Æmilius offered the people peace on the same terms as the embassy, but again the citizens flouted the offer. Then knowing that the legions of Æmilius had come to support the demands of Rome, they sent in hot haste to Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, begging him to come to their aid. The Consul seeing that his terms were rejected, did indeed begin to plunder and lay waste the country, while the Tarentines looked but the more eagerly for the answer of Pyrrhus. Nor was it long in coming. In the early spring of 280 B.C. the king of Epirus reached Tarentum. Epirus, the region over which Pyrrhus was king, lay in the north-west of Greece, among wild mountains and narrow valleys. The Epirots were proud of their king, and because of his courage on the battlefield they called him the ‘Eagle.’ Pyrrhus knew the name his soldiers had given to him, and he said to them, ‘It is by you that I am an eagle, for how should I not be such, while I have your arms as wings to sustain me.’ The king had one peculiarity, which added to the terror he at times inspired. When he opened his mouth no row of upper teeth was to be seen. Instead of teeth, one single long bone was visible, with small lines to mark where the separate teeth should have been. Such was the king who had hastened to the aid of the Tarentines. So eager had Pyrrhus been to set out, that he had refused to wait for a fair wind, and a terrible storm had overtaken his fleet and scattered it, while he, with only a small part of his army, had been driven ashore some distance from Tarentum. With his army Pyrrhus had brought twenty elephants, for, the king had been in Africa and had learned there how useful these huge animals could be on the battlefield. But he had reached Tarentum with only two elephants and a few soldiers. After many difficulties, however, his whole force had succeeded in rejoining him, bringing with it the other eighteen elephants. To the Tarentines, as to the Romans on the battlefield, these elephants were a new and awe-inspiring sight. The king had been but a short time in Tarentum before he found that the people he had come to help were lazy, and more fond of pleasure than of war. They would be well pleased to stay at home to feast, to talk of the great battles they would fight, while their new ally was in the field, enduring hardships and struggling with the Roman legions. The king of the Epirots was used to having real soldiers around him, and he determined, if it was possible, to turn the foolish, indolent Tarentines into an army of trained, resolute men. So he ordered the theatres, the baths, and the other places of amusement to be closed, and then he called upon all who were old enough, to enrol their names for service. Then began a strange state of affairs in Tarentum. The city was turned into a military camp. Discipline was strict, and the recruits grumbled that they were under arms all day, guarding the walls, or watching in the market-place.