23. As the year was now drawing to a conclusion, Quintus Marcius, then abroad, was soon to go out of office. Spurius Postumius, after having conducted the inquisitions with the utmost care and propriety, held the elections. Appius Claudius Pulcher and Marcus Sempronius Tuditanus were chosen consuls. Next day, Publius Cornelius Cethegus, Aulus Postumius Albinus, Caius Afranius Stellio, Caius Atilius Serranus Lucius Postumius Tempsanus, and Marcus Claudius Marcellus were elected prætors. Towards the close of the year, because the consul Spurius Postumius reported that in travelling along the coasts of Italy, for the purpose of holding the inquisitions, he had found two colonies deserted, Sipontum on the upper sea, and Buxentum on the lower; in pursuance of a decree of the senate, Lucius Scribonus Libo, Marcus Tuccius, and Cneius Bebius Tamphilus, were appointed commissioners for conducting colonies thither, by Titus Mænius, city prætor. The war with king Perseus and the Macedonians, which was impending, has not derived its origin from what most persons imagine, nor from Perseus himself. The preliminary steps were taken by Philip, and, if he had lived some time longer, he would himself have carried on that war. When the conditions of peace were imposed on him, when he was vanquished, one particular chagrined him more than all the rest; this was because the liberty of wreaking his vengeance on such of the Macedonians as had revolted from him in the course of the war, was taken from him by the senate; although, because Quintius had left that point undetermined, when lie was adjusting the articles of pacification, he had not despaired of the possibility of obtaining it. Afterwards, on the defeat of Antiochus at Thermopylæ, the armies being separated at the time when the consul Acilius carried on the siege of Heraclea, and Philip besieged Lamia, because he was ordered to retire from the walls of Lamia, as soon as Heraclea was taken, and the town was surrendered to the Romans, he was grievously offended with this circumstance. The consul, indeed, in some measure, soothed his resentment; for, when he was hastening to Naupactum, where the Ætolians had re-assembled after their flight, he gave Philip permission to make war on Amynander and Athamania; and to annex to his dominions the cities which the Ætolians had taken from the Thessalians. Without much difficulty, he expelled Amynander from Athamania, and got possession of several cities. He also reduced under his dominion the city of Demetrias, a place of great strength, and convenient in every respect; with the whole of the Magnesian state. Afterwards, finding that several cities in Thrace, through an abuse of the liberty which they had lately acquired, and to which they had not been accustomed, were distracted by dissensions among their leading men, he, by uniting himself to the parties that were worsted in their disputes with their countrymen, made himself master of them all.