As soon as they fired we threw ourselves upon our elbows and knees, as he had counseled us. The first shot they fired came between our two cat castles, and fell in front of us on the open place which the army had made for the purpose of damming the river. Our men whose duty it was to extinguish fires were all ready for it; and because the Saracens could not aim at them on account of the two wings of the sheds which the king had erected there, they fired straight up towards the clouds, so that their darts came down from above upon the men. The nature of the Greek fire was in this wise, that it rushed forward as large around as a cask of verjuice,[460] and the tail of the fire which issued from it was as big as a large-sized spear. It made such a noise in coming that it seemed as if it were a thunderbolt from heaven and looked like a dragon flying through the air. It cast such a brilliant light that in the camp they could see as clearly as if it were daytime, because of the light diffused by such a bulk of fire. Three times that night they discharged the Greek fire at us, and four times they sent it from the fixed cross-bows. Each time that Our sainted king heard that they had discharged the Greek fire at us, he dressed himself on his bed and stretched out his hands towards our Lord, and prayed with tears: "Fair Sire God, preserve me my people!" And I verily believe that his prayers stood us in good stead in our hour of need. That evening, every time the fire fell, he sent one of his chamberlains to inquire in what state we were and if the fire had done us any damage. One time when they threw it, it fell close to the cat castle which Monseigneur de Courtenay's people were guarding, and struck on the river-bank. Then a knight named Aubigoiz called to me and said: "Sir, if you do not help us we are all burnt, for the Saracens have discharged so many of their darts dipped in Greek fire that there is of them, as it were, a great blazing hedge coming towards our tower." We ran forward and hastened thither and found that he spoke the truth. We extinguished the fire, but before we had done so the Saracens covered us with the darts they discharged from the other side of the river. [Sidenote: Progress of the conflict]