[320] Aurengzêb captured Surat by a similar device, and to the great astonishment of the inhabitants.
[321] According to Diodôros this happened in the neighbourhood of Harmatelia, for conjectures as to the position of which see [Note T]. Strabo says it happened in the country of the Oreitai.
[322] It has been thought this name may be constructed from Maharâjah, “great king.” For identification of Patala see [Note U].
[323] This island is called by Arrian Killouta, and by Plutarch Skilloustis. See Note on Arrian, [p. 164].
[324] See [Note Gg], Tides in Indian Rivers.
[325] This lake, however, was discovered neither on this voyage nor on this arm of the Indus, but during a subsequent voyage which Alexander made down the eastern arm.
[326] “No magnificent idea,” says Vincent, “is requisite to conceive the building of cities in the East. A fort or citadel with a mud wall to mark the circumference of the pettah or town is all that falls to the share of the founder. The habitations are raised in a few days or hours.... The Soldan of Egypt insults Timour by telling him: ‘The cities of the East are built of mud, and ephemeral; ours in Syria and Egypt are of stone, and eternal.’”
[327] Nearchos with the fleet rejoined the army at a point on the river, Pasitigris or Karun, near the modern village of Ahwaz, where was a bridge by which Alexander led his army from Persis to Sousa, where he arrived February 324 B.C.
[328] The Alexandreia of Diodôros, and probably also the Alexandreia which, as we learn from Pliny (vi. 25), was built by Leonnatos by Alexander’s orders on the confines of the Arian nation. It may also be the fifteenth of the Alexandreias of Stephanos Byz., which he places in the country of the Arachosians next to India. It was perhaps, however, the Portus Alexandri, now Karâchi, where Nearchos was detained by the prevalence of the monsoon for twenty-four days.
[329] Hence their name Ichthyophagoi. They inhabited the maritime parts of the Oreitai and Gedrosians. In sailing along their coast Nearchos and his men suffered great hardships from scarcity of provisions. See Arrian’s Indika, 24-31. Much may also be read of this people in Strabo, Pliny, Ailianos, and Agatharchides.