From Memphis, he descended the westernmost branch of the Nile to Kanôpus at its mouth, from whence he sailed westerly along the shore to look at the island of Pharos, celebrated in Homer, and the lake Mareôtis. Reckoning Egypt now as a portion of his empire, and considering that the business of keeping down an unquiet population, as well as of collecting a large revenue, would have to be performed by his extraneous land and sea force, he saw the necessity of withdrawing the seat of government from Memphis, where both the Persians and the natives had maintained it, and of founding a new city of his own on the seaboard, convenient for communication with Greece and Macedonia. His imagination, susceptible to all Homeric impressions and influenced by a dream, first fixed upon the isle of Pharos as a suitable place for his intended city.[342] Perceiving soon, however, that this little isle was inadequate by itself, he included it as part of a larger city to be founded on the adjacent mainland. The gods were consulted, and encouraging responses were obtained; upon which Alexander himself marked out the circuit of the walls, the direction of the principal streets, and the sites of numerous temples to Grecian gods as well as Egyptian.[343] It was thus that the first stone was laid of the mighty, populous, and busy Alexandria; which however the founder himself never lived to see, and wherein he was only destined to repose as a corpse. The site of the place, between the sea and the Lake Mareôtis, was found airy and healthy, as well as convenient for shipping and commerce. The protecting island of Pharos gave the means of forming two good harbors for ships coming by sea, on a coast harborless elsewhere; while the Lake Mareôtis, communicating by various canals with the river Nile, received with facility the exportable produce from the interior.[344] As soon as houses were ready, commencement was made by transporting to them in mass the population of the neighboring town of Kanôpus, and probably of other towns besides, by the intendant Kleomenes.[345] [342] Curtius, iv. 8, 1-4; Plutarch, Alexand. 26. [343] Arrian, iii. 1, 8; Curtius, iv. 8, 2-6; Diodor. xvii. 52. [344] Strabo, xvii. p. 793. Other authors however speak of the salubrity of Alexandria less favorably than Strabo: see St. Croix, Examen des Hist. d’ Alexandre, p. 287. [345] Pseudo-Aristotle, Œconomic. ii. 32.