περιγενομένοις—if we prove the better in the justice of our cause: Dem. Pant. 978, πολλῷ τῷ δικαίῳ περιεῖναι βουλόμενος. The Athenians call on them in effect to say yes or no to their proposal.
τοίνυν—‘well then, if you etc.’ τοίνυν occurs in Thucydides only in direct address; ch. 89, 1: 105, 1, etc.
ὑπονοίας—‘to calculate surmises of what is going to happen’. ὑπόνοια here is a somewhat invidious word: in ii. 41, 4, τῶν ἔργων τὴν ὑπόνοιαν is simply the conception of facts as opposed to the reality. ἄλλο τι—πράξοντες may be mentally supplied, but really the phrase is independent of construction; cf. iii. 85, 4, ἀπόγνοια τοῦ ἄλλο τι ἣ κρατεῖν τῆς γῆς: so iii. 39, 1, τι ἄλλο ἣ ἐπεβούλευσαν: iii. 58, 5, τί ἄλλο ἢ καταλείψετε: ii. 16, οὐδὲν ἄλλο ἢ ἀπολείπων.
ἐκ τῶν παρόντων κ.τ.λ.—contrasted with the invisible future. βουλεύσοντες—here and in ch. 111, 5, the active is appropriately used of the commissioners who ‘advise’ in the interests of the people at large. There seem however undoubted instances where Thucydides uses βουλεύω in the sense of ‘taking counsel’, and ἐβούλευσα of ‘deciding’; and where other Attic writers would employ the middle: see note on iv. 15, 1.
παυοίμεθ̓ ἄν—‘we will (in that case) stop’, Contrast this cynical affectation of indifference with the peremptory εἳπατε at the end of ch. 85.
