History of the Peloponnesian War

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.

The same summer, and at the very time when the Peloponnesians were most offended with Tissaphernes, both on other accounts, and especially because of the return of Alcibiades, thinking that he was now evidently Atticizing, he, wishing, as it seemed, to clear himself to them of these charges, prepared to go to Aspendus for the Phoenician ships, and desired Lichas to accompany him; saying, that with regard to the armament, he would appoint Tamos as his lieutenant, to furnish the supplies while he was himself absent. The same account, however, is not given by all;