Alexander assembled his army for the march against the Indians at Bactra, whither, according to the Epos of the Persians, Semiramis had once summoned her troops against the Indian king Stabrobates. In the spring of the year 327 B.C. he crossed the Hindu Kush with 120,000 foot soldiers and 15,000 horse,[528] and when he arrived at Cabul he began the reduction of the Aryas, who dwelt on the right bank of the Indus.[529] At the confluence of the Cabul and the Indus lay the city of Pushkala, of which the territory was called among the Greeks Penkelaotis (Pushkalavati), and the prince Astes.[530] This city could not be reduced without a siege of 30 days. To the north of the Cabul the Açvakas, to the south the Gandarians had to be overpowered. Of the war against the Gandarians we know very little; the Açvakas made such a stubborn resistance that they were not completely subjugated till the winter. The Greeks call the Açvakas Assacanes, Aspasians, and Hippasians. They were under a king, who resided in the city of Maçaka (Massaga) on the Maçakavati,[531] no doubt an affluent of the Suvastu; lived in fruitful valleys, and kept horses and numerous herds of cattle on the high mountain pastures.[532] Beside the metropolis there were other walled cities and rocky citadels in the land of the Açvakas. At the approach of Alexander they fled to the mountains and to their fortified cities. When the Macedonians had taken the outer walls of the first city which they attacked, and the assault on the second seemed likely to succeed, the besieged sallied forth from the gates, and the majority escaped to the nearest mountains. Retiring with his army to the mountains from the open field before the Macedonians, the king of the Açvakas (western writers call him like his people Assacanus) fell in single combat; his people made the most violent efforts to recover his corpse from the enemies, but in vain.[533] Then, by means of a surprise at night, Alexander succeeded after a severe battle in dispersing the army of the Açvakas; forty thousand Indians are said to have been made prisoners, and above 230,000 cattle were taken as booty.[534] Before Maçaka, where the mother of the fallen king (the Greeks call her Cleophis) had assumed the conduct of affairs,[535] Alexander found an army of 30,000 foot soldiers, 2000 horse, 30 elephants, and 7000 men raised in the further part of India. By pretending to retire Alexander induced the Açvakas to advance further from the walls of the city, but though he made the movement he had prepared with all speed, he did not succeed in slaying more then 200 men. The walls of the city, it is true, gave way before his battering-rams on the very first day, yet he could not take the place, though the assault was carried on with the utmost vigour for four successive days. Then a shot from an engine killed the commander of the besieged; and they began to negociate. Alexander merely required that the mercenaries from the interior of India should leave