and then enquired of them which course was the more desirable for them, whether that leading to peace, or that leading to war.  And when the envoys agreed that they would choose peace rather than the dangers of war, Zaberganes replied:  “Therefore it is necessary for you to purchase this for a great sum of money.”  And the envoys said that they would give as much as they had provided before, when he came against them after capturing Antioch.  And Zaberganes dismissed them with laughter, telling them to deliberate most carefully concerning their safety and then to come again to the Persians.  And a little later Chosroes summoned them, and when they came before him, he recounted how many Roman towns he had previously enslaved and in what manner he had accomplished it; then he threatened that the inhabitants of Edessa would receive more direful treatment at the hands of the Persians, unless they should give them all the wealth which they had inside the fortifications; for only on this condition, he said, would the army depart.  When the envoys heard this, they agreed that they would purchase peace from Chosroes, if only he would not prescribe impossible conditions for them:  but the outcome of a conflict, they said, was plainly seen by no one at all before the struggle.  For there was never a war whose outcome might be taken for granted by those who waged it.  Thereupon Chosroes in anger commanded the envoys to be gone with all speed.

On the eighth day of the siege he formed the design of erecting an artificial hill against the circuit wall of the city; accordingly he cut down trees in great numbers from the adjacent districts and, without removing the leaves, laid them together in a square before the wall, at a point which no missile from the city could reach; then he heaped an immense amount of earth right upon the trees and above that threw on a great quantity of stones, not such as are suitable for building, but cut at random, and only calculated to raise the hill as quickly as possible to a great height.  And he kept laying on long timbers in the midst of the earth and the stones, and made them serve to bind the structure together, in order that as it became high it should not be weak.  But Peter, the Roman general (for he happened to be there with Martinus and Peranius), wishing to check the men who were engaged in this work, sent some of the Huns who were under his command against them.  And they, by making a sudden attack, killed a great number; and one of the guardsmen, Argek by name, surpassed all others, for he alone killed twenty-seven.  From that time on, however, the barbarians kept a careful guard, and there was no further opportunity for anyone to go out against them.  But when the artisans engaged in this work, as they moved forward, came within range of missiles, then the Romans offered a most vigorous resistance from the city wall, using both their slings and their bows against them.  Wherefore the barbarians devised the following plan.