The total number Herodotus gives correctly as 271. The commander of the fleet was the Spartan Eurybiades. #ATHENS AND ATHENIAN SOURCES.# The story goes that, before the embassy was sent to Sicily, it had been arranged that Athens should have the supreme command at sea, but that the Peloponnesian allies opposed this arrangement even to the extent that they threatened to withdraw their contingent altogether if it were allowed to stand. And so, says Herodotus, the Athenians, unwilling to sacrifice the national cause, with a laudable patriotism waived their claim. The refusal of the Peloponnesians was not unnatural. It was one thing to submit to the hegemony of the ancient and respectable Sparta; it was another thing to place themselves under the leadership of this pushing parvenu state, whose rise to importance had been so extremely rapid. On the other hand, the magnanimous attitude of Athens was based, no doubt, on the simple arithmetical calculation that 270 ships were better than 150. Herodotus implies that there had been a change in the attitude of the allies. The profound dissatisfaction which they felt with the Northern policy may easily account for this. At the time of the embassy to Sicily the question of the locality of the defence had probably not been raised in a highly controversial form. [Illustration: PLAIN OF EUBŒA. _From Sketch by E. Lear._] 1. Mount Dirphys (Delph). [_To face page_ 321. ] In this part of the Artemisium narrative the Athenian bias is as strongly marked as elsewhere: it contrasts, however, with the major portion of the story in the fact that it seems to rest upon an official basis. The details of the numbers of the various contingents, and the correct sum-total of the whole,—a trait lacking at times in Herodotus’ history,—render it unlikely that the information can have been derived from mere tradition, or from personal recollection. ◆12th day.◆ The fleet of Xerxes remained at Therma for twelve days after the army had departed. It had now the most difficult and dangerous part of its voyage to perform. From Therma to the Pagasætic Gulf there is no harbour into which it could put; and it is probable that the intention was to perform the passage in one continuous stretch. ◆H. vii. 179.◆