History of the Peloponnesian War

Chrysis immediately, the same night, fled to Phlius, in her fear of the Argives; who, according to the law laid down on the subject, appointed another priestess, by name Phaeinis. The priesthood of Chrysis, at the time she fled, embraced eight years of this war, and to the middle of the ninth.

And now, towards the close of the summer, Scione was entirely invested; and the Athenians, having left a garrison to keep watch over it, returned with the rest of their army.

The following winter, the Athenians and Lacedaemonians remained quiet, in consequence of the armistice; but the Mantineans and Tegeans, with the allies on both sides, fought a battle at Laodicium, in the district of Oresthis, and the victory was doubtful; for each side having put to flight one of the enemy's wings which was opposed to them, they both erected trophies, and sent spoils to Delphi.

Though, however, many had fallen on each side, and the battle was undecisive, and night interrupted the action, the Tegeans bi vouacked on the field, and erected a trophy immediately; whereas the Mantineans withdrew to Bucolion, and erected their counter-trophy afterwards.

Towards the end of the same winter, and when it was now approaching to spring, Brasidas also made an attempt on Potidaea. For he went thither by night, and planted a ladder against the wall, and so far escaped observation; the ladder having been planted just in the interval when [*]( Respecting this expedient for securing the vigilance of troops on guard see Arnold's note.) the bell had been passed round, before the man who passed it returned to that side. Afterwards, however, on their immediately perceiving it, before his troops came up to the place, he led them back again as quickly as possible, and did not wait for the day to break.

And so the winter ended, and the ninth year of this war, of which Thucydides wrote the history.

END OF THE FOURTH BOOK.

THE following summer, the truce for a year [*]( For the arguments with which Arnold establishes, as I think, this interpretation of the passage, see his Appendix. All the later German editors adopt, with little or no variety, the view of Heilmann, Böckh, and others, who suppose it to mean, that in the following summer the truce was broken, and war renewed until the time of the Pythian games. In addition to what Arnold has observed respecting the unsuitableness of the pluperfect tense to such a mode of interpretation, it may be remarked that Thucydides applies the term τὴν ἐκεχειρίαν to the year's truce in the last chapter but one of the preceding book; and therefore it is much more natural that the same armistice should be intended by the same term in this and the following chapters. It seems evident too that there is an opposition expressed by the μέν here and the δέ in the first line of the next chapter:— the one sentence stating how long the truce continued, viz. until the Pythian games, and the other, what military measure was first executed after its expiration; while the chief event which occurred during its continuance is mentioned parenthetically between the two. Nor, again, does it seem at all like the style of Thucydides to allude so cursorily, and by anticipation, to the Pythian games, as the cause which put a final stop to hostilities, and to make no subsequent mention of them at all in what would be the natural place for doing so; but to lead his readers to conclude that the proposals for peace originated solely in the difficulties of both the great belligerent powers, and their natural anxiety to be released from them; which is the sum and substance of his history from chap. 13 to 17.) continued till the Pythian games, and then ended. During the suspension of arms, the Athenians expelled the Delians from their island, thinking that they had been consecrated when in a state of impurity from some crime of ancient date; and, moreover, that this had been the deficiency in their former purification of it; in which case I have before explained that they considered themselves to have performed it rightly by taking up the coffins of the dead. The Delians found a residence at Atramyttium in Asia, given to them by Pharnaces, as each of them arrived there.

After the armistice had expired, Cleon, having persuaded the Athenians to the measure, led an expedition against the Thrace-ward towns, with twelve hundred heavy-armed, and three hundred cavalry of the Athenians, a larger force of the allies, and thirty ships.

After landing in the first place at Scione, which was still being besieged, and taking thence some heavy-armed from the garrison, he sailed into the port of the Colophonians, belonging to the Toronaeans, and at no great distance from their city.

Thence, having learned from deserters both that Brasidas was not in Torone, and that those who were in it were not strong enough to give him battle, with his land forces he marched against the city, while he sent ten ships to sail round into the harbour.