Miriam watched
it with a kind of rapture, letting its glory and its peace sink into
her troubled soul, while from below arose the sound of awakening camps
making ready for the daily battle. Soon a ray of burning light, cast
like a spear from the crest of the Mount of Olives across the Valley of
Jehoshaphat, struck full upon the gold-roofed Temple and its courts. At
its coming, as though at a signal, the northern gates were thrown wide,
and through them poured a flood of gaunt and savage warriors. They came
on in thousands, uttering fierce war-cries. Some pickets of Romans tried
to stay their rush; in a minute they were overcome and destroyed. Now
they were surging round the feet of a great wooden tower filled with
archers. Here the fight was desperate, for the soldiers of Titus rushed
up by companies to defend their engine. But they could not drive back
that onset, and presently the tower was on fire, and in a last mad
effort to save their lives its defenders were casting themselves
headlong from the lofty platform. With shouts of triumph the Jews rushed
through the breaches in the second wall, and leaving what remained of
the castle of Antonia on the left, poured down into the maze of streets
and ruined houses that lay immediately behind the Old Tower whence
Miriam watched.
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