r, for
some reason or other, did not bring them before Alexander, but said
that the king was not at leisure to hear them, as he was engaged in
more important business. This he repeated on a second occasion, and
as his behaviour made the two brothers suspect his loyalty, they
communicated with another officer, and by his means obtained an
audience. They now told Alexander about the design of Limnus, and also
said that Philotas had acted very luke-warmly in the matter, as they
had twice told him that there was a plot against Alexander, and yet he
had, on each occasion, disregarded their warning.

This greatly enraged Alexander: and as when Limnus was arrested he
defended himself desperately and was killed in the scuffle, he was yet
more disturbed, as he feared he had now lost all clue to the plot. He
now openly showed his displeasure with Philotas, and encouraged all
his enemies to say boldly that it was folly of the king to imagine
that an obscure man like Limnus would have ventured to form a
conspiracy against his life, but that Limnus was merely a tool in the
hands of some more powerful person; and that if he wished to discover
the real authors of the plot, he must seek for them among those who
would have been most benefited by its success. Finding that the king
lent a ready ear to suggestions of this kind, they soon furnished him
with an overwhelming mass of evidence of the treasonable designs of
Philotas. Philotas was at once arrested, and put to the torture in the
presence of the chief officers of the Macedonian army, while Alexander
himself sat behind a curtain to hear what he would say. It is said
that when Alexander heard Philotas piteously beg Hephaestion for mercy,
he exclaimed aloud, "Are you such a coward as this, Philotas, and yet
contrive such daring plots?" To be brief, Philotas was put to death,
and immediately afterwards Alexander sent to Media and caused Parmenio
to be assassinated, although he was a man who had performed the most
important services for Philip, had, more than any other of the older
Macedonians, encouraged Alexander to invade Asia, and had seen two of
his three sons die in battle before he perished with the third. This
cruelty made many of the friends of Alexander fear him, and especially
Antipater,[417] who now formed a secret league with the AEtolians, who
also feared Alexander because when he heard of the destruction of the
people of Oeneadae, he said that he himself, and not the sons