Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/240

 208 HISTORY OF GREECE. During this halt at Marakanda (Samarcand) the memorable banquet occurred wherein Alexander murdered Kleitus. It has been already related that Kleitus had saved his life at the battle of the Gi'anikus, by cutting off the sword arm of the Persian Spi- thridates when already uplifted to strike him from behind. Since the death of Philotas, the important function of general of the Companion-cavalry had been divided between Hephaestion and Kleitus. Moreover, the family of Kleitus had been attached to Philip, by ties so ancient, that his sister, Lanike, had been se- lected as the nurse of Alexander himself when a child. Two of her sons had already perished in the Asiatic battles. If, therefore, there were any man who stood high in the service, or was privileged to speak his mind freely to Alexandei", it was Kleitus. In this banquet at Marakanda, when wine, according to the Macedonian habit, had been abudantly drunk, and when Alexan- der, Kleitus, and most of the other guests were already nearly intoxicated, enthusiasts or flatterers heaped immoderate eulogies upon the king's past achievements.' They exalted him above all the most venerated legendary heroes ; -they proclaimed that his superhuman deeds proved his divine paternity, and that he liad earned an apotheosis like Herakles, which nothing but envy could withhold from him during his life. Alexander himself joined in these boasts, and even took credit for the later victories of the reign of his father, whose abilities and glory he depre- ciated. To the old Macedonian officers, such an insult cast on ficrves (Introduction to the Memoirs of Sultan Baber, p. xliii.) : — "The lace of the country is extremely broken, and divided by lofty iiilis ; even the plains are diversified by great varieties of soil, — some extensive districts alonj^ the Kohik river, nearly the whole of Ferghana (along the Jaxartes), the greater part of Kwarizm along the branches of the Oxus, with the large portions of Balkh, Badakshan, Kesh, and Hissar, being of uncommon fertility; while the greater part of the rest is a barren waste, and in some j)laces a sandy desert. Indeed the whole country north of the Oxus has a decided tendency to degenerate into desert, and many of its most fruitful spaces are nearly surrounded by barren sands ; so that the population of all these districts still, as in the time of Baber, consists of the fixed inhabit ants of the cities and fertile lands, and Df the unsettled and roving wander ers of the desert, who dwell in tents of felt, and live on the produce of thei' flocks." • Arrian, iv. 8, 7.