History of the Peloponnesian War

The Athenians ravaged, too, during the same winter a part of Macedonia also, charging Perdiccas with the league he had entered into with the Argives and Lacedaemonians; and with the fact, that when they had prepared to lead an army against the Thrace-ward Chalcidians and Amphipolis, under the command of Nicias son of Niceratus, he had proved false to his allies, and the armament was chiefly broken up in consequence of his having deserted the cause. He was therefore proclaimed an enemy. And thus the winter ended, and the fifteenth year of the war.

The next summer, Alcibiades sailed to Argos with twenty ships, and seized three hundred men, who were still thought to be suspicious characters, and to favour the cause of the Lacedaemonians; and these the Athenians deposited in the neighbouring islands within their dominions. The Athenians also undertook an expedition against the island of Melos, with thirty ships of their own, six of the Chians, two of the Lesbians, sixteen hundred of their own heavy-armed, three hundred bowmen, twenty mounted archers, and about five thousand five hundred heavy-armed of the allies and the islanders.