to their shields they pulled off and gnawed: the very wisps
of old hay became food to some; and some gathered up fibres, and sold
a very small weight of them for four Attic [drachmae]. But why do I
describe the shameless impudence that the famine brought on men in their
eating inanimate things, while I am going to relate a matter of fact,
the like to which no history relates, [15] either among the Greeks or
Barbarians? It is horrible to speak of it, and incredible when heard.
I had indeed willingly omitted this calamity of ours, that I might not
seem to deliver what is so portentous to posterity, but that I have
innumerable witnesses to it in my own age; and besides, my country would
have had little reason to thank me for suppressing the miseries that she
underwent at this time.

4. There was a certain woman that dwelt beyond Jordan, her name was
Mary; her father was Eleazar, of the village Bethezob, which signifies
the house of Hyssop. She was eminent for her family and her wealth, and
had fled away to Jerusalem with the rest of the multitude, and was with
them besieged therein at this time. The other effects of this woman had
been already seized upon, such I mean as she had brought with her out
of Perea, and removed to the city. What she had treasured up besides, as
also what food she had contrived to save, had been also carried off by
the rapacious guards, who came every day running into her house for that
purpose. This put the poor woman into a very great passion, and by
the frequent reproaches and imprecations she east at these rapacious
villains, she had provoked them to anger against her; but none of them,
either out of the indignation she had raised against herself, or out of
commiseration of her case, would take away her life; and if she found
any food, she perceived her labors were for others, and not for herself;
and it was now become impossible for her any way to find any more food,
while the famine pierced through her very bowels and marrow, when also
her passion was fired to a degree beyond the famine itself; nor did she
consult with any thing but with her passion and the necessity she was
in. She then attempted a most unnatural thing; and snatching up her
son, who was a child sucking at her breast, she said, "O thou miserable
infant! for whom shall I preserve thee in this war, this famine, and
this sedition? As to the war with the Romans, if they preserve our
lives, we must be slaves. This famine also wil