Soon after the repulse at Sparta, Pyrrhus again marched against Antig'onus; but having attacked Argos on the way, and after having entered within the walls, he was killed by a tile thrown by a poor woman from a house-top. The death of Pyrrhus forms an important epoch in Grecian history, as it put an end to the struggle for power among Alexander's successors in the West, and left the field clear for the final contest between the liberties of Greece and the power of Macedon. Antigonus now made himself master of the greater part of Peloponnesus, and then sought to reduce Athens, the defence of which was aided by an Egyptian fleet and a Spartan army. Athens was at length taken (262 B.C.), and all Greece, with the exception of Sparta, seemed to lie helpless at the feet of Antigonus, who little dreamed that the league of a few Achæan cities was to become a formidable adversary to him and his house. * * * * * IV. THE ACHÆ'AN LEAGUE.--PHILIP V, OF MACEDON. The Achæan League at first comprised twelve towns of Acha'ia, which were associated together for mutual safety, forming a little federal republic. But about twenty years after the death of Pyrrhus other cities gave in their adherence, until the confederacy embraced nearly the whole of the Peloponnesus. Athens had been reduced to great misery by Antigonus, and was in no condition to aid the League, while Sparta vigorously opposed it, and finally succeeded in inducing Corinth and Argos to withdraw from it. Sparta subsequently made war against the Achæans, and by her successes compelled them to call in the aid of the Macedonians, their former enemies. Antigonus readily embraced this opportunity to restore the influence of his family in southern Greece, and, marching against the Lacedæmonians, he obtained a decisive victory which placed Sparta at his mercy; but he used his victory moderately, and granted the Spartans peace on liberal terms (221 B.C.). Antigonus died soon after this success, and was succeeded by his nephew and adopted son, Philip V., a youth of only seventeen. The Æto'lians, a confederacy of rude Grecian tribes, aided by the Spartans, now began a series of unprovoked aggressions on some of the Peloponnesian states. The Messenians, whose territory they had invaded by way of the western coast of Peloponnesus, called upon the Achæans for assistance; and the youthful Philip having been placed at the head of the Achæan League, a general war began between the Macedonians and Achæans on the one side, and the Ætolians and their allies on the other, that continued with great severity and obstinacy for four years. Philip was on the whole successful, but new and more ambitious designs led him to put an end to the unprofitable contest. The great struggle going on between Rome and Carthage attracted his attention, and he thought that an alliance with the latter would open to himself prospects of future conquest and glory. So a