Philistines overran the country, and chased Saul even to the mountain
fastnesses of Gilboa, where the miserable man, deserted by God, tried to
learn his fate through evil spirits, and only met the certainty of his
doom. In the next day's battle his true-hearted son met a soldier's
death; but Saul, when wounded by the archers, tried in vain to put an
end to his own life, and was, after a reign of forty years, at last
slain by an Amalekite, who brought his crown to David, and was executed
by him for having profanely slain the Lord's anointed.

For seven years David reigned only in his own tribe of Judah, while the
brave Abner kept the rest of the kingdom for Saul's son, Ishbosheth,
until, taking offence because Ishbosheth refused to give him one of
Saul's widows to wife, he offered to come to terms with David, but in
leaving the place of meeting, he was treacherously killed by David's
overbearing nephew, Joab, in revenge for the death of a brother whom he
had slain in single combat. Ishbosheth was soon after murdered by two of
his own servants, and David becoming sole king, ruled prudently with all
his power, and with anxious heed to the will of his true King. He was a
great conqueror, and was the first to win for Israel her great city
on Mount Moriah. It had once been called Salem, or peace, when the
mysterious priest-king, Melchizedek, reigned there in Abraham's
time, but since it had been held by the Jebusites, and called Jebus.
When David took it, he named it Jerusalem, or the vision of peace,
fortified it, built a palace there, and fetched thither with songs and
solemn dances, the long-hidden Ark, so that it might be the place where
God's Name was set, the centre of worship; and well was the spot fitted
for the purpose. It was a hill girdled round by other hills, and so
strong by nature, that when built round with towers and walls, an enemy
could hardly have taken it. David longed to raise a solid home for the
Ark, but this was not a work permitted to a man of war and bloodshed,