make-in close to the land, fearing to be wind-bound on an enemy’s coast, they steered back to Eudamus, and with difficulty towed to Phaselis a captured seven-banked ship, which had been damaged in the beginning of the engagement. They then sailed home to Rhodes, not so much exulting in their victory as blaming one another because the entire fleet had not been taken or sunk, when it could have been done. Hannibal, disheartened by the loss of this one battle, did not even then dare to sail past the coast of Lycia, though he wished to join the king’s main fleet as soon as possible. And that this action might not be unimpeded, the Rhodians sent Chariclitus with twenty ships of war to Patara and the harbour of Megiste. They then ordered Eudamus, with seven of the largest vessels belonging to the fleet which he had commanded, to rejoin the Romans at Samos, and to endeavour by every argument, and by all his influence, to prevail on the Romans to besiege Patara. 25. Now first of all the intelligence of the victory, and subsequently the arrival of the Rhodians, caused great joy to the Romans, and it appeared to them that if that anxiety was taken away from the Rhodians, they would when at leisure render the seas of that country safe. But the march of Antiochus from Sardis did not allow them to quit the guard of Ionia and Æolia, lest the maritime cities should be crushed by his arms. However, they sent Pamphilidas, with four decked ships, to join the fleet which was at Patara. Antiochus not only collected aids from the states that lay around, but also sent to Prusias, king of Bithynia, ambassadors and letters, in which he inveighed against the pressing of the Romans into Asia. “They were coming,” he said, “to abolish all kingly governments; so that there should be no empire in any part of the world, save that of Rome. Philip and Nabis were subdued: he was the third object of attack. Thus the conflagration would spread, without interruption, from one to another, as each lay nearest to the one last ruined, until it enveloped them all. From him there was but one step to Bithynia, now that Eumenes had submitted to voluntary servitude.” Though Prusias was greatly affected by these observations, his mind was relieved from all such doubts by a letter from Scipio, the consul, and still more so by one from his brother Africanus, who, besides urging the invariable practice of the Roman people of augmenting, by every honourable addition, the grandeur of kings in alliance with them, by instances taken from his own family, induced Prusias to earn their friendship. “The petty chieftains in Spain,” he said, “who had been received into alliance, he had left kings. Masinissa he had not only re-established in his father’s kingdom, but had put him in possession of that of Syphax, by whom he had been formerly dethroned: so that he was, at the present, not only by far the most powerful of all the kings in Africa, but equal, both in dignity and strength, to any monarch in any