The army worshipped Alexander, and he knew how to appeal to the imagination of his followers and to gain their devotion. He was once detained by a serious illness, caused by bathing in an ice-cold river. One of his physicians had prepared medicine for him, but before he had taken it, one of his commanders sent the King a letter bidding him beware of Philip (the physician) who, he said, had been bribed by Darius to poison him. Having read the letter, Alexander
put it under his pillow without showing it to anybody, and when Philip came in with the potion, he took it with great cheerfulness and assurance, giving him the letter to read. It was well worth being present to see Alexander take the draught and Philip read the letter at the same time.[[14]]
On one occasion
he had made a long and painful march of eleven days, during which his soldiers suffered so much from want of water that they were ready to give up. While they were in this distress it happened that some Macedonians who had fetched water in skins upon their mules from a river they had found out came about noon to the place where Alexander was, and seeing him almost choked with thirst, presently filled a helmet and offered it to him. He asked them to whom they were carrying the water; they told him to their children, adding that if his life were but saved, it was no matter for them though they all perished. Then he took the helmet into his hands, and looking round about, when he saw all those who were with him stretching their heads out and looking earnestly after the drink, he returned it again with thanks without taking a drop of it. "For," said he, "if I alone should drink, the rest will be out of heart." When the soldiers heard him speak in this way, they one and all cried out to him to lead them forward boldly, and began whipping on their horses. For whilst they had such a King they said they defied both weariness and thirst, and looked upon themselves to be little less than immortal.[[15]]
On another occasion the hardships endured by the army were so great that the men were almost ready to refuse to follow Alexander any further. But he called them together, and spoke to them, reminding them that he asked no one to suffer what he himself did not suffer.
I often sit up at night to watch for you, [he said], that you may be able to sleep. Who is there of you who knows that he has endured greater toil for me than I have for him? I have been wounded with the sword in close fight; I have been shot with arrows; and though I have suffered these things for the sake of your lives, your glory, and your wealth, I am still leading you as conquerors over all the land and sea, all rivers, mountains and plains.[[16]]
And the magic of his personality silenced all their murmuring and banished all their discontent.
Followed by this devoted army, Alexander started on a marvellous campaign which led him to the uttermost limit of the then known world, even beyond the Indus into India. In battle after battle he met those who opposed his path and conquered them. Alexander did not know the meaning of the word impossible. He was told once that a certain mountain pass was impracticable. For other men, it would have been, but Alexander gave orders that his spearmen should cut steps in the steep rock, and where before only the surest-footed goats had climbed, Alexander and his men passed in safety. His men followed him over snowy mountains in winter, and across thirsty deserts in summer, up and down the lower ranges of the Himalaya Mountains, where the best European armies of today can only go with difficulty. They crossed the plains of India in the rainy season, and even went through that country so unfit for human habitation that Mohammedan conquerors of a later age declared it was a place fit only to be dwelt in by the souls of the lost.
Nothing stopped Alexander, not the mountain barrier, nor the deep river, nor the burning sands. On he went, until he reached what he believed to be the River Ocean that girdled the earth.