ROM hence he
sent great part of the spoils to Olympias, Cleopatra, and the rest of his
friends, not omitting his preceptor Leonidas, on whom he bestowed five hundred
talents weight of frankincense, and a hundred of myrrh, in remembrance of the
hopes he had once expressed of him when he was but a child. For Leonidas, it
seems, standing by him one day while he was sacrificing, and seeing him take
both his hands full of incense to throw into the fire, told him it became him
to be more sparing in his offerings, and not be so profuse till he was master
of the countries which those sweet gums and spices came from. So Alexander now
wrote to him, saying, "We have sent you abundance of myrrh and frankincense,
that for the future you may not be stingy to the gods." Among the treasures
and other booty that was taken from Darius, there was a very precious casket,
which being brought to Alexander for a great rarity, he asked those about him
what they thought fittest to be laid up in it; and when they had delivered
their various opinions, he told them he should keep
Homer's Iliad in it. This
is attested by many credible authors, and if what those of Alexandria tell us,
relying upon the authority of Heraclides, be true, Homer was neither an idle,
nor an unprofitable companion to him in his expedition. For when he was master
of Egypt, designing to settle a colony of Greeks there, he resolved to build
a large and populous city, and give it his own name. In order to which, after
he had measured and staked out the ground with the advice of the best
architects, he chanced one night in his sleep to see a wonderful vision; a
grey-headed old man, of a venerable aspect, appeared to stand by him, and
pronounce these verses:--
An island lies, where loud the billows roar,
Pharos they call it, on the Egyptian shore.
Plutarch: ALEXANDER
