Negotiations with .Prusias. The news of the victory followed by the appearance of the Rhodians caused much rejoicing amongst the Romans;it was quite evident that if the Rhodians were relieved from that cause of anxiety they would make all the seas in that part of the world safe. But the departure of Antiochus from Sardis and the danger of his seizing the cities on the coast forbade their abandoning the defence of the shores of Ionia and Aeolis. Consequently, they sent Pamphilidas with four ships to reinforce the fleet off Patara. Antiochus had been busy collecting contingents from all the cities round him. and had also sent a letter to Prusias the kinLy of Bithynia. In this despatch he bitterly complained of the Roman expedition to Asia;they had come, he wrote, to deprive them all of their crowns so that there might be no sovereignty but that of the Romans anywhere in the world;Philip and Nabis had been reduced to submission;he, Antiochus, was to be the third victim;like a spreading conflagration they would envelop all, as each lay nearest to the one already overthrown. Now that Eumenes had voluntarily accepted the yoke of ser6tude, it would be but a step from Antiochus to Bithynia. Prusias was much perturbed by this letter, but any doubts or suspicions which it might have created were set at rest by a letter from the consul and still more so by one from the consul's brother, Africanus. In this letter he showed how it was the uniform一practice of the Roman people to enhance the dignity of their royal allies by bestowing every honour upon them, and quoted instances of his own policy in order to persuade Prusias to show himself worthy of his friendship. The chieftains whom he had taken under his protection in Spain he had left with the title of kings;Masinissa he had established on his throne and on that of Syphax, who had expelled him, as well, and now he was not only by far the most prosperous monarch in Africa, but the peer in greatness and power of any monarch in the world. Philip and Nabis, who had been enemies and whom T. Quinctius had conquered, had still their thrones left them;in the case of Philip even the payment of tribute had been remitted during the past year, his son who had been a hostage was restored to him, and he had been allowed to recapture some cities outside Macedonia without any interference from the Roman generals. Nabis, too, would have retained his honour and dignity had not his own madness and the treachery of the Aetolians proved fatal to him. Such was the tenor of Africanus' communication. What did most to determine the king's attitude was a visit from C. Livius, the late commandant of the fleet. He came on a special mission from Rome and made the king understand how much more certain the prospect of victory was for the Romans than for Antiochus, and how much more inviolable and secure his friendship would be in their eyes than in those of the king.