Having thus formed his array, after giving the troops a certain halt after their march, he advanced at a very slow pace, anxious to maintain his own front even, and anticipating that the enemy might cross the Pinarus to meet him. But as they did not move, he continued his advance, preserving the uniformity of the front, until he arrived within bowshot, when he himself, at the head of his cavalry, hypaspists, and divisions of the phalanx on the right, accelerated his pace, crossed the river at a quick step, and fell upon the Kardakes or Asiatic hoplites on the Persian left. Unprepared for the suddenness and vehemence of this attack, these Kardakes scarcely resisted a moment, but gave way as soon as they came to close quarters, and fled, vigorously pressed by the Macedonian right. Darius, who was in his chariot in the centre, perceived that this untoward desertion exposed his person from the left flank. Seized with panic, he caused his chariot to be turned round, and fled with all speed among the foremost fugitives.[278] He kept to his chariot as long as the ground permitted, but quitted it on reaching some rugged ravines, and mounted on horseback to make sure of escape; in such terror, that he cast away his bow, his shield, and his regal mantle. He does not seem to have given a single order, nor to have made the smallest effort to repair a first misfortune. The flight of the king was the signal for all who observed it to flee also; so that the vast host in the rear were quickly to be seen trampling one another down, in their efforts to get through the difficult ground out of the reach of the enemy. Darius was himself not merely the centre of union for all the miscellaneous contingents composing the army, but also the sole commander; so that after his flight there was no one left to give any general order. [278] Arrian, ii. 11, 6. εὐθὺς, ὡς εἶχεν ἐπὶ τοῦ ἅρματος, ξὺν τοῖς πρώτοις ἔφευγε, etc. This simple statement of Arrian is far more credible than the highly wrought details given by Diodorus (xvii. 34) and Curtius (iii. 11, 9) about a direct charge of Alexander upon the chariot of Darius, and a murderous combat immediately round that chariot, in which the horses became wounded and unmanageable, so as to be on the point of overturning it. Chares even went so far as to affirm that Alexander had come into personal conflict with Darius, from whom he had received his wound in the thigh (Plutarch, Alex. 20). Plutarch had seen the letter addressed by Alexander to Antipater, simply intimating that he had received a slight wound in the thigh. In respect to this point, as to so many others, Diodorus and Curtius have copied the same authority.