gates, at each of which there is a guard posted, and then traverse Cilicia, a space of three stations, or fifteen parasangs and a half. The river Euphrates, which can only be passed by a ferry, separates Cilicia from Armenia, in which there are fifteen stations, or fifty-six parasangs and a half. There is one place where a guard is posted, and four rivers which are crossed in boats. The first is the Tigris, the second and third bear the same appellation,[1] without being either the same river or flowing from the same country, as the first of them comes out of Armenia, and the other out of the land of the Matienians; the fourth is the Gyndes, which Cyrus dispersed by digging for it three hundred and sixty branches.[2] From Armenia into the land of the Matienians there are four stations; and eleven stations, or forty two parasangs and a half, from this country into that of the Cissians (Khuzistan), as far as the river Choaspes, which must likewise be passed in boats; and on the banks of this river stands the city of Susa. Thus, in the journey from Susa to Sardes, there are one hundred and eleven stations with the same number of caravanserais."
Here, then, is a record, four hundred and fifty years before our era, of a well made road of more than one thousand miles in length; and this road is still in existence.[3]*
- ↑ These are the greater and lesser Záb.
- ↑ Referring, probably, to the numerous canals this great conqueror cut, for purposes of irrigation as well as navigation, between the Euphrates and Tigris.
- ↑ "Royal stations" were the abodes of the king's couriers. Cf. Herod. viii. 98. These couriers were very rapid, like the Indian harkâreh of the present day. Strabo (xv. p. 725) states that Alexander's order for the execution of Parmenio, given near Herât, was conveyed eight hundred
