History of the Peloponnesian War

And so it came about that among themselves there was emulation, wherever each was assigned to duty, and the whole thing seemed more like a display of wealth and power before the rest of the Hellenes than an undertaking against enemies.

For if one had reckoned the public expenditure on the part of the state and the private outlay of those who made the expedition—on the part of the city, both what it had already advanced and what it was sending in the hands of the generals, and on the part of private individuals whatever a man had expended on his own person or, if trierarch, on his ship, and what they were going to spend still, and, besides, the money we may suppose that everyone, even apart from the pay he received from the state, provided for himself as travelling expenses, counting upon an expedition of long duration, and all the articles for barter and sale merchant or soldier took with him on the voyage—it would have been found that many talents in all were taken from the city.

And the fame of the armament was noised abroad, not less because of amazement at its boldness and the splendour of the spectacle than on account of its overwhelming force as compared with those whom they were going against; and also because it was the longest voyage from home as yet attempted and undertaken with the highest hopes for the future as compared with their present resources.