dvice, but could draw
from him nothing but threats: "If thou wilt go forth unto the King of
Babylon's princes, then thy soul shall live, and this city shall not be
burned with fire, and thou shalt live and thine house: but if thou wilt
not go forth to the King of Babylon's princes, then shall this city
be given into the hand of the Chal-dseans, and they shall burn it with
fire, and thou shalt not escape out of their hand." Zedekiah would have
asked no better than to follow his advice, but he had gone too far to
draw back now. To the miseries of war and sickness the horrors of famine
were added, but the determination of the besieged was unshaken; bread
was failing, and yet they would not hear of surrender. At length, after
a year and a half of sufferings heroically borne, in the eleventh year
of Zedekiah, the eleventh month, and the fourth day of the month, a
portion of the city wall fell before the attacks of the battering-rams,
and the Chaldaean army entered by the breach. Zedekiah assembled his
remaining soldiers, and took counsel as to the possibility of cutting
his way through the enemy to beyond the Jordan; escaping by night
through the gateway opposite the Pool of Siloam, he was taken prisoner
near Jericho, and carried off to Eiblah, where Nebuchadrezzar was
awaiting with impatience the result of the operations. The Chaldaeans
were accustomed to torture their prisoners in the fashion we frequently
see represented on the monuments of Nineveh, and whenever an unexpected
stroke of good fortune brings to light any decorative bas-relief from
their palaces, we shall see represented on it the impaling stake,
rebels being flayed alive, and chiefs having their tongues torn out.
Nebuchadrezzar, whose patience was exhausted, caused the sons of
Zedekiah to be slain in the presence of their father, together with all
the prisoners of noble birth, and then, having put out his eyes, sent
the king of Babylon loaded with chains. As for the city which had so
long defied his wrath, he gave it over to Nebuzaradan, one of the
great officers of the crown, with orders to demolish it and give it up
systematically to the flames. The temple was despoiled of its precious
wall-coverings, the pillars and brazen ornaments of the time of Solomon
which still remained were broken up, and the pieces carried off to
Chaldoa in sacks, the masonry was overthrown and the blocks of stone
rolled down the hill into the ravine of the Kedron. The survivors amo