28 AN HISTORICAL DISQUISITION

SECT, the latter of thefe objedts, (as I have already obferv-I. ed,) that he examined the navigation of the Indus with fo much attention. With the fame view, on hisreturn to Sufa, he, in pcrfon, furveyed the courfeof the Euphrates and Tigris , and gave directionsto remove the cataracts or dams, with which theancient monarchs of Perfia, induced by a peculiarprecept of their religion , which enjoined them toguard with the utmoft care ngainft defiling anyof the elements, bad conftructed near the mouthsof thefe rivers, in order to Ihut out their fubjectsfrom any accefs to the ocean 4 '. By opening thenavigation in this manner, he propofed , that thevaluable commodities of India fhould be conveyedfrom the Perfian Gulf into the interior parts ofhis Afiatic dominions, while by the Arabian Gulf they fhould be carried to Alexandria, and diftri-buted to the reft of the world.

Grand and extenfive as thefe fchemes were,the precautions employed, and the arrangementsmade for carrying them into execution, were fovarious and fo proper, that Alexander had goodreafon to entertain fanguine hopes of their provingfuccefsful. At the time when the mutinous fpiritof his foldievs obliged him to relinquifh his ope-rations in India , he was not thirty years of aeecomplete. At this enterprifing period of life, aprince, of a fpirit fo acftive, perfevering, and inde-fatigable, muft have foon found means to refume

41 Arrian , lib. vi. c. 7. Strab. lib. xvi. n. 1074. &c.See NOTE IX.