62 THE I-IISTOEY OF THE ORDER OF [book III.

days it was impossible to do it secretly, from thejutting out as requisite, we had to content our-selves with working under the stones, and drawingthem forth from below, and carry them withoutthe least noise into the city; nevertheless, the Turksnearest the fosse remarking that the heap of stonesin it was diminishing, and that they would losethat way of ascent, if they were not very alert,stormed us without delay. Therefore thirty-eightdays having been consumed in these labours,during which they had hurled about three-thousandfive hundred of those monstrous balls of rockagainst our walls, the Turks, perceiving they wereletting slip the opportunity of getting into the city,hastened to finish what they were employed on; andthroughout the entire day and night preceding, andeven dawn of the morning itself of the storm,directed eight of their enormous cannons, hurlingsaid rocks without intermission, against the part ofour walls close to the new fortification, till it wasfor the most part shaken, torn, shattered; videttes,sentinels, "guards, companies, all killed and swept.clear away, that it was hardly possible for one of usto get to the walls at all, save by hiding him withgreat care; and at the stroke of a bell he descendeda little, and at another, mounted. Nor was theretime ever given to repair the fortifications, for the