Furthermore, apart from inaccuracy of orientation, there was a lack of technical language, such as could be employed in such description. When Herodotus says the boats of the western bridge were κατὰ ῥόον, “down stream,” it is probable that he is merely employing a phrase which came handy to him, instead of the cumbrous paraphrase he would have had to employ to express the fact that their axes were at right angles to the axis of the bridge, though this was the fact really in his mind. This is the idea upmost in his mind when he speaks of those in the second bridge as being ἐπικάρσιαι, “oblique.” Their axes were not at right angles to the axis of the bridge. #ROUTE FROM SARDES TO HELLESPONT.# Six cables, two of white flax and four of papyrus, held each bridge in place, and on these trunks of trees were placed. A roadway was formed on this foundation, composed of brushwood with earth laid upon it, and each bridge was fenced in throughout its whole length. ◆H. vii. 37.◆ After spending the winter of 481–480 at Sardes, Xerxes started on his march at the beginning of spring. Herodotus asserts that his departure was signalized by an eclipse of the sun. He is certainly mistaken in attributing an eclipse to this date;[97] but popular tradition was but too apt to mis-date such phenomena in order to make them coincide with some momentous event in history. ◆H. vii. 40, 41.◆ The Persian household troops, gorgeously caparisoned, formed the body-guard of the king on his march. The total number of this _corps d’élite_ amounts to 24,000 in Herodotus’ enumeration. Herodotus, writing for an audience that wished above all to be amused, tells many a tale of the incidents of the march. They are pleasant reading enough, but they are not history. They had, however, a serious as well as a lighter side. He wished to bring before his countrymen a picture of that life of the East which few of them, perhaps, could realize; of the illogical decrees of absolutism; of anything and everything which could display to them the contrast between a splendid liberty and a splendid servitude. ◆H. vii. 42.◆ The route followed by the army in its march from Sardes to the Hellespont led it over the river Kaïkos into Mysia. Then leaving Mount Kane on the left, it passed through Atarneus to Karine. Thence it marched through the plain of Thebe, and passing Adramyttion and Antandros, and, keeping Mount Ida on the _right_,[98] it entered the territory of Ilium. From there it passed near Rhoetion, Ophrynion and Dardanos to Abydos. ◆H. vii. 44.◆