eoples, though usually by the poorer classes only. Of the passage
referring to locusts as part of the Baptist's food while he lived as a
recluse in the desert, Farrar (_Life of Christ_, p. 97, note,) says:
"The fancy that it means the pods of the so-called locust tree (carob)
is a mistake. Locusts are sold as articles of food in regular shops for
the purpose at Medina; they are plunged into salt boiling water, dried
in the sun, and eaten with butter, but only by the poorest beggars."
Geikie (_Life and Words of Christ_, vol. 1, pp. 354, 355) gives place to
the following as applied to the Baptist's life: "His only food was the
locusts which leaped or flew on the bare hills, and the honey of wild
bees which he found, here and there, in the clifts of the rocks, and his
only drink a draught of water from some rocky hollow. Locusts are still
the food of the poor in many parts of the East. 'All the Bedouins of
Arabia, and the inhabitants of towns in Nedj and Hedjaz, are accustomed
to eat them,' says Burckhardt. 'I have seen at Medina and Tayi, locust
shops, where they are sold by measure. In Egypt and Nubia they are eaten
only by the poorest beggars. The Arabs, in preparing them for eating,
throw them alive into boiling water, with which a good deal of salt has
been mixed, taking them out after a few minutes, and drying them in the
sun. The head, feet, and wings, are then torn off, the bodies cleansed
from the salt, and perfectly dried. They are sometimes eaten boiled in
butter, or spread on unleavened bread mixed with butter.' In Palestine,
they are eaten only by the Arabs on the extreme frontiers; elsewhere
they are looked on with disgust and loathing, and only the very poorest
use them. Tristram, however, speaks of them as 'very palatable.' 'I
found them very good,' says he, 'when eaten after the Arab fashion,
stewed with butter. They tasted somewhat like shrimps, but with less
flavour.' In the wilderness of Judea, various kinds abound at all
seasons, and spring up with a drumming sound, at every step, suddenly
spreading their bright hind wings, of scarlet, crimson, blue, yellow,
white, green, or brown, according to the species. They were 'clean,'
under the Mosaic Law, and hence could be eaten by John without offence."

Concerning the mention of wild honey as food used by John, the author
last quoted says in a continuation of the same paragraph: "The wild bees
in Palestine are far more numerous than those kept in hives, and t