Alexander (Vol. 2) Read Online Free PDF Page B

to win shall do the rest: at this stage we simply have no choice but to defeat them. Now, if you want my advice, go and get some rest. The trumpets will sound before dawn and we will march all day.’
    ‘You want to be in position by tomorrow evening, is that right?’
    ‘Exactly. We will hold our war council on the banks of the Granicus.’
    ‘What about you? Are you not going to sleep?’
    ‘There will be time for sleep . . . may the gods grant you a peaceful night, Ptolemy.’
    ‘And you too, Alexander.’
    Ptolemy went back to his tent, which had been pitched on a small rise on the land near the eastern wall of the field. He washed, changed and prepared himself for the night’s rest. He gave one last look outside before lying down and saw that there was still light in just two tents – Alexander’s and, far off across the field, Parmenion’s.
    *
     
    The trumpets sounded before dawn as Alexander had ordered, but the cooks had already been on their feet for some time and had prepared breakfast – steaming pots of maza , semi-liquid oatmeal enriched with cheese. The officers instead had a type of flat bread, sheep’s cheese and cow’s milk.
    At the second fanfare the King mounted his horse and took his place at the head of the army, near the eastern gate of the camp, accompanied by his personal guard and by Perdiccas, Craterus and Lysimachus. Behind him came the phalanx of the pezhetairoi , preceded by two units of light cavalry and followed by the Greek heavy infantry and the Thracian, Triballian and Agrianian auxiliaries, all flanked by two lines of heavy cavalry.
    The sky was turning red in the east and the air was filling with the chirping of sparrows and the whistles of blackbirds. Flocks of wild doves rose from the nearby woods as the rhythmic noise of the march and the clanking of the weapons woke them from their slumber.
    Phrygia lay there before Alexander, with its rolling landscapes covered with fir trees, small valleys crossed by clear-flowing streams along which grew rows of silver poplars and shimmering willows. The flocks and the herds came out to pasture, guided by their shepherds and watched over by the dogs; life seemed to be proceeding peacefully along its daily path as if the threatening sound of Alexander’s army on the move might just blend in perfectly with the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the cattle.
    To the right and the left, in the valleys parallel to the army’s forward movement, groups of scouts, without insignia, camouflaged, also moved forward. Their job was to keep Persian spies as far away as possible. But this was in fact a pointless precaution because any one of the shepherds or peasants might have been an enemy spy.
    At the rear of the column, escorted by half a dozen Thessalian horses, came Callisthenes, together with Philotas and a mule with two panniers full of papyrus scrolls. Every now and then, when they stopped, the historian pulled out a stool, took a wooden board and a scroll from the panniers, and sat down to write under the curious gaze of the soldiers.
    News had soon got round that the official chronicler of the expedition was to be this bony young man with the knowing air, and everyone hoped to be immortalized in his words at some stage. On the other hand no one was bothered about the very ordinary stories of daily life recorded by Eumenes and the other officers who had the job of keeping the march diary, keeping a tally of the various stages of the expedition.
    They stopped to eat around midday and then later, very close to the Granicus by that time, they stopped once more on direct orders from Alexander below a range of low hills, to wait for darkness to fall.
    Shortly before sunset the King called the war council in his tent and presented his battle plan. Craterus was there as head of a division of heavy cavalry and Parmenion as leader of the pezhetairoi phalanx. Cleitus the Black was also present, together with all of Alexander’s companions who