eet. The shaft is formed of
excellent masonry to a great depth until it reaches the rock, and at this
juncture a spring trickles perpetually. Around the mouth of the well is
a circular course of masonry, topped by a circular parapet of about a
foot high. And at a distance of ten or twelve feet are stone troughs
placed in a concentric circle with the well, the sides of which have deep
indentions made by the wear of ropes on the upper edges.

The second well, about 200 yards farther south, is not more than five
feet in diameter, but is formed of equally good masonry, and furnishes
equally good water. This is the most common size of ancient wells
throughout Palestine.

Two other wells of proportions about equal to the first well were shown
us, but they are filled to the brim with earth and stones; and Shaikh
Ayan told us of two others. The barbarous practice of filling up wells
from motives of hostility was adopted at this place very soon after
Abraham had dug them. (Gen. xxvi. 15, etc.) Who can tell how often
these have been opened, closed and opened again?

All Arab-speaking people wish to count neither more nor less than seven
wells here, and so create the name _Seba_; but even in this way the
etymology would not hold good, for the term _seven wells_ would be _Seba
Bear_, not _Beer-es-Seba_. From the Hebrew history, however, we know how
the designation was first given. Gen. xxi. 31, "Wherefore he called that
place Beersheba, because there they _sware_ both of them," _i.e._,
Abraham and Abimelech. Yet it deserves notice that the verb _to swear_
is identical with the numeral _seven_; and in the three preceding verses
we find Abraham ratifying the oath by a sacrifice of _seven_ ewe-lambs as
a public guarantee for the fulfilment of the conditions; the killing of
lambs with this view is a usage which still obtains in the country.

On a rising ground near the wells are scattered lines of houses, covering
a considerable space; but all that now appears is of inferior
construction, and of no importance.

Soon after sunrise the Arabs of the vicinity came to water their flocks
and camels at the troughs. Young men stripping themselves nearly naked,
two at each well, pulled up goat-skins of water by the same rope, hand
over hand, and singing in loud merriment, with most uncivilised screams
between the verse lines. These men were of very dark complexion--not
quite black, but nearly so.

There were linnets singing al