Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

362 MEETING THE PERSIAN VAN.at Arbela, where he established hismagazines, harems, andtreasury, subsequently moving his army forward across theLycus (modern Great Zab) to Gaugamela, on the Bumodus,seventy mileswesterly from Arbela.Darius apjiears to have here again renewed his offer ofhalf his kingdom, his daughter's hand, and thirty thousandtalents of gold to Alexander for peace and the surrender ofhis family. He is said to have been deeply touched, not onlyby Alexander's respectful treatment of his wife, — so unusualin a conqueror,— but quite as much by Alexander's generosityto the queen during her fatal sickness, and to his motherand his children. On learning these facts, he is representedas having implored the deity, that if he could no longer situpon the Persian throne, the crown might rest on the head ofthe Macedonian monarch, his bitterest foe, his greatest benefactor.Alexander submitted the proposal of Darius to theCouncil as a matter of usual routine ;but himself eventuallydecided that Darius was endeavoring to corrupt his friends,and sent away the ambassadors with contumely.When Alexander's scouts had reported a Persian forcehis front, he had at once put the army in order of battle, andcontinued his advance ; but further scouts ascertaining theforce tobe only a small body of perhaps one thousand cavalry,he took an ile of horse-guards, the royal squadron andPseonian dragoons, and himself led the van forward. Thearmy followed in two columns, with cavalry on the flanks andthe baggage in the rear, every man on the qni vive for whatmight soon be coming. The Persian outpost decamped ; afew were slain, some captured. From these latter the kinglearned the composition of Darius' army. There were assembledall the nationalities under the Persian sceptre.inIn numbersthe army is stated by different authorities at from twohundred thousand infantry and forty-five thousand horse to