Persia from the Earliest Period to the Arab

72
HISTORY OF PERSIA.
wounded then in hospital. His success was, how-
ever, brief, for Alexander returned at once, and the
two armies met in the narrow gorge of Issus, where
even the comparatively small force of Alexander
could not be wholly engaged.
"God had declared himself on
Arrian remarks that
the Grecian side by
putting
it into the heart of Darius to execute
such a movement" indeed, it is clear enough that,
if there was not room for the Greeks, any use
Darius could make of his vast host would be prac-
tically inconsiderable. And so the event proved.
Into the details of the great battle that followed
I cannot enter here ; suffice it, that Alexander was
completely victorious, and that Darius fled from the
field, leaving his wife, mother, and all his baggage,
at the disposal of the conqueror. Here, as at the
Graneikus, with the exception of a body of Persian
horse, the Greek mercenaries alone made any real
resistance to the Macedonians. The loss of the
battle was mainly due to the fact, that the Mace-
donians were themselves unquestionably superior
to the Greek levies on the king's side. Yet these
men fought bravely, and, availing themselves of
the broken ground, succeeded at first in throwing
even the phalanx into some confusion.
But, though the conflict of Issus was a crushing
Persia at the feet of Alex-
victory, it did not place
ander; there needed yet another battle in the open
plains, where the Persian ruler could fully employ
every arm of his forces, to shew how incomparably
superior a small Greek force, ably led, was to the
mightiest host the East could bring together. Its