Jehoram was unaware of the approach of Jehu. One messenger after another was sent out to make inquiry, but the messengers were ordered behind, and Jehu came forward until he and the king met at the vineyard of Naboth. The king asked what news was being brought--news of peace or of war. The question was answered with another question: “What peace can there be so long as the idolatrous whoredoms of thy mother, Jezebel, and her witchcrafts are so many?” Jehu thus referred to fundamental wrongs. Instead of trifling with details he went straight to the fountainhead, and by the delivery of a profoundly religious message he excited the alarm of those who heard him. Jehoram was weak and feeble and sought to flee, but Jehu drew a bow with his full strength and smote between his arms, and the arrow went out at the king’s heart, and he sank down in his chariot. Then Jehu ordered his captain, or squire, to take up Jehoram and cast him into the portion of the field of Naboth, the Jezreelite, that the word of the Lord might be fulfilled. And when Ahaziah, the king of Judah, saw this he sought to flee, but Jehu followed him, saying: “Smite him also in the chariot.” After a hot pursuit Ahaziah was struck at the declivity of Gur, where his chariot was forced to slacken its speed. Then came the most tragical of all the acts. No sooner was Jehu come to Jezreel than Jezebel, now old and withered, heard of it, and her blood tingled at the news. She was not one who was easily deterred. According to the custom of Oriental ladies, Jezebel painted her eyebrows and lashes with a pigment composed of antimony and zinc. The intention of the dark border was to throw the eye into relief and make it look larger. She adorned her head with a tire, or a headdress, and after donning her royal dress she looked out at a window, designing to impress Jehu. As Jehu looked up to the window he exclaimed: “Who is on my side?” He ordered the two or three eunuchs who looked out to throw down the painted woman. Jehu knew that the cruel queen was intensely hated by the palace officials. The two or three eunuchs who had been accustomed to crouch before her in servile dread now saw that Jehu was in the ascendant, and in obedience to the demand of the regicide they threw her out of the window. Such has ever been the policy of sycophants--the rats of court--who only linger there with a view of seeing how much they can appropriate or destroy. No sooner was Jezebel thrown down than some of her blood was sprinkled on the wall and on the horses, and she was trodden under foot. Here, again, we see the end of wickedness. For a time there is escape, but in the long run there is ruin. Look at Jezebel, and learn the fate of the wicked. No such fate, in a merely physical sense, may await the iniquitous now; but all those intermediate punishments simply point to the last great penalty: “The wicked shall go away into everlasting punishment.”