This episode is too characteristic of the man to pass by unnoticed. Battles were won in those days by hand-to-hand work, and Alexander always fought like a Homeric hero. He had formed two storming columns, himself heading the one and Perdiccas the other. The Indians but weakly defended the town wall, and retired into the citadel. Alexander at once made his way into the town through a gate which he forced, but Perdiccas was delayed for want of scaling-ladders. Arrived at the citadel, the Macedonians began to undermine its wall, and the ladders were put in position. Alexander, always impatient in his valor, seeing that the work did not progress as fast as his own desires, seized a scaling-ladder, himself planted it, and ascended first of all, bearing his shield aloft, to ward off the darts from above. He was followed by Peucestas, the soldier who always carried before the king in battle the shield brought from the temple of the Trojan Athena, and by Leonnatus, the confidential body-guard. Upon an adjoining ladder went Abreas, a soldier who received double pay for his conspicuous valor. Alexander first mounted the battlements and frayed a place for himself with his sword. The king’s guards, anxious for his safety, crowded upon the ladders in such numbers as to break them down. Alexander was left standing with only Peucestas, Abreas, and Leonnatus upon the wall in the midst of his enemies; but so indomitable were his strength and daring that none came within reach of his sword but to fall. The barbarians had recognized him by his armor and white plume, and the multitude of darts which fell upon him threatened his life at every instant. The Macedonians below implored him to leap down into their outstretched arms. Nothing daunted, however, and calling on every man to follow who loved him, Alexander leaped down inside the wall and, with his three companions backing up against it, stoutly held his own. In a brief moment he had cut down a number of Indians and had slain their leader, who ventured against him. But Abreas fell dead beside him, with an arrow in the forehead, and Alexander was at the same moment pierced by an arrow through the breast. The king valiantly stood his ground till he fell exhausted by loss of blood, and over him, like lions at bay, but glowing with heroic lustre, stood Peucestas, warding missiles from him with the sacred shield, and Leonnatus guarding him with his sword, both dripping blood from many wounds. It seemed that the doom of all was sealed.