History of the Peloponnesian War

The following winter, the Athenians at once began to prepare for their advance upon Syracuse, and the Syracusans also, on their side, for marching against them.

For when they did not, in accordance with their first alarm and expectation, attack them immediately; as every day went on, they regained their courage more. And when they were seen to be sailing on the other side of Sicily, far away from them, and had gone to Hybla, and made an attempt on it without taking it by storm, they despised them still more, and called on their generals—acting as a multitude is wont to do when full of confidence—to lead them against Catana, since the enemy would not come to them.

Moreover, Syracusan parties of horse, sent out to reconnoitre, were continually riding up to the Athenian armament, and asking them, amongst other insulting expressions, whether they had come themselves to settle with them in a strange country, rather than to reinstate the Leontini.

The Athenian generals were acquainted with these things, and wished to draw them as far as possible from their city with their whole force, and themselves, in the mean time, to coast along with their ships by night, and quietly occupy a place for encampment in a favourable position; knowing that [*](οὐκ ἂν ὁμοίως δυνηθέντες καὶ εἰ] Poppo, Göller, and Bloomfield, all bracket the καὶ in this passage, as utterly marring the sense of it; while Arnold only objects to the interpretation of the Scholiast, without attempting to explain it himself. In support of the translation which I have ventured to give, compare I. 143. 4, καὶ οὐκέτι ἐκ τοῦ ὁμοίου ἔσται πελοποννήσου μέροςτι τμηθῆναι καὶ τὴν ʼαττικὴν ἅπασαν, and VII. 28. 4, αἱ μὲν γὰρ δαπάναιοὐχ ὁμοίως καὶ πρὶν, ἀλλὰ πολλῷ μείζους καθέστασαν, κ. τ. λ. In the latter passage the idea of excess is distinctly asserted, after being previously implied, as in the other passages, by the words οὐχ ὁμοίως καί.) so they would be better able to do it, than if they should land from their ships in face of an enemy prepared to receive them, or should be known to be going by land; (for the Syracusan horse, which was numerous, while they themselves had none, would do great mischief to their light-armed and mob of campfollowers;) and that thus they would take a position where they would not be annoyed by the cavalry in a degree worth speaking of; (for some Syracusan exiles who accompanied them told them of the spot near the Olympieum, which they actually occupied.) The generals, therefore, adopted the following stratagem in furtherance of their wishes.

They send a person who was a faithful friend to them, and no less in the interest of the Syracusans, according to their opinion. The man was a Catanian, and said that he was come from certain individuals in Catana, with whose names they were acquainted, and whom they knew to be still left in the town amongst those who were well affected to them. He stated, then, that the Athenians passed the night at some distance from their arms, within the walls of the city;