It would seem that no further attack was made upon Mizpeh and its neighbourhood during the lifetime of Samuel. At least such appears to be the conclusion we must draw from the generalising and optimistic language of the Hebrew historian.[400] For a time, indeed, the whole district was freed from the presence of the foreigner. The villages eastward of Ekron and Gath ceased to pay tribute to the conqueror, though their independence could not have lasted long.[401] Samuel’s ‘circuit’ did not extend beyond Mizpeh, Gilgal and Beth-el, and his sons judged cases in Beer-sheba. Ahitub, the high-priest, was doubtless at Nob with the rest of the Levites of Shiloh, almost within sight of Mizpeh. What had been saved out of the wreck of the temple at Shiloh must have been there with him. We know that at Nob the sword of Goliath was subsequently laid up before Yahveh, and at Nob too was probably preserved the brazen serpent that had been set up by Moses in the wilderness.[402] According to the Chronicler,[403] however, the tabernacle and the brazen altar which had been made by Bezaleel were at Gibeon; how this came to be the case he does not say.[404] At any rate, if the brazen serpent were preserved, there is no reason why other things should not have been preserved as well. And the books of the Law would have been among the first objects to be carried with them by the fugitive priests. We are told that when the ark was brought into the temple of Solomon it still contained the tables of stone which had been placed in it by Moses (1 Kings viii. 9); if these had been removed from it when it was taken to the Israelitish camp, they too must have formed part of the temple furniture which was saved by the priests. Here, therefore, in a small district of the tribe of Benjamin, a portion of which was inhabited by the old Gibeonite natives of the land, all that remained of Israelitish independence, whether religious or political, found its last refuge. Here the national spirit of Israel still lingered among the priests and Levites who had fled from Shiloh, or who lived in the mountains of Ephraim. It is not without significance that here, too, was the home of the Gibeonite serfs of the sanctuary;[405] priests, Levites, and Nethinim were gathered together, as it were, in one spot. Though the temple had fallen, the Mosaic Law and ritual were enshrined in the hearts of those who had served in it.