"I paid nothing for them," he said, as he threw them down. "The man who sold them was praying those who were leaving the town to take them--for he thought that, if the Romans found them in his house, they would destroy it--but no one listened. All were too busy, in carrying off such of their household goods as they could take, to burden themselves further; so he gladly gave me as many as I could take. I carried off nearly all his bows; and I left him breaking up the rest, and his store of arrows, in order to burn them before the Romans arrived.
"A boy, carrying a bag of arrowheads, came with me some little distance. I paid the man for them, and they are now hidden in the forest. You can fetch them when you will, but I could not carry more with me than I have got."
"You have done well, Jonas," John said, as the men seized each a bow, and divided the arrows among them; and then stood waiting, expecting orders from John to proceed, at once, to harass the Roman column as it ascended the hill.
John said, in answer to their looks:
"We will not meddle with them, today. Did we shoot at them, they would suppose that we belonged to Jabez Galaad; and would, in revenge, destroy the town and all those they may find within it; and our first essay against them would bring destruction upon thousands of our countrymen."
The others saw the justness of his reasoning, and their faith in him as their leader was strengthened by his calmness, and readiness of decision.
"Is the bag of arrowheads heavy, Jonas?"
"It is as much as the boy, who was about my own age, could carry," Jonas replied.
"Then do you, Phineas, and you, Simeon, go with Jonas to the place where the bag is hidden, and carry it to the place we have fixed upon for our camp. If, on the way, you come across a herd of goats, shoot two or three of them and take them with you, and get fires ready. The day is getting on, but we will go across the mountains, and see where the Romans are pitching their camp and, by sunset, we will be with you."
Making their way along the mountain the band came, after an hour's walking, to a point where they could obtain a view of Gamala. The city stood on the western extremity of the hill which, after sloping gradually down, rose suddenly in a sharp ridge like the hump of a camel--from which the town had its name, Gamala. On both sides, this rock ended abruptly in a precipitous chasm; in which ran the two branches of the Hieromax, which met at the lower end of the ridge, and ran together into the end of the lake at Tarichea, three miles away.