A brave warrior even in early years, David had been afterwards tested and strengthened by adventures and dangers of every kind; he had understood how to meet or escape even the most difficult situations. He had the inclination and power for great things, and was little scrupulous in the choice of the means which brought him most swiftly and completely to his object. His vision was clear and wide; clever, crafty, and quickly decided, he nevertheless knew how to wait when the object could not be obtained at the moment. It was his in an extraordinary measure to retain old comrades, to win new ones and attach them to himself. It was not his intention to be at the beck of the Philistines longer than he had need of them; with his elevation at Hebron came the moment for breaking with them. He saw that they would not lose without a heavy price the preponderance in which his rebellion against Saul, his leadership in Judah, his struggle against Ishbosheth had again placed them; that their exasperation would be the deeper and more lasting because he had deceived the hopes which they had placed in him. He began his reign with an undertaking which shows the certainty and width of his views. His dominion over the tribes of Simeon and Judah had been established for almost eight years, but over the northern tribes it was recent, and had to be confirmed. The remembrance of Saul was cherished most warmly in the tribe of Benjamin, which lay next to Judah on the north. In this land, not far from the northern border of Judah, was a city of the name of Jebus, inhabited by the Jebusites, a relic of the old population which at the time of the settlement the Benjaminites had not been able to overcome.[283] The city stood on steep heights, surrounded by deep gorges, which formed natural trenches; the walls of the eastern height on which the citadel stood, Mount Zion, were so strong that the Jebusites are said to have boasted that the blind and lame were sufficient to defend them. This city appeared to David excellently situated for protection against the Philistines and for his own royal abode; it had the faithful tribes of Judah and Simeon to the south, and was pushed forward like a fortification into the territory of Benjamin and the northern tribes. Nor was it useful only in establishing his dominion over Israel. Even in Saul's reign it had been difficult when an enemy invaded the open cantons of Israel to find time for assembling the fighting powers, the levy of the people; there had been no fortified point on which the first shock of the enemy's onset broke, no city strongly fortified and of considerable size in which large numbers could find protection.