taken.

20. And now, when Josephus saw this ram still battering the same
place, and that the wall would quickly be thrown down by it, he
resolved to elude for a while the force of the engine. With this
design he gave orders to fill sacks with chaff, and to hang them
down before that place where they saw the ram always battering,
that the stroke might be turned aside, or that the place might
feel less of the strokes by the yielding nature of the chaff.
This contrivance very much delayed the attempts of the Romans,
because, let them remove their engine to what part they pleased,
those that were above it removed their sacks, and placed them
over against the strokes it made, insomuch that the wall was no
way hurt, and this by diversion of the strokes, till the Romans
made an opposite contrivance of long poles, and by tying hooks at
their ends, cut off the sacks. Now when the battering ram thus
recovered its force, and the wall having been but newly built,
was giving way, Josephus and those about him had afterward
immediate recourse to fire, to defend themselves withal;
whereupon they took what materials soever they had that were but
dry, and made a sally three ways, and set fire to the machines,
and the hurdles, and the banks of the Romans themselves; nor did
the Romans well know how to come to their assistance, being at
once under a consternation at the Jews' boldness, and being
prevented by the flames from coming to their assistance; for the
materials being dry with the bitumen and pitch that were among
them, as was brimstone also, the fire caught hold of every thing
immediately, and what cost the Romans a great deal of pains was
in one hour consumed.