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OBSERVATION XVI.

Oil Jars frequently buried in the Ground, the better to preserve their Contents.

WHEN our translation represents Joash as over the cellars of oil, in the time of King David, 1 Chron. xxvii. 28, they have certainly, without any necessity, and perhaps improperly, substituted a particular term for a general expression. Joash was at that time, according to the sacred historian, over the treasures of oil; but whether it was kept in cellars, or in some other way, does not at all appear in the original history.

The modern Greeks, according to Dr. Richard Chandler, do not keep their oil in cellars, but in large earthern jars, sunk in the ground, in the areas before their houses." The custom might obtain among the Jews: as then it was needless, it must be improper to use the particular term cellars, when the original uses a word of the most general signification.

It is certain they sometimes buried their oil in the earth, in order to secrete it in times of danger, on which occasion they must be supposed to choose the most unlikely places, where such concealment would be least suspected-in their fields; whether they were wont to bury a Trav. in Greece, p. 126.

it, at other times, in their court-yards, cannot be so easily ascertained.

OBSERVATION XVII.

Of the Time when the Vine and Olive blossom.

A very ingenious writer supposes that the vine blossoms considerably earlier than the olive that grapes, when half-grown, are wont to fall as well as the olive-blossoms; that the disappointment of people's hopes from either arises from the same cause; and that that cause is the burning pestilential quality of the east wind: but all these suppositions, I would remark, admit of doubt; nor do the words of Eliphaz, in the book of Job, (ch. xv. 33) require us to admit of any of these points.

Some doubt may be made, whether the vine does blossom in the East considerably earlier than the olive, on account of a passage of Dr. Richard Chandler's Travels in Greece. That

• Jer. xli. 8. Ten men were found among them that said unto Ishmael, Slay us not; for we have treasures in the field, of wheat, and of barley, and of oil, and of honey.

P Scott, in his translation of the book of Job, thus translates the 33d verse of the 15th chapter,

"As when the vine her half-grown berries showers,
"Or poison'd olive her unfolding flowers."

And his note there is, "The green grapes shew themselves early in the spring, in those hot climates; and the oliveblossoms in June and July; in which months a pestilential east wind blows there."

curious and observing gentleman informs us," that be set out from Marathon the 5th of May; that the next day he was presented with a handful of white roses fresh gathered. In the same page, he tells us, that that day they procured a live fowl, which they had boiled for breakfast, with some eggs to be fried in oil, he goes on, "We eat under an olive-tree then laden with pale yellow flowers. A strong breeze from the sea scattered the bloom, and incommoded us, but the spot afforded no shelter more eligible."

According to this, the olive-tree blossoms at the same time with the rose-bush; and I have elsewhere shown, that the blossoming of the rose and of the vine are nearly contemporary with us in the latter end of June, in some of the warmer Eastern countries, about the end of April. According to Dr. Chandler, in this passage, the olive, in like manner, was in blossom the beginning of May in Greece, at which time the white rose was just come into bloom, and was presented as a pleasing gift to the Doctor, and at that time the olive-blossoms

P. 159.

P. 161. One would rather imagine, that these were, therefore, considered as something curious, being but just come into blossom, not as to be found on every rose-bush they met with. It might, however, have been otherwise; and rose-bushes and vines have come into flower some time sooner.

• Outlines of a new commentary on Solomon's Song, p. 147.

There is very little difference, in point of time, be tween the blossoming of the white and red rose.

were blown off in such quantities as to incommode them.

It is but justice, however, to add, that Dr. Chandler, in another place of the same book, describes the olive as being in blossom about the end of June. For leaving Athens the 21st of that month, and having passed from place to place in the Saronic gulf, for four or five days, he tells us, p. 211, "We landed, and went to the monastery, which is at some distance from the sea, the situation high and romantic, near a deep torrent-bed. It was surrounded by green vineyards; thickets of myrtle, orange and lemon-trees in blossom; the arbutus with fruit large, but unripe; the oleander or picrodaphne, and the olive laden with flowers."

According to this last account, the grapes near Marathon might be of a considerable size, when the olive-trees in the other place were but in blossom. But (if there is no mistake in one of these accounts) as the olive does not continue long in the blossom, as will appear presently, the difference, in point of time, as to the blossoming of the olive in these two places, must have proceeded from the difference of soil, or exposition, or height, or some, or all, of these causes conjoined; and probably, in consequence, the vine in this lofty situation was proportionably as backward.

It is certain that Miller, the great Chelsea gardener, supposes that with us, oranges, le

Chandler himself observes the situation of the last place was high.

mons, limes, citrons, red, white, and double oleanders, and olives, may be found in flower in the month of July, in our green-houses and stoves, consequently are contemporaries; but the vine blossoms with us before July in the open air.

As to the other particulars: it is very much questioned, whether grapes, when half-grown, are wont to fall from the vines, so as to defeat the hopes of a good vintage. I do not remember to have heard of any such complaint. The hurt done to the olive-tree is, according to a succeeding citation from Dr. Chandler, when they are in blossom; and the Doctor tells us,' not indeed as from his own observation, but from Pausanias, the hurt was done in as early a state to the vine, if not earlier, for that ancient author speaks of their being injured in the bud; and that it was supposed to be a south-west wind that withered them in that early period; whereas it was, according to Chandler, a north or nerth-east wind, that was wont to defeat their hopes from the olive-trees in Greece: to which he adds, that the danger, with regard to the flowers of those trees, is over in a fortnight.

The passage is too curious not to be cited at length here. It is as follows: "The olivegroves are now, as anciently, a principal source of the riches of Athens. . . . The mills for pressing and grinding the olives are in the town, The oil is deposited in large earthern jars, sunk See his Gardener's Kalendar.

J P. 219.

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