occupying 600 mules and 300 camels, all protected by so enormous an army that everyone thought the Macedonians must be crushed. [Picture: Second Temple of Diana at Ephesus] With some skill, Darius’ army passed from the East into Cilicia, and thus got behind Alexander, who had gone two days’ march into Syria; but on the tidings he turned back at once, and found that they had not guarded the passes between him and them. So he attacked them close to Issus, and there again gained a great victory. When Darius saw his Immortals giving way, he was seized with terror, sprang out of his royal chariot, mounted on horseback, and never rested till he was on the other side of the Euphrates. Still there was a sharp fight, and Alexander was slightly wounded in the thigh; but when all the battle was over he came to the tents of Darius, and said he would try a Persian bath. He was amused to find it a spacious curtained hall, full of vessels of gold and silver, perfumes and ointments, of which the simpler Greeks did not even know the use, and with a profusion of slaves to administer them. A Persian feast was ready also; but just as he was going to sit down to it he heard the voice of weeping and wailing in the next tent, and learned that it came from Darius’ family. He rose at once to go and comfort the old mother, Sisygambis, and went into her tent with Hephæstion. Both were plainly dressed, and Hephæstion was the taller, so that the old queen took him for the king, and threw herself at his feet. When she saw her mistake she was alarmed, but Alexander consoled her gently by saying, “Be not dismayed, mother; this is Alexander’s other self.” And he continued to treat her with more kindness and respect than she had ever met with before, even from her own kindred; nor did he ever grieve her but once, when he showed her a robe, spun, woven, and worked by his mother and sisters for him, and offered to have her grand-children taught to make the like. Persian princesses thought it was dignified to have nothing to do, and Sisygambis fancied he meant to make slaves of them; so that he had to reassure her, and tell her that the distaff, loom, and needle were held to give honour to Greek ladies. Darius had fled beyond the rivers, and Alexander waited to follow till he should have reduced the western part of the empire. He turned into Syria and Phœnicia, and laid siege to Tyre, which was built on an island a little way from the sea-shore. He had no ships, but he began building a causeway across the water. However, the Tyrians sallied out and destroyed it; and he had to go to Sidon, which he took much more easily, and thence obtained ships, with which he beat the Tyrian fleet, and, after great toil and danger, at last entered Tyre, after a siege of five months.