bring over the townspeople, he weighed anchor
and coasted along Italy. Opposite the Terinaean Gulf he was caught
by the wind which blows violently and steadily from the north in that
quarter, and was carried out to sea; and after experiencing very rough
weather, remade Tarentum, where he hauled ashore and refitted such of
his ships as had suffered most from the tempest. Nicias heard of his
approach, but, like the Thurians, despised the scanty number of his
ships, and set down piracy as the only probable object of the voyage,
and so took no precautions for the present.

About the same time in this summer, the Lacedaemonians invaded Argos
with their allies, and laid waste most of the country. The Athenians
went with thirty ships to the relief of the Argives, thus breaking their
treaty with the Lacedaemonians in the most overt manner. Up to this time
incursions from Pylos, descents on the coast of the rest of Peloponnese,
instead of on the Laconian, had been the extent of their co-operation
with the Argives and Mantineans; and although the Argives had often
begged them to land, if only for a moment, with their heavy infantry in
Laconia, lay waste ever so little of it with them, and depart, they had
always refused to do so. Now, however, under the command of Phytodorus,
Laespodius, and Demaratus, they landed at Epidaurus Limera, Prasiae,
and other places, and plundered the country; and thus furnished the
Lacedaemonians with a better pretext for hostilities against Athens.
After the Athenians had retired from Argos with their fleet, and the
Lacedaemonians also, the Argives made an incursion into the Phlisaid,
and returned home after ravaging their land and killing some of the
inhabitants.

BOOK VII

CHAPTER XXI

_Eighteenth and Nineteenth Years of the War--Arrival of Gylippus at
Syracuse--Fortification of Decelea--Successes of the Syracusans_

After refitting their ships, Gylippus and Pythen coasted along from
Tarentum to Epizephyrian Locris. They now received the more correct
information that Syracuse was not yet completely invested, but that
it was still possible for an army arriving at Epipolae to effect an
entrance; and they consulted, accordingly, whether they should keep
Sicily on their right and risk sailing in by sea, or, leaving it on
their left, should first sail to Himera and, taking with them the
Himeraeans and any others that might agree to join them, go to Syracuse
by land. Finally they determined t