On the same day that Pausanias and the Grecian land army conquered at Platæa, the naval armament under Leotychidês and Xanthippus was engaged in operations hardly less important, at Mykalê on the Asiatic coast. The Grecian commanders of the fleet, which numbered one hundred and ten triremes, having advanced as far as Delos, were afraid to proceed farther eastward, or to undertake any offensive operations against the Persians at Samos, for the rescue of Ionia,—although Ionian envoys, especially from Chios and Samos, had urgently solicited aid both at Sparta and at Delos. Three Samians, one of them named Hegesistratus, came to assure Leotychidês, that their countrymen were ready to revolt from the despot Theomêstor, whom the Persians had installed there, so soon as the Greek fleet should appear off the island. In spite of emphatic appeals to the community of religion and race, Leotychidês was long deaf to the entreaty; but his reluctance gradually gave way before the persevering earnestness of the orator. While yet not thoroughly determined, he happened to ask the Samian speaker what was his name. To which the latter replied, “Hegesistratus, _i. e._ army-leader.” “I accept Hegesistratus as an omen (replied Leotychidês, struck with the significance of this name), pledge thou thy faith to accompany us,—let thy companions prepare the Samians to receive us, and we will go forthwith.” Engagements were at once exchanged, and while the other two envoys were sent forward to prepare matters in the island, Hegesistratus remained to conduct the fleet, which was farther encouraged by favorable sacrifices, and by the assurances of the prophet Dêiphonus, hired from the Corinthian colony of Apollonia.[393] [393] Herodot. ix, 91, 92, 95; viii, 132, 133. The prophet of Mardonius at Platæa bore the same name, and was probably the more highly esteemed for it (Herodot. ix, 37). Diodorus states the fleet as comprising two hundred and fifty triremes (xi, 34). The anecdotes respecting the Apolloniate Euenius, the father of Deïphonus, will be found curious and interesting (Herodot. ix, 98, 94). Euenius, as a recompense for having been unjustly blinded by his countrymen, had received from the gods the grant of prophecy transmissible to his descendants: a new prophetic breed was thus created, alongside of the Iamids, Telliads, Klytiads, etc.