nian inhabitants of the city; throwing, by means of their balistæ[1] and petraries, the heads of those whom they had slain into the camp of the Franks, that by such means they might wound their feelings.
And now, everything which could be procured for food being destroyed around the city, a sudden famine, which usually makes even fortresses give way, began to oppress the army; so much so, that the harvest not having yet attained to maturity, some persons seized the pods of beans before they were ripe, as the greatest delicacy: others fed on carrion, or hides soaked in water; others passed parboiled[2] thistles through their bleeding jaws into their stomachs. Others sold mice, or such like dainties, to those who required them; content to suffer hunger themselves, so that they could procure money. Some, too, there were, who even fed their corpse-like bodies with other corpses, eating human flesh; but at a distance, and on the mountains, lest others should be offended at the smell of their cookery. Many wandered through unknown paths, in expectation of meeting with sustenance, and were killed by robbers acquainted with the passes. But not long after the city was surrendered.
For Boamund, a man of superior talents, had, by dint of very great promises, induced a Turkish chief,[3] who had the custody of the principal tower, on the side where his station lay, to deliver it up to him. And he, too, to palliate the infamy of his treachery by a competent excuse, gave his son as an hostage to Boamund; professing that he did so by the express command of Christ, which had been communicated to him in a dream. Boamund, therefore, advanced his troops to the tower, having first, by a secret contrivance, obtained from the chiefs the perpetual government of the city, in case he could carry it. Thus the Franks, in the dead of the night, scaling the walls by rope ladders, and displaying on the top of the tower the crimson standard of Boamund, repeated with joyful accents the Christian watchword, "It is the will of God! It is the will of God!" The Turks
