Intense remorse of immedi ately after the deed. No sooner was the deed perpetrated, than the Alexander, feelings of Alexander underwent an entire revolution. The spectacle of Kleitus, a bleeding corpse on the floor, the marks of stupefaction and horror evident in all the spectators, and the reaction from a furious impulse instantaneously satiated-plunged him at once into the opposite extreme of remorse and self-condemnation. Hastening out of the hall, and retiring to bed, he passed three days in an agony of distress, without food or drink. He burst into tears and multiplied exclamations on his own mad act; he dwelt upon the names of Kleitus and preciation of Philip. He then tells us that Kleitus, on hearing their unseemly talk, turned round and whispered to his neighbour some lines out of the Andromachê of Euripides (which lines Plutarch also ascribes to him, though at a later moment); that Alexander, not hearing the words, asked what had been said, but no one would tell him; at length Kleitus himself repeated the sentiment in language of his own. This would suit a literary Greek; but an old Macedonian officer half intoxicated, when animated by a vehement sentiment, would hardly express it by whispering a Greek poetical quotation to his neighbour. He would either hold his tongue, or speak what he felt broadly and directly. Nevertheless Curtius has stated two points very material to the case, which do not appear in Arrian. 1. It was Alexander himself, not his flatterers, who vilipended Philip; at least the flatterers only did so, after him, and following his example. The topic would be dangerous for them to originate, and might easily be carried too far. 2. Among all the topics touched upon by Kleitus, none was so intolerable as the open expression of sympathy, friendship, and regret, for Parmenio. This stung Alexander in the sorest point of his conscience; he must have known that there were many present who sympathised with it; and it was probably the main cause which worked him up to phrenzy. Moreover we may be pretty sure that Kleitus, while expatiating upon Philip, would not forget Philip's general in chief and his own old friend, Parmenio. I cannot believe the statement of Aristobulus, that Kleitus was forced by his friends out of the hall, and afterwards returned to it of his own accord, to defy Alexander once more. It seems plain from Arrian, that Ptolemy said no such thing. The murderous impulse of Alexander was gratified on the spot, and without delay, as soon as he got clear from the gentle restraint of his surrounding friends. CHAP. XCIV.] REMORSE OF ALEXANDER. 287 Lanikê with the debt of gratitude which he owed to each, and denounced himself as unworthy to live after having requited such services with a foul murder1. His friends at length prevailed on him to take food, and return to activity. All joined in trying to restore his self-satisfaction. The Macedonian army passed a public vote that Kleitus had been justly slain, and that his body should remain unburied; which afforded opportunity to Alexander to reverse the vote, and to direct that it should be buried by his own order2. The prophets comforted him by the assurance that his murderous impulse had arisen, not from his own natural mind, but from a maddening perversion intentionally brought on by the God Dionysus, to avenge the omission of a sacrifice due to him on the day of the banquet, but withheld. Lastly, the Greek sophist or philosopher, Anaxarchus of Abdera, revived Alexander's spirits by well-timed flattery, treating his sensibility as nothing better than generous weakness; reminding 1 Arrian, iv. 9, 4; Curtius, viii. 2, 2. 2 Curtius, viii. 2, 12. "Quoque minus cædis puderet, jure interfectum Clitum Macedones decernunt; sepulturâ quoque prohibituri, ni rex humari jussisset." In explanation of this monstrous verdict of the soldiers, we must recollect that the safety of the whole army (now at Samarcand, almost beyond the boundary of inhabited regions, ἔξω τῆς οἰκουμένης) was felt to depend on the life of Alexander. Compare Justin, xii. 6, 15. 3 Arrian, iv. 9, 6. Alexander imagined himself to have incurred the displeasure of Dionysus by having sacked and destroyed the city of Thebes, the supposed birth-place and favourite locality of that god (Plutarch, Alex. 13). The maddening delusion brought upon men by the wrath of Dionysus is awfully depicted in the Baccha of Euripides. Under the influence of that delusion, Agavê, mother of Pentheus, tears her son in pieces and bears away his head in triumph, not knowing what is in her hands. Compare also Euripid. Hippolyt. 440-1412. B.C. 328. Active and successful operations of Alexan der in Sog diana. him that in his exalted position of conqueror and Great King, he was entitled to prescribe what was right and just, instead of submitting himself to laws dictated from without'. Kallisthenes the philosopher was also summoned, along with Anaxarchus, to the king's presence, for the same purpose of offering consolatory reflections. But he is said to have adopted a tone of discourse altogether different, and to have given offence rather than satisfaction to Alexander. To such remedial influences, and probably still more to the absolute necessity for action, Alexander's remorse at length yielded. Like the other emotions of his fiery soul, it was violent and overpowering while it lasted. But it cannot be shown to have left any durable trace on his character, nor any effects justifying the unbounded admiration of Arrian; who has little but blame to bestow on the inurdered Kleitus, while he expresses the strongest sympathy for the mental suffering of the murderer. After ten days, Alexander again put his army in motion, to complete the subjugation of Sogdiana. He found no enemy capable of meeting him in pitched battle; yet Spitamenes, with the Sogdians and some Scythian allies, raised much hostility of detail, which it cost another year to put down. Alexander underwent the greatest fatigue and hardships in his marches through the mountainous parts of this wide, rugged, and poorly supplied country, with rocky positions, strong by nature, 1 Arrian, iv. 9, 10; Plutarch, Alex. 52. 2 Curtius, viii. 2, 13-" decem diebus ad confirmandum pudorem apud Maracanda consumptis," &c. CHAP. XCIV.] MILITARY OPERATIONS IN SOGDIANA. 289 which his enemies sought to defend. One of these fastnesses, held by a native chief named Sisymithres, seemed almost unattackable, and was indeed taken rather by intimidation than by actual force'. The Scythians, after a partial success over a small Macedonian detachment, were at length so thoroughly beaten and overawed, that they slew Spitamenes and sent his head to the conqueror as a propitiatory offering 2. 327, winter, two inex positions dian rock Passion of for Roxana. After a short rest at Naütaka during the extreme B.C. 328winter, Alexander resumed operations, by attacking spring. a strong post called the Sogdian Rock, whither a Capture of large number of fugitives had assembled, with an pugnable ample supply of provision. It was a precipice sup- the Sogposed to be inexpugnable; and would seemingly the rock of have proved so, in spite of the energy and abilities Chorienes. of Alexander, had not the occupants altogether Alexander neglected their guard, and yielded at the mere sight of a handful of Macedonians who had scrambled up the precipice. Among the captives, taken by Alexander on this rock, were the wife and family of the Baktrian chief Oxyartes; one of whose daughters, named Roxana, so captivated Alexander by her beauty that he resolved to make her his wife 3. He then passed out of Sogdiana into the neighbouring territory Parætakênê, where there was another inexpugnable site called the Rock of Choriênes, which he was also fortunate enough to reduce 1. From hence Alexander went to Baktra. Sending B.c. 327. 1 Curtius, viii. 2, 20-30. * Arrian, iv. 17, 11. Curtius (viii. 3) gives a different narrative of the death of Spitamenes. 3 Arrian, iv. 18, 19. 'Arrian, iv. 21. Our geographical knowledge does not enable us to verify these localities, or to follow Alexander in his marches of detail. VOL. XII. U B.C. 327, spring. Alexander Kraterus with a division to put the last hand to the reduction of Parætakênê, he himself remained at Baktra, preparing for his expedition across the Hindoo-Koosh to the conquest of India. As a security for the tranquillity of Baktria and Sogdiana during his absence, he levied 30,000 young soldiers from those countries to accompany him'. It was at Baktra that Alexander celebrated his marriage with the captive Roxana. Amidst the at Baktra repose and festivities connected with that event, the Oriental temper which he was now acquiring demand for displayed itself more forcibly than ever. He could marriage with Roxe ana. His prostration or worship from all. Public harangue of banquet, no longer be satisfied without obtaining prostration, or worship, from Greeks and Macedonians as well as from Persians; a public and unanimous recognition of his divine origin and superhuman dignity. Some Greeks and Macedonians had already rendered to him this homage. Nevertheless to the greater number, in spite of their extreme deference and admiration for him, it was repugnant and degrading. Even the imperious Alexander shrank from issuing public and formal orders on such a subject; but a manœuvre was concerted, with his privity, by the Persians and certain compliant Greek sophists or philosophers, for the purpose of carrying the point by surprise. During a banquet at Baktra, the philosopher Anaxarchus Anaxarchus, addressing the assembly in a prepared during a harangue, extolled Alexander's exploits as greatly surpassing those of Dionysus and Herakles. He proclaimed that Alexander had already done more than enough to establish a title to divine honours from every one to render this wor 1 Curtius, viii. 5, 1; Arrian, iv. 22, 2. |