21. The river of Kishon swept them away, that ancient river, the river Kishon. O my soul, thou hast trodden down strength! [The river Kishon rising, as if elated with joy at the opportunity, and overflowing its banks, swept thousands away; that river, celebrated in ancient times, and the witness of former conflicts. O Deborah, thou art indeed thrice happy in becoming the favoured instrument of exciting this glorious war, and thus eventually of crushing a most formidable confederacy!] 22. Then were the horse-hoofs broken by means of the prancings, the prancings of then mighty ones. [The war-horse, urged in his rapid flight over the flinty soil, cut his hoofs to pieces; or entangled amidst the overflowings of Kishon, pranced, and foamed, and perished. [32]] 23. Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the Lord; curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof, because they came not to the help of the Lord, the help of the Lord against the mighty. [The angel, who preceded our hosts as the sword of an irresistible Providence, denounced a curse upon the city of Meroz, and commanded us to cherish a holy indignation against its lukewarm inhabitants, who, instead of resisting the giant armies of Canaan, remained as uninterested or timid spectators of the dreadful battle.] 24. Blessed above women shall Jael, the wife be of Heber the Kenite, be; blessed shall she be above women in the tent. [But feminine heroism shall exhibited in honourable contrast with such shameful neutrality. Let the benediction of heaven rest upon the head of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, above all other women! Blessed shall she be above all other female, heads of families who remained at home, having with masculine-courage completed in her tent, what was so happily begun in the field.] 25. He asked water, and she gave him milk; she brought forth butter in a lordly dish. [Sisera, famished and fainting, requested water to allay his thirst; she opened a leathern bottle, and with feigned respect presented him with butter-milk; yes, she poured him out butter-milk in a vessel of copper, such as nobles use. [33]] 26. She put her hand to the nail, and her right hand to the workmen's hammer; and with the hammer she smote Sisera; she smote off his head, when she had pierced and stricken through his temples. [Lulled into a fatal security by her deceptive homage, he slept--to wake no more! She seized a nail of her tent, and a hammer, approached in cautious silence the sleeping adversary of Israel, and, animated by an irresistible impulse of patriotic zeal, she drove it through his temples, and cut off his head.] 27. At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down; at her feet he bowed, he fell: where he bowed, there he fell down dead. [Thus fell the great instrument of Canaanitish oppression at the feet of a woman; thus ingloriously he perished [34]]