complaint against each other: the
 complaint of Corinth 
 was that her colony of Potidaea , and Corinthian and Peloponnesian citizens
 within it, were being besieged; that of Athens against the
 Peloponnesians that they had incited a town of hers, a member of her
 alliance and a contributor to her revenue, to revolt, and had come
 and were openly fighting against her on the side of the
 Potidaeans. 
 For all this, war had not yet broken out: there was still truce for a
 while; for this was a private enterprise on the part of Corinth .

But the siege of Potidaea put an end to her
 inaction; she had men inside it: besides, she feared for the
 place. 
 Immediately summoning the allies to Lacedaemon , she came and loudly accused Athens of breach of the treaty
 and aggression on the rights of Peloponnese .

With her, the Aeginetans, formally unrepresented from fear of
 Athens , in secret
 proved not the least urgent of the advocates for war, asserting that
 they had not the independence guaranteed to them by the treaty.

After extending the summons to any of their allies and others who
 might have complaints to make of Athenian aggression, the
 Lacedaemonians held their ordinary assembly, and invited them to
 speak.

There were many who came forward and made their several accusations;
 among them the Megarians, in a long list of grievances, called
 special attention to the fact of their exclusion from the ports of
 the Athenian empire and the market of Athens , in defiance of the
 treaty.

Last of all the Corinthians came forward, and having let those who
 preceded them inflame the Lacedaemonians, now followed with a speech
 to this effect:—

‘Lacedaemonians! the confidence which
 you feel in your constitution and social order, inclines you to
 receive any reflections of ours on other powers with a certain
 skepticism. 
 Hence springs your moderation, but hence also the rather limited
 knowledge which you betray in dealing with foreign politics.

Time after time was our voice raised to warn you of the blows about
 to be dealt us by Athens , and time after time, instead of taking the
 trouble to ascertain the worth of our communications, you contented
 yourselves with suspecting the speakers of being inspired by private
 interest. 
 And so, instead of calling these allies together before the blow
 fell, you have delayed to do so till we are smarting under it;
 allies among whom we have not the worst title to speak, as having
 the greatest complaints to make, complaints of Athenian outrage and
 Lacedaemonian neglect.

Now if these assaults on the rights of Hellas had been made in the dark you might be
 unacquainted with the facts, and it would be our duty to enlighten
 you. 
 As it is, long speeches are not needed where you see servitude
 accomplished for some of us, meditated for others—in particular for
 our allies—and prolonged preparations in the aggressor against the
 hour of war.

Or what, pray, is the meaning of their reception of Corcyra by fraud, and
 their holding it against us by force? what of the siege of
 Potidaea ?—places
 one of which lies most conveniently for any action against the
 Thracian towns; while the other would have contributed a very large
 navy to the Peloponnesians?

For all this you are responsible. 
 You it was who first allowed them to fortify their city after the
 Median war, and afterwards to erect the long walls,—you who, then
 and now, are always depriving of freedom not only those whom they
 have enslaved, but also those who have as yet been your allies. 
 For the true author of the subjugation of a people is not so much the
 immediate agent, as the power which permits it having the means to
 prevent it; particularly if that power aspires to the glory of being
 the liberator of Hellas . 
 We are at last assembled.

It has not been easy to assemble, nor even now are our objects
 defined. 
 We ought not to be still inquiring into the fact of our wrongs, but
 into the means of our defence. 
 For the aggressors with matured plans to oppose to our indecision
 have cast threats aside and betaken themselves to action.

And we know what are the paths by which Athenian aggression travels,
 and how insidious is its progress. 
 A degree of confidence she may feel from the idea that your bluntness
 of perception prevents your noticing her; but it is nothing to the
 impulse which her advance will receive from the knowledge that you
 see, but do not care to interfere.

You, Lacedaemonians, of all the Hellenes are alone inactive, and
 defend yourselves not by doing anything but by looking as if you
 would do something; you alone wait till the power of an enemy is
 becoming twice its original size, instead of crushing it in its
 infancy.

And yet the world used to say that you were to be depended upon; but
 in your case, we fear, it said more than the truth. 
 The Mede , we ourselves know,
 had time to come from the ends of the earth to Peloponnese , without any force of
 yours worthy of the name advancing to meet him. 
 But this was a distant enemy. 
 Well, Athens at all
 events is a near neighbor, and yet Athens you utterly disregard; against Athens you prefer to act on the
 defensive instead of on the offensive, and to make it an affair of
 chances by deferring the struggle till she has grown far stronger
 than at first. 
 And yet you know that on the whole the rock on which the barbarian
 was wrecked was himself, and that if our present enemy Athens has not again and again
 annihilated us, we owe it more to her blunders than to your
 protection.

Indeed, expectations from you have before now been the ruin of some,
 whose faith induced them to omit preparation. We hope that none of you will consider these words of
 remonstrance to be rather words of hostility; men remonstrate with
 friends who are in error, accusations they reserve for enemies who
 have wronged them.

Besides, we consider that we have as good a right as any one to point
 out a neighbor's faults, particularly when we contemplate the great
 contrast between the two national characters; a contrast of which,
 as far as we can see, you have little perception, having never yet
 considered what sort of antagonists you will encounter in the
 Athenians, how widely, how absolutely different from yourselves.

The Athenians are addicted to innovation, and their designs are
 characterized by swiftness alike in conception and execution; you
 have a genius for keeping what you have got, accompanied by a total
 want of invention, and when forced to act you never go far
 enough.

Again, they are adventurous beyond their power, and daring beyond
 their judgment, and in danger they are sanguine; your wont is to
 attempt less than is justified by your power, to mistrust even what
 is sanctioned by your judgment, and to fancy that from danger there
 is no release.

Further, there is promptitude on their side against procrastination
 on yours; they are never at home, you are never from it: for they
 hope by their absence to extend their acquisitions, you fear by your
 advance to endanger what you have left behind.

They are swift to follow up a success, and slow to recoil from a
 reverse.

Their bodies they spend ungrudgingly in their country's cause; their
 intellect they jealously husband to be employed in her service.

A scheme unexecuted is with them a positive loss, a successful
 enterprise a comparative failure. 
 The deficiency created by the miscarriage of an undertaking is soon
 filled up by fresh hopes; for they alone are enabled to call a thing
 hoped for a thing got, by the speed with which they act upon their
 resolutions.

Thus they toil on in trouble and danger all the days of their life,
 with little opportunity for enjoying, being ever engaged in getting:
 their only idea of a holiday is to do what the occasion demands, and
 to them laborious occupation is less of a misfortune than the peace
 of a quiet life.

To describe their character in a word, one might truly say that they
 were born into the world to take no rest themselves and to give none
 to others.

Such is Athens , your antagonist. 
 And yet, Lacedaemonians, you still delay, and fail to see that peace
 stays longest with those, who are not more careful to use their
 power justly than to show their determination not to submit to
 injustice. 
 On the contrary, your ideal of fair dealing is based on the principle
 that if you do not injure others, you need not risk your own
 fortunes in preventing others from injuring you.

Now you could scarcely have succeeded in such a policy even with a
 neighbor like yourselves; but in the present instance, as we have
 just shown, your habits are old-fashioned as compared with
 theirs.

It is the law as in art, so in politics, that improvements ever
 prevail; and though fixed usages may be best for undisturbed
 communities, constant necessities of action must be accompanied by
 the constant improvement of methods. 
 Thus it happens that the vast experience of Athens has carried her further
 than you on the path of innovation.

Here, at least, let your
 procrastination end. 
 For the present, assist your allies and Potidaea in particular, as
 you promised, by a speedy invasion of Attica , and do not sacrifice friends and kindred to
 their bitterest enemies, and drive the rest of us in despair to some
 other alliance.

Such a step would not be condemned either by the gods who received
 our oaths, or by the men who witnessed them. 
 The breach of a treaty cannot be laid to the people whom desertion
 compels to seek new relations, but to the power that fails to assist
 its confederate.

But if you will only act, we will stand by you; it would be unnatural
 for us to change, and never should we meet with such a congenial
 ally.

For these reasons choose the right course, and endeavor not to let
 Peloponnese under your
 supremacy degenerate from the prestige that it enjoyed under that of
 your ancestors.’

Such were the words of the
 Corinthians. 
 There happened to be Athenian envoys present at Lacedaemon on other business. 
 On hearing the speeches they thought themselves called upon to come
 before the Lacedaemonians. 
 Their intention was not to offer a defence on any of the charges
 which the cities brought against them, but to show on a
 comprehensive view that it was not a matter to be hastily decided
 on, but one that demanded further consideration. 
 There was also a wish to call attention to the great power of
 Athens , and to
 refresh the memory of the old and enlighten the ignorance of the
 young, from a notion that their words might have the effect of
 inducing them to prefer tranquillity to war.

So they came to the Lacedaemonians and said that they too, if there
 was no objection, wished to speak to their assembly. 
 They replied by inviting them to come forward. 
 The Athenians advanced, and spoke as follows:—

The object of our mission here was
 not to argue with your allies, but to attend to the matters on which
 our State despatched us. 
 However, the vehemence of the outcry that we hear against us has
 prevailed on us to come forward. 
 It is not to combat the accusations of the cities (indeed you are not
 the judges before whom either we or they can plead), but to prevent
 your taking the wrong course on matters of great importance by
 yielding too readily to the persuasions of your allies. 
 We also wish to show on a review of the whole indictment that we have
 a fair title to our possessions, and that our country has claims to
 consideration.

We need not refer to remote antiquity: there we could appeal to the
 voice of tradition, but not to the experience of our audience. 
 But to the Median war and contemporary history we must refer,
 although we are rather tired of continually bringing this subject
 forward. 
 In our action during that war we ran great risk to obtain certain
 advantages: you had your share in the solid results, do not try to
 rob us of all share in the good that the glory may do us.

However, the story shall be told not so much to deprecate hostility
 as to testify against it, and to show, if you are so ill-advised as
 to enter into a struggle with Athens , what sort of an antagonist she is likely to
 prove.

We assert that at Marathon we were at the front, and faced the
 barbarian single-handed. 
 That when he came the second time, unable to cope with him by land we
 went on board our ships with all our people, and joined in the
 action at Salamis . 
 This prevented his taking the Peloponnesian states in detail, and
 ravaging them with his fleet; when the multitude of his vessels
 would have made any combination for self-defence impossible.

The best proof of this was furnished by the invader himself. 
 Defeated at sea, he considered his power to be no longer what it had
 been, and retired as speedily as possible with the greater part of
 his army.

Such, then, was the result of the
 matter, and it was clearly proved that it was on the fleet of
 Hellas that her cause
 depended. 
 Well, to this result we contributed three very useful elements, viz.
 the largest number of ships, the ablest commander, and the most
 unhesitating patriotism. 
 Our contingent of ships was little less than two-thirds of the whole
 four hundred; the commander was Themistocles, through whom chiefly
 it was that the battle took place in the straits, the acknowledged
 salvation of our cause. 
 Indeed, this was the reason of your receiving him with honors such as
 had never been accorded to any foreign visitor.

While for daring patriotism we had no competitors. 
 Receiving no reinforcements from behind, seeing everything in front
 of us already subjugated, we had the spirit, after abandoning our
 city, after sacrificing our property (instead of deserting the
 remainder of the league or depriving them of our services by
 dispersing), to throw ourselves into our ships and meet the danger,
 without a thought of resenting your neglect to assist us.

We assert, therefore, that we conferred on you quite as much as we
 received. 
 For you had a stake to fight for; the cities which you had left were
 still filled with your homes, and you had the prospect of enjoying
 them again; and your coming was prompted quite as much by fear for
 yourselves as for us; at all events, you never appeared till we had
 nothing left to lose. 
 But we left behind us a city that was a city no longer, and staked
 our lives for a city that had an existence only in desperate hope,
 and so bore our full share in your deliverance and in ours.

But if we had copied others, and allowed fears for our territory to
 make us give in our adhesion to the Mede before you came, or if we had suffered our
 ruin to break our spirit and prevent us embarking in our ships, your
 naval inferiority would have made a sea-fight unnecessary, and his
 objects would have been peaceably attained.

Surely, Lacedaemonians, neither by
 the patriotism that we displayed at that crisis, nor by the wisdom
 of our counsels, do we merit our extreme unpopularity with the
 Hellenes, not at least unpopularity for our empire.

That empire we acquired by no violent means, but because you were
 unwilling to prosecute to its conclusion the war against the
 barbarian, and because the allies attached themselves to us and
 spontaneously asked us to assume the command.

And the nature of the case first compelled us to advance our empire
 to its present height; fear being our principal motive, though honor
 and interest afterwards came in.

And at last, when almost all hated us, when some had already revolted
 and had been subdued, when you had ceased to be the friends that you
 once were, and had become objects of suspicion and dislike, it
 appeared no longer safe to give up our empire; especially as all who
 left us would fall to you.

And no one can quarrel with a people for making, in matters of
 tremendous risk, the best provision that it can for its interest.

You, at all events, Lacedaemonians,
 have used your supremacy to settle the states in Peloponnese as is agreeable to
 you. 
 And if at the period of which we were speaking you had persevered to
 the end of the matter, and had incurred hatred in your command, we
 are sure that you would have made yourselves just as galling to the
 allies, and would have been forced to choose between a strong
 government and danger to yourselves.

It follows that it was not a very wonderful action, or contrary to
 the common practice of mankind, if we did accept an empire that was
 offered to us, and refused to give it up under the pressure of three
 of the strongest motives, fear, honor, and interest. 
 And it was not we who set the example, for it has always been the law
 that the weaker should be subject to the stronger. 
 Besides, we believed ourselves to be worthy of our position, and so
 you thought us till now, when calculations of interest have made you
 take up the cry of justice—a consideration which no one ever yet
 brought forward to hinder his ambition when he had a chance of
 gaining anything by might.

And praise is due to all who, if not so superior to human nature as
 to refuse dominion, yet respect justice more than their position
 compels them to do.

We imagine that our moderation would
 be best demonstrated by the conduct of others who should be placed
 in our position; but even our equity has very unreasonably subjected
 us to condemnation instead of approval.

Our abatement of our rights in the contract trials with our allies,
 and our causing them to be decided by impartial laws at Athens , have gained us the
 character of being litigious.

And none care to inquire why this reproach is not brought against
 other imperial powers, who treat their subjects with less moderation
 than we do; the secret being that where force can be used, law is
 not needed.

But our subjects are so habituated to associate with us as equals,
 that any defeat whatever that clashes with their notions of justice,
 whether it proceeds from a legal judgment or from the power which
 our empire gives us, makes them forget to be grateful for being
 allowed to retain most of their possessions, and more vexed at a
 part being taken, than if we had from the first cast law aside and
 openly gratified our covetousness. 
 If we had done so, not even would they have disputed that the weaker
 must give way to the stronger.

Men's indignation, it seems, is more excited by legal wrong than by
 violent wrong; the first looks like being cheated by an equal, the
 second like being compelled by a superior.

At all events they contrived to put up with much worse treatment than
 this from the Mede , yet
 they think our rule severe, and this is to be expected, for the
 present always weighs heavy on the conquered. 
 This at least is certain.

If you were to succeed in overthrowing us and in taking our place,
 you would speedily lose the popularity with which fear of us has
 invested you, if your policy of to-day is at all to tally with the
 sample that you gave of it during the brief period of your command
 against the Mede . 
 Not only is your life at home regulated by rules and institutions
 incompatible with those of others, but your citizens abroad act
 neither on these rules nor on those which are recognized by the rest
 of Hellas .

Take time then in forming your
 resolution, as the matter is of great importance; and do not be
 persuaded by the opinions and complaints of others to bring trouble
 on yourselves, but consider the vast influence of accident in war,
 before you are engaged in it.

As it continues, it generally becomes an affair of chances, chances
 from which neither of us is exempt, and whose event we must risk in
 the dark.

It is a common mistake in going to war to begin at the wrong end, to
 act first, and wait for disaster to discuss the matter.

But we are not yet by any means so misguided, nor, so far as we can
 see, are you; accordingly, while it is still open to us both to
 choose aright, we bid you not to dissolve the treaty, or to break
 your oaths, but to have our differences settled by arbitration
 according to our agreement. 
 Or else we take the gods who heard the oaths to witness, and if you
 begin hostilities, whatever line of action you choose, we will try
 not to be behindhand in repelling you.’

Such were the words of the
 Athenians. 
 After the Lacedaemonians had heard the complaints of the allies
 against the Athenians, and the observations of the latter, they made
 all withdraw, and consulted by themselves on the question before
 them.

The opinions of the majority all led to the same conclusion; the
 Athenians were open aggressors, and war must be declared at
 once. 
 But Archidamus, the Lacedaemonian king, came forward, who had the
 reputation of being at once a wise and a moderate man, and made the
 following speech:—

‘I have not lived so long,
 Lacedaemonians, without having had the experience of many wars, and
 I see those among you of the same age as myself, who will not fall
 into the common misfortune of longing for war from inexperience or
 from a belief in its advantage and its safety.

This, the war on which you are now debating, would be one of the
 greatest magnitude, on a sober consideration of the matter.

In a struggle with Peloponnesians and neighbors our strength is of
 the same character, and it is possible to move swiftly on the
 different points. 
 But a struggle with a people who live in a distant land, who have
 also an extraordinary familiarity with the sea, and who are in the
 highest state of preparation in every other department; with wealth
 private and public, with ships, and horses, and heavy infantry, and
 a population such as no one other Hellenic place can equal, and
 lastly a number of tributary allies—what can justify us in rashly
 beginning such a struggle? wherein is our trust that we should rush
 on it unprepared?

Is it in our ships? 
 There we are inferior; while if we are to practise and become a match
 for them, time must intervene. 
 Is it in our money? 
 There we have a far greater deficiency. 
 We neither have it in our treasury, nor are we ready to contribute it
 from our private funds.

Confidence might possibly be felt in our superiority in heavy
 infantry and population, which will enable us to invade and
 devastate their lands.

But the Athenians have plenty of other land in their empire, and can
 import what they want by sea.

Again, if we are to attempt an insurrection of their allies, these
 will have to be supported with a fleet, most of them being
 islanders.

What then is to be our war? 
 For unless we can either beat them at sea, or deprive them of the
 revenues which feed their navy, we shall meet with little but
 disaster.

Meanwhile our honor will be pledged to keeping on, particularly if it
 be the opinion that we began the quarrel.

For let us never be elated by the fatal hope of the war being quickly
 ended by the devastation of their lands. 
 I fear rather that we may leave it as a legacy to our children; so
 improbable is it that the Athenian spirit will be the slave of their
 land, or Athenian experience be cowed by war.

Not that I would bid you be so
 unfeeling as to suffer them to injure your allies, and to refrain
 from unmasking their intrigues; but I do bid you not to take up arms
 at once, but to send and remonstrate with them in a tone not too
 suggestive of war, nor again too suggestive of submission, and to
 employ the interval in perfecting our own preparations. 
 The means will be, first, the acquisition of allies, Hellenic or
 barbarian it matters not, so long as they are an accession to our
 strength naval or pecuniary—I say Hellenic or barbarian, because the
 odium of such an accession to all who like us are the objects of the
 designs of the Athenians is taken away by the law of
 self-preservation—and secondly the development of our home
 resources.

If they listen to our embassy, so much the better; but if not, after
 the lapse of two or three years our position will have become
 materially strengthened, and we can then attack them if we think
 proper.

Perhaps by that time the sight of our preparations, backed by
 language equally significant, will have disposed them to submission,
 while their land is still untouched, and while their counsels may be
 directed to the retention of advantages as yet undestroyed.

For the only light in which you can view their land is that of a
 hostage in your hands, a hostage the more valuable the better it is
 cultivated. 
 This you ought to spare as long as possible, and not make them
 desperate, and so increase the difficulty of dealing with them.

For if while still unprepared, hurried away by the complaints of our
 allies, we are induced to lay it waste, have a care that we do not
 bring deep disgrace and deep perplexity upon Peloponnese .

Complaints, whether of communities or individuals, it is possible to
 adjust; but war undertaken by a coalition for sectional interests,
 whose progress there is no means of foreseeing, does not easily
 admit of creditable settlement.

And none need think it cowardice for
 a number of confederates to pause before they attack a single
 city.

The Athenians have allies as numerous as our own, and allies that pay
 tribute, and war is a matter not so much of arms as of money, which
 makes arms of use. 
 And this is more than ever true in a struggle between a continental
 and a maritime power.

First, then, let us provide money, and not allow ourselves to be
 carried away by the talk of our allies before we have done so: as we
 shall have the largest share of responsibility for the consequences
 be they good or bad, we have also a right to a tranquil inquiry
 respecting them.

And the slowness and procrastination,
 the parts of our character that are most assailed by their
 criticism, need not make you blush. 
 If we undertake the war without preparation, we should by hastening
 its commencement only delay its conclusion: further, a free and a
 famous city has through all time been ours.

The quality which they condemn is really nothing but a wise
 moderation; thanks to its possession, we alone do not become
 insolent in success and give way less than others in misfortune; we
 are not carried away by the pleasure of hearing ourselves cheered on
 to risks which our judgment condemns; nor, if annoyed, are we any
 the more convinced by attempts to exasperate us by accusation.

We are both warlike and wise, and it is our sense of order that makes
 us so. 
 We are warlike, because self-control contains honor as a chief
 constituent, and honor bravery. 
 And we are wise, because we are educated with too little learning to
 despise the laws, and with too severe a self-control to disobey
 them, and are brought up not to be too knowing in useless
 matters,—such as the knowledge which can give a specious criticism
 of an enemy's plans in theory, but fails to assail them with equal
 success in practice,—but are taught to consider that the schemes of
 our enemies are not dissimilar to our own, and that the freaks of
 chance are not determinable by calculation.

In practice we always base our preparations against an enemy on the
 assumption that his plans are good; indeed, it is right to rest our
 hopes not on a belief in his blunders, but on the soundness of our
 provisions. 
 Nor ought we to believe that there is much difference between man and
 man, but to think that the superiority lies with him who is reared
 in the severest school.

These practices, then, which our ancestors have delivered to us, and
 by whose maintenance we have always profited, must not be given
 up. 
 And we must not be hurried into deciding in a day's brief space a
 question which concerns many lives and fortunes and many cities, and
 in which honor is deeply involved,—but we must decide calmly. 
 This our strength peculiarly enables us to do.

As for the Athenians, send to them on the matter of Potidaea , send on the matter
 of the alleged wrongs of the allies, particularly as they are
 prepared with legal satisfaction; and to proceed against one who
 offers arbitration as against a wrongdoer, law forbids. 
 Meanwhile do not omit preparation for war. 
 This decision will be the best for yourselves, the most terrible to
 your opponents.’

Such were the words of
 Archidamus. 
 Last came forward Sthenelaidas, one of the Ephors for that year, and
 spoke to the Lacedaemonians as follows:—

‘The long speech of the Athenians I
 do not pretend to understand. 
 They said a good deal in praise of themselves, but nowhere denied
 that they are injuring our allies and Peloponnese . 
 And yet if they behaved well against the Mede then, but ill towards us now, they deserve
 double punishment for having ceased to be good and for having become
 bad.

We meanwhile are the same then and now, and shall not, if we are
 wise, disregard the wrongs of our allies, or put off till to-morrow
 the duty of assisting those who must suffer to-day.

Others have much money and ships and horses, but we have good allies
 whom we must not give up to the Athenians, nor by lawsuits and words
 decide the matter, as it is anything but in word that we are harmed,
 but render instant and powerful help.

And let us not be told that it is fitting for us to deliberate under
 injustice; long deliberation is rather fitting for those who have
 injustice in contemplation.

Vote therefore, Lacedaemonians, for war, as the honor of Sparta demands, and neither
 allow the further aggrandizement of Athens , nor betray our allies to ruin, but with the
 gods let us advance against the aggressors.’

With these words he, as Ephor,
 himself put the question to the assembly of the Lacedaemonians.

He said that he could not determine which was the loudest acclamation
 (their mode of decision is by acclamation not by voting); the fact
 being that he wished to make them declare their opinion openly and
 thus to increase their ardor for war. 
 Accordingly he said, ‘All Lacedaemonians who are of opinion that the
 treaty has been broken, and that Athens is guilty, leave your seats and go there,’
 pointing out a certain place; ‘all who are of the opposite opinion,
 there.’

They accordingly stood up and divided; and those who held that the
 treaty had been broken were in a decided majority.

Summoning the allies, they told them that their opinion was that
 Athens had been
 guilty of injustice, but that they wished to convoke all the allies
 and put it to the vote; in order that they might make war, if they
 decided to do so, on a common resolution.

Having thus gained their point, the delegates returned home at once;
 the Athenian envoys a little later, when they had despatched the
 objects of their mission.

This decision of the assembly judging that the treaty had been
 broken, was made in the fourteenth year of the thirty years' truce,
 which was entered into after the affair of Euboea .

The Lacedaemonians voted that the
 treaty had been broken, and that war must be declared, not so much
 because they were persuaded by the arguments of the allies, as
 because they feared the growth of the power of the Athenians, seeing
 most of Hellas already
 subject to them.

The way in which Athens came to be placed in the
 circumstances under which her power grew was this.

After the Medes had returned from Europe , defeated by sea and land by the Hellenes,
 and after those of them who had fled with their ships to Mycale had
 been destroyed, Leotychides, King of the Lacedaemonians, the
 commander of the Hellenes at Mycale, departed home with the allies
 from Peloponnese . 
 But the Athenians and the allies from Ionia and Hellespont, who had now revolted from the
 king, remained and laid siege to Sestos , which was still held by the Medes. 
 After wintering before it, they became masters of the place on its
 evacuation by the barbarians; and after this they sailed away from
 Hellespont to their
 respective cities.

Meanwhile the Athenian people, after the departure of the barbarian
 from their country, at once proceeded to carry over their children
 and wives, and such property as they had left, from the places where
 they had deposited them, and prepared to rebuild their city and
 their walls. 
 For only isolated portions of the circumference had been left
 standing, and most of the houses were in ruins; though a few
 remained, in which the Persian grandees had taken up their quarters.

Perceiving what they were going to
 do, the Lacedaemonians sent an embassy to Athens . 
 They would have themselves preferred to see neither her nor any other
 city in possession of a wall; though here they acted principally at
 the instigation of their allies, who were alarmed at the strength of
 her newly acquired navy, and the valor which she had displayed in
 the war with the Medes.

They begged her not only to abstain from building walls for herself,
 but also to join them in throwing down the walls that still held
 together of the ultra-Peloponnesian cities. 
 The real meaning of their advice, the suspicion that it contained
 against the Athenians, was not proclaimed; it was urged that so the
 barbarian, in the event of a third invasion, would not have any
 strong place, such as he now had in Thebes , for his base of operations; and that
 Peloponnese would
 suffice for all as a base both for retreat and offence.

After the Lacedaemonians had thus spoken, they were, on the advice of
 Themistocles, immediately dismissed by the Athenians, with the
 answer that ambassadors should be sent to Sparta to discuss the
 question. 
 Themistocles told the Athenians to send him off with all speed to
 Lacedaemon , but not to
 despatch his colleagues as soon as they had selected them, but to
 wait until they had raised their wall to the height from which
 defence was possible. 
 Meanwhile the whole population in the city was to labour at the wall,
 the Athenians, their wives and their children, sparing no edifice,
 private or public, which might be of any use to the work, but
 throwing all down.

After giving these instructions, and adding that he would be
 responsible for all other matters there, he departed.

Arrived at Lacedaemon he did
 not seek an audience with the authorities, but tried to gain time
 and made excuses. 
 When any of the government asked him why he did not appear in the
 assembly, he would say that he was waiting for his colleagues, who
 had been detained in Athens by some engagement; however, that he
 expected their speedy arrival, and wondered that they were not yet
 there.

At first the Lacedaemonians trusted the words of Themistocles,
 through their friendship for him; but when others arrived, all
 distinctly declaring that the work was going on and already
 attaining some elevation, they did not know how to disbelieve
 it.

Aware of this, he told them that rumors are deceptive, and should not
 be trusted; they should send some reputable persons from Sparta to inspect, whose report
 might be trusted.

They despatched them accordingly. 
 Concerning these Themistocles secretly sent word to the Athenians to
 detain them as far as possible without putting them under open
 constraint, and not to let them go until they had themselves
 returned. 
 For his colleagues had now joined him, Abronichus, son of Lysicles,
 and Aristides, son of Lysimachus, with the news that the wall was
 sufficiently advanced; and he feared that when the Lacedaemonians
 heard the facts, they might refuse to let them go.

So the Athenians detained the envoys according to his message, and
 Themistocles had an audience with the Lacedaemonians, and at last
 openly told them that Athens was now fortified sufficiently to protect
 its inhabitants; that any embassy which the Lacedaemonians or their
 allies might wish to send to them, should in future proceed on the
 assumption that the people to whom they were going was able to
 distinguish both its own and the general interests.

That when the Athenians thought fit to abandon their city and to
 embark in their ships, they ventured on that perilous step without
 consulting them; and that on the other hand, wherever they had
 deliberated with the Lacedaemonians, they had proved themselves to
 be in judgment second to none.

That they now thought it fit that their city should have a wall, and
 that this would be more for the advantage of both the citizens of
 Athens and the
 Hellenic confederacy;

for without equal military strength it was impossible to contribute
 equal or fair counsel to the common interest. 
 It followed, he observed, either that all the members of the
 confederacy should be without walls, or that the present step should
 be considered a right one.

The Lacedaemonians did not betray any
 open signs of anger against the Athenians at what they heard. 
 The embassy, it seems, was prompted not by a desire to obstruct, but
 to guide the counsels of their government: besides, Spartan feeling
 was at that time very friendly towards Athens on account of the
 patriotism which she had displayed in the struggle with the
 Mede . 
 Still the defeat of their wishes could not but cause them secret
 annoyance. 
 The envoys of each state departed home without complaint.

In this way the Athenians walled
 their city in a little while.

To this day the building shows signs of the haste of its execution;
 the foundations are laid of stones of all kinds, and in some places
 not wrought or fitted, but placed just in the order in which they
 were brought by the different hands; and many columns, too, from
 tombs and sculptured stones were put in with the rest. 
 For the bounds of the city were extended at every point of the
 circumference; and so they laid hands on everything without
 exception in their haste.

Themistocles also persuaded them to finish the walls of Piraeus , which had been begun
 before, in his year of office as archon; being influenced alike by
 the fineness of a locality that has three natural harbors, and by
 the great start which the Athenians would gain in the acquisition of
 power by becoming a naval people.

For he first ventured to tell them to stick to the sea and forthwith
 began to lay the foundations of the empire.

It was by his advice, too, that they built the walls of that
 thickness which can still be discerned round Piraeus , the stones being
 brought up by two wagons meeting each other. 
 Between the walls thus formed there was neither rubble nor mortar,
 but great stones hewn square and fitted together, cramped to each
 other on the outside with iron and lead. 
 About half the height that he intended was finished.

His idea was by their size and thickness to keep off the attacks of
 an enemy; he thought that they might be adequately defended by a
 small garrison of invalids, and the rest be freed for service in the
 fleet.

For the fleet claimed most of his attention. 
 He saw, as I think, that the approach by sea was easier for the
 king's army than that by land: he also thought Piraeus more valuable than the
 upper city; indeed, he was always advising the Athenians, if a day
 should come when they were hard pressed by land, to go down into
 Piraeus , and defy
 the world with their fleet.

Thus, therefore, the Athenians completed their wall, and commenced
 their other buildings immediately after the retreat of the
 Mede .

Meanwhile Pausanias, son of
 Cleombrotus, was sent out from Lacedaemon as commander-in-chief of the Hellenes,
 with twenty ships from Peloponnese . 
 With him sailed the Athenians with thirty ships, and a number of the
 other allies.

They made an expedition against Cyprus and subdued most of the island, and
 afterwards against Byzantium , which was in the hands of the Medes, and
 compelled it to surrender. 
 This event took place while the Spartans were still supreme.

But the violence of Pausanias had already begun to be disagreeable to
 the Hellenes, particularly to the Ionians and the newly liberated
 populations. 
 These resorted to the Athenians and requested them as their kinsmen
 to become their leaders, and to stop any attempt at violence on the
 part of Pausanias.

The Athenians accepted their overtures, and determined to put down
 any attempt of the kind and to settle everything else as their
 interests might seem to demand.

In the meantime the Lacedaemonians recalled Pausanias for an
 investigation of the reports which had reached them. 
 Manifold and grave accusations had been brought against him by
 Hellenes arriving in Sparta ; and, to all appearance, there had been in
 him more of the mimicry of a despot than of the attitude of a
 general.

As it happened, his recall came just at the time when the hatred
 which he had inspired had induced the allies to desert him, the
 soldiers from Peloponnese 
 excepted, and to range themselves by the side of the Athenians.

On his arrival at Lacedaemon , he was censured for his private acts of
 oppression, but was acquitted on the heaviest counts and pronounced
 not guilty; it must be known that the charge of Medism formed one of
 the principal, and to all appearance one of the best-founded
 articles against him.

The Lacedaemonians did not, however, restore him to his command, but
 sent out Dorkis and certain others with a small force; who found the
 allies no longer inclined to concede to them the supremacy.

Perceiving this they departed, and the Lacedaemonians did not send
 out any to succeed them. 
 They feared for those who went out a deterioration similar to that
 observable in Pausanias; besides, they desired to be rid of the
 Median war, and were satisfied of the competency of the Athenians
 for the position, and of their friendship at the time towards
 themselves.

The Athenians having thus succeeded
 to the supremacy by the voluntary act of the allies through their
 hatred of Pausanias, fixed which cities were to contribute money
 against the barbarian, which ships; their professed object being to
 retaliate for their sufferings by ravaging the king's country.

Now was the time that the office of ‘Treasurers for Hellas ’ was first instituted by
 the Athenians. 
 These officers received the tribute, as the money contributed was
 called. 
 The tribute was first fixed at four hundred and sixty talents. 
 The common treasury was at Delos , and the congresses were held in the temple.

Their supremacy commenced with independent allies who acted on the
 resolutions of a common congress. 
 It was marked by the following undertakings in war and in
 administration during the interval between the Median and the
 present war, against the barbarian, against their own rebel allies,
 and against the Peloponnesian powers which would come in contact
 with them on various occasions.

My excuse for relating these events, and for venturing on this
 digression, is that this passage of history has been omitted by all
 my predecessors, who have confined themselves either to Hellenic
 history before the Median war, or to the Median war itself. 
 Hellanicus, it is true, did touch on these events in his Athenian
 history; but he is somewhat concise and not accurate in his
 dates. 
 Besides, the history of these events contains an explanation of the
 growth of the Athenian empire.

First the Athenians besieged and
 captured Eion on the
 Strymon from the Medes, and made slaves of the inhabitants, being
 under the command of Cimon, son of Miltiades.

Next they enslaved Scyros the island in the Aegean , containing a Dolopian
 population, and colonized it themselves.

This was followed by a war against Carystus, in which the rest of
 Euboea remained
 neutral, and which was ended by surrender on conditions.

After this Naxos left
 the confederacy, and a war ensued, and she had to return after a
 siege; this was the first instance of the engagement being broken by
 the subjugation of an allied city, a precedent which was followed by
 that of the rest in the order which circumstances prescribed.

Of all the causes of defection, that connected with arrears of
 tribute and vessels, and with failure of service, was the chief; for
 the Athenians were very severe and exacting, and made themselves
 offensive by applying the screw of necessity to men who were not
 used to and in fact not disposed for any continuous labour.

In some other respects the Athenians were not the old popular rulers
 they had been at first; and if they had more than their fair share
 of service, it was correspondingly easy for them to reduce any that
 tried to leave the confederacy.

For this the allies had themselves to blame; the wish to get off
 service making most of them arrange to pay their share of the
 expense in money instead of in ships, and so to avoid having to
 leave their homes. 
 Thus while Athens was
 increasing her navy with the funds which they contributed, a revolt
 always found them without resources or experience for war.

Next we come to the actions by land
 and by sea at the river Eurymedon in Pamphylia , between the Athenians with their allies,
 and the Medes, when the Athenians won both battles on the same day
 under the conduct of Cimon, son of Miltiades, and captured and
 destroyed the whole Phoenician fleet, consisting of two hundred
 vessels.

Some time afterwards occurred the defection of the Thasians, caused
 by disagreements about the marts on the opposite coast of Thrace , and about the mine in
 their possession. 
 Sailing with a fleet to Thasos , the Athenians defeated them at sea and
 effected a landing on the island.

About the same time they sent ten thousand settlers of their own
 citizens and the allies to settle the place then called Ennea Hodoi
 or Nine Ways, now Amphipolis . 
 They succeeded in gaining possession of Ennea Hodoi from the
 Edonians, but on advancing into the interior of Thrace were cut off in Drabescus , a town of the
 Edonians, by the assembled Thracians, who regarded the settlement of
 the place Ennea Hodoi as an act of hostility.

Meanwhile the Thasians being defeated in the field and suffering
 siege, appealed to Lacedaemon , and desired her to assist them by an
 invasion of Attica .

Without informing Athens 
 she promised and intended to do so, but was prevented by the
 occurrence of the earthquake, accompanied by the secession of the
 Helots and the Thuriats and Aethaeans of the Perioeci to Ithome . 
 Most of the Helots were the descendants of the old Messenians that
 were enslaved in the famous war; and so all of them came to be
 called Messenians.

So the Lacedaemonians being engaged in a war with the rebels in
 Ithome , the Thasians
 in the third year of the siege obtained terms from the Athenians by
 razing their walls, delivering up their ships, and arranging to pay
 the monies demanded at once, and tribute in future; giving up their
 possessions on the continent together with the mine.

The Lacedaemonians meanwhile finding
 the war against the rebels in Ithome likely to last, invoked the aid of their
 allies, and especially of the Athenians, who came in some force
 under the command of Cimon.

The reason for this pressing summons lay in their reputed skill in
 siege operations; a long siege had taught the Lacedaemonians their
 own deficiency in this art, else they would have taken the place by
 assault.

The first open quarrel between the Lacedaemonians and Athenians arose
 out of this expedition. 
 The Lacedaemonians, when assault failed to take the place,
 apprehensive of the enterprising and revolutionary character of the
 Athenians, and further looking upon them as of alien extraction,
 began to fear that if they remained, they might be tempted by the
 besieged in Ithome to
 attempt some political changes. 
 They accordingly dismissed them alone of the allies, without
 declaring their suspicions, but merely saying that they had now no
 need of them.

But the Athenians, aware that their dismissal did not proceed from
 the more honorable reason of the two, but from suspicions which had
 been conceived, went away deeply offended, and conscious of having
 done nothing to merit such treatment from the Lacedaemonians; and
 the instant that they returned home they broke off the alliance
 which had been made against the Mede , and allied themselves with Sparta 's enemy Argos ; each of the contracting
 parties taking the same oaths and making the same alliance with the
 Thessalians.

Meanwhile the rebels in Ithome , unable to prolong
 further a ten years' resistance, surrendered to Lacedaemon ; the conditions being
 that they should depart from Peloponnese under safe conduct, and should never
 set foot in it again:

any one who might hereafter be found there was to be the slave of his
 captor. 
 It must be known that the Lacedaemonians had an old oracle from
 Delphi , to the
 effect that they should let go the suppliant of Zeus at Ithome .

So they went forth with their children and their wives, and being
 received by Athens from
 the hatred that she now felt for the Lacedaemonians, were located at
 Naupactus , which
 she had lately taken from the Ozolian Locrians.

The Athenians received another addition to their confederacy in the
 Megarians; who left the Lacedaemonian alliance, annoyed by a war
 about boundaries forced on them by Corinth . 
 The Athenians occupied Megara and Pegae, and built the Megarians their
 long walls from the city to Nisaea , in which they placed an Athenian
 garrison. 
 This was the principal cause of the Corinthians conceiving such a
 deadly hatred against Athens .

Meanwhile Inaros, son of
 Psammetichus, a Libyan king of the Libyans on the Egyptian border,
 having his head-quarters at Marea, the town above Pharos, caused a
 revolt of almost the whole of Egypt from King Artaxerxes, and placing himself at
 its head, invited the Athenians to his assistance.

Abandoning a Cyprian expedition upon which they happened to be
 engaged with two hundred ships of their own and their allies, they
 arrived in Egypt and sailed
 from the sea into the Nile ,
 and making themselves masters of the river and two-thirds of
 Memphis , addressed
 themselves to the attack of the remaining third, which is called
 White Castle. 
 Within it were Persians and Medes who had taken refuge there, and
 Egyptians who had not joined the rebellion.

Meanwhile the Athenians, making a
 descent from their fleet upon Haliae, were engaged by a force of
 Corinthians and Epidaurians; and the Corinthians were
 victorious. 
 Afterwards the Athenians engaged the Peloponnesian fleet off
 Cecruphalia; and the Athenians were victorious.

Subsequently war broke out between Aegina and Athens , and there was a great
 battle at sea off Aegina between the Athenians and Aeginetans, each
 being aided by their allies; in which victory remained with the
 Athenians, who took seventy of the enemy's ships, and landed in the
 country and commenced a siege under the command of Leocrates, son of
 Stroebus.

Upon this the Peloponnesians, desirous of aiding the Aeginetans,
 threw into Aegina a
 force of three hundred heavy infantry, who had before been serving
 with the Corinthians and Epidaurians. 
 Meanwhile the Corinthians and their allies occupied the heights of
 Geraneia, and marched down into the Megarid, in the belief that with
 a large force absent in Aegina and Egypt , Athens would be unable to help the Megarians
 without raising the siege of Aegina .

But the Athenians, instead of moving the army of Aegina , raised a force of
 the old and young men that had been left in the city, and marched
 into the Megarid under the command of Myronides.

After a drawn battle with the Corinthians, the rival hosts parted,
 each with the impression that they had gained the victory.

The Athenians, however, if anything, had rather the advantage, and on
 the departure of the Corinthians set up a trophy. 
 Urged by the taunts of the elders in their city, the Corinthians made
 their preparations, and about twelve days afterwards came and set up
 their trophy as victors. 
 Sallying out from Megara ,
 the Athenians cut off the party that was employed in erecting the
 trophy, and engaged and defeated the rest.

In the retreat of the vanquished army, a considerable division,
 pressed by the pursuers and mistaking the road, dashed into a field
 on some private property, with a deep trench all round it, and no
 way out.

Being acquainted with the place, the Athenians hemmed their front
 with heavy infantry, and placing the light troops round in a circle,
 stoned all who had gone in. 
 
 Corinth here suffered a
 severe blow. 
 The bulk of her army continued its retreat home.

About this time the Athenians began
 to build the long walls to the sea, that towards Phalerum and that
 towards Piraeus .

Meanwhile the Phocians made an expedition against Doris, the old home
 of the Lacedaemonians, containing the towns of Boeum, Kitinium, and
 Erineum. 
 They had taken one of these towns, when the Lacedaemonians under
 Nicomedes, son of Cleombrotus, commanding for King Pleistoanax, son
 of Pausanias, who was still a minor, came to the aid of the Dorians
 with fifteen hundred heavy infantry of their own, and ten thousand
 of their allies. 
 After compelling the Phocians to restore the town on conditions, they
 began their retreat.

The route by sea, across the Crissaean gulf, exposed them to the risk
 of being stopped by the Athenian fleet; that across Geraneia seemed
 scarcely safe, the Athenians holding Megara and Pegae. 
 For the pass was a difficult one, and was always guarded by the
 Athenians; and, in the present instance, the Lacedaemonians had
 information that they meant to dispute their passage.

So they resolved to remain in Boeotia , and to consider which would be the safest
 line of march. 
 They had also another reason for this resolve. 
 Secret encouragement had been given them by a party in Athens , who hoped to put an end
 to the reign of democracy and the building of the long walls.

Meanwhile the Athenians marched against them with their whole levy
 and a thousand Argives and the respective contingents of the rest of
 their allies. 
 Altogether they were fourteen thousand strong.

The march was prompted by the notion that the Lacedaemonians were at
 a loss how to effect their passage, and also by suspicions of an
 attempt to overthrow the democracy.

Some cavalry also joined the Athenians from their Thessalian allies;
 but these went over to the Lacedaemonians during the battle.

The battle was fought at Tanagra in Boeotia . 
 After heavy loss on both sides victory declared for the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies.

After entering the Megarid and cutting down the fruit trees, the
 Lacedaemonians returned home across Geraneia and the isthmus. 
 Sixty-two days after the battle the Athenians marched into Boeotia under the command of
 Myronides,

defeated the Boeotians in battle at Oenophyta, and became masters of
 Boeotia and Phocis . 
 They dismantled the walls of the Tanagraeans, took a hundred of the
 richest men of the Opuntian Locrians as hostages, and finished their
 own long walls.

This was followed by the surrender of the Aeginetans to Athens on conditions; they
 pulled down their walls, gave up their ships, and agreed to pay
 tribute in future.

The Athenians sailed round Peloponnese under Tolmides, son of Tolmaeus, burnt
 the arsenal of Lacedaemon ,
 took Chalcis , a town of
 the Corinthians, and in a descent upon Sicyon defeated the Sicyonians in battle.

Meanwhile the Athenians in Egypt and their allies were still
 there, and encountered all the vicissitudes of war.

First the Athenians were masters of Egypt , and the king sent Megabyzus, a Persian, to
 Lacedaemon with money
 to bribe the Peloponnesians to invade Attica and so draw off the Athenians from
 Egypt .

Finding that the matter made no progress, and that the money was only
 being wasted, he recalled Megabazus with the remainder of the money,
 and sent Megabuzus, son of Zopyrus, a Persian, with a large army to
 Egypt .

Arriving by land he defeated the Egyptians and their allies in a
 battle, and drove the Hellenes out of Memphis , and at length shut them up in the island
 of Prosopitis, where he besieged them for a year and six months. 
 At last, draining the canal of its waters, which he diverted into
 another channel, he left their ships high and dry and joined most of
 the island to the mainland, and then marched over on foot and
 captured it.

Thus the enterprise of the Hellenes came to ruin after six years of
 war. 
 Of all that large host a few travelling through Libya reached Cyrene in safety, but most of them
 perished.

And thus Egypt returned to
 its subjection to the king, except Amyrtaeus, the king in the
 marshes, whom they were unable to capture from the extent of the
 marsh; the marshmen being also the most warlike of the
 Egyptians.

Inaros, the Libyan king, the sole author of the Egyptian revolt, was
 betrayed, taken, and crucified.

Meanwhile a relieving squadron of fifty vessels had sailed from
 Athens and the rest
 of the confederacy for Egypt . 
 They put in to shore at the Mendesian mouth of the Nile , in total ignorance of what
 had occurred. 
 Attacked on the land side by the troops, and from the sea by the
 Phoenician navy, most of the ships were destroyed; the few remaining
 being saved by retreat. 
 Such was the end of the great expedition of the Athenians and their
 allies to Egypt .

Meanwhile Orestes, son of
 Echecratidas, the Thessalian king, being an exile from Thessaly , persuaded the Athenians
 to restore him. 
 Taking with them the Boeotians and Phocians their allies, the
 Athenians marched to Pharsalus in Thessaly . 
 They became masters of the country, though only in the immediate
 vicinity of the camp; beyond which they could not go for fear of the
 Thessalian cavalry. 
 But they failed to take the city or to attain any of the other
 objects of their expedition, and returned home with Orestes without
 having effected anything.

Not long after this a thousand of the Athenians embarked in the
 vessels that were at Pegae (Pegae, it must be remembered, was now
 theirs), and sailed along the coast to Sicyon under the command of Pericles, son of
 Xanthippus. 
 Landing in Sicyon and
 defeating the Sicyonians who engaged them,

they immediately took with them the Achaeans, and sailing across,
 marched against and laid siege to Oeniadae in Acarnania . 
 Failing however to take it, they returned home.

Three years afterwards a truce was
 made between the Peloponnesians and Athenians for five years.

Released from Hellenic war, the Athenians made an expedition to
 Cyprus with two hundred
 vessels of their own and their allies, under the command of
 Cimon.

Sixty of these were detached to Egypt at the instance of Amyrtaeus, the king in the
 marshes; the rest laid siege to Kitium, from which, however,

they were compelled to retire by the death of Cimon and by scarcity
 of provisions. 
 Sailing off Salamis in Cyprus , they fought with the Phoenicians, Cyprians,
 and Cilicians by land and sea, and being victorious on both elements
 departed home, and with them the returned squadron from Egypt .

After this the Lacedaemonians marched out on a sacred war, and
 becoming masters of the temple at Delphi , placed it in the hands of the
 Delphians. 
 Immediately after their retreat, the Athenians marched out, became
 masters of the temple, and placed it in the hands of the Phocians.

Some time after this, Orchomenus , Chaeronea , and some other places
 in Boeotia , being in the
 hands of the Boeotian exiles, the Athenians marched against the
 above-mentioned hostile places with a thousand Athenian heavy
 infantry and the allied contingents, under the command of Tolmides,
 son of Tolmaeus. 
 They took Chaeronea , and
 made slaves of the inhabitants, and leaving a garrison, commenced
 their return.

On their road they were attacked at Coronaea, by the Boeotian exiles
 from Orchomenus ,
 with some Locrians and Euboean exiles, and others who were of the
 same way of thinking, were defeated in battle, and some killed,
 others taken captive.

The Athenians evacuated all Boeotia by a treaty providing for the recovery of
 the men;

and the exiled Boeotians returned, and with all the rest regained
 their independence.

This was soon afterwards followed by
 the revolt of Euboea from
 Athens . 
 Pericles had already crossed over with an army of Athenians to the
 island, when news was brought to him that Megara had revolted, that the
 Peloponnesians were on the point of invading Attica , and that the Athenian
 garrison had been cut off by the Megarians, with the exception of a
 few who had taken refuge in Nisaea . 
 The Megarians had introduced the Corinthians, Sicyonians, and
 Epidaurians into the town before they revolted. 
 Meanwhile Pericles brought his army back in all haste from Euboea .

After this the Peloponnesians marched into Attica as far as Eleusis and Thrius, ravaging
 the country under the conduct of King Pleistoanax, the son of
 Pausanias, and without advancing further returned home.

The Athenians then crossed over again to Euboea under the command of Pericles, and subdued
 the whole of the island: all but Histiaea was settled by convention;
 the Histiaeans they expelled from their homes, and occupied their
 territory themselves.

Not long after their return from
 Euboea , they made a
 truce with the Lacedaemonians and their allies for thirty years,
 giving up the posts which they occupied in Peloponnese , Nisaea Pegae,
 Troezen , and Achaia .

In the sixth year of the truce, war broke out between the Samians and
 Milesians about Priene . 
 Worsted in the war, the Milesians came to Athens with loud complaints
 against the Samians. 
 In this they were joined by certain private persons from Samos itself, who wished to
 revolutionize the government.

Accordingly the Athenians sailed to Samos with forty ships and
 set up a democracy; took hostages from the Samians, fifty boys and
 as many men, lodged them in Lemnos , and after leaving a garrison in the island
 returned home.

But some of the Samians had not remained in the island, but had fled
 to the continent. 
 Making an agreement with the most powerful of those in the city, and
 an alliance with Pissuthnes, son of Hystaspes, the then satrap of
 Sardis , they got
 together a force of seven hundred mercenaries, and under cover of
 night crossed over to Samos .

Their first step was to rise on the commons, most of whom they
 secured, their next to steal their hostages from Lemnos ; after which they revolted,
 gave up the Athenian garrison left with them and its commanders to
 Pissuthnes, and instantly prepared for an expedition against
 Miletus . 
 The Byzantines also revolted with them.

As soon as the Athenians heard the
 news, they sailed with sixty ships against Samos . 
 Sixteen of these went to Caria to look out for the Phoenician fleet, and to
 Chios and
 Lesbos carrying round
 orders for reinforcements, and so never engaged; but forty-four
 ships under the command of Pericles with nine colleagues gave
 battle, off the island of Tragia, to seventy Samian vessels, of
 which twenty were transports, as they were sailing from Miletus . 
 Victory remained with the Athenians.

Reinforced afterwards by forty ships from Athens , and twenty-five Chian
 and Lesbian vessels, the Athenians landed, and having the
 superiority by land invested the city with three walls; it was also
 invested from the sea.

Meanwhile Pericles took sixty ships from the blockading squadron, and
 departed in haste for Caunus and Caria , intelligence having been brought in of the
 approach of the Phoenician fleet to the aid of the Samians; indeed
 Stesagoras and others had left the island with five ships to bring
 them.

But in the meantime the Samians made a sudden sally, and fell on the
 camp, which they found unfortified. 
 Destroying the look-out vessels, and engaging and defeating such as
 were being launched to meet them, they remained masters of their own
 seas for fourteen days, and carried in and carried out what they
 pleased.

But on the arrival of Pericles, they were once more shut up. 
 Fresh reinforcements afterwards arrived—forty ships from Athens with Thucydides, Hagnon,
 and Phormio; twenty with Tlepolemus and Anticles, and thirty vessels
 from Chios and
 Lesbos .

After a brief attempt at fighting, the Samians, unable to hold out,
 were reduced after a nine months' siege, and surrendered on
 conditions; they razed their walls, gave hostages, delivered up
 their ships, and arranged to pay the expenses of the war by
 instalments. 
 The Byzantines also agreed to be subject as before.

After this, though not many years
 later, we at length come to what has been already related, the
 affairs of Corcyra 
 and Potidaea , and the
 events that served as a pretext for the present war.

All these actions of the Hellenes against each other and the
 barbarian occurred in the fifty years' interval between the retreat
 of Xerxes and the beginning of the present war. 
 During this interval the Athenians succeeded in placing their empire
 on a firmer basis, and advanced their own home power to a very great
 height. 
 The Lacedaemonians, though fully aware of it, opposed it only for a
 little while, but remained inactive during most of the period, being
 of old slow to go to war except under the pressure of necessity, and
 in the present instance being hampered by wars at home; until the
 growth of the Athenian power could be no longer ignored, and their
 own confederacy became the object of its encroachments. 
 They then felt that they could endure it no longer, but that the time
 had come for them to throw themselves heart and soul upon the
 hostile power, and break it, if they could, by commencing the
 present war.

And though the Lacedaemonians had made up their own minds on the fact
 of the breach of the treaty and the guilt of the Athenians, yet they
 sent to Delphi and
 inquired of the god whether it would be well with them if they went
 to war; and, as it is reported, received from him the answer that if
 they put their whole strength into the war, victory would be theirs,
 and the promise that he himself would be with them, whether invoked
 or uninvoked.

Still they wished to summon their allies again, and to take their
 vote on the propriety of making war. 
 After the ambassadors from the confederates had arrived and a
 congress had been convened, they all spoke their minds, most of them
 denouncing the Athenians and demanding that the war should
 begin. 
 In particular the Corinthians. 
 They had before on their own account canvassed the cities in detail
 to induce them to vote for the war, in the fear that it might come
 too late to save Potidaea ; they were present also on this occasion,
 and came forward the last, and made the following speech:—

‘Fellow allies, we can no longer
 accuse the Lacedaemonians of having failed in their duty: they have
 not only voted for war themselves, but have assembled us here for
 that purpose. 
 We say their duty, for supremacy has its duties. 
 Besides equitably administering private interests, leaders are
 required to show a special care for the common welfare in return for
 the special honors accorded to them by all in other ways.

For ourselves, all who have already had dealings with the Athenians
 require no warning to be on their guard against them. 
 The states more inland and out of the highway of communication should
 understand that if they omit to support the coast powers, the result
 will be to injure the transit of their produce for exportation and
 the reception in exchange of their imports from the sea; and they
 must not be careless judges of what is now said, as if it had
 nothing to do with them, but must expect that the sacrifice of the
 powers on the coast will one day be followed by the extension of the
 danger to the interior, and must recognize that their own interests
 are deeply involved in this discussion.

For these reasons they should not hesitate to exchange peace for
 war. 
 If wise men remain quiet, while they are not injured, brave men
 abandon peace for war when they are injured, returning to an
 understanding on a favorable opportunity: in fact, they are neither
 intoxicated by their success in war, nor disposed to take an injury
 for the sake of the delightful tranquillity of peace.

Indeed, to falter for the sake of such delights is, if you remain
 inactive, the quickest way of losing the sweets of repose to which
 you cling; while to conceive extravagant pretensions from success in
 war is to forget how hollow is the confidence by which you are
 elated.

For if many ill-conceived plans have succeeded through the still
 greater fatuity of an opponent, many more, apparently well laid,
 have on the contrary ended in disgrace. 
 The confidence with which we form our schemes is never completely
 justified in their execution; speculation is carried on in safety,
 but, when it comes to action, fear causes failure.

To apply these rules to ourselves, if
 we are now kindling war it is under the pressure of injury, and with
 adequate grounds of complaint; and after we have chastised the
 Athenians we will in season desist.

We have many reasons to expect success,—first, superiority in numbers
 and in military experience, and secondly our general and unvarying
 obedience in the execution of orders. 
 The naval strength

which they possess shall be raised by us from our respective
 antecedent resources, and from the monies at Olympia and Delphi . 
 A loan from these enables us to seduce their foreign sailors by the
 offer of higher pay. 
 For the power of Athens 
 is more mercenary than national; while ours will not be exposed to
 the same risk, as its strength lies more in men than in money.

A single defeat at sea is in all likelihood their ruin: should they
 hold out, in that case there will be the more time for us to
 exercise ourselves in naval matters; and as soon as we have arrived
 at an equality in science, we need scarcely ask whether we shall be
 their superiors in courage. 
 For the advantages that we have by nature they cannot acquire by
 education; while their superiority in science must be removed by our
 practice.

The money required for these objects shall be provided by our
 contributions: nothing indeed could be more monstrous than the
 suggestion that, while their allies never tire of contributing for
 their own servitude, we should refuse to spend for vengeance and
 self-preservation the treasure which by such refusal we shall
 forfeit to Athenian rapacity, and see employed for our own ruin.

We have also other ways of carrying
 on the war, such as revolt of their allies, the surest method of
 depriving them of their revenues, which are the source of their
 strength, and establishment of fortified positions in their country,
 and various operations which cannot be foreseen at present. 
 For war of all things proceeds least upon definite rules, but draws
 principally upon itself for contrivances to meet an emergency; and
 in such cases the party who faces the struggle and keeps his temper
 best meets with most security, and he who loses his temper about it
 with correspondent disaster.

Let us also reflect that if it was merely a number of disputes of
 territory between rival neighbors, it might be borne; but here we
 have an enemy in Athens ,
 that is a match for our whole coalition, and more than a match for
 any of its members; so that unless as a body and as individual
 nationalities and individual cities we make an unanimous stand
 against her, she will easily conquer us divided and in detail. 
 That conquest, terrible as it may sound, would, it must be known,
 have no other end than slavery pure and simple;

a word which Peloponnese 
 cannot even hear whispered without disgrace, or without disgrace see
 so many states abused by one. 
 Meanwhile the opinion would be either that we were justly so used, or
 that we put up with it from cowardice, and were proving degenerate
 sons in not even securing for ourselves the freedom which our
 fathers gave to Hellas ; and
 in allowing the establishment in Hellas of a tyrant state, though in individual
 states we think it our duty to put down sole rulers.

And we do not know how this conduct can be held free from three of
 the gravest failings, want of sense, of courage, or of
 vigilance. 
 For we do not suppose that you have taken refuge in that contempt of
 an enemy which has proved so fatal in so many instances,—a feeling
 which from the numbers that it has ruined has come to be called, not
 contemptuous but contemptible.

There is, however, no advantage in
 reflections on the past further than may be of service to the
 present. 
 For the future we must provide by maintaining what the present gives
 us and redoubling our efforts; it is hereditary to us to win virtue
 as the fruit of labour, and you must not change the habit, even
 though you should have a slight advantage in wealth and resources;
 for it is not right that what was won in want should be lost in
 plenty. 
 No, we must boldly advance to the war for many reasons; the god has
 commanded it and promised to be with us, and the rest of Hellas will all join in the
 struggle, part from fear, part from interest.

You will not be the first to break a treaty which the god, in
 advising us to go to war, judges to be violated already, but rather
 to support a treaty that has been outraged: indeed, treaties are
 broken not by resistance but by aggression.

Your position, therefore, from whatever quarter you may view it, will
 amply justify you in going to war; and this step we recommend in the
 interests of all, bearing in mind that identity of interests is the
 surest of bonds whether between states or individuals. 
 Delay not, therefore, to assist Potidaea , a Dorian city besieged by Ionians, which
 is quite a reversal of the order of things; nor to assert the
 freedom of the rest. 
 It is impossible for us to wait any longer when waiting can only mean
 immediate disaster for some of us, and, if it comes to be known that
 we have conferred but do not venture to protect ourselves, like
 disaster in the near future for the rest.

Delay not, fellow allies, but convinced of the necessity of the
 crisis and the wisdom of this counsel, vote for the war, undeterred
 by its immediate terrors, but looking beyond to the lasting peace by
 which it will be succeeded. 
 Out of war peace gains fresh stability, but to refuse to abandon
 repose for war is not so sure a method of avoiding danger.

We must believe that the tyrant city that has been established in
 Hellas has been
 established against all alike, with a programme of universal empire,
 part fulfilled, part in contemplation; let us then attack and reduce
 it, and win future security for ourselves and freedom for the
 Hellenes who are now enslaved.’ Such
 were the words of the Corinthians.

The Lacedaemonians having now heard all give their opinion, took the
 vote of all the allied states present in order, great and small
 alike; and the majority voted for war.

This decided, it was still impossible for them to commence at once,
 from their want of preparation; but it was resolved that the means
 requisite were to be procured by the different states, and that
 there was to be no delay. 
 And indeed, in spite of the time occupied with the necessary
 arrangements, less than a year elapsed before Attica was invaded, and the war
 openly begun.

This interval was spent in sending
 embassies to Athens 
 charged with complaints, in order to obtain as good a pretext for
 war as possible, in the event of her paying no attention to
 them.

The first Lacedaemonian embassy was to order the Athenians to drive
 out the curse of the goddess; the history of which is as
 follows.

In former generations there was an Athenian of the name of Cylon, a
 victor at the Olympic games, of good birth and powerful position,
 who had married a daughter of Theagenes, a Megarian, at that time
 tyrant of Megara .

Now this Cylon was inquiring at Delphi ; when he was told by the god to seize the
 Acropolis of Athens on
 the grand festival of Zeus.

Accordingly, procuring a force from Theagenes and persuading his
 friends to join him, when the Olympic festival in Peloponnese came, he seized the
 Acropolis, with the intention of making himself tyrant, thinking
 that this was the grand festival of Zeus, and also an occasion
 appropriate for a victor at the Olympic games.

Whether the grand festival that was meant was in Attica or elsewhere was a question
 which he never thought of, and which the oracle did not offer to
 solve. 
 For the Athenians also have a festival which is called the grand
 festival of Zeus Meilichios or Gracious, viz. the Diasia. 
 It is celebrated outside the city, and the whole people sacrifice not
 real victims but a number of bloodless offerings peculiar to the
 country. 
 However, fancying he had chosen the right time, he made the
 attempt.

As soon as the Athenians perceived it, they flocked in, one and all,
 from the country, and sat down, and laid siege to the citadel.

But as time went on, weary of the labour of blockade, most of them
 departed; the responsibility of keeping guard being left to the nine
 archons, with plenary powers to arrange everything according to
 their good judgment. 
 It must be known that at that time most political functions were
 discharged by the nine archons.

Meanwhile Cylon and his besieged companions were distressed for want
 of food and water.

Accordingly Cylon and his brother made their escape; but the rest
 being hard pressed, and some even dying of famine, seated themselves
 as suppliants at the altar in the Acropolis.

The Athenians who were charged with the duty of keeping guard, when
 they saw them at the point of death in the temple, raised them up on
 the understanding that no harm should be done to them, led them out
 and slew them. 
 Some who as they passed by took refuge at the altars of the awful
 goddesses were despatched on the spot. 
 From this deed the men who killed them were called accursed and
 guilty against the goddess, they and their descendants.

Accordingly these cursed ones were driven out by the Athenians,
 driven out again by Cleomenes of Lacedaemon and an Athenian faction; the living were
 driven out, and the bones of the dead were taken up; thus they were
 cast out. 
 For all that, they came back afterwards, and their descendants are
 still in the city.

This, then, was the curse that the
 Lacedaemonians ordered them to drive out. 
 They were actuated primarily, as they pretended, by a care for the
 honor of the gods; but they also knew that Pericles, son of
 Xanthippus, was connected with the curse on his mother's side, and
 they thought that his banishment would materially advance their
 designs on Athens

Not that they really hoped to succeed in procuring this; they rather
 thought to create a prejudice against him in the eyes of his
 countrymen from the feeling that the war would be partly caused by
 his misfortune.

For being the most powerful man of his time, and the leading Athenian
 statesman, he opposed the Lacedaemonians in everything, and would
 have no concessions, but ever urged the Athenians on to war.

The Athenians retorted by ordering
 the Lacedaemonians to drive out the curse of Taenarus. 
 The Lacedaemonians had once raised up some Helot suppliants from the
 temple of Poseidon at Taenarus, led them away and slain them; for
 which they believe the great earthquake at Sparta to have been a
 retribution.

The Athenians also ordered them to drive out the curse of the goddess
 of the Brazen House; the history of which is as follows.

After Pausanias the Lacedaemonian had been recalled by the Spartans
 from his command in the Hellespont (this is his first recall), and had been
 tried by them and acquitted, not being again sent out in a public
 capacity, he took a galley of Hermione on his own responsibility, without the
 authority of the Lacedaemonians, and arrived as a private person in
 the Hellespont . 
 He came ostensibly for the Hellenic war, really to carry on his
 intrigues with the king, which he had begun before his recall, being
 ambitious of reigning over Hellas .

The circumstance which first enabled him to lay the king under an
 obligation, and to make a beginning of the whole design was
 this.

Some connections and kinsmen of the king had been taken in Byzantium , on its capture
 from the Medes, when he was first there, after the return from
 Cyprus . 
 These captives he sent off to the king without the knowledge of the
 rest of the allies, the account being that they had escaped from
 him.

He managed this with the help of Gongylus, an Eretrian, whom he had
 placed in charge of Byzantium and the prisoners. 
 He also gave Gongylus a letter for the king, the contents of which
 were as follows, as was afterwards discovered:

‘Pausanias, the general of Sparta , anxious to do you a favour, sends you these
 his prisoners of war. 
 I propose also, with your approval, to marry your daughter, and to
 make Sparta and the rest
 of Hellas subject to
 you. 
 I may say that I think I am able to do this, with your
 co-operation. 
 Accordingly if any of this please you, send a safe man to the sea
 through whom we may in future conduct our correspondence.’

This was all that was revealed in the
 writing, and Xerxes was pleased with the letter. 
 He sent off Artabazus, son of Pharnaces, to the sea with orders to
 supersede Megabates, the previous governor in the satrapy of
 Daskylion, and to send over as quickly as possible to Pausanias at
 Byzantium a
 letter which he entrusted to him; to show him the royal signet, and
 to execute any commission which he might receive from Pausanias on
 the king's matters, with all care and fidelity.

Artabazus on his arrival carried the king's orders into effect, and
 sent over the letter,

which contained the following answer:—‘Thus saith King Xerxes to
 Pausanias. 
 For the men whom you have saved for me across sea from Byzantium , an obligation is
 laid up for you in our house, recorded forever; and with your
 proposals I am well pleased. 
 Let neither night nor day stop you from diligently performing any of
 your promises to me, neither for cost of gold nor of silver let them
 be hindered, nor yet for number of troops, wherever it may be that
 their presence is needed; but with Artabazus, an honorable man whom
 I send you, boldly advance my objects and yours, as may be most for
 the honor and interest of us both.’

Before held in high honor by the
 Hellenes as the hero of Plataea , Pausanias, after the receipt of this
 letter, became prouder than ever, and could no longer live in the
 usual style, but went out of Byzantium in a Median dress, was attended on his
 march through Thrace by a
 bodyguard of Medes and Egyptians, kept a Persian table, and was
 quite unable to contain his intentions, but betrayed by his conduct
 in trifles what his ambition looked one day to enact on a grander
 scale.

He also made himself difficult of access, and displayed so violent a
 temper to every one without exception that no one could come near
 him. 
 Indeed, this was the principal reason why the confederacy went over
 to the Athenians.

The above-mentioned conduct, coming
 to the ears of the Lacedaemonians, occasioned his first recall. 
 And after his second voyage out in the ship of Hermione , without their
 orders, he gave proofs of similar behavior. 
 Besieged and expelled from Byzantium by the Athenians, he did not return to
 Sparta ; but news
 came that he had settled at Colonae in the Troad , and was intriguing with the
 barbarians, and that his stay there was for no good purpose; and the
 Ephors, now no longer hesitating, sent him a herald and a scytale
 with orders to accompany the herald or be declared a public
 enemy.

Anxious above everything to avoid suspicion, and confident that he
 could quash the charge by means of money, he returned a second time
 to Sparta . 
 At first thrown into prison by the Ephors (whose powers enable them
 to do this to the king), he soon compromised the matter and came out
 again, and offered himself for trial to any who wished to institute
 an inquiry concerning him.

Now the Spartans had no tangible
 proof against him—neither his enemies nor the nation—of that
 indubitable kind required for the punishment of a member of the
 royal family, and at that moment in high office; he being regent for
 his first cousin King Pleistarchus, Leonidas' son, who was still a
 minor. 
 But by his contempt of the laws and imitation of the barbarians,

he gave grounds for much suspicion of his being discontented with
 things established; all the occasions on which he had in any way
 departed from the regular customs were passed in review, and it was
 remembered that he had taken upon himself to have inscribed on the
 tripod at Delphi , which
 was dedicated by the Hellenes as the first-fruits of the spoil of
 the Medes, the following couplet:— 
 The Mede 
 defeated, great Pausanias raised 
 This monument, that Phoebus might be praised.

At the time the Lacedaemonians had at
 once erased the couplet, and inscribed the names of the cities that
 had aided in the overthrow of the barbarian and dedicated the
 offering. 
 Yet it was considered that Pausanias had here been guilty of a grave
 offence, which, interpreted by the light of the attitude which he
 had since assumed, gained a new significance, and seemed to be quite
 in keeping with his present schemes.

Besides, they were informed that he was even intriguing with the
 Helots; and such indeed was the fact, for he promised them freedom
 and citizenship if they would join him in insurrection, and would
 help him to carry out his plans to the end.

Even now, mistrusting the evidence even of the Helots themselves, the
 Ephors would not consent to take any decided step against him; in
 accordance with their regular custom towards themselves, namely, to
 be slow in taking any irrevocable resolve in the matter of a Spartan
 citizen, without indisputable proof. 
 At last, it is said, the person who was going to carry to Artabazus
 the last letter for the king, a man of Argilus, once the favorite
 and most trusty servant of Pausanias, turned informer. 
 Alarmed by the reflection that none of the previous messengers had
 ever returned, having counterfeited the seal, in order that, if he
 found himself mistaken in his surmises, or if Pausanias should ask
 to make some correction, he might not be discovered, he undid the
 letter, and found the postscript that he had suspected, viz., an
 order to put him to death.

On being shown the letter the Ephors
 now felt more certain. 
 Still, they wished to hear Pausanias commit himself with their own
 ears. 
 Accordingly the man went by appointment to Taenarus as a suppliant,
 and there built himself a hut divided into two by a partition;
 within which he concealed some of the Ephors and let them hear the
 whole matter plainly. 
 For Pausanias came to him and asked him the reason of his suppliant
 position; and the man reproached him with the order that he had
 written concerning him, and one by one declared all the rest of the
 circumstances, how he who had never yet brought him into any danger,
 while employed as agent between him and the king, was yet just like
 the mass of his servants, to be rewarded with death. 
 Admitting all this, and telling him not to be angry about the matter,
 Pausanias gave him the pledge of raising him up from the temple, and
 begged him to set off as quickly as possible, and not to hinder the
 business in hand.

The Ephors listened carefully, and
 then departed, taking no action for the moment, but, having at last
 attained to certainty, were preparing to arrest him in the city. 
 It is reported that, as he was about to be arrested in the street, he
 saw from the face of one of the Ephors what he was coming for;
 another, too, made him a secret signal, and betrayed it to him from
 kindness. 
 Setting off with a run for the temple of the goddess of the Brazen
 House, the enclosure of which was near at hand, he succeeded in
 taking sanctuary before they took him, and entering into a small
 chamber, which formed part of the temple, to avoid being exposed to
 the weather, lay still there.

The Ephors, for the moment distanced in the pursuit, afterwards took
 off the roof of the chamber, and having made sure that he was
 inside, shut him in, barricaded the doors, and staying before the
 place, reduced him by starvation.

When they found that he was on the point of expiring, just as he was,
 in the chamber, they brought him out of the temple, while the breath
 was still in him, and as soon as he was brought out he died.

They were going to throw him into the Kaiadas, where they cast
 criminals, but finally decided to inter him somewhere near. 
 But the god at Delphi 
 afterwards ordered the Lacedaemonians to remove the tomb to the
 place of his death—where he now lies in the consecrated ground, as
 an inscription on a monument declares—and, as what had been done was
 a curse to them, to give back two bodies instead of one to the
 goddess of the Brazen House. 
 So they had two brazen statues made, and dedicated them as a
 substitute for Pausanias.

Accordingly the Athenians retorted by telling the Lacedaemonians to
 drive out what the god himself had pronounced to be a curse.

To return to the Medism of
 Pausanias. 
 Matter was found in the course of the inquiry to implicate
 Themistocles; and the Lacedaemonians accordingly sent envoys to the
 Athenians, and required them to punish him as they had punished
 Pausanias. 
 The Athenians consented to do so.

But he had, as it happened, been ostracized, and, with a residence at
 Argos , was in the
 habit of visiting other parts of Peloponnese . 
 So they sent with the Lacedaemonians, who were ready to join in the
 pursuit, persons with instructions to take him wherever they found
 him.

But Themistocles got scent of their intentions, and fled from
 Peloponnese to
 Corcyra , which
 was under obligations towards him. 
 But the Corcyraeans alleged that they could not venture to shelter
 him at the cost of offending Athens and Lacedaemon , and they conveyed him over to the
 continent opposite.

Pursued by the officers who hung on the report of his movements, at a
 loss where to turn, he was compelled to stop at the house of
 Admetus, the Molossian king, though they were not on friendly
 terms.

Admetus happened not to be indoors, but his wife, to whom he made
 himself a suppliant, instructed him to take their child in his arms
 and sit down by the hearth.

Soon afterwards Admetus came in, and Themistocles told him who he
 was, and begged him not to revenge on Themistocles in exile any
 opposition which his requests might have experienced from
 Themistocles at Athens . 
 Indeed, he was now far too low for his revenge; retaliation was only
 honorable between equals. 
 Besides, his opposition to the king had only affected the success of
 a request, not the safety of his person; if the king were to give
 him up to the pursuers that he mentioned, and the fate which they
 intended for him, he would just be consigning him to certain death.

The king listened to him and raised
 him up with his son, as he was sitting with him in his arms after
 the most effectual method of supplication, and on the arrival of the
 Lacedaemonians not long afterwards, refused to give him up for
 anything they could say, but sent him off by land to the other sea
 to Pydna in Alexander's
 dominions, as he wished to go to the Persian king.

There he met with a merchantman on the point of starting for
 Ionia . 
 Going on board, he was carried by a storm to the Athenian squadron
 which was blockading Naxos . 
 In his alarm—he was luckily unknown to the people in the vessel—he
 told the master who he was and what he was flying for, and said
 that, if he refused to save him, he would declare that he was taking
 him for a bribe. 
 Meanwhile their safety consisted in letting no one leave the ship
 until a favorable time for sailing should arise. 
 If he complied with his wishes, he promised him a proper
 recompense. 
 The master acted as he desired, and, after lying to for a day a night
 out of the reach of the squadron, at length arrived at Ephesus .

After having rewarded him with a
 present of money, as soon as he received some from his friends at
 Athens and from his
 secret hoards at Argos ,
 Themistocles started inland with one of the Coast-Persians, and sent
 a letter to King Artaxerxes, Xerxes' son, who had just come to the
 throne.

Its contents were as follows: ‘I, Themistocles, am come to you, who
 did your house more harm than any of the Hellenes, when I was
 compelled to defend myself against your father's invasion,—harm,
 however, far surpassed by the good that I did him during his
 retreat, which brought no danger for me but much for him. 
 For the past, you are a good turn in my debt,’—here he mentioned the
 warning sent to Xerxes from Salamis to retreat, as well as his finding the
 bridges unbroken, which, as he falsely pretended, was due to
 him,—‘for the present, able to do you great service, I am here,
 pursued by the Hellenes for my friendship for you. 
 However, I desire a year's grace, when I shall be able to declare in
 person the objects of my coming.’

It is said that the king approved his
 intention, and told him to do as he said. 
 He employed the interval in making what progress he could in the
 study of the Persian tongue, and of the customs of the country.

Arrived at Court at the end of the year, he attained to very high
 consideration there, such as no Hellene has ever possessed before or
 since; partly from his splendid antecedents, partly from the hopes
 which he held out of effecting for him the subjugation of Hellas , but principally by the
 proof which experience daily gave of his capacity.

For Themistocles was a man who exhibited the most indubitable signs
 of genius; indeed, in this particular he has a claim on our
 admiration quite extraordinary and unparalleled. 
 By his own native capacity, alike unformed and unsupplemented by
 study, he was at once the best judge in those sudden crises which
 admit of little or of no deliberation, and the best prophet of the
 future, even to its most distant possibilities. 
 An able theoretical expositor of all that came within the sphere of
 his practice, he was not without the power of passing an adequate
 judgment in matters in which he had no experience. 
 He could also excellently divine the good and evil which lay hid in
 the unseen future. 
 In fine, whether we consider the extent of his natural powers, or the
 slightness of his application, this extraordinary man must be
 allowed to have surpassed all others in the faculty of intuitively
 meeting an emergency.

Disease was the real cause of his death; though there is a story of
 his having ended his life by poison, on finding himself unable to
 fulfil his promises to the king.

However this may be, there is a monument to him in the market-place
 of Asiatic Magnesia . 
 He was governor of the district, the king having given him Magnesia,
 which brought in fifty talents a year, for bread, Lampsacus , which was
 considered to be the richest wine country, for wine, and Myus for other provisions.

His bones, it is said, were conveyed home by his relatives in
 accordance with his wishes, and interred in Attic ground. 
 This was done without the knowledge of the Athenians; as it is
 against the law to bury in Attica an outlaw for treason. 
 So ends the history of Pausanias and Themistocles, the Lacedaemonian
 and the Athenian, the most famous men of their time in Hellas .

To return to the Lacedaemonians. 
 The history of their first embassy, the injunctions which it
 conveyed, and the rejoinder which it provoked, concerning the
 expulsion of the accursed persons, have been related already. 
 It was followed by a second, which ordered Athens to raise the siege of
 Potidaea , and to
 respect the independence of Aegina . 
 Above all, it gave her most distinctly to understand that war might
 be prevented by the revocation of the Megara decree, excluding the
 Megarians from the use of Athenian harbors and of the market of
 Athens .

But Athens was not
 inclined either to revoke the decree, or to entertain their other
 proposals; she accused the Megarians of pushing their cultivation
 into the consecrated ground and the unenclosed land on the border,
 and of harboring her runaway slaves.

At last an embassy arrived with the Lacedaemonian ultimatum. 
 The ambassadors were Rhamphias, Melesippus, and Agesander. 
 Not a word was said on any of the old subjects; there was simply
 this:— ‘ Lacedaemon wishes
 the peace to continue, and there is no reason why it should not, if
 you would leave the Hellenes independent. 
 Upon this the Athenians held an assembly, and laid the matter before
 their consideration. 
 It was resolved to deliberate once for all on all their demands, and
 to give them an answer.

There were many speakers who came forward and gave their support to
 one side or the other, urging the necessity of war, or the
 revocation of the decree and the folly of allowing it to stand in
 the way of peace. 
 Among them came forward Pericles, son of Xanthippus, the first man of
 his time at Athens ,
 ablest alike in counsel and in action, and gave the following
 advice:—

‘There is one principle, Athenians,
 which I hold to through everything, and that is the principle of no
 concession to the Peloponnesians. 
 I know that the spirit which inspires men while they are being
 persuaded to make war, is not always retained in action; that as
 circumstances change, resolutions change. 
 Yet I see that now as before the same, almost literally the same,
 counsel is demanded of me; and I put it to those of you, who are
 allowing yourselves to be persuaded, to support the national
 resolves even in the case of reverses, or to forfeit all credit for
 their wisdom in the event of success. 
 For sometimes the course of things is as arbitrary as the plans of
 man; indeed this is why we usually blame chance for whatever does
 not happen as we expected.

Now it was clear before, that Lacedaemon entertained designs against us; it is
 still more clear now. 
 The treaty provides that we shall mutually submit our differences to
 legal settlement, and that we shall meanwhile each keep what we
 have. 
 Yet the Lacedaemonians never yet made us any such offer, never yet
 would accept from us any such offer; on the contrary, they wish
 complaints to be settled by war instead of by negotiation; and in
 the end we find them here dropping the tone of expostulation and
 adopting that of command.

They order us to raise the siege of Potidaea , to let Aegina be independent, to
 revoke the Megara 
 decree; and they conclude with an ultimatum warning us to leave the
 Hellenes independent.

I hope that you will none of you think that we shall be going to war
 for a trifle if we refuse to revoke the Megara decree, which appears in
 front of their complaints, and the revocation of which is to save us
 from war, or let any feeling of self-reproach linger in your minds,
 as if you went to war for slight cause.

Why, this trifle contains the whole seal and trial of your
 resolution. 
 If you give way, you will instantly have to meet some greater demand,
 as having been frightened into obedience in the first instance;
 while a firm refusal will make them clearly understand that they
 must treat you more as equals.

Make your decision therefore at once, either to submit before you are
 harmed, or if we are to go to war, as I for one think we ought, to
 do so without caring whether the ostensible cause be great or small,
 resolved against making concessions or consenting to a precarious
 tenure of our possessions. 
 For all claims from an equal, urged upon a neighbor as commands,
 before any attempt at legal settlement, be they great or be they
 small, have only one meaning, and that is slavery.

As to the war and the resources of
 either party, a detailed comparison will not show you the
 inferiority of Athens .

Personally engaged in the cultivation of their land, without funds
 either private or public, the Peloponnesians are also without
 experience in long wars across sea, from the strict limit which
 poverty imposes on their attacks upon each other.

Powers of this description are quite incapable of often manning a
 fleet or often sending out an army: they cannot afford the absence
 from their homes, the expenditure from their own funds; and besides,
 they have not command of the sea.

Capital, it must be remembered, maintains a war more than forced
 contributions. 
 Farmers are a class of men that are always more ready to serve in
 person than in purse. 
 Confident that the former will survive the dangers, they are by no
 means so sure that the latter will not be prematurely exhausted,
 especially if the war last longer than they expect, which it very
 likely will.

In a single battle the Peloponnesians and their allies may be able to
 defy all Hellas , but they
 are incapacitated from carrying on a war against a power different
 in character from their own, by the want of the single
 council-chamber requisite to prompt and vigorous action, and the
 substitution of a diet composed of various races, in which every
 state possesses an equal vote, and each presses its own ends, a
 condition of things which generally results in no action at all.

The great wish of some is to avenge themselves on some particular
 enemy, the great wish of others to save their own pocket. 
 Slow in assembling, they devote a very small fraction of the time to
 the consideration of any public object, most of it to the
 prosecution of their own objects. 
 Meanwhile each fancies that no harm will come of his neglect, that it
 is the business of somebody else to look after this or that for him;
 and so, by the same notion being entertained by all separately, the
 common cause imperceptibly decays.

But the principal point is the
 hindrance that they will experience from want of money. 
 The slowness with which it comes in will cause delay; but the
 opportunities of war wait for no man.

Again, we need not be alarmed either at the possibility of their
 raising fortifications in Attica , or at their navy.

It would be difficult for any system of fortifications to establish a
 rival city, even in time of peace, much more, surely, in an enemy's
 country, with Athens 
 just as much fortified against it, as it against Athens ;

while a mere post might be able to do some harm to the country by
 incursions and by the facilities which it would afford for
 desertion, but can never prevent our sailing into their country and
 raising fortifications there, and making reprisals with our powerful
 fleet.

For our naval skill is of more use to us for service on land, than
 their military skill for service at sea.

Familiarity with the sea they will not find an easy acquisition.

If you who have been practising at it ever since the Median invasion
 have not yet brought it to perfection, is there any chance of
 anything considerable being effected by an agricultural, unseafaring
 population, who will besides be prevented from practising by the
 constant presence of strong squadrons of observation from Athens ?

With a small squadron they might hazard an engagement, encouraging
 their ignorance by numbers; but the restraint of a strong force will
 prevent their moving, and through want of practice they will grow
 more clumsy, and consequently more timid.

It must be kept in mind that seamanship, just like anything else, is
 a matter of art, and will not admit of being taken up occasionally
 as an occupation for times of leisure; on the contrary, it is so
 exacting as to leave leisure for nothing else.

Even if they were to touch the moneys
 at Olympia or
 Delphi , and try to
 seduce our foreign sailors by the temptation of higher pay, that
 would only be a serious danger if we could not still be a match for
 them, by embarking our own citizens and the aliens resident among
 us. 
 But in fact by this means we are always a match for them; and, best
 of all, we have a larger and higher class of native coxswains and
 sailors among our own citizens than all the rest of Hellas .

And to say nothing of the danger of such a step, none of our foreign
 sailors would consent to become an outlaw from his country, and to
 take service with them and their hopes, for the sake of a few days'
 high pay.

This, I think, is a tolerably fair
 account of the position of the Peloponnesians; that of Athens is free from the defects
 that I have criticized in them, and has other advantages of its own,
 which they can show nothing to equal.

If they march against our country we will sail against theirs, and it
 will then be found that the desolation of the whole of Attica is not the same as that of
 even a fraction of Peloponnese ; for they will not be able to supply
 the deficiency except by a battle, while we have plenty of land both
 on the islands and the continent.

The rule of the sea is indeed a great matter. 
 Consider for a moment. 
 Suppose that we were islanders: can you conceive a more impregnable
 position? 
 Well, this in future should, as far as possible, be our conception of
 our position. 
 Dismissing all thought of our land and houses, we must vigilantly
 guard the sea and the city. 
 No irritation that we may feel for the former must provoke us to a
 battle with the numerical superiority of the Peloponnesians. 
 A victory would only be succeeded by another battle against the same
 superiority: a reverse involves the loss of our allies, the source
 of our strength, who will not remain quiet a day after we become
 unable to march against them. 
 We must cry not over the loss of houses and land but of men's lives;
 since houses and land do not gain men, but men them. 
 And if I had thought that I could persuade you, I would have bid you
 go out and lay them waste with your own hands, and show the
 Peloponnesians that this at any rate will not make you submit.

I have many other reasons to hope for
 a favorable issue, if you can consent not to combine schemes of
 fresh conquest with the conduct of the war, and will abstain from
 willfully involving yourselves in other dangers; indeed, I am more
 afraid of our own blunders than of the enemy's devices.

But these matters shall be explained in another speech, as events
 require; for the present dismiss these men with the answer that we
 allow Megara the use of
 our market and harbours, when the Lacedaemonians suspend their alien
 acts in favour of us and our allies, there being nothing in the
 treaty to prevent either one or the other: that we will leave the
 cities independent, if independent we found them when we made the
 treaty, and when the Lacedaemonians grant to their cities an
 independence not involving subservience to Lacedaemonian interest,
 but such as each severally may desire: that we are willing to give
 the legal satisfaction which our agreements specify, and that we
 shall not commence hostilities, but shall resist those who do
 commence them. 
 This is an answer agreeable at once to the rights and the dignity of
 Athens .

It must be thoroughly understood that war is a necessity; but that
 the more readily we accept it, the less will be the ardour of our
 opponents, and that out of the greatest dangers communities and
 individuals acquire the greatest glory.

Did not our fathers resist the Medes not only with resources far
 different from ours, but even when those resources had been
 abandoned; and more by wisdom than by fortune, more by daring than
 by strength, did not they beat off the barbarian and advance their
 affairs to their present height? 
 We must not fall behind them, but must resist our enemies in any way
 and in every way, and attempt to hand down our power to our
 posterity unimpaired.’

Such were the words of Pericles. 
 The Athenians, persuaded of the wisdom of his advice, voted as he
 desired, and answered the Lacedaemonians as he recommended, both on
 the separate points and in the general; they would do nothing on
 dictation, but were ready to have the complaints settled in a fair
 and impartial manner by the legal method, which the terms of the
 truce prescribed. 
 So the envoys departed home, and did not return again.

These were the changes and
 differences existing between the rival powers before the war,
 arising immediately from the affair at Epidamnus and Corcyra . 
 Still intercourse continued in spite of them, and mutual
 communication. 
 It was carried on without heralds, but not without suspicion, as
 events were occurring which were equivalent to a breach of the
 treaty and matter for war.

The war between the Athenians and
 Peloponnesians and the allies on either side now really begins. 
 For now all intercourse except through the medium of heralds ceased,
 and hostilities were commenced and prosecuted without
 intermission. 
 The history follows the chronological order of events by summers and
 winters.

The thirty years' truce which was
 entered into after the conquest of Euboea lasted fourteen years. 
 In the fifteenth, in the forty-eighth year of the priestess-ship of
 Chrysis at Argos , in the
 Ephorate of Aenesias at Sparta , in the last month but two of the Archonship
 of Pythodorus at Athens ,
 and six months after the battle of Potidaea , just at the beginning of spring, a Theban
 force a little over three hundred strong, under the command of their
 Boeotarchs, Pythangelus, son of Phyleides, and Diemporus, son of
 Onetorides, about the first watch of the night, made an armed entry
 into Plataea , a town of
 Boeotia in alliance
 with Athens .

The gates were opened to them by a Plataean called Naucleides, who,
 with his party, had invited them in, meaning to put to death the
 citizens of the opposite party, bring over the city to Thebes , and thus obtain power
 for themselves.

This was arranged through Eurymachus, son of Leontiades, a person of
 great influence at Thebes . 
 For Plataea had always
 been at variance with Thebes ; and the latter, foreseeing that war was at
 hand, wished to surprise her old enemy in time of peace, before
 hostilities had actually broken out. 
 Indeed this was how they got in so easily without being observed, as
 no guard had been posted.

After the soldiers had grounded arms in the marketplace, those who
 had invited them in wished them to set to work at once and go to
 their enemies' houses. 
 This, however, the Thebans refused to do, but determined to make a
 conciliatory proclamation, and if possible to come to a friendly
 understanding with the citizens. 
 Their herald accordingly invited any who wished to resume their old
 place in the confederacy of their countrymen to ground arms with
 them, for they thought that in this way the city would readily join
 them.

On becoming aware of the presence of
 the Thebans within their gates, and of the sudden occupation of the
 town, the Plataeans concluded in their alarm that more had entered
 than was really the case, the night preventing their seeing
 them. 
 They accordingly came to terms, and accepting the proposal, made no
 movement; especially as the Thebans offered none of them any
 violence.

But somehow or other, during the negotiations, they discovered the
 scanty numbers of the Thebans, and decided that they could easily
 attack and overpower them; the mass of the Plataeans being averse to
 revolting from Athens .

At all events they resolved to attempt it. 
 Digging through the party walls of the houses, they thus managed to
 join each other without being seen going through the streets, in
 which they placed wagons without the beasts in them, to serve as a
 barricade, and arranged everything else as seemed convenient for the
 occasion.

When everything had been done that circumstances permitted, they
 watched their opportunity and went out of their houses against the
 enemy. 
 It was still night, though daybreak was at hand: in daylight it was
 thought that their attack would be met by men full of courage and on
 equal terms with their assailants, while in darkness it would fall
 upon panic-stricken troops, who would also be at a disadvantage from
 their enemy's knowledge of the locality. 
 So they made their assault at once, and came to close quarters as
 quickly as they could.

The Thebans, finding themselves
 outwitted, immediately closed up to repel all attacks made upon
 them.

Twice or thrice they beat back their assailants. 
 But the men shouted and charged them, the women and slaves screamed
 and yelled from the houses and pelted them with stones and tiles;
 besides, it had been raining hard all night; and so at last their
 courage gave way, and they turned and fled through the town. 
 Most of the fugitives were quite ignorant of the right ways out, and
 this, with the mud, and the darkness caused by the moon being in her
 last quarter, and the fact that their pursuers knew their way about
 and could easily stop their escape, proved fatal to many.

The only gate open was the one by which they had entered, and this
 was shut by one of the Plataeans driving the spike of a javelin into
 the bar instead of the bolt; so that even here there was no longer
 any means of exit.

They were now chased all over the town. 
 Some got on the wall and threw themselves over, in most cases with a
 fatal result. 
 One party managed to find a deserted gate, and obtaining an axe from
 a woman, cut through the bar; but as they were soon observed only a
 few succeeded in getting out. 
 Others were cut off in detail in different parts of the city.

The most numerous and compact body rushed into a large building next
 to the city wall: the doors on the side of the street happened to be
 open, and the Thebans fancied that they were the gates of the town,
 and that there was a passage right through to the outside.

The Plataeans, seeing their enemies in a trap, now consulted whether
 they should set fire to the building and burn them just as they
 were, or whether there was anything else that they could do with
 them;

until at length these and the rest of the Theban survivors found
 wandering about the town agreed to an unconditional surrender of
 themselves and their arms to the Plataeans.

While such was the fate of the party
 in Plataea ,

the rest of the Thebans who were to have joined them with all their
 forces before daybreak, in case of anything miscarrying with the
 body that had entered, received the news of the affair on the road,
 and pressed forward to their succor.

Now Plataea is nearly
 eight miles from Thebes ,
 and their march was delayed by the rain that had fallen in the
 night, for the river Asopus had risen and was not easy of
 passage;

and so, having to march in the rain, and being hindered in crossing
 the river, they arrived too late, and found the whole party either
 slain or captive.

When they learned what had happened, there at once formed a design
 against the Plataeans outside the city. 
 As the attack had been made in time of peace, and was perfectly
 unexpected, there were of course men and stock in the fields; and
 the Thebans wished if possible to have some prisoners to exchange
 against their countrymen in the town, should any chance to have been
 taken alive.

Such was their plan. 
 But the Plataeans suspected their intention almost before it was
 formed, and becoming alarmed for their fellow-citizens outside the
 town, sent a herald to the Thebans, reproaching them for their
 unscrupulous attempt to seize their city in time of peace, and
 warning them against any outrage on those outside. 
 Should the warning be disregarded, they threatened to put to death
 the men they had in their hands, but added that, on the Thebans
 retiring from their territory, they would surrender the prisoners to
 their friends.

This is the Theban account of the matter, and they say that they had
 an oath given them. 
 The Plataeans, on the other hand, do not admit any promise of an
 immediate surrender, but make it contingent upon subsequent
 negotiation: the oath they deny altogether.

Be this as it may, upon the Thebans retiring from their territory
 without committing any injury, the Plataeans hastily got in whatever
 they had in the country and immediately put the men to death. 
 The prisoners were a hundred and eighty in number; Eurymachus, the
 person with whom the traitors had negotiated, being one.

This done, the Plataeans sent a
 messenger to Athens ,
 gave back the dead to the Thebans under a truce, and arranged things
 in the city as seemed best to meet the present emergency.

The Athenians meanwhile, having had word of the affair sent them
 immediately after its occurrence, had instantly seized all the
 Boeotians in Attica , and
 sent a herald to the Plataeans to forbid their proceeding to
 extremities with their Theban prisoners without instructions from
 Athens . 
 The news of the men's death had of course not arrived;

the first messenger having left Plataea just when the Thebans entered it, the
 second just after their defeat and capture; so there was no later
 news. 
 Thus the Athenians sent their orders in ignorance of the facts; and
 the herald on his arrival found the men slain.

After this the Athenians marched to Plataea and brought in provisions, and left a
 garrison in the place, also taking away the women and children and
 such of the men as were least efficient.

After the affair at Plataea the treaty had been
 broken by an overt act, and Athens at once prepared for war, as did also
 Lacedaemon and her
 allies. 
 They resolved to send embassies to the king and to such other of the
 barbarian powers as either party could look to for assistance, and
 tried to ally themselves with the independent states at home.

Lacedaemon , in addition to
 the existing marine, gave orders to the states that had declared for
 her in Italy and Sicily to build vessels up to a
 grand total of five hundred, the quota of each city being determined
 by its size, and also to provide a specified sum of money. 
 Till these were ready they were to remain neutral and to admit single
 Athenian ships into their harbors.

Athens on her part
 reviewed her existing confederacy, and sent embassies to the places
 more immediately round Peloponnese , Corcyra , Cephallenia, Acarnania , and Zacynthus ; perceiving that if these could be relied
 on she could carry the war all round Peloponnese .

And if both sides nourished the
 boldest hopes and put forth their utmost strength for the war, this
 was only natural. 
 Zeal is always at its height at the commencement of an undertaking;
 and on this particular occasion Peloponnese and Athens were both full of young men whose
 inexperience made them eager to take up arms, while the rest of
 Hellas stood straining
 with excitement at the conflict of its leading cities.

Everywhere predictions were being recited and oracles being chanted
 by such persons as collect them, and this not only in the contending
 cities.

Further, some while before this, there was an earthquake at
 Delos , for the first
 time in the memory of the Hellenes. 
 This was said and thought to be ominous of the events impending;
 indeed, nothing of the kind that happened was allowed to pass
 without remark.

The good wishes of men made greatly for the Lacedaemonians,
 especially as they proclaimed themselves the liberators of
 Hellas . 
 No private or public effort that could help them in speech or action
 was omitted; each thinking that the cause suffered wherever he could
 not himself see to it.

So general was the indignation felt against Athens , whether by those who
 wished to escape from her empire, or were apprehensive of being
 absorbed by it.

Such were the preparations and such the feelings with which the
 contest opened. The allies of the two
 belligerents were the following.

These were the allies of Lacedaemon : all the Peloponnesians within the
 Isthmus except the Argives and Achaeans, who were neutral;
 Pellene being the
 only Achaean city that first joined in the war, though her example
 was afterwards followed by the rest. 
 Outside Peloponnese the
 Megarians, Locrians, Boeotians, Phocians, Ambraciots, Leucadians,
 and Anactorians.

Of these, ships were furnished by the Corinthians, Megarians,
 Sycyonians, Pellenians, Eleans, Ambraciots, and Leucadians; and
 cavalry by the Boeotians, Phocians, and Locrians. 
 The other states sent infantry. 
 This was the Lacedaemonian confederacy.

That of Athens comprised
 the Chians, Lesbians, Plateans, the Messenians in Naupactus , most of the
 Acarnanians, the Corcyraeans, Zacynthians, and some tributary cities
 in the following countries, viz., Caria upon the sea with her Dorian neighbors,
 Ionia , the Hellespont , the Thracian towns,
 the islands lying between Peloponnese and Crete towards the east, and all the Cyclades except Melos and Thera .

Of these, ships were furnished by Chios , Lesbos , and Corcyra , infantry and money by the rest.

Such were the allies of either party and their resources for the war.

Immediately after the affair at
 Plataea , Lacedaemon sent round orders to
 the cities in Peloponnese 
 and the rest of her confederacy to prepare troops and the provisions
 requisite for a foreign campaign, in order to invade Attica .

The several states were ready at the time appointed and assembled at
 the Isthmus; the contingent of each city being two-thirds of its
 whole force.

After the whole army had mustered, the Lacedaemonian king,
 Archidamus, the leader of the expedition, called together the
 generals of all the states and the principal persons and officers,
 and exhorted them as follows:—

‘Peloponnesians and allies, our
 fathers made many campaigns both within and without Peloponnese , and the elder men
 among us here are not without experience in war. 
 Yet we have never set out with a larger force than the present; and
 if our numbers and efficiency are remarkable, so also is the power
 of the state against which we march.

We ought not then to show ourselves inferior to our ancestors, or
 unequal to our own reputation. 
 For the hopes and attention of all Hellas are bent upon the present effort, and its
 sympathy is with the enemy of the hated Athens .

Therefore, numerous as the invading army may appear to be, and
 certain as some may think it that our adversary will not meet us in
 the field, this is no sort of justification for the least negligence
 upon the march; but the officers and men of each particular city
 should always be prepared for the advent of danger in their own
 quarters.

The course of war cannot be foreseen, and its attacks are generally
 dictated by the impulse of the moment; and where overweening
 self-confidence has despised preparation, a wise apprehension has
 often been able to make head against superior numbers.

Not that confidence is out of place in an army of invasion, but in an
 enemy's country it should also be accompanied by the precautions of
 apprehension: troops will by this combination be best inspired for
 dealing a blow, and best secured against receiving one.

In the present instance, the city against which we are going, far
 from being so impotent for defence, is on the contrary most
 excellently equipped at all points; so that we have every reason to
 expect that they will take the field against us, and that if they
 have not set out already before we are there, they will certainly do
 so when they see us in their territory wasting and destroying their
 property.

For men are always exasperated at suffering injuries to which they
 are not accustomed, and on seeing them inflicted before their very
 eyes; and where least inclined for reflection, rush with the
 greatest heat to action.

The Athenians are the very people of all others to do this, as they
 aspire to rule the rest of the world, and are more in the habit of
 invading and ravaging their neighbors' territory, than of seeing
 their own treated in the like fashion.

Considering, therefore, the power of the state against which we are
 marching, and the greatness of the reputation which, according to
 the event, we shall win or lose for our ancestors and ourselves,
 remember as you follow where you may be led to regard discipline and
 vigilance as of the first importance, and to obey with alacrity the
 orders transmitted to you; as nothing contributes so much to the
 credit and safety of an army as the union of large bodies by a
 single discipline.’

With this brief speech dismissing the
 assembly, Archidamus first sent off Melesippus, son of Diacritus, a
 Spartan, to Athens , in
 case she should be more inclined to submit on seeing the
 Peloponnesians actually on the march.

But the Athenians did not admit him into the city or to their
 assembly; Pericles having already carried a motion against admitting
 either herald or embassy from the Lacedaemonians after they had once
 marched out. 
 The herald was accordingly sent away without an audience, and ordered
 to be beyond the frontier that same day; in future, if those who
 sent him had a proposition to make they must retire to their own
 territory before they dispatched embassies to Athens . 
 An escort was sent with Melesippus to prevent his holding
 communication with any one.

When he reached the frontier and was just going to be dismissed, he
 departed with these words: ‘This day will be the beginning of great
 misfortunes to the Hellenes.’

As soon as he arrived at the camp, and Archidamus learnt that the
 Athenians had still no thoughts of submitting, he at length began
 his march, and advanced with his army into their territory.

Meanwhile the Boeotians, sending their contingent and cavalry to join
 the Peloponnesian expedition, went to Plataea with the remainder and
 laid waste the country.

While the Peloponnesians were still
 mustering at the Isthmus, or on the march before they invaded
 Attica , Pericles, son
 of Xanthippus, one of the ten generals of the Athenians, finding
 that the invasion was to take place, conceived the idea that
 Archidamus, who happened to be his friend, might possibly pass by
 his estate without ravaging it. 
 This he might do, either from a personal wish to oblige him, or
 acting under instructions from Lacedaemon for the purpose of creating a prejudice
 against him, as had been before attempted in the demand for the
 expulsion of the accursed family. 
 He accordingly took the precaution of announcing to the Athenians in
 the assembly that, although Archidamus was his friend, yet this
 friendship should not extend to the detriment of the state, and that
 in case the enemy should make his houses and lands an exception to
 the rest and not pillage them, he at once gave them up to be public
 property, so that they should not bring him into suspicion.

He also gave the citizens some advice on their present affairs in the
 same strain as before. 
 They were to prepare for the war, and to carry in their property from
 the country. 
 They were not to go out to battle, but to come into the city and
 guard it, and get ready their fleet, in which their real strength
 lay. 
 They were also to keep a tight rein on their allies—the strength of
 Athens being derived
 from the money brought in by their payments, and success in war
 depending principally upon conduct and capital.

Here they had no reason to despond. 
 Apart from other sources of income, an average revenue of six hundred
 talents of silver was drawn from the tribute of the allies; and
 there were still six thousand talents of coined silver in the
 Acropolis, out of nine thousand seven hundred that had once been
 there, from which the money had been taken for the porch of the
 Acropolis, the other public buildings, and for Potidaea .

This did not include the uncoined gold and silver in public and
 private offerings, the sacred vessels for the processions and games,
 the Median spoils, and similar resources to the amount of five
 hundred talents.

To this he added the treasures of the other temples. 
 These were by no means inconsiderable, and might fairly be used. 
 Nay, if they were ever absolutely driven to it, they might take even
 the gold ornaments of Athena herself; for the statue contained forty
 talents of pure gold and it was all removable. 
 This might be used for self-preservation, and must every penny of it
 be restored.

Such was their financial position—surely a satisfactory one. 
 Then they had an army of thirteen thousand heavy infantry, besides
 sixteen thousand more in the garrisons and on home duty at
 Athens .

This was at first the number of men on guard in the event of an
 invasion: it was composed of the oldest and youngest levies and the
 resident aliens who had heavy armor. 
 The Phaleric wall ran for four miles, before it joined that round the
 city; and of this last nearly five had a guard, although part of it
 was left without one, viz. that between the Long Wall and the
 Phaleric. 
 Then there were the Long Walls to Piraeus , a distance of some four miles and a half,
 the outer of which was manned. 
 Lastly, the circumference of Piraeus with Munychia was nearly seven miles and a
 half; only half of this, however, was guarded.

Pericles also showed them that they had twelve hundred horse
 including mounted archers, with sixteen hundred archers unmounted,
 and three hundred galleys fit for service.

Such were the resources of Athens in the different departments when the
 Peloponnesian invasion was impending and hostilities were being
 commenced. 
 Pericles also urged his usual arguments for expecting a favorable
 issue to the war.

The Athenians listened to his advice,
 and began to carry in their wives and children from the country, and
 all their household furniture, even to the woodwork of their houses
 which they took down. 
 Their sheep and cattle they sent over to Euboea and the adjacent islands.

But they found it hard to move, as most of them had been always used
 to live in the country.

From very early times this had been
 more the case with the Athenians than with others. 
 Under Cecrops and the first kings, down to the reign of Theseus,
 Attica had always
 consisted of a number of independent townships, each with its own
 town-hall and magistrates. 
 Except in times of danger the king at Athens was not consulted; in ordinary seasons they
 carried on their government and settled their affairs without his
 interference; sometimes even they waged war against him, as in the
 case of the Eleusinians with Eumolpus against Erechtheus.

In Theseus, however, they had a king of equal intelligence and power;
 and one of the chief features in his organization of the country was
 to abolish the council chambers and magistrates of the petty cities,
 and to merge them in the single council-chamber and town-hall of the
 present capital. 
 Individuals might still enjoy their private property just as before,
 but they were henceforth compelled to have only one political
 center, viz. 
 
 Athens ; which thus
 counted all the inhabitants of Attica among her citizens, so that when Theseus
 died he left a great state behind him. 
 Indeed, from him dates the Synoecia, or Feast of Union; which is paid
 for by the state, and which the Athenians still keep in honor of the
 goddess.

Before this the city consisted of the present citadel and the
 district beneath it looking rather towards the south.

This is shown by the fact that the temples the other deities, besides
 that of Athena, are in the citadel; and even those that are outside
 it are mostly situated in this quarter of the city, as that of the
 Olympian Zeus, of the Pythian Apollo, of Earth, and of Dionysus in
 the Marshes, the same in whose honor the older Dionysia are to this
 day celebrated in the month of Anthesterion not only by the
 Athenians but also by their Ionian descendants.

There are also other ancient temples in this quarter. 
 The fountain too, which, since the alteration made by the tyrants,
 has been called Enneacrounos, or Nine Pipes, but which, when the
 spring was open, went by the name of Callirhoe, or Fairwater, was in
 those days, from being so near, used for the most important
 offices. 
 Indeed, the old fashion of using the water before marriage and for
 other sacred purposes is still kept up.

Again, from their old residence in that quarter, the citadel is still
 known among Athenians as the “city”.

The Athenians thus long lived
 scattered over Attica in
 independent townships. 
 Even after the centralization of Theseus, old habit still prevailed;
 and from the early times down to the present war most Athenians
 still lived in the country with their families and households, and
 were consequently not at all inclined to move now, especially as
 they had only just restored their establishments after the Median
 invasion.

Deep was their trouble and discontent at abandoning their houses and
 the hereditary temples of the ancient constitution, and at having to
 change their habits of life and to bid farewell to what each
 regarded as his native city.

When they arrived at Athens , though a few had houses
 of their own to go to, or could find an asylum with friends or
 relatives, by far the greater number had to take up their dwelling
 in the parts of the city that were not built over and in the temples
 and chapels of the heroes, except the Acropolis and the temple of
 the Eleusinian Demeter and such other places as were always kept
 closed. 
 The occupation of the plot of ground lying below the citadel called
 the Pelasgian had been forbidden by a curse; and there was also an
 ominous fragment of a Pythian oracle which said— 
 
 
 Leave the Pelasgian parcel desolate, woe worth the
 day that men inhabit it!

Yet this too was now built over in
 the necessity of the moment. 
 And in my opinion, if the oracle proved true, it was in the opposite
 sense to what was expected. 
 For the misfortunes of the state did not arise from the unlawful
 occupation, but the necessity of the occupation from the war; and
 though the god did not mention this, he foresaw that it would be an
 evil day for Athens in
 which the plot came to be inhabited.

Many also took up their quarters in the towers of the walls or
 wherever else they could. 
 For when they were all come in, the city proved too small to hold
 them; though afterwards they divided the long walls and a great part
 of Piraeus into lots
 and settled there.

All this while great attention was being given to the war; the allies
 were being mustered, and an armament of a hundred ships equipped for
 Peloponnese .

Such was the state of preparation at Athens .

Meanwhile the army of the
 Peloponnesians was advancing. 
 The first town they came to in Attica was Oenoe, where they were to enter the
 country. 
 Sitting down before it, they prepared to assault the wall with
 engines and otherwise.

Oenoe, standing upon the Athenian and Boeotian border, was of course
 a walled town, and was used as a fortress by the Athenians in time
 of war. 
 So the Peloponnesians prepared for their assault, and wasted some
 valuable time before the place.

This delay brought the gravest censure upon Archidamus. 
 Even during the levying of the war he had gained credit for weakness
 and Athenian sympathies by the half measures he had advocated; and
 after the army had assembled he had further injured himself in
 public estimation by his loitering at the Isthmus and the slowness
 with which the rest of the march had been conducted. 
 But all this was as nothing to the delay at Oenoe.

During this interval the Athenians were carrying in their property;
 and it was the belief of the Peloponnesians that a quick advance
 would have found everything still out, had it not been for his
 procrastination.

Such was the feeling of the army towards Archidamus during the
 siege. 
 But he, it is said, expected that the Athenians would shrink from
 letting their land be wasted, and would make their submission while
 it was still uninjured; and this was why he waited.

But after he had assaulted Oenoe, and
 every possible attempt to take it had failed, as no herald came from
 Athens , he at last
 broke up his camp and invaded Attica . 
 This was about eighty days after the Theban attempt upon Plataea , just in the middle of
 summer, when the corn was ripe, and Archidamus, son of Zeuxis, King
 of Lacedaemon , was in
 command.

Encamping in Eleusis and
 the Thriasian plain, they began their ravages, and putting to flight
 some Athenian horse at a place called Rheiti, or the Brooks, they
 then advanced, keeping Mount Aegaleus on their right, through
 Cropia, until they reached Acharnae, the largest of the Athenian
 demes or townships. 
 Sitting down before it, they formed a camp there, and continued their
 ravages for a long while.

The reason why Archidamus remained in
 order of battle at Acharnae during this incursion, instead of
 descending into the plain, is said to have been this.

He hoped that the Athenians might possibly be tempted by the
 multitude of their youth and the unprecedented efficiency of their
 service to come out to battle and attempt to stop the devastation of
 their lands.

Accordingly, as they had not met him at Eleusis or the Thriasian
 plain, he tried if they could be provoked to a sally by the
 spectacle of a camp at Acharnae.

He thought the place itself a good position for encamping; and it
 seemed likely that such an important part of the state as the three
 thousand heavy infantry of the Acharnians would refuse to submit to
 the ruin of their property, and would force a battle on the rest of
 the citizens. 
 On the other hand, should the Athenians not take the field during
 this incursion, he could then fearlessly ravage the plain in future
 invasions, and extend his advance up to the very walls of Athens . 
 After the Acharnians had lost their own property they would be less
 willing to risk themselves for that of their neighbors; and so there
 would be division in the Athenian counsels.

These were the motives of Archidamus for remaining at Acharnae.

In the meanwhile, as long as the army
 was at Eleusis and the
 Thriasian plain, hopes were still entertained of its not advancing
 any nearer. 
 It was remembered that Pleistoanax, son of Pausanias, king of
 Lacedaemon , had invaded
 Attica with a
 Peloponnesian army fourteen years before, but had retreated without
 advancing farther than Eleusis and Thria , which indeed proved the cause of his exile
 from Sparta , as it was
 thought he had been bribed to retreat.

But when they saw the army at Acharnae, barely seven miles from
 Athens , they lost
 all patience. 
 The territory of Athens 
 was being ravaged before the very eyes of the Athenians, a sight
 which the young men had never seen before and the old only in the
 Median wars; and it was naturally thought a grievous insult, and the
 determination was universal, especially among the young men, to
 sally forth and stop it.

Knots were formed in the streets and engaged in hot discussion; for
 if the proposed sally was warmly recommended, it was also in some
 cases opposed. 
 Oracles of the most various import were recited by the collectors,
 and found eager listeners in one or other of the disputants. 
 Foremost in pressing for the sally were the Acharnians, as
 constituting no small part of the army of the state, and as it was
 their land that was being ravaged. 
 In short, the whole city was in a most excited state; Pericles was
 the object of general indignation; his previous counsels were
 totally forgotten; he was abused for not leading out the army which
 he commanded, and was made responsible for the whole of the public
 suffering.

He, meanwhile, seeing anger and
 infatuation just now in the ascendant, and confident of his wisdom
 in refusing a sally, would not call either assembly or meeting of
 the people, fearing the fatal results of a debate inspired by
 passion and not by prudence. 
 Accordingly, he addressed himself to the defence of the city, and
 kept it as quiet as possible,

though he constantly sent out cavalry to prevent raids on the lands
 near the city from flying parties of the enemy. 
 There was a trifling affair at Phrygia between a squadron of the Athenian horse
 with the Thessalians and the Boeotian cavalry; in which the former
 had rather the best of it, until the heavy infantry advanced to the
 support of the Boeotians, when the Thessalians and Athenians were
 routed and lost a few men, whose bodies, however, were recovered the
 same day without a truce. 
 The next day the Peloponnesians set up a trophy.

Ancient alliance brought the Thessalians to the aid of Athens ; those who came being
 the Larisaeans, Pharsalians, Cranonians, Pyrasians, Gyrtonians, and
 Pheraeans. 
 The Larisaean commanders were Polymedes and Aristonus, two party
 leaders in Larisa ; the
 Pharsalian general was Menon; each of the other cities had also its
 own commander.

In the meantime the Peloponnesians,
 as the Athenians did not come out to engage them, broke up from
 Acharnae and ravaged some of the demes between Mount Parnes and
 Brilessus.

While they were in Attica ,
 the Athenians sent off the hundred ships which they had been
 preparing round Peloponnese , with a thousand heavy infantry and four
 hundred archers on board, under the command of Carcinus, son of
 Xenotimus, Proteas, son of Epicles, and Socrates, son of
 Antigenes.

This armament weighed anchor and started on its cruise, and the
 Peloponnesians, after remaining in Attica as long as their provisions lasted, retired
 through Boeotia by a
 different road to that by which they had entered. 
 As they passed Oropus they ravaged the territory of Graea which is
 held by the Oropians from Athens , and reaching Peloponnese broke up to their respective cities.

After they had retired the Athenians
 set guards by land and sea at the points at which they intended to
 have regular stations during the war. 
 They also resolved to set apart a special fund of a thousand talents
 from the monies in the Acropolis. 
 This was not to be spent, but the current expenses of the war were to
 be otherwise provided for. 
 If any one should move or put to the vote a proposition for using the
 money for any purpose whatever except that of defending the city in
 the event of the enemy bringing a fleet to make an attack by sea, it
 should be a capital offence.

With this sum of money they also set aside a special fleet of one
 hundred galleys, the best ships of each year, with their
 captains. 
 None of these was to be used except with the money and against the
 same peril, should such peril arise.

Meanwhile the Athenians in the
 hundred ships round Peloponnese , reinforced by a Corcyraean squadron of
 fifty vessels and some others of the allies in those parts, cruised
 about the coasts and ravaged the country. 
 Among other places they landed in Laconia and made an assault upon Methone ; there being no
 garrison in the place, and the wall being weak.

But it so happened that Brasidas, son of Tellis, a Spartan, was in
 command of a guard for the defence of the district. 
 Hearing of the attack, he hurried with a hundred heavy infantry to
 the assistance of the besieged, and dashing through the army of the
 Athenians, which was scattered over the country and had its
 attention turned to the wall, threw himself into Methone . 
 He lost a few men in making good his entrance, but saved the place
 and won the thanks of Sparta by his exploit, being thus the first officer
 who obtained this notice during the war.

The Athenians at once weighed anchor and continued their cruise. 
 Touching at Pheia in
 Elis , they ravaged the
 country for two days and defeated a picked force of three hundred
 men that had come from the vale of Elis and the immediate neighborhood to the
 rescue.

But a stiff squall came down upon them, and not liking to face it in
 a place where there was no harbor, most of them got on board their
 ships, and doubling Point Ichthys sailed into the port of Pheia . 
 In the meantime the Messenians, and some others who could not get on
 board, marched over by land and took Pheia .

The fleet afterwards sailed round and picked them up and then put to
 sea; Pheia being
 evacuated, as the main army of the Eleans had now come up. 
 The Athenians continued their cruise, and ravaged other places on the
 coast.

About the same time the Athenians
 sent thirty ships to cruise round Locris and also to guard Euboea ; Cleopompus, son of
 Clinias, being in command.

Making descents from the fleet he ravaged certain places on the
 sea-coast, and captured Thronium and took hostages from it. 
 He also defeated at Alope the Locrians that had assembled to resist
 him.

During the summer the Athenians also
 expelled the Aeginetans with their wives and children from
 Aegina , on the
 ground of their having been the chief agents in bringing the war
 upon them. 
 Besides, Aegina lies
 so near Peloponnese , that
 it seemed safer to send colonists of their own to hold it, and
 shortly afterwards the settlers were sent out.

The banished Aeginetans found an asylum in Thyrea, which was given to
 them by Lacedaemon , not
 only on account of her quarrel with Athens , but also because the Aeginetans had laid
 her under obligations at the time of the earthquake and the revolt
 of the Helots. 
 The territory of Thyrea is on the frontier of Argolis and Laconia , reaching down to the
 sea. 
 Those of the Aeginetans who did not settle here were scattered over
 the rest of Hellas .

The same summer, at the beginning of
 a new lunar month, the only time by the way at which it appears
 possible, the sun was eclipsed after noon. 
 After it had assumed the form of a crescent and some of the stars had
 come out, it returned to its natural shape.

During the same summer Nymphodorus,
 son of Pythes, an Abderite, whose sister Sitalces had married, was
 made their Proxenus by the Athenians and sent for to Athens . 
 They had hitherto considered him their enemy; but he had great
 influence with Sitalces, and they wished this prince to become their
 ally. 
 Sitalces was the son of Teres and king of the Thracians.

Teres, the father of Sitalces, was the first to establish the great
 kingdom of the Odrysians on a scale quite unknown to the rest of
 Thrace , a large portion
 of the Thracians being independent.

This Teres is in no way related to Tereus who married Pandion's
 daughter Procne from Athens ; nor indeed did they belong to the same part
 of Thrace . 
 Tereus lived in Daulis ,
 part of what is now called Phocis, but which at that time was
 inhabited by Thracians. 
 It was in this land that the women perpetrated the outrage upon Itys;
 and many of the poets when they mention the nightingale call it the
 Daulian bird. 
 Besides, Pandion in contracting an alliance for his daughter would
 consider the advantages of mutual assistance, and would naturally
 prefer a match at the above moderate distance to the journey of many
 days which separates Athens from the Odrysians. 
 Again the names are different; and this Teres was king of the
 Odrysians, the first by the way who attained to any power.

Sitalces, his son, was now sought as an ally by the Athenians, who
 desired his aid in the reduction of the Thracian towns and of
 Perdiccas.

Coming to Athens ,
 Nymphodorus concluded the alliance with Sitalces and made his son
 Sadocus an Athenian citizen, and promised to finish the war in
 Thrace by persuading
 Sitalces to send the Athenians a force of Thracian horse and
 targeteers.

He also reconciled them with Perdiccas, and induced them to restore
 Therme to him; upon which Perdiccas at once joined the Athenians and
 Phormio in an expedition against the Chalcidians.

Thus Sitalces, son of Teres, king of the Thracians, and Perdiccas,
 son of Alexander, king of the Macedonians, became allies of
 Athens .

Meanwhile the Athenians in the
 hundred vessels were still cruising round Peloponnese . 
 After taking Sollium, a town belonging to Corinth , and presenting the
 city and territory to the Acarnanians of Palaira, they stormed
 Astacus , expelled
 its tyrant Evarchus, and gained the place for their confederacy.

Next they sailed to the island of Cephallenia and brought it over
 without using force. 
 Cephallenia lies off Acarnania and Leucas , and consists of four states, the Paleans,
 Cranians, Samaeans, and Pronaeans. 
 Not long afterwards the fleet returned to Athens .

Towards the autumn of this year the Athenians invaded the Megarid
 with their whole levy, resident aliens included, under the command
 of Pericles, son of Xanthippus. 
 The Athenians in the hundred ships round Peloponnese on their journey home had just reached
 Aegina , and
 hearing that the citizens at home were in full force at Megara , now sailed over and
 joined them.

This was without doubt the largest army of Athenians ever assembled,
 the state being still in the flower of her strength and yet
 unvisited by the plague. 
 Full ten thousand heavy infantry were in the field, all Athenian
 citizens, besides the three thousand before Potidaea . 
 Then the resident aliens who joined in the incursion were at least
 three thousand strong; besides which there was a multitude of light
 troops. 
 They ravaged the greater part of the territory, and then retired.

Other incursions into the Megarid were afterwards made by the
 Athenians annually during the war, sometimes only with cavalry,
 sometimes with all their forces. 
 This went on until the capture of Nisaea .

Atalanta also, the desert island off the Opuntian coast, was towards
 the end of this summer converted into a fortified post by the
 Athenians, in order to prevent privateers issuing from Opus and the
 rest of Locris and
 plundering Euboea . 
 Such were the events of this summer after the return of the
 Peloponnesians from Attica .

In the ensuing winter the Acarnanian
 Evarchus wishing to return to Astacus , persuaded the Corinthians to sail over
 with forty ships and fifteen hundred heavy infantry and restore him;
 himself also hiring some mercenaries. 
 In command of the force were Euphamidas, son of Aristonymus,
 Timoxenus, son of Timocrates, and Eumachus, son of Chrysis,

who sailed over and restored him, and after failing in an attempt on
 some places on the Acarnanian coast which they were desirous of
 gaining, began their voyage home.

Coasting along shore they touched at Cephallenia and made a descent
 on the Cranian territory, and losing some men by the treachery of
 the Cranians, who fell suddenly upon them, put to sea somewhat
 hurriedly and returned home.

In the same winter the Athenians gave
 a funeral at the public cost to those who had first fallen in this
 war. It was a custom of their ancestors, and the manner of it is as
 follows.

Three days before the ceremony, the bones of the dead are laid out in
 a tent which has been erected; and their friends bring to their
 relatives such offerings as they please.

In the funeral procession cypress coffins are borne in cars, one for
 each tribe; the bones of the deceased being placed in the coffin of
 their tribe. 
 Among these is carried one empty bier decked for the missing, that
 is, for those whose bodies could not be recovered.

Any citizen or stranger who pleases, joins in the procession: and the
 female relatives are there to wail at the burial.

The dead are laid in the public sepulchre in the most beautiful
 suburb of the city, in which those who fall in war are always
 buried; with the exception of those slain at Marathon, 
 who for their singular and extraordinary valor were interred on the
 spot where they fell.

After the bodies have been laid in the earth, a man chosen by the
 state, of approved wisdom and eminent reputation, pronounces over
 them an appropriate panegyric; after which all retire.

Such is the manner of the burying; and throughout the whole of the
 war, whenever the occasion arose, the established custom was
 observed.

Meanwhile these were the first that had fallen, and Pericles, son of
 Xanthippus, was chosen to pronounce their eulogium. 
 When the proper time arrived, he advanced from the sepulchre to an
 elevated platform in order to be heard by as many of the crowd as
 possible, and spoke as follows:

‘Most of my predecessors in this
 place have commended him who made this speech part of the law,
 telling us that it is well that it should be delivered at the burial
 of those who fall in battle. 
 For myself, I should have thought that the worth which had displayed
 itself in deeds, would be sufficiently rewarded by honors also shown
 by deeds; such as you now see in this funeral prepared at the
 people's cost. 
 And I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were
 not to be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand
 or fall according as he spoke well or ill. 
 For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where it is even
 difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the
 truth.

On the one hand, the friend who is familiar with every fact of the
 story, may think that some point has not been set forth with that
 fulness which he wishes and knows it to deserve; on the other, he
 who is a stranger to the matter may be led by envy to suspect
 exaggeration if he hears anything above his own nature. 
 For men can endure to hear others praised only so long as they can
 severally persuade themselves of their own ability to equal the
 actions recounted: 
 when this point is passed, envy comes in and with it incredulity.

However, since our ancestors have stamped this custom with their
 approval, it becomes my duty to obey the law and to try to satisfy
 your several wishes and opinions as best I may.

I shall begin with our ancestors: 
 it is both just and proper that they should have the honor of the
 first mention on an occasion like the present. 
 They dwelt in the country without break in the succession from
 generation to generation, and handed it down free to the present
 time by their valor.

And if our more remote ancestors deserve praise, much more do our own
 fathers, 
 who added to their inheritance the empire which we now possess, and
 spared no pains to be able to leave their acquisitions to us of the
 present generation.

Lastly, there are few parts of our dominions that have not been
 augmented by those of us here, who are still more or less in the
 vigor of life; 
 while the mother country has been furnished by us with everything
 that can enable her to depend on her own resources whether for war
 or for peace.

That part of our history which tells of the military achievements
 which gave us our several possessions, or of the ready valor with
 which either we or our fathers stemmed the tide of Hellenic or
 foreign aggression, is a theme too familiar to my hearers for me to
 dilate on, and I shall therefore pass it by. 
 But what was the road by which we reached our position, what the form
 of government under which our greatness grew, what the national
 habits out of which it sprang; these are questions which I may try
 to solve before I proceed to my panegyric upon these men; since I
 think this to be a subject upon which on the present occasion a
 speaker may properly dwell, and to which the whole assemblage,
 whether citizens or foreigners, may listen with advantage.

Our constitution does not copy the
 laws of neighboring states; we are rather a pattern to others than
 imitators ourselves. 
 Its administration favors the many instead of the few; this is why it
 is called a democracy. 
 If we look to the laws, they afford equal justice to all in their
 private differences; if to social standing, advancement in public
 life falls to reputation for capacity, class considerations not
 being allowed to interfere with merit; nor again does poverty bar
 the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he is not hindered by
 the obscurity of his condition.

The freedom which we enjoy in our government extends also to our
 ordinary life. 
 There, far from exercising a jealous surveillance over each other, we
 do not feel called upon to be angry with our neighbor for doing what
 he likes, or even to indulge in those injurious looks which cannot
 fail to be offensive, although they inflict no positive penalty.

But all this ease in our private relations does not make us lawless
 as citizens. Against this fear is our chief safeguard, teaching us
 to obey the magistrates and the laws, particularly such as regard
 the protection of the injured, whether they are actually on the
 statute book, or belong to that code which, although unwritten, yet
 cannot be broken without acknowledged disgrace.

Further, we provide plenty of means
 for the mind to refresh itself from business. We celebrate games and
 sacrifices all the year round, and the elegance of our private
 establishments forms a daily source of pleasure and helps to banish
 the spleen;

while the magnitude of our city draws the produce of the world into
 our harbor, so that to the Athenian the fruits of other countries
 are as familiar a luxury as those of his own.

If we turn to our military policy,
 there also we differ from antagonists. 
 We throw open our city to the world, 
 and never by alien acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of
 learning or observing, although the eyes of an enemy may
 occasionally profit by our liberality; trusting less in system and
 policy than to the native spirit of our citizens; while in
 education, where our rivals from their very cradles by a painful
 discipline seek after manliness, at Athens we live exactly as we please, and yet are
 just as ready to encounter every legitimate danger.

In proof of this it may be noticed that 
 the Lacedaemonians do not invade our country alone, but bring with
 them all their confederates; while we Athenians advance unsupported
 into the territory of a neighbor, and fighting upon a foreign soil
 usually vanquish with ease men who are defending their homes.

Our united force was never yet encountered by any enemy, because we
 have at once to attend to our marine and to despatch our citizens by
 land upon a hundred different services; so that, wherever they
 engage with some such fraction of our strength, a success against a
 detachment is magnified into a victory over the nation, and a defeat
 into a reverse suffered at the hands of our entire people.

And yet if with habits not of labor but of ease, and courage not of
 art but of nature, we are still willing to encounter danger, we have
 the double advantage of escaping the experience of hardships in
 anticipation and of facing them in the hour of need as fearlessly as
 those who are never free from them. Nor are these the only points in which our city is worthy of
 admiration.

We cultivate refinement without extravagance and knowledge without
 effeminacy; wealth we employ more for use than for show, and place
 the real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the fact but in
 declining the struggle against it.

Our public men have, besides politics, their private affairs to
 attend to, and our ordinary citizens, though occupied with the
 pursuits of industry, are still fair judges of public matters; for,
 unlike any other nation, regarding him who takes no part in these
 duties not as unambitious but as useless, 
 we Athenians are able to judge at all events if we cannot originate,
 and instead of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block in the way
 of action, we think it an indispensable preliminary to any wise
 action at all.

Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring
 and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both united
 in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit of
 ignorance, hesitation of reflection. 
 But the palm of courage will surely be adjudged most justly to those,
 who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet
 are never tempted to shrink from danger.

In generosity we are equally singular, 
 acquiring our friends by conferring not by receiving favors. 
 Yet, of course, the doer of the favor is the firmer friend of the
 two, in order by continued kindness to keep the recipient in his
 debt; while the debtor feels less keenly from the very consciousness
 that the return he makes will be a payment, not a free gift.

And it is only the Athenians who, fearless of consequences, confer
 their benefits not from calculations of expediency, but in the
 confidence of liberality.

In short, I say that as a city we are
 the school of Hellas ; while
 I doubt if the world can produce a man, who where he has only
 himself to depend upon, is equal to so many emergencies, and graced
 by so happy a versatility as the Athenian.

And that this is no mere boast thrown out for the occasion, but plain
 matter of fact, the power of the state acquired by these habits
 proves.

For Athens alone of her
 contemporaries is found when tested to be greater than her
 reputation, and alone gives no occasion to her assailants to blush
 at the antagonist by whom they have been worsted, or to her subjects
 to question her title by merit to rule.

Rather, the admiration of the present and succeeding ages will be
 ours, since we have not left our power without witness, but have
 shown it by mighty proofs; and far from needing a Homer for our
 panegyrist, or other of his craft whose verses might charm for the
 moment only for the impression which they gave to melt at the touch
 of fact, we have forced every sea and land to be the highway of our
 daring, and everywhere, whether for evil or for good, have left
 imperishable monuments behind us.

Such is the Athens for
 which these men, in the assertion of their resolve not to lose her,
 nobly fought and died; and well may well every one of their
 survivors be ready to suffer in her cause.

Indeed if I have dwelt at some length
 upon the character of our country, it has been to show that our
 stake in the struggle is not the same as theirs who have no such
 blessings to lose, and also that the panegyric of the men over whom
 I am now speaking might be by definite proofs established.

That panegyric is now in a great measure complete; for the Athens that I have celebrated
 is only what the heroism of these and their like have made her, 
 men whose fame, unlike at of most Hellenes, will be found to be only
 commensurate with their deserts. 
 And if a test of worth be wanted, it is to be found in their closing
 scene, and this not only in the cases in which it set the final seal
 upon their merit, but also in those in which it gave the first
 intimation of their having any.

For there is justice in the claim that steadfastness in his country's
 battles should be as a cloak to cover a man's other imperfections;
 since the good action has blotted out the bad, and his merit as a
 citizen more than outweighed his demerits as an individual.

But none of these allowed either wealth with its prospect of future
 enjoyment to unnerve his spirit, or poverty with its hope of a day
 of freedom and riches to tempt him to shrink from danger. 
 No, holding that vengeance upon their enemies was more to be desired
 than any personal blessings, and reckoning this to be the most
 glorious of hazards, they joyfully determined to accept the risk, to
 make sure of their vengeance and to let their wishes wait; and while
 committing to hope the uncertainty of final success, in the business
 before them they thought fit to act boldly and trust in
 themselves. 
 Thus choosing to die resisting, rather than to live submitting, they
 fled only from dishonor, but met danger face to face, and after one
 brief moment, while at the summit of their fortune, escaped, not
 from their fear, but from their glory.

So died these men as became
 Athenians. 
 You, their survivors, must determine to have as unaltering a
 resolution in the field, though you may pray that it may have a
 happier issue. And not contented with ideas derived only from words
 of the advantages which are bound up with the defence of your
 country, though these would furnish a valuable text to a speaker
 even before an audience so alive to them as the present, you must
 yourselves realize the power of Athens , and feed your eyes upon her from day to
 day, till love of her fills your hearts; and then when all her
 greatness shall break upon you, you must reflect that it was by
 courage, sense of duty, and a keen feeling of honor in action that
 men were enabled to win all this, and that no personal failure in an
 enterprise could make them consent to deprive their country of their
 valor, but they laid it at her feet as the most glorious
 contribution that they could offer.

For this offering of their lives made in common by them all they each
 of them individually received that renown which never grows old, and
 for a sepulchre, not so much that in which their bones have been
 deposited, but that noblest of shrines wherein their glory is laid
 up to be eternally remembered upon every occasion on which deed or
 story shall fall for its commemoration.

For heroes have the whole earth for their tomb; and in lands far from
 their own, where the column with its epitaph declares it, there is
 enshrined in every breast a record unwritten with no tablet to
 preserve it, except that of the heart.

These take as your model, and judging happiness to be the fruit of
 freedom and freedom of valor, never decline the dangers of war.

For it is not the miserable that would most justly be unsparing of
 their lives; these have nothing to hope for: 
 it is rather they to whom continued life may bring reverses as yet
 unknown, and to whom a fall, if it came, would be most tremendous in
 its consequences.

And surely, to a man of spirit, the degradation of cowardice must be
 immeasurably more grievous than the unfelt death which strikes him
 in the midst of his strength and patriotism!

Comfort, therefore, not condolence,
 is what I have to offer to the parents of the dead who may be
 here. 
 Numberless are the chances to which, as they know, the life of man is
 subject; but fortunate indeed are they who draw for their lot a
 death so glorious as that which has caused your mourning, and to
 whom life has been so exactly measured as to terminate in the
 happiness in which it has been passed.

Still I know that this is a hard saying, especially when those are in
 question of whom you will constantly be reminded by seeing in the
 homes of others blessings of which once you also boasted: 
 for grief is felt not so much for the want of what we have never
 known, as for the loss of that to which we have been long
 accustomed.

Yet you who are still of an age to beget children must bear up in the
 hope of having others in their stead; not only will they help you to
 forget those whom you have lost, but will be to the state at once a
 reinforcement and a security; for never can a fair or just policy be
 expected of the citizen who does not, like his fellows, bring to the
 decision the interests and apprehensions of a father.

While those of you who have passed your prime must congratulate
 yourselves with the thought that the best part of your life was
 fortunate, and that the brief span that remains will be cheered by
 the fame of the departed. 
 For it is only the love of honor that never grows old; and honor it
 is, not gain, as some would have it, that rejoices the heart of age
 and helplessness.

Turning to the sons or brothers of
 the dead, I see an arduous struggle before you. 
 When a man is gone, all are wont to praise him, and should your merit
 be ever so transcendent, you will still find it difficult not merely
 to overtake, but even to approach their renown. 
 The living have envy to contend with, while those who are no longer
 in our path are honored with a goodwill into which rivalry does not
 enter.

On the other hand if I must say anything on the subject of female
 excellence to those of you who will now be in widowhood, it will be
 all comprised in this brief exhortation. 
 Great will be your glory in not falling short of your natural
 character; and greatest will be hers who is least talked of among
 the men whether for good or for bad.

My task is now finished. I have
 performed it to the best of my ability, and in words, at least, the
 requirements of the law are now satisfied. 
 If deeds be in question, those who are here interred have received
 part of their honors already, and I for the rest, their children
 will be brought up till manhood at the public expense: the state
 thus offers a valuable prize, as the garland of victory in this race
 of valor, for the reward both of those who have fallen and their
 survivors. 
 And where the rewards for merit are greatest, there are found the
 best citizens.

And now that you have brought to a
 close your lamentations for your relatives, you may depart.’

Such was the funeral that took place
 during this winter, with which the first year of the war came to an
 end.

In the first days of summer the Lacedaemonians and their allies, with
 two-thirds of their forces as before, invaded Attica , under the command of
 Archidamus, son of Zeuxidamus, king of Lacedaemon , and sat down and laid waste the
 country.

Not many days after their arrival in Attica the plague first began to show itself among
 the Athenians. 
 It was said that it had broken out in many places previously in the
 neighborhood of Lemnos and
 elsewhere; but a pestilence of such extent and mortality was nowhere
 remembered.

Neither were the physicians at first of any service, ignorant as they
 were of the proper way to treat it, but they died themselves the
 most thickly, as they visited the sick most often; nor did any human
 art succeed any better. 
 Supplications in the temples, divinations, and so forth were found
 equally futile, till the overwhelming nature of the disaster at last
 put a stop to them altogether.

It first began, it is said, in the
 parts of Ethiopia above
 Egypt , and thence
 descended into Egypt and
 Libya and into most of
 the king's country.

Suddenly falling upon Athens , it first attacked the population in
 Piraeus ,—which was
 the occasion of their saying that the Peloponnesians had poisoned
 the reservoirs, there being as yet no wells there—and afterwards
 appeared in the upper city, when the deaths became much more
 frequent.

All speculation as to its origin and its causes, if causes can be
 found adequate to produce so great a disturbance, I leave to other
 writers, whether lay or professional; for myself, I shall simply set
 down its nature, and explain the symptoms by which perhaps it may be
 recognized by the student, if it should ever break out again. 
 This I can the better do, as I had the disease myself, and watched
 its operation in the case of others.

That year then is admitted to have
 been otherwise unprecedentedly free from sickness; and such few
 cases as occurred, all determined in this.

As a rule, however, there was no ostensible cause; but people in good
 health were all of a sudden attacked by violent heats in the head,
 and redness and inflammation in the eyes, the inward parts, such as
 the throat or tongue, becoming bloody and emitting an unnatural and
 fetid breath.

These symptoms were followed by sneezing and hoarseness, after which
 the pain soon reached the chest, and produced a hard cough. 
 When it fixed in the stomach, it upset it; and discharges of bile of
 every kind named by physicians ensued, accompanied by very great
 distress.

In most cases also an ineffectual retching followed, producing
 violent spasms, which in some cases ceased soon after, in others
 much later.

Externally the body was not very hot to the touch, nor pale in its
 appearance, but reddish, livid, and breaking out into small pustules
 and ulcers. 
 But internally it burned so that the patient could not bear to have
 on him clothing or linen even of the very lightest description; or
 indeed to be otherwise than stark naked. 
 What they would have liked best would have been to throw themselves
 into cold water; as indeed was done by some of the neglected sick,
 who plunged into the rain-tanks in their agonies of unquenchable
 thirst; though it made no difference whether they drank little or
 much.

Besides this, the miserable feeling of not being able to rest or
 sleep never ceased to torment them. 
 The body meanwhile did not waste away so long as the distemper was at
 its height, but held out to a marvel against its ravages; so that
 when they succumbed, as in most cases, on the seventh or eighth day
 to the internal inflammation, they had still some strength in
 them. 
 But if they passed this stage, and the disease descended further into
 the bowels, inducing a violent ulceration there accompanied by
 severe diarrhea, this brought on a weakness which was generally
 fatal.

For the disorder first settled in the head, ran its course from
 thence through the whole of the body, and even where it did not
 prove mortal, it still left its mark on the extremities;

for it settled in the privy parts, the fingers and the toes, and many
 escaped with the loss of these, some too with that of their
 eyes. 
 Others again were seized with an entire loss of memory on their first
 recovery, and did not know either themselves or their friends.

But while the nature of the distemper
 was such as to baffle all description, and its attacks almost too
 grievous for human nature to endure, it was still in the following
 circumstance that its difference from all ordinary disorders was
 most clearly shown. 
 All the birds and beasts that prey upon human bodies, either
 abstained from touching them (though there were many lying
 unburied), or died after tasting them.

In proof of this, it was noticed that birds of this kind actually
 disappeared; they were not about the bodies, or indeed to be seen at
 all. 
 But of course the effects which I have mentioned could best be
 studied in a domestic animal like the dog.

Such then, if we pass over the
 varieties of particular cases, which were many and peculiar, were
 the general features of the distemper. 
 Meanwhile the town enjoyed an immunity from all the ordinary
 disorders; or if any case occurred, it ended in this.

Some died in neglect, others in the midst of every attention. 
 No remedy was found that could be used as a specific; for what did
 good in one case, did harm in another.

Strong and weak constitutions proved equally incapable of resistance,
 all alike being swept away, although dieted with the utmost
 precaution.

By far the most terrible feature in the malady was the dejection
 which ensued when anyone felt himself sickening, for the despair
 into which they instantly fell took away their power of resistance,
 and left them a much easier prey to the disorder; besides which,
 there was the awful spectacle of men dying like sheep, through
 having caught the infection in nursing each other. 
 This caused the greatest mortality.

On the one hand, if they were afraid to visit each other, they
 perished from neglect; indeed many houses were emptied of their
 inmates for want of a nurse: on the other, if they ventured to do
 so, death was the consequence. 
 This was especially the case with such as made any pretensions to
 goodness: honor made them unsparing of themselves in their
 attendance in their friends' houses, where even the members of the
 family were at last worn out by the moans of the dying, and
 succumbed to the force of the disaster.

Yet it was with those who had recovered from the disease that the
 sick and the dying found most compassion. 
 These knew what it was from experience, and had now no fear for
 themselves; for the same man was never attacked twice—never at least
 fatally. 
 And such persons not only received the congratulations of others, but
 themselves also, in the elation of the moment, half entertained the
 vain hope that they were for the future safe from any disease
 whatsoever.

An aggravation of the existing
 calamity was the influx from the country into the city, and this was
 especially felt by the new arrivals.

As there were no houses to receive them, they had to be lodged at the
 hot season of the year in stifling cabins, where the mortality raged
 without restraint. 
 The bodies of dying men lay one upon another, and half-dead creatures
 reeled about the streets and gathered round all the fountains in
 their longing for water.

The sacred places also in which they had quartered themselves were
 full of corpses of persons that had died there, just as they were;
 for as the disaster passed all bounds, men, not knowing what was to
 become of them, became utterly careless of everything, whether
 sacred or profane.

All the burial rites before in use were entirely upset, and they
 buried the bodies as best they could. 
 Many from want of the proper appliances, through so many of their
 friends having died already, had recourse to the most shameless
 sepultures: sometimes getting the start of those who had raised a
 pile, they threw their own dead body upon the stranger's pyre and
 ignited it; sometimes they tossed the corpse which they were
 carrying on the top of another that was burning, and so went off.

Nor was this the only form of lawless
 extravagance which owed its origin to the plague. 
 Men now coolly ventured on what they had formerly done in a corner,
 and not just as they pleased, seeing the rapid transitions produced
 by persons in prosperity suddenly dying and those who before had
 nothing succeeding to their property.

So they resolved to spend quickly and enjoy themselves, regarding
 their lives and riches as alike things of a day.

Perseverance in what men called honor was popular with none, it was
 so uncertain whether they would be spared to attain the object; but
 it was settled that present enjoyment, and all that contributed to
 it, was both honorable and useful.

Fear of gods or law of man there was none to restrain them. 
 As for the first, they judged it to be just the same whether they
 worshipped them or not, as they saw all alike perishing; and for the
 last, no one expected to live to be brought to trial for his
 offences, but each felt that a far severer sentence had been already
 passed upon them all and hung ever over their heads, and before this
 fell it was only reasonable to enjoy life a little.

Such was the nature of the calamity,
 and heavily did it weigh on the Athenians; death raging within the
 city and devastation without.

Among other things which they remembered in their distress was, very
 naturally, the following verse which the old men said had long ago
 been uttered: 
 
 A Dorian war shall come and with it death.

So a dispute arose as to whether
 dearth and not death had not been the word in the verse; but at the
 present juncture, it was of course decided in favor of the latter;
 for the people made their recollection fit in with their
 sufferings. 
 I fancy, however, that if another Dorian war should ever afterwards
 come upon us, and a dearth should happen to accompany it, the verse
 will probably be read accordingly.

The oracle also which had been given to the Lacedaemonians was now
 remembered by those who knew of it. 
 When the God was asked whether they should go to war, he answered
 that if they put their might into it, victory would be theirs, and
 that he would himself be with them.

With this oracle events were supposed to tally. 
 For the plague broke out so soon as the Peloponnesians invaded
 Attica , and never
 entering Peloponnese (not
 at least to an extent worth noticing), committed its worst ravages
 at Athens , and next to
 Athens , at the most
 populous of the other towns. 
 Such was the history of the plague.

After ravaging the plain the
 Peloponnesians advanced into the Paralian region as far as
 Laurium , where the
 Athenian silver mines are, and first laid waste the side looking
 towards Peloponnese , next
 that which faces Euboea and
 Andros .

But Pericles, who was still general, held the same opinion as in the
 former invasion, and would not let the Athenians march out against
 them.

However while they were still in the
 plain, and had not yet entered the Paralian land, he had prepared an
 armament of a hundred ships for Peloponnese , and when all was ready put out to
 sea.

On board the ships he took four thousand Athenian heavy infantry, and
 three hundred cavalry in horse transports, then for the first time
 made out of old galleys; fifty Chian and Lesbian vessels also
 joining in the expedition.

When this Athenian armament put out to sea, they left the
 Peloponnesians in Attica in
 the Paralian region.

Arriving at Epidaurus 
 in Peloponnese they ravaged
 most of the territory, and even had hopes of taking the town by an
 assault: in this however they were not successful.

Putting out from Epidaurus , they laid waste the territory of
 Troezen , Halieis , and Hermione , all towns on the
 coast of Peloponnese ,

and thence sailing to Prasiai, a maritime town in Laconia , ravaged part of its
 territory, and took and sacked the place itself; after which they
 returned home, but found the Peloponnesians gone and no longer in
 Attica .

During the whole time that the
 Peloponnesians were in Attica and the Athenians on the expedition in their
 ships, men kept dying of the plague both in the armament and in
 Athens . 
 Indeed it was actually asserted that the departure of the
 Peloponnesians was hastened by fear of the disorder; as they heard
 from deserters that it was in the city, and also could see the
 burials going on.

Yet in this invasion they remained longer than in any other, and
 ravaged the whole country, for they were about forty days in
 Attica .

The same summer Hagnon, son of
 Nicias, and Cleopompus, son of Clinias, the colleagues of Pericles,
 took the armament of which he had lately made use, and went off upon
 an expedition against the Chalcidians in the direction of Thrace and Potidaea , which was still
 under siege. 
 As soon as they arrived, they brought up their engines against
 Potidaea and tried
 every means of taking it,

but did not succeed either in capturing the city or in doing anything
 else worthy of their preparations. 
 For the plague attacked them here also, and committed such havoc as
 to cripple them completely, even the previously healthy soldiers of
 the former expedition catching the infection from Hagnon's troops;
 while Phormio and the sixteen hundred men whom he commanded only
 escaped by being no longer in the neighborhood of the
 Chalcidians.

The end of it was that Hagnon returned with his ships to Athens , having lost one
 thousand and fifty out of four thousand heavy infantry in about
 forty days; though the soldiers stationed there before remained in
 the country and carried on the siege of Potidaea .

After the second invasion of the
 Peloponnesians a change came over the spirit of the Athenians. 
 Their land had now been twice laid waste; and war and pestilence at
 once pressed heavy upon them.

They began to find fault with Pericles, as the author of the war and
 the cause of all their misfortunes, and became eager to come to
 terms with Lacedaemon , and
 actually sent ambassadors thither, who did not however succeed in
 their mission. 
 Their despair was now complete and all vented itself upon
 Pericles.

When he saw them exasperated at the present turn of affairs and
 acting exactly as he had anticipated, he called an assembly, being
 (it must be remembered) still general, with the double object of
 restoring confidence and of leading them from these angry feelings
 to a calmer and more hopeful state of mind. 
 He accordingly came forward and spoke as follows:

‘I was not unprepared for the
 indignation of which I have been the object, as I know its causes;
 and I have called an assembly for the purpose of reminding you upon
 certain points, and of protesting against your being unreasonably
 irritated with me, or cowed by your sufferings.

I am of opinion that national greatness is more for the advantage of
 private citizens, than any individual well-being coupled with public
 humiliation.

A man may be personally ever so well off, and yet if his country be
 ruined he must be ruined with it; whereas a flourishing commonwealth
 always affords chances of salvation to unfortunate individuals.

Since then a state can support the misfortunes of private citizens,
 while they cannot support hers, it is surely the duty of everyone to
 be forward in her defence, and not like you to be so confounded with
 your domestic afflictions as to give up all thoughts of the common
 safety, and to blame me for having counselled war and yourselves for
 having voted it.

And yet if you are angry with me, it is with one who, as I believe,
 is second to no man either in knowledge of the proper policy, or in
 the ability to expound it, and who is moreover not only a patriot
 but an honest one.

A man possessing that knowledge without that faculty of exposition
 might as well have no idea at all on the matter: if he had both
 these gifts, but no love for his country, he would be but a cold
 advocate for her interests; while were his patriotism not proof
 against bribery, everything would go for a price.

So that if you thought that I was even moderately distinguished for
 these qualities when you took my advice and went to war, there is
 certainly no reason now why I should be charged with having done
 wrong.

For those of course who have a free
 choice in the matter and whose fortunes are not at stake, war is the
 greatest of follies. 
 But if the only choice was between submission with loss of
 independence, and danger with the hope of preserving that
 independence,—in such a case it is he who will not accept the risk
 that deserves blame, not he who will.

I am the same man and do not alter, it is you who change, since in
 fact you took my advice while unhurt, and waited for misfortune to
 repent of it; and the apparent error of my policy lies in the
 infirmity of your resolution, since the suffering that it entails is
 being felt by every one among you, while its advantage is still
 remote and obscure to all, and a great and sudden reverse having
 befallen you, your mind is too much depressed to persevere in your
 resolves.

For before what is sudden, unexpected, and least within calculation
 the spirit quails; and putting all else aside, the plague has
 certainly been an emergency of this kind.

Born, however, as you are, citizens of a great state, and brought up,
 as you have been, with habits equal to your birth, you should be
 ready to face the greatest disasters and still to keep unimpaired
 the lustre of your name. 
 For the judgment of mankind is as relentless to the weakness that
 falls short of a recognized renown, as it is jealous of the
 arrogance that aspires higher than its due. 
 Cease then to grieve for your private afflictions, and address
 yourselves instead to the safety of the commonwealth.

If you shrink before the exertions
 which the war makes necessary, and fear that after all they may not
 have a happy result, you know the reasons by which I have often
 demonstrated to you the groundlessness of your apprehension. 
 If those are not enough, I will now reveal an advantage arising from
 the greatness of your dominion, which I think has never yet
 suggested itself to you, which I never mentioned in my previous
 speeches, and which has so bold a sound that I should scarce
 adventure it now, were it not for the unnatural depression which I
 see around me.

You perhaps think that your empire extends only over your allies; I
 will declare to you the truth. 
 The visible field of action has two parts, land and sea. 
 In the whole of one of these you are completely supreme, not merely
 as far as you use it at present, but also to what further extent you
 may think fit: in fine, your naval resources are such that your
 vessels may go where they please, without the king or any other
 nation on earth being able to stop them.

So that although you may think it a great privation to lose the use
 of your land and houses, still you must see that this power is
 something widely different; and instead of fretting on their
 account, you should really regard them in the light of the gardens
 and other accessories that embellish a great fortune, and as, in
 comparison, of little moment. 
 You should know too that liberty preserved by your efforts will
 easily recover for us what we have lost, while, the knee once bowed,
 even what you have will pass from you. 
 Your fathers receiving these possessions not from others, but from
 themselves, did not let slip what their labor had acquired, but
 delivered them safe to you; and in this respect at least you must
 prove yourselves their equals, remembering that to lose what one has
 got is more disgraceful than to be baulked in getting, and you must
 confront your enemies not merely with spirit but with disdain.

Confidence indeed a blissful ignorance can impart, ay, even to a
 coward's breast, but disdain is the privilege of those who, like us,
 have been assured by reflection of their superiority to their
 adversary.

And where the chances are the same, knowledge fortifies courage by
 the contempt which is its consequence, its trust being placed, not
 in hope, which is the prop of the desperate, but in a judgment
 grounded upon existing resources, whose anticipations are more to be
 depended upon.

Again, your country has a right to
 your services in sustaining the glories of her position. 
 These are a common source of pride to you all, and you cannot decline
 the burdens of empire and still expect to share its honors. 
 You should remember also that what you are fighting against is not
 merely slavery as an exchange for independence, but also loss of
 empire and danger from the animosities incurred in its exercise.

Besides, to recede is no longer possible, if indeed any of you in the
 alarm of the moment has become enamored of the honesty of such an
 unambitious part. 
 For what you hold is, to speak somewhat plainly, a tyranny; to take
 it perhaps was wrong, but to let it go is unsafe.

And men of these retiring views, making converts of others, would
 quickly ruin a state; indeed the result would be the same if they
 could live independent by themselves; for the retiring and
 unambitious are never secure without vigorous protectors at their
 side; in fine, such qualities are useless to an imperial city,
 though they may help a dependency to an unmolested servitude.

But you must not be seduced by
 citizens like these nor be angry with me,—who, if I voted for war,
 only did as you did yourselves,—in spite of the enemy having invaded
 your country and done what you could be certain that he would do, if
 you refused to comply with his demands; and although besides what we
 counted for, the plague has come upon us—the only point indeed at
 which our calculation has been at fault. 
 It is this, I know, that has had a large share in making me more
 unpopular than I should otherwise have been,—quite undeservedly,
 unless you are also prepared to give me the credit of any success
 with which chance may present you.

Besides, the hand of Heaven must be borne with resignation, that of
 the enemy with fortitude; this was the old way at Athens , and do not you prevent
 it being so still.

Remember, too, that if your country has the greatest name in all the
 world, it is because she never bent before disaster; because she has
 expended more life and effort in war than any other city, and has
 won for herself a power greater than any hitherto known, the memory
 of which will descend to the latest posterity; even if now, in
 obedience to the general law of decay, we should ever be forced to
 yield, still it will be remembered that we held rule over more
 Hellenes than any other Hellenic state, that we sustained the
 greatest wars against their united or separate powers, and inhabited
 a city unrivalled by any other in resources or magnitude.

These glories may incur the censure of the slow and unambitious; but
 in the breast of energy they will awake emulation, and in those who
 must remain without them an envious regret.

Hatred and unpopularity at the moment have fallen to the lot of all
 who have aspired to rule others; but where odium must be incurred,
 true wisdom incurs it for the highest objects. 
 Hatred also is shortlived; but that which makes the splendor of the
 present and the glory of the future remains for ever
 unforgotten.

Make your decision, therefore, for glory then and honor now, and
 attain both objects by instant and zealous effort: do not send
 heralds to Lacedaemon , and
 do not betray any sign of being oppressed by your present
 sufferings, since they whose minds are least sensitive to calamity,
 and whose hands are most quick to meet it, are the greatest men and
 the greatest communities.’

Such were the arguments by which
 Pericles tried to cure the Athenians of their anger against him and
 to divert their thoughts from their immediate afflictions.

As a community he succeeded in convincing them; they not only gave up
 all idea of sending to Lacedaemon , but applied themselves with increased
 energy to the war; still as private individuals they could not help
 smarting under their sufferings, the common people having been
 deprived of the little that they ever possessed, while the higher
 orders had lost fine properties with costly establishments and
 buildings in the country, and, worst of all, had war instead of
 peace.

In fact, the public feeling against him did not subside until he had
 been fined.

Not long afterwards, however, according to the way of the multitude,
 they again elected him general and committed all their affairs to
 his hands, having now become less sensitive to their private and
 domestic afflictions, and understanding that he was the best man of
 all for the public necessities.

For as long as he was at the head of the state during the peace, he
 pursued a moderate and conservative policy; and in his time its
 greatness was at its height. 
 When the war broke out, here also he seems to have rightly gauged the
 power of his country.

He outlived its commencement two years and six months, and the
 correctness of his previsions respecting it became better known by
 his death.

He told them to wait quietly, to pay attention to their marine, to
 attempt no new conquests, and to expose the city to no hazards
 during the war, and doing this, promised them a favorable
 result. 
 What they did was the very contrary, allowing private ambitions and
 private interests, in matters apparently quite foreign to the war,
 to lead them into projects unjust both to themselves and to their
 allies—projects whose success would only conduce to the honor and
 advantage of private persons, and whose failure entailed certain
 disaster on the country in the war.

The causes of this are not far to seek. 
 Pericles indeed, by his rank, ability, and known integrity, was
 enabled to exercise an independent control over the multitude—in
 short, to lead them instead of being led by them; for as he never
 sought power by improper means, he was never compelled to flatter
 them, but, on the contrary, enjoyed so high an estimation that he
 could afford to anger them by contradiction.

Whenever he saw them unseasonably and insolently elated, he would
 with a word reduce them to alarm; on the other hand, if they fell
 victims to a panic, he could at once restore them to confidence. 
 In short, what was nominally a democracy became in his hands
 government by the first citizen.

With his successors it was different. 
 More on a level with one another, and each grasping at supremacy,
 they ended by committing even the conduct of state affairs to the
 whims of the multitude.

This, as might have been expected in a great and sovereign state,
 produced a host of blunders, and amongst them the Sicilian
 expedition; though this failed not so much through a miscalculation
 of the power of those against whom it was sent, as through a fault
 in the senders in not taking the best measures afterwards to assist
 those who had gone out, but choosing rather to occupy themselves
 with private cabals for the leadership of the commons, by which they
 not only paralyzed operations in the field, but also first
 introduced civil discord at home.

Yet after losing most of their fleet besides other forces in
 Sicily , and with
 faction already dominant in the city, they could still for three
 years make head against their original adversaries, joined not only
 by the Sicilians, but also by their own allies nearly all in revolt,
 and at last by the king's son, Cyrus, who furnished the funds for
 the Peloponnesian navy. 
 Nor did they finally succumb till they fell the victims of their own
 intestine disorders.

So superfluously abundant were the resources from which the genius of
 Pericles foresaw an easy triumph in the war over the unaided forces
 of the Peloponnesians.

During the same summer the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies made an expedition with a hundred
 ships against Zacynthus , an
 island lying off the coast of Elis , peopled by a colony of Achaeans from
 Peloponnese , and in
 alliance with Athens .

There were a thousand Lacedaemonian heavy infantry on board, and
 Cnemus, a Spartan, as admiral. 
 They made a descent from their ships, and ravaged most of the
 country; but as the inhabitants would not submit, they sailed back
 home.

At the end of the same summer the
 Corinthian Aristeus, Aneristus, Nicolaus, and Pratodamus, envoys
 from Lacedaemon , Timagoras,
 a Tegean, and a private individual named Pollis from Argos , on their way to
 Asia to persuade the
 king to supply funds and join in the war, came to Sitalces, son of
 Teres in Thrace , with the
 idea of inducing him, if possible, forsake the alliance of
 Athens and to march
 on Potidaea then
 besieged by an Athenian force, and also of getting conveyed by his
 means to their destination across the Hellespont to Pharnabazus, who was to send them up
 the country to the king.

But there chanced to be with Sitalces some Athenian ambassadors,
 Learchus, son of Callimachus, and Ameiniades, son of Philemon, who
 persuaded Sitalces' son, Sadocus, the new Athenian citizen, to put
 the men into their hands and thus prevent their crossing over to the
 king and doing their part to injure the country of his choice.

He accordingly had them seized, as they were travelling through
 Thrace to the vessel in
 which they were to cross the Hellespont , by a party whom he had sent on with
 Learchus and Ameiniades, and gave orders for their delivery to the
 Athenian ambassadors, by whom they were brought to Athens .

On their arrival, the Athenians, afraid that Aristeus, who had been
 notably the prime mover in the previous affairs of Potidaea and their Thracian
 possessions, might live to do them still more mischief if he
 escaped, slew them all the same day, without giving them a trial or
 hearing the defence which they wished to offer, and cast their
 bodies into a pit; thinking themselves justified in using in
 retaliation the same mode of warfare which the Lacedaemonians had
 begun, when they slew and cast into pits all the Athenian and allied
 traders whom they caught on board the merchantmen round Peloponnese . 
 Indeed, at the outset of the war, the Lacedaemonians butchered as
 enemies all whom they took on the sea, whether allies of Athens or neutrals.

About the same time towards the close
 of the summer, the Ambraciot forces, with a number of barbarians
 that they had raised, marched against the Amphilochian Argos 
 and the rest of that country.

The origin of their enmity against the Argives was this.

This Argos and the rest of
 Amphilochia were colonized by Amphilochus, son of Amphiaraus. 
 Dissatisfied with the state of affairs at home on his return thither
 after the Trojan war, he built this city in the Ambracian gulf, and
 named it Argos after his
 own country.

This was the largest town in Amphilochia, and its inhabitants the
 most powerful.

Under the pressure of misfortune many generations afterwards, they
 called in the Ambraciots, their neighbors on the Amphilochian
 border, to join their colony; and it was by this union with the
 Ambraciots that they learnt their present Hellenic speech, the rest
 of the Amphilochians being barbarians.

After a time the Ambraciots expelled the Argives and held the city
 themselves.

Upon this the Amphilochians gave themselves over to the Acarnanians;
 and the two together called the Athenians, who sent them Phormio as
 general and thirty ships; upon whose arrival they took Argos by storm, and made slaves
 of the Ambraciots; and the Amphilochians and Acarnanians inhabited
 the town in common.

After this began the alliance between the Athenians and
 Acarnanians.

The enmity of the Ambraciots against the Argives thus commenced with
 the enslavement of their citizens; and afterwards during the war
 they collected this armament among themselves and the Chaonians, and
 other of the neighboring barbarians. 
 Arrived before Argos , they
 became masters of the country; but not being successful in their
 attacks upon the town, returned home and dispersed among their
 different peoples.

Such were the events of the
 summer. 
 The ensuing winter the Athenians sent twenty ships round Peloponnese , under the command of
 Phormio, who stationed himself at Naupactus and kept watch against any one sailing in
 or out of Corinth and
 the Crissaean gulf. 
 Six others went to Caria and
 Lycia under Melesander,
 to collect tribute in those parts, and also to prevent the
 Peloponnesian privateers from taking up their station in those
 waters and molesting the passage of the merchantmen from Phaselis
 and Phoenicia and the
 adjoining continent.

However, Melesander, going up the country into Lycia with a force of Athenians
 from the ships and the allies, was defeated and killed in battle,
 with the loss of a number of his troops.

The same winter the Potidaeans at
 length found themselves no longer able to hold out against their
 besiegers. 
 The inroads of the Peloponnesians into Attica had not had the desired effect of making the
 Athenians raise the siege. 
 Provisions there were none left; and so far had distress for food
 gone in Potidaea that,
 besides a number of other horrors, instances had even occurred of
 the people having eaten one another. 
 So in this extremity they at last made proposals for capitulating to
 the Athenian generals in command against them, Xenophon, son of
 Euripides, Hestiodorus, son of Aristocleides, and Phanomachus, son
 of Callimachus.

The generals accepted their proposals, seeing the sufferings of the
 army in so exposed a position; besides which the state had already
 spent two thousand talents upon the siege.

The terms of the capitulation were as follows: a free passage out for
 themselves, their children, wives and auxiliaries, with one garment
 apiece, the women with two, and a fixed sum of money for their
 journey.

Under this treaty they went out to Chalcidice and other places, according as was in
 their power. 
 The Athenians, however, blamed the generals for granting terms
 without instructions from home, being of opinion that the place
 would have had to surrender at discretion. 
 They afterwards sent settlers of their own to Potidae, and colonized
 it. 
 Such were the events of the winter, and so ended the second year of
 this war of which Thucydides was the historian.

The next summer the Peloponnesians
 and their allies, instead of invading Attica , marched against Plataea , under the command of
 Archidamus, son of Zeuxidamus, king of the Lacedaemonians. 
 He had encamped his army and was about to lay waste the country, when
 the Plataeans hastened to send envoys to him, and spoke as
 follows:

‘Archidamus and Lacedaemonians, in invading the Plataean territory,
 you do what is wrong in itself, and worthy neither of yourselves nor
 of the fathers who begot you. 
 Pausanias, son of Cleombrotus, your countryman, after freeing
 Hellas from the Medes
 with the help of those Hellenes who were willing to undertake the
 risk of the battle fought near our city, offered sacrifice to Zeus
 the Liberator in the market-place of Plataea , and calling all the
 allies together restored to the Plataeans their city and territory,
 and declared it independent and inviolate against aggression or
 conquest. 
 Should any such be attempted, the allies present were to help
 according to their power.

Your fathers rewarded us thus for the courage and patriotism that we
 displayed at that perilous epoch; but you do just the contrary,
 coming with our bitterest enemies, the Thebans, to enslave us.

We appeal, therefore, to the gods to whom the oaths were then made,
 to the gods of your ancestors, and lastly to those of our country,
 and call upon you to refrain from violating our territory or
 transgressing the oaths, and to let us live independent, as
 Pausanias decreed.’

The Plataeans had got thus far when
 they were cut short by Archidamus saying, ‘There is justice,
 Plataeans, in what you say, if you act up to your words. 
 According to the grant of Pausanias, continue to be independent
 yourselves, and join in freeing those of your fellow-countrymen who,
 after sharing in the perils of that period, joined in the oaths to
 you, and are now subject to the Athenians; for it is to free them
 and the rest that all this provision and war has been made. 
 I could wish that you would share our labors and abide by the oaths
 yourselves; if this is impossible, do what we have already required
 of you—remain neutral, enjoying your own; join neither side, but
 receive both as friends, neither as allies for the war. 
 With this we shall be satisfied.’

Such were the words of Archidamus. 
 The Plataeans, after hearing what he had to say, went into the city
 and acquainted the people with what had passed, and presently
 returned for answer that it was impossible for them to do what he
 proposed without consulting the Athenians, with whom their children
 and wives now were; besides which they had their fears for the
 town. 
 After his departure, what was to prevent the Athenians from coming
 and taking it out of their hands, or the Thebans, who would be
 included in the oaths, from taking advantage of the proposed
 neutrality to make a second attempt to seize the city?

Upon these points he tried to reassure them by saying: ‘You have only
 to deliver over the city and houses to us Lacedaemonians, to point
 out the boundaries of your land, the number of your fruit-trees, and
 whatever else can be numerically stated, and yourselves to withdraw
 wherever you like as long as the war shall last. 
 When it is over we will restore to you whatever we received, and in
 the interim hold it in trust and keep it in cultivation, paying you
 a sufficient allowance.’

When they had heard what he had to
 say, they re-entered the city, and after consulting with the people
 said that they wished first to acquaint the Athenians with this
 proposal, and in the event of their approving to accede to it; in
 the meantime they asked him to grant them a truce and not to lay
 waste their territory. 
 He accordingly granted a truce for the number of days requisite for
 the journey, and meanwhile abstained from ravaging their
 territory.

The Plataean envoys went to Athens , and consulted with the Athenians, and
 returned with the following message to those in the city:

‘The Athenians say, Plataeans, that they never hitherto, since we
 became their allies, on any occasion abandoned us to an enemy, nor
 will they now neglect us, but will help us according to their
 ability; and they adjure you by the oaths which your fathers swore,
 to keep the alliance unaltered.’

On the delivery of this message by
 the envoys, the Plataeans resolved not to be unfaithful to the
 Athenians but to endure, if it must be, seeing their lands laid
 waste and any other trials that might come to them, and not to send
 out again, but to answer from the wall that it was impossible for
 them to do as the Lacedaemonians proposed.

As soon as be had received this answer, King Archidamus proceeded
 first to make a solemn appeal to the gods and heroes of the country
 in words following:—‘Ye gods and heroes of the Plataean territory,
 be my witnesses that not as aggressors originally, nor until these
 had first departed from the common oath, did we invade this land, in
 which our fathers offered you their prayers before defeating the
 Medes, and which you made auspicious to the Hellenic arms; nor shall
 we be aggressors in the measures to which we may now resort, since
 we have made many fair proposals but have not been successful. 
 Graciously accord that those who were the first to offend may be
 punished for it, and that vengeance may be attained by those who
 would righteously inflict it.’

After this appeal to the gods
 Archidamus put his army in motion. 
 First he enclosed the town with a palisade formed of the fruit-trees
 which they cut down, to prevent further egress from Plataea ; next day they threw
 up a mound against the city, hoping that the largeness of the force
 employed would insure the speedy reduction of the place.

They accordingly cut down timber from Cithaeron, and built it up on
 either side, laying it like lattice-work to serve as a wall to keep
 the mound from spreading abroad, and carried to it wood and stones
 and earth and whatever other material might help to complete it.

They continued to work at the mound for seventy days and nights
 without intermission, being divided into relief parties to allow of
 some being employed in carrying while others took sleep and
 refreshment; the Lacedaemonian officer attached to each contingent
 keeping the men to the work.

But the Plataeans observing the progress of the mound, constructed a
 wall of wood and fixed it upon that part of the city wall against
 which the mound was being erected, and built up bricks inside it
 which they took from the neighboring houses.

The timbers served to bind the building together, and to prevent its
 becoming weak as it advanced in height; it had also a covering of
 skins and hides, which protected the wood-work against the attacks
 of burning missiles and allowed the men to work in safety.

Thus the wall was raised to a great height, and the mound opposite
 made no less rapid progress. 
 The Plataeans also thought of another expedient; they pulled out part
 of the wall upon which the mound abutted, and carried the earth into
 the city.

Discovering this the Peloponnesians
 twisted up clay in wattles of reed and threw it into the breach
 formed in the mound, in order to give it consistency and prevent its
 being carried away like the soil.

Stopped in this way the Plataeans changed their mode of operation,
 and digging a mine from the town calculated their way under the
 mound, and began to carry off its material as before. 
 This went on for a long while without the enemy outside finding it
 out, so that for all they threw on the top their mound made no
 progress in proportion, being carried away from beneath and
 constantly settling down in the vacuum.

But the Plataeans fearing that even thus they might not be able to
 hold out against the superior numbers of the enemy, had yet another
 invention. 
 They stopped working at the large building in front of the mound, and
 starting at either end of it inside from the old low wall, built a
 new one in the form of a crescent running in towards the town in
 order that in the event of the great wall being taken this might
 remain, and the enemy have to throw up a fresh mound against it, and
 as they advanced within might not only have their trouble over
 again, but also be exposed to missiles on their flanks.

While raising the mound the Peloponnesians also brought up engines
 against the city, one of which was brought up upon the mound against
 the great building and shook down a good piece of it, to the no
 small alarm of the Plataeans. 
 Others were advanced against different parts of the wall but were
 lassoed and broken by the Plataeans; who also hung up great beams by
 long iron chains from either extremity of two poles laid on the wall
 and projecting over it, and drew them up at an angle whenever any
 point was threatened by the engine, and loosing their hold let the
 beam go with its chains slack, so that it fell with a run and
 snapped off the nose of the battering ram.

After this the Peloponnesians,
 finding that their engines effected nothing, and that their mound
 was met by the counter-work, concluded that their present means of
 offence were unequal to the taking of the city, and prepared for its
 circumvallation.

First, however, they determined to try the effects of fire and see
 whether they could not, with the help of a wind, burn the town as it
 was not a large one; indeed they thought of every possible expedient
 by which the place might be reduced without the expense of a
 blockade.

They accordingly brought faggots of brushwood and threw them from the
 mound, first into the space between it and the wall; and this soon
 becoming full from the number of hands at work, they next heaped the
 faggots up as far into the town as they could reach from the top,
 and then lighted the wood by setting fire to it with sulphur and
 pitch.

The consequence was a fire greater than any one had ever yet seen
 produced by human agency, though it could not of course be compared
 to the spontaneous conflagrations sometimes known to occur through
 the wind rubbing the branches of a mountain forest together.

And this fire was not only remarkable for its magnitude, but was
 also, at the end of so many perils, within an ace of proving fatal
 to the Plataeans; a great part of the town became entirely
 inaccessible, and had a wind blown upon it, in accordance with the
 hopes of the enemy, nothing could have saved them.

As it was, there is also a story of heavy rain and thunder having
 come on by which the fire was put out and the danger averted.

Failing in this last attempt the
 Peloponnesians left a portion of their forces on the spot,
 dismissing the rest, and built a wall of circumvallation round the
 town, dividing the ground among the various cities present; a ditch
 being made within and without the lines, from which they got their
 bricks.

All being finished by about the rising of Arcturus, they left men
 enough to man half the wall, the rest being manned by the Boeotians,
 and drawing off their army dispersed to their several cities.

The Plataeans had before sent off their wives and children and oldest
 men and the mass of the noncombatants to Athens ; so that the number of
 the besieged left in the place comprised four hundred of their own
 citizens, eighty Athenians, and a hundred and ten women to bake
 their bread.

This was the sum total at the commencement of the siege, and there
 was no one else within the walls, bond or free. 
 Such were the arrangements made for the blockade of Plataea .

The same summer and simultaneously
 with the expedition against Plataea , the Athenians marched with two thousand
 heavy infantry and two hundred horse against the Chalcidians in the
 direction of Thrace and the
 Bottiaeans, just as the corn was getting ripe, under the command of
 Xenophon, son of Euripides, with two colleagues.

Arriving before Spartolus in Bottiaea, they destroyed the corn and
 had some hopes of the city coming over through the intrigues of a
 faction within. 
 But those of a different way of thinking had sent to Olynthus ; and a garrison of
 heavy infantry and other troops arrived accordingly. 
 These issuing from Spartolus were engaged by the Athenians in front
 of the town:

the Chalcidian heavy infantry, and some auxiliaries with them, were
 beaten and retreated into Spartolus; but the Chalcidian horse and
 light troops defeated the horse and light troops of the
 Athenians.

The Chalcidians had already a few targeteers from Crusis, and
 presently after the battle were joined by some others from
 Olynthus ;

upon seeing whom the light troops from Spartolus, emboldened by this
 accession and by their previous success, with the help of the
 Chalcidian horse and the reinforcement just arrived again attacked
 the Athenians, who retired upon the two divisions which they had
 left with their baggage.

Whenever the Athenians advanced, their adversary gave way, pressing
 them with missiles the instant they began to retire. 
 The Chalcidian horse also, riding up and charging them just as they
 pleased, at last caused a panic amongst them and routed and pursued
 them to a great distance.

The Athenians took refuge in Potidaea , and afterwards recovered their dead under
 truce, and returned to Athens with the remnant of their army; four hundred
 and thirty men and all the generals having fallen. 
 The Chalcidians and Bottiaeans set up a trophy, took up their dead,
 and dispersed to their several cities.

The same summer, not long after this,
 the Ambraciots and Chaonians, being desirous of reducing the whole
 of Acarnania and detaching
 it from Athens ,
 persuaded the Lacedaemonians to equip a fleet from their confederacy
 and send a thousand heavy infantry to Acarnania , representing that if a combined movement
 were made by land and sea, the coast Acarnanians would be unable to
 march; and the conquest of Zacynthus and Cephallenia easily following on the
 possession of Acarnania ,
 the cruise round Peloponnese would be no longer so convenient for
 the Athenians. 
 Besides which there was a hope of taking Naupactus .

The Lacedaemonians accordingly at once sent off a few vessels with
 Cnemus, who was still high admiral, and the heavy infantry on board;
 and sent round orders for the fleet to equip as quickly as possible
 and sail to Leucas .

The Corinthians were the most forward in the business; the Ambraciots
 being a colony of theirs. 
 While the ships from Corinth , Sicyon and the neighborhood were getting ready, and
 those from Leucas ,
 Anactorium and Ambracia , which had arrived before, were waiting
 for them at Leucas ,

Cnemus and his thousand heavy infantry had run into the gulf, giving
 the slip to Phormio, the commander of the Athenian squadron
 stationed off Naupactus , and began at once to prepare for the
 land expedition.

The Hellenic troops with him consisted of the Ambraciots, Leucadians,
 and Anactorians, and the thousand Peloponnesians with whom he came;
 the barbarian of a thousand Chaonians, who, belonging to a nation
 that has no king, were led by Photius and Nicanor, the two members
 of the royal family to whom the chieftainship for that year had been
 confided. 
 With the Chaonians came also some Thesprotians, like them without a
 king,

some Molossians and Atintanians led by Sabylinthus, the guardian of
 king Tharyps who was still a minor, and some Paravaeans, under their
 King Oroedus, accompanied by a thousand Orestians, subjects of King
 Antiochus and placed by him under the command of Oroedus.

There were also a thousand Macedonians sent by Perdiccas without the
 knowledge of the Athenians, but they arrived too late.

With this force Cnemus set out, without waiting for the fleet from
 Corinth . 
 Passing through the territory of Amphilochian Argos ,
 and sacking the open village of Limnaea, they advanced to Stratus
 the Acarnanian capital; this once taken, the rest of the country,
 they felt convinced would speedily follow.

The Acarnanians, finding themselves
 invaded by a large army by land, and from the sea threatened by a
 hostile fleet, made no combined attempt at resistance, but remained
 to defend their homes, and sent for help to Phormio, who replied
 that when a fleet was on the point of sailing from Corinth , it was impossible for
 him to leave Naupactus unprotected.

The Peloponnesians meanwhile and their allies advanced upon Stratus
 in three divisions, with the intention of encamping near it and
 attempting the wall by force if they failed to succeed by
 negotiation.

The order of march was as follows: the center was occupied by the
 Chaonians and the rest of the barbarians, with the Leucadians and
 Anactorians and their followers on the right, and Cnemus with the
 Peloponnesians and Ambraciots on the left; each division being a
 long way off from, and sometimes even out of sight of, the
 others.

The Hellenes advanced in good order, keeping a look-out till they
 encamped in a good position; but the Chaonians, filled with
 self-confidence, and having the highest character for courage among
 the tribes of that part of the continent, without waiting to occupy
 their camp, rushed on with the rest of the barbarians, in the idea
 that they should take the town by assault and obtain the sole glory
 of the enterprise.

While they were coming on, the Stratians, becoming aware how things
 stood, and thinking that the defeat of this division would
 considerably dishearten the Hellenes behind it, occupied the
 environs of the town with ambuscades, and as soon as they approached
 engaged them at close quarters from the city and the ambuscades.

A panic seizing the Chaonians, great numbers of them were slain; and
 as soon as they were seen to give way the rest of the barbarians
 turned and fled.

Owing to the distance by which their allies had preceded them,
 neither of the Hellenic divisions knew anything of the battle, but
 fancied they were hastening on to encamp.

However, when the flying barbarians broke in upon them, they opened
 their ranks to receive them, brought their divisions together, and
 stopped quiet where they were for the day; the Stratians not
 offering to engage them, as the rest of the Acarnanians had not yet
 arrived, but contenting themselves with slinging at them from a
 distance, which distressed them greatly, as there was no stirring
 without their armor. 
 The Acarnanians would seem to excel in this mode of warfare.

As soon as night fell, Cnemus hastily
 drew off his army to the river Anapus, about nine miles from
 Stratus, recovering his dead next day under truce, and being there
 joined by the friendly Oeniadae, fell back upon their city before
 the enemy's reinforcements came up. 
 From hence each returned home; and the Stratians set up a trophy for
 the battle with the barbarians.

Meanwhile the fleet from Corinth and the rest of the
 confederates in the Crissaean gulf, which was to have co-operated
 with Cnemus and prevented the coast Acarnanians from joining their
 countrymen in the interior, was disabled from doing so by being
 compelled about the same time as the battle at Stratus to fight with
 Phormio and the twenty Athenian vessels stationed at Naupactus .

For they were watched, as they coasted along out of the gulf, by
 Phormio, who wished to attack in the open sea.

But the Corinthians and allies had started for Acarnania without any idea of
 fighting at sea, and with vessels more like transports for carrying
 soldiers; besides which, they never dreamed of the twenty Athenian
 ships venturing to engage their forty-seven. 
 However, while they were coasting along their own shore, there were
 the Athenians sailing along in line with them; and when they tried
 to cross over from Patrae in Achaea to the mainland on the other side, on their
 way to Acarnania , they saw
 them again coming out from Chalcis and the river Evenus to meet them. 
 They slipped from their moorings in the night, but were observed, and
 were at length compelled to fight in mid passage.

Each state that contributed to the armament had its own general; the
 Corinthian commanders were Machaon, Isocrates, and
 Agatharchidas.

The Peloponnesians ranged their vessels in as large a circle as
 possible without leaving an opening, with the prows outside and the
 sterns in; and placed within all the small craft in company, and
 their five best sailors to issue out at a moment's notice and
 strengthen any point threatened by the enemy.

The Athenians, formed in line, sailed
 round and round them, and forced them to contract their circle, by
 continually brushing past and making as though they would attack at
 once, having been previously cautioned by Phormio not to do so till
 he gave the signal.

His hope was that the Peloponnesians would not retain their order
 like a force on shore, but that the ships would fall foul of one
 another and the small craft cause confusion; and if the wind should
 blow from the gulf (in expectation of which he kept sailing round
 them, and which usually rose towards morning), they would not, he
 felt sure, remain steady an instant. 
 He also thought that it rested with him to attack when he pleased, as
 his ships were better sailors, and that an attack timed by the
 coming of the wind would tell best.

When the wind came down, the enemy's ships were now in a narrow
 space, and what with the wind and the small craft dashing against
 them, at once fell into confusion: ship fell foul of ship, while the
 crews were pushing them off with poles, and by their shouting,
 swearing and struggling with one another, made captains' orders and
 boatswains' cries alike inaudible, and through being unable for want
 of practice to clear their oars in the rough water, prevented the
 vessels from obeying their helmsmen properly. 
 At this moment Phormio gave the signal, and the Athenians
 attacked. 
 Sinking first one of the admirals, they then disabled all they came
 across, so that no one thought of resistance for the confusion, but
 fled for Patrae and
 Dyme in Achaea .

The Athenians gave chase and captured twelve ships, and taking most
 of the men out of them sailed to Molycrium, and after setting up a
 trophy on the promontory of Rhium and dedicating a ship to Poseidon,
 returned to Naupactus .

As for the Peloponnesians, they at once sailed with their remaining
 ships along the coast from Dyme and Patrae to Cyllene, the Eleian arsenal; where Cnemus
 and the ships from Leucas that were to have joined them, also arrived
 after the battle of Stratus.

The Lacedaemonians now sent to the
 fleet to Cnemus three commissioners, Timocrates, Brasidas, and
 Lycophron, with orders to prepare to engage again with better
 fortune, and not to be driven from the sea by a few vessels;

for they could not at all account for their discomfiture, the less so
 as it was their first attempt at sea; and they fancied that it was
 not that their marine was so inferior, but that there had been
 misconduct somewhere, not considering the long experience of the
 Athenians as compared with the little practice which they had had
 themselves. 
 The commissioners were accordingly sent in anger.

As soon as they arrived they set to work with Cnemus to order ships
 from the different states, and to put those which they already had
 in fighting order.

Meanwhile Phormio sent word to Athens of their preparations and his own victory,
 and desired as many ships as possible to be speedily sent to him, as
 he stood in daily expectation of a battle.

Twenty were accordingly sent, but instructions were given to their
 commander to go first to Crete . 
 For Nicias, a Cretan of Gortys, who was Proxenus of the Athenians,
 had persuaded them to sail against Cydonia , promising to procure the reduction of that
 hostile town; his real wish being to oblige the Polichnitans,
 neighbors of the Cydonians.

He accordingly went with the ships to Crete , and, accompanied by the Polichnitans, laid
 waste the lands of the Cydonians; and, what with adverse winds and
 stress of weather, wasted no little time there.

While the Athenians were thus
 detained in Crete , the
 Peloponnesians in Cyllene got ready for battle, and coasted along to
 Panormus in
 Achaea , where their
 land army had come to support them.

Phormio also coasted along to Molycrian Rhium, and anchored outside
 it with twenty ships, the same as he had fought with before.

This Rhium was friendly to the Athenians. 
 The other, in Peloponnese ,
 lies opposite to it; the sea between them is about three-quarters of
 a mile broad, and forms the mouth of the Crissaean gulf.

At this, the Achaean Rhium, not far off Panormus , where their army
 lay, the Peloponnesians now cast anchor with seventy-seven ships,
 when they saw the Athenians do so.

For six or seven days they remained opposite each other, practising
 and preparing for the battle; the one resolved not to sail out of
 the Rhia into the open sea, for fear of the disaster which had
 already happened to them, the other not to sail into the straits,
 thinking it advantageous to the enemy to fight in the narrows.

At last Cnemus and Brasidas and the rest of the Peloponnesian
 commanders, being desirous of bringing on a battle as soon as
 possible, before reinforcements should arrive from Athens , and noticing that the
 men were most of them cowed by the previous defeat and out of heart
 for the business, first called them together and encouraged them as
 follows:—

‘Peloponnesians, the late engagement
 which may have made some of you afraid of the one now in prospect,
 really gives no just ground for apprehension.

Preparation for it, as you know, there was little enough; and the
 object of our voyage was not so much to fight at sea as an
 expedition by land. 
 Besides this, the chances of war were largely against us; and perhaps
 also inexperience had something to do with our failure in our first
 naval action.

It was not, therefore, cowardice that produced our defeat, nor ought
 the determination which force has not quelled, but which still has a
 word to say with its adversary, to lose its edge from the result of
 an accident; but admitting the possibility of a chance miscarriage,
 we should know that brave hearts must be always brave, and while
 they remain so can never put forward inexperience as an excuse for
 misconduct.

Nor are you so behind the enemy in experience as you are ahead of him
 in courage; and although the science of your opponents would, if
 valor accompanied it, have also the presence of mind to carry out at
 an emergency the lesson it has learnt, yet a faint heart will make
 all art powerless in the face of danger. 
 For fear takes away presence of mind, and without valor art is
 useless.

Against their superior experience set your superior daring, and
 against the fear induced by defeat the fact of your having been then
 unprepared;

remember, too, that you have always the advantage of superior
 numbers, and of engaging off your own coast, supported by your heavy
 infantry; and as a rule, numbers and equipment give victory.

At no point, therefore, is defeat likely; and as for our previous
 mistakes, the very fact of their occurrence will teach us better for
 the future.

Steersmen and sailors may, therefore, confidently attend to their
 several duties, none quitting the station assigned to them;

as for ourselves, we promise to prepare for the engagement at least
 as well as your previous commanders, and to give no excuse for any
 one misconducting himself. 
 Should any insist on doing so, he shall meet with the punishment he
 deserves, while the brave shall be honored with the appropriate
 rewards of valor.’

The Peloponnesian commanders
 encouraged their men after this fashion. 
 Phormio, meanwhile, being himself not without fears for the courage
 of his men, and noticing that they were forming in groups among
 themselves and were alarmed at the odds against them, desired to
 call them together and give them confidence and counsel in the
 present emergency.

He had before continually told them, and had accustomed their minds
 to the idea, that there was no numerical superiority that they could
 not face; and the men themselves had long been persuaded that
 Athenians need never retire before any quantity of Peloponnesian
 vessels.

At the moment, however, he saw that they were dispirited by the sight
 before them, and wishing to refresh their confidence, called them
 together and spoke as follows:—

‘I see, my men, that you are
 frightened by the number of the enemy, and I have accordingly called
 you together, not liking you to be afraid of what is not really
 terrible.

In the first place, the Peloponnesians, already defeated, and not
 even themselves thinking that they are a match for us, have not
 ventured to meet us on equal terms, but have equipped this multitude
 of ships against us. 
 Next, as to that upon which they most rely, the courage which they
 suppose constitutional to them, their confidence here only arises
 from the success which their experience in land service usually
 gives them, and which they fancy will do the same for them at
 sea.

But this advantage will in all justice belong to us on this element,
 if to them on that; as they are not superior to us in courage, but
 we are each of us more confident, according to our experience in our
 particular department.

Besides, as the Lacedaemonians use their supremacy over the allies to
 promote their own glory, they are most of them being brought into
 danger against their will, or they would never, after such a decided
 defeat, have ventured upon a fresh engagement.

You need not, therefore, be afraid of their dash. 
 You, on the contrary, inspire a much greater and better founded
 alarm, both because of your late victory and also of their belief
 that we should not face them unless about to do something worthy of
 a success so signal.

An adversary numerically superior, like the one before us, comes into
 action trusting more to strength than to resolution; while he who
 voluntarily confronts tremendous odds must have very great internal
 resources to draw upon. 
 For these reasons the Peloponnesians fear our irrational audacity
 more than they would ever have done a more commensurate
 preparation.

Besides, many armaments have before now succumbed to an inferior
 through want of skill or sometimes of courage; neither of which
 defects certainly are ours.

As to the battle, it shall not be, if I can help it, in the strait,
 nor will I sail in there at all; seeing that in a contest between a
 number of clumsily managed vessels and a small, fast, well-handled
 squadron, want of sea room is an undoubted disadvantage. 
 One cannot run down an enemy properly without having a sight of him a
 good way off, nor can one retire at need when pressed; one can
 neither break the line nor return upon his rear, the proper tactics
 for a fast sailor; but the naval action necessarily becomes a land
 one, in which numbers must decide the matter.

For all this I will provide as far as can be. 
 Do you stay at your posts by your ships, and be sharp at catching the
 word of command, the more so as we are observing one another from so
 short a distance; and in action think order and silence all
 important—qualities useful in war generally, and in naval
 engagements in particular—; and behave before the enemy in a manner
 worthy of your past exploits.

The issues you will fight for are great—to destroy the naval hopes of
 the Peloponnesians or to bring nearer to the Athenians their fears
 for the sea.

And I may once more remind you that you have defeated most of them
 already; and beaten men do not face a danger twice with the same
 determination.’

Such was the exhortation of
 Phormio. 
 The Peloponnesians finding that the Athenians did not sail into the
 gulf and the narrows, in order to lead them in whether they wished
 it or not, put out at dawn, and forming four abreast, sailed inside
 the gulf in the direction of their own country, the right wing
 leading as they had lain at anchor.

In this wing were placed twenty of their best sailors; so that in the
 event of Phormio thinking that their object was Naupactus , and coasting
 along thither to save the place, the Athenians might not be able to
 escape their onset by getting outside their wing, but might be cut
 off by the vessels in question.

As they expected, Phormio, in alarm for the place at that moment
 emptied of its garrison, as soon as he saw them put out, reluctantly
 and hurriedly embarked and sailed along shore; the Messenian land
 forces moving along also to support him.

The Peloponnesians seeing him coasting along with his ships in single
 file, and by this inside the gulf and close in shore as they so much
 wished, at one signal tacked suddenly and bore down in line at their
 best speed on the Athenians, hoping to cut off the whole
 squadron.

The eleven leading vessels, however, escaped the Peloponnesian wing
 and its sudden movement, and reached the more open water; but the
 rest were overtaken as they tried to run through, driven ashore and
 disabled; such of the crews being slain as had not swum out of
 them.

Some of the ships the Peloponnesians lashed to their own, and towed
 off empty; one they took with the men in it; others were just being
 towed off, when they were saved by the Messenians dashing into the
 sea with their armor and fighting from the decks that they had
 boarded.

Thus far victory was with the
 Peloponnesians, and the Athenian fleet destroyed; the twenty ships
 in the right wing being meanwhile in chase of the eleven Athenian
 vessels that had escaped their sudden movement and reached the more
 open water. 
 These, with the exception of one ship, all out-sailed them and got
 safe into Naupactus ,
 and forming close in shore opposite the temple of Apollo, with their
 prows facing the enemy, prepared to defend themselves in case the
 Peloponnesians should sail in shore against them.

After a while the Peloponnesians came up, chanting the paean for
 their victory as they sailed on; the single Athenian ship remaining
 being chased by a Leucadian far ahead of the rest.

But there happened to be a merchantman lying at anchor in the
 roadstead, which the Athenian ship found time to sail round, and
 struck the Leucadian in chase amidships and sank her.

An exploit so sudden and unexpected produced a panic among the
 Peloponnesians; and having fallen out of order in the excitement of
 victory, some of them dropped their oars and stopped their way in
 order to let the main body come up—an unsafe thing to do considering
 how near they were to the enemy's prows; while others ran aground in
 the shallows, in their ignorance of the localities.

Elated at this incident, the
 Athenians at one word gave a cheer, and dashed at the enemy, who,
 embarrassed by his mistakes and the disorder in which he found
 himself, only stood for an instant, and then fled for Panormus , whence he had put
 out.

The Athenians following on his heels took the six vessels nearest
 them, and recovered those of their own which had been disabled close
 in shore and taken in tow at the beginning of the action; they
 killed some of the crews and took some prisoners.

On board the Leucadian which went down off the merchantman, was the
 Lacedaemonian Timocrates, who killed himself when the ship was sunk,
 and was cast up in the harbor of Naupactus .

The Athenians on their return set up a trophy on the spot from which
 they had put out and turned the day, and picking up the wrecks and
 dead that were on their shore, gave back to the enemy their dead
 under truce.

The Peloponnesians also set up a trophy as victors for the defeat
 inflicted upon the ships they had disabled in shore, and dedicated
 the vessel which they had taken at Achaean Rhium, side by side with
 the trophy.

After this, apprehensive of the reinforcement expected from
 Athens , all except
 the Leucadians sailed into the Crissaean gulf for Corinth .

Not long after their retreat, the twenty Athenian ships, which were
 to have joined Phormio before the battle, arrived at Naupactus .

Thus the summer ended. 
 Winter was now at hand; but before dispersing the fleet, which had
 retired to Corinth and
 the Crissaean gulf, Cnemus, Brasidas, and the other Peloponnesian
 captains allowed themselves to be persuaded by the Megarians to make
 an attempt upon Piraeus , the port of Athens , which from her decided superiority at sea
 had been naturally left unguarded and open.

Their plan was as follows:—The men were each to take their oar,
 cushion, and rowlock thong, and going overland from Corinth to the sea on the
 Athenian side, to get to Megara as quickly as they could, and launching
 forty vessels, which happened to be in the docks at Nisaea , to sail at once to
 Piraeus .

There was no fleet on the look-out in the harbor, and no one had the
 least idea of the enemy attempting a surprise; while an open attack
 would, it was thought, never be deliberately ventured on or if in
 contemplation, would be speedily known at Athens . 
 Their plan formed, the next step was to put it in execution.

Arriving by night and launching the vessels from Nisaea , they sailed, not to
 Piraes as they had originally intended, being afraid of the risk,
 besides which there was some talk of a wind having stopped them, but
 to the point of Salamis that looks towards Megara ; where there was a fort
 and a squadron of three ships to prevent anything sailing in or out
 of Megara . 
 This fort they assaulted, and towed off the galleys empty, and
 surprising the inhabitants began to lay waste the rest of the
 island.

Meanwhile fire signals were raised to
 alarm Athens , and a
 panic ensued there as serious as any that occurred during the
 war. 
 The idea in the city was that the enemy had already sailed into
 Piraeus ; in
 Piraeus it was
 thought that they had taken Salamis and might at any moment arrive in the port;
 as indeed might easily have been done if their hearts had been a
 little firmer; certainly no wind would have prevented them.

As soon as day broke the Athenians assembled in full force, launched
 their ships, and embarking in haste and uproar went with the fleet
 to Salamis ,
 while their soldiery mounted guard in Piraeus .

The Peloponnesians, on becoming aware of the coming relief, after
 they had overrun most of Salamis , hastily sailed off with their plunder and
 captives and the three ships from Fort Budorum to Nisaea ; the state of their
 ships also causing them some anxiety, as it was a long while since
 they had been launched, and they were not water-tight. 
 Arrived at Megara , they
 returned back on foot to Corinth .

The Athenians finding them no longer at Salamis , sailed back
 themselves; and after this made arrangements for guarding Piraeus more diligently in
 future, by closing the harbors, and by other suitable precautions.

About the same time, at the beginning
 of this winter, Sitalces, son of Teres, the Odrysian king of
 Thrace , made an
 expedition against Perdiccas, son of Alexander, king of Macedonia , and the Chalcidians in
 the neighborhood of Thrace ;
 his object being to enforce one promise and fulfil another.

On the one hand Perdiccas had made him a promise, when hard pressed
 at the commencement of the war, upon condition that Sitalces should
 reconcile the Athenians to him and not attempt to restore his
 brother and enemy, the pretender Philip, but had not offered to
 fulfil his engagement; on the other he, Sitalces, on entering into
 alliance with the Athenians, had agreed to put an end to the
 Chalcidian war in Thrace .

These were the two objects of his invasion. 
 With him he brought Amyntas, the son of Philip, whom he destined for
 the throne of Macedonia ,
 and some Athenian envoys then at his court on this business, and
 Hagnon as general; for the Athenians were to join him against the
 Chalcidians with a fleet and as many soldiers as they could get
 together.

Beginning with the Odrysians, he
 first called out the Thracian tribes subject to him between Mounts
 Haemus and Rhodope and the
 Euxine and Hellespont ; next
 the Getae beyond Haemus ,
 and the other hordes settled south of the Danube in the neighborhood of the
 Euxine, who, like the Getae, border on the Scythians and are armed
 in the same manner, being all mounted archers.

Besides these he summoned many of the Hill Thracian independent
 swordsmen, called Dii and mostly inhabiting Mount Rhodope, some of
 whom came as mercenaries, others as volunteers;

also the Agrianes and Laeaeans, and the rest of the Paeonian tribes
 in his empire, at the confines of which these lay, extending up to
 the Laeaean Paeonians and the river Strymon, which flows from Mount
 Scombrus through the country of the Agrianes and Laeaeans; there the
 empire of Sitalces ends and the territory of the independent
 Paeonians begins.

Bordering on the Triballi, also independent, were the Treres and
 Tilataeans, who dwell to the north of Mount Scombrus and extend
 towards the setting sun as far as the river Oskius. 
 This river rises in the same mountains as the Nestus and Hebrus , a wild and extensive range
 connected with Rhodope .

The empire of the Odrysians extended
 along the seaboard from Abdera to the mouth of the Danube in the Euxine. 
 The navigation of this coast by the shortest route takes a
 merchantman four days and four nights with a wind astern the whole
 way: by land an active man, travelling by the shortest road, can get
 from Abdera to the
 Danube in eleven
 days.

Such was the length of its coast line. 
 Inland from Byzantium 
 to the Laeaeans and the Strymon, the farthest limit of its extension
 into the interior, it is a journey of thirteen days for an active
 man.

The tribute from all the barbarian districts and the Hellenic cities,
 taking what they brought in under Seuthes, the successor of
 Sitalces, who raised it to its greatest height, amounted to about
 four hundred talents in gold and silver. 
 There were also presents in gold and silver to a no less amount,
 besides stuff, plain and embroidered, and other articles, made not
 only for the king, but also for the Odrysian lords and nobles.

For there was here established a custom opposite to that prevailing
 in the Persian kingdom, namely, of taking rather than giving; more
 disgrace being attached to not giving when asked than to asking and
 being refused; and although this prevailed elsewhere in Thrace , it was practised most
 extensively among the powerful Odrysians, it being impossible to get
 anything done without a present.

It was thus a very powerful kingdom; in revenue and general
 prosperity surpassing all in Europe between the Ionian gulf and the Euxine, and
 in numbers and military resources coming decidedly next to the
 Scythians,

with whom indeed no people in Europe can bear comparison, there not being even in
 Asia any nation singly
 a match for them if unanimous, though of course they are not on a
 level with other races in general intelligence and the arts of
 civilized life.

It was the master of this empire that
 now prepared to take the field. 
 When everything was ready, he set out on his march for Macedonia , first through his own
 dominions, next over the desolate range of Cercine that divides the
 Sintians and Paeonians, crossing by a road which he had made by
 felling the timber on a former campaign against the latter
 people.

Passing ever these mountains, with the Paeonians on his right and the
 Sintians and Maedians on the left, he finally arrived at Doberus, in
 Paeonia,

losing none of his army on the march, except perhaps by sickness, but
 receiving some augmentations, many of the independent Thracians
 volunteering to join him in the hope of plunder; so that the whole
 is said to have formed a grand total of a hundred and fifty
 thousand.

Most of this was infantry, though there was about a third cavalry,
 furnished principally by the Odrysians themselves and next to them
 by the Getae. 
 The most warlike of the infantry were the independent swordsmen who
 came down from Rhodope ; the
 rest of the mixed multitude that followed him being chiefly
 formidable by their numbers.

Assembling in Doberus, they prepared
 for descending from the heights upon Lower Macedonia , where the dominions of
 Perdiccas lay;

for the Lyncestae, Elimiots, and other tribes more inland, though
 Macedonians by blood and allies and, dependents of their kindred,
 still have their own separate governments.

The country on the sea coast, now called Macedonia, was first
 acquired by Alexander, the father of Perdiccas, and his ancestors,
 originally Temenids from Argos . 
 This was effected by the expulsion from Pieria of the Pierians, who afterwards inhabited
 Phagres and other places under Mount Pangaeus, beyond the Strymon
 (indeed the country between Pangaeus and the sea is still called the
 Pierian gulf) of the Bottiaeans, at present neighbors of the
 Chalcidians, from Bottia,

and by the acquisition in Paeonia of a narrow strip along the river
 Axius extending to
 Pella and the sea;
 the district of Mygdonia, between the Axius and the Strymon, being also added by the
 expulsion of the Edonians.

From Eordia also were driven the Eordians, most of whom perished,
 though a few of them still live round Physca, and the Almopians from
 Almopia.

These Macedonians also conquered places belonging to the other
 tribes, which are still theirs—Anthemus, Crestonia, Bisaltia, and
 much of Macedonia 
 proper. 
 The whole is now called Macedonia , and at the time of the invasion of
 Sitalces, Perdiccas, Alexander's son, was the reigning king.

These Macedonians, unable to take the
 field against so numerous an invader, shut themselves up in such
 strong places and fortresses as the country possessed.

Of these there was no great number, most of those now found in the
 country having been erected subsequently by Archelaus, the son of
 Perdiccas, on his accession, who also cut straight roads, and
 otherwise put the kingdom on a better footing as regards horses,
 heavy infantry, and other war material than had been done by all the
 eight kings that preceded him.

Advancing from Doberus, the Thracian host first invaded what had been
 once Philip's government, and took Idomene by assault, Gortynia,
 Atalanta, and some other places by negotiation, these last coming
 over for love of Philip's son, Amyntas, then with Sitalces. 
 Laying siege to Europus , and failing to take
 it,

he next advanced into the rest of Macedonia to the left of Pella and Cyrrhus, not
 proceeding beyond this into Bottia and Pieria , but staying to lay waste Mygdonia,
 Crestonia, and Anthemus.

The Macedonians never even thought of meeting him with infantry; but
 the Thracian host was, as opportunity offered, attacked by handfuls
 of their horse, which had been reinforced from their allies in the
 interior. 
 Armed with cuirasses, and excellent horsemen, wherever these charged
 they overthrew all before them, but ran considerable risk in
 entangling themselves in the masses of the enemy, and so finally
 desisted from these efforts, deciding that they were not strong
 enough to venture against numbers so superior.

Meanwhile Sitacles opened
 negotiations with Perdiccas on the objects of his expedition; and
 finding that the Athenians, not believing that he would come, did
 not appear with their fleet, though they sent presents and envoys,
 despatched a large part of his army against the Chalcidians and
 Bottiaeans, and cutting them up inside their walls laid waste their
 country.

While he remained in these parts, the people farther south, such as
 the Thessalians, and the Hellenes as far as Thermopylae , all feared
 that the army might advance against them, and prepared
 accordingly.

These fears were shared by the Thracians beyond the Strymon to the
 north, who inhabited the plains, such as the Panaeans, the Odomanti,
 the Droi and the Dersaeans, all of whom are independent.

It was even matter of conversation among the Hellenes who were
 enemies of Athens 
 whether he might not be invited by his ally to advance also against
 them.

Meanwhile he held Chalcidice 
 and Bottice and Macedonia ,
 and was ravaging them all; but finding that he was not succeeding in
 any of the objects of his invasion, and that his army was without
 provisions and was suffering from the severity of the season, he
 listened to the advice of Seuthes, son of Sparadocus, his nephew and
 highest officer, and decided to retreat without delay. 
 This Seuthes had been secretly gained by Perdiccas by the promise of
 his sister in marriage with a rich dowry.

In accordance with this advice, and after a stay of thirty days in
 all, eight of which were spent in Chalcidice , he retired home as quickly as he could;
 and Perdiccas afterwards gave his sister Stratonice to Seuthes as he
 had promised. 
 Such was the history of the expedition of Sitalces.

In the course of this winter, after
 the dispersion of the Peloponnesian fleet, the Athenians in
 Naupactus , under
 Phormio, coasted along to Astacus , and disembarked, and marched into the
 interior of Acarnania with
 four hundred Athenian heavy infantry and four hundred
 Messenians. 
 After expelling some suspected persons from Stratus, Coronta, and
 other places, and restoring Cynes, son of Theolytus, to Coronta,
 they returned to their ships,

deciding that it was impossible in the winter season to march against
 Oeniadae, a place which, unlike the rest of Acarnania , had been always hostile
 to them; for the river Achelous flowing from Mount Pindus through
 Dolopia and the country of the Agraeans and Amphilochians and the
 plain of Acarnania , past
 the town of Stratus in the upper part of its course, forms lakes
 where it falls into the sea round Oeniadae, and thus makes it
 impracticable for an army in winter by reason of the water.

Opposite to Oeniadae lie most of the islands called Echinades, so
 close to the mouths of the Achelous that that powerful stream is
 constantly forming deposits against them, and has already joined
 some of the islands to the continent, and seems likely in no long
 while to do the same with the rest.

For the current is strong, deep, and turbid, and the islands are so
 thick together that they serve to imprison the alluvial deposit and
 prevent its dispersing, lying, as they do, not in one line, but
 irregularly, so as to leave no direct passage for the water into the
 open sea.

The islands in question are uninhabited and of no great size. 
 There is also a story that Alcmaeon, son of Amphiaraus, during his
 wanderings after the murder of his mother was bidden by Apollo to
 inhabit this spot, through an oracle which intimated that he would
 have no release from his terrors until he should find a country to
 dwell in which had not been seen by the sun; or existed as land at
 the time he slew his mother; all else being to him polluted
 ground.

Perplexed at this, the story goes on to say, he at last observed this
 deposit of the Achelous, and considered that a place sufficient to
 support life upon, might have been thrown up during the long
 interval that had elapsed since the death of his mother and the
 beginning of his wanderings. 
 Settling, therefore, in the district round Oeniadae, he founded a
 dominion, and left the country its name from his son Acarnan. 
 Such is the story we have received concerning Alcmaeon.

The Athenians and Phormio putting
 back from Acarnania and
 arriving at Naupactus , sailed home to Athens in the spring, taking
 with them the ships that they had captured, and such of the
 prisoners made in the late actions as were freemen; who were
 exchanged, man for man.

And so ended this winter, and the third year of this war, of which
 Thucydides was the historian.

The next summer, just as the corn was
 getting ripe, the Peloponnesians and their allies invaded Attica under the command of
 Archidamus, son of Zeuxidamus, king of the Lacedaemonians,

and sat down and ravaged the land; the Athenian horse as usual
 attacking them, wherever it was practicable, and preventing the mass
 of the light troops from advancing from their camp and wasting the
 parts near the city.

After staying the time for which they had taken provisions, the
 invaders retired and dispersed to their several cities.

Immediately after the invasion of the
 Peloponnesians all Lesbos ,
 except Methymna ,
 revolted from the Athenians. 
 The Lesbians had wished to revolt even before the war, but the
 Lacedaemonians would not receive them; and yet now when they did
 revolt, they were compelled to do so sooner than they had
 intended.

While they were waiting until the moles for their harbors and the
 ships and walls that they had in building should be finished, and
 for the arrival of archers and corn and other things that they were
 engaged in fetching from the Pontus ,

the Tenedians, with whom they were at enmity, and the Methymnians,
 and some factious persons in Mitylene itself, who were Proxeni of Athens , informed the Athenians
 that the Mitylenians were forcibly uniting the island under their
 sovereignty, and that the preparations about which they were so
 active, were all concerted with the Boeotians their kindred and the
 Lacedaemonians with a view to a revolt, and that unless they were
 immediately prevented, Athens would lose Lesbos .

However, the Athenians, distressed by
 the plague, and by the war that had recently broken out and was now
 raging, thought it a serious matter to add Lesbos with its fleet and
 untouched resources to the list of their enemies; and at first would
 not believe the charge, giving too much weight to their wish that it
 might not be true. 
 But when an embassy which they sent had failed to persuade the
 Mitylenians to give up the union and preparations complained of,
 they became alarmed, and resolved to strike the first blow.

They accordingly suddenly sent off forty ships that had been got
 ready to sail round Peloponnese , under the command of Cleippides, son
 of Deinias, and two others;

word having been brought them of a festival in honor of the Malean
 Apollo outside the town, which is kept by the whole people of
 Mitylene , and at
 which, if haste were made, they might hope to take them by
 surprise. 
 If this plan succeeded, well and good; if not, they were to order the
 Mitylenians to deliver up their ships and to pull down their walls,
 and if they did not obey, to declare war.

The ships accordingly set out; the ten triremes, forming the
 contingent of the Mitylenians present with the fleet according to
 the terms of the alliance, being detained by the Athenians, and
 their crews placed in custody.

However, the Mitylenians were informed of the expedition by a man who
 crossed from Athens to
 Euboea , and going
 overland to Geraestus, sailed from thence by a merchantman which he
 found on the point of putting to sea, and so arrived at Mitylene the third day after
 leaving Athens . 
 The Mitylenians accordingly refrained from going out to the temple at
 Malea, and moreover barricaded and kept guard round the
 half-finished parts of their walls and harbors.

When the Athenians sailed in not long
 after and saw how things stood, the generals delivered their orders,
 and upon the Mitylenians refusing to obey, commenced
 hostilities.

The Mitylenians, thus compelled to go to war without notice and
 unprepared, at first sailed out with their fleet and made some show
 of fighting, a little in front of the harbor; but being driven back
 by the Athenian ships, immediately offered to treat with the
 commanders, wishing, if possible, to get the ships away for the
 present upon any tolerable terms.

The Athenian commanders accepted their offers, being themselves
 fearful that they might not be able to cope with the whole of
 Lesbos ;

and an armistice having been concluded, the Mitylenians sent to
 Athens one of the
 informers, already repentant of his conduct, and others with him, to
 try to persuade the Athenians of the innocence of their intentions
 and to get the fleet recalled.

In the meantime, having no great hope of a favorable answer from
 Athens , they also
 sent off a trireme with envoys to Lacedaemon , unobserved by the Athenian fleet which
 was anchored at Malea to the north of the town.

While these envoys, reaching
 Lacedaemon after a
 difficult journey across the open sea, were negotiating for succors
 being sent them,

the ambassadors from Athens returned without having effected anything;
 and hostilities were at once begun by the Mitylenians and the rest
 of Lesbos , with the
 exception of the Methymnians, who came to the aid of the Athenians
 with the Imbrians and Lemnians and some few of the other allies.

The Mitylenians made a sortie with all their forces against the
 Athenian camp; and a battle ensued, in which they gained some slight
 advantage, but retired notwithstanding, not feeling sufficient
 confidence in themselves to spend the night upon the field. 
 After this they kept quiet wishing to wait for the chance of
 reinforcements arriving from Peloponnese before making a second venture, being
 encouraged by the arrival of Meleas, a Laconian, and Hermaeondas, a
 Theban, who had been sent off before the insurrection but had been
 unable to reach Lesbos 
 before the Athenian expedition, and who now stole in in a trireme
 after the battle, and advised them to send another trireme and
 envoys back with them, which the Mitylenians accordingly did.

Meanwhile the Athenians, greatly
 encouraged by the inaction of the Mitylenians, summoned allies to
 their aid, who came in all the quicker from seeing so little vigor
 displayed by the Lesbians, and bringing round their ships to a new
 station to the south of the town, fortified two camps, one on each
 side of the city, and instituted a blockade of both the harbors.

The sea was thus closed against the Mitylenians, who however
 commanded the whole country, with the rest of the Lesbians who had
 now joined them; the Athenians only holding a limited area round
 their camps, and using Malea more as the station for their ships and
 their market.

While the war went on in this way at
 Mitylene , the
 Athenians, about the same time in this summer, also sent thirty
 ships to Peloponnese under
 Asopius, son of Phormio; the Acarnanians insisting that the
 commander sent should be some son or relative of Phormio.

As the ships coasted along shore they ravaged the seaboard of
 Laconia ;

after which Asopius sent most of the fleet home, and himself went on
 with twelve vessels to Naupactus , and after-wards raising the whole
 Acarnanian population made an expedition against Oeniadae, the fleet
 sailing along the Achelous, while the army laid waste the
 country.

The inhabitants, however, showing no signs of submitting, he
 dismissed the land forces and himself sailed to Leucas , and making a
 descent upon Nericus was cut off during his retreat, and most of his
 troops with him, by the people in those parts aided by some
 coast-guards;

after which the Athenians sailed away, recovering their dead from the
 Leucadians under truce.

Meanwhile the envoys of the
 Mitylenians sent out in the first ship were told by the
 Lacedaemonians to come to Olympia , in order that the rest of the allies might
 hear them and decide upon their matter, and so they journeyed
 thither. 
 It was the Olympiad in which the Rhodian Dorieus gained his second
 victory,

and the envoys having been introduced to make their speech after the
 festival, spoke as follows.

‘Lacedaemonians and allies, the rule
 established among the Hellenes is not unknown to us. 
 Those who revolt in war and forsake their former confederacy are
 favorably regarded by those who receive them, in so far as they are
 of use to them, but otherwise are thought less well of, through
 being considered traitors to their former friends.

Nor is this an unfair way of judging, where the rebels and the power
 from whom they secede are at one in policy and sympathy, and a match
 for each other in resources and power, and where no reasonable
 ground exists for the rebellion. 
 But with us and the Athenians this was not the case;

and no one need think the worse of us for revolting from them in
 danger, after having been honored by them in time of peace.

Justice and honesty will be the first
 topics of our speech, especially as we are asking for alliance;
 because we know that there can never be any solid friendship between
 individuals, or union between communities that is worth the name,
 unless the parties be persuaded of each other's honesty, and be
 generally congenial the one to the other; since from difference in
 feeling springs also difference in conduct.

Between ourselves and the Athenians alliance began, when you withdrew
 from the Median war and they remained to finish the business.

But we did not become allies of the Athenians for the subjugation of
 the Hellenes, but allies of the Hellenes for their liberation from
 the Mede ;

and as long as the Athenians led us fairly we followed them loyally;
 but when we saw them relax their hostility to the Mede , to try to compass the
 subjection of the allies, then our apprehensions began.

Unable, however, to unite and defend themselves, on account of the
 number of confederates that had votes, all the allies were enslaved,
 except ourselves and the Chians, who continued to send our
 contingents as independent and nominally free.

Trust in Athens as a
 leader, however, we could no longer feel, judging by the examples
 already given; it being unlikely that she would reduce our
 fellow-confederates, and not do the same by us who were left, if
 ever she had the power.

Had we all been still independent, we
 could have had more faith in their not attempting any change; but
 the greater number being their subjects, while they were treating us
 as equals, they would naturally chafe under this solitary instance
 of independence as contrasted with the submission of the majority;
 particularly as they daily grew more powerful, and we more
 destitute.

Now the only sure basis of an alliance is for each party to be
 equally afraid of the other: he who would like to encroach is then
 deterred by the reflection that he will not have odds in his
 favour.

Again, if we were left independent, it was only because they thought
 they saw their way to empire more clearly by specious language and
 by the paths of policy than by those of force.

Not only were we useful as evidence that powers who had votes, like
 themselves, would not, surely, join them in their expeditions,
 against their will, without the party attacked being in the wrong;
 but the same system also enabled them to lead the stronger states
 against the weaker first, and so to leave the former to the last,
 stripped of their natural allies, and less capable of
 resistance.

But if they had begun with us, while all the states still had their
 resources under their own control, and there was a center to rally
 round, the work of subjugation would have been found less easy.

Besides this, our navy gave them some apprehension: it was always
 possible that it might unite with you or with some other power, and
 become dangerous to Athens .

The court which we paid to their commons and its leaders for the time
 being, also helped us to maintain our independence.

However, we did not expect to be able to do so much longer, if this
 war had not broken out, from the examples that we had had of their
 conduct to the rest.

How then could we put our trust in
 such friendship or freedom as we had here? 
 We accepted each other against our inclination; fear made them court
 us in war, and us them in peace; sympathy, the ordinary basis of
 confidence, had its place supplied by terror, fear having more share
 than friendship in detaining us in the alliance; and the first party
 that should be encouraged by the hope of impunity was certain to
 break faith with the other.

So that to condemn us for being the first to break off, because they
 delay the blow that we dread, instead of ourselves delaying to know
 for certain whether it will be dealt or not, is to take a false view
 of the case.

For if we were equally able with them to meet their plots and imitate
 their delay, we should be their equals and should be under no
 necessity of being their subjects; but the liberty of offence being
 always theirs, that of defence ought clearly to be ours.

Such, Lacedaemonians and allies, are
 the grounds and the reasons of our revolt; clear enough to convince
 our hearers of the fairness of our conduct, and sufficient to alarm
 ourselves, and to make us turn to some means of safety. 
 This we wished to do long ago, when we sent to you on the subject
 while the peace yet lasted, but were baulked by your refusing to
 receive us; and now, upon the Boeotians inviting us, we at once
 responded to the call, and decided upon a twofold revolt, from the
 Hellenes and from the Athenians, not to aid the latter in harming
 the former, but to join in their liberation, and not to allow the
 Athenians in the end to destroy us, but to act in time against
 them.

Our revolt, however has taken place prematurely and without
 preparation—a fact which makes it all the more incumbent on you to
 receive us into alliance and to send us speedy relief, in order to
 show that you support your friends, and at the same time do harm to
 your enemies.

You have an opportunity such as you never had before. 
 Disease and expenditure have wasted the Athenians: their ships are
 either cruising round your coasts, or engaged in blockading us;

and it is not probable that they will have any to spare, if you
 invade them a second time this summer by sea and land; but they will
 either offer no resistance to your vessels, or withdraw from both
 our shores.

Nor must it be thought that this is a case of putting yourselves into
 danger for a country which is not yours. 
 
 Lesbos may appear far off,
 but when help is wanted she will be found near enough. 
 It is not in Attica that the
 war will be decided, as some imagine, but in the countries by which
 Attica is
 supported;

and the Athenian revenue is drawn from the allies, and will become
 still larger if they reduce us; as not only will no other state
 revolt, but our resources will be added to theirs, and we shall be
 treated worse than those that were enslaved before.

But if you will frankly support us, you will add to your side a state
 that has a large navy, which is your great want; you will smooth the
 way to the overthrow of the Athenians by depriving them of their
 allies, who will be greatly encouraged to come over; and you will
 free yourselves from the imputation made against you, of not
 supporting insurrection. 
 In short, only show yourselves as liberators, and you may count upon
 having the advantage in the war.

Respect, therefore, the hopes placed
 in you by the Hellenes, and that Olympian Zeus, in whose temple we
 stand as very suppliants; become the allies and defenders of the
 Mitylenians, and do not sacrifice us, who put our lives upon the
 hazard, in a cause in which general good will result to all from our
 success, and still more general harm if we fail through your
 refusing to help us;

but be the men that the Hellenes think you, and our fears
 desire.’

Such were the words of the
 Mitylenians. 
 After hearing them out, the Lacedaemonians and confederates granted
 what they urged, and took the Lesbians into alliance, and deciding
 in favour of the invasion of Attica , told the allies present to march as quickly
 as possible to the Isthmus with two-thirds of their forces; and
 arriving there first themselves, got ready hauling machines to carry
 their ships across from Corinth to the sea on the side of Athens , in order to make their
 attack by sea and land at once.

However, the zeal which they displayed was not imitated by the rest
 of the confederates, who came in but slowly, being engaged in
 harvesting their corn and sick of making expeditions.

Meanwhile the Athenians, aware that
 the preparations of the enemy were due to his conviction of their
 weakness, and wishing to show him that he was mistaken, and that
 they were able, without moving the Lesbian fleet, to repel with ease
 that with which they were menaced from Peloponnese , manned a hundred ships by embarking
 the citizens of Athens ,
 except the knights and Pentecosiomedimni, and the resident aliens;
 and putting out to the Isthmus, displayed their power, and made
 descents upon Peloponnese 
 wherever they pleased.

A disappointment so signal made the Lacedaemonians think that the
 Lesbians had not spoken the truth; and embarrassed by the
 non-appearance of the confederates, coupled with the news that the
 thirty ships round Peloponnese were ravaging the lands near Sparta , they went back
 home.

Afterwards, however, they got ready a fleet to send to Lesbos , and ordering a total of
 forty ships from the different cities in the league, appointed
 Alcidas to command the expedition in his capacity of high
 admiral.

Meanwhile the Athenians in the hundred ships, upon seeing the
 Lacedaemonians go home, went home likewise.

If at the time that this fleet was at
 sea, Athens had almost
 the largest number of first-rate ships in commission that she ever
 possessed at any one moment, she had as many or even more when the
 war began.

At that time one hundred guarded Attica , Euboea , and Salamis ; a hundred
 more were cruising round Peloponnese , besides those employed at Potidaea and in other places;
 making a grand total of two hundred and fifty vessels employed on
 active service in a single summer.

It was this, with Potidaea , that most exhausted her revenues—

Potidaea being
 blockaded by a force of heavy infantry (each drawing two drachmae a
 day, one for himself and another for his servant), which amounted to
 three thousand at first, and was kept at this number down to the end
 of the siege; besides sixteen hundred with Phormio who went away
 before it was over; and the ships being all paid at the same
 rate. 
 In this way her money was wasted at first; and this was the largest
 number of ships ever manned by her.

About the same time that the
 Lacedaemonians were at the Isthmus, the Mitylenians marched by land
 with their mercenaries against Methymna , which they thought to gain by
 treachery. 
 After assaulting the town, and not meeting with the success that they
 anticipated, they withdrew to Antissa , Pyrrha , and Eresus; and taking measures for the
 better security of these towns and strengthening their walls,
 hastily returned home.

After their departure the Methymnians marched against Antissa , but were defeated in
 a sortie by the Antissians and their mercenaries, and retreated in
 haste after losing many of their number.

Word of this reaching Athens , and the Athenians learning that the
 Mitylenians were masters of the country and their own soldiers
 unable to hold them in check, they sent out about the beginning of
 autumn Paches, son of Epicurus, to take the command, and a thousand
 Athenian heavy infantry;

who worked their own passage, and arriving at Mitylene , built a single wall
 all round it, forts being erected at some of the strongest
 points.

Mitylene was thus
 blockaded strictly on both sides, by land and by sea, and winter now
 drew near.

The Athenians needing money for the
 siege, although they had for the first time raised a contribution of
 two hundred talents from their own citizens, now sent out twelve
 ships to levy subsidies from their allies, with Lysicles and four
 others in command.

After cruising to different places and laying them under
 contribution, Lysicles went up the country from Myus , in Caria , across the plain of the
 Meander, as far as the hill of Sandius; and being attacked by the
 Carians and the people of Anaia, was slain with many of his
 soldiers.

The same winter the Plataeans, who
 were still being besieged by the Peloponnesians and Boeotians,
 distressed by the failure of their provisions, and seeing no hope of
 relief from Athens , nor
 any other means of safety, formed a scheme with the Athenians
 besieged with them for escaping, if possible, by forcing their way
 over the enemy's walls; the attempt having been suggested by
 Theaenetus, son of Tolmides, a soothsayer, and Eupompides, son of
 Daimachus, one of their generals. 
 At first all were to join:

afterwards, half hung back, thinking the risk great; about two
 hundred and twenty, however, voluntarily persevered in the attempt,
 which was carried out in the following way.

Ladders were made to match the height of the enemy's wall, which they
 measured by the layers of bricks, the side turned towards them not
 being thoroughly whitewashed. 
 These were counted by many persons at once; and though some might
 miss the right calculation, most would hit upon it, particularly as
 they counted over and over again, and were no great way from the
 wall, but could see it easily enough for their purpose.

The length required for the ladders was thus obtained, being
 calculated from the breadth of the brick.

Now the wall of the Peloponnesians
 was constructed as follows. 
 It consisted of two lines drawn round the place, one against the
 Plataeans, the other against any attack on the outside from
 Athens , about
 sixteen feet apart.

The intermediate space of sixteen feet was occupied by huts portioned
 out among the soldiers on guard, and built in one block, so as to
 give the appearance of a single thick wall with battlements on
 either side.

At intervals of every ten battlements were towers of considerable
 size, and the same breadth as the wall, reaching right across from
 its inner to its outer face, with no means of passing except through
 the middle.

Accordingly on stormy and wet nights the battlements were deserted,
 and guard kept from the towers, which were not far apart and roofed
 in above. Such being the structure of
 the wall by which the Plataeans were blockaded,

when their preparations were completed, they waited for a stormy
 night of wind and rain and without any moon, and then set out,
 guided by the authors of the enterprise. 
 Crossing first the ditch that ran round the town, they next gained
 the wall of the enemy unperceived by the sentinels, who did not see
 them in the darkness, or hear them, as the wind drowned with its
 roar the noise of their approach;

besides which they kept a good way off from each other, that they
 might not be betrayed by the clash of their weapons. 
 They were also lightly equipped, and had only the left foot shod to
 preserve them from slipping in the mire.

They came up to the battlements at one of the intermediate spaces
 where they knew them to be unguarded: those who carried the ladders
 went first and planted them; next twelve light-armed soldiers with
 only a dagger and a breastplate mounted, led by Ammias, son of
 Coroebus, who was the first on the wall; his followers getting up
 after him and going six to each of the towers. 
 After these came another party of light troops armed with spears,
 whose shields, that they might advance the easier, were carried by
 men behind, who were to hand them to them when they found themselves
 in presence of the enemy.

After a good many had mounted they were discovered by the sentinels
 in the towers, by the noise made by a tile which was knocked down by
 one of the Plataeans as he was laying hold of the battlements.

The alarm was instantly given, and the troops rushed to the wall, not
 knowing the nature of the danger, owing to the dark night and stormy
 weather; the Plataeans in the town having also chosen that moment to
 make a sortie against the wall of the Peloponnesians upon the side
 opposite to that on which their men were getting over, in order to
 divert the attention of the besiegers.

Accordingly they remained distracted at their several posts, without
 any venturing to stir to give help from his own station, and at a
 loss to guess what was going on.

Meanwhile the three hundred set aside for service on emergencies went
 outside the wall in the direction of the alarm. 
 Fire-signals of an attack were also raised towards Thebes ;

but the Plataeans in the town at once displayed a number of others,
 prepared beforehand for this very purpose, in order to render the
 enemy's signals unintelligible, and to prevent his friends getting a
 true idea of what was passing and coming to his aid, before their
 comrades who had gone out should have made good their escape and be
 in safety.

Meanwhile the first of the
 scaling-party that had got up, after carrying both the towers and
 putting the sentinels to the sword, posted themselves inside to
 prevent any one coming through against them; and rearing ladders
 from the wall, sent several men up on the towers, and from their
 summit and base kept in check all of the enemy that came up, with
 their missiles, while their main body planted a number of ladders
 against the wall, and knocking down the battlements, passed over
 between the towers;

each as soon as he had got over taking up his station at the edge of
 the ditch, and plying from thence with arrows and darts any who came
 along the wall to stop the passage of his comrades.

When all were over, the party on the towers came down, the last of
 them not without difficulty, and proceeded to the ditch, just as the
 three hundred came up carrying torches.

The Plataeans, standing on the edge of the ditch in the dark, had a
 good view of their opponents, and discharged their arrows and darts
 upon the unarmed parts of their bodies, while they themselves could
 not be so well seen in the obscurity for the torches; and thus even
 the last of them got over the ditch, though not without effort and
 difficulty;

as ice had formed in it, not strong enough to walk upon, but of that
 watery kind which generally comes with a wind more east than north,
 and the snow which this wind had caused to fall during the night,
 had made the water in the ditch rise, so that they could scarcely
 breast it as they crossed. 
 However, it was mainly the violence of the storm that enabled them to
 effect their escape at all.

Starting from the ditch, the
 Plataeans went all together along the road leading to Thebes , keeping the chapel of
 the hero Androcrates upon their right; considering that the last
 road which the Peloponnesians would suspect them of having taken
 would be that towards their enemies' country. 
 Indeed they could see them pursuing with torches upon the Athens road towards Cithaeron
 and Druoskephalai or Oakheads.

After going for rather more than half a mile upon the road to
 Thebes , the
 Plataeans turned off and took that leading to the mountain, to
 Erythrae and Hysiae, and reaching the hills, made good their escape
 to Athens , two hundred
 and twelve men in all; some of their number having turned back into
 the town before getting over the wall, and one archer having been
 taken prisoner at the outer ditch.

Meanwhile the Peloponnesians gave up the pursuit and returned to
 their posts; and the Plataeans in the town, knowing nothing of what
 had passed, and informed by those who had turned back that not a man
 had escaped, sent out a herald as soon as it was day to make a truce
 for the recovery of the dead bodies, and then learning the truth,
 desisted. 
 In this way the Plataean party got over and were saved.

Towards the close of the same winter,
 Salaethus, a Lacedaemonian, was sent out in a trireme from
 Lacedaemon to
 Mitylene . 
 Going by sea to Pyrrha ,
 and from thence overland, he passed along the bed of a torrent,
 where the line of circumvallation was passable, and thus entering
 unperceived into Mitylene , told the magistrates that Attica would certainly be invaded,
 and the forty ships destined to relieve them arrive, and that he had
 been sent on to announce this and to superintend matters
 generally.

The Mitylenians upon this took courage, and laid aside the idea of
 treating with the Athenians; and now this winter ended, and with it
 ended the fourth year of the war of which Thucydides was the
 historian.

The next summer the Peloponnesians
 sent off the forty-two ships for Mitylene , under Alcidas, their high admiral, and
 themselves and their allies invaded Attica , their object being to distract the
 Athenians by a double movement, and thus to make it less easy for
 them to act against the fleet sailing to Mitylene .

The commander in this invasion was Cleomenes, in the place of King
 Pausanias, son of Pleistoanax, his nephew, who was still a
 minor.

Not content with laying waste whatever had shot up in the parts which
 they had before devastated, the invaders now extended their ravages
 to lands passed over in their previous incursions; so that this
 invasion was more severely felt by the Athenians than any except the
 second;

the enemy staying on and on until they had overrun most of the
 country, in the expectation of hearing from Lesbos of something having been
 achieved by their fleet, which they thought must now have got
 over. 
 However, as they did not obtain any of the results expected, and
 their provisions began to run short, they retreated and dispersed to
 their different cities.

In the meantime the Mitylenians,
 finding their provisions failing, while the fleet from Peloponnese was loitering on the
 way instead of appearing at Mitylene , were compelled to come to terms with the
 Athenians in the following manner.

Salaethus having himself ceased to expect the fleet to arrive, now
 armed the commons with heavy armour, which they had not before
 possessed, with the intention of making a sortie against the
 Athenians.

The commons, however, no sooner found themselves possessed of arms
 than they refused any longer to obey their officers; and forming in
 knots together, told the authorities to bring out in public the
 provisions and divide them amongst them all, or they would
 themselves come to terms with the Athenians and deliver up the city.

The government, aware of their
 inability to prevent this, and of the danger they would be in, if
 left out of the capitulation, publicly agreed with Paches and the
 army to surrender Mitylene at discretion and to admit the troops into
 the town upon the understanding that the Mitylenians should be
 allowed to send an embassy to Athens to plead their cause, and that Paches should
 not imprison, make slaves of, or put to death any of the citizens
 until its return.

Such were the terms of the capitulation; in spite of which the chief
 authors of the negotiation with Lacedaemon were so completely overcome by terror
 when the army entered, that they went and seated themselves by the
 altars, from which they were raised up by Paches under promise that
 he would do them no wrong, and lodged by him in Tenedos , until he should learn
 the pleasure of the Athenians concerning them .

Paches also sent some triremes and seized Antissa , and took such other
 military measures as he thought advisable.

Meanwhile, the Peloponnesians in the
 forty ships, who ought to have made all haste to relieve Mitylene , lost time in coming
 round Peloponnese itself,
 and proceeding leisurely on the remainder of the voyage, made
 Delos without having
 been seen by the Athenians at Athens , and from thence arriving at Icarus and
 Myconus, there first heard of the fall of Mitylene .

Wishing to know the truth, they put into Embatum, in the Erythraeid,
 about seven days after the capture of the town. 
 Here they learned the truth, and began to consider what they were to
 do; and Teutiaplus, an Elean, addressed them as follows:—

‘Alcidas and Peloponnesians who share
 with me the command of this armament, my advice is to sail just as
 we are to Mitylene ,
 before we have been heard of.

We may expect to find the Athenians as much on their guard as men
 generally are who have just taken a city: this will certainly be so
 by sea, where they have no idea of any enemy attacking them, and
 where our strength, as it happens, mainly lies; while even their
 land forces are probably scattered about the houses in the
 carelessness of victory.

If therefore we were to fall upon them suddenly and in the night, I
 have hopes, with the help of the well-wishers that we may have left
 inside the town, that we shall become masters of the place.

Let us not shrink from the risk, but let us remember that this is
 just the occasion for one of the baseless panics common in war; and
 that to be able to guard against these in one's own case, and to
 detect the moment when an attack will find an enemy at this
 disadvantage, is what makes a successful general.’

These words of Teutiaplus failing to
 move Alcidas, some of the Ionian exiles and the Lesbians with the
 expedition began to urge him, since this seemed too dangerous, to
 seize one of the Ionian cities or the Aeolic town of Cyme, to use as
 a base for effecting the revolt of Ionia . 
 This was by no means a hopeless enterprise, as their coming was
 welcome everywhere; their object would be by this move to deprive
 Athens of her chief
 source of revenue, and at the same time to saddle her with expense,
 if she chose to blockade them; and they would probably induce
 Pissuthnes to join them in the war.

However, Alcidas gave this proposal as bad a reception as the other,
 being eager, since he had come too late for Mitylene , to find himself
 back in Peloponnese as soon
 as possible.

Accordingly he put out from Embatum
 and proceeded along shore; and touching at the Teian town,
 Myonnesus, there butchered most of the prisoners that he had taken
 on his passage.

Upon his coming to anchor at Ephesus , envoys came to him from the Samians at
 Anaia, and told him that he was not going the right way to free
 Hellas in massacring
 men who had never raised a hand against him, and who were not
 enemies of his, but allies of Athens against their will, and that if he did not
 stop he would turn many more friends into enemies than enemies into
 friends.

Alcidas agreed to this, and let go all the Chians still in his hands
 and some of the others that he had taken; the inhabitants, instead
 of flying at the sight of his vessels, rather coming up to them,
 taking them for Athenian, having no sort of expectation that while
 the Athenians commanded the sea Peloponnesian ships would venture
 over to Ionia .

From Ephesus Alcidas set sail in
 haste and fled. 
 He had been seen by the Salaminian and Paralian galleys, which
 happened to be sailing from Athens , while still at anchor off Clarus and
 fearing pursuit he now made across the open sea, fully determined to
 touch nowhere, if he could help it, until he got to Peloponnese .

Meanwhile news of him had come in to Paches from the Erythraeid, and
 indeed from all quarters. 
 As Ionia was unfortified
 great fears were felt that the Peloponnesians coasting along shore,
 even if they did not intend to stay, might make descents in passing
 and plunder the towns; and now the Paralian and Salaminian, having
 seen him at Clarus, themselves brought intelligence of the fact.

Paches accordingly gave hot chase, and continued the pursuit as far
 as the isle of Patmos , and
 then finding that Alcidas had got on too far to be overtaken, came
 back again. 
 Meanwhile he thought it fortunate that, as he had not fallen in with
 them out at sea, he had not overtaken them anywhere where they would
 have been forced to encamp, and so give him the trouble of
 blockading them.

On his return along shore he touched,
 among other places, at Notium , the port of Colophon , where the
 Colophonians had settled after the capture of the upper town by
 Itamenes and the barbarians, who had been called in by certain
 individuals in a party quarrel. 
 The capture of the town took place about the time of the second
 Peloponnesian invasion of Attica .

However, the refugees, after settling at Notium , again split up into
 factions, one of which called in Arcadian and barbarian mercenaries
 from Pissuthnes, and entrenching these in a quarter apart, formed a
 new community with the Median party of the Colophonians who joined
 them from the upper town. 
 Their opponents had retired into exile, and now called in Paches,

who invited Hippias, the commander of the Arcadians in the fortified
 quarter, to a parley, upon condition that, if they could not agree,
 he was to be put back safe and sound in the fortification. 
 However, upon his coming out to him, he put him into custody, though
 not in chains, and attacked suddenly and took by surprise the
 fortification, and putting the Arcadians and the barbarians found in
 it to the sword, afterwards took Hippias into it as he had promised,
 and, as soon as he was inside, seized him and shot him down.

Paches then gave up Notium to the Colophonians not of the Median party;
 and settlers were afterwards sent out from Athens , and the place colonized
 according to Athenian laws, after collecting all the Colophonians
 found in any of the cities.

Arrived at Mitylene , Paches reduced
 Pyrrha and Eresus;
 and finding the Lacedaemonian, Salaethus, in hiding in the town,
 sent him off to Athens ,
 together with the Mitylenians that he had placed in Tenedos , and any other persons
 that he thought concerned in the revolt.

He also sent back the greater part of his forces, remaining with the
 rest to settle Mitylene and the rest of Lesbos as he thought best.

Upon the arrival of the prisoners
 with Salaethus, the Athenians at once put the latter to death,
 although he offered, among other things, to procure the withdrawal
 of the Peloponnesians from Plataea , which was still under siege;

and after deliberating as to what they should do with the former, in
 the fury of the moment determined to put to death not only the
 prisoners at Athens , but
 the whole adult male population of Mitylene , and to make slaves of the women and
 children. 
 It was remarked that Mitylene had revolted without being, like the rest,
 subjected to the empire; and what above all swelled the wrath of the
 Athenians was the fact of the Peloponnesian fleet having ventured
 over to Ionia to her
 support, a fact which was held to argue a long-meditated
 rebellion.

They accordingly sent a trireme to communicate the decree to Paches,
 commanding him to lose no time in despatching the Mitylenians.

The morrow brought repentance with it and reflection on the horrid
 cruelty of a decree, which condemned a whole city to the fate
 merited only by the guilty.

This was no sooner perceived by the Mitylenian ambassadors at
 Athens and their
 Athenian supporters, than they moved the authorities to put the
 question again to the vote; which they the more easily consented to
 do, as they themselves plainly saw that most of the citizens wished
 some one to give them an opportunity for reconsidering the
 matter.

An assembly was therefore at once called, and after much expression
 of opinion upon both sides, Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, the same who
 had carried the former motion of putting the Mitylenians to death,
 the most violent man at Athens , and at that time by far the most powerful
 with the commons, came forward again and spoke as follows:—

‘I have often before now been
 convinced that a democracy is incapable of empire, and never more so
 than by your present change of mind in the matter of Mitylene .

Fears or plots being unknown to you in your daily relations with each
 other, you feel just the same with regard to your allies, and never
 reflect that the mistakes into which you may be led by listening to
 their appeals, or by giving way to your own compassion, are full of
 danger to yourselves, and bring you no thanks for your weakness from
 your allies; entirely forgetting that your empire is a despotism and
 your subjects disaffected conspirators, whose obedience is insured
 not by your suicidal concessions, but by the superiority given you
 by your own strength and not their loyalty.

The most alarming feature in the case is the constant change of
 measures with which we appear to be threatened, and our seeming
 ignorance of the fact that bad laws which are never changed are
 better for a city than good ones that have no authority; that
 unlearned loyalty is more serviceable than quick-witted
 insubordination; and that ordinary men usually manage public affairs
 better than their more gifted fellows.

The latter are always wanting to appear wiser than the laws, and to
 overrule every proposition brought forward, thinking that they
 cannot show their wit in more important matters, and by such
 behavior too often ruin their country; while those who mistrust
 their own cleverness are content to be less learned than the laws,
 and less able to pick holes in the speech of a good speaker; and
 being fair judges rather than rival athletes, generally conduct
 affairs successfully.

These we ought to imitate, instead of being led on by cleverness and
 intellectual rivalry to advise your people against our real
 opinions.

For myself, I adhere to my former
 opinion, and wonder at those who have proposed to reopen the case of
 the Mitylenians, and who are thus causing a delay which is all in
 favour of the guilty, by making the sufferer proceed against the
 offender with the edge of his anger blunted; although where
 vengeance follows most closely upon the wrong, it best equals it and
 most amply requites it. 
 I wonder also who will be the man who will maintain the contrary, and
 will pretend to show that the crimes of the Mitylenians are of
 service to us, and our misfortunes injurious to the allies.

Such a man must plainly either have such confidence in his rhetoric
 as to adventure to prove that what has been once for all decided is
 still undetermined, or be bribed to try to delude us by elaborate
 sophisms.

In such contests the state gives the rewards to others, and takes the
 dangers for herself.

The persons to blame are you who are so foolish as to institute these
 contests; who go to see an oration as you would to see a sight, take
 your facts on hearsay, judge of the practicability of a project by
 the wit of its advocates, and trust for the truth as to past events
 not to the fact which you saw more than to the clever strictures
 which you heard;

the easy victims of newfangled arguments, unwilling to follow
 received conclusions; slaves to every new paradox, despisers of the
 commonplace;

the first wish of every man being that he could speak himself, the
 next to rival those who can speak by seeming to be quite up with
 their ideas by applauding every hit almost before it is made, and by
 being as quick in catching an argument as you are slow in foreseeing
 its consequences;

asking, if I may so say, for something different from the conditions
 under which we live, and yet comprehending inadequately those very
 conditions; very slaves to the pleasure of the ear, and more like
 the audience of a rhetorician than the council of a city.

In order to keep you from this, I
 proceed to show that no one state has ever injured you as much as
 Mitylene .

I can make allowance for those who revolt because they cannot bear
 our empire, or who have been forced to do so by the enemy. 
 But for those who possessed an island with fortifications; who could
 fear our enemies only by sea, and there had their own force of
 triremes to protect them; who were independent and held in the
 highest honor by you—to act as these have done, this is not
 revolt—revolt implies oppression; it is deliberate and wanton
 aggression; an attempt to ruin us by siding with our bitterest
 enemies; a worse offence than a war undertaken on their own account
 in the acquisition of power.

The fate of those of their neighbors who had already rebelled and had
 been subdued, was no lesson to them; their own prosperity could not
 dissuade them from affronting danger; but blindly confident in the
 future, and full of hopes beyond their power though not beyond their
 ambition, they declared war and made their decision to prefer might
 to right, their attack being determined not by provocation but by
 the moment which seemed propitious.

The truth is that great good fortune coming suddenly and unexpectedly
 tends to make a people insolent: in most cases it is safer for
 mankind to have success in reason than out of reason; and it is
 easier for them, one may say, to stave off adversity than to
 preserve prosperity.

Our mistake has been to distinguish the Mitylenians as we have done:
 had they been long ago treated like the rest, they never would have
 so far forgotten themselves, human nature being as surely made
 arrogant by consideration, as it is awed by firmness.

Let them now therefore be punished as their crime requires, and do
 not, while you condemn the aristocracy, absolve the people. 
 This is certain, that all attacked you without distinction, although
 they might have come over to us, and been now again in possession of
 their city. 
 But no, they thought it safer to throw in their lot with the
 aristocracy and so joined their rebellion!

Consider therefore! if you subject to the same punishment the ally
 who is forced to rebel by the enemy, and him who does so by his own
 free choice, which of them, think you, is there that will not rebel
 upon the slightest pretext; when the reward of success is freedom,
 and the penalty of failure nothing so very terrible?

We meanwhile shall have to risk our money and our lives against one
 state after another; and if successful, shall receive a ruined town
 from which we can no longer draw the revenue upon which our strength
 depends; while if unsuccessful, we shall have an enemy the more upon
 our hands, and shall spend the time that might be employed in
 combating our existing foes in warring with our own allies.

No hope, therefore, that rhetoric may
 instil or money purchase, of the mercy due to human infirmity must
 be held out to the Mitylenians. 
 Their offence was not involuntary, but of malice and deliberate; and
 mercy is only for unwilling offenders.

I therefore now as before persist against your reversing your first
 decision, or giving way to the three failings most fatal to
 empire—pity, sentiment, and indulgence.

Compassion is due to those who can reciprocate the feeling, not to
 those who will never pity us in return, but are our natural and
 necessary foes: the orators who charm us with sentiment may find
 other less important arenas for their talents, in the place of one
 where the city pays a heavy penalty for a momentary pleasure,
 themselves receiving fine acknowledgments for their fine phrases;
 while indulgence should be shown towards those who will be our
 friends in future, instead of towards men who will remain just what
 they were, and as much our enemies as before.

To sum up shortly, I say that if you follow my advice you will do
 what is just towards the Mitylenians, and at the same time
 expedient; while by a different decision you will not oblige them so
 much as pass sentence upon yourselves. 
 For if they were right in rebelling, you must be wrong in ruling. 
 However, if, right or wrong, you determine to rule, you must carry
 out your principle and punish the Mitylenians as your interest
 requires; or else you must give up your empire and cultivate honesty
 without danger.

Make up your minds, therefore, to give them like for like; and do not
 let the victims who escaped the plot be more insensible than the
 conspirators who hatched it; but reflect what they would have done
 if victorious over you, especially as they were the aggressors.

It is they who wrong their neighbor without a cause, that pursue
 their victim to the death, on account of the danger which they
 foresee in letting their enemy survive; since the object of a wanton
 wrong is more dangerous, if he escape, than an enemy who has not
 this to complain of.

Do not, therefore, be traitors to yourselves, but recall as nearly as
 possible the moment of suffering and the supreme importance which
 you then attached to their reduction; and now pay them back in their
 turn, without yielding to present weakness or forgetting the peril
 that once hung over you. 
 Punish them as they deserve, and teach your other allies by a
 striking example that the penalty of rebellion is death. 
 Let them once understand this and you will not have so often to
 neglect your enemies while you are fighting with your own
 confederates.’

Such were the words of Cleon. 
 After him Diodotus, son of Eucrates, who had also in the previous
 assembly spoken most strongly against putting the Mitylenians to
 death, came forward and spoke as follows:—

‘I do not blame the persons who have
 reopened the case of the Mitylenians, nor do I approve the protests
 which we have heard against important questions being frequently
 debated. 
 I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and
 passion; haste usually goes hand in hand with folly, passion with
 coarseness and narrowness of mind.

As for the argument that speech ought not to be the exponent of
 action, the man who uses it must be either senseless or interested:
 senseless if he believes it possible to treat of the uncertain
 future through any other medium; interested if wishing to carry a
 disgraceful measure and doubting his ability to speak well in a bad
 cause, he thinks to frighten opponents and hearers by well-aimed
 calumny.

What is still more intolerable is to accuse a speaker of making a
 display in order to be paid for it. 
 If ignorance only were imputed, an unsuccessful speaker might retire
 with a reputation for honesty, if not for wisdom; while the charge
 of dishonesty makes him suspected, if successful, and thought, if
 defeated, not only a fool but a rogue.

The city is no gainer by such a system, since fear deprives it of its
 advisers; although in truth, if our speakers are to make such
 assertions, it would be better for the country if they could not
 speak at all, as we should then make fewer blunders.

The good citizen ought to triumph not by frightening his opponents
 but by beating them fairly in argument; and a wise city without
 over-distinguishing its best advisers, will nevertheless not deprive
 them of their due, and far from punishing an unlucky counsellor will
 not even regard him as disgraced.

In this way successful orators would be least tempted to sacrifice
 their convictions for popularity, in the hope of still higher
 honors, and unsuccessful speakers to resort to the same popular arts
 in order to win over the multitude.

This is not our way; and, besides,
 the moment that a man is suspected of giving advice, however good,
 from corrupt motives, we feel such a grudge against him for the gain
 which after all we are not certain he will receive, that we deprive
 the city of its certain benefit.

Plain good advice has thus come to be no less suspected than bad; and
 the advocate of the most monstrous measures is not more obliged to
 use deceit to gain the people, than the best counsellor is to lie in
 order to be believed.

The city and the city only, owing to these refinements, can never be
 served openly and without disguise; he who does serve it openly
 being always suspected of serving himself in some secret way in
 return.

Still, considering the magnitude of the interests involved, and the
 position of affairs, we orators must make it our business to look a
 little further than you who judge offhand; especially as we, your
 advisers, are responsible, while you, our audience, are not so.

For if those who gave the advice, and those who took it, suffered
 equally, you would judge more calmly; as it is, you visit the
 disasters into which the whim of the moment may have led you, upon
 the single person of your adviser, not upon yourselves, his numerous
 companions in error.

However, I have not come forward
 either to oppose or to accuse in the matter of Mitylene ; indeed, the
 question before us as sensible men is not their guilt, but our
 interests.

Though I prove them ever so guilty, I shall not, therefore, advise
 their death, unless it be expedient; nor though they should have
 claims to indulgence, shall I recommend it, unless it be clearly for
 the good of the country.

I consider that we are deliberating for the future more than for the
 present; and where Cleon is so positive as to the useful deterrent
 effects that will follow from making rebellion capital, I who
 consider the interests of the future quite as much as he, as
 positively maintain the contrary.

And I require you not to reject my useful considerations for his
 specious ones: his speech may have the attraction of seeming the
 more just in your present temper against Mitylene ; but we are not in a
 court of justice, but in a political assembly; and the question is
 not justice, but how to make the Mitylenians useful to Athens .

Now of course communities have
 enacted the penalty of death for many offences far lighter than
 this: still hope leads men to venture; and no one ever yet put
 himself in peril without the inward conviction that he would succeed
 in his design.

Again, was there ever city rebelling that did not believe that it
 possessed either in itself or in its alliances resources adequate to
 the enterprise?

All, states and individuals, are alike prone to err, and there is no
 law that will prevent them; or why should men have exhausted the
 list of punishments in search of enactments to protect them from
 evil-doers? 
 It is probable that in early times the penalties for the greatest
 offences were less severe, and that, as these were disregarded, the
 penalty of death has been by degrees in most cases arrived at, which
 is itself disregarded in like manner.

Either then some means of terror more terrible than this must be
 discovered, or it must be owned that this restraint is useless; and
 that as long as poverty gives men the courage of necessity, or
 plenty fills them with the ambition which belongs to insolence and
 pride, and the other conditions of life remain each under the
 thraldom of some fatal and master passion, so long will the impulse
 never be wanting to drive men into danger.

Hope also and cupidity, the one leading and the other following, the
 one conceiving the attempt, the other suggesting the facility of
 succeeding, cause the widest ruin, and, although invisible agents,
 are far stronger than the dangers that are seen.

Fortune, too, powerfully helps the delusion, and by the unexpected
 aid that she sometimes lends, tempts men to venture with inferior
 means; and this is especially the case with communities, because the
 stakes played for are the highest, freedom or empire, and, when all
 are acting together, each man irrationally magnifies his own
 capacity.

In fine, it is impossible to prevent, and only great simplicity can
 hope to prevent, human nature doing what it has once set its mind
 upon, by force of law or by any other deterrent force whatsoever.

We must not, therefore, commit
 ourselves to a false policy through a belief in the efficacy of the
 punishment of death, or exclude rebels from the hope of repentance
 and an early atonement of their error.

Consider a moment! 
 At present, if a city that has already revolted perceive that it
 cannot succeed, it will come to terms while it is still able to
 refund expenses, and pay tribute afterwards. 
 In the other case, what city think you would not prepare better than
 is now done, and hold out to the last against its besiegers, if it
 is all one whether it surrender late or soon?

And how can it be otherwise than hurtful to us to be put to the
 expense of a siege, because surrender is out of the question; and if
 we take the city, to receive a ruined town from which we can no
 longer draw the revenue which forms our real strength against the
 enemy?

We must not, therefore, sit as strict judges of the offenders to our
 own prejudice, but rather see how by moderate chastisements we may
 be enabled to benefit in future by the revenue-producing powers of
 our dependencies; and we must make up our minds to look for our
 protection not to legal terrors but to careful administration.

At present we do exactly the opposite. 
 When a free community, held in subjection by force, rises, as is only
 natural, and asserts its independence, it is no sooner reduced than
 we fancy ourselves obliged to punish it severely;

although the right course with freemen is not to chastise them
 rigorously when they do rise, but rigorously to watch them before
 they rise, and to prevent their ever entertaining the idea, and, the
 insurrection suppressed, to make as few responsible for it as
 possible.

Only consider what a blunder you
 would commit in doing as Cleon recommends.

As things are at present, in all the cities the people is your
 friend, and either does not revolt with the oligarchy, or, if forced
 to do so, becomes at once the enemy of the insurgents; so that in
 the war with the hostile city you have the masses on your side.

But if you butcher the people of Mitylene, who had nothing to do with
 the revolt, and who, as soon as they got arms, of their own motion
 surrendered the town, first you will commit the crime of killing
 your benefactors; and next you will play directly into the hands of
 the higher classes, who when they induce their cities to rise, will
 immediately have the people on their side, through your having
 announced in advance the same punishment for those who are guilty
 and for those who are not.

On the contrary, even if they were guilty, you ought to seem not to
 notice it, in order to avoid alienating the only class still
 friendly to us.

In short, I consider it far more useful for the preservation of our
 empire voluntarily to put up with injustice, than to put to death,
 however justly, those whom it is our interest to keep alive. 
 As for Cleon's idea that in punishment the claims of justice and
 expediency can both be satisfied, facts do not confirm the
 possibility of such a combination.

Confess, therefore, that this is the
 wisest course, and without conceding too much either to pity or to
 indulgence, by neither of which motives do I any more than Cleon
 wish you to be influenced, upon the plain merits of the case before
 you, be persuaded by me to try calmly those of the Mitylenians whom
 Paches sent off as guilty, and to leave the rest undisturbed.

This is at once best for the future, and most terrible to your
 enemies at the present moment; inasmuch as good policy against an
 adversary is superior to the blind attacks of brute force.’

Such were the words of Diodotus. 
 The two opinions thus expressed were the ones that most directly
 contradicted each other; and the Athenians, notwithstanding their
 change of feeling, now proceeded to a division, in which the show of
 hands was almost equal, although the motion of Diodotus carried the
 day.

Another trireme was at once sent off in haste, for fear that the
 first might reach Lesbos in
 the interval, and the city be found destroyed; the first ship having
 about a day and a night's start.

Wine and barley-cakes were provided for the vessel by the Mitylenian
 ambassadors, and great promises made if they arrived in time; which
 caused the men to use such diligence upon the voyage that they took
 their meals of barley-cakes kneaded with oil and wine as they rowed,
 and only slept by turns while the others were at the oar.

Luckily they met with no contrary wind, and the first ship making no
 haste upon so horrid an errand, while the second pressed on in the
 manner described, the first arrived so little before them, that
 Paches had only just had time to read the decree, and to prepare to
 execute the sentence, when the second put into port and prevented
 the massacre. 
 The danger of Mitylene 
 had indeed been great.

The other party whom Paches had sent
 off as the prime movers in the rebellion, were upon Cleon's motion
 put to death by the Athenians, the number being rather more than a
 thousand. 
 The Athenians also demolished the walls of the Mitylenians, and took
 possession of their ships.

Afterwards tribute was not imposed upon the Lesbians; but all their
 land, except that of the Methymnians, was divided into three
 thousand allotments, three hundred of which were reserved as sacred
 for the gods, and the rest assigned by lot to Athenian shareholders,
 who were sent out to the island. 
 With these the Lesbians agreed to pay a rent of two minae a year for
 each allotment, and cultivated the land themselves.

The Athenians also took possession of the towns on the continent
 belonging to the Mitylenians, which thus became for the future
 subject to Athens . 
 Such were the events that took place at Lesbos .

During the same summer, after the
 reduction of Lesbos , the
 Athenians under Nicias, son of Niceratus, made an expedition against
 the island of Minos, which lies off Megara and was used as a fortified post by the
 Megarians, who had built a tower upon it.

Nicias wished to enable the Athenians to maintain their blockade from
 this nearer station instead of from Budorum and Salamis ; to stop the
 Peloponnesian triremes and privateers sailing out unobserved from
 the island, as they had been in the habit of doing; and at the same
 time prevent anything from coming into Megara .

Accordingly, after taking two towers projecting on the side of
 Nisaea , by engines
 from the sea, and clearing the entrance into the channel between the
 island and the shore, he next proceeded to cut off all communication
 by building a wall on the mainland at the point where a bridge
 across a morass enabled succors to be thrown into the island, which
 was not far off from the continent.

A few days sufficing to accomplish this, he afterwards raised some
 works in the island also, and leaving a garrison there, departed
 with his forces.

About the same time in this summer,
 the Plataean being now without provisions, and unable to support the
 siege, surrendered to the Peloponnesians in the following
 manner.

An assault had been made upon the wall, which the Plataeans were
 unable to repel. 
 The Lacedaemonian commander, perceiving their weakness, wished to
 avoid taking the place by storm; his instructions from Lacedaemon having been so
 conceived, in order that if at any future time peace should be made
 with Athens , and they
 should agree each to restore the places that they had taken in the
 war, Plataea might be
 held to have come over voluntarily, and not be included in the
 list. 
 He accordingly sent a herald to them to ask if they were willing
 voluntarily to surrender the town to the Lacedaemonians, and accept
 them as their judges, upon the understanding that the guilty should
 be punished, but no one without form of law.

The Plataeans were now in the last state of weakness, and the herald
 had no sooner delivered his message than they surrendered the
 town. 
 The Peloponnesians fed them for some days until the judges from
 Lacedaemon, who were five in number, arrived.

Upon their arrival no charge was preferred; they simply called up the
 Plataeans, and asked them whether they had done the Lacedaemonians
 and allies any service in the war then raging.

The Plataeans asked leave to speak at greater length, and deputed two
 of their number to represent them; Astymachus, son of Asopolaus,
 and Lacon, son of Aeimnestus, Proxenus of the Lacedaemonians, who
 came forward and spoke as follows:—

‘Lacedaemonians, when we surrendered
 our city we trusted in you, and looked forward to a trial more
 agreeable to the forms of law than the present, to which we had no
 idea of being subjected; the judges also in whose hands we consented
 to place ourselves were you, and you only (from whom we thought we
 were most likely to obtain justice), and not other persons, as is
 now the case.

As matters stand, we are afraid that we have been doubly
 deceived. 
 We have good reason to suspect, not only that the issue to be tried
 is the most terrible of all, but that you will not prove impartial;
 if we may argue from the fact that no accusation was first brought
 forward for us to answer, but we had ourselves to ask leave to
 speak, and from the question being put so shortly, that a true
 answer to it tells against us, while a false one can be
 contradicted.

In this dilemma, our safest, and indeed our only course, seems to be
 to say something at all risks: placed as we are, we could scarcely
 be silent without being tormented by the damning thought that
 speaking might have saved us.

Another difficulty that we have to encounter is the difficulty of
 convincing you. 
 Were we unknown to each other we might profit by bringing forward new
 matter with which you were unacquainted: as it is, we can tell you
 nothing that you do not know already, and we fear, not that you have
 condemned us in your own minds of having failed in our duty towards
 you, and make this our crime, but that to please a third party we
 have to submit to a trial the result of which is already decided.

Nevertheless, we will place before you what we can justly urge, not
 only on the question of the quarrel which the Thebans have against
 us, but also as addressing you and the rest of the Hellenes; and we
 will remind you of our good services, and endeavor to prevail with
 you.

To your short question, whether we
 have done the Lacedaemonians and allies any service in this war, we
 say, if you ask us as enemies, that to refrain from serving you was
 not to do you injury; if as friends, that you are more in fault for
 having marched against us.

During the peace, and against the Mede , we acted well: we have not now been the first
 to break the peace, and we were the only Boeotians who then joined
 in defending against the Mede the liberty of Hellas .

Although an inland people, we were present at the action at
 Artemisium ; in
 the battle that took place in our territory we fought by the side of
 yourselves and Pausanias; and in all the other Hellenic exploits of
 the time we took a part quite out of proportion to our strength.

Besides, you, as Lacedaemonians, ought not to forget that at the time
 of the great panic at Sparta , after the earthquake, caused by the
 secession of the Helots to Ithome , we sent the third part of our citizens to
 assist you.

On these great and historical
 occasions such was the part that we chose, although afterwards we
 became your enemies. 
 For this you were to blame. 
 When we asked for your alliance against our Theban oppressors, you
 rejected our petition, and told us to go to the Athenians who were
 our neighbors, as you lived too far off.

In the war we never have done to you, and never should have done to
 you, anything unreasonable.

If we refused to desert the Athenians when you asked us, we did no
 wrong; they had helped us against the Thebans when you drew back,
 and we could no longer give them up with honor; especially as we had
 obtained their alliance and had been admitted to their citizenship
 at our own request, and after receiving benefits at their hands; but
 it was plainly our duty loyally to obey their orders.

Besides, the faults that either of you may commit in your supremacy
 must be laid, not upon the followers, but on the chiefs that lead
 them astray.

With regard to the Thebans, they have
 wronged us repeatedly, and their last aggression, which has been the
 means of bringing us into our present position, is within your own
 knowledge.

In seizing our city in time of peace, and what is more at a holy time
 in the month, they justly encountered our vengeance, in accordance
 with the universal law which sanctions resistance to an invader; and
 it cannot now be right that we should suffer on their account.

By taking your own immediate interest and their animosity as the test
 of justice, you will prove yourselves to be rather waiters on
 expediency than judges of right;

although if they seem useful to you now, we and the rest of the
 Hellenes gave you much more valuable help at a time of greater
 need. 
 Now you are the assailants, and others fear you; but at the crisis to
 which we allude, when the barbarian threatened all with slavery, the
 Thebans were on his side.

It is just, therefore, to put our patriotism then against our error
 now, if error there has been; and you will find the merit
 outweighing the fault, and displayed at a juncture when there were
 few Hellenes who would set their valor against the strength of
 Xerxes, and when greater praise was theirs who preferred the
 dangerous path of honor to the safe source of consulting their own
 interest with respect to the invasion.

To these few we belonged, and highly were we honored for it; and yet
 we now fear to perish by having again acted on the same principles,
 and chosen to act well with Athens sooner than wisely with Sparta .

Yet in justice the same cases should be decided in the same way, and
 policy should not mean anything else than lasting gratitude for the
 service of a good ally combined with a proper attention to one's own
 immediate interest.

Consider also that at present the
 Hellenes generally regard you as a pattern of worth and honor; and
 if you pass an unjust sentence upon us in this which is no obscure
 cause, but one in which you the judges, are as illustrious as we,
 the prisoners, are blameless, take care that displeasure be not felt
 at an unworthy decision in the matter of honorable men made by men
 yet more honorable than they, and at the consecration in the
 national temples of spoils taken from the Plataeans, the benefactors
 of Hellas .

Shocking indeed will it seem for Lacedaemonians to destroy Plataea , and for the city
 whose name your fathers inscribed upon the tripod at Delphi for its good service, to
 be by you blotted out from the map of Hellas , to please the Thebans.

To such a depth of misfortune have we fallen, that while the Medes'
 success had been our ruin, Thebans now supplant us in your once fond
 regards; and we have been subjected to two dangers, the greatest of
 any—that of dying of starvation then, if we had not surrendered our
 town, and now of being tried for our lives.

So that we Plataeans, after exertions beyond our power in the cause
 of the Hellenes, are rejected by all, forsaken and unassisted;
 helped by none of our allies, and reduced to doubt the stability of
 our only hope, yourselves.

Still, in the name of the gods who
 once presided over our confederacy, and of our own good service in
 the Hellenic cause, we adjure you to relent; to recall the decision
 which we fear that the Thebans may have obtained from you; to ask
 back the gift that you have given them, that they disgrace not you
 by slaying us; to gain a pure instead of a guilty gratitude, and not
 to gratify others to be yourselves rewarded with shame.

Our lives may be quickly taken, but it will be a heavy task to wipe
 away the infamy of the deed; as we are no enemies whom you might
 justly punish, but friends forced into taking arms against you.

To grant us our lives would be, therefore, a righteous judgment; if
 you consider also that we are prisoners who surrendered of their own
 accord, stretching out our hands for quarter, whose slaughter
 Hellenic law forbids, and who besides were always your
 benefactors.

Look at the sepulchres of your fathers, slain by the Medes and buried
 in our country, whom year by year we honored with garments and all
 other dues, and the first fruits of all that our land produced in
 their season, as friends from a friendly country and allies to our
 old companions in arms! 
 Should you not decide aright, your conduct would be the very opposite
 to ours. 
 Consider only:

Pausanias buried them thinking that he was laying them in friendly
 ground and among men as friendly; but you, if you kill us and make
 the Plataean territory Theban, will leave your fathers and kinsmen
 in a hostile soil and among their murderers, deprived of the honors
 which they now enjoy. 
 What is more, you will enslave the land in which the freedom of the
 Hellenes was won, make desolate the temples of the gods to whom they
 prayed before they overcame the Medes, and take away your ancestral
 sacrifices from those who founded and instituted them.

It were not to your glory,
 Lacedaemonians, either to offend in this way against the common law
 of the Hellenes and against your own ancestors, or to kill us your
 benefactors to gratify another's hatred without having been wronged
 yourselves: it were more so to spare us and to yield to the
 impressions of a reasonable compassion; reflecting not merely on the
 awful fate in store for us, but also on the character of the
 sufferers, and on the impossibility of predicting how soon
 misfortune may fall even upon those who deserve it not.

We, as we have a right to do and as our need impels us, entreat you,
 calling aloud upon the gods at whose common altar all the Hellenes
 worship, to hear our request, to be not unmindful of the oaths which
 your fathers swore, and which we now plead—we supplicate you by the
 tombs of your fathers, and appeal to those that are gone to save us
 from falling into the hands of the Thebans and their dearest friends
 from being given up to their most detested foes. 
 We also remind you of that day on which we did the most glorious
 deeds, by your fathers' sides, we who now, on this are like to
 suffer the most dreadful fate.

Finally, to do what is necessary and yet most difficult for men in
 our situation—that is, to make an end of speaking, since with that
 ending the peril of our lives draws near—

in conclusion we say that we did not surrender our city to the
 Thebans (to that we would have preferred inglorious starvation), but
 trusted in and capitulated to you; and it would be just, if we fail
 to persuade you, to put us back in the same position and let us take
 the chance that falls to us. 
 And at the same time we adjure you not to give us up,—your
 suppliants, Lacedaemonians, out of your hands and faith, Plataeans
 foremost of the Hellenic patriots, to Thebans, our most hated
 enemies,—but to be our saviours, and not, while you free the rest of
 the Hellenes, to bring us to destruction.’

Such were the words of the
 Plataeans. 
 The Thebans, afraid that the Lacedaemonians might be moved by what
 they had heard, came forward and said that they too desired to
 address them, since the Plataeans had, against their wish, been
 allowed to speak at length instead of being confined to a simple
 answer to the question. 
 Leave being granted, the Thebans spoke as follows:—

‘We should never have asked to make
 this speech if the Plataeans on their side had contented themselves
 with shortly answering the question, and had not turned round and
 made charges against us, coupled with a long defence of themselves
 upon matters outside the present inquiry and not even the subject of
 accusation, and with praise of what no one finds fault with. 
 However, since they have done so, we must answer their charges and
 refute their self-praise, in order that neither our bad name nor
 their good may help them, but that you may hear the real truth on
 both points, and so decide.

The origin of our quarrel was
 this. 
 We settled Plataea some
 time after the rest of Boeotia , together with other places out of which we
 had driven the mixed population. 
 The Plataeans not choosing to recognize our supremacy, as had been
 first arranged, but separating themselves from the rest of the
 Boeotians, and proving traitors to their nationality, we used
 compulsion; upon which they went over to the Athenians, and with
 them did us much harm, for which we retaliated.

Next, when the barbarian invaded
 Hellas , they say that
 they were the only Boeotians who did not Medise; and this is where
 they most glorify themselves and abuse us.

We say that if they did not Medise, it was because the Athenians did
 not do so either; just as afterwards when the Athenians attacked the
 Hellenes they, the Plataeans, were again the only Boeotians who
 Atticized.

And yet consider the forms of our respective governments when we so
 acted. 
 Our city at that juncture had neither an oligarchical constitution in
 which all the nobles enjoyed equal rights nor a democracy, but that
 which is most opposed to law and good government and nearest a
 tyranny—the rule of a close cabal.

These, hoping to strengthen their individual power by the success of
 the Mede , kept down by
 force the people, and brought him into the town. 
 The city as a whole was not its own mistress when it so acted, and
 ought not to be reproached for the errors that it committed while
 deprived of its constitution.

Examine only how we acted after the departure of the Mede and the recovery of the
 constitution; when the Athenians attacked the rest of Hellas and endeavored to subjugate
 our country, of the greater part of which faction had already made
 them masters. 
 Did not we fight and conquer at Coronea and liberate Boeotia , and do we not now actively contribute to
 the liberation of the rest, providing horses to the cause and a
 force unequalled by that of any other state in the confederacy?

Let this suffice to excuse us for our
 Medism. 
 We will now endeavor to show that you have injured the Hellenes more
 than we, and are more deserving of condign punishment.

It was in defence against us, say you, that you became allies and
 citizens of Athens . 
 If so, you ought only to have called in the Athenians against us,
 instead of joining them in attacking others: it was open to you to
 do this if you ever felt that they were leading you where you did
 not wish to follow, as Lacedaemon was already your ally against the
 Mede , as you so much
 insist; and this was surely sufficient to keep us off, and above all
 to allow you to deliberate in security. 
 Nevertheless, of your own choice and without compulsion you chose to
 throw your lot in with Athens .

And you say that it had been base for you to betray your benefactors;
 but it was surely far baser and more iniquitous to sacrifice the
 whole body of the Hellenes, your fellow-confederates, who were
 liberating Hellas , than the
 Athenians only, who were enslaving it.

The return that you made them was therefore neither equal nor
 honorable, since you called them in, as you say, because you were
 being oppressed yourselves, and then became their accomplices in
 oppressing others; although baseness rather consists in not
 returning like for like than in not returning what is justly due but
 must be unjustly paid.

Meanwhile, after thus plainly showing
 that it was not for the sake of the Hellenes that you alone then did
 not Medise, but because the Athenians did not do so either, and you
 wished to side with them and to be against the rest;

you now claim the benefit of good deeds done to please your
 neighbors. 
 This cannot be admitted: you chose the Athenians, and with them you
 must stand or fall. 
 Nor can you plead the league then made and claim that it should now
 protect you.

You abandoned that league, and offended against it by helping instead
 of hindering the subjugation of the Aeginetans and others of its
 members, and that not under compulsion, but while in enjoyment of
 the same institutions that you enjoy to the present hour, and no one
 forcing you as in our case. 
 Lastly, an invitation was addressed to you before you were blockaded
 to be neutral and join neither party: this you did not accept.

Who then merit the detestation of the Hellenes more justly than you,
 you who sought their ruin under the mask of honor? 
 The former virtues that you allege you now show not to be proper to
 your character; the real bent of your nature has been at length
 damningly proved: when the Athenians took the path of injustice you
 followed them.

Of our unwilling Medism and your
 willful Atticizing this then is our explanation.

The last wrong of which you complain consists in our having, as you
 say, lawlessly invaded your town in time of peace and festival. 
 Here again we cannot think that we were more in fault than
 yourselves.

If of our own proper motion we made an armed attack upon your city
 and ravaged your territory, we are guilty; but if the first men
 among you in estate and family, wishing to put an end to the foreign
 connection and to restore you to the common Boeotian country, of
 their own free will invited us, wherein is our crime? 
 Where wrong is done, those who lead, as you say, are more to blame
 than those who follow.

Not that, in our judgment, wrong was done either by them or by
 us. 
 Citizens like yourselves, and with more at stake than you, they
 opened their own walls and introduced us into their own city, not as
 foes but as friends, to prevent the bad among you from becoming
 worse; to give honest men their due; to reform principles without
 attacking persons, since you were not to be banished from your city,
 but brought home to your kindred, nor to be made enemies to any, but
 friends alike to all.

That our intention was not hostile is
 proved by our behavior. 
 We did no harm to any one, but publicly invited those who wished to
 live under a national, Boeotian government to come over to us;

which at first you gladly did, and made an agreement with us and
 remained tranquil, until you became aware of the smallness of our
 numbers. 
 Now it is possible that there may have been something not quite fair
 in our entering without the consent of your commons. 
 At any rate you did not repay us in kind. 
 Instead of refraining, as we had done, from violence, and inducing us
 to retire by negotiation, you fell upon us in violation of your
 agreement, and slew some of us in fight, of which we do not so much
 complain, for in that there was a certain justice; but others who
 held out their hands and received quarter, and whose lives you
 subsequently promised us, you lawlessly butchered. 
 If this was not abominable, what is?

And after these three crimes committed one after the other—the
 violation of your agreement, the murder of the men afterwards, and
 the lying breach of your promise not to kill them, if we refrained
 from injuring your property in the country—you still affirm that we
 are the criminals and yourselves pretend to escape justice. 
 Not so, if these your judges decide aright, but you will be punished
 for all together.

Such, Lacedaemonians, are the
 facts. 
 We have gone into them at some length both on your account and on our
 own, that you may feel that you will justly condemn the prisoners,
 and we, that we have given an additional sanction to our
 vengeance.

We would also prevent you from being melted by hearing of their past
 virtues, if any such they had: these may be fairly appealed to by
 the victims of injustice, but only aggravate the guilt of criminals,
 since they offend against their better nature. 
 Nor let them gain anything by crying and wailing, by calling upon
 your fathers' tombs and their own desolate condition.

Against this we point to the far more dreadful fate of our youth,
 butchered at their hands; the fathers of whom either fell at
 Coronea , bringing
 Boeotia over to you, or
 seated, forlorn old men by desolate hearths, who with far more
 reason implore your justice upon the prisoners.

The pity which they appeal to is rather due to men who suffer
 unworthily; those who suffer justly as they do, are on the contrary
 subjects for triumph.

For their present desolate condition they have themselves to blame,
 since they willfully rejected the better alliance. 
 Their lawless act was not provoked by any action of ours; hate, not
 justice, inspired their decision; and even now the satisfaction
 which they afford us is not adequate; they will suffer by a legal
 sentence, not as they pretend as suppliants asking for quarter in
 battle, but as prisoners who have surrendered upon agreement to take
 their trial.

Vindicate, therefore, Lacedaemonians, the Hellenic law which they
 have broken; and to us, the victims of its violation, grant the
 reward merited by our zeal. 
 Nor let us be supplanted in your favour by their harangues, but offer
 an example to the Hellenes, that the contests to which you invite
 them are of deeds, not words: good deeds can be shortly stated, but
 where wrong is done a wealth of language is needed to veil its
 deformity.

However, if leading powers were to do what you are now doing, and
 putting one short question all alike were to decide accordingly, men
 would be less tempted to seek fine phrases to cover bad
 actions.’

Such were the words of the
 Thebans. 
 The Lacedaemonian judges decided that the question, whether they had
 received any service from the Plataeans in the war, was a fair one
 for them to put; as they had always invited them to be neutral,
 agreeably to the original covenant of Pausanias after the defeat of
 the Mede , and had again
 definitely offered them the same conditions before the blockade. 
 This offer having been refused, they were now, they conceived, by the
 loyalty of their intention released from their covenant; and having,
 as they considered, suffered evil at the hands of the Plataeans,
 they brought them in again one by one and asked each of them the
 same question, that is to say, whether they had done the
 Lacedaemonians and allies any service in the war; and upon their
 saying that they had not, took them out and slew them all without
 exception.

The number of Plataeans thus massacred was not less than two hundred,
 with twenty-five Athenians who had shared in the siege. 
 The women were taken as slaves.

The city the Thebans gave for about a year to some political
 emigrants from Megara ,
 and to the surviving Plataeans of their own party to inhabit, and
 afterwards razed it to the ground from the very foundations, and
 built on to the precinct of Hera an inn two hundred feet square,
 with rooms all round above and below, making use for this purpose of
 the roofs and doors of the Plataeans: of the rest of the materials
 in the wall, the brass and the iron, they made couches which they
 dedicated to Hera, for whom they also built a stone chapel of a
 hundred feet square. 
 The land they confiscated and let out on a ten-years' lease to Theban
 occupiers.

The adverse attitude of the Lacedaemonians—in the whole Plataean
 affair was mainly adopted to please the Thebans, who were thought to
 be useful in the war at that moment raging.

Such was the end of Plataea in the ninety-third year after she became
 the ally of Athens .

Meanwhile, the forty ships of the
 Peloponnesians that had gone to the relief of the Lesbians, and
 which we left flying across the open sea, pursued by the Athenians,
 were caught in a storm off Crete , and scattering from thence made their way to
 Peloponnese , where they
 found at Cyllene thirteen Leucadian and Ambraciot triremes, with
 Brasidas, son of Tellis, lately arrived as counsellor to
 Alcidas;

the Lacedaemonians, upon the failure of the Lesbian expedition,
 having resolved to strengthen their fleet and sail to Corcyra , where a
 revolution had broken out, so as to arrive there before the twelve
 Athenian ships at Naupactus could be reinforced from Athens . 
 Brasidas and Alcidas began to prepare accordingly.

The Corcyraean revolution began with
 the return of the prisoners taken in the sea-fights off Epidamnus . 
 These the Corinthians had released, nominally upon the security of
 eight hundred talents given by their Proxeni but in reality upon
 their engagement to bring over Corcyra to Corinth . 
 These men proceeded to canvass each of the citizens, and to intrigue
 with the view of detaching the city from Athens .

Upon the arrival of an Athenian and a Corinthian vessel, with envoys
 on board, a conference was held in which the Corcyraeans voted to
 remain allies of the Athenians according to their agreement, but to
 be friends of the Peloponnesians as they had been formerly.

Meanwhile, the returned prisoners brought Peithias, a volunteer
 Proxenus of the Athenians and leader of the commons, to trial, upon
 the charge of enslaving Corcyra to Athens .

He, being acquitted, retorted by accusing five of the richest of
 their number of cutting stakes in the ground sacred to Zeus and
 Alcinous; the legal penalty being a stater for each stake.

Upon their conviction, the amount of the penalty being very large,
 they seated themselves as suppliants in the temples, to be allowed
 to pay it by instalments; but Peithias, who was one of the senate,
 prevailed upon that body to enforce the law;

upon which the accused, rendered desperate by the law, and also
 learning that Peithias had the intention, while still a member of
 the senate, to persuade the people to conclude a defensive and
 offensive alliance with Athens , banded together armed with daggers, and
 suddenly bursting into the senate killed Peithias and sixty others,
 senators and private persons; some few only of the party of Peithias
 taking refuge in the Athenian trireme, which had not yet departed.

After this outrage, the conspirators
 summoned the Corcyraeans to an assembly, and said that this would
 turn out for the best, and would save them from being enslaved by
 Athens : for the
 future, they moved to receive neither party unless they came
 peacefully in a single ship, treating any larger number as
 enemies. 
 This motion made, they compelled it to be adopted,

and instantly sent off envoys to Athens to justify what had been done and to
 dissuade the refugees there from any hostile proceedings which might
 lead to a reaction.

Upon the arrival of the embassy the
 Athenians arrested the envoys and all who listened to them, as
 revolutionists, and lodged them in Aegina .

Meanwhile a Corinthian trireme arriving in the island with
 Lacedaemonian envoys, the dominant Corcyraean party attacked the
 commons and defeated them in battle.

Night coming on, the commons took refuge in the Acropolis and the
 higher parts of the city, and concentrated themselves there, having
 also possession of the Hyllaic harbor, their adversaries occupying
 the market-place, where most of them lived, and the harbor
 adjoining, looking towards the mainland.

The next day passed in skirmishes of
 little importance, each party sending into the country to offer
 freedom to the slaves and to invite them to join them. 
 The mass of the slaves answered the appeal of the commons; their
 antagonists being reinforced by eight hundred mercenaries from the
 continent.

After a day's interval hostilities recommenced, victory remaining
 with the commons, who had the advantage in numbers and position, the
 women also valiantly assisting them, pelting with tiles from the
 houses, and supporting the melee with a fortitude beyond their
 sex.

Towards dusk, the oligarchs in full rout, fearing that the victorious
 commons might assault and carry the arsenal and put them to the
 sword, fired the houses round the market-place and the
 lodging-houses, in order to bar their advance; sparing neither their
 own, nor those of their neighbors; by which much stuff of the
 merchants was consumed and the city risked total destruction, if a
 wind had come to help the flame by blowing on it.

Hostilities now ceasing, both sides kept quiet, passing the night on
 guard, while the Corinthian ship stole out to sea upon the victory
 of the commons, and most of the mercenaries passed over secretly to
 the continent.

The next day the Athenian general,
 Nicostratus, son of Diitrephes, came up from Naupactus with twelve ships
 and five hundred Messenian heavy infantry. 
 He at once endeavored to bring about a settlement, and persuaded the
 two parties to agree together to bring to trial ten of the
 ringleaders, who presently fled, while the rest were to live in
 peace, making terms with each other, and entering into a defensive
 and offensive alliance with the Athenians.

This arranged, he was about to sail away, when the leaders of the
 commons induced him to leave them five of his ships to make their
 adversaries less disposed to move, while they manned and sent with
 him an equal number of their own.

He had no sooner consented, than they began to enroll their enemies
 for the ships; and these fearing that they might be sent off to
 Athens , seated
 themselves as suppliants in the temple of the Dioscuri.

An attempt on the part of Nicostratus to reassure them and to
 persuade them to rise proving unsuccessful, the commons armed upon
 this pretext, alleging the refusal of their adversaries to sail with
 them as a proof of the hollowness of their intentions, and took
 their arms out of their houses, and would have dispatched some whom
 they fell in with, if Nicostratus had not prevented it.

The rest of the party seeing what was going on, seated themselves as
 suppliants in the temple of Hera, being not less than four hundred
 in number; until the commons, fearing that they might adopt some
 desperate resolution, induced them to rise, and conveyed them over
 to the island in front of the temple where provisions were sent
 across to them.

At this stage in the revolution, on
 the fourth or fifth day after the removal of the men to the island,
 the Peloponnesian ships arrived from Cyllene where they had been
 stationed since their return from Ionia , fifty-three in number, still under the
 command of Alcidas, but with Brasidas also on board as his adviser;
 and dropping anchor at Sybota, a harbor on the mainland, at daybreak
 made sail for Corcyra .

The Corcyraeans in great confusion
 and alarm at the state of things in the city and at the approach of
 the invader, at once proceeded to equip sixty vessels, which they
 sent out, as fast as they were manned, against the enemy, in spite
 of the Athenians recommending them to let them sail out first, and
 to follow themselves afterwards with all their ships together.

Upon their vessels coming up to the enemy in this straggling fashion,
 two immediately deserted: in others the crews were fighting among
 themselves, and there was no order in anything that was done;

so that the Peloponnesians seeing their confusion, placed twenty
 ships to oppose the Corcyraeans, and ranged the rest against the
 twelve Athenian ships, amongst which were the two vessels Salaminia
 and Paralus.

While the Corcyraeans, attacking
 without judgment and in small detachments, were already crippled by
 their own misconduct, the Athenians, afraid of the numbers of the
 enemy and of being surrounded, did not venture to attack the main
 body or even the center of the division opposed to them, but fell
 upon its wing and sank one vessel; after which the Peloponnesians
 formed in a circle, and the Athenians rowed round them and tried to
 throw them into disorder.

Perceiving this, the division opposed to the Corcyraeans fearing a
 repetition of the disaster of Naupactus , came to support their friends, and the
 whole fleet now bore down, united, upon the Athenians,

who retired before it, backing water, retiring as leisurely as
 possible in order to give the Corcyraeans time to escape, while the
 enemy was thus kept occupied.

Such was the character of this sea-fight, which lasted until sunset.

The Corcyraeans now feared that the
 enemy would follow up their victory and sail against the town and
 rescue the men in the island, or strike some other blow equally
 decisive, and accordingly carried the men over again to the temple
 of Hera, and kept guard over the city.

The Peloponnesians, however, although victorious in the sea-fight,
 did not venture to attack the town, but took the thirteen Corcyraean
 vessels which they had captured, and with them sailed back to the
 continent from whence they had put out.

The next day equally they refrained from attacking the city, although
 the disorder and panic were at their height, and though Brasidas, it
 is said, urged Alcidas, his superior officer, to do so, but they
 landed upon the promontory of Leukimme and laid waste the country.

Meanwhile the commons in Corcyra , being still in
 great fear of the fleet attacking them, came to a parley with the
 suppliants and their friends, in order to save the town; and
 prevailed upon some of them to go on board the ships, of which they
 still manned thirty, against the expected attack.

But the Peloponnesians after ravaging the country until midday sailed
 away, and towards nightfall were informed by beacon signals of the
 approach of sixty Athenian vessels from Leucas , under the command
 of Eurymedon, son of Thucles; which had been sent off by the
 Athenians upon the news of the revolution and of the fleet with
 Alcidas being about to sail for Corcyra .

The Peloponnesians accordingly at
 once set off in haste by night for home, coasting along shore; and
 hauling their ships across the Isthmus of Leucas , in order not to be
 seen doubling it, so departed.

The Corcyraeans, made aware of the approach of the Athenian fleet and
 of the departure of the enemy, brought the Messenians from outside
 the walls into the town, and ordered the fleet which they had manned
 to sail round into the Hyllaic harbor; and while it was so doing,
 slew such of their enemies as they laid hands on, dispatching
 afterwards as they landed them, those whom they had persuaded to go
 on board the ships. 
 Next they went to the sanctuary of Hera and persuaded about fifty men
 to take their trial, and condemned them all to death.

The mass of the suppliants who had refused to do so, on seeing what
 was taking place, slew each other there in the consecrated ground;
 while some hanged themselves upon the trees, and others destroyed
 themselves as they were severally able.

During seven days that Eurymedon stayed with his sixty ships, the
 Corcyraeans were engaged in butchering those of their
 fellow-citizens whom they regarded as their enemies: and although
 the crime imputed was that of attempting to put down the democracy,
 some were slain also for private hatred, others by their debtors
 because of the monies owed to them.

Death thus raged in every shape; and, as usually happens at such
 times, there was no length to which violence did not go; sons were
 killed by their fathers, and suppliants dragged from the altar or
 slain upon it; while some were even walled up in the temple of
 Dionysus and died there.

So bloody was the march of the
 revolution, and the impression which it made was the greater as it
 was one of the first to occur. 
 Later on, one may say, the whole Hellenic world was convulsed;
 struggles being everywhere made by the popular chiefs to bring in
 the Athenians, and by the oligarchs to introduce the
 Lacedaemonians. 
 In peace there would have been neither the pretext nor the wish to
 make such an invitation; but in war, with an alliance always at the
 command of either faction for the hurt of their adversaries and
 their own corresponding advantage, opportunities for bringing in the
 foreigner were never wanting to the revolutionary parties.

The sufferings which revolution entailed upon the cities were many
 and terrible, such as have occurred and always will occur, as long
 as the nature of mankind remains the same; though in a severer or
 milder form, and varying in their symptoms, according to the variety
 of the particular cases. 
 In peace and prosperity states and individuals have better
 sentiments, because they do not find themselves suddenly confronted
 with imperious necessities; but war takes away the easy supply of
 daily wants, and so proves a rough master, that brings most men's
 characters to a level with their fortunes.

Revolution thus ran its course from city to city, and the places
 which it arrived at last, from having heard what had been done
 before carried to a still greater excess the refinement of their
 inventions, as manifested in the cunning of their enterprises and
 the atrocity of their reprisals.

Words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take that which was
 now given them. 
 Reckless audacity came to be considered the courage of a loyal ally;
 prudent hesitation, specious cowardice; moderation was held to be a
 cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question
 inaptness to act on any. 
 Frantic violence, became the attribute of manliness; cautious
 plotting, a justifiable means of self-defence.

The advocate of extreme measures was always trustworthy; his opponent
 a man to be suspected. 
 To succeed in a plot was to have a shrewd head, to divine a plot a
 still shrewder; but to try to provide against having to do either
 was to break up your party and to be afraid of your adversaries. 
 In fine, to forestall an intending criminal, or to suggest the idea
 of a crime where it was wanting, was equally commended,

until even blood became a weaker tie than party, from the superior
 readiness of those united by the latter to dare everything without
 reserve; for such associations had not in view the blessings
 derivable from established institutions but were formed by ambition
 for their overthrow; and the confidence of their members in each
 other rested less on any religious sanction than upon complicity in
 crime.

The fair proposals of an adversary were met with jealous precautions
 by the stronger of the two, and not with a generous confidence. 
 Revenge also was held of more account than self-preservation. 
 Oaths of reconciliation, being only proffered on either side to meet
 an immediate difficulty, only held good so long as no other weapon
 was at hand; but when opportunity offered, he who first ventured to
 seize it and to take his enemy off his guard, thought this
 perfidious vengeance sweeter than an open one, since, considerations
 of safety apart, success by treachery won him the palm of superior
 intelligence. 
 Indeed it is generally the case that men are readier to call rogues
 clever than simpletons honest, and are as ashamed of being the
 second as they are proud of being the first.

The cause of all these evils was the lust for power arising from
 greed and ambition; and from these passions proceeded the violence
 of parties once engaged in contention. 
 The leaders in the cities, each provided with the fairest
 professions, on the one side with the cry of political equality of
 the people, on the other of a moderate aristocracy, sought prizes
 for themselves in those public interests which they pretended to
 cherish, and, recoiling from no means in their struggles for
 ascendancy, engaged in the direct excesses; in their acts of
 vengeance they went to even greater lengths, not stopping at what
 justice or the good of the state demanded, but making the party
 caprice of the moment their only standard, and invoking with equal
 readiness the condemnation of an unjust verdict or the authority of
 the strong arm to glut the animosities of the hour. 
 Thus religion was in honor with neither party; but the use of fair
 phrases to arrive at guilty ends was in high reputation. 
 Meanwhile the moderate part of the citizens perished between the two,
 either for not joining in the quarrel, or because envy would not
 suffer them to escape.

Thus every form of iniquity took root
 in the Hellenic countries by reason of the troubles. 
 The ancient simplicity into which honor so largely entered was
 laughed down and disappeared; and society became divided into camps
 in which no man trusted his fellow.

To put an end to this, there was neither promise to be depended upon,
 nor oath that could command respect; but all parties dwelling rather
 in their calculation upon the hopelessness of a permanent state of
 things, were more intent upon self-defence than capable of
 confidence.

In this contest the blunter wits were most successful. 
 Apprehensive of their own deficiencies and of the cleverness of their
 antagonists, they feared to be worsted in debate and to be surprised
 by the combinations of their more versatile opponents, and so at
 once boldly had recourse to action:

while their adversaries, arrogantly thinking that they should know in
 time, and that it was unnecessary to secure by action what policy
 afforded, often fell victims to their want of precaution.

Meanwhile Corcyra gave the first
 example of most of the crimes alluded to; of the reprisals exacted
 by the governed who had never experienced equitable treatment or
 indeed aught but insolence from their rulers—when their hour came;
 of the iniquitous resolves of those who desired to get rid of their
 accustomed poverty, and ardently coveted their neighbors' goods; and
 lastly, of the savage and pitiless excesses into which men who had
 begun the struggle not in a class but in a party spirit, were
 hurried by their ungovernable passions.

In the confusion into which life was now thrown in the cities, human
 nature, always rebelling against the law and now its master, gladly
 showed itself ungoverned in passion, above respect for justice, and
 the enemy of all superiority; since revenge would not have been set
 above religion, and gain above justice, had it not been for the
 fatal power of envy.

Indeed men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their
 revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to
 which all alike can look for salvation in adversity, instead of
 allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid
 may be required.

While the revolutionary passions thus
 for the first time displayed themselves in the factions of
 Corcyra ,
 Eurymedon and the Athenian fleet sailed away;

after which some five hundred Corcyrean exiles who had succeeded in
 escaping, took some forts on the mainland, and becoming masters of
 the Corcyrean territory over the water, made this their base to
 plunder their countrymen in the island, and did so much damage as to
 cause a severe famine in the town.

They also sent envoys to Lacedaemon and Corinth to negotiate their restoration; but meeting
 with no success, afterwards got together boats and mercenaries and
 crossed over to the island, being about six hundred in all; and
 burning their boats so as to have no hope except in becoming masters
 of the country, went up to Mount Istone, and fortifying themselves
 there, began to annoy those in the city and obtained command of the
 country.

At the close of the same summer the
 Athenians sent twenty ships under the command of Laches, son of
 Melanopus, and Charceades, son of Euphiletus, to Sicily ,

where the Syracusans and Leontines were at war. 
 The Syracusans had for allies all the Dorian cities except
 Camarina—these had been included in the Lacedaemonian confederacy
 from the commencement of the war, though they had not taken any
 active part in it—the Leontines had Camarina and the Chalcidian
 cities. 
 In Italy the Locrians were
 for the Syracusans, the Rhegians for their Leontine kinsmen.

The allies of the Leontines now sent to Athens and appealed to their
 ancient alliance and to their Ionian origin, to persuade the
 Athenians to send them a fleet, as the Syracusans were blockading
 them by land and sea.

The Athenians sent it upon the plea of their common descent, but in
 reality to prevent the exportation of Sicilian corn to Peloponnese and to test the
 possibility of bringing Sicily into subjection.

Accordingly they established themselves at Rhegium in Italy , and from thence carried on
 the war in concert with their allies.

Summer was now over. 
 The winter following, the plague a second time attacked the
 Athenians; for although it had never entirely left them, still there
 had been a notable abatement in its ravages.

The second visit lasted no less than a year, the first having lasted
 two; and nothing distressed the Athenians and reduced their power
 more than this.

No less than four thousand four hundred heavy infantry in the ranks
 died of it and three hundred cavalry, besides a number of the
 multitude that was never ascertained.

At the same time took place the numerous earthquakes in Athens , Euboea , and Boeotia , particularly at
 Orchomenus in
 the last-named country.

The same winter the Athenians in
 Sicily and the
 Rhegians, with thirty ships, made an expedition against the islands
 of Aeolus; it being impossible to invade them in summer, owing to
 the want of water.

These islands are occupied by the Liparians, a Cnidian colony, who
 live in one of them of no great size called Lipara ; and from this as
 their headquarters cultivate the rest, Didyme, Strongyle, and
 Hiera.

In Hiera the people in those parts believe that Hephaestus has his
 forge, from the quantity of flame which they see it send out by
 night, and of smoke by day. 
 These islands lie off the coast of the Sicels and Messinese, and were
 allies of the Syracusans.

The Athenians laid waste their land, and as the inhabitants did not
 submit, sailed back to Rhegium . 
 Thus the winter ended, and with it ended the fifth year of this war,
 of which Thucydides was the historian.

The next summer the Peloponnesians
 and their allies set out to invade Attica under the command of Agis, son of
 Archidamus, and went as far as the Isthmus, but numerous earthquakes
 occurring, turned back again without the invasion taking place.

About the same time that these earthquakes were so common, the sea at
 Orobiae, in Euboea ,
 retiring from the then line of coast, returned in a huge wave and
 invaded a great part of the town, and retreated leaving some of it
 still under water; so that what was once land is now sea; such of
 the inhabitants perishing as could not run up to the higher ground
 in time.

A similar inundation also occurred at Atalanta, the island off the
 Opuntian-Locrian coast, carrying away part of the Athenian fort and
 wrecking one of two ships which were drawn up on the beach.

At Peparethus also the sea retreated a little, without however any
 inundation following; and an earthquake threw down part of the wall,
 the town hall, and a few other buildings.

The cause, in my opinion, of this phenomenon must be sought in the
 earthquake. 
 At the point where its shock has been the most violent the sea is
 driven back, and suddenly recoiling with redoubled force, causes the
 inundation. 
 Without an earthquake I do not see how such an accident could happen.

During the same summer different
 operations were carried on by the different belligerents in
 Sicily ; by the
 Siceliots themselves against each other, and by the Athenians and
 their allies: I shall however confine myself to the actions in which
 the Athenians took part, choosing the most important.

The death of the Athenian general Charoeades, killed by the
 Syracusans in battle, left Laches in the sole command of the fleet,
 which he now directed in concert with the allies against Mylae , a place belonging
 to the Messinese. 
 Two Messinese battalions in garrison at Mylae laid an ambush for
 the party landing from the ships,

but were routed with great slaughter by the Athenians and their
 allies, who thereupon assaulted the fortification and compelled them
 to surrender the Acropolis and to march with them upon Messina .

This town afterwards also submitted upon the approach of the
 Athenians and their allies, and gave hostages and all other
 securities required.

The same summer the Athenians sent
 thirty ships round Peloponnese under Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes,
 and Procles, son of Theodorus, and sixty others, with two thousand
 heavy infantry, against Melos , under Nicias, son of Niceratus;

wishing to reduce the Melians, who, although islanders refused to be
 subjects of Athens or
 even to join her confederacy.

The devastation of their land not procuring their submission, the
 fleet, weighing from Melos , sailed to Oropus in the territory of Graea,
 and landing at nightfall, the heavy infantry started at once from
 the ships by land for Tanagra in Boeotia ,

where they were met by the whole levy from Athens , agreeably to a
 concerted signal, under the command of Hipponicus, son of Callias,
 and Eurymedon, son of Thucles.

They encamped, and passing that day in ravaging the Tanagraean
 territory, remained there for the night; and next day, after
 defeating those of the Tanagraeans who sallied out against them and
 some Thebans who had come up to help the Tanagraeans, took some
 arms, set up a trophy, and retired, the troops to the city and the
 others to the ships.

Nicias with his sixty ships coasted along shore and ravaged the
 Locrian seaboard, and so returned home.

About this time the Lacedaemonians
 founded their colony of Heraclea in Trachis , their object being the following.

The Malians form in all three tribes, the Paralians, the Hiereans,
 and the Trachinians. 
 The last of these having suffered severely in a war with their
 neighbors the Oetaeans, at first intended to give themselves up to
 Athens ; but
 afterwards fearing not to find in her the security that they sought,
 sent to Lacedaemon , having
 chosen Tisamenus for their ambassador.

In this embassy joined also the Dorians from the mother country of
 the Lacedaemonians, with the same request, as they themselves also
 suffered from the same enemy.

After hearing them, the Lacedaemonians determined to send out the
 colony, wishing to assist the Trachinians and Dorians, and also
 because they thought that the proposed town would lie conveniently
 for the purposes of the war against the Athenians. 
 A fleet might be got ready there against Euboea , with the advantage of a short passage to
 the island; and the town would also be useful as a station on the
 road to Thrace . 
 In short, everything made the Lacedaemonians eager to found the
 place.

After first consulting the god at Delphi and receiving a favorable answer, they sent
 off the colonists, Spartans and Perioeci, inviting also any of the
 rest of the Hellenes who might wish to accompany them, except
 Ionians, Achaeans, and certain other nationalities; three
 Lacedaemonians leading as founders of the colony, Leon, Alcidas, and
 Damagon.

The settlement effected, they fortified anew the city, now called
 Heraclea , distant about
 four miles and a half from Thermopylae and two miles and a quarter from the
 sea, and commenced building docks, closing the side towards
 Thermopylae 
 just by the pass itself, in order that they might be easily
 defended.

The foundation of this town,
 evidently meant to annoy Euboea (the passage across to Cenaeum in that
 island being a short one), at first caused some alarm at Athens , which the event however
 did nothing to justify, the town never giving them any trouble.

The reason of this was as follows. 
 The Thessalians, who were sovereign in those parts, and whose
 territory was menaced by its foundation, were afraid that it might
 prove a very powerful neighbor, and accordingly continually harassed
 and made war upon the new settlers, until they at last wore them out
 in spite of their originally considerable numbers, people flocking
 from all quarters to a place founded by the Lacedaemonians, and thus
 thought secure of prosperity. 
 On the other hand the Lacedaemonians themselves, in the persons of
 their governors, did their full share towards ruining its prosperity
 and reducing its population, as they frightened away the greater
 part of the inhabitants by governing harshly and in some cases not
 fairly, and thus made it easier for their neighbors to prevail
 against them.

The same summer, about the same time
 that the Athenians were detained at Melos , their
 fellow-citizens in the thirty ships cruising round Peloponnese , after cutting off
 some guards in an ambush at Ellomenus in Leucadia, subsequently went
 against Leucas 
 itself with a large armament, having been reinforced by the whole
 levy of the Acarnanians except Oeniadae, and by the Zacynthians and
 Cephallenans and fifteen ships from Corcyra .

While the Leucadians witnessed the devastation of their land, without
 and within the isthmus upon which the town of Leucas and the temple of
 Apollo stand, without making any movement on account of the
 overwhelming numbers of the enemy, the Acarnanians urged
 Demosthenes, the Athenian general, to build a wall so as to cut off
 the town from the continent, a measure which they were convinced
 would secure its capture and rid them once and for all of a most
 troublesome enemy.

Demosthenes however had in the
 meanwhile been persuaded by the Messenians that it was a fine
 opportunity for him, having so large an army assembled, to attack
 the Aetolians, who were not only the enemies of Naupactus , but whose
 reduction would further make it easy to gain the rest of that part
 of the continent for the Athenians.

The Aetolian nation, although numerous and warlike, yet dwelt in
 unwalled villages scattered far apart, and had nothing but light
 armour, and might, according to the Messenians, be subdued without
 much difficulty before succors could arrive.

The plan which they recommended was to attack first the Apodotians,
 next the Ophionians, and after these the Eurytanians, who are the
 largest tribe in Aetolia ,
 and speak, as is said, a language exceedingly difficult to
 understand, and eat their flesh raw. 
 These once subdued, the rest would easily come in.

To this plan Demosthenes consented,
 not only to please the Messenians, but also in the belief that by
 adding the Aetolians to his other continental allies he would be
 able, without aid from home, to march against the Boeotians by way
 of Ozolian Locris to Kytinium in Doris ,
 keeping Parnassus on his right until he descended to the
 Phocians, whom he could force to join him if their ancient
 friendship for Athens 
 did not, as he anticipated, at once decide them to do so. 
 Arrived in Phocis he was
 already upon the frontier of Boeotia .

He accordingly weighed from Leucas , against the wish of the Acarnanians, and
 with his whole armament sailed along the coast to Sollium, where he
 communicated to them his intention; and upon their refusing to agree
 to it on account of the non-investment of Leucas , himself with the
 rest of the forces, the Cephallenians, the Messenians, and
 Zacynthians, and three hundred Athenian marines from his own ships
 (the fifteen Corcyraean vessels having departed), started on his
 expedition against the Aetolians.

His base he established at Oeneon in Locris , as the Ozolian Locrians were allies of
 Athens and were to
 meet him with all their forces in the interior. 
 Being neighbors of the Aetolians and armed in the same way, it was
 thought that they would be of great service upon the expedition,
 from their acquaintance with the localities and the warfare of the
 inhabitants.

After bivouacking with the army in
 the precinct of Nemean Zeus, in which the poet Hesiod is said to
 have been killed by the people of the country, according to an
 oracle which had foretold that he should die in Nemea , Demosthenes set out at
 daybreak to invade Aetolia .

The first day he took Potidania, the next Krokyle, and the third
 Tichium, where he halted and sent back the booty to Eupalium in
 Locris , having
 determined to pursue his conquests as far as the Ophionians, and in
 the event of their refusing to submit, to return to Naupactus and make them the
 objects of a second expedition.

Meanwhile the Aetolians had been aware of his design from the moment
 of its formation, and as soon as the army invaded their country came
 up in great force with all their tribes; even the most remote
 Ophionians, the Bomiensians, and Calliensians, who extend towards
 the Malian Gulf, being among the number.

The Messenians, however, adhered to
 their original advice. 
 Assuring Demosthenes that the Aetolians were an easy conquest, they
 urged him to push on as rapidly as possible, and to try to take the
 villages as fast as he came up to them, without waiting until the
 whole nation should be in arms against him.

Led on by his advisers and trusting in his fortune, as he had met
 with no opposition, without waiting for his Locrian reinforcements,
 who were to have supplied him with the light-armed darters in which
 he was most deficient, he advanced and stormed Aegitium, the
 inhabitants flying before him and posting themselves upon the hills
 above the town, which stood on high ground about nine miles from the
 sea.

Meanwhile the Aetolians had gathered to the rescue, and now attacked
 the Athenians and their allies, running down from the hills on every
 side and darting their javelins, falling back when the Athenian army
 advanced, and coming on as it retired; and for a long while the
 battle was of this character, alternate advance and retreat, in both
 which operations the Athenians had the worst.

Still as long as their archers had
 arrows left and were able to use them, they held out, the
 light-armed Aetolians retiring before the arrows; but after the
 captain of the archers had been killed and his men scattered, the
 soldiers, wearied out with the constant repetition of the same
 exertions

and hard pressed by the Aetolians with their javelins, at last turned
 and fled, and falling into pathless gullies and places that they
 were unacquainted with, thus perished, the Messenian Chromon, their
 guide, having also unfortunately been killed. 
 A great many were overtaken in the pursuit by the swift-footed and
 light-armed Aetolians, and fell beneath their javelins; the greater
 number however missed their road and rushed into the wood, which had
 no ways out, and which was soon fired and burnt round them by the
 enemy.

Indeed the Athenian army fell victims to death in every form, and
 suffered all the vicissitudes of flight; the survivors escaped with
 difficulty to the sea and Oeneon in Locris , whence they had set out.

Many of the allies were killed, and about one hundred and twenty
 Athenian heavy infantry, not a man less, and all in the prime of
 life. 
 These were by far the best men in the city of Athens that fell during this
 war. 
 Among the slain was also Procles, the colleague of Demosthenes.

Meanwhile the Athenians took up their dead under truce from the
 Aetolians, and retired to Naupactus , and from thence went in their ships to
 Athens ; Demosthenes
 staying behind in Naupactus and in the neighborhood, being afraid to
 face the Athenians after the disaster.

About the same time the Athenians on
 the coast of Sicily sailed
 to Locris , and in a descent
 which they made from the ships defeated the Locrians who came
 against them, and took a fort upon the river Halex.

The same summer the Aetolians, who
 before the Athenian expedition had sent an embassy to Corinth and Lacedaemon , composed of Tolophus,
 an Ophionian, Boriades, an Eurytanian, and Tisander, an Apodotian,
 obtained that an army should be sent them against Naupactus , which had invited
 the Athenian invasion.

The Lacedaemonians accordingly sent off towards autumn three thousand
 heavy infantry of the allies, five hundred of whom were from
 Heraclea , the
 newly-founded city in Trachis , under the command of Eurylochus, a
 Spartan, accompanied by Macarius and Menedaius, also Spartans.

The army having assembled at
 Delphi , Eurylochus
 sent a herald to the Ozolian Locrians; the road to Naupactus lying through
 their territory, and he having besides conceived the idea of
 detaching them from Athens .

His chief abettors in Locris 
 were the Amphissians, who were alarmed at the hostility of the
 Phocians. 
 These first gave hostages themselves, and induced the rest to do the
 same for fear of the invading army; first, their neighbors the
 Myonians, who held the most difficult of the passes, and after them
 the Ipnians, Messapians, Tritaeans, Chalaeans, Tolophonians,
 Hessians, and Oeanthians, all of whom joined in the expedition; the
 Olpaeans contenting themselves with giving hostages, without
 accompanying the invasion; and the Hyaeans refusing to do either,
 until the capture of Polis , one of their villages.

His preparations completed,
 Eurylochus lodged the hostages in Kytinium, in Doris, and advanced
 upon Naupactus 
 through the country of the Locrians, taking upon his way Oeneon and Eupalium, two of
 their towns that refused to join him.

Arrived in the Naupactian territory, and having been now joined by
 the Aetolians, the army laid waste the land and took the suburb of
 the town, which was unfortified; and after this Molycrium also, a
 Corinthian colony subject to Athens .

Meanwhile the Athenian Demosthenes, who since the affair in
 Aetolia had remained
 near Naupactus ,
 having had notice of the army and fearing for the town, went and
 persuaded the Acarnanians, although not without difficulty because
 of his departure from Leucas , to go to the relief of Naupactus .

They accordingly sent with him on board his ships a thousand heavy
 infantry, who threw themselves into the place and saved it; the
 extent of its wall and the small number of its defenders otherwise
 placing it in the greatest danger.

Meanwhile Eurylochus and his companions, finding that this force had
 entered and that it was impossible to storm the town, withdrew, not
 to Peloponnese , but to the
 country once called Aeolis 
 and now Calydon and Pleuron , and to the places in that neighborhood and
 Proschium in Aetolia ;

the Ambraciots having come and urged them to combine with them in
 attacking Amphilochian
 Argos and the rest of Amphilochia and Acarnania ; affirming that the
 conquest of these countries would bring all the continent into
 alliance with Lacedaemon .

To this Eurylochus consented, and dismissing the Aetolians, now
 remained quiet with his army in those parts, until the time should
 come for the Ambraciots to take the field, and for him to join them
 before Argos . Summer was now over.

The winter ensuing, the Athenians in Sicily with their Hellenic allies, and such of the
 Sicel subjects or allies of Syracuse as had revolted from her and joined their
 army, marched against the Sicel town Inessa , the Acropolis of which was held by the
 Syracusans, and after attacking it without being able to take it,
 retired.

In the retreat, the allies retreating after the Athenians were
 attacked by the Syracusans from the fort, and a large part of their
 army routed with great slaughter.

After this, Laches and the Athenians from the ships made some
 descents in Locris , and
 defeating the Locrians, who came against them with Proxenus, son of
 Capaton, upon the river Cacinus, took some arms and departed.

The same winter the Athenians
 purified Delos , in
 compliance, it appears, with a certain oracle. 
 It had been purified before by Pisistratus the tyrant; not indeed the
 whole island, but as much of it as could be seen from the
 temple. 
 All of it was, however, now purified in the following way.

All the sepulchres of those that had died in Delos were taken up, and for the
 future it was commanded that no one should be allowed either to die
 or to give birth to a child in the island; but that they should be
 carried over to Rhenea, which is so near to Delos that Polycrates, tyrant of
 Samos , having
 added Rhenea to his other island conquests during his period of
 naval ascendancy, dedicated it to the Delian Apollo by binding it to
 Delos with a
 chain. The Athenians, after the
 purification, celebrated, for the first time, the quinquennial
 festival of the Delian games.

Once upon a time, indeed, there was a great assemblage of the Ionians
 and the neighboring islanders at Delos , who used to come to the festival, as the
 Ionians now do to that of Ephesus , and athletic and poetical contests took
 place there, and the cities brought choirs of dancers.

Nothing can be clearer on this point than the following verses of
 Homer, taken from a hymn to Apollo:— 
 Phoebus, where'er thou strayest, far or near, 
 
 Delos was still
 of all thy haunts most dear. 
 Thither the robed Ionians take their way 
 With wife and child to keep thy holiday,— 
 Invoke thy favour on each manly game, 
 And dance and sing in honor of thy name.

That there was also a poetical
 contest in which the Ionians went to contend, again is shown by the
 following, taken from the same hymn. 
 After celebrating the Delian dance of the women, he ends his song of
 praise with these verses, in which he also alludes to himself:—
 
 Well, may Apollo keep you all! and so, 
 Sweethearts, good-bye—yet tell me not I go 
 Out from your hearts; and if in after hours 
 Some other wanderer in this world of ours 
 Touch at your shores, and ask your maidens here 
 Who sings the songs the sweetest to your ear, 
 Think of me then, and answer with a smile, 
 
 A blind old man of Chios ' rocky
 isle.

Homer thus attests that there was
 anciently a great assembly and festival at Delos . 
 In later times, although the islanders and the Athenians continued to
 send the choirs of dancers with sacrifices, the contests and most of
 the ceremonies were abolished, probably through adversity, until the
 Athenians celebrated the games upon this occasion with the novelty
 of horse-races.

The same winter the Ambraciots, as
 they had promised Eurylochus when they retained his army, marched
 out against Amphilochian
 Argos with three thousand heavy infantry, and
 invading the Argive 
 territory occupied Olpae, a stronghold on a hill near the sea, which
 had been formerly fortified by the Acarnanians and used as the place
 of assizes for their nation, and which is about two miles and
 three-quarters from the city of Argos upon the sea-coast.

Meanwhile the Acarnanians went with a part of their forces to the
 relief of Argos , and with
 the rest encamped in Amphilochia at the place called Krenae, or the
 Wells, to watch for Eurylochus and his Peloponnesians, and to
 prevent their passing through and effecting their junction with the
 Ambraciots;

while they also sent for Demosthenes, the commander of the Aetolian
 expedition, to be their leader, and for the twenty Athenian ships
 that were cruising off Peloponnese under the command of Aristotle, son of
 Timocrates, and Hierophon, son of Antimnestus.

On their part, the Ambraciots at Olpae sent a messenger to their own
 city, to beg them to come with their whole levy to their assistance,
 fearing that the army of Eurylochus might not be able to pass
 through the Acarnanians, and that they might themselves be obliged
 to fight single-handed, or be unable to retreat, if they wished it,
 without danger.

Meanwhile Eurylochus and his
 Peloponnesians, learning that the Ambraciots at Olpae had arrived,
 set out from Proschium with all haste to join them, and crossing the
 Achelous advanced through Acarnania , which they found deserted by its
 population, who had gone to the relief of Argos ; keeping on their right
 the city of the Stratians and its garrison, and on their left the
 rest of Acarnania .

Traversing the territory of the Stratians, they advanced through
 Phytia, next, skirting Medeon , through Limnaea; after which they left
 Acarnania behind them
 and entered a friendly country, that of the Agraeans.

From thence they reached and crossed Mount Thyamus, which belongs to
 the Agraeans, and descended into the Argive territory after nightfall, and passing
 between the city of Argos 
 and the Acarnanian posts at Krenae, joined the Ambraciots at Olpae.

Uniting here at daybreak, they sat
 down at the place called Metropolis, and encamped. 
 Not long afterwards the Athenians in the twenty ships came into the
 Ambracian Gulf to support the Argives, with Demosthenes and two
 hundred Messenian heavy infantry, and sixty Athenian archers.

While the fleet off Olpae blockaded the hill from the sea, the
 Acarnanians and a few of the Amphilochians, most of whom were kept
 back by force by the Ambraciots, had already arrived at Argos , and were preparing to
 give battle to the enemy, having chosen Demosthenes to command the
 whole of the allied army in concert with their own generals.

Demosthenes led them near to Olpae and encamped, a great ravine
 separating the two armies. 
 During five days they remained inactive; on the sixth both sides
 formed in order of battle. 
 The army of the Peloponnesians was the largest and outflanked their
 opponents; and Demosthenes fearing that his right might be
 surrounded, placed in ambush in a hollow way overgrown with bushes
 some four hundred heavy infantry and light troops, who were to rise
 up at the moment of the onset behind the projecting left wing of the
 enemy, and to take them in the rear.

When both sides were ready they joined battle; Demosthenes being on
 the right wing with the Messenians and a few Athenians, while the
 rest of the line was made up of the different divisions of the
 Acarnanians, and of the Amphilochian darters. 
 The Peloponnesians and Ambraciots were drawn up pell-mell together,
 with the exception of the Mantineans, who were massed on the left,
 without however reaching to the extremity of the wing, where
 Eurylochus and his men confronted the Messenians and Demosthenes.

The Peloponnesians were now well
 engaged and with their outflanking wing were upon the point of
 turning their enemy's right; when the Acarnanians from the ambuscade
 set upon them from behind, and broke them at the first attack,
 without their staying to resist; while the panic into which they
 fell caused the flight of most of their army, terrified beyond
 measure at seeing the division of Eurylochus and their best troops
 cut to pieces. 
 Most of the work was done by Demosthenes and his Messenians, who were
 posted in this part of the field.

Meanwhile the Ambraciots (who are the best soldiers in those
 countries) and the troops upon the right wing, defeated the division
 opposed to them and pursued it to Argos .

Returning from the pursuit, they found their main body defeated; and
 hard pressed by the Acarnanians, With difficulty made good their
 passage to Olpae, suffering heavy loss on the way, as they dashed on
 without discipline or order, the Mantineans excepted, who kept their
 ranks best of any in the army during the retreat. 
 The battle did not end until the evening.

The next day Menedaius, who on the
 death of Eurylochus and Macarius had succeeded to the sole command,
 being at a loss after so signal a defeat how to stay and sustain a
 siege, cut off as he was by land and by the Athenian fleet by sea,
 and equally so how to retreat in safety, opened a parley with
 Demosthenes and the Acarnanian generals for a truce and permission
 to retreat, and at the same time for the recovery of the dead.

The dead they gave back to him, and setting up a trophy took up their
 own also to the number of about three hundred. 
 The retreat demanded they refused publicly to the army; but
 permission to depart without delay was secretly granted to the
 Mantineans and to Menedaius and the other commanders and principal
 men of the Peloponnesians by Demosthenes and his Acarnanian
 colleagues; who desired to strip the Ambraciots and the mercenary
 host of foreigners of their supporters; and, above all, to discredit
 the Lacedaemonians and Peloponnesians with the Hellenes in those
 parts, as traitors and selfseekers.

While the enemy was taking up his
 dead and hastily burying them as he could, and those who obtained
 permission were secretly planning their retreat,

word was brought to Demosthenes and the Acarnanians that the
 Ambraciots from the city, in compliance with the first message from
 Olpae, were on the march with their whole levy through Amphilochia
 to join their countrymen at Olpae, knowing nothing of what had
 occurred. 
 Demosthenes prepared to march with his army against them,

and meanwhile sent on at once a strong division to beset the roads
 and occupy the strong positions.

In the meantime the Mantineans and
 others included in the agreement went out under the pretence of
 gathering herbs and firewood, and stole off by twos and threes,
 picking on the way the things which they professed to have come out
 for, until they had gone some distance from Olpae, when they
 quickened their pace.

The Ambraciots and such of the rest as had accompanied them in larger
 parties, seeing them going on, pushed on in their turn, and began
 running in order to catch them up.

The Acarnanians at first thought that all alike were departing
 without permission, and began to pursue the Peloponnesians; and
 believing that they were being betrayed, even threw a dart or two at
 some of their generals who tried to stop them and told them that
 leave had been given. 
 Eventually, however, they let pass the Mantineans and Peloponnesians,
 and slew only the Ambraciots,

there being much dispute and difficulty in distinguishing whether a
 man was an Ambraciot or a Peloponnesian. 
 The number thus slain was about two hundred; the rest escaped into
 the bordering territory of , and found refuge with Salynthius, the
 friendly king of the Agraeans.

Meanwhile the Ambraciots from the
 city arrived at Idomene. 
 Idomene consists of two lofty hills, the highest of which the troops
 sent on by Demosthenes succeeded in occupying after nightfall,
 unobserved by the Ambraciots, who had meanwhile ascended the smaller
 and bivouacked upon it.

After supper Demosthenes set out with the rest of the army, as soon
 as it was evening; himself with half his force making for the pass,
 and the remainder going by the Amphilochian hills.

At dawn he fell upon the Ambraciots while they were still abed,
 ignorant of what had passed, and fully thinking that it was their
 own countrymen,—

Demosthenes having purposely put the Messenians in front with orders
 to address them in the Doric dialect, and thus to inspire confidence
 in the sentinels, who would not be able to see them, as it was still
 night.

In this way he routed their army as soon as he attacked it, slaying
 most of them where they were, the rest breaking away in flight over
 the hills.

The roads, however, were already occupied, and while the
 Amphilochians knew their own country, the Ambraciots were ignorant
 of it and could not tell which way to turn, and had also heavy
 armour as against a light-armed enemy, and so fell into ravines and
 into the ambushes which had been set for them, and perished
 there.

In their manifold efforts to escape some even turned to the sea,
 which was not far off, and seeing the Athenian ships coasting along
 shore just while the action was going on, swam off to them, thinking
 it better in the panic they were in, to perish, if perish they must,
 by the hands of the Athenians, than by those of the barbarous and
 detested Amphilochians.

Of the large Ambraciot force destroyed in this manner, a few only
 reached the city in safety; while the Acarnanians, after stripping
 the dead and setting up a trophy, returned to Argos .

The next day arrived a herald from
 the Ambraciots who had fled from Olpae to the Agraeans, to ask leave
 to take up the dead that had fallen after the first engagement, when
 they left the camp with the Mantineans and their companions,
 without, like them, having had permission to do so.

At the sight of the arms of the Ambraciots from the city, the herald
 was astonished at their number, knowing nothing of the disaster and
 fancying that they were those of their own party.

Some one asked him what he was so astonished at, and how many of them
 had been killed, fancying in his turn that this was the herald from
 the troops at Idomene. 
 He replied, ‘About two hundred;’ upon which his interrogator took him
 up, saying,

‘Why, the arms you see here are of more than a thousand.’ The herald
 replied, ‘Then they are not the arms of those who fought with us?’
 The other answered, ‘Yes, they are, if at least you fought at
 Idomene yesterday.’ ‘But we fought with no one yesterday; but the
 day before in the retreat.’ ‘However that may be, we fought
 yesterday with those who came to reinforce you from the city of the
 Ambraciots.’

When the herald heard this and knew that the reinforcement from the
 city had been destroyed, he broke into wailing, and stunned at the
 magnitude of the present evils, went away at once without having
 performed his errand, or again asking for the dead bodies.

Indeed, this was by far the greatest disaster that befell any one
 Hellenic city in an equal number of days during this war; and I have
 not set down the number of the dead, because the amount stated seems
 so out of proportion to the size of the city as to be
 incredible. 
 In any case I know that if the Acarnanians and Amphilochians had
 wished to take Ambracia as the Athenians and Demosthenes advised,
 they would have done so without striking a blow; as it was, they
 feared that if the Athenians had it they would be worse neighbors to
 them than the present.

After this the Acarnanians allotted a
 third of the spoils to the Athenians, and divided the rest among
 their own different towns. 
 The share of the Athenians was captured on the voyage home; the arms
 now deposited in the Attic temples are three hundred panoplies,
 which the Acarnanians set apart for Demosthenes, and which he
 brought to Athens in
 person, his return to his country after the Aetolian disaster being
 rendered less hazardous by this exploit.

The Athenians in the twenty ships also went off to Naupactus . 
 The Acarnanians and Amphilochians, after the departure of Demosthenes
 and the Athenians, granted the Ambraciots and Peloponnesians who had
 taken refuge with Salynthius and the Agraeans a free retreat from
 Oeniadae, to which place they had removed from the country of
 Salynthius,

and for the future concluded with the Ambraciots a treaty and
 alliance for one hundred years, upon the terms following. 
 It was to be a defensive, not an offensive alliance; the Ambraciots
 could not be required to march with the Acarnanians against the
 Peloponnesians, nor the Acarnanians with the Ambraciots against the
 Athenians; for the rest the Ambraciots were to give up the places
 and hostages that they held of the Amphilochians, and not to give
 help to Anactorium, which was at enmity with the Acarnanians.

With this arrangement they put an end to the war. 
 After this the Corinthians sent a garrison of their own citizens to
 Ambracia , composed
 of three hundred heavy infantry, under the command of Xenocleides,
 son of Euthycles, who reached their destination after a difficult
 journey across the continent. 
 Such was the history of the affair of Ambracia .

The same winter the Athenians in
 Sicily made a descent
 from their ships upon the territory of Himera, in concert with the
 Sicels, who had invaded its borders from the interior, and also
 sailed to the islands of Aeolus.

Upon their return to Rhegium they found the Athenian general,
 Pythodorus, son of Isolochus, come to supersede Laches in the
 command of the fleet.

The allies in Sicily had
 sailed to Athens and
 induced the Athenians to send out more vessels to their assistance,
 pointing out that the Syracusans who already commanded their land
 were making efforts to get together a navy, to avoid being any
 longer excluded from the sea by a few vessels.

The Athenians proceeded to man forty ships to send to them, thinking
 that the war in Sicily 
 would thus be the sooner ended, and also wishing to exercise their
 navy.

One of the generals, Pythodorus, was accordingly sent out with a few
 ships; Sophocles, son of Sostratides, and Eurymedon, son of Thucles,
 being destined to follow with the main body.

Meanwhile Pythodorus had taken the command of Laches' ships, and
 towards the end of winter sailed against the Locrian fort, which
 Laches had formerly taken, and returned after being defeated in
 battle by the Locrians.

In the first days of this spring, the
 stream of fire issued from Etna , as on former occasions, and destroyed some
 land of the Catanians, who live upon Mount Etna , which is the largest mountain in
 Sicily .

Fifty years, it is said, had elapsed since the last eruption, there
 having been three in all since the Hellenes have inhabited
 Sicily .

Such were the events of this winter; and with it ended the sixth year
 of this war, of which Thucydides was the historian.

Next summer, about the time of the
 corn's coming into ear, ten Syracusan and as many Locrian vessels
 sailed to Messina , in
 Sicily , and occupied
 the town upon the invitation of the inhabitants; and Messina revolted from the
 Athenians.

The Syracusans contrived this chiefly because they saw that the place
 afforded an approach to Sicily , and feared that the Athenians might
 hereafter use it as a base for attacking them with a larger force;
 the Locrians because they wished to carry on hostilities from both
 sides of the Strait and to reduce their enemies, the people of
 Rhegium .

Meanwhile, the Locrians had invaded the Rhegian territory with all
 their forces, to prevent their succoring Messina , and also at the instance
 of some exiles from Rhegium who were with them; the long factions by
 which that town had been torn rendering it for the moment incapable
 of resistance, and thus furnishing an additional temptation to the
 invaders.

After devastating the country the Locrian land forces retired, their
 ships remaining to guard Messina , while others were being manned for the
 same destination to carry on the war from thence.

About the same time in the spring,
 before the corn was ripe, the Peloponnesians and their allies
 invaded Attica under Agis,
 the son of Archidamus, king of the Lacedaemonians, and sat down and
 laid waste the country.

Meanwhile the Athenians sent off the forty ships which they had been
 preparing to Sicily , with
 the remaining generals Eurymedon and Sophocles;

their colleague Pythodorus having already preceded them thither. 
 These had also instructions as they sailed by to look to the
 Corcyraeans in the town, who were being plundered by the exiles in
 the mountain. 
 To support these exiles sixty Peloponnesian vessels had lately
 sailed, it being thought that the famine raging in the city would
 make it easy for them to reduce it.

Demosthenes also, who had remained without employment since his
 return from Acarnania ,
 applied and obtained permission to use the fleet, if he wished it,
 upon the coast of Peloponnese .

Off Laconia they heard that the Peloponnesian ships
 were already at Corcyra , upon which Eurymedon and Sophocles wished
 to hasten to the island, but Demosthenes required them first to
 touch at Pylos and do
 what was wanted there, before continuing their voyage. 
 While they were making objections, a squall chanced to come on and
 carried the fleet into Pylos .

Demosthenes at once urged them to fortify the place, it being for
 this that he had come on the voyage, and made them observe there was
 plenty of stone and timber on the spot, and that the place was
 strong by nature, and together with much of the country round
 unoccupied; Pylos , or
 Coryphasium, as the Lacedaemonians call it, being about forty-five
 miles distant from Sparta , and situated in the old country of the
 Messenians.

The commanders told him that there was no lack of desert headlands in
 Peloponnese if he
 wished to put the city to expense by occupying them. 
 He, however, thought that this place was distinguished from others of
 the kind by having a harbour close by; while the Messenians, the old
 natives of the country, speaking the same dialect as the
 Lacedaemonians, could do them the greatest mischief by their
 incursions from it, and would at the same time be a trusty garrison.

After speaking to the captains of
 companies on the subject, and failing to persuade either the
 generals or the soldiers, he remained inactive with the rest from
 stress of weather; until the soldiers themselves wanting occupation
 were seized with a sudden impulse to go round and fortify the
 place.

Accordingly they set to work in earnest, and having no iron tools,
 picked up stones, and put them together as they happened to fit, and
 where mortar was needed, carried it on their backs for want of hods,
 stooping down to make it stay on, and clasping their hands together
 behind to prevent it falling off;

sparing no effort to be able to complete the most vulnerable points
 before the arrival of the Lacedaemonians, most of the place being
 sufficiently strong by nature without further fortification.

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians were
 celebrating a festival, and also at first made light of the news, in
 the idea that whenever they chose to take the field the place would
 be immediately evacuated by the enemy or easily taken by force; the
 absence of their army before Athens having also something to do with their
 delay.

The Athenians fortified the place on the land side, and where it most
 required it, in six days, and leaving Demosthenes with five ships to
 garrison it, with the main body of the fleet hastened on their
 voyage to Corcyra 
 and Sicily .

As soon as the Peloponnesians in
 Attica heard of the
 occupation of Pylos , they
 hurried back home; the Lacedaemonians and their king Agis thinking
 that the matter touched them nearly. 
 Besides having made their invasion early in the season, and while the
 corn was still green, most of their troops were short of provisions:
 the weather also was unusually bad for the time of year, and greatly
 distressed their army.

Many reasons thus combined to hasten their departure and to make this
 invasion a very short one; indeed they only stayed fifteen days in
 Attica .

About the same time the Athenian
 general Simonides getting together a few Athenians from the
 garrisons, and a number of the allies in those parts, took
 Eion in Thrace , a Mendaean colony and
 hostile to Athens , by
 treachery, but had no sooner done so than the Chalcidians and
 Bottiaeans came up and beat him out of it, with the loss of many of
 his soldiers.

On the return of the Peloponnesians
 from Attica the Spartans
 themselves and the nearest of the Perioeci at once set out for
 Pylos , the other
 Lacedaemonians following more slowly as they had just come in from
 another campaign.

Word was also sent round Peloponnese to come up as quickly as possible to
 Pylos ; while the
 sixty Peloponnesian ships were sent for from Corcyra and being dragged
 by their crews across the isthmus of Leucas , passed unperceived
 by the Athenian squadron at Zacynthus , and reached Pylos , where the land forces had
 arrived before them.

Before the Peloponnesian fleet sailed in, Demosthenes found time to
 send out unobserved two ships to inform Eurymedon and the Athenians
 on board the fleet at Zacynthus of the danger of Pylos and to summon them to his
 assistance.

While the ships hastened on their voyage in obedience to the orders
 of Demosthenes, the Lacedaemonians prepared to assault the fort by
 land and sea, hoping to capture with ease a work constructed in
 haste, and held by a feeble garrison.

Meanwhile, as they expected the Athenian ships to arrive from
 Zacynthus , they
 intended, if they failed to take the place before, to block up the
 entrance of the harbour to prevent their being able to anchor inside
 it.

For the island of Sphacteria , stretching along in a line close in front
 of the harbour, at once makes it safe and narrows its entrances,
 leaving a passage for two ships on the side nearest Pylos and the Athenian
 fortifications, and for eight or nine on that next the rest of the
 mainland: for the rest, the island was entirely covered with wood,
 and without paths through not being inhabited, and about one mile
 and five furlongs in length.

The inlets the Lacedaemonians meant to close with a line of ships
 placed close together, with their prows turned towards the sea, and,
 meanwhile, fearing that the enemy might make use of the island to
 operate against them, carried over some heavy infantry thither,
 stationing others along the coast.

By this means the island and the continent would be alike hostile to
 the Athenians, as they would be unable to land on either; and the
 shore of Pylos itself
 outside the inlet towards the open sea having no harbour, and,
 therefore, presenting no point which they could use as a base to
 relieve their countrymen, they, the Lacedaemonians, without
 sea-fight or risk would in all probability become masters of the
 place, occupied, as it had been on the spur of the moment, and
 unfurnished with provisions.

This being determined, they carried over to the island the heavy
 infantry, drafted by lot from all the companies. 
 Some others had crossed over before in relief parties, but these last
 who were left there were four hundred and twenty in number, with
 their Helot attendants, commanded by Epitadas, son of Molobrus.

Meanwhile Demosthenes, seeing the
 Lacedaemonians about to attack him by sea and land at once, himself
 was not idle. 
 He drew up under the fortification and enclosed in a stockade the
 galleys remaining to him of those which had been left him, arming
 the sailors taken out of them with poor shields made most of them of
 osier, it being impossible to procure arms in such a desert place,
 and even these having been obtained from a thirty-oared Messenian
 privateer and a boat belonging to some Messenians who happened to
 have come to them. 
 Among these Messenians were forty heavy infantry, whom he made use of
 with the rest.

Posting most of his men, unarmed and armed, upon the best fortified
 and strong points of the place towards the interior, with orders to
 repel any attack of the land forces, he picked sixty heavy infantry
 and a few archers from his whole force, and with these went outside
 the wall down to the sea, where he thought that the enemy would most
 likely attempt to land. 
 Although the ground was difficult and rocky, looking towards the open
 sea, the fact that this was the weakest part of the wall would, he
 thought, encourage their ardor,

as the Athenians, confident in their naval superiority, had here paid
 little attention to their defences, and the enemy if he could force
 a landing might feel secure of taking the place.

At this point, accordingly, going down to the water's edge, he posted
 his heavy infantry to prevent, if possible, a landing, and
 encouraged them in the following terms:—

‘Soldiers and comrades in this
 adventure, I hope that none of you in our present strait will think
 to show his wit by exactly calculating all the perils that encompass
 us, but that you will rather hasten to close with the enemy, without
 staying to count the odds, seeing in this your best chance of
 safety. 
 In emergencies like ours calculation is out of place; the sooner the
 danger is faced the better.

To my mind also most of the chances are for us, if we will only stand
 fast and not throw away our advantages, overawed by the numbers of
 the enemy.

One of the points in our favour is the awkwardness of the
 landing. 
 This, however, only helps us if we stand our ground. 
 If we give way it will be practicable enough, in spite of its natural
 difficulty, without a defender; and the enemy will instantly become
 more formidable from the difficulty he will have in retreating,
 supposing that we succeed in repulsing him, which we shall find it
 easier to do, while he is on board his ships, than after he has
 landed and meets us on equal terms.

As to his numbers, these need not too much alarm you. 
 Large as they may be he can only engage in small detachments, from
 the impossibility of bringing to. 
 Besides, the numerical superiority that we have to meet is not that
 of an army on land with everything else equal, but of troops on
 board ship, upon an element where many favorable accidents are
 required to act with effect.

I therefore consider that his difficulties may be fairly set against
 our numerical deficiencies, and at the same time I charge you, as
 Athenians who know by experience what landing from ships on a
 hostile territory means, and how impossible it is to drive back an
 enemy determined enough to stand his ground and not to be frightened
 away by the surf and the terrors of the ships sailing in, to stand
 fast in the present emergency, beat back the enemy at the water's
 edge, and save yourselves and the place.’

Thus encouraged by Demosthenes, the
 Athenians felt more confident, and went down to meet the enemy,
 posting themselves along the edge of the sea.

The Lacedaemonians now put themselves in movement and simultaneously
 assaulted the fortification with their land forces and with their
 ships, forty-three in number, under their admiral, Thrasymelidas,
 son of Cratesicles, a Spartan, who made his attack just where
 Demosthenes expected.

The Athenians had thus to defend themselves on both sides, from the
 land and from the sea; the enemy rowing up in small detachments, the
 one relieving the other—it being impossible for many to bring to at
 once—and showing great ardor and cheering each other on, in the
 endeavor to force a passage and to take the fortification.

He who most distinguished himself was Brasidas. 
 Captain of a galley, and seeing that the captains and steersmen,
 impressed by the difficulty of the position, hung back even where a
 landing might have seemed possible, for fear of wrecking their
 vessels, he shouted out to them, that they must never allow the
 enemy to fortify himself in their country for the sake of saving
 timber, but must shiver their vessels and force a landing; and bade
 the allies, instead of hesitating in such a moment to sacrifice
 their ships for Lacedaemon 
 in return for her many benefits, to run them boldly aground, land in
 one way or another, and make themselves masters of the place and its
 garrison.

Not content with this exhortation, he
 forced his own steersman to run his ship ashore, and stepping on to
 the gangway, was endeavoring to land, when he was cut down by the
 Athenians, and after receiving many wounds fainted away. 
 Falling into the bows, his shield slipped off his arm into the sea,
 and being thrown ashore was picked up by the Athenians, and
 afterwards used for the trophy which they set up for this
 attack.

The rest also did their best, but were not able to land, owing to the
 difficulty of the ground and the unflinching tenacity of the
 Athenians.

It was a strange reversal of the order of things for Athenians to be
 fighting from the lands and from Laconian land too, against
 Lacedaemonians coming from the sea; while Lacedaemonians were trying
 to land from shipboard in their own country, now become hostile, to
 attack Athenians, although the former were chiefly famous at the
 time as an inland people and superior by land, the latter as a
 maritime people with a navy that had no equal.

After continuing their attacks during
 that day and most of the next, the Peloponnesians desisted, and the
 day after sent some of their ships to Asine for timber to make engines, hoping to take by
 their aid, in spite of its height, the wall opposite the harbour,
 where the landing was easiest.

At this moment the Athenian fleet from Zacynthus arrived, now numbering fifty sail, having
 been reinforced by some of the ships on guard at Naupactus and by four Chian
 vessels.

Seeing the coast and the island both crowded with heavy infantry, and
 the hostile ships in harbour showing no signs of sailing out, at a
 loss where to anchor, they sailed for the moment to the desert
 island of Prote, not far off, where they passed the night. 
 The next day they got under weigh in readiness to engage in the open
 sea if the enemy chose to put out to meet them, being determined in
 the event of his not doing so to sail in and attack him.

The Lacedaemonians did not put out to sea, and having omitted to
 close the inlets as they had intended remained quiet on shore,
 engaged in manning their ships and getting ready, in the case of any
 one sailing in, to fight in the harbour, which is a fairly large
 one.

Perceiving this, the Athenians
 advanced against them by each inlet, and falling on the enemy's
 fleet, most of which was by this time afloat and in line, at once
 put it to flight, and giving chase as far as the short distance
 allowed, disabled a good many vessels, and took five, one with its
 crew on board; dashing in at the rest that had taken refuge on
 shore, and battering some that were still being manned, before they
 could put out, and lashing on to their own ships and towing off
 empty others whose crews had fled.

At this sight the Lacedaemonians, maddened by a disaster which cut
 off their men on the island, rushed to the rescue, and going into
 the sea with their heavy armour, laid hold of the ships and tried to
 drag them back, each man thinking that success depended on his
 individual exertions.

Great was the melee, and quite in contradiction to the naval tactics
 usual to the two combatants; the Lacedaemonians in their excitement
 and dismay being actually engaged in a sea-fight on land, while the
 victorious Athenians, in their eagerness to push their success as
 far as possible, were carrying on a land-fight from their ships.

After great exertions and numerous wounds on both sides they
 separated, the Lacedaemonians saving their empty ships, except those
 first taken;

and both parties returning to their camp, the Athenians set up a
 trophy, gave back the dead, secured the wrecks, and at once began to
 cruise round and jealously watch the island, with its intercepted
 garrison, while the Peloponnesians on the mainland, whose
 contingents had now all come up, stayed where they were before
 Pylos .

When the news of what had happened at
 Pylos reached
 Sparta , the disaster
 was thought so serious that the Lacedaemonians resolved that the
 authorities should go down to the camp, and decide on the spot what
 was best to be done.

There seeing that it was impossible to help their men, and not
 wishing to risk their being reduced by hunger or overpowered by
 numbers, they determined, with the consent of the Athenian generals,
 to conclude an armistice at Pylos and send envoys to Athens to obtain a convention,
 and to endeavor to get back their men as quickly as possible.

The generals accepting their offers,
 an armistice was concluded upon the terms following:— That the
 Lacedaemonians should bring to Pylos and deliver up to the Athenians the ships
 that had fought in the late engagement, and all in Laconia that were vessels of war,
 and should make no attack on the fortification either by land or by
 sea. 
 That the Athenians should allow the Lacedaemonians on the mainland to
 send to the men in the island a certain fixed quantity of corn ready
 kneaded, that is to say, two quarts of barley meal, one pint of
 wine, and a piece of meat for each man, and half the same quantity
 for a servant. 
 That this allowance should be sent in under the eyes of the
 Athenians, and that no boat should sail to the island except
 openly. 
 That the Athenians should continue to guard the island the same as
 before, without however landing upon it, and should refrain from
 attacking the Peloponnesian troops either by land or by sea.

That if either party should infringe any of these terms in the
 slightest particular, the armistice should be at once void. 
 That the armistice should hold good until the return of the
 Lacedaemonian envoys from Athens —the Athenians sending them thither in a
 galley and bringing them back again—and upon the arrival of the
 envoys should be at an end, and the ships be restored by the
 Athenians in the same state as they received them.

Such were the terms of the armistice, and the ships were delivered
 over to the number of sixty, and the envoys sent off
 accordingly. 
 Arrived at Athens they spoke as follows:—

‘Athenians, the Lacedaemonians sent
 us to try to find some way of settling the affair of our men on the
 island, that shall be at once satisfactory to your interests, and as
 consistent with our dignity in our misfortune as circumstances
 permit.

We can venture to speak at some length without any departure from the
 habit of our country. 
 Men of few words where many are not wanted, we can be less brief when
 there is a matter of importance to be illustrated and an end to be
 served by its illustration.

Meanwhile we beg you to take what we may say, not in a hostile
 spirit, nor as if we thought you ignorant and wished to lecture you,
 but rather as a suggestion on the best course to be taken, addressed
 to intelligent judges.

You can now, if you choose, employ your present success to advantage,
 so as to keep what you have got and gain honor and reputation
 besides, and you can avoid the mistake of those who meet with an
 extraordinary piece of good fortune, and are led on by hope to grasp
 continually at something further, through having already succeeded
 without expecting it.

While those who have known most vicissitudes of good and bad, have
 also justly least faith in their prosperity; and to teach your city
 and ours this lesson experience has not been wanting.

To be convinced of this you have only
 to look at our present misfortune. 
 What power in Hellas stood
 higher than we did? and yet we are come to you, although we formerly
 thought ourselves more able to grant what we are now here to
 ask.

Nevertheless; we have not been brought to this by any decay in our
 power, or through having our heads turned by aggrandizement; no, our
 resources are what they have always been, and our error has been an
 error of judgment, to which all are equally liable.

Accordingly the prosperity which your city now enjoys, and the
 accession that it has lately received, must not make you fancy that
 fortune will be always with you.

Indeed sensible men are prudent enough to treat their gains as
 precarious, just as they would also keep a clear head in adversity,
 and think that war, so far from staying within the limit to which a
 combatant may wish to confine it, will run the course that its
 chances prescribe; and thus, not being puffed up by confidence in
 military success, they are less likely to come to grief, and most
 ready to make peace, if they can, while their fortune lasts.

This, Athenians, you have a good opportunity to do now with us, and
 thus to escape the possible disasters which may follow upon your
 refusal, and the consequent imputation of having owed to accident
 even your present advantages, when you might have left behind you a
 reputation for power and wisdom which nothing could endanger.

The Lacedaemonians accordingly invite
 you to make a treaty and to end the war, and offer peace and
 alliance and the most friendly and intimate relations in every way
 and on every occasion between us; and in return ask for the men on
 the island, thinking it better for both parties not to stand out the
 end, on the chance of some favorable accident enabling the men to
 force their way out, or of their being compelled to succumb under
 the pressure of blockade.

Indeed if great enmities are ever to be really settled, we think it
 will be, not by the system of revenge and military success, and by
 forcing an opponent to swear to a treaty to his disadvantage, but
 when the more fortunate combatant waives these his privileges, to be
 guided by gentler feelings, conquers his rival in generosity, and
 accords peace on more moderate conditions than he expected.

From that moment, instead of the debt of revenge which violence must
 entail, his adversary owes a debt of generosity to be paid in kind,
 and is inclined by honor to stand to his agreement.

And men oftener act in this manner towards their greatest enemies
 than where the quarrel is of less importance; they are also by
 nature as glad to give way to those who first yield to them, as they
 are apt to be provoked by arrogance to risks condemned by their own
 judgment.

To apply this to ourselves: if peace
 was ever desirable for both parties, it is surely so at the present
 moment, before anything irremediable befall us and force us to hate
 you eternally, personally as well as politically, and you to miss
 the advantages that we now offer you.

While the issue is still in doubt, and you have reputation and our
 friendship in prospect, and we the compromise of our misfortune
 before anything fatal occur, let us be reconciled, and for ourselves
 choose peace instead of war, and grant to the rest of the Hellenes a
 remission from their sufferings, for which be sure they will think
 they have chiefly you to thank. 
 The war that they labour under they know not which began, but the
 peace that concludes it, as it depends on your decision, will by
 their gratitude he laid to your door.

By such a decision you can become firm friends with the
 Lacedaemonians at their own invitation, which you do not force from
 them, but oblige them by accepting.

And from this friendship consider the advantages that are likely to
 follow: when Attica and
 Sparta are at one,
 the rest of Hellas , be
 sure, will remain in respectful inferiority before its heads.’

Such were the words of the
 Lacedaemonians, their idea being that the Athenians, already
 desirous of a truce and only kept back by their opposition, would
 joyfully accept a peace freely offered, and give back the men.

The Athenians, however, having the men on the island, thought that
 the treaty would be ready for them whenever they chose to make it,
 and grasped at something further.

Foremost to encourage them in this policy was Cleon, son of
 Cleaenetus, a popular leader of the time and very powerful with the
 multitude, who persuaded them to answer as follows: First, the men
 in the island must surrender themselves and their arms and be
 brought to Athens . 
 Next; the Lacedaemonians must restore Nisaea , Pegae, Troezen , and Achaia , all places acquired not by arms, but by the
 previous convention, under which they had been ceded by Athens herself at a moment of
 disaster, when a truce was more necessary to her than at
 present. 
 This done they might take back their men, and make a truce for as
 long as both parties might agree.

To this answer the envoys made no
 reply, but asked that commissioners might be chosen with whom they
 might confer on each point, and quietly talk the matter over and try
 to come to some agreement.

Hereupon Cleon violently assailed them, saying that he knew from the
 first that they had no right intentions, and that it was clear
 enough now by their refusing to speak before the people, and wanting
 to confer in secret with a committee of two or three. 
 No! if they meant anything honest let them say it out before all.

The Lacedaemonians, however, seeing that whatever concessions they
 might be prepared to make in their misfortune, it was impossible for
 them to speak before the multitude and lose credit with their allies
 for a negotiation which might after all miscarry, and on the other
 hand, that the Athenians would never grant what they asked upon
 moderate terms, returned from Athens without having effected anything.

Their arrival at once put an end to
 the armistice at Pylos ,
 and the Lacedaemonians asked back their ships according to the
 convention. 
 The Athenians, however, alleged an attack on the fort in
 contravention of the truce, and other grievances seemingly not worth
 mentioning, and refused to give them back, insisting upon the clause
 by which the slightest infringement made the armistice void. 
 The Lacedaemonians, after denying the contravention and protesting
 against their bad faith in the matter of the ships, went away and
 earnestly addressed themselves to the war.

Hostilities were now carried on at Pylos upon both sides with vigor. 
 The Athenians cruised round the island all day with two ships going
 different ways; and by night, except on the seaward side in windy
 weather, anchored round it with their whole fleet, which having been
 reinforced by twenty ships from Athens come to aid in the blockade, now numbered
 seventy sail; while the Peloponnesians remained encamped on the
 continent, making attacks on the fort, and on the look-out for any
 opportunity which might offer itself for the deliverance of their
 men.

Meanwhile the Syracusans and their
 allies in Sicily had
 brought up to the squadron guarding Messina the reinforcement which we left them
 preparing, and carried on the war from thence,

incited chiefly by the Locrians from hatred of the Rhegians, whose
 territory they had invaded with all their forces.

The Syracusans also wished to try their fortune at sea, seeing that
 the Athenians had only a few ships actually at Rhegium , and hearing that the
 main fleet destined to join them was engaged in blockading the
 island.

A naval victory, they thought, would enable them to blockade
 Rhegium by sea and
 land, and easily to reduce it; a success which would at once place
 their affairs upon a solid basis, the promontory of Rhegium in Italy and Messina in Sicily being so near each other
 that it would be impossible for the Athenians to cruise against them
 and command the strait.

The strait in question consists of the sea between Rhegium and Messina , at the point where
 Sicily approaches
 nearest to the continent, and is the Charybdis through which the
 story makes Ulysses sail; and the narrowness of the passage and the
 strength of the current that pours in from the vast Tyrrhenian and
 Sicilian mains, have rightly given it a bad reputation.

In this strait the Syracusans and
 their allies were compelled to engage, late in the day, about the
 passage of a boat, putting out with rather more than thirty ships
 against sixteen Athenian and eight Rhegian vessels.

Defeated by the Athenians they hastily set off, each for himself, to
 their own stations at Messina and Rhegium , with the loss of one ship; night coming on
 before the battle was finished.

After this the Locrians retired from the Rhegian territory, and the
 ships of the Syracusans and their allies united and came to anchor
 at Cape Pelorus in the territory of Messina , where their land forces joined them.

Here the Athenians and Rhegians sailed up, and seeing the ships
 unmanned, made an attack, in which they in their turn lost one
 vessel, which was caught by a grappling iron, the crew saving
 themselves by swimming.

After this the Syracusans got on board their ships, and while they
 were being towed along shore to Messina , were again attacked by the Athenians, but
 suddenly got out to sea and became the assailants, and caused them
 to lose another vessel.

After thus holding their own in the voyage along shore and in the
 engagement as above described, the Syracusans sailed on into the
 harbour of Messina .

Meanwhile the Athenians, having
 received warning that Camarina was about to be betrayed to the
 Syracusans by Archias and his party, sailed thither; and the
 Messinese took this opportunity to attack by sea and land with all
 their forces their Chalcidian neighbor, Naxos .

The first day they forced the Naxians to keep their walls, and laid
 waste their country; the next they sailed round with their ships,
 and laid waste their land on the river Akesines, while their land
 forces menaced the city.

Meanwhile the Sicels came down from the high country in great
 numbers, to aid against the Messinese; and the Naxians, elated at
 the sight, and animated by a belief that the Leontines and their
 other Hellenic allies were coming to their support, suddenly sallied
 out from the town, and attacked and routed the Messinese, killing
 more than a thousand of them; while the remainder suffered severely
 in their retreat home, being attacked by the barbarians on the road,
 and most of them cut off.

The ships put in to Messina ,
 and afterwards dispersed for their different homes. 
 The Leontines and their allies, with the Athenians, upon this at once
 turned their arms against the now weakened Messina , and attacked, the
 Athenians with their ships on the side of the harbour, and the land
 forces on that of the town.

The Messinese, however, sailing out with Demoteles and some Locrians
 who had been left to garrison the city after the disaster, suddenly
 attacked and routed most of the Leontine army, killing a great
 number; upon seeing which the Athenians landed from their ships, and
 falling on the Messinese in disorder chased them back into the town,
 and setting up a trophy retired to Rhegium .

After this the Hellenes in Sicily continued to make war on each other by land,
 without the Athenians.

Meanwhile the Athenians at Pylos were still besieging the
 Lacedaemonians in the island, the Peloponnesian forces on the
 continent remaining where they were.

The blockade was very laborious for the Athenians from want of food
 and water; there was no spring except one in the citadel of
 Pylos itself, and
 that not a large one, and most of them were obliged to grub up the
 shingle on the sea beach and drink such water as they could
 find.

They also suffered from want of room, being encamped in a narrow
 space; and as there was no anchorage for the ships, some took their
 meals on shore in their turn, while the others were anchored out at
 sea.

But their greatest discouragement arose from the unexpectedly long
 time which it took to reduce a body of men shut up in a desert
 island, with only brackish water to drink, a matter which they had
 imagined would take them only a few days.

The fact was, that the Lacedaemonians had made advertisement for
 volunteers to carry into the island ground corn, wine, cheese, and
 any other food useful in a siege; high prices being offered, and
 freedom promised to any of the Helots who should succeed in doing
 so.

The Helots accordingly were most forward to engage in this risky
 traffic, putting off from this or that part of Peloponnese , and running in by
 night on the seaward side of the island.

They were best pleased, however, when they could catch a wind to
 carry them in. 
 It was more easy to elude the look-out of the galleys, when it blew
 from the seaward, as it became impossible for them to anchor round
 the island; while the Helots had their boats rated at their value in
 money, and ran them ashore, without caring how they landed, being
 sure to find the soldiers waiting for them at the
 landing-places. 
 But all who risked it in fair weather were taken.

Divers also swam in under water from the harbour, dragging by a cord
 in skins poppy-seed mixed with honey, and bruised linseed; these at
 first escaped notice, but afterwards a look-out was kept for
 them.

In short, both sides tried every possible contrivance, the one to
 throw in provisions, and the other to prevent their introduction.

At Athens , meanwhile, the news that the army was in
 great distress, and that corn found its way in to the men in the
 island caused no small perplexity; and the Athenians began to fear
 that winter might come on and find them still engaged in the
 blockade. 
 They saw that the convoying of provisions round Peloponnese would be then
 impossible. 
 The country offered no resources in itself, and even in summer they
 could not send round enough. 
 The blockade of a place without harbor could no longer be kept up;
 and the men would either escape by the siege being abandoned, or
 would watch for bad weather and sail out in the boats that brought
 in their corn.

What caused still more alarm was the attitude of the Lacedaemonians,
 who must, it was thought by the Athenians, feel themselves on strong
 ground not to send them any more envoys; and they began to repent
 having rejected the treaty.

Cleon, perceiving the disfavor with which he was regarded for having
 stood in the way of the convention, now said that their informants
 did not speak the truth; and upon the messengers recommending them,
 if they did not believe them, to send some commissioners to see,
 Cleon himself and Theagenes were chosen by the Athenians as
 commissioners.

Aware that he would now be obliged either to say what had been
 already said by the men whom he was slandering, or be proved a liar
 if he said the contrary, he told the Athenians, whom he saw to be
 not altogether disinclined for a fresh expedition, that instead of
 sending commissioners and wasting their time and opportunities, if
 they believed what was told them, they ought to sail against the
 men.

And pointing at Nicias, son of Niceratus, then general, whom he
 hated, he tauntingly said that it would be easy, if they had men for
 generals, to sail with a force and take those in the island, and
 that if he had himself been in command, he would have done it.

Nicias, seeing the Athenians
 murmuring against Cleon for not sailing now if it seemed to him so
 easy, and further seeing himself the object of attack, told him that
 for all that the generals cared, he might take what force he chose
 and make the attempt.

At first Cleon fancied that this resignation was merely a figure of
 speech, and was ready to go, but finding that it was seriously
 meant, he drew back, and said that Nicias, not he, was general,
 being now frightened, and having never supposed that Nicias would go
 so far as to retire in his favour.

Nicias, however, repeated his offer, and resigned the command against
 Pylos , and called the
 Athenians to witness that he did so. 
 And as the multitude is wont to do, the more Cleon shrank from the
 expedition and tried to back out of what he had said, the more they
 encouraged Nicias to hand over his command, and clamored at Cleon to
 go.

At last, not knowing how to get out of his words, he undertook the
 expedition, and came forward and said that he was not afraid of the
 Lacedaemonians, but would sail without taking any one from the city
 with him, except the Lemnians and Imbrians that were at Athens , with some targeteers
 that had come up from Aenus , and four hundred archers from other
 quarters. 
 With these and the soldiers at Pylos , he would within twenty days either bring the
 Lacedaemonians alive, or kill them on the spot.

The Athenians could not help laughing at his fatuity, while sensible
 men comforted themselves with the reflection that they must gain in
 either circumstance; either they would be rid of Cleon, which they
 rather hoped, or if disappointed in this expectation, would reduce
 the Lacedaemonians.

After he had settled everything in
 the assembly, and the Athenians had voted him the command of the
 expedition, he chose as his colleague Demosthenes, one of the
 generals at Pylos , and
 pushed forward the preparations for his voyage.

His choice fell upon Demosthenes because he heard that he was
 contemplating a descent on the island; the soldiers distressed by
 the difficulties of the position, and rather besieged than
 besiegers, being eager to fight it out, while the firing of the
 island had increased the confidence of the general.

He had been at first afraid, because the island having never been
 inhabited was almost entirely covered with wood and without paths,
 thinking this to be in the enemy's favour, as he might land with a
 large force, and yet might suffer loss by an attack from an unseen
 position. 
 The mistakes and forces of the enemy the wood would in a great
 measure conceal from him, while every blunder of his own troops
 would be at once detected, and they would be thus able to fall upon
 him unexpectedly just where they pleased, the attack being always in
 their power.

If, on the other hand, he should force them to engage in the thicket,
 the smaller number who knew the country would, he thought, have the
 advantage over the larger who were ignorant of it, while his own
 army might be cut off imperceptibly, in spite of its numbers, as the
 men would not be able to see where to succor each other.

The Aetolian disaster, which had been
 mainly caused by the wood, had not a little to do with these
 reflections.

Meanwhile, one of the soldiers who were compelled by want of room to
 land on the extremities of the island and take their dinners, with
 outposts fixed to prevent a surprise, set fire to a little of the
 wood without meaning to do so; and as it came on to blow soon
 afterwards, almost the whole was consumed before they were aware of
 it. 
 Demosthenes was now able for the first time to see how numerous
 the

Lacedaemonians really were, having up to this moment been under the
 impression that they took in provisions for a smaller number; he
 also saw that the Athenians thought success important and were
 anxious about it, and that it was now easier to land on the island,
 and accordingly got ready for the attempt, sent for troops from the
 allies in the neighborhood, and pushed forward his other
 preparations.

At this moment Cleon arrived at Pylos with the troops which he had asked for,
 having sent on word to say that he was coming. 
 The first step taken by the two generals after their meeting was to
 send a herald to the camp on the mainland, to ask if they were
 disposed to avoid all risk and to order the men on the island to
 surrender themselves and their arms, to be kept in gentle custody
 until some general convention should be concluded.

On the rejection of this proposition
 the generals let one day pass, and the next embarking all their
 heavy infantry on board a few ships, put out by night, and a little
 before dawn landed on both sides of the island from the open sea and
 from the harbour, being about eight hundred strong, and advanced
 with a run against the first post in the island.

The enemy had distributed his force as follows:—In this first post
 there were about thirty heavy infantry; the center and most level
 part, where the water was, was held by the main body, and by
 Epitadas their commander; while a small party guarded the very end
 of the island, towards Pylos , which was precipitous on the sea-side and
 very difficult to attack from the land, and where there was also a
 sort of old fort of stones rudely put together, which they thought
 might be useful to them, in case they should be forced to
 retreat. 
 Such was their disposition.

The advanced post thus attacked by
 the Athenians was at once put to the sword, the men being scarcely
 out of bed and still arming, the landing having taken them by
 surprise, as they fancied the ships were only sailing as usual to
 their stations for the night.

As soon as day broke, the rest of the army landed, that is to say,
 all the crews of rather more than seventy ships, except the lowest
 rank of oars, with the arms they carried, eight hundred archers, and
 as many targeteers, the Messenian reinforcements, and all the other
 troops on duty round Pylos , except the garrison on the fort.

The tactics of Demosthenes had divided them into companies of two
 hundred, more or less, and made them occupy the highest points in
 order to paralyze the enemy by surrounding him on every side and
 thus leaving him without any tangible adversary, exposed to the
 cross-fire of their host; plied by those in his rear if he attacked
 in front, and by those on one flank he moved against those on the
 other.

In short, wherever he went he would have the assailants behind him,
 and these light-armed assailants, the most awkward of all; arrows,
 darts, stones, and slings making them formidable at a distance, and
 there being no means of getting at them at close quarters, as they
 could conquer flying, and the moment their pursuer turned they were
 upon him. 
 Such was the idea that inspired Demosthenes in his conception of the
 descent, and presided over its execution.

Meanwhile the main body of the troops
 in the island (that under Epitadas), seeing their outpost cut off
 and an army advancing against them, serried their ranks and pressed
 forward to close with the Athenian heavy infantry in front of them,
 the light troops being upon their flanks and rear.

However, they were not able to engage or to profit by their superior
 skill, the light troops keeping them in check on either side with
 their missiles, and the heavy infantry remaining stationary instead
 of advancing to meet them; and although they routed the light troops
 wherever they ran up and approached too closely, yet they retreated
 fighting, being lightly equipped, and easily getting the start in
 their flight, from the difficult and rugged nature of the ground, in
 an island hitherto desert, over which the Lacedaemonians could not
 pursue them with their heavy armour.

After this skirmishing had lasted
 some little while, the Lacedaemonians became unable to dash out with
 the same rapidity as before upon the points attacked, and the light
 troops, finding that they now fought with less vigor, became more
 confident. 
 They could see with their own eyes that they were many times more
 numerous than the enemy; they were now more familiar with his aspect
 and found him less terrible, the result not having justified the
 apprehensions which they had suffered, when they first landed in
 slavish dismay at the idea of attacking Lacedaemonians; and
 accordingly their fear changing to disdain, they now rushed all
 together with loud shouts upon them, and pelted them with stones,
 darts, and arrows, whichever came first to hand.

The shouting accompanying their onset confounded the Lacedaemonians,
 unaccustomed to this mode of fighting; dust rose from the
 newly-burnt wood, and it was impossible to see in front of one with
 the arrows and stones flying through clouds of dust from the hands
 of numerous assailants.

The Lacedaemonians had now to sustain a rude conflict; their caps
 would not keep out the arrows, darts had broken off in the armour of
 the wounded, while they themselves were helpless for offence, being
 prevented from using their eyes to see what was before them, and
 unable to hear the words of command for the hubbub raised by the
 enemy; danger encompassed them on every side, and there was no hope
 of any means of defence or safety.

At last, after many had been already
 wounded in the confined space in which they were fighting, they
 formed in close order and retired on the fort at the end of the
 island, which was not far off, and to their friends who held it.

The moment they gave way, the light troops became bolder and pressed
 upon them, shouting louder than ever, and killed as many as they
 came up with in their retreat, but most of the Lacedaemonian made
 good their escape to the fort, and with the garrison in it ranged
 themselves all along its whole extent to repulse the enemy wherever
 it was assailable.

The Athenians pursuing, unable to surround and hem them in, owing to
 the strength of the ground, attacked them in front and tried to
 storm the position.

For a long time, indeed for most of the day, both sides held out
 against all the torments of the battle, thirst, and sun, the one
 endeavoring to drive the enemy from the high ground, the other to
 maintain himself upon it, it being now more easy for the
 Lacedaemonians to defend themselves than before, as they could not
 be surrounded upon the flanks.

The struggle began to seem endless,
 when the commander of the Messenians came to Cleon and Demosthenes,
 and told them that they were losing their labour: but that if they
 would give him some archers and light troops to go round on the
 enemy's rear by a way he would undertake to find, he thought he
 could force the approach.

Upon receiving what he asked for, he started from a point out of
 sight in order not to be seen by the enemy, and creeping on wherever
 the precipices of the island permitted, and where the
 Lacedaemonians, trusting to the strength of the ground, kept no
 guard, succeeded after the greatest difficulty in getting round
 without their seeing him, and suddenly appeared on the high
 grounding their rear, to the dismay of the surprised enemy and the
 still greater joy of his expectant friends.

The Lacedaemonians thus placed between two fires, and in the same
 dilemma, to compare small things with great, as at Thermopylae , where the
 defenders were cut off through the Persians getting round by the
 path, being now attacked in front and behind, began to give way, and
 overcome by the odds against them and exhausted from want of food,
 retreated. The Athenians were
 already masters of the approaches

when Cleon and Demosthenes perceiving that, if the enemy gave way a
 single step further, they would be destroyed by their soldiery, put
 a stop to the battle and held their men back; wishing to take the
 Lacedaemonians alive to Athens , and hoping that their stubbornness might
 relax on hearing the offer of terms, and that they might surrender
 and yield to the present overwhelming danger.

Proclamation was accordingly made, to know if they would surrender
 themselves and their arms to the Athenians to be dealt with at their
 discretion.

The Lacedaemonians hearing this
 offer, most of them lowered their shields and waved their hands to
 show that they accepted it. 
 Hostilities now ceased, and a parley was held between Cleon and
 Demosthenes and Styphon, son of Pharax, the other side; since
 Epitadas, the first of the previous commanders, had been killed, and
 Hippagretas, the next in command, left for dead among the slain,
 though still alive, and thus the command had devolved upon Styphon
 according to the law, in case of anything happening to his
 superiors.

Styphon and his companions said they wished to send a herald to the
 Lacedaemonians on the mainland, to know what they were to do.

The Athenians would not let any of them go, but themselves called for
 heralds from the mainland, and after questions had been carried
 backwards and forwards two or three times, the last man that passed
 over from the Lacedaemonians on the continent brought this message:
 ‘The Lacedaemonians bid you to decide for yourselves so long as you
 do nothing dishonourable;’ upon which after consulting together they
 surrendered themselves and their arms.

The Athenians, after guarding them that day and night, the next
 morning set up a trophy in the island, and got ready to sail, giving
 their prisoners in batches to be guarded by the captains of the
 galleys; and the Lacedaemonians sent a herald and took up their
 dead.

The number of the killed and prisoners taken in the island was as
 follows: four hundred and twenty heavy infantry had passed over;
 three hundred all but eight were taken alive to Athens ; the rest were
 killed. 
 About a hundred and twenty of the prisoners were Spartans. 
 The Athenian loss was small, the battle not having been fought at
 close quarters.

The blockade in all, counting from
 the fight at sea to the battle in the island, had lasted seventy-two
 days.

For twenty of these, during the absence of the envoys sent to treat
 for peace, the men had provisions given them, for the rest they were
 fed by the smugglers. 
 Corn and other victual was found in the island; the commander
 Epitadas having kept the men upon half rations.

The Athenians and Peloponnesians now each withdrew their forces from
 Pylos , and went home,
 and crazy as Cleon's promise was, he fulfilled it, by bringing the
 men to Athens within the
 twenty days as he had pledged himself to do.

Nothing that happened in the war
 surprised the Hellenes so much as this. 
 It was the opinion that no force or famine could make the
 Lacedaemonians give up their arms, but that they would fight on as
 they could, and die with them in their hands:

indeed people could scarcely believe that those who had surrendered
 were of the same stuff as the fallen; and an Athenian ally, who some
 time after insultingly asked one of the prisoners from the island if
 those that had fallen were men of honor, received for answer that
 the atraktos—that is, the arrow—would be worth a great deal if it
 could tell men of honor from the rest; in allusion to the fact that
 the killed were those whom the stones and the arrow happened to hit.

Upon the arrival of the men the
 Athenians determined to keep them in prison until the peace, and if
 the Peloponnesians invaded their country in the interval, to bring
 them out and put them to death.

Meanwhile the defence of Pylos was not forgotten; the Messenians from
 Naupactus sent to
 their old country, to which Pylos formerly belonged, some of the likeliest of
 their number, and began a series of incursions into Laconia , which their common
 dialect rendered most destructive.

The Lacedaemonians, hitherto without experience of incursions or a
 warfare of the kind, finding the Helots deserting, and fearing the
 march of revolution in their country, began to be seriously uneasy,
 and in spite of their unwillingness to betray this to the Athenians
 began to send envoys to Athens , and tried to recover Pylos and the prisoners.

The Athenians, however, kept grasping at more, and dismissed envoy
 after envoy without their having effected anything. 
 Such was the history of the affair of Pylos .

The same summer, directly after these
 events, the Athenians made an expedition against the territory of
 Corinth with eighty
 ships and two thousand Athenian heavy infantry, and two hundred
 cavalry on board horse transports, accompanied by the Milesians,
 Andrians, and Carystians from the allies; under the command of
 Nicias, son of Niceratus, with two colleagues.

Putting out to sea they made land at daybreak between Chersonese and
 Rheitus, at the beach of the country underneath the Solygian hill,
 upon which the Dorians in old times established themselves and
 carried on war against the Aeolian inhabitants of Corinth , and where a village
 now stands called Solygia. 
 The beach where the fleet came to is about a mile and a half from the
 village, seven miles from Corinth , and two and a quarter from the
 Isthmus.

The Corinthians had heard from Argos of the coming of the Athenian armament, and
 had all come up to the Isthmus long before, with the exception of
 those who lived beyond it, and also of five hundred who were away in
 garrison in Ambracia 
 and Leucadia; and they were there in full force watching for the
 Athenians to land.

These last, however, gave them the slip by coming in the dark; and
 being informed by signals of the fact, the Corinthians left half
 their number at Cenchreae, in case the Athenians should go against
 Crommyon, and marched in all haste to the rescue.

Battus, one of the two generals
 present at the action, went with a company to defend the village of
 Solygia, which was unfortified; Lycophron remaining to give battle
 with the rest.

The Corinthians first attacked the right wing of the Athenians, which
 had just landed in front of Chersonese , and
 afterwards the rest of the army. 
 The battle was an obstinate one, and fought throughout hand to
 hand.

The right wing of the Athenians and Carystians, who had been placed
 at the end of the line, received and with some difficulty repulsed
 the Corinthians, who thereupon retreated to a wall upon the rising
 ground behind, and throwing down the stones upon them, came on again
 singing the paean, and being received by the Athenians, were again
 engaged at close quarters.

At this moment a Corinthian company having come to the relief of the
 left wing, routed and pursued the Athenian right to the sea, whence
 they were in their turn driven back by the Athenians and Carystians
 from the ships.

Meanwhile the rest of the army on either side fought on tenaciously,
 especially the right wing of the Corinthians, where Lycophron
 sustained the attack of the Athenian left, which it was feared might
 attempt the village of Solygia.

After holding on for a long while
 without either giving way, the Athenians aided by their horse, of
 which the enemy had none, at length routed the Corinthians, who
 retired to the hill and halting remained quiet there, without coming
 down again.

It was in this rout of the right wing that they had the most killed,
 Lycophron their general being among the number. 
 The rest of the army, broken and put to flight in this way without
 being seriously pursued or hurried, retired to the high ground and
 there took up its position.

The Athenians, finding that the enemy no longer offered to engage
 them, stripped his dead and took up their own and immediately set up
 a trophy.

Meanwhile, the half of the Corinthians left at Cenchreae to guard
 against the Athenians sailing on Crommyon, although unable to see
 the battle for Mount Oneion, found out what was going on by the
 dust, and hurried up to the rescue; as did also the older
 Corinthians from the town, upon discovering what had occurred.

The Athenians seeing them all coming against them, and thinking that
 they were reinforcements from the neighbouring Peloponnesians,
 withdrew in haste to their ships with their spoils and their own
 dead, except two that they left behind, not being able to find
 them,

and going on board crossed over to the islands opposite, and from
 thence sent a herald, and took up under truce the bodies which they
 had left behind. 
 Two hundred and twelve Corinthians fell in the battle, and rather
 less than fifty Athenians.

Weighing from the islands, the
 Athenians sailed the same day to Crommyon in the Corinthian
 territory, about thirteen miles from the city, and coming to anchor
 laid waste the country, and passed the night there.

The next day, after first coasting along to the territory of
 Epidaurus and
 making a descent there, they came to Methana between Epidaurus and Troezen , and drew a wall across
 and fortified the isthmus of the peninsula, and left a post there
 from which incursions were henceforth made upon the country of
 Troezen , Haliae, and
 Epidaurus . 
 After walling off this spot the fleet sailed off home.

While these events were going on,
 Eurymedon and Sophocles had put to sea with the Athenian fleet from
 Pylos on their way to
 Sicily , and arriving at
 Corcyra ,
 joined the townsmen in an expedition against the party established
 on Mount Istone, who had crossed over, as I have mentioned, after
 the revolution, and become masters of the country, to the great hurt
 of the inhabitants.

Their stronghold having been taken by an attack, the garrison took
 refuge in a body upon some high ground and there capitulated,
 agreeing to give up their mercenary auxiliaries, lay down their
 arms, and commit themselves to the discretion of the Athenian
 people.

The generals carried them across under truce to the island of
 Ptychia, to be kept in custody until they could be sent to
 Athens , upon the
 understanding that if any were caught running away, all would lose
 the benefit of the treaty.

Meanwhile the leaders of the Corcyraean commons, afraid that the
 Athenians might spare the lives of the prisoners, had recourse to
 the following stratagem.

They gained over some few men on the island by secretly sending
 friends with instructions to provide them with a boat, and to tell
 them, as if for their own sakes, that they had best escape as
 quickly as possible, as the Athenian generals were going to give
 them up to the Corcyraean people.

These representations succeeding, it
 was so arranged that the men were caught sailing out in the boat
 that was provided, and the treaty became void accordingly, and the
 whole were given up to the Corcyraeans.

For this result the Athenian generals were in a great measure
 responsible; their evident disinclination to sail for Sicily , and thus to leave to
 others the honour of conducting the men to Athens , encouraged the
 intriguers in their design and seemed to affirm the truth of their
 representations.

The prisoners thus handed over were shut up by the Corcyraeans in a
 large building, and afterwards taken out by twenties and led past
 two lines of heavy infantry, one on each side, being bound together,
 and beaten and stabbed by the men in the lines whenever any saw pass
 a personal enemy; while men carrying whips went by their side and
 hastened on the road those that walked too slowly.

As many as sixty men were taken out
 and killed in this way without the knowledge of their friends in the
 building, who fancied they were merely being moved from one prison
 to another. 
 At last, however, some one opened their eyes to the truth, upon which
 they called upon the Athenians to kill them themselves, if such was
 their pleasure, and refused any longer to go out of the building,
 and said they would do all they could to prevent any one coming
 in.

The Corcyraeans, not liking themselves to force a passage by the
 doors, got up on the top of the building, and breaking through the
 roof, threw down the tiles and let fly arrows at them, from which
 the prisoners sheltered themselves as well as they could.

Most of their number, meanwhile, were engaged in dispatching
 themselves by thrusting into their throats the arrows shot by the
 enemy, and hanging themselves with the cords taken from some beds,
 that happened to be there, and with strips made from their clothing;
 adopting, in short, every possible means of self-destruction, and
 also falling victims to the missiles of their enemies on the
 roof. 
 Night came on while these horrors were enacting, and most of it had
 passed before they were concluded.

When it was day the Corcyraeans threw them in layers upon wagons and
 carried them out of the city. 
 All the women taken in the stronghold were sold as slaves.

In this way the Corcyraeans of the mountain were destroyed by the
 commons; and so after terrible excesses the party strife came to an
 end, at least as far as the period of this war is concerned, for of
 one party there was practically nothing left.

Meanwhile the Athenians sailed off to Sicily , their primary destination, and carried on
 the war with their allies there.

At the close of the summer, the
 Athenians at Naupactus and the Acarnanians made an expedition
 against Anactorium, the Corinthian town lying at the mouth of the
 Ambracian gulf, and took it by treachery; and the Acarnanians
 themselves sending settlers from all parts of Acarnania occupied the
 place. Summer was now over.

During the winter ensuing Aristides, son of Archippus, one of the
 commanders of the Athenian ships sent to collect money from the
 allies, arrested at Eion 
 on the Strymon Artaphernes, a Persian, on his way from the king to
 Lacedaemon .

He was conducted to Athens , where the Athenians got his dispatches
 translated from the Assyrian character and read them. 
 With numerous references to other subjects, they in substance told
 the Lacedaemonians that the king did not know what they wanted, as
 of the many ambassadors they had sent him no two ever told the same
 story; however they were prepared to speak plainly they might send
 him some envoys with this Persian.

The Athenians afterwards sent back Artaphernes in a galley to
 Ephesus , and
 ambassadors with him, who heard there of the death of King
 Artaxerxes, son of Xerxes, which took place about that time, and so
 returned home.

The same winter the Chians pulled
 down their new wall at the command of the Athenians, who suspected
 them of meditating an insurrection, after first however obtaining
 pledges from the Athenians, and security as far as this was possible
 for their continuing to treat them as before. 
 Thus the winter ended, and with it ended the seventh year of this war
 of which Thucydides is the historian.

In the first days of the next summer
 there was an eclipse of the sun at the time of new moon, and in the
 early part of the same month an earthquake.

Meanwhile, the Mitylenian and other Lesbian exiles set out, for the
 most part from the continent, with mercenaries hired in Peloponnese , and others levied on
 the spot, and took Rhoeteum, but restored it without injury on the
 receipt of two thousand Phocaean staters.

After this they marched against Antandrus and took the town by
 treachery, their plan being to free Antandrus and the rest of the
 Actaean towns, formerly owned by Mitylene but now held by the Athenians. 
 Once fortified there, they would have every facility for shipbuilding
 from the vicinity of Ida and the consequent abundance of timber, and
 plenty of other supplies, and might from this base easily ravage
 Lesbos , which was not
 far off, and make themselves masters of the Aeolian towns on the
 continent. While these were the
 schemes of the exiles,

the Athenians in the same summer made an expedition with sixty ships,
 two thousand heavy infantry, a few cavalry, and some allied troops
 from Miletus and other
 parts, against Cythera ,
 under the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus, Nicostratus, son of
 Diotrephes, and Autocles, son of Tolmaeus.

Cythera is an island lying
 off Laconia , opposite
 Malea; the inhabitants are Lacedaemonians of the class of the
 Perioeci; and an officer called the Judge of Cythera went over to the place
 annually from Sparta . 
 A garrison of heavy infantry was also regularly sent there, and great
 attention paid to the island,

as it was the landing-place for the merchantmen from Egypt and Libya , and at the same time
 secured Laconia from the
 attacks of privateers from the sea, at the only point where it is
 assailable, as the whole coast rises abruptly towards the Sicilian
 and Cretan seas.

Coming to land here with their
 armament, the Athenians with ten ships and two thousand Milesian
 heavy infantry took the town of Scandea, on the sea; and with the
 rest of their forces landing on the side of the island looking
 towards Malea, went against the lower town of Cythera , where they found all the
 inhabitants encamped.

A battle ensuing, the Cytherians held their ground for some little
 while, and then turned and fled into the upper town, where they soon
 afterwards capitulated to Nicias and his colleagues, agreeing to
 leave their fate to the decision of the Athenians, their lives only
 being safe.

A correspondence had previously been going on between Nicias and
 certain of the inhabitants, which caused the surrender to be
 effected more speedily, and upon terms more advantageous, present
 and future, for the Cytherians; who would otherwise have been
 expelled by the Athenians on account of their being Lacedaemonians
 and their island being so near to Laconia .

After the capitulation, the Athenians occupied the town of Scandea
 near the harbour, and appointing a garrison for Cythera , sailed to Asine , Helus, and most of the
 places on the sea, and making descents and passing the night on
 shore at such spots as were convenient, continued ravaging the
 country for about seven days.

The Lacedaemonians seeing the
 Athenians masters of Cythera , and expecting descents of the kind upon
 their coasts, nowhere opposed them in force, but sent garrisons here
 and there through the country, consisting of as many heavy infantry
 as the points menaced seemed to require, and generally stood very
 much upon the defensive. 
 After the severe and unexpected blow that had befallen them in the
 island, the occupation of Pylos and Cythera , and the apparition on every side of a war
 whose rapidity defied precaution, they lived in constant fear of
 internal revolution,

and now took the unusual step of raising four hundred horse and a
 force of archers, and became more timid than ever in military
 matters, finding themselves involved in a maritime struggle, which
 their organisation had never contemplated, and that against
 Athenians, with whom an enterprise unattempted was always looked
 upon as a success sacrificed.

Besides this, their late numerous reverses of fortune, coming close
 one upon another without any reason, had thoroughly unnerved them,
 and they were always afraid of a second disaster like that on the
 island,

and thus scarcely dared to take the field, but fancied that they
 could not stir without a blunder, for being new to the experience of
 adversity they had lost all confidence in themselves.

Accordingly they now allowed the
 Athenians to ravage their seaboard, without making any movement, the
 garrisons in whose neighbourhood the descents were made always
 thinking their numbers insufficient, and sharing the general
 feeling. 
 A single garrison which ventured to resist, near Cotyrta and
 Aphrodisia, struck terror by its charge into the scattered mob of
 light troops, but retreated, upon being received by the heavy
 infantry, with the loss of a few men and some arms, for which the
 Athenians set up a trophy, and then sailed off to Cythera .

From thence they sailed round to the Limeran Epidaurus, ravaged part
 of the country, and so came to Thyrea in the Cynurian territory,
 upon the Argive and
 Laconian border. 
 This district had been given by its Lacedaemonian owners to the
 expelled Aeginetans to inhabit, in return for their good offices at
 the time of the earthquake and the rising of the Helots; and also
 because, although subjects of Athens , they had always sided with Lacedaemon .

While the Athenians were still at
 sea, the Aeginetans evacuated a fort which they were building upon
 the coast, and retreated into the upper town where they lived,
 rather more than a mile from the sea.

One of the Lacedaemonian district garrisons which was helping them in
 the work, refused to enter here with them at their entreaty,
 thinking it dangerous to shut themselves up within the wall, and
 retiring to the high ground remained quiet, not considering
 themselves a match for the enemy.

Meanwhile the Athenians landed, and instantly advanced with all their
 forces and took Thyrea. 
 The town they burnt, pillaging what was in it; the Aeginetans who
 were not slain in action they took with them to Athens , with Tantalus, son of
 Patrocles, their Lacedaemonian commander, who had been wounded and
 taken prisoner.

They also took with them a few men from Cythera whom they thought it
 safest to remove. 
 These the Athenians determined to lodge in the islands: the rest of
 the Cytherians were to retain their lands and pay four talents'
 tribute; the Aeginetans captured to be all put to death, on account
 of the old inveterate feud; and Tantalus to share the imprisonment
 of the Lacedaemonians taken on the island.

The same summer, the inhabitants of
 Camarina and Gela in
 Sicily first made an
 armistice with each other, after which embassies from all the other
 Sicilian cities assembled at Gela to try to bring about a pacification. 
 After many expressions of opinion on one side and the other,
 according to the griefs and pretensions of the different parties
 complaining, Hermocrates, son of Hermon, a Syracusan, the most
 influential man among them, addressed the following words to the
 assembly:—

‘If I now address you, Sicilians, it
 is not because my city is the least in Sicily or the greatest sufferer by the war, but in
 order to state publicly what appears to me to be the best policy for
 the whole island.

That war is an evil is a proposition so familiar to every one that it
 would be tedious to develop it. 
 No one is forced to engage in it by ignorance, or kept out of it by
 fear, if he fancies there is anything to be gained by it. 
 To the former the gain appears greater than the danger, while he
 latter would rather stand the risk than put up with any immediate
 sacrifice.

But if both should happen to have chosen the wrong moment for acting
 in this way, advice to make peace would not be unserviceable;

and this, if we did but see it, is just what we stand most in need of
 at the present juncture. I suppose
 that no one will dispute that we went to war at first, in order to
 serve our own several interests, that we are now, in view of the
 same interests, debating how we can make peace; and that if we
 separate without having as we think our rights, we shall go to war
 again.

And yet, as men of sense, we ought to see that our separate interests
 are not alone at stake in the present congress: there is also the
 question whether we have still time to save Sicily , the whole of which in my
 opinion is menaced by Athenian ambition; and we ought to find in the
 name of that people more imperious arguments for peace than any
 which I can advance, when we see the first power in Hellas watching our mistakes with
 the few ships that she has at present in our waters, and under the
 fair name of alliance speciously seeking to turn to account the
 natural hostility that exists between us.

If we go to war, and call in to help us a people that are ready
 enough to carry their arms even where they are not invited; and if
 we injure ourselves at our own expense, and at the same time serve
 as the pioneers of their dominion, we may expect when they see us
 worn out, that they will one day come with a larger armament, and
 seek to bring all of us into subjection.

And yet as sensible men, if we call
 in allies and court danger, it should be in order to enrich our
 different countries with new acquisitions, and not to ruin what they
 possess already; and we should understand that the intestine
 discords which are so fatal to communities generally, will be
 equally so to Sicily , if
 we, its inhabitants, absorbed in our local quarrels, neglect the
 common enemy.

These considerations should reconcile individual with individual, and
 city with city, and unite us in a common effort to save the whole of
 Sicily . 
 Nor should any one imagine that the Dorians only are enemies of
 Athens , while the
 Chalcidian race is secured by its Ionian blood;

the attack in question is not inspired by hatred of one of two
 nationalities, but by a desire for the good things in Sicily , the common property of us
 all.

This is proved by the Athenian reception of the Chalcidian
 invitation: an ally who has never given them any assistance
 whatever, at once receives from them almost more than the treaty
 entitles him to.

That the Athenians should cherish this ambition and practise this
 policy is very excusable; and I do not blame those who wish to rule,
 but those who are over ready to serve. 
 It is just as much in men's nature to rule those who submit to them,
 as it is to resist those who molest them; one is not less invariable
 than the other.

Meanwhile all who see these dangers and refuse to provide for them
 properly, or who have come here without having made up their minds
 that our first duty is to unite to get rid of the common peril, are
 mistaken.

The quickest way to be rid of it is to make peace with each other;
 since the Athenians menace us not from their own country, but from
 that of those who invited them here. 
 In this way instead of war issuing in war, peace quietly ends our
 quarrels; and the guests who come hither under fair pretences for
 bad ends, will have good reason for going away without having
 attained them.

So far as regards the Athenians such
 are the great advantages proved inherent in a wise policy.

Independently of this, in the face of the universal consent that
 peace is the first of blessings, how can we refuse to make it
 amongst ourselves; or do you not think that the good which you have,
 and the ills that you complain of, would be better preserved and
 cured by quiet than by war; that peace has its honours and
 splendours of a less perilous kind, not to mention the numerous
 other blessings that one might dilate on, with the not less numerous
 miseries of war? 
 These considerations should teach you not to disregard my words, but
 rather to look in them every one for his own safety.

If there be any here who feels certain either by right or might to
 effect his object, let not this surprise be to him too severe a
 disappointment. 
 Let him remember that many before now have tried to chastise a
 wrongdoer, and failing to punish their enemy have not even saved
 themselves; while many who have trusted in force to gain an
 advantage, instead of gaining anything more, have been doomed to
 lose what they had.

Vengeance is not necessarily successful because wrong has been done,
 or strength sure because it is confident; but the incalculable
 element in the future exercises the widest influence, and is the
 most treacherous, and yet in fact the most useful of all things, as
 it frightens us all equally, and thus makes us consider before
 attacking each other.

Let us therefore now allow the
 undefined fear of this unknown future, and the immediate terror of
 the Athenians' presence to produce their natural impression, and let
 us consider any failure to carry out the programmes that we may each
 have sketched out for ourselves as sufficiently accounted for by
 these obstacles, and send away the intruder from the country; and if
 everlasting peace be impossible between us, let us at all events
 make a treaty for as long a term as possible, and put off our
 private differences to another day.

In fine, let us recognize that the adoption of my advice will leave
 us each citizens of a free state, and as such arbiters of our own
 destiny, able to return good or bad offices with equal effect; while
 its rejection will make us dependent on others, and thus not only
 impotent to repel an insult, but on the most favourable supposition,
 friends to our direst enemies, and at feud with our natural friends.

For myself, though, as I said at
 first, the representative of a great city, and able to think less of
 defending myself than of attacking others, I am prepared to concede
 something in prevision of these dangers. 
 I am not inclined to ruin myself for the sake of hurting my enemies,
 or so blinded by animosity as to think myself equally master of my
 own plans and of fortune which I cannot command; but I am ready to
 give up anything in reason.

I call upon the rest of you to imitate my conduct of your own free
 will, without being forced to do so by the enemy.

There is no disgrace in connections giving way to one another, a
 Dorian to a Dorian, or a Chalcidian to his brethren; above and
 beyond this we are neighbors, live in the same country, are girt by
 the same sea, and go by the same name of Sicilians. 
 We shall go to war again, I suppose, when the time comes, and again
 make peace among ourselves by means of future congresses;

but the foreign invader, if we are wise, will always find us united
 against him, since the hurt of one is the danger of all; and we
 shall never, in future, invite into the island either allies or
 mediators.

By so acting we shall at the present moment do for Sicily a double service, ridding
 her at once of the Athenians, and of civil war, and in future shall
 live in freedom at home, and be less menaced from abroad.’

Such were the words of
 Hermocrates. 
 The Sicilians took his advice, and came to an understanding among
 themselves to end the war, each keeping what they had—the
 Camarinaeans taking Morgantina at a price fixed to be paid to the
 Syracusans—

and the allies of the Athenians called the officers in command, and
 told them that they were going to make peace and that they would be
 included in the treaty. 
 The generals assenting, the peace was concluded, and the Athenian
 fleet afterwards sailed away from Sicily .

Upon their arrival at Athens , the Athenians banished Pythodorus and
 Sophocles, and fined Eurymedon for having taken bribes to depart
 when they might have subdued Sicily .

So thoroughly had the present prosperity persuaded the citizens that
 nothing could withstand them, and that they could achieve what was
 possible and impracticable alike, with means ample or inadequate it
 mattered not. 
 The secret of this was their general extraordinary success, which
 made them confuse their strength with their hopes.

The same summer the Megarians in the
 city, pressed by the hostilities of the Athenians, who invaded their
 country twice every year with all their forces, and harassed by the
 incursions of their own exiles at Pegae, who had been expelled in a
 revolution by the popular party, began to ask each other whether it
 would not be better to receive back their exiles, and free the town
 from one of its two scourges.

The friends of the emigrants perceiving the agitation, now more
 openly than before demanded the adoption of this proposition;

and the leaders of the commons, seeing that the sufferings of the
 times had tired out the constancy of their supporters, entered in
 their alarm into correspondence with the Athenian generals,
 Hippocrates, son of Ariphron, and Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes,
 and resolved to betray the town, thinking this less dangerous to
 themselves than the return of the party which they had banished. 
 It was accordingly arranged that the Athenians should first take the
 long walls extending for nearly a mile from the city to the port of
 Nisaea , to prevent
 the Peloponnesians coming to the rescue from that place, where they
 formed the sole garrison to secure the fidelity of Megara ; and that after this the
 attempt should be made to put into their hands the upper town, which
 it was thought would then come over with less difficulty.

The Athenians, after plans had been
 arranged between themselves and their correspondents both as to
 words and actions, sailed by night to Minoa , the island off Megara , with six hundred heavy
 infantry under the command of Hippocrates, and took post in a quarry
 not far off, out of which bricks used to be taken for the walls;

while Demosthenes, the other commander, with a detachment of Plataean
 light troops and another of Peripoli, placed himself in ambush in
 the precinct of Enyalius, which was still nearer. 
 No one knew of it, except those whose business it was to know that
 night.

A little before daybreak, the traitors in Megara began to act. 
 Every night for a long time back, under pretence of marauding, in
 order to have a means of opening the gates, they had been used, with
 the consent of the officer in command, to carry by night a sculling
 boat upon a cart along the ditch to the sea, and so to sail out,
 bringing it back again before day upon the cart, and taking it
 within the wall through the gates, in order, as they pretended, to
 baffle the Athenian blockade at Minoa , there being no boat to be seen in the
 harbour.

On the present occasion the cart was already at the gates, which had
 been opened in the usual way for the boat, when the Athenians, with
 whom this had been concerted, saw it, and ran at the top of their
 speed from the ambush in order to reach the gates before they were
 shut again, and while the cart was still there to prevent their
 being closed; their Megarian accomplices at the same moment killing
 the guard at the gates.

The first to run in was Demosthenes with his Plataeans and Peripoli,
 just where the trophy now stands; and he was no sooner within the
 gates than the Plataeans engaged and defeated the nearest party of
 Peloponnesians who had taken the alarm and come to the rescue, and
 secured the gates for the approaching Athenian heavy infantry.

After this, each of the Athenians as
 fast as they entered went against the wall.

A few of the Peloponnesian garrison stood their ground at first, and
 tried to repel the assault, and some of them were killed but the
 main body took fright and fled; the night attack and the sight of
 the Megarian traitors in arms against them making them think that
 all Megara had gone over
 to the enemy.

It so happened also that the Athenian herald of his own idea called
 out and invited any of the Megarians that wished, to join the
 Athenian ranks; and this was no sooner heard by the garrison than
 they gave way, and, convinced that they were the victims of a
 concerted attack, took refuge in Nisaea .

By daybreak, the walls being now taken and the Megarians in the city
 in great agitation, the persons who had negotiated with the
 Athenians, supported by the rest of the popular party which was
 privy to the plot, said that they ought to open the gates and march
 out to battle.

It had been concerted between them that the Athenians should rush in,
 the moment that the gates were opened, while the conspirators were
 to be distinguished from the rest by being anointed with oil, and so
 to avoid being hurt. 
 They could open the gates with more security, as four thousand
 Athenian heavy infantry from Eleusis , and six hundred horse, had marched all
 night, according to agreement, and were now close at hand.

The conspirators were all ready anointed and at their posts by the
 gates when one of their accomplices denounced the plot to the
 opposite party, who gathered together and came in a body, and
 roundly said that they must not march out—a thing they had never yet
 ventured on even when in greater force than at present—or wantonly
 compromise the safety of the town, and that if what they said was
 not attended to, the battle would have to be fought in Megara . 
 For the rest, they gave no signs of their knowledge of the intrigue,
 but stoutly maintained that their advice was the best, and meanwhile
 kept close by and watched the gates, making it impossible for the
 conspirators to effect their purpose.

The Athenian generals seeing that
 some obstacle had arisen, and that the capture of the town by force
 was no longer practicable, at once proceeded to invest Nisaea , thinking that if they
 could take it before relief arrived, the surrender of Megara would soon follow.

Iron, stone-masons, and everything else required quickly coming up
 from Athens , the
 Athenians started from the wall which they occupied, and from this
 point built a cross wall looking towards Megara down to the sea on
 either side of Nisaea ;
 the ditch and the walls being divided among the army, stones and
 bricks taken from the suburb, and the fruit-trees and timber cut
 down to make a palisade wherever this seemed necessary; the houses
 also in the suburb with the addition of battlements sometimes
 entering into the fortification. 
 The whole of this day the work continued,

and by the afternoon of the next the wall was all but completed, when
 the garrison in Nisaea ,
 alarmed by the absolute want of provisions, which they used to take
 in for the day from the upper town, not anticipating any speedy
 relief from the Peloponnesians, and supposing Megara to be hostile,
 capitulated to the Athenians on condition that they should give up
 their arms, and should each be ransomed for a stipulated sum; their
 Lacedaemonian commander, and any others of his countrymen in the
 place, being left to the discretion of the Athenians.

On these conditions they surrendered and came out, and the Athenians
 broke down the long walls at their point of junction with Megara , took possession of
 Nisaea , and went on
 with their other preparations.

Just at this time the Lacedaemonian
 Brasidas, son of Tellis, happened to be in the neighbourhood of
 Sicyon and Corinth , getting ready an army
 for Thrace . 
 As soon as he heard of the capture of the walls, fearing for the
 Peloponnesians in Nisaea 
 and the safety of Megara , he sent to the Boeotians to meet him as quickly
 as possible at Tripodiscus, a village so called of the Megarid,
 under Mount Geraneia, and went himself, with two thousand seven
 hundred Corinthian heavy infantry, four hundred Phliasians, six
 hundred Sicyonians, and such troops of his own as he had already
 levied, expecting to find Nisaea not yet taken.

Hearing of its fall (he had marched out by night to Tripodiscus), he
 took three hundred picked men from the army, without waiting till
 his coming should be known, and came up to Megara unobserved by the
 Athenians, who were down by the sea, ostensibly, and really if
 possible, to attempt Nisaea , but above all to get into Megara and secure the town. 
 He accordingly invited the townspeople to admit his party, saying
 that he had hopes of recovering Nisaea .

However, one of the Megarian factions
 feared that he might expel them and restore the exiles; the other
 that the commons, apprehensive of this very danger, might set upon
 them, and the city be thus destroyed by a battle within its gates
 under the eyes of the ambushed Athenians. 
 He was accordingly refused admittance, both parties electing to
 remain quiet and await the event;

each expecting a battle between the Athenians and the relieving army,
 and thinking it safer to see their friends victorious before
 declaring in their favour. Unable to
 carry his point, Brasidas went back to the rest of the army.

At daybreak the Boeotians joined him. 
 Having determined to relieve Megara , whose danger they considered their own,
 even before hearing from Brasidas, they were already in full force
 at Plataea , when his
 messenger arrived to add spurs to their resolution; and they at once
 sent on to him two thousand two hundred heavy infantry, and six
 hundred horse, returning home with the main body.

The whole army thus assembled numbered six thousand heavy
 infantry. 
 The Athenian heavy infantry were drawn up by Nisaea and the sea; but the
 light troops being scattered over the plain were attacked by the
 Boeotian horse and driven to the sea, being taken entirely by
 surprise, as on previous occasions no relief had ever come to the
 Megarians from any quarter.

Here the Boeotians were in their turn charged and engaged by the
 Athenian horse, and a cavalry action ensued which lasted a long
 time, and in which both parties claimed the victory.

The Athenians killed and stripped the leader of the Boeotian horse
 and some few of his comrades who had charged right up to Nisaea , and remaining masters
 of the bodies gave them back under truce, and set up a trophy; but
 regarding the action as a whole the forces separated without either
 side having gained a decisive advantage, the Boeotians returning to
 their army and the Athenians to Nisaea .

After this Brasidas and the army came
 nearer to the sea and to Megara , and taking up a convenient position,
 remained quiet in order of battle, expecting to be attacked by the
 Athenians and knowing that the Megarians were waiting to see which
 would be the victor.

This attitude seemed to present two advantages. 
 Without taking the offensive or willingly provoking the hazards of a
 battle, they openly showed their readiness to fight, and thus
 without bearing the burden of the day would fairly reap its honours;
 while at the same time they effectually served their interests at
 Megara .

For if they had failed to show themselves, they would not have had a
 chance, but would have certainly been considered vanquished, and
 have lost the town. 
 As it was, the Athenians might possibly not be inclined to accept
 their challenge, and their object would be attained without
 fighting.

And so it turned out. 
 The Athenians formed outside the long walls, and the enemy not
 attacking, there remained motionless; their generals having decided
 that the risk was too unequal. 
 In fact most of their objects had been already attained; and they
 would have to begin a battle against superior numbers, and if
 victorious could only gain Megara , while a defeat would destroy the flower of
 their heavy soldiery. 
 For the enemy it was different; as even the states actually
 represented in his army risked each only a part of its entire force,
 he might well be more audacious. 
 Accordingly after waiting for some time without either side
 attacking, the Athenians withdrew to Nisaea , and the Peloponnesians after them to the
 point from which they had set out. 
 The friends of the Megarian exiles now threw aside their hesitation,
 and opened the gates to Brasidas and the commanders from the
 different states looking upon him as the victor and upon the
 Athenians as having declined the battle—and receiving them into the
 town proceeded to discuss matters with them; the party in
 correspondence with the Athenians being paralyzed by the turn things
 had taken.

Afterwards Brasidas let the allies go
 home, and himself went back to Corinth , to prepare for his expedition to
 Thrace , his original
 destination.

The Athenians also returning home, the Megarians in the city most
 implicated in the Athenian negotiation, knowing that they had been
 detected, presently disappeared; while the rest conferred with the
 friends of the exiles, and restored the party at Pegae, after
 binding them under solemn oaths to take no vengeance for the past,
 and only to consult the real interests of the town.

However, as soon as they were in office, they held a review of the
 heavy infantry, and separating the battalions, picked out about a
 hundred of their enemies, and of those who were thought to be most
 involved in the correspondence with the Athenians, brought them
 before the people, and compelling the vote to be given openly, had
 them condemned and executed, and established a close oligarchy in
 the town—

a revolution which lasted a very long while, although effected by a
 very few partisans.

The same summer the Mitylenians were
 about to fortify Antandrus as they had intended, when Demodocus and
 Aristides, the commanders of the Athenian squadron engaged in
 levying subsidies, heard on the Hellespont of what was being done to the place
 (Lamachus their colleague having sailed with ten ships into the
 Pontus ) and conceived
 fears of its becoming a second Anaia,—the place in which the Samian
 exiles had established themselves to annoy Samos , helping the
 Peloponnesians by sending pilots to their navy, and keeping the city
 in agitation and receiving all its outlaws. 
 They accordingly got together a force from the allies and set sail,
 defeated in battle the troops that met them from Antandrus, and
 retook the place.

Not long after, Lamachus, who had sailed into the Pontus , lost his ships at anchor
 in the river Calex, in the territory of Heraclea , rain having fallen in the interior and
 the flood coming suddenly down upon them; and himself and his troops
 passed by land through the Bithynian Thracians on the Asiatic side,
 and arrived at Chalcedon , the Megarian colony at the mouth of the
 Pontus .

The same summer the Athenian general,
 Demosthenes, arrived at Naupactus with forty ships immediately after the
 return from the Megarid.

Hippocrates and himself had had overtures made to them by certain men
 in the cities in Boeotia ,
 who wished to change the constitution and introduce a democracy as
 at Athens ; Ptoeodorus, a
 Theban exile, being the chief mover in this intrigue.

The seaport town of Siphae , in the bay of Crisae, in the Thespian
 territory, was to be betrayed to them by one party; Chaeronea (a dependency of what
 was formerly called the Minyan, now the Boeotian, Orchomenus ), to be put into
 their hands by another from that town, whose exiles were very active
 in the business, hiring men in Peloponnese . 
 Some Phocians also were in the plot, Chaeronea being the frontier town of Boeotia and close to Phanotis in
 Phocis .

Meanwhile the Athenians were to seize Delium , the sanctuary of Apollo, in the territory
 of Tanagra looking
 towards Euboea ; and all
 these events were to take place simultaneously upon a day appointed,
 in order that the Boeotians might be unable to unite to oppose them
 at Delium , being everywhere
 detained by disturbances at home.

Should the enterprise succeed, and Delium be fortified, its authors confidently
 expected that even if no revolution should immediately follow in
 Boeotia , yet with these
 places in their hands, and the country being harassed by incursions,
 and a refuge in each instance near for the partisans engaged in
 them, things would not remain as they were, but that the rebels
 being supported by the Athenians and the forces of the oligarchs
 divided, it would be possible after a while to settle matters
 according to their wishes.

Such was the plot in
 contemplation. 
 Hippocrates with a force raised at home awaited the proper moment to
 take the field against the Boeotians; while he sent on Demosthenes
 with the forty ships above mentioned to Naupactus , to raise in those
 parts an army of Acarnanians and of the other allies, and sail and
 receive Siphae from the
 conspirators; a day having been agreed on for the simultaneous
 execution of both these operations.

Demosthenes on his arrival found Oeniadae already compelled by the
 united Acarnanians to join the Athenian confederacy, and himself
 raising all the allies in those countries marched against and
 subdued Salynthius and the Agraeans; after which he devoted himself
 to the preparations necessary to enable him to be at Siphae by the time appointed.

About the same time in the summer,
 Brasidas set out on his march for the Thracian places with seventeen
 hundred heavy infantry, and arriving at Heraclea in Trachis , from thence sent on a messenger to his
 friends at Pharsalus ,
 to ask them to conduct himself and his army through the country. 
 Accordingly there came to Melitia in Achaia Panaerus, Dorus,
 Hippolochidas, Torylaus, and Strophacus, the Chalcidian Proxenus,
 under whose escort he resumed his march,

being accompanied also by other Thessalians, among whom was Niconidas
 from Larissa, a friend of Perdiccas. 
 It was never very easy to traverse Thessaly without an escort; and throughout all
 Hellas for an armed
 force to pass without leave through a neighbour's country, was a
 delicate step to take. 
 Besides this the Thessalian people had always sympathized with the
 Athenians.

Indeed if instead of the customary close oligarchy there had been a
 constitutional government in Thessaly , he would never have been able to proceed;
 since even as it was, he was met on his march at the river Enipeus
 by certain of the opposite party who forbade his further progress,
 and complained of his making the attempt without the consent of the
 nation.

To this his escort answered that they had no intention of taking him
 through against their will; they were only friends in attendance on
 an unexpected victor. 
 Brasidas himself added that he came as a friend to Thessaly and its inhabitants; his
 arms not being directed against them but against the Athenians, with
 whom he was at war, and that although he knew of no quarrel between
 the Thessalians and Lacedaemonians to prevent the two nations having
 access to each other's territory, he neither would nor could proceed
 against their wishes; he could only beg them not to stop him.

With this answer they went away, and he took the advice of his
 escort, and pushed on without halting, before a greater force might
 gather to prevent him. 
 Thus in the day that he set out from Melitia he performed the whole
 distance to Pharsalus , and encamped on the river Apidanus; and so
 to Phacium, and from thence to Perrhaebia.

Here his Thessalian escort went back, and the Perrhaebians, who are
 subjects of Thessaly , set
 him down at Dium in the dominions of Perdiccas, a Macedonian town
 under Mount
 Olympus , looking towards Thessaly .

In this way Brasidas hurried through
 Thessaly before any one
 could be got ready to stop him, and reached Perdiccas and Chalcidice .

The departure of the army from Peloponnese had been procured by the Thracian towns
 in revolt against Athens 
 and by Perdiccus, alarmed at the successes of the Athenians. 
 The Chalcidians thought that they would be the first objects of an
 Athenian expedition, not that the neighbouring towns which had not
 yet revolted did not also secretly join in the invitation; and
 Perdiccas also had his apprehensions on account of his old quarrels
 with the Athenians, although not openly at war with them, and above
 all wished to reduce Arrhabaeus king of the Lyncestians.

It had been less difficult for them
 to get an army to leave Peloponnese , because of the ill fortune of the
 Lacedaemonians at the present moment.

The attacks of the Athenians upon Peloponnese , and in particular upon Laconia , might, it was hoped, be
 diverted most effectually by annoying them in return, and by sending
 an army to their allies, especially as they were willing to maintain
 it and asked for it to aid them in revolting.

The Lacedaemonians were also glad to have an excuse for sending some
 of the Helots out of the country, for fear that the present aspect
 of affairs and the occupation of Pylos might encourage them to move.

Indeed fear of their numbers and obstinacy even persuaded the
 Lacedaemonians to the action which I shall now relate, their policy
 at all times having been governed by the necessity of taking
 precautions against them. 
 The Helots were invited by a proclamation to pick out those of their
 number who claimed to have most distinguished themselves against the
 enemy, in order that they might receive their freedom; the object
 being to test them, as it was thought that the first to claim their
 freedom would be the most high spirited and the most apt to
 rebel.

As many as two thousand were selected accordingly, who crowned
 themselves and went round the temples, rejoicing in their new
 freedom. 
 The Spartans, however, soon afterwards did away with them, and no one
 ever knew how each of them perished.

The Spartans now therefore gladly sent seven hundred as heavy
 infantry with Brasidas, who recruited the rest of his force by means
 of money in Peloponnese .

Brasidas himself was sent out by the
 Lacedaemonians mainly at his own desire, although the Chalcidians
 also were eager to have a man so thorough as he had shown himself
 whenever there was anything to be done at Sparta , and whose after service
 abroad proved of the utmost use to his country.

At the present moment his just and moderate conduct towards the towns
 generally succeeded in procuring their revolt, besides the places
 which he managed to take by treachery; and thus when the
 Lacedaemonians desired to treat, as they ultimately did, they had
 places to offer in exchange, and the burden of war meanwhile shifted
 from Peloponnese . 
 Later on in the war, after the events in Sicily , the present valour and conduct of Brasidas,
 known by experience to some, by hearsay to others, was what mainly
 created in the allies of Athens a feeling for the Lacedaemonians.

He was the first who went out and showed himself so good a man at all
 points as to leave behind him the conviction that the rest were like
 him.

Meanwhile his arrival in the Thracian
 country no sooner became known to the Athenians than they declared
 war against Perdiccas, whom they regarded as the author of the
 expedition, and kept a closer watch on their allies in that quarter.

Upon the arrival of Brasidas and his
 army, Perdiccas immediately started with them and with his own
 forces against Arrhabaeus, son of Bromerus king of the Lyncestian
 Macedonians, his neighbour, with whom he had a quarrel and whom he
 wished to subdue.

However, when he arrived with his army and Brasidas at the pass
 leading into Lyncus, Brasidas told him that before commencing
 hostilities he wished to go and try to persuade Arrhabaeus to become
 the ally of Lacedaemon ,

this latter having already made overtures intimating his willingness
 to make Brasidas arbitrator between them, and the Chalcidian envoys
 accompanying him having warned him not to remove the apprehensions
 of Perdiccas, in order to insure his greater zeal in their
 cause.

Besides, the envoys of Perdiccas had talked at Lacedaemon about his bringing many
 of the places round him into alliance with them; and thus Brasidas
 thought he might take a larger view of the question of
 Arrhabaeus.

Perdiccas however retorted that he had not brought him with him to
 arbitrate in their quarrel, but to put down the enemies whom he
 might point out to him; and that while he, Perdiccas, maintained
 half his army it was a breach of faith for Brasidas to parley with
 Arrhabaeus.

Nevertheless Brasidas disregarded the wishes of Perdiccas and held
 the parley in spite of him, and suffered himself to be persuaded to
 lead off the army without invading the country of Arrhabaeus; after
 which Perdiccas, holding that faith had not been kept with him,
 contributed only a third instead of half of the support of the army.

The same summer, without loss of
 time, Brasidas marched with the Chalcidians against Acanthus, a
 colony of the Andrians, a little before vintage.

The inhabitants were divided into two parties on the question of
 receiving him; those who had joined the Chalcidians in inviting him,
 and the popular party. 
 However, fear for their fruit, which was still out, enabled Brasidas
 to persuade the multitude to admit him alone, and to hear what he
 had to say before making a decision; and he was admitted accordingly
 and appeared before the people, and not being a bad speaker for a
 Lacedaemonian, addressed them as follows:—

‘Acanthians, the Lacedaemonians have
 sent out me and my army to make good the reason that we gave for the
 war when we began it, viz. that we were going to war with the
 Athenians in order to free Hellas .

Our delay in coming has been caused by mistaken expectations as to
 the war at home, which led us to hope, by our own unassisted efforts
 and without your risking anything, to effect the speedy downfall of
 the Athenians and you must not blame us for this, as we are now come
 the moment that we were able, prepared with your aid to do our best
 to subdue them.

Meanwhile I am astonished at finding your gates shut against me, and
 at not meeting with a better welcome.

We Lacedaemonians thought of you as allies eager to have us, to whom
 we should come in spirit even before we were with you in body; and
 in this expectation undertook all the risks of a march of many days
 through a strange country, so far did our zeal carry us.

It will be a terrible thing if after this you have other intentions,
 and mean to stand in the way of your own and Hellenic freedom.

It is not merely that you oppose me yourselves; but wherever I may go
 people will be less inclined to join me, on the score that you, to
 whom I first came—an important town like Acanthus, and prudent men
 like the Acanthians—refused to admit me. 
 I shall have nothing to prove that the reason which I advance is the
 true one; it will be said either that there is something unfair in
 the freedom which I offer, or that I am here in insufficient force
 and unable to protect you against an attack from Athens .

Yet when I went with the army which I now have to the relief of
 Nisaea , the
 Athenians did not venture to engage me although in greater force
 than I; and it is not likely they will ever send across sea against
 you an army as numerous as they had at Nisaea .

And for myself, I have come here not
 to hurt but to free the Hellenes, witness the solemn oaths by which
 I have bound my government that the allies that I may bring over
 shall be independent; and besides my object in coming is not by
 force or fraud to obtain your alliance, but to offer you mine to
 help you against your Athenian masters.

I protest, therefore, against any suspicions of my intentions after
 the guarantees which I offer, and equally so against doubts of my
 ability to protect you, and I invite you to join me without
 hesitation.

Some of you may hang back because
 they have private enemies, and fear that I may put the city into the
 hands of a party: none need be more tranquil than they.

I am not come here to help this party or that; and I do not consider
 that I should be bringing you freedom in any real sense, if I should
 disregard your constitution, and enslave the many to the few or the
 few to the many.

This would be heavier than a foreign yoke; and we Lacedaemonians
 instead of being thanked for our pains, should get neither honour
 nor glory, but contrariwise reproaches. 
 The charges which strengthen our hands in the war against the
 Athenians would on our own showing be merited by ourselves, and more
 hateful in us than in those who make no pretensions to honesty;

as it is more disgraceful for persons of character to take what they
 covet by fair-seeming fraud than by open force; the one aggression
 having for its justification the might which fortune gives, the
 other being simply a piece of clever roguery.

A matter which concerns us thus
 nearly we naturally look to most jealously; and over and above the
 oaths that I have mentioned, what stronger assurance can you have,
 when you see that our words, compared with the actual facts, produce
 the necessary conviction that it is our interest to act as we
 say?

If to these considerations of mine
 you put in the plea of inability, and claim that your friendly
 feeling should save you from being hurt by your refusal; if you say
 that freedom, in your opinion, is not without its dangers, and that
 it is right to offer it to those who can accept it, but not to force
 it on any against their will, then I shall take the gods and heroes
 of your country to witness that I came for your good and was
 rejected, and shall do my best to compel you by laying waste your
 land.

I shall do so without scruple, being justified by the necessity which
 constrains me, first, to prevent the Lacedaemonians from being
 damaged by you, their friends, in the event of your non-adhesion,
 through the monies that you pay to the Athenians; and secondly, to
 prevent the Hellenes from being hindered by you in shaking off their
 servitude.

Otherwise indeed we should have no right to act as we propose; except
 in the name of some public interest, what call should we
 Lacedaemonians have to free those who do not wish it?

Empire we do not aspire to: it is what we are labouring to put down;
 and we should wrong the greater number if we allowed you to stand in
 the way of the independence that we offer to all.

Endeavour, therefore, to decide wisely, and strive to begin the work
 of liberation for the Hellenes, and lay up for yourselves endless
 renown, while you escape private loss, and cover your commonwealth
 with glory.’

Such were the words of Brasidas. 
 The Acanthians, after much had been said on both sides of the
 question, gave their votes in secret, and the majority, influenced
 by the seductive arguments of Brasidas and by fear for their fruit,
 decided to revolt from Athens ; not however admitting the army until they
 had taken his personal security for the oaths sworn by his
 government before they sent him out, assuring the independence of
 the allies whom he might bring over.

Not long after, Stagirus, a colony of the Andrians, followed their
 example and revolted. 
 Such were the events of this summer.

It was in the first days of the
 winter following that the places in Boeotia were to be put into the hands of Athenian
 generals, Hippocrates and Demosthenes, the latter of whom was to go
 with his ships to Siphae , the former to Delium . 
 A mistake, however, was made in the days on which they were each to
 start; and Demosthenes sailing first to Siphae , with the Acarnanians
 and many of the allies from those parts on board, failed to effect
 anything, through the plot having been betrayed by Nicomachus, a
 Phocian from Phanotis, who told the Lacedaemonians, and they the
 Boeotians.

Succours accordingly flocked in from all parts of Boeotia , Hippocrates not being yet
 there to make his diversion, and Siphae and Chaeronea were promptly secured, and the
 conspirators, informed of the mistake, did not venture on any
 movement in the towns.

Meanwhile Hippocrates made a levy in
 mass of the citizens, resident aliens, and foreigners in Athens , and arrived at his
 destination after the Boeotians had already come back from
 Siphae , and
 encamping his army began to fortify Delium , the sanctuary of Apollo, in the following
 manner.

A trench was dug all round the temple and the consecrated ground, and
 the earth thrown up from the excavation was made to do duty as a
 wall, in which stakes were also planted, the vines round the
 sanctuary being cut down and thrown in, together with stones and
 bricks pulled down from the houses near; every means, in short,
 being used to run up the rampart. 
 Wooden towers were also erected where they were wanted, and where
 there was no part of the temple buildings left standing, as on the
 side where the gallery once existing had fallen in.

The work was begun on the third day after leaving home, and continued
 during the fourth, and till dinner-time on the fifth,

when most of it being now finished the army removed from Delium about a mile and a quarter
 on its way home. 
 From this point most of the light troops went straight on, while the
 heavy infantry halted and remained where they were; Hippocrates
 having stayed behind at Delium to arrange the posts, and to give directions
 for the completion of such part of the outworks as had been left
 unfinished.

During the days thus employed the
 Boeotians were mustering at Tanagra , and by the time that they had come in from
 all the towns, found the Athenians already on their way home. 
 The rest of the eleven Boeotarchs were against giving battle, as the
 enemy was no longer in Boeotia , the Athenians being just over the Oropian
 border, when they halted; but Pagondas, son of Aeolidas, one of the
 Boeotarchs of Thebes 
 (Arianthides, son of Lysimachidas, being the other), and then
 commander-in-chief, thought it best to hazard a battle. 
 He accordingly called the men to him, company after company, to
 prevent their all leaving their arms at once, and urged them to
 attack the Athenians, and stand the issue of a battle, speaking as
 follows:—

‘Boeotians, the idea that we ought
 not to give battle to the Athenians unless we came up with them in
 Boeotia , is one which
 should never have entered into the head of any of us, your
 generals. 
 It was to annoy Boeotia that
 they crossed the frontier and built a fort in our country; and they
 are therefore, I imagine, our enemies wherever we may come up with
 them, and from wheresoever they may have come to act as enemies
 do.

And if any one has taken up with the idea in question for reasons of
 safety, it is high time for him to change his mind. 
 The party attacked, whose own country is in danger, can scarcely
 discuss what is prudent with the calmness of men who are in full
 enjoyment of what they have got, and are thinking of attacking a
 neighbour in order to get more.

It is your national habit, in your country or out of it, to oppose
 the same resistance to a foreign invader; and when that invader is
 Athenian, and lives upon your frontier besides, it is doubly
 imperative to do so.

As between neighbours generally, freedom means simply a determination
 to hold ones own; and with neighbours like these, who are trying to
 enslave near and far alike, there is nothing for it but to fight it
 out to the last. 
 Look at the condition of the Euboeans and of most of the rest of
 Hellas , and be
 convinced that others have to fight with their neighbours for this
 frontier or that, but that for us conquest means one frontier for
 the whole country, about which no dispute can be made, for they will
 simply come and take by force what we have.

So much more have we to fear from this neighbour than from
 another. 
 Besides, people who, like the Athenians in the present instance, are
 tempted by pride of strength to attack their neighbours, usually
 march most confidently against those who keep still, and only defend
 themselves in their own country, but think twice before they grapple
 with those who meet them outside their frontier and strike the first
 blow if opportunity offers.

The Athenians have shown us this themselves; the defeat which we
 inflicted upon them at Coronea , at the time when our quarrels had allowed
 them to occupy the country, has given great security to Boeotia until the present day.

Remembering this, the old must equal their ancient exploits, and the
 young, the sons of the heroes of that time, must endeavor not to
 disgrace their native valour; and trusting in the help of the god
 whose temple has been sacrilegiously fortified, and in the victims
 which in our sacrifices have proved propitious, we must march
 against the enemy, and teach him that he must go and get what he
 wants by attacking some one who will not resist him, but that men
 whose glory it is to be always ready to give battle for the liberty
 of their own country, and never unjustly to enslave that of others,
 will not let him go without a struggle.’

By these arguments Pagondas persuaded
 the Boeotians to attack the Athenians, and quickly breaking up his
 camp led his army forward, it being now late in the day. 
 On nearing the enemy, he halted in a position where a hill
 intervening prevented the two armies from seeing each other, and
 then formed and prepared for action.

Meanwhile Hippocrates at Delium , informed of the approach of the Boeotians,
 sent orders to his troops to throw themselves into line, and himself
 joined them not long afterwards, leaving about three hundred horse
 behind him at Delium , at
 once to guard the place in case of attack, and to watch their
 opportunity and fall upon the Boeotians during the battle.

The Boeotians placed a detachment to deal with these, and when
 everything was arranged to their satisfaction appeared over the
 hill, and halted in the order which they had determined on, to the
 number of seven thousand heavy infantry, more than ten thousand
 light troops, one thousand horse, and five hundred targeteers.

On their right were the Thebans and those of their province, in the
 center the Haliartians, Coronaeans, Copaeans, and the other people
 around the lake, and on the left the Thespians, Tanagraeans, and
 Orchomenians, the cavalry and the light troops being at the
 extremity of each wing. 
 The Thebans formed twenty-five shields deep, the rest as they
 pleased.

Such was the strength and disposition of the Boeotian army.

On the side of the Athenians, the
 heavy infantry throughout the whole army formed eight deep, being in
 numbers equal to the enemy, with the cavalry upon the two wings. 
 Light troops regularly armed there were none in the army, nor had
 there ever been any at Athens . 
 Those who had joined in the invasion, though many times more numerous
 than those of the enemy, had mostly followed unarmed, as part of the
 levy in mass of the citizens and foreigners at Athens , and having started
 first on their way home were not present in any number.

The armies being now in line and upon the point of engaging,
 Hippocrates, the general, passed along the Athenian ranks, and
 encouraged them as follows:—

‘Athenians, I shall only say a few
 words to you, but brave men require no more, and they are addressed
 more to your understanding than to your courage.

None of you must fancy that we are going out of our way to run this
 risk in the country of another. 
 Fought in their territory the battle will be for ours: if we conquer,
 the Peloponnesians will never invade your country without the
 Boeotian horse, and in one battle you will win Boeotia and in a manner free
 Attica .

Advance to meet them then like citizens of a country in which you all
 glory as the first in Hellas , and like sons of the fathers who beat them
 at Oenophyta with Myronides and thus gained possession of Boeotia .’

Hippocrates had got half through the
 army with his exhortation, when the Boeotians, after a few more
 hasty words from Pagondas, struck up the paean, and came against
 them from the hill; the Athenians advancing to meet them, and
 closing at a run.

The extreme wing of neither army came into action, one like the other
 being stopped by the water-courses in the way; the rest engaged with
 the utmost obstinacy, shield against shield.

The Boeotian left, as far as the center, was worsted by the
 Athenians. 
 The Thespians in that part of the field suffered most severely. 
 The troops alongside them having given way, they were surrounded in a
 narrow space and cut down fighting hand to hand; some of the
 Athenians also fell into confusion in surrounding the enemy and
 mistook and so killed each other.

In this part of the field the Boeotians were beaten, and retreated
 upon the troops still fighting; but the right, where the Thebans
 were, got the better of the Athenians and shoved them further and
 further back, though gradually at first.

It so happened also that Pagondas, seeing the distress of his left,
 had sent two squadrons of horse, where they could not be seen, round
 the hill, and their sudden appearance struck a panic into the
 victorious wing of the Athenians, who thought that it was another
 army coming against them.

At length in both parts of the field, disturbed by this panic, and
 with their line broken by the advancing Thebans, the whole Athenian
 army took to flight.

Some made for Delium and the
 sea, some for Oropus, others for Mount Parnes, or wherever they had
 hopes of safety,

pursued and cut down by the Boeotians, and in particular by the
 cavalry, composed partly of Boeotians and partly of Locrians, who
 had come up just as the rout began. 
 Night however coming on to interrupt the pursuit, the mass of the
 fugitives escaped more easily than they would otherwise have
 done.

The next day the troops at Oropus and Delium returned home by sea, after leaving a
 garrison in the latter place, which they continued to hold
 notwithstanding the defeat.

The Boeotians set up a trophy, took
 up their own dead, and stripped those of the enemy, and leaving a
 guard over them retired to Tanagra , there to take measures for attacking
 Delium .

Meanwhile a herald came from the Athenians to ask for the dead, but
 was met and turned back by a Boeotian herald, who told him that he
 would effect nothing until the return of himself the Boeotian
 herald, and who then went on to the Athenians, and told them on the
 part of the Boeotians that they had done wrong in transgressing the
 law of the Hellenes.

Of what use was the universal custom protecting the temples in an
 invaded country if the Athenians were to fortify Delium and live there, acting
 exactly as if they were on unconsecrated ground, and drawing and
 using for their purposes the water which they, the Boeotians, never
 touched except for sacred uses?

Accordingly for the god as well as for themselves, in the name of the
 deities concerned, and of Apollo, the Boeotians invited them first
 to evacuate the temple, if they wished to take up the dead that
 belonged to them.

After these words from the herald,
 the Athenians sent their own herald to the Boeotians to say that
 they had not done any wrong to the temple, and for the future would
 do it no more harm than they could help; not having occupied it
 originally in any such design, but to defend themselves from it
 against those who were really wronging them.

The law of the Hellenes was that conquest of a country, whether more
 or less extensive, carried with it possession of the temples in that
 country, with the obligation to keep up the usual ceremonies, at
 least as far as possible.

The Boeotians and most other people who had turned out the owners of
 a country, and put themselves in their places by force, now held as
 of right the temples which they originally entered as usurpers.

If the Athenians could have conquered more of Boeotia this would have been the
 case with them: as things stood, the piece of it which they had got
 they should treat as their own, and not quit unless obliged.

The water they had disturbed under the impulsion of a necessity which
 they had not wantonly incurred, having been forced to use it in
 defending themselves against the Boeotians who had first invaded
 Attica .

Besides, anything done under the pressure of war and danger might
 reasonably claim indulgence even in the eye of the god; or why,
 pray, were the altars the asylum for involuntary offences? 
 Transgression also was a term applied to presumptuous offenders, not
 to the victims of adverse circumstances.

In short, which were most impious—the Boeotians who wished to barter
 dead bodies for holy places, or the Athenians who refused to give up
 holy places to obtain what was theirs by right?

The condition of evacuating Boeotia must therefore be withdrawn. 
 They were no longer in Boeotia . 
 They stood where they stood by the right of the sword. 
 All that the Boeotians had to do was to tell them to take up their
 dead under a truce according to the national custom.

The Boeotians replied that if they
 were in Boeotia , they must
 evacuate that country before taking up their dead; if they were in
 their own territory, they could do as they pleased: for they knew
 that, although the Oropid where the bodies as it chanced were lying
 (the battle having been fought on the borders) was subject to
 Athens , yet the
 Athenians could not get them without their leave. 
 Besides, why should they grant a truce for Athenian ground? 
 And what could be fairer than to tell them to evacuate Boeotia if they wished to get what
 they asked? 
 The Athenian herald accordingly returned with this answer, without
 having accomplished his object.

Meanwhile the Boeotians at once sent
 for darters and slingers from the Malian gulf, and with two thousand
 Corinthian heavy infantry who had joined them after the battle, the
 Peloponnesian garrison which had evacuated Nisaea , and some Megarians with
 them, marched against Delium , and attacked the fort, and after divers
 efforts finally succeeded in taking it by an engine of the following
 description.

They sawed in two and scooped out a great beam from end to end, and
 fitting it nicely together again like a pipe, hung by chains a
 cauldron at one extremity, with which communicated an iron tube
 projecting from the beam, which was itself in great part plated with
 iron.

This they brought up from a distance upon carts to the part of the
 wall principally composed of vines and timber, and when it was near,
 inserted huge bellows into their end of the beam and blew with
 them.

The blast passing closely confined into the cauldron, which was
 filled with lighted coals, sulphur and pitch, made a great blaze,
 and set fire to the wall, which soon became untenable for its
 defenders, who left it and fled; and in this way the fort was
 taken.

Of the garrison some were killed and two hundred made prisoners; most
 of the rest got on board their ships and returned home.

Soon after the fall of Delium , which took place seventeen
 days after the battle, the Athenian herald, without knowing what had
 happened, came again for the dead, which were now restored by the
 Boeotians, who no longer answered as at first.

Not quite five hundred Boeotians fell in the battle, and nearly one
 thousand Athenians, including Hippocrates the general, besides a
 great number of light troops and camp followers.

Soon after this battle Demosthenes,
 after the failure of his voyage to Siphae and of the plot on the town, availed himself
 of the Acarnanian and Agraean troops and of the four hundred
 Athenian heavy infantry which he had on board, to make a descent on
 the Sicyonian coast.

Before however all his ships had come to shore, the Sicyonians came
 up and routed and chased to their ships those that had landed,
 killing some and taking others prisoners; after which they set up a
 trophy, and gave back the dead under truce.

About the same time with the affair
 of Delium took place the
 death of Sitalces, king of the Odrysians, who was defeated in
 battle, in a campaign against the TribalIi; Seuthes, son of
 Sparadocus, his nephew, succeeding to the kingdom of the Odrysians,
 and of the rest of Thrace 
 ruled by Sitalces.

The same winter Brasidas, with his
 allies in the Thracian places, marched against Amphipolis , the Athenian
 colony on the river Strymon.

A settlement upon the spot on which the city now stands, was before
 attempted by Aristagoras, the Milesian (when he fled from king
 Darius), who was however dislodged by the Edonians; and thirty-two
 years later by the Athenians, who sent thither ten thousand settlers
 of their own citizens, and whoever else chose to go. 
 These were cut off at Drabescus by the Thracians.

Twenty-nine years after, the Athenians returned (Hagnon, son of
 Nicias, being sent out as a leader of the colony) and drove out the
 Edonians, and founded a town on the spot, formerly called
 Ennea-hodoi or Nine Ways. 
 The base from which they started was Eion , their commercial seaport at the mouth of the
 river, not more than three miles from the present town, which Hagnon
 named Amphipolis ,
 because the Strymon flows round it on two sides, and he built it so
 as to be conspicuous from the sea and land alike, running a long
 wall across from river to river, to complete the circumference.

Brasidas now marched against this
 town, starting from Arne 
 in Chalcidice . 
 Arriving about dusk at Aulon 
 and Bromiscus, where the lake of Bolbe runs into the sea, he supped
 there, and went on during the night.

The weather was stormy and it was snowing a little, which encouraged
 him to hurry on, in order, if possible, to take every one at
 Amphipolis by
 surprise, except the party who were to betray it.

The plot was carried on by some natives of Argilus, an Andrian
 colony, residing in Amphipolis , where they had also other accomplices
 gained over by Perdiccas or the Chalcidians.

But the most active in the matter were the inhabitants of Argilus
 itself, which is close by, who had always been suspected by the
 Athenians, and had had designs on the place. 
 These men now saw their opportunity arrive with Brasidas, and having
 for some time been in correspondence with their countrymen in
 Amphipolis for
 the betrayal of the town, at once received him into Argilus, and
 revolted from the Athenians, and that same night took him on to the
 bridge over the river;

where he found only a small guard to oppose him, the town being at
 some distance from the passage, and the walls not reaching down to
 it as at present. 
 This guard he easily drove in, partly through there being treason in
 their ranks, partly from the stormy state of the weather and the
 suddenness of his attack, and so got across the bridge, and
 immediately became master of all the property outside; the
 Amphipolitans having houses all over the quarter.

The passage of Brasidas was a
 complete surprise to the people in the town; and the capture of many
 of those outside, and the flight of the rest within the wall,
 combined to produce great confusion among the citizens; especially
 as they did not trust one another.

It is even said that if Brasidas, instead of stopping to pillage, had
 advanced straight against the town, he would probably have taken
 it.

In fact, however, he established himself where he was and overran the
 country outside, and for the present remained inactive, vainly
 awaiting a demonstration on the part of his friends within.

Meanwhile the party opposed to the traitors proved numerous enough to
 prevent the gates being immediately thrown open, and in concert with
 Eucles, the general, who had come from Athens to defend the place,
 sent to the other commander in Thrace , Thucydides, son of Olorus, the author of
 this history, who was at the isle of Thasos , a Parian colony,
 half a day's sail from Amphipolis , to tell him to come to their
 relief.

On receipt of this message he at once set sail with seven ships which
 he had with him, in order, if possible, to reach Amphipolis in time to
 prevent its capitulation, or in any case to save Eion .

Meanwhile Brasidas, afraid of succors
 arriving by sea from Thasos , and learning that Thucydides possessed the
 right of working the gold mines in that part of Thrace , and had thus great
 influence with the inhabitants of the continent, hastened to gain
 the town, if possible, before the people of Amphipolis should be
 encouraged by his arrival to hope that he could save them by getting
 together a force of allies from the sea and from Thrace , and so refuse to
 surrender.

He accordingly offered moderate terms, proclaiming that any of the
 Amphipolitans and Athenians who chose, might continue to enjoy their
 property with full rights of citizenship; while those who did not
 wish to stay had five days to depart, taking their property with
 them.

The bulk of the inhabitants, upon
 hearing this, began to change their minds, especially as only a
 small number of the citizens were Athenians, the majority having
 come from different quarters, and many of the prisoners outside had
 relations within the walls. 
 They found the proclamation a fair one in comparison of what their
 fear had suggested; the Athenians being glad to go out, as they
 thought they ran more risk than the rest, and further, did not
 expect any speedy relief, and the multitude generally being content
 at being left in possession of their civic rights, and at such an
 unexpected reprieve from danger.

The partisans of Brasidas now openly advocated this course, seeing
 that the feeling of the people had changed, and that they no longer
 gave ear to the Athenian general present; and thus the surrender was
 made and Brasidas was admitted by them on the terms of his
 proclamation.

In this way they gave up the city, and late in the same day
 Thucydides and his ships entered the harbour of Eion ,

Brasidas having just got hold of Amphipolis , and having been within a night of
 taking Eion had the ships
 been less prompt in relieving it, in the morning it would have been
 his.

After this Thucydides put all in
 order at Eion to secure it
 against any present or future attack of Brasidas, and received such
 as had elected to come there from the interior according to the
 terms agreed on.

Meanwhile Brasidas suddenly sailed with a number of boats down the
 river to Eion to see if he
 could not seize the point running out from the wall, and so command
 the entrance; at the same time he attempted it by land, but was
 beaten off on both sides and had to content himself with arranging
 matters at Amphipolis and in the neighbourhood.

Myrcinus, an Edonian town, also came over to him; the Edonian king
 Pittacus having been killed by the sons of Goaxis and his own wife
 Brauro; and Galepsus and Oesime, which are Thasian colonies, not
 long after followed its example. 
 Perdiccas too came up immediately after the capture and joined in
 these arrangements.

The news that Amphipolis was in the hands
 of the enemy caused great alarm at Athens . 
 Not only was the town valuable for the timber it afforded for
 shipbuilding, and the money that it brought in; but also, although
 the escort of the Thessalians gave the Lacedaemonians a means of
 reaching the allies of Athens as far as the Strymon, yet as long as they
 were not masters of the bridge but were watched on the side of
 Eion by the Athenian
 galleys, and on the land side impeded by a large and extensive lake
 formed by the waters of the river, it was impossible for them to go
 any further. 
 Now, on the contrary, the path seemed open. 
 There was also the fear of the allies revolting,

owing to the moderation displayed by Brasidas in all his conduct, and
 to the declarations which he was everywhere making that he was sent
 out to free Hellas .

The towns subject to the Athenians, hearing of the capture of
 Amphipolis and
 of the terms accorded to it, and of the gentleness of Brasidas, felt
 most strongly encouraged to change their condition, and sent secret
 messages to him, begging him to come on to them; each wishing to be
 the first to revolt.

Indeed there seemed to be no danger in so doing; their mistake in
 their estimate of the Athenian power was as great as that power
 afterwards turned out to be, and their judgment was based more upon
 blind wishing than upon any sound prevision; for it is a habit of
 mankind to entrust to careless hope what they long for, and to use
 sovereign reason to thrust aside what they do not fancy.

Besides the late severe blow which the Athenians had met with in
 Boeotia , joined to the
 seductive, though untrue, statements of Brasidas, about the
 Athenians not having ventured to engage his single army at
 Nisaea , made the
 allies confident, and caused them to believe that no Athenian force
 would be sent against them.

Above all the wish to do what was agreeable at the moment, and the
 likelihood that they should find the Lacedaemonians full of zeal at
 starting, made them eager to venture. 
 Observing this, the Athenians sent garrisons to the different towns,
 as far as was possible at such short notice and in winter; while
 Brasidas sent despatches to Lacedaemon asking for reinforcements, and himself
 made preparations for building galleys in the Strymon.

The Lacedaemonians however did not send him any, partly through envy
 on the part of their chief men, partly because they were more bent
 on recovering the prisoners of the island and ending the war.

The same winter the Megarians took
 and razed to the foundations the long walls which had been occupied
 by the Athenians; and Brasidas after the capture of Amphipolis marched with his
 allies against Acte,

a promontory running out from the king's dike with an inward curve,
 and ending in Athos , a
 lofty mountain looking towards the Aegean sea.

In it are various towns, Sane, an Andrian colony, close to the canal,
 and facing the sea in the direction of Euboea ; the others being Thyssus, Cleone, Acrothoi,
 Olophyxus,

and Dium, inhabited by mixed barbarian races speaking the two
 languages. 
 There is also a small Chalcidian element; but the greater number are
 Tyrrheno-Pelasgians once settled in Lemnos and Athens , and Bisaltians, Crestonians, and Edonians;
 the towns being all small ones.

Most of these came over to Brasidas; but Sane and Dium held out and
 saw their land ravaged by him and his army.

Upon their not submitting, he at once
 marched against Torone 
 in Chalcidice , which was
 held by an Athenian garrison, having been invited by a few persons
 who were prepared to hand over the town. 
 Arriving in the dark a little before daybreak, he sat down with his
 army near the temple of the Dioscuri, rather more than a quarter of
 a mile from the city.

The rest of the town of Torone and the Athenians in garrison did not
 perceive his approach; but his partisans knowing that he was coming
 (a few of them had secretly gone out to meet him), were on the watch
 for his arrival, and were no sooner aware of it than they took in to
 them seven light-armed men with daggers, who alone of twenty men
 ordered on this service dared to enter, commanded by Lysistratus an
 Olynthian. 
 These passed through the sea wall, and without being seen went up and
 put to the sword the garrison of the highest post in the town, which
 stands on a hill, and broke open the postern on the side of
 Canastraeum.

Brasidas meanwhile came a little
 nearer and then halted with his main body, sending on one hundred
 targeteers to be ready to rush in first, the moment that a gate
 should be thrown open and the beacon lighted as agreed.

After some time passed in waiting and wondering at the delay, the
 targeteers by degrees got up close to the town. 
 The Toronaeans inside at work with the party that had entered, had by
 this time broken down the postern and opened the gates leading to
 the marketplace by cutting through the bar, and first brought some
 men round and let them in by the postern, in order to strike a panic
 into the surprised townsmen by suddenly attacking them from behind
 and on both sides at once; after which they raised the fire-signal
 as had been agreed, and took in by the market gates the rest of the
 targeteers.

Brasidas seeing the signal told the
 troops to rise, and dashed forward amid the loud hurrahs of his men,
 which carried dismay among the astonished townspeople.

Some burst in straight by the gate, others over some square pieces of
 timber placed against the wall (which had fallen down and was being
 rebuilt) to draw up stones;

Brasidas and the greater number making straight uphill for the higher
 part of the town, in order to take it from top to bottom, and once
 for all, while the rest of the multitude spread in all directions.

The capture of the town was effected
 before the great body of the Toronaeans had recovered from their
 surprise and confusion;

but the conspirators and the citizens of their party at once joined
 the invaders. 
 About fifty of the Athenian heavy infantry happened to be sleeping in
 the market-place when the alarm reached them. 
 A few of these were killed fighting; the rest escaped, some by land,
 others to the two ships on the station, and took refuge in Lecythus,
 a fort garrisoned by their own men in the corner of the town running
 out into the sea and cut off by a narrow isthmus;

where they were joined by the Toronaeans of their party.

Day now arrived, and the town being
 secured, Brasidas made a proclamation to the Toronaeans who had
 taken refuge with the Athenians, to come out, as many as chose, to
 their homes without fearing for their rights or persons, and sent a
 herald to invite the Athenians to accept a truce, and to evacuate
 Lecythus with their property, as being Chalcidian ground.

The Athenians refused this offer, but asked for a truce for a day to
 take up their dead. 
 Brasidas granted it for two days, which he employed in fortifying the
 houses near, and the Athenians in doing the same to their
 positions.

Meanwhile he called a meeting of the Toronaeans, and said very much
 what he had said at Acanthus, namely, that they must not look upon
 those who had negotiated with him for the capture of the town as bad
 men or as traitors, as they had not acted as they had done from
 corrupt motives or in order to enslave the city, but for the good
 and freedom of Torone ;
 nor again must those who had not shared in the enterprise fancy that
 they would not equally reap its fruits, as he had not come to
 destroy either city or individual.

This was the reason of his proclamation to those that had fled for
 refuge to the Athenians: he thought none the worse of them for their
 friendship for the Athenians; he believed that they had only to make
 trial of the Lacedaemonians to like them as well, or even much
 better, as acting much more justly: it was for want of such a trial
 that they were now afraid of them.

Meanwhile he warned all of them to prepare to be staunch allies, and
 for being held responsible for all faults in future: for the past,
 they had not wronged the Lacedaemonians but had been wronged by
 others who were too strong for them, and any opposition that they
 might have offered him could be excused.

Having encouraged them with this
 address, as soon as the truce expired he made his attack upon
 Lecythus; the Athenians defending themselves from a poor wall and
 from some houses with parapets.

One day they beat him off; the next the enemy were preparing to bring
 up an engine against them from which they meant to throw fire upon
 the wooden defences, and the troops were already coming up to the
 point where they fancied they could best bring up the engine, and
 where the place was most assailable; meanwhile the Athenians put a
 wooden tower upon a house opposite, and carried up a quantity of
 jars and casks of water and big stones, and a large number of men
 also climbed up.

The house thus laden too heavily suddenly broke down with a loud
 crash; at which the men who were near and saw it were more vexed
 than frightened; but those not so near, and still more those
 furthest off thought that the place was already taken at that point,
 and fled in haste to the sea and the ships.

Brasidas, perceiving that they were
 deserting the parapet, and seeing what was going on, dashed forward
 with his troops, and immediately took the fort, and put to the sword
 all whom he found in it.

In this way the place was evacuated by the Athenians, who went across
 in their boats and ships to Pallene . 
 Now there is a temple of Athena in Lecythus, and Brasidas had
 proclaimed in the moment of making the assault, that he would give
 thirty silver minae to the man first on the wall. 
 Being now of opinion that the capture was scarcely due to human
 means, he gave the thirty minae to the goddess for her temple, and
 razed and cleared Lecythus, and made the whole of it consecrated
 ground.

The rest of the winter he spent in settling the places in his hands,
 and in making designs upon the rest; and with the expiration of the
 winter the eighth year of this war ended.

In the spring of the summer
 following, the Lacedaemonians and Athenians made an armistice for a
 year; the Athenians thinking that they would thus have full leisure
 to take their precautions before Brasidas could procure the revolt
 of any more of their towns, and might also, if it suited them,
 conclude a general peace; the Lacedaemonians divining the actual
 fears of the Athenians, and thinking that after once tasting a
 respite from trouble and misery they would be more disposed to
 consent to a reconciliation, and to give back the prisoners, and
 make a treaty for the longer period.

The great idea of the Lacedaemonians was to get back their men while
 Brasidas' good fortune lasted: further successes might make the
 struggle a less unequal one in Chalcidice , but would leave them still deprived of
 their men, and even in Chalcidice not more than a match for the Athenians
 and by no means certain of victory.

An armistice was accordingly concluded by Lacedaemon and her allies upon the
 terms following:—

1. 
 As to the temple and oracle of the Pythian Apollo, we are agreed that
 whosoever will shall have access to it, without fraud or fear,
 according to the usages of his forefathers.

The Lacedaemonians and the allies present agree to this, and promise
 to send heralds to the Boeotians and Phocians, and to do their best
 to persuade them to agree likewise.

2. 
 As to the treasure of the god, we agree to exert ourselves to detect
 all malversators, truly and honestly following the customs of our
 forefathers, we and you and all others willing to do so, all
 following the customs of our forefathers.

As to these points the Lacedaemonians and the other allies are agreed
 as has been said. 3. 
 As to what follows, the Lacedaemonians and the other allies agree, if
 the Athenians conclude a treaty, to remain, each of us in our own
 territory, retaining our respective acquisitions; the garrison in
 Coryphasium keeping within Buphras and Tomeus; that in Cythera attempting no
 communication with the Peloponnesian confederacy, neither we with
 them, or they with us; that in Nisaea and Minoa not crossing the road leading from the gates
 of the temple of Nisus to that of Poseidon and from thence straight
 to the bridge at Minoa ; the
 Megarians and the allies being equally bound not to cross this road,
 and the Athenians retaining the island they have taken, without any
 communication on either side; as to Troezen , each side retaining what it has, and as
 was arranged with the Athenians.

4. 
 As to the use of the sea, so far as refers to their own coast and to
 that of their confederacy, that the Lacedaemonians and their allies
 may voyage upon it in any vessel rowed by oars and of not more than
 five hundred talents' tonnage, not a vessel of war.

5. 
 That all heralds and embassies, with as many attendants as they
 please, for concluding the war and adjusting claims, shall have free
 passage, going and coming, to Peloponnese or Athens by land and by sea.

6. 
 That during the truce, deserters whether bond or free shall be
 received neither by you, nor by us.

7. 
 Further, that satisfaction shall be given by you to us and by us to
 you according to the public law of our several countries,

all disputes being settled by law without recourse to
 hostilities. 
 The Lacedaemonians and allies agree to these articles: but if you
 have anything fairer or juster to suggest, come to Lacedaemon and let us know;
 whatever shall be just will meet with no objection either from the
 Lacedaemonians or from the allies.

Only let those who come come with full powers, as you desire us. 
 The truce shall be for one year. 
 Approved by the people.

The tribe of Acamantis had the prytany, Phoenippus was secretary,
 Niciades chairman. 
 Laches moved, in the name of the good luck of the Athenians, that
 they should conclude the armistice upon the terms agreed upon by the
 Lacedaemonians and the allies.

It was agreed accordingly in the popular assembly, that the armistice
 should be for one year, beginning that very day, the fourteenth of
 the month of Elaphebolion;

during which time ambassadors and heralds should go and come between
 the two countries to discuss the bases of a pacification.

That the generals and prytanes should call an assembly of the people,
 in which the Athenians should first consult on the peace, and on the
 mode in which the embassy for putting an end to the war should be
 admitted. 
 That the embassy now present should at once take the engagement
 before the people to keep well and truly this truce for one year.

On these terms the Lacedaemonians
 concluded with the Athenians and their allies on the twelfth day of
 the Spartan month Cerastius;

the allies also taking the oaths. 
 Those who concluded and poured the libation were Taurus, son of
 Echetimides, Athenaeus, son of Pericleidas, and Philocharidas, son
 of Eryxilaidas, Lacedaemonians; Aeneas, son of Aeneas, and
 Euphamidas, son of Aristonymus, Corinthians; Damotimus, son of
 Naucrates, and Onasimus, son of Megacles, Sicyonians; Nicasus, son
 of Cecalus, and Menecrates, son of Amphidorus, Megarians; and
 Amphias, son of Eupaidas, an Epidaurian; and the Athenian generals
 Nicostratus, son of Diitrephes, Nicias, son of Niceratus, and
 Autocles, son of Tolmaeus.

Such was the armistice, and during the whole of it conferences went
 on on the subject of a pacification.

In the days in which they were going
 backwards and forwards to these conferences, Scione , a town in Pallene , revolted from
 Athens , and went
 over to Brasidas. 
 The Scionaeans say that they are Pallenians from Peloponnese , and that their first
 founders on their voyage from Troy were carried in to this spot by the storm
 which the Achaeans were caught in and there settled.

The Scionaeans had no sooner revolted than Brasidas crossed over by
 night to Scione , with a
 friendly galley ahead and himself in a small boat some way behind;
 his idea being that if he fell in with a vessel larger than the boat
 he would have the galley to defend him, while a ship that was a
 match for the galley, would probably neglect the small vessel to
 attack the large one, and thus leave him time to escape.

His passage effected, he called a meeting of the Scionaeans and spoke
 to the same effect as at Acanthus and Torone , adding that they
 merited the utmost commendation in that, in spite of Pallene within the isthmus
 being cut off by the Athenian occupation of Potidaea and of their own
 practically insular position, they had of their own free will gone
 forward to meet their liberty instead of timorously waiting until
 they had been by force compelled to their own manifest good. 
 This was a sign that they would valiantly undergo any trial, however
 great; and if he should order affairs as he intended, he should
 count them among the truest and sincerest friends of the
 Lacedaemonians, and would in every other way honour them.

The Scionaeans were elated by his
 language, and even those who had at first disapproved of what was
 being done catching the general confidence, they determined on a
 vigorous conduct of the war, and welcomed Brasidas with all possible
 honours, publicly crowning him with a crown of gold as the liberator
 of Hellas ; while private
 persons crowded round him and decked him with garlands as though he
 had been an athlete.

Meanwhile Brasidas left them a small garrison for the present and
 crossed back again, and not long afterwards sent over a larger
 force, intending with the help of the Scionaeans to attempt Mende
 and Potidaea before
 the Athenians should arrive; Scione , he felt, being too like an island for them
 not to relieve it. 
 He had besides intelligence in the above towns about their betrayal.

In the midst of his designs upon the
 towns in question, a galley arrived with the commissioners carrying
 round the news of the armistice, Aristonymus for the Athenians and
 Athenaeus for the Lacedaemonians.

The troops now crossed back to Torone , and the commissioners gave Brasidas notice
 of the convention. 
 All the Lacedaemonian allies in Thrace accepted what had been done;

and Aristonymus made no difficulty about the rest, but finding, on
 counting the days, that the Scionaeans had revolted after the date
 of the convention, refused to include them in it. 
 To this Brasidas earnestly objected, asserting that the revolt took
 place before, and would not give up the town.

Upon Aristonymus reporting the case to Athens , the people at once
 prepared to send an expedition to Scione . 
 Upon this, envoys arrived from Lacedaemon , alleging that this would be a breach of
 the truce, and laying claim to the town upon the faith of the
 assertion of Brasidas, and meanwhile offering to submit the question
 to arbitration.

Arbitration, however, was what the Athenians did not choose to risk;
 being determined to send troops at once to the place, and furious at
 the idea of even the islanders now daring to revolt, in a vain
 reliance upon the power of the Lacedaemonians by land.

Besides the facts of the revolt were rather as the Athenians
 contended, the Scionaeans having revolted two days after the
 convention. 
 Cleon accordingly succeeded in carrying a decree to reduce and put to
 death the Scionaeans and the Athenians employed the leisure which
 they now enjoyed in preparing for the expedition.

Meanwhile Mende revolted, a town in
 Pallene and a
 colony of the Eretrians, and was received without scruple by
 Brasidas, in spite of its having evidently come over during the
 armistice, on account of certain infringements of the truce alleged
 by him against the Athenians.

This audacity of Mende was partly caused by seeing Brasidas forward
 in the matter and by the conclusions drawn from his refusal to
 betray Scione ; and
 besides, the conspirators in Mende were few, and, as I have already
 intimated, had carried on their practices too long not to fear
 detection for themselves, and not to wish to force the inclination
 of the multitude.

This news made the Athenians more furious than ever, and they at once
 prepared against both towns.

Brasidas expecting their arrival conveyed away to Olynthus in Chalcidice the women and children
 of the Scionaeans and Mendaeans, and sent over to them five hundred
 Peloponnesian heavy infantry and three hundred Chalcidian
 targeteers, all under the command of Polydamidas. Leaving these two towns to prepare together
 against the speedy arrival of the Athenians,

Brasidas and Perdiccas started on a second joint expedition into
 Lyncus against Arrhabaeus; the latter with the forces of his
 Macedonian subjects, and a corps of heavy infantry composed of
 Hellenes domiciled in the country; the former with the
 Peloponnesians whom he still had with him and the Chalcidians,
 Acanthians, and the rest in such force as they were able. 
 In all there were about three thousand Hellenic heavy infantry,
 accompanied by all the Macedonian cavalry with the Chalcidians, near
 one thousand strong, besides an immense crowd of barbarians.

On entering the country of Arrhabaeus, they found the Lyncestians
 encamped awaiting them, and themselves took up a position
 opposite.

The infantry on either side were upon a hill, with a plain between
 them, into which the horse of both armies first galloped down, and
 engaged a cavalry action. 
 After this the Lyncestian heavy infantry advanced from their hill to
 join their cavalry and offered battle; upon which Brasidas and
 Perdiccas also came down to meet them, and engaged and routed them
 with heavy loss; the survivors taking refuge upon the heights and
 there remaining inactive.

The victors now set up a trophy and waited two or three days for the
 Illyrian mercenaries who were to join Perdiccas. 
 Perdiccas then wished to go on and attack the villages of Arrhabaeus,
 and to sit still no longer; but Brasidas, afraid that the Athenians
 might sail up during his absence, and of something happening to
 Mende, and seeing besides that the Illyrians did not appear, far
 from seconding this wish was anxious to return.

While they were thus disputing, the
 news arrived that the Illyrians had actually betrayed Perdiccas and
 had joined Arrhabaeus; and the fear inspired by their warlike
 character made both parties now think it best to retreat. 
 However, owing to the dispute, nothing had been settled as to when
 they should start; and night coming on, the Macedonians and the
 barbarian crowd took fright in a moment in one of those mysterious
 panics to which great armies are liable; and persuaded that an army
 many times more numerous than that which had really arrived was
 advancing and all but upon them, suddenly broke and fled in the
 direction of home, and thus compelled Perdiccas, who at first did
 not perceive what had occurred, to depart without seeing Brasidas,
 the two armies being encamped at a considerable distance from each
 other.

At daybreak Brasidas, perceiving that the Macedonians had gone on,
 and that the Illyrians and Arrhabaeus were on the point of attacking
 him, formed his heavy infantry into a square, with the light troops
 in the center, and himself also prepared to retreat.

Posting his youngest soldiers to dash out wherever the enemy should
 attack them, he himself with three hundred picked men in the rear
 intended to face about during the retreat and beat off the most
 forward of their assailants.

Meanwhile, before the enemy approached, he sought to sustain the
 courage of his soldiers with the following hasty exhortation:—

‘Peloponnesians, if I did not suspect
 you of being dismayed at being left alone to sustain the attack of a
 numerous and barbarian enemy, I should just have said a few words to
 you as usual without further explanation. 
 As it is, in the face of the desertion of our friends and the numbers
 of the enemy, I have some advice and information to offer, which,
 brief as they must be, will, I hope, suffice for the more important
 points.

The bravery that you habitually display in war does not depend on
 your having allies at your side in this or that encounter, but on
 your native courage; nor have numbers any terrors for citizens of
 states like yours, in which the many do not rule the few, but rather
 the few the many, owing their position to nothing else than to
 superiority in the field.

Inexperience now makes you afraid of barbarians; and yet the trial of
 strength which you had with the Macedonians among them, and my own
 judgment, confirmed by what I hear from others, should be enough to
 satisfy you that they will not prove formidable.

Where an enemy seems strong but is really weak, a true knowledge of
 the facts makes his adversary the bolder, just as a serious
 antagonist is encountered most confidently by those who do not know
 him. 
 Thus the present enemy might terrify an inexperienced imagination,
 they are formidable in outward bulk, their loud yelling is
 unbearable, and the brandishing of their weapons in the air has a
 threatening appearance.

But when it comes to real fighting with an opponent who stands his
 ground, they are not what they seemed; they have no regular order
 that they should be ashamed of deserting their positions when hard
 pressed; flight and attack are with them equally honourable, and
 afford no test of courage; their independent mode of fighting never
 leaving any one who wants to run away without a fair excuse for so
 doing. 
 In short, they think frightening you at a secure distance a surer
 game than meeting you hand to hand; otherwise they would have done
 the one and not the other.

You can thus plainly see that the terrors with which they were at
 first invested are in fact trifling enough, though to the eye and
 ear very prominent. 
 Stand your ground therefore when they advance, and again wait your
 opportunity to retire in good order, and you will reach a place of
 safety all the sooner, and will know for ever afterwards that rabble
 such as these, to those who sustain their first attack, do but show
 off their courage by threats of the terrible things that they are
 going to do, at a distance, but with those who give way to them are
 quick enough to display their heroism in pursuit when they can do so
 without danger.’

With this brief address Brasidas
 began to lead off his army. 
 Seeing this, the barbarians came on with much shouting and hubbub,
 thinking that he was flying and that they would over take him and
 cut him off.

But wherever they charged they found the young men ready to dash out
 against them, while Brasidas with his picked company sustained their
 onset. 
 Thus the Peloponnesians withstood the first attack, to the surprise
 of the enemy, and afterwards received and repulsed them as fast as
 they came on, retiring as soon as their opponents became quiet. 
 The main body of the barbarians ceased therefore to molest the
 Hellenes with Brasidas in the open country, and leaving behind a
 certain number to harass their march, the rest went on after the
 flying Macedonians, slaying those with whom they came up, and so
 arrived in time to occupy the narrow pass between two hills that
 leads into the country of Arrhabaeus. 
 They knew that this was the only way by which Brasidas could retreat,
 and now proceeded to surround him just as he entered the most
 impracticable part of the road, in order to cut him off.

Brasidas, perceiving their intention,
 told his three hundred to run on without order, each as quickly as
 he could, to the hill which seemed easiest to take, and to try to
 dislodge the barbarians already there, before they should be joined
 by the main body closing round him.

These attacked and overpowered the party upon the hill, and the main
 army of the Hellenes now advanced with less difficulty towards it;
 the barbarians being terrified at seeing their men on that side
 driven from the height, and no longer following the main body, who,
 they considered, had gained the frontier and made good their
 escape.

The heights once gained, Brasidas now proceeded more securely, and
 the same day arrived at Arnisa, the first town in the dominions of
 Perdiccas.

The soldiers, enraged at the desertion of the Macedonians, vented
 their rage on all their yokes of oxen which they found on the road,
 and on any baggage which had tumbled off (as might easily happen in
 the panic of a night retreat), by unyoking and cutting down the
 cattle and taking the baggage for themselves. 
 From this moment

Perdiccas began to regard Brasidas as an enemy and to feel against
 the Peloponnesians a hatred which could not be congenial to the
 adversary of the Athenians. 
 However, he departed from his natural interests and made it his
 endeavour to come to terms with the latter and to get rid of the
 former.

On his return from Macedonia to Torone , Brasidas found the
 Athenians already masters of Mende, and remained quiet where he was,
 thinking it now out of his power to cross over into Pallene and assist the
 Mendaeans, but he kept good watch over Torone .

For about the same time as the campaign in Lyncus, the Athenians
 sailed upon the expedition which we left them preparing against
 Mende and Scione , with
 fifty ships, ten of which were Chians, one thousand Athenian heavy
 infantry and six hundred archers, one hundred Thracian mercenaries
 and some targeteers drawn from their allies in the neighbourhood,
 under the command of Nicias, son of Niceratus, and Nicostratus, son
 of Diitrephes.

Weighing from Potidaea ,
 the fleet came to land opposite the temple of Poseidon, and
 proceeded against Mende; the men of which town, reinforced by three
 hundred Scionaeans, with their Peloponnesians auxiliaries, seven
 hundred heavy infantry in all, under Polydamidas, they found
 encamped upon a strong hill outside the city.

These Nicias, with one hundred and twenty light-armed Methonaeans,
 sixty picked men from the Athenian heavy infantry, and all the
 archers, tried to reach by a path running up the hill, but received
 a wound and found himself unable to force the position; while
 Nicostratus, with all the rest of the army, advancing upon the hill,
 which was naturally difficult, by a different approach further off,
 was thrown into utter disorder; and the whole Athenian army narrowly
 escaped being defeated.

For that day, as the Mendaeans and their allies showed no signs of
 yielding, the Athenians retreated and encamped, and the Mendaeans at
 nightfall returned into the town.

The next day the Athenians sailed
 round to the Scione side
 and took the suburb, and all day plundered the country, without any
 one coming out against them, partly because of intestine
 disturbances in the town; and the following night the three hundred
 Scionaeans returned home.

On the morrow Nicias advanced with half the army to the frontier of
 Scione and laid
 waste the country; while Nicostratus with the remainder sat down
 before the town near the upper gate on the road to Potidaea .

The arms of the Mendaeans and of their Peloponnesian auxiliaries
 within the wall happened to be piled in that quarter, where
 Polydamidas accordingly began to draw them up for battle,
 encouraging the Mendaeans to make a sortie.

At this moment one of the popular party answered him factiously that
 they would not go out and did not want a war, and for thus answering
 was dragged by the arm and knocked about by Polydamidas. 
 Hereupon the infuriated commons at once seized their arms and rushed
 at the Peloponnesians and at their allies of the opposite
 faction.

The troops thus assaulted were at once routed, partly from the
 suddenness of the conflict and partly through fear of the gates
 being opened to the Athenians, with whom they imagined that the
 attack had been concerted.

As many as were not killed on the spot took refuge in the citadel,
 which they had held from the first; and the whole Athenian army,
 Nicias having by this time returned and being close to the city, now
 burst into Mende, which had opened its gates without any convention,
 and sacked it just as if they had taken it by storm, the generals
 even finding some difficulty in restraining them from also
 massacring the inhabitants.

After this the Athenians told the Mendaeans that they might retain
 their civil rights, and themselves judge the supposed authors of the
 revolt; and cut off the party in the citadel by a wall built down to
 the sea on either side, appointing troops to maintain the
 blockade. 
 Having thus secured Mende, they proceeded against Scione .

The Scionaeans and Peloponnesians
 marched out against them, occupying a strong hill in front of the
 town, which had to be captured by the enemy before they could invest
 the place.

The Athenians stormed the hill, defeated and dislodged its occupants,
 and having encamped and set up a trophy, prepared for the work of
 circumvallation.

Not long after they had begun their operations, the auxiliaries
 besieged in the citadel of Mende forced the guard by the sea side
 and arrived by night at Scione , into which most of them succeeded in
 entering, passing through the besieging army.

While the investment of Scione was in progress,
 Perdiccas sent a herald to the Athenian generals and made peace with
 the Athenians, through spite against Brasidas for the retreat from
 Lyncus, from which moment indeed he had begun to negotiate.

The Lacedaemonian Ischagoras was just then upon the point of starting
 with an army overland to join Brasidas; and Perdiccas, being now
 required by Nicias to give some proof of the sincerity of his
 reconciliation to the Athenians, and being himself no longer
 disposed to let the Peloponnesians into his country, put in motion
 his friends in Thessaly ,
 with whose chief men he always took care to have relations, and go
 effectually stopped the army and its preparation that they did not
 even try the Thessalians.

Ischagoras himself, however, with Araeinias and Aristeus, succeeded
 in reaching Brasidas; they had been commissioned by the
 Lacedaemonians to inspect the state of affairs, and brought out from
 Sparta (in violation
 of all precedent) some of their young men to put in command of the
 towns, to guard against their being entrusted to the persons upon
 the spot. 
 Brasidas accordingly placed Clearidas, son of Cleonymus, in
 Amphipolis , and
 Pasitelidas, son of Hegesander, in Torone .

The same summer the Thebans
 dismantled the wall of the Thespians on the charge of Atticism,
 having always wished to do so, and now finding it an easy matter, as
 the flower of the Thespian youth had perished in the battle with the
 Athenians.

The same summer also the temple of Hera at Argos was burnt down, through
 Chrysis, the priestess, placing a lighted torch near the garlands
 and then falling asleep, so that they all caught fire and were in a
 blaze before she observed it.

Chrysis that very night fled to Phlius for fear of the Argives, who,
 agreeably to the law in such a case, appointed another priestess
 named Phaeinis. 
 Chrysis at the time of her flight had been priestess for eight years
 of the present war and half the ninth.

At the close of the summer the investment of Scione was completed, and the
 Athenians, leaving a detachment to maintain the blockade, returned
 with the rest of their army.

During the winter following the
 Athenians and Lacedaemonians were kept quiet by the armistice; but
 the Mantineans and Tegeans, and their respective allies, fought a
 battle at Laodicium, in the Oresthid. 
 The victory remained doubtful, as each side routed one of the wings
 opposed to them, and both set up trophies and sent spoils to
 Delphi .

After heavy loss on both sides the battle was undecided, and night
 interrupted the action; yet the Tegeans passed the night on the
 field and set up a trophy at once, while the Mantineans withdrew to
 Bucolion and set up theirs afterwards.

At the close of the same winter, in
 fact almost in spring, Brasidas made an attempt upon Potidaea . 
 He arrived by night, and succeeded in planting a ladder against the
 wall without being discovered, the ladder being planted just in the
 interval between the passing round of the bell and the return of the
 man who brought it back. 
 Upon the garrison, however, taking the alarm immediately afterwards,
 before his men came up, he quickly led off his troops, without
 waiting until it was day.

So ended the winter and the ninth year of this war of which
 Thucydides is the historian.

The next summer the truce for a year
 ended, after lasting until the Pythian games. 
 During the armistice the Athenians expelled the Delians from
 Delos , concluding
 that they must have been polluted by some old offense at the time of
 their consecration, and that this had been the omission in the
 previous purification of the island, which as I have related, had
 been thought to have been duly accomplished by the removal of the
 graves of the dead. 
 The Delians had Atramyttium in Asia given them by Pharnaces, and settled there as
 they removed from Delos .

Meanwhile Cleon prevailed on the
 Athenians to let him set sail at the expiration of the armistice for
 the towns in the direction of Thrace with twelve hundred heavy infantry and three
 hundred horse from Athens , a larger force of the allies, and thirty
 ships.

First touching at the still besieged Scione , and taking some heavy infantry from the
 army there, he next sailed into Cophosa harbor in the territory of
 Torone , which is not
 far from the town.

From thence, having learnt from deserters that Brasidas was not in
 Torone , and that its
 garrison was not strong enough to give him battle, he advanced with
 his army against the town, sending ten ships to sail round into the
 harbor.

He first came to the fortification lately thrown up in front of the
 town by Brasidas in order to take in the suburb, to do which he had
 pulled down part of the original wall and made it all one city.

To this point Pasitelidas, the Lacedaemonian commander, with such
 garrison as there was in the place, hurried to repel the Athenian
 assault; but finding himself hard pressed, and seeing the ships that
 had been sent round sailing into the harbor, Pasitelidas began to be
 afraid that they might get up to the city before its defenders were
 there, and the fortification being also carried, he might be taken
 prisoner, and so abandoned the outwork and ran into the town.

But the Athenians from the ships had already taken Torone , and their land forces
 following at his heels burst in with him with a rush over the part
 of the old wall that had been pulled down, killing some of the
 Peloponnesians and Toronaeans in the melee, and making prisoners of
 the rest, and Pasitelidas their commander amongst them.

Brasidas meanwhile had advanced to relieve Torone , and had only about four
 miles more to go when he heard of its fall on the road, and turned
 back again.

Cleon and the Athenians set up two trophies, one by the harbor, the
 other by the fortification, and making slaves of the wives and
 children of the Toronaeans, sent the men with the Peloponnesians and
 any Chalcidians that were there, to the number of seven hundred, to
 Athens ; whence,
 however, they all came home afterwards, the Peloponnesians on the
 conclusion of peace, and the rest by being exchanged against other
 prisoners with the Olynthians.

About the same time Panactum, a fortress on the Athenian border, was
 taken by treachery by the Boeotians.

Meanwhile Cleon, after placing a garrison in Torone , weighed anchor and
 sailed round Athos on his
 way to Amphipolis .

About the same time Phaeax, son of
 Erasistratus, set sail with two colleagues as ambassador from
 Athens to Italy and Sicily .

The Leontines, upon the departure of the Athenians from Sicily after the pacification, had
 placed a number of new citizens upon the roll, and the commons had a
 design for redividing the land; but the upper classes, aware of
 their intention, called in the Syracusans and expelled the
 commons.

These last were scattered in various directions; but the upper
 classes came to an agreement with the Syracusans, abandoned and laid
 waste their city, and went and lived at Syracuse , where they were
 made citizens.

Afterwards some of them were dissatisfied, and leaving Syracuse occupied Phocaeae, a
 quarter of the town of Leontini, and Bricinniae, a strong place in
 the Leontine country, and being there joined by most of the exiled
 commons carried on war from the fortifications.

The Athenians hearing this, sent Phaeax to see if they could not by
 some means so convince their allies there and the rest of the
 Sicilians of the ambitious designs of Syracuse , as to induce them
 to form a general coalition against her, and thus save the commons
 of Leontini.

Arrived in Sicily , Phaeax
 succeeded at Camarina 
 and Agrigentum , but meeting
 with a repulse at Gela did
 not go on to the rest, as he saw that he should not succeed with
 them, but returned through the country of the Sicels to Catana , and after visiting
 Bricinniae as he passed, and encouraging its inhabitants, sailed
 back to Athens .

During his voyage along the coast to
 and from Sicily , he treated
 with some cities in Italy 
 on the subject of friendship with Athens , and also fell in with some Locrian settlers
 exiled from Messina , who
 had been sent thither when the Locrians were called in by one of the
 factions that divided Messina after the pacification of Sicily , and Messina came for a time into the
 hands of the Locrians.

These being met by Phaeax on their return home received no injury at
 his hands, as the Locrians had agreed with him for a treaty with
 Athens .

They were the only people of the allies who, when the reconciliation
 between the Sicilians took place, had not made peace with her; nor
 indeed would they have done so now, if they had not been pressed by
 a war with the Hipponians and Medmaeans who lived on their border,
 and were colonists of theirs. 
 Phaeax meanwhile proceeded on his voyage, and at length arrived at
 Athens .

Cleon, whom we left on his voyage
 from Torone to
 Amphipolis , made
 Eion his base, and
 after an unsuccessful assault upon the Andrian colony of Stagirus,
 took Galepsus, a colony of Thasos , by storm.

He now sent envoys to Perdiccas to command his attendance with an
 army, as provided by the alliance; and others to Thrace , to Polles, king of the
 Odomantians, who was to bring as many Thracian mercenaries as
 possible; and himself remained inactive in Eion , awaiting their arrival.

Informed of this, Brasidas on his part took up a position of
 observation upon Cerdylium, a place situated in the Argilian country
 on high ground across the river, not far from Amphipolis , and commanding
 a view on all sides, and thus made it impossible for Cleon's army to
 move without his seeing it; for he fully expected that Cleon,
 despising the scanty numbers of his opponent, would march against
 Amphipolis with
 the force that he had got with him.

At the same time Brasidas made his preparations, calling to his
 standard fifteen hundred Thracian mercenaries, and all the Edonians,
 horse and targeteers; he also had a thousand Myrcinian and
 Chalcidian targeteers, besides those in Amphipolis ,

and a force of heavy infantry numbering altogether about two
 thousand, and three hundred Hellenic horse. 
 Fifteen hundred of these he had with him upon Cerdylium; the rest
 were stationed with Clearidas in Amphipolis .

After remaining quiet for some time,
 Cleon was at length obliged to do as Brasidas expected.

His soldiers, tired of their inactivity, began also seriously to
 reflect on the weakness and incompetence of their commander and the
 skill and valor that would be opposed to him, and on their own
 original unwillingness to accompany him. 
 These murmurs coming to the ears of Cleon, he resolved not to disgust
 the army by keeping it in the same place, and broke up his camp and
 advanced.

The temper of the general was what it had been at Pylos , his success on that
 occasion having given him confidence in his capacity. 
 He never dreamed of any one coming out to fight him, but said that he
 was rather going up to view the place; and if he waited for his
 reinforcements it was not in order to make victory secure in case he
 should be compelled to engage, but to be enabled to surround and
 storm the city.

He accordingly came and posted his army upon a strong hill in front
 of Amphipolis , and
 proceeded to examine the lake formed by the Strymon, and how the
 town lay on the side of Thrace .

He thought to retire at pleasure without fighting, as there was no
 one to be seen upon the wall or coming out of the gates, all of
 which were shut. 
 Indeed, it seemed a mistake not to have brought down engines with
 him; he could then have taken the town, there being no one to defend
 it.

As soon as Brasidas saw the Athenians
 in motion he descended himself from Cerdylium and entered Amphipolis .

He did not venture to go out in regular order against the Athenians:
 he mistrusted his strength, and thought it inadequate to the
 attempt; not in numbers—these were not so unequal—but in quality,
 the flower of the Athenian army being in the field, with the best of
 the Lemnians and Imbrians. 
 He therefore prepared to assail them by stratagem.

By showing the enemy the number of his troops, and the shifts which
 he had been put to to arm them, he thought that he should have less
 chance of beating him than by not letting him have a sight of them,
 and thus learn how good a right he had to despise them.

He accordingly picked out a hundred and fifty heavy infantry, and
 putting the rest under Clearidas determined to attack suddenly
 before the Athenians retired; thinking that he should not have again
 such a chance of catching them alone, if their reinforcements were
 once allowed to come up; and so calling all his soldiers together in
 order to encourage them and explain his intention, spoke as
 follows:—

‘Peloponnesians, the character of the
 country from which we have come, one which has always owed its
 freedom to valor, and the fact that you are Dorians and the enemy
 you are about to fight Ionians, whom you are accustomed to beat, are
 things that do not need further comment.

But the plan of attack that I propose to pursue, this it is as well
 to explain, in order that the fact of our adventuring with a part
 instead of with the whole of our forces may not damp your courage by
 the apparent disadvantage at which it places you.

I imagine it is the poor opinion that he has of us, and the fact that
 he has no idea of any one coming out to engage him, that has made
 the enemy march up to the place and carelessly look about him as he
 is doing, without noticing us.

But the most successful soldier will always be the man who most
 happily detects a blunder like this, and who carefully consulting
 his own means makes his attack not so much by open and regular
 approaches, as by seizing the opportunity of the moment;

and these stratagems, which do the greatest service to our friends by
 most completely deceiving our enemies, have the most brilliant name
 in war.

Therefore, while their careless confidence continues, and they are
 still thinking, as in my judgment they are now doing, more of
 retreat than of maintaining their position, while their spirit is
 slack and not high-strung with expectation, I with the men under my
 command will, if possible, take them by surprise and fall with a run
 upon their center;

and do you, Clearidas, afterwards, when you see me already upon them,
 and, as is likely, dealing terror among them, take with you the
 Amphipolitans, and the rest of the allies, and suddenly open the
 gates and dash at them, and hasten to engage as quickly as you
 can.

That is our best chance of establishing a panic among them, as a
 fresh assailant has always more terrors for an enemy than the one he
 is immediately engaged with.

Show yourself a brave man, as a Spartan should; and do you, allies,
 follow him like men, and remember that zeal, honor, and obedience
 mark the good soldier, and that this day will make you either free
 men and allies of Lacedaemon , or slaves of Athens ; even if you escape
 without personal loss of liberty or life, your bondage will be on
 harsher terms than before, and you will also hinder the liberation
 of the rest of the Hellenes.

No cowardice then on your part, seeing the greatness of the issues at
 stake, and I will show that what I preach to others I can practise
 myself.’

After this brief speech Brasidas
 himself prepared for the sally, and placed the rest with Clearidas
 at the Thracian gates to support him as had been agreed.

Meanwhile he had been seen coming down from Cerdylium and then in the
 city, which is overlooked from the outside, sacrificing near the
 temple of Athena; in short, all his movements had been observed, and
 word was brought to Cleon, who had at the moment gone on to look
 about him, that the whole of the enemy's force could be seen in the
 town, and that the feet of horses and men in great numbers were
 visible under the gates, as if a sally were intended.

Upon hearing this he went up to look, and having done so, being
 unwilling to venture upon the decisive step of a battle before his
 reinforcements came up, and fancying that he would have time to
 retire, bid the retreat be sounded and sent orders to the men to
 effect it by moving on the left wing in the direction of Eion , which was indeed the only
 way practicable.

This however not being quick enough for him, he joined the retreat in
 person and made the right wing wheel round, thus turning its unarmed
 side to the enemy.

It was then that Brasidas seeing the Athenian force in motion and his
 opportunity come, said to the men with him and the rest, ‘Those
 fellows will never stand before us, one can see that by the way
 their spears and heads are going. 
 Troops which do as they do seldom stand a charge. 
 Quick, some one, and open the gates I spoke of, and let us be out and
 at them with no fears for the result.’

Accordingly issuing out by the palisade gate and by the first in the
 long wall then existing, he ran at the top of his speed along the
 straight road, where the trophy now stands as you go by the steepest
 part of the hill, and fell upon and routed the center of the
 Athenians, panic-stricken by their own disorder and astounded at his
 audacity.

At the same moment Clearidas in execution of his orders issued out
 from the Thracian gates to support him, and also attacked the
 enemy.

The result was that the Athenians, suddenly and unexpectedly attacked
 on both sides, fell into confusion; and their left towards
 Eion , which had
 already got on some distance, at once broke and fled. 
 Just as it was in full retreat and Brasidas was passing on to attack
 the right, he received a wound; but his fall was not perceived by
 the Athenians, as he was taken up by those near him and carried off
 the field.

The Athenian right made a better stand, and though Cleon, who from
 the first had no thought of fighting, at once fled and was overtaken
 and slain by a Myrcinian targeteer, his infantry forming in close
 order upon the hill twice or thrice repulsed the attacks of
 Clearidas, and did not finally give way until they were surrounded
 and routed by the missiles of the Myrcinian and Chalcidian horse and
 the targeteers.

Thus the Athenian army was all now in flight; and such as escaped
 being killed in the battle by the Chalcidian horse and the
 targeteers, dispersed among the hills, and with difficulty made
 their way to Eion .

The men who had taken up and rescued Brasidas, brought him into the
 town with the breath still in him: he lived to hear of the victory
 of his troops, and not long after expired.

The rest of the army returning with Clearidas from the pursuit
 stripped the dead and set up a trophy.

After this all the allies attended in
 arms and buried Brasidas at the public expense in the city, in front
 of what is now the market-place, and the Amphipolitans having
 enclosed his tomb, ever afterwards sacrifice to him as a hero and
 have given to him the honor of games and annual offerings. 
 They constituted him the founder of their colony, and pulled down the
 Hagnonic erections and obliterated everything that could be
 interpreted as a memorial of his having founded the place; for they
 considered that Brasidas had been their preserver and courting as
 they did the alliance of Lacedaemon for fear of Athens , in their present
 hostile relations with the latter they could no longer with the same
 advantage or satisfaction pay Hagnon his honors.

They also gave the Athenians back their dead. 
 About six hundred of the latter had fallen and only seven of the
 enemy, owing to there having been no regular engagement, but the
 affair of accident and panic that I have described.

After taking up their dead the Athenians sailed off home, while
 Clearidas and his troops remained to arrange matters at Amphipolis .

About the same time three
 Lacedaemonians—Ramphias, Autocharidas, and Epicydidas—led a
 reinforcement of nine hundred heavy infantry to the towns in the
 direction of Thrace , and
 arriving at Heraclea in
 Trachis reformed
 matters there as seemed good to them.

While they delayed there, this battle took place and so the summer
 ended.

With the beginning of the winter
 following Ramphias and his companions penetrated as far as Pierium
 in Thessaly ; but as the
 Thessalians opposed their further advance, and Brasidas whom they
 came to reinforce was dead, they turned back home, thinking that the
 moment had gone by, the Athenians being defeated and gone, and
 themselves not equal to the execution of Brasidas' designs.

The main cause however of their return was because they knew that
 when they set out, Lacedaemonian opinion was really in favour of
 peace.

Indeed it so happened that directly
 after the battle of Amphipolis and the retreat of Ramphias from
 Thessaly , both sides
 ceased to prosecute the war and turned their attention to peace. 
 
 Athens had suffered
 severely at Delium , and
 again shortly afterwards at Amphipolis , and had no longer that confidence in
 her strength which had made her before refuse to treat, in the
 belief of ultimate victory which her success at the moment had
 inspired;

besides, she was afraid of her allies being tempted by her reverses
 to rebel more generally, and repented having let go the splendid
 opportunity for peace which the affair of Pylos had offered.

Lacedaemon , on the other
 hand, found the event of the war falsify her notion that a few years
 would suffice for the overthrow of the power of the Athenians by the
 devastation of their land. 
 She had suffered on the island a disaster hitherto unknown at
 Sparta ; she saw her
 country plundered from Pylos and Cythera ; the Helots were deserting, and she was in
 constant apprehension that those who remained in Peloponnese would rely upon those
 outside and take advantage of the situation to renew their old
 attempts at revolution.

Besides this, as chance would have it, her thirty years' truce with
 the Argives was upon the point of expiring; and they refused to
 renew it unless Cynuria were restored to them; so that it seemed
 impossible to fight Argos 
 and Athens at once. 
 She also suspected some of the cities in Peloponnese of intending to go over to the enemy,
 as was indeed the case.

These considerations made both sides
 disposed for an accommodation; the Lacedaemonians being probably the
 most eager, as they ardently desired to recover the men taken upon
 the island, the Spartans among whom belonged to the first families
 and were accordingly related to the governing body in Lacedaemon .

Negotiations had been begun directly after their capture, but the
 Athenians in their hour of triumph would not consent to any
 reasonable terms; though after their defeat at Delium Lacedaemon,
 knowing that they would be now more inclined to listen, at once
 concluded the armistice for a year, during which they were to confer
 together and see if a longer period could not be agreed upon.

Now, however, after the Athenian
 defeat at Amphipolis , and the death of Cleon and Brasidas, who
 had been the two principal opponents of peace on either side—the
 latter from the success and honor which war gave him, the former
 because he thought that, if tranquillity were restored, his crimes
 would be more open to detection and his slanders less credited—the
 foremost candidates for power in either city, Pleistoanax, son of
 Pausanias, king of Lacedaemon , and Nicias, son of Niceratus, the most
 fortunate general of his time, each desired peace more ardently than
 ever. 
 Nicias, while still happy and honored, wished to secure his good
 fortune, to obtain a present release from trouble for himself and
 his countrymen, and hand down to posterity a name as an
 ever-successful statesman, and thought the way to do this was to
 keep out of danger and commit himself as little as possible to
 fortune, and that peace alone made this keeping out of danger
 possible. 
 Pleistoanax, again, was assailed by his enemies for his restoration,
 and regularly held up by them to the prejudice of his countrymen,
 upon every reverse that befell them, as though his unjust
 restoration were the cause;

the accusation being that he and his brother Aristocles had bribed
 the prophetess of Delphi 
 to tell the Lacedaemonian deputations which successively arrived at
 the temple to bring home the seed of the demigod son of Zeus from
 abroad, else they would have to plough with a silver share.

In this way, it was insisted, in time he had induced the
 Lacedaemonians in the nineteenth year of his exile to Lycaeum
 (whither he had gone when banished on suspicion of having been
 bribed to retreat from Attica , and had built half his house within the
 consecrated precinct of Zeus for fear of the Lacedaemonians), to
 restore him with the same dances and sacrifices with which they had
 instituted their kings upon the first settlement of Lacedaemon .

The smart of this accusation, and the reflection that in peace no
 disaster could occur, and that when Lacedaemon had recovered her men there would be
 nothing for his enemies to take hold of (whereas, while war lasted
 the highest station must always bear the scandal of everything that
 went wrong), made him ardently desire a settlement.

Accordingly this winter was employed in conferences; and as spring
 rapidly approached, the Lacedaemonians sent round orders to the
 cities to prepare for a fortified occupation of Attica , and held this as a sword
 over the heads of the Athenians to induce them to listen to their
 overtures; and at last, after many claims had been urged on either
 side at the conferences, a peace was agreed on upon the following
 basis. 
 Each party was to restore its conquests, but Athens was to keep Nisaea ; her demand for
 Plataea being met
 by the Thebans asserting that they had acquired the place not by
 force or treachery, but by the voluntary adhesion upon agreement of
 its citizens; and the same, according to the Athenian account, being
 the history of her acquisition of Nisaea . 
 This arranged, the Lacedaemonians summoned their allies, and all
 voting for peace except the Boeotians, Corinthians, Eleans, and
 Megarians, who did not approve of these proceedings, they concluded
 the treaty and made peace, each of the contracting parties swearing
 to the following articles:—

The Athenians and Lacedaemonians and
 their allies made a treaty, and swear to it, city by city, as
 follows:

1. 
 Touching the national temples, there shall be a free passage by land
 and by sea to all who wish it, to sacrifice, travel, consult, and
 attend the oracle or games, according to the customs of their
 countries. 2. 
 The temple and shrine of Apollo at Delphi and the Delphians shall be governed by their
 own laws, taxed by their own state, and judged by their own judges,
 the land and the people, according to the custom of their
 country.

3. 
 The treaty shall be binding for fifty years upon the Athenians and
 the allies of the Athenians, and upon the Lacedaemonians and the
 allies of the Lacedaemonians, without fraud or hurt by land or by
 sea.

4. 
 It shall not be lawful to take up arms, with intent to do hurt,
 either for the Lacedaemonians and their allies against the Athenians
 and their allies, or for the Athenians and their allies against the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies, in any way or means whatsoever. 
 But should any difference arise between them they are to have
 recourse to law and oaths, according as may be agreed between the
 parties.

5. 
 The Lacedaemonians and their allies shall give back Amphipolis to the
 Athenians. 
 Nevertheless, in the case of cities given up by the Lacedaemonians to
 the Athenians, the inhabitants shall be allowed to go where they
 please and to take their property with them; and the cities shall be
 independent, paying only the tribute of Aristides. 
 And it shall not be lawful for the Athenians or their allies to carry
 on war against them after the treaty has been concluded, so long as
 the tribute is paid. 
 The cities referred to are Argilus, Stagirus, Acanthus, Scolus,
 Olynthus , and
 Spartolus. 
 These cities shall be neutral, allies neither of the Lacedaemonians
 nor of the Athenians; but if the cities consent, it shall be lawful
 for the Athenians to make them their allies, provided always that
 the cities wish it.

The Mecybernaeans, Sanaeans and Singaeans shall inhabit their own
 cities, as also the Olynthians and Acanthians;

but the Lacedaemonians and their allies shall give back Panactum to
 the Athenians. 6. 
 The Athenians shall give back Coryphasium, Cythera , Methana , Pteleum, and Atalanta
 to the Lacedaemonians, and also all Lacedaemonians that are in the
 prison at Athens or
 elsewhere in the Athenian dominions, and shall let go the
 Peloponnesians besieged in Scione , and all others in Scione that are allies of the
 Lacedaemonians, and all whom Brasidas sent in there, and any others
 of the allies of the Lacedaemonians that may be in the prison at
 Athens or elsewhere
 in the Athenian dominions. 7. 
 The Lacedaemonians and their allies shall in like manner give back
 any of the Athenians or their allies that they may have in their
 hands.

8. 
 In the case of Scione ,
 Torone , and
 Sermylium, and any other cities that the Athenians may have, the
 Athenians may adopt such measures as they please.

9. 
 The Athenians shall take an oath to the Lacedaemonians and their
 allies, city by city. 
 Every man shall swear by the most binding oath of his country,
 seventeen from each city. 
 The oath shall be as follows:—‘I will abide by this agreement and
 treaty honestly and without deceit.’ In the same way an oath shall
 be taken by the Lacedaemonians and their allies to the
 Athenians;

and the oath shall be renewed annually by both parties. 
 Pillars shall be erected at Olympia , Pythia, the Isthmus, at Athens in the Acropolis, and at
 Lacedaemon in the
 temple at Amyclae.

10. 
 If anything be forgotten, whatever it be, and on whatever point, it
 shall be consistent with their oath for both parties the Athenians
 and Lacedaemonians to alter it, according to their discretion.

The treaty begins from the Ephoralty
 of Pleistolas in Lacedaemon , on the 27th day of the month of Artemisium , and from the
 Archonship of Alcaeus at Athens , on the 25th day of the month of
 Elaphebolion.

Those who took the oath and poured the libations for the
 Lacedaemonians were Pleistoanax, Agis, Pleistolas, Damagetus,
 Chionis, Metagenes, Acanthus, Daithus, Ischagoras, Philocharidas,
 Zeuxidas, Antippus, Tellis, Alcinadas, Empedias, Menas, and
 Laphilus; for the Athenians, Lampon, Isthmionicus, Nicias, Laches,
 Euthydemus, Procles, Pythodorus, Hagnon, Myrtilus, Thrasycles,
 Theagenes, Aristocrates, Iolcius, Timocrates, Leon, Lamachus and
 Demosthenes.

This treaty was made in the spring,
 just at the end of winter, directly after the city festival of
 Dionysus, just ten years, with the difference of a few days, from
 the first invasion of Attica and the commencement of this war.

This must be calculated by the seasons rather than by trusting to the
 enumeration of the names of the several magistrates or offices of
 honor that are used to mark past events. 
 Accuracy is impossible where an event may have occurred in the
 beginning, or middle, or at any period in their tenure of
 office.

But by computing by summers and winters, the method adopted in this
 history, it will be found that, each of these amounting to half a
 year, there were ten summers and as many winters contained in this
 first war.

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians, to
 whose lot it fell to begin the work of restitution, immediately set
 free all the prisoners of war in their possession, and sent
 Ischagoras, Menas, and Philocharidas as envoys to the towns in the
 direction of Thrace , to
 order Clearidas to hand over Amphipolis to the Athenians, and the rest of their
 allies each to accept the treaty as it affected them.

They, however, did not like its terms, and refused to accept it;
 Clearidas also, willing to oblige the Chalcidians, would not hand
 over the town, averring his inability to do so against their
 will.

Meanwhile he hastened in person to Lacedaemon with envoys from the place, to defend
 his disobedience against the possible accusations of Ischagoras and
 his companions, and also to see whether it was too late for the
 agreement to be altered; and on finding the Lacedaemonians were
 bound, quickly set out back again with instructions from them to
 hand over the place, if possible, or at all events to bring out the
 Peloponnesians that were in it.

The allies happened to be present in
 person at Lacedaemon , and
 those who had not accepted the treaty were now asked by the
 Lacedaemonians to adopt it. 
 This, however, they refused to do, for the same reasons as before,
 unless a fairer one than the present were agreed upon;

and remaining firm in their determination were dismissed by the
 Lacedaemonians, who now decided on forming an alliance with the
 Athenians, thinking that Argos, who had refused the application of
 Ampelidas and Lichas for a renewal of the treaty, would without
 Athens be no longer
 formidable, and that the rest of the Peloponnese would be most likely to keep quiet, if
 the coveted alliance of Athens were shut against them.

Accordingly, after conference with the Athenian ambassadors, an
 alliance was agreed upon and oaths were exchanged, upon the terms
 following:—

1. 
 The Lacedaemonians shall be allies of the Athenians for fifty
 years. 2. 
 Should any enemy invade the territory of Lacedaemon and injure the Lacedaemonians, the
 Athenians shall help them in such way as they most effectively can,
 according to their power. 
 But if the invader be gone after plundering the country, that city
 shall be the enemy of Lacedaemon and Athens , and shall be chastised by both, and one
 shall not make peace without the other. 
 This to be honestly, loyally, and without fraud.

3. 
 Should any enemy invade the territory of Athens and injure the
 Athenians, the Lacedaemonians shall help them in such way as they
 most effectively can, according to their power. 
 But if the invader be gone after plundering the country, that city
 shall be the enemy of Lacedaemon and Athens , and shall be chastised by both, and one
 shall not make peace without the other. 
 This to be honestly, loyally, and without fraud.

4. 
 Should the slave population rise, the Athenians shall help the
 Lacedaemonians with all their might, according to their power.

5. 
 This treaty shall be sworn to by the same persons on either side that
 swore to the other. 
 It shall be renewed annually by the Lacedaemonians going to
 Athens for the
 Dionysia, and the Athenians to Lacedaemon for the Hyacinthia,

and a pillar shall be set up by either party; at Lacedaemon near the statue of
 Apollo at Amyclae, and at Athens on the Acropolis near the statue of
 Athena.

Should the Lacedaemonians and Athenians see fit to add to or take
 away from the alliance in any particular, it shall be consistent
 with their oaths for both parties to do so, according to their
 discretion.

Those who took the oath for the
 Lacedaemonians were Pleistoanax, Agis, Pleistolas, Damagetus,
 Chionis, Metagenes, Acanthus, Daithus, Ischagoras, Philocharidas,
 Zeuxidas, Antippus, Alcinadas, Tellis, Empedias, Menas, and
 Laphilus; for the Athenians, Lampon, Isthmionicus, Laches, Nicias,
 Euthydemus, Procles, Pythodorus, Hagnon, Myrtilus, Thrasycles,
 Theagenes, Aristocrates, Iolcius, Timocrates, Leon, Lamachus, and
 Demosthenes.

This alliance was made not long after
 the treaty; and the Athenians gave back the men from the island to
 the Lacedaemonians, and the summer of the eleventh year began. 
 This completes the history of the first war, which occupied the whole
 of the ten years previously.

After the treaty and the alliance
 between the Lacedaemonians and Athenians, concluded after the ten
 years' war, in the Ephorate of Pleistolas at Lacedaemon , and the Archonship of
 Alcaeus at Athens , the
 states which had accepted them were at peace; but the Corinthians
 and some of the cities in Peloponnese trying to disturb the settlement, a
 fresh agitation was instantly commenced by the allies against
 Lacedaemon .

Further, the Lacedaemonians, as time went on, became suspected by the
 Athenians through their not performing some of the provisions in the
 treaty;

and though for six years and ten months they abstained from invasion
 of each other's territory, yet abroad an unstable armistice did not
 prevent either party doing the other the most effectual injury,
 until they were finally obliged to break the treaty made after the
 ten years' war and to have recourse to open hostilities.

The history of this period has been
 also written by the same Thucydides, an Athenian, in the
 chronological order of events by summers and winters, to the time
 when the Lacedaemonians and their allies put an end to the Athenian
 empire, and took the Long Walls and Piraeus . 
 The war had then lasted for twenty-seven years in all.

Only a mistaken judgment can object to including the interval of
 treaty in the war. 
 Looked at by the light of facts it cannot, it will be found, be
 rationally considered a state of peace, where neither party either
 gave or got back all that they had agreed, apart from the violations
 of it which occurred on both sides in the Mantinean and Epidaurian
 wars and other instances, and the fact that the allies in the
 direction of Thrace were in
 as open hostility as ever, while the Boeotians had only a truce
 renewed every ten days.

So that the first ten years' war, the treacherous armistice that
 followed it, and the subsequent war will, calculating by the
 seasons, be found to make up the number of years which I have
 mentioned, with the difference of a few days, and to afford an
 instance of faith in oracles being for once justified by the
 event.

I certainly all along remember from the beginning to the end of the
 war its being commonly declared that it would last thrice nine
 years.

I lived through the whole of it, being of an age to comprehend
 events, and giving my attention to them in order to know the exact
 truth about them. 
 It was also my fate to be an exile from my country for twenty years
 after my command at Amphipolis ; and being present with both parties,
 and more especially with the Peloponnesians by reason of my exile, I
 had leisure to observe affairs somewhat particularly.

I will accordingly now relate the differences that arose after the
 ten years' war, the breach of the treaty, and the hostilities that
 followed.

After the conclusion of the fifty
 years' truce and of the subsequent alliance, the embassies from
 Peloponnese which had
 been summoned for this business returned from Lacedaemon .

The rest went straight home, but the Corinthians first turned aside
 to Argos and opened
 negotiations with some of the men in office there, pointing out that
 Lacedaemon could have
 no good end in view, but only the subjugation of Peloponnese , or she would never
 have entered into treaty and alliance with the once detested
 Athenians, and that the duty of consulting for the safety of
 Peloponnese had now
 fallen upon Argos, who should immediately pass a decree inviting any
 Hellenic state that chose, such state being independent and
 accustomed to meet fellow-powers upon the fair and equal ground of
 law and justice, to make a defensive alliance with the Argives;
 appointing a few individuals with plenipotentiary powers, instead of
 making the people the medium of negotiation, in order that, in the
 case of an applicant being rejected, the fact of his overtures might
 not be made public. 
 They said that many would come over from hatred of the
 Lacedaemonians.

After this explanation of their views the Corinthians returned home.

The persons with whom they had
 communicated reported the proposal to their government and people,
 and the Argives passed the decree and chose twelve men to negotiate
 an alliance for any Hellenic state that wished it, except Athens and Lacedaemon , neither of which
 should be able to join without reference to the Argive people.

Argos came in to the plan
 the more readily because she saw that war with Lacedaemon was inevitable, the
 truce being on the point of expiring; and also because she hoped to
 gain the supremacy of Peloponnese . 
 For at this time Lacedaemon 
 had sunk very low in public estimation because of her disasters,
 while the Argives were in a most flourishing condition, having taken
 no part in the Attic war, but having on the contrary profited
 largely by their neutrality.

The Argives accordingly prepared to receive into alliance any of the
 Hellenes that desired it.

The Mantineans and their allies were
 the first to come over through fear of the Lacedaemonians. 
 Having taken advantage of the war against Athens to reduce a large part
 of Arcadia into subjection,
 they thought that Lacedaemon would not leave them undisturbed in
 their conquests, now that she had leisure to interfere, and
 consequently gladly turned to a powerful city like Argos , the historical enemy of
 the Lacedaemonians, and a sister democracy.

Upon the defection of Mantinea the rest of Peloponnese at once began to agitate the propriety
 of following her example, conceiving that the Mantineans would not
 have changed sides without good reason, besides which they were
 angry with Lacedaemon among
 other reasons for having inserted in the treaty with Athens that it should be
 consistent with their oaths for both parties, Lacedaemonians and
 Athenians, to add to or take away from it according to their
 discretion.

It was this clause that was the real origin of the panic in
 Peloponnese , by
 exciting suspicions of a Lacedaemonian and Athenian combination
 against their liberties: any alteration should properly have been
 made conditional upon the consent of the whole body of the
 allies.

With these apprehensions there was a very general desire in each
 state to place itself in alliance with Argos .

In the meantime the Lacedaemonians
 perceiving the agitation going on in Peloponnese , and that Corinth was the author of it
 and was herself about to enter into alliance with the Argives, sent
 ambassadors thither in the hope of preventing what was in
 contemplation. 
 They accused her of having brought it all about, and told her that
 she could not desert Lacedaemon and become the ally of Argos , without adding violation
 of her oaths to the crime which she had already committed in not
 accepting the treaty with Athens , when it had been expressly agreed that the
 decision of the majority of the allies should be binding, unless the
 gods or heroes stood in the way.

Corinth in her answer,
 delivered before those of her allies who had like her refused to
 accept the treaty, and whom she had previously invited to attend,
 refrained from openly stating the injuries she complained of, such
 as the non-recovery of Sollium or Anactorium from the Athenians, or
 any other point in which she thought she had been prejudiced, but
 took shelter under the pretext that she could not give up her
 Thracian allies, to whom her separate individual security had been
 given, when they first rebelled with Potidaea , as well as upon
 subsequent occasions.

She denied, therefore, that she committed any violation of her oaths
 to the allies in not entering into the treaty with Athens ; having sworn upon the
 faith of the gods to her Thracian friends, she could not honestly
 give them up. 
 Besides, the expression was, ‘unless the gods or heroes stand in the
 way.’ Now here, as it appeared to her, the gods stood in the
 way.

This was what she said on the subject of her former oaths. 
 As to the Argive alliance
 she would confer with her friends, and do whatever was right.

The Lacedaemonian envoys returning home, some Argive ambassadors who happened to
 be in Corinth pressed
 her to conclude the alliance without further delay, but were told to
 attend at the next congress to be held at Corinth .

Immediately afterwards an Elean
 embassy arrived, and first making an alliance with Corinth went on from thence to
 Argos , according to
 their instructions, and became allies of the Argives, their country
 being just then at enmity with Lacedaemon and Lepreum.

Some time back there had been a war between the Lepreans and some of
 the Arcadians; and the Eleans being called in by the former with the
 offer of half their lands, had put an end to the war, and leaving
 the land in the hands of its Leprean occupiers had imposed upon them
 the tribute of a talent to the Olympian Zeus.

Till the Attic war this tribute was paid by the Lepreans, who then
 took the war as an excuse for no longer doing so, and upon the
 Eleans using force appealed to Lacedaemon . 
 The case was thus submitted to her arbitrament; but the Eleans,
 suspecting the fairness of the tribunal, renounced the reference and
 laid waste the Leprean territory.

The Lacedaemonians nevertheless decided that the Lepreans were
 independent and the Eleans aggressors, and as the latter did not
 abide by the arbitration, sent a garrison of heavy infantry into
 Lepreum.

Upon this the Eleans, holding that Lacedaemon had received one of their rebel
 subjects, put forward the convention providing that each confederate
 should come out of the Attic war in possession of what he had when
 he went into it, and considering that justice had not been done them
 went over to the Argives, and now made the alliance through their
 ambassadors, who had been instructed for that purpose.

Immediately after them the Corinthians and the Thracian Chalcidians
 became allies of Argos . 
 Meanwhile the Boeotians and Megarians, who acted together, remained
 quiet, being left to do as they pleased by Lacedaemon , and thinking that the
 Argive democracy would
 not suit so well with their aristocratic government as the
 Lacedaemonian constitution.

About the same time in this summer
 Athens succeeded in
 reducing Scione , put the
 adult males to death, and making slaves of the women and children,
 gave the land for the Plataeans to live in. 
 She also brought back the Delians to Delos , moved by her misfortunes in the field and by
 the commands of the god at Delphi .

Meanwhile the Phocians and Locrians commenced hostilities.

The Corinthians and Argives being now in alliance, went to Tegea to bring about its
 defection from Lacedaemon ,
 seeing that if so considerable a state could be persuaded to join,
 all Peloponnese would be
 with them.

But when the Tegeans said that they would do nothing against
 Lacedaemon , the
 hitherto zealous Corinthians relaxed their activity, and began to
 fear that none of the rest would now come over.

Still they went to the Boeotians and tried to persuade them to
 alliance and a common action generally with Argos and themselves, and also
 begged them to go with them to Athens and obtain for them a ten days' truce
 similar to that made between the Athenians and Boeotians not long
 after the fifty years' treaty, and in the event of the Athenians
 refusing, to throw up the armistice, and not make any truce in
 future without Corinth . 
 These were the requests of the Corinthians.

The Boeotians stopped them on the subject of the Argive alliance, but went with
 them to Athens , where
 however they failed to obtain the ten days' truce; the Athenian
 answer being, that the Corinthians had truce already, as being
 allies of Lacedaemon .

Nevertheless the Boeotians did not throw up their ten days' truce, in
 spite of the prayers and reproaches of the Corinthians for their
 breach of faith; and these last had to content themselves with a de
 facto armistice with Athens .

The same summer the Lacedaemonians
 marched into Arcadia with
 their whole levy under Pleistoanax, son of Pausanias, king of
 Lacedaemon , against the
 Parrhasians, who were subjects of Mantinea , and a faction of whom had invited their
 aid. 
 They also meant to demolish, if possible, the fort of Cypsela which
 the Mantineans had built and garrisoned in the Parrhasian territory,
 to annoy the district of Sciritis in Laconia .

The Lacedaemonians accordingly laid waste the Parrhasian country, and
 the Mantineans, placing their town in the hands of an Argive garrison, addressed
 themselves to the defence of their confederacy, but being unable to
 save Cypsela or the Parrhasian towns went back to Mantinea .

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians made the Parrhasians independent, razed
 the fortress and returned home.

The same summer the soldiers from
 Thrace who had gone out with Brasidas came back, having been brought
 from thence after the treaty by Clearidas; and the Lacedaemonians
 decreed that the Helots who had fought with Brasidas should be free
 and allowed to live where they liked, and not long afterwards
 settled them with the Neodamodes at Lepreum, which is situated on
 the Laconian and Elean border; Lacedaemon being at this time at enmity with
 Elis .

Those however of the Spartans who had been taken prisoners on the
 island and had surrendered their arms might, it was feared, suppose
 that they were to be subjected to some degradation in consequence of
 their misfortune, and so make some attempt at revolution, if left in
 possession of their franchise. 
 These were therefore at once disfranchised, although some of them
 were in office at the time, and thus placed under a disability to
 take office, or buy and sell anything. 
 After some time, however, the franchise was restored to them.

The same summer the Dians took
 Thyssus, a town on Acte by Athos in alliance with Athens .

During the whole of this summer intercourse between the Athenians and
 Peloponnesians continued, although each party began to suspect the
 other directly after the treaty, because of the places specified in
 it not being restored.

Lacedaemon , to whose lot it
 had fallen to begin by restoring Amphipolis and the other towns, had not done
 so. 
 She had equally failed to get the treaty accepted by her Thracian
 allies, or by the Boeotians or the Corinthians; although she was
 continually promising to unite with Athens in compelling their compliance, if it were
 longer refused. 
 She also kept fixing a time at which those who still refused to come
 in were to be declared enemies to both parties, but took care not to
 bind herself by any written agreement.

Meanwhile the Athenians, seeing none of these professions performed
 in fact, began to suspect the honesty of her intentions, and
 consequently not only refused to comply with her demands for
 Pylos , but also
 repented having given up the prisoners from the island, and kept
 tight hold of the other places, until Lacedaemon 's part of the treaty should be
 fulfilled.

Lacedaemon , on the other
 hand, said she had done what she could, having given up the Athenian
 prisoners of war in her possession, evacuated Thrace , and performed everything
 else in her power. 
 
 Amphipolis it was out
 of her ability to restore; but she would endeavor to bring the
 Boeotians and Corinthians in to the treaty, to recover Panactum, and
 send home all the Athenian prisoners of war in Boeotia .

Meanwhile she required that Pylos should be restored, or at all events that the
 Messenians and Helots should be withdrawn, as her troops had been
 from Thrace , and the place
 garrisoned, if necessary, by the Athenians themselves.

After a number of different conferences held during the summer she
 succeeded in persuading Athens to withdraw from Pylos the Messenians and the
 rest of the Helots and deserters from Laconia, who were accordingly
 settled by her at Cranii in Cephallenia.

Thus during this summer there was peace and intercourse between the
 two peoples.

Next winter, however, the Ephors
 under whom the treaty had been made were no longer in office, and
 some of their successors were directly opposed to it. 
 Embassies now arrived from the Lacedaemonian confederacy, and the
 Athenians, Boeotians, and Corinthians also presented themselves at
 Lacedaemon , and after
 much discussion and no agreement between them, separated for their
 several homes; when Cleobulus and Xenares, the two Ephors who were
 the most anxious to break off the treaty, took advantage of this
 opportunity to communicate privately with the Boeotians and
 Corinthians, and advising them to act as much as possible together,
 instructed the former first to enter into alliance with Argos , and then try and bring
 themselves and the Argives into alliance with Lacedaemon . 
 The Boeotians would so be least likely to be compelled to come in to
 the Attic treaty; and the Lacedaemonians would prefer gaining the
 friendship and alliance of Argos even at the price of the hostility of
 Athens and the
 rupture of the treaty. 
 The Boeotians knew that an honorable friendship with Agros had been
 long the desire of Lacedaemon ; for the Lacedaemonians believed that
 this would considerably facilitate the conduct of the war outside
 Peloponnese .

Meanwhile they begged the Boeotians to place Panactum in her hands in
 order that she might, if possible, obtain Pylos in exchange for it, and so
 be more in a position to resume hostilities with Athens .

After receiving these instructions
 for their governments from Xenares and Cleobulus and their other
 friends at Lacedaemon , the
 Boeotians and Corinthians departed.

On their way home they were joined by two persons high in office at
 Argos who had waited
 for them on the road, and who now sounded them upon the possibility
 of the Boeotians joining the Corinthians, Eleans, and Mantineans in
 becoming the allies of Argos , in the idea that if this could be effected
 they would be able, thus united, to make peace or war as they
 pleased either against Lacedaemon or any other power.

The Boeotian envoys were pleased at thus hearing themselves
 accidentally asked to do what their friends at Lacedaemon had told them; and the
 two Argives perceiving that their proposal was agreeable, departed
 with a promise to send ambassadors to the Boeotians.

On their arrival the Boeotians reported to the Boeotarchs what had
 been said to them at Lacedaemon and also by the Argives who had met
 them, and the Boeotarchs, pleased with the idea, embraced it with
 the more eagerness from the lucky coincidence of Argos soliciting the very thing
 wanted by their friends at Lacedaemon .

Shortly afterwards ambassadors appeared from Argos with the proposals
 indicated; and the Boeotarchs approved of the terms and dismissed
 the ambassadors with a promise to send envoys to Argos to negotiate the alliance.

In the meantime it was decided by the
 Boeotarchs, the Corinthians, the Megarians, and the envoys from
 Thrace first to
 interchange oaths together to give help to each other whenever it
 was required and not to make war or peace except in common; after
 which the Boeotians and Megarians, who acted together, should make
 the alliance with Argos .

But before the oaths were taken the Boeotarchs communicated these
 proposals to the four councils of the Boeotians, in whom the supreme
 power resides, and advised them to interchange oaths with all such
 cities as should be willing to enter into a defensive league with
 the Boeotians.

But the members of the Boeotian councils refused their assent to the
 proposal, being afraid of offending Lacedaemon by entering into a league with the
 deserter Corinth ; the
 Boeotarchs not having acquainted them with what had passed at
 Lacedaemon and with the
 advice given by Cleobulus and Xenares and the Boeotian partisans
 there, namely, that they should become allies of Corinth and Argos as a preliminary to a
 junction with Lacedaemon ;
 fancying that, even if they should say nothing about this, the
 councils would not vote against what had been decided and advised by
 the Boeotarchs.

This difficulty arising, the Corinthians and the envoys from
 Thrace departed without
 anything having been concluded; and the Boeotarchs, who had
 previously intended after carrying this to try and effect the
 alliance with Argos , now
 omitted to bring the Argive 
 question before the councils, or to send to Argos the envoys whom they had
 promised; and a general coldness and delay ensued in the matter.

In this same winter Mecyberna was
 assaulted and taken by the Olynthians, having an Athenian garrison
 inside it.

All this while negotiations had been
 going on between the Athenians and Lacedaemonians about the
 conquests still retained by each, and Lacedaemon , hoping that if Athens were to get back
 Panactum from the Boeotians she might herself recover Pylos , now sent an embassy to
 the Boeotians, and begged them to place Panactum and their Athenian
 prisoners in her hands, in order that she might exchange them for
 Pylos .

This the Boeotians refused to do, unless Lacedaemon made a separate alliance with them as
 she had done with Athens . 
 
 Lacedaemon knew that this
 would be a breach of faith to Athens , as it had been agreed that neither of them
 should make peace or war without the other; yet wishing to obtain
 Panactum which she hoped to exchange for Pylos , and the party who pressed
 for the dissolution of the treaty strongly affecting the Boeotian
 connection, she at length concluded the alliance just as winter gave
 way to spring; and Panactum was instantly razed. 
 And so the eleventh year of the war ended.

In the first days of the summer
 following, the Argives, seeing that the promised ambassadors from
 Boeotia did not arrive,
 and that Panactum was being demolished, and that a separate alliance
 had been concluded between the Boeotians and Lacedaemonians, began
 to be afraid that Argos 
 might be left alone, and all the confederacy go over to Lacedaemon .

They fancied that the Boeotians had been persuaded by the
 Lacedaemonians to raze Panactum and to enter into the treaty with
 the Athenians, and that Athens was privy to this arrangement, and even her
 alliance, therefore, no longer open to them—a resource which they
 had always counted upon, by reason of the dissensions existing, in
 the event of the non-continuance of their treaty with Lacedaemon .

In this strait the Argives, afraid that, as the result of refusing to
 renew the treaty with Lacedaemon and aspiring to the supremacy in
 Peloponnese , they would
 have the Lacedaemonians, Tegeans, Boeotians, and Athenians on their
 hands all at once, now hastily sent off Eustrophus and Aeson, who
 seemed the persons most likely to be acceptable, as envoys to
 Lacedaemon , with the
 view of making as good a treaty as they could with the
 Lacedaemonians, upon such terms as could be got, and being left in
 peace.

Having reached Lacedaemon , their ambassadors
 proceeded to negotiate the terms of the proposed treaty.

What the Argives first demanded was that they might be allowed to
 refer to the arbitration of some state or private person the
 question of the Cynurian land, a piece of frontier-territory about
 which they have always been disputing, and which contains the towns
 of Thyrea and Anthene, and is occupied by the Lacedaemonians. 
 The Lacedaemonians at first said that they could not allow this point
 to be discussed, but were ready to conclude upon the old terms. 
 Eventually, however, the Argive ambassadors succeeded in obtaining from them
 this concession:—For the present there was to be a truce for fifty
 years, but it should be competent for either party, there being
 neither plague nor war in Lacedaemon or Argos , to give a formal challenge and decide the
 question of this territory by battle, as on a former occasion, when
 both sides claimed the victory; pursuit not being allowed beyond the
 frontier of Argos or
 Lacedaemon .

The Lacedaemonians at first thought this mere folly; but at last,
 anxious at any cost to have the friendship of Argos , they agreed to the terms
 demanded, and reduced them to writing. 
 However, before any of this should become binding, the ambassadors
 were to return to Argos 
 and communicate with their people, and in the event of their
 approval, to come at the Feast of the Hyacinthia and take the
 oaths. The envoys returned
 accordingly.

In the meantime, while the Argives were engaged in these
 negotiations, the Lacedaemonian ambassadors, Andromedes, Phaedimus,
 and Antimenidas, who were to receive the prisoners from the
 Boeotians and restore them and Panactum to the Athenians, found that
 the Boeotians had themselves razed Panactum, upon the plea that
 oaths had been anciently exchanged between their people and the
 Athenians, after a dispute on the subject, to the effect that
 neither should inhabit the place, but that they should graze it in
 common. 
 As for the Athenian prisoners of war in the hands of the Boeotians,
 these were delivered over to Andromedes and his colleagues, and by
 them conveyed to Athens 
 and given back. 
 The envoys at the same time announced the razing of Panactum, which
 to them seemed as good as its restitution, as it would no longer
 lodge an enemy of Athens .

This announcement was received with great indignation by the
 Athenians, who thought that the Lacedaemonians had played them
 false, both in the matter of the demolition of Panactum, which ought
 to have been restored to them standing, and in having, as they now
 heard, made a separate alliance with the Boeotians, in spite of
 their previous promise to join Athens in compelling the adhesion of those who
 refused to accede to the treaty. 
 The Athenians also considered the other points in which Lacedaemon had failed in her
 compact, and thinking that they had been overreached, gave an angry
 answer to the ambassadors and sent them away.

The breach between the Lacedaemonians
 and Athenians having gone thus far, the party at Athens , also, who wished to
 cancel the treaty, immediately put themselves in motion.

Foremost amongst these was Alcibiades, son of Clinias, a man yet
 young in years for any other Hellenic city, but distinguished by the
 splendor of his ancestry. 
 Alcibiades thought the Argive alliance really preferable, not that
 personal pique had not also a great deal to do with his opposition;
 he being offended with the Lacedaemonians for having negotiated the
 treaty through Nicias and Laches, and having overlooked him on
 account of his youth, and also for not having shown him the respect
 due to the ancient connection of his family with them as their
 Proxeni, which, renounced by his grandfather, he had lately himself
 thought to renew by his attentions to their prisoners taken in the
 island.

Being thus, as he thought, slighted on all hands, he had in the first
 instance spoken against the treaty, saying that the Lacedaemonians
 were not to be trusted, but that they only treated, in order to be
 enabled by this means to crush Argos , and afterwards to attack Athens alone; and now,
 immediately upon the above breach occurring, he sent privately to
 the Argives, telling them to come as quickly as possible to
 Athens , accompanied
 by the Mantineans and Eleans, with proposals of alliance; as the
 moment was propitious and he himself would do all he could to help
 them.

Upon receiving this message and
 discovering that the Athenians, far from being privy to the Boeotian
 alliance, were involved in a serious quarrel with the
 Lacedaemonians, the Argives paid no further attention to the embassy
 which they had just sent to Lacedaemon on the subject of the treaty, and began
 to incline rather towards the Athenians, reflecting that, in the
 event of war, they would thus have on their side a city that was not
 only an ancient ally of Argos , but a sister democracy and very powerful at
 sea.

They accordingly at once sent ambassadors to Athens to treat for an
 alliance, accompanied by others from Elis and Mantinea .

At the same time arrived in haste
 from Lacedaemon an embassy
 consisting of persons reputed well disposed towards the
 Athenians—Philocharidas, Leon, and Endius, for fear that the
 Athenians in their irritation might conclude alliance with the
 Argives, and also to ask back Pylos in exchange for Panactum, and in defence of
 the alliance with the Boeotians to plead that it had not been made
 to hurt the Athenians.

Upon the envoys speaking in the senate upon these points, and stating
 that they had come with full powers to settle all others at issue
 between them, Alcibiades became afraid that if they were to repeat
 these statements to the popular assembly, they might gain the
 multitude, and the Argive 
 alliance might be rejected,

and accordingly had recourse to the following stratagem. 
 He persuaded the Lacedaemonians by a solemn assurance that if they
 would say nothing of their full powers in the assembly, he would
 give back Pylos to them
 (himself, the present opponent of its restitution, engaging to
 obtain this from the Athenians), and would settle the other points
 at issue.

His plan was to detach them from Nicias and to disgrace them before
 the people, as being without sincerity in their intentions, or even
 common consistency in their language, and so to get the Argives,
 Eleans, and Mantineans taken into alliance.

This plan proved successful. 
 When the envoys appeared before the people, and upon the question
 being put to them, did not say as they had said in the senate, that
 they had come with full powers, the Athenians lost all patience, and
 carried away by Alcibiades, who thundered more loudly than ever
 against the Lacedaemonians, were ready instantly to introduce the
 Argives and their companions and to take them into alliance. 
 An earthquake, however, occurring, before anything definite had been
 done, this assembly was adjourned.

In the assembly held the next day,
 Nicias, in spite of the Lacedaemonians having been deceived
 themselves, and having allowed him to be deceived also in not
 admitting that they had come with full powers, still maintained that
 it was best to be friends with the Lacedaemonians, and, letting the
 Argive proposals stand
 over, to send once more to Lacedaemon and learn her intentions. 
 The adjournment of the war could only increase their own prestige and
 injure that of their rivals; the excellent state of their affairs
 making it their interest to preserve this prosperity as long as
 possible, while those of Lacedaemon were so desperate that the sooner she
 could try her fortune again the better.

He succeeded accordingly in persuading them to send ambassadors,
 himself being among the number, to invite the Lacedaemonians, if
 they were really sincere, to restore Panactum intact with Amphipolis , and to abandon
 their alliance with the Boeotians (unless they consented to accede
 to the treaty), agreeably to the stipulation which forbade either
 party to treat without the other.

The ambassadors were also directed to say that the Athenians, had
 they wished to play false, might already have made alliance with the
 Argives, who were indeed come to Athens for that very purpose, and went off
 furnished with instructions as to any other complaints that the
 Athenians had to make.

Having reached Lacedaemon 
 they communicated their instructions, and concluded by telling the
 Lacedaemonians that unless they gave up their alliance with the
 Boeotians, in the event of their not acceding to the treaty, the
 Athenians for their part would ally themselves with the Argives and
 their friends. 
 The Lacedaemonians, however, refused to give up the Boeotian
 alliance—the party of Xenares the Ephor, and such as shared their
 view, carrying the day upon this point—but renewed the oaths at the
 request of Nicias, who feared to return without having accomplished
 anything and to be disgraced; as was indeed his fate, he being held
 the author of the treaty with Lacedaemon .

When he returned, and the Athenians heard that nothing had been done
 at Lacedaemon , they flew
 into a passion, and deciding that faith had not been kept with them,
 took advantage of the presence of the Argives and their allies, who
 had been introduced by Alcibiades, and made a treaty and alliance
 with them upon the terms following:—

The Athenians, Argives, Mantineans,
 and Eleans, acting for themselves and the allies in their respective
 empires, made a treaty for a hundred years, to be without fraud or
 hurt by land and by sea.

1. 
 It shall not be lawful to carry on war, either for the Argives,
 Eleans, Mantineans, and their allies, against the Athenians, or the
 allies in the Athenian empire; or for the Athenians and their allies
 against the Argives, Eleans, Mantineans, or their allies, in any way
 or means whatsoever. The Athenians,
 Argives, Eleans, and Mantineans shall be allies for a hundred years
 upon the terms following:—

2. 
 If an enemy invade the country of the Athenians, the Argives, Eleans,
 and Mantineans shall go to the relief of Athens , according as the
 Athenians may require by message, in such way as they most
 effectually can, to the best of their power. 
 But if the invader be gone after plundering the territory, the
 offending state shall be the enemy of the Argives, Mantineans,
 Eleans, and Athenians, and war shall be made against it by all these
 cities; and no one of the cities shall be able to make peace with
 that state, except all the above cities agree to do so.

3. 
 Likewise the Athenians shall go to the relief of Argos , Mantinea , and Elis , if an enemy invade the
 country of Elis ,
 Mantinea , or
 Argos , according as
 the above cities may require by message, in such way as they most
 effectually can, to the best of their power. 
 But if the invader be gone after plundering the territory, the state
 offending shall be the enemy of the Athenians, Argives, Mantineans,
 and Eleans, and war shall be made against it by all these cities,
 and peace may not be made with that state except all the above
 cities agree to it.

4. 
 No armed force shall be allowed to pass for hostile purposes through
 the country of the powers contracting, or of the allies in their
 respective empires, or to go by sea, except all the cities—that is
 to say, Athens ,
 Argos , Mantinea , and Elis—vote for
 such passage.

5. 
 The relieving troops shall be maintained by the city sending them for
 thirty days from their arrival in the city that has required them,
 and upon their return in the same way; if their services be desired
 for a longer period the city that sent for them shall maintain them,
 at the rate of three Aeginetan obols per day for a heavy-armed
 soldier, archer, or light soldier, and an Aeginetan drachma for a
 trooper.

6. 
 The city sending for the troops shall have the command when the war
 is in its own country; but in case of the cities resolving upon a
 joint expedition the command shall be equally divided among all the
 cities.

7. 
 The treaty shall be sworn to by the Athenians for themselves and
 their allies, by the Argives, Mantineans, Eleans, and their allies,
 by each state individually. 
 Each shall swear the oath most binding in his country over full-grown
 victims; the oath being as follows: ‘I
 will stand by the alliance and its articles, justly, innocently, and
 sincerely, and I will not transgress the same in any way or means
 whatsoever.’

The oath shall be taken at Athens by the Senate and the
 magistrates, the Prytanes administering it; at Argos by the Senate, the Eighty,
 and the Artynae, the Eighty administering it; at Mantinea by the Demiurgi, the
 Senate, and the other magistrates, the Theori and Polemarchs
 administering it; at Elis 
 by the Demiurgi, the magistrates, and the Six Hundred, the Demiurgi
 and the Thesmophylaces administering it.

The oaths shall be renewed by the Athenians going to Elis , Mantinea , and Argos thirty days before the
 Olympic games; by the Argives, Mantineans, and Eleans going to
 Athens ten days
 before the great feast of the Panathenaea.

The articles of the treaty, the oaths, and the alliance shall be
 inscribed on a stone pillar by the Athenians in the citadel, by the
 Argives in the market-place, in the temple of Apollo; by the
 Mantineans in the temple of Zeus, in the market-place; and a brazen
 pillar shall be erected jointly by them at the Olympic games now at
 hand.

Should the above cities see good to make any addition to these
 articles, whatever all the above cities shall agree upon, after
 consulting together, shall be binding.

Although the treaty and alliances
 were thus concluded, still the treaty between the Lacedaemonians and
 Athenians was not renounced by either party.

Meanwhile Corinth ,
 although the ally of the Argives, did not accede to the new treaty,
 any more than she had done to the alliance, defensive and offensive,
 formed before this between the Eleans, Argives, and Mantineans, when
 she declared herself content with the first alliance, which was
 defensive only, and which bound them to help each other, but not to
 join in attacking any.

The Corinthians thus stood aloof from their allies, and again turned
 their thoughts towards Lacedaemon .

At the Olympic games which were held
 this summer, and in which the Arcadian Androsthenes was victor the
 first time in the wrestling and boxing, the Lacedaemonians were
 excluded from the temple by the Eleans, and thus prevented from
 sacrificing or contending, for having refused to pay the fine
 specified in the Olympic law imposed upon them by the Eleans, who
 alleged that they had attacked Fort Phyrcus, and sent heavy infantry
 of theirs into Lepreum during the Olympic truce. 
 The amount of the fine was two thousand minae, two for each
 heavy-armed soldier, as the law prescribes.

The Lacedaemonians sent envoys, and pleaded that the imposition was
 unjust; saying that the truce had not yet been proclaimed at
 Lacedaemon when the
 heavy infantry were sent off.

But the Eleans affirmed that the armistice with them had already
 begun (they proclaim it first among themselves), and that the
 aggression of the Lacedaemonians had taken them by surprise while
 they were living quietly as in time of peace, and not expecting
 anything.

Upon this the Lacedaemonians submitted, that if the Eleans really
 believed that they had committed an aggression, it was useless after
 that to proclaim the truce at Lacedaemon ; but they had proclaimed it
 notwithstanding, as believing nothing of the kind, and from that
 moment the Lacedaemonians had made no attack upon their country.

Nevertheless the Eleans adhered to what they had said, that nothing
 would persuade them that an aggression had not been committed; if,
 however, the Lacedaemonians would restore Lepreum, they would give
 up their own share of the money and pay that of the god for them.

As this proposal was not accepted,
 the Eleans tried a second. 
 Instead of restoring Lepreum, if this was objected to, the
 Lacedaemonians should ascend the altar of the Olympian Zeus, as they
 were so anxious to have access to the temple, and swear before the
 Hellenes that they would surely pay the fine at a later day.

This being also refused, the Lacedaemonians were excluded from the
 temple, the sacrifice, and the games, and sacrificed at home; the
 Lepreans being the only other Hellenes who did not attend.

Still the Eleans were afraid of the Lacedaemonians sacrificing by
 force, and kept guard with a heavy-armed company of their young men;
 being also joined by a thousand Argives, the same number of
 Mantineans, and by some Athenian cavalry who stayed at Harpina
 during the feast.

Great fears were felt in the assembly of the Lacedaemonians coming in
 arms, especially after Lichas, son of Arcesilaus, a Lacedaemonian,
 had been scourged on the course by the umpires; because, upon his
 horses being the winners, and the Boeotian people being proclaimed
 the victor on account of his having no right to enter, he came
 forward on the course and crowned the charioteer, in order to show
 that the chariot was his. 
 After this incident all were more afraid than ever, and firmly looked
 for a disturbance: the Lacedaemonians, however, kept quiet, and let
 the feast pass by, as we have seen.

After the Olympic games, the Argives and the allies repaired to
 Corinth to invite
 her to come over to them. 
 There they found some Lacedaemonian envoys; and a long discussion
 ensued, which after all ended in nothing, as an earthquake occurred,
 and they dispersed to their different homes.

Summer was now over. 
 The winter following a battle took place between the Heracleots in
 Trachinia and the Aenianians, Dolopians, Malians, and certain of the
 Thessalians,

all tribes bordering on and hostile to the town, which directly
 menaced their country. 
 Accordingly, after having opposed and harassed it from its very
 foundation by every means in their power, they now in this battle
 defeated the Heracleots, Xenares, son of Cnidis, their Lacedaemonian
 commander, being among the slain. 
 Thus the winter ended and the twelfth year of this war ended also.

After the battle Heraclea 
 was so terribly reduced that in the first days of the summer
 following the Boeotians occupied the place and sent away the
 Lacedaemonian Agesippidas for misgovernment, fearing that the town
 might be taken by the Athenians while the Lacedaemonians were
 distracted with the affairs of Peloponnese . 
 The Lacedaemonians, nevertheless, were offended with them for what
 they had done.

The same summer Alcibiades, son of
 Clinias, now one of the generals at Athens , in concert with the Argives and the allies,
 went into Peloponnese with
 a few Athenian heavy infantry and archers, and some of the allies in
 those parts whom he took up as he passed, and with this army marched
 here and there through Peloponnese , and settled various matters connected
 with the alliance, and among other things induced the Patrians to
 carry their walls down to the sea, intending himself also to build a
 fort near the Achaean Rhium. 
 However, the Corinthians and Sicyonians, and all others who would
 have suffered by its being built, came up and hindered him.

The same summer war broke out between
 the Epidaurians and Argives. 
 The pretext was that the Epidaurians did not send an offering for
 their pasture-land to Apollo Pythaeus, as they were bound to do, the
 Argives having the chief management of the temple; but, apart from
 this pretext, Alcibiades and the Argives were determined, if
 possible, to gain possession of Epidaurus , and thus to insure the neutrality of
 Corinth and give
 the Athenians a shorter passage for their reinforcement from
 Aegina than if
 they had to sail round Scyllaeum. 
 The Argives accordingly prepared to invade Epidaurus by themselves, to
 exact the offering.

About the same time the
 Lacedaemonians marched out with all their people to Leuctra upon
 their frontier, opposite to Mount Lycaeum, under the command of
 Agis, son of Archidamus, without any one knowing their destination,
 not even the cities that sent the contingents.

The sacrifices, however, for crossing the frontier not proving
 propitious, the Lacedaemonians returned home themselves, and sent
 word to the allies to be ready to march after the month ensuing,
 which happened to be the month of Carneus, a holy time for the
 Dorians.

Upon the retreat of the Lacedaemonians the Argives marched out on the
 last day but three of the month before Carneus, and keeping this as
 the day during the whole time that they were out, invaded and
 plundered Epidaurus .

The Epidaurians summoned their allies to their aid, some of whom
 pleaded the month as an excuse; others came as far as the frontier
 of Epidaurus and
 there remained inactive.

While the Argives were in Epidaurus embassies from the
 cities assembled at Mantinea , upon the invitation of the Athenians. 
 The conference having begun, the Corinthian Euphamidas said that
 their actions did not agree with their words; while they were
 sitting deliberating about peace, the Epidaurians and their allies
 and the Argives were arrayed against each other in arms; deputies
 from each party should first go and separate the armies, and then
 the talk about peace might be resumed.

In compliance with this suggestion they went and brought back the
 Argives from Epidaurus , and afterwards reassembled, but without
 succeeding any better in coming to a conclusion; and the Argives a
 second time invaded Epidaurus and plundered the country.

The Lacedaemonians also marched out to Caryae; but the frontier
 sacrifices again proving unfavorable, they went back again,

and the Argives, after ravaging about a third of the Epidaurian
 territory, returned home. 
 Meanwhile a thousand Athenian heavy infantry had come to their aid
 under the command of Alcibiades, but finding that the Lacedaemonian
 expedition was at an end, and that they were no longer wanted, went
 back again. So passed the summer.

The next winter the Lacedaemonians managed to elude the vigilance of
 the Athenians, and sent in a garrison of three hundred men to
 Epidaurus , under
 the command of Agesippidas.

Upon this the Argives went to the Athenians and complained of their
 having allowed an enemy to pass by sea, in spite of the clause in
 the treaty by which the allies were not to allow an enemy to pass
 through their country. 
 Unless, therefore, they now put the Messenians and Helots in
 Pylos to annoy the
 Lacedaemonians, they, the Argives, should consider that faith had
 not been kept with them.

The Athenians were persuaded by Alcibiades to inscribe at the bottom
 of the Laconian pillar that the Lacedaemonians had not kept their
 oaths, and to convey the Helots at Cranii to Pylos to plunder the country;
 but for the rest they remained quiet as before.

During this winter hostilities went on between the Argives and
 Epidaurians, without any pitched battle taking place, but only
 forays and ambuscades, in which the losses were small and fell now
 on one side and now on the other.

At the close of the winter, towards the beginning of spring, the
 Argives went with scaling-ladders to Epidaurus , expecting to find
 it left unguarded on account of the war and to be able to take it by
 assault, but returned unsuccessful. 
 And the winter ended, and with it the thirteenth year of the war
 ended also.

In the middle of the next summer the
 Lacedaemonians, seeing the Epidaurians, their allies, in distress,
 and the rest of Peloponnese 
 either in revolt or disaffected, concluded that it was high time for
 them to interfere if they wished to stop the progress of the evil,
 and accordingly with their full force, the Helots included, took the
 field against Argos ,
 under the command of Agis, son of Archidamus, king of the
 Lacedaemonians.

The Tegeans and the other Arcadian allies of Lacedaemon joined in the
 expedition. 
 The allies from the rest of Peloponnese and from outside mustered at Phlius;
 the Boeotians with five thousand heavy infantry and as many light
 troops, and five hundred horse and the same number of dismounted
 troopers; the Corinthians with two thousand heavy infantry; the rest
 more or less as might happen; and the Phliasians with all their
 forces, the army being in their country.

The preparations of the
 Lacedaemonians from the first had been known to the Argives, who did
 not, however, take the field until the enemy was on his road to join
 the rest at Phlius. 
 Reinforced by the Mantineans with their allies, and by three thousand
 Elean heavy infantry,

they advanced and fell in with the Lacedaemonians at Methydrium in Arcadia . 
 Each party took up its position upon a hill, and the Argives prepared
 to engage the Lacedaemonians while they were alone; but Agis eluded
 them by breaking up his camp in the night, and proceeded to join the
 rest of the allies at Phlius.

The Argives discovering this at daybreak, marched first to Argos and then to the Nemean
 road, by which they expected the Lacedaemonians and their allies
 would come down.

However, Agis, instead of taking this road as they expected, gave the
 Lacedaemonians, Arcadians, and Epidaurians their orders, and went
 along another difficult road, and descended into the plain of
 Argos . 
 The Corinthians, Pellenians, and Phliasians marched by another steep
 road; while the Boeotians, Megarians, and Sicyonians had
 instructions to come down by the Nemean road where the Argives were
 posted, in order that if the enemy advanced into the plain against
 the troops of Agis, they might fall upon his rear with their
 cavalry.

These dispositions concluded, Agis invaded the plain and began to
 ravage Saminthus and other places.

Discovering this, the Argives came up
 from Nemea , day having
 now dawned. 
 On their way they fell in with the troops of the Phliasians and
 Corinthians, and killed a few of the Phliasians, and had perhaps a
 few more of their own men killed by the Corinthians.

Meanwhile the Boeotians, Megarians, and Sicyonians, advancing upon
 Nemea according to
 their instructions, found the Argives no longer there, as they had
 gone down on seeing their property ravaged, and were now forming for
 battle, the Lacedaemonians imitating their example.

The Argives were now completely surrounded; from the plain the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies shut them off from their city; above
 them were the Corinthians, Phliasians, and Pellenians; and on the
 side of Nemea the
 Boeotians, Sicyonians, and Megarians. 
 Meanwhile their army was without cavalry, the Athenians alone among
 the allies not having yet arrived.

Now the bulk of the Argives and their allies did not see the danger
 of their position, but thought that they could not have a fairer
 field, having intercepted the Lacedaemonians in their own country
 and close to the city.

Two men, however, in the Argive army, Thrasylus, one of the five generals,
 and Alciphron, the Lacedaemonian Proxenus, just as the armies were
 upon the point of engaging, went and held a parley with Agis and
 urged him not to bring on a battle, as the Argives were ready to
 refer to fair and equal arbitration whatever complaints the
 Lacedaemonians might have against them, and to make a treaty and
 live in peace in future.

The Argives who made these statements
 did so upon their own authority, not by order of the people, and
 Agis on his accepted their proposals, and without himself either
 consulting the majority, simply communicated the matter to a single
 individual, one of the high officers accompanying the expedition,
 and granted the Argives a truce for four months, in which to fulfil
 their promises; after which he immediately led off the army without
 giving any explanation to any of the other allies.

The Lacedaemonians and allies followed their general out of respect
 for the law, but amongst themselves loudly blamed Agis for going
 away from so fair a field (the enemy being hemmed in on every side
 by infantry and cavalry) without having done anything worthy of
 their strength.

Indeed this was by far the finest Hellenic army ever yet brought
 together; and it should have been seen while it was still united at
 Nemea , with the
 Lacedaemonians in full force, the Arcadians, Boeotians, Corinthians,
 Sicyonians, Pellenians, Phliasians and Megarians, and all these the
 flower of their respective populations, thinking themselves a match
 not merely for the Argive 
 confederacy, but for another such added to it.

The army thus retired blaming Agis, and returned every man to his
 home.

The Argives however blamed still more loudly the persons who had
 concluded the truce without consulting the people, themselves
 thinking that they had let escape with the Lacedaemonians an
 opportunity such as they should never see again; as the struggle
 would have been under the walls of their city, and by the side of
 many and brave allies.

On their return accordingly they began to stone Thrasylus in the bed
 of the Charadrus, where they try all military causes before entering
 the city. 
 Thrasylus fled to the altar, and so saved his life; his property
 however they confiscated.

After this arrived a thousand
 Athenian heavy infantry and three hundred horse, under the command
 of Laches and Nicostratus; whom the Argives, being nevertheless loth
 to break the truce with the Lacedaemonians, begged to depart, and
 refused to bring before the people, to whom they had a communication
 to make, until compelled to do so by the entreaties of the
 Mantineans and Eleans, who were still at Argos .

The Athenians, by the mouth of Alcibiades their ambassador there
 present, told the Argives and the allies that they had no right to
 make a truce at all without the consent of their
 fellow-confederates, and now that the Athenians had arrived so
 opportunely the war ought to be resumed.

These arguments proving successful with the allies, they immediately
 marched upon Orchomenos , all except the Argives, who, although
 they had consented like the rest, stayed behind at first, but
 eventually joined the others.

They now all sat down and besieged Orchomenos , and made
 assaults upon it; one of their reasons for desiring to gain this
 place being that hostages from Arcadia had been lodged there by the
 Lacedaemonians.

The Orchomenians, alarmed at the weakness of their wall and the
 numbers of the enemy, and at the risk they ran of perishing before
 relief arrived, capitulated upon condition of joining the league, of
 giving hostages of their own to the Mantineans, and giving up those
 lodged with them by the Lacedaemonians.

Orchomenos thus
 secured, the allies now consulted as to which of the remaining
 places they should attack next. 
 The Eleans were urgent for Lepreum; the Mantineans for Tegea ; and the Argives and
 Athenians giving their support to the Mantineans,

the Eleans went home in a rage at their not having voted for Lepreum;
 while the rest of the allies made ready at Mantinea for going against
 Tegea , which a party
 inside had arranged to put into their hands.

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians, upon
 their return from Argos 
 after concluding the four months' truce, vehemently blamed Agis for
 not having subdued Argos ,
 after an opportunity such as they thought they had never had before;
 for it was no easy matter to bring so many and so good allies
 together.

But when the news arrived of the capture of Orchomenos , they became
 more angry than ever, and, departing from all precedent, in the heat
 of the moment had almost decided to raze his house, and to fine him
 ten thousand drachmae.

Agis however entreated them to do none of these things, promising to
 atone for his fault by good service in the field, failing which they
 might then do to him whatever they pleased;

and they accordingly abstained from razing his house or fining him as
 they had threatened to do, and now made a law, hitherto unknown at
 Lacedaemon , attaching
 to him ten Spartans as counsellors, without whose consent he should
 have no power to lead an army out of the city.

At this juncture arrived word from
 their friends in Tegea 
 that unless they speedily appeared, Tegea would go over from them to the Argives and
 their allies, if it had not gone over already.

Upon this news a force marched out from Lacedaemon , of the Spartans and Helots and all
 their people, and that instantly and upon a scale never before
 witnessed.

Advancing to Orestheum in Maenalia, they directed the Arcadians in
 their league to follow close after them to Tegea , and going on themselves
 as far as Orestheum, from thence sent back the sixth part of the
 Spartans, consisting of the oldest and youngest men, to guard their
 homes, and with the rest of their army arrived at Tegea ; where their Arcadian
 allies soon after joined them.

Meanwhile they sent to Corinth , to the Boeotians, the Phocians, and
 Locrians, with orders to come up as quickly as possible to
 Mantinea . 
 These had but short notice; and it was not easy except all together,
 and after waiting for each other, to pass through the enemy's
 country, which lay right across and blocked up the line of
 communication. 
 Nevertheless they made what haste they could.

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonians with the Arcadian allies that had joined
 them, entered the territory of Mantinea , and encamping near the temple of Heracles
 began to plunder the country.

Here they were seen by the Argives
 and their allies, who immediately took up a strong and difficult
 position, and formed in order of battle.

The Lacedaemonians at once advanced against them, and came on within
 a stone's throw or javelin's cast, when one of the older men, seeing
 the enemy's position to be a strong one, hallooed to Agis that he
 was minded to cure one evil with another; meaning that he wished to
 make amends for his retreat, which had been so much blamed, from
 Argos , by his present
 untimely precipitation.

Meanwhile Agis, whether in consequence of this halloo or of some
 sudden new idea of his own, quickly led back his army without
 engaging,

and entering the Tegean territory, began to turn off into that of
 Mantinea the water
 about which the Mantineans and Tegeans are always fighting, on
 account of the extensive damage it does to whichever of the two
 countries if falls into.

His object in this was to make the Argives and their allies come down
 from the hill, to resist the diversion of the water, as they would
 be sure to do when they knew of it, and thus to fight the battle in
 the plain. 
 He accordingly stayed that day where he was, engaged in turning off
 the water. 
 The Argives and their allies were at first amazed at the sudden
 retreat of the enemy after advancing so near, and did not know what
 to make of it; but when he had gone away and disappeared, without
 their having stirred to pursue him, they began anew to find fault
 with their generals, who had not only let the Lacedaemonians get off
 before, when they were so happily intercepted before Argos , but who now again allowed
 them to run away, without any one pursuing them, and to escape at
 their leisure while the Argive army was leisurely betrayed.

The generals, half-stunned for the moment, afterwards led them down
 from the hill, and went forward and encamped in the plain, with the
 intention of attacking the enemy.

The next day the Argives and their
 allies formed in the order in which they meant to fight, if they
 chanced to encounter the enemy; and the Lacedaemonians returning
 from the water to their old encampment by the temple of Heracles,
 suddenly saw their adversaries close in front of them, all in
 complete order, and advanced from the hill.

A shock like that of the present moment the Lacedaemonians do not
 ever remember to have experienced: there was scant time for
 preparation, as they instantly and hastily fell into their ranks,
 Agis, their king, directing everything, agreeably to the law.

For when a king is in the field all commands proceed from him: he
 gives the word to the Polemarchs; they to the Lochages; these to the
 Pentecostyes; these again to the Enomotarchs, and these last to the
 Enomoties.

In short all orders required pass in the same way and quickly reach
 the troops; as almost the whole Lacedaemonian army, save for a small
 part, consists of officers under officers, and the care of what is
 to be done falls upon many.

In this battle the left wing was
 composed of the Sciritae, who in a Lacedaemonian army have always
 that post to themselves alone; next to these were the soldiers of
 Brasidas from Thrace , and
 the Neodamodes with them; then came the Lacedaemonians themselves,
 company after company, with the Arcadians of Heraea at their side. 
 After these were the Maenalians, and on the right wing the Tegeans
 with a few of the Lacedaemonians at the extremity; their cavalry
 being posted upon the two wings.

Such was the Lacedaemonian formation. 
 That of their opponents was as follows:—On the right were the
 Mantineans, the action taking place in their country: next to them
 the allies from Arcadia ;
 after whom came the thousand picked men of the Argives, to whom the
 state had given a long course of military training at the public
 expense; next to them the rest of the Argives, and after them their
 allies, the Cleonaeans and Orneans, and lastly the Athenians on the
 extreme left, and their own cavalry with them.

Such were the order and the forces of
 the two combatants. 
 The Lacedaemonian army looked the largest;

though as to putting down the numbers of either host, or of the
 contingents composing it, I could not do so with any accuracy. 
 Owing to the secrecy of their government the number of the
 Lacedaemonians was not known, and men are so apt to brag about the
 forces of their country that the estimate of their opponents was not
 trusted. 
 The following calculation, however, makes it possible to estimate the
 numbers of the Lacedaemonians present upon this occasion.

There were seven companies in the field without counting the
 Sciritae, who numbered six hundred men: in each company there were
 four Pentecostyes, and in the Pentecosty four Enomoties. 
 The first rank of the Enomoty was composed of four soldiers: as to
 the depth, although they had not been all drawn up alike, but as
 each captain chose, they were generally ranged eight deep; the first
 rank along the whole line, exclusive of the Sciritae, consisted of
 four hundred and forty-eight men.

The armies being now on the eve of
 engaging, each contingent received some words of encouragement from
 its own commander. 
 The Mantineans were reminded that they were going to fight for their
 country and to avoid returning to the experience of servitude after
 having tasted that of empire; the Argives, that they would contend
 for their ancient supremacy, to regain their once equal share of
 Peloponnese of which
 they had been so long deprived, and to punish an enemy and a
 neighbor for a thousand wrongs; the Athenians, of the glory of
 gaining the honors of the day with so many and brave allies in arms,
 and that a victory over the Lacedaemonians in Peloponnese would cement and
 extend their empire, and would besides preserve Attica from all invasions in
 future.

These were the incitements addressed to the Argives and their
 allies. 
 The Lacedaemonians meanwhile, man to man, and with their war-songs in
 the ranks, exhorted each brave comrade to remember what he had
 learnt before; well aware that the long training of action was of
 more saving virtue than any brief verbal exhortation, though never
 so well delivered.

After this they joined battle, the
 Argives and their allies advancing with haste and fury, the
 Lacedaemonians slowly and to the music of many flute-players—a
 standing institution in their army, that has nothing to do with
 religion, but is meant to make them advance evenly, stepping in
 time, without breaking their order, as large armies are apt to do in
 the moment of engaging.

Just before the battle joined, King
 Agis resolved upon the following manoeuvre. 
 All armies are alike in this: on going into action they get forced
 out rather on their right wing, and one and the other overlap with
 this their adversary's left; because fear makes each man do his best
 to shelter his unarmed side with the shield of the man next him on
 the right, thinking that the closer the shields are locked together
 the better will he be protected. 
 The man primarily responsible for this is the first upon the right
 wing, who is always striving to withdraw from the enemy his unarmed
 side; and the same apprehension makes the rest follow him.

On the present occasion the Mantineans reached with their wing far
 beyond the Sciritae, and the Lacedaemonians and Tegeans still
 farther beyond the Athenians, as their army was the largest.

Agis afraid of his left being surrounded, and thinking that the
 Mantineans outflanked it too far, ordered the Sciritae and
 Brasideans to move out from their place in the ranks and make the
 line even with the Mantineans, and told the Polemarchs Hipponoidas
 and Aristocles to fill up the gap thus formed, by throwing
 themselves into it with two companies taken from the right wing;
 thinking that his right would still be strong enough and to spare,
 and that the line fronting the Mantineans would gain in solidity.

However, as he gave these orders in
 the moment of the onset, and at short notice, it so happened that
 Aristocles and Hipponoidas would not move over, for which offence
 they were afterwards banished from Sparta , as having been guilty of cowardice; and the
 enemy meanwhile closed before the Sciritae (whom Agis on seeing that
 the two companies did not move over ordered to return to their
 place) had time to fill up the breach in question.

Now it was, however, that the Lacedaemonians, utterly worsted in
 respect of skill, showed themselves as superior in point of
 courage.

As soon as they came to close quarters with the enemy, the Mantinean
 right broke their Sciritae and Brasideans, and bursting in with
 their allies and the thousand picked Argives into the unclosed
 breach in their line cut up and surrounded the Lacedaemonians, and
 drove them in full rout to the wagons, slaying some of the older men
 on guard there.

But the Lacedaemonians, worsted in this part of the field, with the
 rest of their army, and especially the center, where the three
 hundred knights, as they are called, fought round King Agis, fell on
 the older men of the Argives and the five companies so named, and on
 the Cleonaeans, the Orneans, and the Athenians next them, and
 instantly routed them; the greater number not even waiting to strike
 a blow, but giving way the moment that they came on, some even being
 trodden under foot, in their fear of being overtaken by their
 assailants.

The army of the Argives and their
 allies having given way in this quarter was now completely cut in
 two, and the Lacedaemonian and Tegean right simultaneously closing
 round the Athenians with the troops that outflanked them, these last
 found themselves placed between two fires, being surrounded on one
 side and already defeated on the other. 
 Indeed they would have suffered more severely than any other part of
 the army, but for the services of the cavalry which they had with
 them.

Agis also on perceiving the distress of his left opposed to the
 Mantineans and the thousand Argives, ordered all the army to advance
 to the support of the defeated wing;

and while this took place, as the enemy moved past and slanted away
 from them, the Athenians escaped at their leisure, and with them the
 beaten Argive division. 
 Meanwhile the Mantineans and their allies and the picked body of the
 Argives ceased to press the enemy, and seeing their friends defeated
 and the Lacedaemonians in full advance upon them, took to
 flight.

Many of the Mantineans perished; but the bulk of the picked body of
 the Argives made good their escape. 
 The flight and retreat, however, were neither hurried nor long; the
 Lacedaemonians fighting long and stubbornly until the rout of their
 enemy, but that once effected, pursuing for a short time and not
 far.

Such was the battle, as nearly as
 possible as I have described it; the greatest that had occurred for
 a very long while among the Hellenes, and joined by the most
 considerable states.

The Lacedaemonians took up a position in front of the enemy's dead,
 and immediately set up a trophy and stripped the slain; they took up
 their own dead and carried them back to Tegea , where they buried them,
 and restored those of the enemy under truce.

The Argives, Orneans, and Cleonaeans had seven hundred killed; the
 Mantineans two hundred, and the Athenians and Aeginetans also two
 hundred, with both their generals. 
 On the side of the Lacedaemonians, the allies did not suffer any loss
 worth speaking of: as to the Lacedaemonians themselves it was
 difficult to learn the truth; it is said, however, that there were
 slain about three hundred of them.

While the battle was impending,
 Pleistoanax, the other king, set out with a reinforcement composed
 of the oldest and youngest men, and got as far as Tegea , where he heard of the
 victory and went back again.

The Lacedaemonians also sent and turned back the allies from
 Corinth and from
 beyond the Isthmus, and returning themselves dismissed their allies,
 and kept the Carnean holidays, which happened to be at that
 time.

The imputations cast upon them by the Hellenes at the time, whether
 of cowardice on account of the disaster in the island, or of
 mismanagement and slowness generally, were all wiped out by this
 single action: fortune, it was thought, might have humbled them, but
 the men themselves were the same as ever.

The day before this battle, the
 Epidaurians with all their forces invaded the deserted Argive territory, and cut off many
 of the guards left there in the absence of the Argive army.

After the battle three thousand Elean heavy infantry arriving to aid
 the Mantineans, and a reinforcement of one thousand Athenians, all
 these allies marched at once against Epidaurus while the
 Lacedaemonians were keeping the Carnea, and dividing the work among
 them began to build a wall round the city.

The rest left off; but the Athenians finished at once the part
 assigned to them round Cape Heraeum; and having all joined in
 leaving a garrison in the fortification in question, they returned
 to their respective cities.

Summer now came to an end. 
 In the first days of the next winter, when the Carnean holidays were
 over, the Lacedaemonians took the field, and arriving at Tegea sent on to Argos proposals of
 accommodation.

They had before had a party in the town desirous of overthrowing the
 democracy; and after the battle that had been fought, these were now
 far more in a position to persuade the people to listen to
 terms. 
 Their plan was first to make a treaty with the Lacedaemonians, to be
 followed by an alliance, and after this to fall upon the
 commons.

Lichas, son of Arcesilaus, the Argive Proxenus, accordingly arrived
 at Argos with two
 proposals from Lacedaemon ,
 to regulate the conditions of war or peace, according as they
 preferred the one or the other. 
 After much discussion, Alcibiades happening to be in the town, the
 Lacedaemonian party who now ventured to act openly, persuaded the
 Argives to accept the proposal for an accommodation; which ran as
 follows:—

The assembly of the Lacedaemonians
 agrees to treat with the Argives upon the terms following— 1. 
 The Argives shall restore to the Orchomenians their children, and to
 the Moenalians their men, and shall restore the men they have in
 Mantinea to the
 Lacedaemonians.

2. 
 They shall evacuate Epidaurus , and raze the fortification there. 
 If the Athenians refuse to withdraw from Epidaurus , they shall be
 declared enemies of the Argives and of the Lacedaemonians, and of
 the allies of the Lacedaemonians and the allies of the Argives.

3. 
 If the Lacedaemonians have any children in their custody, they shall
 restore them every one to his city.

4. 
 As to the offering to the god, the Argives, if they wish, shall
 impose an oath upon the Epidaurians, but, if not, they shall swear
 it themselves.

5. 
 All the cities in Peloponnese , both small and great, shall be
 independent according to the customs of their country.

6. 
 If any of the powers outside Peloponnese invade Peloponnesian territory, the
 parties contracting shall unite to repel them, on such terms as they
 may agree upon, as being most fair for the Peloponnesians.

7. 
 All allies of the Lacedaemonians outside Peloponnese shall be on the same footing as the
 Lacedaemonians, and the allies of the Argives shall be on the same
 footing as the Argives, being left in enjoyment of their own
 possessions.

8. 
 This treaty shall be shown to the allies, and shall be concluded, if
 they approve: if the allies think fit, they may send the treaty to
 be considered at home.

The Argives began by accepting this
 proposal, and the Lacedaemonian army returned home from Tegea . 
 After this intercourse was renewed between them, and not long
 afterwards the same party contrived that the Argives should give up
 the league with the Mantineans, Eleans, and Athenians, and should
 make a treaty and alliance with the Lacedaemonians; which was
 consequently done upon the terms following:—

The Lacedaemonians and Argives agree
 to a treaty and alliance for fifty years upon the terms
 following:— 1. 
 All disputes shall be decided by fair and impartial arbitration,
 agreeably to the customs of the two countries. 2. 
 The rest of the cities in Peloponnese may be included in this treaty and
 alliance, as independent and sovereign, in full enjoyment of what
 they possess; all disputes being decided by fair and impartial
 arbitration, agreeably to the customs of the said cities.

3. 
 All allies of the Lacedaemonians outside Peloponnese shall be upon the same footing as the
 Lacedaemonians themselves, and the allies of the Argives shall be
 upon the same footing as the Argives themselves, continuing to enjoy
 what they possess.

4. 
 If it shall be anywhere necessary to make an expedition in common,
 the Lacedaemonians and Argives shall consult upon it and decide, as
 may be most fair for the allies.

5. 
 If any of the cities, whether inside or outside Peloponnese , have a question
 whether of frontiers or otherwise, it must be settled; but if one
 allied city should have a quarrel with another allied city, it must
 be referred to some third city thought impartial by both
 parties. 
 Private citizens shall have their disputes decided according to the
 laws of their several countries.

The treaty and above alliance
 concluded, each party at once released everything whether acquired
 by war or otherwise, and thenceforth acting in common voted to
 receive neither herald nor embassy from the Athenians unless they
 evacuated their forts and withdrew from Peloponnese , and also to make neither peace nor war
 with any, except jointly.

Zeal was not wanting: both parties sent envoys to the Thracian places
 and to Perdiccas, and persuaded the latter to join their league. 
 Still he did not at once break off from Athens , although minded to do
 so upon seeing the way shown him by Argos , the original home of his family. 
 They also renewed their old oaths with the Chalcidians and took new
 ones:

the Argives, besides, sent ambassadors to the Athenians, bidding them
 evacuate the fort at Epidaurus . 
 The Athenians, seeing their own men outnumbered by the rest of the
 garrison, sent Demosthenes to bring them out. 
 This general, under color of a gymnastic contest which he arranged on
 his arrival, got the rest of the garrison out of the place, and shut
 the gates behind them. 
 Afterwards the Athenians renewed their treaty with the Epidaurians,
 and by themselves gave up the fortress.

After the defection of Argos from the league, the
 Mantineans, though they held out at first, in the end finding
 themselves powerless without the Argives, themselves too came to
 terms with Lacedaemon , and
 gave up their sovereignty over the towns.

The Lacedaemonians and Argives, each a thousand strong, now took the
 field together, and the former first went by themselves to
 Sicyon and made the
 government there more oligarchical than before, and then both,
 uniting, put down the democracy at Argos and set up an oligarchy favorable to
 Lacedaemon . 
 These events occurred at the close of the winter, just before spring;
 and the fourteenth year of the war ended.

The next summer the people of Dium, in Athos , revolted from the Athenians to the
 Chalcidians, and the Lacedaemonians settled affairs in Achaea in a way more agreeable to
 the interests of their country.

Meanwhile the popular party at Argos little by little gathered new consistency and
 courage, and waited for the moment of the Gymnopaedic festival at
 Lacedaemon , and then
 fell upon the oligarchs. 
 After a fight in the city victory declared for the commons, who slew
 some of their opponents and banished others.

The Lacedaemonians for a long while let the messages of their friends
 at Argos remain without
 effect. 
 At last they put off the Gymnopaediae and marched to their succor,
 but learning at Tegea the
 defeat of the oligarchs, refused to go any further in spite of the
 entreaties of those who had escaped, and returned home and kept the
 festival.

Later on, envoys arrived with messages from the Argives in the town
 and from the exiles, when the allies were also at Sparta ; and after much had been
 said on both sides, the Lacedaemonians decided that the party in the
 town had done wrong, and resolved to march against Argos , but kept delaying and
 putting off the matter.

Meanwhile the commons at Argos , in fear of the Lacedaemonians, began again
 to court the Athenian alliance, which they were convinced would be
 of the greatest service to them; and accordingly proceeded to build
 long walls to the sea, in order that in case of a blockade by land,
 with the help of the Athenians they might have the advantage of
 importing what they wanted by sea.

Some of the cities in Peloponnese were also privy to the building of
 these walls; and the Argives with all their people, women and slaves
 not excepted, addressed themselves to the work, while carpenters and
 masons came to them from Athens . Summer was
 now over.

The winter following the Lacedaemonians, hearing of the walls that
 were building, marched against Argos with their allies, the Corinthians excepted,
 being also not without intelligence in the city itself; Agis, son of
 Archidamus, their king, was in command.

The intelligence which they counted upon within the town came to
 nothing; they however took and razed the walls which were being
 built, and after capturing the Argive town Hysiae and killing all the freemen that
 fell into their hands, went back and dispersed every man to his
 city.

After this the Argives marched into Phlius and plundered it for
 harboring their exiles, most of whom had settled there, and so
 returned home.

The same winter the Athenians blockaded Macedonia , on the score of the league entered into
 by Perdiccas with the Argives and Lacedaemonians, and also of his
 breach of his engagements on the occasion of the expedition prepared
 by Athens against the
 Chalcidians in the direction of Thrace and against Amphipolis , under the
 command of Nicias, son of Niceratus which had to be broken up mainly
 because of his desertion. 
 He was therefore proclaimed an enemy. 
 And thus the winter ended, and the fifteenth year of the war ended
 with it.

The next summer Alcibiades sailed
 with twenty ships to Argos and seized the suspected persons still left
 of the Lacedaemonian faction to the number of three hundred, whom
 the Athenians forthwith lodged in the neighboring islands of their
 empire. 
 The Athenians also made an expedition against the isle of Melos with thirty ships of
 their own, six Chian, and two Lesbian vessels, sixteen hundred heavy
 infantry, three hundred archers, and twenty mounted archers from
 Athens , and about
 fifteen hundred heavy infantry from the allies and the
 islanders.

The Melians are a colony of Lacedaemon that would not submit to the Athenians
 like the other islanders, and at first remained neutral and took no
 part in the struggle, but afterwards upon the Athenians using
 violence and plundering their territory, assumed an attitude of open
 hostility.

Cleomedes, son of Lycomedes, and Tisias, son of Tisimachus, the
 generals, encamping in their territory with the above armament,
 before doing any harm to their land, sent envoys to negotiate. 
 These the Melians did not bring before the people, but bade them
 state the object of their mission to the magistrates and the few;
 upon which the Athenian envoys spoke as follows:—

‘Since the negotiations are not to go on before the people, in
 order that we may not be able to speak straight on without
 interruption, and deceive the ears of the multitude by seductive
 arguments which would pass without refutation (for we know that
 this is the meaning of our being brought before the few), what
 if you who sit there were to pursue a method more cautious
 still! 
 Make no set speech yourselves, but take us up at whatever you do
 not like, and settle that before going any farther. 
 And first tell us if this proposition of ours suits you.’

The Melian commissioners
 answered:— 
 

 
 ‘To the fairness of quietly instructing each other as you propose
 there is nothing to object; but your military preparations are
 too far advanced to agree with what you say, as we see you are
 come to be judges in your own cause, and that all we can
 reasonably expect from this negotiation is war, if we prove to
 have right on our side and refuse to submit, and in the contrary
 case, slavery.’

‘If you have met to reason about presentiments of the future, or
 for anything else than to consult for the safety of your state
 upon the facts that you see before you, we will give over;
 otherwise we will go on.’

‘It is natural and excusable for men in our position to turn
 more ways than one both in thought and utterance. 
 However, the question in this conference is, as you say, the
 safety of our country; and the discussion, if you please, can
 proceed in the way which you propose.’

‘For ourselves, we shall not trouble you with specious
 pretences—either of how we have a right to our empire because we
 overthrew the Mede , or
 are now attacking you because of wrong that you have done us—and
 make a long speech which would not be believed; and in return we
 hope that you, instead of thinking to influence us by saying
 that you did not join the Lacedaemonians, although their
 colonists, or that you have done us no wrong, will aim at what
 is feasible, holding in view the real sentiments of us both;
 since you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes,
 is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do
 what they can and the weak suffer what they must.’

‘As we think, at any rate, it is expedient—we speak as we are
 obliged, since you enjoin us to let right alone and talk only of
 interest—that you should not destroy what is our common
 protection, the privilege of being allowed in danger to invoke
 what is fair and right, and even to profit by arguments not
 strictly valid if they can be got to pass current. 
 And you are as much interested in this as any, as your fall would
 be a signal for the heaviest vengeance and an example for the
 world to meditate upon.’

‘The end of our empire, if end it should, does not frighten us:
 a rival empire like Lacedaemon , even if Lacedaemon was our real
 antagonist, is not so terrible to the vanquished as subjects who
 by themselves attack and overpower their rulers.

This, however, is a risk that we are content to take. 
 We will now proceed to show you that we are come here in the
 interest of our empire, and that we shall say what we are now
 going to say, for the preservation of your country; as we would
 fain exercise that empire over you without trouble, and see you
 preserved for the good of us both.’

‘And how, pray, could it turn out as good for us to serve as for
 you to rule?’

‘Because you would have the advantage of submitting before
 suffering the worst, and we should gain by not destroying
 you.’

‘So that you would not consent to our being neutral, friends
 instead of enemies, but allies of neither side.’

‘No; for your hostility cannot so much hurt us as your
 friendship will be an argument to our subjects of our weakness,
 and your enmity of our power.’

‘Is that your subjects' idea of equity, to put those who have
 nothing to do with you in the same category with peoples that
 are most of them your own colonists, and some conquered
 rebels?’

‘As far as right goes they think one has as much of it as the
 other, and that if any maintain their independence it is because
 they are strong, and that if we do not molest them it is because
 we are afraid; so that besides extending our empire we should
 gain in security by your subjection; the fact that you are
 islanders and weaker than others rendering it all the more
 important that you should not succeed in baffling the masters of
 the sea.’

‘But do you consider that there is no security in the policy
 which we indicate? 
 For here again if you debar us from talking about justice and
 invite us to obey your interest, we also must explain ours, and
 try to persuade you, if the two happen to coincide. 
 How can you avoid making enemies of all existing neutrals who
 shall look at our case and conclude from it that one day or
 another you will attack them? 
 And what is this but to make greater the enemies that you have
 already, and to force others to become so who would otherwise
 have never thought of it?’

‘Why, the fact is that continentals generally give us but little
 alarm; the liberty which they enjoy will long prevent their
 taking precautions against us; it is rather islanders like
 yourselves, outside our empire, and subjects smarting under the
 yoke, who would be the most likely to take a rash step and lead
 themselves and us into obvious danger.’

‘Well then, if you risk so much to retain your empire, and your
 subjects to get rid of it, it were surely great baseness and
 cowardice in us who are still free not to try everything that
 can be tried, before submitting to your yoke.’

‘Not if you are well advised, the contest not being an equal
 one, with honor as the prize and shame as the penalty, but a
 question of self-preservation and of not resisting those who are
 far stronger than you are.’

‘But we know that the fortune of war is sometimes more impartial
 than the disproportion of numbers might lead one to suppose; to
 submit is to give ourselves over to despair, while action still
 preserves for us a hope that we may stand erect.’

‘Hope, danger's comforter, may be indulged in by those who have
 abundant resources, if not without loss at all events without
 ruin; but its nature is to be extravagant, and those who go so
 far as to put their all upon the venture see it in its true
 colors only when they are ruined; but so long as the discovery
 would enable them to guard against it, it is never found
 wanting.

Let not this be the case with you, who are weak and hang on a
 single turn of the scale; nor be like the vulgar, who,
 abandoning such security as human means may still afford, when
 visible hopes fail them in extremity, turn to invisible, to
 prophecies and oracles, and other such inventions that delude
 men with hopes to their destruction.’

‘You may be sure that we are as well aware as you of the
 difficulty of contending against your power and fortune, unless
 the terms be equal. 
 But we trust that the gods may grant us fortune as good as yours,
 since we are just men fighting against unjust, and that what we
 want in power will be made up by the alliance of the
 Lacedaemonians, who are bound, if only for very shame, to come
 to the aid of their kindred. 
 Our confidence, therefore, after all is not so utterly
 irrational.’

‘When you speak of the favour of the gods, we may as fairly hope
 for that as yourselves; neither our pretensions nor our conduct
 being in any way contrary to what men believe of the gods, or
 practise among themselves.

Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary
 law of their nature they rule wherever they can. 
 And it is not as if we were the first to make this law, or to act
 upon it when made: we found it existing before us, and shall
 leave it to exist for ever after us; all we do is to make use of
 it, knowing that you and everybody else, having the same power
 as we have, would do the same as we do.

Thus, as far as the gods are concerned, we have no fear and no
 reason to fear that we shall be at a disadvantage. 
 But when we come to your notion about the Lacedaemonians, which
 leads you to believe that shame will make them help you, here we
 bless your simplicity but do not envy your folly.

The Lacedaemonians, when their own interests or their country's
 laws are in question, are the worthiest men alive; of their
 conduct towards others much might be said, but no clearer idea
 of it could be given than by shortly saying that of all the men
 we know they are most conspicuous in considering what is
 agreeable honorable, and what is expedient just. 
 Such a way of thinking does not promise much for the safety which
 you now unreasonably count upon.’

‘But it is for this very reason that we now trust to their
 respect for expediency to prevent them from betraying the
 Melians, their colonists, and thereby losing the confidence of
 their friends in Hellas 
 and helping their enemies.’

‘Then you do not adopt the view that expediency goes with
 security, while justice and honor cannot be followed without
 danger; and danger the Lacedaemonians generally court as little
 as possible.’

‘But we believe that they would be more likely to face even
 danger for our sake, and with more confidence than for others,
 as our nearness to Peloponnese makes it easier for them to act;
 and our common blood insures our fidelity.’

‘Yes, but what an intending ally trusts to, is not the goodwill
 of those who ask his aid, but a decided superiority of power for
 action; and the Lacedaemonians look to this even more than
 others. 
 At least, such is their distrust of their home resources that it
 is only with numerous allies that they attack a neighbor; now is
 it likely that while we are masters of the sea they will cross
 over to an island?’

‘But they would have others to send. 
 The Cretan sea is a wide one, and it is more difficult for those
 who command it to intercept others, than for those who wish to
 elude them to do so safely.

And should the Lacedaemonians miscarry in this, they would fall
 upon your land, and upon those left of your allies whom Brasidas
 did not reach; and instead of places which are not yours, you
 will have to fight for your own country and your own
 confederacy.’

‘Some diversion of the kind you speak of you may one day
 experience, only to learn, as others have done, that the
 Athenians never once yet withdrew from a siege for fear of
 any.

But we are struck by the fact, that after saying you would
 consult for the safety of your country, in all this discussion
 you have mentioned nothing which men might trust in and think to
 be saved by. 
 Your strongest arguments depend upon hope and the future, and
 your actual resources are too scanty, as compared with those
 arrayed against you, for you to come out victorious. 
 You will therefore show great blindness of judgment, unless,
 after allowing us to retire, you can find some counsel more
 prudent than this.

You will surely not be caught by that idea of disgrace, which in
 dangers that are disgraceful, and at the same time too plain to
 be mistaken, proves so fatal to mankind; since in too many cases
 the very men that have their eyes perfectly open to what they
 are rushing into, let the thing called disgrace, by the mere
 influence of a seductive name, lead them on to a point at which
 they become so enslaved by the phrase as in fact to fall
 willfully into hopeless disaster, and incur disgrace more
 disgraceful as the companion of error, than when it comes as the
 result of misfortune.

This, if you are well advised, you will guard against; and you
 will not think it dishonorable to submit to the greatest city in
 Hellas , when it
 makes you the moderate offer of becoming its tributary ally,
 without ceasing to enjoy the country that belongs to you; nor
 when you have the choice given you between war and security,
 will you be so blinded as to choose the worse. 
 And it is certain that those who do not yield to their equals,
 who keep terms with their superiors, and are moderate towards
 their inferiors, on the whole succeed best.

Think over the matter, therefore, after our withdrawal, and
 reflect once and again that it is for your country that you are
 consulting, that you have not more than one, and that upon this
 one deliberation depends its prosperity or ruin.’

The Athenians now withdrew from
 the conference; and the Melians, left to themselves, came to a
 decision corresponding with what they had maintained in the
 discussion, and answered,

‘Our resolution, Athenians, is the same as it was at first. 
 We will not in a moment deprive of freedom a city that has been
 inhabited these seven hundred years; but we put our trust in the
 fortune by which the gods have preserved it until now, and in
 the help of men, that is, of the Lacedaemonians; and so we will
 try and save ourselves.

Meanwhile we invite you to allow us to be friends to you and foes
 to neither party, and to retire from our country after making
 such a treaty as shall seem fit to us both.’

Such was the answer of the
 Melians. 
 The Athenians now departing from the conference said, ‘Well, you
 alone, as it seems to us, judging from these resolutions, regard
 what is future as more certain than what is before your eyes,
 and what is out of sight, in your eagerness, as already coming
 to pass; and as you have staked most on, and trusted most in,
 the Lacedaemonians, your fortune, and your hopes, so will you be
 most completely deceived.’

The Athenian envoys now returned
 to the army; and the Melians showing no signs of yielding, the
 generals at once betook themselves to hostilities, and drew a
 line of circumvallation round the Melians, dividing the work
 among the different states.

Subsequently the Athenians returned with most of their army,
 leaving behind them a certain number of their own citizens and
 of the allies to keep guard by land and sea. 
 The force thus left stayed on and besieged the place.

About the same time the Argives
 invaded the territory of Phlius and lost eighty men cut off in
 an ambush by the Phliasians and Argive exiles.

Meanwhile the Athenians at Pylos took so much plunder from the
 Lacedaemonians that the latter, although they still refrained
 from breaking off the treaty and going to war with Athens , yet proclaimed that
 any of their people that chose might plunder the Athenians.

The Corinthians also commenced hostilities with the Athenians for
 private quarrels of their own; but the rest of the
 Peloponnesians stayed quiet.

Meanwhile the Melians attacked by night and took the part of the
 Athenian lines over against the market, and killed some of the
 men, and brought in corn and all else that they could find
 useful to them, and so returned and kept quiet, while the
 Athenians took measures to keep better guard in
 future. Summer was now over.

The next winter the Lacedaemonians intended to invade the
 Argive territory,
 but arriving at the frontier found the sacrifices for crossing
 unfavorable, and went back again. 
 This intention of theirs gave the Argives suspicions of certain
 of their fellow-citizens, some of whom they arrested; others,
 however, escaped them.

About the same time the Melians again took another part of the
 Athenian lines which were but feebly garrisoned.

Reinforcements afterwards arriving from Athens in consequence,
 under the command of Philocrates, son of Demeas, the siege was
 now pressed vigorously; and some treachery taking place inside,
 the Melians surrendered at discretion to the Athenians,

who put to death all the grown men whom they took, and sold the
 women and children for slaves, and subsequently sent out five
 hundred colonists and inhabited the place themselves.

The same winter the Athenians
 resolved to sail again to Sicily , with a greater armament than that under
 Laches and Eurymedon, and, if possible, to conquer the island; most
 of them being ignorant of its size and of the number of its
 inhabitants, Hellenic and barbarian, and of the fact that they were
 undertaking a war not much inferior to that against the
 Peloponnesians.

For the voyage round Sicily 
 in a merchantman is not far short of eight days; and yet, large as
 the island is, there are only two miles of sea to prevent its being
 mainland.

It was settled originally as follows,
 and the peoples that occupied it are these. 
 The earliest inhabitants spoken of in any part of the country are the
 Cyclopes and Laestrygones; but I cannot tell of what race they were,
 or whence they came or whither they went, and must leave my readers
 to what the poets have said of them and to what may be generally
 known concerning them.

The Sicanians appear to have been the next settlers, although they
 pretend to have been the first of all and aborigines; but the facts
 show that they were Iberians, driven by the Ligurians from the river
 Sicanus in Iberia . 
 It was from them that the island, before called Trinacaria, took its
 name of Sicania, and to the present day they inhabit the west of
 Sicily .

On the fall of Ilium , some
 of the Trojans escaped from the Achaeans, came in ships to
 Sicily , and settled
 next to the Sicanians under the general name of Elymi; their towns
 being called Eryx and
 Egesta . 
 With them settled some of the Phocians carried on their way from
 Troy by a storm, first
 to Libya , and afterwards
 from thence to Sicily .

The Sicels crossed over to Sicily from their first home Italy , flying from the Opicans, as
 tradition says and as seems not unlikely, upon rafts, having watched
 till the wind set down the strait to effect the passage; although
 perhaps they may have sailed over in some other way. 
 Even at the present day there are still Sicels in Italy ; and the country got its
 name of Italy from Italus,
 a king of the Sicels, so called.

These went with a great host to Sicily , defeated the Sicanians in battle and forced
 them to remove to the south and west of the island, which thus came
 to be called Sicily instead
 of Sicania, and after they crossed over continued to enjoy the
 richest parts of the country for near three hundred years before any
 Hellenes came to Sicily ;
 indeed they still hold the centre and north of the island.

There were also Phoenicians living all round Sicily, who had occupied
 promontories upon the sea coasts and the islets adjacent for the
 purpose of trading with the Sicels. 
 But when the Hellenes began to arrive in considerable numbers by sea,
 the Phoenicians abandoned most of their stations, and drawing
 together took up their abode in Motye, Soloeis , and Panormus , near the Elymi,
 partly because they confided in their alliance, and also because
 these are the nearest points, for the voyage between Carthage and Sicily .

These were the barbarians in
 Sicily , settled as I
 have said. 
 Of the Hellenes, the first to arrive were Chalcidians from Euboea with Thucles, their
 founder. 
 They founded Naxos 
 and built the altar to Apollo Archegetes, which now stands outside
 the town, and upon which the deputies for the games sacrifice before
 sailing from Sicily .

Syracuse was founded
 the year afterwards by Archias, one of the Heraclids from Corinth,
 who began by driving out the Sicels from the island upon which the
 inner city now stands, though it is no longer surrounded by water:
 in process of time the outer town also was taken within the walls
 and became populous.

Meanwhile Thucles and the Chalcidians set out from Naxos in the fifth year
 after the foundation of Syracuse , and drove out the Sicels by arms and
 founded Leontini and afterwards Catana ; the Catanians themselves choosing Evarchus
 as their founder.

About the same time Lamis arrived in
 Sicily with a colony
 from Megara , and after
 founding a place called Trotilus beyond the river Pantacyas, and
 afterwards leaving it and for a short while joining the Chalcidians
 at Leontini, was driven out by them and founded Thapsus . 
 After his death his companions were driven out of Thapsus , and founded a place
 called the Hyblaean Megara; Hyblon, a Sicel king, having given up
 the place and inviting them thither.

Here they lived two hundred and forty-five years; after which they
 were expelled from the city and the country by the Syracusan tyrant
 Gelo. 
 Before their expulsion, however, a hundred years after they had
 settled there, they sent out Pamillus and founded Selinus ; he having come from
 their mother country Megara to join them in its foundation.

Gela was founded by
 Antiphemus from Rhodes and
 Entimus from Crete, who joined in leading a colony thither, in the
 forty-fifth year after the foundation of Syracuse . 
 The town took its name from the river Gelas, the place where the
 citadel now stands, and which was first fortified, being called
 Lindii. 
 The institutions which they adopted were Dorian.

Near one hundred and eight years after the foundation of Gela , the Geloans founded
 Acragas ( Agrigentum ), so called from the
 river of that name, and made Aristonous and Pystilus their founders;
 giving their own institutions to the colony.

Zancle was originally
 founded by pirates from Cuma , the Chalcidian town in the country of the
 Opicans: afterwards, however, large numbers came from Chalcis and the rest of
 Euboea , and helped to
 people the place; the founders being Perieres and Crataemenes from
 Cuma and Chalcis respectively. 
 It first had the name of Zancle given it by the Sicels, because the place is
 shaped like a sickle, which the Sicels call Zanclon; but upon the
 original settlers being afterwards expelled by some Samians and
 other Ionians who landed in Sicily flying from the Medes,

and the Samians in their turn not long afterwards by Anaxilas, tyrant
 of Rhegium , the town
 was by him colonised with a mixed population, and its name changed
 to Messina , after his old
 country.

Himera was founded from Zancle by Euclides, Simus, and
 Sacon, most of those who went to the colony being Chalcidians;
 though they were joined by some exiles from Syracuse , defeated in a civil
 war, called the Myletidae. 
 The language was a mixture of Chalcidian and Doric, but the
 institutions which prevailed were the Chalcidian.

Acrae and Casmenae were
 founded by the Syracusans; Acrae seventy years after Syracuse , Casmenae nearly
 twenty after Acrae .

Camarina was first founded by the Syracusans, close upon a hundred
 and thirty-five years after the building of Syracuse ; its founders being
 Daxon and Menecolus. 
 But the Camarinaeans being expelled by arms by the Syracusans for
 having revolted, Hippocrates, tyrant of Gela , some time later receiving
 their land in ransom for some Syracusan prisoners, resettled
 Camarina, himself acting as its founder. 
 Lastly, it was again depopulated by Gelo, and settled once more for
 the third time by the Geloans.

Such is the list of the peoples,
 Hellenic and barbarian, inhabiting Sicily , and such the magnitude of the island which
 the Athenians were now bent upon invading; being ambitious in real
 truth of conquering the whole, although they had also the specious
 design of succouring their kindred and other allies in the
 island.

But they were especially incited by envoys from Egesta, who had come
 to Athens and invoked
 their aid more urgently than ever. 
 The Egestaeans had gone to war with their neighbours the Selinuntines
 upon questions of marriage and disputed territory, and the
 Selinuntines had procured the alliance of the Syracusans, and
 pressed Egesta hard by land
 and sea. 
 The Egestaeans now reminded the Athenians of the alliance made in the
 time of Laches, during the former Leontine war, and begged them to
 send a fleet to their aid, and among a number of other
 considerations urged as a capital argument, that if the Syracusans
 were allowed to go unpunished for their depopulation of Leontini, to
 ruin the allies still left to Athens in Sicily , and to get the whole power of the island
 into their hands, there would be a danger of their one day coming
 with a large force, as Dorians, to the aid of their Dorian brethren,
 and as colonists, to the aid of the Peloponnesians who had sent them
 out, and joining these in pulling down the Athenian empire. 
 The Athenians would, therefore, do well to unite with the allies
 still left to them, and to make a stand against the Syracusans;
 especially as they, the Egestaeans, were prepared to furnish money
 sufficient for the war.

The Athenians, hearing these arguments constantly repeated in their
 assemblies by the Egestaeans and their supporters, voted first to
 send envoys to Egesta , to
 see if there was really the money that they talked of in the
 treasury and temples, and at the same time to ascertain in what
 posture was the war with the Selinuntines.

The envoys of the Athenians were
 accordingly despatched to Sicily . 
 The same winter the Lacedaemonians and their allies, the Corinthians
 expected, marched into the Argive territory, and ravaged a small part of the
 land, and took some yokes of oxen and carried off some corn. 
 They also settled the Argive 
 exiles at Orneae, and left them a few soldiers taken from the rest
 of the army; and after making a truce for a certain while, according
 to which neither Orneatae nor Argives were to injure each other's
 territory, returned home with the army.

Not long afterwards the Athenians came with thirty ships and six
 hundred heavy infantry, and the Argives joining them with all their
 forces, marched out and besieged the men in Orneae for one day; but
 the garrison escaped by night, the besiegers having bivouacked some
 way off. 
 The next day the Argives, discovering it, razed Orneae to the ground,
 and went back again; after which the Athenians went home in their
 ships.

Meanwhile the Athenians took by sea to Methone on the Macedonian
 border some cavalry of their own and the Macedonian exiles that were
 at Athens , and plundered
 the country of Perdiccas.

Upon this the Lacedaemonians sent to the Thracian Chalcidians, who
 had a truce with Athens 
 from one ten days to another, urging them to join Perdiccas in the
 war, which they refused to do. 
 And the winter ended, and with it ended the sixteenth year of this
 war of which Thucydides is the historian.

Early in the spring of the following
 summer the Athenian envoys arrived from Sicily , and the Egestaeans with them, bringing
 sixty talents of uncoined silver, as a month's pay for sixty ships,
 which they were to ask to have sent them.

The Athenians held an assembly, and after hearing from the Egestaeans
 and their own envoys a report, as attractive as it was untrue, upon
 the state of affairs generally, and in particular as to the money,
 of which, it was said, there was abundance in the temples and the
 treasury, voted to send sixty ships to Sicily , under the command of Alcibiades, son of
 Clinias, Nicias, son of Niceratus, and Lamachus, son of Xenophanes,
 who were appointed with full powers; they were to help the
 Egestaeans against the Selinuntines, to restore Leontini upon
 gaining any advantage in the war, and to order all other matters in
 Sicily as they should
 deem best for the interests of Athens .

Five days after this a second assembly was held, to consider the
 speediest means of equipping the ships, and to vote whatever else
 might be required by the generals for the expedition;

and Nicias, who had been chosen to the command against his will, and
 who thought that the state was not well advised, but upon a slight
 and specious pretext was aspiring to the conquest of the whole of
 Sicily , a great matter
 to achieve, came forward in the hope of diverting the Athenians from
 the enterprise, and gave them the following counsel:—

‘Although this assembly was convened
 to consider the preparations to be made for sailing to Sicily , I think, notwithstanding,
 that we have still this question to examine, whether it be better to
 send out the ships at all, and that we ought not to give so little
 consideration to a matter of such moment, or let ourselves be
 persuaded by foreigners into undertaking a war with which we have
 nothing to do.

And yet, individually, I gain in honour by such a course, and fear as
 little as other men for my person—not that I think a man need be any
 the worse citizen for taking some thought for his person and estate;
 on the contrary, such a man would for his own sake desire the
 prosperity of his country more than others—nevertheless, as I have
 never spoken against my convictions to gain honour, I shall not
 begin to do so now, but shall say what I think best.

Against your character any words of mine would be weak enough; if I
 were to advise your keeping what you have got and not risking what
 is actually yours for advantages which are dubious in themselves,
 and which you may or may not attain. 
 I will, therefore, content myself with showing that your ardour is
 out of season, and your ambition not easy of accomplishment.

I affirm, then, that you leave many
 enemies behind you here to go yonder and bring more back with
 you.

You imagine, perhaps, that the treaty which you have made can be
 trusted; a treaty that will continue to exist nominally, as long as
 you keep quiet—for nominal it has become, owing to the practices of
 certain men here and at Sparta—but which in the event of a serious
 reverse in any quarter would not delay our enemies a moment in
 attacking us; first, because the convention was forced upon them by
 disaster and was less honourable to them than to us; and secondly,
 because in this very convention there are many points that are still
 disputed.

Again, some of the most powerful states have never yet accepted the
 arrangement at all. 
 Some of these are at open war with us; others (as the Lacedaemonians
 do not yet move) are restrained by truces renewed every ten
 days,

and it is only too probable that if they found our power divided, as
 we are hurrying to divide it, they would attack us vigorously with
 the Siceliots, whose alliance they would have in the past valued as
 they would that of few others.

A man ought, therefore, to consider these points, and not to think of
 running risks with a country placed so critically, or of grasping at
 another empire before we have secured the one we have already; for
 in fact the Thracian Chalcidians have been all these years in revolt
 from us without being yet subdued, and others on the continents
 yield us but a doubtful obedience. 
 Meanwhile the Egestaeans, our allies, have been wronged, and we run
 to help them, while the rebels who have so long wronged us still
 wait for punishment.

And yet the latter, if brought under,
 might be kept under; while the Sicilians, even if conquered, are too
 far off and too numerous to be ruled without difficulty. 
 Now it is folly to go against men who could not be kept under even if
 conquered, while failure would leave us in a very different position
 from that which we occupied before the enterprise.

The Siceliots, again, to take them as they are at present, in the
 event of a Syracusan conquest (the favourite bugbear of the
 Egestaeans), would to my thinking be even less dangerous to us than
 before.

At present they might possibly come here as separate states for love
 of Lacedaemon ; in the other
 case one empire would scarcely attack another; for after joining the
 Peloponnesians to overthrow ours, they could only expect to see the
 same hands overthrow their own in the same way.

The Hellenes in Sicily would
 fear us most if we never went there at all, and next to this, if
 after displaying our power we went away again as soon as
 possible. 
 We all know that that which is farthest off and the reputation of
 which can least be tested, is the object of admiration; at the least
 reverse they would at once begin to look down upon us, and would
 join our enemies here against us.

You have yourselves experienced this with regard to the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies, whom your unexpected success, as
 compared with what you feared at first, has made you suddenly
 despise, tempting you further to aspire to the conquest of
 Sicily .

Instead, however, of being puffed up by the misfortunes of your
 adversaries, you ought to think of breaking their spirit before
 giving yourselves up to confidence, and to understand that the one
 thought awakened in the Lacedaemonians by their disgrace is how they
 may even now, if possible, overthrow us and repair their dishonour;
 inasmuch as military reputation is their oldest and chiefest
 study.

Our struggle, therefore, if we are wise, will not be for the
 barbarian Egestaeans in Sicily , but how to defend ourselves most
 effectually against the oligarchical machinations of Lacedaemon .

We should also remember that we are
 but now enjoying some respite from a great pestilence and from war,
 to the no small benefit of our estates and persons, and that it is
 right to employ these at home on our own behalf, instead of using
 them on behalf of these exiles whose interest it is to lie as fairly
 as they can, who do nothing but talk themselves and leave the danger
 to others, and who if they succeed will show no proper gratitude,
 and if they fail will drag down their friends with them.

And if there be any man here, overjoyed at being chosen to command,
 who urges you to make the expedition, merely for ends of his
 own—especially if he be still too young to command—who seeks to be
 admired for his stud of horses, but on account of its heavy expenses
 hopes for some profit from his appointment, do not allow such an one
 to maintain his private splendour at his country's risk, but
 remember that such persons injure the public fortune while they
 squander their own, and that this is a matter of importance, and not
 for a young man to decide or hastily to take in hand.

When I see such persons now sitting
 here at the side of that same individual and summoned by him, alarm
 seizes me; and I, in my turn, summon any of the older men that may
 have such a person sitting next him, not to let himself be shamed
 down, for fear of being thought a coward if he do not vote for war,
 but, remembering how rarely success is got by wishing and how often
 by forecast, to leave to them the mad dream of conquest, and as a
 true lover of his country, now threatened by the greatest danger in
 its history, to hold up his hand on the other side; to vote that the
 Siceliots be left in the limits now existing between us, limits of
 which no one can complain (the Ionian sea for the coasting voyage,
 and the Sicilian across the open main), to enjoy their own
 possessions and to settle their own quarrels;

that the Egestaeans, for their part, be told to end by themselves
 with the Selinuntines the war which they began without consulting
 the Athenians; and that for the future we do not enter into
 alliance, as we have been used to do, with people whom we must help
 in their need, and who can never help us in ours.

And you, Prytanis, if you think it
 your duty to care for the commonwealth, and if you wish to show
 yourself a good citizen, put the question to the vote, and take a
 second time the opinions of the Athenians. 
 If you are afraid to move the question again, consider that a
 violation of the law cannot carry any prejudice with so many
 abettors, that you will be the physician of your misguided city, and
 that the virtue of men in office is briefly this, to do their
 country as much good as they can, or in any case no harm that they
 can avoid.’

Such were the words of Nicias. 
 Most of the Athenians that came forward spoke in favour of the
 expedition, and of not annulling what had been voted, although some
 spoke on the other side.

By far the warmest advocate of the expedition was, however,
 Alcibiades, son of Clinias, who wished to thwart Nicias both as his
 political opponent and also because of the attack he had made upon
 him in his speech, and who was, besides, exceedingly ambitious of a
 command by which he hoped to reduce Sicily and Carthage , and personally to gain in wealth and
 reputation by means of his successes.

For the position he held among the citizens led him to indulge his
 tastes beyond what his real means would bear, both in keeping horses
 and in the rest of his expenditure; and this later on had not a
 little to do with the ruin of the Athenian state.

Alarmed at the greatness of his license in his own life and habits,
 and of the ambition which he showed in all things soever that he
 undertook, the mass of the people set him down as a pretender to the
 tyranny, and became his enemies; and although publicly his conduct
 of the war was as good as could be desired individually, his habits
 gave offence to every one, and caused them to commit affairs to
 other hands, and thus before long to ruin the city.

Meanwhile he now came forward and gave the following advice to the
 Athenians:—

‘Athenians, I have a better right to
 command than others—I must begin with this as Nicias has attacked
 me—and at the same time I believe myself to be worthy of it. 
 The things for which I am abused, bring fame to my ancestors and to
 myself, and to the country profit besides.

The Hellenes, after expecting to see our city ruined by the war,
 concluded it to be even greater than it really is, by reason of the
 magnificence with which I represented it at the Olympic games, when
 I sent into the lists seven chariots, a number never before entered
 by any private person, and won the first prize, and was second and
 fourth, and took care to have everything else in a style worthy of
 my victory. 
 Custom regards such displays as honourable, and they cannot be made
 without leaving behind them an impression of power.

Again, any splendour that I may have exhibited at home in providing
 choruses or otherwise, is naturally envied by my fellow-citizens,
 but in the eyes of foreigners has an air of strength as in the other
 instance. 
 And this is no useless folly, when a man at his own private cost
 benefits not himself only, but his city:

nor is it unfair that he who prides himself on his position should
 refuse to be upon an equality with the rest. 
 He who is badly off has his misfortunes all to himself, and as we do
 not see men courted in adversity, on the like principle a man ought
 to accept the insolence of prosperity; or else, let him first mete
 out equal measure to all, and then demand to have it meted out to
 him.

What I know is that persons of this kind and all others that have
 attained to any distinction, although they may be unpopular in their
 lifetime in their relations with their fellow-men and especially
 with their equals, leave to posterity the desire of claiming
 connection with them even without any ground, and are vaunted by the
 country to which they belonged, not as strangers or ill-doers, but
 as fellow-countrymen and heroes.

Such are my aspirations, and however I am abused for them in private,
 the question is whether any one manages public affairs better than I
 do. 
 Having united the most powerful states of Peloponnese , without great danger
 or expense to you, I compelled the Lacedaemonians to stake their all
 upon the issue of a single day at Mantinea ; and although victorious in the battle,
 they have never since fully recovered confidence.

Thus did my youth and so-called
 monstrous folly find fitting arguments to deal with the power of the
 Peloponnesians, and by its ardour win their confidence and
 prevail. 
 And do not be afraid of my youth now, but while I am still in its
 flower, and Nicias appears fortunate, avail yourselves to the utmost
 of the services of us both.

Neither rescind your resolution to sail to Sicily , on the ground that you
 would be going to attack a great power. 
 The cities in Sicily are
 peopled by motley rabbles, and easily change their institutions and
 adopt new ones in their stead;

and consequently the inhabitants, being without any feeling of
 patriotism, are not provided with arms for their persons, and have
 not regularly established themselves on the land; every man thinks
 that either by fair words or by party strife he can obtain something
 at the public expense, and then in the event of a catastrophe settle
 in some other country, and makes his preparations accordingly.

From a mob like this you need not look for either unanimity in
 counsel or concert in action; but they will probably one by one come
 in as they get a fair offer, especially if they are torn by civil
 strife as we are told.

Moreover, the Siceliots have not so many heavy infantry as they
 boast; just as the Hellenes generally did not prove so numerous as
 each state reckoned itself, but Hellas greatly over-estimated their numbers, and
 has hardly had an adequate force of heavy infantry throughout this
 war.

The states in Sicily ,
 therefore, from all that I can hear, will be found as I say, and I
 have not pointed out all our advantages, for we shall have the help
 of many barbarians, who from their hatred of the Syracusans will
 join us in attacking them; nor will the powers at home prove any
 hindrance, if you judge rightly.

Our fathers with these very adversaries, which it is said we shall
 now leave behind us when we sail, and the Mede as their enemy as well, were
 able to win the empire, depending solely on their superiority at
 sea.

The Peloponnesians had never so little hope against us at present;
 and let them be ever so sanguine, although strong enough to invade
 our country even if we stay at home, they can never hurt us with
 their navy, as we leave one of our own behind us that is a match for
 them.

In this state of things what reason
 can we give to ourselves for holding back, or what excuse can we
 offer to our allies in Sicily for not helping them? 
 They are our confederates, and we are bound to assist them, without
 objecting that they have not assisted us. 
 We did not take them into alliance to have them to help us in
 Hellas , but that they
 might so annoy our enemies in Sicily as to prevent them from coming over here and
 attacking us.

It is thus that empire has been won, both by us and by all others
 that have held it, by a constant readiness to support all, whether
 barbarians or Hellenes, that invite assistance; since if all were to
 keep quiet or to pick and choose whom they ought to assist, we
 should make but few new conquests, and should imperil those we have
 already won. 
 Men do not rest content with parrying the attacks of a superior, but
 often strike the first blow to prevent the attack being made.

And we cannot fix the exact point at which our empire shall stop; we
 have reached a position in which we must not be content with
 retaining but must scheme to extend it, for, if we cease to rule
 others, we are in danger of being ruled ourselves. 
 Nor can you look at inaction from the same point of view as others,
 unless you are prepared to change your habits and make them like
 theirs.

Be convinced then that we shall
 augment our power at home by this adventure abroad, and let us make
 the expedition, and so humble the pride of the Peloponnesians by
 sailing off to Sicily , and
 letting them see how little we care for the peace that we are now
 enjoying; and at the same time we shall either become masters, as we
 very easily may, of the whole of Hellas through the accession of the Sicilian
 Hellenes, or in any case ruin the Syracusans, to the no small
 advantage of ourselves and our allies.

The faculty of staying if successful, or of returning, will be
 secured to us by our navy, as we shall be superior at sea to all the
 Siceliots put together.

And do not let the do-nothing policy which Nicias advocates, or his
 setting of the young against the old, turn you from your purpose,
 but in the good old fashion by which our fathers, old and young
 together, by their united counsels brought our affairs to their
 present height, do you endeavour still to advance them;
 understanding that neither youth nor old age can do anything the one
 without the other, but that levity, sobriety, and deliberate
 judgment are strongest when united, and that, by sinking into
 inaction, the city, like everything else, will wear itself out, and
 its skill in everything decay; while each fresh struggle will give
 it fresh experience, and make it more used to defend itself not in
 word but in deed.

In short, my conviction is that a city not inactive by nature could
 not choose a quicker way to ruin itself than by suddenly adopting
 such a policy, and that the safest rule of life is to take one's
 character and institutions for better and for worse, and to live up
 to them as closely as one can.’

Such were the words of
 Alcibiades. 
 After hearing him and the Egestaeans and some Leontine exiles, who
 came forward reminding them of their oaths and imploring their
 assistance, the Athenians became more eager for the expedition than
 before.

Nicias, perceiving that it would be now useless to try to deter them
 by the old line of argument, but thinking that he might perhaps
 alter their resolution by the extravagance of his estimates, came
 forward a second time and spoke as follows:—

‘I see, Athenians, that you are
 thoroughly bent upon the expedition, and therefore hope that all
 will turn out as we wish, and proceed to give you my opinion at the
 present juncture.

From all that I hear we are going against cities that are great and
 not subject to one another, or in need of change, so as to be glad
 to pass from enforced servitude to an easier condition, or in the
 least likely to accept our rule in exchange for freedom; and, to
 take only the Hellenic towns, they are very numerous for one
 island.

Besides Naxos and
 Catana , which I
 expect to join us from their connection with Leontini, there are
 seven others armed at all points just like our own power,
 particularly Selinus 
 and Syracuse , the
 chief objects of our expedition.

These are full of heavy infantry, archers, and darters, have galleys
 in abundance and crowds to man them; they have also money, partly in
 the hands of private persons, partly in the temples at Selinus , and at Syracuse first-fruits from
 some of the barbarians as well. 
 But their chief advantage over us lies in the number of their horses,
 and in the fact that they grow their corn at home instead of
 importing it.

Against a power of this kind it will
 not do to have merely a weak naval armament, but we shall want also
 a large land army to sail with us, if we are to do anything worthy
 of our ambition, and are not to be shut out from the country by a
 numerous cavalry; especially if the cities should take alarm and
 combine, and we should be left without friends (except the
 Egestaeans) to furnish us with horse to defend ourselves with.

It would be disgraceful to have to retire under compulsion, or to
 send back for reinforcements, owing to want of reflection at first:
 we must therefore start from home with a competent force, seeing
 that we are going to sail far from our country, and upon an
 expedition not like any which you may have undertaken in the quality
 of allies, among your subject states here in Hellas , where any additional
 supplies needed were easily drawn from the friendly territory; but
 we are cutting ourselves off, and going to a land entirely strange,
 from which during four months in winter it is not even easy for a
 messenger to get to Athens .

I think, therefore, that we ought to
 take great numbers of heavy infantry, both from Athens and from our allies, and
 not merely from our subjects, but also any we may be able to get for
 love or for money in Peloponnese , and great numbers also of archers and
 slingers, to make head against the Sicilian horse. 
 Meanwhile we must have an overwhelming superiority at sea, to enable
 us the more easily to carry in what we want; and we must take our
 own corn in merchant vessels, that is to say, wheat and parched
 barley, and bakers from the mills compelled to serve for pay in the
 proper proportion; in order that in case of our being weather-bound
 the armament may not want provisions, as it is not every city that
 will be able to entertain numbers like ours. 
 We must also provide ourselves with everything else as far as we can,
 so as not to be dependent upon others; and above all we must take
 with us from home as much money as possible, as the sums talked of
 as ready at Egesta are
 readier, you may be sure, in talk than in any other way.

Indeed, even if we leave Athens with a force not only
 equal to that of the enemy except in the number of heavy infantry in
 the field, but even at all points superior to him, we shall still
 find it difficult to conquer Sicily or save ourselves.

We must not disguise from ourselves that we go to found a city among
 strangers and enemies, and that he who undertakes such an enterprise
 should be prepared to become master of the country the first day he
 lands, or failing in this to find everything hostile to him.

Fearing this, and knowing that we shall have need of much good
 counsel and more good fortune—a hard matter for mortal men to aspire
 to—I wish as far as may be to make myself independent of fortune
 before sailing, and when I do sail, to be as safe as a strong force
 can make me.

This I believe to be surest for the country at large, and safest for
 us who are to go on the expedition. 
 If any one thinks differently I resign to him my command.’

With this Nicias concluded, thinking
 that he should either disgust the Athenians by the magnitude of the
 undertaking, or, if obliged to sail on the expedition, would thus do
 so in the safest way possible.

The Athenians, however, far from having their taste for the voyage
 taken away by the burdensomeness of the preparations, became more
 eager for it than ever; and just the contrary took place of what
 Nicias had thought, as it was held that he had given good advice,
 and that the expedition would be the safest in the world.

All alike fell in love with the enterprise. 
 The older men thought that they would either subdue the places
 against which they were to sail, or at all events, with so large a
 force, meet with no disaster; those in the prime of life felt a
 longing for foreign sights and spectacles, and had no doubt that
 they should come safe home again; while the idea of the common
 people and the soldiery was to earn wages at the moment, and make
 conquests that would supply a never-ending fund of pay for the
 future.

With this enthusiasm of the majority, the few that liked it not,
 feared to appear unpatriotic by holding up their hands against it,
 and so kept quiet.

At last one of the Athenians came
 forward and called upon Nicias and told him that he ought not to
 make excuses or put them off, but say at once before them all what
 forces the Athenians should vote him.

Upon this he said, not without reluctance, that he would advise upon
 that matter more at leisure with his colleagues; as far however as
 he could see at present, they must sail with at least one hundred
 galleys—the Athenians providing as many transports as they might
 determine, and sending for others from the allies—not less than five
 thousand heavy infantry in all, Athenian and allied, and if possible
 more; and the rest of the armament in proportion; archers from home
 and from Crete , and
 slingers, and whatever else might seem desirable, being got ready by
 the generals and taken with them.

Upon hearing this the Athenians at once voted that the generals
 should have full powers in the matter of the numbers of the army and
 of the expedition generally, to do as they judged best for the
 interests of Athens .

After this the preparations began; messages being sent to the allies
 and the rolls drawn up at home. 
 And as the city had just recovered from the plague and the long war,
 and a number of young men had grown up and capital had accumulated
 by reason of the truce, everything was the more easily provided.

In the midst of these preparations
 all the stone Hermae in the city of Athens , that is to say the customary square figures
 so common in the doorways of private houses and temples, had in one
 night most of them their faces mutilated.

No one knew who had done it, but large public rewards were offered to
 find the authors; and it was further voted that any one who knew of
 any other act of impiety having been committed should come and give
 information without fear of consequences, whether he were citizen,
 alien, or slave.

The matter was taken up the more seriously, as it was thought to be
 ominous for the expedition, and part of a conspiracy to bring about
 a revolution and to upset the democracy.

Information was given accordingly by
 some resident aliens and body servants, not about the Hermae but
 about some previous mutilations of other images perpetrated by young
 men in a drunken frolic, and of mock celebrations of the mysteries,
 averred to take place in private houses.

Alcibiades being implicated in this charge, it was taken hold of by
 those who could least endure him, because he stood in the way of
 their obtaining the undisturbed direction of the people, and who
 thought that if he were once removed the first place would be
 theirs. 
 These accordingly magnified the manner and loudly proclaimed that the
 affair of the mysteries and the mutilation of the Hermae were part
 and parcel of a scheme to overthrow the democracy, and that nothing
 of all this had been done without Alcibiades; the proofs alleged
 being the general and undemocratic license of his life and habits.

Alcibiades repelled on the spot the
 charges in question, and also before going on the expedition, the
 preparations for which were now complete, offered to stand his
 trial, that it might be seen whether he was guilty of the acts
 imputed to him; desiring to be punished if found guilty, but, if
 acquitted, to take the command.

Meanwhile he protested against their receiving slanders against him
 in his absence, and begged them rather to put him to death at once
 if he were guilty, and pointed out the imprudence of sending him out
 at the head of so large an army, with so serious a charge still
 undecided.

But his enemies feared that he would have the army for him if he were
 tried immediately, and that the people might relent in favour of the
 man whom they already caressed as the cause of the Argives and some
 of the Mantineans joining in the expedition, and did their utmost to
 get this proposition rejected, putting forward other orators who
 said that he ought at present to sail and not delay the departure of
 the army, and be tried on his return within a fixed number of days;
 their plan being to have him sent for and brought home for trial
 upon some graver charge, which they would the more easily get up in
 his absence. 
 Accordingly it was decreed that he should sail.

After this the departure for
 Sicily took place, it
 being now about midsummer. 
 Most of the allies, with the corn transports and the smaller craft
 and the rest of the expedition, had already received orders to
 muster at Corcyra ,
 to cross the Ionian sea from thence in a body to the Iapygian
 promontory. 
 But the Athenians themselves, and such of their allies as happened to
 be with them, went down to Piraeus upon a day appointed at daybreak, and began
 to man the ships for putting out to sea.

With them also went down the whole population, one may say, of the
 city, both citizens and foreigners; the inhabitants of the country
 each escorting those that belonged to them, their friends, their
 relatives, or their sons, with hope and lamentation upon their way,
 as they thought of the conquests which they hoped to make, or of the
 friends whom they might never see again, considering the long voyage
 which they were going to make from their country.

Indeed, at this moment, when they were now upon the point of parting
 from one another, the danger came more home to them than when they
 voted for the expedition; although the strength of the armament, and
 the profuse provision which they remarked in every department, was a
 sight that could not but comfort them. 
 As for the foreigners and the rest of the crowd, they simply went to
 see a sight worth looking at and passing all belief. Indeed this armament that first sailed out
 was by far the most costly and splendid Hellenic force that had ever
 been sent out by a single city up to that time.

In mere number of ships and heavy infantry that against Epidaurus under Pericles,
 and the same when going against Potidaea under Hagnon, was not inferior; containing
 as it did four thousand Athenian heavy infantry, three hundred
 horse, and one hundred galleys accompanied by fifty Lesbian and
 Chian vessels and many allies besides.

But these were sent upon a short voyage and with a scanty
 equipment. 
 The present expedition was formed in contemplation of a long term of
 service by land and sea alike, and was furnished with ships and
 troops so as to be ready for either as required. 
 The fleet had been elaborately equipped at great cost to the captains
 and the state; the treasury giving a drachma a day to each seaman,
 and providing empty ships, sixty men of war and forty transports,
 and manning these with the best crews obtainable; while the captains
 gave a bounty in addition to the pay from the treasury to the
 thranitae and crews generally, besides spending lavishly upon
 figure-heads and equipments, and one and all making the utmost
 exertions to enable their own ships to excel in beauty and fast
 sailing. 
 Meanwhile the land forces had been picked from the best muster-rolls,
 and vied with each other in paying great attention to their arms and
 personal accoutrements.

From this resulted not only a rivalry among themselves in their
 different departments, but an idea among the rest of the Hellenes
 that it was more a display of power and resources than an armament
 against an enemy.

For if any one had counted up the public expenditure of the state,
 and the private outlay of individuals—that is to say, the sums which
 the state had already spent upon the expedition and was sending out
 in the hands of the generals, and those which individuals had
 expended upon their personal outfit, or as captains of galleys had
 laid out and were still to lay out upon their vessels; and if he had
 added to this the journey money which each was likely to have
 provided himself with, independently of the pay from the treasury,
 for a voyage of such length, and what the soldiers or traders took
 with them for the purpose of exchange—it would have been found that
 many talents in all were being taken out of the city.

Indeed the expedition became not less famous for its wonderful
 boldness and for the splendour of its appearance, than for its
 overwhelming strength as compared with the peoples against whom it
 was directed, and for the fact that this was the longest passage
 from home hitherto attempted, and the most ambitious in its objects
 considering the resources of those who undertook it.

The ships being now manned, and
 everything put on board with which they meant to sail, the trumpet
 commanded silence, and the prayers customary before putting out to
 sea were offered, not in each ship by itself, but by all together to
 the voice of a herald; and bowls of wine were mixed through all the
 armament, and libations made by the soldiers and their officers in
 gold and silver goblets.

In their prayers joined also the crowds on shore, the citizens and
 all others that wished them well. 
 The hymn sung and the libations finished, they put out to sea, and
 first sailing out in column then raced each other as far as
 Aegina , and so
 hastened to reach Corcyra where the rest of the allied forces were
 also assembling.

Meanwhile at Syracuse news came in from
 many quarters of the expedition, but for a long while met with no
 credence whatever. 
 Indeed, an assembly was held in which speeches, as will be seen, were
 delivered by different orators, believing or contradicting the
 report of the Athenian expedition; among whom Hermocrates, son of
 Hermon, came forward, being persuaded that he knew the truth of the
 matter, and gave the following counsel:—

‘Although I shall perhaps be no
 better believed than others have been when I speak upon the reality
 of the expedition, and although I know that those who either make or
 repeat statements thought not worthy of belief not only gain no
 converts, but are thought fools for their pains, I shall certainly
 not be frightened into holding my tongue when the state is in
 danger, and when I am persuaded that I can speak with more authority
 on the matter than other persons.

Much as you wonder at it, the Athenians nevertheless have set out
 against us with a large force, naval and military, professedly to
 help the Egestaeans and to restore Leontini, but really to conquer
 Sicily , and above all
 our city, which once gained, the rest, they think, will easily
 follow.

Make up your minds, therefore, to see them speedily here, and see how
 you can best repel them with the means under your hands, and do not
 be taken off your guard through despising the news, or neglect the
 common weal through disbelieving it.

Meanwhile those who believe me need not be dismayed at the force or
 daring of the enemy. 
 They will not be able to do us more hurt than we shall do them; nor
 is the greatness of their armament altogether without advantage to
 us. 
 Indeed, the greater it is the better, with regard to the rest of the
 Siceliots, whom dismay will make more ready to join us; and if we
 defeat or drive them away, disappointed of the objects of their
 ambition (for I do not fear for a moment that they will get what
 they want), it will be a most glorious exploit for us, and in my
 judgment by no means an unlikely one.

Few indeed have been the large armaments, either Hellenic or
 barbarian, that have gone far from home and been successful. 
 They cannot be more numerous than the people of the country and their
 neighbours, all of whom fear leagues together; and if they miscarry
 for want of supplies in a foreign land, to those against whom their
 plans were laid none the less they leave renown, although they may
 themselves have been the main cause of their own discomfort.

Thus these very Athenians rose by the defeat of the Mede , in a great measure due to
 accidental causes, from the mere fact that Athens had been the object of
 his attack; and this may very well be the case with us also.

Let us, therefore, confidently begin
 preparations here; let us send and confirm some of the Sicels, and
 obtain the friendship and alliance of others, and despatch envoys to
 the rest of Sicily to show
 that the danger is common to all, and to Italy to get them to become our
 allies, or at all events to refuse to receive the Athenians.

I also think that it would be best to send to Carthage as well; they are by
 no means there without apprehension, but it is their constant fear
 that the Athenians may one day attack their city, and they may
 perhaps think that they might themselves suffer by letting
 Sicily be sacrificed,
 and be willing to help us secretly if not openly, in one way if not
 in another. 
 They are the best able to do so, if they will, of any of the present
 day, as they possess most gold and silver, by which war, like
 everything else, flourishes.

Let us also send to Lacedaemon and Corinth , and ask them to come here and help us as
 soon as possible, and to keep alive the war in Hellas .

But the true thing of all others, in my opinion, to do at the present
 moment, is what you, with your constitutional love of quiet, will be
 slow to see, and what I must nevertheless mention. 
 If we Siceliots, all together, or at least as many as possible
 besides ourselves, would only launch the whole of our actual navy
 with two months' provisions, and meet the Athenians at Tarentum and the Iapygian
 promontory, and show them that before fighting for Sicily they must first fight for
 their passage across the Ionian sea, we should strike dismay into
 their army, and set them on thinking that we have a base for our
 defensive—for Tarentum is
 ready to receive us—while they have a wide sea to cross with all
 their armament, which could with difficulty keep its order through
 so long a voyage, and would be easy for us to attack as it came on
 slowly and in small detachments.

On the other hand, if they were to lighten their vessels, and draw
 together their fast sailors and with these attack us, we could
 either fall upon them when they were wearied with rowing, or if we
 did not choose to do so, we could retire to Tarentum ; while they, having
 crossed with few provisions just to give battle, would be hard put
 to it in desolate places, and would either have to remain and be
 blockaded, or to try to sail along the coast, abandoning the rest of
 their armament, and being further discouraged by not knowing for
 certain whether the cities would receive them.

In my opinion this consideration alone would be sufficient to deter
 them from putting out from Corcyra ; and what with deliberating and
 reconnoitring our numbers and whereabouts, they would let the season
 go on until winter was upon them, or, confounded by so unexpected a
 circumstance, would break up the expedition, especially as their
 most experienced general has, as I hear, taken the command against
 his will, and would grasp at the first excuse offered by any serious
 demonstration of ours.

We should also be reported, I am certain, as more numerous than we
 really are, and men's minds are affected by what they hear, and
 besides the first to attack, or to show that they mean to defend
 themselves against an attack, inspire greater fear because men see
 that they are ready for the emergency.

This would just be the case with the Athenians at present. 
 They are now attacking us in the belief that we shall not resist,
 having a right to judge us severely because we did not help the
 Lacedaemonians in crushing them; but if they were to see us showing
 a courage for which they are not prepared, they would be more
 dismayed by the surprise than they could ever be by our actual
 power.

I could wish to persuade you to show this courage; but if this cannot
 be, at all events lose not a moment in preparing generally for the
 war; and remember all of you that contempt for an assailant is best
 shown by bravery in action, but that for the present the best course
 is to accept the preparations which fear inspires as giving the
 surest promise of safety, and to act as if the danger was real. 
 That the Athenians are coming to attack us, and are already upon the
 voyage, and all but here—this is what I am sure of.’

Thus far spoke Hermocrates. 
 Meanwhile the people of Syracuse were at great strife among themselves;
 some contending that the Athenians had no idea of coming and that
 there was no truth in what he said; some asking if they did come
 what harm they could do that would not be repaid them tenfold in
 return; while others made light of the whole affair and turned it
 into ridicule. 
 In short, there were few that believed Hermocrates and feared for the
 future.

Meanwhile Athenagoras, the leader of the people and very powerful at
 that time with the masses, came forward and spoke as follows:—

‘For the Athenians, he who does not
 wish that they may be as misguided as they are supposed to be, and
 that they may come here to become our subjects, is either a coward
 or a traitor to his country; while as for those who carry such
 tidings and fill you with so much alarm, I wonder less at their
 audacity than at their folly if they flatter themselves that we do
 not see through them.

The fact is that they have their private reasons to be afraid, and
 wish to throw the city into consternation to have their own terrors
 cast into the shade by the public alarm. 
 In short, this is what these reports are worth; they do not arise of
 themselves, but are concocted by men who are always causing
 agitation here in Sicily .

However, if you are well advised, you will not be guided in your
 calculation of probabilities by what these persons tell you, but by
 what shrewd men and of large experience, as I esteem the Athenians
 to be, would be likely to do.

Now it is not likely that they would leave the Peloponnesians behind
 them, and before they have well ended the war in Hellas wantonly come in quest of a
 new war quite as arduous, in Sicily ; indeed, in my judgment, they are only too
 glad that we do not go and attack them, being so many and so great
 cities as we are.

However, if they should come as is
 reported, I consider Sicily 
 better able to go through with the war than Peloponnese , as being at all
 points better prepared, and our city by itself far more than a match
 for this pretended army of invasion, even were it twice as large
 again. 
 I know that they will not have horses with them, or get any here,
 except a few perhaps from the Egestaeans; or be able to bring a
 force of heavy infantry equal in number to our own, in ships which
 will already have enough to do to come all this distance, however
 lightly laden, not to speak of the transport of the other stores
 required against a city of this magnitude, which will be no slight
 quantity.

In fact, so strong is my opinion upon the subject, that I do not well
 see how they could avoid annihilation if they brought with them
 another city as large as Syracuse , and settled down and carried on war from
 our frontier; much less can they hope to succeed with all Sicily hostile to them, as all
 Sicily will be, and
 with only a camp pitched from the ships, and composed of tents and
 bare necessaries, from which they would not be able to stir far for
 fear of our cavalry.

But the Athenians see this as I tell
 you, and as I have reason to know are looking after their
 possessions at home, while persons here invent stories that neither
 are true nor ever will be.

Nor is this the first time that I see these persons, when they cannot
 resort to deeds, trying by such stories and by others even more
 abominable to frighten your people and get into their hands the
 government: it is what I see always. 
 And I cannot help fearing that trying so often they may one day
 succeed, and that we, as long as we do not feel the smart, may prove
 too weak for the task of prevention, or, when the offenders are
 known, of pursuit.

The result is that our city is rarely at rest, but is subject to
 constant troubles and to contests as frequent against herself as
 against the enemy, not to speak of occasional tyrannies and infamous
 cabals.

However, I will try, if you will support me, to let nothing of this
 happen in our time, by gaining you, the many, and by chastising the
 authors of such machinations, not merely when they are caught in the
 act—a difficult feat to accomplish—but also for what they have the
 wish though not the power to do; as is necessary to punish an enemy
 not only for what he does, but also beforehand for what he intends
 to do, if the first to relax precaution would not be also the first
 to suffer. 
 I shall also reprove, watch, and on occasion warn the few—the most
 effectual way, in my opinion, of turning them from their evil
 courses.

And after all, as I have often asked—What would you have, young
 men? 
 Would you hold office at once? 
 The law forbids it, a law enacted rather because you are not
 competent than to disgrace you when competent. 
 Meanwhile you would not be on a legal equality with the many! 
 But how can it be right that citizens of the same state should be
 held unworthy of the same privileges?

It will be said, perhaps, that
 democracy is neither wise nor equitable, but that the holders of
 property are also the best fitted to rule. 
 I say, on the contrary, first, that the word “demos,” or people,
 includes the whole state, oligarchy only a part; next, that if the
 best guardians of property are the rich, and the best counsellors
 the wise, none can hear and decide so well as the many; and that all
 these talents, severally and collectively, have their just place in
 a democracy.

But an oligarchy gives the many their share of the danger, and not
 content with the largest part takes and keeps the whole of the
 profit; and this is what the powerful and young among you aspire to,
 but in a great city cannot possibly obtain.

But even now, foolish men, most
 senseless of all the Hellenes that I know, if you have no sense of
 the wickedness of your designs, or most criminal if you have that
 sense and still dare to pursue them,—even now, if it is not a case
 for repentance, you may still learn wisdom, and thus advance the
 interest of the country, the common interest of us all. 
 Reflect that in the country's prosperity the men of merit in your
 ranks will have a share and a larger share than the great mass of
 your fellow-countrymen, but that if you have other designs you run a
 risk of being deprived of all; and desist from reports like these,
 as the people know your object and will not put up with it.

If the Athenians arrive, this city will repulse them in a manner
 worthy of itself; we have, moreover, generals who will see to this
 matter. 
 And if nothing of this be true, as I incline to believe, the city
 will not be thrown into a panic by your intelligence, or impose upon
 itself a self-chosen servitude by choosing you for its rulers; the
 city itself will look into the matter, and will judge your words as
 if they were acts, and instead of allowing itself to be deprived of
 its liberty by listening to you, will strive to preserve that
 liberty, by taking care to have always at hand the means of making
 itself respected.’

Such were the words of
 Athenagoras. 
 One of the generals now stood up and stopped any other speakers
 coming forward, adding these words of his own with reference to the
 matter in hand:—

‘It is not well for speakers to utter calumnies against one another,
 or for their hearers to entertain them; we ought rather to look to
 the intelligence that we have received, and see how each man by
 himself and the city as a whole may best prepare to repel the
 invaders.

Even if there be no need, there is no harm in the state being
 furnished with horses and arms and all other insignia of war;

and we will undertake to see to and order this, and to send round to
 the cities to reconnoitre and do all else that may appear
 desirable. 
 Part of this we have seen to already, and whatever we discover shall
 Syracusans departed from the assembly.

In the meantime the Athenians with
 all their allies had now arrived at Corcyra . 
 Here the generals began by again reviewing the armament, and made
 arrangements as to the order in which they were to anchor and
 encamp, and dividing the whole fleet into three divisions, allotted
 one to each of their number, to avoid sailing all together and being
 thus embarrassed for water, harbourage, or provisions at the
 stations which they might touch at, and at the same time to be
 generally better ordered and easier to handle, by each squadron
 having its own commander.

Next they sent on three ships to Italy and Sicily to find out which of the cities would
 receive them, with instructions to meet them on the way and let them
 know before they put in to land.

After this the Athenians weighed from
 Corcyra , and
 proceeded to cross to Sicily with an armament now consisting of one
 hundred and thirty-four galleys in all (besides two Rhodian
 fifty-oars) of which one hundred were Athenian vessels—sixty
 men-of-war, and forty troopships—and the remainder from Chios and the other allies;
 five thousand and one hundred heavy infantry in all, that is to say,
 fifteen hundred Athenian citizens from the rolls at Athens and seven hundred Thetes
 shipped as marines, and the rest allied troops, some of them
 Athenian subjects, and besides these five hundred Argives, and two
 hundred and fifty Mantineans serving for hire; four hundred and
 eighty archers in all, eighty of whom were Cretans, seven hundred
 slingers from Rhodes , one
 hundred and twenty light-armed exiles from Megara , and one horse-transport
 carrying thirty horses.

Such was the strength of the first
 armament that sailed over for the war. 
 The supplies for this force were carried by thirty ships of burden
 laden with corn, which conveyed the bakers, stone-masons and
 carpenters, and the tools for raising fortifications, accompanied by
 one hundred boats, like the former pressed into the service, besides
 many other boats and ships of burden which followed the armament
 voluntarily for purposes of trade; all of which now left Corcyra and struck across
 the Ionian sea together.

The whole force making land at the Iapygian promontory and Tarentum , with more or less good
 fortune, coasted along the shores of Italy , the cities shutting their markets and gates
 against them, and according them nothing but water and liberty to
 anchor, and Tarentum and
 Locri not even that,
 until they arrived at Rhegium , the extreme point of Italy .

Here at length they reunited, and not gaining admission within the
 walls pitched a camp outside the city in the precinct of Artemis,
 where a market was also provided for them, and drew their ships on
 shore and kept quiet. 
 Meanwhile they opened negotiations with the Rhegians, and called upon
 them as Chalcidians to assist their Leontine kinsmen; to which the
 Rhegians replied that they would not side with either party, but
 should await the decision of the rest of the Italiots, and do as
 they did.

Upon this the Athenians now began to consider what would be the best
 action to take in the affairs of Sicily , and meanwhile waited for the ships sent on
 to come back from Egesta ,
 in order to know whether there was really there the money mentioned
 by the messengers at Athens .

In the meantime came in from all
 quarters to the Syracusans, as well as from their own officers sent
 to reconnoitre, the positive tidings that the fleet was at
 Rhegium ; upon which
 they laid aside their incredulity and threw themselves heart and
 soul into the work of preparation. 
 Guards or envoys, as the case might be, were sent round to the
 Sicels, garrisons put into the posts of the Peripoli in the country,
 horses and arms reviewed in the city to see that nothing was
 wanting, and all other steps taken to prepare for a war which might
 be upon them at any moment.

Meanwhile the three ships that had
 been sent on came from Egesta to the Athenians at Rhegium , with the news that so
 far from there being the sums promised, all that could be produced
 was thirty talents.

The generals were not a little disheartened at being thus
 disappointed at the outset, and by the refusal to join in the
 expedition of the Rhegians, the people they had first tried to gain
 and had had most reason to count upon, from their relationship to
 the Leontines and constant friendship for Athens . 
 If Nicias was prepared for the news from Egesta , his two colleagues were taken completely by
 surprise.

The Egestaeans had had recourse to the following stratagem, when the
 first envoys from Athens 
 came to inspect their resources. 
 They took the envoys in question to the temple of Aphrodite at
 Eryx and showed them
 the treasures deposited there; bowls, wine-ladles, censers, and a
 large number of other pieces of plate, which from being in silver
 gave an impression of wealth quite out of proportion to their really
 small value. 
 They also privately entertained the ships' crews, and collected all
 the cups of gold and silver that they could find in Egesta itself or could borrow in
 the neighbouring Phoenician and Hellenic towns, and each brought
 them to the banquets as their own;

and as all used pretty nearly the same, and everywhere a great
 quantity of plate was shown, the effect was most dazzling upon the
 Athenian sailors, and made them talk loudly of the riches they had
 seen when they got back to Athens .

The dupes in question—who had in their turn persuaded the rest—when
 the news got abroad that there was not the money supposed at
 Egesta , were much
 blamed by the soldiers.

Meanwhile the generals consulted upon
 what was to be done. 
 The opinion of Nicias was to sail with all the armament to Selinus , the main object of
 the expedition, and if the Egestaeans could provide money for the
 whole force, to advise accordingly; but if they could not, to
 require them to supply provisions for the sixty ships that they had
 asked for, to stay and settle matters between them and the
 Selinuntines either by force or by agreement, and then to coast past
 the other cities, and after displaying the power of Athens and proving their zeal
 for their friends and allies, to sail home again (unless they should
 have some sudden and unexpected opportunity of serving the
 Leontines, or of bringing over some of the other cities), and not to
 endanger the state by wasting its home resources.

Alcibiades said that a great
 expedition like the present must not disgrace itself by going away
 without having done anything; heralds must be sent to all the cities
 except Selinus and
 Syracuse , and
 efforts be made to make some of the Sicels revolt from the
 Syracusans, and to obtain the friendship of others, in order to have
 corn and troops; and first of all to gain the Messinese, who lay
 right in the passage and entrance to Sicily , and would afford an excellent harbour and
 base for the army. 
 Thus, after bringing over the towns and knowing who would be their
 allies in the war, they might at length attack Syracuse and Selinus ; unless the latter
 came to terms with Egesta 
 and the former ceased to oppose the restoration of Leontini.

Lamachus, on the other hand, said
 that they ought to sail straight to Syracuse , and fight their
 battle at once under the walls of the town while the people were
 still unprepared, and the panic at its height.

Every armament was most terrible at first; if it allowed time to run
 on without showing itself, men's courage revived, and they saw it
 appear at last almost with indifference. 
 By attacking suddenly, while Syracuse still trembled at their coming, they would
 have the best chance of gaining a victory for themselves and of
 striking a complete panic into the enemy by the aspect of their
 numbers—which would never appear so considerable as at present—by
 the anticipation of coming disaster, and above all by the immediate
 danger of the engagement.

They might also count upon surprising many in the fields outside,
 incredulous of their coming; and at the moment that the enemy was
 carrying in his property the army would not want for booty if it sat
 down in force before the city.

The rest of the Siceliots would thus be immediately less disposed to
 enter into alliance with the Syracusans, and would join the
 Athenians, without waiting to see which were the strongest. 
 They must make Megara 
 their naval station as a place to retreat to and a base from which
 to attack: it was an uninhabited place at no great distance from
 Syracuse either by
 land or by sea.

After speaking to this effect,
 Lamachus nevertheless gave his support to the opinion of
 Alcibiades. 
 After this Alcibiades sailed in his own vessel across to Messina with proposals of
 alliance, but met with no success, the inhabitants answering that
 they could not receive him within their walls, though they would
 provide him with a market outside. 
 Upon this he sailed back to Rhegium .

Immediately upon his return the generals manned and victualled sixty
 ships out of the whole fleet and coasted along to Naxos , leaving the rest
 of the armament behind them at Rhegium with one of their number.

Received by the Naxians, they then coasted on to Catana , and being refused
 admittance by the inhabitants, there being a Syracusan party in the
 town, went on to the river Terias.

Here they bivouacked, and the next day sailed in single file to
 Syracuse with all
 their ships except ten which they sent on in front to sail into the
 great harbour and see if there was any fleet launched, and to
 proclaim by herald from shipboard that the Athenians were come to
 restore the Leontines to their country, as being their allies and
 kinsmen, and that such of them, therefore, as were in Syracuse should leave it
 without fear and join their friends and benefactors the
 Athenians.

After making this proclamation and reconnoitring the city and the
 harbours, and the features of the country which they would have to
 make their base of operations in the war, they sailed back to
 Catana .

An assembly being held here, the
 inhabitants refused to received the armament, but invited the
 generals to come in and say what they desired; and while Alcibiades
 was speaking and the citizens were intent on the assembly, the
 soldiers broke down an ill-walled-up postern-gate without being
 observed, and getting inside the town, flocked into the
 marketplace.

The Syracusan party in the town no sooner saw the army inside than
 they became frightened and withdrew, not being at all numerous;
 while the rest voted for an alliance with the Athenians and invited
 them to fetch the rest of their forces from Rhegium .

After this the Athenians sailed to Rhegium , and put off, this time with all the
 armament, for Catana ,
 and fell to work at their camp immediately upon their arrival.

Meanwhile word was brought them from
 Camarina that if they went there the town would go over to them, and
 also that the Syracusans were manning a fleet. 
 The Athenians accordingly sailed along shore with all their armament,
 first to Syracuse ,
 where they found no fleet manning, and so always along the coast to
 Camarina, where they brought to at the beach, and sent a herald to
 the people, who, however, refused to receive them, saying that their
 oaths bound them to receive the Athenians only with a single vessel,
 unless they themselves sent for more.

Disappointed here, the Athenians now sailed back again, and after
 landing and plundering on Syracusan territory and losing some
 stragglers from their light infantry through the coming up of the
 Syracusan horse, so got back to Catana .

There they found the Salaminia come
 from Athens for
 Alcibiades, with orders for him to sail home to answer the charges
 which the state brought against him, and for certain others of the
 soldiers who with him were accused of sacrilege in the matter of the
 mysteries and of the Hermae.

For the Athenians, after the departure of the expedition, had
 continued as active as ever in investigating the facts of the
 mysteries and of the Hermae, and, instead of testing the informers,
 in their suspicious temper welcomed all indifferently, arresting and
 imprisoning the best citizens upon the evidence of rascals, and
 preferring to sift the matter to the bottom sooner than to let an
 accused person of good character pass unquestioned, owing to the
 rascality of the informer.

The commons had heard how oppressive the tyranny of Pisistratus and
 his sons had become before it ended, and further that that tyranny
 had been put down at last, not by themselves and Harmodius, but by
 the Lacedaemonians, and so were always in fear and took everything
 suspiciously.

Indeed, the daring action of
 Aristogiton and Harmodius was undertaken in consequence of a love
 affair, which I shall relate at some length, to show that the
 Athenians are not more accurate than the rest of the world in their
 accounts of their own tyrants and of the facts of their own
 history.

Pisistratus dying at an advanced age in possession of the tyranny,
 was succeeded by his eldest son, Hippias, and not Hipparchus, as is
 vulgarly believed. 
 Harmodius was then in the flower of youthful beauty, and Aristogiton,
 a citizen in the middle rank of life, was his lover and possessed
 him.

Solicited without success by Hipparchus, son of Pisistratus,
 Harmodius told Aristogiton, and the enraged lover, afraid that the
 powerful Hipparchus might take Harmodius by force, immediately
 formed a design, such as his condition in life permitted, for
 overthrowing the tyranny.

In the meantime Hipparchus, after a second solicitation of Harmodius,
 attended with no better success, unwilling to use violence, arranged
 to insult him in some covert way.

Indeed, generally their government was not grievous to the multitude,
 or in any way odious in practice; and these tyrants cultivated
 wisdom and virtue as much as any, and without exacting from the
 Athenians more than a twentieth of their income, splendidly adorned
 their city, and carried on their wars, and provided sacrifices for
 the temples.

For the rest, the city was left in full enjoyment of its existing
 laws, except that care was always taken to have the offices in the
 hands of some one of the family. 
 Among those of them that held the yearly archonship at Athens was Pisistratus, son of
 the tyrant Hippias, and named after his grandfather, who dedicated
 during his term of office the altar to the twelve gods in the
 market-place, and that of Apollo in the Pythian precinct.

The Athenian people afterwards built on to and lengthened the altar
 in the market-place, and obliterated the inscription; but that in
 the Pythian precinct can still be seen, though in faded letters, and
 is to the following effect:— 
 Pisistratus, the son of Hippias, 
 Set up this record of his archonship 
 In precinct of Apollo Pythias.

That Hippias was the eldest son and
 succeeded to the government, is what I positively assert as a fact
 upon which I have had more exact accounts than others, and may be
 also ascertained by the following circumstance. 
 He is the only one of the legitimate brothers that appears to have
 had children; as the altar shows, and the pillar placed in the
 Athenian Acropolis, commemorating the crime of the tyrants, which
 mentions no child of Thessalus or of Hipparchus, but five of
 Hippias, which he had by Myrrhine, daughter of Callias, son of
 Hyperechides; and naturally the eldest would have married first.

Again, his name comes first on the pillar after that of his father,
 and this too is quite natural, as he was the eldest after him, and
 the reigning tyrant.

Nor can I ever believe that Hippias would have obtained the tyranny
 so easily, if Hipparchus had been in power when he was killed, and
 he, Hippias, had had to establish himself upon the same day; but he
 had no doubt been long accustomed to over-awe the citizens, and to
 be obeyed by his mercenaries, and thus not only conquered, but
 conquered with ease, without experiencing any of the embarrassment
 of a younger brother unused to the exercise of authority.

It was the sad fate which made Hipparchus famous that got him also
 the credit with posterity of having been tyrant.

To return to Harmodius; Hipparchus
 having been repulsed in his solicitations insulted him as he had
 resolved, by first inviting a sister of his, a young girl, to come
 and bear a basket in a certain procession, and then rejecting her,
 on the plea that she had never been invited at all owing to her
 unworthiness.

If Harmodius was indignant at this, Aristogiton for his sake now
 became more exasperated than ever; and having arranged everything
 with those who were to join them in the enterprise, they only waited
 for the great feast of the Panathenaea, the sole day upon which the
 citizens forming part of the procession could meet together in arms
 without suspicion. 
 Aristogiton and Harmodius were to begin, but were to be supported
 immediately by their accomplices against the bodyguard.

The conspirators were not many, for better security, besides which
 they hoped that those not in the plot would be carried away by the
 example of a few daring spirits, and use the arms in their hands to
 recover their liberty.

At last the festival arrived; and
 Hippias with his bodyguard was outside the city in the Ceramicus,
 arranging how the different parts of the procession were to
 proceed. 
 Harmodius and Aristogiton had already their daggers and were getting
 ready to act,

when seeing one of their accomplices talking familiarly with Hippias,
 who was easy of access to every one, they took fright, and concluded
 that they were discovered and on the point of being taken;

and eager if possible to be revenged first upon the man who had
 wronged them and for whom they had undertaken all this risk, they
 rushed, as they were, within the gates, and meeting with Hipparchus
 by the Leocorium recklessly fell upon him at once, infuriated,
 Aristogiton by love, and Harmodius by insult, and smote him and slew
 him.

Aristogiton escaped the guards at the moment, through the crowd
 running up, but was afterwards taken and dispatched in no merciful
 way: Harmodius was killed on the spot.

When the news was brought to Hippias
 in the Ceramicus, he at once proceeded not to the scene of action,
 but to the armed men in the procession, before they, being some
 distance away, knew anything of the matter, and composing his
 features for the occasion, so as not to betray himself, pointed to a
 certain spot, and bade them repair thither without their arms.

They withdrew accordingly, fancying he had something to say; upon
 which he told the mercenaries to remove the arms, and there and then
 picked out the men he thought guilty and all found with daggers, the
 shield and spear being the usual weapons for a procession.

In this way offended love first led
 Harmodius and Aristogiton to conspire, and the alarm of the moment
 to commit the rash action recounted.

After this the tyranny pressed harder on the Athenians, and Hippias,
 now grown more fearful, put to death many of the citizens, and at
 the same time began to turn his eyes abroad for a refuge in case of
 revolution.

Thus, although an Athenian, he gave his daughter, Archedice, to a
 Lampsacene, Aeantides, son of the tyrant of Lampsacus , seeing that they
 had great influence with Darius. 
 And there is her tomb in Lampsacus with this inscription:— 
 Archedice lies buried in this earth, 
 Hippias her sire, and Athens gave her birth; 
 Unto her bosom pride was never known, 
 Though daughter, wife, and sister to the throne.

Hippias, after reigning three years longer over the Athenians was
 deposed in the fourth by the Lacedaemonians and the banished
 Alcmaeonidae, and went with a safe conduct to Sigeum, and to
 Aeantides at Lampsacus , and from thence to King Darius; from
 whose court he set out twenty years after, in his old age, and came
 with the Medes to Marathon.

With these events in their minds, and
 recalling everything they knew by hearsay on the subject, the
 Athenian people grew difficult of humour and suspicious of the
 persons charged in the affair of the mysteries, and persuaded that
 all that had taken place was part of an oligarchical and monarchical
 conspiracy.

In the state of irritation thus produced, many persons of
 consideration had been already thrown into prison, and far from
 showing any signs of abating, public feeling grew daily more savage,
 and more arrests were made; until at last one of those in custody,
 thought to be the most guilty of all, was induced by a
 fellow-prisoner to make a revelation, whether true or not is a
 matter on which there are two opinions, no one having been able,
 either then or since, to say for certain who did the deed.

However this may be, the other found arguments to persuade him, that
 even if he had not done it, he ought to save himself by gaining a
 promise of impunity, and free the state of its present suspicions;
 as he would be surer of safety if he confessed after promise of
 impunity than if he denied and were brought to trial.

He accordingly made a revelation, affecting himself and others in the
 affair of the Hermae; and the Athenian people, glad at last, as they
 supposed, to get at the truth, and furious until then at not being
 able to discover those who had conspired against the commons, at
 once let go the informer and all the rest whom he had not denounced,
 and bringing the accused to trial executed as many as were
 apprehended, and condemned to death such as had fled and set a price
 upon their heads.

In this it was, after all, not clear whether the sufferers had been
 punished unjustly, while in any case the rest of the city received
 immediate and manifest relief.

To return to Alcibiades: public
 feeling was very hostile to him, being worked on by the same enemies
 who had attacked him before he went out; and now that the Athenians
 fancied that they had got at the truth of the matter of the Hermae,
 they believed more firmly than ever that the affair of the mysteries
 also, in which he was implicated, had been contrived by him in the
 same intention and was connected with the plot against the
 democracy.

Meanwhile it so happened that, just at the time of this agitation, a
 small force of Lacedaemonians had advanced as far as the Isthmus, in
 pursuance of some scheme with the Boeotians. 
 It was now thought that this had come by appointment, at his
 instigation, and not on account of the Boeotians, and that if the
 citizens had not acted on the information received, and forestalled
 them by arresting the prisoners, the city would have been
 betrayed. 
 The citizens went so far as to sleep one night armed in the temple of
 Theseus within the walls.

The friends also of Alcibiades at Argos were just at this time suspected of a design
 to attack the commons; and the Argive hostages deposited in the islands were given
 up by the Athenians to the Argive people to be put to death upon that
 account:

in short, everywhere something was found to create suspicion against
 Alcibiades. 
 It was therefore decided to bring him to trial and execute him, and
 the Salaminia was sent to Sicily for him and the others named in the
 information, with instructions to order him to come and answer the
 charges against him,

but not to arrest him, because they wished to avoid causing any
 agitation in the army or among the enemy in Sicily , and above all to retain
 the services of the Mantineans and Argives, who, it was thought, had
 been induced to join by his influence.

Alcibiades, with his own ship and his fellow-accused, accordingly
 sailed off with the Salaminia from Sicily , as though to return to Athens , and went with her as
 far as Thurii , and there
 they left the ship and disappeared, being afraid to go home for
 trial with such a prejudice existing against them.

The crew of the Salaminia stayed some time looking for Alcibiades and
 his companions, and at length, as they were nowhere to be found, set
 sail and departed. 
 Alcibiades, now an outlaw, crossed in a boat not long after from
 Thurii to Peloponnese ; and the Athenians
 passed sentence of death by default upon him and those in his
 company.

The Athenian generals left in
 Sicily now divided the
 armament into two parts, and each taking one by lot, sailed with the
 whole for Selinus and
 Egesta , wishing to know
 whether the Egestaeans would give the money, and to look into the
 question of Selinus and
 ascertain the state of the quarrel between her and Egesta .

Coasting along Sicily , with
 the shore on their left, on the side towards the Tyrrhene Gulf, they
 touched at Himera , the
 only Hellenic city in that part of the island, and being refused
 admission resumed their voyage.

On their way they took Hyccara, a petty Sicanian seaport,
 nevertheless at war with Egesta , and making slaves of the inhabitants gave
 up the town to the Egestaeans, some of whose horse had joined them;
 after which the army proceeded through the territory of the Sicels
 until it reached Catana ,
 while the fleet sailed along the coast with the slaves on board.

Meanwhile Nicias sailed straight from Hyccara along the coast and
 went to Egesta , and after
 transacting his other business and receiving thirty talents,
 rejoined the forces. 
 They now sold their slaves for the sum of one hundred and twenty
 talents,

and sailed round to their Sicel allies to urge them to send troops;
 and meanwhile went with half their own force to the hostile town of
 Hybla in the territory of Gela , but did not succeed in taking it.

Summer was now over. 
 The winter following, the Athenians at once began to prepare for
 moving on Syracuse ,
 and the Syracusans on their side for marching against them.

From the moment when the Athenians failed to attack them instantly as
 they at first feared and expected, every day that passed did
 something to revive their courage; and when they saw them sailing
 far away from them on the other side of Sicily , and going to Hybla only to fail in their
 attempts to storm it, they thought less of them than ever, and
 called upon their generals, as the multitude is apt to do in its
 moments of confidence, to lead them to Catana , since the enemy would
 not come to them.

Parties also of the Syracusan horse employed in reconnoitring
 constantly rode up to the Athenian armament, and among other insults
 asked them whether they had not really come to settle with the
 Syracusans in a foreign country rather than to resettle the
 Leontines in their own.

Aware of this, the Athenian generals
 determined to draw them out in mass as far as possible from the
 city, and themselves in the meantime to sail by night along shore,
 and take up at their leisure a convenient position. 
 This they knew they could not so well do, if they had to disembark
 from their ships in front of a force prepared for them, or to go by
 land openly. 
 The numerous cavalry of the Syracusans (a force which they were
 themselves without), would then be able to do the greatest mischief
 to their light troops and the crowd that followed them; but this
 plan would enable them to take up a position in which the horse
 could do them no hurt worth speaking of, some Syracusan exiles with
 the army having told them of the spot near the Olympieum, which they
 afterwards occupied. 
 In pursuance of their idea, the generals imagined the following
 stratagem.

They sent to Syracuse a
 man devoted to them, and by the Syracusan generals thought to be no
 less in their interest; he was a native of Catana , and said he came from
 persons in that place, whose names the Syracusan generals were
 acquainted with, and whom they knew to be among the members of their
 party still left in the city.

He told them that the Athenians passed the night in the town, at some
 distance from their arms, and that if the Syracusans would name a
 day and come with all their people at daybreak to attack the
 armament, they, their friends, would close the gates upon the troops
 in the city, and set fire to the vessels, while the Syracusans would
 easily take the camp by an attack upon the stockade. 
 In this they would be aided by many of the Catanians, who were
 already prepared to act, and from whom he himself came.

The generals of the Syracusans, who
 did not want confidence, and who had intended even without this to
 march on Catana ,
 believed the man without any sufficient inquiry, fixed at once a day
 upon which they would be there, and dismissed him, and the
 Selinuntines and others of their allies having now arrived, gave
 orders for all the Syracusans to march out in mass. 
 Their preparations completed, and the time fixed for their arrival
 being at hand, they set out for Catana , and passed the night upon the river
 Symaethus, in the Leontine territory.

Meanwhile the Athenians no sooner knew of their approach than they
 took all their forces and such of the Sicels or others as had joined
 them, put them on board their ships and boats, and sailed by night
 to Syracuse .

Thus, when morning broke the Athenians were landing opposite the
 Olympieum ready to seize their camping ground, and the Syracusan
 horse having ridden up first to Catana and found that all the armament had put to
 sea, turned back and told the infantry, and then all turned back
 together, and went to the relief of the city.

In the meantime, as the march before
 the Syracusans was a long one, the Athenians quietly sate down their
 army in a convenient position, where they could begin an engagement
 when they pleased, and where the Syracusan cavalry would have least
 opportunity of annoying them, either before or during the action,
 being fenced off on one side by walls, houses, trees, and by a
 marsh, and on the other by cliffs.

They also felled the neighbouring trees and carried them down to the
 sea, and formed a palisade alongside of their ships, and with stones
 which they picked up and wood hastily raised a fort at Daskon, the
 most vulnerable point of their position, and broke down the bridge
 over the Anapus.

These preparations were allowed to go on without any interruption
 from the city, the first hostile force to appear being the Syracusan
 cavalry, followed afterwards by all the foot together. 
 At first they came close up to the Athenian army, and then, finding
 that they did not offer to engage, crossed the Helorine road and
 encamped for the night.

The next day the Athenians and their
 allies prepared for battle, their dispositions being as
 follows:—Their right wing was occupied by the Argives and
 Mantineans, the centre by the Athenians, and the rest of the field
 by the other allies. 
 Half their army was drawn up eight deep in advance, half close to
 their tents in a hollow square, formed also eight deep, which had
 orders to look out and be ready to go to the support of the troops
 hardest pressed. 
 The camp followers were placed inside this reserve.

The Syracusans, meanwhile, formed their heavy infantry sixteen deep,
 consisting of the mass-levy of their own people, and such allies as
 had joined them, the strongest contingent being that of the
 Selinuntines; next to them the cavalry of the Geloans, numbering two
 hundred in all, with about twenty horse and fifty archers from
 Camarina. 
 The cavalry was posted on their right, full twelve hundred strong,
 and next to it the darters.

As the Athenians were about to begin the attack, Nicias went along
 the lines, and addressed these words of encouragement to the army
 and the nations composing it:—

‘Soldiers, a long exhortation is
 little needed by men like ourselves, who are here to fight in the
 same battle, the force itself being, to my thinking, more fit to
 inspire confidence than a fine speech with a weak army.

Where we have Argives, Mantineans, Athenians, and the first of the
 islanders in the ranks together, it were strange indeed, with so
 many and so brave companions in arms, if we did not feel confident
 of victory; especially when we have mass-levies opposed to our
 picked troops, and what is more, Siceliots, who may disdain us but
 will not stand against us, their skill not being at all commensurate
 to their rashness.

You may also remember that we are far from home and have no friendly
 land near, except what your own swords shall win you; and here I put
 before you a motive just the reverse of that which the enemy are
 appealing to; their cry being that they shall fight for their
 country, mine that we shall fight for a country that is not ours,
 where we must conquer or hardly get away, as we shall have their
 horse upon us in great numbers.

Remember, therefore, your renown, and go boldly against the enemy,
 thinking the present strait and necessity more terrible than
 they.’

After this address Nicias at once led
 on the army. 
 The Syracusans were not at that moment expecting an immediate
 engagement, and some had even gone away to the town, which was close
 by; these now ran up as hard as they could, and though behind time,
 took their places here or there in the main body as fast as they
 joined it. 
 Want of zeal or daring was certainly not the fault of the Syracusans,
 either in this or the other battles, but although not inferior in
 courage, so far as their military science might carry them, when
 this failed them they were compelled to give up their resolution
 also. 
 On the present occasion, although they had not supposed that the
 Athenians would begin the attack, and although constrained to stand
 upon their defence at short notice, they at once took up their arms
 and advanced to meet them.

First, the stone-throwers, slingers, and archers of either army began
 skirmishing, and routed or were routed by one another, as might be
 expected between light troops; next, soothsayers brought forward the
 usual victims, and trumpeters urged on the heavy infantry to the
 charge;

and thus they advanced, the Syracusans to fight for their country,
 and each individual for his safety that day and liberty hereafter;
 in the enemy's army, the Athenians to make another's country theirs
 and to save their own from suffering by their defeat; the Argives
 and independent allies to help them in getting what they came for,
 and to earn by victory another sight of the country they had left
 behind; while the subject allies owed most of their ardour to the
 desire of self-preservation, which they could only hope for if
 victorious; next to which, as a secondary motive, came the chance of
 serving on easier terms, after helping the Athenians to a fresh
 conquest.

The armies now came to close
 quarters, and for a long while fought without either giving
 ground. 
 Meanwhile there occurred some claps of thunder with lightning and
 heavy rain, which did not fail to add to the fears of the party
 fighting for the first time, and very little acquainted with war;
 while to their more experienced adversaries these phenomena appeared
 to be produced by the time of year, and much more alarm was felt at
 the continued resistance of the enemy.

At last the Argives drove in the Syracusan left, and after them the
 Athenians routed the troops opposed to them, and the Syracusan army
 was thus cut in two and betook itself to flight.

The Athenians did not pursue far, being held in check by the numerous
 and undefeated Syracusan horse, who attacked and drove back any of
 their heavy infantry whom they saw pursuing in advance of the rest;
 in spite of which the victors followed so far as was safe in a body,
 and then went back and set up a trophy.

Meanwhile the Syracusans rallied at the Helorine road, where they
 reformed as well as they could under the circumstances, and even
 sent a garrison of their own citizens to the Olympieum, fearing that
 the Athenians might lay hands on some of the treasures there. 
 The rest returned to the town.

The Athenians, however did not go to
 the temple, but collected their dead and laid them upon a pyre, and
 passed the night upon the field. 
 The next day they gave the enemy back their dead under truce, to the
 number of about two hundred and sixty, Syracusans and allies, and
 gathered together the bones of their own, some fifty, Athenians and
 allies, and taking the spoils of the enemy, sailed back to
 Catana .

It was now winter; and it did not seem possible for the moment to
 carry on the war before Syracuse , until horse should have been sent for
 from Athens and levied
 among the allies in Sicily—to do away with their utter inferiority
 in cavalry—and money should have been collected in the country and
 received from Athens ,
 and until some of the cities, which they hoped would be now more
 disposed to listen to them after the battle, should have been
 brought over, and corn and all other necessaries provided, for a
 campaign in the spring against Syracuse .

With this intention they sailed off
 to Naxos and
 Catana for the
 winter. 
 Meanwhile the Syracusans burned their dead, and then held an
 assembly,

in which Hermocrates, son of Hermon, a man who with a general ability
 of the first order had given proofs of military capacity and
 brilliant courage in the war, came forward and encouraged them, and
 told them not to let what had occurred make them give way,

since their spirit had not been conquered, but their want of
 discipline had done the mischief. 
 Still they had not been beaten by so much as might have been
 expected, especially as they were, one might say, novices in the art
 of war, an army of artisans opposed to the most practised soldiers
 in Hellas .

What had also done great mischief was the number of the generals
 (there were fifteen of them) and the quantity of orders given,
 combined with the disorder and insubordination of the troops. 
 But if they were to have a few skilful generals, and used this winter
 in preparing their heavy infantry, finding arms for such as had not
 got any, so as to make them as numerous as possible, and forcing
 them to attend to their training generally, they would have every
 chance of beating their adversaries, courage being already theirs
 and discipline in the field having thus been added to it. 
 Indeed, both these qualities would improve, since danger would
 exercise them in discipline, while their courage would be led to
 surpass itself by the confidence which skill inspires.

The generals should be few and elected with full powers, and an oath
 should be taken to leave them entire discretion in their command: if
 they adopted this plan, their secrets would be better kept, all
 preparations would be properly made, and there would be no room for
 excuses.

The Syracusans heard him, and voted
 everything as he advised, and elected three generals, Hermocrates
 himself, Heraclides, son of Lysimachus, and Sicanus, son of
 Execestes.

They also sent envoys to Corinth and Lacedaemon to procure a force of allies to join
 them, and to induce the Lacedaemonians for their sakes openly to
 address themselves in real earnest to the war against the Athenians,
 that they might either have to leave Sicily or be less able to send reinforcements to
 their army there.

The Athenian forces at Catana now at once sailed
 against Messina , in the
 expectation of its being betrayed to them. 
 The intrigue, however, after all came to nothing: Alcibiades, who was
 in the secret, when he left his command upon the summons from home,
 foreseeing that he would be outlawed, gave information of the plot
 to the friends of the Syracusans in Messina , who had at once put to death its authors,
 and now rose in arms against the opposite faction with those of
 their way of thinking, and succeeded in preventing the admission of
 the Athenians.

The latter waited for thirteen days, and then, as they were exposed
 to the weather and without provisions, and met with no success, went
 back to Naxos ,
 where they made places for their ships to lie in, erected a palisade
 round their camp, and retired into winter quarters; meanwhile they
 sent a galley to Athens 
 for money and cavalry to join them in the spring.

During the winter the Syracusans built a wall on to the city, so as
 to take in the statue of Apollo Temenites, all along the side
 looking towards Epipolae, to make the task of circumvallation longer
 and more difficult, in case of their being defeated, and also
 erected a fort at Megara 
 and another in the Olympieum, and stuck palisades along the sea
 wherever there was a landing place.

Meanwhile, as they knew that the Athenians were wintering at
 Naxos , they
 marched with all their people to Catana , and ravaged the land and set fire to the
 tents and encampment of the Athenians, and so returned home.

Learning also that the Athenians were sending an embassy to Camarina,
 on the strength of the alliance concluded in the time of Laches, to
 gain, if possible, that city, they sent another from Syracuse to oppose them. 
 They had a shrewd suspicion that the Camarinaeans had not sent what
 they did send for the first battle very willingly; and they now
 feared that would refuse to assist them at all in future, after
 seeing the success of the Athenians in the action, and would join
 the latter on the strength of their old friendship.

Hermocrates, with some others, accordingly arrived at Camarina from Syracuse , and Euphemus and
 others from the Athenians; and an assembly of the Camarinaeans
 having been convened, Hermocrates spoke as follows, in the hope of
 prejudicing them against the Athenians:—

‘Camarinaeans, we did not come on
 this embassy because we were afraid of your being frightened by the
 actual forces of the Athenians, but rather of your being gained by
 what they would say to you before you heard anything from us.

They are come to Sicily with
 the pretext that you know, and the intention which we all suspect,
 in my opinion less to restore the Leontines to their homes than to
 oust us from ours; as it is out of all reason that they should
 restore in Sicily the
 cities that they lay waste in Hellas , or should cherish the Leontine Chalcidians
 because of their Ionian blood, and keep in servitude the Euboean
 Chalcidians, of whom the Leontines are a colony.

No; but the same policy which has proved so successful in Hellas is now being tried in
 Sicily . 
 After being chosen as the leaders of the Ionians and of the other
 allies of Athenian origin, to punish the Mede , the Athenians accused some
 of failure in military service, some of fighting against each other,
 and others, as the case might be, upon any colourable pretext that
 could be found, until they thus subdued them all.

In fine, in the struggle against the Medes, the Athenians did not
 fight for the liberty of the Hellenes, or the Hellenes for their own
 liberty, but the former to make their countrymen serve them instead
 of him, the latter to change one master for another, wiser indeed
 than the first, but wiser for evil.

But we are not now come to declare to
 an audience familiar with them the misdeeds of a state so open to
 accusation as is the Athenian, but much rather to blame ourselves,
 who, with the warnings we possess in the Hellenes in those parts
 that have been enslaved through not supporting each other, and
 seeing the same sophisms being now tried upon ourselves—such as
 restorations of Leontine kinsfolk and support of Egestaean allies—do
 not stand together and resolutely show them that here are no
 Ionians, or Hellespontines, or islanders, who change continually,
 but always serve a master, sometimes the Mede and sometimes some other, but
 free Dorians from independent Peloponnese , dwelling in Sicily .

Or, are we waiting until we be taken in detail, one city after
 another; knowing as we do that in no other way can we be conquered,
 and seeing that they turn to this plan, so as to divide some of us
 by words, to draw some by the bait of an alliance into open war with
 each other, and to ruin others by such flattery as different
 circumstances may render acceptable? 
 And do we fancy when destruction first overtakes a distant
 fellow-countryman that the danger will not come to each of us also,
 or that he who suffers before us will suffer in himself alone?

As for the Camarinaean, who says that
 it is the Syracusan, not he, that is the enemy of the Athenian, and
 who thinks it hard to have to encounter risk in behalf of my
 country, I would have him bear in mind that he will fight in my
 country, not more for mine than for his own, and by so much the more
 safely in that he will enter on the struggle not alone, after the
 way has been cleared by my ruin, but with me as his ally; and that
 the object of the Athenian is not so much to punish the enmity of
 the Syracusan as to use me as a blind to secure the friendship of
 the Camarinaean.

As for him who envies or even fears us (and envied and feared great
 powers must always be), and who on this account wishes Syracuse to be humbled to
 teach us a lesson, but would still have her survive in the interest
 of his own security, the wish that he indulges is not humanly
 possible. 
 A man can control his own desires, but he cannot likewise control
 circumstances.

And in the event of his calculations proving mistaken, he may live to
 bewail his own misfortune, and wish to be again envying my
 prosperity.An idle wish, if he now sacrifice us and refuse to take
 his share of perils which are the same, in reality though not in
 name, for him as for us; what is nominally the preservation of our
 power being really his own salvation.

It was to be expected that you, of all people in the world,
 Camarinaeans, being our immediate neighbours and the next in danger,
 would have foreseen this, and instead of supporting us in the
 lukewarm way that you are now doing, would rather come to us of your
 own accord, and be now offering at Syracuse the aid which you would have asked for at
 Camarina , if to
 Camarina the Athenians had first come, to encourage us to resist the
 invader. 
 Neither you, however, nor the rest have as yet bestirred yourselves
 in this direction.

Fear perhaps will make you study to do right both by us and by the
 invaders, and plead that you have an alliance with the
 Athenians. 
 But you made that alliance, not against your friends, but against the
 enemies that might attack you, and to help the Athenians when they
 were wronged by others, not when as now they are wronging their
 neighbours.

Even the Rhegians, Chalcidians though they be, refuse to help to
 restore the Chalcidian Leontines; and it would be strange if, while
 they suspect the gist of this fine pretence and are wise without
 reason, you, with every reason on your side, should yet choose to
 assist your natural enemies, and should join with their direst foes
 in undoing those whom nature has made your own kinsfolk.

This is not to do right; but you should help us without fear of their
 armament, which has no terrors if we hold together, but only if we
 let them succeed in their endeavours to separate us; since even
 after attacking us by ourselves and being victorious in battle, they
 had to go off without effecting their purpose.

United, therefore, we have no cause
 to despair, but rather new encouragement to league together;
 especially as succors will come to us from the Peloponnesians, in
 military matters the undoubted superiors of the Athenians. 
 And you need not think that your prudent policy of taking sides with
 neither, because allies of both, is either safe for you or fair to
 us.

Practically it is not as fair as it pretends to be. 
 If the vanquished be defeated, and the victor conquer, through your
 refusing to join, what is the effect of your abstention but to leave
 the former to perish unaided, and to allow the latter to offend
 unhindered? 
 And yet it were more honourable to join those who are not only the
 injured party, but your own kindred, and by so doing to defend the
 common interests of Sicily 
 and save your friends the Athenians from doing wrong.

In conclusion, we Syracusans say that
 it is useless for us to demonstrate either to you or to the rest
 what you know already as well as we do; but we entreat, and if our
 entreaty fail, we protest that we are menaced by our eternal enemies
 the Ionians, and are betrayed by you our fellow Dorians.

If the Athenians reduce us, they will owe their victory to your
 decision, but in their own name will reap the honour, and will
 receive as the prize of their triumph the very men who enabled them
 to gain it. 
 On the other hand, if we are the conquerors, you will have to pay for
 having been the cause of our danger.

Consider, therefore; and now make your choice between the security
 which present servitude offers and the prospect of conquering with
 us and so escaping disgraceful submission to an Athenian master and
 avoiding the lasting enmity of Syracuse .’

Such were the words of Hermocrates;
 after whom Euphemus, the Athenian ambassador, spoke as follows:—

‘Although we came here only to renew
 the former alliance, the attack of the Syracusans compels us to
 speak of our empire and of the good right we have to it.

The best proof of this the speaker himself furnished, when he called
 the Ionians eternal enemies of the Dorians. 
 It is the fact; and the Peloponnesian Dorians being our superiors in
 numbers and next neighbours, we Ionians looked out for the best
 means of escaping their domination.

After the Median war we had a fleet, and so got rid of the empire and
 supremacy of the Lacedaemonians, who had no right to give orders to
 us more than we to them, except that of being the strongest at that
 moment; and being appointed leaders of the king's former subjects,
 we continue to be so, thinking that we are least likely to fall
 under the dominion of the Peloponnesians, if we have a force to
 defend ourselves with, and in strict truth having done nothing
 unfair in reducing to subjection the Ionians and islanders, the
 kinsfolk whom the Syracusans say we have enslaved.

They, our kinsfolk, came against their mother country, that is to say
 against us, together with the Mede , and instead of having the courage to revolt
 and sacrifice their property as we did when we abandoned our city,
 chose to be slaves themselves, and to try to make us so.

We, therefore, deserve to rule
 because we placed the largest fleet and an unflinching patriotism at
 the service of the Hellenes, and because these, our subjects, did us
 mischief by their ready subservience to the Medes; and, desert
 apart, we seek to strengthen ourselves against the
 Peloponnesians.

We make no fine professions of having a right to rule because we
 overthrew the barbarian single-handed, or because we risked what we
 did risk for the freedom of the subjects in question any more than
 for that of all, and for our own: no one can be quarrelled with for
 providing for his proper safety. 
 If we are now here in Sicily , it is equally in the interest of our security,
 with which we perceive that your interest also coincides.

We prove this from the conduct which the Syracusans cast against us
 and which you somewhat too timorously suspect; knowing that those
 whom fear has made suspicious, may be carried away by the charm of
 eloquence for the moment, but when they come to act follow their
 interests.

Now, as we have said, fear makes us
 hold our empire in Hellas ,
 and fear makes us now come, with the help of our friends, to order
 safely matters in Sicily ,
 and not to enslave any but rather to prevent any from being
 enslaved.

Meanwhile, let no one imagine that we are interesting ourselves in
 you without your having anything to do with us, seeing that if you
 are preserved and able to make head against the Syracusans, they
 will be less likely to harm us by sending troops to the
 Peloponnesians.

In this way you have everything to do with us, and on this account it
 is perfectly reasonable for us to restore the Leontines, and to make
 them, not subjects like their kinsmen in Euboea , but as powerful as
 possible, to help us by annoying the Syracusans from their
 frontier.

In Hellas we are alone a
 match for our enemies; and as for the assertion that it is out of
 all reason that we should free the Sicilian, while we enslave the
 Chalcidian, the fact is that the latter is useful to us by being
 without arms and contributing money only; while the former, the
 Leontines and our other friends, cannot be too independent.

Besides, for tyrants and imperial
 cities nothing is unreasonable if expedient, no one a kinsman unless
 sure; but friendship or enmity is everywhere an affair of time and
 circumstance. 
 Here, in Sicily , our
 interest is not to weaken our friends, but by means of their
 strength to cripple our enemies. 
 Why doubt this? 
 In Hellas we treat our allies as we find them useful.

The Chians and Methymnians govern themselves and furnish ships; most
 of the rest have harder terms and pay tribute in money; while
 others, although islanders and easy for us to take, are free
 altogether, because they occupy convenient positions round
 Peloponnese .

In our settlement of the states here in Sicily , we should, therefore, naturally be guided
 by our interest, and by fear, as we say, of the Syracusans. 
 Their ambition is to rule you, their object to use the suspicions
 that we excite to unite you, and then, when we have gone away
 without effecting anything, by force or through your isolation, to
 become the masters of Sicily . 
 And masters they must become, if you unite with them; as a force of
 that magnitude would be no longer easy for us to deal with united,
 and they would be more than a match for you as soon as we were away.

Any other view of the case is
 condemned by the facts. 
 When you first asked us over, the fear which you held out was that of
 danger to Athens if we
 let you come under the dominion of Syracuse ;

and it is not right now to mistrust the very same argument by which
 you claimed to convince us, or to give way to suspicion because we
 are come with a larger force against the power of that city. 
 Those whom you should really distrust are the Syracusans.

We are not able to stay here without you, and if we proved perfidious
 enough to bring you into subjection, we should be unable to keep you
 in bondage, owing to the length of the voyage and the difficulty of
 guarding large, and in a military sense continental, towns: they,
 the Syracusans, live close to you, not in a camp, but in a city
 greater than the force we have with us, plot always against you,
 never let slip an opportunity once offered,

as they have shown in the case of the Leontines and others, and now
 have the face, just as if you were fools, to invite you to aid them
 against the power that hinders this, and that has thus far
 maintained Sicily 
 independent.

We, as against them, invite you to a much more real safety, when we
 beg you not to betray that common safety which we each have in the
 other, and to reflect that they, even without allies, will, by their
 numbers, have always the way open to you, while you will not often
 have the opportunity of defending yourselves with such numerous
 auxiliaries; if, through your suspicions, you once let these go away
 unsuccessful or defeated, you will wish to see if only a handful of
 them back again, when the day is past in which their presence could
 do anything for you.

But we hope, Camarinaeans, that the
 calumnies of the Syracusans will not be allowed to succeed either
 with you or with the rest: we have told you the whole truth upon the
 things we are suspected of, and will now briefly recapitulate, in
 the hope of convincing you.

We assert that we are rulers in Hellas in order not to be subjects; liberators in
 Sicily that we may not
 be harmed by the Sicilians; that we are compelled to interfere in
 many things, because we have many things to guard against; and that
 now, as before, we are come as allies to those of you who suffer
 wrong in this island, not without invitation but upon
 invitation.

Accordingly, instead of making yourselves judges or censors of our
 conduct, and trying to turn us, which it were now difficult to do,
 so far as there is anything in our interfering policy or in our
 character, that chimes in with your interest, this take and make use
 of; and be sure that far from being injurious to all alike, to most
 of the Hellenes that policy is even beneficial.

Thanks to it, all men in all places, even where we are not, who
 either apprehend or meditate aggression, from the near prospect
 before them, in the one case, of obtaining our intervention in their
 favour, in the other, of our arrival making the venture dangerous,
 find themselves constrained, respectively, to be moderate against
 their will, and to be preserved without trouble of their own.

Do not you reject this security that is open to all who desire it,
 and is now offered to you; but do like others, and instead of being
 always on the defensive against the Syracusans, unite with us, and
 in your turn at last threaten them.’

Such were the words of Euphemus. 
 What the Camarinaeans felt was this. 
 Sympathising with the Athenians, except in so far as they might be
 afraid of their subjugating Sicily , they had always been at enmity with their
 neighbour Syracuse . 
 From the very fact, however, that they were their neighbours, they
 feared the Syracusans most of the two, and being apprehensive of
 their conquering even without them, both sent them in the first
 instance the few horsemen mentioned, and for the future determined
 to support them most in fact, although as sparingly as possible; but
 for the moment in order not to seem to slight the Athenians,
 especially as they had been successful in the engagement, to answer
 both alike.

Agreeably to this resolution they answered that as both the
 contending parties happened to be allies of theirs, they thought it
 most consistent with their oaths, at present, to side with neither;
 with which answer the ambassadors of either party departed.

In the meantime, while Syracuse pursued her
 preparations for war, the Athenians were encamped at Naxos , and tried by
 negotiation to gain as many of the Sicels as possible.

Those more in the low lands, and subjects of Syracuse , mostly held aloof;
 but the peoples of the interior who had never been otherwise than
 independent, with few exceptions, at once joined the Athenians, and
 brought down corn to the army, and in some cases even money.

The Athenians marched against those who refused to join, and forced
 some of them to do so; in the case of others they were stopped by
 the Syracusans sending garrisons and reinforcements. 
 Meanwhile the Athenians moved their winter quarters from Naxos to Catana , and reconstructed the
 camp burnt by the Syracusans, and stayed there the rest of the
 winter.

They also sent a galley to Carthage , with proffers of friendship, on the
 chance of obtaining assistance, and another to Tyrrhenia; some of
 the cities there having spontaneously offered to join them in the
 war. 
 They also sent round to the Sicels and to Egesta , desiring them to send them
 as many horses as possible, and meanwhile prepared bricks, iron, and
 all other things necessary for the work of circumvallation,
 intending by the spring to begin hostilities.

In the meantime the Syracusan envoys
 despatched to Corinth 
 and Lacedaemon tried as
 they passed along the coast to persuade the Italiots to interfere
 with the proceedings of the Athenians, which threatened Italy quite as much as Syracuse , and having arrived
 at Corinth made a
 speech calling on the Corinthians to assist them on the ground of
 their common origin.

The Corinthians voted at once to aid them heart and soul themselves,
 and then sent on envoys with them to Lacedaemon , to help them to persuade her also to
 prosecute the war with the Athenians more openly at home and to send
 succors to Sicily .

The envoys from Corinth 
 having reached Lacedaemon 
 found there Alcibiades with his fellow-refugees, who had at once
 crossed over in a trading vessel from Thurii , first to Cyllene in
 Elis , and afterwards
 from thence to Lacedaemon ;
 upon the Lacedaemonians' own invitation, after first obtaining a
 safe conduct, as he feared them for the part he had taken in the
 affair of Mantinea .

The result was that the Corinthians, Syracusans, and Alcibiades,
 pressing all the same request in the assembly of the Lacedaemonians,
 succeeded in persuading them; but as the Ephors and the authorities,
 although resolved to send envoys to Syracuse to prevent their
 surrendering to the Athenians, showed no disposition to send them
 any assistance, Alcibiades now came forward and inflamed and stirred
 the Lacedaemonians by speaking as follows:—

‘I am forced first to speak to you of
 the prejudice with which I am regarded, in order that suspicion may
 not make you disinclined to listen to me upon public matters.

The connection with you as your Proxeni, which the ancestors of our
 family by reason of some discontent renounced, I personally tried to
 renew by my good offices towards you, in particular upon the
 occasion of the disaster at Pylos . 
 But although I maintained this friendly attitude, you yet chose to
 negotiate the peace with the Athenians through my enemies, and thus
 to strengthen them and to discredit me.

You had therefore no right to complain if I turned to the Mantineans
 and Argives, and seized other occasions of thwarting and injuring
 you; and the time has now come when those among you, who in the
 bitterness of the moment may have been then unfairly angry with me,
 should look at the matter in its true light, and take a different
 view. 
 Those again who judged me unfavourably, because I leaned rather to
 the side of the commons, must not think that their dislike is any
 better founded.

We have always been hostile to tyrants, and all who oppose arbitrary
 power are called commons; hence we continued to act as leaders of
 the multitude; besides which, as democracy was the government of the
 city, it was necessary in most things to conform to established
 conditions.

However, we endeavoured to be more moderate than the licentious
 temper of the times; and while there were others, formerly as now,
 who tried to lead the multitude astray, the same who banished
 me,

our party was that of the whole people, our creed being to do our
 part in preserving the form of government under which the city
 enjoyed the utmost greatness and freedom, and which we had found
 existing. 
 As for democracy, the men of sense among us knew what it was, and I
 perhaps as well as any, as I have the more cause to complain of it;
 but there is nothing new to be said of a patent absurdity—meanwhile
 we did not think it safe to alter it under the pressure of your
 hostility.

So much then for the prejudices with
 which I am regarded: I now can call your attention to the questions
 you must consider, and upon which superior knowledge perhaps permits
 me to speak.

We sailed to Sicily first to
 conquer, if possible, the Siceliots, and after them the Italiots
 also, and finally to assail the empire and city of Carthage .

In the event of all or most of these schemes succeeding, we were then
 to attack Peloponnese ,
 bringing with us the entire force of the Hellenes lately acquired in
 those parts, and taking a number of barbarians into our pay, such as
 the Iberians and others in those countries, confessedly the most
 warlike known, and building numerous galleys in addition to those
 which we had already, timber being plentiful in Italy ; and with this fleet
 blockading Peloponnese from
 the sea and assailing it with our armies by land, taking some of the
 cities by storm, drawing works of circumvallation round others, we
 hoped without difficulty to effect its reduction, and after this to
 rule the whole of the Hellenic name.

Money and corn meanwhile for the better execution of these plans were
 to be supplied in sufficient quantities by the newly acquired places
 in those countries, independently of our revenues here at home.

You have thus heard the history of
 the present expedition from the man who most exactly knows what our
 objects were; and the remaining generals will, if they can, carry
 these out just the same. 
 But that the states in Sicily must succumb if you do not help them, I will
 now show.

Although the Siceliots, with all their inexperience, might even now
 be saved if their forces were united, the Syracusans alone, beaten
 already in one battle with all their people and blockaded from the
 sea, will be unable to withstand the Athenian armament that is now
 there.

But if Syracuse falls,
 all Sicily falls also, and
 Italy immediately
 afterwards; and the danger which I just now spoke of from that
 quarter will before long be upon you.

None need therefore fancy that Sicily only is in question; Peloponnese will be so also,
 unless you speedily do as I tell you, and send on board ship to
 Syracuse troops
 that shall be able to row their ships themselves, and serve as heavy
 infantry the moment that they land; and what I consider even more
 important than the troops, a Spartan as commanding officer to
 discipline the forces already on foot and to compel recusants to
 serve. 
 The friends that you have already will thus become more confident,
 and the waverers will be encouraged to join you.

Meanwhile you must carry on the war here more openly, that the
 Syracusans seeing that you do not forget them, may put heart into
 their resistance, and that the Athenians may be less able to
 reinforce their armament.

You must fortify Decelea in Attica , the blow of which the Athenians are always
 most afraid and the only one that they think they have not
 experienced in the present war; the surest method of harming an
 enemy being to find out what he most fears, and to choose this means
 of attacking him, since every one naturally knows best his own weak
 points and fears accordingly.

The fortification in question, while it benefits you, will create
 difficulties for your adversaries, of which I shall pass over many,
 and shall only mention the chief. 
 Whatever property there is in the country will most of it become
 yours, either by capture or surrender; and the Athenians will at
 once be deprived of their revenues from the silver mines at
 Laurium , of their
 present gains from their land and from the law courts, and above all
 of the revenue from their allies, which will be paid less regularly,
 as they lose their awe of Athens , and see you addressing yourselves with
 vigour to the war.

The zeal and speed with which all this shall be done depends,
 Lacedaemonians, upon yourselves; as to its possibility, I am quite
 confident, and I have little fear of being mistaken.

Meanwhile I hope that none of you
 will think any the worse of me if after having hitherto passed as a
 lover of my country, I now actively join its worst enemies in
 attacking it, or will suspect what I say as the fruit of an outlaw's
 enthusiasm.

I am an outlaw from the iniquity of those who drove me forth, not, if
 you will be guided by me, from your service: my worst enemies are
 not you who only harmed your foes, but they who forced their friends
 to become enemies;

and love of country is what I do not feel when I am wronged, but what
 I felt when secure in my rights as a citizen. 
 Indeed I do not consider that I am now attacking a country that is
 still mine; I am rather trying to recover one that is mine no
 longer; and the true lover of his country is not he who consents to
 lose it unjustly rather than attack it, but he who longs for it so
 much that he will go all lengths to recover it.

For myself, therefore, Lacedaemonians, I beg you to use me without
 scruple for danger and trouble of every kind, and to remember the
 argument in every one's mouth, that if I did you great harm as an
 enemy, I could likewise do you good service as a friend, inasmuch as
 I know the plans of the Athenians, while I only guessed yours. 
 For yourselves I entreat you to believe that your most capital
 interests are now under deliberation; and I urge you to send without
 hesitation the expeditions to Sicily and Attica ; by the presence of a small part of your
 forces you will save important cities in that island, and you will
 destroy the power of Athens both present and prospective; after this you
 will dwell in security and enjoy the supremacy over all Hellas , resting not on force but
 upon consent and affection.’

Such were the words of
 Alcibiades. 
 The Lacedaemonians, who had themselves before intended to march
 against Athens , but were
 still waiting and looking about them, at once became much more in
 earnest when they received this particular information from
 Alcibiades, and considered that they had heard it from the man who
 best knew the truth of the matter.

Accordingly they now turned their attention to the fortifying of
 Decelea and sending immediate aid to the Sicilians; and naming
 Gylippus, son of Cleandridas, to the command of the Syracusans, bade
 him consult with that people and with the Corinthians and arrange
 for succors reaching the island, in the best and speediest way
 possible under the circumstances.

Gylippus desired the Corinthians to send him at once two ships to
 Asine , and to prepare
 the rest that they intended to send, and to have them ready to sail
 at the proper time. 
 Having settled this, the envoys departed from Lacedaemon .

In the meantime arrived the Athenian
 galley from Sicily sent by
 the generals for money and cavalry; and the Athenians, after hearing
 what they wanted, voted to send the supplies for the armament and
 the cavalry. 
 And the winter ended, and with it ended the seventeenth year of the
 present war of which Thucydides is the historian.

The next summer, at the very
 beginning of the season, the Athenians in Sicily put out from Catana , and sailed along shore
 to Megara in Sicily , from which, as I have
 mentioned above, the Syracusans expelled the inhabitants in the time
 of their tyrant Gelo, themselves occupying the territory.

Here the Athenians landed and laid waste the country, and after an
 unsuccessful attack upon a fort of the Syracusans, went on with the
 fleet and army to the river Terias, and advancing inland laid waste
 the plain and set fire to the corn; and after killing some of a
 small Syracusan party which they encountered, and setting up a
 trophy, went back again to their ships.

They now sailed to Catana 
 and took in provisions there, and going with their whole force
 against Centoripa, a town of the Sicels, acquired it by
 capitulation, and departed, after also burning the corn of the
 Inessaens and Hybleans.

Upon their return to Catana they found the horsemen arrived from
 Athens , to the
 number of two hundred and fifty (with their equipments, but without
 their horses which were to be procured upon the spot), and thirty
 mounted archers and three hundred talents of silver.

The same spring the Lacedaemonians
 marched against Argos ,
 and went as far as Cleonae, when an earthquake occurred and caused
 them to return. 
 After this the Argives invaded the Thyreatid, which is on their
 border, and took much booty from the Lacedaemonians, which was sold
 for no less than twenty-five talents.

The same summer, not long after, the Thespian commons made an attack
 upon the party in office, which was not successful, but succors
 arrived from Thebes , and
 some were caught, while others took refuge at Athens .

The same summer the Syracusans
 learned that the Athenians had been joined by their cavalry, and
 were on the point of marching against them; and seeing that without
 becoming masters of Epipolae, a precipitous spot situated exactly
 over the town, the Athenians could not, even if victorious in
 battle, easily invest them, they determined to guard its approaches,
 in order that the enemy might not ascend unobserved by this, the
 sole way by which ascent was possible,

as the remainder is lofty ground, and falls right down to the city,
 and can all be seen from inside; and as it lies above the rest the
 place is called by the Syracusans Epipolae or Overtown.

They accordingly went out in mass at daybreak into the meadow along
 the river Anapus, their new generals, Hermocrates and his
 colleagues, having just come into office, and held a review of their
 heavy infantry, from whom they first selected a picked body of six
 hundred, under the command of Diomilus, an exile from Andros , to guard Epipolae,
 and to be ready to muster at a moment's notice to help wherever help
 should be required.

Meanwhile the Athenians, the very
 same morning, were holding a review, having already made land
 unobserved with all the armament from Catana , opposite a place called
 Leon , not much more than half a mile from
 Epipolae, where they disembarked their army, bringing the fleet to
 anchor at Thapsus , a
 peninsula running out into the sea, with a narrow isthmus, and not
 far from the city of Syracuse either by land or water.

While the naval force of the Athenians threw a stockade across the
 isthmus and remained quiet at Thapsus , the land army immediately went on at a run
 to Epipolae, and succeeded in getting up by Euryelus before the
 Syracusans perceived them, or could come up from the meadow and the
 review.

Diomilus with his six hundred and the rest advanced as quickly as
 they could, but they had nearly three miles to go from the meadow
 before reaching them.

Attacking in this way in considerable disorder, the Syracusans were
 defeated in battle at Epipolae and retired to the town, with a loss
 of about three hundred killed, and Diomilus among the number.

After this the Athenians set up a trophy and restored to the
 Syracusans their dead under truce, and next day descended to
 Syracuse itself;
 and no one coming out to meet them, reascended and built a fort at
 Labdalum , upon the
 edge of the cliffs of Epipolae, looking towards Megara , to serve as a magazine
 for their baggage and money, whenever they advanced to give battle
 or to work at the lines.

Not long afterwards three hundred
 cavalry came to them from Egesta , and about a hundred from the Sicels,
 Naxians, and others; and thus, with the two hundred and fifty from
 Athens , for whom
 they had got horses from the Egestaeans and Catanians, besides
 others that they bought, they now mustered six hundred and fifty
 cavalry in all.

After posting a garrison in Labdalum , they advanced to Syca, where they sate
 down and quickly built the Circle or centre of their wall of
 circumvallation. 
 The Syracusans, appalled at the rapidity with which the work
 advanced, determined to go out against them and give battle and
 interrupt it;

and the two armies were already in battle array, when the Syracusan
 generals observed that their troops found such difficulty in getting
 into line, and were in such disorder, that they led them back into
 the town, except part of the cavalry. 
 These remained and hindered the Athenians from carrying stones or
 dispersing to any great distance,

until a tribe of the Athenian heavy infantry, with all the cavalry,
 charged and routed the Syracusan horse with some loss; after which
 they set up a trophy for the cavalry action.

The next day the Athenians began
 building the wall to the north of the Circle, at the same time
 collecting stone and timber, which they kept laying down towards
 Trogilus along the shortest line for their works from the great
 harbour to the sea;

while the Syracusans, guided by their generals, and above all by
 Hermocrates, instead of risking any more general engagements,
 determined to build a counterwork in the direction in which the
 Athenians were going to carry their wall. 
 If this could be completed in time the enemy's lines would be cut;
 and meanwhile, if he were to attempt to interrupt them by an attack,
 they would send a part of their forces against him, and would secure
 the approaches beforehand with their stockade, while the Athenians
 would have to leave off working with their whole force in order to
 attend to them.

They accordingly sallied forth and began to build, starting from
 their city, running a cross wall below the Athenian Circle, cutting
 down the olives and erecting wooden towers.

As the Athenian fleet had not yet sailed round into the great
 harbour, the Syracusans still commanded the sea-coast, and the
 Athenians brought their provisions by land from Thapsus .

The Syracusans now thought the
 stockades and stonework of their counter-wall sufficiently far
 advanced; and as the Athenians, afraid of being divided and so
 fighting at a disadvantage, and intent upon their own wall, did not
 come out to interrupt them, they left one tribe to guard the new
 work and went back into the city. 
 Meanwhile the Athenians destroyed their pipes of drinking-water
 carried underground into the city; and watching until the rest of
 the Syracusans were in their tents at midday, and some even gone
 away into the city, and those in the stockade keeping but
 indifferent guard, appointed three hundred picked men of their own,
 and some men picked from the light troops and armed for the purpose,
 to run suddenly as fast as they could to the counterwork, while the
 rest of the army advanced in two divisions, the one with one of the
 generals to the city in case of a sortie, the other with the other
 general to the stockade by the postern gate.

The three hundred attacked and took the stockade, abandoned by its
 garrison, who took refuge in the outworks round the statue of Apollo
 Temenites. 
 Here the pursuers burst in with them, and after getting in were
 beaten out by the Syracusans, and some few of the Argives and
 Athenians slain;

after which the whole army retired, and having demolished the
 counterwork and pulled up the stockade, carried away the stakes to
 their own lines, and set up a trophy.

The next day the Athenians from the
 Circle proceeded to fortify the cliff above the marsh which on this
 side of Epipolae looks towards the great harbour; this being also
 the shortest line for their work to go down across the plain and the
 marsh to the harbour.

Meanwhile the Syracusans marched out and began a second stockade,
 starting from the city, across the middle of the marsh, digging a
 trench alongside to make it impossible for the Athenians to carry
 their wall down to the sea.

As soon as the Athenians had finished their work at the cliff they
 again attacked the stockade and ditch of the Syracusans. 
 Ordering the fleet to sail round from Thapsus into the great harbour of Syracuse , they descended at
 about dawn from Epipolae into the plain, and laying doors and planks
 over the marsh where it was muddy and firmest, crossed over on
 these, and by daybreak took the ditch and the stockade, except a
 small portion which they captured afterwards.

A battle now ensued, in which the Athenians were victorious, the
 right wing of the Syracusans flying to the town and the left to the
 river. 
 The three hundred picked Athenians, wishing to cut off their passage,
 pressed on at a run to the bridge,

when the alarmed Syracusans, who had with them most of their cavalry,
 closed and routed them, hurling them back upon the Athenian right
 wing, the first tribe of which was thrown into a panic by the
 shock.

Seeing this, Lamachus came to their aid from the Athenian left with a
 few archers and with the Argives, and crossing a ditch, was left
 alone with a few that had crossed with him, and was killed with five
 or six of his men. 
 These the Syracusans managed immediately to snatch up in haste and
 get across the river into a place of security, themselves retreating
 as the rest of the Athenian army now came up.

Meanwhile those who had at first fled
 for refuge to the city, seeing the turn affairs were taking, now
 rallied from the town and formed against the Athenians in front of
 them, sending also a part of their number to the Circle on Epipolae,
 which they hoped to take while denuded of its defenders.

These took and destroyed the Athenian outwork of a thousand feet, the
 Circle itself being saved by Nicias, who happened to have been left
 in it through illness, and who now ordered the servants to set fire
 to the engines and timber thrown down before the wall; want of men,
 as he was aware, rendering all other means of escape impossible.

This step was justified by the result, the Syracusans not coming any
 further on account of the fire, but retreating. 
 Meanwhile succors were coming up from the Athenians below, who had
 put to flight the troops opposed to them; and the fleet also,
 according to orders, was sailing from Thapsus into the great harbour.

Seeing this, the troops on the heights retired in haste, and the
 whole army of the Syracusans re-entered the city, thinking that with
 their present force they would no longer be able to hinder the wall
 reaching the sea.

After this the Athenians set up a
 trophy and restored to the Syracusans their dead under truce,
 receiving in return Lamachus and those who had fallen with him. 
 The whole of their forces, naval and military, being now with them,
 they began from Epipolae and the cliffs and enclosed the Syracusans
 with a double wall down to the sea.

Provisions were now brought in for the armament from all parts of
 Italy ; and many of the
 Sicels, who had hitherto been looking to see how things went, came
 as allies to the Athenians: there also arrived three ships of fifty
 oars from Tyrrhenia. 
 Meanwhile everything else progressed favourably for their hopes.

The Syracusans began to despair of finding safety in arms, no relief
 having reached them from Peloponnese , and were now proposing terms of
 capitulation among themselves and to Nicias, who after the death of
 Lamachus was left sole commander.

No decision was come to, but as was natural with men in difficulties
 and besieged more straitly than before, there was much discussion
 with Nicias and still more in the town. 
 Their present misfortunes had also made them suspicious of one
 another; and the blame of their disasters was thrown upon the
 ill-fortune or treachery of the generals under whose command they
 had happened; and these were deposed and others, Heraclides, Eucles,
 and Tellias, elected in their stead.

Meanwhile the Lacedaemonian,
 Gylippus, and the ships from Corinth were now off Leucas , intent upon going
 with all haste to the relief of Sicily . 
 The reports that reached them being of an alarming kind, and all
 agreeing in the falsehood that Syracuse was already completely invested, Gylippus
 abandoned all hope of Sicily , and wishing to save Italy , rapidly crossed the
 Ionian Sea to
 Tarentum with the
 Corinthian, Pythen, two Laconian, and two Corinthian vessels,
 leaving the Corinthians to follow him after manning, in addition to
 their own ten, two Leucadian and two Ambraciot ships.

From Tarentum Gylippus first went on an embassy to Thurii , and claimed anew the
 rights of citizenship which his father had enjoyed; failing to bring
 over the townspeople, he weighed anchor and coasted along Italy . 
 Opposite the Terinaean gulf he was caught by the wind which blows
 violently and steadily from the north in that quarter, and was
 carried out to sea; and after experiencing very rough weather,
 remade Tarentum , where he
 hauled ashore and refitted such of his ships as had suffered most
 from the tempest.

Nicias heard of his approach, but, like the Thurians, despised the
 scanty number of his ships, and set down piracy as the only probable
 object of the voyage, and so took no precautions for the present.

About the same time in this summer,
 the Lacedaemonians invaded Argos with their allies, and laid waste most of the
 country. 
 The Athenians went with thirty ships to the relief of the Argives,
 thus breaking their treaty with the Lacedaemonians in the most overt
 manner.

Up to this time incursions from Pylos , descents on the coasts of the rest of
 Peloponnese , instead of
 on the Laconian, had been the extent of their cooperation with the
 Argives and Mantineans; and although the Argives had often begged
 them to land, if only for a moment, with their heavy infantry in
 Laconia , lay waste ever
 so little of it with them, and depart, they had always refused to do
 so. 
 Now, however, under the command of Pythodorus, Laespodius, and
 Demaratus, they landed at Epidaurus , Limera, Prasiae, and other places, and
 plundered the country; and thus furnished the Lacedaemonians with a
 better pretext for hostilities against Athens .

After the Athenians had retired from Argos with their fleet, and the Lacedaemonians
 also, the Argives made an incursion into the Phliasid, and returned
 home after ravaging their land and killing some of the
 inhabitants.

After refitting their ships, Gylippus
 and Pythen coasted along from Tarentum to Epizephyrian Locris. 
 They now received the more correct information that Syracuse was not yet
 completely invested, but that it was still possible for an army
 arriving by Epipolae to effect an entrance; and they consulted,
 accordingly, whether they should keep Sicily on their right and risk sailing in by sea,
 or leaving it on their left, should first sail to Himera, and taking
 with them the Himeraeans and any others that might agree to join
 them, go to Syracuse 
 by land.

Finally they determined to sail for Himera, especially as the four
 Athenian ships which Nicias had at length sent off, on hearing that
 they were at Locris , had
 not yet arrived at Rhegium . 
 Accordingly, before these reached their post, the Peloponnesians
 crossed the strait, and after touching at Rhegium and Messina , came to Himera .

Arrived there, they persuaded the Himeraeans to join in the war, and
 not only to go with them themselves but to provide arms for the
 seamen from their vessels which they had drawn ashore at Himera; and
 they sent and appointed a place for the Selinuntines to meet them
 with all their forces.

A few troops were also promised by the Geloans and some of the
 Sicels, who were now ready to join them with much greater alacrity,
 owing to the recent death of Archonidas, a powerful Sicel king in
 that neighborhood and friendly to Athens , and owing also to the vigor shown by
 Gylippus in coming from Lacedaemon .

Gylippus now took with him about seven hundred of his sailors and
 marines, that number only having arms, a thousand heavy infantry and
 light troops from Himera with a body of a hundred horse, some light
 troops and cavalry from Selinus , a few Geloans, and Sicels numbering a
 thousand in all, and set out on his march for Syracuse .

Meanwhile the Corinthian fleet from
 Leucas made all
 haste to arrive; and one of their commanders, Gongylus, starting
 last with a single ship, was the first to reach Syracuse , a little before
 Gylippus. 
 Gongylus found the Syracusans on the point of holding an assembly to
 consider whether they should not put an end to the war. 
 This he prevented, and reassured them by telling them that more
 vessels were still to arrive, and that Gylippus, son of Cleandridas,
 had been despatched by the Lacedaemonians to take the command.

Upon this the Syracusans took courage, and immediately marched out
 with all their forces to meet Gylippus, who they found was now close
 at hand.

Meanwhile Gylippus, after taking Ietae, a fort of the Sicels, on his
 way, formed his army in order of battle, and so arrived at Epipolae,
 and ascending by Euryelus, as the Athenians had done at first, now
 advanced with the Syracusans against the Athenian lines.

His arrival chanced at a critical moment. 
 The Athenians had already finished a double wall of six or seven
 furlongs to the great harbor, with the exception of a small portion
 next to the sea, which they were still engaged upon; and in the
 remainder of the circle towards Trogilus on the other sea, stones
 had been laid ready for building for the greater part of the
 distance, and some points had been left half finished, while others
 were entirely completed. 
 The danger of Syracuse 
 had indeed been great.

Meanwhile the Athenians, recovering
 from the confusion into which they had been at first thrown by the
 sudden approach of Gylippus and the Syracusans, formed in order of
 battle. 
 Gylippus halted at a short distance off and sent on a herald to tell
 them that if they would evacuate Sicily with bag and baggage within five days' time,
 he was willing to make a truce accordingly.

The Athenians treated this proposition with contempt, and dismissed
 the herald without an answer. 
 After this both sides began to prepare for action.

Gylippus, observing that the Syracusans were in disorder and did not
 easily fall into line, drew off his troops more into the open
 ground, while Nicias did not lead on the Athenians but lay still by
 his own wall. 
 When Gylippus saw that they did not come on, he led off his army to
 the citadel of the quarter of Apollo Temenites, and passed the night
 there.

On the following day he led out the main body of his army, and
 drawing them up in order of battle before the walls of the Athenians
 to prevent their going to the relief of any other quarter,
 despatched a strong force against Fort Labdalum and took it, and put
 all whom he found in it to the sword, the place not being within
 sight of the Athenians.

On the same day an Athenian galley that lay moored off the harbor was
 captured by the Syracusans.

After this the Syracusans and their
 allies began to carry a single wall, starting from the city, in a
 slanting direction up Epipolae, in order that the Athenians, unless
 they could hinder the work, might be no longer able to invest
 them.

Meanwhile the Athenians, having now finished their wall down to the
 sea, had come up to the heights; and part of their wall being weak,
 Gylippus drew out his army by night and attacked it.

However, the Athenians who happened to be bivouacking outside took
 the alarm and came out to meet him, upon seeing which he quickly led
 his men back again. 
 The Athenians now built their wall higher, and in future kept guard
 at this point themselves, disposing their confederates along the
 remainder of the works, at the stations assigned to them.

Nicias also determined to fortify Plemmyrium, a promontory over
 against the city, which juts out and narrows the mouth of the great
 harbor. 
 He thought that the fortification of this place would make it easier
 to bring in supplies, as they would be able to carry on their
 blockade from a less distance, near to the port occupied by the
 Syracusans; instead of being obliged, upon every movement of the
 enemy's navy, to put out against them from the bottom of the great
 harbor. 
 Besides this, he now began to pay more attention to the war by sea,
 seeing that the coming of Gylippus had diminished their hopes by
 land.

Accordingly, he conveyed over his ships and some troops, and built
 three forts in which he placed most of his baggage, and moored there
 for the future the larger craft and men-of-war.

This was the first and chief occasion of the losses which the crews
 experienced. 
 The water which they used was scarce and had to be fetched from far,
 and the sailors could not go out for firewood without being cut off
 by the Syracusan horse, who were masters of the country; a third of
 the enemy's cavalry being stationed at the little town of Olympieum,
 to prevent plundering incursions on the part of the Athenians at
 Plemmyrium.

Meanwhile Nicias learned that the rest of the Corinthian fleet was
 approaching, and sent twenty ships to watch for them, with orders to
 be on the look-out for them about Locris and Rhegium and the approach to Sicily .

Gylippus, meanwhile, went on with the
 wall across Epipolae, using the stones which the Athenians had laid
 down for their own wall, and at the same time constantly led out the
 Syracusans and their allies, and formed them in order of battle in
 front of the lines, the Athenians forming against him.

At last he thought that the moment was come, and began the attack;
 and a hand-to-hand fight ensued between the lines, where the
 Syracusan cavalry could be of no use;

and the Syracusans and their allies were defeated and took up their
 dead under truce, while the Athenians erected a trophy. 
 After this Gylippus called the soldiers together, and said that the
 fault was not theirs but his; he had kept their lines too much
 within the works, and had thus deprived them of the services of
 their cavalry and darters.

He would now, therefore, lead them on a second time. 
 He begged them to remember that in material force they would be fully
 a match for their opponents, while with respect to moral advantages,
 it were intolerable if Peloponnesians and Dorians should not feel
 confident of overcoming Ionians and islanders with the motley rabble
 that accompanied them, and of driving them out of the country.

After this he embraced the first
 opportunity that offered of again leading them against the
 enemy. 
 Now Nicias and the Athenians were of opinion that even if the
 Syracusans should not wish to offer battle, it was necessary for
 them to prevent the building of the cross wall, as it already almost
 overlapped the extreme point of their own, and if it went any
 further it would from that moment make no difference whether they
 fought ever so many successful actions, or never fought at all. 
 They accordingly came out to meet the Syracusans.

Gylippus led out his heavy infantry further from the fortifications
 than on the former occasion, and so joined battle; posting his horse
 and darters upon the flank of the Athenians in the open space, where
 the works of the two walls terminated.

During the engagement the cavalry attacked and routed the left wing
 of the Athenians, which was opposed to them; and the rest of the
 Athenian army was in consequence defeated by the Syracusans and
 driven headlong within their lines.

The night following the Syracusans carried their wall up to the
 Athenian works and passed them, thus putting it out of their power
 any longer to stop them, and depriving them, even if victorious in
 the field, of all chance of investing the city for the future.

After this the remaining twelve
 vessels of the Corinthians, Ambraciots, and Leucadians sailed into
 the harbor under the command of Erasinides, a Corinthian, having
 eluded the Athenian ships on guard, and helped the Syracusans in
 completing the remainder of the cross wall.

Meanwhile Gylippus went into the rest of Sicily to raise land and naval forces, and also to
 bring over any of the cities that either were lukewarm in the cause
 or had hitherto kept out of the war altogether.

Syracusan and Corinthian envoys were also despatched to Lacedaemon and Corinth to get a fresh force
 sent over, in any way that might offer, either in merchant vessels
 or transports, or in any other manner likely to prove successful, as
 the Athenians too were sending for reinforcements;

while the Syracusans proceeded to man a fleet and to exercise,
 meaning to try their fortune in this way also, and generally became
 exceedingly confident.

Nicias perceiving this, and seeing
 the strength of the enemy and his own difficulties daily increasing,
 himself also sent to Athens . 
 He had before sent frequent reports of events as they occurred, and
 felt it especially incumbent upon him to do so now, as he thought
 that they were in a critical position, and that unless speedily
 recalled or strongly reinforced from home, they had no hope of
 safety.

He feared, however, that the messengers, either through inability to
 speak, or through failure of memory, or from a wish to please the
 multitude, might not report the truth, and so though it best to
 write a letter, to insure that the Athenians should know his own
 opinion without its being lost in transmission, and be able to
 decide upon the real facts of the case.

His emissaries, accordingly, departed with the letter and the
 requisite verbal instructions; and he attended to the affairs of the
 army, making it his aim now to keep on the defensive and to avoid
 any unnecessary danger.

At the close of the same summer the
 Athenian general Euetion marched in concert with Perdiccas with a
 large body of Thracians against Amphipolis , and failing to take it brought some
 galleys round into the Strymon, and blockaded the town from the
 river, having his base at Himeraeum. Summer was now over.

The winter ensuing, the persons sent by Nicias, reaching Athens , gave the verbal
 messages which had been entrusted to them, and answered any
 questions that were asked them, and delivered the letter. 
 The clerk of the city now came forward and read out to the Athenians
 the letter, which was as follows:—

‘Our past operations, Athenians, have
 been made known to you by many other letters; it is now time for you
 to become equally familiar with our present condition, and to take
 your measures accordingly.

We had defeated in most of our engagements with them the Syracusans,
 against whom we were sent, and we had built the works which we now
 occupy, when Gylippus arrived from Lacedaemon with an army obtained from Peloponnese and from some of the
 cities in Sicily . 
 In our first battle with him we were victorious; in the battle on the
 following day we were overpowered by a multitude of cavalry and
 darters, and compelled to retire within our lines.

We have now, therefore, been forced by the numbers of those opposed
 to us to discontinue the work of circumvallation, and to remain
 inactive; being unable to make use even of all the force we have,
 since a large portion of our heavy infantry is absorbed in the
 defence of our lines. 
 Meanwhile the enemy have carried a single wall past our lines, thus
 making it impossible for us to invest them in future, until this
 cross wall be attacked by a strong force and captured.

So that the besieger in name has become, at least from the land side,
 the besieged in reality; as we are prevented by their cavalry from
 even going for any distance into the country.

Besides this, an embassy has been
 despatched to Peloponnese 
 to procure reinforcements, and Gylippus has gone to the cities in
 Sicily , partly in the
 hope of inducing those that are at present neutral to join him in
 the war, partly of bringing from his allies additional contingents
 for the land forces and material for the navy.

For I understand that they contemplate a combined attack, upon our
 lines with their land forces and with their fleet by sea.

You must none of you be surprised that I say by sea also. 
 They have discovered that the length of the time we have now been in
 commission has rotted our ships and wasted our crews, and that with
 the entireness of our crews and the soundness of our ships the
 pristine efficiency of our navy has departed.

For it is impossible for us to haul our ships ashore and careen them,
 because, the enemy's vessels being as many or more than our own, we
 are constantly anticipating an attack.

Indeed, they may be seen exercising, and it lies with them to take
 the initiative; and not having to maintain a blockade, they have
 greater facilities for drying their ships.

This we should scarcely be able to
 do, even if we had plenty of ships to spare, and were freed from our
 present necessity of exhausting all our strength upon the
 blockade. 
 For it is already difficult to carry in supplies past Syracuse ; and were we to
 relax our vigilance in the slightest degree it would become
 impossible.

The losses which our crews have suffered and still continue to suffer
 arise from the following causes. 
 Expeditions for fuel and for forage, and the distance from which
 water has to be fetched, cause our sailors to be cut off by the
 Syracusan cavalry; the loss of our previous superiority emboldens
 our slaves to desert; our foreign seamen are impressed by the
 unexpected appearance of a navy against us, and the strength of the
 enemy's resistance; such of them as were pressed into the service
 take the first opportunity of departing to their respective cities;
 such as were originally seduced by the temptation of high pay, and
 expected little fighting and large gains, leave us either by
 desertion to the enemy or by availing themselves of one or other of
 the various facilities of escape which the magnitude of Sicily affords them. 
 Some even engage in trade themselves and prevail upon the captains to
 take Hyccaric slaves on board in their place; thus they have ruined
 the efficiency of our navy.

Now I need not remind you that the
 time during which a crew is in its prime is short, and that the
 number of sailors who can start a ship on her way and keep the
 rowing in time is small.

But by far my greatest trouble is, that holding the post which I do,
 I am prevented by the natural indocility of the Athenian seaman from
 putting a stop to these evils; and that meanwhile we have no source
 from which to recruit our crews, which the enemy can do from many
 quarters, but are compelled to depend both for supplying the crews
 in service and for making good our losses upon the men whom we
 brought with us. 
 For our present confederates, Naxos and Catana , are incapable of supplying us.

There is only one thing more wanting to our opponents, I mean the
 defection of our Italian markets. 
 If they were to see you neglect to relieve us from our present
 condition, and were to go over to the enemy, famine would compel us
 to evacuate, and Syracuse would finish the war without a blow.

I might, it is true, have written to
 you something different and more agreeable than this, but nothing
 certainly more useful, if it is desirable for you to know the real
 state of things here before taking your measures. 
 Besides I know that it is your nature to love to be told the best
 side of things, and then to blame the teller if the expectations
 which he has raised in your minds are not answered by the result;
 and I therefore thought it safest to declare to you the truth.

Now you are not to think that either
 your generals or your soldiers have ceased to be a match for the
 forces originally opposed to them. 
 But you are to reflect that a general Sicilian coalition is being
 formed against us; that a fresh army is expected from Peloponnese , while the force we
 have here is unable to cope even with our present antagonists; and
 you must promptly decide either to recall us or to send out to us
 another fleet and army as numerous again, with a large sum of money,
 and some one to succeed me, as a disease in the kidneys unfits me
 for retaining my post.

I have, I think, some claim on your indulgence, as while I was in my
 prime I did you much good service in my commands. 
 But whatever you mean to do, do it at the commencement of spring and
 without delay as the enemy will obtain his Sicilian reinforcements
 shortly, those from Peloponnese after a longer interval; and unless you
 attend to the matter the former will be here before you, while the
 latter will elude you as they have done before.’

Such were the contents of Nicias'
 letter. 
 When the Athenians had heard it they refused to accept his
 resignation, but chose him two colleagues, naming Menander and
 Euthydemus, two of the officers at the seat of war, to fill their
 places until their arrival, that Nicias might not be left alone in
 his sickness to bear the whole weight of affairs. 
 They also voted to send out another army and navy, drawn partly from
 the Athenians on the muster-roll, partly from the allies.

The colleagues chosen for Nicias were Demosthenes, son of
 Alcisthenes, and Eurymedon, son of Thucles. 
 Eurymedon was sent off at once, about the time of the winter
 solstice, with ten ships, a hundred and twenty talents of silver,
 and instructions to tell the army that reinforcements would arrive,
 and that care would be taken of them;

but Demosthenes stayed behind to organize the expedition, meaning to
 start as soon as it was spring, and sent for troops to the allies,
 and meanwhile got together money, ships, and heavy infantry at
 home.

The Athenians also sent twenty
 vessels round Peloponnese 
 to prevent any one crossing over to Sicily from Corinth or Peloponnese .

For the Corinthians, filled with confidence by the favorable
 alteration in Sicilian affairs which had been reported by the envoys
 upon their arrival, and convinced that the fleet which they had
 before sent out had not been without its use, were now preparing to
 despatch a force of heavy infantry in merchant vessels to Sicily , while the Lacedaemonians
 did the like for the rest of Peloponnese .

The Corinthians also named a fleet of twenty-five vessels, intending
 to try the result of a battle with the squadron on guard at
 Naupactus , and
 meanwhile to make it less easy for the Athenians there to hinder the
 departure of their merchantmen, by obliging them to keep an eye upon
 the galleys thus arrayed against them.

In the meantime the Lacedaemonians
 prepared for their invasion of Attica , in accordance with their own previous
 resolve, and at the instigation of the Syracusans and Corinthians,
 who wished for an invasion to arrest the reinforcements which they
 heard that Athens was
 about to send to Sicily . 
 Alcibiades also urgently advised the fortification of Decelea, and a
 vigorous prosecution of the war.

But the Lacedaemonians derived most encouragement from the belief
 that Athens , with two
 wars on her hands, against themselves and against the Siceliots,
 would be more easy to subdue, and from the conviction that she had
 been the first to infringe the truce. 
 In the former war, they considered, the offence had been more on
 their own side, both on account of the entrance of the Thebans into
 Plataea in time of
 peace, and also of their own refusal to listen to the Athenian offer
 of arbitration, in spite of the clause in the former treaty that
 where arbitration should be offered there should be no appeal to
 arms. 
 For this reason they thought that they deserved their misfortunes,
 and took to heart seriously the disaster at Pylos and whatever else had
 befallen them.

But when, besides the ravages from Pylos , which went on without any intermission, the
 thirty Athenian ships came out from Argos and wasted part of Epidaurus , Prasiae, and
 other places; when upon every dispute that arose as to the
 interpretation of any doubtful point in the treaty, their own offers
 of arbitration were always rejected by the Athenians,—the
 Lacedaemonians at length decided that Athens had now committed the
 very same offence as they had before done, and had become the guilty
 party; and they began to be full of ardor for the war.

They spent this winter in sending round to their allies for iron, and
 in getting ready the other implements for building their fort; and
 meanwhile began raising at home, and also by forced requisitions in
 the rest of Peloponnese , a
 force to be sent out in the merchantmen to their allies in
 Sicily . 
 Winter thus ended, and with it the eighteenth year of this war of
 which Thucydides is the historian.

In the first days of the spring
 following, at an earlier period than usual, the Lacedaemonians and
 their allies invaded Attica , under the command of Agis, son of Archidamus,
 king of the Lacedaemonians. 
 They began by devastating the parts bordering upon the plain, and
 next proceeded to fortify Decelea, dividing the work among the
 different cities.

Decelea is about thirteen or fourteen miles from the city of
 Athens , and the same
 distance or not much further from Boeotia ; and the fort was meant to annoy the plain
 and the richest parts of the country, being in sight of Athens .

While the Peloponnesians and their allies in Attica were engaged in the work of
 fortification, their countrymen at home sent off, at about the same
 time, the heavy infantry in the merchant vessels to Sicily ; the Lacedaemonians
 furnishing a picked force of Helots and Neodamodes ‘or freedmen),
 six hundred heavy infantry in all, under the command of Eccritus, a
 Spartan; and the Boeotians three hundred heavy infantry, commanded
 by two Thebans, Xenon and Nicon, and by Hegesander, a Thespian.

These were among the first to put out into the open sea, starting
 from Taenarus in Laconia . 
 Not long after their departure the Corinthians sent off a force of
 five hundred heavy infantry, consisting partly of men from
 Corinth itself, and
 partly of Arcadian mercenaries, placed under the command of
 Alexarchus, a Corinthian. 
 The Sicyonians also sent off two hundred heavy infantry at the same
 time as the Corinthians, under the command of Sargeus, a
 Sicyonian.

Meantime the five-and-twenty vessels manned by Corinth during the winter, lay
 confronting the twenty Athenian ships at Naupactus until the heavy
 infantry in the merchantmen were fairly on their way from Peloponnese ; thus fulfilling the
 object for which they had been manned originally, which was to
 divert the attention of the Athenians from the merchantmen to the
 galleys.

During this time the Athenians were
 not idle. 
 Simultaneously with the fortification of Decelea, at the very
 beginning of spring, they sent thirty ships round Peloponnese , under Charicles, son
 of Apollodorus, with instructions to call at Argos and demand a force of
 their heavy infantry for the fleet, agreeably to the alliance. 
 At the same time they despatched Demosthenes to Sicily ,

as they had intended, with sixty Athenian and five Chian vessels,
 twelve hundred Athenian heavy infantry from the muster-roll, and as
 many of the islanders as could be raised in the different quarters,
 drawing upon the other subject allies for whatever they could supply
 that would be of use for the war. 
 Demosthenes was instructed first to sail round with Charicles and to
 operate with him upon the coasts of Laconia ,

and accordingly sailed to Aegina and there waited for the remainder of his
 armament, and for Charicles to fetch the Argive troops.

In Sicily about the same
 time in this spring, Gylippus came to Syracuse with as many troops
 as he could bring from the cities which he had persuaded to
 join.

Calling the Syracusans together, he told them that they must man as
 many ships as possible, and try their hand at a sea-fight, by which
 he hoped to achieve an advantage in the war not unworthy of the
 risk.

With him Hermocrates actively joined in trying to encourage his
 countrymen to attack the Athenians at sea, saying that the latter
 had not inherited their naval prowess nor would they retain it for
 ever; they had been landsmen even to a greater degree than the
 Syracusans, and had only become a maritime power when obliged by the
 Mede . 
 Besides, to daring spirits like the Athenians, a daring adversary
 would seem the most formidable; and the Athenian plan of paralyzing
 by the boldness of their attack a neighbor often not their inferior
 in strength, could now be used against them with as good effect by
 the Syracusans.

He was convinced also that the unlooked-for spectacle of Syracusans
 daring to face the Athenian navy would cause a terror to the enemy,
 the advantages of which would far outweigh any loss that Athenian
 science might inflict upon their inexperience. 
 He accordingly urged them to throw aside their fears and to try their
 fortune at sea;

and the Syracusans, under the influence of Gylippus and Hermocrates,
 and perhaps some others, made up their minds for the sea-fight and
 began to man their vessels.

When the fleet was ready, Gylippus
 led out the whole army by night; his plan being to assault in person
 the forts of Plemmyrium by land, while thirty-five Syracusan galleys
 sailed according to appointment against the enemy from the great
 harbor, and the forty-five remaining came round from the lesser
 harbor, where they had their arsenal, in order to effect a junction
 with those inside and simultaneously to attack Plemmyrium, and thus
 to distract the Athenians by assaulting them on two sides at
 once.

The Athenians quickly manned sixty ships, and with twenty-five of
 these engaged the thirty-five of the Syracusans in the great harbor,
 sending the rest to meet those sailing round from the arsenal; and
 an action now ensued directly in front of the mouth of the great
 harbor, maintained with equal tenacity on both sides; the one
 wishing to force the passage, the other to prevent them.

In the meantime, while the Athenians
 in Plemmyrium were down at the sea, attending to the engagement,
 Gylippus made a sudden attack on the forts in the early morning and
 took the largest first, and afterwards the two smaller, whose
 garrisons did not wait for him, seeing the largest so easily
 taken.

At the fall of the first fort, the men from it who succeeded in
 taking refuge in their boats and merchantmen, found great difficulty
 in reaching the camp, as the Syracusans were having the best of it
 in the engagement in the great harbor, and sent a fast sailing
 galley to pursue them. 
 But when the two others fell, the Syracusans were now being defeated;
 and the fugitives from these sailed along shore with more ease.

The Syracusan ships fighting off the mouth of the harbor, forced
 their way through the Athenian vessels and sailing in without any
 order fell foul of one another, and transferred the victory to the
 Athenians; who not only routed the squadron in question, but also
 that by which they were at first being defeated in the harbor,

sinking eleven of the Syracusan vessels and killing most of the men,
 except the crews of three ships whom they made prisoners. 
 Their own loss was confined to three vessels; and after hauling
 ashore the Syracusan wrecks and setting up a trophy upon the islet
 in front of Plemmyrium, they retired to their own camp.

Unsuccessful at sea, the Syracusans
 had nevertheless the forts in Plemmyrium, for which they set up
 three trophies. 
 One of the two last taken they razed, but put in order and garrisoned
 the two others.

In the capture of the forts a great many men were killed and made
 prisoners, and a great quantity of property was taken in all. 
 As the Athenians had used them as a magazine, there was a large stock
 of goods and corn of the merchants inside, and also a large stock
 belonging to the captains; the masts and other furniture of forty
 galleys being taken, besides three galleys which had been drawn up
 on shore.

Indeed the first and chiefest cause of the ruin of the Athenian army
 was the capture of Plemmyrium; even the entrance of the harbor being
 now no longer safe for carrying in provisions, as the Syracusan
 vessels were stationed there to prevent it, and nothing could be
 brought in without fighting; besides the general impression of
 dismay and discouragement produced upon the army.

After this the Syracusans sent out
 twelve ships under the command of Agatharchus, a Syracusan. 
 One of these went to Peloponnese with ambassadors to describe the
 hopeful state of their affairs, and to incite the Peloponnesians to
 prosecute the war there even more actively than they were now doing,
 while the eleven others sailed to Italy , hearing that vessels laden with stores were
 on their way to the Athenians.

After falling in with and destroying most of the vessels in question,
 and burning in the Caulonian territory a quantity of timber for
 shipbuilding, which had been got ready for the Athenians,

the Syracusan squadron went to Locri , and one of the merchantmen from Peloponnese coming in, while they
 were at anchor there, carrying Thespian heavy infantry,

took these on board and sailed along shore towards home. 
 The Athenians were on the look-out for them with twenty ships at
 Megara , but were
 only able to take one vessel with its crew; the rest getting clear
 off to Syracuse .

There was also some skirmishing in the harbor about the piles which
 the Syracusans had driven in the sea in front of the old docks, to
 allow their ships to lie at anchor inside, without being hurt by the
 Athenians sailing up and running them down.

The Athenians brought up to them a ship of ten thousand talents'
 burden furnished with wooden turrets and screens, and fastened ropes
 round the piles from their boats, wrenched them up and broke them,
 or dived down and sawed them in two. 
 Meanwhile the Syracusans plied them with missiles from the docks, to
 which they replied from their large vessel; until at last most of
 the piles were removed by the Athenians.

But the most awkward part of the stockade was the part out of sight:
 some of the piles which had been driven in did not appear above
 water, so that it was dangerous to sail up, for fear of running the
 ships upon them, just as upon a reef, through not seeing them. 
 However divers went down and sawed off even these for reward;
 although the Syracusans drove in others.

Indeed there was no end to the contrivances to which they resorted
 against each other, as might be expected between two hostile armies
 confronting each other at such a short distance: and skirmishes and
 all kinds of other attempts were of constant occurrence.

Meanwhile the Syracusans sent embassies to the cities composed of
 Corinthians, Ambraciots, and Lacedaemonians, to tell them of the
 capture of Plemmyrium, and that their defeat in the sea-fight was
 due less to the strength of the enemy than to their own disorder;
 and generally, to let them know that they were full of hope, and to
 desire them to come to their help with ships and troops, as the
 Athenians were expected with a fresh army, and if the one already
 there could be destroyed before the other arrived, the war would be
 at an end.

While the contending parties in
 Sicily were thus
 engaged, Demosthenes, having now got together the armament with
 which he was to go to the island, put out from Aegina , and making sail
 for Peloponnese , joined
 Charicles and the thirty ships of the Athenians. 
 Taking on board the heavy infantry from Argos they sailed to Laconia ,

and after first plundering part of Epidarus Limera, landed on the
 coast of Laconia , opposite
 Cythera , where the
 temple of Apollo stands, and laying waste part of the country,
 fortified a sort of isthmus, to which the Helots of the
 Lacedaemonians might desert, and from whence plundering incursions
 might be made as from Pylos .

Demosthenes helped to occupy this place, and then immediately sailed
 on to Corcyra to
 take up some of the allies in that island, and so to proceed without
 delay to Sicily ; while
 Charicles waited until he had completed the fortification of the
 place, and leaving a garrison there, returned home subsequently with
 his thirty ships and the Argives also.

This same summer arrived at
 Athens thirteen
 hundred targeteers, Thracian swordsmen of the tribe of the Dii, who
 were to have sailed to Sicily with Demosthenes.

Since they had come too late, the Athenians determined to send them
 back to Thrace , whence they
 had come; to keep them for the Decelean war appearing too expensive,
 as the pay of each man was a drachma a day.

Indeed since Decelea had been first fortified by the whole
 Peloponnesian army during this summer, and then occupied for the
 annoyance of the country by the garrisons from the cities relieving
 each other at stated intervals, it had been doing great mischief to
 the Athenians; in fact this occupation, by the destruction of
 property and loss of men which resulted from it, was one of the
 principal causes of their ruin.

Previously the invasions were short, and did not prevent their
 enjoying their land during the rest of the time: the enemy was now
 permanently fixed in Attica ; at one time it was an attack in force, at
 another it was the regular garrison overrunning the country and
 making forays for its subsistence, and the Lacedaemonian king, Agis,
 was in the field and diligently prosecuting the war; great mischief
 was therefore done to the Athenians.

They were deprived of their whole country: more than twenty thousand
 slaves had deserted, a great part of them artisans, and all their
 sheep and beasts of burden were lost; and as the cavalry rode out
 daily upon excursions to Decelea and to guard the country, their
 horses were either lamed by being constantly worked upon rocky
 ground, or wounded by the enemy.

Besides, the transport of provisions
 from Euboea , which had
 before been carried on so much more quickly over land by Decelea
 from Oropus, was now effected at great cost by sea round Sunium;
 everything the city required had to be imported from abroad, and
 instead of a city it became a fortress.

Summer and winter the Athenians were worn out by having to keep guard
 on the fortifications, during the day by turns, by night all
 together, the cavalry excepted, at the different military posts or
 upon the wall.

But what most oppressed them was that they had two wars at once, and
 had thus reached a pitch of frenzy which no one would have believed
 possible if he had heard of it before it had come to pass. 
 For could any one have imagined that even when besieged by the
 Peloponnesians entrenched in Attica , they would still, instead of withdrawing
 from Sicily , stay on there
 besieging in like manner Syracuse , a town (taken as a town) in no way
 inferior to Athens , or
 would so thoroughly upset the Hellenic estimate of their strength
 and audacity, as to give the spectacle of a people which, at the
 beginning of the war, some thought might hold out one year, some
 two, none more than three, if the Peloponnesians invaded their
 country, now seventeen years after the first invasion, after having
 already suffered from all the evils of war, going to Sicily and undertaking a new war
 nothing inferior to that which they already had with the
 Peloponnesians?

These causes, the great losses from Decelea, and the other heavy
 charges that fell upon them, produced their financial embarrassment;
 and it was at this time that they imposed upon their subjects,
 instead of the tribute, the tax of a twentieth upon all imports and
 exports by sea, which they thought would bring them in more money;
 their expenditure being now not the same as at first, but having
 grown with the war while their revenues decayed.

Accordingly, not wishing to incur
 expense in their present want of money, they sent back at once the
 Thracians who came too late for Demosthenes, under the conduct of
 Diitrephes, who was instructed, as they were to pass through the
 Euripus, to make use of them if possible in the voyage along shore
 to injure the enemy.

Diitrephes first landed them at Tanagra and hastily snatched some booty; he then
 sailed across the Eurious in the evening from Chalcis in Euboea and disembarking in
 Boeotia led them
 against Mycalessus.

The night he passed unobserved near the temple of Hermes, not quite
 two miles from Mycalessus, and at daybreak assaulted and took the
 town, which is not a large one; the inhabitants being off their
 guard and not expecting that any one would ever come up so far from
 the sea to molest them, the wall too being weak, and in some places
 having tumbled down, while in others it had not been built to any
 height, and the gates also being left open through their feeling of
 security.

The Thracians bursting into Mycalessus sacked the houses and temples,
 and butchered the inhabitants, sparing neither youth nor age, but
 killing all they fell in with, one after the other, children and
 women, and even beasts of burden, and whatever other living
 creatures they saw; the Thracian race, like the bloodiest of the
 barbarians, being ever most so when it has nothing to fear.

Everywhere confusion reigned and death in all its shapes; and in
 particular they attacked a boys' school, the largest that there was
 in the place, into which the children had just gone, and massacred
 them all. 
 In short, the disaster falling upon the whole town was unsurpassed in
 magnitude, and unapproached by any in suddenness and in horror.

Meanwhile the Thebans heard of it and
 marched to the rescue, and overtaking the Thracians before they had
 gone far, recovered the plunder and drove them in panic to the
 Euripus and the sea, where the vessels which brought them were
 lying.

The greatest slaughter took place while they were embarking, as they
 did not know how to swim, and those in the vessels on seeing what
 was going on on shore moored them out of bowshot: in the rest of the
 retreat the Thracians made a very respectable defence against the
 Theban horse, by which they were first attacked, dashing out and
 closing their ranks according to the tactics of their country, and
 lost only a few men in that part of the affair. 
 A good number who were after plunder were actually caught in the town
 and put to death.

Altogether the Thracians had two hundred and fifty killed out of
 thirteen hundred, the Thebans and the rest who came to the rescue
 about twenty, troopers and heavy infantry, with Scirphondas, one of
 the Boetarchs. 
 The Mycalessians lost a large proportion of their population.

While Mycalessus thus experienced a
 calamity, for its extent, as lamentable as any that happened in the
 war, Demosthenes, whom we left sailing to Corcyra , after the
 building of the fort in Laconia , found a merchantman lying at Rhea in
 Elis , in which the
 Corinthian heavy infantry were to cross to Sicily . 
 The ship he destroyed, but the men escaped, and subsequently got
 another in which they pursued their voyage.

After this, arriving at Zacynthus and Cephallenia, he took a body of heavy
 infantry on board, and sending for some of the Messenians from
 Naupactus ,
 crossed over to the opposite coast of Acarnania , to Alyzia , and to Anactorium which was held by the
 Athenians.

While he was in these parts he was met by Eurymedon returning from
 Sicily , where he had
 been sent, as has been mentioned, during the winter, with the money
 for the army, who told him the news, and also that he had heard,
 while at sea, that the Syracusans had taken Plemmyrium.

Here, also, Conon came to them, the commander at
 Naupactus , with
 news that the twenty-five Corinthian ships stationed opposite to
 him, far from giving over the war, were meditating an engagement;
 and he therefore begged them to send him some ships, as his own
 eighteen were not a match for the enemy's twenty-five.

Demosthenes and Eurymedon, accordingly, sent ten of their best
 sailors with Conon to reinforce the squadron at
 Naupactus , and
 meanwhile prepared for the muster of their forces; Eurymedon, who
 was now the colleague of Demosthenes, and had turned back in
 consequence of his appointment, sailing to Corcyra to tell them to
 man fifteen ships and to enlist heavy infantry; while Demosthenes
 raised slingers and darters from the parts about Acarnania .

Meanwhile the envoys, already
 mentioned, who had gone from Syracuse to the cities after the capture of
 Plemmyrium, had succeeded in their mission, and were about to bring
 the army that they had collected, when Nicias got scent of it, and
 sent to the Centoripae and Alicyaeans and other of the friendly
 Sicels, who held the passes, not to let the enemy through, but to
 combine to prevent their passing, there being no other way by which
 they could even attempt it, as the Agrigentines would not give them
 a passage through their country.

Agreeably to this request the Sicels laid a triple ambuscade for the
 Siceliots upon their march, and attacking them suddenly, while off
 their guard, killed about eight hundred of them and all the envoys,
 the Corinthian only excepted, by whom fifteen hundred who escaped
 were conducted to Syracuse .

About the same time the Camarinaeans
 also came to the assistance of Syracuse with five hundred heavy infantry, three
 hundred darters and as many archers, while the Geloans sent crews
 for five ships, four hundred darters and two hundred horse.

Indeed almost the whole of Sicily , except the Agrigentines, who were neutral,
 now ceased merely to watch events as it had hitherto done, and
 actively joined Syracuse against the Athenians.

While the Syracusans after the Sicel
 disaster put off any immediate attack upon the Athenians,
 Demosthenes and Eurymedon, whose forces from Corcyra and the continent
 were now ready, crossed the Ionian gulf with all their armament to
 the Iapygian promontory,

and starting from thence touched at the Choerades Isles lying off
 Iapygia, where they took on board a hundred and fifty Iapygian
 darters of the Messapian tribe, and after renewing an old friendship
 with Artas the chief, who had furnished them with the darters,
 arrived at Metapontium in Italy .

Here they persuaded their allies the Metapontines, to send with them
 three hundred darters and two galleys, and with this reinforcement
 coasted on to Thurii ,
 where they found the party hostile to Athens recently expelled by a
 revolution,

and accordingly remained there to muster and review the whole army,
 to see if any had been left behind, and to prevail upon the Thurians
 resolutely to join them in their expedition, and in the
 circumstances in which they found themselves to conclude a defensive
 and offensive alliance with the Athenians.

About the same time the
 Peloponnesians in the twenty-five ships stationed opposite to the
 squadron at Naupactus 
 to protect the passage of the transports to Sicily , had got ready for
 engaging, and manning some additional vessels, so as to be
 numerically little inferior to the Athenians, anchored off Erineus
 in Achaia in the Rhypic
 country.

The place off which they lay being in the form of a crescent, the
 land forces furnished by the Corinthians and their allies on the
 spot, came up and ranged themselves upon the projecting headlands on
 either side, while the fleet, under the command of Polyanthes, a
 Corinthian, held the intervening space and blocked up the
 entrance.

The Athenians under Diphilus now sailed out against them with
 thirty-three ships from Naupactus ,

and the Corinthians, at first not moving, at length thought they saw
 their opportunity, raised the signal, and advanced and engaged the
 Athenians.

After an obstinate struggle, the Corinthians lost three ships, and
 without sinking any altogether, disabled seven of the enemy, which
 were struck prow to prow and had their foreships stoven in by the
 Corinthian vessels, whose cheeks had been strengthened for this very
 purpose.

After an action of this even character, in which either party could
 claim the victory (although the Athenians became masters of the
 wrecks through the wind driving them out to sea, the Corinthians not
 putting out again to meet them) the two combatants parted. 
 No pursuit took place, and no prisoners were made on either side; the
 Corinthians and Peloponnesians who were fighting near the shore
 escaping with ease, and none of the Athenian vessels having been
 sunk.

The Athenians now sailed back to Naupactus , and the Corinthians immediately set up a
 trophy as victors, because they had disabled a greater number of the
 enemy's ships. 
 Moreover they held that they had not been worsted, for the very same
 reason that their opponent held that he had not been victorious; the
 Corinthians considering that they were conquerors, if not decidedly
 conquered, and the Athenians thinking themselves vanquished, because
 not decidedly victorious.

However, when the Peloponnesians sailed off and their land forces had
 dispersed, the Athenians also set up a trophy as victors in
 Achaia , about two miles
 and a quarter from Erineus, the Corinthian station.

This was the termination of the
 action at Naupactus . 
 To return to Demosthenes and Eurymedon: the Thurians having now got
 ready to join in the expedition with seven hundred heavy infantry
 and three hundred darters, the two generals ordered the ships to
 sail along the coast to the Crotonian territory, and meanwhile held
 a review of all the land forces upon the river Sybaris , and then led them
 through the Thurian country.

Arrived at the river Hylias, they here received a message from the
 Crotonians, saying that they would not allow the army to pass
 through their country; upon which the Athenians descended towards
 the shore, and bivouacked near the sea and the mouth of the Hylias,
 where the fleet also met them, and the next day embarked and sailed
 along the coast touching at all the cities except Locri , until they came to
 Petra in the Rhegian
 territory.

Meanwhile the Syracusans hearing of
 their approach resolved to make a second attempt with their fleet
 and their other forces on shore, which they had been collecting for
 this very purpose in order to do something before their arrival.

In addition to other improvements suggested by the former sea-fight
 which they now adopted in the equipment of their navy, they cut down
 their prows to a smaller compass to make them more solid and made
 their cheeks stouter, and from these let stays into the vessel's
 sides for a length of six cubits within and without, in the same way
 as the Corinthians had altered their prows before engaging the
 squadron at Naupactus .

The Syracusans thought that they would thus have an advantage over
 the Athenian vessels, which were not constructed with equal
 strength, but were slight in the bows, from their being more used to
 sail round and charge the enemy's side than to meet him prow to
 prow, and that the battle being in the great harbor, with a great
 many ships in not much room, was also a fact in their favour. 
 Charging prow to prow, they would stave in the enemy's bows, by
 striking with solid and stout beaks against hollow and weak
 ones;

and secondly, the Athenians for want of room would be unable to use
 their favorite manoeuvre of breaking the line or of sailing round,
 as the Syracusans would do their best not to let them do the one,
 and want of room would prevent their doing the other.

This charging prow to prow which had hitherto been thought want of
 skill in a helmsman, would be the Syracusans' chief manoeuvre, as
 being that which they should find most useful, since the Athenians,
 if repulsed, would not be able to back water in any direction except
 towards the shore, and that only for a little way, and in the little
 space in front of their own camp. 
 The rest of the harbor would be commanded by the Syracusans;

and the Athenians, if hard pressed, by crowding together in a small
 space and all to the same point, would run foul of one another and
 fall into disorder, which was, in fact, the thing that did the
 Athenians most harm in all the sea-fights, they not having, like the
 Syracusans, the whole harbor to retreat over. 
 As to their sailing round into the open sea, this would be
 impossible, with the Syracusans in possession of the way out and in,
 especially as Plemmyrium would be hostile to them, and the mouth of
 the harbor was not large.

With these contrivances to suit their
 skill and ability, and now more confident after the previous
 sea-fight, the Syracusans attacked by land and sea at once.

The town force Gylippus led out a little the first and brought them
 up to the wall of the Athenians, where it looked towards the city,
 while the force from the Olympieum, that is to say, the heavy
 infantry that were there with the horse and the light troops of the
 Syracusans, advanced against the wall from the opposite side; the
 ships of the Syracusans and allies sailing out immediately
 afterwards.

The Athenians at first fancied that they were to be attacked by land
 only, and it was not without alarm that they saw the fleet suddenly
 approaching as well; and while some were forming upon the walls and
 in front of them against the advancing enemy, and some marching out
 in haste against the numbers of horse and darters coming from the
 Olympieum and from outside, others manned the ships or rushed down
 to the beach to oppose the enemy, and when the ships were manned put
 out with seventy-five sail against about eighty of the Syracusans.

After spending a great part of the
 day in advancing and retreating and skirmishing with each other,
 without either being able to gain any advantage worth speaking of,
 except that the Syracusans sank one or two of the Athenian vessels,
 they parted, the land force at the same time retiring from the
 lines.

The next day the Syracusans remained quiet, and gave no signs of what
 they were going to do; but Nicias, seeing that the battle had been a
 drawn one, and expecting that they would attack again, compelled the
 captains to refit any of the ships that had suffered, and moored
 merchant vessels before the stockade which they had driven into the
 sea in front of their ships,

to serve instead of an enclosed harbor, at about two hundred feet
 from each other, in order that any ship that was hard pressed might
 be able to retreat in safety and sail out again at leisure. 
 These preparations occupied the Athenians all day until nightfall.

The next day the Syracusans began
 operations at an earlier hour, but with the same plan of attack by
 land and sea.

A great part of the day the rivals spent as before, confronting and
 skirmishing with each other; until at last Ariston, son of
 Pyrrhicus, a Corinthian, the ablest helmsman in the Syracusan
 service, persuaded their naval commanders to send to the officials
 in the city, and tell them to move the sale market as quickly as
 they could down to the sea, and oblige every one to bring whatever
 eatables he had and sell them there, thus enabling the commanders to
 land the crews and dine at once close to the ships, and shortly
 afterwards, the selfsame day, to attack the Athenians again when
 they were not expecting it.

In compliance with this advice a
 messenger was sent and the market got ready, upon which the
 Syracusans suddenly backed water and withdrew to the town, and at
 once landed and took their dinner upon the spot;

while the Athenians, supposing that they had returned to the town
 because they felt they were beaten, disembarked at their leisure and
 set about getting their dinners and about their other occupations,
 under the idea that they had done with fighting for that day.

Suddenly the Syracusans manned their ships and again sailed against
 them; and the Athenians, in great confusion and most of them
 fasting, got on board, and with great difficulty put out to meet
 them.

For some time both parties remained on the defensive without
 engaging, until the Athenians at last resolved not to let themselves
 be worn out by waiting where they were, but to attack without delay,
 and giving a cheer, went into action.

The Syracusans received them, and charging prow to prow as they had
 intended, stove in a great part of the Athenian foreships by the
 strength of their beaks; the darters on the decks also did great
 damage to the Athenians, but still greater damage was done by the
 Syracusans who went about in small boats, ran in upon the oars of
 the Athenian galleys, and sailed against their sides, and discharged
 from thence their darts upon the sailors.

At last, fighting hard in this
 fashion, the Syracusans gained the victory, and the Athenians turned
 and fled between the merchantmen to their own station.

The Syracusan ships pursued them as far as the merchantmen, where
 they were stopped by the beams armed with dolphins suspended from
 those vessels over the passage.

Two of the Syracusan vessels went too near in the excitement of
 victory and were destroyed, one of them being taken with its
 crew.

After sinking seven of the Athenian vessels and disabling many, and
 taking most of the men prisoners and killing others, the Syracusans
 retired and set up trophies for both the engagements, being now
 confident of having a decided superiority by sea, and by no means
 despairing of equal success by land.

In the meantime, while the Syracusans
 were preparing for a second attack upon both elements, Demosthenes
 and Eurymedon arrived with the succors from Athens , consisting of about
 seventy-three ships, including the foreigners; nearly five thousand
 heavy infantry, Athenian and allied; a large number of darters,
 Hellenic and barbarian, and slingers and archers and everything else
 upon a corresponding scale.

The Syracusans and their allies were for the moment not a little
 dismayed at the idea that there was to be no term or ending to their
 dangers, seeing, in spite of the fortification of Decelea, a new
 army arrive nearly equal to the former, and the power of Athens proving so great in
 every quarter. 
 On the other hand, the first Athenian armament regained a certain
 confidence in the midst of its misfortunes.

Demosthenes, seeing how matters stood, felt that he could not drag on
 and fare as Nicias had done, who by wintering in Catana instead of at once
 attacking Syracuse had
 allowed the terror of his first arrival to evaporate in contempt,
 and had given time to Gylippus to arrive with a force from
 Peloponnese , which the
 Syracusans would never have sent for if he had attacked immediately;
 for they fancied that they were a match for him by themselves, and
 would not have discovered their inferiority until they were already
 invested, and even if they then sent for succors, they would no
 longer have been equally able to profit by their arrival. 
 Recollecting this, and well aware that it was now on the first day
 after his arrival that he like Nicias was most formidable to the
 enemy, Demosthenes determined to lose no time in drawing the utmost
 profit from the consternation at the moment inspired by his
 army;

and seeing that the counter wall of the Syracusans, which hindered
 the Athenians from investing them, was a single one, and that he who
 should become master of the way up to Epipolae, and afterwards of
 the camp there, would find no difficulty in taking it, as no one
 would even wait for his attack, made all haste to attempt the
 enterprise.

This he took to be the shortest way of ending the war, as he would
 either succeed and take Syracuse , or would lead back the armament instead
 of frittering away the lives of the Athenians engaged in the
 expedition and the resources of the country at large.

First therefore the Athenians went
 out and laid waste the lands of the Syracusans about the Anapus and
 carried all before them as at first by land and by sea, the
 Syracusans not offering to oppose them upon either element, unless
 it were with their cavalry and darters from the Olympieum.

Next Demosthenes resolved to attempt the counter wall first by means
 of engines. 
 As however the engines that he brought up were burnt by the enemy
 fighting from the wall, and the rest of the forces repulsed after
 attacking at many different points, he determined to delay no
 longer, and having obtained the consent of Nicias and his
 fellow-commanders, proceeded to put in execution his plan of
 attacking Epipolae.

As by day it seemed impossible to approach and get up without being
 observed, he ordered provisions for five days, took all the masons
 and carpenters, and other things, such as arrows, and everything
 else that they could want for the work of fortification if
 successful; and after the first watch set out with Eurymedon and
 Menander and the whole army for Epipolae, Nicias being left behind
 in the lines.

Having come up by the hill of Euryelus (where the former army had
 ascended at first), unobserved by the enemy's guards, they went up
 to the fort which the Syracusans had there, and took it, and put to
 the sword part of the garrison.

The greater number, however, escaped at once and gave the alarm to
 the camps, of which there were three upon Epipolae, defended by
 outworks, one of the Syracusans, one of the other Siceliots, and one
 of the allies; and also to the six hundred Syracusans forming the
 original garrison for this part of Epipolae.

These at once advanced against the assailants, and falling in with
 Demosthenes and the Athenians, were routed by them after a sharp
 resistance, the victors immediately pushing on, eager to achieve the
 objects of the attack without giving time for their ardor to cool;
 meanwhile others from the very beginning were taking the counter
 wall of the Syracusans, which was abandoned by its garrison, and
 pulling down the battlements.

The Syracusans and the allies, and Gylippus with the troops under his
 command, advanced to the rescue from the outworks, but engaged in
 some consternation (a night attack being a piece of audacity which
 they had never expected), and were at first compelled to
 retreat.

But while the Athenians, flushed with their victory, now advanced
 with less order, wishing to make their way as quickly as possible
 through the whole force of the enemy not yet engaged, without
 relaxing their attack or giving them time to rally, the Boeotians
 made the first stand against them, attacked them, routed them, and
 put them to flight.

The Athenians now fell into great
 disorder and perplexity, so that it was not easy to get from one
 side or the other any detailed account of the affair. 
 By day certainly the combatants have a clearer notion, though even
 then by no means of all that takes place, no one knowing much of
 anything that does not go on in his own immediate neighborhood; but
 in a night engagement (and this was the only one that occurred
 between great armies during the war) how could any one know anything
 for certain?

Although there was a bright moon they saw each other only as men do
 by moonlight, that is to say, they could distinguish the form of the
 body, but could not tell for certain whether it was a friend or an
 enemy. 
 Both had great numbers of heavy infantry moving about in a small
 space.

Some of the Athenians were already defeated, while others were coming
 up yet unconquered for their first attack. 
 A large part also of the rest of their forces either had only just
 got up, or were still ascending, so that they did not know which way
 to march. 
 Owing to the rout that had taken place all in front was now in
 confusion, and the noise made it difficult to distinguish
 anything.

The victorious Syracusans and allies were cheering each other on with
 loud cries, by night the only possible means of communication, and
 meanwhile receiving all who came against them; while the Athenians
 were seeking for one another, taking all in front of them for
 enemies, even although they might be some of their now flying
 friends; and by constantly asking for the watchword, which was their
 only means of recognition, not only caused great confusion among
 themselves by asking all at once, but also made it known to the
 enemy,

whose own they did not so readily discover, as the Syracusans were
 victorious and not scattered, and thus less easily mistaken. 
 The result was that if the Athenians fell in with a party of the
 enemy that was weaker than they, it escaped them through knowing
 their watchword; while if they themselves failed to answer they were
 put to the sword.

But what hurt them as much, or indeed more than anything else, was
 the singing of the Paean, from the perplexity which it caused by
 being nearly the same on either side: the Argives and Corcyraeans
 and any other Dorian peoples in the army, struck terror into the
 Athenians whenever they raised their Paean, no less than did the
 enemy.

Thus, after being once thrown into disorder, they ended by coming
 into collision with each other in many parts of the field, friends
 with friends, and citizens with citizens, and not only terrified one
 another, but even came to blows and could only be parted with
 difficulty.

In the pursuit many perished by throwing themselves down the cliffs,
 the way down from Epipolae being narrow; and of those who got down
 safely into the plain, although many, especially those who belonged
 to the first armament, escaped through their better acquaintance
 with the locality, some of the newcomers lost their way and wandered
 over the country, and were cut off in the morning by the Syracusan
 cavalry and killed.

The next day the Syracusans set up
 two trophies, one upon Epipolae where the ascent had been made, and
 the other on the spot where the first check was given by the
 Boeotians; and the Athenians took back their dead under truce.

A great many of the Athenians and allies were killed, although still
 more arms were taken than could be accounted for by the number of
 the dead, as some of those who were obliged to leap down from the
 cliffs without their shields escaped with their lives and did not
 perish like the rest.

After this the Syracusans, recovering
 their old confidence at such an unexpected stroke of good fortune,
 despatched Sicanus with fifteen ships to Agrigentum where there was a
 revolution, to induce if possible the city to join them; while
 Gylippus again went by land into the rest of Sicily to bring up reinforcements,
 being now in hope of taking the Athenian lines by storm, after the
 result of the affair on Epipolae.

In the meantime the Athenian generals
 consulted upon the disaster which had happened, and upon the general
 weakness of the army. 
 They saw themselves unsuccessful in their enterprises, and the
 soldiers disgusted with their stay;

disease being rife among them owing to its being the sickly season of
 the year, and to the marshy and unhealthy nature of the spot in
 which they were encamped; and the state of their affairs generally
 being thought desperate.

Accordingly, Demosthenes was of opinion that they ought not to stay
 any longer; but agreeably to his original idea in risking the
 attempt upon Epipolae, now that this had failed, he gave his vote
 for going away without further loss of time, while the sea might yet
 be crossed, and their late reinforcement might give them the
 superiority at all events on that element.

He also said that it would be more profitable for the state to carry
 on the war against those who were building fortifications in
 Attica , than against
 the Syracusans whom it was no longer easy to subdue; besides which
 it was not right to squander large sums of money to no purpose by
 going on with the siege.

This was the opinion of
 Demosthenes. 
 Nicias, without denying the bad state of their affairs, was unwilling
 to avow their weakness, or to have it reported to the enemy that the
 Athenians in full council were openly voting for retreat; for in
 that case they would be much less likely to effect it when they
 wanted without discovery.

Moreover, his own particular information still gave him reason to
 hope that the affairs of the enemy would soon be in a worse state
 than their own, if the Athenians persevered in the siege; as they
 would wear out the Syracusans by want of money, especially with the
 more extensive command of the sea now given them by their present
 navy. 
 Besides this, there was a party in Syracuse who wished to betray the city to the
 Athenians, and kept sending him messages and telling him not to
 raise the siege.

Accordingly, knowing this and really waiting because he hesitated
 between the two courses and wished to see his way more clearly, in
 his public speech on this occasion he refused to lead off the army,
 saying he was sure the Athenians would never approve of their
 returning without a vote of theirs. 
 Those who would vote upon their conduct, instead of judging the facts
 as eye-witnesses like themselves and not from what they might hear
 from hostile critics, would simply be guided by the calumnies of the
 first clever speaker;

while many, indeed most, of the soldiers on the spot, who now so
 loudly proclaimed the danger of their position, when they reached
 Athens would
 proclaim just as loudly the opposite, and would say that their
 generals had been bribed to betray them and return. 
 For himself, therefore, who knew the Athenian temper, sooner than
 perish under a dishonorable charge and by an unjust sentence at the
 hands of the Athenians, he would rather take his chance and die, if
 die he must, a soldier's death at the hand of the enemy.

Besides, after all, the Syracusans were in a worse case than
 themselves. 
 What with paying mercenaries, spending upon fortified posts, and now
 for a full year maintaining a large navy, they were already at a
 loss and would soon be at a standstill: they had already spent two
 thousand talents and incurred heavy debts besides, and could not
 lose even ever so small a fraction of their present force through
 not paying it, without ruin to their cause; depending as they did
 more upon mercenaries than upon soldiers obliged to serve, like
 their own.

He therefore said that they ought to stay and carry on the siege, and
 not depart defeated in point of money, in which they were much
 superior.

Nicias spoke positively because he
 had exact information of the financial distress at Syracuse , and also because of
 the strength of the Athenian party there which kept sending him
 messages not to raise the siege; besides which he had more
 confidence than before in his fleet, and felt sure at least of its
 success.

Demosthenes, however, would not hear for a moment of continuing the
 siege, but said that if they could not lead off the army without a
 decree from Athens , and
 if they were obliged to stay on, they ought to remove to Thapsus or Catana ; where their land forces
 would have a wide extent of country to overrun, and could live by
 plundering the enemy, and would thus do them damage; while the fleet
 would have the open sea to fight in, that is to say, instead of a
 narrow space which was all in the enemy's favour, a wide sea-room
 where their science would be of use, and where they could retreat or
 advance without being confined or circumscribed either when they put
 out or put in.

In any case he was altogether opposed to their staying on where they
 were, and insisted on removing at once, as quickly and with as
 little delay as possible; and in this judgment Eurymedon agreed.

Nicias however still objecting, a certain diffidence and hesitation
 came over them, with a suspicion that Nicias might have some further
 information to make him so positive.

While the Athenians lingered on in
 this way without moving from where they were, Gylippus and Sicanus
 now arrived at Syracuse . 
 Sicanus had failed to gain Agrigentum , the party friendly to the Syracusans
 having been driven out while he was still at Gela ; but Gylippus was
 accompanied not only by a large number of troops raised in
 Sicily , but by the
 heavy infantry sent off in the spring from Peloponnese in the merchantmen,
 who had arrived at Selinus from Libya .

They had been carried to Libya by a storm, and having obtained two galleys
 and pilots from the Cyrenians, on their voyage along shore had taken
 sides with the Euesperitae and had defeated the Libyans who were
 besieging them, and from thence coasting on to Neapolis , a Carthaginian mart, and
 the nearest point to Sicily , from which it is only two days' and a night's
 voyage, there crossed over and came to Selinus .

Immediately upon their arrival the Syracusans prepared to attack the
 Athenians again by land and sea at once. 
 The Athenian generals seeing a fresh army come to the aid of the
 enemy, and that their own circumstances, far from improving, were
 becoming daily worse, and above all distressed by the sickness of
 the soldiers, now began to repent of not having removed before; and
 Nicias no longer offering the same opposition, except by urging that
 there should be no open voting, they gave orders as secretly as
 possible for all to be prepared to sail out from the camp at a given
 signal.

All was at last ready, and they were on the point of sailing away,
 when an eclipse of the moon, which was then at the full, took
 place. 
 Most of the Athenians, deeply impressed by this occurrence, now urged
 the generals to wait; and Nicias, who was somewhat over-addicted to
 divination and practices of that kind, refused from that moment even
 to take the question of departure into consideration, until they had
 waited the thrice nine days prescribed by the soothsayers. The besiegers were thus condemned to stay in
 the country;

and the Syracusans getting wind of what had happened, became more
 eager than ever to press the Athenians, who had now themselves
 acknowledged that they were no longer their superiors either by sea
 or by land, as otherwise they would never have planned to sail
 away. 
 Besides which the Syracusans did not wish them to settle in any other
 part of Sicily , where they
 would be more difficult to deal with, but desired to force them to
 fight at sea as quickly as possible, in a position favorable to
 themselves.

Accordingly they manned their ships and practised for as many days as
 they thought sufficient. 
 When the moment arrived they assaulted on the first day the Athenian
 lines, and upon a small force of heavy infantry and horse sallying
 out against them by certain gates, cut off some of the former and
 routed and pursued them to the lines, where, as the entrance was
 narrow, the Athenians lost seventy horses and some few of the heavy
 infantry.

Drawing off their troops for this
 day, on the next the Syracusans went out with a fleet of seventy-six
 sail, and at the same time advanced with their land forces against
 the lines. 
 The Athenians put out to meet them with eighty-six ships, came to
 close quarters and engaged. 
 The Syracusans and their allies first defeated the Athenian
 center,

and then caught Eurymedon, the commander of the right wing, who was
 sailing out from the line more towards the land in order to surround
 the enemy, in the hollow and recess of the harbor, and killed him
 and destroyed the ships accompanying him; after which they now
 chased the whole Athenian fleet before them and drove them ashore.

Gylippus seeing the enemy's fleet
 defeated and carried ashore beyond their stockades and camp, ran
 down to the breakwater with some of his troops, in order to cut off
 the men as they landed and make it easier for the Syracusans to tow
 off the vessels by the shore being friendly ground.

The Tyrrhenians who guarded this point for the Athenians seeing them
 come on in disorder, advanced out against them and attacked and
 routed their van, hurling it into the marsh of Lysimeleia.

Afterwards the Syracusan and allied troops arrived in greater
 numbers, and the Athenians fearing for their ships came up also to
 the rescue and engaged them, and defeated and pursued them to some
 distance and killed a few of their heavy infantry. 
 They succeeded in rescuing most of their ships and brought them down
 by their camp; eighteen however were taken by the Syracusans and
 their allies, and all the men killed.

The rest the enemy tried to burn by means of an old merchantman which
 they filled with faggots and pine-wood, set on fire and let drift
 down the wind which blew full on the Athenians. 
 The Athenians, however, alarmed for their ships, contrived means for
 stopping it and putting it out, and checking the flames and the
 nearer approach of the merchantman, thus escaped the danger.

After this the Syracusans set up a
 trophy for the sea-fight and for the heavy infantry whom they had
 cut off up at the lines, where they took the horses; and the
 Athenians for the rout of the foot driven by the Tyrrhenians into
 the marsh, and for their own victory with the rest of the army.

The Syracusans had now gained a
 decisive victory at sea, where until now they had feared the
 reinforcement brought by Demosthenes, and deep, in consequence, was
 the despondency of the Athenians, and great their disappointment,
 and greater still their regret for having come on the
 expedition.

These were the only cities that they had yet encountered, similar to
 their own in character, under democracies like themselves, which had
 ships and horses, and were of considerable magnitude. 
 They had been unable to divide and bring them over by holding out the
 prospect of changes in their governments, or to crush them by their
 great superiority in force, but had failed in most of their
 attempts, and being already in perplexity, had now been defeated at
 sea, where defeat could never have been expected, and were thus
 plunged deeper in embarrassment than ever.

Meanwhile the Syracusans immediately
 began to sail freely along the harbor, and determined to close up
 its mouth, so that the Athenians might not be able to steal out in
 future, even if they wished.

Indeed, the Syracusans no longer thought only of saving themselves,
 but also how to hinder the escape of the enemy; thinking, and
 thinking rightly, that they were now much the strongest, and that to
 conquer the Athenians and their allies by land and sea would win
 them great glory in Hellas . 
 The rest of the Hellenes would thus immediately be either freed or
 released from apprehension, as the remaining forces of Athens would be henceforth
 unable to sustain the war that would be waged against her; while
 they, the Syracusans, would be regarded as the authors of this
 deliverance, and would be held in high admiration, not only with all
 men now living but also with posterity.

Nor were these the only considerations that gave dignity to the
 struggle. 
 They would thus conquer not only the Athenians but also their
 numerous allies, and conquer not alone, but with their
 companions-in-arms, commanding side by side with the Corinthians and
 Lacedaemonians, having offered their city to stand in the van of
 danger, and having been in a great measure the pioneers of naval
 success.

Indeed, there were never so many
 peoples assembled before a single city, if we except the grand total
 gathered together in this war under Athens and Lacedaemon .

The following were the states on either side who came to Syracuse to fight for or
 against Sicily , to help to
 conquer or defend the island. 
 Right or community of blood was not the bond of union between them,
 so much as interest or compulsion as the case might be.

The Athenians themselves being Ionians went against the Dorians of
 Syracuse of their
 own free will; and the peoples still speaking Attic and using the
 Athenian laws, the Lemnians, Imbrians, and Aeginetans, that is to
 say, the then occupants of Aegina , being their colonists, went with them. 
 To these must be also added the Hestiaeans dwelling at Hestiaea in
 Euboea .

Of the rest some joined in the expedition as subjects of the
 Athenians, others as independent allies, others as mercenaries.

To the number of the subjects paying tribute belonged the Eretrians,
 Chalcidians, Styrians, and Carystians from Euboea ; the Ceans, Andrians, and
 Tenians from the islands; and the Milesians, Samians, and Chians
 from Ionia . 
 The Chians, however, joined as independent allies, paying no tribute,
 but furnishing ships. 
 Most of these were Ionians and descended from the Athenians, except
 the Carystians, who are Dryopes, and although subjects and obliged
 to serve, were still Ionians fighting against Dorians.

Besides these there were men of Aeolic race, the Methymnians,
 subjects who provided ships, not tribute, and the Tenedians and
 Aenians who paid tribute. 
 These Aeolians fought against their Aeolian founders, the Boeotians
 in the Syracusan army, because they were obliged, while the
 Plataeans, the only native Boeotians opposed to Boeotians, did so
 upon a just quarrel.

Of the Rhodians and Cytherians, both Dorians, the latter,
 Lacedaemonian colonists, fought in the Athenian ranks against their
 Lacedaemonian countrymen with Gylippus; while the Rhodians, Argives
 by race, were compelled to bear arms against the Dorian Syracusans
 and their own colonists, the Geloans, serving with the
 Syracusans.

Of the islanders round Peloponnese , the Cephallenians and Zacynthians
 accompanied the Athenians as independent allies, although their
 insular position really left them little choice in the matter, owing
 to the maritime supremacy of Athens , while the Corcyraeans, who were not only
 Dorians but Corinthians, were openly serving against Corinthians and
 Syracusans, although colonists of the former and of the same race as
 the latter, under color of compulsion, but really out of free will
 through hatred of Corinth .

The Messenians, as they are now called in Naupactus and from
 Pylos , then held by
 the Athenians, were taken with them to the war. 
 There were also a few Megarian exiles, whose fate it was to be now
 fighting against the Megarian Selinuntines.

The engagement of the rest was more
 of a voluntary nature. 
 It was less the league than hatred of the Lacedaemonians and the
 immediate private advantage of each individual that persuaded the
 Dorian Argives to join the Ionian Athenians in a war against
 Dorians; while the Mantineans and other Arcadian mercenaries,
 accustomed to go against the enemy pointed out to them at the
 moment, were led by interest to regard the Arcadians serving with
 the Corinthians as just as much their enemies as any others. 
 The Cretans and Aetolians also served for hire, and the Cretans who
 had joined the Rhodians in founding Gela , thus came to consent to fight for pay
 against, instead of for, their colonists.

There were also some Acarnanians paid to serve, although they came
 chiefly for love of Demosthenes and out of goodwill to the Athenians
 whose allies they were. 
 These all lived on the Hellenic side of the Ionian gulf.

Of the Italiots, there were the Thurians and Metapontines, dragged
 into the quarrel by the stern necessities of a time of revolution;
 of the Siceliots, the Naxians and the Catanians; and of the
 barbarians, the Egestaeans, who called in the Athenians, most of the
 Sicels, and outside Sicily 
 some Tyrrhenian enemies of Syracuse and Iapygian mercenaries.

Such were the peoples serving with
 the Athenians. 
 Against these the Syracusans had the Camarinaeans their neighbors,
 the Geolans who live next them, and then passing over the neutral
 Agrigentines, the Selinuntines settled on the farther side of the
 island.

These inhabit the part of Sicily looking towards Libya ; the Himeraeans came from the side towards
 the Tyrrhenian sea, being the only Hellenic inhabitants in that
 quarter, and the only people that came from thence to the aid of the
 Syracusans.

Of the Hellenes in Sicily 
 the above peoples joined in the war, all Dorians and independent,
 and of the barbarians the Sicels only, that is to say, such as did
 not go over to the Athenians. 
 Of the Hellenes outside Sicily there were the Lacedaemonians, who provided
 a Spartan to take the command, and a force of Neodamodes or
 Freedmen, and of Helots; the Corinthians, who alone joined with
 naval and land forces, with their Leucadian and Ambraciot kinsmen;
 some mercenaries sent by Corinth from Arcadia ; some Sicyonians forced to serve, and from
 outside Peloponnese the
 Boeotians.

In comparison, however with these foreign auxiliaries, the great
 Siceliot cities furnished more in every department—numbers of heavy
 infantry, ships and horses, and an immense multitude besides having
 been brought together; while in comparison, again, one may say, with
 all the rest put together, more was provided by the Syracusans
 themselves, both from the greatness of the city and from the fact
 that they were in the greatest danger.

Such were the auxiliaries brought
 together on either side, all of which had by this time joined,
 neither party experiencing any subsequent accession.

It was no wonder, therefore, if the Syracusans and their allies
 thought that it would win them great glory if they could follow up
 their recent victory in the sea-fight by the capture of the whole
 Athenian armada, without letting it escape either by sea or by
 land.

They began at once to close up the Great Harbor by means of boats,
 merchant vessels, and galleys moored broadside across its mouth,
 which is nearly a mile wide, and made all their other arrangements
 for the event of the Athenians again venturing to fight at sea. 
 There was, in fact, nothing little either in their plans or their
 ideas.

The Athenians, seeing them closing up
 the harbor and informed of their further designs, called a council
 of war.

The generals and colonels assembled and discussed the difficulties of
 the situation; the point which pressed most being that they no
 longer had provisions for immediate use (having sent on to
 Catana to tell them
 not to send any, in the belief that they were going away), and that
 they would not have any in future unless they could command the
 sea. 
 They therefore determined to evacuate their upper lines, to enclose
 with a cross-wall and garrison a small space close to the ships,
 only just sufficient to hold their stores and sick, and manning all
 the ships, seaworthy or not, with every man that could be spared
 from the rest of their land forces, to fight it out at sea, and if
 victorious, to go to Catana , if not, to burn their vessels, form in
 close order, and retreat by land for the nearest friendly place they
 could reach, Hellenic or barbarian.

This was no sooner settled than carried into effect: they descended
 gradually from the upper lines and manned all their vessels,
 compelling all to go on board who were of age to be in any way of
 use.

They thus succeeded in manning about one hundred and ten ships in
 all, on board of which they embarked a number of archers and darters
 taken from the Acarnanians and from the other foreigners, making all
 other provisions allowed by the nature of their plan and by the
 necessities which imposed it.

All was now nearly ready, and Nicias, seeing the soldiery
 disheartened by their unprecedented and decided defeat at sea, and
 by reason of the scarcity of provisions eager to fight it out as
 soon as possible, called them all together, and first addressed them
 speaking as follows:—

‘Soldiers of the Athenians and of the
 allies, we have all an equal interest in the coming struggle, in
 which life and country are at stake for us quite as much as they can
 be for the enemy; since if our fleet wins the day, each can see his
 native city again, wherever that city may be.

You must not lose heart, or be like men without any experience, who
 fail in a first essay, and ever afterwards fearfully forebode a
 future as disastrous.

But let the Athenians among you who have already had experience of
 many wars, and the allies who have joined us in so many expeditions,
 remember the surprises of war, and with the hope that fortune will
 not be always against us, prepare to fight again in a manner worthy
 of the number which you see yourselves to be.

Now, whatever we thought would be of
 service against the crush of vessels in such a narrow harbor, and
 against the force upon the decks of the enemy, from which we
 suffered before, has all been considered with the helmsmen, and, as
 far as our means allowed, provided.

A number of archers and darters will go on board, and a multitude
 that we should not have employed in an action in the open sea, where
 our science would be crippled by the weight of the vessels; but in
 the present land-fight that we are forced to make from shipboard all
 this will be useful.

We have also discovered the changes in construction that we must make
 to meet theirs; and against the thickness of their cheeks, which did
 us the greatest mischief, we have provided grappling-irons, which
 will prevent an assailant backing water after charging, if the
 soldiers on deck here do their duty;

since we are absolutely compelled to fight a land battle from the
 fleet, and it seems to be our interest neither to back water
 ourselves, nor to let the enemy do so, especially as the shore,
 except so much of it as may be held by our troops, is hostile
 ground.

You must remember this and fight on
 as long as you can, and must not let yourselves be driven ashore,
 but once alongside must make up your minds not to part company until
 you have swept the heavy infantry from the enemy's deck.

I say this more for the heavy infantry than for the seamen, as it is
 more the business of the men on deck; and our land forces are even
 now on the whole the strongest.

The sailors I advise, and at the same time implore, not to be too
 much daunted by their misfortunes, now that we have our decks better
 armed and a greater number of vessels. 
 Bear in mind how well worth preserving is the pleasure felt by those
 of you who through your knowledge of our language and imitation of
 our manners were always considered Athenians, even though not so in
 reality, and as such were honored throughout Hellas , and had your full share of
 the advantages of our empire, and more than your share in the
 respect of our subjects and in protection from ill treatment.

You, therefore, with whom alone we freely share our empire, we now
 justly require not to betray that empire in its extremity, and in
 scorn of Corinthians, whom you have often conquered, and of
 Siceliots, none of whom so much as presumed to stand against us when
 our navy was in its prime, we ask you to repel them, and to show
 that even in sickness and disaster your skill is more than a match
 for the fortune and vigor of any other.

For the Athenians among you I add
 once more this reflection:—you left behind you no more such ships in
 your docks as these, no more heavy infantry in their flower; if you
 do aught but conquer, our enemies here will immediately sail
 thither, and those that are left of us at Athens will become unable to
 repel their home assailants, reinforced by these new allies. 
 Here you will fall at once into the hands of the Syracusans—I need
 not remind you of the intentions with which you attacked them—and
 your countrymen at home will fall into those of the
 Lacedaemonians.

Since the fate of both thus hangs upon this single battle—now, if
 ever, stand firm, and remember, each and all, that you who are now
 going on board are the army and navy of the Athenians, and all that
 is left of the state and the great name of Athens , in whose defence if any
 man has any advantage in skill or courage, now is the time for him
 to show it, and thus serve himself and save all.’

After this address Nicias at once
 gave orders to man the ships. 
 Meanwhile Gylippus and the Syracusans could perceive by the
 preparations which they saw going on that the Athenians meant to
 fight at sea. 
 They had also notice of the grappling-irons,

against which they specially provided by stretching hides over the
 prows and much of the upper part of their vessels, in order that the
 irons when thrown might slip off without taking hold.

All being now ready, the generals and Gylippus addressed them in the
 following terms:—

‘Syracusans and allies, the glorious
 character of our past achievements and the no less glorious results
 at issue in the coming battle are, we think, understood by most of
 you, or you would never have thrown yourselves with such ardor into
 the struggle; and if there be any one not as fully aware of the
 facts as he ought to be, we will declare them to him.

The Athenians came to this country first to effect the conquest of
 Sicily , and after that,
 if successful, of Peloponnese and the rest of Hellas , possessing already the
 greatest empire yet known, of present or former times, among the
 Hellenes. 
 Here for the first time they found in you men who faced their navy
 which made them masters everywhere; you have already defeated them
 in the previous sea-fight, and will in all likelihood defeat them
 again now.

When men are once checked in what they consider their special
 excellence, their whole opinion of themselves suffers more than if
 they had not at first believed in their superiority, the unexpected
 shock to their pride causing them to give way more than their real
 strength warrants; and this is probably now the case with the
 Athenians.

With us it is different. 
 The original estimate of ourselves which gave us courage in the days
 of our unskillfulness has been strengthened, while the convictions
 super-added to it that we must be the best seamen of the time, if we
 have conquered the best, has given a double measure of hope to every
 man among us; and, for the most part, where there is the greatest
 hope, there is also the greatest ardor for action.

The means to combat us which they have tried to find in copying our
 armament are familiar to our warfare, and will be met by proper
 provisions; while they will never be able to have a number of heavy
 infantry on their decks, contrary to their custom, and a number of
 darters (born landsmen, one may say, Acarnanians and others,
 embarked afloat, who will not know how to discharge their weapons
 when they have to keep still), without hampering their vessels and
 falling all into confusion among themselves through fighting not
 according to their own tactics.

For they will gain nothing by the number of their ships—I say this to
 those of you who may be alarmed by having to fight against odds—as a
 quantity of ships in a confined space will only be slower in
 executing the movements required, and most exposed to injury from
 our means of offence.

Indeed, if you would know the plain truth, as we are credibly
 informed, the excess of their sufferings and the necessities of
 their present distress have made them desperate; they have no
 confidence in their force, but wish to try their fortune in the only
 way they can, and either to force their passage and sail out, or
 after this to retreat by land, it being impossible for them to be
 worse off than they are.

The fortune of our greatest enemies
 having thus betrayed itself, and their disorder being what I have
 described, let us engage in anger, convinced that, as between
 adversaries, nothing is more legitimate than to claim to sate the
 whole wrath of one's soul in punishing the aggressor, and nothing
 more sweet, as the proverb has it, than the vengeance upon an enemy,
 which it will now be ours to take.

That enemies they are and mortal enemies you all know, since they
 came here to enslave our country, and if successful had in reserve
 for our men all that is most dreadful, and for our children and
 wives all that is most dishonorable, and for the whole city the name
 which conveys the greatest reproach.

None should therefore relent or think it gain if they go away without
 further danger to us. 
 This they will do just the same, even if they get the victory; while
 if we succeed, as we may expect, in chastising them, and in handing
 down to all Sicily her
 ancient freedom strengthened and confirmed, we shall have achieved
 no mean triumph. 
 And the rarest dangers are those in which failure brings little loss
 and success the greatest advantage.’

After the above address to the
 soldiers on their side, the Syracusan generals and Gylippus now
 perceived that the Athenians were manning their ships, and
 immediately proceeded to man their own also.

Meanwhile Nicias, appalled by the position of affairs, realizing the
 greatness and the nearness of the danger now that they were on the
 point of putting out from shore, and thinking, as men are apt to
 think in great crises, that when all has been done they have still
 something left to do, and when all has been said that they have not
 yet said enough, again called on the captains one by one, addressing
 each by his father's name and by his own, and by that of his tribe,
 and adjured them not to belie their own personal renown, or to
 obscure the hereditary virtues for which their ancestors were
 illustrious; he reminded them of their country, the freest of the
 free, and of the unfettered discretion allowed in it to all to live
 as they pleased; and added other arguments such as men would use at
 such a crisis, and which, with little alteration, are made to serve
 on all occasions alike—appeals to wives, children, and national
 gods,—without caring whether they are thought common-place, but
 loudly invoking them in the belief that they will be of use in the
 consternation of the moment.

Having thus admonished them, not, he felt, as he would, but as he
 could, Nicias withdrew and led the troops to the sea, and ranged
 them in as long a line as he was able, in order to aid as far as
 possible in sustaining the courage of the men afloat;

while Demosthenes, Menander, and Euthydemus, who took the command on
 board, put out from their own camp and sailed straight to the
 barrier across the mouth of the harbor and to the passage left open,
 to try to force their way out.

The Syracusans and their allies had
 already put out with about the same number of ships as before, a
 part of which kept guard at the outlet, and the remainder all round
 the rest of the harbor, in order to attack the Athenians on all
 sides at once; while the land forces held themselves in readiness at
 the points at which the vessels might put into the shore. 
 The Syracusan fleet was commanded by Sicanus and Agatharchus, who had
 each a wing of the whole force, with Pythen and the Corinthians in
 the center.

When the rest of the Athenians came up to the barrier, with the first
 shock of their charge they overpowered the ships stationed there,
 and tried to undo the fastenings; after this, as the Syracusans and
 allies bore down upon them from all quarters, the action spread from
 the barrier over the whole harbor, and was more obstinately disputed
 than any of the preceding ones.

On either side the rowers showed great zeal in bringing up their
 vessels at the boatswains' orders, and the helmsmen great skill in
 maneuvering, and great emulation one with another; while the ships
 once alongside, the soldiers on board did their best not to let the
 service on deck be outdone by the others;

in short, every man strove to prove himself the first in his
 particular department. 
 And as many ships were engaged in a small compass (for these were the
 largest fleets fighting in the narrowest space ever known, being
 together little short of two hundred), the regular attacks with the
 beak were few, there being no opportunity of backing water or of
 breaking the line; while the collisions caused by one ship chancing
 to run foul of another, either in flying from or attacking a third,
 were more frequent.

So long as a vessel was coming up to the charge the men on the decks
 rained darts and arrows and stones upon her; but once alongside, the
 heavy infantry tried to board each other's vessel, fighting hand to
 hand.

In many quarters also it happened, by reason of the narrow room, that
 a vessel was charging an enemy on one side and being charged herself
 on another, and that two, or sometimes more ships had perforce got
 entangled round one, obliging the helmsmen to attend to defence
 here, offence there, not to one thing at once, but to many on all
 sides; while the huge din caused by the number of ships crashing
 together not only spread terror, but made the orders of the
 boatswains inaudible.

The boatswains on either side in the discharge of their duty and in
 the heat of the conflict shouted incessantly orders and appeals to
 their men; the Athenians they urged to force the passage out, and
 now if ever to show their mettle and lay hold of a safe return to
 their country; to the Syracusans and their allies they cried that it
 would be glorious to prevent the escape of the enemy, and
 conquering, to exalt the countries that were theirs.

The generals, moreover, on either side, if they saw in any part of
 the battle backing ashore without being forced to do so, called out
 to the captain by name and asked him—the Athenians, whether they
 were retreating because they thought the thrice hostile shore more
 their own than that sea which had cost them so much labour to win;
 the Syracusans, whether they were flying from the flying Athenians,
 whom they well knew to be eager to escape in whatever way they
 could.

Meanwhile the two armies on shore,
 while victory hung in the balance, were a prey to the most agonizing
 and conflicting emotions; the natives thirsting for more glory than
 they had already won, while the invaders feared to find themselves
 in even worse plight than before.

The all of the Athenians being set upon their fleet, their fear for
 the event was like nothing they had ever felt; while their view of
 the struggle was necessarily as checkered as the battle itself.

Close to the scene of action and not all looking at the same point at
 once, some saw their friends victorious and took courage, and fell
 to calling upon heaven not to deprive them of salvation, while
 others who had their eyes turned upon the losers, wailed and cried
 aloud, and, although spectators, were more overcome than the actual
 combatants. 
 Others, again, were gazing at some spot where the battle was evenly
 disputed; as the strife was protracted without decision, their
 swaying bodies reflected the agitation of their minds, and they
 suffered the worst agony of all, ever just within reach of safety or
 just on the point of destruction.

In short, in that one Athenian army as long as the sea-fight remained
 doubtful there was every sound to be heard at once, shrieks, cheers,
 ‘We win,’ ‘We lose,’ and all the other manifold exclamations that a
 great host would necessarily utter in great peril;

and with the men in the fleet it was nearly the same; until at last
 the Syracusans and their allies, after the battle had lasted a long
 while, put the Athenians to flight, and with much shouting and
 cheering chased them in open rout to the shore.

The naval force, one one way, one another, as many as were not taken
 afloat, now ran ashore and rushed from on board their ships to their
 camp; while the army, no more divided, but carried away by one
 impulse, all with shrieks and groans deplored the event, and ran
 down, some to help the ships, others to guard what was left of their
 wall, while the remaining and most numerous part already began to
 consider how they should save themselves.

Indeed, the panic of the present moment had never been surpassed. 
 They now suffered very nearly what they had inflicted at Pylos ; as then the
 Lacedaemonians with the loss of their fleet lost also the men who
 had crossed over to the island, so now the Athenians had no hope of
 escaping by land, without the help of some extraordinary accident.

The sea-fight having been a severe
 one, and many ships and lives having been lost on both sides, the
 victorious Syracusans and their allies now picked up their wrecks
 and dead, and sailed off to the city and set up a trophy.

The Athenians, overwhelmed by their misfortune, never even thought of
 asking leave to take up their dead or wrecks, but wished to retreat
 that very night.

Demosthenes, however, went to Nicias and gave it as his opinion that
 they should man the ships they had left and make another effort to
 force their passage out next morning; saying that they had still
 left more ships fit for service than the enemy, the Athenians having
 about sixty remaining as against less than fifty of their
 opponents.

Nicias was quite of his mind; but when they wished to man the
 vessels, the sailors refused to go on board, being so utterly
 overcome by their defeat as no longer to believe in the possibility
 of success.

Accordingly they all now made up
 their minds to retreat by land. 
 Meanwhile the Syracusan Hermocrates suspecting their intention, and
 impressed by the danger of allowing a force of that magnitude to
 retire by land, establish itself in some other part of Sicily , and from thence renew the
 war, went and stated his views to the authorities, and pointed out
 to them that they ought not to let the enemy get away by night, but
 that all the Syracusans and their allies should at once march out
 and block up the roads and seize and guard the passes.

The authorities were entirely of his opinion, and thought that it
 ought to be done, but on the other hand felt sure that the people,
 who had given themselves over to rejoicing and were taking their
 ease after a great battle at sea, would not be easily brought to
 obey; besides, they were celebrating a festival, having on that day
 a sacrifice to Heracles, and most of them in their rapture at the
 victory had fallen to drinking at the festival, and would probably
 consent to anything sooner than to take up their arms and march out
 at that moment.

For these reasons the thing appeared impracticable to the
 magistrates; and Hermocrates, finding himself unable to do anything
 further with them, had now recourse to the following stratagem of
 his own. 
 What he feared was that the Athenians might quietly get the start of
 them by passing the most difficult places during the night; and he
 therefore sent, as soon as it was dusk, some friends of his own to
 the camp with some horsemen who rode up within earshot and called
 out to some of the men, as though they were well-wishers of the
 Athenians, and told them to tell Nicias (who had in fact some
 correspondence who informed him of what went on inside the town),
 not to lead off the army by night as the Syracusans were guarding
 the roads, but to make his preparations at his leisure and to
 retreat by day.

After saying this they departed; and their hearers informed the
 Athenian generals,

who put off going for that night on the strength of this message, not
 doubting its sincerity. Since after
 all they had not set out at once, they now determined to stay also
 the following day to give time to the soldiers to pack up as well as
 they could the most useful articles, and, leaving everything else
 behind, to start only with what was strictly necessary for their
 personal subsistence.

Meanwhile the Syracusans and Gylippus marched out and blocked up the
 roads through the country by which the Athenians were likely to
 pass, and kept guard at the fords of the stream and rivers, posting
 themselves so as to receive them and stop the army where they
 thought best; while their fleet sailed up to the beach and towed off
 the ships of the Athenians. 
 Some few were burned by the Athenians themselves as they had
 intended; the rest the Syracusans lashed on to their own at their
 leisure as they had been thrown up on shore, without any one trying
 to stop them, and conveyed to the town.

After this, Nicias and Demosthenes
 now thinking that enough had been done in the way of preparation,
 the removal of the army took place upon the second day after the
 sea-fight.

It was a lamentable scene, not merely from the single circumstance
 that they were retreating after having lost all their ships, their
 great hopes gone, and themselves and the state in peril; but also in
 leaving the camp there were things most grievous for every eye and
 heart to contemplate.

The dead lay unburied, and each man as he recognized a friend among
 them shuddered with grief and horror; while the living whom they
 were leaving behind, wounded or sick, were to the living far more
 shocking than the dead, and more to be pitied than those who had
 perished.

These fell to entreating and bewailing until their friends knew not
 what to do, begging them to take them and loudly calling to each
 individual comrade or relative whom they could see, hanging upon the
 necks of their tent-fellows in the act of departure, and following
 as far as they could, and when their bodily strength failed them,
 calling again and again upon heaven and shrieking aloud as they were
 left behind. 
 So that the whole army being filled with tears and distracted after
 this fashion found it not easy to go, even from an enemy's land,
 where they had already suffered evils too great for tears and in the
 unknown future before them feared to suffer more.

Dejection and self-condemnation were also rife among them. 
 Indeed they could only be compared to a starved-out town, and that no
 small one, escaping; the whole multitude upon the march being not
 less than forty thousand men. 
 All carried anything they could which might be of use, and the heavy
 infantry and troopers, contrary to their wont, while under arms
 carried their own victuals, in some cases for want of servants, in
 others through not trusting them; as they had long been deserting
 and now did so in greater numbers than ever. 
 Yet even thus they did not carry enough, as there was no longer food
 in the camp.

Moreover their disgrace generally, and the universality of their
 sufferings, however to a certain extent alleviated by being borne in
 company, were still felt at the moment a heavy burden, especially
 when they contrasted the splendor and glory of their setting out
 with the humiliation in which it had ended.

For this was by far the greatest reverse that ever befell an Hellenic
 army. 
 They had come to enslave others, and were departing in fear of being
 enslaved themselves: they had sailed out with prayer and paeans, and
 now started to go back with omens directly contrary; travelling by
 land instead of by sea, and trusting not in their fleet but in their
 heavy infantry. 
 Nevertheless the greatness of the danger still impending made all
 this appear tolerable.

Nicias seeing the army dejected and
 greatly altered, passed along the ranks and encouraged and comforted
 them as far as was possible under the circumstances, raising his
 voice still higher and higher as he went from one company to another
 in his earnestness, and in his anxiety that the benefit of his words
 might reach as many as possible:—

‘Athenians and allies, even in our
 present position we must still hope on, since men have ere now been
 saved from worse straits than this; and you must not condemn
 yourselves too severely either because of your disasters or because
 of your present unmerited sufferings.

I myself who am not superior to any of you in strength—indeed you see
 how I am in my sickness—and who in the gifts of fortune am, I think,
 whether in private life or otherwise, the equal of any, am now
 exposed to the same danger as the meanest among you; and yet my life
 has been one of much devotion towards the gods, and of much justice
 and without offence towards men.

I have, therefore, still a strong hope for the future, and our
 misfortunes do not terrify me as much as they might. 
 Indeed we may hope that they will be lightened: our enemies have had
 good fortune enough; and if any of the gods was offended at our
 expedition, we have been already amply punished.

Others before us have attacked their neighbors and have done what men
 will do without suffering more than they could bear; and we may now
 justly expect to find the gods more kind, for we have become fitter
 objects for their pity than their jealousy. 
 And then look at yourselves, mark the numbers and efficiency of the
 heavy infantry marching in your ranks, and do not give way too much
 to despondency, but reflect that you are yourselves at once a city
 wherever you sit down, and that there is no other in Sicily that could easily resist
 your attack, or expel you when once established.

The safety and order of the march is for yourselves to look to; the
 one thought of each man being that the spot on which he may be
 forced to fight must be conquered and held as his country and
 stronghold.

Meanwhile we shall hasten on our way night and day alike, as our
 provisions are scanty; and if we can reach some friendly place of
 the Sicels, whom fear of the Syracusans still keeps true to us, you
 may forthwith consider yourselves safe. 
 A message has been sent on to them with directions to meet us with
 supplies of food.

To sum up, be convinced, soldiers, that you must be brave, as there
 is no place near for your cowardice to take refuge in, and that if
 you now escape from the enemy, you may all see again what your
 hearts desire, while those of you who are Athenians will raise up
 again the great power of the state, fallen though it be. 
 Men make the city and not walls or ships without men in them.’

As he made this address, Nicias went
 along the ranks, and brought back to their place any of the troops
 that he saw straggling out of the line; while Demosthenes did as
 much for his part of the army, addressing them in words very
 similar.

The army marched in a hollow square, the division under Nicias
 leading, and that of Demosthenes following, the heavy infantry being
 outside and the baggage-carriers and the bulk of the army in the
 middle.

When they arrived at the ford of the river Anapus they there found
 drawn up a body of the Syracusans and allies, and routing these,
 made good their passage and pushed on, harassed by the charges of
 the Syracusan horse and by the missiles of their light troops.

On that day they advanced about four miles and a half, halting for
 the night upon a certain hill. 
 On the next they started early and got on about two miles further,
 and descended into a place in the plain and there encamped, in order
 to procure some eatables from the houses, as the place was
 inhabited, and to carry on with them water from thence, as for many
 furlongs in front, in the direction in which they were going, it was
 not plentiful.

The Syracusans meanwhile went on and fortified the pass in front,
 where there was a steep hill with a rocky ravine on each side of it,
 called the Acraean cliff.

The next day the Athenians advancing found themselves impeded by the
 missiles and charges of the horse and darters, both very numerous,
 of the Syracusans and allies; and after fighting for a long while,
 at length retired to the same camp, where they had no longer
 provisions as before, it being impossible to leave their position by
 reason of the cavalry.

Early next morning they started
 afresh and forced their way to the hill, which had been fortified,
 where they found before them the enemy's infantry drawn up many
 shields deep to defend the fortification, the pass being narrow.

The Athenians assaulted the work, but were greeted by a storm of
 missiles from the hill, which told with the greater effect through
 its being a steep one, and unable to force the passage, retreated
 again and rested.

Meanwhile occurred some claps of thunder and rain, as often happens
 towards autumn, which still further disheartened the Athenians, who
 thought all these things to be omens of their approaching ruin.

While they were resting Gylippus and the Syracusans sent a part of
 their army to throw up works in their rear on the way by which they
 had advanced; however, the Athenians immediately sent some of their
 men and prevented them;

after which they retreated more towards the plain and halted for the
 night. 
 When they advanced the next day the Syracusans surrounded and
 attacked them on every side, and disabled many of them, falling back
 if the Athenians advanced and coming on if they retired, and in
 particular assaulting their rear, in the hope of routing them in
 detail, and thus striking a panic into the whole army.

For a long while the Athenians persevered in this fashion, but after
 advancing for four or five furlongs halted to rest in the plain, the
 Syracusans also withdrawing to their own camp.

During the night Nicias and
 Demosthenes, seeing the wretched condition of their troops, now in
 want of every kind of necessary, and numbers of them disabled in the
 numerous attacks of the enemy, determined to light as many fires as
 possible, and to lead off the army, no longer by the same route as
 they had intended, but towards the sea in the opposite direction to
 that guarded by the Syracusans.

The whole of this route was leading the army not to Catana but to the other side of
 Sicily , towards
 Camarina, Gela , and the
 other Hellenic and barbarian towns in that quarter.

They accordingly lit a number of fires and set out by night. 
 Now all armies, and the greatest most of all, are liable to fears and
 alarms, especially when they are marching by night through an
 enemy's country and with the enemy near; and the Athenians falling
 into one of these panics,

the leading division, that of Nicias, kept together and got on a good
 way in front, while that of Demosthenes, comprising rather more than
 half the army, got separated and marched on in some disorder.

By morning, however, they reached the sea, and getting into the
 Helorine Road, pushed on in order to reach the river Cacyparis, and
 to follow the stream up through the interior, where they hoped to be
 met by the Sicels whom they had sent for.

Arrived at the river, they found there also a Syracusan party engaged
 in barring the passage of the ford with a wall and a palisade, and
 forcing this guard, crossed the river and went on to another called
 the Erineus, according to the advice of their guides.

Meanwhile, when day came and the
 Syracusans and allies found that the Athenians were gone, most of
 them accused Gylippus of having let them escape on purpose, and
 hastily pursuing by the road which they had no difficulty in finding
 that they had taken, overtook them about dinner-time.

They first came up with the troops under Demosthenes, who were behind
 and marching somewhat slowly and in disorder, owing to the
 night-panic above referred to, and at once attacked and engaged
 them, the Syracusan horse surrounding them with more ease now that
 they were separated from the rest, and hemming them in on one
 spot.

The division of Nicias was five or six miles on in front, as he led
 them more rapidly, thinking that under the circumstances their
 safety lay not in staying and fighting, unless obliged, but in
 retreating as fast as possible, and only fighting when forced to do
 so.

On the other hand, Demosthenes was, generally speaking, harassed more
 incessantly, as his post in the rear left him the first exposed to
 the attacks of the enemy; and now, finding that the Syracusans were
 in pursuit, he omitted to push on, in order to form his men for
 battle, and so lingered until he was surrounded by his pursuers and
 himself and the Athenians with him placed in the most distressing
 position, being huddled into an enclosure with a wall all round it,
 a road on this side and on that, and olive-trees in great number,
 where missiles were showered in upon them from every quarter.

This mode of attack the Syracusans had with good reason adopted in
 preference to fighting at close quarters, as to risk a struggle with
 desperate men was now more for the advantage of the Athenians than
 for their own; besides, their success had now become so certain that
 they began to spare themselves a little in order not to be cut off
 in the moment of victory, thinking too that, as it was, they would
 be able in this way to subdue and capture the enemy.

In fact, after plying the Athenians
 and allies all day long from every side with missiles, they at
 length saw that they were worn out with their wounds and other
 sufferings; and Gylippus and the Syracusans and their allies made a
 proclamation, offering their liberty to any of the islanders who
 chose to come over to them; and some few cities went over.

Afterwards a capitulation was agreed upon for all the rest with
 Demosthenes, to lay down their arms on condition that no one was to
 be put to death either by violence or imprisonment or want of the
 necessaries of life.

Upon this they surrendered to the number of six thousand in all,
 laying down all the money in their possession, which filled the
 hollows of four shields, and were immediately conveyed by the
 Syracusans to the town. Meanwhile
 Nicias with his division arrived that day at the river Erineus,
 crossed over and posted his army upon some high ground upon the
 other side.

The next day the Syracusans overtook him and told him that the troops
 under Demosthenes had surrendered, and invited him to follow their
 example. 
 Incredulous of the fact, Nicias asked for a truce to send a horseman
 to see,

and upon the return of the messenger with the tidings that they had
 surrendered, sent a herald to Gylippus and the Syracusans, saying
 that he was ready to agree with them on behalf of the Athenians to
 repay whatever money the Syracusans had spent upon the war if they
 would let his army go; and offered until the money was paid to give
 Athenians as hostages, one for every talent.

The Syracusans and Gylippus rejected this proposition, and attacked
 this division as they had the other, standing all round and plying
 them with missiles until the evening.

Food and necessaries were as miserably wanting to the troops of
 Nicias as they had been to their comrades; nevertheless they watched
 for the quiet of the night to resume their march. 
 But as they were taking up their arms the Syracusans perceived it and
 raised their paean,

upon which the Athenians, finding that they were discovered, laid
 them down again, except about three hundred men who forced their way
 through the guards and went on during the night as they were able.

As soon as it was day Nicias put his
 army in motion, pressed, as before, by the Syracusans and their
 allies, pelted from every side by their missiles, and struck down by
 their javelins.

The Athenians pushed on for the Assinarus, impelled by the attacks
 made upon them from every side by a numerous cavalry and the swarm
 of other arms, fancying that they should breathe more freely if once
 across the river, and driven on also by their exhaustion and craving
 for water.

Once there they rushed in, and all order was at an end, each man
 wanting to cross first, and the attacks of the enemy making it
 difficult to cross at all; forced to huddle together, they fell
 against and trod down one another, some dying immediately upon the
 javelins, others getting entangled together and stumbling over the
 articles of baggage, without being able to rise again.

Meanwhile the opposite bank, which was steep, was lined by the
 Syracusans, who showered missiles down upon the Athenians, most of
 them drinking greedily and heaped together in disorder in the hollow
 bed of the river.

The Peloponnesians also came down and butchered them, especially
 those in the water, which was thus immediately spoiled, but which
 they went on drinking just the same, mud and all, bloody as it was,
 most even fighting to have it.

At last, when many dead now lay piled
 one upon another in the stream, and part of the army had been
 destroyed at the river, and the few that escaped from thence cut off
 by the cavalry, Nicias surrendered himself to Gylippus, whom he
 trusted more than he did the Syracusans, and told him and the
 Lacedaemonians to do what they liked with him, but to stop the
 slaughter of the soldiers.

Gylippus, after this, immediately gave orders to make prisoners; upon
 which the rest were brought together alive, except a large number
 secreted by the soldiery, and a party was sent in pursuit of the
 three hundred who had got through the guard during the night, and
 who were now taken with the rest.

The number of the enemy collected as public property was not
 considerable; but that secreted was very large, and all Sicily was filled with them, no
 convention having been made in their case as for those taken with
 Demosthenes.

Besides this, a large portion were killed outright, the carnage being
 very great, and not exceeded by any in this Sicilian war. 
 In the numerous other encounters upon the march, not a few also had
 fallen. 
 Nevertheless many escaped, some at the moment, others served as
 slaves, and then ran away subsequently. 
 These found refuge at Catana .

The Syracusans and their allies now
 mustered and took up the spoils and as many prisoners as they could,
 and went back to the city.

The rest of their Athenian and allied captives were deposited in the
 quarries, this seeming the safest way of keeping them; but Nicias
 and Demosthenes were butchered, against the will of Gylippus, who
 thought that it would be the crown of his triumph if he could take
 the enemy's generals to Lacedaemon .

One of them, as it happened, Demosthenes, was one of her greatest
 enemies, on account of the affair of the island and of Pylos ; while the other, Nicias,
 was for the same reasons one of her greatest friends, owing to his
 exertions to procure the release of the prisoners by persuading the
 Athenians to make peace.

For these reasons the Lacedaemonians felt kindly towards him; and it
 was in this that Nicias himself mainly confided when he surrendered
 to Gylippus. 
 But some of the Syracusans who had been in correspondence with him
 were afraid, it was said, of his being put to the torture and
 troubling their success by his revelations; others, especially the
 Corinthians, of his escaping, as he was wealthy, by means of bribes,
 and living to do them further mischief; and these persuaded the
 allies and put him to death.

This or the like was the cause of the death of a man who, of all the
 Hellenes in my time, least deserved such a fate, seeing that the
 whole course of his life had been regulated with strict attention to
 virtue.

The prisoners in the quarries were at
 first hardly treated by the Syracusans. 
 Crowded in a narrow hole, without any roof to cover them, the heat of
 the sun and the stifling closeness of the air tormented them during
 the day, and then the nights which came on autumnal and chilly, made
 them ill by the violence of the change;

besides, as they had to do everything in the same place for want of
 room, and the bodies of those who died of their wounds or from the
 variation in the temperature, or from similar causes, were left
 heaped together one upon another, intolerable stenches arose; while
 hunger and thirst never ceased to afflict them, each man during
 eight months having only half a pint of water and a pint of corn
 given him daily. 
 In short, no single suffering to be apprehended by men thrust into
 such a place was spared them.

For some seventy days they thus lived all together, after which all,
 except the Athenians and any Siceliots or Italiots who had joined in
 the expedition, were sold.

The total number of prisoners taken it would be difficult to state
 exactly, but it could not have been less than seven thousand.

This was the greatest Hellenic
 achievement of any in this war, or, in my opinion, in Hellenic
 history; at once most glorious to the victors, and most calamitous
 to the conquered.

They were beaten at all points and altogether; all that they suffered
 was great; they were destroyed, as the saying is, with a total
 destruction, their fleet, their army—everything was destroyed, and
 few out of many returned home. 
 Such were the events in Sicily .

Such were the events in Sicily . 
 When the news was brought to Athens , for a long while they disbelieved even the
 most respectable of the soldiers who had themselves escaped from the
 scene of action and clearly reported the matter, a destruction so
 complete not being thought credible. 
 When the conviction was forced upon them, they were angry with the
 orators who had joined in promoting the expedition, just as if they
 had not themselves voted it, and were enraged also with the reciters
 of oracles and soothsayers, and all other omenmongers of the time
 who had encouraged them to hope that they should conquer Sicily .

Already distressed at all points and in all quarters, after what had
 now happened, they were seized by a fear and consternation quite
 without example. 
 It was grievous enough for the state and for every man in his proper
 person to lose so many heavy infantry, cavalry, and able-bodied
 troops, and to see none left to replace them; but when they saw,
 also, that they had not sufficient ships in their docks, or money in
 the treasury, or crews for the ships, they began to despair of
 salvation. 
 They thought that their enemies in Sicily would immediately sail with their fleet
 against Piraeus ,
 inflamed by so signal a victory; while their adversaries at home,
 redoubling all their preparations, would vigorously attack them by
 sea and land at once, aided by their own revolted confederates.

Nevertheless, with such means as they had, it was determined to
 resist to the last, and to provide timber and money, and to equip a
 fleet as they best could, to take steps to secure their confederates
 and above all Euboea , to
 reform things in the city upon a more economical footing, and to
 elect a board of elders to advise upon the state of affairs as
 occasion should arise.

In short, as is the way of a democracy, in the panic of the moment
 they were ready to be as prudent as possible. These resolves were at once carried into effect.

Summer was now over. 
 The winter ensuing saw all Hellas stirring under the impression of the great
 Athenian disaster in Sicily . 
 Neutrals now felt that even if uninvited they ought no longer to
 stand aloof from the war, but should volunteer to march against the
 Athenians, who, as they severally reflected, would probably have
 come against them if the Sicilian campaign had succeeded. 
 Besides, they considered that the war would now be short, and that it
 would be creditable for them to take part in it. 
 Meanwhile the allies of the Lacedaemonians felt all more anxious than
 ever to see a speedy end to their heavy labours.

But above all, the subjects of the Athenians showed a readiness to
 revolt even beyond their ability, judging the circumstances with
 passion, and refusing even to hear of the Athenians being able to
 last out the coming summer.

Beyond all this, Lacedaemon 
 was encouraged by the near prospect of being joined in great force
 in the spring by her allies in Sicily , lately forced by events to acquire their
 navy.

With these reasons for confidence in every quarter, the
 Lacedaemonians now resolved to throw themselves without reserve into
 the war considering that, once it was happily terminated, they would
 be finally delivered from such dangers as that which would have
 threatened them from Athens , if she had become mistress of Sicily , and that the overthrow of
 the Athenians would leave them in quiet enjoyment of the supremacy
 over all Hellas .

Their king, Agis, accordingly set out
 at once during this winter with some troops from Decelea, and levied
 from the allies contributions for the fleet, and turning towards the
 Malian gulf exacted a sum of money from the Oetaeans by carrying off
 most of their cattle in reprisal for their old hostility, and, in
 spite of the protests and opposition of the Thessalians, forced the
 Achaeans of Phthiotis and
 the other subjects of the Thessalians in those parts to give him
 money and hostages, and deposited the hostages at Corinth , and tried to bring
 their countrymen into the confederacy.

The Lacedaemonians now issued a requisition to the cities for
 building a hundred ships, fixing their own quota and that of the
 Boeotians at twenty-five each; that of the Phocians and Locrians
 together at fifteen; that of the Corinthians at fifteen; that of the
 Arcadians, Pellenians, and Sicyonians together at ten; and that of
 the Megarians, Troezenians, Epidaurians, and Hermionians together at
 ten also; and meanwhile made every other preparation for commencing
 hostilities by the spring.

In the meantime the Athenians were
 not idle. 
 During this same winter, as they had determined, they contributed
 timber and pushed on their ship-building, and fortified Sunium to
 enable their corn-ships to round it in safety, and evacuated the
 fort in Laconia which they
 had built on their way to Sicily ; while they also, for economy, cut down any
 other expenses that seemed unnecessary, and above all kept a careful
 look-out against the revolt of their confederates.

While both parties were thus engaged,
 and were as intent upon preparing for the war as they had been at
 the outset, the Euboeans first of all sent envoys during this winter
 to Agis to treat of their revolting from Athens . 
 Agis accepted their proposals, and sent for Alcamenes, son of
 Sthenelaidas, and Melanthus from Lacedaemon , to take the command in Euboea . 
 These accordingly arrived with some three hundred Neodamodes, and
 Agis began to arrange for their crossing over.

But in the meanwhile arrived some Lesbians, who also wished to
 revolt; and these being supported by the Boeotians, Agis was
 persuaded to defer acting in the matter of Euboea , and made arrangements for
 the revolt of the Lesbians, giving them Alcamenes, who was to have
 sailed to Euboea , as
 governor, and himself promising them ten ships, and the Boeotians
 the same number.

All this was done without instructions from home, as Agis while at
 Decelea with the army that he commanded had power to send troops to
 whatever quarter he pleased, and to levy men and money. 
 During this period, one might say, the allies obeyed him much more
 than they did the Lacedaemonians in the city, as the force he had
 with him made him feared at once wherever he went.

While Agis was engaged with the Lesbians, the Chians and Erythraeans,
 who were also ready to revolt, applied, not to him but at Lacedaemon ; where they arrived
 accompanied by an ambassador from Tissaphernes, the commander of
 King Darius, son of Artaxerxes,

in the maritime districts, who invited the Peloponnesians to come
 over, and promised to maintain their army. 
 The king had lately called upon him for the tribute from his
 government, for which he was in arrears, being unable to raise it
 from the Hellenic towns by reason of the Athenians; and he therefore
 calculated that by weakening the Athenians he should get the tribute
 better paid, and should also draw the Lacedaemonians into alliance
 with the king; and by this means, as the king had commanded him,
 take alive or dead Amorges, the bastard son of Pissuthnes, who was
 in rebellion on the coast of Caria .

While the Chians and Tissaphernes
 thus joined to effect the same object, about the same time
 Calligeitus, son of Laophon, a Megarian, and Timagoras, son of
 Athenagoras, a Cyzicene, both of them exiles from their country and
 living at the court of Pharnabazus, son of Pharnaces, arrived at
 Lacedaemon upon a
 mission from Pharnabazus, to procure a fleet for the Hellespont ; by means of which, if
 possible, he might himself effect the object of Tissaphernes'
 ambition, and cause the cities in his government to revolt from the
 Athenians, and so get the tribute, and by his own agency obtain for
 the king the alliance of the Lacedaemonians.

The emissaries of Pharnabazus and
 Tissaphernes treating apart, a keen competition now ensued at
 Lacedaemon as to
 whether a fleet and army should be sent first to Ionia and Chios , or to the Hellespont .

The Lacedaemonians, however, decidedly favoured the Chians and
 Tissaphernes, who were seconded by Alcibiades, the family friend of
 Endius, one of the Ephors for that year. 
 Indeed, this is how their house got its Laconic name, Alcibiades
 being the family name of Endius.

Nevertheless the Lacedaemonians first sent to Chios Phrynis, one of
 the Perioeci, to see whether they had as many ships as they said,
 and whether their city generally was as great as was reported; and
 upon his bringing word that they had been told the truth,
 immediately entered into alliance with the Chians and Erythraeans,
 and voted to send them forty ships, there being already, according
 to the statement of the Chians, not less than sixty in the
 island.

At first the Lacedaemonians meant to send ten of these forty
 themselves, with Melanchridas their admiral; but afterwards, an
 earthquake having occurred, they sent Chalcideus instead of
 Melanchridas, and instead of the ten ships equipped only five in
 Laconia . 
 And the winter ended, and with it ended also the nineteenth year of
 this war of which Thucydides is the historian.

At the beginning of the next summer
 the Chians were urging that the fleet should be sent off, being
 afraid that the Athenians, from whom all these embassies were kept a
 secret, might find out what was going on, and the Lacedaemonians at
 once sent three Spartans to Corinth to haul the ships as quickly as possible
 across the Isthmus from the other sea to that on the side of
 Athens , and to order
 them all to sail to Chios , those which Agis was equipping for
 Lesbos not
 excepted. 
 The number of ships from the allied states was thirty-nine in all.

Meanwhile Calligeitus and Timagoras
 did not join on behalf of Pharnabazus in the expedition to
 Chios or give
 the money—twenty-five talents—which they had brought with them to
 help in despatching a force, but determined to sail afterwards with
 another force by themselves.

Agis, on the other hand, seeing the Lacedaemonians bent upon going to
 Chios first,
 himself came in to their views; and the allies assembled at
 Corinth and held a
 council, in which they decided to sail first to Chios under the command of
 Chalcideus, who was equipping the five vessels in Laconia , then to Lesbos , under the command of
 Alcamenes, the same whom Agis had fixed upon, and lastly to go to
 the Hellespont , where the
 command was given to Clearchus, son of Ramphias.

Meanwhile they would take only half the ships across the Isthmus
 first, and let those sail off at once, in order that the Athenians
 might attend less to the departing squadron than to those to be
 taken across afterwards,

as no care had been taken to keep this voyage secret through contempt
 of the impotence of the Athenians, who had as yet no fleet of any
 account upon the sea. 
 Agreeably to this determination twenty-one vessels were at once
 conveyed across the Isthmus.

They were now impatient to set sail,
 but the Corinthians were not willing to accompany them until they
 had celebrated the Isthmian festival, which fell at that time. 
 Upon this Agis proposed to them to save their scruples about breaking
 the Isthmian truce by taking the expedition upon himself.

The Corinthians not consenting to this, a delay ensued, during which
 the Athenians conceived suspicions of what was preparing at
 Chios , and sent
 Aristocrates, one of their generals, and charged them with the fact,
 and upon the denial of the Chians, ordered them to send with them a
 contingent of ships, as faithful confederates. 
 Seven were sent accordingly.

The reason of the despatch of the ships lay in the fact that the mass
 of the Chians were not privy to the negotiations, while the few who
 were in the secret did not wish to break with the multitude until
 they had something positive to lean upon, and no longer expected the
 Peloponnesians to arrive by reason of their delay.

In the meantime the Isthmian games
 took place, and the Athenians, who had been also invited, went to
 attend them, and now seeing more clearly into the designs of the
 Chians, as soon as they returned to Athens took measures to prevent the fleet putting
 out from Cenchreae without their knowledge.

After the festival the Peloponnesians set sail with twenty-one ships
 for Chios , under the
 command of Alcamenes. 
 The Athenians first sailed against them with an equal number, drawing
 off towards the open sea. 
 The enemy, however, turning back before he had followed them far, the
 Athenians returned also, not trusting the seven Chian ships which
 formed part of their number,

and afterwards manned thirty-seven vessels in all and chased him on
 his passage along shore into Spiraeum, a desert Corinthian port on
 the edge of the Epidaurian frontier. 
 After losing one ship out at sea, the Peloponnesians got the rest
 together and brought them to anchor.

The Athenians now attacked not only from the sea with their fleet,
 but also disembarked upon the coast; and melee ensued of the most
 confused and violent kind, in which the Athenians disabled most of
 the enemy's vessels and killed Alcamenes their commander, losing
 also a few of their own men.

After this they separated, and the
 Athenians, detaching a sufficient number of ships to blockade those
 of the enemy, anchored with the rest at the islet adjacent, upon
 which they proceeded to encamp, and sent to Athens for reinforcements;

the Peloponnesians having been joined on the day after the battle by
 the Corinthians, who came to help the ships, and by the other
 inhabitants in the vicinity not long afterwards. 
 These saw the difficulty of keeping guard in a desert place, and in
 their perplexity at first thought of burning the ships, but finally
 resolved to haul them up on shore and sit down and guard them with
 their land forces, until a convenient opportunity for escaping
 should present itself. 
 Agis also, on being informed of the disaster, sent them a Spartan of
 the name of Thermon .

The Lacedaemonians first received the news of the fleet having put
 out from the Isthmus, Alcamenes having been ordered by the Ephors to
 send off a horseman when this took place, and immediately resolved
 to despatch their own five vessels under Chalcideus, and Alcibiades
 with him. 
 But while they were full of this resolution came the second news of
 the fleet having taken refuge in Spiraeum; and disheartened at their
 first step in the Ionian war proving a failure, they laid aside the
 idea of sending the ships from their own country, and even wished to
 recall some that had already sailed.

Perceiving this, Alcibiades again
 persuaded Endius and the other Ephors to persevere in the
 expedition, saying that the voyage would be made before the Chians
 heard of the fleet's misfortune, and that as soon as he set foot in
 Ionia , he should, by
 assuring them of the weakness of the Athenians and the zeal of
 Lacedaemon , have no
 difficulty in persuading the cities to revolt, as they would readily
 believe his testimony.

He also represented to Endius himself in private that it would be
 glorious for him to be the means of making Ionia revolt and the king become
 the ally of Lacedaemon ,
 instead of that honour being left to Agis

(Agis, it must be remembered, was the enemy of Alcibiades); and
 Endius and his colleagues thus persuaded, he put to sea with the
 five ships and the Lacedaemonian Chalcideus, and made all haste upon
 the voyage.

About this same time the sixteen
 Peloponnesian ships from Sicily , which had served through the war with
 Gylippus, were caught on their return off Leucadia and roughly
 handled by the twenty-seven Athenian vessels under Hippocles, son of
 Menippus, on the look-out for the ships from Sicily . 
 After losing one of their number the rest escaped from the Athenians
 and sailed into Corinth .

Meanwhile Chalcideus and Alcibiades
 seized all they met with on their voyage, to prevent news of their
 coming, and let them go at Corycus, the first point which they
 touched at in the continent. 
 Here they were visited by some of their Chian correspondents, and
 being urged by them to sail up to the town without announcing their
 coming, arrived suddenly before Chios .

The many were amazed and confounded, while the few had so arranged
 that the council should be sitting at the time; and after speeches
 from Chalcideus and Alcibiades stating that many more ships were
 sailing up, but saying nothing of the fleet being blockaded in
 Spiraeum, the Chians revolted from the Athenians, and the
 Erythraeans immediately afterwards.

After this three vessels sailed over to Clazomenae, and made that
 city revolt also; and the Clazomenians immediately crossed over to
 the mainland and began to fortify Polichna, in order to retreat
 there, in case of necessity, from the island where they dwelt.

While the revolted places were all
 engaged in fortifying and preparing for the war, news of Chios speedily reached
 Athens . 
 The Athenians thought the danger by which they were now menaced great
 and unmistakable, and that the rest of their allies would not
 consent to keep quiet after the secession of the greatest of their
 number. 
 In the consternation of the moment they at once took off the penalty
 attaching to whoever proposed or put to the vote a proposal for
 using the thousand talents which they had jealously avoided touching
 throughout the whole war, and voted to employ them to man a large
 number of ships, and to send off at once under Strombichides, son of
 Diotimus, the eight vessels, forming part of the blockading fleet at
 Spiraeum, which had left the blockade and had returned after
 pursuing and failing to overtake the vessels with Chalcideus. 
 These were to be followed shortly afterwards by twelve more under
 Thrasycles, also taken from the blockade.

They also recalled the seven Chian vessels, forming part of their
 squadron blockading the fleet in Spiraeum, and giving the slaves on
 board their liberty, put the freemen in confinement, and speedily
 manned and sent out ten fresh ships to blockade the Peloponnesians
 in the place of all those that had departed, and decided to man
 thirty more. 
 Zeal was not wanting, and no effort was spared to send relief to
 Chios .

In the meantime Strombichides with
 his eight ships arrived at Samos , and taking one Samian vessel, sailed to
 Teos and required them
 to remain quiet. 
 Chalcideus also set sail with twenty-three ships for Teos from Chios , the land forces of
 the Clazomenians and Erythraeans moving along shore to support
 him.

Informed of this in time, Strombichides put out from Teos before their arrival, and
 while out at sea, seeing the number of the ships from Chios , fled towards
 Samos , chased by
 the enemy.

The Teians at first would not receive the land forces, but upon the
 flight of the Athenians took them into the town. 
 There they waited for some time for Chalcideus to return from the
 pursuit, and as time went on without his appearing, began themselves
 to demolish the wall which the Athenians had built on the land side
 of the city of the Teians, being assisted by a few of the barbarians
 who had come up under the command of Stages, the lieutenant of
 Tissaphernes.

Meanwhile Chalcideus and Alcibiades,
 after chasing Strombichides into Samos , armed the crews of the ships from Peloponnese and left them at
 Chios , and
 filling their places with substitutes from Chios and manning twenty
 others, sailed off to effect the revolt of Miletus .

The wish of Alcibiades, who had friends among the leading men of the
 Milesians, was to bring over the town before the arrival of the
 ships from Peloponnese , and
 thus, by causing the revolt of as many cities as possible with the
 help of the Chian power and of Chalcideus, to secure the honour for
 the Chians and himself and Chalcideus, and, as he had promised, for
 Endius who had sent them out.

Not discovered until their voyage was nearly completed, they arrived
 a little before Strombichides and Thrasycles (who had just come with
 twelve ships from Athens , and had joined Strombichides in pursuing them),
 and occasioned the revolt of Miletus . 
 The Athenians sailing up close on their heels with nineteen ships
 found Miletus closed
 against them, and took up their station at the adjacent island of
 Lade.

The first alliance between the king and the Lacedaemonians was now
 concluded immediately upon the revolt of the Milesians, by
 Tissaphernes and Chalcideus, and was as follows:—

The Lacedaemonians and their allies
 made a treaty with the king and Tissaphernes upon the terms
 following:— 1. 
 Whatever country or cities the king has, or the king's ancestors had,
 shall be the king's; and whatever came in to the Athenians from
 these cities, either money or any other thing, the king and the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies shall jointly hinder the Athenians
 from receiving either money or any other thing.

2. 
 The war with the Athenians shall be carried on jointly by the king
 and by the Lacedaemonians and their allies; and it shall not be
 lawful to make peace with the Athenians except both agree, the king
 on his side and the Lacedaemonians and their allies on theirs.

3. 
 If any revolt from the king they shall be the enemies of the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies. 
 And if any revolt from the Lacedaemonians and their allies they shall
 be the enemies of the king in like manner.

This was the alliance. 
 After this the Chians immediately manned ten more vessels and sailed
 for Anaia, in order to gain intelligence of those in Miletus , and also to make the
 cities revolt.

A message, however, reaching them from Chalcideus to tell them to go
 back again, and that Amorges was at hand with an army by land, they
 sailed to the temple of Zeus, and there sighting ten more ships
 sailing up with which Diomedon had started from Athens after Thrasycles,

fled, one ship to Ephesus , the rest to Teos . 
 The Athenians took four of their ships empty, the men finding time to
 escape ashore; the rest took refuge in the city of the Teians; after
 which the Athenians sailed off to Samos ,

while the Chians put to sea with their remaining vessels, accompanied
 by the land forces, and caused Lebedos to revolt, and after it
 Erae. 
 After this they both returned home, the fleet and the army.

About the same time the twenty ships
 of the Peloponnesians in Spiraeum, which we left chased to land and
 blockaded by an equal number of Athenians, suddenly sallied out and
 defeated the blockading squadron, took four of their ships, and
 sailing back to Cenchreae, prepared again for the voyage to
 Chios and
 Ionia . 
 Here they were joined by Astyochus as high-admiral from Lacedaemon , henceforth invested
 with the supreme command at sea.

The land forces now withdrawing from Teos , Tissaphernes repaired thither in person with
 an army and completed the demolition of anything that was left of
 the wall, and so departed. 
 Not long after his departure Diomedon arrived with ten Athenian
 ships, and having made a convention by which the Teians admitted him
 as they had the enemy, coasted along to Erae, and failing in an
 attempt upon the town, sailed back again.

About this time took place the rising
 of the commons at Samos against the upper classes, in concert with
 some Athenians, who were there in three vessels. 
 The Samian commons put to death some two hundred in all of the upper
 classes, and banished four hundred more, and themselves took their
 land and houses; after which the Athenians decreed their
 independence, being now sure of their fidelity, and the commons
 henceforth governed the city, excluding the landholders from all
 share in affairs, and forbidding any of the commons to give his
 daughter in marriage to them or to take a wife from them in future.

After this, during the same summer,
 the Chians, whose zeal continued as active as ever, and who even
 without the Peloponnesians found themselves in sufficient force to
 effect the revolt of the cities and also wished to have as many
 companions in peril as possible, made an expedition with thirteen
 ships of their own to Lesbos ; the instructions from Lacedaemon being to go to that
 island next, and from thence to the Hellespont . 
 Meanwhile the land forces of the Peloponnesians who were with the
 Chians and of the allies on the spot, moved along shore for
 Clazomenae and Cuma ,
 under the command of Eualas, a Spartan; while the fleet under
 Diniades, one of the Perioeci,

first sailed up to Methymna and caused it to revolt, and, leaving four
 ships there, with the rest procured the revolt of Mitylene .

In the meantime Astyochus, the
 Lacedaemonian admiral, set sail from Cenchreae with four ships, as
 he had intended, and arrived at Chios . 
 On the third day after his arrival the Athenian ships, twenty-five in
 number, sailed to Lesbos 
 under Diomedon and Leon, who had lately arrived with a reinforcement
 of ten ships from Athens .

Late in the same day Astyochus put to sea, and taking one Chian
 vessel with him sailed to Lesbos to render what assistance he could. 
 Arrived at Pyrrha , and
 from thence the next day at Eresus, he there learned that Mitylene had been taken,
 almost without a blow, by the Athenians,

who had sailed up and unexpectedly put into the harbour, had beaten
 the Chian ships, and landing and defeating the troops opposed to
 them, had become masters of the city. 
 Informed of this by the Eresians and the Chian ships, which had been
 left with Eubulus at Methymna and had fled upon the capture of
 Mitylene , and
 three of which he now fell in with,

one having been taken by the Athenians, Astyochus did not go on to
 Mitylene , but
 raised and armed Eresus, and sending the heavy infantry from his own
 ships by land under Eteonicus to Antissa and Methymna , himself proceeded along shore thither
 with the ships which he had with him and with the three Chians, in
 the hope that the Methymnians upon seeing them would be encouraged
 to persevere in their revolt.

As, however, everything went against him in Lesbos , he took up his own force
 and sailed back to Chios ; the land forces on board, which were to have
 gone to the Hellespont ,
 being also conveyed back to their different cities. 
 After this six of the allied Peloponnesian ships at Cenchreae joined
 the forces at Chios .

The Athenians, after restoring matters to their old state in
 Lesbos , set sail from
 thence and took Polichna, the place that the Clazomenians were
 fortifying on the continent, and carried the inhabitants back to
 their town upon the island, except the authors of the revolt, who
 withdrew to Daphnus; and thus Clazomenae became once more Athenian.

The same summer the Athenians in the
 twenty ships at Lade blockading Miletus , made a descent at Panormus in the Milesian
 territory, and killed Chalcideus the Lacedaemonian commander, who
 had come with a few men against them, and the third day after sailed
 over and set up a trophy, which, as they were not masters of the
 country, was however pulled down by the Milesians.

Meanwhile Leon and Diomedon with the Athenian
 fleet from Lesbos issuing
 from the OeLacedaenussae, the isles off Chios , and from their forts
 of Sidussa and Pteleum in the Erythraeid, and from Lesbos , carried on the war against
 the Chians from the ships, having on board heavy infantry from the
 rolls pressed to serve as marines.

Landing in Cardamyle and in Bolissus they defeated with heavy loss
 the Chians that took the field against them, and laying desolate the
 places in that neighbourhood, defeated the Chians again in another
 battle at Phanae, and in a third at Leuconium. 
 After this the Chians ceased to meet them in the field, while the
 Athenians devastated the country, which was beautifully stocked and
 had remained uninjured ever since the Median wars.

Indeed, after the Lacedaemonians, the Chians are the only people that
 I have known who knew how to be wise in prosperity, and who ordered
 their city the more securely the greater it grew.

Nor was this revolt, in which they might seem to have erred on the
 side of rashness, ventured upon until they had numerous and gallant
 allies to share the danger with them, and until they perceived the
 Athenians after the Sicilian disaster themselves no longer denying
 the thoroughly desperate state of their affairs. 
 And if they were thrown out by one of the surprises which upset human
 calculations, they found out their mistake in company with many
 others who believed, like them, in the speedy collapse of the
 Athenian power.

While they were thus blockaded from the sea and plundered by land,
 some of the citizens undertook to bring the city over to the
 Athenians. 
 Appraised of this the authorities took no action themselves, but
 brought Astyochus, the admiral, from Erythrae, with four ships that
 he had with him, and considered how they could most quietly, either
 by taking hostages or by some other means, put an end to the
 conspiracy.

While the Chians were thus engaged, a
 thousand Athenian heavy infantry and fifteen hundred Argives (five
 hundred of whom were light troops furnished with armour by the
 Athenians), and one thousand of the allies, towards the close of the
 same summer sailed from Athens in forty-eight ships, some of which were
 transports, under the command of Phrynichus, Onomacles, and
 Scironides, and putting in to Samos crossed over and encamped at Miletus .

Upon this the Milesians came out to the number of eight hundred heavy
 infantry, with the Peloponnesians who had come with Chalcideus, and
 some foreign mercenaries of Tissaphernes, Tissaphernes himself and
 his cavalry, and engaged the Athenians and their allies.

While the Argives rushed forward on their own wing with the careless
 disdain of men advancing against Ionians who would never stand their
 charge, and were defeated by the Milesians with a loss little short
 of three hundred men,

the Athenians first defeated the Peloponnesians, and driving before
 them the barbarians and the ruck of the army, without engaging the
 Milesians, who after the rout of the Argives retreated into the town
 upon seeing their comrades worsted, crowned their victory by
 grounding their arms under the very walls of Miletus .

Thus, in this battle, the Ionians on both sides overcame the Dorians,
 the Athenians defeating the Peloponnesians opposed to them, and the
 Milesians the Argives. 
 After setting up a trophy, the Athenians prepared to draw a wall
 round the place, which stood upon an isthmus; thinking that if they
 could gain Miletus , the
 other towns also would easily come over to them.

Meanwhile about dusk tidings reached
 them that the fifty-five ships from Peloponnese and Sicily might be instantly expected. 
 Of these the Siceliots, urged principally by the Syracusan
 Hermocrates to join in giving the finishing blow to the power of
 Athens , furnished
 twenty-two—twenty from Syracuse , and two from Selinus ; and the ships that we
 left preparing in Peloponnese being now ready, both squadrons had
 been entrusted to Therimenes, a Lacedaemonian, to take to Astyochus,
 the admiral. 
 They now put in first at Leros the island off Miletus ,

and from thence, discovering that the Athenians were before the town,
 sailed into the Iasic gulf, in order to learn how matters stood at
 Miletus .

Meanwhile Alcibiades came on horseback to Teichiussa in the Milesian
 territory, the point of the gulf in which they had put in for the
 night, and told them of the battle, in which he had fought in person
 by the side of the Milesians and Tissaphernes, and advised them, if
 they did not wish to sacrifice Ionia and their cause, to fly to the relief of
 Miletus and hinder
 its investment.

Accordingly they resolved to relieve
 it the next morning. 
 Meanwhile Phrynichus, the Athenian commander, had received precise
 intelligence of the fleet from Leros , and when his colleagues expressed a wish to
 keep the sea and fight it out, flatly refused either to stay himself
 or to let them or any one else do so if he could help it.

Where they could hereafter contend, after full and undisturbed
 preparation, with an exact knowledge of the number of the enemy's
 fleet and of the force which they could oppose to him, he would
 never allow the reproach of disgrace to drive him into a risk that
 was unreasonable.

It was no disgrace for an Athenian fleet to retreat when it suited
 them: put it as they would, it would be more disgraceful to be
 beaten, and to expose the city not only to disgrace, but to the most
 serious danger. 
 After its late misfortunes it could hardly be justified in
 voluntarily taking the offensive even with the strongest force,
 except in a case of absolute necessity: much less then without
 compulsion could it rush upon peril of its own seeking.

He told them to take up their wounded as quickly as they could and
 the troops and stores which they had brought with them, and leaving
 behind what they had taken from the enemy's country, in order to
 lighten the ships, to sail off to Samos , and there
 concentrating all their ships to attack as opportunity served.

As he spoke so he acted; and thus not now more than afterwards, nor
 in this alone but in all that he had to do with, did Phrynichus show
 himself a man of sense.

In this way that very evening the Athenians broke up from before
 Miletus , leaving
 their victory unfinished, and the Argives, mortified at their
 disaster, promptly sailed off home from Samos .

As soon as it was morning the
 Peloponnesians weighed from Teichiussa and put into Miletus after the departure of
 the Athenians; they stayed one day, and on the next took with them
 the Chian vessels originally chased into port with Chalcideus, and
 resolved to sail back for the tackle which they had put on shore at
 Teichiussa .

Upon their arrival Tissaphernes came to them with his land forces and
 induced them to sail to Iasus, which was held by his enemy
 Amorges. 
 Accordingly they suddenly attacked and took Iasus, whose inhabitants
 never imagined that the ships could be other than Athenian. 
 The Syracusans distinguished themselves most in the action.

Amorges, a bastard of Pissuthnes and a rebel from the king, was taken
 alive and handed over to Tissaphernes, to carry to the king, if he
 chose, according to his orders: Iasus was sacked by the army, who
 found a very great booty there, the place being wealthy from ancient
 date.

The mercenaries serving with Amorges the Peloponnesians received and
 enrolled in their army without doing them any harm, since most of
 them came from Peloponnese ,
 and handed over the town to Tissaphernes with all the captives, bond
 or free, at the stipulated price of one Doric stater a head; after
 which they returned to Miletus .

Pedaritus, son of Leon, who had been sent by the Lacedaemonians to
 take the command at Chios , they despatched by land as far as Erythrae
 with the mercenaries taken from Amorges; appointing Philip to remain
 as governor of Miletus .

Summer was now over. 
 The winter following Tissaphernes put Iasus in a state of defence,
 and passing on to Miletus distributed a month's pay to all the ships
 as he had promised at Lacedaemon , at the rate of an Attic drachma a day
 for each man. 
 In future, however, he was resolved not to give more than three
 obols, until he had consulted the king; when if the king should so
 order he would give, he said, the full drachma.

However, upon the protest of the Syracusan general Hermocrates (for
 as Therimenes was not admiral, but only accompanied them in order to
 hand over the ships to Astyochus, he made little difficulty about
 the pay), it was agreed that the amount of five ships' pay should be
 given over and above the three obols a day for each man;
 Tissaphernes paying thirty talents a month for fifty-five ships, and
 to the rest, for as many ships as they had beyond that number, at
 the same rate.

The same winter the Athenians in
 Samos having
 been joined by thirty-five more vessels from home under Charminus,
 Strombichides, and Euctemon, called in their squadron at Chios and all the rest,
 intending to blockade Miletus with their navy, and to send a fleet and an
 army against Chios ;
 drawing lots for the respective services. 
 This intention they carried into effect;

Strombichides, Onamacles, and Euctemon sailing against Chios , which fell to their
 lot, with thirty ships and a part of the thousand heavy infantry,
 who had been to Miletus , in transports; while the rest remained masters
 of the sea with seventy-four ships at Samos , and advanced upon
 Miletus .

Meanwhile Astyochus, whom we left at
 Chios collecting
 the hostages required in consequence of the conspiracy, stopped upon
 learning that the fleet with Therimenes had arrived, and that the
 affairs of the league were in a more flourishing condition, and
 putting out to sea with ten Peloponnesian and as many Chian
 vessels,

after a futile attack upon Pteleum, coasted on to Clazomenae, and
 ordered the Athenian party to remove inland to Daphnus, and to join
 the Peloponnesians, an order in which also joined Tamos the king's
 lieutenant in Ionia .

This order being disregarded, Astyochus made an attack upon the town,
 which was unwalled, and having failed to take it was himself carried
 off by a strong gale to Phocaea and Cuma , while the rest of the ships put in at the
 islands adjacent to Clazomenae, Marathussa, Pele, and Drymussa.

Here they were detained eight days by the winds, and plundering and
 consuming all the property of the Clazomenians there deposited, put
 the rest on shipboard and sailed off to Phocaea and Cuma to join Astyochus.

While he was there, envoys arrived
 from the Lesbians who wished to revolt again. 
 With Astyochus they were successful; but the Corinthians and the
 other allies being averse to it by reason of their former failure,
 he weighed anchor and set sail for Chios , where they
 eventually arrived from different quarters, the fleet having been
 scattered by a storm.

After this Pedaritus, whom we left marching along the coast from
 Miletus , arrived at
 Erythrae, and thence crossed over with his army to Chios , where he found also
 about five hundred soldiers who had been left there by Chalcideus
 from the five ships with their arms.

Meanwhile some Lesbians making offers to revolt, Astyochus urged upon
 Pedaritus and the Chians that they ought to go with their ships and
 effect the revolt of Lesbos , and so increase the number of their allies, or,
 if not successful, at all events harm the Athenians. 
 The Chians, however, turned a deaf ear to this, and Pedaritus flatly
 refused to give up to him the Chian vessels.

Upon this Astyochus took five
 Corinthian and one Megarian vessel, with another from Hermione , and the ships which
 had come with him from Laconia , and set sail for Miletus to assume his command
 as admiral; after telling the Chians with many threats that he would
 certainly not come and help them if they should be in need.

At Corycus in the Erythraeid he brought to for the night; the
 Athenian armament sailing from Samos against Chios being only separated from him by a hill, upon
 the other side of which it brought to; so that neither perceived the
 other.

But a letter arriving in the night from Pedaritus to say that some
 liberated Erythraean prisoners had come from Samos to betray Erythrae,
 Astyochus at once put back to Erythrae, and so just escaped falling
 in with the Athenians.

Here Pedaritus sailed over to join him; and after inquiry into the
 pretended treachery, finding that the whole story had been made up
 to procure the escape of the men from Samos , they acquitted them
 of the charge, and sailed away, Pedaritus to Chios and Astyochus to
 Miletus , as he had
 intended.

Meanwhile the Athenian armament
 sailing round Corycus fell in with three Chian men of war off
 Arginus, and gave immediate chase. 
 A great storm coming on, the Chians with difficulty took refuge in
 the harbour; the three Athenian vessels most forward in the pursuit
 being wrecked and thrown up near the city of Chios , and the crews slain
 or taken prisoners. 
 The rest of the Athenian fleet took refuge in the harbour called
 Phoenicus, under Mount Mimas, and from thence afterwards put into
 Lesbos and prepared for
 the work of fortification.

The same winter the Lacedaemonian
 Hippocrates sailed out from Peloponnese with ten Thurian ships under the
 command of Dorieus, son of Diagoras, and two colleagues, one
 Laconian and one Syracusan vessel, and arrived at Cnidus , which had already revolted
 at the instigation of Tissaphernes.

When their arrival was known at Miletus , orders came to them to leave half their
 squadron to guard Cnidus ,
 and with the rest to cruise round Triopium and seize all the
 merchantmen arriving from Egypt . 
 Triopium is a promontory of Cnidus and sacred to Apollo.

This coming to the knowledge of the Athenians, they sailed from
 Samos and
 captured the six ships on the watch at Triopium, the crews escaping
 out of them. 
 After this the Athenians sailed into Cnidus and made an assault upon the town, which was
 unfortified, and all but took it;

and the next day assaulted it again, but with less effect, as the
 inhabitants had improved their defences during the night, and had
 been reinforced by the crews escaped from the ships at Triopium. 
 The Athenians now withdrew, and after plundering the Cnidian
 territory sailed back to Samos .

About the same time Astyochus came to
 the fleet at Miletus . 
 The Peloponnesian camp was still plentifully supplied, being in
 receipt of sufficient pay, and the soldiers having still in hand the
 large booty taken at Iasus. 
 The Milesians also showed great ardour for the war.

Nevertheless the Peloponnesians thought the first convention with
 Tissaphernes, made with Chalcideus, defective, and more advantageous
 to him than to them, and consequently while Therimenes was still
 there concluded another, which was as follows:—

The convention of the Lacedaemonians
 and the allies with King Darius and the sons of the king, and with
 Tissaphernes for a treaty and friendship, as follows:—

1. 
 Neither the Lacedaemonians nor the allies of the Lacedaemonians shall
 make war against or otherwise injure any country or cities that
 belong to King Darius or did belong to his father or to his
 ancestors: neither shall the Lacedaemonians nor the allies of the
 Lacedaemonians exact tribute from such cities. 
 Neither shall King Darius nor any of the subjects of the king make
 war against or otherwise injure the Lacedaemonians or their
 allies.

2. 
 If the Lacedaemonians or their allies should require any assistance
 from the king, or the king from the Lacedaemonians or their allies,
 whatever they both agree upon they shall be right in doing.

3. 
 Both shall carry on jointly the war against the Athenians and their
 allies; and if they make peace, both shall do so jointly. 4. 
 The expense of all troops in the king's country, sent for by the
 king, shall be borne by the king.

5. 
 If any of the states comprised in this convention with the king
 attack the king's country, the rest shall stop them and aid the king
 to the best of their power. 
 And if any in the king's country or in the countries under the king's
 rule attack the country of the Lacedaemonians or their allies, the
 king shall stop it and help them to the best of his power.

After this convention Therimenes
 handed over the fleet to Astyochus, sailed off in a small boat, and
 was lost.

The Athenian armament had now crossed over from Lesbos to Chios , and being master by
 sea and land began to fortify Delphinium, a place naturally strong
 on the land side, provided with more than one harbour, and also not
 far from the city of Chios .

Meanwhile the Chians remained inactive. 
 Already defeated in so many battles, they were now also at discord
 among themselves; the execution of the party of Tydeus, son of Ion,
 by Pedaritus upon the charge of Atticism, followed by the forcible
 imposition of an oligarchy upon the rest of the city, having made
 them suspicious of one another; and they therefore thought neither
 themselves nor the mercenaries under Pedaritus a match for the
 enemy.

They sent, however, to Miletus to beg Astyochus to assist them, which he
 refused to do, and was accordingly denounced at Lacedaemon by Pedaritus as a
 traitor.

Such was the state of the Athenian affairs at Chios ; while their fleet at
 Samos kept
 sailing out against the enemy in Miletus , until they found that he would not accept
 their challenge, and then retired again to Samos and remained quiet.

In the same winter the twenty-seven
 ships equipped by the Lacedaemonians for Pharnabazus through the
 agency of the Megarian Calligeitus, and the Cyzicene Timagoras, put
 out from Peloponnese and
 sailed for Ionia about the
 time of the solstice, under the command of Antisthenes, a
 Spartan.

With them the Lacedaemonians also sent eleven Spartans as advisers to
 Astyochus; Lichas, son of Arcesilaus, being among the number. 
 Arrived at Miletus ,
 their orders were to aid in generally superintending the good
 conduct of the war; to send off the above ships or a greater or less
 number to the Hellespont to
 Pharnabazus, if they thought proper, appointing Clearchus, son of
 Ramphias, who sailed with them, to the command; and further, if they
 thought proper, to make Antisthenes admiral, dismissing Astyochus,
 whom the letters of Pedaritus had caused to be regarded with
 suspicion.

Sailing accordingly from Malea across the open sea, the squadron
 touched at Melos and
 there fell in with ten Athenian ships, three of which they took
 empty and burned. 
 After this, being afraid that the Athenian vessels escaped from
 Melos might, as
 they in fact did, give information of their approach to the
 Athenians at Samos ,
 they sailed to Crete , and
 having lengthened their voyage by way of precaution made land at
 Caunus in Asia ,

from whence considering themselves in safety they sent a message to
 the fleet at Miletus 
 for a convoy along the coast.

Meanwhile the Chians and Pedaritus,
 undeterred by the backwardness of Astyochus, went on sending
 messengers pressing him to come with all the fleet to assist them
 against their besiegers, and not to leave the greatest of the allied
 states in Ionia to be shut
 up by sea and overrun and pillaged by land.

There were more slaves at Chios than in any one other city except Lacedaemon , and being also by
 reason of their numbers punished more rigorously when they offended,
 most of them when they saw the Athenian armament firmly established
 in the island with a fortified position, immediately deserted to the
 enemy, and through their knowledge of the country did the greatest
 mischief.

The Chians therefore urged upon Astyochus that it was his duty to
 assist them, while there was still a hope and a possibility of
 stopping the enemy's progress, while Delphinium was still in process
 of fortification and unfinished, and before the completion of a
 higher rampart which was being added to protect the camp and fleet
 of their besiegers. 
 Astyochus now saw that the allies also wished it and prepared to go,
 in spite of his intention to the contrary owing to the threat
 already referred to.

In the meantime news came from
 Caunus of the
 arrival of the twenty-seven ships with the Lacedaemonian
 commissioners; and Astyochus postponing everything to the duty of
 convoying a fleet of that importance, in order to be more able to
 command the sea, and to the safe conduct of the Lacedaemonians sent
 as spies over his behaviour, at once gave up going to Chios and set sail for
 Caunus .

As he coasted along he landed at the Meropid Cos and sacked the city,
 which was unfortified and had been lately laid in ruins by an
 earthquake, by far the greatest in living memory, and, as the
 inhabitants had fled to the mountains, overran the country and made
 booty of all it contained, letting go, however, the free men.

From Cos arriving in the night at Cnidus he was constrained by the representations of
 the Cnidians not to disembark the sailors, but to sail as he was
 straight against the twenty Athenian vessels, which with Charminus,
 one of the commanders at Samos , were on the watch for the very twenty-seven
 ships from Peloponnese 
 which Astyochus was himself sailing to join;

the Athenians in Samos having heard from Melos of their approach,
 and Charminus being on the look-out off Syme , Chalce, Rhodes and Lycia , as he now heard that they were at Caunus .

Astyochus accordingly sailed as he
 was to Syme , before he was
 heard of, in the hope of catching the enemy somewhere out at
 sea. 
 Rain, however, and foggy weather encountered him, and caused his
 ships to straggle and get into disorder in the dark.

In the morning his fleet had parted company and was most of it still
 straggling round the island, and the left wing only in sight of
 Charminus and the Athenians, who took it for the squadron which they
 were watching for from Caunus , and hastily put out against it with part
 only of their twenty vessels,

and attacking immediately sank three ships and disabled others, and
 had the advantage in the action until the main body of the fleet
 unexpectedly hove in sight, when they were surrounded on every
 side.

Upon this they took to flight, and after losing six ships, with the
 rest escaped to Teutlussa or Beet Island, and from thence to
 Halicarnassus . 
 After this the Peloponnesians put into Cnidus , and being joined by the twenty-seven ships
 from Caunus , sailed all
 together and set up a trophy in Syme , and then returned to anchor at Cnidus .

As soon as the Athenians knew of the
 sea-fight they sailed with all the ships at Samos to Syme , and without attacking or
 being attacked by the fleet at Cnidus , took the ships' tackle left at Syme , and touching at Lorymi on
 the main land sailed back to Samos .

Meanwhile the Peloponnesian ships being now all at Cnidus , underwent such repairs as
 were needed; while the eleven Lacedaemonian commissioners conferred
 with Tissaphernes, who had come to meet them, upon the points which
 did not satisfy them in the past transactions, and upon the best and
 mutually most advantageous manner of conducting the war in
 future.

The severest critic of the present proceeding was Lichas, who said
 that neither of the treaties could stand, neither that of
 Chalcideus, nor that of Therimenes; it being monstrous that the king
 should at this date pretend to the possession of all country
 formerly ruled by himself or by his ancestors—a pretension which
 implicitly put back under the yoke all the islands, Thessaly , Locris , and everything as far as
 Boeotia , and made the
 Lacedaemonians give to the Hellenes instead of liberty a Median
 master.

He therefore invited Tissaphernes to conclude another and a better
 treaty, as they certainly would not recognise those existing and did
 not want any of his pay upon such conditions. 
 This offended Tissaphernes so much that he went away in a rage
 without settling anything.

The Peloponnesians now determined to
 sail to Rhodes , upon the
 invitation of some of the principal men there, hoping to gain an
 island powerful by the number of its seamen and by its land forces,
 and also thinking that they would be able to maintain their fleet
 from their own confederacy, without having to ask for money from
 Tissaphernes.

They accordingly at once set sail that same winter from Cnidus , and first put in with
 ninety-four ships at Camirus in the Rhodian country, to the great
 alarm of the mass of the inhabitants, who were not privy to the
 intrigue, and who consequently fled, especially as the town was
 unfortified. 
 They were afterwards, however, assembled by the Lacedaemonians
 together with the inhabitants of the two other towns of Lindus and Ialysus ; and the Rhodians were
 persuaded to revolt from the Athenians and the island went over to
 the Peloponnesians.

Meanwhile the Athenians had received the alarm and set sail with the
 fleet from Samos to
 forestall them, and came within sight of the island, but being a
 little too late sailed off for the moment to Chalce, and from thence
 to Samos , and
 subsequently waged war against Rhodes , issuing from Chalce, Cos, and Samos .

The Peloponnesians now levied a
 contribution of thirty-two talents from the Rhodians, after which
 they hauled their ships ashore and for eighty days remained
 inactive.

During this time, and even earlier, before they removed to Rhodes , the following intrigues
 took place. 
 After the death of Chalcideus and the battle at Miletus , Alcibiades began to
 be suspected by the Peloponnesians; and Astyochus received from
 Lacedaemon an order
 from them to put him to death, he being the personal enemy of Agis,
 and in other respects thought unworthy of confidence. 
 Alcibiades in his alarm first withdrew to Tissaphernes, and
 immediately began to do all he could with him to injure the
 Peloponnesian cause.

Henceforth becoming his adviser in everything, he cut down the pay
 from an Attic drachma to three obols a day, and even this not paid
 too regularly; and told Tissaphernes to say to the Peloponnesians
 that the Athenians, whose maritime experience was of an older date
 than their own, only gave their men three obols, not so much from
 poverty as to prevent their seamen being corrupted by being too well
 off, and injuring their condition by spending money upon enervating
 indulgences, and also paid their crews irregularly in order to have
 a security against their deserting in the arrears which they would
 leave behind them.

He also told Tissaphernes to bribe the captains and generals of the
 cities, and so to obtain their connivance—an expedient which
 succeeded with all except the Syracusans, Hermocrates alone opposing
 him on behalf of the whole confederacy.

Meanwhile the cities asking for money Alcibiades sent off, by roundly
 telling them in the name of Tissaphernes, that it was great
 impudence in the Chians, the richest people in Hellas , not content with being
 defended by a foreign force, to expect others to risk not only their
 lives but their money as well in behalf of their freedom;

while the other cities, he said, had had to pay largely to Athens before their rebellion,
 and could not justly refuse to contribute as much or even more now
 for their own selves.

He also pointed out that Tissaphernes was at present carrying on the
 war at his own charges, and had good cause for economy, but that as
 soon as he received remittances from the king he would give them
 their pay in full, and do what was reasonable for the cities.

Alcibiades further advised
 Tissaphernes not to be in too great a hurry to end the war, or to
 let himself be persuaded to bring up the Phoenician fleet which he
 was equipping, or to provide pay for more Hellenes, and thus put the
 power by land and sea into the same hands; but to leave each of the
 contending parties in possession of one element, thus enabling the
 king when he found one troublesome to call in the other.

For if the command of the sea and land were united in one hand, he
 would not know where to turn for help to overthrow the dominant
 power; unless he at last chose to stand up himself, and go through
 with the struggle at great expense and hazard. 
 The cheapest plan was to let the Hellenes wear each other out, at a
 small share of the expense and without risk to himself.

Besides, he would find the Athenians the most convenient partners in
 empire as they did not aim at conquests on shore, and carried on the
 war upon principles and with a practice most advantageous to the
 king; being prepared to combine to conquer the sea for Athens , and for the king all
 the Hellenes inhabiting his country, whom the Peloponnesians, on the
 contrary, had come to liberate. 
 Now it was not likely that the Lacedaemonians would free the Hellenes
 from the Hellenic Athenians, without freeing them also from the
 barbarian Mede , unless
 overthrown by him in the meanwhile.

Alcibiades therefore urged him to wear them both out at first, and
 after docking the Athenian power as much as he could, forthwith to
 rid the country of the Peloponnesians.

In the main Tissaphernes approved of this policy, so far at least as
 could be conjectured from his behaviour; since he now gave his
 confidence to Alcibiades in recognition of his good advice, and kept
 the Peloponnesians short of money, and would not let them fight at
 sea, but ruined their cause by pretending that the Phoenician fleet
 would arrive, and that they would thus be enabled to contend with
 the odds in their favour, and so made their navy lose its
 efficiency, which had been very remarkable, and generally betrayed a
 coolness in the war that was too plain to be mistaken.

Alcibiades gave this advice to
 Tissaphernes and the king, with whom he then was, not merely because
 he thought it really the best, but because he was studying means to
 effect his restoration to his country, well knowing that if he did
 not destroy it he might one day hope to persuade the Athenians to
 recall him, and thinking that his best chance of persuading them lay
 in letting them see that he possessed the favour of
 Tissaphernes.

The event proved him to be right. 
 When the Athenians at Samos found that he had influence with
 Tissaphernes, principally of their own motion (though partly also
 through Alcibiades himself sending word to their chief men to tell
 the best men in the army, that if there were only an oligarchy in
 the place of the rascally democracy that had banished him, he would
 be glad to return to his country and to make Tissaphernes their
 friend), the captains and chief men in the armament at once embraced
 the idea of subverting the democracy.

The design was first mooted in the
 camp, and afterwards from thence reached the city. 
 Some persons crossed over from Samos and had an interview with Alcibiades, who
 immediately offered to make first Tissaphernes, and afterwards the
 king, their friend, if they would give up the democracy, and make it
 possible for the king to trust them. 
 The higher class, who also suffered most severely from the war, now
 conceived great hopes of getting the government into their own
 hands, and of triumphing over the enemy.

Upon their return to Samos the emissaries formed their partisans into a
 club, and openly told the mass of the armament that the king would
 be their friend, and would provide them with money, if Alcibiades
 were restored, and the democracy abolished.

The multitude, if at first irritated by these intrigues, were
 nevertheless kept quiet by the advantageous prospect of the pay from
 the king; and the oligarchical conspirators, after making this
 communication to the people, now re-examined the proposals of
 Alcibiades among themselves, with most of their associates.

Unlike the rest, who thought them advantageous and trustworthy,
 Phrynichus, who was still general, by no means approved of the
 proposals. 
 Alcibiades, he rightly thought, cared no more for an oligarchy than
 for a democracy, and only sought to change the institutions of his
 country in order to get himself recalled by his associates; while
 for themselves their one object should be to avoid civil
 discord. 
 It was not the king's interest, when the Peloponnesians were now
 their equals at sea, and in possession of some of the chief cities
 in his empire, to go out of his way to side with the Athenians whom
 he did not trust, when he might make friends of the Peloponnesians
 who had never injured him.

And as for the allied states to whom oligarchy was now offered,
 because the democracy was to be put down at Athens , he well knew that this
 would not make the rebels come in any the sooner, or confirm the
 loyal in their allegiance; as the allies would never prefer
 servitude with an oligarchy or democracy to freedom with the
 constitution which they actually enjoyed, to whichever type it
 belonged.

Besides, the cities thought that the so-called better classes would
 prove just as oppressive as the commons, as being those who
 originated, proposed, and for the most part benefited from the acts
 of the commons injurious to the confederates. 
 Indeed, if it depended on the better classes, the confederates would
 be put to death without trial and with violence; while the commons
 were their refuge and the chastiser of these men.

This he positively knew that the cities had learned by experience,
 and that such was their opinion. 
 The propositions of Alcibiades, and the intrigues now in progress,
 could therefore never meet with his approval.

However, the members of the club
 assembled, agreeably to their original determination, accepted what
 was proposed, and prepared to send Pisander and others on an embassy
 to Athens to treat for
 the restoration of Alcibiades and the abolition of the democracy in
 the city, and thus to make Tissaphernes the friend of the Athenians.

Phrynichus now saw that there would
 be a proposal to restore Alcibiades, and that the Athenians would
 consent to it; and fearing after what he had said against it that
 Alcibiades, if restored, would revenge himself upon him for his
 opposition, had recourse to the following expedient. 
 He sent a secret letter to the Lacedaemonian admiral,

Astyochus, who was still in the neighbourhood of Miletus , to tell him that
 Alcibiades was ruining their cause by making Tissaphernes the friend
 of the Athenians, and containing an express revelation of the rest
 of the intrigue, desiring to be excused if he sought to harm his
 enemy even at the expense of the interests of his country.

However, Astyochus, instead of thinking of punishing Alcibiades, who,
 besides, no longer ventured within his reach as formerly, went up to
 him and Tissaphernes at Magnesia , communicated to them the letter from
 Samos , and
 turned informer, and if report may be trusted, became the paid
 creature of Tissaphernes, undertaking to inform him as to this and
 all other matters; which was also the reason why he did not
 remonstrate more strongly against the pay not being given in
 full.

Upon this Alcibiades instantly sent to the authorities at Samos a letter against
 Phrynichus, stating what he had done, and requiring that he should
 be put to death.

Phrynichus distracted, and placed in the utmost peril by the
 denunciation, sent again to Astyochus, reproaching him with having
 so ill kept the secret of his previous letter, and saying that he
 was now prepared to give them an opportunity of destroying the whole
 Athenian armament at Samos ; giving a detailed account of the means which
 he should employ, Samos being unfortified, and pleading that being in
 danger of his life on their account, he could not now be blamed for
 doing this or anything else to escape being destroyed by his mortal
 enemies. 
 This also Astyochus revealed to Alcibiades.

Meanwhile Phrynichus having had
 timely notice that he was playing him false, and that a letter on
 the subject was on the point of arriving from Alcibiades, himself
 anticipated the news, and told the army that the enemy, seeing that
 Samos was
 unfortified and the fleet not all stationed within the harbour,
 meant to attack the camp; that he could be certain of this
 intelligence, and that they must fortify Samos as quickly as
 possible, and generally look to their defences. 
 It will be remembered that he was general, and had himself authority
 to carry out these measures.

Accordingly they addressed themselves to the work of fortification,
 and Samos was thus
 fortified sooner than it would otherwise have been. 
 Not long afterwards came the letter from Alcibiades, saying that the
 army was betrayed by Phrynichus, and the enemy about to attack
 it.

Alcibiades, however, gained no credit, it being thought that he was
 in the secret of the enemy's designs, and had tried to fasten them
 upon Phrynichus, and to make out that he was their accomplice, out
 of hatred; and consequently far from hurting him he rather bore
 witness to what he had said by this intelligence.

After this Alcibiades set to work to
 persuade Tissaphernes to become the friend of the Athenians. 
 Tissaphernes, although afraid of the Peloponnesians because they had
 more ships in Asia than the
 Athenians, was yet disposed to be persuaded if he could, especially
 after his quarrel with the Peloponnesians at Cnidus about the treaty of
 Therimenes. 
 The quarrel had already taken place, as the Peloponnesians were by
 this time actually at Rhodes ; and in it the original argument of
 Alcibiades touching the liberation of all the towns by the
 Lacedaemonians had been verified by the declaration of Lichas, that
 it was impossible to submit to a convention which made the king
 master of all the states at any former time ruled by himself or by
 his fathers. While Alcibiades was
 besieging the favour of Tissaphernes with an earnestness
 proportioned to the greatness of the issue,

the Athenian envoys who had been despatched from Samos with Pisander arrived
 at Athens , and made a
 speech before the people, giving a brief summary of their views, and
 particularly insisting that if Alcibiades were recalled and the
 democratic constitution changed, they could have the king as their
 ally, and would be able to overcome the Peloponnesians.

A number of speakers opposed them on the question of the democracy,
 the enemies of Alcibiades cried out against the scandal of a
 restoration to be effected by a violation of the constitution, and
 the Eumolpidae and Ceryces protested in behalf of the mysteries, the
 cause of his banishment, and called upon the gods to avert his
 recall; when Pisander, in the midst of much opposition and abuse,
 came forward, and taking each of his opponents aside asked him the
 following question:—In the face of the fact that the Peloponnesians
 had as many ships as their own confronting them at sea, more cities
 in alliance with them, and the king and Tissaphernes to supply them
 with money, of which the Athenians had none left, had he any hope of
 saving the state, unless some one could induce the king to come over
 to their side?

Upon their replying that they had not, he then plainly said to them:
 ‘This we cannot have unless we have a more moderate form of
 government, and put the offices into fewer hands, and so gain the
 king's confidence, and forthwith restore Alcibiades, who is the only
 man living that can bring this about. 
 The safety of the state, not the form of its government, is for the
 moment the most pressing question, as we can always change
 afterwards whatever we do not like.'

The people were at first highly
 irritated at the mention of an oligarchy, but upon understanding
 clearly from Pisander that this was the only resource left, they
 took counsel of their fears, and promised themselves some day to
 change the government again, and gave way.

They accordingly voted that Pisander should sail with ten others and
 make the best arrangement that they could with Tissaphernes and
 Alcibiades.

At the same time the people, upon a false accusation of Pisander,
 dismissed Phrynichus from his post together with his colleague
 Scironides, sending Diomedon and Leon to replace them in the command
 of the fleet. 
 The accusation was that Phrynichus had betrayed Iasus and Amorges;
 and Pisander brought it because he thought him a man unfit for the
 business now in hand with Alcibiades.

Pisander also went the round of all the clubs already existing in the
 city for help in lawsuits and elections, and urged them to draw
 together and to unite their efforts for the overthrow of the
 democracy; and after taking all other measures required by the
 circumstances, so that no time might be lost, set off with his ten
 companions on his voyage to Tissaphernes.

In the same winter Leon and Diomedon,
 who had by this time joined the fleet, made an attack upon
 Rhodes . 
 The ships of the Peloponnesians they found hauled up on shore, and
 after making a descent upon the coast and defeating the Rhodians who
 appeared in the field against them, withdrew to Chalce and made that
 place their base of operations instead of Cos, as they could better
 observe from thence if the Peloponnesian fleet put out to sea.

Meanwhile Xenophantes, a Laconian, came to Rhodes from Pedaritus at
 Chios , with the
 news that the fortification of the Athenians was now finished, and
 that, unless the whole Peloponnesian fleet came to the rescue, the
 cause in Chios must
 be lost. 
 Upon this they resolved to go to his relief.

In the meantime Pedaritus, with the mercenaries that he had with him
 and the whole force of the Chians, made an assault upon the work
 round the Athenian ships and took a portion of it, and got
 possession of some vessels that were hauled up on shore, when the
 Athenians sallied out to the rescue, and first routing the Chians,
 next defeated the remainder of the force round Pedaritus, who was
 himself killed, with many of the Chians, a great number of arms
 being also taken.

After this the Chians were besieged
 even more straitly than before by land and sea, and the famine in
 the place was great. 
 Meanwhile the Athenian envoys with Pisander arrived at the court of
 Tissaphernes, and conferred with him about the proposed
 agreement.

However, Alcibiades, not being altogether sure of Tissaphernes (who
 feared the Peloponnesians more than the Athenians, and besides
 wished to wear out both parties, as Alcibiades himself had
 recommended), had recourse to the following stratagem to make the
 treaty between the Athenians and Tissaphernes miscarry by reason of
 the magnitude of his demands.

In my opinion Tissaphernes desired this result, fear being his
 motive; while Alcibiades, who now saw that Tissaphernes was
 determined not to treat on any terms, wished the Athenians to think,
 not that he was unable to persuade Tissaphernes, but that after the
 latter had been persuaded and was willing to join them, they had not
 conceded enough to him.

For the demands of Alcibiades, speaking for Tissaphernes, who was
 present, were so extravagant that the Athenians, although for a long
 while they agreed to whatever he asked, yet had to bear the blame of
 failure: he required the cession of the whole of Ionia , next of the islands
 adjacent, besides other concessions, and these passed without
 opposition; at last, in the third interview, Alcibiades, who now
 feared a complete discovery of his inability, required them to allow
 the king to build ships and sail along his own coast wherever and
 with as many as he pleased. 
 Upon this the Athenians would yield no further, and concluding that
 there was nothing to be done, but that they had been deceived by
 Alcibiades, went away in a passion and proceeded to Samos .

Tissaphernes immediately after this,
 in the same winter, proceeded along shore to Caunus , desiring to bring the
 Peloponnesian fleet back to Miletus , and to supply them with pay, making a
 fresh convention upon such terms as he could get, in order not to
 bring matters to an absolute breach between them. 
 He was afraid that if many of their ships were left without pay they
 would be compelled to engage and be defeated, or that their vessels
 being left without hands, the Athenians would attain their objects
 without his assistance. 
 Still more he feared that the Peloponnesians might ravage the
 continent in search of supplies.

Having calculated and considered all this, agreeably to his plan of
 keeping the two sides equal, he now sent for the Peloponnesians and
 gave them pay, and concluded with them a third treaty in words
 following:—

In the thirteenth year of the reign
 of Darius, while Alexippidas was Ephor at Lacedaemon , a convention was
 concluded in the plain of the Moeander by the Lacedaemonians and
 their allies with Tissaphernes, Hieramenes, and the sons of
 Pharnaces, concerning the affairs of the king and of the
 Lacedaemonians and their allies.

1. 
 The country of the king in Asia shall be the king's, and the king shall treat
 his own country as he pleases.

2. 
 The Lacedaemonians and their allies shall not invade or injure the
 king's country; neither shall the king invade or injure that of the
 Lacedaemonians or of their allies.

If any of the Lacedaemonians or of their allies invade or injure the
 king's country, the Lacedaemonians and their allies shall prevent
 it; and if any from the king's country invade or injure the country
 of the Lacedaemonians or of their allies, the king shall prevent
 it.

3. 
 Tissaphernes shall provide pay for the ships now present, according
 to the agreement, until the arrival of the king's vessels;

but after the arrival of the king's vessels the Lacedaemonians and
 their allies may pay their own ships if they wish it. 
 If, however, they choose to receive the pay from Tissaphernes,
 Tissaphernes shall furnish it; and the Lacedaemonians and their
 allies shall repay him at the end of the war such monies as they
 shall have received.

4. 
 After the king's vessels have arrived, the ships of the
 Lacedaemonians and of their allies and those of the king shall carry
 on the war jointly, according as Tissaphernes and the Lacedaemonians
 and their allies shall think best. 
 If they wish to make peace with the Athenians, they shall make peace
 also jointly.

This was the treaty. 
 After this Tissaphernes prepared to bring up the Phoenician fleet
 according to agreement, and to make good his other promises, or at
 all events wished to make it appear that he was so preparing.

Winter was now drawing towards its
 close, when the Boeotians took Oropus by treachery, though held by
 an Athenian garrison. 
 Their accomplices in this were some of the Eretrians and of the
 Oropians themselves, who were plotting the revolt of Euboea , as the place was exactly
 opposite Eretria , and
 while in Athenian hands was necessarily a source of great annoyance
 to Eretria and the rest
 of Euboea .

Oropus being in their hands, the Eretrians now came to Rhodes to invite the
 Peloponnesians into Euboea . 
 The latter, however, were rather bent on the relief of the distressed
 Chians, and accordingly put out to sea and sailed with all their
 ships from Rhodes .

Off Triopium they sighted the Athenian fleet out at sea sailing from
 Chalce, and neither attacking the other, arrived, the latter at
 Samos , the
 Peloponnesians at Miletus , seeing that it was no longer possible to
 relieve Chios 
 without a battle. 
 And this winter ended, and with it ended the twentieth year of this
 war of which Thucydides is the historian.

Early in the spring of the summer
 following Dercyllidas, a Spartan, was sent with a small force by
 land to the Hellespont : to
 effect the revolt of Abydos , which is a Milesian colony; and the Chians,
 while Astyochus was at a loss how to help them, were compelled to
 fight at sea by the pressure of the siege.

While Astyochus was still at Rhodes they had received from Miletus , as their commander
 after the death of Pedaritus, a Spartan named Leon, who had come out
 with Antisthenes, and twelve vessels which had been on guard at
 Miletus , five of
 which were Thurian, four Syracusan, one from Anaia, one Milesian,
 and one Leon's own.

Accordingly the Chians marched out in mass and took up a strong
 position, while thirty-six of their ships put out and engaged
 thirty-two of the Athenians; and after a tough fight, in which the
 Chians and their allies had rather the best of it, as it was now
 late, retired to their city.

Immediately after this Dercyllidas
 arrived by land from Miletus ; and Abydos in the Hellespont revolted to him and Pharnabazus, and
 Lampsacus two
 days later.

Upon receipt of this news Strombichides hastily sailed from
 Chios with
 twenty-four Athenian ships, some transports carrying heavy infantry
 being of the number, and defeating the Lampsacenes who came out
 against him, took Lampsacus , which was unfortified, at the first
 assault, and making prize of the slaves and goods, restored the
 freemen to their homes, and went on to Abydos .

The inhabitants, however, refusing to capitulate, and his assaults
 failing to take the place, he sailed over to the coast opposite, and
 appointed Sestos , the
 town in the Chersonese held by the Medes at a former period in
 this history, as the centre for the defence of the whole Hellespont .

In the meantime the Chians commanded
 the sea more than before; and the Peloponnesians at Miletus and Astyochus, hearing
 of the sea-fight and of the departure of the squadron with
 Strombichides, took fresh courage.

Coasting along with two vessels to Chios , Astyochus took the
 ships from that place, and now moved with the whole fleet upon
 Samos , from
 whence, however, he sailed back to Miletus , as the Athenians did not put out against
 him, owing to their suspicions of one another.

For it was about this time, or even before, that the democracy was
 put down at Athens . 
 When Pisander and the envoys returned from Tissaphernes to Samos they at once
 strengthened still further their interest in the army itself, and
 instigated the upper class in Samos to join them in establishing an oligarchy,
 the very form of government which a party of them had lately risen
 to avoid.

At the same time the Athenians at Samos , after a consultation among themselves,
 determined to let Alcibiades alone, since he refused to join them,
 and besides was not the man for an oligarchy; and now that they were
 once embarked, to see for themselves how they could best prevent the
 ruin of their cause, and meanwhile to sustain the war, and to
 contribute without stint money and all else that might be required
 from their own private estates, as they would henceforth labour for
 themselves alone.

After encouraging each other in these
 resolutions, they now at once sent off half the envoys and Pisander
 to do what was necessary at Athens (with instructions to establish oligarchies
 on their way in all the subject cities which they might touch at),
 and despatched the other half in different directions to the other
 dependencies.

Diitrephes also, who was in the neighbourhood of Chios , and had been elected
 to the command of the Thracian towns, was sent off to his
 government, and arriving at Thasos abolished the democracy there.

Two months, however, had not elapsed after his departure before the
 Thasians began to fortify their town, being already tired of an
 aristocracy with Athens ,
 and in daily expectation of freedom from Lacedaemon .

Indeed there was a party of them (whom the Athenians had banished),
 with the Peloponnesians, who with their friends in the town were
 already making every exertion to bring a squadron, and to effect the
 revolt of Thasos ;
 and this party thus saw exactly what they most wanted done, that is
 to say, the reformation of the government without risk, and the
 abolition of the democracy which would have opposed them.

Things at Thasos 
 thus turned out just the contrary to what the oligarchical
 conspirators at Athens 
 expected; and the same in my opinion was the case in many of the
 other dependencies; as the cities no sooner got a moderate
 government and liberty of action, than they went on to absolute
 freedom without being at all seduced by the show of reform offered
 by the Athenians.

Pisander and his colleagues on their
 voyage along shore abolished, as had been determined, the
 democracies in the cities, and also took some heavy infantry from
 certain places as their allies, and so came to Athens .

Here they found most of the work already done by their
 associates. 
 Some of the younger men had banded together, and secretly
 assassinated one Androcles, the chief leader of the commons, and
 mainly responsible for the banishment of Alcibiades; Androcles being
 singled out both because he was a popular leader, and because they
 sought by his death to recommend themselves to Alcibiades, who was,
 as they supposed, to be recalled, and to make Tissaphernes their
 friend. 
 There were also some other obnoxious persons whom they secretly did
 away with in the same manner.

Meanwhile their cry in public was that no pay should be given except
 to persons serving in the war, and that not more than five thousand
 should share in the government, and those such as were most able to
 serve the state in person and in purse.

But this was a mere catchword for the
 multitude, as the authors of the revolution were really to
 govern. 
 However, the Assembly and the Council of the Bean still met
 notwithstanding, although they discussed nothing that was not
 approved of by the conspirators, who both supplied the speakers, and
 reviewed in advance what they were to say.

Fear, and the sight of the numbers of the conspirators, closed the
 mouths of the rest; or if any ventured to rise in opposition, he was
 presently put to death in some convenient way, and there was neither
 search for the murderers nor justice to be had against them if
 suspected; but the people remained motionless, being so thoroughly
 cowed that men thought themselves lucky to escape violence, even
 when they held their tongues.

An exaggerated belief in the numbers of the conspirators also
 demoralised the people, rendered helpless by the magnitude of the
 city, and by their want of intelligence with each other, and being
 without means of finding out what those numbers really were.

For the same reason it was impossible for any one to open his grief
 to a neighbour and to concert measures to defend himself, as he
 would have had to speak either to one whom he did not know, or whom
 he knew but did not trust.

Indeed all the popular party approached each other with suspicion,
 each thinking his neighbour concerned in what was going on, the
 conspirators having in their ranks persons whom no one could ever
 have believed capable of joining an oligarchy; and these it was who
 made the many so suspicious, and so helped to procure impunity for
 the few, by confirming the commons in their mistrust of one another.

At this juncture arrived Pisander and
 his colleagues, who lost no time in doing the rest. 
 First they assembled the people, and moved to elect ten commissioners
 with full powers to frame a constitution, and that when this was
 done they should on an appointed day lay before the people their
 opinion as to the best mode of governing the city.

Afterwards, when the day arrived, the conspirators enclosed the
 assembly in Colonus , a
 temple of Poseidon, a little more than a mile outside the city; when
 the commissioners simply brought forward this single motion, that
 any Athenian might propose with impunity whatever measure he
 pleased, heavy penalties being imposed upon any who should indict
 for illegality, or otherwise molest him for so doing.

The way thus cleared, it was now plainly declared, that all tenure of
 office and receipt of pay under the existing institutions were at an
 end, and that five men must be elected as presidents, who should in
 their turn elect one hundred, and each of the hundred three apiece;
 and that this body thus made up to four hundred should enter the
 council chamber with full powers and govern as they judged best, and
 should convene the five thousand whenever they pleased.

The man who moved this resolution was
 Pisander, who was throughout the chief ostensible agent in putting
 down the democracy. 
 But he who concerted the whole affair, and prepared the way for the
 catastrophe, and who had given the greatest thought to the matter,
 was Antiphon, one of the best men of his day in Athens ; who, with a head to
 contrive measures and a tongue to recommend them, did not willingly
 come forward in the assembly or upon any public scene, being
 ill-looked upon by the multitude owing to his reputation for talent;
 and who yet was the one man best able to aid in the courts, or
 before the assembly, the suitors who required his opinion.

Indeed, when he was afterwards himself tried for his life on the
 charge of having been concerned in setting up this very government,
 when the Four Hundred were overthrown and hardly dealt with by the
 commons, he made what would seem to be the best defence of any known
 up to my time.

Phrynichus also went beyond all others in his zeal for the
 oligarchy. 
 Afraid of Alcibiades, and assured that he was no stranger to his
 intrigues with Astyochus at Samos , he held that no oligarchy was ever likely to
 restore him, and once embarked in the enterprise, proved, where
 danger was to be faced, by far the staunchest of them all.

Theramenes, son of Hagnon, was also one of the foremost of the
 subverters of the democracy—a man as able in council as in
 debate. 
 Conducted by so many and by such sagacious heads, the enterprise,
 great as it was, not unnaturally went forward; although it was no
 light matter to deprive the Athenian people of its freedom, almost a
 hundred years after the deposition of the tyrants, when it had been
 not only not subject to any during the whole of that period, but
 accustomed during more than half of it to rule over subjects of its
 own.

The assembly ratified the proposed
 constitution, without a single opposing voice, and was then
 dissolved; after which the Four Hundred were brought into the
 council chamber in the following way. 
 On account of the enemy at Decelea, all the Athenians were constantly
 on the wall or in the ranks at the various military posts.

On that day the persons not in the secret were allowed to go home as
 usual, while orders were given to the accomplices of the
 conspirators to hang about, without making any demonstration, at
 some little distance from the posts, and in case of any opposition
 to what was being done, to seize the arms and put it down.

There were also some Andrians and Tenians, three hundred Carystians,
 and some of the settlers in Aegina come with their own arms for this very
 purpose, who had received similar instructions.

These dispositions completed, the Four Hundred went, each with a
 dagger concealed about his person, accompanied by one hundred and
 twenty Hellenic youths, whom they employed wherever violence was
 needed, and appeared before the Councillors of the Bean in the
 council chamber, and told them to take their pay and be gone;
 themselves bringing it for the whole of the residue of their term of
 office, and giving it to them as they went out.

Upon the Council withdrawing in this
 way without venturing any objection, and the rest of the citizens
 making no movement, the Four Hundred entered the council chamber,
 and for the present contented themselves with drawing lots for their
 Prytanes, and making their prayers and sacrifices to the gods upon
 entering office, but afterwards departed widely from the democratic
 system of government, and except that on account of Alcibiades they
 did not recall the exiles, ruled the city by force;

putting to death some men, though not many, whom they though it
 convenient to remove, and imprisoning and banishing others. 
 They also sent to Agis, the Lacedaemonian king, at Decelea, to say
 that they desired to make peace, and that he might reasonably be
 more disposed to treat now that he had them to deal with instead of
 the inconstant commons.

Agis, however, did not believe in the
 tranquillity of the city, or that the commons would thus in a moment
 give up their ancient liberty, but thought that the sight of a large
 Lacedaemonian force would be sufficient to excite them if they were
 not already in commotion, of which he was by no means certain. 
 He accordingly gave to the envoys of the Four Hundred an answer which
 held out no hopes of an accommodation, and sending for large
 reinforcements from Peloponnese , not long afterwards, with these and
 his garrison from Decelea, descended to the very walls of Athens ; hoping either that
 civil disturbances might help to subdue them to his terms, or that,
 in the confusion to be expected within and without the city, they
 might even surrender without a blow being struck; at all events he
 thought he would succeed in seizing the Long Walls, bared of their
 defenders.

However, the Athenians saw him come close up, without making the
 least disturbance within the city; and sending out their cavalry,
 and a number of their heavy infantry, light troops, and archers shot
 down some of his soldiers who approached too near, and got
 possession of some arms and dead. 
 Upon this Agis, at last convinced, led his army back again,

and remaining with his own troops in the old position at Decelea,
 sent the reinforcement back home, after a few days' stay in
 Attica . 
 After this the Four Hundred persevering sent another embassy to Agis,
 and now meeting with a better reception, at his suggestion
 despatched envoys to Lacedaemon to negotiate a treaty, being desirous of
 making peace.

They also sent ten men to Samos to reassure the army,
 and to explain that the oligarchy was not established for the hurt
 of the city or the citizens, but for the salvation of the country at
 large; and that there were five thousand, not four hundred only,
 concerned; although, what with their expeditions and employments
 abroad, the Athenians had never yet assembled to discuss a question
 important enough to bring five thousand of them together.

The emissaries were also told what to say upon all other points, and
 were so sent off immediately after the establishment of the new
 government, which feared, as it turned out justly, that the mass of
 seamen would not be willing to remain under the oligarchical
 constitution, and, the evil beginning there, might be the means of
 their overthrow.

Indeed at Samos the question of the
 oligarchy had already entered upon a new phase, the following events
 having taken place just at the time that the Four Hundred were
 conspiring.

That part of the Samian population which has been mentioned as rising
 against the upper class, and as being the democratic party, had now
 turned round, and yielding to the solicitations of Pisander during
 his visit, and of the Athenians in the conspiracy at Samos , had bound themselves
 by oaths to the number of three hundred, and were about to fall upon
 the rest of their fellow-citizens, whom they now in their turn
 regarded as the democratic party.

Meanwhile they put to death one Hyperbolus, an Athenian, a pestilent
 fellow that had been ostracised, not from fear of his influence on
 position, but because he was a rascal and a disgrace to the city;
 being aided in this by Charminus, one of the generals, and by some
 of the Athenians with them, to whom they had sworn friendship, and
 with whom they perpetrated other acts of the kind, and now
 determined to attack the people.

The latter got wind of what was coming, and told two of the generals,
 Leon and Diomedon, who, on account of the credit which they enjoyed
 with the commons, were unwilling supporters of the oligarchy; and
 also Thrasybulus and Thrasyllus, the former a captain of a galley,
 the latter serving with the heavy infantry, besides certain others
 who had ever been thought most opposed to the conspirators,
 entreating them not to look on and see them destroyed, and
 Samos , the sole
 remaining stay of their empire, lost to the Athenians.

Upon hearing this, the persons whom they addressed now went round the
 soldiers one by one, and urged them to resist, especially the crew
 of the Paralus, which was made up entirely of Athenians and freemen,
 and had from time out of mind been enemies of oligarchy, even when
 there was no such thing existing; and Leon and Diomedon left behind
 some ships for their protection in case of their sailing away
 anywhere themselves.

Accordingly, when the Three Hundred attacked the people, all these
 came to the rescue, and foremost of all the crew of the Paralus; and
 the Samian commons gained the victory, and putting to death some
 thirty of the Three Hundred, banishing three others of the
 ringleaders, accorded an amnesty to the rest, and lived together
 under a democratic government for the future.

The ship Paralus, with Chaereas, son
 of Archestratus, on board, an Athenian who had taken an active part
 in the revolution, was now without loss of time sent off by the
 Samians and the army to Athens to report what had occurred; the fact that
 the Four Hundred were in power not being yet known.

When they sailed into harbour the Four Hundred immediately arrested
 two or three of the Parali, and taking the vessel from the rest,
 shifted them into a troopship and set them to keep guard round
 Euboea .

Chaereas, however, managed to secrete himself as soon as he saw how
 things stood, and returning to Samos , drew a picture to the soldiers of the
 horrors enacting at Athens , in which everything was exaggerated; saying
 that all were punished with stripes, that no one could say a word
 against the holders of power, that the soldiers' wives and children
 were outraged, and that it was intended to seize and shut up the
 relatives of all in the army at Samos who were not of the government's way of
 thinking, to be put to death in case of their disobedience; besides
 a host of other injurious inventions.

On hearing this the first thought of
 the army was to fall upon the chief authors of the oligarchy and
 upon all the rest concerned. 
 Eventually, however, they desisted from this idea upon the men of
 moderate views opposing it and warning them against ruining their
 cause, with the enemy close at hand and ready for battle.

After this Thrasybulus, son of Lycus, and Thrasyllus, the chief
 leaders in the revolution, now wishing in the most public manner to
 change the government at Samos to a democracy, bound all the soldiers by the
 most tremendous oaths, and those of the oligarchical party more than
 any, to accept a democratic government, to be united, to prosecute
 actively the war with the Peloponnesians, and to be enemies of the
 Four Hundred, and to hold no communication with them.

The same oath was also taken by all the Samians of full age; and the
 soldiers associated the Samians in all their affairs and in the
 fruits of their dangers, having the conviction that there was no way
 of escape for themselves or for them, but that success of the Four
 Hundred or of the enemy at Miletus must be their ruin.

The struggle now was between the army
 trying to force a democracy upon the city, and the Four Hundred an
 oligarchy upon the camp.

Meanwhile the soldiers forthwith held an assembly, in which they
 deposed the former generals and any of the captains whom they
 suspected, and chose new captains and generals to replace them,
 besides Thrasybulus and Thrasyllus, whom they had already.

They also stood up and encouraged one another, and among other things
 urged that they ought not to lose heart because the city had
 revolted from them, as the party seceding was smaller and in every
 way poorer in resources than themselves.

They had the whole fleet with which to compel the other cities in
 their empire to give them money just as if they had their base in
 the capital, having a city in Samos which, so far from wanting strength, had when
 at war been within an ace of depriving the Athenians of the command
 of the sea, while as far as the enemy was concerned they had the
 same base of operations as before. 
 Indeed, with the fleet in their hands, they were better able to
 provide themselves with supplies than the government at home.

It was their advanced position at Samos which had throughout enabled the home
 authorities to command the entrance into Piraeus ; and if they refused
 to give them back the constitution, they would now find that the
 army was more in a position to exclude them from the sea than they
 were to exclude the army.

Besides, the city was of little or no use towards enabling them to
 overcome the enemy; and they had lost nothing in losing those who
 had no longer either money to send them (the soldiers having to find
 this for themselves), or good counsel, which entitles cities to
 direct armies. 
 On the contrary, even in this the home government had done wrong in
 abolishing the institutions of their ancestors, while the army
 maintained the said institutions, and would try to force the home
 government to do so likewise. 
 So that even in point of good counsel the camp had as good
 counsellors as the city.

Moreover, they had but to grant him security for his person and his
 recall, and Alcibiades would be only too glad to procure them the
 alliance of the king. 
 And above all, if they failed altogether, with the navy which they
 possessed, they had numbers of places to retire to in which they
 would find cities and lands.

Debating together and comforting
 themselves after this manner, they pushed on their war measures as
 actively as ever; and the ten envoys sent to Samos by the Four Hundred,
 learning how matters stood while they were still at Delos , stayed quiet there.

About this time a cry arose among the
 soldiers in the Peloponnesian fleet at Miletus that Astyochus and
 Tissaphernes were ruining their cause. 
 Astyochus had not been willing to fight at sea—either before, while
 they were still in full vigour and the fleet of the Athenians small,
 or now, when the enemy was, as they were informed, in a state of
 sedition and his ships not yet united—but kept them waiting for the
 Phoenician fleet from Tissaphernes, which had only a nominal
 existence, at the risk of wasting away in inactivity. 
 While Tissaphernes not only did not bring up the fleet in question,
 but was ruining their navy by payments made irregularly, and even
 then not made in full. 
 They must therefore, they insisted, delay no longer, but fight a
 decisive naval engagement. 
 The Syracusans were the most urgent of any.

The confederates and Astyochus, aware
 of these murmurs, had already decided in council to fight a decisive
 battle; and when the news reached them of the disturbance at
 Samos , they put
 to sea with all their ships, one hundred and ten in number, and
 ordering the Milesians to move by land upon Mycale, set sail
 thither.

The Athenians with the eighty-two ships from Samos were at the moment
 lying at Glauce in Mycale, a point where Samos approaches near to
 the continent; and seeing the Peloponnesian fleet sailing against
 them, retired into Samos , not thinking themselves numerically strong
 enough to stake their all upon a battle.

Besides, they had notice from Miletus of the wish of the enemy to engage, and
 were expecting to be joined from the Hellespont by Strombichides, to whom a messenger
 had been already despatched, with the ships that had gone from
 Chios to
 Abydos .

The Athenians accordingly withdrew to Samos , and the
 Peloponnesians put in at Mycale, and encamped with the land forces
 of the Milesians and the people of the neighbourhood.

The next day they were about to sail against Samos , when tidings reached
 them of the arrival of Strombichides with the squadron from the
 Hellespont , upon which
 they immediately sailed back to Miletus .

The Athenians, thus reinforced, now in their turn sailed against
 Miletus with a
 hundred and eight ships, wishing to fight a decisive battle, but as
 no one put out to meet them, sailed back to Samos .

In the same summer, immediately after
 this, the Peloponnesians having refused to fight with their fleet
 united, through not thinking themselves a match for the enemy, and
 being at a loss where to look for money for such a number of ships,
 especially as Tissaphernes proved so bad a paymaster, sent off
 Clearchus, son of Ramphias, with forty ships to Pharnabazus,
 agreeably to the original instructions from Peloponnese ;

Pharnabazus inviting them and being prepared to furnish pay, and
 Byzantium besides
 sending offers to revolt to them.

These Peloponnesian ships accordingly put out into the open sea, in
 order to escape the observation of the Athenians, and being
 overtaken by a storm, the majority with Clearchus got into
 Delos , and afterwards
 returned to Miletus ,
 whence Clearchus proceeded by land to the Hellespont to take the command:
 ten, however, of their number, under the Megarian Helixus, made good
 their passage to the Hellespont , and effected the revolt of Byzantium .

After this, the commanders at Samos were informed of it, and sent a squadron
 against them to guard the Hellespont ; and an encounter took place before
 Byzantium between
 eight vessels on either side.

Meanwhile the chiefs at Samos , and especially
 Thrasybulus, who from the moment that he had changed the government
 had remained firmly resolved to recall Alcibiades, at last in an
 assembly brought over the mass of the soldiery, and upon their
 voting for his recall and amnesty, sailed over to Tissaphernes and
 brought Alcibiades to Samos , being convinced that their only chance of
 salvation lay in his bringing over Tissaphernes from the
 Peloponnesians to themselves.

An assembly was then held in which Alcibiades complained of and
 deplored his private misfortune in having been banished, and
 speaking at great length upon public affairs, highly incited their
 hopes for the future, and extravagantly magnified his own influence
 with Tissaphernes. 
 His object in this was to make the oligarchical government at
 Athens afraid of
 him, to hasten the dissolution of the clubs, to increase his credit
 with the army at Samos and heighten their own confidence, and lastly
 to prejudice the enemy as strongly as possible against Tissaphernes,
 and blast the hopes which they entertained.

Alcibiades accordingly held out to the army such extravagant promises
 as the following: that Tissaphernes had solemnly assured him that if
 he could only trust the Athenians they should never want for
 supplies while he had anything left, no, not even if he should have
 to coin his own silver couch, and that he would bring the Phoenician
 fleet now at Aspendus 
 to the Athenians instead of to the Peloponnesians; but that he could
 only trust the Athenians if Alcibiades were recalled to be his
 security for them.

Upon hearing this and much more
 besides, the Athenians at once elected him general together with the
 former ones, and put all their affairs into his hands. 
 There was now not a man in the army who would have exchanged his
 present hopes of safety and vengeance upon the Four Hundred for any
 consideration whatever; and after what they had been told they were
 now inclined to disdain the enemy before them, and to sail at once
 for Piraeus .

To the plan of sailing for Piraeus , leaving their more immediate enemies
 behind them, Alcibiades opposed the most positive refusal, in spite
 of the numbers that insisted upon it, saying that now that he had
 been elected general he would first sail to Tissaphernes and concert
 with him measures for carrying on the war.

Accordingly, upon leaving this assembly, he immediately took his
 departure in order to have it thought that there was an entire
 confidence between them, and also wishing to increase his
 consideration with Tissaphernes, and to show that he had now been
 elected general and was in a position to do him good or evil as he
 chose; thus managing to frighten the Athenians with Tissaphernes and
 Tissaphernes with the Athenians.

Meanwhile the Peloponnesians at
 Miletus heard of
 the recall of Alcibiades, and already distrustful of Tissaphernes,
 now became far more disgusted with him than ever.

Indeed after their refusal to go out and give battle to the Athenians
 when they appeared before Miletus , Tissaphernes had grown slacker than ever
 in his payments; and even before this, on account of Alcibiades, his
 unpopularity had been on the increase.

Gathering together, just as before, the soldiers and some persons of
 consideration besides the soldiery, began to reckon up how they had
 never yet received their pay in full; that what they did receive was
 small in quantity, and even that paid irregularly, and that unless
 they fought a decisive battle or removed to some station where they
 could get supplies, the ships' crews would desert; and that it was
 all the fault of Astyochus, who humoured Tissaphernes for his own
 private advantage.

The army was engaged in these
 reflections, when the following disturbance took place about the
 person of Astyochus.

Most of the Syracusan and Thurian sailors were freemen, and these the
 freest crews in the armament were likewise the boldest in setting
 upon Astyochus and demanding their pay. 
 The latter answered somewhat stiffly and threatened them, and when
 Dorieus spoke up for his own sailors even went so far as to lift his
 baton against him;

upon seeing which the mass of the men, in sailor fashion, rushed in a
 fury to strike Astyochus. 
 He, however, saw them in time and fled for refuge to an altar; and
 they were thus parted without his being struck.

Meanwhile the fort built by Tissaphernes in Miletus was surprised and
 taken by the Milesians, and the garrison in it turned out,—an act
 which met with the approval of the rest of the allies, and in
 particular of the Syracusans,

but which found no favour with Lichas, who said moreover that the
 Milesians and the rest in the king's country ought to show a
 reasonable submission to Tissaphernes and to pay him court, until
 the war should be happily settled. 
 The Milesians were angry with him for this and for other things of
 the kind, and upon his afterwards dying of sickness, would not allow
 him to be buried where the Lacedaemonians with the army desired.

The discontent of the army with
 Astyochus and Tissaphernes had reached this pitch, when Mindarus
 arrived from Lacedaemon to
 succeed Astyochus as admiral, and assumed the command. 
 Astyochus now set sail for home;

and Tissaphernes sent with him one of his confidants, Gaulites, a
 Carian, who spoke the two languages, to complain of the Milesians
 for the affair of the fort, and at the same time to defend himself
 against the Milesians, who were, as he was aware, on their way to
 Sparta chiefly to
 denounce his conduct, and had with them Hermocrates, who was to
 accuse Tissaphernes of joining with Alcibiades to ruin the
 Peloponnesian cause and of playing a double game.

Indeed Hermocrates had always been at enmity with him about the pay
 not being restored in full; and eventually when he was banished from
 Syracuse , and new
 commanders, Potamis, Myscon, and Demarchus, had come out to
 Miletus to the
 ships of the Syracusans, Tissaphernes pressed harder than ever upon
 him in his exile, and among other charges against him accused him of
 having once asked him for money, and then given himself out as his
 enemy because he failed to obtain it.

While Astyochus and the Milesians and
 Hermocrates made sail for Lacedaemon , Alcibiades had now crossed back from
 Tissaphernes to Samos .

After his return the envoys of the Four Hundred sent, as has been
 mentioned above, to pacify and explain matters to the forces at
 Samos , arrived
 from Delos ; and an
 assembly was held in which they attempted to speak.

The soldiers at first would not hear them, and cried out to put to
 death the subverters of the democracy, but at last, after some
 difficulty, calmed down and gave them a hearing.

Upon this the envoys proceeded to inform them that the recent change
 had been made to save the city, and not to ruin it or to deliver it
 over to the enemy, for they had already had an opportunity of doing
 this when he invaded the country during their government; that all
 the Five Thousand would have their proper share in the government;
 and that their hearers' relatives had neither outrage, as Chaereas
 had slanderously reported, nor other ill-treatment to complain of,
 but were all in undisturbed enjoyment of their property just as they
 had left them.

Besides these they made a number of other statements which had no
 better success with their angry auditors; and amid a host of
 different opinions the one which found most favour was that of
 sailing to Piraeus . 
 Now it was that Alcibiades for the first time did the state a
 service, and one of the most signal kind. 
 For when the Athenians at Samos were bent upon sailing against their
 countrymen, in which case Ionia and the Hellespont would most certainly at once have passed
 into possession of the enemy, Alcibiades it was who prevented
 them.

At that moment, when no other man would have been able to hold back
 the multitude, he put a stop to the intended expedition, and rebuked
 and turned aside the resentment felt, on personal grounds, against
 the envoys;

he dismissed them with an answer from himself, to the effect that he
 did not object to the government of the Five Thousand, but insisted
 that the Four Hundred should be deposed and the Council of Five
 Hundred reinstated in power: meanwhile any retrenchments for
 economy, by which pay might be better found for the armament, met
 with his entire approval.

Generally, he bade them hold out and show a bold face to the enemy,
 since if the city were saved there was good hope that the two
 parties might some day be reconciled, whereas if either were once
 destroyed, that at Samos , or that at Athens , there would no longer be any one to be
 reconciled to.

Meanwhile arrived envoys from the Argives, with offers of support to
 the Athenian commons at Samos : these were thanked by Alcibiades, and
 dismissed with a request to come when called upon.

The Argives were accompanied by the crew of the Paralus, whom we left
 placed in a troopship by the Four Hundred with orders to cruise
 round Euboea , and who being
 employed to carry to Lacedaemon some Athenian envoys sent by the Four
 Hundred, Laespodias, Aristophon, and Melesias, as they sailed by
 Argos laid hands upon
 the envoys, and delivering them over to the Argives as the chief
 subverters of the democracy, themselves, instead of returning to
 Athens , took the
 Argive envoys on board,
 and came to Samos in
 the galley which had been confided to them.

The same summer at the time that the
 return of Alcibiades coupled with the general conduct of
 Tissaphernes had carried to its height the discontent of the
 Peloponnesians, who no longer entertained any doubt of his having
 joined the Athenians, Tissaphernes wishing, it would seem, to clear
 himself to them of these charges, prepared to go after the
 Phoenician fleet to Aspendus , and invited Lichas to go with him; saying
 that he would appoint Tamos as his lieutenant to provide pay for the
 armament during his own absence.

Accounts differ, and it is not easy to ascertain with what intention
 he went to Aspendus ,
 and did not bring the fleet after all.

That one hundred and forty-seven Phoenician ships came as far as
 Aspendus is
 certain; but why they did not come on has been variously accounted
 for. 
 Some think that he went away in pursuance of his plan of wasting the
 Peloponnesian resources, since at any rate Tamos, his lieutenant,
 far from being any better, proved a worse paymaster than himself:
 others that he brought the Phoenicians to Aspendus to exact money from
 them for their discharge, having never intended to employ them:
 others again that it was in view of the outcry against him at
 Lacedaemon , in order
 that it might be said that he was not in fault, but that the ships
 were really manned and that he had certainly gone to fetch them.

To myself it seems only too evident that he did not bring up the
 fleet because he wished to wear out and paralyse the Hellenic
 forces, that is, to waste their strength by the time lost during his
 journey to Aspendus ,
 and to keep them evenly balanced by not throwing his weight into
 either scale. 
 Had he wished to finish the war, he could have done so, assuming of
 course that he made his appearance in a way which left no room for
 doubt; as by bringing up the fleet he would in all probability have
 given the victory to the Lacedaemonians, whose navy, even as it was,
 faced the Athenian more as an equal than as an inferior.

But what convicts him most clearly, is the excuse which he put
 forward for not bringing the ships. 
 He said that the number assembled was less than the king had ordered;
 but surely it would only have enhanced his credit if he spent little
 of the king's money and effected the same end at less cost.

In any case, whatever was his intention, Tissaphernes went to
 Aspendus and saw
 the Phoenicians; and the Peloponnesians at his desire sent a
 Lacedaemonian called Philip with two galleys to fetch the fleet.

Alcibiades finding that Tissaphernes
 had gone to Aspendus ,
 himself sailed thither with thirteen ships, promising to do a great
 and certain service to the Athenians at Samos , as he would either
 bring the Phoenician fleet to the Athenians, or at all events
 prevent its joining the Peloponnesians. 
 In all probability he had long known that Tissaphernes never meant to
 bring the fleet at all, and wished to compromise him as much as
 possible in the eyes of the Peloponnesians through his apparent
 friendship for himself and the Athenians, and thus in a manner to
 oblige him to join their side. While
 Alcibiades weighed anchor and sailed eastward straight for Phaselis
 and Caunus ,

the envoys sent by the Four Hundred to Samos arrived at Athens . 
 Upon their delivering the message from Alcibiades, telling them to
 hold out and to show a firm front to the enemy, and saying that he
 had great hopes of reconciling them with the army and of overcoming
 the Peloponnesians, the majority of the members of the oligarchy,
 who were already discontented and only too much inclined to be quit
 of the business in any safe way that they could, were at once
 greatly strengthened in their resolve.

These now banded together and strongly criticised the administration,
 their leaders being some of the principal generals and men in office
 under the oligarchy, such as Theramenes, son of Hagnon,
 Aristocrates, son of Scellias, and others; who, although among the
 most prominent members of the government (being afraid, as they
 said, of the army at Samos , and most especially of Alcibiades, and also
 lest the envoys whom they had sent to Lacedaemon , might do the state some harm without
 the authority of the people), without insisting on objections to the
 excessive concentration of power in a few hands, yet urged that the
 Five Thousand must be shown to exist not merely in name but in
 reality, and the constitution placed upon a fairer basis.

But this was merely their political cry; most of them being driven by
 private ambition into the line of conduct so surely fatal to
 oligarchies that arise out of democracies. 
 For all at once pretend to be not only equals but each the chief and
 master of his fellows; while under a democracy a disappointed
 candidate accepts his defeat more easily, because he has not the
 humiliation of being beaten by his equals.

But what most clearly encouraged the malcontents was the power of
 Alcibiades at Samos ,
 and their own disbelief in the stability of the oligarchy; and it
 was now a race between them as to which should first become the
 leader of the commons.

Meanwhile the leaders and members of
 the Four Hundred most opposed to a democratic form of
 government—Phrynichus who had had the quarrel with Alcibiades during
 his command at Samos , Aristarchus the bitter and inveterate enemy of
 the commons, and Pisander and Antiphon and others of the chiefs who
 already as soon as they entered upon power, and again when the army
 at Samos seceded
 from them and declared for a democracy, had sent envoys from their
 own body to Lacedaemon and
 made every effort for peace, and had built the wall in Eetionia,—now
 redoubled their exertions when their envoys returned from Samos , and they saw not
 only the people but their own most trusted associates turning
 against them.

Alarmed at the state of things at Athens as at Samos , they now sent off in haste Antiphon and
 Phrynichus and ten others with injunctions to make peace with
 Lacedaemon upon any
 terms, no matter what, that should be at all tolerable.

Meanwhile they pushed on more actively than ever with the wall in
 Eetionia. 
 Now the meaning of this wall, according to Theramenes and his
 supporters, was not so much to keep out the army of Samos in case of its trying
 to force its way into Piraeus as to be able to let in, at pleasure, the
 fleet and army of the enemy.

For Eetionia is a mole of Piraeus , close alongside of the entrance of the
 harbour, and was now fortified in connection with the wall already
 existing on the land side, so that a few men placed in it might be
 able to command the entrance; the old wall on the land side and the
 new one now being built within on the side of the sea, both ending
 in one of the two towers standing at the narrow mouth of the
 harbour.

They also walled off the largest porch in Piraeus which was in immediate
 connection with this wall, and kept it in their own hands,
 compelling all to unload there the corn that came into the harbour,
 and what they had in stock, and to take it out from thence when they
 sold it.

These measures had long provoked the
 murmurs of Theramenes, and when the envoys returned from Lacedaemon without having effected
 any general pacification, he affirmed that this wall was like to
 prove the ruin of the state.

At this moment forty-two ships from Peloponnese , including some Siceliot and Italiot
 vessels from Locri and
 Tarentum , had been
 invited over by the Euboeans and were already riding off Las in
 Laconia preparing for
 the voyage to Euboea , under
 the command of Agesandridas, son of Agesander, a Spartan. 
 Theramenes now affirmed that this squadron was destined not so much
 to aid Euboea as the party
 fortifying Eetionia, and that unless precautions were speedily taken
 the city would be surprised and lost.

This was no mere calumny, there being really some such plan
 entertained by the accused. 
 Their first wish was to have the oligarchy without giving up the
 empire; failing this to keep their ships and walls and be
 independent; while, if this also were denied them, sooner than be
 the first victims of the restored democracy, they were resolved to
 call in the enemy and make peace, give up their walls and ships, and
 at all costs retain possession of the government, if their lives
 were only assured to them.

For this reason they pushed forward
 the construction of their work with posterns and entrances and means
 of introducing the enemy, being eager to have it finished in
 time.

Meanwhile the murmurs against them were at first confined to a few
 persons and went on in secret, until Phrynichus, after his return
 from the embassy to Lacedaemon , was laid wait for and stabbed in full
 market by one of the Peripoli, falling down dead before he had gone
 far from the council chamber. 
 The assassin escaped; but his accomplice, an Argive , was taken and put to the
 torture by the Four Hundred, without their being able to extract
 from him the name of his employer, or anything further than that he
 knew of many men who used to assemble at the house of the commander
 of the Peripoli and at other houses. 
 Here the matter was allowed to drop. 
 This so emboldened Theramenes and Aristocrates and the rest of their
 partisans in the Four Hundred and out of doors, that they now
 resolved to act.

For by this time the ships had sailed round from Las, and anchoring
 at Epidaurus had
 overrun Aegina ; and
 Theramenes asserted that, being bound for Euboea , they would never have
 sailed in to Lacedae and come back to anchor at Epidaurus , unless they had
 been invited to come to aid in the designs of which he had always
 accused the government. 
 Further inaction had therefore now become impossible.

In the end, after a great many seditious harangues and suspicions,
 they set to work in real earnest. 
 The heavy infantry in Piraeus building the wall in Eetionia, among whom
 was Aristocrates, a colonel, with his own tribe, laid hands upon
 Alexicles, a general under the oligarchy and the devoted adherent of
 the cabal, and took him into a house and confined him there.

In this they were assisted by one Hermon, commander of the Peripoli
 in Munychia, and others, and above all had with them the great bulk
 of the heavy infantry.

As soon as the news reached the Four Hundred, who happened to be
 sitting in the council chamber, all except the disaffected wished at
 once to go to the posts where the arms were, and menaced Theramenes
 and his party. 
 Theramenes defended himself, and said that he was ready immediately
 to go and help to rescue Alexicles; and taking with him one of the
 generals belonging to his party, went down to Piraeus , followed by
 Aristarchus and some young men of the cavalry.

All was now panic and confusion. 
 Those in the city imagined that Piraeus was already taken and the prisoner put to
 death, while those in Piraeus expected every moment to be attacked by the
 party in the city.

The older men, however, stopped the persons running up and down the
 town and making for the stands of arms; and Thucydides the
 Pharsalian, Proxenus of the city, came forward and threw himself in
 the way of the rival factions, and appealed to them not to ruin the
 state, while the enemy was still at hand waiting for his
 opportunity, and so at length succeeded in quieting them and in
 keeping their hands off each other.

Meanwhile Theramenes came down to Piraeus , being himself one of the generals, and
 raged and stormed against the heavy infantry, while Aristarchus and
 the adversaries of the people were angry in right earnest.

Most of the heavy infantry, however, went on with the business
 without faltering, and asked Theramenes if he thought the wall had
 been constructed for any good purpose, and whether it would not be
 better that it should be pulled down. 
 To this he answered that if they thought it best to pull it down, he
 for his part agreed with them. 
 Upon this the heavy infantry and a number of the people in Piraeus immediately got up on
 the fortification and began to demolish it.

Now their cry to the multitude was that all should join in the work
 who wished the Five Thousand to govern instead of the Four
 Hundred. 
 For instead of saying in so many words ‘all who wished the commons to
 govern’ they still disguised themselves under the name of the Five
 Thousand; being afraid that these might really exist, and that they
 might be speaking to one of their number and get into trouble
 through ignorance. 
 Indeed this was why the Four Hundred neither wished the Five Thousand
 to exist, nor to have it known that they did not exist; being of
 opinion that to give themselves so many partners in empire would be
 downright democracy, while the mystery in question would make the
 people afraid of one another.

The next day the Four Hundred,
 although alarmed, nevertheless assembled in the council chamber,
 while the heavy infantry in Piraeus , after having released their prisoner
 Alexicles and pulled down the fortification, went with their arms to
 the theatre of Dionysus, close to Munychia, and there held an
 assembly in which they decided to march into the city, and setting
 forth accordingly halted in the Anaceum.

Here they were joined by some delegates from the Four Hundred, who
 reasoned with them one by one, and persuaded those whom they saw to
 be the most moderate to remain quiet themselves, and to keep in the
 rest; saying that they would make known the Five Thousand, and have
 the Four Hundred chosen from them in rotation, as should be decided
 by the Five Thousand, and meanwhile entreated them not to ruin the
 state or drive it into the arms of the enemy.

After a great many had spoken and had been spoken to, the whole body
 of heavy infantry became calmer than before, absorbed by their fears
 for the country at large, and now agreed to hold upon an appointed
 day an assembly in the theatre of Dionysus for the restoration of
 concord.

When the day came for the assembly in
 the theatre, and they were upon the point of assembling, news
 arrived that the forty-two ships under Agesandridas were sailing
 from Megara along the
 coast of Salamis . 
 The people to a man now thought that it was just what Theramenes and
 his party had so often said, that the ships were sailing to the
 fortification, and concluded that they had done well to demolish
 it.

But though it may possibly have been by appointment that Agesandridas
 hovered about Epidaurus and the neighbourhood, he would also
 naturally be kept there by the hope of an opportunity arising out of
 the troubles in the town.

In any case the Athenians, on receipt of the news, immediately ran
 down in mass to Piraeus , seeing themselves threatened by the enemy with
 a worse war than their war among themselves, not at a distance, but
 close to the harbour of Athens . 
 Some went on board the ships already afloat, while others launched
 fresh vessels, or ran to defend the walls and the mouth of the
 harbour.

Meanwhile the Peloponnesian vessels
 sailed by, and rounding Sunium anchored between Thoricus and
 Prasiae, and afterwards arrived at Oropus.

The Athenians, with revolution in the city, and unwilling to lose a
 moment in going to the relief of their most important possession
 (for Euboea was everything
 to them now that they were shut out from Attica ), were compelled to put to
 sea in haste and with untrained crews, and sent Thymochares with
 some vessels to Eretria .

These upon their arrival, with the ships already in Euboea , made up a total of
 thirty-six vessels, and were immediately forced to engage. 
 For Agesandridas, after his crews had dined, put out from Oropus,
 which is about seven miles from Eretria by sea;

and the Athenians, seeing him sailing up, immediately began to man
 their vessels. 
 The sailors, however, instead of being by their ships, as they
 supposed, were gone away to purchase provisions for their dinner in
 the houses in the outskirts of the town; the Eretrians having so
 arranged that there should be nothing on sale in the market-place,
 in order that the Athenians might be a long time in manning their
 ships, and the enemy's attack taking them by surprise, might be
 compelled to put to sea just as they were. 
 A signal also was raised in Eretria to give them notice in Oropus when to put
 to sea.

The Athenians, forced to put out so poorly prepared, engaged off the
 harbour of Eretria , and
 after holding their own for some little while notwithstanding, were
 at length put to flight and chased to the shore.

Such of their number as took refuge in Eretria , which they presumed
 to be friendly to them, found their fate in that city, being
 butchered by the inhabitants; while those who fled to the Athenian
 fort in the Eretrian territory, and the vessels which got to
 Chalcis , were
 saved.

The Peloponnesians, after taking twenty-two Athenian ships, and
 killing or making prisoners of the crews, set up a trophy, and not
 long afterwards effected the revolt of the whole of Euboea (except Oreus, which was
 held by the Athenians themselves), and made a general settlement of
 the affairs of the island.

When the news of what had happened in
 Euboea reached
 Athens a panic
 ensued such as they had never before known. 
 Neither the disaster in Sicily , great as it seemed at the time, nor any
 other had ever so much alarmed them.

The camp at Samos was
 in revolt; they had no more ships or men to man them; they were at
 discord among themselves and might at any moment come to blows; and
 a disaster of this magnitude coming on the top of all, by which they
 lost their fleet, and worst of all Euboea , which was of more value to them than
 Attica , could not occur
 without throwing them into the deepest despondency.

Meanwhile their greatest and most immediate trouble was the
 possibility that the enemy, emboldened by his victory, might make
 straight for them and sail against Piraeus , which they had no longer ships to defend;
 and every moment they expected him to arrive.

This, with a little more courage, he might easily have done, in which
 case he would either have increased the dissensions of the city by
 his presence, or if he had stayed to besiege it have compelled the
 fleet from Ionia , although
 the enemy of the oligarchy, to come to the rescue of their country
 and of their relatives, and in the meantime would have become master
 of the Hellespont ,
 Ionia , the islands, and
 of everything as far as Euboea , or, to speak roundly, of the whole Athenian
 empire.

But here, as on so many other occasions the Lacedaemonians proved the
 most convenient people in the world for the Athenians to be at war
 with. 
 The wide difference between the two characters, the slowness and want
 of energy of the Lacedaemonians as contrasted with the dash and
 enterprise of their opponents, proved of the greatest service,
 especially to a maritime empire like Athens . 
 Indeed this was shown by the Syracusans, who were most like the
 Athenians in character, and also most successful in combating them.

Nevertheless, upon receipt of the
 news, the Athenians manned twenty ships and called immediately a
 first assembly in the Pnyx, where they had been used to meet
 formerly, and deposed the Four Hundred and voted to hand over the
 government to the Five Thousand, of which body all who furnished a
 suit of armour were to be members, decreeing also that no one should
 receive pay for the discharge of any office,

or if he did should be held accursed. 
 Many other assemblies were held afterwards, in which law-makers were
 elected and all other measures taken to form a constitution. 
 It was during the first period of this constitution that the
 Athenians appear to have enjoyed the best government that they ever
 did, at least in my time. 
 For the fusion of the high and the low was effected with judgment,
 and this was what first enabled the state to raise up her head after
 her manifold disasters.

They also voted for the recall of Alcibiades and of other exiles, and
 sent to him and to the camp at Samos , and urged them to devote themselves
 vigorously to the war.

Upon this revolution taking place,
 the party of Pisander and Alexicles, and the chiefs of the oligarchs
 immediately withdrew to Decelea, with the single exception of
 Aristarchus, one of the generals, who hastily took some of the most
 barbarian of the archers and marched to Oenoe.

This was a fort of the Athenians upon the Boeotian border, at that
 moment besieged by the Corinthians, irritated by the loss of a party
 returning from Decelea, who had been cut off by the garrison. 
 The Corinthians had volunteered for this service, and had called upon
 the Boeotians to assist them.

After communicating with them, Aristarchus deceived the garrison in
 Oenoe by telling them that their countrymen in the city had
 compounded with the Lacedaemonians, and that one of the terms of the
 capitulation was that they must surrender the place to the
 Boeotians. 
 The garrison believed him as he was general, and besides knew nothing
 of what had occurred owing to the siege, and so evacuated the fort
 under truce.

In this way the Boeotians gained possession of Oenoe, and the
 oligarchy and the troubles at Athens ended.

To return to the Peloponnesians in
 Miletus . 
 No pay was forthcoming from any of the agents deputed by Tissaphernes
 for that purpose upon his departure for Aspendus ; neither the
 Phoenician fleet nor Tissaphernes showed any signs of appearing, and
 Philip, who had been sent with him, and another Spartan,
 Hippocrates, who was at Phaselis, wrote word to Mindarus, the
 admiral, that the ships were not coming at all, and that they were
 being grossly abused by Tissaphernes. 
 Meanwhile Pharnabazus was inviting them to come, and making every
 effort to get the fleet and, like Tissaphernes, to cause the revolt
 of the cities in his government still subject to Athens , founding great hopes on
 his success; until at length, at about the period of the summer
 which we have now reached, Mindarus yielded to his importunities,
 and, with great order and at a moment's notice, in order to elude
 the enemy at Samos ,
 weighed anchor with seventy-three ships from Miletus and set sail for the
 Hellespont . 
 Thither sixteen vessels had already preceded him in the same summer,
 and had overrun part of the Chersonese . 
 Being caught in a storm, Mindarus was compelled to run in to Icarus,
 and after being detained five or six days there by stress of
 weather, arrived at Chios .

Meanwhile Thrasyllus had heard of his
 having put out from Miletus , and immediately set sail with fifty-five
 ships from Samos , in
 haste to arrive before him in the Hellespont .

But learning that he was at Chios , and expecting that he would stay there, he
 posted scouts in Lesbos and
 on the continent opposite to prevent the fleet moving without his
 knowing it, and himself coasted along to Methymna , and gave orders to
 prepare meal and other necessaries, in order to attack them from
 Lesbos in the event of
 their remaining for any length of time at Chios .

Meanwhile he resolved to sail against Eresus, a town in Lesbos which had revolted, and, if
 he could, to take it. 
 For some of the principal Methymnian exiles had carried over about
 fifty heavy infantry, their sworn associates, from Cuma , and hiring others from the
 continent, so as to make up three hundred in all, chose Anaxander, a
 Theban, to command them, on account of the community of blood
 existing between the Thebans and the Lesbians, and first attacked
 Methymna . 
 Baulked in this attempt by the advance of the Athenian guards from
 Mitylene , and
 repulsed a second time in a battle outside the city, they then
 crossed the mountain and effected the revolt of Eresus.

Thrasyllus accordingly determined to go there with all his ships and
 to attack the place. 
 Meanwhile Thrasybulus had preceded him thither with five ships from
 Samos , as soon
 as he heard that the exiles had crossed over, and coming too late to
 save Eresus, went on and anchored before the town.

Here they were joined also by two vessels on their way home from the
 Hellespont , and by the
 ships of the Methymnians, making a grand total of sixty-seven
 vessels; and the forces on board now made ready with engines and
 every other means available to do their utmost to storm Eresus.

In the meantime Mindarus and the
 Peloponnesian fleet at Chios , after taking provisions for two days and
 receiving three Chian pieces of money for each man from the Chians,
 on the third day put out in haste from the island; in order to avoid
 falling in with the ships at Eresus, they did not make for the open
 sea, but keeping Lesbos on
 their left, sailed for the continent.

After touching at the port of Carteria, in the Phocaeid, and dining,
 they went on along the Cumaean coast and supped at Arginusae, on the
 continent over against Mitylene .

From thence they continued their voyage along the coast, although it
 was late in the night, and arriving at Harmatus on the continent
 opposite Methymna ,
 dined there; and swiftly passing Lectum, Larisa , Hamaxitus, and the
 neighbouring towns, arrived a little before midnight at
 Rhoeteum. 
 Here they were now in the Hellespont . 
 Some of the ships also put in at Sigeum and at other places in the
 neighbourhood.

Meanwhile the warnings of the
 fire-signals and the sudden increase in the number of fires on the
 enemy's shore informed the eighteen Athenian ships at Sestos of the approach of the
 Peloponnesian fleet. 
 That very night they set sail in haste just as they were, and hugging
 the shore of the Chersonese , coasted along to Elaeus, in order to
 sail out into the open sea away from the fleet of the enemy.

After passing unobserved the sixteen ships at Abydos , which had
 nevertheless been warned by their approaching friends to be on the
 alert to prevent their sailing out, at dawn they sighted the fleet
 of Mindarus, which immediately gave chase. 
 All had not time to get away; the greater number however escaped to
 Imbros and Lemnos , while
 four of the hindmost were overtaken off Elaeus.

One of these was stranded opposite to the temple of Protesilaus and
 taken with its crew, two others without their crews; the fourth was
 abandoned on the shore of Imbros and burned by the enemy.

After this the Peloponnesians were
 joined by the squadron from Abydos , which made up their fleet to a grand total
 of eighty-six vessels; they spent the day in unsuccessfully
 besieging Elaeus, and then sailed back to Abydos .

Meanwhile the Athenians, deceived by their scouts, and never dreaming
 of the enemy's fleet getting by undetected, were tranquilly
 besieging Eresus. 
 As soon as they heard the news they instantly abandoned Eresus, and
 made with all speed for the Hellespont ,

and after taking two of the Peloponnesian ships which had been
 carried out too far into the open sea in the ardour of the pursuit
 and now fell in their way, the next day dropped anchor at Elaeus,
 and bringing back the ships that had taken refuge at Imbros, during
 five days prepared for the coming engagement.

After this they engaged in the
 following way. 
 The Athenians formed in column and sailed close along shore to
 Sestos ; upon
 perceiving which the Peloponnesians put out from Abydos to meet them.

Realising that a battle was now imminent, both combatants extended
 their flank; the Athenians along the Chersonese from
 Idacus to Arrhiani with seventy-six ships; the Peloponnesians from
 Abydos to
 Dardanus with eighty-six.

The Peloponnesian right wing was occupied by the Syracusans, their
 left by Mindarus in person with the best sailors in the navy; the
 Athenian left by Thrasyllus, their right by Thrasybulus, the other
 commanders being in different parts of the fleet.

The Peloponnesians hastened to engage first, and outflanking with
 their left the Athenian right sought to cut them off, if possible,
 from sailing out of the straits, and to drive their centre upon the
 shore, which was not far off. 
 The Athenians perceiving their intention extended their own wing and
 outsailed them,

while their left had by this time passed the point of Cynossema . 
 This, however, obliged them to thin and weaken their centre,
 especially as they had fewer ships than the enemy, and as the coast
 round Point Cynossema 
 formed a sharp angle which prevented their seeing what was going on
 on the other side of it.

The Peloponnesians now attacked their
 centre and drove ashore the ships of the Athenians, and disembarked
 to follow up their victory.

No help could be given to the centre either by the squadron of
 Thrasybulus on the right, on account of the number of ships
 attacking him, or by that of Thrasyllus on the left, from whom the
 point of Cynossema hid what was going on, and who was also hindered
 by his Syracusan and other opponents, whose numbers were fully equal
 to his own. 
 At length, however, the Peloponnesians in the confidence of victory
 began to scatter in pursuit of the ships of the enemy, and allowed a
 considerable part of their fleet to get into disorder.

On seeing this the squadron of Thrasybulus discontinued their lateral
 movement and, facing about, attacked and routed the ships opposed to
 them, and next fell roughly upon the scattered vessels of the
 victorious Peloponnesian division, and put most of them to flight
 without a blow. 
 The Syracusans also had by this time given way before the squadron of
 Thrasyllus, and now openly took to flight upon seeing the flight of
 their comrades.

The rout was now complete. 
 Most of the Peloponnesians fled for refuge first to the river Midius,
 and afterwards to Abydos . 
 Only a few ships were taken by the Athenians; as owing to the
 narrowness of the Hellespont the enemy had not far to go to be in
 safety. 
 Nevertheless nothing could have been more opportune for them than
 this victory.

Up to this time they had feared the Peloponnesian fleet, owing to a
 number of petty losses and to the disaster in Sicily ; but they now ceased to
 mistrust themselves or any longer to think their enemies good for
 anything at sea.

Meanwhile they took from the enemy eight Chian vessels, five
 Corinthian, two Ambraciot, two Boeotian, one Leucadian,
 Lacedaemonian, Syracusan, and Pellenian, losing fifteen of their
 own.

After setting up a trophy upon Point Cynossema, securing the wrecks,
 and restoring to the enemy his dead under truce, they sent off a
 galley to Athens with
 the news of their victory.

The arrival of this vessel with its unhoped-for good news, after the
 recent disasters of Euboea ,
 and in the revolution at Athens , gave fresh courage to the Athenians, and
 caused them to believe that if they put their shoulders to the wheel
 their cause might yet prevail.

On the fourth day after the sea-fight
 the Athenians in Sestos 
 having hastily refitted their ships sailed against Cyzicus , which had
 revolted. 
 Off Harpagium and Priapus they sighted at anchor the eight vessels
 from Byzantium , and
 sailing up and routing the troops on shore, took the ships, and then
 went on and recovered the town of Cyzicus , which was unfortified, and levied money
 from the citizens.

In the meantime the Peloponesians sailed from Abydos to Elaeus, and
 recovered such of their captured galleys as were still uninjured,
 the rest having been burned by the Elaeusians, and sent Hippocrates
 and Epicles to Euboea to
 fetch the squadron from that island.

About the same time Alcibiades
 returned with his thirteen ships from Caunus and Phaselis to
 Samos , bringing
 word that he had prevented the Phoenician fleet from joining the
 Peloponnesians, and had made Tissaphernes more friendly to the
 Athenians than before.

Alcibiades now manned nine more ships, and levied large sums of money
 from the Halicarnassians, and fortified Cos. 
 After doing this and placing a governor in Cos, he sailed back to
 Samos , autumn
 being now at hand.

Meanwhile Tissaphernes, upon hearing that the Peloponnesian fleet had
 sailed from Miletus to
 the Hellespont , set off
 again back from Aspendus , and made all sail for Ionia .

While the Peloponnesians were in the Hellespont , the Antandrians, a people of Aeolic
 extraction, conveyed by land across Mount Ida some heavy infantry
 from Abydos , and
 introduced them into the town; having been ill-treated by Arsaces,
 the Persian lieutenant of Tissaphernes. 
 This same Arsaces had, upon pretence of a secret quarrel, invited the
 chief men of the Delians to undertake military service (these were
 Delians who had settled at Atramyttium after having been driven from
 their homes by the Athenians for the sake of purifying Delos ); and after drawing them
 out from their town as his friends and allies, had laid wait for
 them at dinner, and surrounded them and caused them to be shot down
 by his soldiers.

This deed made the Antandrians fear that he might some day do them
 some mischief; and as he also laid upon them burdens too heavy for
 them to bear, they expelled his garrison from their citadel.

Tissaphernes upon hearing of this act
 of the Peloponnesians in addition to what had occurred at Miletus and Cnidus, where his
 garrisons had been also expelled, now saw that the breach between
 them was serious; and fearing further injury from them, and being
 also vexed to think that Pharnabazus should receive them, and in
 less time and at less cost perhaps succeed better against Athens than he had done,
 determined to rejoin them in the Hellespont , in order to complain of the events at
 Antandros and excuse himself as best he could in the matter of the
 Phoenician fleet and of the other charges against him. 
 Accordingly he went first to Ephesus and offered sacrifice to Artemis.

[When the winter after this summer
 is over the twenty-first year of this war will be completed.]