After a day employed in making a great number of hurdles, ladders, and hooks, the Gauls of the army of succour left their camp in silence towards the middle of the night, and approached the works in the plain. Then, suddenly uttering loud cries, in order to warn the besieged, they throw their fascines, to fill up the fosse, attack the defenders of the _vallum_ with a shower of sling-balls, arrows, and stones, and prepare everything for an assault. At the same time, Vercingetorix, hearing the cries from without, gives the signal with the trumpet, and leads his troops out of the place. The Romans take in the retrenchments the places assigned to them beforehand, and they spread disorder among the Gauls by throwing leaden balls, stones of a pound weight, and employing the stakes placed in the works beforehand; the machines rain down upon the enemy a shower of darts. As they fought in the dark (the shields being useless), there were in both armies many wounded. The lieutenants M. Antony and C. Trebonius, to whom was entrusted the defence of the threatened points, supported the troops that were too hardly pressed by means of reserves drawn from the neighbouring redoubts. So long as the Gauls kept far from the circumvallation, the multitude of their missiles gave them the advantage; but when they approached, some became suddenly entangled in the _stimuli_; others fell bruised into the _scrobes_; others again were transpierced by the heavy _pila_ used in sieges, which were thrown from the tops of the _vallum_ and the towers. They had many disabled, and nowhere succeeded in forcing the Roman lines. When day began to break, the army of succour retired, fearing to be taken in their uncovered flank (the right side) by a sally from the camps established on the mountain of Flavigny. On their side, the besieged, after losing much valuable time in transporting the material for the attack, and in making efforts to fill up the first fosse (the one which was twenty feet wide), learnt the retreat of the army of succour before they had reached the real retrenchment. This attempt having failed, like the other, they returned into the town. Thus twice repulsed with great loss, the Gauls of the army of succour deliberated on what was to be done. They interrogate the inhabitants of the country, who inform them of the position and the sort of defences of the Roman camps placed on the heights.