History of the Peloponnesian War

It was with this object in view that they were now diligently building this fort, which was furnished with posterns and entrances and ways for letting the enemy in, and they wished to have it finished in time.

Now hitherto the talk had been confined to small groups and indulged in with some attempt at secrecy; but finally Phrynichus, after his return from his mission to Lacedaemon, was stabbed in full market as the result of a plot by a man of the frontier-patrol, and before he had gone far from the senate-chamber suddenly died. The assassin escaped, while his accomplice, an Argive fellow, was seized and put to the torture by the Four Hundred, but did not reveal the name of anyone who instigated the deed nor anything else, except that he knew many who were wont to come together in the house of the commander of the frontier-patrol and at other houses. So now at length, when no signal action had been taken in consequence of this, Theramenes and Aristocrates and all the rest of the Four Hundred and those outside that body who were of the same way of thinking, went to work more boldly.

For at this same time the Peloponnesian ships had already sailed round from Las, and after taking station at Epidaurus had overrun Aegina; and Theramenes said it was not likely, if their destination were Euboea, that they would have run up the gulf as far as Aegina and then put in to Epidaurus to anchor, unless they had come on invitation for the purposes which he himself had always been denouncing; it was therefore impossible, he concluded, to keep quiet any longer.