ufed vulgarly by the Jews about the time of Chrift. I fhewed them when at Jerufalem to the rabbins; they were of the fame opi by the Ifraelites; for if they had been after the publication of the law, Mofes would not have permitted them to engrave images, fo immediately after he had received the fecond commandment: if they went this way, and not along the coaft, they had then no characters, that we know of, unless frequent, was phy; and to that fome of them were killed in hi nion, and thought which is eroglyphics, and there have no 72829936=9234= connexion with them. It will be not the leaft refemblance to them: Saracen characters are very unlike; befides, I fhould place them higher than the Hegira. I think it then not unprobable that they were written in the first ages of christianity, and perhaps the very firft; when, I fuppofe, pilgrimages from Jerufalem to Mount Si. nai were fashionable, confequently frequent and numerous, by the new Chriftian Jews, who believed in Chrift; therefore, I fhould believe them Hebrew characters, which is just before with a small -by chang שלב שך ישוע crofs ing the fin into fin, and ad- had had tranfports at Dzahab, or Sharme. I, for the first reafon given, did not think them written by the lfraelites, and could not conceive that they were of any great confequence. I only took thefe few as a fpecimen. Here are on other parts of this rock, fome Greek, and Arabic, as well as fome Saracen infcriptions and an Hebrew one, which is, 17 The Saracens and Arabic only fay, "fuch an one was here at fuch a time;" the fame fay the Greek ones, except one, which fays, as I remember, for I have it not with me, "The evil genius of the army wrote this," which can only prove, that fome body of Greeks was worsted here, after the characters were written, and that they attributed their defeat to fome magic power in thefe characters: as we are now fruitful in conjecture, perhaps fome gentlemen will bring Xenophon here. The characters feem to be of the very fame kind with those ftained on different parts of Mount Sinai, Meribah, &c. which my learned and accurate friend the bishop of Offory has given. I The third day from this place, travelling westward, we encamped at Sarondou, as the journal calls it; but it is Korondel, where are the bitter waters, Marah. tried if the branches of any of the trees had any effect on the waters; but found none: fo the effect mentioned in fcripture, must have been miraculous. Thefe waters at the fpring are fomewhat bitter and brackish, but as every foot they run over the fand is covered with bituminous falts, grown up by the exceffive heat of the fun, they acquire much NO faltnefs and bitterness, and very foon become not potable. This place, off which the hips caft anchor, is below the fand, which I From mentioned before, near the Birque Korondel. After nine hours and a half march we arrived and encamped at the desert of Shur, or Sour. The conftant tradition is, that the Ifraelites afcended from the fea here; this is oppofite to the plain Badeah, to which the above-mentioned_pass in the mountains lead. this place the openings in the mountains appear a great crack, and may be called a mouth, taking Hiroth for an appellative. However, I fhould rather adopt the fignification of liberty. It would hardly have been neceffary for the Ifraelites to pass the fea, if they were within two or three miles of the northern extremity of the gulf; the fpace of at moft two miles, the breadth of the golf at Suez, and at most three foot deep at low water, for it is then conftantly waded over, could not have contained fo many people, or drowned Pharaoh's army. There would have been little neceffity for his cavalry and chariots to precipitate themselves after a number of people on foot, incumbered with their wives, children, and baggage, when they could foon have overtaken them with going fo little about. These reafons, added to the fignificant names of the places, Tauriche Beni Ifrael, road of the children of Ifrael; Attacah, Deliverance, Pihahiroth, whether an appellative or fignificative; Badeah, new thing, or miracle; Bachorel Políum, fea of deftruction; convince me that the IfraK 4 elites ,'מסיף The denomination of elites entered the fea at Badeah, truly fay with Horace-Omne tulit and no where else. Befides, all punctum, &c. the rest of the coaft from Suez, and below Badeah, is steep rocks, fo there must have been another miracle for them to defcend: the current too fets from this place where we encamped, toward the oppofite fhore into the pool Birque Pharaone, Pool of Pharaoh, where, the tradition is, his hoft was drowned; a current, formeč, I fuppofe, by the falling and rush ing of one watery wall on the other, and driving it down; a current, perhaps, by God permitted to remain ever fince, in memoriam rei; the diflance to the bitter waters is about thirty miles. I omitted to mention in its place, that, between this and Korondel, we were not fo lucky as the author of the journal, who met with a charming rivulet of sweet water; we met with none, good or bad. The Ain Moufa, which the Ifraelites would have met with, if they had paffed at Suez, and the coaft from hence fouthward, about a mile to Tor, being all rock, and fteep too, induce me to believe, that they entered the fea at Badeah, and afcended from it here, and not at any other place. But I am too fenfible of my own inability to decide, and leave that to better judges than I am. I only throw out what occurs to me, from the infpection of the country, an infpection as accurate as I am capable of. If any thing I have faid can in the leaft fupport that revelation, to which I dare declare myself a friend, even in this enlightened age, I fhall be very happy; or if this trip of mine can be of any ufe whatever, as I had great pleasure in it, I may I believe, only regards the Hierapolitic branch, as the marine productions, Madrepores, &c. which form admirable forefts in the bottom of it, are not in the Elanitic branch, or the gulf; I mean the broad part below Cape Mahomet. No more than that weftern branch was known to the Ifraelites at the time of their paffage, if it was to the Egyptians: but the name defcended to the whole, as their knowledge of it. The Red Sea feems to regard the broad part alone; for though there are not the above-mentioned fea productions, yet there is fo great a quantity of the tube coral (not found in the western branch of the Hierapolitic golf) and fuch rocks, as one may fay of them, that the Gedda fhips faften themselves to them inftead of cafting anchor. It is of a deep red, fo that poffibly, the firft navigators entering at the freight of Babel Mandel, from the red they faw, called it the Red Sea, and that name defcended to the whole with their navigation. This fea is tempeftuous and full of fhoals; there is no harbour on the Arabian coaft after Tor, except one, I mean between Suez and Gidda or Mecca, which is a day and a half from Gidda. Gidda is its port; and there is only one on the other coaft, Coffire; but it is a very bad one; however, fhips fometimes go thither, and caravans cross the country to Morshout. The ships are, as the bishop of Offory has defcribed them; the helm is on the outfide, as I fuppofe with his lordship, that of St. Paul was. They They make ufe of but four fails, and no compafs, nor do they ever caft the lead. They fail only by day-light, from anchoring place to anchoring place, and are not above two days out of fight of land, from Cape Mahomet to the Arabian main: if a gale happen, they are often loft; about one in ten every year. I shall be glad to be honoured with the fociety's commands, and in communicating this you will oblige, Sir, Your most humble Servant, Pifa, Dec. 2, 1705. P. S. I am a very bad draughtfman; but I affure you the sketches contained in plate III. are rather better than the originals. They are about fix inches long, the marble is whitish, in fome places reddish, of a flesh colour; they are engraved with a pointed inftrument, for one fees in the bottom of them round marks of the point of the inftrument. I have met with much bafalto, but not one piece of that foft ftone of which is the buft at Turin, nor any of the characters upon it, except fome are found amongst these, I have neither feen any head, buft, or ftatue, in the character of that. The second rock ftruck by Mofes is, I think, 43 feet long, 16 broad, 13 high; it has two cracks, oblique ones; in them are fome mouths, like thofe of Meribah: it is of a hard ftone, not granite or marble. I have the exact dimenfions and elevation of the second stone, as well as of Meribah. Some account of the ruins of Poeftum, or Polonia, an ancient city of Magna Gracia, in the kingdom of Naples, which have been lately difcovered. Extracted from a work newly published, that contains a defcription and views of the remaining antiquities, the infcriptions that have been difcovered in or near that city, together with its ancient and modern hiftory, &c. H OW aftonishing foever it may feem, that fuch very confiderable remains of ancient magnificence should have continued totally undiscovered during fo many centuries, it is neverthelefs moft certain that the author of this book is the first traveller who has given us any account of the ruins of Poeftum. If indeed this city, like Herculaneum, had been buried under ground by an earthquake or the eruption of a volcano, its concealment would not be at all miraculous. This miracle, however, is to be accounted for from its remote fituation, in a part of Italy entirely unfrequented by travellers. The manner in which it was discovered is related by our author in the following words; In the year 1755, an apprentice to a painter at Naples, who was on a vifit to his friends at Capaccio, by accident took a walk to the mountains which surround the territory of Poeftum. The only habitation he perceived was the cottage of a farmer, who cultivated the best part of the ground, ground, and referved the reft for pifture. The ruins of the and ent city made a part of this view, and particularly ftruck the eyes of the young painter; who, approaching nearer, faw with aftonifhment, walls, towers, gates, and temples. Upon his return to Capaccio, he confulted the neighbouring people about the origin of thefe monuments of antiquity, He could only learn, that this part of the country had been uncultivated and abandoned during their memory; that about ten years before, the farmer, whofe habitation he had noticed, eftablifhed himself there; and that having dug in many places, and fearched among the ruins that lay round him, he had found treafures fufficient to enable him to purchafe the whole. At the painter's return to Naples, he informed his master of these particulars, whofe curiofity was fo greatly excited by the defcription, that he took a journey to the place, and made drawings of the principal views. Thefe were fhewn to the king of Naples, who ordered the ruins to be cleared, and Poeftum arofe from the obfcurity in which it had remained for upwards of feven hundred years, as little known to the neighbouring inhabitants as to travellers.' Our learned author, who has certainly been upon the fpot, gives the following defcription of Poeftum, in its prefent ftate. It is, fays he, of an oblong figure, about two miles and a half in circumference. It has four gates which are oppofite to each other. On and within a hippocampus. The walls which ftill remain are compofed of very large cubical ftones, and are extremely thick, in fome parts eighteen feet. That the walls have remained unto this time, is owing to the very exact manner in which the ftones are fitted to one another (a circumftance obferved univerfally in the mafonry of the antients); and perhaps in fome measure to a ftalactical concretion which has grown over them. On the walls here and there are placed towers of different heights, thofe near the gates being much higher and larger than the others, and are evidently of modern workmanfhip. He obferves that, from its fituation among marshes, bituminous and fulphurous fprings, Poeftum muft have been unwholefome; a circumftance mentioned by Strabo, morbofam eam facit fluvius in paludes diffufus. In fuch a fituation the water must have been bad. Hence the inhabitants were obliged to convey that neceffary of life from purer fprings by means of aqueducts, of which many veftiges till remain. The principal monuments of antiquity are a theatre, an amphitheatre, and three temples. The theatre and amphitheatre are much ruined. The firft temple is hexaftylos, and amphiprolylos. At one end the pilaftres and two columns which divided the cella from the pronaos are still remaining. Within the cella are two rows of imaller columns, with an architrave, which fupport the fecond order. This temple he takes to be of that kind called by Vitruvius Hyphethros, and fupports his opinion by a quotation from |