8 But Apelles, being unable either to keep Philip under his influence or to endure the diminishment of his power that resulted from the king's disregard, formed a conspiracy with Leontius and Megaleas by which these two were to remain with Philip and in the actual hour of need damage the king's service by deliberate neglect, while he himself would withdraw to Chalcis and take care that the supplies required for Philip's project should not reach him from any quarter. The king, then, and the bulk of the Macedonian army remained in Corinth occupied with this training and preparation. The Macedonians obeyed his orders in this respect with the utmost alacrity, 5 for they are not only most intrepid in regular battles on land, but very ready to undertake temporary service at sea, and also industrious in digging trenches, 6 just as Hesiod represents the sons of Achaeus to be "joying in war as if it were a feast." 4 Having resolved on this he collected at the Lechaeum the Achaean ships and his own, and by constant practice trained the soldiers of the phalanx to row. For it was against the Aetolians, Lacedaemonians, 2 This, he was convinced, was the only way by which he could himself fall suddenly on his enemies from every side, while at the same time his adversaries would be deprived of the power of rendering assistance to each other, 3 separated as they were geographically and each in alarm for their own safety owing to the rapidity and secrecy with which the enemy could descend on them by sea. When the troops had mustered from their winter quarters, the king at a council of his friends decided to prosecute the war by sea. 11 For the Achaeans passed a vote to pay him at once fifty talents for his first campaign, to provide three months' pay for his troops and ten thousand medimni of corn, 12 and for the future as long as he remained in the Peloponnese fighting in alliance with them he was to receive seventeen talents per month from the League.Ģ 1 After passing this decree the Achaeans dispersed to their several cities. 10 Upon their readily consenting, he entered the assembly and with the support of these statesmen managed to obtain all he wanted for his purpose. 9 He therefore persuaded the magistrates to transfer the Assembly to Sicyon and there meeting the elder and younger Aratus in private and laying all the blame for what had happened on Apelles, he begged them not to desert their original policy. P5 owing to the intrigues of Apelles against him at the late election, and that Eperatus was by nature no man of action and was held in contempt by all, 8 he became convinced by these facts of the error that Apelles and Leontius had committed, and decided to take the part of Aratus. 7 When this met at Aegium according to the law of the League, noticing that Aratus was little disposed to help him King Philip, being in want of corn º and money for his army, summoned the Achaeans through their magistrates to a General Assembly. 3 Contemporaneously in the early summer, Hannibal, having now openly embarked on the war against Rome, had started from New Carthage, and having crossed the Ebro was beginning to march on Italy in pursuit of his plan 4 the Romans at the same time sent Tiberius Sempronius Longus to Africa with an army and Publius Cornelius Scipio to Spain, 5 and Antiochus and Ptolemy, having abandoned the attempt to settle by diplomatic means their dispute about Coele-Syria, went to war with each other. 2 On his retirement he was succeeded by Eperatus, Dorimachus being still the strategus of the Aetolians. 1 1 The year of office of the younger Aratus came to an end at the rising of the Pleiades, 1 such being then the Achaean reckoning of time.
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