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[229]
In the mean time, there deserted to him Ananus, who came from Emmaus,
the most bloody of all Simon's guards, and Archelaus, the son of Magadatus,
they hoping to be still forgiven, because they left the Jews at a time
when they were the conquerors. Titus objected this to these men, as a cunning
trick of theirs; and as he had been informed of their other barbarities
towards the Jews, he was going in all haste to have them both slain. He
told them that they were only driven to this desertion because of the utmost
distress they were in, and did not come away of their own good disposition;
and that those did not deserve to be preserved, by whom their own city
was already set on fire, out of which fire they now hurried themselves
away. However, the security he had promised deserters overcame his resentments,
and he dismissed them accordingly, though he did not give them the same
privileges that he had afforded to others. And now the soldiers had already
put fire to the gates, and the silver that was over them quickly carried
the flames to the wood that was within it, whence it spread itself all
on the sudden, and caught hold on the cloisters. Upon the Jews seeing this
fire all about them, their spirits sunk together with their bodies, and
they were under such astonishment, that not one of them made any haste,
either to defend himself or to quench the fire, but they stood as mute
spectators of it only. However, they did not so grieve at the loss of what
was now burning, as to grow wiser thereby for the time to come; but as
though the holy house itself had been on fire already, they whetted their
passions against the Romans. This fire prevailed during that day and the
next also; for the soldiers were not able to burn all the cloisters that
were round about together at one time, but only by pieces.
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