136 HISTORY OF (JRKKi'K their retreat homo from the pursuit of the Sikels. Their fleet went back also to Messene, from whence such of the ships as were not Messenian returned home. So much was the city weak- ened by its recent defeat, that a Lokrian garrison was sent for its protection under Demomeles, while the Leontines and Naxians, together with the Athenian squadron on returning from Kamarina, attacked it by land and sea in this moment of distress. A well- timed sally of the Messenians and Lokrians, however, dispersed the Leontine land-force; but the Athenian force, landing from their ships, attacked the assailants while in the disorder of pursuit, and drove them back within the walls. The scheme against Messene, however, had now become impracticable, so that the Athenians crossed the strait to Rhegium. 1 Thus indecisive was the result of operations in Sicily, during the first half of the seventh year of the Peloponnesian war : nor does it appear that the Athenians undertook anything considerable during the autumnal half, though the full fleet under Eurymedon had then joined Pythodorus. 2 Yet while the presence of so large an Athenian fleet at Rhegium would produce considerable effect upon the Syracusan mind, the triumphant promise of Athenian affairs, and the astonishing humiliation of Sparta during the months immediately following the capture of Sphakteria, prob- ably struck much deeper. In the spring of the eighth year of the war, Athens was not only in possession of the Spartan pris oners, but also of Pylos and Kythera, so that a rising among the Helots appeared noway improbable. She was in the full swing of hope, while her discouraged enemies were all thrown on the defensive. Hence the Sicilian Dorians, intimidated by a state of affairs so different from that in which they had begun the war three years before, were now eager to bring about a pacification in their island. 3 The Dorian city of Kamarina, which had hith- erto acted along with the Ionic or Chalkidic cities, was the first io make a separate accommodation with its neighboring city of Gela ; at which latter place deputies were invited to attend from 1 Thneyd. iv, 25. * Thucyd. i .-, 48. 3 Compare a similar remark made by the Syracusan Hermokrates, nine years afterwards, when the great Athenian expedition against Syracuse was on its way, respecting the increased disposition to union among thi
Sii ilian cities, produced by common fear of Athens (Thneyd. vi. 33)
