cts, while there are many who think the Jews an Ethiopian stock,
driven to migrate by their fear and dislike of King Cepheus.[466]
Another tradition makes them Assyrian refugees,[467] who, lacking
lands of their own, occupied a district of Egypt, and later took to
building cities of their own and tilling Hebrew territory and the
frontier-land of Syria. Yet another version assigns to the Jews an
illustrious origin as the descendants of the Solymi--a tribe famous in
Homer[468]--who founded the city and called it Hiero_solyma_ after
their own name.[469]

Most authorities agree that a foul and disfiguring disease once 3
broke out in Egypt, and that King Bocchoris,[470] on approaching the
oracle of Ammon and inquiring for a remedy, was told to purge his
kingdom of the plague and to transport all who suffered from it into
some other country, for they had earned the disfavour of Heaven. A
motley crowd was thus collected and abandoned in the desert. While all
the other outcasts lay idly lamenting, one of them, named Moses,
advised them not to look for help to gods or men, since both had
deserted them, but to trust rather in themselves and accept as divine
the guidance of the first being by whose aid they should get out of
their present plight. They agreed, and set out blindly to march
wherever chance might lead them. Their worst distress came from lack
of water. When they were already at death's door and lying prostrate
all over the plain, it so happened that a drove of wild asses moved
away from their pasture to a rock densely covered with trees. Guessing
the truth from the grassy nature of the ground, Moses followed and
disclosed an ample flow of water.[471] This saved them. Continuing
their march for six successive days, on the seventh they routed the
natives and gained possession of the country. There they consecrated
their city and their temple.

To ensure his future hold over the people, Moses introduced a new 4
cult, which was the opposite of all other religions. All that we hold
sacred they held profane, and allowed practices which we abominate.
They dedicated in a shrine an image of the animal[472] whose guidance
had put an end to their wandering and thirst. They killed a ram,
apparently as an insult to Ammon, and also sacrificed a bull, because
the Egyptians worship the bull Apis.[473] Pigs are subject to leprosy;
so they abstain from pork in memory of their misfortune and the foul
plague with which