a dispute in the Field of Mars, the affair was brought before the senate, where it was voted, “that when a person sued for any post, which by the laws he was permitted to hold, the people had the right of choosing whoever they thought proper.”  To this decision of the senate the tribunes submitted, and thereupon Sextus Aelius Paetus and Titus Quinctius Flamininus were elected consuls.  Then was held the election of praetors.  The persons chosen were, Lucius Cornelius Merula, Marcus Claudius Marcellus, Marcus Porcius Cato, and Caius Helvius, who had been plebeian aediles.  By these the plebeian games were repeated, and, on occasion of the games, a feast of Jupiter was celebrated.  The curule aediles, also, Caius Valerius Flaccus, who was flamen of Jupiter, and Caius Cornelius Cethegus, celebrated the Roman games with great magnificence.  Servius and Caius Sulpicius Galba, pontiffs, died this year; in their room were substituted Marcus Aemilius Lepidus and Cneius Cornelius Scipio, as pontiffs.

8.  The new consuls, Sextus Aelius Paetus and Titus Quinctius Flamininus, on assuming the administration, convened the senate in the Capitol, and the fathers decreed, that “the consuls should settle between themselves or cast lots for the provinces, Macedonia and Italy.  That he to whom Macedonia fell should enlist, as a supplement to the legions, three thousand Roman footmen and three hundred horse, and also five thousand footmen and five hundred horsemen belonging to the Latin confederacy.”  The army assigned to the other consul was to consist entirely of newly-raised men.  Lucius Lentulus, consul of the preceding year, was continued in command, and was ordered not to depart from the province, nor to remove the old army, until the consul should arrive with the new legions.  The consuls cast lots for the provinces, and Italy fell to Aelius, Macedonia to Quintius.  Of the praetors, the lots gave to Lucius Cornelius Merula the city jurisdiction; to Marcus Claudius, Sicily; to Marcus Porcius, Sardinia; and to Caius Helvius, Gaul.  The levying of troops was then begun, for besides the consular armies, the praetors had been ordered also to enlist men:  for Marcellus, in Sicily, four thousand foot and three hundred horse of the Latin confederates; for Cato, in Sardinia, three thousand foot and two hundred horse of the same class of soldiers; with directions, that both these praetors, on their arrival in their provinces, should disband the veterans, both foot and horse.  The consuls then introduced to the senate ambassadors from king Attalus.  These, after representing that their king gave every assistance to the Roman arms on land and sea, with his fleet and all his forces, and had up to that day executed with zeal and obedience every order of the consuls, added, that “they feared it would not be in his power to continue so to do by reason of king Antiochus, for that Antiochus had invaded the kingdom of Attalus, when destitute of protective forces by sea and land.  That Attalus, therefore,