No. 132. xi. 2. Bed chamber.] A bed chamber does not, according to the usage of the East, mean a lodging room, but a repository for beds. Chardin says, "In the East, beds are not raised from the ground with posts, a canopy, and curtains; people lie on the ground. In the evening they spread out a mattress or two of cotton, very light, of which they have several in great houses, against they should have occasion, and a room on purpose for them." From hence it appears that it was in a chamber of beds that Joash was concealed.

HARMER, vol. ii. p. 489.

No. 133.-xi. 12. Clapped their hands.] The way by which females in the East express their joy, is by gently applying one of their hands to their mouths. This custom appears to be very ancient, and seems to be referred to in several places of scripture. PITTS (Religion and Manners of the Mahometans, p. 85.) describing the joy with which the leaders of their sacred caravans are received in the several towns of Barbary through which they pass, says, "This Emir Hagge, into whatever town he comes, is received with a great deal of joy, because he is going about so religious a work. The women get upon the tops of the houses to view the parade, where they keep striking their four fingers on their lips softly as fast as they can, making a joyful noise all the while." The sacred writers suppose two different methods of expressing joy by a quick motion of the hand: the clapping of the hands, and that of one hand only, though these are confounded in our translation. The former of these methods obtained anciently, as an expression of malignant joy; (Lam. ii. 15. Job xxvii. 23.) but other words, which our version translates clapping the hands, signify, the applying of only one hand somewhere with softness, in testimony of a joy of

a more agreeable kind. Thus in 2 Kings xi. 12. and Psalm xlvii. 1. it should be rendered in the singular, Clap your hand, and as the word implies gentleness, it may allude to such an application of the hand to the mouth as has now been recited.

HARMER, vol. iii. p. 277.

No. 134.-xii. 10. They put up (bound up) in bags, and told the money.] It appears to have been usual in the East for money to be put into bags, which, being ascertained as to the exact sum deposited in each, were sealed, and probably labelled, and thus passed currently. Instances of this kind may be traced in the scriptures, at least so far as that money was thus conveyed, (2 Kings v. 23.) and also thus delivered from superior to inferior officers for distribution: as in the passage referred to in this article. Major RENNELL (on the Geography of Herodotus, sect. 15.) in giving an abstract of the History of Tobit, says, "we find him again at Nineveh (Tobit xi. 16.) from whence he dispatches his son Tobias to Rages by way of Ecbatana, for the money. At the latter place, he marries his kinswoman Sara, and sends a messenger on to Rages. The mode of keeping and delivering the money was exactly as at present in the East. Gabael, who kept the money in trust, "brought forth bags, which were sealed up, and gave them to him," (Tobit ix. 5.) and received in return the handwriting or acknowledgment which Tobias had taken care to require of his father before he left Nineveh. The money we learn (Tobit i. 14.) was left in trust, or as a deposit, and not on usury, and, as it may be concluded, with Tobit's seal on the bags. In the East, in the present times, a bag of money passes (for some time at least) currently from hand to hand, under the authority of a banker's seal, without any examination of its contents."

No. 135.-xx. 13. Shewed them all the house of his precious things.] The display which Hezekiah made of his treasure was to gratify the ambassadors of the king of Babylon. It appears to have been an extraordinary thing, and not done but upon this and occasions of a similar nature; such probably was the general practice. Lord Macartney informs us, that "the splendor of the emperor of China and his court, and the riches of the mandarins, surpass all that can be said of them. Their silks, porcelain, cabinets, and other furniture, make a most glittering appearance. These, however, are only exposed when they make or receive visits: for they commonly neglect themselves at home, the laws against private pomp and luxury being very severe.'

No. 136.1 CHRONICLES xxvii. 28.

Cellars of oil.

DR. CHANDLER (Trav. in Greece, p. 126.) says, the modern Greeks keep their oil in large earthen jars, sunk in the ground, in the areas before their houses. The custom might obtain among the Jews; it is certain they sometimes buried their oil in the earth, to secrete it in times of danger, in which case they fixed upon the most likely place for concealment-the fields. (Jer. xli. 8.) Joash may therefore be properly considered as set over the treasures of oil, whatever was the place in which it was stored. HARMER, vol. iv. P. 108.

No. 137.-2 CHRONICLES xxviii. 27.

And Ahaz slept with his fathers, and they buried him in the city, even in Jerusalem; but they brought him not into the sepulchres of the kings of Israel.

THE Israelites were accustomed to honour in a peculiar manner the memory of those kings who had reigned over them uprightly. On the contrary, some marks of posthumous disgrace followed those monarchs who left the world under the disapprobation of their people. The proper place of interment was in Jerusalem. There, in some appointed receptacle, the remains of their princes were deposited: and, from the circumstance of this being the cemetery for successive rulers, it was said, when one died and was so buried, that he was gathered to his fathers. Several instances occur in the history of the kings of Israel, wherein, on certain accounts, they were not thus interred with their predecessors, but in some other place in Jerusalem. So it was with Ahaz, who though brought into the city, was not buried in the sepulchres of the kings of Israel. In some other cases, perhaps to mark out a greater degree of censure, they were taken to a small distance from Jerusalem. It is said that Uzziah was buried with his fathers in the field of the burial which belonged to the kings; for they said, he is a leper. (2 Chron. xxvi. 23.) It was doubtless with a design to make a suitable impression on the minds of their kings while living, that such distinctions were made after their decease. They might thus restrain them from evil or excite them to good, according as they were fearful of being execrated, or desirous of being honoured, when they were dead. The Egyptians had a custom in some measure similar to this; it was however general as to all persons, though it re

ceived very, particular attention, as far as it concerned their kings. It is thus described in FRANKLIN'S History of ancient and modern Egypt, vol. i. p. 374. "As soon as a man was dead, he was brought to his trial. The public accuser was heard. If he proved that the deceased had led a bad life, his memory was condemned, and he was deprived of the honours of sepulture. Thus, that sage people were affected with laws which extended even beyond the grave, and every one, struck with the disgrace inflicted on the dead person, was afraid to reflect dishonour on his own memory, and that of his family.

"But what was singular, the sovereign himself was not exempted from this public inquest upon his death. The public peace was interested in the lives of their sovereigns in their administration, and as death terminated all their actions, it was then deemed for the public welfare, that they should suffer an impartial scrutiny by a public trial, as well as the most common subject. Even some of them were not ranked among the honoured dead, and consequently were deprived of public burial. The Israelites would not suffer the bodies of some of their flagitious princes to be carried into the sepulchres appropriated to their virtuous sovereigns. The custom was singular: the effect must have been powerful and influential. The most haughty despot, who might trample on laws human and divine in his life, saw, by this solemn investigation of human conduct, that at death he also would be doomed to infamy and execration.” What degree of conformity there was between the practice of the Israelites and the Egyptians, and with whom the custom first originated, may be difficult to ascertain and decide, but the conduct of the latter appears to be founded on the same principle as that of the former, and as it is more circumstantially detailed, affords us an agreeable explanation of a rite but slightly mentioned in the scriptures.