Page:Jerusalem's captivities lamented, or, A plain description of Jerusalem from Joshua's time to the year 1517, both from Scripture and ancient history.pdf/13

Rh of howling, yelling, weeping, wailing, ſobbing and ſighing of women, children, and aged men ſtarving for want of bread, and others roaring in their wounds; ſo that all manner of miſeries oppreſſed the inhabitants, and he was thought a happy man who was dead before that day.

At this time Veſpaſian with his army, was lying in Galilee, and from thence he went to Rome to receive the Imperial Crown, and left his ſon Titus, with the half of his army to beſiege Jeruſalem, the other to tarry at Alexandria till further orders, “ That I ſhall do (ſaid Titus) dear father, for unto you it belongeth to command, and for me to obey."

In the firſt year of the reign of Veſpaſian, Titus muſtered his army, and found them ſufficient for the ſiege of Jeruſalem. He then marched to Samaria, and from thence to Atelonia, thirty furlongs from Jeruſalem, where he pitched his camp, and the next day he brought his whole army to Jeruſalem a little before the feaſt of unleavened bread, which was April the 14th, ſo that an infinite number of people, who came to celebrate, were all ſhut up in the city, which raiſed a famine; oxen's dung was ſold at a dear rate, ſo was old leather; and ſome women, for want, boiled their children and did eat them.

Now Titus approached the walls of the