This daring scheme might have led to something important, if the fleet had been commanded by Brasidas. But Alcidas was a man of very different temper, and having arrived too late to save Mytilene, he had now but one thought,--to return to Peloponnesus as fast as he could, and get out of the reach of the terrible Athenian triremes. So he set his fleet in motion, and sailing along the coast in a southerly direction put in at Ephesus. On the voyage he showed himself to be as cruel as he was cowardly, by capturing and putting to death the crews of the vessels which came in his way. These were not a few, for the ships which crossed his path approached fearlessly, under the impression that his fleet was from Athens; for no one dreamed that a Peloponnesian squadron would dare to enter these waters. For this senseless barbarity he was severely rebuked by a deputation of Samian exiles, now living on the mainland, who met him at Ephesus. His was a strange method, they remarked with bitter irony, of helping the Ionians to recover their liberty--to butcher defenceless men, who had done him no harm, but looked to him for rescue from their bondage to Athens! If he continued to behave thus, he would make the name of Sparta detested throughout Ionia. Dull as he was, Alcidas could not but feel the justice of this reprimand, and he let the rest of his prisoners go. The presence of a Peloponnesian fleet had caused great alarm among the inhabitants of Ionia, and urgent messages came in daily to Paches at Mytilene, summoning him to their aid. For even though Alcidas had declined to take up a permanent station on the coast, as the exiles had suggested, it was apprehended that he would pillage the sea-side towns, which were unfortified, on his homeward voyage. At last two state triremes, the _Paralus_ and _Salaminia,_ which had been sent on public business from Athens, came into Mytilene with the news that they had sighted the fleet of Alcidas lying at anchor off Clarus. [Footnote: A little town, north-west of Ephesus.] Thereupon Paches put to sea at once, and gave chase. But Alcidas had got wind of his danger, and was already on the high seas, making all speed for Peloponnesus. Paches pursued him as far as Patmos, and then turned back. He would gladly have caught the Peloponnesians in blue water, where he could have sent all their ships to the bottom; but as it was he thought himself fortunate to have escaped the necessity of forming a blockade, as he must have done if he had come up with them near land, and driven them ashore. As for Alcidas, he fled in wild haste, keeping the open sea, being resolved not to touch land, if he could help it, until he reached the shelter of a Peloponnesian harbour. III