The king sat on the ivory throne just out of
arrow shot, watching the ebb and flow of the battle. Hydarnes approached
and prostrated himself.

"Omnipotence, I the least of your slaves put my life at your bidding.
Command that I forfeit my head, but my men can do no more. I have lost
hundreds. The pass is not to be stormed."

Only the murmur of assent from all the well-tried generals about the
throne saved Hydarnes from paying the last penalty. The king's rage was
fearful; men trembled to look on him. His words came so thick, the rest
could never follow all his curses and commands. Only Mardonius was bold
enough to stand up before his face.

"Your Eternity, this is an unlucky day. Is it not sacred to Angra-Mainyu
the Evil? The arch-Magian says the holy fire gives forth sparks of
ill-omen. Wait, then, till to-morrow. Verethraghna, the Angel of Victory,
will then return to your servants."

The bow-bearer led his trembling master to the royal tent, and naught more
of Xerxes was seen till the morning. All that night Mardonius never slept,
but went unceasingly the round of the host preparing for battle. Glaucon
saw little of him. The Athenian himself had been posted among the guard of
nobles directly about the person of the king, and he was glad he was set
nowhere else, otherwise he might have been ordered to join in the attack.
Like every other in the host, he slept under arms, and never returned to
Mardonius's pavilion. His heart had been in his eyes all that day. He had
believed Leonidas would be swept from the pass at the first onset. Even he
had underrated the Spartan prowess. The repulse of the Medes had
astonished him. When Hydarnes reeled back, he could hardly conceal his
joy. The Hellenes were fighting! The Hellenes were conquering! He forgot
he stood almost at Xerxes's side when the last charge failed; and barely
in time did he save himself from joining in the shout of triumph raised by
the defenders when the decimated Immortals slunk away. He had grown
intensely proud of his countrymen, and when he heard the startled Persian
lords muttering dark forbodings of the morrow, he all but laughed his
gladness in their faces.

So the night passed for him: the hard earth for a bed, a water cruse
wrapped in a cloak for a pillow. And just as the first red blush stole
over the green Malian bay and the mist-hung hills of Euboea beyond, he woke
with all the army. Mardonius had used the night well. Chosen contingents
from ev