him, in his marches from place to place, with provisions for himself and attendants.

Barzillai's and other people's supplying David at Mahanaim with honey, butter, sheep, wheat, &c, on these grounds, appears to have been not a mere act of benevolence and pity, but the paying him the wonted refpect with which their princes were treated; and confequently acknowledging him, in the best manner, their fovereign, while the greateft part of the Ifraelites were in rebellion against him.

OBSERVATION VI.

There is often in these countries a great deal of pomp and parade in presenting their gifts; and that not only when they are prefented to princes or governors of provinces, but where they are of a more private na

ture.

Thus Dr. Ruffell tells us, that the money that the bridegrooms of Aleppo pay for their brides, is laid out in furniture for a chamber, in cloaths, jewels, or ornaments of gold, for the bride, whose father makes fome addition, according to his circumstances; which things are fent with great pomp to the bridegroom's houfe three days before the wedding. The like management obtains in Ægypt, and is very livelily described by

V.

Maillet, in his account of that country, where these gifts are carried with great pomp too to the bridegroom's houfe, but on the marriage-day itself, and immediately before the bride: carpets, cushions, mattreffes, coverlets, pignates', dishes, basons, jewels, trinkets of gold, pearls, girdles, plate, every thing down to the wooden fandals wrought with mother-of-pearl, which they cali cobcal. And through oftentation, fays this writer, they never fail to load upon four or five borfes what might eafily be carried by one; in like manner as to the jewels, trinkets, and other things of value, they place in fifteen dishes what a single plate would very well hold.

Something of this pomp feems to be referred to in Judges iii. 18, where we read of making an end of offering the prefent, and of a number of people that bare it, all which apparently points out the introducing with great diftinctness, as well as ceremony, every part of the prefent fent to this ancient prince, and the making ufe of as many hands in it as might be, conformably to the modern ritual of the Eastern courts. But what I chiefly take notice of it for, is to illuftrate the account that is given us of Benhadad's prefent to the Prophet Elisha, which confifted of forty camels burthen of the good things of Damafcus. This Syrian prince

2 Let. 10. p. 86. do not know.

2

4

3 What he means by this word, I 2 Kings 8. 9.

without

without doubt fent Elisha a prefent answerable to his magnificence; but can it be imagined that it was the full loading of forty camels, and at the fame time wholly confisting of provifions, fuch as bread and wine, fruit and fowl, as a Jewish Rabbi fuppofed, if I understand Bishop Patrick right '?

A gentleman, I remember, once fhewed me a prodigious tooth in his poffeffion, which apparently had belonged to one of the monfters of the deep, but was found by one of his ancestors among the treasures of a Roman Catholic who was fond of relics, wrapped up in filk, befides two or three outer covers of paper, on one of which was written, A tooth of the holy Saint Paul. "Don't you think," faid the humourous poffeffor, turning himself to the company with this curiofity, "that Saint Paul had a fine fet of grind

ers ?" One would imagine these commentators must have fuppofed the Prophet Elifha's were full as large, to be able to make use of forty camel-loads of provifions, equivalent to twenty thousand pound weight at least, during his stay at Damafcus.

In his Com. on the place. • See Ruffell, p. 56, who tells us there, that the Arab camel carries one hundred Rotoloes, or five hundred pounds weight, according to which forty camel-loads is equal to twenty thoufand pounds; but the Turkman camel's common load is one hundred and fixty Rotoloes, or eight hundred pounds weight: if we suppose these camels of Damafcus were only of the Arab breed, twenty thousand pounds weight was their proper loading.

The true light in which we are doubtlefs to confider this paffage is, that the various things that were sent to Elisha for a present, were carried for ftate on a number of camels, and that no fewer than forty were employed in the cavalcade; not that they carried each a full loading. And we may very well believe that befides eatables, and wine of Helbon, fome of their valuable manufactures of white wool' were contained in the prefent: they were as properly the good things of Damafcus, as the produce of their enchanting gardens.

OBSERVATION VII.

[That present that the children of Ifrael fent to Eglon king of Moab, which I was mentioning under the last Obfervation, was a kind of tribute, or an acknowledgment of inferiority and fubjection; and the presents that are fent to powerful princes, by other kings, are frequently looked upon in this light by those that receive them.

Sir J. Chardin has remarked, that prefents are viewed in this light, in fuch cafes, not only in Turkey, but almost through all the Levant; and he very juftly applies the thought to Pf. lxxii. 10. Thofe prefents were evidently of that kind, the following verfe puts it out of all doubt; but the haughty 7 Ezek. 27. 18.

Afiatic

Afiatic princes oftentimes put that construction on presents that were not fent with any fuch intention. As they do fo now, they probably did fo anciently: to which fome lefs powerful or diftreffed princes might the more willingly fubmit, as there was an equivocalnefs in these marks of attention paid to potent princes.]

OBSERVATION VIII.

Maillet, in that paffage I quoted in the last article but one, fpeaks diminutively of the the cobcal, or wooden fandals of the ladies, which are carried in their nuptial proceffions with the reft; though, according to his ownaccount, they are not wholly without ornaments. Shoes perhaps of this kind are referred to by the Prophet Amos, chap. ii. 6, where shoes have been commonly, and it appears from hence with juftness, understood to mean fomething of a trifling value.

VI.

The Turkish officers, and "alfo their "wives," fays Rauwolff, fpeaking of Tripoli on the coast of Syria', go very richly "cloathed with rich flowered filks, artificially made and mixed of feveral co"lours. But thefe cloaths are commonly given them by thofe that have causes depending before them, (for they do not love "to part with their own money,) to pro