fter obstinate
resistance to capitulate, attempted to make their peace with the
sorely provoked Romans; but the stringent demands of the Roman consul,
and a consignment of money seasonably arriving from Antiochus,
emboldened them once more to break off the negotiations and to sustain
for two whole months a siege in Naupactus. The town was already
reduced to extremities, and its capture or capitulation could not have
been long delayed, when Flamininus, constantly striving to save every
Hellenic community from the worst consequences of its own folly and
from the severity of his ruder colleagues, interposed and arranged in
the first instance an armistice on tolerable terms. This terminated,
at least for the moment, armed resistance in Greece.

Maritime War, and Preparations for Crossing to Asia
Polyxenidas and Pausistratus
Engagement off Aspendus
Battle of Myonnesus

A more serious war was impending in Asia--a war which appeared of a
very hazardous character on account not so much of the enemy as of the
great distance and the insecurity of the communications with home,
while yet, owing to the short-sighted obstinacy of Antiochus, the
struggle could not well be terminated otherwise than by an attack on
the enemy in his own country. The first object was to secure the sea.
The Roman fleet, which during the campaign in Greece was charged with
the task of interrupting the communication between Greece and Asia
Minor, and which had been successful about the time of the battle at
Thermopylae in seizing a strong Asiatic transport fleet near Andros,
was thenceforth employed in making preparations for the crossing of
the Romans to Asia next year and first of all in driving the enemy's
fleet out of the Aegean Sea. It lay in the harbour of Cyssus on the
southern shore of the tongue of land that projects from Ionia towards
Chios; thither in search of it the Roman fleet proceeded, consisting
of 75 Roman, 24 Pergamene, and 6 Carthaginian, decked vessels under
the command of Gaius Livius. The Syrian admiral, Polyxenidas, a
Rhodian emigrant, had only 70 decked vessels to oppose to it; but, as
the Roman fleet still expected the ships of Rhodes, and as Polyxenidas
relied on the superior seaworthiness of his vessels, those of Tyre and
Sidon in particular, he immediately accepted battle. At the outset
the Asiatics succeeded in sinking one of the Carthaginian vessels;
but, when they came to grapple, Roman valour prevailed, and it was
o