ce between them, the first being about 160 paces long, the second 200, the third 220: they are all lined with wall, and plastered, and contain a great depth of water." Such is the account which this traveller gives of the pools which were Solomon's: of the fountain he thus speaks: "Close to the pools is a pleasant castle of modern structure, and about 140 paces from it is the fountain from which the pools chiefly derive their waters, which the friars will have to be the sealed fountain to which the spouse is compared." In confirmation of which opinion they pretend a tradition that king Solomon shut up these springs, and kept the door sealed with his signet, in order to preserve the waters in their natural freshness and purity for his own drinking. And, indeed, this would not have been difficult, as they rise under ground, and have no avenues to them but a hole like the mouth of a narrow well, through which there is a descent of about four yards, which opens into a vaulted room, fifteen paces long and eight broad: joining to this is another room of the same form, but somewhat less, and both of them covered with handsome stone arches, that are very ancient. There are four places at which the water rises, whence it is conveyed by little rivulets into a kind of bason, and covered from thence by a large subterraneous passage into the pools: but, before it arrives at them, a part of the stream flows into an aqueduct of brick pipes, that carries it by turnings and windings about the mountains to Jerusalem." On the 31st August, 1814, when Captain Light visited these pools and aqueduct, they were empty, that being the driest season of the year; and we are particularly told that "the communication with Jerusalem, which the aqueduct once had, is now cut off." But this was not the all whole of the water which supplied Jerusalem: for, not to mention the brook Kidron, which though dry in summer, was a considerable stream in winter, there were two pools in or near the city supplied by springs: the upper pool, or the old pool, supplied by the spring called Gihon, towards the higher part of the city, in the highway of the fuller's field," near Zion, or the city of David; and the lower pool, probably supplied by Siloam, towards the lower part. When Hezekiah was threatened with a siege by Sennacherib, he stopped up the waters of the fountains without the city, and brought them into the city by a conduit, or subterraneous passage cut through the rock. This he did in order to distress the enemy, and to supply the city during the siege and it was reckoned so great a work, that it is mentioned not only in 2 Kings xx. 20, and 2 Chron. xxxii. 3, 4, 30, but by the son of Sirach, in his encomium on Hezekiah, in Eccles. xlviii. 17, and by Tacitus, in his history. Josephus informs us that long after Hezekiah's days, Pontius Pilate, the procurator of Judea, undertook to bring a current of water to Jerusalem, with the public money, from the distance of two hundred furlongs, (twenty-five miles ;) but that the Jews opposed the measure, as a misapplication of the money which belonged to the Temple. In his Wars of the Jews he makes the distance four hundred furlongs, and explains the sacred treasure to mean the Corban. It appears, however, that while every method was taken to supply the public from wells and cisterns, there were several fountains which were private property; to which Solomon beautifully alludes in Prov. v. 15: "Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own 2 Chron, xxxii. 30. d Antiq. xviii. 3. b2 Kings xviii. 17. < Lib. v. cap. 12. well." One of these was the well of Jacob, mentioned in John iv. 6, which is thus described by Maundrell : "Having proceeded one third of an hour from Naplosa, which is the ancient Sychar, we came to Jacob's well, famous for the memorable conference of our blessed Saviour with the woman of Samaria. Over this well there formerly stood a large church, erected by the empress Helena, of which the remains of the foundation are still to be seen. The well is at present covered with an old stone vault, into which you are let down through a very strait hole, and then removing a broad flat stone, you discover the mouth of the well, which is dug in the firm rock. It is about three yards in diameter, and thirty-five yards in depth, five of which we found were filled with water." As the Samaritan woman objects to our Saviour that he had nothing to draw with, which such wells naturally required, we may observe, that when there was no flight of steps to get down to the reservoirs or wells, when the water began to fail, travellers often carried leathern buckets to enable them to fill the skins which carried their water: and that at the wells which were not deep there were often small vessels attached for the convenience of travellers, and troughs of stone for the watering of cattle. I have been thus particular about the manner in which they supplied cities with water, since it has been repeatedly observed, that in such warm latitudes, the existence of animals and vegetables depends upon it. I shall only add a few observations on their rights of citizenship. If a man tarried in a city thirty days, he became one of the citizens in respect of the alms chest; that is, those who went round required from him alms for the poor. If six months, he became a citizen in re * 24 March, 1696. spect of clothing: that is, they required him to assist, not only in supporting, but in clothing the poor. If nine months, he became a citizen in respect of burying; that is, of assisting to bury the poor. And if twelve months, he became a citizen in respect of all the tributes and taxes which the other citizens paid." The roads between city and city were eight cubits wide, regularly cast up, or formed. Hence Jeremiah xviii. 15, calls by-paths, ways not cast us. A private road was four cubits; a public road was sixteen cubits; and the roads to the cities of refuge were thirty-two cubits. Josephus tells us that," with respect to Jerusalem, Solomon laid a causeway of black stone along the roads that led to it; both to render them easy to travellers, and to manifest the grandeur of his riches and government." In Ps. lix. 9, 14, 15, the Psalmist speaks of a singular attendant on Jewish cities, viz, a number of dogs that had no master, and that were allowed to roam at large. It is rather particular that the same practice prevails in the East at this day. Le Bruyn, among others, gives the following account of this public nuisance: "Great numbers,” says he, "crowd the streets. They do not belong to any one, but either get their food as they can, or are supported by the charitable, who give money to bakers and butchers to feed them, and even leave legacies for that purpose." In Shaw's Abridgment of Bruce's Travels into Abyssinia, we are told that "the dead bodies of criminals slain for treason, murder, and violence, on the highway, are seldom buried in Abyssinia: and that the streets of Gondar, the capital, are strewed with pieces of their carcasses, which bring the wild beasts in multitudes into the city, as soon as it becomes dark; a d Lightf, Heb. and Talm. Exer. Matt. iv. 13. b Antiq. viii. 7. < Tom. i. p. 361, 362. d Page 216. so that it is scarcely safe for any one to walk in the night. "The dogs," he adds, " used to bring pieces of human bodies into the house, and court-yard, to eat them in greater security." And Chateaubriand," when speaking of Galata, near Constantinople, says, that "the almost total absence of women, the want of wheel carriages, and the multitude of dogs without masters, were the three distinguishing characteristics that first struck him in the interior of this city." The curse, therefore, that was denounced against the houses of Jeroboam, Baasha, and Ahab, kings of Israel, would be literally fulfilled. "Him that dieth in the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth on the field shall the fowls of the air eat; for the Lord hath spoken it. And the following judgment on the Jews, as recorded by Jeremiah, would be literally accomplished, "I will appoint over them four kinds, saith the Lord; the sword to slay, and the dog to tear, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the earth to devour and destroy." SECT. II. Marriages of the Jews. Espousing; copy of the contract; dowry given to the bride, laid out in marriage dresses; custom at Aleppo and in Egypt. Persons in the East always marry young; young men to virgins; widowers to widows. The bride elegantly dressed; virgins married on the fourth day of the week, and widows on the fifth: one divorced or a widow, could not marry till after ninety days. The marriage procession of the bridegroom to the house of the bride: the marriage ceremony; procession of both parties to the house of the bridegroom: commonly in the night. The songs and ceremonies during the procession; marriage supper; office of architriclinus: the paranymphi; the shushbenin. Music and dancing after supper. Signs of virginity: consequences if they appeared not. Marriage feast lasted eight days: that of a widow only three. The bride had commonly a slave given her by her parents. Husbands exempted from military service for a year; Alexander the Great did this after the battle of the Granicus. A large family accounted a bless a * Travels, vol. i. p. 315. VOL. II. 1 Kings xiv. 11. xvi. 4, xxü. 24. * Jer. xv. S. S |