The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-10-12
A LEAF FROM THE OLD HE
BREW RECORDS.

"And in the fourteenth year came
Chedorlaomer, and the kings that were
with him, and smote the Rephaim in
Ashcroft Karnaim" (Gen. xiv: 5.)-
These were the tall sons of Anak"
whose presence afterwards terrified the
spies that went up with Caleb,-of the
race of the giants" of whom Goliath,
and Sippai, and Lahmi were the sur
vivors in the time of David.
This "Ashteroth- Karnaim" ESQ called
from the crescent-crowned Astarte, whose
images are carved upon the ruins of the
deserted cities of this region) was the cap
ital Of the ancient Bashan, with all the
region of Argob," whose giant king Og
was defeated at Edrei by Moses. The
fertile and Aourishing kingdom of " the
remnant of the giants" lay to the east of
Jordan on the borders of Syria and the
territory of the Amorites. 1t is described
by the Hebrew poets as an earthly para
disc, with luxuriant and wide-spreading
plains and meadows, enclosed amid pic
turesque mountains. Its evergreen oaks,
its pasture-lands, its rams, and its bulls,
and its goats, figure amid the imagery Of
the prophetic writings. 1t was on the
slopes of these grassy hills that our Sa-
vlour, on two occasions, fed the multi
tudes who thronged around him; and it
was down the rocky steep on the western
border of this table-land that he drove
the herd of swine into the Sea of Galilee.
The region now is inhabited by the
warlike Druses, who hold it against the
lawless freebooters of the desert. "Not
spot of land, said the Sheik Assad to
an English traveller, from Wady Musa
to Aleppo is safe from their raids, and
Druses, Moslems, and Christians are alike
to them. ;. Oh, my lord these sons of
Ishmael are fleet as gazelles, and fierce
as leopards
Said the same traveller to Mahmoud,
his guide, "Why do you permit these
magnificent oaks to be burned through at
the trunkT He replied that it was done
by "the Bedawin," who destroyed the
forests in this way to make charcoal for
the Damascus market.
but why do you permit such need
less waste and destruction?"
80 my lord it is you Franks alone
who have wisdom to look to the future.
=. What can we do in this unhappy
country? We are all wanderers-here
to-day, away tomorrow. Should we at
tempt to preserve these oaks, or to plant
vineyards and olives, or to spend labor
and money on fields and houses the
Bedawin would be attracted in clouds
around the tempting fruit. We can
have no permanent interest in the ground.
We can only hold it as we have got it,
by the sword; and the poorer it looks,
the less will our enemies covet it,"
| When Israel, passing the eastern bor-
der OF Mount SER, appeared on the banks
OF the Arnon and forced passage
through the territory of Sihon, king Of
the Amorites, they found themselves con
fronted by the monarch of this then pop
ulous and busy kingdom. What Moses
begun was completed by Jair the son of
Manasseh Ito which tribe the territory
was afterwards assigned). The Lord de-
livered Og into their hands, "and" writes
the sacred historian, eve took all his
cities at that time f.. three-score cities,
all the region of Argob, the kingdom Of
Og in Bashan. All these cities were
fenced with high walls, gates, and bars
besides unwalled towns great many"
An astonishing statement "Sixty
fenced cities with high walls, gates, and
bars; besides unwalled towns a great
many" in an area about the size of the
county of CHESTERFIELD No wonder there
is new school Of critics to smooth down
the bold rhetorical figures of the Oriental
fancy 1t is on par with the tremen-
dous population attributed by the books
of Kings and Chronicles to the little king
dom of Palestine in the time of David
some six millions on territory about the
size of Wales
In country house, the other day, we
picked up the volume of travel from
which we have quoted above "Often