and the principal means of
breaking down a wall was by the battering-ram, which consisted of a
heavy beam of wood, hung by a rope or chain from a massive frame, and
then swung against the gate or wall which it was intended to break
through. In the engraving you see such a ram suspended from the frame,
with men at work below, impelling it against a gateway.

[Illustration: THE BATTERING-RAM.]

Sometimes these battering-rams were very large and heavy, and the men
drew them back and forth, in striking the wall with them, by means of
ropes. There are accounts of some battering-rams which weighed forty
or fifty tons, and required fifteen hundred men to work them.

The men, of course, were very much exposed while engaged in this
operation, for the people whom they were besieging would gather on the
walls above, and shoot spears, darts, and arrows at them, and throw
down stones and other missiles, as you see in the engraving.

[Illustration: THE BALLISTA.]

Then, besides the battering-ram, which, though very efficient against
walls, was of no service against men, there were other engines made
in those days which were designed to throw stones or monstrous darts.
These last were, of course, designed to operate against bodies of men.
They were made in various forms, and were called catapultas,
ballistas, maginalls, and by other such names. The force with which
they operated consisted of springs made by elastic bars of wood,
twisted ropes, and other such contrivances.

[Illustration: THE CATAPULTA.]

Some were for throwing stones, others for monstrous darts. Of course,
these engines required for their construction heavy frames of sound
timber. Richard did not expect to find such timber in the Holy Land,
nor did he wish to consume the time after he should arrive in making
them; so he employed the winter in constructing a great number of
these engines, and in packing them, in parts, on board his galleys.

Richard performed a great religious ceremony, too, while he was at
Sicily this winter, as a part of the preparation which he deemed it
necessary to make for the campaign. It is a remarkable fact that every
great military freebooter that has organized an armed gang of men to
go forth, and rob and murder his fellow-men, in any age of the world,
has considered some great religious performance necessary at the
outset of the work, to prepare the minds of his soldiers for it, and
to give them the necessary resolution and confide