I must first refresh your memory with a little history. You remember, men of Athens, when news came three or four years ago that Philip was in Thrace besieging the fortress of Heraeum. Well, it was the month of Maemacterion, and there was a long and excited debate in the Assembly, and you finally decided to launch a fleet of forty vessels manned by citizens under the age of forty-five, and to raise forty talents by a special tax.