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Having, by these means, filled up the numbers of his army about the vernal equinox, he drew together all his forces to Dius: he encamped them there in a fixed post; and, exercising the soldiers every day, waited for the enemy. About the same time Quinctius left Elatia, and came by Thronium and Scarphea to Thermopylae.
King Antiochus was one of whom they did not doubt that, so soon as he was satisfied that his forces were adequate, he would cross over into Europe; and they were unwilling to let these cities, the possession of which would be so advantageous to him, lie open to his occupation. Quinctius, with the ten ambassadors, sailed from Elatia to Anticyra, and thence to Corinth.
Marcus Sergius, city praetor, read them in the senate, and afterwards, by direction of the fathers, in an assembly of the people; on which a supplication, of four days' continuance, was decreed. It was by this time winter; and while Titus Quinctius, after the reduction of Elatia, had his winter quarters distributed in Phocis and Locris, a violent dissension broke out at Opus.
Having recovered Thronium, as has been a little before mentioned, he set out thence; and having taken Tritonos and Drymae, inconsiderable towns of Doris, he came thence to Elatia, where he had ordered the ambassadors of Ptolemy and the Rhodians to wait for him.
Philip, being informed of the departure of the Romans from Elatia, and considering that, on the approaching contest, his kingdom was at hazard, thought it advisable to make an encouraging speech to his soldiers; in which, after he had expatiated on many topics often alluded to before, respecting the virtues of their ancestors, and the military fame of the Macedonians, he touched particularly on those considerations which at the time threw the greatest damp on their spirits, and on those by which they might be animated to some degree of confidence.
Quinctius led back his army to Elatia, whence he had set out to the Spartan war.
While the naval forces were thus employed, the consul, having encamped before Elatia, in Phocis, first endeavoured, by conferring with the principal inhabitants, to bring them over, and by their means to effect his purpose; but on their answering that they had nothing in their power, because the king's troops were more numerous and stronger than the townsmen, he assaulted the city on all sides at once with arms and engines.
To the ambassadors of Antiochus, who, at this time, proposed to treat of an alliance, he answered, that "he could say nothing on the subject in the absence of the ten ambassadors. They must go to Rome, and apply to the senate." As soon as the troops arrived from Elatia, Quinctius set out to lead them towards Argos.
Before the convention broke up, they saw the garrison march down from the citadel of Corinth, proceed forward to the gate, and depart. The general followed them, accompanied by the whole assembly, who, with loud acclamations, blessed him as their preserver and deliverer. At length, taking leave of these, and dismissing them, he returned to Elatia by the same road through which he came.
The king had got far before him, as he did not halt in his precipitate flight until he came to Elatia. There having collected the survivors of the battle and the retreat, he, with a very small body of half-armed men, betook himself to Chalcis.
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