Phélippeaux undertook the defence of the fortress as we have said; Sidney Smith was to provide the arms and the soldiers.
And there, where Bonaparte expected to find only a stupid Turk in command, as at Gaza and Jaffa, he found all the science of a compatriot, and all the hatred of an Englishman.
That same evening Bonaparte ordered Sanson, the chief of the engineering brigade, to reconnoitre the counterscarp. The latter waited until it was very dark. It was a moonless night well suited to such operations. He set out alone, traversed the ruined village, and the gardens from which the Arabs had been dislodged and driven in the morning. Seeing a black mass ahead which could be nothing else than the fortress, he got down on his hands and knees to feel the ground step by step. Just as he discovered a more rapid angle which made him believe that the moat was without facing, he was discovered by a sentinel whose eyes were probably accustomed to the darkness, or who in common with other men shared that propensity of the animals which enables them to see in the dark.
His cry "Who goes there?" rang out in the darkness.
Sanson did not reply. The cry was repeated a second, then a third time; a shot followed, and the ball shattered the outstretched hand of the general of the engineers. In spite of his terrible sufferings the officer made no sound; he crawled back again, thinking that he had studied the moat sufficiently, and made his report to Bonaparte.
The trench was begun on the following day. They took advantage of the gardens which were the ancient moats of Ptolemais, whose history we will relate later, as we did that of Jaffa.
They used an aqueduct which crossed the glacis, and in ignorance of the fatal support which Djezzar possessed to the undoing of the French, they gave the trench but three feet of depth.
When the giant Kléber saw the trench he shrugged his shoulders and said to Bonaparte: "That is a fine trench, general: it will scarcely reach to my knees."
On the 23d of March Sidney Smith captured the two large vessels which were bringing Bonaparte his heavy artillery and the army its supplies. The French watched this capture without being able to prevent it, and found themselves in the strange position of besiegers being fought with their own weapons.