History of the Peloponnesian War

And now the ambassadors from the Four Hundred, whom they sent at the time we mentioned to appease and inform those at Samos, arrived from Delos, after Alcibiades had come; and when an assembly had been called, they attempted to make a speech.

But the soldiers at first would not hear them, but cried out, that they should put to death those who were abolishing the democracy; afterwards, however, they were with difficulty calmed down, and gave them a hearing.

They, then, delivered to them this message;

that it was neither for the destruction of the state that the recent change had been made, but for its preservation; nor in order that it might be delivered up to the enemy, (for they might have done that when they invaded the country during their government:) that all in their turn should share the privileges of the Five Thousand; and that their relatives were neither being outraged, as Chaereas had slanderously reported to them, nor suffering any harm, but remained as they were, each in the enjoyment of his property.

Though they made this and many other statements besides, they listened none the more favourably, but were angry, and expressed different opinions, though most generally, that they should sail to the Piraeus. And on that occasion Alcibiades appeared to have benefited the state for the first time, and in a degree inferior to no one else. For when the Athenians at Samos were bent on sailing against their countrymen, in which case most certainly the enemy would have taken possession of Ionia and the Hellespont, he was the man who prevented them.

Indeed on that emergency no one else would have been able to restrain the multitude. He, however, both made them desist from the attack, and silenced with rebukes those individuals who were on their own account most angry with the ambassadors.

He then dismissed them with an answer from himself,

that he did not object to the Five Thousand being in power, but ordered them to depose the Four Hundred, and to establish the council of Five Hundred as before. That if any retrenchment had been made with a view to economy, in order that those who were on service might be better provided with supplies, he entirely approved of it.

In other respects also he urged them to stand out, and not at all to submit to the enemy. For if only the state were preserved, there was great hope of their being reconciled to one another;

but if either of the two parties were once destroyed, either that at Samos, or that at home, there would no longer be any one for them to be reconciled to.

but Alcibiades thanked them, and desiring them to come when they should be called upon, thus dismissed them. Now the Argives came in company with the crew of the Paralus, who, when last mentioned, had been commanded by the Four Hundred to cruise in the troop-ship round Euboea; and who, while taking to Lacedaemon some Athenians that had been sent as ambassadors by the Four Hundred, namely, Laespodias, Aristophon, and Melesias, when off Argos in their passage, seized the ambassadors, and delivered them up to the Argives, as being some of those who had been most instrumental in abolishing the democracy; while they themselves did not go to Athens again, but taking the ambassadors from Argos to Samos arrived there with the trireme they were in.