a method which was at first
successful. While Alexander was occupied in the destruction of Thebes,
the Rhodian general Memnon, to whom had been entrusted the defence of
Asia Minor, forced the invaders to entrench themselves in the Troad. If
the Persian fleet had made its appearance in good time, and had kept
an active watch over the straits, the advance-guard of the Macedonians
would have succumbed to the enemy before the main body of the troops
had succeeded in joining them in Asia, and it was easy to foretell
what would have been the fate of an enterprise inaugurated by such
a disaster. Persia, however, had not yet learnt to seize the crucial
moment for action: her vessels were still arming when the enemy made
their appearance on the European shore of Hellespont, and Alexander had
ample time to embark and disembark the whole of his army without having
to draw his sword from the scabbard. He was accompanied by about thirty
thousand foot soldiers and four thousand five hundred horse; the finest
troops commanded by the best generals of the time--Parmenion, his two
sons Nikanor and Philotas, Crater, Clitos, Antigonus, and others
whose names are familiar to us all; a larger force than Memnon and his
subordinates were able to bring up to oppose him, at all events at
the opening of the campaign, during the preliminary operations which
determined the success of the enterprise.

The first years of the campaign seem like a review of the countries
and nations which in bygone times had played the chief part in Oriental
history. An engagement at the fords of the Granicus, only a few days
after the crossing of the Hellespont, placed Asia Minor at the mercy
of the invader (334). Mysia, Lydia, Caria, and Lycia tendered their
submission, Miletus and Halicarnassus being the only towns to offer any
resistance. In the spring of 333, Phrygia followed the general movement,
in company with Cappadocia and Cilicia; these represented the Hittite
and Asianic world, the last representatives of which thus escaped from
the influences of the East and passed under the Hellenic supremacy.

[Illustration: 376.jpg THE BATTLEFIELD OF ISSUS]

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Lortet.

At the foot of the Amanus, Alexander came into conflict not only with
the generals of Darius, but with the great king himself. The Amanus, and
the part of the Taurus which borders on the Euphrates valley, had always
constituted the line of demarcation between t