Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 2.djvu/262

 254 ATHENIANS SURPRISE EPIPOLAE [vi came to the rescue. Some of the insurgents were appre- hended, others fled to Athens. 96 The Syracusans heard that the Athenians had re- ^, ^, ceived their cavalry, and that they The Syracusans de- ,^, termine to guard Epi- would soon be upon them. I hey con- polae, but are antici- sidered that, unless the Athenians pated, ivhile holding a gj^i^ed posscssion of Epipolac (which rei>iew,by the Athenians; ° . 1 1 • 1 was a steep place looking down upon Syracuse), the city could not easily be invested, even if they were defeated in battle ; they therefore determined to guard the paths leading to the summit that the enemy might not get up by stealth. At all other points the place was secure, as it lies high and slopes right down to the city, from the interior of which it can all be seen ; the Syracusans call it Epipolae (or the plateau^ because it is above the level of the adjacent country. Hermocrates and his colleagues had now entered upon their command. The whole people went out at break of day to the meadow skirting the river Anapus, and proceeded to hold a review of their forces. A selection was at once made of six hundred hoplites, who were appointed to guard Epipolae, and to run in a body to any point at which they were needed. They were commanded by Diomilus, an Andrian exile. 97 On the very same morning the Athenians were likewise who land, unobserved, holding a muster of their army. They north of the city. They j^^d come from Catana with their earn the sumnnt of . . ^ 111 •, j Epipolae and put to ^hole forcc, and had put in unobserved flight the Syracusan near a place called Leon, which is dis- hoplites. tjjpj from Epipolae not quite a mile ; there they disembarked their troops. Their ships cast anchor at Thapsus, which is a peninsula with a narrow isthmus, running out into the sea, and not far from Syra- cuse either by land or water. The Athenian sailors made a stockade across the isthmus and remained at Thapsus, while the troops ran to Epipolae, and gained the summit by the way of the Euryelus before the Syracusans saw