1 INVASION OF ALEXANDER. 67
2 dazzling wealth and great fertility of the regions of the Ganges, of kingdoms
3 overflowing with riches and of treasures accumulated for ages, and his
4 desire was to plant the triumphant flag of Macedon on the extreme eastern
5 limit of Asia, where it was bounded by the ocean. He had now reached
6 the Hyphasis (Bids) at a point conjectured to have been below its confluence
7 with the Sutlej. The historians of Alexander make no mention of the
8 Sutlej, though they allude to a desert beyond the Hyphasis which existed
9 below the junction of the two rivers. Here his soldiers were told that the
10 the kings of the Gangarides and Parasians had formed a confederacy to
11 check the progress of the Macedonians with an army of eighty thousand
12 cavalry, two hundred thousand infantry, two thousand armed chariots and
13 three thousand war elephants. They heard of the warlike resources and
14 power of Palibothra, the Indian Babylon, of the might of the royal lunar race
15 that adorned the throne of Magadha, and of the military strength of the Hindu
16 towns of Indraprastha. Hastinapuir and Mathfira. Above all, they were told
17 that, after they had crossed the Hyphasis (Bids,) their direct line of march
18 would lie through a dreary desert of eleven days’ journey, at the end of
19 which they would reach the Ganges, described as a very broad, deep and rapid
20 river. These appalling accounts filled the Grecian soldiers with consternation,
21 and they refused to march further, on the plea of fatigue and exhaustion,
22 caused by the hardships they had undergone in the late wars, carried on in
23 countries so difficult of access and so remote from their beloved home. The
24 ambition of Alexander, moreover, was boundless, and there was no knowing
25 where he might lead them.
26 In vain did Alexander appeal to the valour and zeal of the Macedonian
27 soldiers. In vain did he seek to win the sympathy of his veteran officers for
28 his projects. In vain did he remind them of their past glorious career, and
29 of the great victories they had gained on the plains of Arbela and in Bactria,
30 Sogdiana and other places, auguring future triumphs still more glorious. He
31 urged upon them further that retreat would be untimely and disgraceful, and
32 that, having advanced thus far towards their goal, they should not relinquish
33 the dazzling prize. All his eloquence had no effect on the toil-worn soldiery,
34 whose desire to revisit their native country was insuperable, and retiring to
35 his tent in disgust, he shut himself up for three days in sullen solitude, re-
36 fusing to see even those who had the privilege of his intimate friendship:
37 but when, on his again appearing in public, he found the soldiers as obstinate
38 as before, the conqueror of the world, fearing that the disaffection might
39 ihe in open sedition, at length yielded a reluctant assent to the wishes of
40 is army.
41 Before, however, commencing his retrogade march, Alexander raised twelve
42 magnificent altars of hewn stone, fifty cubits in height, on the eastern bank
43 of the Hyphasis (Bids) below its confluence with the Hesudrus (Sutlej) as
44 an enduring monument of his labours and victories, and upon them sacrifices
45 to the gods were offered, with due solemnity, followed by the customary festi-
46 vities and equestrian games. According to Arrian, these altars were equal
47 in height to fortified towers, but far exceeded them in bulk. Plutarch, in his
48 Vita Alexandris, informs us that these colossal altars remained standing in
49 his time, and that “the Indians from beyond the Ganges used to come and
50 sacrifice au them.” Mr. Prinsep, writing on the expedition of Alexander,
51 in the Jéurnal of the Asiatic Soci ety of Bengal, says: “ Appollonius Tyaneus
52 saw thése altars, in the first century of the Christian era, when a king of
53 Greek race, named Pharaotes, was reigning in the Panjab.” Burnes made a
54 diligent search for their remains below the junction of the Bids and the
55 Sutlej, but could find none,
56 The Grecian soldicis
57 dismayed at the appal-
58 lang accounts heard by
59 them of the regions of
60 the Ganges.
61 Their refusal to
62 maich further,
63 Alexander exhoits
64 them to continue their
65 march,
66 The soldiers insist
67 on a 1etreat.
68 Alexander yields
69 a reluctant_assent,
70 The altars of
71 Alexander.
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