Page:Tudor Jenks--The defense of the castle.djvu/94

70 place their artillery. After much discussion, they marked two points as the most likely, and then Edgar gave orders that two mangonels of their own should be erected on the castle, commanding both of these positions.

Men were at once set to work by torchlight, and by morning the machines were in place, though the besiegers under cover of the darkness fired not a few bolts from their crossbows in the hope of interrupting or making difficult whatever work was going forward. Edgar had a narrow escape, his hat being carried off by an arrow, but that was the only damage inflicted, since the workmen kept as much as possible behind the merlons or solid parts of the battlements, and the openings or embrasures were closed by heavy mantelets of planks.

These mantelets were thick boards framed together and hinged so that they could be raised when the archers were discharging their arrows through the embrasures, or could be closed to protect the garrison against missiles coming from without, when at work behind the battlements.

As soon as it was light enough to see clearly, the besiegers cut down the trees that had until then hidden their mangonel from the garrison, and at once their engineers began to make the great engine ready for action. The commander