those that followed Alexander were in this respect nothing more than his conscious or unconscious imitators. The great princes and generals who after his death parted his Empire among them, and the Romans who gradually ate up the fragments left to these princes’ effete descendants, could but carry on the work set on foot by the Great Conqueror. As Mr Hogarth has said, very little that he did was ever undone, and for good or ill, he has taken his place among the immortals[102]. Thus, from the scientific point of view, there is none among the forerunners of Christianity who did more to prepare and make ready its way than Alexander. Footnote 30: Such as the Arimaspi or one-eyed inhabitants of Russia, about whom Herodotus (Bk III. c. 116) quotes the legend that they stole gold from its griffin guardians, and those _myrmeces_ or great ants whom Megasthenes (Strabo, Bk XV. c. 1, § 44) and other writers describe as digging for gold on the Thibetan frontier—a story of which more than one rationalistic explanation has been suggested. Footnote 31: Rawlinson’s _Herodotus_ (1862 edition), II. p. 462 for authorities. Footnote 32: Maspero, _Histoire ancienne des Peuples de l’Orient_, Paris, 1904, p. 706. Rawlinson, _op. cit._ p. 463, thinks this practice lapsed early, but Xenophon seems clear that it was in force in his time (_Cyropaedia_, Bk VIII. c. 6). Footnote 33: He was probably allowed a reasonable sum for the maintenance of his court and government; but if he exceeded this, was liable to severe punishment. This appears from the execution by Alexander, on his return from India, of the satraps who had been guilty of extortion. He seems to have purposely preserved the Persian laws and customs on this point unaltered. Footnote 34: This is the opinion of Rawlinson, _op. cit._ pp. 460 _sqq._ Footnote 35: Rawlinson, _op. cit._ p. 464; Winwood Reade, _Martyrdom of Man_, 1910, p. 56; Sayce, _Ancient Empires of the East_, 1884, pp. 250, 251; Maspero, _op. cit._ p. 721. Footnote 36: Oppert, _Le Peuple et la Langue des Mèdes_, Paris, pp. 17 _sqq._; Maspero, _op. cit._ p. 559, n. 11. Footnote 37: Sir Thomas Holdich, in his excellent book _The Gates of India_ (p. 104), says that when he defeated the Aspasians or Yusufzai in the Kuner Valley he sent the pick of their cattle back to Macedonia to improve the native breed. Arrian, _Anabasis_, Bk IV. c. 25, however, in quoting the story from Ptolemy, says only that Alexander “wished to send them” to till the soil. It seems impossible that they could have survived the journey before the days of steamships. Still more incredible is the story in Plutarch, _Life of Alexander_, c. L. that when Alexander was at Prophthasia (probably Farrah in Seistan), he received some grapes grown on the coast of Greece. But such stories, although coloured by age, may serve to show how perfect his communications were always thought to have been.