The historians represent Alexander as simple in his tastes and habits at this period. He was temperate in eating, drank wine with great moderation, and if he sat long at table, it was for the purpose of conversation, in which he excelled, though given to boasting of his military exploits. When business called, nothing could detain him; but in times of leisure, his first business in the morning was to sacrifice to the gods. He then took his dinner, sitting. The rest of the day he spent in hunting, or deciding differences among his troops, or in reading and writing. Sometimes he would exercise himself in shooting or darting the javelin, or in mounting and alighting from a chariot in full career. Sometimes, also, he diverted himself with fowling and fox-hunting. His chief meal was supper, which he took at evening, and in a recumbent posture, with his friends around him. He was not fond of delicacies and though they were always found at his table, he usually sent them to others. Such was Alexander during the early periods of his campaigns in Asia. After various operations, Alexander marched against Phoenicia and Sidon, which submitted at once. Tyre resisted, but, after a siege of seven months, was taken by storm. Eight thousand Tyrians fell in the onslaught, and thirty thousand captives were sold into slavery. Gaza was now taken, after a siege of two months. Alexander then marched to Jerusalem, to punish the inhabitants for refusing to supply him with men and money. The high priest, Jaddus, went forth to meet the conqueror, attended by the priests and the people, with all the imposing emblems and signs of the Jewish religion. Alexander was so struck with the spectacle, that he pardoned the people, adored the name of the Most High, and performed sacrifices in the temple, according to the instructions of Jaddus. The book of the prophet Daniel was shown to him, and the passage pointed out in which it was foretold that the king of Grecia would overcome the king of Persia, with which he was well pleased. The conqueror now turned his arms against Egypt, which yielded without striking a blow. Having established the government on a liberal footing, he set out, A. D. 331, to attack the Persian king, who had gathered an army of a million of men, and was now in Persia. About this time, he received a letter from Darius, in which that prince proposed, on condition of a pacification and future friendship, to pay him ten thousand talents in ransom of his prisoners, to cede him all the countries on this side the Euphrates, and to give him his daughter in marriage. Upon his communicating these proposals to his friends, Parmenio said, “If I were Alexander, I would accept them.” “So would I,” said Alexander, “if I were Parmenio.” The answer he gave Darius, was, “that if he would come to him, he should find the best of treatment; if not, he must go and seek him.”