During these incidents amongst the Lucanians and Hirpini, the five ships which were carrying the Macedonian and Carthaginian agents to Rome, after sailing almost round the whole of Italy in their passage from the upper to the lower sea were off Cumae, when Gracchus, uncertain whether they belonged to friends or foes, sent vessels from his own fleet to intercept them. [2] After mutual questionings those on board learnt that the consul was at Cumae. [3] The vessels accordingly were brought into the harbour and the prisoners were brought before the consul and the letters placed in his hands. He read the letters of Philip and Hannibal through and sent everything under seal by land to the senate, the agents he ordered to be taken by sea. [4] The letters and the agents both reached Rome the same day, and when it was ascertained that what the agents said in their examination agreed with the letters, the senate were filled with very gloomy apprehensions. [5] They recognised what a heavy burden a war with Macedon would impose upon them at a time when it was all they could do to bear the weight of the Punic war. [6] They did not, however, so far give way to despondency as not to enter at once upon a discussion as to how they could divert the enemy from Italy by themselves commencing hostilities against him. [7] Orders were given for the agents to be kept in chains and their companions to be sold as slaves; they also decided to equip twenty vessels in addition to the twenty-five which P. Valerius Flaccus already had under his command. [8] After these had been fitted out and launched, the five ships which had carried the agents were added and thirty vessels left Ostia for Tarentum. [9] Publius Valerius was instructed to place on board the soldiers which had belonged to Varro's army and which were now at Tarentum under the command of L. Apustius, and with his combined fleet of fifty-five vessels he was not only to protect the coast of Italy but try to obtain information about the hostile attitude of Macedon. [10] If Philip's designs should prove to correspond to the captured despatches and the statements of the agents, he was to write to Marcus Valerius, the praetor, to [11??] that effect and then, after placing his army under the command of L. Apustius, go to the fleet at Tarentum and sail across to Macedonia at the first opportunity and do his utmost to confine Philip within his own dominions. [12] A decree was made that the money which had been sent to Appius Claudius in Sicily to be returned to King Hiero should now be devoted to the maintenance of the fleet and the expenses of the Macedonian war, and it was conveyed to Tarentum through L. Antistius. [13] Two hundred thousand modii of wheat and barley were sent at the same time by King Hiero.
