seems to have left the main body; by far the greater number continued their cruise onwards, more hopeful ever, until the high and snow-capped mountains of Lebanon stood majestically before them in the distance.

Even now some cautious few may have kept by the river, and followed it to the mountains of Kurdistân, and so founded a nation there. But the greater part were soon encamped in the rich land of northern Syria. As their number increased, they worked their way southwards, until nearly all the land west of Antilebanon, and west of Jordan, became peopled by them. All the mountains of Judea and the fine plains of Phoenicia, with the sea-coast, and the hilly country about Nazareth and the Vale of Colesyria, and the mountains of Lebanon became the possession of one great race, a branch of the descendants of Ham.

It seems that about the same time that this division of the children of Ham were following the Euphrates until they reached northern Syria and established themselves there, a more adventurous and daring party, likewise from the same race of Ham, determined upon exploring their way directly across the Desert, and taking advantage of the rainy season, when alone a large body of men with cattle could perform the journey. They set out, and directed their course westward. We have already described the monotonous and anxious journey of the other Hamitic wanderers, who followed the Euphrates; but these must have had a far more laborious and dangerous experience. Except at certain spots in this great plain, even in the time of the great rains, no water is to be found, or at least not sufficient water to supply a moving host. There were not only a large number of men and camels, but horses, and sheep, and goats; and these last require to drink very frequently. The camel, indeed, will go a very long time without requiring drink, and on such journeys he is the waterbearer of the caravan, and carries goat-skins, which are filled every pool. It is usually where some rocky ground breaks in upon the otherwise smooth plain, that a considerable supply of water is to be found; and these spots are almost invariably near to, or actually under, some solitary hill, which seems placed there to serve two purposes-both for attracting clouds and thus causing more rain to fall on the rocky ground about it, and for pointing out from afar to the thirsty traveller where a refreshing draught is to be procured. After a long journey, they were indeed fully rewarded. They reached a land with which they must have been well satisfied. Their first restingplace was probably under a chain of hills east of the mountains of Bashan, and south-west of Tadmor. The chain rises from a

at

rocky region called Es-Safah; and there, in the hollows of the rocks, abundance of water could be found. On exploring still farther westward, they would find the richer mountains of Bashan clad with forests of oak, and rich in springs, and shrubs, and grass. Soon they would extend their dominions, until at last this one race occupied the whole country east of Jordan, even from the Red Sea, on the south, to the river Pharpar. All the mountainous country east of the Dead Sea and of Jordan was peopled by them; and the plains, again, to the east of the mountains; and there some of the earliest cities were built of which we have any historical notice. Indeed, it was a country in many ways admirably adapted to a wild and uncivilized people. At certain intervals the soil, otherwise very rich, is strewed with innumerable masses of black stone; and in some parts a labyrinth of rocks rises up, in which the inhabitants could secure themselves against the attacks of any foe. These stones, too, were of great service to these people in building their houses and their cities.

And this enterprising people, whose journey we have now traced across the Desert were that noted division of the Hamites called the REPHAIM. We shall be much concerned with them in this Essay, and we only take leave of them for the present, to refer to the doings of those other tribes who now occupied the land to the west and to the north of them,

Now to all these early wanderers in search of a country there was one spot which, beyond all others, must have offered an irresistible temptation for them to settle; and happy were they whose lot it was to be the first to reach it. Under the high mountains of Antilebanon, and on the eastern side of the range is a piece of land, surrounded by two rivers, which, taking their rise from the mountains above it, go rushing into the plain; and there, breaking into numerous streamlets, so water and fructify the soil that the whole land enclosed between the rivers becomes one beautiful garden, so rich and so luxuriant, that it almost seems a realization of the brightest picture which the vivid imagination of a fanciful child ever made of the Garden of Eden.

Here in the earliest times the foundation of a great city was laid-a city which has subsisted through the many changes to which that land has been subjected, which was eminent under every rule, and which, after nearly forty centuries, still shows life, though a capital of the weakest and most degraded government which perhaps ever ruled any empire. It is likewise curious that this city, the oldest in the world, has always retained the same name. It was DIMESHK in Abraham's

time, it was DIMESHK in our Lord's time, it is DIMESHK now. As we have seen, the greater part of the land on the western side of the great Desert had passed into the hands of the descendants of Ham; but on the descendants of Shem fell the good fortune of having possession of that land on the east of Antilebanon, of which the rich portion of ground just mentioned forms a part. And there, between the two rivers, the Abana and the Pharpar, they built their capital, Damascus. We have already alluded to certain of the emigrants who, forsaking the Euphrates, reached an oasis, where they founded the city of Tadmor. When they became settled, they would soon explore the country around their new territory, and in following that chain of mountains, an offshoot from Antilebanon, which branches out into the Desert to near Tadmor, they would be directly led to the plains watered by the Abana and the Pharpar. So, we suppose, that the founders of Tadmor were a short time afterwards the founders of Da

mascus.

The number of the Shemites, compared with that of the Hamites, who first crossed to the western side of the great Desert, was probably small; perhaps one great tribe only were the original possessors of the land. Their new territory they named ARAM, in honour of their ancestor, one of the sons of Shem. Their western boundary was the chain of Antilebanon, and probably their territory extended northwards near to Homs, where the mountains gradually sink into the plain; and there also was the line of the territory of the Hamites, while eastwards it stretched far away, perhaps almost to Tadmor. Although one general name was given to the whole of this possession, yet certain portions had specific names to distinguish them. Thus, the rich portion about Damascus, encircled by the two rivers Abana and Pharpar, and reaching to the lakes in which these rivers are lost, was called Aram Naharaim, or Aram of the Two Rivers.' While the plains beyond were generally known by this term, Padan Aram, or 'the Plains of Aram.' A native of this country was called Aram, or an 'Aramite.' It might easily be anticipated that a people possessing so rich a country, and a capital of such commercial and political importance as Damascus from the first necessarily must have been, would increase in importance and power. So in after years we find the king of Aram a great and powerful sovereign, continually making war with the Israelites, and frequently defeating them and taking from them their possessions. And when the dominions of these Aramites became considerably more extensive, still the same

name of Aram was preserved for the whole-the name which has invariably been rendered into our version by 'Syria.'

It seems to have been somewhere in the plains east of Damascus that Haran, a son of Terah, settled, and built a city which he called by his own name. Before that time he and his father and his brothers had dwelt in Mesopotamia.

It seems that a large proportion of the Shemite race remained actually in Shinar long after the other tribes had gone. And although one division of the Shemites had, as we have seen, crossed westwards and taken possession of Tadmor and of southern Syria, yet great numbers still remained behind, and that tribe especially from whom God's chosen people, the Israelites, were descended. Thus we see that, even at the time of the Dispersion, the descendants of Shem were especially favoured, and perhaps, as we have before surmised, amongst them a clearer knowledge of the true God had been preserved.

We should just remark here an interesting notice in Genesis x. 25, where we are told that Eber had two sons. One was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided.' Now Peleg does mean 'division,' but the translation should rather have been for in his days the earth was cut into canals,' the verb there used referring rather to a mechanical division of land, such as ploughing or cutting, than to a political division. We have no doubt that this notice, short as it is, is a record of the first cutting of some of those canals which are found in such numbers between the Tigris and the Euphrates; and the elder son of Eber, who was probably a man of great consequence in the country, and had large possessions, devised that way of improving the land; and was hence surnamed a divider, or, strictly, in the modern English term, 'navvie.' We do not know whether this has ever been pointed out before, but we believe that what we are stating is philologically correct. Peleg was the ancestor of Terah. And when Terah was an old man, he started with all his family from Mesopotamia and reached the city of Haran, and there he died. It was from Haran that Abram was called to go and take possession of the land of Canaan, which was promised to him and his descendants. Where Haran exactly was situated we do not know. It has been admitted by almost general consent that this city was beyond the Euphrates; and many believe that the ruins of Haran, south of Örfah, in Mesopotamia, show the site of Terah's burial-place. We do not concur in this; we believe that, so far from Haran being in Mesopotamia, it was situated within a short distance only of Damascus. However

much opposed this be to the generally received idea, we have strong grounds for making such an assertion, and can bring powerful arguments forward in support of it.*

We will suppose, then, that Haran was situated east of Damascus, and not far from the three lakes into which the rivers fall. Abram and his kinsmen would probably, while they resided there, have much intercourse with the people of the city. Living in the plain, their riches would consist in their flocks of sheep and goats, and their horses, and herds of cattle and camels. To Damascus they would naturally at all times resort, as the great market where the live stock would be sold or exchanged for the luxuries of the town.

There at all times would be found most probably individuals from the different Hamite tribes who dwelt within a few days of the city, and who would come likewise to purchase some of the wares for which Damascus was so early famed. Their wild appearance and savage manners would make them objects of special dislike to the more civilized and better-educated inhabitants of the city, and they were likely enough to be a bye-word among all the Shemites.

We do not wish to make it appear that at this early period a very high degree of civilization had been attained by the inhabitants of Damascus ; yet even then it is far from being improbable that some advances might already have been made in the different arts. We find, at a later time, when the Israelites came up out of Egypt, that iron was in use in Bashan, which was probably one of the countries most backward in civilization; and it is more than probable that this ironware came from Damascus. But, besides, there is a tendency among Easterns, and perhaps not only among Easterns, to consider all foreigners as greatly inferior to themselves; so that prejudice would have much to do with the opinion that the Aramites would have of the Hamite tribes. We bring this forward in order that we may realize more fully the feelings of Abraham (who, although not an inhabitant of Damascus, was a Shemite) when he was about to leave his kindred and his friends to dwell in the midst of a people whom he had always been used to look upon with aversion. He took with him his wife, his nephew Lot, and Eliezer, a native of Damascus, as his chief servant, and passing through the land of Canaan, he encamped on the plains of Moreh, near Shechem.

*We should refer the reader to some extremely valuable papers on this subject by Miss Fanny Corbaux, printed in the Journal of Sacred Literature, and in the Journal of the Royal Society of Literature.