22 The Rev. J. Hamilton on the Punic Passage in Plautus, 



in it no epithet appropriate to Hanno's daughters, on whom his fondest affections 

 seem so strongly to have centered. In one of the following scenes, however, 

 (Act V.) where the fond father gives vent to his feelings on the recognition of his 

 children, he does so by the affectionate compellation, cupitce et expectatce, the 

 same that is addressed by an Apostle to the spiritual children from whom he had 

 been separated — " beloved, and longed for" — like that effusion also of excited 

 feeling in the song of Solomon, " O beloved." In the passage last referred to, the 

 Hebrew is dodim, with which the Punic word we are now illustrating in fact 

 agrees, except that in order to correspond grammatically with its substantive, it 

 is made rii'i dodain, " dodain benothai," my beloved daughters. 



In reference to the Libyan version we should here observe, that there are two 

 remarkable synonimes for pn, dilectus, viz. : pn, gratiosus, suavis ; (Hebrew 

 Scriptures, passim); and "^VW^, delicicB ; (Proverbs, viii. 30.,) " I was daily his 

 delight." We find, accordingly. In the corresponding part of the Libyan passage 

 these two very strong expressions of affection exempHfying those duplicates in 

 sense which we mentioned as recurring in that version. 



Byrn Arob, niK pyi Bvir'n Ar'b, " surripuit eos insidiator," he swept 

 them off- — the Her in wait. 



The next word, arob, signifies a Her in wait, and nearly corresponds with 

 prcedo, the pirate or andrapodist spoken of in the Poenulus as the author of the 

 surreptitious abduction, which nefarious object was generally effected by lying 

 in wait for the unwary victim. By one of those Hers in wait Hanno's nephew 

 has been already mentioned as being decoyed or led astray. And of one of that 

 class of persons it is that we read in the tenth Psalm, " He doth ravish or carry 

 off his victims when he draweth them into his net, he lieth in wait for that pur- 

 pose." Or, as elsewhere, " lieth in wait to catch men." As, therefore, the 

 ravishing, catching, or carrying off the children, was expressed by the preceding 

 word, -lyn, ra'puit sustulit, we are not surprised to find that word accompanied 

 by a word signifying lying in wait for them, m^ ; " surreptcB sunt, surripuit eas 

 prtedo," the man-stealer carried them off, llj^ pyn. 



That the word arob is used in Scripture in similar cases of abduction, and 

 exactly in a similar way, in reference either to the method or agent by which 

 abduction is effected, shall be shown in the following clause. 



