I will tell you. Just two years before Pericles died, that is, 431 years before Christ, Athens and Sparta and the other states of Greece began to fight each other as they often had done before, and for nearly a hundred years they quarreled most of the time. So many battles were fought that in the end all the states had become very weak and were without power, for they had lost a large number of their best men. Just then, for almost the first time, they began to hear of Macedonia.

Macedonia was a mountainous country about twice as far north of Athens as Sparta was southwest of it. Its people were Greeks, too, but in many ways they were not like the Greeks of Athens and Sparta.

Why had Macedonia not been heard of before? It was because its people still lived in country tribes and had not learned to live in cities. They did not have fine large temples for their gods until many years after the Athenians had. Great forests covered most of the country, and the people lived in rude houses and fed their few sheep on the mountain sides. They were fond of hunting, and often had to fight the wild beasts which came to steal away their sheep.

No boy could sit at the table with men until he had killed a wild boar, and every one that had not yet killed a foe must wear a rope around his body to show he was not yet free. Such wild life, and such struggles as these, made them brave and warlike, and they became most excellent fighters.

Once the Macedonians fought with Thebes and were overcome, and the people of Thebes made the king of Macedonia give them his little son Philip as a pledge that he would not trouble them again. While Philip was growing up at Thebes, he found out that the Greek cities were very jealous of each other, and kept fighting and trying to destroy each other.

When at last Philip's father died and Philip was allowed to go back home to be the king of Macedonia, he began to train his hardy, rough shepherds to fight. He taught them what he had learned at Thebes. He formed what was called a phalanx. Each soldier in the phalanx carried a light shield and a spear twenty one feet long. When they advanced, they were taught to place their shields together, somewhat like the scales on a fish, so as to form a wall, and they stood in rows, one behind another, sixteen men deep. Each soldier grasped the spear six feet from the front end, thrusting it forward just over the shoulders of those who stood before him; thus each man in the front row had four spears pointing before him.

Philip had seen how weak the Greek cities had become by their long wars, for they never learned to be true friends of one another; so he decided he would make war upon them, and in this way become ruler of all the Greeks.

Athens and Sparta and Thebes and all the rest of the Greek cities ceased quarreling for a little time, and united when they saw Philip coming; but in one great battle he defeated them all, and they were forced to choose him as their leader. So at last, you see, the Greek cities were no longer free, but all had become a part of Macedonia, and Philip was king over all of them.

Philip now asked them to join with him in making war on their old enemy Persia, who, you remember, had fought Greece, and burnt Athens to the ground about one hundred and fifty years before this time. He began to get his soldiers ready to start. Soon after this he was holding a great feast and games on his daughter's wedding day, and in the midst of the rejoicing he was murdered.

His son Alexander now became king. Alexander was only twenty years old, but he soon showed that he was even a greater king than his father had been. Two years before, when he was only eighteen, he had fought in the great battle in which the Macedonians had overcome the other Greeks, and his father had praised him for his bravery.

When he was thirteen, a beautiful but wild and fiery horse was brought to his father's court. None of the king's men could manage it, so King Philip had ordered them to take it away, when Alexander said, "I could manage that horse better than those men do." Philip, hearing him say it, let him try. Alexander saw the horse was afraid of its shadow. So he turned the horse directly toward the sun, in order that it might not see the shadow. He stroked it gently, and soon it became very quiet. Then he gave a quick leap and was on the horse's back. At first it tried to throw him off, but Alexander managed it so well that soon he was riding about as if it were an old and gentle horse. He was very fond of it, and named it Bucephalus. In later years Bucephalus carried him safely through many battles, and at last, when the faithful animal became old and died, Alexander built a city and named it Bucephalia.

Alexander was not only brave, but he was also studious. His father got for him the best teachers that could be found. He sent for Aristotle, the wisest man in all Greece. The boy loved Aristotle and studied hard. He thought there was nothing too hard for him to learn, but he liked the "Iliad" best of all, for it told of wars and the old Trojan and Greek heroes. It is said he knew it all by heart.

While he was yet a boy, the king of Persia sent some men to Philip on a matter of business, but Philip did not happen to be at home. So Alexander had to entertain the men. Although a boy, he surprised them by the intelligent questions he asked about Persia. He wanted to know how far they had come, and if the roads were good; how large was the king's army, and whether the people liked him, and many other things like these.

Once, when he heard that his father had captured another city, he said to his playmates, "My father will go on until he has conquered all the cities, and there will be none left for us to take when I am king."

But as I have said, Philip was killed when Alexander was only twenty. Alexander soon showed that he could manage a state as well as he had managed Bucephalus. Because he was so young, the Greeks whom his father had conquered thought they could easily win back their freedom. But Alexander marched swiftly from one end of his kingdom to the other, overcoming them everywhere, and soon things were quiet again. Then he decided to take up his father's plan of conquering Persia.

Very soon he had gathered an army of about thirty thousand and was ready to start. Soon they had reached the Hellespont and were ready to cross into Asia. Here is where Xerxes had crossed into Europe on his bridge of boats one hundred and fifty years before, when he came with a million men to conquer Greece. Alexander is now crossing to conquer Persia.

But can he do it? Persia is fifty times as large as Macedonia, including all Greece, and has an army more than twenty times as large as Alexander's. But you remember the Macedonian phalanx. We are now to see if a small army with a brave leader like Alexander is more powerful than a large army with a poor leader like Darius, the king of Persia.

Soon they crossed the Hellespont. Alexander himself guided one of the vessels, and when they came near the shore he hurled his spear into the bank, to show his men how he aimed to conquer Persia. He was the first one to jump ashore; and how he must have felt, for now he was in the land of Troy,—the land of the hero Achilles, the warrior whom he had worshiped from childhood, and whom he loved to think he was like,—the land of Paris and Helen and old King Priam, the heroes of whom Homer had sung.

He went to the spot where the proud city of Troy had stood so long ago. He found the places where it was said Achilles had fought and where he lay buried. In order to show him honor, Alexander told his men to celebrate the games. So all the warriors put aside, for a few days, thoughts of war and danger, and enjoyed themselves as they used to do in the gymnasium at home. Through all the years of marching and fighting Alexander never forgot the games his soldiers knew and loved, and often they laid aside the dangers of war, and by hunting, the theater, and the gymnastic sports, enjoyed themselves in the camp. But Alexander did more than this, for he ordered a new city to be built where Troy had once stood, and he named it Ilium in honor of the old city and his most treasured book, the "Iliad."

Alexander longed to fight as the ancient Greeks at Troy had fought. He wanted to win a glorious victory. His wishes were soon to be granted, for he had not gone far eastward when he came to the Granicus River, in Asia Minor, where the Persian army was placed, so that he must drive them away if he wished to cross.

The Macedonian king did not hesitate. He mounted his horse and asked the men to remember how well they had fought for his father. The command was given for the battle to begin, when on they went, through the valley and river, singing the battle hymn. Alexander was in the thickest of the fight. His lance was broken. He was hit on the head by a sword, and a piece of his helmet was broken. He would certainly have been killed, had not his friend Clitus rushed to his aid and saved his life. In spite of the size of the Persian army, he completely scattered all of it and won a great victory. By one battle he had freed all of the Greek cities in Asia Minor.

Marching on, Alexander came to the city of Gordium, once the home of greedy, rich King Midas, who wanted everything he touched to be turned to gold. In a temple the people showed him a wagon to which the yoke was fastened by a knotted cord, and they told him that whoever would untie it should become ruler of all Asia. Alexander tried to unfasten it as many others had done; but when he found it was very difficult, he drew his sword and cut the string, and so it came off.

Soon he reached the Issus River, near the northeast angle of the Mediterranean Sea, and found out that Darius himself was coming with a large army to fight him. This is just what Alexander wanted.

What a splendid sight the Persian army made as it marched along! First came the silver altar, bearing the sacred fire; then came youths, one for each day in the year, in front of the chariot of the sun, drawn by white horses. On the chariot sat the king, wearing a fine purple mantle, containing many precious stones. Around him on every side were his soldiers, many of them wearing robes glittering with gold and carrying silver-handled lances.

Then they began to fight. The battle was sharp and Alexander was wounded; but as usual he won the victory. Darius soon saw that the Persians were beaten, so he jumped on a horse and hurried away to escape with his life, leaving behind his wife, his mother and children, as well as his purple mantle. But Alexander was not cruel to his fair prisoners, and Darius' own mother said she was treated better by her kingly captor than she had been by Darius himself.

That night Alexander ate the supper which had been prepared for Darius, and slept in Darius' tent. He and his plain Macedonian soldiers were surprised at the many fine things they had captured. There were dishes and pitchers and bath-tubs of solid gold, wondrously made. The odors of spices and myrrh sweetened the king's tent. Fine carpets and rugs were there in great abundance; and, what pleased the soldiers greatly, they found a large pile of Persian money.

The Greeks now entered Phoenicia, the land where stood the city of Tyre. You remember you learned how the merchants from Tyre sailed over all the seas trading with the different countries, carrying the goods from one place to another. In this way the people became very rich and proud and had built around the edge of their island-city a wall one hundred and fifty feet high, made out of large stones, accurately joined and tightly cemented. On the shore, a half mile away, stood the old city. They thought they would be forever safe behind the walls of their new city; and well they might, for once Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, with a great army, had tried thirteen years to capture it and had failed. But Nebuchadnezzar was not an Alexander.

The Tyrians did not wish the Greek army to enter their city, so they left all the houses on the shore in the old town and shut themselves behind the great walls on the island-city. Alexander had no fear that he would not be able to capture it, but how was he to get over the half mile of water which extended between the coast and the city?

He decided to build a road out through the water to the island. So he tore down the houses on the shore and brought down trees from Mt. Lebanon near by, and tumbled rocks, wood, dirt and all—a whole forest and a whole city—into the sea, making a path two hundred feet wide, reaching from the shore to the walls. The Tyrians tried to tear up the way, but the Greek soldiers quickly repaired it every time it was torn down.

But how will the Greeks break down the walls when they get to them? Will they use cannon to break them to pieces, as we would? No, indeed, they will not; for in that day, and for almost two thousand years afterward, there were no cannon, and gunpowder was not known.

They tried to dig holes under the sides of the wall so as to cause it to fall, but the Tyrians threw down stones and poured kettles of hot oil upon the men who were digging and drove them away. Then the soldiers built huge battering-rams with which to batter the walls to pieces. A battering-ram is a large pole, thicker and longer than the largest telegraph pole, the end of which is covered with a head of hard iron. The pole is hung on a chain in a frame, so it may be moved back and forth lengthwise, heavily battering against the solid wall. Day after day for seven long months they beat at the strong walls and hurled immense stones and sharp bars of iron at them with another machine, called a catapult, till at last they broke through a hole large enough for some of the soldiers to enter. Alexander was one of the first inside, and soon the city was captured. What do you think became of the people? Well, some of them were killed, but most of them were sold as slaves, and some of them were cruelly crucified. Thus the city of Tyre completely lost the importance which it had so long held as the queen city of the eastern Mediterranean. After Tyre is destroyed, there is for fifty years or more no great city on the eastern Mediterranean coast.