for the attempt. It was known that in such nights the sentinels took shelter in the towers, and left the intervening battlements unguarded; and it was on this practice that the success of the adventure mainly depended. It was concerted, that the part of the garrison which remained behind should make demonstrations of attacking the enemy's lines on the side opposite to that by which their comrades attempted to escape. And first a small party lightly armed, the right foot bare, to give them a surer footing in the mud, keeping at such a distance from each other as to prevent their arms from clashing, crossed the ditch, and planted their ladders, unseen and unheard; for the noise of their approach was drowned by the wind. The first who mounted were twelve men armed with short swords, led by Ammeas, son of Corbus. His followers, six on each side, proceeded immediately to secure the two nearest towers. Next came another party with short spears, their shields being carried by their comrades behind them. But before many more had mounted, the fall of a tile, broken off from a battlement by one of the Plateans, as he laid hold of it, alarmed the nearest sentinels, and presently the whole force of the besiegers was called to the walls. But no one knew what had happened, and the general confusion was increased by the sally of the besieged. Thirlwall.

LIVY, xxiv. c. 46. XXV. c. 23, 24. v. c. 39, 899. xxi. c. 56, 58.

STORMING Of the tempLE OF JERUSALEM BY TITÚS.

ΜΕ

EANWHILE Titus advanced his engines to the outer wall; but the strength of its compacted masonry still defied the battering rams. He undermined the gates; his engines shook their sustaining bulwarks; but though the surface crumbled, the mass stood firm, and barred ingress. He applied ladders, and the Romans mounted without opposition. On the summit they were met by a remnant of the defenders, who still, in the fury of their despair, found strength to hurl them headlong. Finally, the

assailants brought fire to the gates, and, meeting again with no resistance, succeeded in melting the silver plates which encased them, and in kindling the wood beneath. The flames now cleared the way for their advance, and swept from pillar to pillar till they enveloped all that was yet standing of the interior porticoes. Hundreds of Jews perished in this storm of fire. Titus called his chiefs together, and deliberated on the fate of the sanctuary. "Destroy it utterly," exclaimed some; "retain it for ransom,” suggested others; but Titus himself, so at least we are assured by his panegyrist, was anxious at all events to save it. Perhaps he regarded it as a trophy of victory; possibly he had imbibed in his Eastern service some reverence for the mysteries it enshrined ; and even the fortunes of his family disposed him to superstition. He ordered the flames to be quenched; but while the soldiers were employed in checking them, the Jews sallied from their inner stronghold a last struggle ensued. Titus swept the foe from the court with a charge of cavalry, and, as they shut the gates behind them, a Roman, climbing on his comrade's shoulders, flung a blazing brand through a latticed opening. The flames shot up: the Jews shrank shrieking and yelling from the parapets.-Merivale.

TACITUS, Hist. iii. c. 71, 72, 73. iij. c. 29-33. Ann. xv. c. 38, 39, 40.

CAPTURE OF DUREN.

HE town was strong, and powerfully garrisoned.

A storm

THE town the stroossible, and the stores of provisions within

the walls would last till the winter, when a besieging army would be driven from the field. The herald was told scornfully that he might take his proclamation to those from whom it came; the soldiers of Duren know no reading; he pretended to come from the Emperor; the Emperor had fed the fishes of the Mediterranean when he was seeking to return from Algiers, and from him they had nothing to fear. Before forty-eight hours had expired, they found reason to know that neither was Duren impregnable, nor the

Emperor a delusion. The second morning after their reply, the Spaniards were led up to the walls, and after a struggle of three hours, the garrison broke and fled. Seven hundred were killed. The rest, attempting to escape on the other side of the town, fell into the hands of the Prince of Orange. Charles, coolly merciless, refused to spare a man who had borne arms against him. The commander was hanged before the gates: the other prisoners were variously executed.-Froude.

TACITUS, Hist. iii. c. 30, 31.

XXV. c. 19.

LIVY, xxxiii. c. 17, 18. xxiv. c. 19. CESAR, Bell. Gall. vii. c. 11.

SIEGE OF LEYDEN.

N the other side, the king's men were not wanting in securing their forts, and repairing them with earth, hay, and whatsoever else they could come by of most commodious; and hoping that the waters would swell no higher, they persuaded themselves that they should, within a few days, finish their business. They very well knew the townmen's necessities; and that all their victuals being already spent, the affairs within were drawing to great extremity. While both sides were in these hopes and fears, the time came wherein Nature, by way of her hidden causes, was likewise to work her effects. About the end of September the sea began to swell exceedingly, according as she useth to do in that season of the year; and pouring in at the high tides, no longer waves, but even mountains of waters, into the most inward channels and rivers, made so great an inundation as all the country about Leyden seemed to be turned into a sea. It cannot be said how much the rebels were hereby encouraged, and the king's men discouraged. The former came presently forth with their fleet, which consisted of about one hundred and fifty bottoms, a great part whereof were made like galleys: and to these were added many other boats which served only to carry victuals.—Bentivoglio. CESAR, Bell. Gall. iii. c. 9. Bell. Alex. c. 2. TACITUS, Ann. ii. c. 8.

THE

SIEGE Of leydeN.

"Una salus victis nullam sperare salutem.”

HE tidings of despair created a terrible commotion in the starving city. There was no hope either in submission or resistance. Massacre or starvation was the only alternative. But if there was no hope within the walls, without there was still a soldier's death. For a moment the garrison and the able-bodied citizens resolved to advance from the gates in a solid column, to cut their way through the enemy's camp, or to perish on the field. It was thought that the helpless and the infirm, who would alone be left in the city, might be treated with indulgence after the fighting men had all been slain. At any rate, by remaining, the strong could neither protect nor comfort them. As soon, however, as this resolve was known, there was such wailing and outcry of women and children as pierced the hearts of the soldiers and burghers, and caused them to forego the project. They felt that it was cowardly not to die in their presence. It was then determined to form all the females, the sick, the aged, and the children, into a square, to surround them with all the able-bodied men who still remained, and thus arrayed to fight their way forth from the gates, and to conquer by the strength of despair, or at least to perish all together.

CESAR, Bell. Gall. vii. c. 77, 78.

xxviii. c. 22, 23.

LIVY, v. c. 42. xxi. c. 7-15. TACITUS, Ann. i. c. 70.

SIEGE OF GENOA-SCARCITY OF FOOD.

INTER passed away, and spring returned, so early and so

beautiful on that garden-like coast, sheltered as it is from the north winds by its belt of mountains, and open to the full rays of the southern sun. Spring returned, and clothed the hill sides within the lines with its fresh verdure. But that verdure was no longer the mere delight of the careless eye of luxury, refreshing the citizens by its liveliness and softness when they rode or walked up thither from the city to enjoy the surpassing beauty of the prospect. The green hill sides were now visited for a very different object;

ladies of the highest rank might be seen cutting up every plant which it was possible to turn to food, and bearing home the common weeds of our road sides as a most precious treasure. The French general pitied the distress of the people, but the lives and strength of his garrison seemed to him more important than the lives of the Genoese, and such provisions as remained were reserved in the first place for the French army. Scarcity became utter want, and want became famine. In the most gorgeous palaces of that gorgeous city, no less than in the humblest tenements of its humblest poor, death was busy; not the momentary death of battle or massacre, nor the speedy death of pestilence, but the lingering and most miserable death of famine.

TACITUS, Hist. iv. c. 60. LIVY, xxiii. c. 19, 30.

Cæsar, Bell. Civil. iii. c. 58.

SIEGE OF SIENA-CONSTANCY AND COURAGE OF THE

WITH

DEFENDERS.

ITH this view he fortified his own camp with great care, occupied all the posts of strength round the place, and having entirely cut off the besieged from any communication with the adjacent country, he waited patiently until necessity should compel them to open their gates. But their enthusiastic zeal for liberty made the citizens despise the distresses occasioned by the scarcity of provisions, and supported them long under all the miseries of famine. Monluc, by his example and exhortations, taught his soldiers to vie with them in patience and abstinence; and it was not until they had withstood a siege of ten months, until they had eaten up all the horses, dogs, and other animals in the place, and were reduced almost to their last morsel of bread, that they proposed a capitulation. Even then they demanded honourable terms; and as Cosmo, though no stranger to the extremity of their condition, was afraid that despair might prompt them to venture upon some wild enterprise, he immediately granted them conditions more favourable than they could have expected.-Robertson.

LIVY, xxiii. c. 19, 30. CESAR, Bell. Civil. iii. c. 58.