First interesting thing in Thucydides

400 pages in, and I finally got to the first piece of information I found genuinely interesting in Book Five, Section 71 of the Peloponnesian War:

"It is true of all armies that, when they are moving into action, the right wing tends to get unduly extended and each side overlaps the enemy’s left with its own right. This is because fear makes every man do his best to find protection for his unarmed side in the shield of the man next to him on the right, thinking that the more closely the shields are locked together, the safer he will be. The fault comes originally from the man on the extreme right of the front line, who is always trying to keep his unarmed side away from the enemy, and his fear spreads to the others who follow his example."