1 And it came to pass that in the latter *end of the eighteenth year those armies of ^arobbers had prepared for battle, and began to come down and to sally forth from the hills, and out of the mountains, and the wilderness, and their strongholds, and their ^bsecret places, and began to take possession of the lands, both which were in the land south and which were in the land north, and began to take possession of all the lands which had been ^cdeserted by the Nephites, and the cities which had been left desolate.