For the others had this advantage at any rate, that the sailors who had come to their ships drawn from the official lists, stayed with them in order to make sure of their return home when the general should discharge them; whereas mine, trusting in their skill as able rowers, went off wherever they were likely to be re-employed at the highest wages, thinking more of their gain for the immediate present than of the danger impending over them, if they should ever be caught by me.

Consequently when my affairs were in the condition which I have described, and at the same time I was ordered by the general, Timomachus, to sail to HieronHieron was on the eastern shore of the Cimmerian Bosporus (the straight between the Black Sea and the Sea of Azof). to convoy the grain, though he provided no pay (word had been brought that the Byzantines and the Calchedonians were again bringing the ships into port and forcing them to unload their grain), I borrowed money from Archidemus of Anaphlystus, Anaphlystus, a deme of the tribe Antiochis. fifteen minae at interest, and I secured from Nicippus, the shipowner, who happened to be in Sestus, Sestus, also a town on the Hellespont. eight hundred drachmae, as a maritime loan at 12 1/2 per cent, on condition that I should pay him principal and interest when the ship should get safely back to Athens.

Further, I sent Euctemon, the pentecontarch, The pentecontarch was properly an under-officer in charge of a tier of fifty oarsmen. to Lampsacus, Lampsacus, a town on the Hellespont. giving him money and letters to friends of my father, and bade him hire for me the best sailors he could. I myself stayed in Sestus and gave some money—all I had—to the old sailors who stayed with me, since the term of my trierarchy had expired, and I secured also some other sailors at full pay, while the general was making ready for his voyage to Hieron.

But when Euctemon came back from Lampsacus, bringing the sailors whom he had hired, and the general gave the word for us to put to sea, it happened that Euctemon suddenly fell sick, and was in a very serious condition. I, therefore, gave him his pay, adding money for his journey, and sent him home; while I secured another pentecontarch and put out to sea to convoy the grain, and I stayed there forty-five days, until the vessels sailed out from Pontus after the rising of Arcturus.The rising of Arcturus falls at the time of the autumnal equinox.

When I arrived at Sestus, I expected to sail for home, as my term of service had expired, and I had already served two months beyond it and no successor had arrived to take over the ship. The general, Timomachus, however,—for an embassy from the Maronites had come to him, begging him to convoy their grain ships—ordered us trierarchs to make cables fast to the ships and tow them to Maroneia—a long voyage across the open sea.