FOUNDATION OF ALEXANDRIA. 147 and the sites of numerous temples to Grecian gods as well aa Egyptian.^ It was thus that the first stone was laid of the mighty, populous, and busy Alexandria ; which however the founder himself never lived to see, and wherein he was only destined to repose as a corpse. The site of the place, between the sea and the Lake Mareotis, was found airy and healthy, a? welf as convenient for shipping and commerce. The protecting island of Pharos gave the means of forming two good harbori; for ships coming by sea, on a coast harborless elsewhere ; while the Lake Mareotis, communicating by various canals with the river Nile, received with facility the exportable produce from the interior.^ As soon as houses were ready, commencement was made by transporting to them in mass the population of the neighboring town of Kanopus, and probably of other towns be- sides, by the intendant Kleomenes.3 Alexandria became afterwards the capital of the Ptolemaic princes. It acquired immense grandeur and population during their rule of two centuries and a half, when their enormous reve- nues were spent greatly in its improvement and decoration. But we cannot reasonably ascribe to Alexander himself any pre- science of such an imposing future. He intended it as a place from which he could conveniently rule Egypt, considered as a portion of his extensive empire all round the -^gean ; and had Egypt re- mained thus a fraction, instead of becoming a substantive impe- rial whole, Alexandria would probably not have risen beyond mediocrity.* The other most notable incident, which distinguished the four or five months' stay of' Alexander in Egypt, was his march through the sandy desert to the temple of Zeus Ammon. Tliis is chiefly memorable as it marks his increasing self-adoration and ' Arrian, iii. 1,8; Curtius, iv. 8. 2-6 ; Diodor. xvii. 52.
- Strabo, xvii. p. 79-3. Other authors however speak of the salubrity ol
Alexandria less favorably than Strabo: see St. Croix, Examen des Hist, d' Alexandre, p. 287. ' Pseudo- Aristotle, CEconomic. ii. 32.
- Arrian, iii. 5,4-9. Tacitus (Annal. i. 11) says about Egypt under the
Romans — " pr^vinciam aditu difficilem, annon« fecundam, superstitione et lascivift discjrdem et mobilem, insciam legum, ignaram magistrataum," etc. Compare Polybius ap. Strabon. xvii. p. 7S^-
