Lamia was not very interested in fighting; though she was interested in the stratagems of war, especially in the novel engines designed by her lover.
He began by devising a floating boom, to shield the warships which closed the harbour-mouth. This was a novelty. Booms were used frequently in defence, but not in attack. His boom would be pushed forward by the beaks of six warships advancing behind it; it was tall enough to protect the ships from missiles, and plated with iron sheeting. He designed the whole thing in his head, without any previous example; and drew it so clearly on the sand-table that his engineers made exactly what he had in mind.
It worked, too, when it was finished. The warships pushed it forward; it floated, it could be steered, and it protected them. After the harbour was closed he had it pushed farther in, so that his marines gained a lodgement on the mole. Covered by wheeled pentices, his men advanced up the mole as far as the town wall. But they got no farther; assaults on the wall were beaten off after desperate fighting.
All this had taken two months, and now he was expected in Thessaly. But he could not abandon the siege. The great Demetrius son of Antigonus had liberated Hellas and in a single battle destroyed the power of Egypt. But his invasion of Egypt had failed, and he could not afford a second check. His men followed him because he was reputed invincible.
He looked once again at the harbour. This was the midday lull, when both sides thinned out the front line while the troops ate their dinners. But there were plenty of sentries on the mole; he could see the glint of their helmets. In a little creek at the very end of the harbour the Rhodian warships lay crowded together, penned there by his mighty floating boom.
Behind the boom six of his warships rocked at anchor, oars in the rowlocks, ready for instant action. Then he noticed a flock of small boats round these guard ships; the rowers were being taken off to dine in comfort on the shore. That was unsoldierly, in the presence of the enemy; though of course they must feel safe with the boom so high before them and the city so quiet. Next time he visited the harbour he would send for the officer of the day and tell him what he thought of this slackness. No need to rebuke the rowers themselves. They were volunteers from the islands, enthusiasts for the cause of liberty; but, like all Hellenes, very easily bored by the routine of a long siege.
Hallo, on the mole the sentries were moving. Their gleaming helmets clustered by the city wall. And in the harbour something was up; rowers scrambled back to their ships from the shore-boats. As a trumpet sounded the alarm he stood for one last look before running down the hill to take over command in this emergency.
From the inner creek issued a cloud of black skiffs. They were bigger than ordinary skiffs, as big as an old-fashioned fifty-oar. The Rhodians must have built them especially for this coup. They were black because from each came the smoke of burning oil-pots, and they were making at full speed for the boom. His guardships were getting up their anchors, but the enemy would be first at the boom.
He pelted down the slope. But by the time he reached the harbour all was over. His great boom, made from the best ship-timber and protected by costly sheet-iron, blazed fiercely. On the mole the Rhodians had landed behind his sentries, who laid down their arms when they saw themselves surrounded; that was one of the drawbacks of a war waged with humanity, with quarter and a speedy exchange guaranteed to all prisoners. Two months of hard work was thrown away. He was back at the beginning again.
The officer responsible for the slackness of the harbour-guard had to do some clever explaining. But you could never be severe with the contingents from allied cities; if they thought their commander a tyrant they would just withdraw from the war. The man had been stupid, not treacherous. He must be forgiven.
His council advised him to raise the siege. By all accounts Cassander was getting the better of the democratic army in Thessaly, and might soon advance into Boeotia. Meanwhile it was becoming difficult to supply his large force on this island. But Demetrius was obstinate. These impudent Rhodians must be punished. He decided to mount another attack on the city, this time from the landward.
Planning this attack was an absorbing study. He designed a new engine so splendid that his soldiers at once named it the City Taker. It as an immense movable tower, high enough to overtop the city walls and yet a good deal broader than it was high; each of its eight stages was strong enough for the emplacement of big catapults; these catapults shot their darts through loop-holes which might be closed by armoured shutters. The whole enormous machine, though proof against enemy missiles, could be pushed easily on its many wheels. Once they had filled in the ditch they would push it right up to the city wall.
Unfortunately the filling-in of the ditch was a slow business, even though 30,000 pioneers were available for the work. It seemed likely that Demetrius would be held up for the whole summer. The delay was a great nuisance, but it must be endured. A Saviour God cannot admit defeat. The siege must continue, even though half the cities of Hellas sent envoys to mediate in this unfortunate dispute which occupied the forces of their Deliverer.
Demetrius was careful to show himself as the friend of civilisation, in contrast to these merchants who sold aid to Pharaoh and his beast-headed gods. In a garden just outside the city wall his pioneers found a studio containing a half-finished picture. Not only was this an important work of art, it was in the most literal sense irreplaceable. It depicted, among other things, an angry dog; and Protogenes, its painter, had achieved his effect by a happy accident. After trying again and again to paint the slavering muzzle he had lost his temper and thrown at the picture the damp sponge he used for erasures. The ensuing smear was most life-like; but if the picture were destroyed the effect could never be reproduced.
‘What I like about that story is that Protogenes must have told it against himself,’ Lamia remarked. ‘If he had kept his mouth shut no one would have known it was a happy accident. Any barbarian would boast that he had done it by his own skill, or perhaps that some god had inspired him. Only a Hellene would admit in public that his supreme masterpiece had been made by a lucky throw. Of course you will take care of the picture. What will you do? Send it into the city?’
‘I thought of that, but the moving might damage it, and then I would be blamed. I have done something better. I have arranged with the Rhodians that the studio shall rank as a shrine. Six sentries will guard it day and night, three of ours and three of theirs. It is out of bounds to all other troops in both armies. I have promised not to attack the stretch of wall behind the studio. For all I care Protogenes may come out from the city to finish his picture. The war goes on, but I shan’t disturb him.’
‘Must the war go on?’ asked Lamia. ‘These Rhodians seem to be our kind of people, the kind we want on our side. And you are needed in Hellas.’
‘My dear, we have gone into this time and again. The war must go on because the great Demetrius cannot admit that he has been baffled by a single island. It’s not altogether a waste of time, you know. My engines are the talk of Hellas, so famous that they have given me a new surname. I am called Demetrius Poliorcetes, the Besieger of Cities. As my fame grows Cassander’s allies will lose heart. It looks now as though I shan’t reach Hellas this year; but when I land next year there may be no resistance.
‘Besides,’ he added after a pause, ‘these Rhodians are not quite so blameless as Homer’s Ethiopians. They have just played a dirty trick on me. Their cruisers captured one of my despatch boats. In it were letters from my family, and the clothes and bedding dear Phila sends me constantly. The darling doesn’t fear that swords may hurt her warrior, but she hates to think of me sneezing. Well, the Rhodians captured all this, and then sent the whole lot to Ptolemy. I suppose the Rhodians thought the letters would make spicy reading in Alexandria, full of reproaches about my friendship with you. They will be disappointed. Phila understands. She is my Queen, and I honour her; but I have never pretended to love her. She knows that I need a companion, someone whose mind can talk with mine; an intellectua
l equal, just as Phila is my equal in blood. Probably her letters don’t mention you at all.’
‘I’m not sure I like this,’ said Lamia, pouting. ‘Are you getting just the least little bit pompous, darling? I am your hetaira, your amusement in the evening. That doesn’t mean that you have searched the world to find a mind equal to yours. It might be just that you like my flute-playing. And you seem to forget the other girls. Afterwards they boast about it, naturally, so everyone knows. No. Soldiers on active service need their comforts, and I am one of them. But while you are having such a good time you mustn’t be high-minded about the sacred relationship between a husband and his faithful wife,’
She saw him frown. He was indeed growing pompous. Like a good hetaira she changed the subject.
‘How did the Rhodians capture the despatches? I thought all their ships were hemmed in at the end of the harbour. Don’t the Saviour Gods rule the sea, especially after the great victory at Salamis?’
Demetrius smiled again. He enjoyed nothing more than explaining the technicalities of war, and in dealing with these technicalities he was never pompous.
‘We rule the sea all right, in a manner of speaking. No fleet in the world can challenge mine. But the sea is a big place, and I don’t control every yard of it for every hour of the day. You see, a warship is designed for battle. It’s devilish uncomfortable to cruise in - cold food and nowhere to sleep. The crew ought to get ashore at least every third night; six nights at sea is the utmost you can ask of them even in a crisis. But the Rhodians have armed their merchantmen. Those sailing-ships, carrying a small crew, can keep the sea for fifteen or twenty days if they have to. They pop out of secret havens when my blockading squadrons are resting or taking on fresh water. I can sail anywhere I like. No one dare stop me. But even I can’t safeguard every little despatch boat from Asia. I must just put up with an occasional loss.’
After a pause he added: ‘So the only way to make the sea absolutely safe is to conquer this one rebel city.’
‘Or make peace with it,’ answered Lamia. ‘Why do you call them rebels? Were they born your subjects?’
‘You win,’ laughed Demetrius. ‘My honourable foes, if you prefer it. Anyway, they will be my allies as soon as I have knocked a hole in their wall. Tomorrow you must watch my City Taker in action. There’s never been a machine like it,’
That was what interested him, Lamia reflected: constructing great machines which would overcome other machines. How unfortunate that people had to be overcome, killed or wounded, at the same time. A war waged by machines only would have suited him just as well.
Until autumn the great City Taker battered away, assisted by other engines almost as remarkable. Pentices had been pushed up to the wall, so stoutly roofed that no Rhodian machine could harm them; they sheltered huge battering rams 180 feet long, made from the tallest trees to be found in Asia. The engineering skill of Demetrius the Besieger of Cities was the wonder of the civilised world.
About vintage time a practicable breach appeared. But the long-awaited assault ended in failure. Behind the damaged wall the Rhodians had built another, and a third behind that. There had been ample time for the building, and the mortar ha set hard. The attacking columns were brought to a stand before the second wall, until Demetrius ordered a retreat. If the assault had been kept up it was just possible that the defenders might have collapsed from exhaustion; but casualties were heavy, and Demetrius could not bear to see his men dying in vain. A horror of bloodshed handicaps even the most ingenious soldier.
The attackers withdrew in some confusion. The Rhodians took advantage of a momentary panic to sally out and break the wheels of the great City Taker. The huge tower remained leaning helplessly against their shattered wall, of no use to either side.
On a dark winter night Demetrius ordered an escalade. For a month the besiegers had lain quiet, as though relying only on blockade; half an hour’s inattention from the Rhodian sentries would give them victory.
An escalade was notoriously hazardous. One difficulty was that the attackers, after creeping up in dead silence, must dash into the defences with a verve and alacrity usually worked up by paeans and war cries. To avoid hesitation on the brink Demetrius decided to lead the assault in person.
His counsellors were shocked by the rash proposal. A chance javelin might end the war at a blow. Demetrius had an answer to these objections; he would wear his famous spear-proof cuirass.
A Cypriot armourer had advertised his workshop by sending two special cuirasses to the Saviour God. They were proof against a dart shot from a catapult, as had been shown by demonstration; the dart bounced off. Their only disadvantage was that they were very heavy. For this short escalade Demetrius thought he could carry one; the other he gave to the most famous man-at-arms in his forces, Alcimus of Epirus, who habitually carried a hundredweight of steel into battle.
The escalade failed. Probably some mercenary had sold a timely warning to the Rhodians. Waiting defenders cast down the ladders as they were placed in position. For some time the columns milled about in the ditch, under a rain of javelins and stones; even Demetrius never set foot on a ladder. Then a man near him was rather horribly disembowelled by a barbed javelin, and he saw many other ugly corpses. Sickened as usual by this slaughter he ordered a retreat; which was carried out so steadily that the Rhodians dared not follow up. The hero Alcimus was less lucky. He had worked himself into his usual battle-rage and ignored the order to retire. Next morning his magnificent body lay at the foot of the wall, still encased in its famous cuirass.
There was nothing for it but to continue the blockade. The Rhodians had already missed one harvest, and they ought to be getting hungry. But Ptolemy backed them with the money and grain of Egypt. Fast seaworthy grain-ships ran the blockade in bad weather, now that no boom closed the harbour. The pirates should have dealt with them, but the pirates were tired of a siege which had lasted for the best part of a year. The Rhodians were still far from starvation.
When spring came round there seemed no reason why the siege should not continue for another nine years, like the leaguer of Troy. But the patience of Antigonus was exhausted.
‘This is an order,’ his letter opened. ‘You will immediately transfer your forces to the mainland of Hellas. Make some kind of peace with the Rhodians, or at least a truce; the seas must be quiet behind us. Bear in mind that Rhodes has won the war, and take the best terms you can get. If you do it with good humour the world may see the outcome as a draw, instead of a naked defeat for the Saviour Gods. As soon as you are in Hellas you will devote all your strength to the defeat of Cassander, without being diverted to any other object.’
This had been written by a clerk at headquarters. Below came a scribble in the wavering, senile hand of Antigonus himself:
‘You have squandered a year, out of the few which remain to me. There is real danger that Cassander may conquer Athens. Then we shall have the whole pack at our heels - Ptolemy, Lysimachus, Seleucus - every jackal who rends the corpse of Alexander’s Empire. At my age I can’t fight on three fronts at once. Drop everything and come to help your father.’
‘That’s final,’ said Demetrius, throwing the despatch to Lamia. ‘This summer we shall fight with swords, not with machines. There will be hard marching too, and I may not be able to keep you at headquarters. I’m sorry. I like everything about war except the killing, and now I must slaughter Cassander’s men, decent Hellene mercenaries who might be serving me if my recruiting officers had met them first. Let’s see. The first step is peace with Rhodes. It’s lucky there are mediators in camp this minute, about the twentieth effort at mediation since the siege began. I haven’t bothered to receive them. Now they shall have the glory of arranging peace at any price.’
‘Never mind,’ answered Lamia. ‘You don’t want to sack beautiful and courageous Rhodes any more than I do, and it would be hard to capture the city without damaging it. You had your fun, designing all those lovely engines.’
‘A
nd you, my dear, will see Hellas at last, and see it as it should be seen. You will enter Athens, the most glorious city in the world, as the companion of Athene’s, own colleague and Saviour.’
‘In the autumn, perhaps,’ Lamia said quickly. ‘You are not to sail direct to Piraeus and fight bloody battle all over Attica. That’s what any Macedonian drill-sergeant would do, but not a Saviour God. Land somewhere else, and make Cassander march to meet you. Athens is special, it’s not a public battlefield.’
Peace was quickly arranged in a spirit of sweet reason. To save face all round it was agreed that the Rhodians should become the allies of Antigonus against all his enemies, save Ptolemy of Egypt. They remained the allies of Ptolemy as well, and might continue their valuable trade with Alexandria. Demetrius admitted privately to Lamia that these terms might have been obtained before the siege began. As his father said, he had indeed squandered a year on a purposeless though fascinating problem of military engineering. But to the outside world it looked a reasonable compromise. Demetrius remained Poliorcetes, the Besieger of Cities, the greatest captain of the age.
Cassander, encamped in Attica, was preparing to blockade Athens from the land side. Following Lamia’s advice, Demetrius did not sail to Piraeus. Instead he landed at Aulis, astride Cassander’s communications with Macedonia.
Meanwhile the Rhodians celebrated their deliverance, with a discreet exuberance which would not give offence to their recent enemies. The famous engines designed and built by the great Poliorcetes were first put on show at so much a peep, and then sold at auction. With the money the citizens erected a suitable war memorial, a bronze statue of Helios the Sun God so huge that it straddled their harbour; the tallest ship might enter between its legs. A statue of Helios casts no reflection on anyone.
Elephants and Castles Page 12
