130 ON THE TRACK OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT
The mountain crags guard well the pass ;
' Is Darius there with his men ? ' Till now he has fled — will he here make stand
And retrieve his Glory again ? ^
- Nike is ours — the victory ours ! '
The Greeks shout out as they speed ; The valley resounds to their chargers' hoofs,
As each horseman quickens his steed.
Yon scout — what brings he, with horse af oam ?
- The hosts of Darius have fled,
Crying KhsTiayathiya marta asti —
« Our lord, the King, is dead 1 '"
The Persian troops had fled indeed, and there is little doubt that wild rumors about the king already filled the air, although Alexander did not learn that Darius was taken until just after passing through the Caspian Gates into the Plain of Khvar that day, nor did he come upon the king's dead body until four days later.
As the map shows, the Sar-Darrah Pass is a gorge cutting through a spur that juts out, some twenty miles, in a south- westerly direction from the great Alburz range. ^ This projec- tion is called Kuh-i Tuz, ' Salt Mountain,' ^ and it forms a barrier that divides the two plains of Varamin and Khvar. The pass itself, which the natives reckon as two farsakhs long, is some- thing over six miles in length.* A stream of salt water seams its way irregularly through the entire defile, thus joining by its shining thread the plains which the mountains divide.
1 This is the Persian kavaem Van Mierop's diary (quoted by Han- xvardno 'Glory of Kings,' in the way, 1. 358=3 ed. 1. 246) to 'pass- Avesta. ing by a rock of salt.'
2 See Holdich, Map of Persia, * This estimate of six miles is in London, Stanford, 1897. harmony with Clerk, Notes in Persia,
8 The name is from the extensive in Journ. Boy. Geog. 8oc. 31. 38, and
saline deposits, as noted below. See with Curzon, Persia, 1. 294, at which
also Pliny, N. H. 6. 14-15, 17, §§ 43- latter place a good note on the varying
44 (quoted below), and the allusion in estimates will be found.
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