upon this point. As he has expreffly applied it to a paffage of Scripture, it would not have been agreeabie to my design to have mentioned this circumftance, had I not had fome additional remarks to make upon this head, which poffibly may not be ungrateful to the curious reader, and which therefore I fhall here fet down. I fuppofe my reader acquainted with Maundrell; but it will be proper, for the fake of perfpicuity, first to recite at full length that paffage in him I refer to.

Thursday, March 11. This day we all "dined at Conful Haftings's houfe; and af“ter dinner went to wait upon Oftan the Baffa of Tripoli, having firft fent our prefent, as the manner is among the Turks, to procure a propitious recep

66

❝tion.

"It is counted uncivil to vifit in this country "without an offering in hand. All great men

66

expect it as a kind of tribute due to their "character and authority; and look upon "themselves as affronted, and indeed defrauded, when this compliment is omitted. "Even in familiar vifits amongst inferior

people, you fhall feldom have them come "without bringing a flower, or an orange, "or fome other fuch token of their respect "to the perfon vifited: the Turks in this point keeping up the ancient oriental cuftom hinted 1 Sam. ix. 7. If we go (fays Saul) what skall we bring the man of God?

"there

"there is not a prefent, &c, which words "are questionless to be understood in con"formity to this eastern custom, as relating to a token of respect, and not a price of "divination".

Maundrell doth not tell us what the present was which they made Oftan. It will be more entirely fatisfying then to the mind to obferve, that in the Eaft they not only univerfally send before them a prefent, or carry one with them, especially when they visit fuperiors, either civil or ecclefiaftical; but that this present is frequently a piece of money, and that of no very great value. So Dr. Pococke tells us, that he presented an Arab Sheik of an illuftrious defcent on whom he waited, and who attended him to the ancient Hierapolis, with a piece of money which he was told he expected"; and that in Ægypt an Aga being diffatisfied with the prefent he made him, he fent for the Doctor's fervant, and told him, that he ought to have given him a piece of cloth, and, if he had none, two fequins, worth about a guinea, must be brought to him, otherwife he fhould fee no more, with which demand he complied3. In one case a piece of money was expected, in the other two fequins demanded. A trifling present of money to a person of distinction amongst us would be an affront; it is not so however, it feems, in the East. Agree

. P. 26, 27. 2 Vol. 2. p. 167. 3 Vol. 1. p. 119.

bly to these accounts of Pococke, we are told in the travels of Egmont and Heyman, that the well of Jofeph in the castle of Cairo is not to be seen without leave from the Commandant; which having obtained, they in return prefented him with a fequin. These inftances are curious exemplifications of Mr. Maundrell's account of the nature of fome of the Eastern prefents, and ought by no means to be omitted in collections of the kind I am now making.

How much happier was the cultivation of Mr. Maundrell's genius than of St. Jerome's! Though this father lived fo many years in the Eaft, and might have advantageoufly applied the remains of their ancient cuftoms to the elucidation of Scripture, to which if he was a stranger, he must have been an egregiously negligent observer; yet we find him, in his comment on Micah iii. 11, roundly declaring, that by a Prophet's receiving money, his prophefying became divination. And when he afterwards mentions this cafe of Saul's application to Samuel, as what he forefaw might be objected to him, he endeavours to avoid the difficulty, by faying, We do not find that Samuel accepted it, or that they even ventured to offer it; or if it must be fuppofed that he received it, that it was rather to be confidered as money prefented to the tabernacle, than the rewards

4 Vol. 2. p. 76.

of

of prophefying. How embarraffed was the Saint by a circumstance capable of the most clear explanation! Fond of allegorizing, he neglected the fureft methods of interpretation, for which he had peculiar advantages : how different are the rewards of divination, which were to be earned, from the unconditional prefents that were made to perfons of figure upon being introduced into their prefence!

Before I quit this Obfervation, I cannot forbear remarking, that there are other things prefented in the Eaft, befides money, which appear to us extremely low and mean, unworthy the quality of those that offer them, or of those to whom they are presented; and consequently that we must be extremely unqualified to judge of these oriental compliments. In what light might an European wit place the prefent of a Governor of an Ægyptian village, who fent to a British Conful fifty eggs as a mark of respect, and that in a country where they are fo cheap as to be fold at the rate of ten for a penny'?

5

Prophetæ Hierufalem in pecunia divinabant, nescientes aliud effe prophetiam, aliud divinationem: Videbantur fibi quidem effe Prophetæ : fed quia pecuniam accipiebant, prophetia ipforum facta eft divinatio.-Nec quenquam moveat illud quod in primo Regum libro legimus : Saul volentem ire ad Samuelem dixiffe puero fuo, &c: non enim fcriptum eft, quod Samuel acceperit: aut quod illi obtulerint.-Sed fac eum accepiffe, ftipes magis æftimandæ funt tabernaculi, quam munera prophetiæ. cocke's Trav. Vol. 1. p. 17. 7 Seven or eight for a medine, or three farthings. Pococke, Vol. 1. p. 260. OBSER

B 3

• Po

OBSERVATION II.

What the prefents were that were made the ancient Prophets, we are not always told; but all the particulars of that made by Jeroboam's Queen to the Prophet Ahijah are given us, 1 Kings xiv. 3. I very much queftion, however, whether that was any part of the disguise the affumed, as an eminent Prelate fuppofes', who imagines the prefented him with fuch things as might make the Prophet think her to be a countrywoman, rather than a courtier.

It undoubtedly was not a prefent that proclaimed royalty, that would have been contrary to Jeroboam's intention that she should be concealed; but it doth not appear to have been, in the estimation of the East, a present only fit for a country-woman to have made : for d'Arvieux tells us, that when he waited on an Arab Emir, his mother and fifter, to gratify whofe curiofity that vifit was made, fent him, early in the morning after his arrival in their camp, a prefent of paftry, honey, fresh butter, with a bafon of fweetmeats of Damafcus: now this prefent differs but little from that of Jeroboam's wife, who carried loaves, cracknells, (or rather cakes enriched with feeds,) and a crufe of honey, and was made by princesses that

2 Voy. dans la Pal,