[229] Isokrates gives the number twenty-four cities (Or. xv, Permut. s. 120). So also Deinarchus cont. Demosthen. s. 15; cont. Philokl. s. 17. The statement of Æschines, that Timotheus brought seventy-five cities into the confederacy, appears large, and must probably include all that that general either acquired or captured (Æsch. Fals. Leg. c. 24, p. 263). Though I think the number twenty-four probable enough, yet it is difficult to identify what towns they were. For Isokrates, so far as he particularizes, includes Samos, Sestos, and Krithôtê, which were not acquired until many years afterwards,—in 366-365 B.C. Neither of these orators distinguish between those cities which Timotheus brought or persuaded to come into the confederacy, when it was first formed (among which we may reckon Eubœa, or most part of it—Plutarch, De Glor. Athen. p. 351 A.)—from those others which he afterwards took by siege, like Samos. [230] Isokrates, Or. xiv, Plataic. s. 30. [231] Isokrates, Or. xiv, (Plat.) s. 20. Οἱ μὲν γὰρ ὑφ’ ὑμῶν κατὰ κράτος ἁλόντες εὐθὺς μὲν ἁρμοστοῦ καὶ δουλείας ἀπηλλάγησαν, νῦν δὲ τοῦ συνεδρίου καὶ τῆς ἐλευθερίας μετέχουσιν, etc. The adverb of time here used indicates about 372 B.C., about a year before the battle of Leuktra. [232] Diodor. xv, 30. The first votes both of Athens herself, and of the newly-assembled congress, threatened war upon the largest scale. A resolution was passed to equip twenty thousand hoplites, five hundred horsemen, and two hundred triremes.[233] Probably the insular and Ionic deputies promised each a certain contribution of money, but nothing beyond. We do not, however, know how much,—nor how far the engagements, large or small, were realized,—nor whether Athens was authorized to enforce execution against defaulters,—or was in circumstances to act upon such authority, if granted to her by the congress. It was in this way (as the reader will recollect from my fifth volume) that Athens had first rendered herself unpopular in the confederacy of Delos,—by enforcing the resolutions of the confederate synod against evasive or seceding members. It was in this way that what was at first a voluntary association had ultimately slid into an empire by constraint. Under the new circumstances of 378 B.C., we may presume that the confederates, though ardent and full of promises on first assembling at Athens, were even at the outset not exact, and became afterwards still less exact, in performance; yet that Athens was forced to be reserved in claiming, or in exercising, the right of enforcement. To obtain a vote of contribution by the majority of deputies present, was only the first step in the process; to obtain punctual payment, when the Athenian fleet was sent round for the purpose of collecting,—yet without incurring dangerous unpopularity,—was the second step, but by far the most doubtful and difficult. [233] Diodor. xv, 29.