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No. 175.-lviii. 6. Break their teeth.] This clause of the verse is understood as a continuation of the foregoing verse, and to be interpreted of the method made use of to tame serpents, which, Chardin says, is by breaking out their teeth. Music has a wonderful influence upon them. Adders will swell at the sound of a flute, raising themselves up on the one half of their body, turning themselves about, and beating proper time. (Harmer, vol. ii. p. 223.) Teixeira, a Spanish writer, in the first book of his Persian History, says, that in India he had often seen the Gentiles leading about the enchanted serpents, making them dance to the sound of a flute, twining them about their necks, and handling them without any harm. (See also PICART's Ceremonies and Religious Customs of all Nations, vol. iii. p. 268. note. Niebuhr, vol. i. p. 152.)

No. 176.-lix. 14. Dog.] Though dogs are not suffered in the houses in the East, and people are very careful to avoid them, lest they should be polluted by touching them, there are great numbers of them in their streets. They do not belong to particular persons, nor are they fed regularly, but get their food as they can. It is considered right however to take some care of them: and charitable people frequently give money to butchers and bakers to feed them, and some leave legacies at their deaths for the same purpose. (Le Bruyn, tom. i. p. 361.) Dogs seem to have been looked upon among the Jews in a disagreeable light, (1 Sam. xvii. 43. 2 Kings viii. 13.) yet they had them in considerable numbers in their cities. They were not shut up in their houses or courts, but seem to have been forced to seek their food where they could find it. (Psalm lix. 6, 14, 15.) Some care of them seems to be indirectly enjoined upon the Jews, Exod, xxii. 31. HARMER, vol. i. p. 220.

No. 177.-lxix. 9. The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.] PEYSONNEL, in his Remarks on BARON Du TOTT (p. 45.) describes a custom which probably is alluded to by the Psalmist. "Those who are aggrieved stand before the gate of the seraglio; each carries on his head a kind of match, or wick, lighted and smoking, which is considered as the allegorical emblem of the fire that consumes his soul." The LXX. acquainted with this practice, have given a version of the passage more bold than our own, and more agreeable to the He brew. The zeal of thine house hath MELTED me-i. e, consumed me by fire.

No. 178.-lxxii. 10. The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents.] Presents were sometimes made as an acknowledgment of inferiority and subjection, They were a kind of tribute from those who made to those who received them: in this light we are doubtless to understand those spoken of in this verse.

HARMER, Vol, ii, p. 20.

No. 179.-lxxv. 4, 5. Lift not up your horn on high, speak not with a stiff neck.] This passage will receive some illustration from Bruce's remarks in his Travels to discover the Source of the Nile, where, speaking of the head-dress of the governors of the provinces of Abyssinią, he represents it as consisting of a large broad fillet bound upon their forehead, and tied behind their head. In the middle of this was a horn, or a conical piece of silver, gilt, about four inches long, much in the shape of our common candle extinguishers. This is called kirn, or horn, and is only worn in reviews, or parades after victory. The crooked manner in which they hold the neck, when this ornament is on their forehead, for fear it should fall forward, seems to agree with what the Psalmist calls, speaking with a stiff neck, for it perfectly

shews the meaning of speaking with a stiff neck, when you hold the horn on high, or erect, like the horn of a unicorn. See also Psalm xcii. 10.

No. 180. lxxxiv. 7. They go from strength to strength.] The scarcity of water in the East makes travellers particularly careful to take up their lodgings as much as possible near some river or fountain. D'Herbelot informs us, that the Mohammedans have dug wells in the deserts, for the accommodation of those who go in pilgrimage to Mecca. (p. 396.) To conveniences perhaps of this kind, made, or renewed, by the devout Israelites in the valley of Baca, to facilitate their going up to Jerusalem, the Psalmist may refer in these words. Hence also there appears less of accident than we commonly think of, in Jacob's lodging on the banks of Jabbok, (Gen. xxxii. 22.) and the men of David's waiting for him by the brook Besor, (1 Sam. xxx. 21.) when they could not hold out with him in his march.

HARMER, vol. i. p. 421.

No. 181.-xc. 4. As a watch in the night.] " 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 given notice of. In the Indies, the parts of the night are made known, as well by instruments (of music) as by the rounds of the watchmen, who with cries, and small drums give them notice that a fourth part of the night is passed. Now as these cries awakened those that had slept all that quarter part of the night, it appeared to them but as a moment." (Chardin.) It is apparent the ancient Jews knew how the night passed away, though we cannot determine by what means the information was communicated to them.

No. 182.-xcii. 10. My horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of an unicorn; I shall be anointed with fresh oil.] Mr. BRUCE, after having given it as his opinion, that the reem of scripture is the rhinoceros, says, "the derivation of this word, both in the Hebrew and in the Ethiopic, seems to be from erectness, or standing straight. This is certainly no particular quality in the animal itself, wnich is not more, or even so much erect as many other quadrupeds, for in its knees it is rather crooked; but it is from the circumstance and manner in which his horn is placed. The horns of other animals are inclined to some degree of parallelism with the nose or os frontis. The horn of the rhinoceros alone is erect and perpendicular to this bone, on which it stands at right angles, thereby possessing a greater purchase, or power, as a lever, than any horn could possibly have in any other position.

"This situation of the horn is very happily alluded to in the sacred writings: my horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of an unicorn; and the horn here alluded to is not wholly figurative, as I have already taken notice in the course of my history, but was really an ornament worn by great men in the days of victory, preferment, or rejoicing, when they were anointed with new, sweet, or fresh oil, a circumstance which David joins with that of erecting the horn." (Travels, vol. v. p. 88.)

No. 183.-cii. 26. As a vesture shalt thou change them.] A frequent change of garments is very common in the East; and that, both to shew respect and to display magnificence. Thevenot tells us (part i. p. 86.) that when he saw the grand seignior go to the new mosque, he was clad in a satin doliman of a flesh colour, and a vest nearly similar; but when he had said his prayers there, he changed his vest, and put on one of a particular kind

of green. To this frequent change of vestments amongst the great, the Psalmist may allude in these words.

HARMER, vol. ii. p. 117.

No. 184. civ. 2. Who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain.] It is usual in the summer season, and upon all occasions when a large company is to be received, to have the court of the house (which is the middle of an open square) sheltered from the heat of the weather by an umbrella or veil, which, being expanded upon ropes from one side of the parapet-wall to the other, may be folded or unfolded at pleasure. The Psalmist seems to allude to some covering of this kind in that beautiful expression of stretching out the heavens like a curtain. SHAW's Travels, p. 274.

No. 185.-cxix. 83. I am become like a bottle in the smoke.] Cups and drinking vessels of gold and silver were doubtless used in the courts of princes. (1 Kings x. 21.) But in the Arab tents leathern bottles as well as pitchers were used. These of course were smoky habitations. To this latter circumstance, and the contrast between the drinking utensils, the Psalmist alludes: "My appearance in my present state is as different from what it was when I dwelt at court, as the furniture of a palace differs from that of a poor Arab's tent." HARMER, vol. i. p. 131.

No. 186. cxxiii. 2. As the eyes of servants look unto the hands of their masters.] The servants or slaves in the East attend their masters or mistresses with the profoundest respect. MAUNDRELL (Journey at March,p.13.) observes, that the servants in Turkey stand round their master and his guests with the profoundest respect, silence, and order imaginable. Pococke says, that at a visit in Egypt, every thing is done with the greatest