History of the Peloponnesian War

And one might hear in one and the same army, as long as the fight upon the water was indifferent, at one and the same time lamentations, shouts that they won, that they lost, and whatsoever else a great army in great danger is forced differently to utter.

They also that were aboard suffered the same, till at last the Syracusians and their confederates, after long resistance on the other side, put them to flight, and manifestly pressing, chased them with great clamour and encouragement of their own to the shore.

And the sea forces, making to the shore, some one way and some another, except only such as were lost by being far from it, escaped into the harbour. And the army that was upon the land, no longer now of different passions, with one and the same vehemence, all with shrieks and sighs unable to sustain what befel, ran part to save the galleys, part to the defence of the camp, and the residue, who were far the greatest number, fell presently to consider every one of the best way to save himself.

And this was the time wherein of all other they stood in greatest fear, and they suffered now the like to what they had made others to suffer before at Pylus. For the Lacedaemonians then, besides the loss of their fleet, lost the men which they had set over into the island; and the Athenians now, without some accident not to be expected, were out of all hope to save themselves by land.