Part 12 (2/2)
The hand appeared at the entrance of the hole, and the whole body was forcibly dragged through, not without excoriations, by the friar and one of his companions. The new comer was disarmed and conducted before Anseric and the baron as soon as the mouth of the drain had been securely closed. The poor wretch remained trembling before the two Seigneurs and navely recounted what had happened to him. He was a young man from Semur, in Auxois, who, like most of his countrymen, was not wanting in intelligence. He gave all the information demanded of him concerning the duke's army: ”Listen attentively to what I say,” said the baron: ”if the castle is taken, thou wilt be hanged by us before the first Burgundian enters. If the duke's men take the castle, thou wilt be hanged by them, to a certainty. If thou servest us faithfully and the duke's troops are obliged to raise the siege, the Lord of Roche-Pont will take thee into his service: what is thy calling?” ”A harness-maker”
”Well then! thou shalt be attached to his stables--shall he not, my worthy nephew?” ”Certainly; and if he aids us efficiently, and if events show us that he speaks the truth, he shall have two pounds of silver on the raising of the siege.”
[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 43.--THE BOSSON.]
These last words completely loosened the harness-maker's tongue; and he told all that he knew as to the number of the engines, the arrangements of the besiegers, the posts they guarded, and the towers of the contravallation; after which he was sent to the servants' hall, where he soon made friends with Anseric's dependants. Friar Jerome, however, was ordered not to lose sight of him.
It was not before the time when the miners were to be relieved (by another set) that the Burgundians discovered what had happened. The vanished harness-maker was strongly suspected of having a.s.sa.s.sinated his comrades while at work; they sought for him--to no purpose, of course.
Before sunrise the baron commenced a countermine at the point indicated by the deserter, inside the bailey wall. ”If thou mistakest by so much as a yard,” said the baron to the harness-maker, ”thou shalt be hanged.”
The work was carried on by both parties, and towards the close of the day the miners and counterminers met and attacked each other in their close quarters with crowbars and pickaxes. The Burgundians and the Lord of Roche-Pont each sent men to seize the mines. A barrel of Greek fire dislodged the duke's men; but the masonry of the wall, whose mortar had not thoroughly set, cracked above the mine. Seeing this, the Burgundians next night, making use of the rescued portion of the _cat_, set up a kind of front-work, formed of pieces of timber; and in the morning brought a _bosson_, or battering-ram on wheels (Fig. 43), with which they set to work to batter the base of the wall. At each blow the masonry was shaken, and stones fell down within and without.
The besieged tried to break the _bosson_, by letting fall great pieces of timber on its head, and to set fire to the timber; but these had been wetted, covered with mud, and filled round with manure at the bottom: the parapet was so well swept by the duke's mangonels and by the crossbow men that it was scarcely possible to retain a footing on it.
Besides the men upon this wall, shaken as it was and vibrating at every blow of the ram, lost their self-possession and did not do their best; while the _bosson_ held out, especially as the a.s.sailants had put large pieces of timber in an inclined position against the wall, which caused the beams thrown by the besieged to slide off.
At the end of three hours of continued effort, the wall gave way, and a piece about twelve feet long fell on the bosson. The Burgundians immediately bringing up planks and ladders rushed to the a.s.sault through the narrow breach. The struggle was severe, and the garrison themselves, mounted on the ruins of the wall, fought bravely and maintained their front unbroken.
From the parts of curtains that remained intact and from the towers the defenders showered darts and stones on the a.s.saulting column. The trebuchets within the rampart continued to send stones which, pa.s.sing over the heads of the defenders and a.s.sailants on the breach, struck those who were gathered around the remains of the _cat_, and made wide lanes among them. By the evening, the Burgundians were masters of the breach; but seeing the interior rampart before them they did not venture to descend, but took up a position on the breach, protected by mantelets and fascines.
The same evening they set miners to work between the tower of the north-west angle and its neighbour; reckoning on thus getting round the retrenchment by pa.s.sing through a second breach.[26] They likewise took possession of the two rampart walks of the curtain in which the breach had been made; but the tower of the gate and that on the left were still holding out at eight o'clock in the evening.
[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 44.]
An hour later, the a.s.sailants being masters of the rampart walk in that quarter, set fire to the roofs of these towers (Fig. 44), which the defenders were forced to abandon.
In the morning, therefore, the gate was in the power of the enemy. The defenders still held the rampart walk to the east and west of the towers that had been burned, had raised barricades, and were determined to contest the position inch by inch.
The a.s.sailants as well as the defenders needed rest. Notwithstanding their progress, the Burgundians were suffering considerable losses, while of the force in the castle there were only a hundred killed and wounded. By a kind of tacit agreement the day following the a.s.sault pa.s.sed without fighting. The duke, alarmed at the losses he had already sustained, determined not to continue the attack without taking every precaution; for his men were complaining that they were always made to fight unprotected against soldiers carefully s.h.i.+elded, and a.s.serting that even if they got as far as the donjon, there would not be a man left in the duke's army to enter it.
That day was spent by the Burgundians in thoroughly protecting their quarters on the breach, in placing a catapult, then in crenelating the back walls of the towers, of which they had got possession, and in constructing a kind of wooden tower provided with a second catapult at the interior opening of the gateway. The defenders, on the other hand, made a second retrenchment from the angle of the building D of the stabling to the western curtain, and a strong barricade from the angle of the chapel choir E, to the neighbouring tower. Next, in front of the main gateway of the castle, a _breteche_, or outwork with palisading to protect the men in case of retreat. It was evident that next day, the 6th of June, a decisive action would render the Burgundians masters of the bailey, even if they did not exert themselves to the utmost; but the defenders were resolved that they should pay dearly for their success.
Anseric, firmly resolved to resist to the last extremity, and to perish under the ruins of his donjon, congratulated himself on Eleanor's absence, and regretted that his children were not with her. The n.o.ble lady was, however, not far off. The evening of the day that had been entirely employed in preparations for attacking and defending the bailey, she and her escort had arrived at the dwelling of the vava.s.sor, Pierre Landry, who had immediately despatched a trusty messenger to the castle.
At the base of the donjon was pierced a slanting aperture one foot six inches square, which, opening into the lower hall, ended in the rampart walk left between the great tower and its outer inclosure. From this rampart walk a subterranean pa.s.sage made along the foundations of the Roman wall, descended the slope of the plateau for a length of sixty feet, and opened out in an old quarry overgrown with brambles. Two strong iron gratings closed this tunnel. Watchmen were posted night and day in this pa.s.sage; they were let down and hoisted up through the inclined shaft of the donjon by means of a carriage worked by a windla.s.s.
By this pa.s.sage Anseric had often sent out and brought in spies, who at night made their way furtively among the Burgundian posts. Now in the dead of night, Pierre Landry's messenger presented himself at the entrance of the subterranean pa.s.sage, gave the signal agreed upon, and handed to the watchman a little box, saying that he was awaiting the answer hidden in the quarry. The box was immediately transmitted to Anseric. Eleanor informed him of her return, and said that she would contrive to re-enter the castle with her train the following night by the donjon postern. Anseric hardly knew whether to rejoice or grieve at this return. But the baron called his attention to a flower which Eleanor had attached to the end of the vellum on which the letter was written, and which was a token of good news.
On the morning of the 6th of June the Burgundians were in no hurry to attack; they contented themselves with sending darts inside the retrenchment, with their catapults and quarrels and arrows in great numbers from the top of the abandoned towers; they were replied to from the top of the church, the stabling, and the great towers of the castle gateway. About three o'clock in the afternoon, the miners engaged (as above mentioned) at the north-west curtain, threw down a part of it. The duke had thus three openings into the bailey; this last breach, the one effected two days before, and the gateway. Baron Guy advised that time and men should not be lost in defending this second breach, since they were intrenched behind; but, thanks to the corner tower, he was able to resist the immediate capture of the rampart of the curtains on that side. The defenders occupying the tower Y[27] were thus cut off. Anseric sent them a note by means of an arrow, urging them to hold out as long as possible. Fortunately this tower had no doors opening on the bailey, and no perceptible communication except with the ramparts. Now those adjacent to this tower still remained in the power of the occupants of the castle; as the Burgundians only possessed the defences of the middle part of the front. About five o'clock the signal for the a.s.sault was given. Three columns entered in good order by the two breaches and the gateway, and rushed, protected by their s.h.i.+elds and bucklers, against the palisading, resolutely throwing themselves into the little ditch, in spite of the missiles which the defenders, who still possessed the tower Y and its curtains, hurled upon them from behind.
An egress had been left in the strong barricade which connected the angle of the chapel choir with the adjacent tower.
Anseric and a party of his best men issued by this outlet and fell upon the flank of the attack, which fell back in disorder.
Then other egresses well masked were opened on the front of the retrenchment, and the defenders resumed the offensive. They very nearly regained possession of these breaches and of the gateway; but the duke, on seeing his force in disorder, brought up his reserves, and the three bodies of a.s.sailants, four times more numerous than the defenders, obliged the latter to retire again behind their retrenchments. Then about seven o'clock in the evening--for the combat was prolonged without decisive success on either side, and the days are long at this period of the year--the two catapults discharged a quant.i.ty of darts furnished with burning tow on the roof of the stabling and of the chapel. The men of the castle exclusively occupied with the defence of the retrenchment, had no time to think of extinguis.h.i.+ng the fire, more especially as the crossbowmen stationed on the defences of the bailey, now in the hands of the Burgundians, struck every defender showing himself on these buildings. The fire, therefore, soon gained the roofs. During the attack on the retrenchment, the duke resolved to get rid of the defenders remaining in his rear in the tower Y, and who annoyed the a.s.sailants. He called to them by a herald, that they could no longer hope for relief, that if they did not instantly surrender they should all be put to the sword. These brave men sent, as their only reply to the herald, a crossbow bolt, which wounded him. Then the duke, much irritated, ordered straw and f.a.ggots to be collected within the bailey and in the outside ditch, and all the wood they might have at hand, and set fire to, in order to smoke out the rebels. Very soon, in fact, the tower was licked by curls of flame, and communicated the fire to the h.o.a.rding and roof.
Not one man cried ”quarter!” for all seeing the fire gaining them, and blinded by the smoke, had retreated by a subterranean pa.s.sage which from this tower communicated with the gateway of the castle--it was a Roman work preserved beneath the ancient curtain.[28] In withdrawing, they had stopped up the outlet of this pa.s.sage, which, moreover, was soon filled up by the smoking _debris_ of the tower floors. The duke was persuaded that they had perished in the flames rather than surrender, and that set him gravely thinking.
To the last glimmering of daylight succeeded, for the combatants, the illumination of these three fires.
It seemed as if the heavens were bent on adding to the horror of the scene. The day had been fiercely hot; a storm soon arose accompanied by gusts of wind from the south-west, which blew down the smoke and strewed burning brands over the combatants.
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