1855.] on Siege Operations, 45 



places of cover and security, protecting themselves from these 

 projectiles by such temporary buildings as they can erect. The 

 enemy in reply keep up a continuous fire from small mortars, 

 called royals and coehorns, upon the head of the advancing 

 trench ; light balls (a brilliantly burning firework), thrown by the 

 garrison, disclose the operations of the enemy, who try to extinguish 

 them with sand or wetted hides, and if such means fail, place 

 smoke balls to obscure the light. 



The approaches are now carried forward by sapping, — a most 

 hazardous duty. The foremost workman, protected by the sap- 

 roller, pushed in front by a long fork, places a gabion on the side 

 nearest the fortress ; he rapidly fills it with earth from the trench 

 he is excavating (a labour he performs on his knees), digging the 

 earth eighteen inches deep, and a like width, but never exposing 

 himself beyond the first placed gabion. He is followed by three 

 comrades, who increase the dimensions of the trench, and frequently 

 relieve him in his perilous undertaking ; sand-bags are placed in 

 the hollows between each gabion, and thus safe cover is effected ; 

 ten feet of sap may be made in one hour. At the late siege of 

 Antwerp, the French sappers were protected by helmets and cui- 

 rasses, their weight however impeded the movements of the men ; 

 and the celerity of the operation. 



At this period of the siege, the fire from the place being much 

 weakened, many guns dismounted, and the ramparts ploughed up 

 by the severity of the besiegers' fire, a third parallel is at length 

 formed at the foot of the glacis, and an attempt made to gain the 

 covered way, the palisades in which have been broken and de- 

 stroyed by the ricochet batteries. If this is to be effected by 

 assault, the interior of the breastwork of the third parallel is made 

 in steps, so that the assailants may simultaneously sally forth to 

 attain their object : but the slower and more certain method is by 

 the sap and mine. At the siege of Cambray, Dumetz stormed a 

 work during the attack contrary to the advice of Vauban, and sus- 

 tained a defeat, together with a loss of 40 officers, and 400 men ; 

 Vauban gained the same object two days later by sap, and lost but 

 three lives. 



The covered way being now in possession of the besiegers, breach- 

 ing batteries to destroy the revetments of the fortress are con- 

 structed. The fire of six 24- pounders, so directed as to make 

 perpendicular cuts in the masonry, play upon the wall : one long 

 horizontal fissure three feet in depth is also effected, and by the firing 

 in salvos or volleys, the loosened mass and superincumbent para- 

 pet falls bodily into the ditch, presenting a slope or means of ascent 

 more or less practicable. The troops are led to the assault by 

 means of a subterraneous gallery leading from the trenches to the 

 ditch. 



The garrison now usually capitulates. But if the latter part of 

 the operations are carried on by the system of mining, the entire 



