But it was as though a man had thrust him through with a knife.

The king gazed after him in admiration of his magnificent obedience.
"Stay!" he called out.

"How long wilt thou be gone ?" Zoroaster turned sharply round in military fashion, as he answered: "It is a hundred and fifty farsangs[3] to Ecbatana.

By the king's relays I can ride there in six days, and I can bring back Phraortes in six days more--if he die not of the riding," he added, with a grim smile.
[Footnote 3: Between five and six hundred English miles.

South American postilions at the present day ride six hundred miles a week for a bare living.] "Is he old, or young?
Fat, or meagre ?" asked the king, laughing.
"He is a man of forty years, neither thin nor fat--a good horseman in his way, but not as we are." "Bind him to his horse if he falls off from weariness.