69.4
After thus speaking, he lay down and covered his head, nor did he move as the fire approached him, but continued to lie in the same posture as at first, and so sacrificed himself acceptably, as the wise men of his country had done from of old. The same thing was done many years afterwards by another Indian who was in the following of Caesar,Augustus Caesar. at Athens; and the Indian’s Tomb is shown there to this day.
70.1
But Alexander, after returning from the funeral pyre and assembling many of his friends and officers for supper, proposed a contest in drinking neat wine, the victor to be crowned. Well, then, the one who drank the most, Promachus, got as far as four pitchers;The chous, or pitcher, held about three quarts. he took the prize, a crown of a talent’s worth, but lived only three days afterwards. And of the rest, according to Chares, forty-one died of what they drank, a violent chill having set in after their debauch.
70.2
At Susa he brought to pass the marriage of his companions, took to wife himself the daughter of Dareius, Stateira, assigned the noblest women to his noblest men, and gave a general wedding feast for those of his Macedonians who had already contracted other marriages. At this feast, we are told, nine thousand guests reclined at supper, to each of whom a golden cup for the libations was given. All the other appointments too, were amazingly splendid, and the host paid himself the debts which his guests owed, the whole outlay amounting to nine thousand eight hundred and seventy talents.Alexander also paid the debts of all his soldiers, amounting to 20,000 talents (Arrian, Anab. vii. 5, 1-3), unless this is the donation which Plutarch has here erroneously connected with the great wedding feast. Cf. Athenaeus, xii. pp. 538 ff.
