For six or seven days successively, the two fleets were drawn out against each other,—Phormio trying to entice the Peloponnesians to the outside of the gulf, while they on their side did what they could to bring him within it.[346] To him, every day’s postponement was gain, since it gave him a new chance of his reinforcements arriving: for that very reason, the Peloponnesian commanders were eager to accelerate an action, and at length resorted to a well-laid plan for forcing it on. But in spite of immense numerical superiority, such was the discouragement and reluctance, prevailing among their seamen, many of whom had been actual sufferers in the recent defeat,—that Knêmus and Brasidas had to employ emphatic exhortations; insisting on the favorable prospect before them,—pointing out that the late battle had been lost only by mismanagement and imprudence, which would be for the future corrected,—and appealing to the inherent bravery of the Peloponnesian warrior. They concluded by a hint, that while those who behaved well in the coming battle would receive due honor, the laggards would assuredly be punished:[347] a topic rarely touched upon by ancient generals in their harangues on the eve of battle, and demonstrating conspicuously the reluctance of many of the Peloponnesian seamen, who had been brought to the fight again chiefly by the ascendency and strenuous commands of Sparta. To this reluctance Phormio pointedly alluded, in the encouraging exhortations which he on his side addressed to his men: for they too, in spite of their habitual confidence at sea, strengthened by the recent victory, were dispirited by the smallness of their numbers. He reminded them of their long practice and rational conviction of superiority at sea, such as no augmentation of numbers, especially with an enemy conscious of his own weakness, could overbalance: and he called upon them to show their habitual discipline and quick apprehension of orders, and above all to perform their regular movements in perfect silence during the actual battle,[348]—useful in all matters of war, and essential to the proper conduct of a sea-fight. The idea of entire silence on board the Athenian ships while a sea-fight was going on, is not only striking as a feature in the picture, but is also one of the most powerful evidences of the force of self-control and military habits among these citizen-seamen. [346] Thucyd. ii, 86. [347] Thucyd. ii, 87. Τῶν δὲ πρότερον ἡγεμόνων οὐ χεῖρον τὴν ἐπιχείρησιν ἡμεῖς παρασκευάσομεν, καὶ οὐκ ἐνδώσομεν πρόφασιν οὐδενὶ κακῷ γενέσθαι· ἢν δέ τις ἄρα καὶ βουληθῇ, κολασθήσεται τῇ πρεπούσῃ ζημίᾳ, οἱ δὲ ἀγαθοὶ τιμήσονται τοῖς προσήκουσιν ἄθλοις τῆς ἀρετῆς. [348] Thucyd. ii, 89. Καὶ ἐν τῷ ἔργῳ ~κόσμον καὶ σιγὴν~ περὶ πλείστου ἡγεῖσθε, ὃ ἔς τε τὰ πολλὰ τῶν πολεμικῶν ξυμφέρει, καὶ ναυμαχίᾳ οὐχ ἥκιστα, etc.