=Migration of the Danites.= The eighteenth and nineteenth chapters of Judges contain an exceedingly old and vivid picture of the way in which the different tribes individually won their homes in this land, where there was no political unity and where each tribe and city fought its own battles single-handed. At first the little tribe of the Danites had settled at a point where the Valley of Sorek penetrated the Judean hills on the west and opened out into a diamond-shaped valley. Here the Danites were pressed by the Judahites on the south, the Ephraimites and Benjamites on the north, and above all by the Philistines, who were able to enter this fertile valley by its western gateway. Acting on the advice of the spies whom they had sent out to find a more favorable place of abode, a large body of the Danites migrated to the north. At the foot of Mount Hermon, amidst the rushing waters which come from the copious sources of the Jordan, they found a Sidonian colony.^{(78)} It had probably been established as a trading outpost, for past it ran the great highway from Damascus through Northern Israel. It was cut off from all connection with its parent city by the heights of upper Galilee. The Danites suddenly attacked the city, put to death its inhabitants, and changed its name from Laish to Dan. Thus was founded a city which became the famous sanctuary of the north. =The Moabite Invasion.= All the earlier narratives of the Old Testament indicate that the Hebrews undertook the conquest of Canaan, not as a united nation, but as independent tribes. At first they appear to have contented themselves with the least desirable and therefore unoccupied regions. These were scattered throughout the wide extent of the land and were separated by zones of Canaanite cities. The result was that the local Hebrew tribes soon fell a prey to the older races. Early during the period of settlement the Moabites who were at first confined to the south of the Arnon, swept over this natural barrier and appeared at the fords of the Jordan opposite Jericho. They even exacted tribute of the Hebrew tribes in southern Canaan. The Moabite oppression was overthrown by the Benjamite Ehud, who treacherously slew the Moabite king and rallied the strong clans of Ephraim. By seizing and holding the two lower fords of the Jordan they succeeded, with the aid of this great natural barrier, in keeping back the Moabites; but it is evident that by this time these aggressive foes had largely reconquered the old kingdom of Sihon and subjugated the Hebrews who remained east of the Jordan and south of the Jabbok.