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the other by rain: both are to be found in considerable numbers in Judea, and are, according to Rauwolff, more numerous in these countries than springs that lie high, than fountains and brooks that is of running water.

Some of these have been made for the use of the people that dwell in their neighbourhood, some for travellers, and especially those that travel for devotion. Thevenot found two," made a little before his time for the use of travellers, by Turks of distinction, in the desert between Cairo and Gaza. And from a history d'Herbelot has given us, it appears, that the Mohammedans have dug wells in the deserts, for the accommodation of those that go in pilgrimage to Mecca, their sacred city, where the distances between such places as Nature had made pleasant for them to stop, and take up water at, were too great: for he tells us, that Gianabi, a famous Mohammedan rebel, filled up with sand all the wells that had been dug in the road to Mecca for the benefit of the pilgrims, &c.

To conveniences perhaps of this kind made, or renewed, by the devout Israelites in the valley of Baca, to facilitate their going up to Jerusalem, the Psalmist refers in the lxxxivth Psalm, where he speaks of going from strength to strength till they appeared in Zion.* Part 1, p. 179.

¡ P. 396.

Sir J. Chardin observed this difference in the East between wells of living water and reservoirs of rain water, that these last have frequently, especially in the Indies, a flight to steps down of the water, that as the water dimi.

This same scarcity of water makes them particularly careful to take up their lodgings, as mnch as possible, near some river, fountain, or well for which reason there is, we may believe, less of accident than we commonly think of Jacob's lodging on the banks of Jabbok, Gen. xxxii. 22, and the men of David waiting for him by the brook Besor, 1 Sam. xxx. 21, who could not hold out with him in his march. So Dr. Pococke tells us, that when he came to the fountain, which supplies the aqueduct of Tyre, he found there the great sheikh of those parts with a considerable number of attendants, who had stopped there, but soon went away, it being usual with them to halt whereever they find a spring. And for halting, such nishes, people may still take it up with their hands; whereas he hardly ever observed a well furnished with those steps through all the East.* He concludes from this circumstance, that the place from whence Rebecca took up water, Gen. xxiv. 11, was a reservoir of rain water. This is the account that he gives us in his sixth MS. volume, and it explains very clearly what is meant by Rebecca's going down to the well, Gen. xxiv. 16. But all reservoirs of rain wa ter have not these steps. His mentioning the Indies in particular shows, that in the nearer parts of the East they frequently are without them, as well as those receptacles of water that are supplied by springs: so the well to which the woman of Samaria repaired, it seems, was nothing but a reservoir of rain water, since our LORD opposes its waters, I think, to living water, John iv. 10. If this remark be just, that which is now shown for that well cannot be the true place, for it is supplied by springs: Mr. Maundrell expresses a jealousy of this kind, but he touches upon it with a very gentle hand, p. 62, 63.

1 Vol. ii, p. 81.

Of the fountains near Aleppo, says Dr. Russell, (MS. note) on the Scanderoon road, there are steps that go down into the reservoir of several of them. EDIT.

places are always preferred, for very obvious

reasons.

OBSERVATION III.

Carry also Provender for their Beasts.

BUT, besides provisions for themselves, they are obliged to carry food for the beasts on which they ride, or carry their goods. That food is of different kinds. They make little or no hay in these countries, and are therefore very careful of their straw, which they cut into small bits, by an instrument which at the same time threshes out the corn; this chopped straw, with barley, beans, and balls made of bean and barley-meal, or of the pounded kernels of dates," are what they are wont to feed them with.

The officers of Solomon are accordingly said to have brought, every man in his month, barley and straw for the horses and dromedaries, I Kings iv. 28. Not straw to litter them with, there is reason to think, for it is not now used in those countries for that purpose; but chopped straw for them to eat alone with their barley. The litter they use for them is their own dung, dried in the sun, and bruised between their hands, which they heap up again in the morning, sprinkling it in the summer with fresh water, to keep it from corrupting.".

תג

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Maillett, Lett. ix, p. 8 and 13.

Voy. dans la Pal. p. 168. Dr. Russell confirms this account, in a MS. note on this place. EDIT.

In some other places we read of provender and straw, not barley and straw because it may be, other things were used for their food anciently, as well as now, hesides barley and chopped straw, beleel, one of the words translated provender, (Is. xxx, 24) implies something of mixture, and the participle of the verb from which it is derived is used for the mingling of flour with oil; so the verb in Judges xix. 21, may be as well translated, "he mingled (food) for the asses, a veyabal lechamoreem, as, he gave them provender, signifying that he mixed some chopped straw and barley together for the asses. And thus also barley and chopped straw, as it lies just after reaping unseparated in the field, might naturally be expressed by the Hebrew word we translate provender, which signifies barley and straw that had been mingled together, accordingly seems to be so, Job xxiv. 6. They reap every one his corn in the field. "Heb, mingled corn, or dredge," says the margin. What ideas are usually affixed to secondary translation, I do not know; but Job apparently al

• For, according to Maillet, they immediately after reaping chop the straw, and tread out the grain in the field itself.

In this state, says Dr. Russell, (MS. note) the animals who tread the corn eat it freely; but the usual provender is barley winnowed and cleansed, which, when given to the cattle, is mixed with the chopped straw: the corn and straw being purchased separately at Aleppo, it is always judged necessary to mingle a little straw with the barley, to pre vent, according to the common opinion, the horses from getting too fat. EDIT.

ludes to the provender, or heap of chopped straw and corn lying mingled together in the field, after having passed under the threshing instrument, to which he compares the spoils that were taken from the passengers, so early as his time, by those that lived somewhat after the present manner of the wild Arabs, which spoils are to them what the harvest and vintage were to others. To this agrees that other sage of Job where this word occurs, ch. vi. 5. Will the ox low (in complaint) over his provender? or fodder, as it is translated in our version; when he has not only straw enough, but mixed with barley.

pas

The accurate Vitringa, in his commentary, has taken notice of that word's implying something of mixture which is translated provender in Is. xxx. 24, but for want of more nicely attending to Eastern customs, though he has done it more than most commentators, he has been very unhappy in explaining the cause of it; for be supposes it signifies a mixture of straw, hay, and bran. I have no where observed in books of travels, that they give their labouring beasts bran in the East, and hay is not made there ;' the mixture that is meant, if we are to explain it by the present Eastern usages, is chopped straw and barley. But the additional word

P To the testimony of other writers, concerning their not making hay, we may add that of Sir J. Chardin's MS. which, speaking of a passage of the vulgar Latin translation, where the word fœnum (hay) is used, says, This is an error, arising from not having known Arabia or the adjoining counties; for no hay is made any where there.

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