298 HISTORY OF GREECE. marched out under Gylippus to threaten one side of the Athe- nian lines, while the car<iiry and the garrison of the Olympieion marched up to the other side. The Athenians were putting them- selves in position to defend their walls from what seemed to be a land attack, when <ihey saw the Syracusan fleet, eighty triremes strong, sailing out from its dock prepared for action : upon which they too, though at first confused by this unexpected appearance, put their crews on shipboard, and went out of their palisaded station, seventy-five triremes in number, to meet the enemy. The whole day passed off, however, in desultory and indecisive skir- mish, with trifling advantage to the Syracusans, who disabled one or two Athenian ships, yet merely tried to invite the Athe- nians to attack, without choosing themselves to force on a close and general action. 1 It was competent to the Athenians to avoid altogether a naval action, at least until the necessity arose for escorting fresh sup- plies into the harbor, by keeping within their station; and as Demosthenes was now at hand, prudence counselled this reserve. Nikias himself, too, is said to have deprecated immediate fight- ing, but to have been outvoted by his two newly-appointed col- leagues Menander and Euthydemus, who were anxious to show what they could do without Demosthenes, and took their stand upon Athenian maritime honor, whbh peremptorily forbade them to shrink from the battle when offered. 2 Though on the next day the Syracusans made no movement, yet Nikias foreseeing that they would speedily recommence, and noway encouraged by the equal manifestations of the preceding day, caused every trierarch to repair what damage his ship had sustained, and even took the precaution of farther securing his naval station by mooring merchant-vessels just alongside of the openings in the palisade, about two hundred feet apart. The prows of these vessels were provided with dolphins, or beams lifted up on high and armed at the end with massive heads of 1 Thucyd. vii, 37. 38.
- Plutarch, Nikias, c. 20. Diodorus (xiii, 10) represents the battle an
having been brought on against the wish and intention of the Athenians generally, not alluding to any difference of opinion among tho c.o:r,
manders.
