by R. W. Peake
“So your major concern is the lack of water?”
The men all cried out that this was so, then Caesar held his hands up again.
“If I provide the means to end this problem, so that water isn't a concern, are you willing to stay and fight without further complaint?’
Oh, he had them boxed now, and the quicker ones among them knew it immediately. There were whispered conferences as men argued among themselves. After a couple of moments, the buzzing subsided, followed by a period where nobody spoke. Finally, some men began to mumble their assent, but a blind man could tell that they were not happy about it.
But Caesar was not going to quibble about the quality of their agreement, and he spoke again, “I have your agreement then? Good. Then that is all.”
He turned to leave, but stopped at the howls of protest, and now I could definitely see that ghost of a smile playing at his mouth.
“How do we find water, Caesar? You said that you'd provide us with water!”
He affected a look of surprise as he said, “Why, you dig for it, of course.”
There was total silence, the men standing in stunned disbelief, and I must confess I was as shocked as the rest of the men. Dig for it? Could it really be that simple? A storm of protest burst forth as the men overcame their shock, their anger at perceiving that they had been tricked by Caesar very real, and very dangerous. However, Caesar was not cowed in the slightest; he merely stood there once again, letting the men spend their fury, waiting for the moment when everyone paused to catch their breath before howling anew.
When it came, he said in his command voice, “Centurions, you will form the men into working parties composed of two sections apiece. Each working party will dig a well, starting in the courtyard of every private residence in our sector. Only the guard Centuries will be relieved of this duty; however, they will stand watch all three night watches while the rest of the men work. No working party will be excused until they have dug a well that produces water. Once they do, they are relieved and can return to their quarters to rest. You have your orders, Centurions. Carry them out.”
He turned to leave, but someone shouted after him, “And if we don’t find any water?”
As he dismounted the stage, he called over his shoulder. “Then we will leave.”
~ ~ ~ ~
At first, the men were not enthused at all about their task, even my men. Walking from one working party to the next, I could hear their bitter complaints about what they viewed as a folly by Caesar.
“He’s just making us sweat as punishment for those cunni in the 28th calling a meeting,” a ranker from the Fifth of the Tenth said, standing waist-deep in a hole and tossing out another shovelful of sandy dirt, his comrades heartily agreeing with him.
This was more or less the tone of every working party as they dug, and these were men of the 6th. I could only imagine what Cartufenus was dealing with from his boys, I thought. I resigned myself to a whole night of complaining, but it was barely a third of a watch into work when I heard a great shout coming a block over from my spot at that moment, where I had sent some men of the 7th to work. Running down the street, I turned the corner to find Valens standing in the middle of the street, but covered in mud from the waist down. He was laughing with some of his men as I ran up, and he managed a salute despite his ear to ear smile.
“We struck water, Primus Pilus. Not more than six feet down.”
“And? Is it potable?” I demanded, my heart racing not just from the run over.
“Sweet as any that I've ever tasted.”
Despite myself, I let out a whoop of joy, clapping Valens and his men on the back.
“Well, you lucky bastards have the rest of the night off,” I said with a smile. “And nobody could deserve it more. Well done.”
Even as I hurried to report to Caesar, I heard first one, then another shout as men struck water. Arriving at headquarters, I learned that so far, barely more than a third of a watch into the endeavor, a total of eight wells had struck water. Cartufenus was there, looking immensely relieved; his men had found five so far, and for a moment, I cursed the idea that he and the 28th had beaten the 6th at anything. Deeper into the night, the number kept going up, until by morning more than 60 wells were dug, and it was only because Caesar determined that our water shortage was at an end that he called off the work. In a stroke, not only was our water shortage ended, but Caesar had nipped a mutiny in the bud before it could really get started. Finding water did not solve all of our problems; we were still surrounded and outnumbered, and there was still considerable tension between the 6th and the 28th, yet somehow knowing that you were not going to die of thirst made those problems seem surmountable.
It seemed that luck was once again returning to Caesar, since two days later, a courier managed to slip through the Egyptian defenses to inform Caesar that the 37th Legion, the Legion, which Cassius was charged with finding and sending to us, had arrived and was just a few miles up the coast. They were not without difficulty themselves however; as the courier explained that their own water situation was perilous, having run out the day that the courier left for Alexandria. Caesar decided to go see for himself, but since he could spare none of us from the defenses, took only a galley with its contingent of oarsmen and marines, leaving from the royal docks, commanding the rest of the fleet to follow once it was ready, which it did.
~ ~ ~ ~
I always found it interesting to see what happened when Caesar left others in command. None of his generals seemed willing to make a decision, despite the fact he was not the type of general to second-guess his subordinates. I think it was more a matter of not wanting to disappoint him than any fear they had of his disapproval. The only one who did not seem to worry about that was Antonius; indeed, he made decisions in Caesar’s name that caused Caesar untold problems, yet there was some bond between him and Caesar that made Caesar forgive Antonius some of his more outrageous actions, or at least so I thought at the time. Caesar had left very loose instructions when he left, saying only that we do nothing precipitate and maintain our normal routine. The 37th was at a spot called Chersonesus, and when Caesar arrived on the scene, he ordered the marines to go foraging for water, except they went too far inland and were captured by Egyptian cavalry. Under torture, they revealed that Caesar was present on one of the ships, and Ganymede was alerted to this fact. Ganymede threw together a scratch fleet of armed merchant vessels and a couple of thirty’s that had been in the Inner Harbor and escaped destruction, then headed after Caesar. Rather, the fleet did; Ganymede was not of the same stripe as Caesar, preferring to pull the strings from afar rather than to get personally involved in the action. Meanwhile, as was his habit, Caesar turned a precarious situation to his advantage. When Caesar arrived on the scene, the men of the 37th and the crews of the Rhodian ships that were carrying them had been without water for two days, meaning in that heat and climate they were in dire straits. Otherwise, everything went Caesar’s way once Ganymede’s fleet closed with his, temporarily succeeding in isolating one of the Rhodian thirty’s that was part of the relief force. However, Caesar turned it to his benefit, inflicting losses on the Egyptians that Ganymede could ill afford. Caesar returned with his fleet, along with the reinforcements, towing the Rhodian ship that was damaged in the fight. And just like that, we were reinforced, our numbers more than doubled.
~ ~ ~ ~
Because of the limited space inside our position, Caesar kept the 37th onboard ship, spreading them around so that every ship of the fleet had at least a Century aboard. Along with what we had brought with us, the ships of the reinforcing fleet, and those that Caesar had captured in his action against Ganymede, our flotilla now consisted of 34 craft of varying size. To protect the more valuable warships, Caesar circled them with the transports, acting as a screen in the event that the Egyptians tried to use their fire boats again. However, Ganymede was not so easily undone. Despite Caesar’s success in destroying the entire fleet residing in the harbor
at Alexandria, he had not ended the Egyptian maritime threat. There were Egyptian naval vessels patrolling up and down the Nile, and along the coast, while there were a number of larger vessels, quinqueremes most of them, that were in dry-dock because of the expense of upkeep. Now Ganymede brought them out of storage, summoning the patrol vessels to return to Alexandria at the same time, as the shops around the city were immediately set to work refitting the ships. The biggest deficiency the enemy faced was in having enough oars to power so many vessels; therefore, every scrap of wood was ransacked from the public buildings that had the potential of being turned into oars. Working all day and through the night, day after day and night after night, all we could do was watch and wait for the inevitable. One morning, one of the sentries on the roof sounded the alarm, and I went to see what had alerted him. I was dismayed to see no less than five quinqueremes, 22 quadriremes, and four biremes rowing around the Inner Harbor. While we knew that they were working on rebuilding their fleet, until that moment we had no idea of the size, and it was massive. Word of the fleet leapt through the army, meaning that soon every man not on duty was standing on a roof, watching the Egyptians testing the vessels. Our future was passing before us as we watched; if that massive flotilla defeated ours, we were finished, and we all knew it. Even as grim as the prospect was, that did not stop the men from wagering on the outcome, but I was happy to see that most men were betting on us to win.
~ ~ ~ ~
The expected battle played out in full view, with our fleet leaving the Great Harbor, then turning west, heading towards the entrance to the Inner Harbor. Like the entrance to the Great Harbor, there is a line of shoals making entrance to the Inner Harbor treacherous, so the Romans formed up, facing the entrance, while in turn the Egyptians formed up in the Inner Harbor, facing them. One consequence of the coming battle was that both sides that were still in the city temporarily forgot their own fight, climbing to the roofs in their respective sectors to watch. It was almost like a festival atmosphere; all that was missing were the vendors selling meat pies and wine, and the whores plying their trade. Nevertheless, you could cut the tension in the air with a dagger and I found myself tapping my vitus against my thigh, while other men chattered incessantly to hide their nervousness, or said nothing at all, their entire attention on the scene in the harbor below them. For the better part of a third of a watch, both fleets remained motionless, and the men began getting restless. Of course, the betting was brisk as they wagered on when the attack would come and who would start it. I was standing with Felix, Clemens, and Diocles, waiting for something to happen and I briefly thought about sending the men down, except what was about to happen was too important and they had a right to know their fate, so I dismissed the idea. Instead, we stood waiting, when finally something happened, with four ships from our fleet suddenly detaching themselves to begin rowing swiftly towards the entrance of the Inner Harbor.
“There they go,” someone shouted.
I turned from my conversation with Clemens to watch the first four Roman ships shooting through the gap in single file before quickly maneuvering into a line abreast. Almost as quickly, four Egyptian ships detached themselves from their own formation, then began rowing directly towards our ships, with our vessels turning so their bows were facing the enemy even as they picked up speed. Both sides were picking up momentum and, despite being too far away to hear it, we could tell when the ships struck each other head-on that the impact was tremendous. It reminded me of watching the rams butt each other when I was a child in Hispania, and it seemed to have about as much effect on the ships as it had on the rams back home. Immediately after the initial impact, all the ships reversed their oars, pulling back from their individual adversaries as they maneuvered around each other, looking for another opening. While I am no expert in naval warfare, it was clear to see that whoever it was handling our four ships was highly skilled, moving their vessels to face another attack, this time by four different ships that apparently hoped to catch them engaged with their original adversaries. The Egyptians were unsuccessful, with our ships again meeting this new threat head-on.
“What are they trying to do?” Clemens asked, and we all looked in surprise when Diocles spoke up.
“Their primary goal is to catch our ships broadside and use their ram to hole the vessel.”
“I know that,” Clemens said impatiently. “But it doesn’t look like that’s what they’re doing.”
“If they can’t score a hit broadside, then they'll try to shear off the other ship’s oars by running alongside and at the last moment shipping their own oars. It appears that our commanders are too skilled for them to get caught broadside, so I think the Egyptians are trying to kill their mobility.”
This made what we were watching make sense to us, and I reminded myself to ask Diocles how he knew about naval warfare. Now that our first four were totally engaged, Caesar gave the command to the rest of the fleet, and they rowed quickly through the entrance into the Inner Harbor, using the melee as a screen to keep the rest of the Egyptian fleet from attacking them before they could get into the standard battle formation. Once the rest of our fleet entered the harbor, it appeared as if the surface of the water was completely packed with ships.
“They don’t have any room to maneuver,” Diocles commented. “That means that it comes down to which side’s marines and soldiers can fight onboard ship better. They’re going to start grappling each other in a few moments.”
And while we watched, that is exactly what happened. Once it started, the battle quickly degenerated into a one-sided affair, with the men of the 37th leaping over onto the ship that their own vessel had grappled with, making quick work of the Egyptians. Our forces captured a quinquereme and a bireme, and sunk three more. The rest, seeing the fate of those ships we came to grips with, quickly rowed to the far western side of the Inner Harbor or towards the Heptastadion, where the Egyptians had artillery emplaced to provide protective fire, driving off any of our ships that got too close in their pursuit. For our part, not a ship was lost, and the casualties among the marines and Legionaries were light. We had won a great battle, but when Caesar returned and called a meeting of his staff and Centurions, his demeanor was not that of a man who had just won a great victory, and we soon knew why he was so downcast.
“We won today, but we didn't really solve anything,” he said once we were settled and congratulations were offered. This was certainly not what we were expecting to hear from him. “It’s clear that they have vastly superior resources than we do, and at the end of the day, we only neutralized a small portion of their fleet. And it's become clear to me that no matter how many times we bring them to battle, all they have to do if things start to turn against them is to row close to shore and to be covered by their artillery. It would be a war of attrition, and it would be a war that we would lose.”
When he finished, there was silence as we all digested this, and it did not take long to realize that he was absolutely right. As much of a boost to morale as the victory was, in the grand strategic sense, it was almost as bad as a loss.
I believe it was Hirtius who said, “I doubt that you would have brought up such cheerful news if you hadn’t already thought of a solution.”
Caesar smiled at him. “And you'd be right, Hirtius. As we made our way back to the royal enclosure, we had to pass the island, and I examined it thoroughly. Ganymede hasn't invested the place properly. It can be assaulted, and that's what I intend to do.”
Men looked at each other; generals looking at generals, Tribunes looking at Tribunes and Centurions looking at Centurions. Even at moments like these, hierarchy is important to us Romans.
Caesar either did not notice or chose to ignore the reaction of his staff, and went on talking. “By taking the island, we can do the same thing to the Inner Harbor that we've done to the Great Harbor. Emplacing artillery on the western mole will bottle up the Egyptian fleet. If we do that, it won't be necessary to destroy the fleet. I also plan on c
apturing the Heptastadion, which will deprive them of the whole eastern side of the harbor.”
Nero objected. “But don’t we want to destroy their fleet anyway?”
Caesar shook his head. “No, we have to think about the days after this is over. If we completely destroy their fleet, Egypt will be vulnerable to depredation by pirates, and their neighbors might be tempted to take advantage of their weakness. Then we'd find ourselves back here fighting all over again. No,” he repeated, “what's necessary here is to neutralize the fleet, not destroy it.”
Even if anyone was disposed to do so, there was really no argument to be made, mainly because what Caesar said made perfect sense. Seeing our acceptance, Caesar turned his attention to his plan for taking the island.
“Pullus,” he said without warning, catching me by surprise. “I'll need you and your men. Can I count on you?”
I snapped to intente. “Absolutely, sir.”
~ ~ ~ ~
The plan, such as it was, called for ten Cohorts, of which the 7th would be one of them and that I would lead. This meant that we would have to make a run from our positions through the streets of Alexandria to join the assault force, a prospect that the men were none too keen on doing. Additionally, we had to do it quickly, when the moment came, and without making any preparations that might alert the Egyptians what we were about, thereby compounding the difficulty. Once at the harbor, we would board a number of open boats that would row us to the island. The rest of the Cohorts were composed of the 37th, along with one Cohort from the 28th, which also did not sit well with the men. The 28th was considered suspect by the men of the 6th, and not a few of Caesar’s staff, if the gossip was any indication. Augmenting the force were a couple Cohorts worth of missile troops that were part of the relief force, along with about a hundred of Caesar’s cavalry that he thought were best suited to fight as infantry for this sortie. The day for the assault was set for three days after the naval battle, and since it only took a few thirds of a watch for the men to make themselves ready, this ultimately meant that we sat and waited. This was incredibly wearing on everyone, because there is nothing quite as maddening as knowing that in some short period of time, one is going to be facing death, yet having nothing to do to occupy the mind during the waiting period. It is also a trial of the patience of the Centurions and Optios, since the men are determined to cram as much debauchery and high living as possible into those days, meaning that we were running from one building to another in the sector that housed our quarters as the inevitable quarrels and fights broke out. Very quickly, I determined that trying to stop the men completely from drinking and whoring for the entire three days would result in exhausted officers, along with half the Cohort up on a charge, so I instructed the Centurions to turn a blind eye towards a certain level of debauchery and carousing while we waited. Of course, if you give a Gregarius an obol, he wants a sesterce; if you give him a slice of bread, he wants the whole loaf. It is their nature, and even relaxing the rules a bit, there are always men who will try to push to get away with more, both with their Centurions and Optios, and their comrades. The only saving grace was that with men as veteran as these, when compared to a Legion composed of younger men, the problems they caused were not of sufficient scale to draw the attention of the senior officers. Still, by the night before the attack, the Centurions and Optios, myself included, had dispensed bathhouse justice on a number of men and I was extremely tired. I hope that it does not surprise you, gentle reader, when I mention that the men were doing as much whoring as drinking and gambling, perhaps more so because of the relative scarcity of wine. As I have mentioned, when we cordoned off our area, we did it so quickly that a large number of civilians were given no opportunity to flee. If I were not a suspicious man, I would simply ascribe the relatively high number of women who made their living on their back to a happy accident, and that we had somehow managed to select the quarter of the city where the whores congregated. But, since we were around the royal enclosure, the resulting neighborhood that sprang up around it was composed of the homes of wealthy government officials and merchants who did business with Pharaoh. In other words, there were no businesses catering to the fleshly desires in this quarter of the city, at least of which I was aware. Somehow, however, a force of a couple hundred whores managed to get themselves trapped inside our redoubt, and in fact one back street had become their own headquarters area, so to speak. The citizens of Alexandria that remained in our area had decided to turn a blind eye to the steady stream of Gregarii who headed for the street the moment they were secured from duty. The only reason that no wine shops had opened on the street, since whores and drinking go hand in hand, was due only to a lack of supply and not any finer distinction. Consequently, it was to this street that the Centurions and Optios found themselves running when some word of a problem reached them, although more than one of them managed to wander over there under their own power a time or two, if my meaning is clear. Another complicating factor was that while the street was actually located in the 28th’s area, there was no way that my men would have sat still if I made the area off-limits to them, meaning that there was ample opportunity for trouble when the men of the two Legions mingled. All in all, it was a touchy situation, and the three-day wait for my men did not make things any easier. By the night before the attack, I was so tired that I slept more soundly than I ever had the night before a battle, and I suspect that the rest of the officers felt the same.