135 



Bitumen, in this fluid state, has been called by some Latin 

 writers, oleum vivum. Thus 



Vulcano condicta domus, quam subter eunti 



Stagna sedent venis oleoque mudentia vivo. GRATIUS. 



Hieronymus observes, that the lake Asphaltitis is called the 

 Dead Sea, because no animal can live in it : and if any fish, by 

 chance, come into it, they soon die, and swim on the surface *. 



Diodorus, who wrote about forty years before Christ, relates, 

 that Demetrius, after his battle with Ptolornaeus, formed his camp 

 on the Asphaltine lake, which, he observes, is highly worthy of de- 

 scription. He describes it as situated in the middle of the province 

 of Idumaea, being five hundred stadia in length, and sixty in width. 

 Its water was so bitter and fetid, that no.fish, nor any other animal,' 

 could live in it; and, although many rivers of fresh water emptied' 

 themselves into it, its strong odour was still prevalent. On the mid- 

 dle of this lake, a mass of solid bitumen arose every year ; some- 

 times more than three acres, and at other times rather less than one ( 

 acre, in extent. The barbarous inhabitants of the borders of the lake, 

 named the larger mass, The Bull, and the smaller, The Calf. As the 

 bitumen swam upon the water, it appeared to those who viewed it 

 from a distance, to resemble a kind of island. The rising of the 

 bitumen, he says, is preceded for twenty days by certain peculiar 

 signs The smell of the bitumen, with an injurious vapour, is dif- 

 fused to the distance of many stadia around the lake ; and what- 

 ever articles of gold, silver, or brass are within its influence, lose 

 their original colour ; which they however regain when all the bitu- 

 men has exhaled. A neighbouring spot, under which a subterra- 

 neous fire exists, yields a vapour which smells much more strongly, 

 and which renders the inhabitants unhealthy and short lived; anjl 

 to which, perhaps, this change of the surface of metals is more pro* 



* Bieronym. in Ezekiel, sec. xlvii. 



