[-2-] On learning this Sextus himself lay quietly at anchor off Messana, watching for his attempt to cross, and ordered Demochares to anchor opposite Agrippa at Mylae. This pair spent most of the time in testing each other's strength according as each one would temporarily give way a little; yet they did not dare to risk an engagement with their entire armaments. They were not acquainted with each other's forces and on both sides they figured everything about their opponents as being greater and more terrible than the reality. Finally Agrippa comprehended that it was not advantageous for him to delay,--for the adherents of Sextus, occupying a friendly position, had no need to hurry,--and taking the best of his ships set out for Mylae to spy out the numbers of the enemy. As he could not see them all and no one of them manifested any inclination to come out into the open sea, he despised them, and on his return made preparations to sail against Mylae on the following day with all his ships. Demochares came to much, the same conclusion. He had the idea that the ships which had approached him were the only ones, and seeing that they sailed very slowly by reason of their size he sent for Sextus by night and made preparations to assail Lipara itself. When day broke, they were sailing against each other, expecting to meet inferior numbers. [-3-] As they came near together and each contrary to his expectations saw that his opponents were many more than he had thought, they were at first both alike thrown into confusion, and some even backed water. Then, fearing flight more than battle, because in the latter they hoped to prevail, but in the former they expected to be utterly destroyed, they moved toward each other and joined in conflict on the sea. The one side surpassed in the number of its ships, the other in the experience of its sailors: to the first the height of the vessels, the thickness of the catheads and the towers were a help, but charges straight ahead furthered the progress of the second, and the strength of Caesar's marines was matched by the daring of their antagonists; for the majority of them, being deserters from Italy, were quite desperate. As a result, possessing the mutual advantages and deficiencies which I have mentioned, they had equal power contributed by their evenly balanced equipment, and so their contest was close for a very long period. The followers of Sextus alarmed their opponents by the way they dashed up the waves: and they knocked holes in some ships by assailing them with a rush and bursting open the parts outside the oars, but as they were struck from the towers in the combat and brought alongside by grappling irons, they suffered no less harm than they inflicted. The Caesarians, also, when they came into close conflict and had crossed over to the hostile ships, proved superior; but as the enemy leaped out into the sea whenever the boats sank, and by