, among whom he took his share
of the first and greatest danger. He also gave orders, that when the
legions made a shout, they should stop their ears, that they might not
be affrighted at it, and that, to avoid the multitude of the enemy's
darts, they should bend down on their knees, and cover themselves with
their shields, and that they should retreat a little backward for a
while, till the archers should have emptied their quivers; but that When
the Romans should lay their instruments for ascending the walls, they
should leap out on the sudden, and with their own instruments should
meet the enemy, and that every one should strive to do his best,
in order not to defend his own city, as if it were possible to be
preserved, but in order to revenge it, when it was already destroyed;
and that they should set before their eyes how their old men were to be
slain, and their children and wives were to be killed immediately by the
enemy; and that they would beforehand spend all their fury, on account
of the calamities just coming upon them, and pour it out on the actors.

26. And thus did Josephus dispose of both his bodies of men; but then
for the useless part of the citizens, the women and children, when they
saw their city encompassed by a threefold army, [for none of the usual
guards that had been fighting before were removed,] when they also saw,
not only the walls thrown down, but their enemies with swords in their
hands, as also the hilly country above them shining with their weapons,
and the darts in the hands of the Arabian archers, they made a final and
lamentable outcry of the destruction, as if the misery were not only
threatened, but actually come upon them already. But Josephus ordered
the women to be shut up in their houses, lest they should render the
warlike actions of the men too effeminate, by making them commiserate
their condition, and commanded them to hold their peace, and threatened
them if they did not, while he came himself before the breach, where his
allotment was; for all those who brought ladders to the other places,
he took no notice of them, but earnestly waited for the shower of arrows
that was coming.

27. And now the trumpeters of the several Roman legions sounded
together, and the army made a terrible shout; and the darts, as
by order, flew so last, that they intercepted the light. However,
Josephus's men remembered the charges he had given them, they stopped
their ears at the sounds, and co