Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 2.djvu/418

 4.IO DEPOSITION OF THE FOUR HUNDRED [vill touched them nearest, and most agitated their minds, was the fear lest their enemies, emboldened by victory, should at once attack the Piraeus, in which no ships were left ; indeed they fancied that they were all but there. And had the Peloponnesians been a little more enterprising they could easily have executed such a plan. Either they might have cruised near, and would then have aggravated the divisions in the city ; or by remaining and carrying on a blockade they might have compelled the fleet in Ionia, although hostile to the oligarchy, to come and assist their kindred and their native city; and then the Hellespont, Ionia, all the islands between Ionia and Euboea, in a word, the whole Athenian empire, would have fallen into their hands. But on this as on so many other occasions the Lacedaemonians proved themselves to be the most con- venient enemies whom the Athenians could possibly have had. For the two peoples were of very different tempers ; the one quick, the other slow; the one adventurous, the other timorous ^ ; and the Lacedaemonian character was of great service to the Athenians, the more so because the empire for which they were fighting was maritime. And this view is confirmed by the defeat of the Athenians at Syracuse ; for the Syracusans, who were most like them'', fought best against them. 97 When the news came the Athenians in their extremity They immediately de- Still Contrived to man twenty ships, and pose the Four Hun- immediately summoned an assembly d,ed, and establish a ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^ ^^ -^^ ^^^ ,^^ ^^jj^^ new government the, -.^ best iMch Thucydides the Pnyx, wherc they had always been had known) of Five in the habit of meeting; at which Thousand being the assembly they deposed the Four Hun- citizens ivho supplied ^ j i. themselves with arms, ared, and voted that the government Pay/or ojfices abolished, should be in the hands of the Five Alcibiades recalled. Thousand ; this number was to include all who could furnish themselves with arms. No one was Cp i. 70. ^ Cp. i. 141 med. ; vii. 55.