¹⁶ She dealeth hardly with her young ones, as if they were not hers: Though her labor be in vain, `she is' without fear;

³ Even the jackals draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones: The daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

⁵⁶ The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter,

⁵⁷ and toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet, and toward her children whom she shall bear; for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly, in the siege and in the distress wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates.

²⁶ Then spake the woman whose the living child was unto the king, for her heart yearned over her son, and she said, Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and in no wise slay it. But the other said, It shall be neither mine nor thine; divide it.

²⁷ Then the king answered and said, Give her the living child, and in no wise slay it: she is the mother thereof.

²⁸ And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to-day, and we will eat my son to-morrow.

²⁹ So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him; and she hath hid her son.

¹⁵ The labor of fools wearieth every one of them; for he knoweth not how to go to the city.

²⁰ See, O Jehovah, and behold to whom thou hast done thus! Shall the women eat their fruit, the children that are dandled in the hands? Shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?

¹³ Behold, is it not of Jehovah of hosts that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity?

³¹ without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, unmerciful: