thanks to his officers and people for their exertions in his favour, or, in the language of the hiftorian, fpake to the hearts of his fervants', and when he received their compliments of congratulation: it is, I fay, fomewhat uncertain, whether he met his friends in the upper chamber, whither he retired to mourn, which the author of the paper in the Archæologia would call the ftate-room; or in the room where he first fat between the two gates; or in fome other apartment of that building. Joab indeed, we are told, with great roughnefs laid before him the neceffity of laying afide his mourning, of appearing in public, and graciously acknowledging the fervice his people had done him, in doing which he calls. upon him to arife and go forth; but this doth not inform us where he fat in ftate, only we know from the following verfe, that it was fomewhere in the gate. And the words go forth might even only mean, arife from the ground on which thou lieft, go out of this clofet, or this obfcure corner, where thou haft given up thyfelf to mourning, into this adjoining state-room, and appear like thyfelf, the king of Ifrael, to whom God has preferved the crown, on a feat of dignity fuitable to thy present state.

See ch. 19. v. 7, margin.

2 The 8th.

3 And Mr. King has fhown, that very frequently small recefles attended thefe public rooms in or over the gates of our old English caftles.

We

We fit not now, in common, in the gates of our public buildings, but Bishop Pococke, when he travelled in these countries, found So fpeakthis ancient custom still kept up. "When ing of the ancient Byblus, he fays, "I returned from viewing the town, the "fheik and the elders were fitting in the "gate of the city, after the ancient manner, " and I fat a while with them "."

There is another circumftance relating to this old castle at Tunbridge, which is mentioned in this fame paper of the Archæologia, and which fhould not be paffed over in filence here, and that is the use of pitch, instead of lime, for cementing ftones together. On digging at the bottom of the fofs, he tells the Antiquarian Society, "were found

66

remaining the foundations of two piers, "which fupported the bridge; and which "were constructed in a very remarkable manner, the stones being laid in pitch, mixed " with hair, instead of mortar.'

66

When then it is faid in the book of Genefis, that in building the tower of Babel they had flime for morter, by which bitumen is fuppofed to be meant, which very much resembles pitch, and which pitchy substance the earth throws out in various places, it is not a neceflary confequence, derivable from that account, that it was the first kind of cement that ever was made ufe of, fince the use

Trav. vol. 2. p. 98.

2 Gen. II. 3.

of

of lime might be known in that age, and the bitumen be ufed notwithstanding, as pitch in the caftle at Tunbridge, for it's fuppofed ftrength.

Many ftructures of ftone have been raised up without any cement at all, and there are fome fuch still remaining in Scotland, as appears by the papers of the Antiquarian Society', fo artfully were the ftones laid; but when the Tunbridge caftle was built, the use of lime was certainly well known in England : pitch must have been chofen on account of it's fuppofed ftrength; bitumen might be used for the fame reafon, in the conftruction of the tower of Babel.

The early use of burnt brick in the building that tower, deferves attention too: “ They "faid one to another, Go to, let us maké brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for ftone, and flime had they for morter." A great part, perhaps the largeft, of the bricks that are used at this day in these countries are only dried in the fun.

66

OBSERVATION XXXVIII.

The fame ingenious gentleman, in the fame paper of obfervations on our old caftles,

Niebuhr found many buildings in the fouthern part of Arabia, that had no cement, but were formed of loofe ftones placed with fome management on each other. Voy. 2 Archaol. v. 6. p. 293.

tom. I.

gives us a note defigned to illuftrate, though with great modefty, another paffage of Scripture, which it may not be amiss to add to the preceding.

"When I read (in the 9th ch. of the 2d "book of Kings) that on Jehu's being an"ointed king over Ifrael, at Ramoth-Gilead, "the captains of the hoft, who were then fit

66

ting in council, as foon as they heard there"of, took every man his garment, and put it under him, on the top of the fairs; and " blew with trumpets, proclaiming, Jebu is king; and when I confider the account given by Herodotus, of the ancient Ecbatana, "which was at no great distance from Syria, "and in a country much connected with it; "and reflect alfo on the appearance of the top "of the ftair-cafes both at Lancefton and Connisborough'; when, I fay, I confider all thefe circumftances, I am very apt to conclude, that at either of the two latter places is ftill to be beheld, nearly the fame kind "of scenery, as to building, which was ex"hibited to the world, on the remarkable ❝ occafion of inaugurating Jehu at Ramoth

According to the 23d plate of this volume, which gives us reprefentations of this caftle at Connilborough, in one corner of a court, ftrongly walled in, is a keep, or tower of peculiar ftrength, to which the afcent is by a narrow, fteep, and dangerous flight of many steps, which Mr. King fuppofes might resemble the stairs afcending the tower in which Jehu was fitting in council, and on the top of which stairs he was proclaimed.

"Gilead:

"Gilead: but I dare not to determine pre"cisely on a matter of fuch very high anti"quity; and leave every one to form his "own conclufions, from what has been here "laid before him, as to the affinity of these "kinds of buildings, and the derivation of "their original plan from the Eaft."

This is very ingenious, as well as amiably modeft. All I would fay on this obfcure fubject is comprised in the following particulars.

1. That Ramoth-Gilead was a place of which the poffeffion was disputed between the kings of Syria and of the ten tribes, I Kings xxii, 3.

See

2. That it was at this time in poffeffion of Ifrael, 2 Kings ix. 14.

3. That before this time they had been wontto ftrengthen fortified towns, in this country, with a tower of peculiar ftrength built in it, to which the inhabitants fled when they apprehended the town itself not tenable against an army, or no longer fo. See Judges ix. 51, viii. 9.

4. As in the earlier ages in our own country strong places were wont to be built on eminences, and we have reason to believe were fo in many other countries, fo we find mention made of stairs, for going up to or coming down from the city of David, or Zion, the strongest part of the city of Jerufalem, at least after the Temple. Nehem. iii. 15.

5. There