What is there strange and unexpected that has not happened in our time? We have not lived the life of ordinary men, and the things we have seen will become a tale of wonder to posterity. Is not the King of the Persians, he who channelled Athos, he who bridged the Hellespont, he who demanded earth and water of the Greeks, he who dared to write in his letters that he was lord of all men from the rising of the sun unto its setting, is he not struggling now, no longer for lordship over others, but already for his life? Alexander had conquered the Great King and seated himself on the royal throne of Persia under the canopy of gold. But now that he had reached the summit of his ambition and was master of the greatest empire in the world, a change came over him, and he began to indulge his passions and to give himself up to all kinds of dissipation. He dressed like a Persian, which deeply offended the {354} Greeks, who became jealous of the increasing favour the King showed to the Barbarian. Slowly the leaders of Alexander's army began to realize the change that was taking place in their general, and though he gained in popularity with the Persians, he began to lose some of the devotion hitherto felt for him by the Greeks and Macedonians, and he was becoming estranged from his old followers. At length they realized that it was not a Greek conquest that would enslave Asia of which he dreamed, but of a world empire, in which the Barbarian would live on equal terms with the Greek. Alexander was far-seeing beyond his age, and he had learned that men whose customs are alien to those in which he had been brought up were not always to be despised, and that if he dreamed of holding the world empire he had conquered, he could only do so by treating all parts of it alike, and by encouraging intercourse between the different races which composed it. However wise this may have been, it is not difficult to understand the feeling of the older Greeks who had been educated to feel a gulf between them and the Barbarian that nothing could ever bridge. The climax of the estrangement between Alexander and his old companions came in a tragic scene at a banquet. Alexander and his friends had been drinking fast and furiously, then songs had been sung, some of which ridiculed the Macedonian officers who had recently been unfortunate in a skirmish. The older men present were offended, but Alexander laughed and had the song repeated. Clitus, who had been an old and trusted friend of {355} the King, said angrily: "It is not well to make a jest of Macedonians among their enemies, for, though they have met with misfortunes, they are better men than those who laugh at them." Angry words passed between him and the King, until, unable to control his rage, Alexander snatched a spear from one of his guards and ran it through the body of Clitus, who fell dead to the ground. Dead silence followed this mad deed, and Alexander was