History of the Peloponnesian War

On the next day the Syracusans set up two trophies on Epipolae, one where the Athenian ascent was made, the other at the place where the Boeotians made the first resistance; and the Athenians recovered their dead under truce.

Not a few were killed, both of the Athenians and their allies; the arms taken, however, were out of all proportion to the dead, for while some of those who were forced to leap down the bluffs perished, some escaped.

After this the Syracusans, their earlier confidence now being restored as a result of their unexpected good fortune, sent Sicanus with fifteen ships to Agrigentum, which was in a state of revolution, in order that he might if possible win over that city; and Gylippus went out once more by land to the other parts of Sicily to secure additional troops, being in hope that he could even carry the walls of the Athenians by storm, now that the engagement on Epipolae had turned out thus.

Meanwhile the Athenian generals were deliberating about the situation in view both of the calamity that had happened and of the utter discouragement that now prevailed in the army. They saw that they were not succeeding in their undertaking, and that the soldiers were finding their stay burdensome.

For they were distressed by sickness for a double cause, the season of the year being that in which men are most liable to illness, while at the same time the place in which they were encamped was marshy and unhealthy; and the situation in general appeared to them to be utterly hopeless.