1854.] Gracilis ad Aornon. 347 



guides. The ivy, if indeed it was then confined to Mt. Meros, now 

 abounds in hills and valleys exceeding 4000 feet throughout Huzara. 

 It is remarkable that it is by Hindi lore sacred to Hercules, bearing 

 the name Hur Bail.* But I do not remember to have met with it 

 in the arid stony plains and naked mountains of Afghanistan. It 

 is a plant rapidly propagated by birds, and it is not absolutely 

 impossible that it may have been introduced by the Bacchic Colonies, 

 as the wild olive seems to have been introduced by the Macedonians. 



If we follow the history of Arrian in our search for Nusa and 

 Mt. Meros, we must place ourselves on the right bank of the Indus, 

 and from thence proceed into the Doaba of the Indus and Koopheen. 

 Mr. Williams, in his history, thus happily disposes of the difficulty. 

 Alexander we have seen on returning to the Indus from Aornos, 

 ordered timber to be felled and boats to be constructed.f On which 

 Mr. Williams observes : " It was as the fleet was falling down the 

 Indus that he visited Nysa."J Now the building of a fleet from 

 timber, great part of which had to be felled, squared and sawn, could 

 not have been the work of a day or of a week, and Alexander would 

 scarcely have waited on the spot a couple of months, in order to 

 drop down a river along the border of which he could march in 

 three days with his army. It seems to have been his purpose in 

 perambulating the Eusufzye to enable the workmen to prepare a 

 sufficient number of ferry boats for the passage of his army. We 

 cannot therefore from any passage in Arrian positively insist upon 

 finding ISTusa on the bank of the Indus, although such a site might 

 not be improbable. 



The most remarkable sites on the right bank of the Indus below 



* i. e. the creeper of Hur or Hurri. 



f From the following passage in Plutarch we learn that Nusa was washed by a 

 deep yet fordable stream. "When he sat down before Nysa the Macedonians 

 made some difficulty of advancing to the attack on account of the depth of the 

 river which washed its walls, until Alexander said * What a wretch am I that I did 

 not learn to swim,' and was going to ford it with a shield in his hand. After the 

 first assault ambassadors came offering to capitulate." See Life of Alexander. 

 Langhorne's Translation. 



% Mr. Williams seems to have adopted Rooke's reading of the passage which 

 certainly differs essentially from the text of the most esteemed edition of Arrian. 



