from that of the common herd,--and like Philopœmen, now saw plainly that Perseus would not be able to stand his ground against the Romans, and only supported him with pious wishes and prayers, the many dreamt that he could not fail to be victorious. They egregiously exaggerated trifling successes, such as the battle in Thessaly, and were guilty of the worst outrages and insolence against the Romans; just as was done in Germany, when the French were at the height of their power. Such men also as Polybius had a very strong feeling against the Romans: it was not till afterwards, when he was living among them, that he became aware of the good that was in them. The state of affairs at that time is clearly shown by the fragments of his history. The Romans now also, on their side, everywhere looked upon the Greeks as enemies; and this gave rise to the most cruel deeds, for which the prætor Lucretius was particularly notorious. A number of Greek towns on the sea-coast were taken and utterly destroyed, under the command of this Lucretius and of Hostilius, and the inhabitants were led away as slaves: in Bœotia, Haliartus and Coronea were burned to ashes. If Perseus had taken advantage of these circumstances, and had pressed the consul hard, the whole country on the other side of the Adriatic would have risen in revolt: but he was irresolute and narrow-minded; he had made out for himself a petty plan, within the range of which alone he could do any thing, and of those great enterprises, which would have been needed to overthrow the Roman empire, he was utterly incapable. Thus he listened to the delusive offers of the Roman consul to make a lasting peace; and in the meanwhile Crassus got himself out of his wretched plight, and the negociations were, of course, broken off. In the same way, when Marcius Philippus subsequently opposed Perseus again with insufficient means, he was allowed to offer the king a truce, which, it was given out, was to lead to a peace, whereas the Romans merely availed themselves of it to send the consul the reinforcements which he wanted. In the second and third years of the war, Perseus was very successful; he even drove back the Romans out of Macedon into Illyria, and also gained time to protect his empire against the attacks of the savage Dardanians.