s worst ravages at
Athens, and next to Athens, at the most populous of the other towns.
Such was the history of the plague.

After ravaging the plain, the Peloponnesians advanced into the Paralian
region as far as Laurium, where the Athenian silver mines are, and first
laid waste the side looking towards Peloponnese, next that which faces
Euboea and Andros. But Pericles, who was still general, held the same
opinion as in the former invasion, and would not let the Athenians march
out against them.

However, while they were still in the plain, and had not yet entered
the Paralian land, he had prepared an armament of a hundred ships for
Peloponnese, and when all was ready put out to sea. On board the ships
he took four thousand Athenian heavy infantry, and three hundred
cavalry in horse transports, and then for the first time made out of old
galleys; fifty Chian and Lesbian vessels also joining in the expedition.
When this Athenian armament put out to sea, they left the Peloponnesians
in Attica in the Paralian region. Arriving at Epidaurus in Peloponnese
they ravaged most of the territory, and even had hopes of taking the
town by an assault: in this however they were not successful. Putting
out from Epidaurus, they laid waste the territory of Troezen, Halieis,
and Hermione, all towns on the coast of Peloponnese, and thence sailing
to Prasiai, a maritime town in Laconia, ravaged part of its territory,
and took and sacked the place itself; after which they returned home,
but found the Peloponnesians gone and no longer in Attica.

During the whole time that the Peloponnesians were in Attica and the
Athenians on the expedition in their ships, men kept dying of the plague
both in the armament and in Athens. Indeed it was actually asserted
that the departure of the Peloponnesians was hastened by fear of the
disorder; as they heard from deserters that it was in the city, and
also could see the burials going on. Yet in this invasion they remained
longer than in any other, and ravaged the whole country, for they were
about forty days in Attica.

The same summer Hagnon, son of Nicias, and Cleopompus, son of Clinias,
the colleagues of Pericles, took the armament of which he had lately
made use, and went off upon an expedition against the Chalcidians in the
direction of Thrace and Potidaea, which was still under siege. As soon
as they arrived, they brought up their engines against Potidaea and
tried every means of taking it, but d