CHAPTER LV. THE CONQUEST OF INDIA

After the conquest of the Bactrian satrapy, there remained only one province of the Persian empire into which Alexander had not yet carried his arms. Already, indeed, before he crossed the Paropamisus, he had made himself master of a great part of the country which the Persians called India, and perhaps had very nearly reached the utmost limits within which the authority of the Great King was acknowledged in the latter years of the monarchy. But the power of the first Darius had certainly been extended much farther eastward. At the battle of Arbela the Greeks for the first time saw elephants, which they heard had been brought from the banks of the Indus. To Alexander and his companions India appeared from a distance as a new world, of indefinite extent, and abounding in wonders and riches. Even without any other inducement, he must eagerly have desired to explore and subdue it.

The king of Taxila [or Takshasila] had offered his alliance to Alexander, and sought aid from him against a powerful neighbour; and thus Alexander ascertained that the state of things in this part of India was highly favourable to his projected invasion. Through some revolutions, no record of which has been preserved, a great part of it had in Alexander’s time fallen under the dominion of three princes, Taxiles and two who were kinsmen and bore the name of Porus. The most powerful of these was the immediate neighbour of Taxiles; his territories lay to the east of the Hydaspes. It was against him that the king of Taxila sought to strengthen himself by an alliance with the Macedonian conqueror.

[Sidenote: [327-326 B.C.]]

Alexander marched into India at the head of 120,000 foot and 15,000 horse. We must suppose that at least 70,000 of these were Asiatic troops. The summer of 327 had scarcely begun, when he crossed the mountains and advanced to the banks of the Cophen, the river formed by the confluence of the Kabul river with the Panjshir, a larger stream, which meets it from the northwest. Here, in conformity to his summons, he was met by Taxiles, and by several chiefs from the country west of the Indus, bringing presents, such as were accounted the most honourable; and as he expressed a wish for elephants, they promised all they possessed, which however amounted to no more than five-and-twenty.

Alexander now divided his forces. He sent Hephæstion and Perdiccas, with a strong division, accompanied by the Indian chiefs, down the vale of the Cophen to the Indus, to prepare a bridge for the passage of the army, while he himself directed his march into the mountains north of the Cophen, and included between it and the Indus. Here lay the territories of three warlike tribes--the Aspasians or Hippasians, Guræans, and Assacenians. The operations of this campaign, which occupied the rest of the year, do not require to be related here with all the military details. He ascended the rugged vale of the Choes; and gathered a vast booty, including forty thousand captives, and between three and four hundred thousand head of cattle, from which he selected some of the finest to be sent into Macedonia. He then, with some difficulty, effected the passage of the deep and rapid Guræus, and entered the territory of the Assacenians. Alexander accepted the surrender of Massaga, the capital, on the condition that the mercenaries should join his army. But they discovered a degree of patriotism which he had not looked for. They were so averse from the thought of turning their arms against their countrymen, that, having marched out, and encamped on a hill by themselves, they meditated making their escape in the night. Alexander was apprised of their design, and, though they had not begun to execute it, with less generosity than might have been expected from him, even if mercy was out of the question, surrounded the hill with his troops, and cut them all to pieces. Then, holding the capitulation to have been broken, he stormed the defenceless city, where the chief’s mother and daughter fell into his hands.

The inhabitants of Bazira fled to a place of refuge, which was deemed impregnable, and soon became crowded with fugitives from all parts of the country. This was a hill fort on the right bank of the Indus, not far above its junction with the Cophen. Its Indian name seems to have been slightly distorted by the Greeks, according to their usual practice, into that of Aornus, which answered to its extraordinary height, as above the flight of a bird. It was precipitous on all sides, and accessible only by a single path cut in the rock, though in one direction it was connected with a range of hills. But its summit was an extensive plain of fruitful soil, partly clothed with wood, and containing copious springs. The traditions of the country concerning its insurmountable strength seem to have given occasion to the fable, which spread through the Macedonian camp, that Hercules himself had assailed it without success. Alexander did not need this inducement to excite him to the undertaking. It had been a principle, to which he owed most of his conquests, to show that he was not to be deterred by any natural difficulties; and he resolved to make the Aornus his own.

He had not long arrived at it, before he received information of a rugged and difficult track that led up to the top of a hill, separated by a hollow of no great depth, though of considerable width, from the rock. By this path he sent Ptolemy, with a body of light troops, who reached the summit before he was noticed by the garrison, and immediately, as he had been ordered, threw up an entrenchment, and by a fire-signal announced his success to the camp below. The Indians attempted in vain to dislodge him from his position: and the next day Alexander, by a hard struggle, notwithstanding their vigorous resistance, joined him there with the rest of the army. He now availed himself of his superior numbers, and began to carry a mound across the hollow. He took part in the work with his own hands, and the whole army, animated by his example and exhortations, prosecuted it with restless assiduity. But the Indians, astonished at the intrepidity with which a handful of men had seized this vantage-ground, and alarmed by the progress of the work, began to despair of resistance, and to meditate flight. But while they were stealing out of the place, Alexander scaled the deserted wall with a part of his guard, entered the fortress, and chased the fugitives with great slaughter into the plains below. The capture of the rock which had baffled the assaults of Hercules was celebrated with solemn sacrifices, and supplied a fresh theme for the eloquence of Agis and Anaxarchus.

It was in the course of the campaign in the highlands between the Cophen and the Indus, and, it seems, in the territory of the Guræans, that the Macedonians were struck with some appearances in the productions of the soil, and the manners of the natives, and probably also by the sound of some names which reminded them of the legends of Dionysus, whose fabulous conquests were now so often mentioned by Alexander’s flatterers, for the purpose of exalting the living hero, whom they proposed to deify, above the god. And so we read that Alexander came to a city called Nysa, which boasted of Dionysus as its founder, and, as evidence of the fact, showed the ivy and laurel which he had planted--a sight new to the Macedonians, since they had left their native land. Alexander, Arrian observes, was gratified by their story, and wished it to be believed that he was then treading in the steps of Dionysus; for he hoped that the Macedonians, roused by emulation, would be the more willing to bear the fatigues of the expedition in which he purposed to pass the utmost distance that had been reached by the divine conqueror. If we may depend on this observation, it would prove that he had not yet thought of any limit to his own progress, within the farthest bounds of the eastern world.

It cannot have been later than March 326 when he crossed the Indus, probably a little above its junction with the Cophen. He celebrated his arrival on the eastern bank by a solemn sacrifice, and soon after met Taxiles, who had come out, with his army and his elephants, to greet him, and conduct him to his capital, with professions of the most entire devotion. It seems to have been during his stay at Taxila, that Alexander was first enabled to gratify his curiosity concerning the doctrines and practices of the Indian ascetics. He had already witnessed something similar at Corinth, where he found Diogenes living in habits of simplicity not unworthy of the Eastern gymnosophists--as the Greeks called the sages who exposed themselves almost naked to the inclemency of the Indian sky. He is reported to have said that, had he not been Alexander, he would have been Diogenes. The independence of a man who had nothing to ask of his royal visitor but that he would not stand between him and the sun, struck him as only less desirable than the conquest of the world; and he conceived a like admiration for the Indian quietists, who manifested a kindred spirit. He was desirous of carrying away with him some of the Indian sophists as companions of Anaxarchus.

After solemn sacrifices and games, Alexander resumed his march. He was informed that Porus had collected his forces on the left bank of the Hydaspes, to defend the passage; and he therefore sent Cœnus back to the Indus, with orders to have the vessels in which the army had crossed sawed each into two or three pieces, and transported to the Hydaspes. He left all his invalids at Taxila, and strengthened his army with five thousand Indians, who were commanded by Taxiles in person. Having arrived on the right bank of the Hydaspes, he beheld the whole army of Porus, with between two hundred and three hundred elephants, drawn up on the other side.

To distract the attention of Porus, he divided his army into several columns, with which he made frequent excursions in various directions, as if uncertain where he should attempt a passage.

THE WAR WITH PORUS

At the distance of a day’s march above the camp, at a bend of the river towards the west, where the projecting right bank was covered with wood, an island, also thickly wooded, parted the stream. This was the spot which Alexander fixed upon for his attempt. He ordered the vessels brought in pieces from the Indus to be carried to it--the shelter of the wood enabled the workmen to put them together again unobserved. Skins also were provided to be stuffed with straw. Night after night he sallied forth with his cavalry, as noisily as possible, and pushed up or down the river, as if to attempt a passage. Porus at first drew out his elephants, and moved towards the quarter from which the clamour proceeded. But when the feint had been often repeated, he ceased to attend to it, and did not stir his elephants for any noise that he might hear on the other side.

Alexander himself set out with the flower of his Macedonian cavalry, and the Bactrian, Sogdian, and Scythian auxiliaries, in all about five thousand, and a select division of heavy and light infantry, which included the hypaspists and the brigades of Clitus and Cœnus. He directed his march at a sufficient distance from the river to be concealed from the enemy’s view, and about sunset arrived over against the island. During the night a violent fall of rain, accompanied by a terrible thunderstorm, a little impeded the labours of the men; but the noise also served to drown the clatter of the axes and hammers, and all the din of preparation, which might otherwise have reached the post on the opposite bank.

With the return of light the rain had ceased, and the storm was hushed: and the troops were immediately embarked. The king himself, with Ptolemy, Perdiccas, Lysimachus, and Seleucus, the founder of the Syrian dynasty, went on board a small galley, with a part of the hypaspists. The woody island concealed their movements, until, having passed it, they were within a short distance of the left bank. Then first they were perceived by the Indians stationed there; who immediately rode off at full speed to carry the tidings. Porus was not of a spirit to be so easily overpowered. His first thought, when he received the intelligence, was that there might still be time to come up with the enemy, before they had completed their landing; and he immediately sent one of his sons, with two thousand cavalry, and 120 chariots, towards the place. Alexander charged with all his cavalry. The Indians scarcely waited for the shock of this greatly superior force. Four hundred of them were slain, and among them the prince himself.

Even this disaster did not bow the courage of Porus; leaving a part of his elephants to check Craterus, he advanced to the decisive conflict, with two hundred of them, the whole of his cavalry (about four thousand), three hundred chariots, and the bulk of his thirty thousand men.

Alexander, when he came in sight of the enemy, made his cavalry halt, to allow time for the infantry to come up, and recover breath, after their long and quick march, while he himself, observing the disposition of the hostile army, decided on his plan of attack. He posted himself, as usual, in the right wing, with the main body of the cavalry; but stationed Cœnus, with two squadrons, on the left. With his wonted sagacity he anticipated that an attack on the enemy’s left wing would draw out the cavalry on the right to protect it; and he ordered Cœnus in this case to fall on their rear. The horse-bowmen were first ordered to advance, and threw the enemy into some disorder by a shower of arrows. Alexander then led up the rest of his cavalry to the charge. The Indian cavalry of the right wing was brought up to the relief of their left, and was at the same time taken in the rear by Cœnus, and charged by Alexander in front. The whole body, in disorder, sought shelter in the line of the elephants, and the Macedonian phalanx then advanced to take advantage of the confusion, and to support their cavalry. Yet the shock of the huge animals, as long as they were under control, made havoc even in the ranks of the phalanx, and afforded time for the Indian cavalry to rally. But when they were driven in by a second charge of the Macedonian horse, and the engagement was crowded within a narrower space, the elephants, pressed on all sides, began to grow unmanageable; many lost their drivers, and, maddened by wounds, turned their fury indiscriminately against friend and foe. The phalanx then opened a large space for them and eluded their onset, while the light troops plied them with their missiles, or mutilated their trunks, and drove them back upon their own ranks, where, as long as their strength lasted, they spread havoc and confusion. At length, when many of them were killed, and the rest, spent with wounds and toil, ceased to be formidable, Alexander ordered another general charge of horse and foot; and the Indians, routed at all points, betook themselves to flight. By this time Craterus, and the divisions on the right bank, had effected their passage; and engaging in the pursuit with all the vigour of fresh troops, made dreadful slaughter among the fugitives.

The number of the slain on the side of the Indians amounted, according to the more moderate account in Diodorus, to about twelve thousand. Among them were two other sons of Porus, and the greater part of his principal officers. Nine thousand prisoners were taken, and eighty elephants. The loss of the Macedonians is estimated, as usual, at only a few hundreds.

Porus himself, mounted on an elephant, had both directed the movements of his forces, and gallantly taken part in the action. He had received a wound in his shoulder--his body was protected by a corselet of curious workmanship, which was proof against all missiles--yet, unlike Darius, as long as any of his troops kept their ground he would not retire from the field. When, however, he saw all dispersed, he too turned his elephant for flight. He was a conspicuous object, and easily overtaken. All he would ask of Alexander, was to be treated as a king; and when Alexander observed that this was no more than a king must do for his own sake, and bade him make some request for himself, his reply was still that all was included in this. His expectations could scarcely have equalled the conqueror’s munificence. He was not only reinstated in his royal dignity, but received a large addition of territory. Yet it was certainly not pure magnanimity, or admiration for his character, that determined Alexander to this proceeding. He was conscious that his forces were not sufficient to enable him to displace the native princes east of the Indus, and to annex their territories, in the form of a satrapy, to his empire. Hence the generosity he had shown to Taxiles. But Taxiles himself might have become formidable without a rival; and the only way to secure the Macedonian ascendency in the Punjab, was to trim the balance of power.

Alexander, after he had buried his slain, and solemnised his victory with his usual magnificence, allowed the main body of his army a month’s rest, perhaps in the capital of Porus. The continuance of the rains was probably the chief motive for this delay. But before he quitted the scene of his triumph, he founded two cities near the Hydaspes--one, which he named Nicæa, near the field of battle, the other near the place where he had crossed the river; this he named Bucephala, after his gallant steed, which had sunk either under fatigue or wounds in the hour of victory.

THE EASTERN LIMIT

Before he resumed his march eastward, Alexander ordered a great quantity of ship timber to be felled in the forests on the upper course of the Hydaspes, which abound in fir and cedar, and floated down the stream to his new cities, and a fleet to be built for the navigation of the Indus. Alexander, on his march up the river Hydraotes, received or extorted the submission of some other smaller tribes. As he approached Sangala, he found the Cathæans strongly entrenched on an insulated hill near the city, behind a triple barrier of wagons. A bloody carnage ensued; for the besieged made a vigorous resistance, and more than twelve hundred of the besiegers, including several general officers, were wounded. In revenge seventeen thousand of the barbarians were massacred; seventy thousand were made prisoners. Alexander then continued his march towards the southeast and arrived on the banks of the Hyphasis, or rather of the stream formed by the junction of the Hyphasis (Bias) with the Hesidrus (Sutlej).

Here he had at length reached the fated term of his progress towards the east. Alexander had, no doubt, long been undeceived as to the narrow limits which, according to the geography of his day, he had at first assigned to India, and to the eastern side of the earth. The ocean, which he had once imagined to be separated by no very vast tract from the banks of the Indus, had receded, as he advanced, to an immeasurable distance. He had discovered that, beyond the Hyphasis, a desert more extensive than any he had yet crossed parted the plains of the Five Streams from the region watered by the tributaries of the Ganges, a river mightier than the Indus: that the country east of the Ganges was the seat of a great monarchy, far more powerful than that of Porus, the land of the Gangarides and Prasians, whose king could bring into the field two hundred thousand foot, twenty thousand horse, and several thousands of elephants. That this information rather served to inflame Alexander’s curiosity and ambition than to deter him, could scarcely be doubted by any one who has fully entered into his character, even if it had not been expressly stated by the ancients.

But the accounts which kindled his ardour, plunged the Macedonians into sullen dejection, which at length broke out into open murmurs. It is possible that, if they had seen any distinct and certain goal before them, they would not have shrunk from the dangers and difficulties of a last enterprise, however arduous. But to set out from a region which had once appeared to them as the verge of the habitable world on a new series of conquests, to which they could foresee no termination, was enough to appal the most adventurous spirits.[32] Their thoughts began to revert with uncontrollable force to their homes in the distant west, as they had reason to fear that they were on the point of being torn from them forever. For even of those who might escape the manifold dangers of a fresh campaign, how many might be doomed to sit down as colonists, and to spend the rest of their lives in that strange land! India was a still more hopeless place of exile than Bactria and Sogdiana, where the Greeks, who had been planted by violence, were only detained by terror. The wish to return became universal, and was soon transformed into a firm resolution not to proceed.

It is difficult to guess how far the arguments by which Alexander endeavoured to overcome the repugnance of his troops, and to animate them with his own spirit, resembled any of those which are attributed to him by Arrian and Curtius. The threat which Curtius puts into his mouth, that, if the Macedonians would not follow him, he would throw himself on his Bactrian and Scythian auxiliaries and make the expedition with them alone, most likely misrepresents the tone which he assumed. But it may easily be supposed that he expressed his wishes, and urged the army to compliance, with passionate eloquence. Not only, however, the feelings of the troops, but the judgment of his officers was adverse to the proposed enterprise; and Cœnus, in a speech which has either been better written or more faithfully reported than the king’s, exhorted him to abandon his design. Alexander retired to his tent in displeasure.

The next day he again assembled the army, and made another attempt to overpower their reluctance, declaring that he would force no Macedonian to accompany him; he was sure that there would be volunteers enough among them for his purpose; the rest might return home and say that they had left their king in the midst of his enemies. But even this appeal produced no effect. For three days he kept within his tent, where not even his chief officers were admitted to his presence, waiting for a change in the disposition of the men. But the stillness which prevailed in the camp convinced him, more strongly than words could have done, that their determination was fixed. He then felt that it was time to yield--not perhaps without some pride in the reflection that there was not a man in the army who was capable of his own contempt for difficulties and dangers. He had however gone too far, it seems, to recede without some other pretext. The sacrifices easily supplied one. When they were found unpropitious to the passage of the river, he called his council and declared his resolution to retreat.

It was received with tears of joy and grateful shouts by the army. Before he quitted the Hyphasis, he ordered twelve colossal altars to be built on its banks, and dedicated to the gods who had led him thus far victorious; then, after a solemn sacrifice and games, he began to retrace his steps. On the Acesines he found the city, which Hephæstion had been ordered to build, ready to receive a colony; and there he left the disabled mercenaries, and as many natives of the neighbouring districts, as were willing to settle there.

The fleet on the Hydaspes was now nearly ready, but the two new cities had suffered so much from the rains that the army was for some time employed in restoring them. In the meanwhile, Alexander made his final arrangement of the affairs of the northern Punjab, by which Porus gained a fresh addition of territory, so that his dominions included, it is said, seven nations and above two thousand cities, with, it seems, a title which established his superiority over all the chiefs east of the Indus.

THE MARCH TO THE WEST

[Sidenote: [326-325 B.C.]]

The fleet, which was probably for the most part collected from the natives, numbered, according to Ptolemy, nearly two thousand vessels of various kinds, including eighty galleys of war. The command of the whole fleet was entrusted to Nearchus. Alexander divided his forces into four corps. The main body, with about two hundred elephants, was to advance along the eastern bank under the command of Hephæstion. Craterus was to lead a smaller division of infantry and cavalry on the opposite side of the river. Philippus, with the troops of his satrapy, was ordered to take a circuitous route towards the point where the two other generals were to wait for the fleet, in which the king himself was to embark with the hypaspists, the bowmen, and a division of his horse-guard--in all, eight thousand men. On the morning of the embarkation, Alexander himself, under the direction of his soothsayers, offered the libations and prayers which were deemed fittest to propitiate the powers of the Indian streams, Hydaspes and the impetuous Acesines, which was soon to join it, and the mighty Indus, which was afterwards to receive their united waters. Among the gods of the west, Hercules and Ammon were invoked with especial devotion; then, at the sound of the trumpet, the fleet began to drop down the river.

It was a spectacle such as the bosom of the Hydaspes had never before witnessed, nor has it since. Its high banks were crowded with the natives, who flocked from all quarters with eager curiosity to gaze, and accompanied the armament in its progress to some distance before they could be satiated with the sight of the stately galleys, the horses, the men, the mighty mass of vessels gliding down in unbroken order; and as the adjacent woods rang with the signals of the boatswains, the measured shouts of the rowers, and the plash of numberless oars, keeping time with perfect exactness, the Indians too testified their delight in strains of their national music.

Alexander, as he proceeded, landed his troops wherever he found a display of force necessary to extort submission from the neighbouring tribes, though it was with reluctance that he spent any time in these incursions; he was anxious, as soon as possible, to reach the frontiers of the Malli, a warlike race, from whom he expected a vigorous resistance, and whom he therefore wished to surprise before they had completed their preparations and had been joined by their allies, particularly their southern neighbours the Oxydracæ or Sudracæ. In five days he arrived at the second place of rendezvous, the confluence of the Hydaspes and the Acesines. His Indian pilots had warned him of the danger which the fleet would have to encounter at this point; yet it did not escape. The united rivers were at that time pent into a narrow space, where their conflicting waters roared and chafed in eddies and waves. Several of the long galleys lost a great part of their oars, and were much shattered; two were dashed against each other, and entirely wrecked, and many of the crews perished. According to some accounts, Alexander himself at one time thought his own galley so much in danger, that he was on the point of jumping overboard. As the stream widened, and spent its violence, a headland on the right bank afforded shelter to the fleet.

While it was undergoing the necessary repairs, Alexander made an expedition inland against the Sibas, or Sivaites, so called undoubtedly from the Indian deity, who was the chief object of their worship. On his return to the fleet, he was rejoined by his three generals, and immediately made his dispositions for the subjugation of the Malli.

There can be little doubt that the name of this people has been preserved in that of the modern city of Multan. The united forces of the Malli and the Sudracæ are estimated in the accounts of Diodorus and Curtius, on the most moderate calculation, at eighty thousand foot, ten thousand horse, and seven hundred chariots; and from the manner in which they are coupled together, we are led to presume that in this respect there was no inequality between them. But the two races were composed of widely different elements: for the name of the one appears to have been derived from that of the Sudra caste; and it is certain that the Brahmans were predominant in the other. As it was on the side of the desert that they might be expected to feel most secure, Alexander resolved to strike across it himself with one division of his army, into the heart of their country, while two other corps traversed it in other directions, to intercept the retreat of those whom he might drive before him.[b]

It was with a wonderful ease and enthusiasm that Alexander and his troops captured citadel after citadel and routed horde after horde, slaying ruthlessly those who fought and those who fled. But it is not with equal ease and enthusiasm that the modern reader peruses a catalogue of victories so long as to grow monotonous. We therefore omit the accounts of the various successes of the Macedonians, and hasten to the picturesque climax before the chief Mallian city as told by Arrian.[a]

THE BRAVE MALLIANS

[Sidenote: [325 B.C.]]

When the defendants were unable to endure the violence of his assault they retired into the castle. Alexander with his forces, having burst open one of the gates of the city, entered, and took possession thereof, a long time before the rest. Perdiccas and his party no sooner mounted the walls (for many of them had not yet recovered their ladders) than they perceived the city taken, because the walls were left defenceless.

However, the besieged, entering the castle, and being resolutely bent to hold it, some of the Macedonians endeavoured to undermine the walls, others to scale them, and accordingly busied themselves in fixing their ladders, wherever they could, with design to storm the place. But Alexander, not brooking their slow proceedings, snatched a ladder out of the hands of one of the soldiers, and applying it to the wall, immediately mounted, having guarded his body with his shield. Peucestas followed his steps, bearing the consecrated shield, which Alexander had taken from the temple of the Trojan Pallas, and had ordered to be borne before him in all his battles; after him, Leonnatus ascended by the same ladder, and Abreas (one who received a double stipend, on account of former services) by another. And now Alexander, having gained the top of the battlements, and fixed his shield for defence, drove some of the defendants headlong down into the castle, and slew others with his sword, clearing the place where he stood.

But the royal targeteers being solicitous and endeavouring to ascend in too great numbers, broke the ladders, and thereby not only fell down themselves, but hindered others from mounting. Alexander, in the meantime, stood as a mark for all the Indians, who were in the adjacent towers, for none of them durst venture to come so near him as to fight hand to hand; and those within the castle also cast their darts at him, but at some distance (for the Indians had thrown up a rampart there within the wall, where they stood, and they easily perceived who he was, both by the brightness of his armour, and the greatness of his courage). However, he resolved, rather than to continue exposed in that station, where nothing was to be done worthy notice, to cast himself directly into the castle, imagining that such an action would strike a terror into the besieged, or at least it would add greatly to his glory, and if he died there, he should gain the admiration and applause of posterity; upon which he immediately leaped down into the castle, where, fixing himself against the wall, some of the enemy who rushed forwards upon him he slew with his sword, and among the rest, the Indian general. Others, as they advanced towards him, he smote with stones, and beat them back; but upon their second, and higher approach, he slew them also with his sword, so that the barbarians durst now no more attempt to come within his reach, but gathering about him, at some distance, threw their darts, and such other weapons, at him, as they had, or could find, from that station.

Peucestas, Abreas, and Leonnatus were the only three persons of the whole Macedonian army who mounted the castle wall before the ladders broke, and they leaped down on the inside and valiantly fought to save their king. Abreas was wounded in the face with an arrow, and fell down dead. Alexander’s breastplate was pierced through with an arrow, whereby he received a wound in the breast, which Ptolemy says, was so dangerous that, by the vast effusion of blood, his life was despaired of: nevertheless, so long as he was hot, he retained his innate courage, and defended himself valiantly; but the blood streaming from him, and his spirits sinking, he was seized with a dizziness in his head, and a chillness throughout his limbs, whereupon he fell forward upon his shield. Peucestas then, with the sacred shield of Pallas, stood by the king, and protected him from the enemies’ darts on the one side, as did Leonnatus on the other; but they were also sore wounded, and Alexander was very nigh losing his blood and life together.

The Macedonians without were in the utmost anxiety to decide how they should ascend the walls, and get to the inside of the castle, fearing lest their king, who had rashly exposed himself by scaling the walls, and leaping down among the enemy, should be in danger; and their ladders being broken, they used all their skill to contrive other ways to mount: whereupon some of them drove large iron pins into the wall (which was built with brick), and taking hold of those, hoisted themselves up with great difficulty; others mounted upon the shoulders of their companions, and so gained the top; however, he who ascended first leaped down on the other side, and saw the king lying prostrate; and afterward, others following, with dreadful shouts and lamentations, a sharp battle ensued, they endeavouring with all their might to save their king, by covering him with their shields. In the meanwhile, others having torn off the bars, and forced open a gate between two towers, made way for their companions to enter, and a part of the wall giving way to the violent shocks of some others, opened a new passage into the castle.

ALEXANDER’S SEVERE WOUND AND THE ARMY’S GRIEF

A mighty slaughter of the Indians then ensued, every individual found being cut off, and not so much as the women or children spared. The Macedonians then turned their thoughts on their king, whom they bore away upon his shield, not knowing whether he would die or live. Some authors relate that Critodemus, a physician of Cos, laid open his wound and drew out the arrow; others, that Perdiccas performed that task, no physician being present and the case urgent: for Alexander commanded that the wound should be opened, though with a sword, and the dart drawn out of his body. However, he lost abundance of blood in the operation, and again fainted away.

While the king lay there, to wait for the healing of his wound, news was carried to the camp, from whence he set out on that expedition, that he was dead; upon which a sudden cry run throughout the camp, as the report spread from one to another: and when they came a little to themselves, and began to set bounds to their grief, they were strangely perplexed, and in great doubt, who should be chosen to head the army (for many seemed to have equal pretence to that dignity, by their merit, not only in Alexander’s opinion, but also in that of the Macedonians), and how they should be led safe into their own country, being surrounded with so many fierce and warlike nations; some whereof, whom they had not yet visited, would, in all probability, fight stoutly for their liberty, and others, whom they had, would revolt, when they were freed from the fear of Alexander. Besides, when they begun to consider how many vast rivers were between them and their country, which they were in no ways able to pass over, they were almost driven to despair; and indeed everything seemed terrible to them, when they wanted their king: and even when the former accounts were contradicted, and news came of his being still alive, the messenger could hardly find credit, for they had before heard that there were but small hopes of his life--nay, when letters arrived signifying that he would return to the camp in a short while, the news seemed incredible to many, for they supposed that the letters had been no more than a contrivance of his bodyguards and the generals of his army.

When Alexander came to the knowledge of this, he began to fear that an insurrection might happen, for which reason, as soon as his health would admit, he ordered himself to be conveyed to the banks of the river Hydraotes, and from thence, down the stream, to the camp, which was nigh the confluence of the Hydraotes and Acesines, where Hephæstion had the command of the army, and Nearchus of the navy. When the ship, which had the king on board, approached in view of the camp, he ordered the cover of his royal pavilion to be hoisted upon the poop thereof, to be seen by the whole army. But neither yet did many believe him to be alive, thinking the ship was bringing his dead body, until at last he drew near the shore, and stretched out his right hand to the multitude.

Then a loud shout was raised for joy, some holding up their hands to heaven, others to their king; and many, who despaired of his life, melting into tears, by such a sudden and unexpected joy. And when, upon his coming on shore, they brought the bed or litter, whereon he had been carried before, he refused it, and ordered his horse to be made ready, which having mounted, he again received the joyful acclamations of the whole army; the banks and neighbouring woods, echoing with the sound. When he approached his tent, he leaped from his horse, and showed himself also to his army on foot, to give them the greater certainty of his health. Then arose a general emulation among them, and they strove which should approach nighest to him, and some were ambitious to touch his hands, others, his knees, others aspired no nigher than his garment; and some were even satisfied with the sight of him, and with wishing him health and happiness; some brought garlands, and others, flowers such as the country produced to strew in his way; and when some of his friends reproved him for exposing himself to such dangers for the army, and told him, it was not the business of a general, but of a common soldier, Nearchus tells us he took their reproofs ill, and the reason why he was offended at the liberty they used, seems to be, because their reproofs were just, and he was conscious he deserved them. However, his fortitude in battle, and his thirst after glory, hurried him so far, that he could not contain himself, nor keep out of the midst of danger.[e]

While Alexander was convalescent from his grievous wound, such of the Malli and Sudracæ as remained alive sent ambassadors and made submission with what tattered pride they could muster. They were banqueted and then attached to the satrapy of Philippus, and a thousand of their best troops required to follow Alexander down the river. At the juncture of the Acesines with the Indus he bade Philippus build a city. His father-in-law Oxyartes, bringing news of the misconduct of Tyriaspes the satrap of Paropamisus, was given the satrapy for his own. Craterus was sent westward into Carmania with the bulk of the land-forces. The opulent princedom of Musicanus submitted gracefully, but later revolted, and Musicanus was hanged upon a cross as an example. The prince of Pattala surrendered without struggle and Alexander sailed on to the ocean. Here the Macedonians first saw a real oceanic tide, and many of their vessels, after being stranded, were later shattered by the swift reflux of that coast, till the frightened troops as Quintus Curtius says “neither dared trust themselves on the land, nor remain on board,” and there followed the usual result of panic, for as old John Digby in 1747 quaintly translated Curtius “in all tumultuary assemblies, haste is of pernicious consequence.”

[Sidenote: [325-324 B.C.]]

Nearchus, the admiral, was now left to conduct the fleet from the Indus to the Tigris by way of the Persian Gulf, a marvellous feat of seafaring in that early day. Alexander about August moved westward by land, soon striking the desert of Gedrosia, where the horrors of the march deserve fuller description.[a]

THE DESERT MARCH

He himself then marched forward to Pura, the capital city of the Gedrosi, where he arrived the sixtieth day, after his departure from the country of the Oritæ. Many of the writers of Alexander’s life tell us that all the hardships which his army endured in his expedition through Asia were not to be compared with those they underwent in that march. And Nearchus assures us that though he could not possibly be ignorant of the difficulties they must struggle with in such a country, yet nevertheless he was resolved to go forwards.

He tells us the inhabitants informed him that no general was ever able to conduct an army safe through these deserts; that Semiramis entering them with great numbers of men in her flight from India, carried no more than twenty through out of her whole army: and that Cyrus, the son of Cambyses, who also attempted to invade India, but miscarried, lost the greatest part of his forces in those dangerous wastes, himself and seven of his followers only escaping; that these stories being told to Alexander were so far from damping his resolutions that he was thereupon the rather excited to attempt to conduct his army through these parts, where both Cyrus and Semiramis had failed of success, to show that no country was impassable to such soldiers, led on by such a general.

For these reasons, as also that he might be nigh the seacoast to provide necessaries for his fleet, he chose to return that way. However, the heats were so vehement and their want of water so much, that many of his men and most of their beasts of burden died--some by being smothered in the deep scorching sands, but the greatest part of thirst; for they found many little tumuli or hillocks of sand which they were obliged to ascend, and where no firm footing could be had, but they sank deep into it, as they would into clay or new-fallen snow; and their horses and mules were no less harassed and wearied out by the excessive heats and intolerable fatigues of such a march than the men. The great distance of their resting-places was one occasion of the army’s hardship, for their want of water caused them oftentimes to continue their march much farther than otherwise they would. Then the length of the march, with the excessive heats and raging thirsts they endured, despatched many of them.

The soldiers then began to slay many beasts of burden for their own use; for when provisions failed they consulted together, and killed both horses and mules, and ate their flesh, and afterwards excused themselves, by pretending that they died of heat or thirst, and there was none who took the pains to inquire thoroughly into the affair: even Alexander himself, it is said, was not ignorant of it; but as their necessities pleaded in their behalf, he deemed it prudence rather to conceal his knowledge thereof, than to seem to authorise it, by suffering the guilty persons to escape punishment. And now, to such straits were they reduced, that neither the sick, nor those who were weary with travel, could be drawn any further, partly for want of beasts, and partly for want of carriages--which the soldiers themselves, because they could not easily drag them through the sands, broke in pieces. Many also broke their wagons, before they began this march, through fear that they should be forced to leave the shorter and nearer path, and take that which was farther about, only because it was more convenient for carriages.

On this account, many were left behind--some by reason of sickness--some of heat and weariness, and others of thirst; and none took care, either to restore them to health again, or to help them forwards; for the army moved apace, and the whole was so much in danger that they were obliged to neglect the care of particular persons. If any chanced to fall asleep, by reason of the vast fatigues of a hard night’s march, when they awaked, if they had strength they followed the army by the track of their footsteps, though few of them ever came up with it, the far greatest part sinking into the sands, like sailors into the ocean, and so perishing.

Another accident also happened, which equally affected man and beast; for the Gedrosian country, like the Indies, is subject to rains while the Etesian winds blow; but these rains fall not in the plains, but among the mountains, where the clouds, not reaching their tops, are, as it were, pent up by the winds and dissolved into showers. When the army therefore, encamped nigh a small brook, for the sake of the water, the same, about the second watch of the night (being swelled with sudden rains, which none of them perceived), poured down such a dreadful inundation, that many women and children, who followed the camp, with the royal furniture, and the baggage mules, which were left alive, were swept away. Nay, so furious was the deluge, that the soldiers were hardly able to save themselves, many of them losing their arms, and some few their lives; many also, who had long endured the utmost extremities of heat and thirst, finding plenty of water, at their first coming here, drank to excess, and died. And hence it was, that Alexander would never, after that time, suffer them to encamp near a torrent, but at the distance of twenty furlongs, at least, to hinder his men from rushing too violently forwards, and drinking too large draughts, to their own destruction; he also took care, that those who came first should not run into the water with their feet, and thereby render it unwholesome to the rest of the army.

While the army laboured under the most dreadful inconveniences of heat and thirst in this desert, Alexander performed one gallant act, which we can by no means pass over in silence, though some authors affirm it was not done here, but in the desert of Paropamisus. As the forces continued their march through these sands, which reflected the burning rays of the sun upon them, it was necessary that they should send out parties daily to seek for water; the king, though ready to faint away with thirst, marched on foot, at the head of his troops, that his officers and soldiers (as is usual in such cases) might the more patiently endure those hardships which their general shared in common with them. In the meanwhile, some light-armed soldiers, who were despatched to search for water, found a small quantity, not far from the army, in the channel of a brook, almost dried up, but it was very muddy; however, they drew it up, and bringing it in a shield, presented it to the king, as a choice gift.

He received it, and returning due thanks to those who brought it, poured it immediately upon the ground, in presence of the army. This action of his encouraged the soldiers, as much as if every man had drunk a share of that water which he refused to taste; and his extraordinary self-denial is no less praiseworthy, than the noble example he showed of a wise and consummate general.

Another accident happened here, which, if it had not been speedily remedied, might have occasioned the loss of the whole army; for the sands being moved to and fro, by the winds, and all the surface reduced to a level, their guides themselves were at a loss how to conduct the army any further: for no sign of any track appeared to point out the path; nor was there so much as a tree, nor a shrub, nor any certain hillock, to be seen to direct them. Besides, they were unacquainted with the manner of observing the motions of the sun by day, and the stars by night, to regulate their march, as mariners at sea to their course by the two Bears, the Phœnicians by the Lesser, but most other nations by the Greater. In this difficulty, Alexander was forced to proceed as chance directed him. However, he ordered his army to turn to the left, and himself, with a few choice horse, went before to point out the road; but their horses, quite spent with heat, were most of them left behind--insomuch, that only he, with five of his followers, passed through the sands, to the seashore, safe on horseback. However, on their arrival there, they dug nigh the coast, and found plenty of water, sweet, and clear; whereupon he ordered the army thither, and, after that travelled seven days along the seacoast, and always found plenty of water. Then, his guides assuring him they knew the way again, they left the sea, and led the army into the inland parts again.[e]

EXCESSES AND CRUELTIES DESCRIBED BY CURTIUS

By these means the army came at last upon the frontiers of the Gedrosians, whose territory was very fruitful. Here he stayed some time to refresh his harassed troops; in the interim he received letters from Leonnatus, importing “that he had fought and overcome eight thousand foot, and five hundred horse of the Oritæ.” Craterus likewise sent him advice “that he had seized and put into custody Ozines and Zariaspes, two noblemen of Persia, who were contriving a rebellion.” The king afterwards appointed Siburtius governor of that province, in the room of Memnon, who was lately dead, and then marched into Carmania. Aspastes had the government of this nation, and was suspected to aim at innovations during the king’s abode in India; but as he came to meet the king, his majesty thought fit to dissemble his resentment, and kept him in the same station till he could get a clearer information of the crimes he was accused of.

The governor of India having sent him by this time (according to his orders) a great number of horses and draught cattle out of the respective countries subject to his empire, he remounted, and gave fresh equipages to those who wanted. He also restored their arms to their former splendour, for they were not now far from Persia, which was not only in a profound peace, but vastly rich.

As therefore he not only rivalled the glory Bacchus had gained by the conquest of these countries, but also his fame, he resolved (his mind being elevated above mortal grandeur) to imitate him in his manner of triumph, though it be uncertain whether it was at first intended by Bacchus as a triumph, or only the sport and pastime of the drunken crew. Hereupon he caused all the streets through which he was to pass to be strewed with flowers and garlands, and large vessels and cups filled with wine to be placed before the doors of the houses. Then he ordered wagons to be made of a sufficient largeness to contain a great many, which were adorned like tents, some with white coverings, and some with precious furniture.

The king’s friends and the royal band went first, wearing on their heads chaplets made of variety of flowers, in some places the flutes and hautboys were heard, in others the harmonious sound of the harp and lute; all the army followed, eating and drinking after a dissolute manner, everyone setting off his wagon according to his ability, their arms (which were extraordinarily fine) hanging round about the same. The king, with the companions of his debauchery, was carried in a magnificent chariot laden with gold cups, and other large vessels of the same metal. After this manner did this army of bacchanals march for seven days together, a noble as well as certain prey to those they had conquered, if they had had but courage enough to fall upon them in this drunken condition: nay, it had been an easy matter for a thousand men (provided they were but sober) to have made themselves masters of this riotous army, in the midst of its triumph, as it lay plunged in the surfeits and excesses of a seven days’ debauch; but fortune, that sets the price and credit of things, turned this military scandal into glory. The then present age and posterity since have with reason admired, how they could, in that drunken condition, with safety pass through nations hardly yet sufficiently subdued; but the barbarians interpreted the rankest temerity imaginable for a well-grounded assurance. However, all this pomp and splendour had the executioner at its heels, for the satrap Aspastes, of whom we before made mention, was ordered to be put to death. Thus we see that luxury is no obstacle to cruelty, nor cruelty to luxury.

About this time Cleander and Sitalces, with Agathon and Heracon (who had killed Parmenion by the king’s orders), came to him, having with them five thousand foot and one thousand horse; but they were followed by their accusers out of the respective provinces of which they had had the prefecture; and indeed it was impossible for them to atone for so many enormous crimes which they had committed, though they had been instruments in an execution altogether grateful to the king; for they were not contented to pillage the public, but even plundered the temples, and left the virgins and chief matrons to bewail the violation of their honour. In fine, by their avarice and lust, they had rendered the very name of the Macedonians odious to the barbarians; but Cleander’s fury exceeded all the rest, for he was not contented to defile a noble virgin, but gave her afterwards to his slave for a concubine.

The major part of Alexander’s friends did not so much regard the grievousness of the crimes that were now publicly laid to their charge, as the memory of Parmenion, who had been killed by their hands, which perhaps might secretly plead for them in the king’s breast; and they were overjoyed to see those ministers of his anger experience the dire effects of it themselves, and “that no power that is injuriously acquired can be of long duration.”

The king having heard their accusation, said “that their adversaries had forgot one thing, and the greatest of all their crimes, which was their despairing of his safety; for they would never have dared to be guilty of such villainies, if they had either hoped or believed he should have returned safe from India.” He therefore committed them to custody, and ordered “six hundred soldiers who had been the instruments of their cruelty to be put to death.” The same days also the authors of the Persian revolt (whom Craterus had brought along with him) were executed.[f]

Still cruelty, in the most odious sense of the word, wanton injustice, was always foreign to his nature; nor have we any proof that his temper had become in other respects harsher, or less even, than before his Indian expedition.

THE RETURN OF NEARCHUS

In the meanwhile he was in painful uncertainty, and was giving way more and more to gloomy thoughts, as to the fate of Nearchus and the fleet. They were at length dispelled by tidings that Nearchus had landed on the coast of Carmania, within a few days’ march of the camp. The bearer of the news was the governor of the maritime district in which the event had occurred. Some of the men belonging to the fleet, in an excursion up the country, had fallen in with one of Alexander’s soldiers, and learned from him that the king was encamped only five days’ march from the sea; by him Nearchus was brought to the governor, who hastened to the camp with the joyful tidings. Alexander sent party after party with means of conveyance for Nearchus. Some of his messengers proceeded but a short distance, and returned without intelligence. Others went further, but lost the road. He began to suspect that he had been deceived, and ordered the governor to be arrested. Meanwhile Nearchus had hauled up his vessels on shore, and had fortified a naval camp, where he left the greater part of his men, and set out, with Archias, his second in command, and five or six companions, to seek the king. On their way they met one of the parties which had been sent with horses and carriages in search of them. But so great was the change made in their appearance by the hardships of the voyage, that, even when they inquired the road to the camp, they were not recognised by their countrymen, until, on the suggestion of Archias, they made themselves known. Some now hastened to inform Alexander of their approach. When he heard of the smallness of their number, he concluded that the fleet was lost, and that they were the only survivors. But their arrival cleared up all mistakes, and diffused universal joy.

The details of the voyage would be foreign to our purpose. Nearchus had been forced to begin it, before the winds had become favourable, by the hostility of the Indians at Pattala; and though he waited four-and-twenty days on the Arabite coast, he afterwards lost three of his vessels in the adverse monsoon. On the coast of Oritis he met Leonnatus, who, after Alexander’s departure, had been obliged to defend himself against the combined forces of the natives and their allies. He had gained a great victory with the loss of few men; the satrap Apollophanes was among the slain. From Leonnatus, according to the king’s orders, Nearchus received a supply of corn sufficient for ten days, and exchanged some of his least active sailors for better men from the camp; but it does not appear that he lighted upon any of the magazines destined by Alexander for his use. After manifold hardships and perils, from the monsters of the deep, the barrenness of the coast, the hostility of the barbarians, and from the timidity and despondency of his own crews, he at length, with the aid of a Gedrosian pilot, reached the mouth of the Persian Gulf. When they came in sight of Arabia, Onesicritus--with what view is not perfectly clear--urged the admiral to strike across, and steer to the south. Nearchus however prudently refused to deviate from the king’s instructions, and finally landed near the mouth of the river Anamis (Ibrahim), not far to the east of the isle of Ormuz.[b]

Now Alexander, having conceived vast designs, had resolved after he had conquered all the eastern coast, to pass out of Syria into Africa, being very much incensed against the Carthaginians, and from thence marching through the deserts of Numidia, to direct his course towards Cadiz; for it was generally reported that Hercules had there planted his pillars. From hence he proposed to march through Spain, which the Greeks call Iberia, from the river Iberus; and having passed the Alps to come to the coast of Italy, from whence it was but a short cut to Epirus. He therefore gave orders to his governors in Mesopotamia “to cut down timber in Mount Libanus, and convey it to Thapsacus, a town in Syria, where it was to be employed to build large vessels, which were afterwards to be conducted to Babylon. The kings of Cyprus were also commanded to supply them with copper, hemp and sails.”

While he was doing these things he received letters from the kings Porus and Taxiles, to acquaint him with the death of Abisares by sickness, and that Philip his lieutenant was dead of his wounds; as also that the persons concerned in that action had been punished. Hereupon he substituted Eudœmon (who was commander of the Thracians) in the room of Philip, and gave Abisares’ kingdom to his son. From thence he came to Pasargada, which is a city of Persia, and whose satrap’s name was Orxines, who in nobility and riches far exceeded all the barbarians; he derived his pedigree from Cyrus, formerly king of Persia; his predecessors had left him a great deal of wealth, which he had very much increased by the long enjoyment of his authority. This nobleman came to meet the king, with all sorts of presents, as well for himself as for his friends; he had with him whole studs of horses ready broke, chariots adorned with gold and silver, rich furniture, jewels, gold plate to a great value, purple garments, and four thousand talents of coined silver. However, this excessive liberality proved the cause of his death; for having presented all the king’s friends with gifts far beyond their expectation, he took no notice of Bagoas the eunuch, who had endeared Alexander to him by his abominable compliance; and being informed by some who wished him well, that he was very much in Alexander’s favour, he made answer, “that he honoured the king’s friends, but not his eunuchs, it not being the custom of the Persians.” The eunuch was no sooner acquainted with this answer, than he employed all the power and interest he had so shamefully procured himself to ruin this innocent nobleman.

It happened that Alexander caused Cyrus’ tomb to be opened, in order to pay his ashes the funeral rites; and whereas he believed it to be full of gold and silver, according to the general opinion of the Persians, there was nothing found in it but a rotten buckler, two Scythian bows and a scimitar. However, the king placed a crown of gold upon his coffin, and covered it with the cloak he used to wear himself, and seemed to wonder “that so great a prince, who abounded in riches, was not more sumptuously interred than if he had been a private person.” Hereupon Bagoas, who stood next to the king, turning to him said: “What wonder is it to find the royal tombs empty, when the satrap’s houses are not able to contain the treasures they have taken from thence? As for my own part, I must confess, I never saw this tomb before, but I remember I have heard Darius say that there were three thousand talents buried with Cyrus. From hence proceeds Orxines’ liberality to you, that what he knew he could not keep with impunity might produce him your favour, when he presented you with it.”

Having thus stirred up the king’s anger, those whom Bagoas had entrusted with the same affair came in, so that he on one side, and the suborned witnesses on the other so possessed the king’s ears, that Orxines found himself in chains before he had the least suspicion of his being accused. This vile eunuch was not satisfied with the death of this innocent prince, but had the impudence to strike him as he was going to be executed; whereupon Orxines looking at him said: “I had heard indeed, that formerly women reigned in Asia, but it is altogether new, that a eunuch should be a king.” This was the end of the chiefest nobleman of Persia, who was not only innocent, but had likewise been profusely liberal to the king.[33] At that time Phradates was put to death, being suspected to aim at the regal dignity. “Now,” says Curtius, “Alexander began to be too apt to give credit to false informations; from whence it is plain that prosperity is able to change the best nature, it being a rarity to find anyone sufficiently cautious against good fortune. Thus he who a little before could not find in his heart to condemn Lyncestes Alexander, though accused by two witnesses; and who had suffered several prisoners of a mean condition to be acquitted, even contrary to his own inclination, only because they seemed innocent to the rest, and had restored kingdoms to his conquered enemies, at last so degenerated from himself as even against his own sentiment to bestow kingdoms on some at the pleasure of an infamous catimite, and deprive others of their lives.”

Much about the same time he received letters from Cœnus concerning the transactions in Europe and Asia, whilst he was subduing India--_viz._, that Zopirio his governor of Thrace, in his expedition against the Getæ, had been surprised with a sudden storm, and perished therein with the whole army; and that Sceuthes being informed thereof had solicited the Odrysians his countrymen to revolt, whereby Thrace was almost lost, and Greece itself in danger; for Alexander having punished the insolence of some of the satraps (who during his wars in India, had exercised all manner of crimes in their respective provinces) had thereby terrified others, who being guilty of the same foul practices, expected to be rewarded after the same manner, and therefore took refuge with the mercenary troops, designing to make use of their hands in their defence, if they were called to execution; others, getting together what money they could, fled. The king being advised hereof, despatched letters to all the governors throughout Asia, whereby they were commanded upon sight to disband all the foreign troops within their respective provinces.

Harpalus was one of these offenders; Alexander had always a great confidence in him, because he had upon his account formerly been banished by Philip, and therefore when Mazæus died, he conferred upon him the satrapship of Babylon, and the guard of the treasures. This man having, by the extravagance of his crimes, lost all the confidence he had in the king’s favour, took five thousand talents out of the treasury, and having hired six thousand mercenaries, returned into Europe. He had for a considerable time followed the bent of his lust and luxury, so that despairing of the king’s mercy, he began to look about for foreign means to secure himself against his anger; and as he had all along cultivated the friendship of the Athenians--whose power was no way contemptible, and whose authority he knew was very great with the other Greeks, as well as their private hatred to the Macedonians--he flattered those of his party that, as soon as the Athenians should be informed of his arrival, and behold the troops and treasure he brought with him, they would immediately join their arms and counsels to his; for he thought that by the means of wicked instruments whose avarice set everything to sale, he might by presents and bribes compass his ends with an ignorant and wavering people.

The king being informed of these things, was equally incensed against Harpalus and the Athenians, and immediately ordered a fleet to be got ready, resolving to repair immediately to Athens; but while he was taken up with these thoughts he received letters of advice that Harpalus had indeed entered Athens, and by large sums gained the chief citizens; notwithstanding which, in an assembly of the people, he had been commanded to leave the town, whereupon he retired to the Greek soldiers, who seized him, and that he was afterwards treacherously killed by a certain traveller.[34] Being pleased with this account, he laid aside his thoughts of passing into Europe; however, he ordered all the cities of Greece to receive their respective exiles, excepting such who had defiled their hands with the blood of their fellow-citizens.

The Greeks not daring to disobey his commands (although they looked upon them as a beginning of the subversion of their laws), not only recalled them, but also restored to them all their effects that were in being. The Athenians were the only people who on this occasion asserted both their own and the public liberty; for, looking upon it as an insupportable grievance (as not being used to monarchical government, but to their own laws and customs of their country), they forbade the exiles entering their territories, being resolved to suffer anything rather than grant admittance to those former dregs of their own town, and now the refuse of the places of their exile.[f]

FOOTNOTES

[32] [“Their very horses’ hoofs were worn away by their continual marches,” says Diodorus[d] xvii.]

[33] [Arrian[e] says, however, that Orxines was proved clearly guilty of defacing and plundering the tomb of Cyrus and of other acts of sacrilege.]

[34] For a fuller account of the affairs of Harpalus and the exile decree, see Chapter LVIII.