History of the Peloponnesian War

but they themselves lost one ship, which was caught by a grappling-iron cast upon it, the crew having leaped overboard.

After this the Syracusans embarked and their ships were being towed along the shore by ropes toward Messene when the Athenians attacked again, but lost another ship, since the Syracusans made a sudden turn outwards and charged them first.

In the passage along the shore, then, and in the sea-fight that followed in this unusual fashion, the Syracusans had the best of it, and at length gained the harbour at Messene. But the Athenians, on the report that Camarina was to be betrayed to the Syracusans by Archias and his faction, sailed thither.

The Messenians meanwhile took all their land-forces and also the allied fleet and made an expedition against Naxos, the Chalcidian settlement on their borders.

On the first day they confined the Naxians within their walls and ravaged their lands; on the next day, while their fleet sailed round to the river Acesines and ravaged the land there, their army assaulted the city of Naxos.