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Cyrus on his way to Babylon came to the banks of the Gyndes, a
stream which, rising in the Matienian mountains, runs through the
country of the Dardanians, and empties itself into the river Tigris.
The Tigris, after receiving the Gyndes, flows on by the city of
Opis, and discharges its waters into the Erythraean sea. When
Cyrus reached this stream, which could only be passed in boats, one
of the sacred white horses accompanying his march, full of spirit and
high mettle, walked into the water, and tried to cross by himself;
but the current seized him, swept him along with it, and drowned him
in its depths. Cyrus, enraged at the insolence of the river,
threatened so to break its strength that in future even women should
cross it easily without wetting their knees. Accordingly he put off
for a time his attack on Babylon, and, dividing his army into two
parts, he marked out by ropes one hundred and eighty trenches on each
side of the Gyndes, leading off from it in all directions, and
setting his army to dig, some on one side of the river, some on the
other, he accomplished his threat by the aid of so great a number of
hands, but not without losing thereby the whole summer season.
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