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important victory *. Diodorus states the loss of the Persians, in the 

 battle of the Granicus, at ten thousand infantry and two thousand 

 cavalry ; but it seems scarcely credible, considering the obstinate 

 resistance of the Persians on its banks, and the numbers that perished 

 in the river, that the loss of the invading army should only amount 

 to eighty-five horse and thirty foot-f-. In this, as in all other similar 

 cases throughout the campaign in Asia, we must allow no small 

 latitude to Greek vanity and exaggeration. 



We have been more particular in our account of this first engage- 

 ment of Alexander in Asia, because it clearly shews the resolute 

 character of the man, in exposing his life to such imminent danger, 

 and his full confidence, or rather a kind of prescient conviction, of 

 the success of his Asiatic expedition. The affair of the Granicus has 

 been branded by Plutarch J as the result of extreme rashness and 

 almost insanity in the Macedonian hero, in attacking, to such infinite 

 disadvantage, an army so superior in point of numbers and position ; 

 but he is fully exculpated by Arrian, who brings in Alexander, de- 

 claring it was done that the enemy might see the determined ardour 

 with which he pursued his great object of subduing Persia, and that 

 he might at once strike an irresistible terror into the soul of his 

 enemies. The consequence was as Alexander had wisely pre- 

 judged ; this decisive victory put him in possession of Sardis, the 

 capital of Lydia, and all the adjacent region. The rich city of 

 Ephesus surrendered to him without a summons; and, though at 

 Miletus and Halicarnassus, he met with a vigorous resistance from 

 the determined valour of Memnon, the Rhodian, who successively 

 threw himself into those cities with a body of resolute Greeks, who 

 had escaped with him from the battle of the Granicus, yet, on their 



* Arrian, lib. i. cap. 17. t Diod. Sic. lib. xvii. p. 367. 



* Plutarch in Vit. Alexand. 



