Meanwhile MICHAL, the king’s second daughter, had fallen in love with her father’s armour-bearer. As if to bring his previous designs to a positive fulfilment, Saul named as her dowry proof that David had slain a hundred of the Philistines. At the head of his men David went, and slew twice that number, and brought the required proofs of their death. The marriage was celebrated, and David became captain of the royal body-guard, second only, if not equal, to Abner. But the king’s jealousy of his successful rival was only the more increased, and he went so far as to propose to Jonathan and his servants that David should be put out of the way, and was only dissuaded by the moving intercession of Jonathan himself. A partial reconciliation with the king ensued, and David returned to court. But his life was not more secure. On one occasion his own vigilance in eluding the royal javelin, on another the devotion of his wife Michal, alone saved his life. On the last occasion, the officers charged to put him to death had actually penetrated into his chamber, but only to find in the bed, in place of the object of their search, an _image_, or household god, with the head enveloped in a net of goats’ hair[249]. During the night his wife had let him down from the window. (Comp. Ps. lix.) David now fled away to Naioth[250], the _huts or habitations_ near Ramah, where he enjoyed a brief respite from danger and anxiety in the congenial society of the aged Samuel, whom he had not seen since the occurrence at Bethlehem, and of the company of prophets there gathered together under his superintendence. News of his hiding-place reached the ears of Saul, who forthwith sent messengers to take him. But the sight of the prophets performing their sacred functions under the eye of the venerable Samuel and their strains of sacred melody so wrought upon the messengers, that they could not refrain from joining in their religious exercises. A similar issue attended a second, and even a third deputation. At length Saul went in person to the great well or cistern of Sechu, not far from Ramah, and enquired for the Prophet and the fugitive. But as he drew near the place, he himself could not resist the prophetic impulse, and for the second time justified the enquiry, _Is Saul also among the prophets?_ (1 Sam. xix. 24).