This measure
appears to have been more energetic than the occasion really required;
and yet it proved more ruinous in the design than in the execution:
for although some of the soldiers were vexed at the order, most of
them with enthusiastic shouts distributed their most useful property
among those who were in want, burning and destroying all the rest with
a cheerful alacrity which raised Alexander's spirits to the highest
pitch. Yet Alexander was terrible and pitiless in all cases of
dereliction of duty. He put to death Menander, one of his personal
friends, because he did not remain in a fort, where he had been
appointed to command the garrison; and he shot dead with his own hand
Orsodates, a native chief who had revolted from him. At this time it
happened that a ewe brought forth a lamb, upon whose head was a tiara
in shape and colour like that of the King of Persia, with stones
hanging on each side of it.
Alexander, much disturbed at this portent, was purified by the
priests at Babylon, whom he was accustomed to make use of for this
purpose, but told his friends that he was alarmed for their sake, and
not for his own, as he feared that if he fell, heaven might transfer
his crown to some unworthy and feeble successor. However, he was soon
cheered by a better omen. The chief of Alexander's household servants,
a Macedonian named Proxenus, while digging a place to pitch the royal
tent near the river Oxus, discovered a well, full of a smooth, fatty
liquid.
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