About the month of July he reached Patala (Tatta), where he
built a citadel and formed a port for his shipping. He then proceeded,
with part of his fleet, by the western branch of the river, to discover
the ocean. This he accomplished at great hazard, when he sacrificed to
the gods (particularly to Neptune), and besought them not to suffer any
mortal after him to exceed the bounds of his expedition. He then
returned to join the rest of his fleet and army at Patala, and to make
arrangements for his march to Babylon. He appointed Nearchus admiral of
his fleet, and having given him orders to ascend the Persian Gulf to the
Euphrates, he commenced his march through Beloochistan, leaving Nearchus
to follow him as soon as the season would permit. Alexander was more
than sixty days in reaching the frontiers of Persia, during which time
his army sufficed such dreadful privations from want of food, that the
soldiers were obliged to eat their own war-horses, and from the sickness
consequent upon such a state of distress, his army was reduced to less
than one-half of the number which left Patala. It is not necessary to
follow him to Babylon, or to describe the voyage of Nearchus, who,
having sailed up the Persian Gulf, united his forces to those of his
royal master in the river Pasi-Tigris, near Susa.
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