The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c23.s4.52

v4.c23.s4.52

But finally the two commanders joined hands under the walls of Ayuthia. Mahanawrahta fixed his headquarters there at a pagoda built by Bayinnaung. In spite of wastage their hosts were as numerous as ever, as they had exacted contingents from the states which they had conquered, and according to Burmese custom their prisoners were made to fight for them. They were to spend fourteen months before Ayuthia. The rains came and flooded them out: they stood their ground. Their commanders died of hardship: they did not lose heart. Imperial armies from China invaded upper Burma: they were not recalled. During the first open season they could not get near the walls because of the numerous stockades outside the city; sometimes the whole plain was alive with swarms of Siamese working under the supervision of grandees, who were carried about in sedan chairs; both sides used bamboo matting between two uprights containing earth for temporary defence while they constructed permanent works. The Siamese had foreign adventurers fighting for them, one of their outworks containing four hundred Chinese. When the rains began to lay the whole country several feet under water, the commanders urged Mahanawrahta to withdraw, but he refused, and Thihapate supported him. The men stayed on knolls of rising ground or built dykes to keep out the water. The Siamese seeing them scattered in isolated groups attacked them in boats. In one of these attacks a Siamese leader, while waving his sword and hurling defiance in the bows of his boat, was brought down by a musket shot and fell into the water, and the whole flotilla fled. Ayuthia prided itself on its great guns, some of them 30 feet long with 30 *viss* (100 lb.) ball; one of these burst with an overcharge, but the shot killed several men on two Burmese boats. The Burmese had war-canoes in plenty, constructed by their lieges up the rivers, and so they were able to prevent provisions entering the city. When the dry season returned they reconstructed their earthworks. Some of these were higher than the walls, and the cannon were also mounted aloft on pagodas so as to fire down into the palace. Often the palace guns ceased fire, because the king yielded to the entreaties of his harem, who were terrified at the noise.¹