History of the Peloponnesian War

He himself, then, and his own troops remained at their post in Deceleia, but the reinforcements that had come he sent back home after they had remained a few days in Attica. After this the Four Hundred, notwithstanding their earlier experience, kept sending envoys to Agis, and as he now received them more readily and advised them to do so, they sent envoys also to Lacedaemon to negotiate an agreement, since they were now desirous of making peace.

They also sent ten men to Samos to reassure the army there and to explain that the oligarchy had been set up, not for the injury of the city or the citizens, but for the salvation of the whole Athenian cause; and also to explain that there were five thousand, not four hundred only, who were participating in the government, although, because of their military expeditions and their activities abroad, the Athenians had never yet come to consult upon any matter so important that five thousand had assembled.

So after giving them these and other instructions as to the proper explanations to offer, they sent them off immediately after their own assumption of office, fearing lest— as actually happened—a crowd of sailors might of itself not be willing to abide by the oligarchical form of government, and so, the mischief having once begun at Samos, bring about their own overthrow.