pears that the metal was still
used alone, being beaten fine and then rounded. This art the Hebrews
probably learnt from the Egyptians, by whom it was carried to such an
astonishing degree of nicety, that they could either weave it in or
work it on their finest linen. And doubtless the productions of the
Hebrews now must have equalled the most costly and intricate of those
of Egypt. This the adornments of the Tabernacle testify.

FOOTNOTE:

[4] Persia had great wardrobes, where there were always many hundred
habits, sorted, ready for presents, and the intendant of the wardrobe
sent them to those persons for whom they were designed by the
sovereign; more than forty tailors were always employed in this
service. In Turkey they do not attend so much to the richness as to
the number of the dresses, giving more or fewer according to the
dignity of the persons to whom they are presented, or the marks of
favour the prince would confer on his guests.

CHAPTER III.

NEEDLEWORK OF THE TABERNACLE.

"The cedars wave on Lebanon,
But Judah's statelier maids are gone."

Byron.

Gorgeous and magnificent must have been the spectacle presented by
that ancient multitude of Israel, as they tabernacled in the
wilderness of Sinai. These steril solitudes are now seldom trodden by
the foot of man, and the adventurous traveller who toils up their
rugged steeps can scarce picture to himself a host sojourning there,
so wild, so barren is the place, so fearful are the precipices, so
dismal the ravines. On the spot where "Moses talked with God" the grey
and mouldering remnants of a convent attest the religious veneration
and zeal of some of whom these ruins are the only memorial; and near
them is a small chapel dedicated to the Virgin, while religious hands
have crowned even the summit of the steep ascent by "a house of
prayer;" and at the foot of the sister peak, Horeb, is an ancient
Greek convent, founded by the Emperor Justinian 1400 years ago, which
is occupied still by some harmless recluses, the monotony of whose
lives is only broken by the few and far between visits of the
adventurous traveller, or the more frequent and startling
interruptions of the wild Arabs on their predatory expeditions.

But neither church nor temple of any sort, nor inquiring traveller,
nor prowling Arab, varied the tremendous grandeur of the scene, when
the Israelitish host encamped there. Weary and toilsome had been