334 SCRIPTURE NATURAL HISTORY. 



PITCH. 



IN the English Bible there are two Hebrew words which are 

 rendered * Pitch ' zepheth (Ex. ii. 3, Isaiah xxxiv. 9), and chemer 

 (Gen. vi. 14); the latter of which is again rendered slime, in Gen. 

 xi. 3, and xiv. 10. They are both thought to be used for asphaltum 

 or bitumen, a brittle substance of a black or brownish color, and of 

 a consistence somewhat harder than pitch. 



The ancients were well acquainted with this substance, which is 

 nothing more than mineral tar in an indurated or hardened state. 

 It is found on the surface of volcanic productions ; and it floats in 

 solid pieces, and in considerable abundance, on the Asphaltic Lake, 

 which has thence received its name. 



It is also found near ancient Babylon, and there is reason to sup- 

 pose that the mortar so celebrated among the ancients, and with 

 which the walls of Babylon were cemented was nothing more than 

 a preparation of this substance, Gen. xi. 3. We are informed by 

 Herodotus, that a composition of heated bitumen mixed with the 

 tops of reeds, was used by the ancients as a cement. This account 

 is confirmed by modern travellers, who assert that the remains of 

 buildings have been discovered, in which bitumen was formerly 

 thus employed. It was doubtless the pitch used by Noah, for clos- 

 ing the interstices of the Ark (Gen. xi. 14) ; and by the mother of 

 MOSPS, to render the vessel in which she placed her infant son on 

 the Nile (Ex. ii. 3,) water-proof. The Arabs still^use it for similar 

 purposes. 



Josephus states that bitumen was used among the ingredients for 

 embalming the dead, 



SALT. 



THIS well-known fossil substance is several times mentioned hi 

 scripture ; and from the uses to which it was appropriated by the 

 Jewish people, it will require a notice of some length. Its Hebrew 

 name is melech, from a verb which signifies to melt, and it is well 

 known to be a body soluble by water. 



The use of salt in cleansing and preserving bodies from putrefac- 

 tion, was the occasion, no doubt, of its being prescribed to accom- 

 pany all the sacrifices offered under the Mosaic law : ' Every obla- 

 tion of thy meat-offering, shalt thou season with salt ; neither shalt 

 thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from 

 thy meat-offering : with all thine offerings thou shalt offer salt,' Lev. 

 ii. 13. 



Salt was the opposite to leaven, for it preserved from putrefac- 



