From the beginning these two factions had been but
imperfectly welded together, because their tendencies were different;
but now the struggle for power between Pericles and Thucydides drew a
sharp line of demarcation between them, and one was called the party of
the Many, the other that of the Few. Pericles now courted the people in
every way, constantly arranging public spectacles, festivals, and
processions in the city, by which he educated the Athenians to take
pleasure in refined amusements; and also he sent out sixty triremes to
cruise every year, in which many of the people served for hire for eight
months, learning and practising seamanship. Besides this he sent a
thousand settlers to the Chersonese, five hundred to Naxos, half as many
to Andros, a thousand to dwell among the Thracian tribe of the Bisaltae,
and others to the new colony in Italy founded by the city of Sybaris,
which was named Thurii. By this means he relieved the state of numerous
idle agitators, assisted the necessitous, and overawed the allies of
Athens by placing his colonists near them to watch their behavior.
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