something positive to lean upon,
and no longer expected the Peloponnesians to arrive by reason of their
delay.

In the meantime the Isthmian games took place, and the Athenians, who
had been also invited, went to attend them, and now seeing more clearly
into the designs of the Chians, as soon as they returned to Athens took
measures to prevent the fleet putting out from Cenchreae without
their knowledge. After the festival the Peloponnesians set sail
with twenty-one ships for Chios, under the command of Alcamenes. The
Athenians first sailed against them with an equal number, drawing off
towards the open sea. The enemy, however, turning back before he had
followed them far, the Athenians returned also, not trusting the seven
Chian ships which formed part of their number, and afterwards manned
thirty-seven vessels in all and chased him on his passage alongshore
into Spiraeum, a desert Corinthian port on the edge of the Epidaurian
frontier. After losing one ship out at sea, the Peloponnesians got the
rest together and brought them to anchor. The Athenians now attacked not
only from the sea with their fleet, but also disembarked upon the coast;
and a melee ensued of the most confused and violent kind, in which the
Athenians disabled most of the enemy's vessels and killed Alcamenes
their commander, losing also a few of their own men.

After this they separated, and the Athenians, detaching a sufficient
number of ships to blockade those of the enemy, anchored with the rest
at the islet adjacent, upon which they proceeded to encamp, and sent to
Athens for reinforcements; the Peloponnesians having been joined on the
day after the battle by the Corinthians, who came to help the ships, and
by the other inhabitants in the vicinity not long afterwards. These
saw the difficulty of keeping guard in a desert place, and in their
perplexity at first thought of burning the ships, but finally resolved
to haul them up on shore and sit down and guard them with their land
forces until a convenient opportunity for escaping should present
itself. Agis also, on being informed of the disaster, sent them a
Spartan of the name of Thermon. The Lacedaemonians first received the
news of the fleet having put out from the Isthmus, Alcamenes having been
ordered by the ephors to send off a horseman when this took place,
and immediately resolved to dispatch their own five vessels under
Chalcideus, and Alcibiades with him. But while they were full of this