Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/369

 DEATH OF PERDIKKAS. 337 t(T.T behavior gained their goodwill. Onlj two days after this revolution, a messenger from Eumenes reached the camp, an- nouncing his victory and the death of Kraterus. Had tliis intel- ligence been received by Perdikkas himself at the head of his army, the course of subsequent events might have been sensibly altered. Eumenes would have occupied the most commanding position in Asia, as general of the kings of the Alexandrine fam- ily, to whom both his interests and his feelings attached him. But the news, arriving at the moment when it did, caused throughout the army only the most violent exasperation against him ; not simply as ally of the odious Perdikkas, but as cause of death to the esteemed Kraterus. He, together with Alketa^s and fifty officers, was voted by the soldiers a public enemy. No measures were kept with him henceforward by Macedonian offi- cers or soldiers. At the same time several officers attached to Perdikkas in the camp, and also Atalanta his sister, were slain.^ By the death of Perdikkas, and the defection of his soldiers, complete preponderance was thrown into the hands of Antipater, Ptolemy, and Antigonus. Antipater was invited to join the army, now consisting of the forces both of Ptolemy and Perdik- kas united. He was there invested with the guardianship of the persons of the kings, and with the sort of ministerial supremacy previously held by Perdikkas. He was however exposed to much difficulty, and even to great personal danger, fi-om the in trigues of the princess Eurydike, who displayed a masculine boldness in publicly haranguing the soldiers — and from the dis- contents of the army, who claimed presents, formerly promised to them by Alexander, which there were no funds to liquidate at the moment. At Triparadisus in Syria, Antipater made a second distribution of the satrapies of the empire ; somewhat modified, yet coinciding in the main with that which had been drawn up shortly after the death of Alexander. To Ptolemy was assured Egypt and Libya, — to Antigonus, the Greater Phrygia, Lykia, and Pamphylia — as each had had before.- Antigonus was placed in command of the principal Macedon- ' Plutarch, Eumenes, 8; Cornel. Ncpos, Eumenes, 4 ; Diodor. xviii. 3G, 37. VOL. XII. 29
 * Diodor xviii. 39. Arrian, ap. I'hotium.