paces ; but in length they differ, the first being 160 paces, the second, 100, and the third, 220. All three are of a considerable depth, well walled and plastered, and contain a large quantity of water. About 120 paces distant is the spring which supplies them with water. The aqueduct is built on a foundation of stone, and the water runs in earthen pipes, about 10 inches in diameter, which are cased with two stones so as to fit them ; these are covered over with other, but rough 8 PRELIMINARY ESSAY. stones, well cemented together, and the whole is so sunk into the ground on the side of the hills, that in many places nothing is to be seen of it. This work did formerly extend the length of five or six leagues, and appears by the strength and contrivance of it to have been designed to last as long as the world." Maundrel, an English traveller, and consul at Aleppo, visited Judea in 1697, and published an account of his travels from which we make this further extract, concerning Solomon's Aqueduct : " At about 140 paces from Solomon's pools, is the fountain from which principally they derive their waters. This the friars believe to be that sealed fountain to which the Holy Spouse is compared, [Cant. 4, 12,] and in confirmation of this opinion, they pretend a tradition, that Solomon shut up these springs and kept the door of them sealed with his signet, to the end that he might preserve the water for his drinking in the natural freshness and purity. Nor was it difficult thus to secure them, they rising under ground, and having no avenue to them but a little hole like the mouth of a narrow well. Through this hole you descend directly down, not without some difficulty, for about four yards, and then arrive in a vaulted room fifteen paces long, by eight broad. Joining to this, is another room of the same fashion, but somewhat less. Both these rooms are covered with handsome stone arches* very ancient, and perhaps the work of Solomon himself. You find here four places at which the waters rise ; from these separate sources it is conveyed by little rivulets into a kind of basin, and from thence is carried by a large subterranean passage down into the pools. In the way, before it reaches the pools, there is an aqueduct. of brick pipes which receives part of the stream, and carries it by many turnings and windings about the mountain to Jerusalem." Again, in speaking of the environs of Bethlehem, the same traveller thus more particularly describes this aqueduct : " About two. furlongs beyond David's well, lying west of Bethlehem, are to be seen remains of an old aqueduct, which anciently conveyed the waters of Solomon's pools to Jerusalem. This is said to be the genuine work of Solomon, and may well be allowed in reality, what it purports to be. It is carried all along on the surface of the ground, and composed of stonest feet long, and — — feet thick, perforated with a cavity of inches diameter, to make a channel. These stones are let into each other with a fillet, framed round about the cavity to prevent leakage, and united to each other with so firm a cement, that they will sometimes sooner break (though of a coarse kind of marble) than endure separation. This train of stones was covered, for its greater security, with a case of marble stones laid over it in very strong mortar. The whole work seems endued with such absolute firmness, as if designed for eternity. But of this strong aqueduct, which * If this be accurate, and " stone arches," or arches of any kind really existed, then it would decide, that the construction was not by Solomon, since in the detailed descriptions of his magnificent temple, no allusion is made to arches, which undoubtedly would, if known, have been resorted to in such an edifice. — [En.] t The traveller evidently supposed the stones in which the earthen pipes were tightly enclosed, to have been the pipes themselves.— [Ec.] PRELIMINARY ESSAY. 9 was carried formerly five or six leagues, the Turks have left only here and there a frag- ment remaining."* Dr. Pococke, another English traveller, who visited the same region about half a cen- tury later, presents a nearly similar account of these works.! " We spent," says he, " another day in seeing the pools of Solomon. Descending the hills of Bethlehem to the south, we passed over a narrow valley and ascended the opposite hills, on the sides of which there is an aqueduct which conveys the water from the sealed fountain to Jerusalem. It here winds round the