ousand seven hundred Corinthian heavy infantry, four hundred
Phliasians, six hundred Sicyonians, and such troops of his own as he had
already levied, expecting to find Nisaea not yet taken. Hearing of its
fall (he had marched out by night to Tripodiscus), he took three hundred
picked men from the army, without waiting till his coming should be
known, and came up to Megara unobserved by the Athenians, who were down
by the sea, ostensibly, and really if possible, to attempt Nisaea, but
above all to get into Megara and secure the town. He accordingly
invited the townspeople to admit his party, saying that he had hopes of
recovering Nisaea.

However, one of the Megarian factions feared that he might expel them
and restore the exiles; the other that the commons, apprehensive of this
very danger, might set upon them, and the city be thus destroyed by a
battle within its gates under the eyes of the ambushed Athenians. He was
accordingly refused admittance, both parties electing to remain quiet
and await the event; each expecting a battle between the Athenians
and the relieving army, and thinking it safer to see their friends
victorious before declaring in their favour.

Unable to carry his point, Brasidas went back to the rest of the army.
At daybreak the Boeotians joined him. Having determined to relieve
Megara, whose danger they considered their own, even before hearing from
Brasidas, they were already in full force at Plataea, when his messenger
arrived to add spurs to their resolution; and they at once sent on to
him two thousand two hundred heavy infantry, and six hundred horse,
returning home with the main body. The whole army thus assembled
numbered six thousand heavy infantry. The Athenian heavy infantry were
drawn up by Nisaea and the sea; but the light troops being scattered
over the plain were attacked by the Boeotian horse and driven to the
sea, being taken entirely by surprise, as on previous occasions no
relief had ever come to the Megarians from any quarter. Here the
Boeotians were in their turn charged and engaged by the Athenian horse,
and a cavalry action ensued which lasted a long time, and in which
both parties claimed the victory. The Athenians killed and stripped
the leader of the Boeotian horse and some few of his comrades who had
charged right up to Nisaea, and remaining masters of the bodies gave
them back under truce, and set up a trophy; but regarding the action
as a whole the forces separated witho