will obtain his Sicilian reinforcements shortly,
those from Peloponnese after a longer interval; and unless you attend
to the matter the former will be here before you, while the latter will
elude you as they have done before."

Such were the contents of Nicias's letter. When the Athenians had heard
it they refused to accept his resignation, but chose him two colleagues,
naming Menander and Euthydemus, two of the officers at the seat of war,
to fill their places until their arrival, that Nicias might not be left
alone in his sickness to bear the whole weight of affairs. They also
voted to send out another army and navy, drawn partly from the Athenians
on the muster-roll, partly from the allies. The colleagues chosen for
Nicias were Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes, and Eurymedon, son of
Thucles. Eurymedon was sent off at once, about the time of the winter
solstice, with ten ships, a hundred and twenty talents of silver, and
instructions to tell the army that reinforcements would arrive, and that
care would be taken of them; but Demosthenes stayed behind to organize
the expedition, meaning to start as soon as it was spring, and sent for
troops to the allies, and meanwhile got together money, ships, and heavy
infantry at home.

The Athenians also sent twenty vessels round Peloponnese to prevent
any one crossing over to Sicily from Corinth or Peloponnese. For the
Corinthians, filled with confidence by the favourable alteration in
Sicilian affairs which had been reported by the envoys upon their
arrival, and convinced that the fleet which they had before sent out
had not been without its use, were now preparing to dispatch a force of
heavy infantry in merchant vessels to Sicily, while the Lacedaemonians
did the like for the rest of Peloponnese. The Corinthians also manned
a fleet of twenty-five vessels, intending to try the result of a battle
with the squadron on guard at Naupactus, and meanwhile to make it
less easy for the Athenians there to hinder the departure of their
merchantmen, by obliging them to keep an eye upon the galleys thus
arrayed against them.

In the meantime the Lacedaemonians prepared for their invasion of
Attica, in accordance with their own previous resolve, and at the
instigation of the Syracusans and Corinthians, who wished for an
invasion to arrest the reinforcements which they heard that Athens
was about to send to Sicily. Alcibiades also urgently advised the
fortification of Decelea, and a vigor