of the very material which was needed to correct the deficiencies of the dried locusts which he used instead of bread.

The expression "a land flowing with milk and honey" has become proverbial as a metaphor expressive of plenty. Those to whom the words were spoken understood it as something more than a metaphor. In the work to which reference has already been made Signor Pierotti writes as follows:-"Let us now see how far the land could be said to flow with milk and honey during the latter part of its history and at the present day.

We find that honey was abundant in the time of the Crusades, for the English, who followed Edward I. to Palestine, died in great numbers from the excessive heat, and from eating too much fruit and honey. (See M. Sanutus, Liber secretorum fidelium Crucis,' lib. iii. p. xii.)

"At the present day, after traversing the country in every direction, I am able to affirm that in the south-east and northeast, where the ancient customs of the patriarchs are most fully preserved, and the effects of civilization have been felt least, milk and honey may still be said to flow, as they form a portion of every meal, and may even be more abundant than water, which fails occasionally in the heat of summer. . . . I have often eaten of the comb, which I found very good and of delicious. fragrance."

A reference to sickness occasioned by eating too much honey occurs in Prov. xxv. 16: Hast thou found honey? Eat so much as is sufficient for thee, lest thou be filled therewith, and vomit it." A similar warning is given in verse 27: "It is not good to eat much honey: so for men to search their own glory is not glory."

So plentiful indeed was the wild honey that it was exported to other countries, and in the palmy days of Israel formed part of a regular trade with Tyre. See Ezek. xxvii. 17: "Judah and the land of Israel, they were thy merchants: they traded in thy market wheat of Minnith, and Pannag, and honey, and oil, and balm."

In one or two passages honey is mentioned as being eaten with butter. (See, for example, 2 Sam. xvii. 29.) When David and his followers were wearied at Mahanaim, the people brought presents to him, among which are specially mentioned butter and honey.

Then there is the familiar prophecy, "Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good." The same image is repeated in the same chapter: "And it shall come to pass for the abundance of milk that they shall give he shall eat butter: for butter and honey shall every one eat that is left in the land" (ver. 22).

This mixture is at the present day a favourite one. All Orientals are fond of sweets, and in the composition of many of their favourite sweetmeats use honey instead of sugar. But an extemporized sweetmeat is often made by mixing together honey and butter, and eating it without further preparation.

It is right to mention here that there is a substance which is sometimes called honey, but which is not made by Bees. This is still used in Palestine under the name of " dibs," a word which is almost identical with the Hebrew d'bash. A very excellent account of this preparation is given by Mr. Urquhart in his "Lebanon." "The dibs, the honey of Scripture, which Jacob sent to Joseph, is the inspissated juice of the grape. It is of two sorts: one dark and liquid, resembling molasses-this is the racon; the other is thick, and of a yellow brown, and is called dibs (jibes). In every village there is an establishment for making it, some of them bearing marks of great antiquity. There are vats for pressing, and troughs cut in the rock for holding the juice, and a furnace for boiling it.

"The grapes are not trodden by the feet, but laid in a heap and pressed by a beam, of which one end is fixed in the wall, and a heavy stone attached to the other, as the oil seems anciently to have been expressed, judging from the relics I observed near Tyre. The juice is then boiled in the iron pan for an hour, then poured back into the trough. After it has cooled it is again returned into the pan and boiled-if for the racon for three hours, if for the jibes four.

"The process is thus complete for the first; the second is still liquid, and is conveyed home, where, during a month, it is daily for an hour turned or beaten with a fresh branch of fig-tree, or botun. This property of the fig-tree is curious.

The racon takes four okes of grapes to make one oke; the

jibes five. The first is worth forty paras, and the second sixty."

THE Hebrew word donag, which has been rightly interpreted as wax, occurs very seldom in the Old Testament. No mention is made of any use to which it was put, and in every instance it is employed simply as a metaphor.

Three examples occur in the Psalms: "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels" (Psa. xxii. 14).

The word occurs again in Psa. lxviii. 2: “As smoke is driven away, so drive them away: as wax melteth before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God." It occurs for the third time in Psa. xcvii. 5: "The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth."

The Prophet Micah uses a similar image: "Behold the Lord cometh forth out of His place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth.

"And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are poured down a steep place." (i. 3, 4.)

The Bee represented on page 606 is the common Bee of Palestine, Apis fasciata. The lowest figure in the corner, with a long body and shut wings, is the queen. The central figure represents the drone, conspicuous by means of his large eyes, that almost join each other at the top of the head, and for his thicker and stouter body, while the third figure represents the worker Bee. Near them is shown the entrance to one of the natural hives which are so plentiful in the Holy Land, and are made in the "clefts of the rocks." A number of Bees are shown issuing from the hole.

THE HORNET.

The Tzirah or Hornet of Scripture-Travellers driven away by Hornets--The Hornet used as metaphor--Oriental symbolism—The Talmudical writers— Sting of the Hornet.

STILL keeping to the hymenopterous insects, we come to the Hornet. There are three passages in which occurs the word tzirah, which has been translated as Hornet. In every case when the word is mentioned the insect is employed in a metaphorical sense. See, for example, Exod. xxiii. 27, 28: "I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come; and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee.

"And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee."

A similar use of the word is made in Deut. vii. 20: "Moreover the Lord thy God will send the hornet among them, until they that are left, and hide themselves from thee, be destroyed."

The fulfilment of this promise is recorded in Josh. xxiv. 11, 12: "And ye went over Jordan, and came unto Jericho : and the men of Jericho fought against you, the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Girgashites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; and I delivered them into your hand.

"And I sent the hornet before you, which drave them out from before you, even the two kings of the Amorites; but not with thy sword, nor with thy bow."

It is most probable that in these passages the word is used rather as a metaphor than as the statement of a fact, and that under the symbol of the Hornet was signified some means whereby the people should be driven out of the land as men are driven when chased by angry Hornets. The reader may

remember that the word "bee" is more than once used in a similar manner. This view of the case is corroborated by such passages

as Deut. ii. 25; "This day will I begin to put the dread of thee, and the fear of thee, upon the nations that are under the whole heaven, who shall hear report of thee, and shall tremble, and be in anguish because of thee." Also Josh. ii. 9-11: "I know that the Lord hath given you the land, and that your terror is

fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.

"For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you, when ye came out of Egypt; and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites, that were on the other side Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed.