he tells us, feemed to refemble mummies, and related, as he imagined, to fome fepulchres thereabouts; I fhould be ready to fuppofe this must be fame very ancient buryingplace. Such a fuppofition juftifies the ex

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3 Either of the Ifraelites when in the wilderness, in which cafe the examining the infcriptions will answer the fame end, as if the Bishop of Clogher's fuppofition were juft; or of fome warriors belonging to other nations, who lay buried there; or made ufe of upon fome other occafion, of which the memory is now loft. [I muft not however conceal from my reader, that fince the first edition of this book, a paper of Mr. Wortley Montague's has been published in the Philofophical Trantactions, vol. 56, in which he feems to afcribe thefe engravings to pilgrims, in their journies from Jerufalem to Mount Sinai. But would they in that cafe have been fo numerous? Or at leaft, would they have been engraven by fuch perfons at the height of twelve or fourteen feet? Perhaps there is a mixture of both kinds of infcription. Benjamin the Jew, who lived fix hundred years ago, tells us, in his Itinerary, that travellers were then wont to infcribe their names on certain remarkable places: he mentions one at Jerufalem, p. 75 (Ed. Elzev. 1633); and Rachel's fepulchre as another, where all Jews that paffed by wrote their names, p. 83. In another page he fpeaks of a great burying-place near Rama, which ftretched out two miles in length, p. 89. Might not the written mountains be a burial-place half as long again as that near Rama? And might not travellers engrave their names on these fame rocks, as Benjamin tells us the Jews of his time were wont to do on Rachel's fepulchre, and thus mingle together the memorials of thofe wayfaring-men that tarried there only for a night, and of thofe that were entered into their long home? The Greek and Arabic infcriptions, which only fay "fuch an one was here at fuch a time," as Montague affures us, are evidently the trivial memorandums of paffengers, written by people of different nations; thofe engraven at the height of twelve or fourteen feet, one would

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planation of Grey, as to the alluding in these words to a fepulchral infcription; but would engage us to retain the English translation as to the term rock, in contradistinction to monumental pillars, or graveftones cut from the quarry.

But be this as it will, it is certain there are in Arabia feveral inscriptions in the natural rock; that this way of writing is very durable, for these engravings have, it seems, outlived the knowledge of the characters made use of; the practice was, for the fame reafon, very ancient as well as durable; and if these letters are not fo ancient as the days of Mofes, which the Bishop of Clogher supposes, yet these infcriptions might very well be the continuation of a practice in ufe in the days of Job, and may therefore be thought to be referred to in these words of his, "O "that they were graven. . . . .. in the rock "for ever!",

think should be fepulchral infcriptions. Niebuhr mentions a great cœmetery in this fame defert of Sinai, where a great many ftones are fet up in an erect pofition, on a high and Steep mountain, covered with as beautiful hieroglyphics as thofe of the ancient Egyptian monuments. The Arabs, he fays, carried them to this burial-place, which is really more remarkable than the written mountains, feen and defcribed by other travellers in this defert; for fo many well-cut ftones could never be the monuments of wandering Arabs, but must neceffarily owe their origin to the inhabitants of fome great city near this place, which is however now a defert, p. 347. Unhappily he doth not tell us whether the hieroglyphics of this burial-place are incruftated with colours, like those of Ægypt, or not.]

But however happy our tranflators have been in ufing the word rock in the 24th verse, it is certain they have been very far from being fo in the 23d, as to the word printed: it was abfurd to employ a term that expreffes what was invented but three hundred years ago; and especially as it doth not even by an improper expreffion convey the idea of Job, which was the perpetuating his words, as is apparent from the 24th verfe-records, to which Job refers, being written, not printed among us.

These written Arabian mountains very agreeably illustrate these words in part, and perhaps but in part; for it doth not appear from the accounts of the Prefetto with what view lead is mentioned here, " graven with "an iron pen and lead." Grey fuppofes the letters being hollowed in the rock with the iron pen or chiffel, were filled up with melted lead, in order to be more legible; but it doth not appear that any of thefe infcriptions are fo filled up. Indeed, though fome of them are engraven, moft of thofe Dr. Pococke obferved near Mount Sinai, were not cut, but stained, making the granite of

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+ Vol. I. p. 148. Dr. Pococke, however, himself saw fome that were cut, fee p. 59; as indeed the expreffion, that most of them that he faw were ftained, implies that fome were engraven. [That paper of Wortley Montague's, in the Philofophical Tranfactions, vol. 50, in like manner speaks of feveral infcriptions, in this wilderness, that were stained; but it tells us, that those of the written mountains were engraved, with a pointed inftrument.]

a lighter colour, which stain he had an opportunity of being fatisfied funk fome depth into the ftone; whether this was done with lead, let the curious determine. The Septuagint do not explain this at all, though the painting of granite rocks was very common anciently in Egypt, and thofe paintings, (ftainings, or mere incruftations, as Norden tock them to be,) extremely durable. This "fort of painting," fays Norden, “has neither fhade nor degradation. The figures "are incruftated like the cyphers on the dial-plates of watches, with this differ"ence, that they cannot be detached. "muft own, that this incruftated matter furpaffes in ftrength all that I have seen "in this kind. It is fuperior to the alfresco, and the Mofaic work; and indeed, has the advantage of lafting a longer "time. It is fomething furprizing to fee "how gold, ultra marine, and divers other colours, have preserved their luftre to the prefent age. Perhaps I fhall be asked "how all these lively colours could foften

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together; but I muft own it is a question "that I am unable to decide." But if Job referred to the writing with these durable ftaining materials on the rocks, the Septuagint did not understand him to do fo, they feem rather to have fuppofed he meant the recording things by engraving accounts of them on plates of lead. "Who

52 part, p. 75, 76.

"will caufe my words to be written, to be put in a book that fhall last for ever; "with an iron pen and lead, (i. e. upon

lead,) or to be engraven on the rocks?" Which cutting letters on lead marks out an ancient method, indeed, of perpetuating the memory of things, but is very different from that which Dr. Pococke faw had anciently obtained in Arabia, the country of Job, and to which therefore his words may poffibly refer.

[I am inclined however, upon the reconfidering this place, to believe, that the incruftating materials, that were anciently ufed for the colouring the engravings on the rock or ftone, fuch as Norden faw in Ægypt, are meant by the word translated lead here, whether they were preparations of lead, or composed of other matters; fince we find it is used Lev. xiv. 42, 45, for the plaifter made ufe of to cover the stones of a building, and perhaps for the terrace-morter of the roof, being applied to a building in the fame way as gold and filver were to the walls of the temple; the fame verb being ufed for the application of both to their refpective buildings, Chron. xxix. 4. As it was a common practice in Ægypt, to overlay their hieroglyphics with fome coloured plaifter or paint, which the word tranflated lead fignifies, the fame might be practised in Arabia in the time of Job, though we are not expressly told that travellers have met with

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