72.
Caesar, on learning these proceedings from the deserters
and captives, adopted the following system of fortification; he dug a trench
twenty feet deep, with perpendicular sides, in such a manner that the base of
this trench should extend so far as the edges were apart at the top. He raised
all his other works at a distance of four hundred feet from that ditch; [he did]
that with this intention, lest (since he necessarily embraced so extensive an
area, and the whole works could not be easily surrounded by a line of soldiers)
a large number of the enemy should suddenly, or by night, sally against the
fortifications; or lest they should by day cast weapons against our men while
occupied with the works. Having left this interval, he drew two trenches fifteen
feet broad, and of the same depth; the innermost of them, being in low and level
ground, he filled with water conveyed from the river. Behind these he raised a
rampart and wall twelve feet high; to this he added a parapet and battlements,
with large stakes cut like stags' horns, projecting from the junction of the
parapet and battlements, to prevent the enemy from scaling it, and surrounded
the entire work with turrets, which were eighty feet distant from one another.
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