254 PHYSICAL SCIENCE BK. vi 



roams. When an excessive quantity has entered 

 and cannot escape it shakes the earth. This ex- 

 planation is approved by others, too, as mentioned 

 a little above. Perhaps the crowd of witnesses 

 will impress you. The view has the adhesion of 

 Callisthenes, and he is a man not lightly to be 

 set aside. He was endowed with a lofty intellect, 

 and he dared to brave the wrath of a king. His 

 death is an eternal blot on the memory of 

 Alexander, which no valour and no success in 



2 war can ever remove. As often as it is said, 

 Alexander slew many thousands of the Persians, 

 the retort will be, And Callisthenes too. As often 

 as it is said, He slew Darius, in whose hands there 

 was then a mighty kingdom, the retort will be, 

 Yes, and Callisthenes too. As often as it is said, 

 He conquered all lands right up to the Ocean, the 

 Ocean likewise he essayed with fleets strange to 

 its waters, from a corner of Thrace he extended 

 his empire to the bounds of the East ; it will 

 also be said, Yes, but he slew Callisthenes. 



3 Granted that he surpassed all former precedents of 

 generals and kings, yet of all that he did, nothing 

 will match his guilt in slaying Callisthenes. 



Well, this Callisthenes, in the treatise in 

 which he gives details of the sinking of Helice 

 and Buris, and discusses the disaster which sent 

 them into the sea, or the sea into them, says 

 what I have said at a previous point. Air, he 

 says, enters the earth by hidden openings under 



4 the sea, just as everywhere else. By and by, 

 when the path is blocked by which it had 

 descended, and the resistance of the water in the 

 rear has cut off its retreat, it is borne hither and 

 thither, and encountering itself in its course it 



