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Another door, this time unfastened, led into a larger apartment, which was also at present unoccupied. They could hear now the shouts of the combatants without, the loud orders given by the leaders on the walls, the crack, as the stones hurled by the mangonels struck the walls, and the ring of steel as the arrows struck against steel cap and cuirass.
This operation was of course an exceedingly slow one, a whole day being occupied with each trip of the wagons. They were not unmolested in their advance, for, from the walls, mangonels and other machines hurled great stones down upon the wooden screens, succeeding sometimes, in spite of their thickness, in crashing through them, killing many of the men beneath.
"On Thursday, 14th July 1199, at daybreak, the trumpets resounded, and the whole Christian army stood to their arms. All the machines were worked at once: the mangonels and engines poured on the ramparts a shower of stones, while the battering-rams were brought up close to their feet.
"Oh! ye men of Paris, ye are worse than the Pagans of old Rome." Just then the mangonels firing from the Porte Saint-Denis mingled their thunder with Brother Joconde's voice and shook the bystanders' hearts within them. Some one in the press cried out, "Death! death to traitors!" All this time Messire Florimont Lecocq was within-doors doing on his armour.
But, daughter, that sore choice has not yet been thrust upon you. When Saladin says that he sets you against the lives of all this cityful, then you must judge." "Ay," repeated Rosamund, "then I must judge." The siege went on; from terror to terror it went on. The mangonels hurled their stones unceasingly, the arrows flew in clouds so that none could stand upon the walls.
"And fear not that task shall be other than thine own, my gallant friend," was Hereford's instant reply, his features kindling at Lancaster's words more than they had done yet; and then again quickly resuming his calm unimpassioned exterior, he inquired if the mangonels and other engines were again fit for use. There were several that could instantly be put in action was the reply.
The besieged were not idle, but laboured at the construction of several mangonels capable of casting huge blocks of stone. In the morning the Danes planted their battering-rams, one on each side of the tower, and recommenced the assault.
Stones could be thrown over the walls by mangonels to annoy the garrison. Sometimes a wall could be brought down by a battering- ram. But the quickest and surest way was by mining. The miners worked their way to the wall, and then began to take some of the stones of the outer casing out, propping the wall up with beams of wood.
Remember what he did to them of Alencon, when they hung raw hides over the wall, and cried, 'Plenty of work for the tanner!" "Let him pick out the prisoners' eyes, and chop off their hands, and shoot them into the town from mangonels, he must go far and thrive well ere I give him a chance of doing that by me." "Hereward, Hereward, my own! Boast not, but fear God.
Mangonels, or catapults, huge engines stationed on the roofs of the towers, sent masses of stone hurtling through the air, whistling arbelast bolts and clothyard shafts flew in thick showers, boiling oil or lead rained down on the heads of those who ventured down to attack the doors, and arrows, with Greek fire attached, were shot with nice aim into the wooden balconies and bridges.
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