n, "What is sweeter than honey? and what is stronger than a
lion?" And he said unto them,--

"If ye had not plowed with my heifer,
Ye had not found out my riddle."

And the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and he went down to
Ashkelon, and smote thirty men of them, and took their spoil, and gave
the changes of raiment unto them that declared the riddle. And his
anger was kindled, and he went up to his father's house.

{175}

_How Samson Burned the Cornfield and Slew His Enemies_.

At another time, Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took
firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst
between every two tails. And when he had set the brands on fire, he
let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up
both the shocks and the standing corn, and also the oliveyards.

Then the Philistines went up, and camped in Judah, and spread
themselves in Lehi. And the men of Judah said, "Why are ye come up
against us?"

And they said, "To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath
done to us."

Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of
Etam, and said to Samson, "Knowest thou not that the Philistines are
rulers over us? what then is this that thou hast done to us?"

And he said to them, "As they did to me, so have I done to them."

And they said to him, "We are come down to bind thee, that we may
deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines."

And Samson said unto them, "Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon
me yourselves."

And they spoke unto him, saying, "No; but we will bind thee fast, and
deliver thee into their hand: but surely we will not kill thee."

And they bound him with two new ropes, and brought him up from the
rock. When he came unto Lehi, the {176} Philistines shouted as they
met him: and the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and the
ropes that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire,
and his bands dropped from off his hands.

And he found a fresh jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and
took it, and smote a thousand men therewith. And Samson said,--

"With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps,
With the jawbone of an ass have I smitten a thousand men."

_How Samson Carried Off the Gates of Gaza_.

And Samson went to Gaza. And it was told the Gazites, saying, "Samson
is come hither." And they surrounded him, and laid wait for him all
night in the gat