From incidents such as this, and from the multitude of petty insults which so flagitious an outrage implies as coexistent, we are not surprised to learn that the Demos of Argos soon recovered their lost courage, and resolved upon an effort to put down their oligarchical oppressors. They waited for the moment when the festival called the Gymnopædiæ was in course of being solemnized at Sparta,—a festival at which the choric performances of men and boys were so interwoven with Spartan religion as well as bodily training, that the Lacedæmonians would make no military movement until they were finished. At this critical moment, the Argeian Demos rose in insurrection, and after a sharp contest gained a victory over the oligarchy, some of whom were slain, while others only saved themselves by flight. Even at the first instant of danger, pressing messages had been sent to Sparta for aid. But the Lacedæmonians at first peremptorily refused to move during the period of their festival: nor was it until messenger after messenger had arrived to set forth the pressing necessity of their friends, that they reluctantly put aside their festival to march towards Argos. They were too late: the precious moment had already passed by. They were met at Tegea by an intimation that their friends were overthrown, and Argos in possession of the victorious people. Nevertheless, various exiles who had escaped still promised them success, urgently entreating them to proceed, but the Lacedæmonians refused to comply, returned to Sparta, and resumed their intermitted festival.[144] [144] Thucyd. v, 82; Diodor. xii, 80. Thus was the oligarchy of Argos overthrown, after a continuance of about four months,[145] from February to June, 417 B.C., and the chosen Thousand-regiment either dissolved or destroyed. The movement excited great sympathy in several Peloponnesian cities,[146] who were becoming jealous of the exorbitant preponderance of Sparta. Nevertheless, the Argeian Demos, though victorious within the city, felt so much distrust of being able to maintain themselves, that they sent envoys to Sparta to plead their cause and to entreat favorable treatment: a proceeding which proves the insurrection to have been spontaneous, not fomented by Athens. But the envoys of the expelled oligarchs were there to confront them, and the Lacedæmonians, after a lengthened discussion, adjudging the Demos to have been guilty of wrong, proclaimed the resolution of sending forces to put them down. Still, the habitual tardiness of Lacedæmonian habits prevented any immediate or separate movement. Their allies were to be summoned, none being very zealous in the cause, and least of all at this moment, when the period of harvest was at hand; so that about three months intervened before any actual force was brought together.