Exaggerated as are the numbers given in Herodotus, the mere fact that the Persian commanders ventured thus to divide their fleet in face of an enemy with 271 ships, together with the comparative ill-success with which the Greeks fought with that part of the fleet which remained at Aphetæ, shows that the Persians must, even after the disaster on the Sepiad strand, have had a very large number of vessels at their disposal. Herodotus does not say, but he certainly implies, ◆H. viii. 7. _ad fin._◆ that this flying squadron was despatched on the very day of the arrival at Aphetæ. It is not necessary to insist that this was, under the circumstances, hardly possible. The fleet had been terribly knocked about by the storm. The storm itself had only ceased that very morning. There had been no time to refit before leaving for Aphetæ; and the fleet had only reached that anchorage early in the afternoon of that sixteenth day. ◆H. viii. 7, _ad init._◆ These two hundred vessels, moreover, were evidently despatched by daylight.[136] #PERSIAN SQUADRON SENT ROUND EUBŒA.# It is here, no doubt, that one of those missing days has been omitted from Herodotus’ narrative of Artemisium. The despatch of the squadron round Eubœa must have taken place on the morning of the seventeenth day. The one fear of the Persians at this time was that the Greek fleet would run away. They, consequently, adopted the stratagem of sending the squadron of two hundred vessels by the channel north of Skiathos, so as to give the impression that it was sailing to Therma or elsewhere. It was an effective manœuvre, because the island completely fills in the sea horizon of the mouth of the channel. ◆H. viii. 7. 18th day.◆ On the next day[137] they reviewed their fleet at Aphetæ, but otherwise lay quiet, intending to wait for news of the encircling squadron.