HIS battle
being thus over, seemed to put a period to the Persian empire; and Alexander,
who was now proclaimed king of Asia, returned thanks to the gods in
magnificent sacrifices, and rewarded his friends and followers with great sums
of money, and places, and governments of provinces. And eager to gain honor
with the Greeks, he wrote to them that he would have all tyrannies
abolished, that they might live free according to their own laws, and
specially to the Plataeans, that their city should be rebuilt, because their
ancestors had permitted their countrymen of old to make their territory the
seat of the war, when they fought with the barbarians for their common
liberty. He sent also part of the spoils into Italy, to the Crotoniats, to
honor the zeal and courage of their citizen Phayllus, the wrestler, who, in
the Median war, when the other Grecian colonies in Italy disowned Greece, that
he might have a share in the danger, joined the fleet at Salamis, with a
vessel set forth at his own charge. So affectionate was Alexander to all kind
of virtue, and so desirous to preserve the memory of laudable actions.