attempt of the natives to cut the main column during this crossing of the mountains.  His position might at any moment have become a critical one, had the allies taken advantage of it and attacked each battalion as it issued on to the plain before it could re-form.  But the Prince of Qodshu, either from ignorance of his adversary’s movements, or confident of victory in the open, declined to take the initiative.  Towards one o’clock in the afternoon, the Egyptians found themselves once more united on the further side of the range, close to a torrent called the Qina, a little to the south of Megiddo.  When the camp was pitched, Thutmosis announced his intention of engaging the enemy on the morrow.  A council of war was held to decide on the position that each corps should occupy, after which the officers returned to their men to see that a liberal supply of rations was served out, and to organise an efficient system of patrols.  They passed round the camp to the cry:  “Keep a good heart:  courage!  Watch well, watch well!  Keep alive in the camp!” The king refused to retire to rest until he had been assured that “the country was quiet, and also the host, both to south and north.”  By dawn the next day the whole army was in motion.  It was formed into a single line, the right wing protected by the torrent, the left extended into the plain, stretching beyond Megiddo towards the north-west.  Thutmosis and his guards occupied the centre, standing “armed in his chariot of electrum like unto Horus brandishing his pike, and like Montu the Theban god.”  The Syrians, who had not expected such an early attack, were seized with panic, and fled in the direction of the town, leaving their horses and chariots on the field; but the citizens, fearing lest in the confusion the Egyptians should effect an entrance with the fugitives, had closed their gates and refused to open them.  Some of the townspeople, however, let down ropes to the leaders of the allied party, and drew them up to the top of the ramparts:  “and would to heaven that the soldiers of His Majesty had not so far forgotten themselves as to gather up the spoil left by the vile enemy!  They would then have entered Megiddo forthwith; for while the men of the garrison were drawing up the Lord of Qodshu and their own prince, the fear of His Majesty was upon their limbs, and their hands failed them by reason of the carnage which the royal urous carried into their ranks.”  The victorious soldiery were dispersed over the fields, gathering together the gilded and silvered chariots of the Syrian chiefs, collecting the scattered weapons and the hands of the slain, and securing the prisoners; then rallying about the king, they greeted him with acclamations and filed past to deliver up the spoil.  He reproached them for having allowed themselves to be drawn away from the heat of pursuit.  “Had you carried Megiddo, it would have been a favour granted to me by Ra my father this day; for all the kings of the country being shut up within it, it would have