802 T E W. 
fome parts of which John had made fuch devaftations, 
that they ferved them, for a field of battle, from which 
they Tallied unanimoufly againft the common enemy ‘when¬ 
ever’occa lion ferved; after which they returned to their 
ufual lioftilities, turning their arms againft each other, as 
if they had fvvorn to make their ruin more eafy to the 
Romans. Thefe- drew ftill nearer to the walls, having 
with great labour and pains levelled all the ground be¬ 
tween Scopas and them, by pulling down all the houfes 
and hedges, cutting down the trees, and even cleaving 
fhe rocks that ftood in their way, from Scopas to the 
tomb of Herod, and Bethara, or the pool of ferpents ; in 
which work fo many hands were employed, that they 
finiflied it in four days. 
Whilft this was doing., Titus fent the belieged fome 
offers of peace; and Jofephtis was pitched upon to be the 
meffenger of them ; but they were rejected .with indigna¬ 
tion. Ke feht a.fecond time Nicanor and Jofephus with 
frefli offers, and the former received a wound in-his 
fhoulder; upon which Titus refblved to begin the affault 
in good earneft, and ordered his men to raze the fuburbs, 
cut down all the trees, and ufe the materials to raife 
platforms againft the wall. Every thing was now carried 
on with invincible ardour; the Romans began to play 
their engines againft the city with all their might. The 
Jews had likewife their machines upon the walls* which 
they plied with uncommon fury; they had .taken them 
1 'ately from Ceftius; bi^t were fo ignorant in their ufe, 
that they did little execution with them, till they were 
better inftrufted by fome Roman deferters; till then, their 
chief fuccefs was rather owing to their frequent Tallies ; 
but the Roman legions, who bad all their towers and ma¬ 
chines before them, made terrible havoc. The leaft ftones 
'they threw were near xoolbs. weight; and thefe they 
could throw the length of a quarter of a mile againft the 
city, and with fuch a force, that they could do mifchief 
on thofe that ftood at lome diftance behind them. Ti¬ 
tus had reared three towers, fifty cubits high ; one of 
which happening to fall in the middle of the night, 
greatly alarmed the Roman camp, who immediately ran 
to arms at the noife of it: but Titus, upon knowing fhe 
eaufe, difmifted them, and caufed it to be fet up-again. 
Thele towers being plated with iron, the Jews tried in 
vain to fet fire to them, but were at length forced to re¬ 
tire out of the reach of their fhot; by which the batter¬ 
ing-rams were now at full liberty' - to play againft the wall. 
A breach was loon made in it, at which the Romans en¬ 
tered; and the Jews, abandoning this laft inclofure, re¬ 
tired behind the next. This happened about the 28th of 
April, a fortnight after the beginning of the fiege. 
John defended the temple and the caftle of Antonia, 
and Simon* the reft .of the city. Titus marched clofe to 
the fecondwall, and plied his battering-rams fo furioufly, 
that one of the towers which looked towards the north 
wave a prodigious fliake. The men who were in it made 
a ftgnal to the Romans, as if they would furrender; and, 
at the fame time, feht Simon word to be ready to give 
them a warm reception. Titus, having difcovered their 
ffratagem, plied his work more furioufly, whilft the Jews 
that were in the tower fet it on fire, and flung tbemfelves 
into the flames. The tower being fallen, gave them an 
entrance into the fecond. inclofure, five days after gain¬ 
ing the firft ; and Titus, who was bent on faving the 
city,, would not fuffer any part of the wall or ftreets to be 
d-emolifhed ; which left the breach and lanes fo narrow* 
that, when his men were furioufly repulfed by Simon* 
they had not room enough to make a quick retreat, fa 
that there was a number of them killed in it. This- over- 
fight was quickly rectified ; and the attack renewed with 
fuch vigour, that the place was carried four days after 
their firft repulle. 
The famine, raging in a terrible manner in the city* 
was foon followed by a peftilence; and, as thefe two 
dreadful judgments increaied, fo did the rage of the fac¬ 
tious, who, by their inteftine feuds, had defiroyed fucli 
quantities of provifion, that they were forced to prey 
upon the people with the moft unheard-of cruelty. They 
forced their houfes; and, if they found any victuals in 
them, they butchered them for not apprising them of it 5 
and, if they found nothing but-bare walls, which was al- 
moft every where the cafe, they put them to the moft fe~ 
vere tortures, under pretence that they had fome provi- 
fron concealed. • “ I fhould (fays jofephus) undertake an 
impoflible talk, were I to enter into a detail of all the 
cruelties of thofe impious wretches; it will be fufficient 
to fay, that I do not think, that fince the creation any 
city ever fuffered fuch dreadful calamities, or abounded 
with men fo fertile in all kinds of wickednefs.” 
.Titus, who knew their iniferable condition, and was 
ftill. willing to fpare them, gave them four days to cool ;. 
during which he caufed his army to be muftered, anci 
provilions to be diftributed to them in fight of the Jews*, 
who flocked upon the walls to fee it. Jofephus was fent 
to fpeak to them afrelli, and to exhort them net to run 
themfelves into inevitable ruin, by obftinateiy perfiftiny 
in the defence of a place which could hold out but a very 
little while, and which the Romans looked upon already 
as their own. But this ftubborn people, after many bit- 
ter. inveftives, began to dart their arrows at him ; a? 
which, liot at all difeouraged, he went on with greater ve¬ 
hemence ; but all the effeft it wrought on them- was, that 
it prevailed on great numbers to fteal away privately to* 
the Romans, whilft the reft became only the more defpe- 
rate and refolute to liold out to the laft, in fpite of Ti¬ 
tus’s merciful offers. 
To ha'ften therefore their deftined ruin, he caufed the 
city to be furrounded with- a ftrong. wall, to prevent ei¬ 
ther their receiving any fuccours or provifion from abroad* 
or their efcaping his refehtmeht by flight. This'’wall*, 
which was near five miles in circuit, was yet carried on 
with fuch fpeed, and by fo many hands, that it was- 
finiflied in three days; by which one may guefs at the 
ardour of the beflegers to make themfelves matters of the* 
city. 
There was now nothing to be feen through the ftreettr 
.of Jerusalem but heaps of dead bodies rotting above 
ground, walking lkeletons, and dying wretches. A& 
many as were caught by the Romans in their failles, Ti¬ 
tus caufed to be crucified in fight of the town, to inject 
a terror among the reft ; but flic zealots gave it out* 
that they were thofe who fled to him for protection - 
whiclj when Titus underftood, he fent - a prifoner with; 
his hands cut off to undeceive them, and to affure them* 
that he fpared all that voluntarily came over to him * 
which encouraged- great numbers to accept his offers*, 
though the avenues were clofely guarded by the factious* 
who put all to death who were caught going on that er¬ 
rand. A greater mifchief than that was, that even thofe 
who efcaped fate to the Roman, camp were miferably 
butchered by the foldiers, from a notion which thefe had 
taken that they had fwallowed great quantities of gold 5 
infomuch that two thoufand of them were ripped up in 
one night* to come at their fuppofed tr.eafure. When 
Titus was apprifed of this barbarity, he would have con¬ 
demned ali thofe butchering wretches to death ; hut they 
proved fo numerous, that he was forced to fpare them* 
and contented himfelf with fending a proclamation through, 
his camp* that as many as fnould be fofpefted thencefor¬ 
ward of that horrid villiany, fliould be put to immediate 
death ; yet did not this deter, many of them from it, only 
they did it more privately than before 5 fo greedy were- 
they of that bewitching'metal. All this while the defec¬ 
tion increafed ftill more through* the inhumanity of the 
faction within, who made the miferies and dying groans 
of their ftarving brethren the fubjeft of their cruel mirth* 
and carried their barbarity even to the ftieathing of their 
fvvords in fportin thole poor wretches, under pretence of 
trying their, fltarpnefs* 
'Wires 
