for corn themselves, that a supply of it, which he intended for the fleet, and on which he had affixed his own seal, was seized by the men whom he had ordered to protect and escort it to the coast.  At last he was obliged to give up all attempts of relieving Nearchus; and after struggling 60 days with want of water,—­during which period, if he himself had not, at the head of a few horse, pushed on to the coast, and there obtained a supply, by opening the sands, his whole army must have perished,—­he with great difficulty reached the capital of this desert country.  Nearchus, thus left to himself, was indebted to the natives for the means of discovering water, by opening the sands, as the king had done; but to the Greeks, who regarded the want of bread as famine, even when its place was supplied by meat, the fish the natives offered them was no relief.

We have already remarked, that the real character of Alexander will be much elevated in the opinion of men of humanity and philosophers, if the particulars we possess of his endeavours to improve the condition of those he conquered, and to advance the interests of science, scanty and imperfect as they are, were more attentively considered, and had not been neglected and overlooked in the glare of his military achievements.  His march through the deserts of Gadrosia has been ascribed solely to vanity; but this imputation will be removed, and must give way to a more worthy impression of his motives on this occasion, when it is stated, that it was part of the great design which he had formed of opening a communication between his European dominions and India by sea; and that as the accomplishment of this design mainly depended on the success of the expedition committed to Nearchus, it was a paramount object with him to assist the fleet, which he thrice attempted, even in the midst of his own distress in the deserts.

On their arrival at the river Kalama, which is supposed to be the Churmut, 60 days after their departure from the Indus, they at length obtained from the natives some sheep; but the flesh of it, as well as the fowls which they obtained, had a very fishy taste—­the sheep, fowls, and inhabitants, all feeding on fish, there being no herbage or trees of any kind, except a few palm-trees.  On the next day, having doubled a cape, they anchored in a harbour called Mosarna, where they found a pilot, who undertook to conduct the fleet to the Gulf of Persia.  It would appear from Arrian, that the intercourse between this place and the Gulf was frequent, the voyage less dangerous, and the harbours on the coast better known.  Owing to these favourable circumstances, the skill of the pilot, and the breeze which blew from the land during the night, their course was more rapid; and they sailed by night as well as day.  The coast, however, still continued barren, and the inhabitants unable to supply them with any thing but fish till they arrived at Barna on the 64th day:  here the inhabitants were more civilized; they had gardens producing fruit-trees, flowers, myrtle, &c., with which the Greek sailors formed garlands to adorn their hair.