upon the ramparts wherever there was a vacant spot. Many of them could not carry off or succour their fallen relations, till they had hurled back the enemy from the walls. The assailants also suffered dreadfully; many were drowned, being dragged into the sea by the swords, hooks, and curved lances, thrown by the besieged upon the floating towers. Very many were dashed to pieces with beams and stones, as they were scaling the walls with ladders. In other places, the besieged threw torches, tow, and pitch upon the enemy, so that often they did not know whither to run, or on what side to defend themselves first. The Bonifazians were now exhausted by the ceaseless contest, which had already raged without intermission for many days, and the king resolved once more to collect all his strength in order to make a grand assault on the following day. So the fight raged anew, and more terribly than before, for the foe brought every engine, tower, and catapult to bear upon the town, and almost buried it under a shower of stones, arrows, and steel hooks. Only at the tower of Scarincio the bombarding ceased, for the besiegers feared to overwhelm the Spaniards—who had already at that point forced their way into the town—in the same destruction with the citizens. There, armed women fought untiringly beside the men, and threw harpoons on the assailants. From the ship-towers and the cross-trees, the Spaniards kept up a ceaseless shower of darts, and propelled leaden acorns out of certain cast-metal hand-bombs, which were bored like a reed, and went by the name of Sclopetus. (This is Peter of Corsica's description of a musket, which in those days was a rare, but is now too common a weapon in Corsica.) They threw also showers of sulphur, followed by fire, on the houses and men, so that many were half burnt, and others were precipitated headlong through the breach. In this way the breach, which was near the tower of Preghera, stood open to the foe. As soon as the sulphur-smoke, which had wrapt it in thick darkness, had cleared off, matrons, the unarmed, and crowds of children, could be seen carrying stones and missiles of every kind to the wall, to supply the combatants; when they found the breach deserted, they raised loud cries of lamentation. Then, with wailing and tears, the mother besought her son, the daughter her father, the wife her husband, to return to the breach. The priests and monks also took up arms, and hurled down flaming bundles of tow and slacked lime. This had such great effect that very many, stupified and almost blinded by the dust and the floating vapour, were forced to shoot at random. As the flames subsided a little, the besieged sallied from the gate. This day had been the most severe which the citizens had yet endured; but it had been a destructive one to the enemy.