Page:History of Greece Vol VI.djvu/444

 122 HISTORY OF GREECE. of Brasidas ; but Sane and Dion held out, nor could he bring them to terms evtn by ravaging their territory. He next marched into the Sithonian peninsula, to attack Torone, situated near the southern extremity of that peninsula, opposite to Cape Kanastrceum, the extreme headland of the peninsula of Pallene. 1 Torone was inhabited by a Chalkidic population, but had not partaken in the revolt of the neighboring Chalkidians against Athens. A small Athenian garrison had been sent there, prob- ably since the recent dangers, and were now defending it, as well as repairing the town-wall in various parts where it had been so neglected as to crumble down. They occupied as a sort of dis- tinct citadel the outlying cape called Lekythus, joining by a nar- row isthmus the hill on which the city stood, and forming a port wherein lay two Athenian triremes as guardships. A small party in Torone, without privity 2 or even suspicion of the rest, entered into correspondence with Brasidas, and engaged to pro- vide for him the means of entering and mastering the town. Accordingly, he advanced by a night-march to the temple of the Dioskuri, Kastor and Pollux, within about a quarter of a mile of the town-gates, which he reached a little before daybreak, sending forward one hundred peltasts to be still nearer, and to rush upon the gate at the instant when signal was made from within. His Toronaean partisans, some of whom were already concealed on the spot, awaiting his arrival, made their final ar- rangements with him, and then returned into the town, conducting with them seven determined men from his army, armed only with daggers, and having Lysistratus of Olynthus as their chief : twenty men had been originally named for this service, but the danger appeared so extreme, that only seven of them were bold enough to go. This forlorn hope, enabled to creep in, through a email aperture in the wall towards the sea, were conducted silently up to the topmost watch-tower on the city hill, where they sur- prised and slew the guards, and set open a neighboring postern 1 Thucyd. iv, 109 STff TTJV iroXiv irapadovvai, iv, 113. TCJV tie Topuvaiuv -yi-yvouivrji: -fi( 4A<3.v eldof, t-&opvf}el TO, etc.
 * Thucyd. iv, 110 KOI avrbv uvdpes b"kiyoi tirfiyov Kpva, i-oipoi