When they were all ready, they had the bombards set in place. The following day their firing was so loud and came so often that Tirant found it necessary to shift his encampment to the top of a hill, very close to the river, where there were springs of pure water and large expanses of meadowland. At times all the bombards fired together. And although it was a very clear day, the sky grew dark, for they had more than six hundred bombards, both small and large, despite the fact that they had lost so many when they were defeated. When Tirant's men so saw many of them, they were frightened at the large number of men on horseback and on foot. There were many who wished they were one hundred leagues from there. When the sultan saw that he could not cross the river to engage the Christians in battle, he quickly had the bridge repaired. When Tirant saw them repairing the bridge, he took four of his men a league distant to a large stone bridge, and at each end of the bridge there was rocky ground and a castle. When the sultan had conquered all that land, he saw that bridge, but Lord Malvei, the gentleman who was lord of the two castles, would never make a pact with him, no matter how much he promised. For he never wanted to deny or be ungrateful to God or to his natural lord--the emperor. Instead, from those castles at the bridge, they often waged war against the villas and cities the Turks had taken. As a result, the sultan was forced to make a wooden bridge so that his men could cross over to carry out the conquest of the empire. When Tirant reached the castle, he spoke with the knight whose name was Malvei and who had a very valiant son. The father occupied one castle, and his son the other. They each had thirty horsemen, and with the war they had become very wealthy. The son, whose name was Hippolytus, became a great friend of Tirant and almost never left his side. The father and son begged Tirant to grant him the honor of chivalry, and he did so. Then Tirant had many trees in the woods cut down, the driest they could find. They measured the width of the river and they made beams, nailing them together with heavy spikes, and they made them so long that they reached across the river. And they put those beams underneath the stone bridge, and from one beam to another they nailed heavy joists, and over the joists they nailed wooden slabs. It was smooth from one end to the other, and it was well caulked with pitch. When this raft was finished, they put a chain at each end and attached it to the stone bridge. And they covered it well with green branches in order to hide it.