Book 3
85.3
They also sent envoys to Lacedaemon and Corinth to negotiate their restoration; but meeting with no success, afterwards got together boats and mercenaries and crossed over to the island, being about six hundred in all;
85.4
and burning their boats so as to have no hope except in becoming masters of the country, went up to Mount Istone, and fortifying themselves there, began to annoy those in the city and obtained command of the country.
86.1
At the close of the same summer the Athenians sent twenty ships under the command of Laches, son of Melanopus, and Charceades, son of Euphiletus, to Sicily,
86.2
where the Syracusans and Leontines were at war. The Syracusans had for allies all the Dorian cities except Camarina—these had been included in the Lacedaemonian confederacy from the commencement of the war, though they had not taken any active part in it—the Leontines had Camarina and the Chalcidian cities. In Italy the Locrians were for the Syracusans, the Rhegians for their Leontine kinsmen.
86.3
The allies of the Leontines now sent to Athens and appealed to their ancient alliance and to their Ionian origin, to persuade the Athenians to send them a fleet, as the Syracusans were blockading them by land and sea.
86.4
The Athenians sent it upon the plea of their common descent, but in reality to prevent the exportation of Sicilian corn to Peloponnese and to test the possibility of bringing Sicily into subjection.
86.5
Accordingly they established themselves at Rhegium in Italy, and from thence carried on the war in concert with their allies.
87.1
Summer was now over. The winter following, the plague a second time attacked the Athenians; for although it had never entirely left them, still there had been a notable abatement in its ravages.
87.2
The second visit lasted no less than a year, the first having lasted two; and nothing distressed the Athenians and reduced their power more than this.
