Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 2.djvu/141

 I 38-40] PYLOS AND PAN ACTUM 133 promise of sending envoys to Argos; but the whole business was neglected and deferred. During the same winter the Olynthians made a sudden 39 attack upon Mecyberna", which was The Lacedaewomaus, held by an Athenian garrison, and took wauthig to recover Py- it. The Athenians and Lacedae- los, persuade ihe Boec ttarts, with tvliont they monians still continued to negotiate ,„^^,^ „ separate alii- about the places which had not been a>tce,togiveup Panac- restored, the Lacedaemonians hoping '"'"' that, if the Athenians got back Panactum from the Boeo- tians, they might themselves recover Pylos. So they sent an embassy to the Boeotians, and begged of them to give up Panactum and the Athenian prisoners to themselves, that they might obtain Pylos in return for them. But the Boeotians refused to give them up unless the Lacedae- monians made a separate alliance with them as they had done with the Athenians. Now the Lacedaemonians knew that, if they acceded to this request, they would be dealing unfairly with Athens, because there was a stipulation which forbade either state to make war or peace without the consent of the other ; but they were eager to obtain Panactum and thereby, as they hoped, recover Pylos. At the same time the party who wished to break the peace with Athens were zealous on behalf of the Boeotians. So they made the alliance about the end of winter and the B.C. 420. beginning of spring. The Boeotians at once commenced ' ^°' the demolition of Panactum; and the eleventh year of the war ended. Immediately on the commencement of spring, the 40 Argives, observing that the envoys jhe Argives are whom the Boeotians promised to send alarmed at the seeming had not arrived, that Panactum was ogreemeut of the Boeo- tiaiis ana Lacedae- being demolished, and that a private ,„onians, in which alliance had been made between the they suppose the Athen- Lacedaemonians and the Boeotians, i^'^^ fo be included. began to fear that they would be isolated, and that the » Cp. V. 1 8. § 7.