rian
might traverse the twenty-seven and odd miles, and still have time to
take part in an assault on a town and to watch an execution. But it is
an altogether different thing when we come to a large army. It is well
known that the speed with which a body of men can move diminishes with
the number. A company can march faster than a regiment; a regiment than
a brigade; a brigade than an army corps. But for a large force thirty
miles in the entire day is heavy work. "Thus Sir Archibald Hunter's
division, in its march through Bechuanaland to the relief of Mafeking,
starting at four in the morning, went on till seven or eight at night,
covering as many as thirty miles a day at times." Joshua's achievement
was a march fully as long as any of General Hunter's, but it was
accomplished in less than seven hours instead of from fifteen to
sixteen, and it followed straight on from a march seventeen hours in
length which had ended in a battle. In all, between one sunset and the
next he had marched between fifty and sixty miles besides fighting a
battle and taking a town.

If we turn to the records of other battles fought in this neighbourhood,
we find that they agree as closely as we could expect, not with Joshua's
achievement, but with General Hunter's. In the case of the great victory
secured by Jonathan, the gallant son of Saul, the Israelites smote the
Philistines from Michmash to Ajalon;--not quite twenty miles. In the
defeat of Cestius Gallus, the Jews followed him from Beth-horon to
Antipatris, a little over twenty miles, the pursuit beginning at
daybreak, and being evidently continued nearly till sundown. The pursuit
of the Syrians under Nicanor by Judas Maccabaeus seems also to have
covered about the same distance, for Nicanor was killed at the first
onslaught and his troops took to flight.

It is not at all unusual to read in comments on the Book of Joshua that
the "miracle" is simply the result of the dulness of the prose
chronicler in accepting as literal fact an expression that originated in
the poetic exuberance of an old bard. The latter, so it is urged, simply
meaning to add a figure of dignity and importance to his song
commemorating a great national victory, had written:--

"And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed,
Until the nation had avenged themselves of their enemies,"

but with no more expectation that the stay of the moon would be accepted
literally, than the singers, who welcomed David a