authority. It is rash to speculate on unexecuted purposes; but as far as we can judge, such compulsory mingling of the different races promises nothing favorable to the happiness of either of them, though it might serve as an imposing novelty and memento of imperial omnipotence. In respect of intelligence and combining genius, Alexander was Hellenic to the full; in respect of disposition and purpose, no one could be less Hellenic. To describe him as a son of Hellas, imbued with the political maxims of Aristotle, and bent on the systematic diffusion of Hellenic culture for the improvement of mankind, is, in my judgment, an estimate of his character contrary to the evidence. Alexander is indeed said to have invited suggestions from Aristotle as to the best mode of colonizing; but his temper altered so much, after a few years of Asiatic conquest, that he came not only to lose all deference for Aristotle's advice, but even to hate him bitterly. ... Aristotle's idea substantially coincided with that pointed out by Burke in his speeches at the beginning of the American war, between the principles of government, proper to be followed by England in the American colonies and in British India. No Greek thinker believed the Asiatics to be capable of that free civil policy upon which the march of every Grecian community was based. Aristotle did not wish to degrade the Asiatics below the level to which they had been accustomed, but rather to preserve the Greeks from being degraded to the same level. Now Alexander recognized no such distinction as that drawn by his preceptor. He treated Greeks and Asiatics alike: not by elevating the latter, but by degrading the former. Though he employed all indescriminately as instruments, yet he presently found the free speech of Greeks, and even of Macedonians, so distasteful and offensive, that his preferences turned more and more in favor of the servile Asiatic sentiments and customs. Instead of Hellenizing Asia he was tending to Asiaticise Macedonia and Hellas. His temper and character, as modified by a few years of conquest, rendered him quite unfit to follow the course recommended by Aristotle toward the Greeks quite as unfit as any of the Persian kings, or as the French emperor Napoleon, to endure that partial frustration, compromise, and smart from free criticism which is inseparable from the position of a limited chief. Among a multitude of subjects, more diversecolored than even the army of Xerxes, it is quite possible that he might have turned his power toward the improvements of the rudest portions. We are told though the fact is difficult to credit, from his want of time that he abolished various barbarisms of the Hyrkanians, Arachosians, and Sogdians. But Macedonians as well as Greeks would have been pure losers by being absorbed into an immense Asiatic aggregate. . . . This process of Hellenizing Asia,-in so far as Asia was ever Hellenized, which has often been ascribed to Alexander, was in reality the work of the Diadochi who came after him; though his conquests doubtless opened the door and established the military ascendency which rendered such a work practicable. The position, the aspirations, and the interests of these DiadochiAntigonus, Ptolemy, Seleukus, Lysimachus, etc. were materially different from those of Alexander. They had neither appetite nor means for new and remote conquest; their great rivalry was with each other; each sought to strengthen himself near home against the rest. It became a matter of fashion and pride with them, not less than of interest, to found new cities immortalizing their family names. These foundations were chiefly made in the regions of Asia near and known to Greeks, where Alexander had planted none. Thus the great and numerous foundations of Seleukus Nikator and his successors covered Syria, Mesopotamia, and parts of Asia Minor. All these regions were known to Greeks, and more or less tempting to new Grecian immigrants, not out of reach or hearing of the Olympic and other festivals as the Jaxartes and the Indus were. In this way a considerable influx of new Hellenic blood was poured into Asia during the century succeeding Alexander; probably in great measure from Italy and Sicily, where the conditions of the Greek cities became more and more calamitous, besides the numerous Greeks who took service as individuals under these Asiatic kings. Greeks, and Macedonians speaking Greek, became predominant, if not in numbers at least in importance, throughout most of the cities in western Asia. In particular, the Macedonian military organization, discipline, and administration were maintained systematically among these Asiatic kings. In the account of the battle of Magnesia, fought by the Seleukid king Antiochus the Great against the Romans in 190 B. C., the Macedonian phalanx, constituting the main force of his Asiatic army, appears in all its completeness, just as it stood under Philip and Perseus in Macedonia itself. LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY. GUINEY, LOUISE IMOGEN, an American poet and essayist; born in Boston, January 7, 1861. She was educated at the Convent of the Sacred Heart. Among her volumes of verse may be mentioned: "Verse;" "Songs at the Start" (1884); “A Roadside Harp" (1893); "The White Sail" (1887); etc. She has also published: "GooseQuill Papers" (1885); "Brownies and Bogles " (1888); "Monsieur Henri" (1892); "A Little English Gallery;" "Lovers' Saint Ruths;" ""Patrins" (1897); etc. She has edited an edition of Mangan's poems. THE WILD RIDE. I HEAR in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses, All day the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses, All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing. Cowards and laggards fall back; but alert to the saddle. Straight, grim, and abreast, vault our weather-worn, galloping legion, With stirrup-cup each to the one gracious woman that loves him. The road is through dolor and dread, over crags and morasses; Thought's self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb, And friendship a flower in the dust, and her pitiful beauty! I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses, All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing. We spur to a land of no name, outracing the storm-wind; |