250 HISTORY OF GREECE, pirc, whore his great naval preparations were now going oil He found Nearchus with his fleet, who had come up from the mouth of the river, — and also the ships directed to be built in Phenicia, which had come down the river from Thapsakus, to- gether with large numbers of seafaring men to serve aboai-d.' The ships of cypress-wood, and the large docks, which he had ordered to be constructed at Babylon, were likewise in full pro- gress. He lost no time in concerting with Nearchus the details of an expedition into Arabia and the Persian Gulf, by his land- force and naval force cooperating. From various naval officers, who had been sent to survey the Persian Gulf and now made their reports, he learned that though there were no serious diffi- culties w^ithin it or along its southern coast, yet to double the eastern cape which terminated that coast — to circumnavigate the unknown peninsula of Arabia, — and thus to reach the Red Sea — w as an enterprise perilous at least, if not impracticable."^ Pint to achieve that which other men thought impracticable, was the leading passion of Alexander. He resolved to circumnavi- gate Arabia fus well as to conquer the Arabians, from whom it was sufficient offence that they had sent no envoys to him. He also contemplated the foundation of a great maritime city in the interior of the Persian Gulf, to rival in wealth and commerce the cities of Phenicia.* Amidst preparations for this expedition — and while the im- mense funeral pile destined for Hephtestion Avas being built — Alexander sailed down the Euphrates to the great dyke called Pallakopas, about ninety miles below Babylon ; a sluice con- structed by the ancient Assyrian kings, for the purpose of being opened when the river was too full, so as to let oiF the water into 1 Anian, vii. 19, 5-12; Diodor. xvli. 112. ' Arrian, vii. 20, 15; Arrian, Indica, 43. To undertake this circumnavi- pation, Alexander had despatched a ship-master of Soli in Cyprus, named Hiero ; who becoming alarmed at the distance to which he was advancing, and at the apparently interminable stretch of Arabia towards the south, re- turned without accomplishing the object. Even in the time of Arrian, in the second century after the Christian era, Arabia had never been circumnavigated, from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea — at leaf=t so far as his knowledge extended. ' Arrian, vii. 19, 11
