this position you will hold the command of all Greece; you will give
the Romans reason to think, that you intend to sail over to Italy;
and you will be in readiness so to do, if occasion require. This is
my advice; and though I may not be the most skilful in every kind of
warfare, yet surely I must have learned, in a long series of both good
and bad fortune, how to wage war against the Romans. For the execution
of the measures which I have advised, I promise you my most faithful
and zealous endeavours. Whatever plan you shall consider the best, may
the gods grant it their approbation."

8. Such, nearly, was the counsel given by Hannibal, which the hearers
rather commended at the time, than actually executed. For not one
article of it was carried into effect, except the sending Polyxenidas
to bring over the fleet and army from Asia. Ambassadors were sent to
Larissa, to the diet of the Thessalians. The Aetolians and Amynander
appointed a day for the assembling of their troops at Pherae, and the
king with his forces came thither immediately. While he waited there
for Amynander and the Aetolians, he sent Philip, the Megalopolitan,
with two thousand men, to collect the bones of the Macedonians round
Cynoscephalae, where the final battle had been fought with king
Philip; being advised to this, either in order to gain favour with the
Macedonians and draw their displeasure on the king for having left
his soldiers unburied, or having of himself, through the spirit of
vain-glory incident to kings, conceived such a design,--splendid
indeed in appearance, but really insignificant. There is a mount there
formed of the bones which had been scattered about, and were then
collected into one heap. Although this step procured him no thanks
from the Macedonians, yet it excited the heaviest displeasure of
Philip; in consequence of which, he who had hitherto intended to
regulate his counsels by the fortune of events, now sent instantly a
message to the propraetor, Marcus Baebius, that "Antiochus had made
an irruption into Thessaly; that, if he thought proper, he should move
out of his winter quarters, and that he himself would advance to meet
him, that they might consider together what was proper to be done."

9. While Antiochus lay encamped near Pherae, where the Aetolians
and Amynander had joined him, ambassadors came to him from Larissa,
desiring to know on account of what acts or words of theirs he had
made war on the Thessalians; at t