After Major Brown had formed his lines about the cave he called on the Indians to surrender. This they answered with cries of defiance, followed by a few scattering shots which did no harm. Later on Brown again called on them to surrender, or if not that, to send out their women and children, promising no harm should come to them. Again the Indians refused to accept the offer. They heaped epithets, dear to the Apache heart, upon the soldiers, taunting them with cowardice, and assuring them that they would soon be food for the buzzards and ravens. "May the coyotes howl over your grave," is a favorite Apache expression of contempt, which they hurled at their opponents many times during the fight. Daylight came slowly, and then the siege was on in earnest. Brown again renewed his offer of protection to the women and children, but to no purpose. Of arrows and lances, as well as fixed ammunition for their rifles, the Indians seemed to have an unlimited supply. They showered arrows upon the soldiers by hundreds, sending them high into the air, so they would fall upon the men lying behind the rocks scattered about. Lances were also thrown in the same manner, but they were unable to inflict any damage upon the besiegers by such tactics. The Indians also played all the tricks belonging to their style of warfare. War bonnets and hats were raised upon lances above the wall with the intention of drawing the fire of some soldier and getting him exposed to a return shot. But Brown warned his men against all such schemes, and no harm was done by them. Twice did small parties of the Indians make bold dashes out of the cave, evidently with the intention or hope of gaining the rear of the troopers to harass them from the heights above, or else to secure assistance from other bands of hostiles known to be in the vicinity. But these sorties were repulsed by the soldiers with a loss of several Indians. Whether the trick of the Indians in shooting arrows at such an angle as to drop on the men behind the rocks suggested retaliation in kind, no one can say today; but finding direct firing without any great effect, Brown conceived the idea of having his men aim their carbines so that the bullets would strike against the roof of the cave; by so doing, he believed the bullets would be so deflected as to strike amongst the Indians huddled in the small space below. For some time the soldiers poured their fire against the rocky roof with no apparent results, although the shriek of a wounded squaw or the pitiful cry of some child, struck by the spattering lead, convinced them that some of the bullets were finding a mark. The Indians fought with the desperation of trapped animals, but finally there came a lull in their fire. From the cave came a weird wild chant. It was the death chant of the Apaches, which the scouts warned the officers meant a charge.