Mr. Hale invites us to an excursion which offers a pleasant
occupation for a brief while, and we cheerfully go with him. The
Biblical Delilah is a vague figure, except in two respects: She is
a woman of such charms that she wins the love of Samson, and such
guile and cupidity that she plays upon his passion and betrays him
to the lords of the Philistines for pay. The Bible knows nothing of
her patriotism, nor does the sacred historian give her the title of
Samson's wife, though it has long been the custom of Biblical
commentators to speak of her in this relation. St. Chrysostom set
the fashion and Milton followed it:--

But who is this? What thing of sea or land--
Female of sex it seems--
That, so bedeck'd, ornate and gay
Comes this way sailing
Like a stately ship
Of Tarsus, bound for the isles
Of Javan or Gadire,
With all her bravery on, and tackle trim,
Sails fill'd and streamers waving,
Courted by all the winds that hold them play;
An amber scent of odorous perfume--
Her harbinger, a damsel train behind?
Some rich Philistian matron she may seem;
And now, at nearer view, no other certain
Than Dalila, thy wife.


It cannot be without significance that the author of the story in
the Book of Judges speaks in a different way of each of the three