The sense here brought out is distinct and rational; and I think it lies fairly in the words. Thucydidês does not intend to represent the Lacedæmonians as feeling, that if Brasidas should really gain more than he had gained already, such further acquisition would be a disadvantage to them, and prevent them from recovering their captives. He represents them as preferring the certainty of those acquisitions which Brasidas had already made, to the chance and hazard of his aiming at greater; which could not be done without endangering that which was now secure, and not only secure, but sufficient, if properly managed, to procure the restoration of the captives.
Poppo refers τοῖς δὲ to the Athenians: Göller refers it to the remaining Spartan military force, apart from the captives who were detained at Athens. The latter reference seems to me inadmissible, for τοῖς δὲ must signify some persons or things which have been before specified or indicated; and that which Göller supposes it to mean has not been before indicated. To refer it to the Athenians, with Poppo and Haack, in his second edition, we should have to look a great way back for the subject, and there is, moreover, a difficulty in construing ἀμυνόμενοι with the dative case. Otherwise, this reference would be admissible; though I think it better to refer τοῖς δὲ to the same subject as ἀντίπαλα. In the phrase κινδυνεύειν, or κινδυνεύσειν, for there seems no sufficient reason why this old reading should be altered, καὶ κρατήσειν, the particle καὶ has a disjunctive sense, of which there are analogous examples; see Kühner, Griechische Grammmatik, sect. 726, signifying, substantially, the same as ἢ: and examples even in Thucydidês, in such phrases as τοιαῦτα καὶ παραπλήσια (i, 22, 143), τοιαύτη καὶ ὅτι ἐγγύτατα τούτων, v, 74; see Poppo’s note on i, 22.
[685] Thucyd. v, 17. ἥμισυ τῆς οἰκίας τοῦ ἱεροῦ τότε τοῦ Διὸς οἰκοῦντα φόβῳ τῶν Λακεδαιμονίων.
“The reason was, that he might be in sanctuary at an instant’s notice, and yet might be able to perform some of the common offices of life without profanation, which could not have been the case had the whole dwelling been within the sacred precinct.” (Dr. Arnold’s note.)
[686] Thucyd. v, 17, 18.
[687] Thucyd. v, 15. σφαλέντων δ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τῷ Δηλίῳ παραχρῆμα οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι, γνόντες νῦν μᾶλλον ἂν ἐνδεξομένους, ποιοῦνται τὴν ἐνιαύσιον ἐκεχειρίαν, etc.
[688] Thucyd. iv, 118; v, 43.
[689] Thucyd. iv, 117. νομίσαντες Ἀθηναῖοι μὲν οὐκ ἂν ἔτι τὸν Βρασίδαν σφῶν προσαποστῆσαι οὐδὲν πρὶν παρασκευάσαιντο καθ᾽ ἡσυχίαν, etc.
[690] This appears from the form of the truce in Thucyd. iv, 118; it is prepared at Sparta, in consequence of a previous proposition from Athens; in sect. 6. οἱ δὲ ἰόντες, τέλος ἔχοντες ἰόντων, ᾗπερ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἡμᾶς κελεύετε.
[691] Thucyd. iv, 117. καὶ γενομένης ἀνακωχῆς κακῶν καὶ ταλαιπωρίας μᾶλλον ἐπιθυμήσειν (τοὺς Ἀθηναίους) αὐτοὺς πειρασαμένους ξυναλλαγῆναι, etc.