ofore the king. Then the king said: This woman saith
my son liveth and thine is dead, and this answereth Nay, but thy son is
dead, and mine liveth. Then the king said: Bring to me here a sword.
When they had brought forth a sword the king said: Divide ye, said he,
the living child in two parts, and give that one half to that one, and
that other half to that other. Then said the woman that was mother of
the living child to the king, for all her members and bowels were moved
upon her son: I beseech and pray thee, my lord, give to her the child
alive, and slay him not, and contrary said that other woman: Let it not
be given to me ne to thee, but let it be divided. The king then answered
and said: Give the living child to this woman, and let it not be slain;
this is verily the mother. All Israel heard how wisely the king had
given this sentence and dreaded him, seeing that the wisdom of God was
in him in deeming of rightful dooms.

After this Solomon sent his messengers to divers kings for cedar trees
and for workmen, for to make and build a temple unto our Lord. Solomon
was rich and glorious, and all the realms from the river of the ends of
the Philistines unto the end of Egypt were accorded with him, and
offered to him gifts and to serve him all the days of his life. Solomon
had daily for the meat of his household thirty measures, named chores,
of corn, and sixty of meal, ten fat oxen, and twenty oxen of pasture and
an hundred wethers, without venison that was taken, as harts, goats,
bubals, and other flying fowls and birds. He obtained all the region
that was from Tiphsa unto Azza, and had peace with all the kings of all
the realms that were in every part round about him. In that time Israel
and Judah dwelled without fear and dread, every each under his vine and
fig tree from Dan unto Beersheba.

Solomon had forty thousand racks for the horses of his carts, chariots
and cars, and twelve thousand for horses to ride on, by which prefects
brought necessary things for the table of King Solomon, with great
diligence in their time. God gave to Solomon much wisdom and prudence in
his heart, like to the gravel that is in the sea-side, and the sapience
and wisdom of Solomon passed and went tofore the sapience of all them of
the Orient and of Egypt, and he was the wisest of all men, and so he was
named. He spake three thousand parables, and five thousand songs, and
disputed upon all manner trees and virtue of them, from the cedar