mastered by any other pleasure, he had not sufficient self-control to keep aloof from danger, through his impetuosity in battle and his passion for glory. Nearchus also says that a certain old Boeotian, whose name he does not mention, perceiving that Alexander was offended at the censures of his friends and was looking sullenly at them, came near him, and speaking in the Boeotian dialect, said: "Alexander, it is the part of heroes to perform great deeds!" and repeated a certain Iambic verse, the purport of which is, that the man who performs anything great is destined also to suffer.[1] This man was not only acceptable to Alexander at the time, but was afterwards received into his more intimate acquaintance.
CHAPTER XIV.
Voyage down the Hydraotes and Acesines into the Indus.
At this time arrived envoys from the Mallians who still survived, offering the submission of the nation; also from the Oxydracians came both the leaders of the cities and the governors of the provinces, accompanied by the other 150 most notable men, with full powers to make a treaty, bringing the gifts which are considered most valuable among the Indians, and also, like the Mallians, offering the submission of their nation. They said that their error in not having sent an embassy to him before was pardonable, because they excelled other races in the desire to be free and independent, and their freedom had been secure from the time Dionysus came into India until Alexander came; but if it seemed good to him, inasmuch as there was a general report that
- ↑ This line is a fragment from one of the lost tragedies of Aeschylus: δράσαντι γάρ τι καὶ παιθεῖν ὀφείλεται
