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So the new commanders took their departure from the court and went down
to Cilicia, to the Aleian plain, having with them a numerous and
wellappointed land army. Encamping here, they were joined by the sea
force which had been required of the several states, and at the same
time by the horsetransports which Darius had, the year before,
commanded his tributaries to make ready. Aboard these the horses were
embarked; and the troops were received by the ships of war; after
which the whole fleet, amounting in all to six hundred triremes, made
sail for Ionia. Thence, instead of proceeding with a straight course
along the shore to the Hellespont and to Thrace, they loosed from
Samos and voyaged across the Icarian sea through the midst of the
islands; mainly, as I believe, because they feared the danger of
doubling Mount Athos, where the year before they had suffered so
grievously on their passage; but a constraining cause also was their
former failure to take Naxos.
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