RESEMBLING THOSE OF KEREFTO. 
551 
combustibles they contained in a blaze. Amongst the unhappy 
wretches driven to desperation, was an old veteran of the moun¬ 
tain, with his wife and seven of his children. They prayed him 
to allow them to go forth, and yield themselves to the enemy ; 
the king having published before the commencement of the 
last attack, that all who surrendered should be spared. But 
instead of consenting to this submission, he placed himself at 
the cave’s mouth, and as each of his sons sought to pass him, 
to claim the offered pardon, he slew him with his own hand, 
and cast the body down the precipice, till he had destroyed the 
whole seven; then stabbing his wife, he clasped her in his arms, 
and flinging himself after them, so embraced death rather than 
captivity. Herod, who witnessed all that was doing, had in 
vain stretched out his hand to this cruel parent, offering him 
any security for his life and that of his children, but he would 
not see nor hear. And so, by these means, all the caves were 
taken, and the robbers entirely subdued.” 
That similar fierce inhabitants have frequently been the pos¬ 
sessors of the fastnesses of Kerefto, and indeed till only within 
these few years, many persons near the spot have too good reason 
to remember. But the style of these caverns, their vastness, their 
masterly finishing where completed by art, their regularly dis¬ 
posed and numberless lamp-niches, and the effect of their lights 
having produced a consistency of smoke which could not have 
been collected in even ages of the common mode of illuminating 
the most extravagant banditti revels,—-all prove their destination 
to have had some more august and solemn purpose; and which, 
I have no hesitation in believing, was that of some deeply mys¬ 
terious and superstitious rites. 
It is not necessary to discuss here, whether the old Mith- 
