Page:Tudor Jenks--The defense of the castle.djvu/90

66 bad temper, was fair enough to admit his mistake and his rashness.

"Luke, my man," he said, "you were right and I was wrong, and we have paid dearly for it. They tell me that we have lost a hundred men, one way or another, and that without killing a man of the garrison or cracking a stone of the fortress. It is too high a price to pay for my wrongheadedness. I still think that with brave men we might have overrun the defenses; but these villains of ours have no stomach for hard fighting, and no honor to lose by saving their pestilent hides. So have your own way. If we must smash that chicken-coop before taking the Red Lion by the beard, why, get out your trebuchets and rain rocks upon it till it is splinters. Meanwhile, I'll to dinner."

Luke needed no further encouragement. Sending for the artificers, he chose a rocky knoll that was screened by a light growth of trees, and upon this set up the frame of a —one of those powerful pieces of artillery that then took the place of cannon.

The men worked busily in putting the great beams together, adjusting the ropes and pulleys, fitting the levers, greasing or oiling the moving parts, and last attaching the weights that gave force to the long lever, more than forty feet long,