From this place they endeavoured to force a passage into Cilicia.  Now 21 the entrance was by an exceedingly steep cart-road, impracticable for an army in face of a resisting force; and report said that Syennesis was on the summit of the pass guarding the approach.  Accordingly they halted a day in the plain; but next day came a messenger informing them that Syenesis had left the pass; doubtless, after perceiving that Menon’s army was already in Cilicia on his own side of the mountains; and he had further been informed that ships of war, belonging to the Lacedaemonians and to Cyrus himself, with Tamos on board as admiral, were sailing round from Ionia to Cilicia.  Whatever the reason might be, Cyrus made his way up into the hills without let or hindrance, and came in sight of the tents where the Cilicians were on guard.  From that point he descended gradually into a large and beautiful plain country, well watered, and thickly covered with trees of all sorts and vines.  This plain produces sesame plentifully, as also panic and millet and barley and wheat; and it is shut in on all sides by a steep and lofty wall of mountains from sea to sea.  Descending through this plain country, he advanced four stages—­twenty-five parasangs—­to Tarsus, a large and prosperous city of Cilicia.  Here stood the palace of Syennesis, the king of the country; and through the middle of the city flows a river called the Cydnus, two hundred feet broad.  They found that the city had been deserted by its inhabitants, who had betaken themselves, with Syennesis, to a strong place on the hills.  All had gone, except the tavern-keepers.  The sea-board inhabitants of Soli and Issi also remained.  Now Epyaxa, Syennesis’s queen, had reached Tarsus five days in advance of Cyrus.  During their passage over the mountains into the plain, two companies of Menon’s army were lost.  Some said they had been cut down by the Cilicians, while engaged on some pillaging affair; another account was that they had been left behind, and being unable to overtake the main body, or discover the route, had gone astray and perished.  However it was, they numbered one hundred hoplites; and when the rest arrived, being in a fury at the destruction of their fellow soldiers, they vented their spleen by pillaging the city of Tarsus and the palace to boot.  Now when Cyrus had marched into the city, he sent for Syennesis to come to him; but 26 the latter replied that he had never yet put himself into the hands of any one who was his superior, nor was he willing to accede to the proposal of Cyrus now; until, in the end, his wife persuaded him, and he accepted pledges of good faith.  After this they met, and Syennesis gave Cyrus large sums in aid of his army; while Cyrus presented him with the customary royal gifts—­to wit, a horse with a gold bit, a necklace of gold, a gold bracelet, and a gold scimitar, a Persian dress, and lastly, the exemption of his territory from further pillage, with the privilege of taking back the slaves that had been seized, wherever they might chance to come upon them.