and capacity to contain five hundred soldiers,
had been rolled forwards to the foot of the rampart: but the descent of
the door or drawbridge was checked by an enormous beam, and the wooden
structure was constantly consumed by artificial flames.

While the Roman empire was attacked by the Turks in the East, east, and
the Normans in the West, the aged successor of Michael surrendered the
sceptre to the hands of Alexius, an illustrious captain, and the founder
of the Comnenian dynasty. The princess Anne, his daughter and historian,
observes, in her affected style, that even Hercules was unequal to a
double combat; and, on this principle, she approves a hasty peace with
the Turks, which allowed her father to undertake in person the relief of
Durazzo. On his accession, Alexius found the camp without soldiers, and
the treasury without money; yet such were the vigor and activity of his
measures, that in six months he assembled an army of seventy thousand
men, and performed a march of five hundred miles. His troops were levied
in Europe and Asia, from Peloponnesus to the Black Sea; his majesty
was displayed in the silver arms and rich trappings of the companies
of Horse-guards; and the emperor was attended by a train of nobles and
princes, some of whom, in rapid succession, had been clothed with
the purple, and were indulged by the lenity of the times in a life of
affluence and dignity. Their youthful ardor might animate the multitude;
but their love of pleasure and contempt of subordination were pregnant
with disorder and mischief; and their importunate clamors for speedy
and decisive action disconcerted the prudence of Alexius, who might have
surrounded and starved the besieging army. The enumeration of provinces
recalls a sad comparison of the past and present limits of the Roman
world: the raw levies were drawn together in haste and terror; and
the garrisons of Anatolia, or Asia Minor, had been purchased by the
evacuation of the cities which were immediately occupied by the
Turks. The strength of the Greek army consisted in the Varangians, the
Scandinavian guards, whose numbers were recently augmented by a colony
of exiles and volunteers from the British Island of Thule. Under the
yoke of the Norman conqueror, the Danes and English were oppressed
and united; a band of adventurous youths resolved to desert a land
of slavery; the sea was open to their escape; and, in their long
pilgrimage, they visited every coast that afford