Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/300

 26b HISTORY OF GREECE. fiable nor probable, unless we either reckon up simple military posts, or borrow from the list of foundations really established by his successors. Except Alexandria in Egypt, none of the cities founded by Alexander himself can be shown to have attained any great development. Nearly all were planted among the remote, warlike, and turbulent peoples eastward of the Cas-. plan Gates. Such establishments were really fortified posts to hold the country Iq subjection : Alexander lodged in them de- tachments from his army ; but none of these detachments can well have been large, since he could not afford materially to weaken his army, while active military operations were still go- ing on and while farther advance was in contemplation. More of these settlements were founded in Sogdiana than elsewhere ; but respecting the Sogdian foundations, we know that the Greeks whom he established there, chained to the spot only by fear of his powep, broke away in mutiny immediately on the news of his death.^ Some Greek soldiers in Alexandei''s army on the Jax- artes or the Hydaspes, sick and weary of his interminable marches, might prefer being enrolled among the colonists of a new city on one of these unknown rivers, to the ever-repeated routine of ex- the founder, .appears to me altogether slender and unsatisfactory. If Alex ander founded so many cities as Droysen imagines, liow does it happen that Arrian mentions only so comparatively small a number ? The argu- ment derived from Arrian's silence, for rejecting what is affirmed by other ancients respecting Alexander, is indeed employed by modern authors (and by Droysen himself among them), far oftener than I think warrantable. But if there be any one proceeding of Alexander more than another, in respect of which the silence of Arrian ought to make us suspicious — it is the foundation of a new colony ; a solemn act, requiring delay and multi- plied regulations, intended for perpetuity, and redounding to the honor of the founder. I do not believe in any colonies founded by Alexander^ beyond those comparatively few which Arrian mentions, except such as rest upon some other express and good testimony. Whoever will read through Droysen's list, will sec that most of the names in it will not stand this test. The short life, and rapid movements, of Alexander, are of them- Rclves the strongest presumption against his having founded so large a number of colonics. ' Diodor. xvii. 99; xviii. 7. Curtius, ix. 7, 1. Curtius observes (vii. 10, 15) respecting Alexander's colonies in Sogdiana — that they were founded "velut frasni domitarum gentium ; nunc originis suae oblita serviunt, qui bos iniperaverunt."