Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

RAMS AND MINES. 177water to quench fires which the bcsiegetl might set.Generallythe battering-ranis were slung in the lower story ; the enginesstood in the middle ones ; the soldiers occupied the upperstories. While the tower was being advanced, the men inthe several stories kept up a constant fireof arrows, javelinsand other missiles upon the besieged who occupied the walls,to prevent their interference with the operations of the siegeand from this tower, when near enough, bridges hingedthereto, and sometimes concealed, were dropped upon the walls.Over these bridges the besiegers marched to the assault.Towers were often made on permanent foundations, and notinfrequently ofbrick.Earns were at first long bars of iron, or beams pointed withiron, which were handled by the soldiers. Pliny recognizesthe ram in the story of the horse of Troy. Thucydides clearlydescribes one at the siege of Samos in the Peloponnesianwar.Next came the idea of suspending the rams in a frameworkand moving them to and fro by manned ropes, thusgetting the advantage of impetus. Later they were mountedon wheels ^running in tracks. This latter kind averaged fiftyfeet long. Demetrius is said to have had two, each one hundredand twenty feet long. They were often loaded at bothends so as to deliver a heavier blow.They needed many mento operate them, as they often weighed hundreds of tons. Totransport one mentioned by Diodorus required three hundredpairs of horses ; to operate it fifteen hundi-ed men, includingthe relays.While the besiegers were engaged at undermining the wallsof the town, the besieged were busy undermining theterraceor mound and the towers of the besiegers. Having no explosives,they were obliged to make chambers large enoughto weaken the entire structure. The roofs of these chamberswere sustained by beams, and when completed, they were