Meanwhile the detachment of two thousand, marching by the circuitous road, and reaching in the night the elevated position, (though there was another above yet more commanding), held by the Karduchians, surprised and dispersed them, passing the night by their fires. At daybreak, and under favor of a mist, they stole silently towards the position occupied by the other Karduchians in front of the main Grecian army. On coming near they suddenly sounded their trumpets, shouted aloud, and commenced the attack, which proved completely successful. The defenders, taken unprepared, fled with little resistance, and scarcely any loss, from their activity and knowledge of the country; while Cheirisophus and the main Grecian force, on hearing the trumpet which had been previously concerted as the signal, rushed forward and stormed the height in front; some along the regular path, others climbing up as they could and pulling each other up by means of their spears. The two bodies of Greeks thus joined each other on the summit, so that the road became open for farther advance. Xenophon, however, with the rear guard, marched on the circuitous road taken by the two thousand, as the most practicable for the baggage animals, whom he placed in the centre of his division,—the whole array covering a great length of ground, since the road was very narrow. During this interval, the dispersed Karduchians had rallied, and reoccupied two or three high peaks, commanding the road,—from whence it was necessary to drive them. Xenophon’s troops stormed successively these three positions, the Karduchians not daring to affront close combat, yet making destructive use of their missiles. A Grecian guard was left on the hindermost of the three peaks, until all the baggage train should have passed by. But the Karduchians, by a sudden and well-timed movement, contrived to surprise this guard, slew two out of the three leaders, with several soldiers, and forced the rest to jump down the crags as they could, in order to join their comrades in the road. Encouraged by such success, the assailants pressed nearer to the marching army, occupying a crag over against that lofty summit on which Xenophon was posted. As it was within speaking distance, he endeavored to open a negotiation with them in order to get back the dead bodies of the slain. To this demand the Karduchians at first acceded, on condition that their villages should not be burnt; but finding their numbers every moment increasing, they resumed the offensive. When Xenophon with the army had begun his descent from the last summit, they hurried onward in crowds to occupy it; beginning again to roll down masses of rock, and renew their fire of missiles, upon the Greeks. Xenophon himself was here in some danger, having been deserted by his shield-bearer; but he was rescued by an Arcadian hoplite named Eurylochus, who ran to give him the benefit of his own shield as a protection for both in the retreat.[168]