Athens had been permitted to complete the conquest of Samos without hindrance; but the addition which this success made to her power rendered it only the more evident, that peace could not last much longer between her and the Peloponnesian confederacy. Her ambition, the animosity which she had excited in several of the allies of Sparta, and the jealousy of Sparta herself, had reached such a height, that it was clear the Thirty Years Truce was much more likely to be violently abridged, than to lead to a lasting settlement. Nevertheless the two leading states, as if foreseeing the ruinous consequences of their conflict, shrank from striking the first blow, as well as from forfeiting the divine favour by a breach of the treaty. Sparta, as she had been a quiet spectatress of the fall of Samos, rejected an application which was made to her by the Mitylenæans, who, if they could have reckoned on her aid, would have renounced the Athenian alliance, and would probably have engaged the whole island to join in their revolt. According to Theophrastus a sum of ten talents distributed by Pericles every year among the leading Spartans, kept them in a pacific mood. But the expectation which generally prevailed of an approaching renewal of hostilities, contributed to hasten the event. Without it the occurrences which immediately occasioned the disastrous war which we are about to relate, either would not have happened, or would have passed by without such an effect.