32. Had it not been for familiar friendship, and the claims of your office, your life should have gone for theirs.
33. Hermon, being threatened in this unexpected and alarming manner, was troubled in visage, and depressed in countenance.
34. The friends, too, stole out one by one, and dismissed the assembled multitudes to their respective occupations.
35. The Jews, having heard of these events, praised the glorious God and King of kings, because they had obtained this help, too, from him.
36. Now the king arranged another banquet after the same manner, and proclaimed an invitation to mirth.
37. And he summoned Hermon to his presence, and said, with threats, How often, O wretch, must I repeat my orders to you about these same persons?
38. Once more, arm the elephants against the morrow for the extermination of the Jews.
39. His kinsmen, who were reclining with him, wondered at his instability, and thus expressed themselves:
40. O king, how long do you make trial of us, as of men bereft of reason? This is the third time that you have ordered their destruction. When the thing is to be done, you change your mind, and recall your instructions.
41. For this cause the feeling of expectation causes tumult in the city: it swarms with factions; and is continually on the point of being plundered.
42. The king, just like another Phalaris, a prey to thoughtlessness, made no account of the changes which his own mind had undergone, issuing in the deliverance of the Jews. He swore a fruitless oath, and determined forthwith to send them to hades, crushed by the knees and feet of the elephants.
43. He would also invade Judea, and level its towns with fire and the sword; and destroy that temple which the heathen might not enter, and prevent sacrifices ever after being offered up there.
44. Joyfully his friends broke up, together with his kinsmen; and, trusting in his determination, arranged their forces in guard at the most convenient places of the city.
45. And the master of the elephants urged the beasts into an almost maniacal state, drenched them with incense and wine, and decked them with frightful instruments.
46. About early morning, when the city was now filled with an immense number of people at the hippodrome, he entered the palace, and called the king to the business in hand.
47. The king’s heart teemed with impious rage; and he rushed forth with the mass, along with the elephants. With feelings unsoftened, and eyes pitiless, he longed to gaze at the hard and wretched doom of the above-mentioned Jews.