Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 34
Cyrus Evans, Ed.

61. When he had brought the king to agree in his opinion, he judged it necessary to predispose the minds of his countrymen to the same; but he durst not send a letter, lest it might, by some accident, be intercepted, and his plans by that means be discovered. [2] He had found at Ephesus a Tyrian called [p. 1550]Aristo, and in several less important commissions, had discovered him to possess a good degree of ingenuity. This man he now loaded with presents and promises of rewards, which were confirmed by the king himself, and sent him to Carthage with messages. [3] He told him the names of the persons whom it was necessary that he should see, and furnished him with secret tokens, by which they would know, with certainty, that the messages came from him. [4] On this Aristo's appearing at Carthage, the reason of his coming was not discovered by Hannibal's friends sooner than by his enemies. [5] At first, the subject was bruited about in their circles and at their tables; [6] and at last some persons declared in the senate, that “the banishment of Hannibal answered no purpose, if, while resident in another country, he was still able to propagate designs for changing the administration, and disturbing the quiet of the state by his intrigues. [7] That a Tyrian stranger, named Aristo, had come with a commission from Hannibal and king Antiochus; that certain men daily held secret conferences with him, and were concocting that in private, the consequences of which would soon break out, to the ruin of the public.” [8] This produced a general outcry, that “Aristo ought to be summoned, and examined respecting the reason of his coming; and if he did not disclose it, to be sent to Rome, with ambassadors accompanying him: that they had already suffered enough of punishment in atonement of the headstrong rashness of one individual; [9] that the faults of private citizens should be at their own risk, and the state should be preserved free, not only from guilt, but even from the suspicion of it.” [10] Aristo, being summoned, contended for his innocence; and urged, as his strongest defence, that he had brought no letter to any person whatever: [11] but he gave no satisfactory reason for his coming, and was chiefly embarrassed by the fact which they urged, that he had conversed solely with men of the Barcine faction. [12] A warm debate ensued; some earnestly pressing, that he should be immediately seized as a spy, and kept in custody; while others insisted, that there were not sufficient grounds for such violent measures; that “putting strangers into confinement, without reason, was a step that afforded a bad precedent; for that the same would happen to the Carthaginians at Tyre, and other marts, where they frequently traded.” [13] The question was ad- [p. 1551]journed on that day. [14] Aristo practised on the Carthaginians a Carthaginian artifice; for having early in the evening hung up a written tablet, in the most frequented place of the city, over the tribunal where the magistrates daily sat, he went on board his ship at the third watch, and fled. Next day, when the suffetes had taken their seats to administer justice, the tablet was observed, taken down, and read. [15] Its contents were, that “Aristo came not with a private commission to any person, but with a public one to the elders;” by this name they called the senate. The imputation being thus thrown on the state, less pains were taken in searching into the suspicions harboured of a few individuals: [16] however, it was determined, that ambassadors should be sent to Rome, to represent the affair to the consuls and the senate, and, at the same time, to complain of the injuries received from Masinissa.