History of the Peloponnesian War

Nevertheless they sent about to the cities of the Peloponnesus to require their assistance with all speed at Pylus, and also to their threescore galleys that were at Corcyra, which, transported over the isthmus of Leucas, arrived at Pylus unseen of the Athenian galleys lying at Zacynthus. And by this time their army of foot was also there.

Whilst the Peloponnesian galleys were coming toward Pylus, Demosthenes sent two galleys secretly to Eurymedon and the Athenian fleet at Zacynthus, in all haste, to tell them that they must come presently to him for as much as the place was in danger to be lost.

And according as Demosthenes' message imported, so the fleet made haste. The Lacedaemonians in the meantime prepared themselves to assault the fort both by sea and land, hoping easily to win it, being a thing built in haste and not many men within it.

And because they expected the coming of the Athenian fleet from Zacynthus, they had a purpose, if they took not the fort before, to bar up the entries of the harbour.