As soon as they had thus got over the first difficulties, and placed matters on a footing which seemed to promise stability, they despatched ten envoys to Samos. Aware beforehand of the danger impending over them in that quarter from the known aversion of the soldiers and seamen to anything in the nature of oligarchy, they had, moreover, just heard, by the arrival of Chæreas and the paralus, of the joint attack made by the Athenian and Samian oligarchs, and of its complete failure. Had this event occurred a little earlier, it might perhaps have deterred even some of their own number from proceeding with the revolution at Athens, which was rendered thereby almost sure of failure, from the first. Their ten envoys were instructed to represent at Samos that the recent oligarchy had been established with no views injurious to the city, but on the contrary for the general benefit; that though the Council now installed consisted of Four Hundred only, yet the total number of partisans who had made the revolution, and were qualified citizens under it, was Five Thousand; a number greater, they added, than had ever been actually assembled in the Pnyx under the democracy, even for the most important debates,[57] in consequence of the unavoidable absences of numerous individuals on military service and foreign travel. [57] Thucyd. viii, 72. This allegation, respecting the number of citizens who attended in the Athenian democratical assemblies, has been sometimes cited as if it carried with it the authority of Thucydidês; which is a great mistake, duly pointed out by all the best recent critics. It is simply the allegation of the Four Hundred, whose testimony, as a guarantee for truth, is worth little enough. That _no_ assembly had ever been attended by so many as five thousand (οὐδεπώποτε) I certainly am far from believing. It is not improbable, however, that five thousand was an unusually large number of citizens to attend. Dr. Arnold, in his note, opposes the allegation in part, by remarking that “the law required not only the presence but the sanction of at least six thousand citizens to some particular decrees of the assembly.” It seems to me, however, quite possible that, in cases where this large number of votes was required, as in the ostracism, and where there was no discussion carried on immediately before the voting, the process of voting may have lasted some hours, like our keeping open of a poll. So that though more than six thousand citizens must have _voted_, altogether, it was not necessary that all should have been present in the same assembly.