“Certainly.”
“Aristeides summons you at once. Come.”
There was no reason for refusing. Democrates followed.
CHAPTER XXXIX
THE AVENGING OF LEONIDAS
Morning at last, ruddy and windy. The Persian host had been long prepared. The Tartar cavalry with their bulls-hide targets and long lances, the heavy Persian cuirassiers, the Median and Assyrian archers with their ponderous wicker-shields, stood in rank waiting only the word that should dash them as sling-stones on Pausanias and his ill-starred following. The Magi had sacrificed a stallion, and reported that the holy fire gave every favouring sign. Mardonius went from his tent, all his eunuchs bowing their foreheads to the earth and chorussing, “Victory to our Lord, to Persia, and to the King.”
They brought Mardonius his favourite horse, a white steed of the sacred breed of Nisæa. The Prince had bound around his turban the gemmed tiara Xerxes had given him on his wedding-day. Few could wield the Babylonish cimeter that danced in the chieftain’s hand. The captains cheered him loudly, as they might have cheered the king.
“Life to the general! To the satrap of Hellas!”