he king, that since he
had come in person, which was the great point of all, to support the
rights of Greece, he would also send for his fleets and armies. For
the king, at the head of an army, might obtain something, but without
that could have very little influence with the Romans, either in the
cause of the Aetolians, or even in his own." This opinion was adopted,
and the council voted, that the title of general should be conferred
on the king. They also nominated thirty distinguished men with whom
he might deliberate on any business which he might think proper.--The
council was then broken up, and all went home to their respective
states.

46. Next day the king held a consultation with their select council,
respecting the place from whence his operations should commence. They
judged it best to make the first trial on Chalcis, which had lately
been attempted in vain by the Aetolians; and they thought that
the business required rather expedition than any great exertion or
preparation. Accordingly the king, with a thousand foot, who had
followed him from Demetrias, took his route through Phocis; and the
Aetolian chiefs, going by another road, met at Cheronaea a small
number of their young men whom they had called to arms, and thence, in
ten decked ships, proceeded after him. Antiochus pitched his camp at
Salganea, while himself, with the Aetolian chiefs, crossed the Euripus
in the ships. When he had advanced a little way from the harbour, the
magistrates and other chief men of Chalcis came out before their gate.
A small number from each side met to confer together. The Aetolians
warmly recommended to the others, "without violating the friendship
subsisting between them and the Romans, to receive the king also as
a friend and ally; for that he had crossed into Europe not for the
purpose of making war, but of vindicating the liberty of Greece; and
of vindicating it in reality, not in words and pretence merely, as the
Romans had done. Nothing could be more advantageous to the states of
Greece than to embrace the alliance of both, as they would then be
always secure against ill-treatment from either, under the guarantee
and protection of the other. If they refuse to receive the king, they
ought to consider what they would have immediately to suffer; the aid
of the Romans being far distant, and Antiochus, whom with their own
strength they could not possibly resist, in character of an enemy at
their gates." To this Mictio,