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Nor does Asaph, in the close of the eightyfirst Psalm, speak, I apprehend, of honey found in cavities of rocks: nor yet is he there describing it as collected from the odoriferous plants that grow in the rocky hills of those countries, if the reading of our present Hebrew copies be right but the Prophet tells Israel, that had they been obedient GOD would have fed them with the fat of wheat, and with the rock of honey would he have satisfied them: that is, with the most delicious wheat, and with the richest, most invigorating honey, in large quantities, beth for eating, and making agreeable drink. Its reviving, strengthening quality, appears in the story of Jonathan, Saul's son, 1 Sam. xiv. 27; as the using the term rock to signify strength, &c. appears in a multitude of places. The rock of a sword, Psal. Ixxxix. 43, for the edge of a sword, in which its energy lies, is perhaps as strange an expression to Western, ears.

I shall have occasion to take notice of the excellency of the grapes of Judea in a succeeding chapter; and I may be dispensed with as to the pursuing the further examination of the productions of this country, upon giving furnishing them at an easy rate with rock-honey, which has a better flavour than that of the hive. If this account be exact, it does not follow that this ever was the case in Palestine: the present inhabitants are too indolent to give themselves the trouble of making hives, if they could be furnished with sufficient quantities out of the rocks, easy to be come at, and at the same time better tasted than the honey of a hive; but we find by Hasselquist, that they ac. tually make use of hives at this day, though of a very different construction from those of this country.

my reader a remark of Dr. Shaw's to this purpose, that it is impossible for pulse, wheat, or grain of any kind, to be richer or better tasted, than what is commonly sold at Jerusalem."

Only it may not be amiss to add, with respect to this country's being well watered, that the depth on tehom, spoken of in this passage, seems to mean reservoirs of water, filled by the rains of winter, and of great use to make their lands fertile; as the second word n tealotecah, seems to mean wells, or some such sort of conveniencies, supplied by springs; and the first word naharoteeah, rivers, or running streams, whether carrying a larger or a smaller body of water. What an important part of this pleasing description, especially in the ears of those that had wandered near forty years in a most dry and parched wilderness! I will only add, without entering into particulars, that the present face of the country answers this description.

" P. 336.

* The word apparently means something of this kind in Ezek. xxxi. 4; and again, Job xxxviii. 30, for he could be supposed to know nothing of the face of any other deep, than a large pool or reservoir of water.

1

OBSERVATION VIII.

Of the Fish found in the Mediterranean, the Sea of Galilee, and the Nile.

THE Scriptures, in their representations of the fruitfulness of the Land of Promise, do in no place, so far as I remember, speak of the plenty of fish there, though Egypt was famous for its fish, and the children of Israel longed with eager desire for fish when in the wilderTo whatever cause this was owing, it does not appear to be the scarcity of this kind. of food in that country.

ness.

Fish catched in the Mediterranean were brought to Jerusalem, in the time of Nehemiah, in considerable quantities, by the Tyrians, Neh. xiii. 16. As the inhabitants of Tyre were remarkable for skill in maritime affairs, it is impossible to say how far their fisheries might extend; however, it cannot but be pleasing to find, by modern travellers, that they might have catched much fish in their own neighbourhood. "While I was busy in considering the city," says Le Bruyn, speaking of Tyre, "my comrade employed his time in fishing with a line, and his manner of doing it was by putting the line about his finger, and when he found the fish had taken the bait, he drew the sting with both hands, one after the other; by which means we had a very good dish of fish, and found them excellently well tasted."

y Tom. 1. p. 564:

Travellers have found, that the sea of Tiberias, in Galilee, abounds in fish, some of them very large; so they were anciently, John xxi. II. Hasselquist tells us, several of the sorts of fish in this great lake, are the same with those found in the Nile, a circumstance which he thinks remarkable; doubtless, because it is imagined by the curious, that the fish of that river are peculiar to it. It is certain that Maillet, in the ninth letter of the description of Egypt, tells us, that it is surprising, that, notwithstanding the prodigious quantity of fish in the Nile, there are hardly any, excepting the eel, that resemble those that are taken in the rivers of Europe. This remark, however curious, little concerns these papers; it is more agreeable to my design, to take notice, that among those mentioned by Hasselquist, as common to the sea of Galilee and the Nile, are the charmud, or karmud, as Egmont and Heyman call it, and which these gentlemen tell us, is of the size of the bonni, another of those fish which are common to the Nile and the Sea of Galilee, and which they say weighs commonly near thirty pounds. Well then might these authors say, some of the fish of Galilee were very large. To which I would add, that one hundred and fifty-three fishes of this size, half this size, might well be supposed by St. John to en

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b P. 158

danger a net, in the passage just now cited

from him.

OBSERVATION IX.

Of the Mulberry Trees mentioned in Scripture.

HASSELQUIST says, that the mulberry-tree scarcely ever grows in Judea, very little in Galilee, but in abundance in Syria and mount Lebanon. He therefore blames the translation of Luther, which renders the word we translate sycamore-tree, Luke xix. 4, mulberrytree, and again, it seems, Luke xvii. 6.

Our translators do not so render these two passages; but there are other places in which they mention mulberry-trees, in particular 2 Sam. v. 23, 24. and I Chron. xiv. 14, 15, and in the margin of Psalm lxxxiv. 6. I am afraid, therefore, he would equally have condemned them, had he been acquainted with our version.

If they are a species of trees not natural to those countries, we cannot imagine them to have been brought into Judea before the reign. of David, hundreds of years before the pro duction of silk was thought of there, which is the cause, I presume, of their now growing in abundance in Syria and mount Lebanon, the inhabitants of those places applying themselves, in these later times, with great industry, to the

d P. 287.

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