Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 2.djvu/276

 268 THE ATHENIANS ON THE DEFENSIVE [vil the Athenians were sending for assistance. The Syra- cusans, who were in high spirits, also manned a fleet, and began to practise, intending to try their hand at this new sort of warfare. 8 Nicias observing how they were employed, and seeing that the strength of the enemy and the Day bv day the Syra-, , , /• i a i • i • i cusa>,sayegaMnga»d helplessncss of the Athenians was daily the Athenians losing increasing. Sent to Athens a full report strength. Nicias writes ^f j^jg circumstances, as he had often done before, but never in such detail. He now thought the situation so critical that, if the Athen- ians did not at once recall them or send another considerable army to their help, the expedition was lost. Fearing lest his messengers, either from inability to speak or a from want of intelligence », or because they desired to please the people, might not tell the whole truth, he wrote a letter, that the Athenians might receive his own opinion of their affairs unimpaired in the transmission, and so be better able to judge of the real facts of the case. The messengers departed carrying his letter and taking verbal instructions. He was now careful to keep his army on the defensive, and to run no risks which he could avoid. 9 At the end of the same summer, Euetion an Athenian Failure of an attack general, in concert with Perdiccas and upon AmphipoUs. assisted by a large force of Thracians, made an attack upon Amphipolis, which he failed to take. He then brought round triremes into the Strymon and besieged the place from the river, making Himeraeum his head-quarters. So the summer ended, lo In the following winter the messengers from Nicias The messengers of arrived at Athens. They delivered Nicias arrive at Athens, their verbal instructions, and answered any questions which were put to them. They also pre- Or, reading /in7/iv« instead oi -^wntji : ' from defect of memory.'