contrivances, as robbers make use of, and with the plundering of
all that came to hand, as also with the setting fire to all the
other works; and this till Vespasian made his army leave off
fighting them, and resolved to lie round the city, and to starve
them into a surrender, as supposing that either they would be
forced to petition him for mercy by want of provisions, or if
they should have the courage to hold out till the last, they
should perish by famine: and he concluded he should conquer them
the more easily in fighting, if he gave them an interval, and
then fell upon them when they were weakened by famine; but still
he gave orders that they should guard against their coming out of
the city.

12. Now the besieged had plenty of corn within the city, and
indeed of all necessaries, but they wanted water, because there
was no fountain in the city, the people being there usually
satisfied with rain water; yet is it a rare thing in that country
to have rain in summer, and at this season, during the siege,
they were in great distress for some contrivance to satisfy their
thirst; and they were very sad at this time particularly, as if
they were already in want of water entirely, for Josephus seeing
that the city abounded with other necessaries, and that the men
were of good courage, and being desirous to protract the siege to
the Romans longer than they expected, ordered their drink to be
given them by measure; but this scanty distribution of water by
measure was deemed by them as a thing more hard upon them than
the want of it; and their not being able to drink as much as they
would made them more desirous of drinking than they otherwise had
been; nay, they were as much disheartened hereby as if they were
come to the last degree of thirst. Nor were the Romans