about their affairs. Alexander
he counted a happy man and at the same time declared that he himself had
advanced farther. This was the tenor of the despatch that he forwarded to
the senate, although he was unable to preserve even what territory had
been subdued. On its receipt he obtained among other honors the privilege
of celebrating a triumph for as many nations as he pleased. For, on
account of the number of those peoples regarding which communications in
writing were being constantly forwarded to them, they were unable to
understand them or even to name some of them correctly. So the citizens of
the capital prepared a trophy-bearing arch, besides many other decorations
in his own forum, and were getting themselves in readiness to meet him
some distance out when he should return. But he was destined never to
reach Rome again nor to accomplish anything deserving comparison with his
previous exploits, and furthermore to lose even those earlier
acquisitions. For, during the time that he was sailing down the ocean and
returning from there again, all his conquests were thrown into tumult and
revolted. And the garrisons placed among the various peoples were in some
cases driven out and in others killed.

[Sidenote:--30--] Trajan ascertained this in Babylon. [Footnote: The
Tauchnitz reading, [Greek: en ploio] will not fit the context. Just below
[Greek: ithous] (Bekker) has to be read for [Greek: mythous].] He had
taken the side-trip there on the basis of reports, unmerited by aught that
he saw (which were merely mounds and stones and ruins), and for the sake
of Alexander, to whose spirit he offered sacrifice in the room where he
had died. When, therefore, he ascertained it, he sent Lusius and Maximus
against the rebels. The latter perished after a defeat in the field; but
Lusius was generally successful, recovering Nisibis, besieging Edessa,
plundering and burning. Seleucia was also captured by Erucius Clarus and
Julius Alexander, lieutenants, and was burned. Trajan, in fear that the
Parthians, too, might begin some revolt, decided to give them a king of
their own. And when he came to Ctesiphon he called together in a great
plain all the Romans and likewise all the Parthians that were there at the
time. He mounted a lofty platform, and, after describing in lofty language
what he had accomplished, he appointed Parthamaspates king of the
Parthians and set the diadem upon his head.

[Sidenote: LXXV, 9, 6] When Volgaesus, th