[18]
There Antiochus built a double wall on which he placed engines. He sent Ætolian troops to occupy the summits of the mountains to prevent anybody from coming around secretly by way of the hill called Atropos, as Xerxes had come upon the Spartans under Leonidas, the mountain paths at that time being unguarded. One thousand Ætolians occupied each mountain. The remainder encamped by themselves near the city of Heraclea. When Manius saw the enemy's preparations he gave the signal for battle on the morrow and ordered two of his tribunes, Marcus Cato and Lucius Valerius, to select such forces as they pleased and to go around the mountains by night and drive the Ætolians from the heights as best they could. Lucius was repulsed from Mount Tichius by the Ætolians, who at that place fought well, but Cato, who moved against Mount Callidromus, fell upon the enemy while they were still asleep, about the last watch. Nevertheless there was a stiff fight here, as he was obliged to climb over high rocks and precipices in the face of an opposing enemy. Meantime Manius was leading his army against Antiochus' front in straight lines, as this was the only way possible in the narrow pass. The king placed his light-armed troops and peltasts in front of the phalanx, and drew up the phalanx itself in front of the camp, with the archers and slingers on the right hand next to the foot-hills, and the elephants, with the guard that always accompanied them, on the left near the sea.1
1 The words right and left are transposed in the text. As Antiochus was looking toward Thessaly, his right hand was on the sea-shore and his left against the mountains.
Appian. The Foreign Wars. Horace White. New York. THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 1899.
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