History of The Peloponnesian War - Book III   

less, and all in the prime of life. These were by far the best men
in the city of Athens that fell during this war. Among the slain was
also Procles, the colleague of Demosthenes. Meanwhile the Athenians
took up their dead under truce from the Aetolians, and retired to
Naupactus, and from thence went in their ships to Athens;
Demosthenes staying behind in Naupactus and in the neighbourhood,
being afraid to face the Athenians after the disaster.
About the same time the Athenians on the coast of Sicily sailed to
Locris, and in a descent which they made from the ships defeated the
Locrians who came against them, and took a fort upon the river Halex.
The same summer the Aetolians, who before the Athenian expedition
had sent an embassy to Corinth and Lacedaemon, composed of Tolophus,
an Ophionian, Boriades, an Eurytanian, and Tisander, an Apodotian,
obtained that an army should be sent them against Naupactus, which had
invited the Athenian invasion. The Lacedaemonians accordingly sent off
towards autumn three thousand heavy infantry of the allies, five
hundred of whom were from Heraclea, the newly founded city in Trachis,
under the command of Eurylochus, a Spartan, accompanied by Macarius
and Menedaius, also Spartans.
The army having assembled at Delphi, Eurylochus sent a herald to the
Ozolian Locrians; the road to Naupactus lying through their territory,
and he having besides conceived the idea of detaching them from
Athens. His chief abettors in Locris were the Amphissians, who were
alarmed at the hostility of the Phocians. These first gave hostages
themselves, and induced the rest to do the same for fear of the
invading army; first, their neighbours the Myonians, who held the most
difficult of the passes, and after them the Ipnians, Messapians,
Tritaeans, Chalaeans, Tolophonians, Hessians, and Oeanthians, all of
whom joined in the expedition; the Olpaeans contenting themselves with
giving hostages, without accompanying the invasion; and the Hyaeans
refusing to do either, until the capture of Polis, one of their
villages.
His preparations completed, Eurylochus lodged the hostages in
Kytinium, in Doris, and advanced upon Naupactus through the country of
the Locrians, taking upon his way Oeneon and Eupalium, two of their
towns that refused to join him. Arrived in the Naupactian territory,
and having been now joined by the Aetolians, the army laid waste the
land and took the suburb of the town, which was unfortified; and after
this Molycrium also, a Corinthian colony subject to Athens.
Meanwhile the Athenian Demosthenes, who since the affair in Aetolia
had remained near Naupactus, having had notice of the army and fearing
for the town, went and persuaded the Acarnanians, although not without
difficulty because of his departure from Leucas, to go to the relief
of Naupactus. They accordingly sent with him on board his ships a
thousand heavy infantry, who threw themselves into the place and saved
it; the extent of its wall and the small number of its defenders
otherwise placing it in the greatest danger. Meanwhile Eurylochus
and his companions, finding that this force had entered and that it
was impossible to storm the town, withdrew, not to Peloponnese, but to
the country once called Aeolis, and now Calydon and Pleuron, and to
the places in that neighbourhood, and Proschium in Aetolia; the
Ambraciots having come and urged them to combine with them in
attacking Amphilochian Argos and the rest of Amphilochia and
Acarnania; affirming that the conquest of these countries would
bring all the continent into alliance with Lacedaemon. To this
Eurylochus consented, and dismissing the Aetolians, now remained quiet
with his army in those parts, until the time should come for the
Ambraciots to take the field, and for him to join them before Argos.
Summer was now over. The winter ensuing, the Athenians in Sicily
with their Hellenic allies, and such of the Sicel subjects or allies
of Syracuse as had revolted from her and joined their army, marched
against the Sicel town Inessa, the acropolis of which was held by
the Syracusans, and after attacking it without being able to take
it, retired. In the retreat, the allies retreating after the Athenians