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22 - Rise of the Macedonian Empire by Arthur M. Curteis · Rise of the Macedonian Empire

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  Speaker 1: Section twenty two of the Rise of the Macedonian Empire
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  Speaker 1: by Arthur M. Curtis. This librovox recording is in the
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  Speaker 1: public domain. Read by Pamelinagami, Chapter fifteen, from the Oxes
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  Speaker 1: to the Hyphasis, Part two. But Porus was a different
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  Speaker 1: man from Darius. As soon as he learned that he
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  Speaker 1: had been outwitted and that the Macedonians were actually across
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  Speaker 1: the river, he sent forward one of his sons with
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  Speaker 1: two thousand cavalry and a hundred twenty chariots, while he
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  Speaker 1: himself prepared to follow with the main body. These cavalry
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  Speaker 1: were presently met by Alexander, but recognizing him and seeing
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  Speaker 1: his superior numbers, they faltered, broke and fled, hardly waiting
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  Speaker 1: for his charge. All the chariots, which had stuck fast
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  Speaker 1: and the mud, remained in his hands, and four hundred horsemen,
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  Speaker 1: including their leader, lay dead upon the field. Meanwhile, Porus
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  Speaker 1: had stationed a small force with a few elephants on
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  Speaker 1: the river banks to hold Craterus in check, and, having
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  Speaker 1: chosen his ground on sandy soil where there was firmer
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  Speaker 1: footing and ample room, was engaged in drawing up his
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  Speaker 1: troops in order of battle. The two hundred elephants were
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  Speaker 1: the mainstay of his line, standing forwards as Deotterus, like
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  Speaker 1: the bastions of a wall, at intervals of one hundred
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  Speaker 1: feet from one another, and the heavy armed infantry were
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  Speaker 1: like the curtain, ranged in line immediately behind the elephants.
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  Speaker 1: No horses, he thought, could be brought to face such
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  Speaker 1: a line, No troops could be so rash as to
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  Speaker 1: venture within. The spaces between the elephants on either flank
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  Speaker 1: were massed the cavalry, but his main reliance was clearly
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  Speaker 1: placed in the center of a line that seemed like
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  Speaker 1: a city to look at. As usual, Alexander's tack were
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  Speaker 1: suited to his enemy as at Issus and Gaugamela. So
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  Speaker 1: here he resolved that the cavalry of the right wing
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  Speaker 1: should bear the brunt of the attack, and that he
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  Speaker 1: himself would lead it, while the phalanx in the center
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  Speaker 1: was to hold back for a while in readiness to
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  Speaker 1: deliver the decisive blow. Coynus was on the left wing
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  Speaker 1: with about fifteen hundred cavalry, and was ordered to watch
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  Speaker 1: the cavalry of the enemy's wing opposite, and if they
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  Speaker 1: should offer to ride across to help their comrades on
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  Speaker 1: the left to follow and charge them. In the rear.
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  Speaker 1: The Indian cavalry on their left wing were still deploying
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  Speaker 1: from column into line when the Macedonian mounted archers rode
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  Speaker 1: forward to the attack, supported by the King himself with
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  Speaker 1: the companion cavalry. The Indians moved forward to meet the attack,
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  Speaker 1: but so much superior where Alexander's numbers seemed to be,
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  Speaker 1: that the horse from every part of the field, including
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  Speaker 1: the right wing, were at once ordered up to reinforce
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  Speaker 1: the threatened left. It was the very movement which Alexander
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  Speaker 1: had foreseen and provided for. Scarcely had the cavalry on
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  Speaker 1: the Indian right galloped off along the front to join
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  Speaker 1: their overmatched comrades on the left, than Coinnus wheeled round
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  Speaker 1: and followed them, and one wing of each army was
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  Speaker 1: thus suddenly withdrawn to the other end of the line.
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  Speaker 1: The Indian cavalry, however, now masked upon the left, had
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  Speaker 1: a difficult maneuver to perform, and that in the very
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  Speaker 1: face of the enemy, For being well in advance of
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  Speaker 1: their own center. They were threatened on two points at
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  Speaker 1: once by Alexander in front and coynus in the rear,
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  Speaker 1: and had therefore to face both rear and front. They
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  Speaker 1: were in the act of attempting this maneuver when Alexander
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  Speaker 1: gave the word to charge. Unsteady and hesitating, they wavered
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  Speaker 1: for a moment, then broke and rode for their lives
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  Speaker 1: toward the elephants as to the shelter of a friendly
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  Speaker 1: rampart passing between them and through the intervals between the
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  Speaker 1: divisions of the infantry. The Mohoots, it would appear, had
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  Speaker 1: already begun to urge their animals on to the charge,
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  Speaker 1: and were supported by the infantry, a movement which might
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  Speaker 1: have been dangerous had it not been checked by a
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  Speaker 1: rapid advance of the phalanx. It was a fearful struggle,
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  Speaker 1: such as even these veterans had never before experienced. The
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  Speaker 1: huge animals trampled down their ranks by sheer weight, or
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  Speaker 1: seized the men singly with their trunks and raising them aloft,
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  Speaker 1: dashed them to the ground, while the soldiers in the
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  Speaker 1: howdahs plied them with arrows and javelins. The cavalry moreover
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  Speaker 1: had rallied and presently advanced once more to the charge,
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  Speaker 1: but they were no match for Alexander's troopers either instead
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  Speaker 1: this or bodily strength, and were speedily repulsed and driven
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  Speaker 1: in again upon the center. By this time too, the elephants,
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  Speaker 1: a force scarcely more dangerous to foes than friends, were
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  Speaker 1: becoming unmanageable. Some of them had been wounded, and many
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  Speaker 1: of the mohouts slain, and being hemmed in by the
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  Speaker 1: close press of horsemen and infantry. Distracted by the confusion
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  Speaker 1: and maddened by pain, they kept up an incessant trumpeting
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  Speaker 1: and began to turn round, treading down the men of
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  Speaker 1: their own side, or to try and back out of
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  Speaker 1: the turmoil like boats backing water. Then the infantry also
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  Speaker 1: were thrown into confusion, foot and horse and elephants being
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  Speaker 1: hopelessly intermingled. Whereupon the King, ordering the phalanx to push
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  Speaker 1: steadily onwards in front, drew a cordon of cavalry, as
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  Speaker 1: it were, round the flank and rear of the struggling,
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  Speaker 1: helpless mass, and completed the immoralization and ruin by repeated charges.
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  Speaker 1: The loss was prodigious, including all the chariots. Two of
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  Speaker 1: the sons of Poris were slain, and a great number
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  Speaker 1: of the superior officers. If a portion of the infantry
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  Speaker 1: and cavalry broke through and escaped, it was but to
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  Speaker 1: find themselves hotly pursued by a fresh and unspent enemy
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  Speaker 1: in the person of Craterus, who had forced the passage
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  Speaker 1: of the river during the battle, so that three thousand
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  Speaker 1: of the horse are said to have been slain and
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  Speaker 1: twelve thousand of the infantry, while nine thousand prisoners were
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  Speaker 1: taken and eighty elephants. The Macedonian loss was, as usual trifling,
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  Speaker 1: amounting to no more than two hundred and eighty cavalry
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  Speaker 1: and seven hundred infantry, taking the highest estimate of the
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  Speaker 1: Macedonians and the lowest of the Indian losses. July three,
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  Speaker 1: twenty six. Poris himself fought like a brave man, not
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  Speaker 1: as Darius, being the first to flee, but stoutly resisting
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  Speaker 1: to the last. But when he saw the day was lost,
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  Speaker 1: being himself also wounded in the shoulder, he turned his
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  Speaker 1: elephant and began to retire. Alexander was most anxious that
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  Speaker 1: he should be taken alive, but Porus sullenly resisted all
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  Speaker 1: overtures for surrender, even attacking the officers whom the king
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  Speaker 1: sent after him. At last, weary and faint with thirst,
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  Speaker 1: he yielded to the appeals of a personal friend, halted
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  Speaker 1: and dismounted from his elephant. The king, it is said,
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  Speaker 1: when Porus was brought into his presence, was struck with
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  Speaker 1: admiration for his manly presence and undaunted bearing, and because
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  Speaker 1: he approached him as one brave man should approach another.
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  Speaker 1: Alexander asked him how he wished to be treated like
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  Speaker 1: a king. Was the answer that boon o Porus replied,
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  Speaker 1: the kind enqueror, thou shalt have for my sake, for
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  Speaker 1: thy own sake, ask what thou wilt. But Porus answered
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  Speaker 1: that everything was contained in his request to be treated
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  Speaker 1: like a king. Alexander was so charmed with his reply
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  Speaker 1: that he restored to him his kingdom and added to
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  Speaker 1: it largely, and thus secured a faithful friend. The army
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  Speaker 1: was now allowed to rest a month in the capital
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  Speaker 1: of Poris until the reins had somewhat abated. In the interval,
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  Speaker 1: Alexander founded two cities, Nikaia near the field of battle,
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  Speaker 1: and Bucephalia, which he named after the favorite horse which
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  Speaker 1: had carried him so gallantly through a thousand dangers, and
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  Speaker 1: was now dead. He further ordered timber to be felled
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  Speaker 1: in the forests of the upper Hydaspes, and a fleet
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  Speaker 1: to be built for the navigation of the Indus. Then
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  Speaker 1: he crossed successively the Acassines and the Hydraotes into the
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  Speaker 1: country of the warlike Cathayans, whom he soon reduced and
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  Speaker 1: added to the subjects of Porus. The high faces Sutledge,
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  Speaker 1: to which he next advanced, was the eastward limit of
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  Speaker 1: his conquering march. Beyond it, he was told, lay a
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  Speaker 1: desert of eleven days march as far as the mighty Ganges,
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  Speaker 1: whose valley was the empire of a king greater than Porus.
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  Speaker 1: To Alexander's enterprising spirit, such a vista of adventures was
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  Speaker 1: no doubt delightful. Indeed, if we can credit the speech
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  Speaker 1: to the army put into his mouth by Arian, he
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  Speaker 1: had some strange notion that the great sea which encircles
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  Speaker 1: the earth was just beyond the Ganges, and that thence
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  Speaker 1: they might circumnavigate Libya to the pillars of Heracles, and
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  Speaker 1: so marched through Libya homewards. But soldiers and officers alike
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  Speaker 1: were downcast and homesick, and at first only answered his
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  Speaker 1: appeals with an eloquent silence, until being urged him to speak.
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  Speaker 1: They expressed their feelings in the curious speech assigned by
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  Speaker 1: Auran to coin us. Our numbers are thinned, he said,
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  Speaker 1: we are longing to see our wives and children. Let
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  Speaker 1: us return, and afterwards, if thou wilt, lead other troops
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  Speaker 1: fresher and younger than we are, to the Euxine, or
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  Speaker 1: to Carthage, or wherever thou wilt. But Alexander was wroth
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  Speaker 1: and dismissed his troops to their quarters. Next day, he
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  Speaker 1: tried a further appeal to their loyalty and devotion. Any
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  Speaker 1: One who pleased, he said, should return. He would take
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  Speaker 1: with him only volunteers. The rest might go home and
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  Speaker 1: report that they had abandoned their king in the midst
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  Speaker 1: of his enemies. And then he retired to his tent,
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  Speaker 1: deeply mortified. For three days, no one was admitted to
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  Speaker 1: his presence, but gloom and silence still pervaded the camp,
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  Speaker 1: and the revulsion of feeling which he hoped for, never came.
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  Speaker 1: On the fourth day, he offered sacrifice preparatory to crossing
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  Speaker 1: the river, but the victims were unpropitious. Then, at last,
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  Speaker 1: overborne by all these adverse signs, he summoned his friends
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  Speaker 1: and some of the companions, and bade them make known
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  Speaker 1: to the army his resolution to return. The universal joy
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  Speaker 1: was attested by shouts and tears and blessings on their king,
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  Speaker 1: who had never known defeat. But from them twelve huge
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  Speaker 1: altars were raised on the bank as a thank offering
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  Speaker 1: for the protection of the gods, and as the memorial
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  Speaker 1: of his victories. And sacrifices were offered, and games were
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  Speaker 1: celebrated before he set his face finally westward. Then, at
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  Speaker 1: last the armies set out on its long march for home.
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  Speaker 1: The Hydraotes was past, and the Akassinis, and at length
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  Speaker 1: they reached the new cities Nikaia and Buchephalia, where the
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  Speaker 1: fleet was being built and the preparations made for the
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  Speaker 1: voyage down the Indus. But one man, at least was
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  Speaker 1: destined never to go further. Coynus died and was honored
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  Speaker 1: with a magnificent funeral. Although Alexander, having not forgotten nor
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  Speaker 1: perhaps forgiven, his expostulations at the Hyphasis, could not forbear
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  Speaker 1: the cynical remark that Coynus had made his long speech
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  Speaker 1: to very little purpose, and of Section twenty two