The farmer and mechanic., 1915-04-27

OerS of the ancient NOIlu III a oo.
of lectures delivered recently In Phli-
adelphia. says an article in the New
York Sun He also made puDnc oiS-
coveries about the Old and the Ne"
Testament. His explorations unearth-
ed Hebrew inscriptions when nad |
been hidden for from three TO TOUR
thousand years from the sight OF
man. summary Of the lectures IS
given below.
The palace of Nero had three ele-
vators.
In the year A. D. an income tax
we established in Rome on all IN
comes in excess of $4,000.
The hobble skirt was one of Dame
Fashions DEGREES in the days OF
Moses.
These and many other interesting
facts going to show that life among
the ancients was not so different from
that of today wehe brought out oy
Prof Cobern in beginning his lee
lures.
Prof. Cobern pointed out that the
Jews had three different systems OF
shorthand reporting in the first CEN
tury and that in every Jewish court
a shorthand reporter or clerk sat ON
each side of the judge. Many of the
Roman aristocrats took "stenograph-
ers" with them upon their travels.
Some Of the other advantages en-
joyed by the ancients. according to
Prof. Cobern follow:
In st. Pauls time there were seven
ty labor unions in Rome; hence
struggle between capital and labor
must have been waged even then.
There were several great monop-
olies in the first century, the greatest
of all being the oil business. although
no mention of Rockefeller appears on
the papyrus Examined by the Ameri-
can scholar. The trust had not
cornered kerosene, which was un-
known at that period, but dealt in
olive oil and the like.
There also were monopOlies in eggs,
perfumes and bricks.
AS to homes, the ancientS made the
New York milliOnaires look like
''pikers' Prof. Cobern says he has
read in manuscripts dug from ancient
spent $12,000,00O upon decorations
for his house. Another plutocrat
spent $90.000,00 in one year. Even
Nero was not backward when it came
to burning money" On one occa-
sion he spent $4,000 for roses on his
banquet tables. The roses were
brought from Egypt.
During his explorations at Jericho
Prof. Cobern saw the crumbled rem.
nants of three lines of Notifications
(the Bible story mentions but one
which fell before the triumphant Is
raelites. They were of concrete, stone
and brick, and in some places mus
have been twenty-eight feet high.
At Taannach the archaeologis
found evidences Of human. sacrifice.
made by the Israelties; in one hill
were the bodies of sixteen babies
murdered by their parents when the.
were less than a week old. In hOl
was found the skeleton Of an old wo
man. Her neighbors forced her t
crawl inside and then walled her in.
Prof. Cobern told of thrilling dasl
to the oasis at kadesh- -Barnea, wher
Moses struck the rock with his ro
and brought forth water for the Is
raelities. The explorer drank frOT
this spring, which he says contain
water as pure and clear las any to b
found in Pennsylvania
The oasis is held sacred by tn
Arabs and, as in the case of Mecca
they look upon it as a duty to XII
unbelievers who profne the place b
their presence. Knowing that tn
Arabs rode camels DR.. Cobern pre-
vided his party with Arab horse
couneing upon their swiftness to ou
distance the camels.
After considerable search the oas
was found, a bit of land "hardl
larger than Arch Street church
Philadelphia somewhat below tt
level of the surrounding desert, whic
made it invisible at even a short di
tance. A few Arab women who wei
filling goatsIin sacks at the sprir
which gushed from beneath a lime
stone rock made off to give the alar,
when they beheld DR.. Cobern and h
party.
His explanation of the Biblical mi
acle Is that Moses knew of the pre-
ence OF the spring, which was hidde
by one of the big limestone rocks ar
struck the rock with his rod to ind
cate to his followers that the spri1
was to be found there
Prof. Cobern found three sprin
with enough water to supply {
army with drink although n
enough to supply 100000 fghtil
men, which some Biblical studen
enormously suppose the Israelities
have numbered. Prof. Cobern's i
depreciation Of this passage is that t