Such was the constitution which they drew up for the time to come, but
for the immediate present they devised the following scheme. There
should be a Council of Four Hundred, as in the ancient constitution,
forty from each tribe, chosen out of candidates of more than thirty
years of age, selected by the members of the tribes. This Council
should appoint the magistrates and draw up the form of oath which they
were to take; and in all that concerned the laws, in the examination of
official accounts, and in other matters generally, they might act
according to their discretion. They must, however, observe the laws
that might be enacted with reference to the constitution of the state,
and had no power to alter them nor to pass others. The generals should
be provisionally elected from the whole body of the Five Thousand, but
so soon as the Council came into existence it was to hold an
examination of military equipments, and thereon elect ten persons,
together with a secretary, and the persons thus elected should hold
office during the coming year with full powers, and should have the
right, whenever they desired it, of joining in the deliberations of the
Council. The Five thousand was also to elect a single Hipparch and ten
Phylarchs; but for the future the Council was to elect these officers
according to the regulations above laid down. No office, except those
of member of the Council and of general, might be held more than once,
either by the first occupants or by their successors. With reference to
the future distribution of the Four Hundred into the four successive
sections, the hundred commissioners must divide them whenever the time
comes for the citizens to join in the Council along with the rest.