clared to him that "Out of the north evil shall break out upon all the
inhabitants of the land." Already the enemy is hastening: "Behold, he
shall come up as clouds, and his chariots shall be as the whirlwind:
his horses are swifter than eagles. Woe unto us! for we are spoiled. O
Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved.
How long shall thine evil thoughts lodge within thee? For a voice
declareth from Dan, and publisheth evil from the hills of Ephraim:
make ye mention to the nations; behold, publish against Jerusalem!" The
Scythians had hardly been mentioned before they were already beneath the
walls, and the prophet almost swoons with horror at the sound of their
approach. "My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart: my heart
is disquieted in me; I cannot hold my peace; because thou hast heard,
O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction upon
destruction is cried; for the whole land is spoiled, and my curtains in
a moment. How long shall I see the standard and hear the sound of the
trumpet?" It would seem that the torrent of invasion turned aside
from the mountains of Judah; it flowed over Galilee, Samaria, and the
Philistine Shephelah, its last eddies dying away on the frontiers of
Egypt. Psammetiehus is said to have bribed the barbarians to retire. As
they fell back they plundered the temple of Derketo, near Ashkelon: we
are told that in order to punish them for this act of sacrilege, the
goddess visited them with a disease which caused serious ravages amongst
them, and which the survivors carried back with them to their own
country.*

* Herodotus calls the goddess Aphrodite Urania, by which we
must understand Derketo or Atargatis, who is mentioned by
several other classical authors, e.g. Xanthus of Lydia,
Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, Pliny. According to Justin, the
Scythians were stopped only by the marshes of the Delta. The
disease by which the Scythians were attacked is described by
Hippocrates; but in spite of what he tells us about it, its
precise nature has not yet been determined.

There was, however, no need to introduce a supernatural agency in order
to account for their rapid disappearance. The main body of invaders had
never quitted Media or the northern part of the Assyrian empire, and
only the southern regions of Syria were in all probability exposed to
the attacks of isolated bands. These stragglers, who ye