Such was the entry of Dion into Syracuse, on the third day[203] after his landing in Sicily; and such the first public act of renewed Syracusan freedom; the first after that fatal vote which, forty-eight years before, had elected the elder Dionysius general plenipotentiary, and placed in his hands the sword of state, without foresight of the consequences. In the hands of Dion, that sword was vigorously employed against the common enemy. He immediately attacked Epipolæ; and such was the consternation of the garrison left in it by the fugitive Timokrates, that they allowed him to acquire possession of it, together with the strong fort of Euryalus, which a little courage and devotion might long have defended. This acquisition, made suddenly in the tide of success on one side and discouragement on the other, was of supreme importance, and went far to determine the ultimate contest. It not only reduced the partisans of Dionysius within the limits of Ortygia, but also enabled Dion to set free many state prisoners,[204] who became ardent partisans of the revolution. Following up his success, he lost no time in taking measures against Ortygia. To shut it up completely on the land-side, he commenced the erection of a wall of blockade, reaching from the Great Harbor at one extremity, to the sea on the eastern side of the Portus Lakkius, at the other.[205] He at the same time provided arms as well as he could for the citizens, sending for those spare arms which he had deposited with Synalus at Minoa. It does not appear that the garrison of Ortygia made any sally to impede him; so that in the course of seven days, he had not only received his arms from Synalus, but had completed, in a rough way, all or most of the blockading cross-wall.[206] [203] Cornelius Nepos, Dion, c. 5. [204] Plutarch, Dion, c. 29. [205] Plutarch, Dion, c. 29; Diodor. xvi. 12. Plutarch says, τὴν δὲ ἀκρόπολιν ἀπετείχισε—Diodorus is more specific—Τῶν δὲ Συρακοσίων κατεσκευακότων ἐκ θαλάσσης εἰς θάλασσαν διατειχίσματα, etc. These are valuable words as indicating the line and the two terminations of Dion’s blockading cross-wall. [206] Plutarch, Dion, c. 29.