entire number of the army, as already stated, was probably not less than
forty thousand; they had numerous chariots, and were armed with bows and
arrows, cuirasses, and bronze or copper swords. They had skin tents, and
brought with them their wives and children, with the intention of
settling in Egypt, as the Hyksos had done five hundred years earlier.
They had also with them a considerable number of cattle, as bulls, oxen,
and goats. The chiefs came provided with thrones, and both they and
their officers had numerous drinking vessels of bronze, of silver, and
of gold.

The attack was made on the western side of Egypt, towards the apex of
the Delta. It was at first completely successful. The small frontier
towns were taken by assault, and "turned Into heaps of rubbish;" the
Delta was entered upon, and a position taken up In the nome of
Paari-sheps, or Prosopis, which lay between the Canobic and Sebennytic
branches of the Nile, commencing at the point of their separation. From
this position Memphis and Heliopolis were alike menaced. Menephthah
hastily fortified these cities, or rather, we must suppose, strengthened
their existing defences. Meanwhile the Libyans and their allies ravaged
the open country. "The like had not been seen," as the native scribe
observes, "even in the times of the kings of Lower Egypt, when the
plague (_i.e._ the Hyksos power) was in the land, and the kings of Upper
Egypt were unable to drive it out." Egypt was desolated; its people
"trembled like geese;" the fertile lands were overrun and wasted; the
cities were pillaged; even the harbours were in some cases ruined and
destroyed. Menephthah for a time remained on the defensive, shut up
within the walls of Memphis, whose god Phthah he viewed as his special
protector. He made, however, strenuous efforts to gather together a
powerful force; his captains collected the native troops from the
various provinces of Egypt, while he sent a number of emissaries Into
Asia, who were instructed to raise a large body of mercenaries in that
quarter. At last all was ready, and Menephthah appointed the fourteenth
day as that on which he would place himself at the head of his army and
lead them in person against the enemy; but, before the day came, his
courage failed him. He "saw in a dream"--at least so he himself
declares--"as it were a figure of the god Phthah, standing so as to
prevent his advance;" and the figure said to him, "Stay where thou art,
and let t