arms had not
forgotten how to defy the tempest, and their captains had been well
advised in preparing to attack first what seemed the securest side of
the temple. The struggle, he foresaw, would be against tried soldiers,
and it was with a deep curse and a smile of bitter scorn that he thought
of the inexperienced novices under his command. It was only yesterday
that he had tried to moderate Olympius' sanguine dreams, and had said to
him: "It is not by enthusiasm but by tactics that we defeat a foe!"

The skill and experience he had to contend with were in no respect
inferior to his own; and he would know, only too soon, what the
practical worth might be of the daring and enthusiastic youths whom he
had undertaken to command, and of whom he still had secret hopes for the
best.

The one thing to do was to prevent the Christians from effecting the
breach which they evidently intended to make in the back-wall, before
the Libyan army of relief should arrive; and, at the same time, to
defend the front of the temple from the roof. There was a use for every
one who could heave a stone or flourish a sword; and when he thought
over the number of his troops he believed he might succeed in holding
the building for some considerable time. But he was counting on false
premises, for he did not know how attractive the races had proved to his
"enthusiastic youth" and how great a change had come over most of them.

As soon as the wind had so far subsided that he could stand alone, he
went to collect those that still remained, and to have the brass gong
sounded which was to summon the combatants to their posts. Its metallic
clang rang loud and far through the dim dawn; a deaf man might have
heard it in the deepest recess of the sanctuary--and yet the minutes
slipped by--a quarter of an hour--and no one had come at its call. The
old captain's impatience turned to surprise, his surprise became wrath.
The messengers he sent down did not return and the great moving shed
of the Romans was brought nearer and nearer to the southern side of the
temple, screening the miners from the rare missiles which the few men
remaining with him cast clown by his orders.

The enemy were evidently making a suitable foundation on which to place
the storming engine--a beam with a ram's head of iron-to make a breach
in the temple-wall. Every minute's delay on the part of the besieged was
an advantage to the enemy. A hundred-two hundred more hands on the roof,