SIEGES OF MASSAGA AND ORA.
Alexander now sent Alcetas with his own brigade to recover the men
who had been severely wounded, and to recall to the camp those who
were assailing the enemy. On the fourth day he brought up another
bridge against the wall in like manner upon another military engine.
The Indians, as long as the ruler of the place survived, defended
themselves gallantly; but when he was struck and killed with a missile
hurled from an engine, and as some of their number had fallen in the
siege, which had gone on without any cessation, while most of them
were wounded and unfit for service, they sent a herald to Alexander.
He was glad to preserve the lives of brave men; so he came to terms
with the Indian mercenaries on this condition, that they should be
admitted into the ranks with the rest of his army and serve as his
soldiers. They therefore came out of the city with their arms, and
encamped by themselves upon a hill which was facing the camp of the
Macedonians; but they resolved to arise by night and run away to
their own abodes, because they were unwilling to take up arms against
the other Indians. When Alexander received intelligence of this,
he placed the whole of his army round the hill in the night, and
intercepting them in the midst of their flight, cut them to pieces.
He then took the city by storm, denuded as it was of defenders; and
captured the mother and daughter of Assacenus.[609] In the whole siege
five-and-twenty of Alexander’s men were killed. Thence he despatched
Coenus to Bazira,[610] entertaining an opinion that the inhabitants
would surrender, when they heard of the capture of Massaga. He also
despatched Attalus, Alcetas, and Demetrius the cavalry officer to
another city, named Ora, with instructions to blockade it until he
himself arrived. The men of this city made a sortie against the forces
of Alcetas; but the Macedonians easily routed them, and drove them into
the city within the wall. But affairs at Bazira were not favourable to
Coenus, for the inhabitants showed no sign of capitulating, trusting
to the strength of the place, because not only was it situated on a
lofty eminence, but it was also thoroughly fortified all round. When
Alexander learnt this, he started off to Bazira; but ascertaining that
some of the neighbouring barbarians were about to get into the city
of Ora by stealth, being despatched thither by Abisares[611] for that
very purpose, he first marched to Ora. He ordered Coenus to fortify a
certain strong position to serve as a basis of operations against the
city of Bazira, and then to come to him with the rest of his army,
after leaving in that place a sufficient garrison to restrain the men
in the city from enjoying the free use of their land. But when the
men of Bazira saw Coenus departing with the larger part of his army,
they despised the Macedonians, as not being able to contend with them,
and sallied forth into the plain. A sharply contested battle ensued,
in which 500 of the barbarians fell, and over seventy were taken
prisoners. But the rest, fleeing for refuge into the city,[612] were
now more securely shut off from the country by the men in the fort.
The siege of Ora proved an easy matter to Alexander, for he no sooner
attacked the walls than at the first assault he got possession of the
city, and captured the elephants which had been left there.