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20 recover that important place. But they committed the blunder, and allowed the people of Amphipolis to remain their own masters. Soon afterwards, in 358 B.C., Philip thought he might as well possess himself of it; and when the inhabitants refused to surrender, he laid siege to the city. Envoys were sent to Athens, asking for help; but it is possible that at this crisis the war with the allies had just begun, and that the Athenians may have thus found themselves fully occupied. Philip, too, promised them in a very civil letter that he would put them in possession of it as soon as he had taken it. The Athenians did nothing, though it could not have been very difficult for them to have saved the place and secured it for themselves. This was indeed shortsighted, as they now again had an opportunity of securing a commanding position, and of nipping Philip's power in the bud. It was one of those errors which can never be retrieved. Athens lost prestige, as well as a most useful dependency. When Philip took the city, Olynthus, which was not far distant, and was at the head of a group of Greek townships in the peninsula of Chalcidice, was seriously alarmed, and proposed an alliance to Athens. The offer was rejected, as the Athenians, it seems, still wished to look on Philip as their friend, and were persuaded to trust his promises. The cunning prince contrived not only to buy off the hostility of Olynthus, but actually to win its friendship and to become its ally by the cession of a disputed strip of territory near Thessalonica. The next thing he did was to venture on an openly hostile act against Athens by conquering and wresting from