CHAPTER XIX
THE ROUT OF THE SATRAPS
Again and yet again Amyntas was thrust back from the other shore,slippery with mud and clay, while deadly gusts of arrows and javelinsbeat upon him. Jealous of glory, the young Persian nobles crowded withreckless daring to the brink and overwhelmed him by the weight of theirnumbers. But they could not drive him off. He clung to the attackwith the stubborn tenacity that knows not defeat, refusing to abandonthe stream, although his lines were broken and his men were fallingaround him.
Alexander, watching the battle like a hawk, saw the desperate situationinto which he had thrown Amyntas. "Enyalius!" he shouted, calling uponthe God of War by the name that the Homeric heroes had used beforeIlium; "Enyalius! Follow me, Macedonians!"
The Agema swept down the slope behind the waving plumes of white andstruck the river into foam. The disordered ranks of Amyntas raised abreathless cheer as it passed, heading straight for the thickest of thefight. There was a splintering of shafts, a crash of steel upon steel,and from the fierce vortex of the battle rose cries of rage and agony.
Clearchus fastened his eyes upon the double white plume which flutteredbefore them. He heard the cry "Alexander! Alexander!" run from lip tolip through the Persian host and saw its squadrons rushing down to meetthe onset.
A lean, swarthy man, wearing a head-dress that glittered with jewels,aimed a blow at him with his curved sword. The Athenian threw himselfback upon his horse to avoid the stroke and thrust the man through theside with his lance.
Alexander was fighting in the foremost rank amid a flashing circle ofsteel. The Persian courtiers threw themselves upon the Macedonianspears in their eagerness to reach the king and win the honors whichthey knew would be bestowed upon the fortunate man who should slay him.The young leader seemed heedless of his danger. Twice he spurred hishorse up the treacherous bank and twice he was hurled back. The river,from shore to shore, was filled with soldiers fending off as best theymight the merciless rain of darts and arrows. The moment was critical.Unless the Agema could gain footing on the Persian side, the day waslost.
"We must end this," roared Chares above the turmoil. "Down with them!Alexander!"
He drove his bloody spur deep into the flank of his powerful steed.The tortured animal leaped at the bank and staggered upward against theliving wall that barred the way. A score of swords struck at him, andthe polished shield that the Theban held above his head rang beneaththe blows that were showered upon it. The great roan gained the top ofthe bank, but a spearman buried a javelin in his broad chest and hisknees gave way. As he fell, Chares leaped from his back and stood firm.
"Alexander!" he cried again, in a mighty voice that rose above the dinof conflict like the roar of a lion at bay. His long sword, so heavythat a man of ordinary strength could hardly wield it, though he usedboth hands, swept on this side and on that in whistling circles. Downwent horse and rider before it like grain within the compass of asickle. For a moment a space was cleared, and in the next the doubleplume of white flaunted before his eyes as Alexander passed him, andthe Theban knew that the shore had been won. The Agema, like a wedge,struck far into the Persian ranks and held there, driven home by theweight of troops behind it.
Mithridates, son-in-law of Darius, infuriated by this success, ordereda charge which should sweep the Macedonians back into the river.Followed by Rhoisakes, his brother, and by a throng of nobles he hurledhimself upon the stubborn mountaineers, aiming straight for Alexander.Chares, who was in the path of the avalanche, was swept aside. Hisshield was shattered upon his arm by the blow of a mace which alsobroke the fastenings of his helmet. A shout of warning rose from theAgema as it wheeled to face the attack. With sword upraised,Mithridates rushed upon Alexander; but the king's tough lance piercedthe scales of his armor before he could deliver his stroke. The princefell from his horse and rolled beneath the flying hoofs. Rhoisakes,thundering behind him, aimed a blow with his keen battle-axe whichshore away the king's crest and half the double plume. At the samemoment the satrap Spithridates attacked Alexander from behind, butbefore his arm could fall, dark Clitus, with an upward stroke, severedhis wrist so that his hand, still grasping his hilt, leaped into theair. Rhoisakes met his brother's fate upon Alexander's spear. Dismayfilled the Persian ranks. The charge was broken. "Enyalius!"Alexander shouted, and the Agema thundered up the slope against thedisordered barbarians.
Clearchus and Leonidas fought close behind Alexander. The Athenian wasnever afterward able to recall the details of that desperate struggle.His remembrance was a confused blur of thrust and parry, of shoutingand confusion. Suddenly, out of the shifting throng, the proud,flushed face of Phradates appeared to him as in a dream. The youngman's gaze was fixed and he seemed to be striving to extricate hishorse from the press that hemmed him in. Struck by the expression ofrage and hate that convulsed his features, Clearchus followed thedirection of his glance and saw Chares, with bare head and on foot,holding two adversaries in check with his sword. Blood flowed from awound upon his cheek, reddening his shoulder and dimming the lustre ofhis armor. He had been left behind by the cavalry, and the spacearound him was clear except for the two riders, who had thought to findhim an easy victim.
Clearchus read the thought in the dark face of the Ph[oe]nician.Phradates had recognized his rival and was bent upon taking him at adisadvantage. The Athenian turned to warn Chares of his peril, butPhradates shot out of the crowd in advance of him and spurred down uponhis enemy, bending low upon the neck of his fleet Arabian horse.
"Ho, Chares! Guard thyself!" Clearchus shouted, realizing that hewould be too late.
The cry reached the ears of the Theban, who turned his head for aninstant and saw Phradates rushing upon him. He leaped forward andhewed one of his adversaries from the back of his horse. The otherclosed in, aiming a blow with his sword that Chares had barely time tocatch upon his own blade. The shoulder of the leaping horse hurtledagainst him, causing him to stagger and drop his point.
"I have thee, dog!" screamed Phradates.
So intent was the Ph[oe]nician upon his ignoble revenge that he had notseen Clearchus, spurring desperately to overtake him. The Athenianheard his shout of triumph and his heart failed.
"I cannot reach him in time!" he groaned.
In a few more strides, Chares would be at the mercy of his foe.Phradates raised his arm to strike at the defenceless head. There wasone chance of stopping him and one only. Clearchus hurled his sword atthe Ph[oe]nician. The hilt of the whirling blade struck Phradates onthe arm with such force that, with a cry of pain, he let fall the swordfrom his benumbed fingers.
"Not this time, Ph[oe]nician!" Chares shouted, as Phradates swoopedpast him. "Go back to Tyre and await my coming; for I follow!"
Clearchus leaped down from his horse and recovered his sword with theintention of pursuing Phradates, but he saw at a glance that theattempt would be useless. The Ph[oe]nician, unarmed as he was, fledtoward the Persian lines too fast to be overtaken.
He looked around for the second of the two horsemen with whom Chareshad been engaged when Phradates attacked him, but the man was nowhereto be seen. He turned to his friend and embraced him.
"You were just in time," Chares said.
"Thank the Gods!" Clearchus replied. "This is no place to die. Ithink the battle is ours."
Phradates, riding at full speed, passed through the Persian lines andgalloped up the slope. Here and there a Persian horseman saw him goand followed. Others, and still others, joined the flight until, likea dam that goes down before the swollen current of a river in spring,the barbarian squadrons wavered and broke, streaming up the hilldisordered and panic-stricken, with death at their heels. Their onlythought was to save themselves.
Slaughter took the place of conflict. Grim and silent the Macedoniancavalry and the Thessalian horse rode among the fugitives with swordsthat knew no mercy. In that disastrous rout the pride of Persia'schivalry was dragged in the dust, and the court
ier deemed himselffortunate who escaped to tell of his own dishonor.
Past the camp of the despised Greek mercenaries who had been bidden towatch the defenders of the Great King conquer or die, ran the barbarianrabble, with the wolves of Macedon tearing at their flanks. Southwardthey fled, leaving behind a broad track of the wounded and the dying,and scattering as they went until no semblance of the Persian armyremained. Sweet in their ears at last was the music of the trumpetnotes that withdrew the pursuit and left them free to take breath.
The mercenaries stood before their camp, unmoved amid the panic,awaiting the command to fight or flee. The order never came. Memnonhad fought beside the Persian generals and had been swept away withthem, leaving his army to its fate. Below them the Greeks saw theMacedonian phalanx re-forming its ranks, with the cavalry, of whichthey had none, upon its wings.
"Why should we die for these cowards?" they said, one to another."They have deserted us and we are free."
They stretched out their hands in supplication toward Alexander.
"Grant us our lives, O king!" they cried.
"They surrender," Parmenio said. "They are ready to join us. Why notaccept them? It will cost many lives to punish them."
Alexander's brow darkened. "They are traitors to Greece," he said. "Iwill have none in my army who has raised his hand against his country."
The deep phalanx rolled onward to the chant of the paean, and thedespairing mercenaries knew that they could expect no quarter.
"Let us die like Greeks, since we must die," their captains exhorted."There is no escape for us."
The phalanx dashed upon them with a rending shock. The long sarissastore through their ranks; but they stood firm, giving blow for blow,and calling upon each other not to disgrace their name. They evenforced the veterans of Macedon to recoil, and the phalanx surged backlike a mighty wave that dashes itself against a sounding cliff andreturns with renewed strength.
Had only the foot-soldiers, with whom they could fight on equal terms,been arrayed against them, the issue might have remained in doubt; butthe cavalry, against which they had no defence, fell upon their rearranks with terrible effect. Their squares were broken; their captainsfell; disordered and without guidance, they went down before lance andsword, fighting to the last.
Alexander's horse was killed under him while he was leading the cavalrycharge upon the left, and for the second time that day he narrowlyescaped with his life.
"They fought like men," he said sadly to Ptolemy. "I wish they hadbeen with us instead of against us, for they were Greeks."
He gave command to stop the carnage. Where the mercenary line hadstood the dead lay in heaps, friend and foe together. A few of themercenaries who had been cut off from the main body by the cavalry hadsucceeded in making their escape; but of the twenty thousand whomMemnon had led, eighteen thousand never left that bloody field. Atleast, they had shown the barbarians how to die.
"It will be harder for Darius to hire Greeks to fight for him afterthis," Chares remarked, as he reined in his horse beside his twofriends and dismounted.
"They were of our race, after all," Clearchus said, regretfully.
"They were not cowards," Chares assented, nodding his head in approval,"and we have lost more men than we could spare. Here is a fellow, now,who might have amounted to something."
He pointed to the body of a young man who lay with his broken swordbeside him. His pale face was calm and his wide eyes stared upward atthe crimson evening sky. His corselet had been broken, disclosing theend of a thin roll of papyrus. Chares drew it out and broke the seals.
"He may have been a poet," he said, handing the roll to Clearchus."Read it!"
The Athenian glanced at the writing and uttered a quick exclamation.
"Artemisia is in Halicarnassus!" he cried.
"What do you mean?" Chares demanded.
"This is a letter from Xanthe to me," Clearchus said, and he proceededto read the lines that his unhappy aunt had written with so much toil.
"Who is this Iphicrates?" Leonidas asked.
"I know not," Clearchus replied eagerly, "but if it be the will of theGods we shall learn. Let us seek the king at once!"