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Reasons for not placing Gurbs round Wells. [Book I.

he not lay hold of it and lift it out V Matt, xii, 11. And again in Luke ,‘ which of you’ shall have an ass, or an ox fallen into a pit, and will notstraightway pull him out on the sabbath day.’ xiv, 5.

In these passages, which are parallel to those quoted from Exodus andJosephus , the Word ‘ pit’ is synonymous with ‘ well.’ In Antiq. vii, 12,‘ the well of Bethlehem,’ is called a ‘ pit.’ Wells without curbs are metwith in Judea and the east generally, at the present time, although theyare not so numerous as formerly. Mr. Stephens, in his ‘ Incidents ofTravel,’ observed on the road to Gaza, ‘two remarkable wells ofthe verybest Roman workmanship, about fifty feet deep, lined with large hardstones, as firm and perfect as on the day on which they were laid; the up-permost layer on the top of the well, 1 was on a level with the pavement. aIn some illustrations of the Book of Genesis , executed in the fourth orfifth Century, one represents the interview between Rebecca and Eliezer ;the well is square, and the curb but a few inches high.

REASONS FOR NOT PLACING CURBS ROUND THE MOUTHS OF WELLS.

The motives which induced the ancients to leave their wells withoutcurbs were various:

1. That they might be more readily concealed. This was a universalcustom in times of war. When Darius invaded Scythia , the inhabitantsdid not attempt an open resistance, but covered up their wells and springsand retired. Herod . iv, 120. Mr. Elphinstone, in his mission to Cabaul,says, the people ‘ have a mode of covering their wells with boards, heapedwith sand, that effectually conceals them from an enemy.’ Diodorus Si-culus, remarked the same of the Bedouin Arabs , eighteen centuries ago,and they still practise it. Trayelersin the Lybian desert are often six andseven days without water, and frequently perish for want of it; ‘ thedrifting sand having covered the marks of the wells.’ b Wells, when thus con-cealed ‘ can only be found by persons whose profession it is to pilot Cara-vans across this ocean of sand, and the sagacity with which these men per-form their duty is wonderful;’ like pilots at sea with nothing but the starsto direct them.

2. To prevent them from being poisoned or filled up, both of which

frequently occurred. The Roman General Aquilius conquered the citiesof the kingdom of Pergamus, one by one, by poisoning the waters. Thishorrid crime has always prevailed. In 1320, many Jews were burnt inFrance , while others were massacred by the infuriate people, under thebelief that they had poisoned the wells and fountains of Paris . The Earlof Savoy was poisoned in this manner in 1384, and the practice was com-mon in the fifteenth Century. 0 Some of the wells belonging to Abraham ,were stopped up by the inhabitants. ‘ And Isaac digged again the wellsof water, which they had digged in the days of Abraham his father, forthe Philistines had stopped them, after the death of Abraham .’ Gen. xxvi,18. ‘ We walked on some distance to a well, which we found full of

sand; Hussein scooped it out with his hands, when the water rose andall of us drank.’ Lindsay’s Trav. Let. 7. When the Assyrians underSenacherib, invaded Judea in the eighth Century, B. C. ‘ Hezekiah tookcounsel with his princes and mighty men, to stop the waters of the foun-tains which were without the city; and they stopped all the fountains,sayinaf, whv should the kine: of Assyria come here and find much water V2 Kings, iii, 19. 25

a Vol. ii, 101, and Lindsay’s Trav. Let. 9. b Ogilvy’s Afriea, 281.c Mezeray’s France . Lon. 1683. pp. 349, 408, 414.