The entry of the Romans into Syracuse
Already the thousand soldiers were masters of part of the ramparts. The rest of the troops were brought up, and with more ladders they scaled the wall. The signal was given them from the Hexapyle, where the first assailants had arrived in the midst of profound solitude, most of the guards, after having given themselves up to debauchery on the towers, being drowsy with wine, or finishing get drunk. A few, however, were surprised and had their throats cut in their beds. Near the Hexapyle was a small door which they began to break with violence.
And at the same time the trumpet gave the agreed signal from the top of the walls. Already from all sides it was no longer a surprise, but an open force attack; for they had arrived at the Epipoles quarter, where the posts were numerous. It then remained to frighten rather than deceive the enemy, and we succeeded. Indeed, at the first sound of the trumpets, at the cries of the Romans, who occupied the walls and part of the city, the sentries believed that everything was in the power of the enemy. Some fled along the walls, others jumped into the ditches, or were thrown into them by the crowd of fugitives. However, a large part of the inhabitants were unaware of their misfortune, because all were weighed down by wine and sleep, and because in such a vast city, the disaster of one district could not be immediately known to others.
At daybreak, when the Hexapyle was forced, the entry of Marcellus with all his troops awakened the besieged, who ran to arms to succor, if possible, a half-taken city.
Epicydes leaves the island called Nasos and goes quickly to meet the attackers, whom he supposes to have crossed the walls in small numbers thanks to the negligence of the guards and whom he hopes to repel without difficulty. He reproaches the fugitives he finds on his way for increasing the alarms, magnifying the objects and exaggerating the danger; but when he sees the district of Epipoles filled with enemies, he hastens, after having fired a few darts at them, to return towards Achradine, less in fear of not being able to support the efforts of numerous enemies than in the purpose of preventing within the interior any betrayal which might arise from the circumstance, and closing to him, in the midst of the tumult, the gates of Achradine and of the island.
Marcellus, having entered Syracuse, and, from a height, contemplating at its feet this city, perhaps the most beautiful that was then, wept, it is said, tears, half of joy to have put an end to such a great enterprise, half moved by the memory of the ancient glory of this city. He remembered two Athenian fleets sunk to the bottom, two formidable armies destroyed with two illustrious generals, so many hazardous wars waged against Carthage, so many tyrants and kings so powerful, and above all, Hieron, whose memory was still so fresh, and who had distinguished himself by his courage, by his successes, above all by the services he had rendered to the Roman people. Filled with these memories and the thought that everything he saw would in an hour fall prey to flames and be reduced to ashes, he wanted, before attacking Achradine, to be preceded by Syracusans who, like it has been said, had taken refuge in the Roman camp, in the hope that they might persuade, by persuasion, the enemies to surrender the city.