=Capture of Megiddo.= Not daunted by its seemingly impregnable walls, Thotmose III at once gave orders to surround it. His servants he sent out to gather the ripening grain on the fields which stretched across the Plain of Esdraelon and to collect the great herds that were pasturing over the grass-covered hills and valleys on its border. Within the city no provision had been made for a siege, and the thousands shut up within its walls were soon reduced to starvation. After several weeks, the city was, therefore, compelled to surrender. The king of Kadesh had fled, but his family and the families of his nobles fell into the hands of the conqueror. The spoils found in the captured city reveals the almost incredible opulence of this early Canaanite civilization. Nine hundred and twenty-four chariots, two thousand two hundred and thirty-eight horses, two hundred suits of armor, the royal tent, with the sceptre of the king of Kadesh, an ebony statue of himself, inlaid with lapis-lazuli and gold, a silver statue, probably of some god, and vast quantities of gold and silver were among the spoils which the conqueror claims to have found in the captured city. =The Cities of Palestine.= The contemporary literature already discovered indicates that by 1400 B.C. most of the cities that figured in Hebrew history were already established and that Palestine was almost, if not fully, as densely populated as in the days of the Hebrews. Among the chief Phœnician cities on the coast were Arvad in the north, Byblos and Beirut in central Syria, and Sidon, Tyre, and Accho in the south. The coast plains to the south of Mount Carmel, including the cities of Dor, Gezer, Ashdod, Altaku, Askalon, Gath, and Gaza, were at this period held by the Phœnicians or their kinsmen the Canaanites. Among the cities later captured by the Hebrews were Kadesh and Hanathon in Galilee, and Shechem, Bethel, Beth-horon, Ajalon, Jerusalem, and Beth-anoth in southern Palestine. As in the days of the Hebrew occupation, the Plain of Esdraelon was the centre of a strong Canaanite confederacy, which included Megiddo, Taanach, Shunem, Bethshean, and certain other cities whose sites have not yet been identified.