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1. So now Titus's banks were advanced a great way,
notwithstanding his soldiers had been very much distressed from
the wall. He then sent a party of horsemen, and ordered they
should lay ambushes for those that went out into the valleys to
gather food. Some of these were indeed fighting men, who were not
contented with what they got by rapine; but the greater part of
them were poor people, who were deterred from deserting by the
concern they were under for their own relations; for they could
not hope to escape away, together with their wives and children,
without the knowledge of the seditious; nor could they think of
leaving these relations to be slain by the robbers on their
account; nay, the severity of the famine made them bold in thus
going out; so nothing remained but that, when they were concealed
from the robbers, they should be taken by the enemy; and when
they were going to be taken, they were forced to defend
themselves for fear of being punished; as after they had fought,
they thought it too late to make any supplications for mercy; so
they were first whipped, and then tormented with all sorts of
tortures, before they died, and were then crucified before the
wall of the city. This miserable procedure made Titus greatly to
pity them, while they caught every day five hundred Jews; nay,
some days they caught more: yet it did not appear to be safe for
him to let those that were taken by force go their way, and to
set a guard over so many he saw would be to make such as great
deal them useless to him. The main reason why he did not forbid
that cruelty was this, that he hoped the Jews might perhaps yield
at that sight, out of fear lest they might themselves afterwards
be liable to the same cruel treatment. So the soldiers, out of
the wrath and hatred they bore the Jews, nailed those they
caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the
crosses, by way of jest, when their multitude was so great, that
room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses wanting for the
bodies.
2. But so far were the seditious from repenting at this sad
sight, that, on the contrary, they made the rest of the multitude
believe otherwise; for they brought the relations of those that
had deserted upon the wall, with such of the populace as were
very eager to go over upon the security offered them, and showed
them what miseries those underwent who fled to the Romans; and
told them that those who were caught were supplicants to them,
and not such as were taken prisoners. This sight kept many of
those within the city who were so eager to desert, till the truth
was known; yet did some of them run away immediately as unto
certain punishment, esteeming death from their enemies to be a
quiet departure, if compared with that by famine. So Titus
commanded that the hands of many of those that were caught should
be cut off, that they might not be thought deserters, and might
be credited on account of the calamity they were under, and sent
them in to John and Simon, with this exhortation, that they would
now at length leave off [their madness], and not force him to
destroy the city, whereby they would have those advantages of
repentance, even in their utmost distress, that they would
preserve their own lives, and so find a city of their own, and
that temple which was their peculiar. He then went round about
the banks that were cast up, and hastened them, in order to show
that his words should in no long time be followed by his deeds.
In answer to which the seditious cast reproaches upon Caesar
himself, and upon his father also, and cried out, with a loud
voice, that they contemned death, and did well in preferring it
before slavery; that they would do all the mischief to the Romans
they could while they had breath in them; and that for their own
city, since they were, as he said, to be destroyed, they had no
concern about it, and that the world itself was a better temple
to God than this. That yet this temple would be preserved by him
that inhabited therein, whom they still had for their assistant
in this war, and did therefore laugh at all his threatenings,
which would come to nothing, because the conclusion of the whole
depended upon God only. These words were mixed with reproaches,
and with them they made a mighty clamor.
3. In the mean time Antiochus Epiphanes came to the city, having
with him a considerable number of other armed men, and a band
called the Macedonian band about him, all of the same age, tall,
and just past their childhood, armed, and instructed after the
Macedonian manner, whence it was that they took that name. Yet
were many of them unworthy of so famous a nation; for it had so
happened, that the king of Commagene had flourished more than any
other kings that were under the power of the Romans, till a
change happened in his condition; and when he was become an old
man, he declared plainly that we ought not to call any man happy
before he is dead. But this son of his, who was then come thither
before his father was decaying, said that he could not but wonder
what made the Romans so tardy in making their attacks upon the
wall. Now he was a warlike man, and naturally bold in exposing
himself to dangers; he was also so strong a man, that his
boldness seldom failed of having success. Upon this Titus smiled,
and said he would share the pains of an attack with him. However,
Antiochus went as he then was, and with his Macedonians made a
sudden assault upon the wall; and, indeed, for his own part, his
strength and skill were so great, that he guarded himself from
the Jewish darts, and yet shot his darts at them, while yet the
young men with him were almost all sorely galled; for they had so
great a regard to the promises that had been made of their
courage, that they would needs persevere in their fighting, and
at length many of them retired, but not till they were wounded;
and then they perceived that true Macedonians, if they were to be
conquerors, must have Alexander's good fortune also.
4. Now as the Romans began to raise their banks on the twelfth
day of the month Artemisius, [Jyar,] so had they much ado to
finish them by the twenty-ninth day of the same month, after they
had labored hard for seventeen days continually. For there were
now four great banks raised, one of which was at the tower
Antonia; this was raised by the fifth legion, over against the
middle of that pool which was called Struthius. Another was cast
up by the twelfth legion, at the distance of about twenty cubits
from the other. But the labors of the tenth legion, which lay a
great way off these, were on the north quarter, and at the pool
called Amygdalon; as was that of the fifteenth legion about
thirty cubits from it, and at the high priest's monument. And
now, when the engines were brought, John had from within
undermined the space that was over against the tower of Antonia,
as far as the banks themselves, and had supported the ground over
the mine with beams laid across one another, whereby the Roman
works stood upon an uncertain foundation. Then did he order such
materials to be brought in as were daubed over with pitch and
bitumen, and set them on fire; and as the cross beams that
supported the banks were burning, the ditch yielded on the
sudden, and the banks were shaken down, and fell into the ditch
with a prodigious noise. Now at the first there arose a very
thick smoke and dust, as the fire was choked with the fall of the
bank; but as the suffocated materials were now gradually
consumed, a plain flame brake out; on which sudden appearance of
the flame a consternation fell upon the Romans, and the
shrewdness of the contrivance discouraged them; and indeed this
accident coming upon them at a time when they thought they had
already gained their point, cooled their hopes for the time to
come. They also thought it would be to no purpose to take the
pains to extinguish the fire, since if it were extinguished, the
banks were swallowed up already [and become useless to them].
5. Two days after this, Simon and his party made an attempt to
destroy the other banks; for the Romans had brought their engines
to bear there, and began already to make the wall shake. And here
one Tephtheus, of Garsis, a city of Galilee, and Megassarus, one
who was derived from some of queen Mariamne's servants, and with
them one from Adiabene, he was the son of Nabateus, and called by
the name of Chagiras, from the ill fortune he had, the word
signifying "a lame man," snatched some torches, and ran suddenly
upon the engines. Nor were there during this war any men that
ever sallied out of the city who were their superiors, either in
their boldness, or in the terror they struck into their enemies.
For they ran out upon the Romans, not as if they were enemies,
but friends, without fear or delay; nor did they leave their
enemies till they had rushed violently through the midst of them,
and set their machines on fire. And though they had darts thrown
at them on every side, and were on every side assaulted with
their enemies' swords, yet did they not withdraw themselves out
of the dangers they were in, till the fire had caught hold of the
instruments; but when the flame went up, the Romans came running
from their camp to save their engines. Then did the Jews hinder
their succors from the wall, and fought with those that
endeavored to quench the fire, without any regard to the danger
their bodies were in. So the Romans pulled the engines out of the
fire, while the hurdles that covered them were on fire; but the
Jews caught hold of the battering rams through the flame itself,
and held them fast, although the iron upon them was become red
hot; and now the fire spread itself from the engines to the
banks, and prevented those that came to defend them; and all this
while the Romans were encompassed round about with the flame;
and, despairing of saying their works from it, they retired to
their camp. Then did the Jews become still more and more in
number by the coming of those that were within the city to their
assistance; and as they were very bold upon the good success they
had had, their violent assaults were almost irresistible; nay,
they proceeded as far as the fortifications of the enemies' camp,
and fought with their guards. Now there stood a body of soldiers
in array before that camp, which succeeded one another by turns
in their armor; and as to those, the law of the Romans was
terrible, that he who left his post there, let the occasion be
whatsoever it might be, he was to die for it; so that body of
soldiers, preferring rather to die in fighting courageously, than
as a punishment for their cowardice, stood firm; and at the
necessity these men were in of standing to it, many of the others
that had run away, out of shame, turned back again; and when they
had set the engines against the wall, they put the multitude from
coming more of them out of the city, [which they could the more
easily do] because they had made no provision for preserving or
guarding their bodies at this time; for the Jews fought now hand
to hand with all that came in their way, and, without any
caution, fell against the points of their enemies' spears, and
attacked them bodies against bodies; for they were now too hard
for the Romans, not so much by their other warlike actions, as by
these courageous assaults they made upon them; and the Romans
gave way more to their boldness than they did to the sense of the
harm they had received from them.
6. And now Titus was come from the tower of Antonia, whither he
was gone to look out for a place for raising other banks, and
reproached the soldiers greatly for permitting their own walls to
be in danger, when they had taken the wails of their enemies, and
sustained the fortune of men besieged, while the Jews were
allowed to sally out against them, though they were already in a
sort of prison. He then went round about the enemy with some
chosen troops, and fell upon their flank himself; so the Jews,
who had been before assaulted in their faces, wheeled about to
Titus, and continued the fight. The armies also were now mixed
one among another, and the dust that was raised so far hindered
them from seeing one another, and the noise that was made so far
hindered them from hearing one another, that neither side could
discern an enemy from a friend. However, the Jews did not flinch,
though not so much from their real strength, as from their
despair of deliverance. The Romans also would not yield, by
reason of the regard they had to glory, and to their reputation
in war, and because Caesar himself went into the danger before
them; insomuch that I cannot but think the Romans would in the
conclusion have now taken even the whole multitude of the Jews,
so very angry were they at them, had these not prevented the
upshot of the battle, and retired into the city. However, seeing
the banks of the Romans were demolished, these Romans were very
much east down upon the loss of what had cost them so long pains,
and this in one hour's time. And many indeed despaired of taking
the city with their usual engines of war only.
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