1During the same days a fleet from Hiero put in at Ostia with a large cargo of supplies. 2His envoys, brought into the senate, announced that King Hiero had been so grieved at the news of the slaughter of the consul Gaius Flaminius and his army that no disaster of his own or of his kingdom could have moved him more. 3Therefore, though he well knew that the greatness of the Roman people was almost more admirable in adversity than in prosperity, he had nevertheless sent everything with which wars were usually aided by good and loyal allies; 4and he earnestly begged the conscript fathers not to refuse to accept these things.
5First of all, for the sake of the omen, they were bringing a golden Victory weighing two hundred and twenty pounds: let them accept it, keep it and hold it as their own for ever. 6They had also brought three hundred thousand pecks of wheat and two hundred thousand of barley, so that supplies should not run short, and whatever more was needed they would convey wherever they were ordered. 7He knew that the Roman people used no infantry or cavalry except Romans and men of Latin status; 7but he had seen light-armed auxiliaries, even foreign ones, in Roman camps: so he had sent a thousand archers and slingers, a force well suited against the Balearians and Moors and other peoples who fight with missiles.
9To these gifts they also added advice, that the praetor to whom the province of Sicily had fallen should take a fleet across to Africa, so that the enemy too might have war in their own land and be given less freedom to send reinforcements to Hannibal. 10The senate replied to the king's envoys that Hiero was a good man and an outstanding ally, and that in one unbroken course, ever since he had entered into the friendship of the Roman people, he had kept faith and generously aided the Roman cause at every time and place. 10This was as welcome to the Roman people as it ought to be.
11Gold had also been brought by certain states, but the Roman people, while grateful for the gesture, had not accepted it; 12the Victory and the omen they accepted, and they gave and dedicated to the goddess as her seat the Capitol, the temple of Jupiter Best and Greatest. 12Consecrated in that citadel of the city of Rome, she would be willing and propitious, firm and steadfast for the Roman people. 13The slingers and archers and the grain were handed over to the consuls. 13Twenty-five quinqueremes were added to the fleet of * ships which was in Sicily with Titus Otacilius the propraetor, and he was permitted to cross to Africa if he judged it to be in the interest of the state.