"of the room. Some of thefe carpets are "60 feet long, and fo heavy as scarcely to "be carried by two men.' He adds, "I "have often put my hand under these pieces "of felt in the apartments of Ifpahan, and "elsewhere, which have been laid upon "the bare earth, thinking it would be im

poffible that they should not be found "fomewhat moift; but I have conftantly "found them dry. If we were to cover "the ground after this manner in Europe "with carpets, we fhould find them rotten "in a twelvemonth's time, in the greatest of it's countries'.

part

The mention of foft fkins in the tent of Holofernes doth not, I fhould think, neceffarily fuppofe they might not be covered over with carpets, as the Perfians cover over the felt they use in their apartments. Or if it fhould be fuppofed that it doth, it only should seem to be a proof, that the Jew who drew up this account lived in fome of the moifter provinces of the Eaft', where leather, properly prepared, was made use of to prevent the bad effects of the moisture of the earth on rich car

pets, and drew up this history under the

Tome 2. p. 54.

The country about Babylon is well known to have been very marthy; and fome of the provinces adjoining to the ancient Media, through whose cities the ten tribes were fcattered, are described as very moift and warm, Ghilan in particular,

influence

influence of the custom of his native pro

vince.

This may be fufficient, without adding, that as the inhabitants of thefe countries now frequently make ufe of furs for the edging, or otherwise decorating their vestments, it is not difficult to conceive of fome skins being used as a carpet, which would be not only very beautiful, but esteemed extremely precious too, as well as thought very proper to guard against the moisture of the ground when refiding in a tent,

OBSERVATION XXIII.

Though the festivity of Nabal's Sheepfhearing is reprefented as very great, yet I never met with any account of folemnities of this kind in books of travels; and, upon enquiring of the Greek gentleman who wrote the Hiftory of the Revolt of Aly Bey, I cannot find that the Arabs of that country are wont to make fumptuous entertainments on that occafion: whence I should think we are to conclude, that the wealth of Nabal was not only very great; but that he lived in a princely manner among his countrymen'; and was known to have large ftores

It should feem David might have addreffed him as the children of Heth did Abraham, Gen. 23. 6, "Hear << us, my lord: thou art a prince of God (a mighty "prince) among us."

of

of provifions, particularly on fuch rural folemnities.

1

Such circumftances, put together, naturally invited one in David's fituation to apply to him, rather than any other in that part of the country; and led him more feverely to resent his insulting neglect.

As to the feafting of the modern Arabs on fuch occafions, Lufignan's account is nothing more than this, that the Arabs perhaps kill a lamb at fuch times, and treat their relations or friends with it, together with new cheefe and milk, and fo pass their time fomewhat joyously on the occafion.

This is very different from the feaft Nabal held when his sheep were fhorn'; or, we may believe, from the entertainment Abfalom prepared for the family of king David, when Amnon was flain.

OBSERVATION XXIV.

Our tranflators fuppofe, that the edifice at which Jehu flew the brethren of Abaziah king of Judah', was deftined to the fole purpofe of hearing of sheep; but as I apprehend the term in the original is ambi

1 Sam. 25. 8, 36; to which is to be added the account given of the plentiful prefent made to David by Abigail, v. 18, which, large as it was, feems not to have been miffed by Nabal, at least did not prevent his celcbrating the feftival. 22 Kings, 10. 12, 14.

guous,

guous, which is accordingly literally tranflated in the margin, "the house of fhep"herds binding," it might be more agreeable to use fome lefs determinate word, as the word, I am ready to believe, may fignify the binding fheep for fhearing; the binding up their fleeces, after thofe fleeces taken from the sheep beforehand were washed; or the binding the fheep for the purpose of milking. Whether it was erected for all three purposes, or if only for one of them, then for which of the three, it may be very difficult precisely to say.

A pit near fuch a building must be useful in any of the three cafes, for the affording water for the fheep that were detained there for fome time, in the firft and third cafe, to drink; and for the washing the wool in the other.

If the intention of the hiftorian had been to describe it as the place appropriated to the fhearing of theep, it would have been natural for him to have used the word that precifely expreffes that operation, not such a general term as the houfe of binding.

All know that sheep must be bound, or at least forcibly held, in order to be fhorn; and it appears in the Travels of Dr. Richard Chandler in the Leffer Afia, that the shepberds there, fitting at the mouth of the pen, were wont to feize on the ewes and the-goats, each by the hind-leg, as they preffed forwards,

to

to milk them', which feizing them fufficiently shows they must be held, shackled, or fomehow bound when milked.

In another Obfervation I have taken notice of the readiness of great men, in the Eaft, to repose themselves, when fatigued, under the fhelter of roofs of a very mean kind; the brethren, it seems, of Ahaziah anciently did the fame thing. But they found no more fafety in this obfcure retreat, than they would have found in the palaces of either Samaria or Jezreel.

The flaying them at the pit, near this place, seems to have been owing to a custom at that time, whether arifing from fuperftition, to preferve the land from being defiled, or any other notion, doth not at first fight appear; but it was, it seems, a customary thing at that time to put people to death near water, at leaft near where water was foon expected to flow, as appears from 1 Kings xviii. 40.

OBSERVATION XXV.

It will greatly add to the beauty of the image made ufe of by the prophet Isaiah, where he compares the efcape of Ifrael from Pharaoh, through the Red-Sea, to the motion of horse in the Wilderness, and the