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insupportable. It is not impossible that the corrupt spring to which Solomon alludes, Prov. xxv. 26, and to which he compares a righteous man slain by a wicked one, whose promised usefulness was by that means cut off, might intend a receptacle of water made useless after this manner; though it must be allowed that the corrupting a rill of water, by making it muddy, is as natural an interpretation,

OBSERVATION LIII.

Fountains, the lurking Places of Robbers and

Assassins.

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DR. Shaw mentions a beautiful rill in Barbary, which is received into a large bason, called shrub we krub, (drink and away,) there being great danger of meeting there with rogues and assassins. If such places are proper for the lurking of murderers in times of peace, they must be proper for the lying in ambush in times of war; a circumstance that Deborah takes notice of in her song, Judges v. 11.

But the writer who is placed first in that collection which is intituled Gesta Dei per Francos, gives a more perfect comment still on that passage: for, speaking of the want of water, which the Croisade army so severely felt, at

Gesta Dei per Francos, p. 895.

* P. 20.

the siege of Jerusalem, he complains, that besides their being forced to use water that stunk, and barley-bread, their people were in continual danger from the Saracens, who lying hid near all the fountains, and places of water, every where destroyed numbers of them, and carried off their cattle.'

To which may be added a story from William of Tyre, relating to Godfrey duke of Lorrain, afterwards king of Jerusalem, who stopping short of Antioch five or six miles, (to which place he was returning,) in order to take some refreshment in a pleasant grassy place near a fountain, was suddenly set upon by a number of horsemen of the enemy, who rushed out of a reedy fenny place near them, and attacked the duke and his people."

OBSERVATION LIV.

Of the Water Engines wrought by the Feet.

BUT though Hezekiah stopped up the wells of water, &c. Sennacherib however boasted that he was not afraid of wanting water, or of being reduced to get it with hazard or difficulty from small fountains, at a distance; which boast was perhaps occasioned by an account he had heard, of the precautions taken by Hezekiah I have digged and drank strange

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waters, and with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of besieged (or fenced) places, (or of Egypt, as others understand it.) 2 Kings xix. 24.

The curious Vitringa admires" the explanation which Grotius has given, of that watering with the foot by which Egypt was distinguished from Judea, derived from an Observation made on Philo, who lived in Egypt, Philo having described a machine used by the peasants of that country for watering as wrought by the feet; which sort of watering Dr. Shaw has since understood of the gardener's putting a stop to the farther flowing of the water in the rill, in which those things were planted that wanted watering, by turning the earth against it with his foot." Great respect is due to so candid and ingenious a traveller as Dr. Shaw; I must however own, that I apprehend the meaning of Moses is more truly represented by Grotius than the Doctor. For Moses seems to intend to represent the great labour of this way of watering by the foot, which the working that instrument really was, on which account it. it seems to be laid aside in Egypt since the time of Philo, and easier methods of raising the water made use of; whereas the turning the earth with the foot which Dr. Shaw speaks of, is the least part of the labour of watering. If

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it should be remarked, that this machine was not older than Archimedes, which has been supposed, I would by way of reply observe, that the more ancient Egyptian machines might be equally wrought with the foot, and were undoubtedly more laborious still, as otherwise the invention of Archimedes would not have brought them into disuse.

But though I think the interpretation of Deut. xi. 10, by Grotius is preferable to that of Dr. Shaw, I readily admit that the Doctor's thought may be very naturally applied to these words of Sennacherib, (to which however the Doctor has not applied it;) for he seems to boast, that he could as easily turn the water of great rivers, and cause their old channels to become dry, as a gardener stops the water from flowing any longer in a rill by the sole of his foot.

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And as the gardener stops up one rill and opens another with his mattock, to let in the water; so, says Sennacherib, I have digged and drank strange waters, that is, which did not heretofore flow in the places I have made them flow in. This is the easiest interpretation that can, I believe, be given to the word strange, made use of by this Assyrian prince, and makes the whole verse a reference to the Eastern way of watering: I have digged channels, and drank, and caused my army to drink out of new-made rivers, into which I have conducted the waters that used to flow

See Shaw in the last cited place.

elsewhere, and have laid those old channels dry with the sole of my foot, with as much ease as a gardener digs channels in his garden, and directing the waters of a cistern into a new rill, with his foot stops up that in which it before ran.

In confirmation of all which, let it be remembered, that this way of watering by rills is in use in those countries from whence Sennacherib came;' continued down from ancient times there, without doubt, as it is in Egypt.

The nderstuanding those words of the Psalmist, Ps. lxv. 9, Thou visitest the earth and waterest it, thou greatly enrichest it with the river of GOD, of the watering it as by a rill of water, makes an easy and beautiful sense; the rain being to the earth, in general, the same thing from GOD, that a watering rill, or little river, is to a garden from man.

OBSERVATION LV.

Cutting down valuable Plantations, one of the Methods used to distress an Enemy.

As the people of these countries endeavoured to distress those that came to besiege them, by concealing their waters; so those on the other hand frequently cut down the most valuable trees of their enemies. This Moses forbad to Thevenot, part 2. p. 50, 51.

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