1He who dashes in pieces has come up against thee. Keep the fortress. Watch the way. Make thy loins strong. Fortify thy power mightily. 2For LORD restores the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel, for the emptiers have emptied them out, and destroyed their vine-branches. 3The shield of his mighty men is made red. The valiant men are in scarlet. The chariots flash with steel in the day of his preparation, and the cypress [spears] are brandished. 4The chariots rage in the streets; they rush to and fro in the broad ways. The appearance of them is like torches. They run like the lightnings. 5He remembers his nobles. They stumble in their march. They make haste to the wall of it, and the mantelet is prepared. 6The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace is dissolved. 7And it is decreed. She is uncovered. She is carried away, and her handmaids moan as with the voice of doves, beating upon their breasts. 8But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water. Yet they flee away. Stand, stand, [they cry], but none looks back. 9Take ye the spoil of silver. Take the spoil of gold. For there is no end of the store, the glory of all goodly furniture. 10She is empty, and void, and waste. And the heart melts, and the knees smite together, and anguish is in all loins, and the faces of them all have grown pale. 11Where is the den of the lions, and the feeding-place of the young lions, where the lion [and] the lioness walked, the lion's whelp, and none made them afraid? 12The lion tore in pieces enough for his whelps, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with prey, and his dens with prey. 13Behold, I am against thee, says LORD of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions. And I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be hear