Not only these thick-walled buildings, but all the houses, were converted into forts, the doors and windows being built up, the fronts loop-holed, and openings for communication broken through the party-walls; while the streets were defended by trenches and earthen ramparts mounted with cannon. Never before was there such an instance of a whole city converted into a fortress, the thickness of the ramparts being here practically measured by the whole width of the city. Saragossa had been a royal depot for saltpetre, and powder-mills near by had taught many of its people the process of manufacture, so no magazines of powder subject to explosion were provided, this indispensable substance being made as it was needed. Outside the walls the trees were cut down and the houses demolished, so that they might not shield the enemy; the public magazines contained six months’ provisions, the convents and houses were well stocked, and every preparation was made for a long siege and a vigorous defence. Again, as before, companies of women were enrolled to attend the wounded in the hospitals and carry food and ammunition to the men, the Countess Burita being once more their commander, and performing her important duty with a heroism and high intelligence worthy of the utmost praise. Not less than fifty thousand combatants within the walls faced the thirty-five thousand French soldiers without, who had before them the gigantic task of overcoming a city in which every dwelling was a fort and every family a garrison. A month and more passed before the walls were taken. Steadily the French guns played on these defences, breach after breach was made, a number of the encircling convents were entered and held, and by the 1st of February the walls and outer strongholds of the city were lost. Ordinarily, under such circumstances, the city would have fallen, but here the work of the assailants had but fairly begun. The inner defences—the houses with their unyielding garrisons—stood intact, and a terrible task still faced the French. The war was now in the city streets, the houses nearest the posts held by the enemy were crowded with defenders, in every quarter the alarm-bells called the citizens to their duty, new barricades rose in the streets, mines were sunk in the open spaces, and the internal passages from house to house were increased until the whole city formed a vast labyrinth, throughout which the defenders could move under cover. Marshall Lannes, the French commander, viewed with dread and doubt the scene before him. Untrained in the art of war as were the bulk of the defenders, courage and passionate patriotism made up for all deficiencies. Men like these, heedless of death in their determined defence, were dangerous to meet in open battle, and the prudent Frenchman resolved to employ the slow but surer process of excavating a passage and fighting his way through house after house until the city should be taken piecemeal.