National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

inhabited cannot be treated as a serious objection. The advantages provided by
so large an island were all the greater, because by taking his troops on boats and
rafts along it for a considerable distance down the river, Alexander could bring
them much nearer to the enemy, and thereby increase that advantage of surprise
which necessarily counted for much in his hazardous enterprise. Nor can we
ignore the fact that the flatness of the opposite bank was bound to add greatly
to the effectiveness of the screen, whereas the supposed crossing-place below
Mangla lies within full view of the ridge opposite, some 200 feet higher and
only about 2½ miles away.

The remaining three points specifically brought forward against my location
of the crossing-place can be dealt with succinctly. The ground upon which the
landing took place and which was mistaken for solid land is definitely described
by Arrian (v. xiii. 2) as a great island 'parted from the other side by the river'.
Of the ground supposed to have been reached below Mangla Professor Breloer
himself speaks as 'tatsächlich Festland'. The road leading from Haranpur to
Jalālpur, which I assume Alexander to have followed on his secret march from
his main camp to the latter place, lies throughout across cultivated ground with
plentiful tree growth as the maps show. It nowhere approaches the river bank
closer than 2 miles, and for the most part lies farther away from it. The distance
on the road between the two places is recorded in the Survey map No. 43. H. NW.
as 17 miles, corresponding as closely as may be to the 150 stadia of Arrian. On the
other hand, the distance between Jhēlum town and the Pothawāla Kas, as shown
in Professor Breloer's sketch-map, presumably prepared from the Survey of
India's 1-inch sheet, is only a little over 14 miles, even on the somewhat
devious route marked by him. The reference made by Arrian (v. xii. 1) to the
reserves under Meleager, Attalos, and Gorgias posted half-way between the
great camp and the intended crossing-place affords no topographical criterion as
the position is not otherwise specified.

As regards the concluding remarks of Professor Breloer's critique which con-
cern the site of the battle, it will suffice to say that, as already plainly stated
in my paper²¹ᵃ and repeated above, I hold it 'quite impossible to determine
the exact position of the battle-field'. I clearly stated above that we have no
definite indication as to the distance from the place of landing to where the main
force of Poros was encountered.²² Hence the belief attributed to me that Poros