When his galleys returned, and he heard from his officers the events of the expedition, King Agron was so beside himself with joy at the idea of having conquered the Aetolians, whose confidence in their own prowess had been extreme, that, giving himself over to excessive drinking and other similar indulgences, he was attacked by a pleurisy of which in a few days he died. His wife Teuta succeeded him on the throne; and managed the various details of administration by means of friends whom she could trust. But her woman’s head had been turned by the success just related, and she fixed her gaze upon that, and had no eyes for anything going on outside the country. Her first measure was to grant letters of marque to privateers, authorising them to plunder all whom they fell in with; and she next collected a fleet and military force as large as the former one, and despatched them with general instructions to the leaders to regard every land as belonging to an enemy. [Sidenote: Teuta’s piratical fleet, B.C. 230.] [Sidenote: Takes Phoenice in Epirus.] +5.+ Their first attack was to be upon the coast of Elis and Messenia, which had been from time immemorial the scene of the raids of the Illyrians. For owing to the length of their seaboard, and to the fact that their most powerful cities were inland, troops raised to resist them had a great way to go, and were long in coming to the spot where the Illyrian pirates landed; who accordingly overran those districts, and swept them clean without having anything to fear. However, when this fleet was off Phoenice in Epirus they landed to get supplies. There they fell in with some Gauls, who to the number of eight hundred were stationed at Phoenice, being in the pay of the Epirotes; and contracted with them to betray the town into their hands. Having made this bargain, they disembarked and took the town and everything in it at the first blow, the Gauls within the walls acting in collusion with them. When this news was known, the Epirotes raised a general levy and came in haste to the rescue. Arriving in the neighbourhood of Phoenice, they pitched their camp so as to have the river which flows past Phoenice between them and the enemy, tearing up the planks of the bridge over it for security. But news being brought them that Scerdilaidas with five thousand Illyrians was marching overland by way of the pass near Antigoneia, they detached some of their forces to guard that town; while the main body gave themselves over to an unrestrained indulgence in all the luxuries which the country could supply; and among other signs of demoralisation they neglected the necessary precaution of posting sentries and night pickets. The division of their forces, as well as the careless conduct of the remainder, did not escape the observation of the Illyrians; who, sallying out at night, and replacing the planks on the bridge, crossed the river safely, and having secured a strong position, remained there