INTRODUCTION. 3

field lark everywhere; the goldfinch in the gardens near
Nazareth; the red partridge and other species; the quail,
the turtle-dove, and ring-dove ; wild geese, ducks, widgeons,
snipes, and water-fowl of every description abound in some
situations. The Holy Land is at present infested with
lizards, different kinds of serpents, vipers, scorpions, and
various insects; flies of many species are extremely annoy-
ing; and ants are so numerous in some parts, that one
traveller describes the road to Jaffa, from El Arisch, as, for
three days’ journey, one continued ant-hill.”*

It would be, however, as unnecessary to look for, as im-
possible to find, even one-half of the animals named in the
Scriptures, in Palestine, or its immediate vicinity. Very
many were brought into the country either for domestic
use, or, in the case of Solomon, as objects of enlightened
curiosity, ornament, and luxury; others are expressly de-
scribed as the productions of foreign lands; and many would
be familiar to the Jews from their residence in Egypt and
their captivity in Babylon, thereby furnishing that poetical
people with the variety of similes with which their figura-
tive language so abounds, and accounting for the numerous
animals mentioned. Thus, speaking of the desolation of

* Modern Traveller—Palestine,