It seems probable, as far as we can form an opinion, that the conspirators had two objects, perhaps some of them one and some the other: to ruin Alkibiadês, to frustrate or delay the expedition. How they pursued the former purpose, will be presently seen: towards the latter, nothing was ostensibly done, but the position of Teukrus, and other metics implicated, renders it more likely that they were influenced by sympathies with Corinth and Megara,[252] prompting them to intercept an expedition which was supposed to promise great triumphs to Athens, rather than corrupted by the violent antipathies of intestine politics. Indeed, the two objects were intimately connected with each other; for the prosecution of the enterprise, while full of prospective conquest to Athens, was yet more pregnant with future power and wealth to Alkibiadês himself. Such chances would disappear if the expedition could be prevented; nor was it at all impossible that the Athenians, under the intense impression of religious terror consequent on the mutilation of the Hermæ, might throw up the scheme altogether. Especially Nikias, exquisitely sensitive in his own religious conscience, and never hearty in his wish for going, a fact perfectly known to the enemy,[253] would hasten to consult his prophets, and might reasonably be expected to renew his opposition on the fresh ground offered to him, or at least to claim delay until the offended gods should have been appeased. We may judge how much such a proceeding was in the line of his character, and of the Athenian character, when we find him, two years afterwards, with the full concurrence of his soldiers, actually sacrificing the last opportunity of safe retreat for the half-ruined Athenian army in Sicily, and refusing even to allow the proposition to be debated, in consequence of an eclipse of the moon; and when we reflect that Spartans and other Greeks frequently renounced public designs if an earthquake happened before the execution.[254] [252] Plutarch, Alkib. c. 18; Pseudo-Plutarch, Vit. X, Orator. p. 834, who professes to quote from Kratippus, an author nearly contemporary. The Pseudo-Plutarch, however, asserts, what cannot be true, that the Corinthians employed Leontine and Egestæan agents to destroy the Hermæ. The Leontines and Egestæans were exactly the parties who had greatest interest in getting the Sicilian expedition to start: they are the last persons whom the Corinthians would have chosen as instruments. The fact is, that no foreigners could well have done the deed: it required great familiarity with all the buildings, highways, and byways of Athens.