ought therefore to satisfy us ;" and so refused very generously to accept of what the king had allotted him.

CHAPTER XIV.

FROM ALEXANDER'S ARRIVAL IN ASIA TO HIS DEATH.

ALEXANDER having taken the necessary precautions for securing the tranquillity of Macedon in his absence, set out for Asia in the beginning of the spring. His army consisted of little more than thirty thousand foot, and four or five thousand horse; but then they were all brave men, well disciplined, and enured to fatigue. They had made several campaigns under Philip, and were each of them, in case of necessity, capable of commanding : most of the officers were near threescore years of age, and the common men fifty; and when they were either assembled, or drawn up at the head of a camp, they had the appearance of a venerable senate. Parmenio commanded the infantry; Philotas, his son, had eighteen hundred horse under him; and Callas, the son of Harpalus, the same number of Thessalian cavalry. The rest of the horse, consisting of natives of the several states, were under the direction of a separate commander. And the Thracians and Poonians, who were always in front, were headed by Cassandra. Such was the army, which was to decide the fortune, not only of Greece, but of all the eastern world. Alexander began his march along the lake Cercinum; and after passing the rivers Strymon and Hebrus, he came to the shore of the Hellespont, which he crossed in a hundred and sixty gallies, and several flatbottomed vessels, himself steering his own galley; and upon his arrival at the opposite coast, as if to take possession of

L

the continent, he leaped from his ship in complete armour, and expressed the greatest transports of joy.

It has frequently been thought strange, that the Persians took no step to check the progress of the Macedonians at the Hellespont, where they might certainly have been opposed with the greatest ease: especially as the former were possessed of a large and powerful fleet, and that of the latter was very inconsiderable. Whether this proceeded from supineness and inattention, or from a contempt of the enemy, it is difficult to determine. Whatever was the cause, the event proved equally fatal to the Persians.

Alexander being arrived at Lampsacus, was going to destroy it, in order to punish the rebellion of the inhabitants; and Anaximenes, therefore, a native of the place, came to him with a view of diverting him from his cruel resolution. This man, who was a famous historian, had been very intimate with Philip his father; and Alexander himself had a great esteem for him, having been his pupil. The king, suspecting the purport of his errand, and willing to be beforehand with him, swore, that he would never grant his request. "The favour I have to desire of you," says Anaximenes, "is, that you would destroy Lampsacus." By this witty evasion, the historian saved his country.

From thence Alexander went to Troy, where he paid great honours to the memory of the heroes who had fallen there, and particularly to that of Achilles, at whose tomb he caused funeral games to be performed. He declared that he looked upon Achilles as one of the happiest of men, in having had, during his life, so faithful a friend as Patroclus, and, after his death, so famous a poet as Homer, to celebrate his actions.

When Darius was informed of Alexander's arrival in Asia, he expressed the utmost contempt for the Macedonian army, and indignation at the presumption of their general.

He wrote letters to the governors of his different provinces,› commanding them, if they took Alexander alive, to whip him with rods, to make prisoners of his whole army, and to send them as slaves to one of the remotest and most desert parts of his dominions. It was not long, however, before he had reason to entertain more just and more modest sentiments. Alexander being arrived on the banks of the Granicus; a river of Phrygia, found the Persians, to the number of a hundred and ten thousand men, drawn up on the other side, and ready to dispute his passage. Memnon, who commanded all the sea-coast of Asia under Darius, gave it as his opinion, that the wisest course would be to lay waste the adjacent country, and thus to oblige the Macedonian army either to retreat, or to surrender at discretion for want of provisions. But this prudent advice was over-ruled by Arsites, a Phrygian satrap, who said, that he would never suffer the Grecians to make such havock in the territories he governed.

Nor was Alexander, on his side, without those who advised him to proceed with caution, and to refrain from crossing the river the same day on which he reached it. This, in particular, was the opinion of Parmenio, a brave and experienced officer, who observed, that the troops were already too much fatigued with their march, to be equal to the additional labour of crossing a river, especially one which was so deep, and whose banks were so craggy, and that too in the face of such an immense body of the enemy, who were perfectly fresh, and were ready to oppose him. But these arguments made no impression on Alexander, who declared, that it would be a shame for him, after crossing the Hellespont, to suffer his progress to be interrupted by a rivulet, for so he called the Granicus by way of contempt; that, on the contrary, they ought to take advantage of the terror which the suddenness of his arrival, and

the boldness of his attempt, had spread among the Persians, and answer the high opinion the world had conceived of his courage, and the valour of the Macedonians.

The two armies, however, continued for some time on the opposite banks of the river, the one looking out for a proper place to ford it, and the other narrowly watching their motions, and determined, if possible, to prevent their passage. At last, Alexander ordered his horse to be brought; and commanding the noblemen of his court to follow him, and behave gallantly, he caused a strong detachment to march into the river, himself following it with the right wing of his army, as Parmenio did with the left. The Persians, seeing the detachment advance, began to let fly their arrows, and march to a place where the bank was not so steep, in order to keep the Macedonians from landing. But now the horse engaged with great fury, one part endeavouring to land, and the other striving to prevent them. The Macedonians, whose cavalry were vastly inferior in number, besides the disadvantage of the ground, were overwhelmed with the showers of darts that were poured from the eminence; not to mention that the flower of the Persian horse were drawn together here, and were headed by Memnon, the ablest and most resolute of all the Persian generals. The Macedonians, therefore, at last gave way, after having performed many signal acts of valour. But Alexander coming up, restored the battle; he reinforced them with his best troops; he headed them himself; he animated them by his presence; he pushed the Persians, and at last routed them; upon which the whole army followed after, crossed the river, and attacked the enemy on all sides.

Alexander first charged the thickest part of the enemy's horse, in which the generals fought. He himself was particularly conspicuous by his shield, and the plume of feathers that overshadowed his helmet, so that he was easily

distinguished from the rest of the army. The charge, therefore, was very furious about his person; and though only the horse engaged, they fought like foot, man to man, without giving way on either side. Spithridates, lieutenantgovernor of Ionia, and son-in-law to Darius, distinguished himself above the rest of the generals by his superior bravery. Surrounded by forty Persian lords, all of them his relations, of experienced valour, and who never moved from his side, he carried terror wherever he came. Alexander observing in how gallant a manner he signalized himself, clapt spurs to his horse and advanced towards him. Immediately they engaged, and each having thrown a javelin, wounded the other slightly. Spithridates falls furiously sword in hand upon Alexander, who, being prepared for him, thrusts his pike into his face, and laid him dead at his feet. At that very moment, Rhesaces, brother to that nobleman, charging him on the side, gave him a furious blow on the head with his battle axe, which beat off his plume, but went no deeper than his hair. As he was going to repeat the blow on his head, which now appeared through the broken helmet, Clytus cut off Rhesaces's hand with one stroke of his scymitar, and by that means saved his sovereign's life. The danger to which Alexander had exposed himself, added fresh courage to his soldiers, who now performed prodigies of valour. The Persians therefore, unable any longer to sustain the assault of the Macedonians, immediately gave way, and were put to a total rout. Alexander did not pursue them far, but wheeling about suddenly, began in an instant to make an attack upon the foot.

The contest here was neither long nor violent; for the enemy seeing the Macedonian phalanx, which had now crossed the river, and was regularly formed, advancing against them, they immediately took to flight, all but the Grecian infantry in Darius's pay. This body of foot,