discouraged army sought in the night to retreat by a different route. The rear division, under Demosthenes, was overtaken and forced to surrender, and were carried captives to Syracuse—some six thousand in number. The next day, the first division, under Nicias, also was overtaken and made prisoners. No less than forty thousand who had started from the Athenian camp, six days before, were either killed or made prisoners, with the two generals who commanded them. The prisoners at first were subjected to the most cruel and inhuman treatment, and then sold as slaves. Both Nicias and Demosthenes were put to death, B.C. 413. (M549) Such was the disastrous close of the Sicilian expedition. Our limits prevent an extended notice. We can only give the barren outline. But never in Grecian history had so large a force been arrayed against a foreign power, and never was ruin more complete. The enterprise was started at the instance of Alcibiades. It was he who brought this disaster on his country. But it would have been better to have left the expedition to his management. Nicias was a lofty and religious man, but was no general. He grossly mismanaged from first to last. The confidence of the Athenians was misplaced; and he, after having spent his life in inculcating a conservative policy, which was the wiser, yet became the unwilling instrument of untold and unparalleled calamities. His fault was over-confidence. He was personally brave, religious, incorruptible, munificent, affable—in all respects honorable and respectable, but he had no military genius. (M550) The Lacedæmonians, at the suggestion of Alcibiades, had permanently occupied Decelea—a fortified post within fifteen miles of Athens, and instead of spending a few weeks in ravaging Attica, now intrenched themselves, and issued out in excursions until they had destroyed all that was valuable in the neighborhood of Athens. The great calamities which the Athenians had suffered prevented them from expelling the invaders, and the city itself was now in the condition of a post besieged. All the accumulations in her treasury were exhausted, and she was compelled to dismiss even her Thracian mercenaries. They were sent back to their own country under Dotrephes; but after inflicting great atrocities in Bœotia, were driven back by the Thebans. (M551) The Athenian navy was now so crippled that it could no longer maintain the supremacy of the sea. The Corinthians were formidable rivals and enemies. A naval battle at Naupactus, at the mouth of the Corinthian Gulf, between the Athenians and Corinthians, though indecisive, yet really was to the advantage of the latter.