more shown herself a friend. At a congress of the Peloponnesian
allies, summoned to consider an appeal from the Samians for help, the
Corinthians had spoken strongly against interference with the revolted
allies of another city. Corinth was a place of old renown, the queen
of the Isthmus, a centre of civilisation; whereas Corcyra was a remote
island, and her people, though Greeks by descent, were in manners and
character more than half barbarians.

But there were two arguments put forward by the Corcyraean orator,
which outweighed all other considerations of policy or friendship. The
first was addressed to the fears of the Athenians, the second to their
ambition. War, he argued, was inevitable, and it was of the utmost
importance for Athens to secure the alliance of the Corcyraean fleet,
and prevent it from being added to the naval forces of her enemies.
And his concluding words struck a note which found a response among
the more daring spirits among his hearers, whose thoughts, as it would
seem, were already turning to the western colonies of Greece, as a new
field of enterprise and conquest. "It will not do," he said, "to be
too nice. While you are hesitating, and weighing nice points of
international right, you will be outdistanced in the race for power,
if you tamely give up a great naval station which holds the key to
Italy and Sicily."

Such reasoning, hollow and false as it was, turned the scale in favour
of Corcyra, and a defensive alliance was concluded, pledging the
Athenians and Corcyraeans to aid each other against any attack on the
territory or allies of either state. For the Athenians wished to avoid
breaking the Thirty Years' Truce, and therefore refrained from
entering into any agreement which might oblige them to acts of open
aggression against Corinth.