Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/175

 SIEGE OF GAZA. 143 produced all ai-ound when he should bi seeu to have tri- umphed.* He began by erecting a mound south of the city, cbse by the wall, for the purpose of bringing up his battering engines. This external mound was completed, and the engines had begun to batter the wall, when a weU-planned sally by the garrison over- threw the assailants and destroyed the engines. The timely aid of Alexander himself with his hypaspists, protected their re- treat; but he himseh", after escaping a snare from a pretended Arabian deserter, received a severe wound through the shield and the breastplate into the shoulder, by a dart discharged from a catapult ; as the prophet Aristander had predicted — giving assurance at the same time, that Gaza would faU into his liands.'^ During the treatment of his wound, he ordered the engines em- ployed at Tyre to be brought up by sea ; and caused his mound to be carried ai-ound the whole circumference of the town, so as to render it approachable from every point. This Herculean work, the description of which we i-ead with astonislmient, was 250 feet high all round, and two stadia (1240 feet) broad 3; the loose sand around could hardly have been suitable, so that mate- rials must have been brought up from a distance. The under- taking was at length completed ; in what length of time we do not know, but it must have been considerable — though doubt- less thousands of laborers would be pressed in from the circum- jacent country. * ^ Arrian, ii. 26, 5. 01 6e fiiixo-vorroiot yvufifjv uKedeiKvvvro, inzopov dvai 6ia iXelv to relxo^, Sia vrpog tov ;^;fcj/^u;rof• a/l/l' '' AXe^uvdpu edoKet acpereov elvaij OGOJ arropurepov' £K~AJi§€iv yap rovg TToXefiiovi rd epyov tCi napa/.oyo) ewl fiEya^ koi to laj iXelv alaxpov elvai oi, 2,Ey6fj.evov eg re Tovg "VJ.^.rjvag Kal AapEiov. About the fidelity, and obstinate defensive courage, shown more than once by the inhabitants of Gaza — see Polybius, xvi. 40. "Arrian, ii. 26, 27 ; Curtius, iv. 6, 12-18 ; Plutarch, Alexand. 25. ■* Arrian, ii. 27, 5. ;j;a)//a ;t;wvv{)fat ev KVK/.unavTo^ev T/jg tto- 7f6)f. It is certainly possible, as Droysen remarks (Gesch. Alex, des Grossen, p. 199), that Travroi^ci' is not to be interpreted with literal strict- ness, but only as meaning in many different portions of the walled circuit. Yet if this had been intended, Arrian would surely have said x'^f-^^'^ in the plural, not x^l'-^^- montlis. This seems rather under than over the probable truth
 * Diodorus ( xvii. 48 ) states the whole duration of the siege as two