They had offered these as a sacrifice, even as Abraham had offered Isaac, and the Lord had caught them a timely ram in the thicket.
In the midst of the general rejoicing, Joel Rae was overwhelmed with humiliation and despair.

He was ashamed for having once wished to be another Lion of the Lord.

It was a poor way to find favour with God, he thought,--this refusing battle when it had been all but forced upon them.

It was plain, however, that the Lord meant to try them further,--plain, too, that in His inscrutable wisdom He had postponed the destruction of the wicked nation to the east of them.
He longed again to rise before the people and call them to repentance and to action.

Once he would have done so, but now an evil shadow lay upon him.