in
wisdom. And all the earth sought the presence of Solomon, to hear his
wisdom, which God had put in his heart. And they brought every man his
present, vessels of silver, and vessels of gold, and raiment, and
armor, and spices, horses, and mules, a rate year by year.

And Solomon gathered together chariots and horsemen: and he had a
thousand and four hundred chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen,
which he bestowed in the chariot cities, and with the king at
Jerusalem. And the king made silver to be in Jerusalem as stones, and
cedars made he to be as the sycamore trees that are in the lowland,
for abundance.

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NOTES

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NOTES.

ABRAHAM. HIS JOURNEYS.

_Ur of the Chaldees_ was an ancient city on the great plain of
Babylon.

_Haran_. A city lying far to the north of Ur, northeast of Palestine,
on the road from the east to the Mediterranean coast.

_Canaan, Palestine, the Land of Israel_, are all names which have been
used at different times for the same country. Canaan is the oldest
Biblical name. It means "the lowlands" near the Mediterranean, but was
used for the whole country.

_Shechem_. A city in the middle of Canaan, in a valley between two
mountains, Ebal and Gerizim.

_Oak of Mamre_. The name suggests an oak that was connected with a
sacred place. Its exact site is not known, but it must be somewhere
near Hebron.

_Beth-el_ was a sacred place, in later times very important. It is on
the great road north and south, about twelve miles north of Jerusalem.
_Ai_ was about two miles east, in the head of a valley which falls
rapidly toward the Jordan.

_The South_ was used as the name of the country to the south of
Canaan, as we use "the South" and "the West" to mean sections of our
own country.

DIVISION OF THE LAND.

_Plain of the Jordan_. The river Jordan runs through a deep valley,
which broadens out in its southern part into a plain. It was warm, rich
and fertile. Here were situated the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.

_Zoar_. One of the cities of the Plain of the Jordan, perhaps on higher
ground than the others.

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_Hebron_, near which the oaks of Mamre were, lies about twenty miles
south of Jerusalem. It was from very early time regarded as a sacred
city. It is still a town of considerable size.

THE FIGHT OF THE FIVE KINGS.

_The five kings_ were from Babylonia and the mountain country of Elam
beyond Babylonia. As the story stands, the king of