[302] Alexander here refers to the plot of Hermoläos and the pages against his life.
[303] Philip was assassinated by Pausanias while entering the door of a theatre. The Elzevir editor aptly quotes an epigram on Henry IV. of France, to whom a saying was attributed Duo protegit unus:
“Gallorum Rex regna, inquis, duo protegit unus;
Protexêre tuum nec duo regna caput.”
[304] The incident is mentioned briefly by Diodôros (xvii. 99). The 3000 Greeks who left their colonies to return home suffered great hardships on the way, and were slain by the Macedonians after Alexander’s death.
[305] The Sudracae and the Malli. They arrived while Alexander was still in camp near the confluence of the Hydraôtês with the Akesinês, where he had joined Hêphaistiôn and Nearchos.
[306] A statement, as Thirlwall observes, hardly consistent either with the boasts of independence made by the two nations, or with their recorded actions.
[307] Athenaios (vi. 13) relates, on the authority of Aristoboulos, that this Dioxippos, the Athenian, whom he calls a pankratiast, when Alexander on a certain occasion was wounded, and the blood flowing, exclaimed: “This is ichor such as flows in the veins of the blessed gods.” Ailianos in his Hist. Var. (x. 22) describes his combat with the Macedonian. Pliny (xxxv. 11) informs us that Dioxippos was painted as a victor in the Olympic pancratium by Aleimachus.
[308] It is uncertain whether the Macedonians were of the same blood as the Greeks. Their kings undoubtedly were, but Grote, influenced by his antipathy to Alexander, who had crushed the liberties of Greece, considered him little better than a barbarian, “who had at most put on some superficial varnish of Hellenic culture.” See on this point Freeman’s Historical Essays, vol. ii. pp. 192-201, 3rd ed.
[309] “The sword blades of India had a great fame over the East, and Indian steel, according to esteemed authorities, continued to be imported into Persia till days quite recent. Its fame goes back to very old times. Ktesias mentions two wonderful swords of such material that he got from the King of Persia and his mother. It is perhaps the ferrum candidum of which the Malli and Oxydracae sent 100 talents’ weight as a present to Alexander. Indian iron and steel are mentioned in the Periplus as imports into the Abyssinian ports.” See Yule’s Marco Polo, i. p. 94.