assembly,
unexpected by the Achaeans. They were at the time consulting about a
war against Nabis, tyrant of the Lacedaemonians; who, on the command
being transferred from Philopoemen to Cycliades, a general by no
means his equal, perceiving that the confederates of the Achaeans were
falling off, had renewed the war, was ravaging the territories of his
neighbours, and had become formidable even to the cities. While they
were deliberating what number of men should be raised out of each of
the states to oppose this enemy, Philip promised that he would relieve
them of that care, as far as concerned Nabis and the Lacedaemonians;
and that he would not only secure the lands of their allies from
devastation, but transfer the whole terror of the war on Laconia
itself, by leading his army thither instantly. This discourse being
received with general approbation, he added,--"It is but reasonable,
however, that while I am employed in protecting your property by my
arms, my own should not be deprived of protection; therefore, if you
think proper, provide such a number of troops as will be sufficient to
secure Orcus, Chalcis, and Corinth; that my affairs being in a state
of safety behind me, I may without anxiety make war on Nabis and the
Lacedaemonians." The Achaeans were not ignorant of the tendency of
this so kind promise, and of his proffered assistance against the
Lacedaemonians; that his purpose was to draw the Achaean youth out of
Peloponnesus as hostages, in order to implicate the nation in a war
with the Romans. Cycliades, the Achaean praetor, thinking that it was
irrelevant to develope the matter by argument, said nothing more than
that it was not allowable, according to the laws of the Achaeans, to
take any matters into consideration except those on which they had
been called together: and the decree for levying an army against Nabis
being passed, he dismissed the assembly, after having presided in it
with much resolution and public spirit, and until that day having been
reckoned among the partisans of the king. Philip, disappointed in a
high expectation, after having collected a few voluntary soldiers,
returned to Corinth, and from thence into the territories of Athens.

26. In those days in which Philip was in Achaia, Philocles, one of the
king's generals, marching from Euboea with two thousand Thracians and
Macedonians, in order to lay waste the territories of the Athenians,
crossed the forest of Cithaeron opposite to