in Greece now, towards war against Persia. — Preparations of Philip for the invasion of Persia. — Philip repudiates Olympias at the instance of his recently married wife, Kleopatra — resentment of Olympias and Alexander — dissension at Court. — Great festival in Macedonia — celebrating the birth of a son to Philip by Kleopatra, and the marriage of his daughter with Alexander of Epirus. — Pausanias — outrage inflicted upon him — his resentment against Philip, encouraged by the partisans of Olympias and Alexander. — Assassination of Philip by Pausanias, who is slain by the guards. — Accomplices of Pausanias. — Alexander the great is declared king — first notice given to him by the Lynkestian Alexander, one of the conspirators — Attalus and queen Kleopatra, with her infant son, are put to death. — Satisfaction manifested by Olympias at the death of Philip. — Character of Philip. 434-523 HISTORY OF GREECE. CHAPTER LXXXIII. SICILIAN AFFAIRS (_continued_). — FROM THE DESTRUCTION OF THE CARTHAGINIAN ARMY BY PESTILENCE BEFORE SYRACUSE, DOWN TO THE DEATH OF DIONYSIUS THE ELDER. B. C. 394-367. In my preceding volume, I have described the first eleven years of the reign of Dionysius called the Elder, as despot at Syracuse, down to his first great war against the Carthaginians; which war ended by a sudden turn of fortune in his favor, at a time when he was hard pressed and actually besieged. The victorious Carthaginian army before Syracuse was utterly ruined by a terrible pestilence, followed by ignominious treason on the part of its commander Imilkon. Within the space of less than thirty years, we read of four distinct epidemic distempers,[1] each of frightful severity, as having afflicted Carthage and her armies in Sicily, without touching either Syracuse or the Sicilian Greeks. Such epidemics were the most irresistible of all enemies to the Carthaginians, and the most effective allies to Dionysius. The second and third,—conspicuous among the many fortunate events of his life,—occurred at the exact juncture necessary for rescuing him from a tide of superiority in the Carthaginian arms, which seemed in a fair way to overwhelm him completely. Upon what physical conditions the frequent repetition of such a calamity depended, together with the remarkable fact that it was confined to Carthage and her armies,—we know partially in respect to the third of the four cases, but not at all in regard to the others. [1] Diodor. xiii. 86-114; xiv. 70; xv. 24. Another pestilence is alluded to by Diodorus in 368 B. C. (Diodor. xv. 73). Movers notices the intense and frequent sufferings of the ancient Phœnicians, in their own country, from pestilence; and the fearful expiations to which these sufferings gave rise (Die Phönizier, vol. ii. part ii. p. 9).