Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

634 COMPLAINTS OF MACEDONIANS.organization, drill, and equipment they conformed to theMacedonian fashion. A considerable extension of this systemhad been determined on by Alexander from the time ofthe refusal of the Macedonians to cross the Hyphasis, and hehad sent orders to increase the number of these youths, towhat extent is not determined. Some of them had alreadyserved with the army. He proposed to have fresh and submissivetroops, and these had become, under so consummatean organizer, a powerful body, which added to pride intheir callinof and gratitude for the distinguished favors of theking the natural blind obedience of the Orient. The fullimportance of this body, so far as concerned their own relationsto the fortunes of the great empire of Alexander, hadperhaps not fully dawned upon the Macedonians until sometime after they reached Susa, where they were brought faceto face with the new corps. But now this became a fresh andunfortunate cause for suspicion and irritation on the part ofthe old Macedonian soldiers, who had for some time beenfretting under the assumption by Alexander of the Mediandress and manners and the promotion of Orientals.There were probably left not more than twenty-five thousandMacedonians, if so many, of the two hundred thousandmen who had come with the army of invasion or as reinforcements.Half of these had been in continuous service since334 B. C. — ten long years. Most of them were utterly tiredof war. They were, moreover, getting to be less easy to handle; no wonder they felt their own importance. But Alexanderwanted no more Hyphasis troubles. It is not improbablethat since the Hyphasis there had been a sort of moralwall building up between Alexander and his Macedonians,where before there had been perfect trustfulness. The kinghad hoped by his generosity, his feasts, and the abundantmarriage gifts, to quell this bad feeling, but he had so far