WATCHERS

gated the moral government of the earth to celestial spirits, who had the charge of making inquisition into human actions, and punishing the guilty. C.

WATCHMAN. The best account of the precautions taken to secure the peace and protection of Jewish citizens during the night, is that published in Dr. Jamieson's edition of Paxton's Illustrations, from which we extract the following particulars.

"The Orientals employed watchmen to patrol the city during the night, to suppress any disorders in the streets, or to guard the walls against the attempts of a foreign enemy. To this custom Solomon refers in these words: 'The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the wall took away my veil from me.' (Song 5.7.) This custom may be traced to a very remote antiquity; so early as the departure of Israel from the land of Egypt, the morning watch is mentioned, certainly indicating the time when the watchmen were commonly relieved. In Persia, the watchmen were obliged to indemnify those who were robbed in the streets, and make satisfaction with their own blood for those who were murdered; which accounts for the vigilance and severity which they display in the discharge of their office, and illustrates the character of watchman given to Ezekiel, who lived in that country, and the duties he was required to perform. If the wicked perished in his iniquities without warning, the prophet was to be accountable for his blood; but if he duly pointed out his danger, he delivered his own soul. (Ezek. 33. 5.) These terms, therefore, were neither harsh nor severe; they were the common appointments of watchmen in Persia. They were also charged to announce the progress of the night to the slumbering city: The burden of Dumah; he calls to me out of Seir, Watchman, what of the night? watchman, what of the night? The watchman said, The morning cometh, and also the night.' (Isai. 21. 11.) This is confirmed by an observation of Chardin, upon these words of Moses: "For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night; that as the people of the East have no clocks, the several parts of the day and of the night, which are eight in all, are announced. In the Indies, the parts of the night are made known, as well by instruments of music, in great cities, as by the rounds of the watchmen, who, with cries and small drums, give them notice that a fourth part of the night is past. Now, as these cries awaked those who had slept all that quarter part of the night, it appeared to them but as a moment. There are sixty of these in the Indies by day, and as many by night; that is, fifteen for each division.

"It is evident the ancient Jews knew, by means of some public notice, how the night watches passed away; but whether the men simply announced the termination of the watch, or made use of trumpets, or other sonorous instruments, in making the proclamation, it may not be easy to determine; and still less what kind of chronometers the watchmen used. The probability is, that the watches were announced with the sound of a trumpet; for the prophet Ezekiel makes it a part of the watchmen's duty, at least in time of war, to blow the trumpet, and warn the people. (Ezek. 33. 5.)

"They were required not only at each watch of the night, but at frequent intervals in the progress of it, to cry aloud, in order to give the people, who depend upon them for the protection of their lives and property, assurance that they are not sleeping at their posts, or negligent of their charge. On these latter occasions,

the exclamations are made in the form of addresses to their comrades, and generally consist of some expressions, in the form of a dialogue, tending to enliven one another in the discharge of their solitary and monotonous task; some watchword, or set form of words, similar to what a traveller informs us is used by the watchmen of the caravans in the desert, who, in going these rounds, exclaim when they meet, God is merciful,' while the other responds in the same elevated tone, Blessings be on you, or attend yourselves.' This custom of the watchmen crying aloud in the course of the watches, and that, too, by saluting each other when they met in the form of a set dialogue, was observed also by the ancient officers of this description among the Jews, the watchword being then, as we have seen it is still among the watchmen of the caravans, some pious sentiment, in which the name of Jehovah was specially expressed. Two remarkable instances of this occur in Scripture. The one is in the prophecies of Isaiah, where, speaking of the watchmen of the temple, who were always Levites, and among whom the same regulations subsisted as among other watchmen, he addresses them under the poetical description of 'Ye that make mention of the Lord,' i. e., Ye whose watchword is the name of Jehovah. (Isai. 62. 6.) The other instance is in Psalm 134, the whole of which, as is justly observed by Bishop Lowth, is nothing more than the alternate cry of two different divisions of the watch. The first watch addresses the second, reminding them of their duty; the second answers by a solemn blessing. The address and the answer seem both to be a set form, which each proclaimed aloud at stated intervals to notify the time of night:

"First band of watchmen-' Bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, who by night stand in the house of the Lord. Lift up your hands in the sanctuary, and bless the Lord.'

"Second band of watchmen answer- -The Lord bless thee out of Zion, the Lord that made heaven and earth.'

"The watchman, in a time of danger, seems to have taken his station in a tower, which was built over the gate of the city. We may form a tolerably distinct idea of the ancient towers in Palestine, from the description which the sacred historian gives us of one, in the entrance of Mahanaim:-' And David sat between the two gates: and the watchman went up to the roof over the gate unto the wall, and lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold a man running alone. The watchman cried and told the king; and the king said, If he be alone, there is tidings in his mouth. And the watchman saw another man running; and the watchman called unto the porter, and said, Behold, another man running alone; and the king said, He also bringeth tidings.' (2Sam. 18. 24; and 19. 8.) When the tidings were announced, the historian observes, 'the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept.' It is afterwards added,-"Then the king arose and sat in the gate; and they told unto all the people, saying, Behold the king doth sit in the gate; and all the people came before the king; for Israel had fled every man to his tent."

"From this description, it appears that the tower in the entrance of Mahanaim had two pair of gates, at some distance from each other; in a small room, which was often found by the side of these fortified gates, the door of which opened into the passage between them, sat the king, waiting in fearful suspense the issue of the contest; for it cannot be supposed he sat in the passage itself, which had been at once unbecoming his dignity, and incommodious to the passengers entering or leaving

the city. We find a watchman stationed on the top of this tower, to which he went up by a staircase from the passage, which, like the roof of their dwelling-houses, was flat, for the purpose of descrying at a distance those that were approaching the place, or repelling the attacks of an enemy. The observations made by the watchman were not communicated by him immediately to the king, but by the intervention of a warder at the outer gate of the tower; and it appears that a private staircase led from the lower room, in which the king was sitting, to the upper room over the gateway; for by that communication he retired to give full vent to his sorrow."

WATCH-TOWER. See TOWER.

WATER, one of the chief necessaries of life. In the Sacred Scriptures, bread and water are commonly mentioned as the principal supports of human existence; and to provide a sufficient quantity of water, to prepare it for use, and to deal it out to the thirsty, are among the principal cares of an Oriental householder.

Fetching water is one of the heaviest of the many heavy duties which devolve on females in the East, and one which the most sensibly impresses us with a sense of their degraded condition. They usually draw the water in the evening, and frequently in the cool of the morning also. From this drudgery married women are exempted, unless when single women are wanting. The young women of Guzerat daily draw water from the wells, and carry the jars upon the head, but those of high rank carry them upon the shoulder.

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In the same way Rebecca carried her pitcher, and probably for the same reason, because she was the daughter of an Eastern prince. (Gen. 24. 45.) In Turkey and Persia, however, the poorer women only are subject to this servile employment, respectable families being supplied daily by men who make the supplying of water a distinct business. They carry the water about in a well-prepared goat-skin, which is generally slung to the back, the neck, which is usually brought under the arm, and compressed by the hand, serving as the mouth of this curious but exceedingly useful vessel. Persons of larger dealings have an ass which carries two skins at once, borne like panniers, and very prosperous' watercarriers have been known who had ox-skins carried on a

horse. These men continually passing to and fro with their wet bags through the narrow streets, are great nuisances in the towns, from the difficulty of avoiding contact with them. The care taken to avoid them in some degree answers to that which people exhibit in our own streets to avoid carriages and carts. There are no draught vehicles in Asiatic towns, and the water-carriers with their bags, together with the "hewers of wood" bearing large fagots on their own backs, or on the backs of horses or mules, form the only obstructions which usually occur in the streets, narrow as they are. time of public calamity, the water-carriers are the last to discontinue their labour, and their doing so is a sure indication that the distress has become most intense and imminent, and is indeed a great calamity in itself. In Deuteronomy 29. 11, there is particular mention made of "the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water."

In a

Water for the feet is a necessary and most grateful part of hospitality in the East. When Abraham entertained the angels, his first request was, that they would not pass, but "Let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet." (Gen. 18. 4,) And where people wear sandals which are intended only to protect the soles, the feet soon become foul and parched, and to have the feet and ancles bathed is the most gratifying of

Washing of Hands.

refreshments after that of quenching thirst. The office is usually performed by servants. Mr. Roberts mentions that in passing through Hindoo villages it is comtraveller. mon to see this office performed for the weary In the sandy deserts of Arabia and the bordering countries, no covering for the feet can prevent the necessity for this refreshment at the end of a day's journey. The fine impalpable sand or dust penetrates all things, and with the perspiration, produces an itching and feverish irritation, which next to the quenching of his thirst, it is the first wish of a traveller to allay, and to uncover his feet and get water to wash them, is a prime object of attention. If sandals only are used, or the feet are entirely without defence, it becomes still more necessary to wash them after a journey.

The first plague sent by the Almighty on Egypt to induce Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, was turning the waters of the Nile into blood. This was a dire calamity, for we are told that the waters of the Nile are among the sweetest and purest in the world. Very ancient writers inform us that the water was considered so nourishing that the priests abstained from giving it to

their sacred bull Apis, lest he should get too fat; and others state that it never became impure, whether preserved at home, or exported abroad.

It is said that the natives excite thirst artificially, that they may drink the more of this delicious water; and it is a saying among them, that had Mohammed himself drunk of it, he would have desired to have lived for ever, that he might always have enjoyed it. We may therefore judge what a calamity it was to the Egyptians, "to loathe to drink of the water of the river." (Exod. 7. 18.)

In the 24th verse of the same chapter we are told, that "the Egyptians digged round the river for water to drink." As similar operations are of frequent occurrence in the East, we will give Dr. Richardson's account of one.

“On our arrival at Gatsulakh, we stopped in a low wind-swept valley beside a precipitous sand-bank that towered above our heads to the height of 100 feet. Here, however, we were told there was water, though to our longing and inexperienced eyes every inch of surface was covered with dry sand, without the slightest indication of the fluid below.

"Our flasks were all drained, and we alighted and laid ourselves down on the sand, wishing for the arrival of our camels to bring us a fresh supply. Meanwhile, as we were admiring the operations of the industrious beetle rolling his ball over the smooth surface of the desert the sheikh of the caravan began to clear away the arenaceous accumulation from a very unlikely spot, which, however, soon discovered signs of water beneath. He then proceeded to deepen the excavation, by basketing out the sand, singing at the same time an appropriate Arab tune. They continued digging and singing for about ten minutes, when abundance of the wished-for fluid flowed amain. At the joyful sight men, women, dogs, and asses, all crowded round to dip their eager lips in the wave. We all drank of it, and though it is muddy and brackish in the extreme, our first sentiment was that of universal approbation. It is extremely good,' flowed from every tongue after it had tasted the water. We tried it a second time; but the voice of applause stuck in our throats."

We may here observe, that the well-water of Egypt is detestable, a circumstance which, no doubt, greatly enhances the estimation in which the water of the Nile is held.

In Exodus 15. 22-25, we find the Israelites "murmuring at the bitter waters of Marah: "And Moses cried unto the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet." And again, when the children of Israel pitched in Rephidim, "there was no water for them to drink." "And the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this, that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt to kill us, and our children, and our cattle, with thirst?" And the Lord commanded Moses "to smite the rock in Horeb, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel." (Exod. 17. 1-6.)

To furnish travellers with water is even in present times reckoned of so much importance, that many of the Eastern philanthropists have been at considerable expense to procure them that enjoyment. The nature of the climate, and the general aspect of the Oriental regions, require numerous fountains to excite and sustain the languid powers of vegetation, and the sun burning with intense heat in a cloudless sky, demands for the fainting inhabitants, verdure, shade, and coolness; hence, fountains of water are met with in the towns and

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villages, in the fields and gardens, and by the sides of the roads and of the beaten tracks on the mountains, and a cup of cold water from these wells is no contemptible present. "Fatigued with heat and thirst," says Carne, we came to a few cottages in a palm wood, and stopped to drink of a fountain of delicious water. In this northern climate, no idea can be formed of the luxury of drinking in Egypt: little appetite for food is felt, but, when after crossing the burning sands, you reach the fresh line of woods on the brinks of the Nile, and pluck the fresh limes, and mixing their juice with Egyptian sugar and the soft river water, drink repeated bowls of lemonade, you feel that every other pleasure of the senses must yield to this. One then perceives the beauty and force of those similes in Scripture, where the sweetest emotions of the heart are compared to the assuaging of thirst in a thirsty land.”

Water is used in the sense of purification, as the "washing away of sin." When clear, cool, and pleasant, it is the symbol of great good, and when muddy and thick, it denotes disease and affliction. Hence, the torments of wicked men after this life were by the ancients represented under the symbol of a lake whose waters were full of mud and dung.

Water sometimes signifies the element of water, (Gen. 1. 10,) and metaphorically, trouble and affliction. (Psalm 56. 1.) Water is put for children or posterity, (Numb. 24.7; Isai. 48. 1;) for the clouds, (Psalm 104. 3.) Water sometimes stands for tears, (Jerem. 9. 1,7;) for the ordinances of the Gospel, (Isai. 12. 3; 35. 6,7; 55. 1; John 7. 37,38.) "Stolen waters" denote unlawful pleasures with strange women. (Prov. 9. 17.) The Israelites are reproached with having forsaken the fountain of living water to quench their thirst at broken cisterns, (Jerem. 2. 13,) that is, with having quitted the worship of the all-sufficient God, for the worship of vain and senseless idols.

Many waters, on account of their noise, number, disorder, and the confusion of the waves, are the symbols of peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. The symbol is so explained in Revelations 17. 15, and Jeremiah 47. 2; waters signifying an army or multitude. The comparison of the noise of a multitude to the noise of many or mighty waters, is used by Isaiah, (17. 12,13.) "Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas, and to the rushing of nations that make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters. The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters, but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.” A.

WAX, 7 donagh, a soft, yielding substance, formed by melting the combs in which bees deposit their honey. It is believed that the Jews were unacquainted with the art of making artificial waxes from the resins.

WAY. See ROAD.

WAYFARING MAN. In consequence of the hilly nature of Palestine, and the badness of its roads, journeys were usually performed on foot, a practice which, to a great extent, continues to the present day. There were no inns or taverns in the primitive ages of the world; wayfarers depended on the voluntary hospitality of those whom they casually met, and they could do so with safety, because it was considered not merely honourable, but an act of positive duty to open one's house to the traveller and stranger. house to the traveller and stranger. Eliphaz makes the

neglect of this duty the subject of bitter, but in this case, unmerited, reproach to Job in his sufferings:

"Is not thy wickedness great? and thine iniquities infinite? For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for nought, and stripped the naked of their clothing. Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from the hungry." (Job 22.5-7.)

The indignant and powerful reply of the patriarch shows how deeply he felt the scandal of these imputations, the most severe that could be uttered against an Oriental chief:

"If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail; or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof; (for from my youth he was brought up with me, as with a father, and I have guided her from my mother's womb;) if I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering; if his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep; if I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate; then let mine arm fall from my shoulder-blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone." (Job 32. 16-22.)

Buckingham, in his travels among the Arab tribes, says, "A foot-passenger could make his way at little or no expense, as travellers and wayfarers of every description halt at the sheik's house, where, whatever may be the rank or condition of the stranger, before any questions are asked him as to where he comes from, or whither he is going, coffee is served to him from a large pot, always on the fire; and a meal of bread, milk, oil, honey, or butter, is set before him, for which no money is asked or even expected by the host, who in this manner feeds at least twenty persons on an average every day in the year from his own purse; at least I could not learn that he was remunerated in any manner for this expenditure, though it is considered as a necessary consequence of his situation, as chief of the community, that he should maintain this ancient practice of hospitality to strangers. We had been directed to the house of Eesa or Jesus. Our horses were taken into the court-yard of the house, and unburdened of their saddles, without a single question being asked on either side; and it was not until we had seated ourselves that our intention to remain here for the night was communicated to the master of the house; so much is it regarded as a matter of course, that those who have a house to shelter themselves in, and food to partake of, should share their comforts with wayfarers."

A remarkable allusion is made to the difficulties which wayfarers had to encounter on account of the bad condition of the roads and highways of Palestine, in the prophet's description of the flourishing estate of the Messiah's kingdom.

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Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense; he will come, and save you.

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water: in the habitation of dragons, where each lay, shall be grass with reeds and rushes. And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called the way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." (Isai. 35. 4-8.)

This passage receives elucidation from some of the

accounts of modern travellers. "It was on the 24th of March," says Hoste, "that I departed from Alexandria for Rosetta; it was a good day's journey thither, over a level country, but a perfect desert, so that the wind plays with the sand, and there is no trace of a road. We travel first six leagues along the coast; but when we leave this it is about six miles more to Rosetta, and from thence to the town there are high stone or bark pillars in a line, according to which travellers direct their journey." W.

WEALTH. In Genesis 13. 2, we read, "And Abram was very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold.” The wealth of the patriarchs almost entirely consisted in their flocks and herds. The Arab tribes, which claim to be descended from Abraham, and still wander in or near the regions which the patriarch traversed, still follow a mode of life which affords the most instructive illustrations of the primitive, described in the Book of Genesis. The wealth of their sheiks and other persons of distinction is nearly the same as that of Abraham. It is true that few are rich in "silver and in gold;" but many are very rich in cattle, and in the same kinds of cattle which are assigned to Abraham in Genesis 12. 16: "And he had sheep and oxen, and he asses, and men-servants and maid-servants, and she-asses and camels." The number of the patriarch's cattle is not given; but, in considering the number which makes an Arab rich, we may have some idea of the property in cattle which made Abram "very rich." Burckhardt says that the wealth of an Arab consists almost wholly in horses and camels. But this must be understood with limitations, for there have been tribes which, in favourable situations, have few camels or horses, but extensive flocks of sheep and goats. Burckhardt proceeds to say, "No Arab family can exist without one camel, at least; a man who has but two is reckoned poor; thirty or forty place a man in easy circumstances, and he who possesses sixty is rich." The standard of wealth is, of course, lower in poor tribes. The same author mentions sheiks who had as many as three hundred camels; and one, who was his guide to Tadmor, was reputed to possess one hundred camels, between two and three hundred sheep and goats, two mares, and one horse. In the richest tribes, a father of a family is said to be poor with less than forty camels, and the usual stock of a family is from one to two hundred. Although some Arab families pride themselves on having only camels, there is no tribe wholly destitute of sheep and goats. It is observable that Abraham is not stated to have had any horses. The horse was not much in use among the Israelites till the time of Solomon, nor does it appear to have been very common then, or afterwards. Horses are even now by no means so common among the Arabs as the reports of some travellers would lead us to conclude. Among the Aeneze tribes, Burckhardt could not find more than one mare to six or seven tents; but they are rather more numerous in some other tribes. Upon the whole, it seems that the property of these Arab sheiks, whose wealth is rumoured far and wide in the East, seems in most cases very moderate, when estimated by European standards of value. It may useful to remember this, when riches in cattle are mentioned indefinitely in the Old Testament. We may conclude, however, that Abraham's wealth approximated more nearly to that of Job than to that of most of the present Arab sheiks.

be

We shall now attempt to estimate the value of the property which constituted Job "the greatest of all the men of the East." The statement given fortunately

WEALTH

enables us to see the amount of property which constituted wealth in these primitive times. In Job 1. 3, we read, “His substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses, and a very great household, so that this man was the greatest of all the men of the East." This statement concerning the quantity and character of the property which constituted extreme wealth in those early times is very valuable. From what we have already mentioned it will appear that the cattle only here assigned to Job is immense, according to the present state of property among the Arabian emirs, who seem to bear the nearest resemblance to this patriarch in their condition of life. As we are accustomed to estimate property in money, it will be interesting to state the value in money of the cattle here enumerated. From all the information we possess, we should say that the average in the same country might now be between thirty and forty thousand pounds-perhaps nearer the latter sum than the former. In this we estimate the camels at ten pounds, the oxen at one pound each, and the sheep at three for one pound, which are, we believe, about the average prices in Western Asia. About the asses the average is more difficult to determine, as so much depends upon their breed and use. Their small number seems to intimate high value, and they were probably used for riding, so that, perhaps, we may suppose them to have been on an average about the same value as the camels. But in this calculation we must not overlook the fact, that money is of so much the greater value in the East than in England, that such a man would seem incomparably greater than with us, particularly in a condition of life resembling the patriarchal, so that a sheik, or emir, whose whole property may be worth five or six thousand pounds, will be considered a very rich man, and is such, relatively to the circumstances of his people. These facts may suggest some ideas as to the greatness of Job, whose possessions were indeed princely. But, moreover, it appears that all his wealth did not consist in cattle. He was not a nomade. He belonged to that condition of life which fluctuated between that of the wandering shepherd and that of a people settled in towns. That he resided, or had a residence, in a town is obvious; but his flocks and herds evidently pastured in the deserts, between which and the town his own time was probably divided. He differed from the Hebrew patriarchs chiefly in this, that he did not so much wander about, "without any certain dwellingplace," as they. Yet, withal, he was a cultivator, as appears from his oxen being mentioned by "yokes," and from their being occupied in ploughing (ver. 14) when the Sabeans fell upon them, as well as from various circumstances which come out in the discussion. This mixed condition of life, which is still frequently exhibited in Western Asia, will, we apprehend, account sufficiently for the diversified character of the allusions and pictures which the Book contains,—to the pastoral life, and the scenes and products of the wilderness, to the scenes and circumstances of agriculture, and to the arts and sciences of settled life and advancing civilization. See Notes to Pictorial Bible, Job 1. 3.

With respect to Abraham's gold and silver, there can be no doubt that it arose from the same source which supplies the conveniences of life to the existing nomade tribes, namely, the sale of animals for slaughter, and of butter, cheese, and wool, to the townspeople. IIe would naturally accumulate much property from this source in Egypt, the inhabitants of which depended chiefly for their supplies upon the pastoral people who

abode in or near their country. The Egyptians themselves hated pastoral pursuits.

For an account of the sources of wealth to the Hebrews when Palestine became a kingdom, see art. COMMERCE. A.

WEANING. Most Oriental people suckle their children much longer than is usual in Europe, and the same custom may be traced in the Bible. When the time is come to wean the child, a fortunate day is looked for, and the event is accompanied by feasting and religious ceremonies. When Samuel was weaned he was old enough to be left with Eli for the service of the Tabernacle; in 2Chronicles 31. 16, nothing is assigned for the provision of the children of priests and Levites until after three years of age, which renders it probable that they were not weaned sooner; and in the Second Book of Maccabees, (7. 27,) a mother says, "O my son, have pity upon me that bare thee nine months in my womb, and gave thee suck three years, and nourished thee, and brought thee up unto this age." When the Persian ambassador was in England, he attributed to the custom of early weaning the greater forwardness of our children in mental acquirements than those of his own country, where male children are often kept to the breast till three years of age, and never taken from it till two years and two months.

The practice is nearly the same in other Asiatic countries. In India, the period is precisely three years. But everywhere a girl is taken from the breast sooner than a boy; in Persia in two years, in India within the year. The Hindoos do so because they think that if they did not she would become sterile.

When the child is weaned, the Persians make "a great feast," to which friends and relatives are invited, and of which the child also partakes, this being, in fact, his introduction to the customary fare of the country. The practice is the same among the Hindoos. The custom of giving a feast to the friends and relations on the day that the child was weaned, is one that may be traced to very remote antiquity, for in Genesis 21. 8, we read that "Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac was weaned." A.

WEAPONS. See ARMS, &c.

WEASEL, choled. This destructive animal is very injurious to poultry, killing their young, and sucking their eggs; on this account, and also because of its rank smell, it is universally detested, and its name has become proverbially synonymous with mischief and cunning. Bochart was of opinion that the Hebrew word

choled should be translated "the mole;" observing that the Syriac chuleda, the Arabic chold, the Turkish chuld, all signify the mole; and Russell's valuable work informs us that it is also called khuld atAleppo. C.

WEAVING. The origin of the arts of spinning and weaving is lost in remote antiquity; they appear to have existed among the earliest institutions of civilized society, and to have been called into existence by the very first perception of artificial wants. According to a Greek tradition, which ought not to be wholly rejected because it is mingled with mythological fable, the first notion of weaving was derived from observation of the web of the spider; the legend declares that Minerva changed Arachne into that insect because the nymph surpassed the goddess of wisdom both in drawing fine threads from the spindle, and producing rich fabrics at