Although Alexandria perhaps in the end may have surpassed the expectations of the founder, yet the selection of the site, favourable only for navigation and commerce, shows that an eye was originally had to those objects. 25. Invasion of Inner Asia, facilitated by the tacit submission of the ruling tribes, and by the state of cultivation in which the country was found. On the plains of Arbela the Macedonian tactics were completely triumphant. It might now be said that the throne of Persia was overturned; and the unexpectedly easy capture of Babylon, Susa, and Persepolis, was surely of more importance for the moment than the pursuit of a flying king. Insurrection of the Greeks quelled by Antipater; Alexander himself falls in with the malcontent envoys to Darius in the interior of Asia. 26. The subjection of the north-eastern provinces of the Persian empire would perhaps have been attended with the greatest difficulties, had not the astonishing activity of the conqueror crushed in their birth the schemes of the treacherous Bessus, who, after the assassination of Darius, wished to erect a separate kingdom in Bactria. The Jaxartes was now the northern boundary of the Macedonian monarchy, as it had hitherto been that of the Persian. Besides, the possession of the rich trading countries, Bactria and Sogdiana, was in itself an object of vast importance. During this expedition, the execution of Philotas and his father Parmenio took place, though both were, probably, guiltless of the conspiracy laid to their charge, 330. After the death of Darius, Alexander met with almost constant opposition in his own army: the majority of the troops fancying that that event precluded the necessity of any further exertions. Cautious as Alexander was in his treatment of the Macedonian nobles, we may discern, not however by the mere example of Clitus, how difficult they found it to banish from their memory the relations in which they had formerly stood to their kings. 27. Alexander's expedition against India had, no doubt, its origin in that propensity to romantic enterprise which constituted a main feature in his character. Yet what could be more natural than that a close view of Persian splendour, the conquest of such wealthy countries, and the desire of prosecuting his vast commercial designs, should gradually mature in the mind of the Macedonian king the plan of subjecting a country which was represented as the golden land of Asia. To this likewise the scantiness of geographic information must have greatly contributed; if he pressed forward to the eastern seas, the circle of his dominion would, it was supposed, be complete.--It appears very certain that Alexander was destitute of a sufficient knowledge of the country when he entered upon this expedition.