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serving as a retreat', and at a small distance "from it were four others, being, as it were, "the bed-chambers of the Grand Signior and "his fons '.'

N° III.

Having, in another place, endeavoured to illuftrate that paffage in Ezekiel, in which mention is made of the talking of the Jewish people about that prophet, by the walls and in the doors of their boufes'; a very learned and ingenious friend has thought, the like confiderations may ferve to elucidate a paffage in Homer, and has wished I would not forget it in the present work.

The paffage he has pointed out is in the 22d Iliad, and relates to the foliloquy of Hector, while waiting, with apprehenfion, for the coming of Achilles, which accordingly terminated in Hector's death. He deliberates whether he should meet him unarmed, and

"What hope of mercy from this vengeful foe,
"But woman-like to fall, and fall without a blow?
"We greet not here, as man converfing man,
"Met at an oak, or journeying o'er a plain;
"No feafon now for calm familiar talk,

"Like youths and maidens in an ev'ning walk."

POPE'S Homer.

Such an one might have ferved for the lodging of

Brifëis. 2 Vol. 1, ch. 15, p. 212, 213.

on divers Paffages of Scrip, vol. 1, ch. 1, obf. 6.

b 3

3 Obferv.

make

make proposals of reftitution, &c, but concludes that fuch an attempt would be vain.

There is fome deviation here from the literal fenfe of the original, which has been thought confiderably obfcure, as appears by the following note on the third and fourth lines of the above citation. "The words are literally thefe, There is no talking with "Achilles, from an oak, or from a rock, [or "about an oak or a rock,] as a young man " and maiden talk together. It is thought

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an obfcure paffage, though I confess I am "either too fond of my own explication in "the above-cited verfes, or they make it a

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very clear one. There is no converfing "with this implacable enemy in the rage of "battle; as when fauntering people talk at ❝leifure to one another on the road, or when young men and women meet in a field.' I "think the expofition of Euftathius more farfetched, though it be ingenious; and there"fore I must do him the justice not to fupprefs it. It was a common practice,' fays "he, with the heathens, to expofe fuch chil"dren as they either could not, or would not "educate. The places where they depofited "them, were usually in the cavities of rocks,

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or the hollow of oaks: these children be"ing frequently found and preserved by ftrangers, were faid to be the offspring of "thofe oaks or rocks where they were found. "This gave occafion to the poets to feign that men were born of oaks, and there was

"a famous

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a famous fable too of Deucalion and Pyr"rha's repairing mankind by cafting ftones "behind them. It grew at laft into a pro"verb, to fignify idle tales; fo that in the

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prefent paffage it imports, that Achilles "will not listen to fuch idle tales as may pass "with filly maids and fond lovers, &c.'

He adds, "Euftathius's explanation may be "corroborated by a parallel place in the Odylley; where the poet says,

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σε Ου γαρ απο δρυος εσσι παλαιφαίς, εδ' απο πέτρης"

"The meaning of which paffage is plainly this, "Tell me of what race you are, for undoubtedly "6 you bad a father and a mother; you are not, according to the old story, defcended from an "oak or a rock."

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Here I would remark, that Hector was deliberating about a matter of the highest confequence to himself, his family, and his country, and could not naturally, I fhould think, be supposed to refer to fuch an idle tale. The explanation, however, by the celebrated modern tranflator is neither diftinct enough, nor does it feem to give us the exact thought. I fhould fuppofe Hector is not reprefented as referring to the fauntering converfation of lovers, with little or no meaning; but to the friendly intercourfe of perfons meeting under an oak or a rock, ftrangers to each other, but with the moft benevolent intentions on both fides, and perhaps with mutual advantage and benefit,

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Shade is in common fought for by Oriental travellers when they reft. They are wont to take their repafts, and often to fleep in it, when fatigued with the heat of the weather: and the shade of rocks and trees is mentioned on fuch occafions. So the fishermen, in whose barque Monfieur Doubdan and his companion were paffengers going from Tyre to Sidon, went afhore with them, between thofe two cities, in a place where there was a very large and deep cavern, hollowed out of the rock by the agitation of the waves of the fea; there they cooked their fish; and there they found many Turks, Moors, and Arabs, (people of all colours,) of whom fome were enjoying their repofe and the fresh air on the fand, others were dreffing their provifions among these rocks, others were jmoking tobacco, notwithstanding the danger, which was fo apparent, by the falling of large males of the rock from time to time: but they are wont frequently to affemble there, on account of a Spring of exceeding good water in that place".

So Dr. Richard Chandler, in his Travels in Greece, tells us, a Turk is fometimes feen fquatting on his hams, in the shade, by the door of his houfe; or in a group, looking on his horfes feeding in the feafon on the green corn2; and in a fucceeding page (p. 62) he fays, that they repaired to a goat-fland, where the peasants killed and roafted a kid for his fupper, after which

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be laid down to fleep in the lee of an huge bare rock'.

And as they not only fit in the entrances of their houses, but in the fhade near their doors, and eat and fleep under rocks, fo they eat and fleep under trees too that are thick and spreading. Dr. Chandler gives an account, in the fame volume, of taking his repaft under an olive-tree in full bloffom ; of his eating of a roafted kid under a spreading vine, in the neighbourhood of the place where Troy once ftood; of people's fheltering under plane-trees after a fcorching ride. I do not recollect that Chandler mentions oaks in particular, but as they choose those trees that are most shady, the thick oaks, as they are called in Scripture', must have been made ufe of, when they happened on them, as commonly as any trees. Homer himself mentions the taking a repaft, by the harvest-men of a prince, under an oak. So the ancient Jews are reprefented as fitting under oaks, in their journeying'.

Doubdan complains of his meeting with fome incivility, from some of those that were affembled under the rocks between Tyre and Sidon; but if that was not more in apprehenfion, owing to his timidnefs, than in reality, it is certain that they are not wont to be

· P. 162. Minor, p. 31. • II. 18. 559. added Judges 6. II,

2 P. 161.

4 P. 21.

3 Trav. in Afia

s Ezek. 6. 13.

71 Kings 13. 14; to which may be

unfociable,

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