The garrison brought its engines along the broad parapet within range of the ships, and hurled great blocks of stone at the besieging fleet. Several of the smaller vessels were sunk. Sometimes the stones met in the air and burst into fragments. The attack upon the wall was not relaxed. Finally a block was sufficiently exposed to permit the grappling-irons to be fastened to its inner angles. Strong ropes were attached to it and carried out to a quinquereme. The rowers bent to their work, and the ropes lifted, dripping, from the water. The block held fast for a moment, and then came out of its bed like a cork out of a bottle, rolling with a splash into the sea.
Amid the triumphant shouts of the Macedonians, a flatboat was pushed forward and a hundred men attacked the weakened wall with levers and bars of irons. Some of them were crushed by the rocks toppled down upon them from above, others were pierced by arrows; but when they withdrew, a wide cavity yawned where they had been, exposing the inner courses of masonry.
After them came the largest and heaviest of the rams. Under its tremendous blows the cavity deepened and widened until the wall above it began to tremble. It swayed, crumbled, and at last with a mighty roar it fell, burying the ram and half the men who had been working it under tons of broken stone. The Macedonians, gazing through the gap that was opened, saw the Temple of Baal-Moloch, with its dome and towers, rising gloomily among the cypress trees that surrounded it.
With one impulse, the vessels carrying the shield-bearing guards and the veterans of the Agema rushed in toward the breach. The soldiers leaped ashore. Order was impossible upon such an insecure footing as the tumbled blocks afforded. Every man clung where he could, advancing step by step, and protecting himself by holding his shield above his head.
The Tyrians from the ends of the broken wall and from the top of the slope where the gap had been made sent down flights of darts and arrows. In order to repel the storming party, they even loosened portions of the wall that still held firm and hurled them down upon the enemy.
Still the Macedonians pressed upward in the hope of winning the breach, and holding it until reinforcements could arrive. Ptolemy, son of Lagus, and Black Clitus fought in the foremost ranks. Beside them Leonidas plied his sword, and with him were Clearchus and Chares.
"Ho, comrades! Beware the stone!" the Theban shouted, as a loosened block rushed toward them down the slope.
Leonidas started aside, but his foot slipped and he fell to his knees. Chares caught his arm and dragged him away. The fragment grazed him as it hurtled past.
"Forward, men of Macedon!" Ptolemy cried. "Alexander is watching you."
A breathless cheer from the struggling ranks behind him told him that the soldiers were doing their best. The stones of the fallen wall, slippery with blood, rocked beneath their feet. Some of the men were caught in crevices between the blocks and their lives were crushed out, or they were held there until a javelin put an end to their misery. But those who escaped this peril pressed upward like wolves when the quarry is in sight. The exasperation of all the long months of the siege, the accumulation of countless insults, and the joy of the battle filled their hearts.