172 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XVI.- No. 399 



liat the governor's palace contained an archive chamber. For 

 aught we know, the clay tablets with which the archive chamber 

 was once stored may still lie buried under the debris which has 

 concealed the ruins of the Amorite city for so many generations 

 from the eyes and ravages of man. 



However this may be, Mr. Petrie's excavations, brief and 

 imperfect as they have necessarily been, have taught us two 

 important facts. The first of these facts is the mutability of local 

 nomenclature in the East. The recurrence of an ancient name in 

 the mouths of the modern inhabitants of Palestine by no means 

 implies that the place to which it is given is the representative of 

 an ancient locality of the same name. The utmost it can prove 

 is that the ancient site is probably to be sought in the near neigh- 

 borhood of the spot to which the name is now applied. The exist- 

 ■ence of a name like Khurbet 'Ajlan, given though it may be to a 

 ■comparatively recent site, may yet show that the Eglon of the 

 j)ast once stood somewhere in its vicinity. But it can do no more. 

 The tides of war which have swept from time to time over the 

 civilized East have displaced the older population, have reduced 

 the earlier cities of the land to "ruinous heaps,'' and have trans- 

 ferred their inhabitants to other places. When the Jews returned 

 from the Babylonian exile, they were in most cases likely to settle 

 in the open country, at a distance from the barren mounds which 

 were all that remained of the older cities. The new Eglon would 

 arise, not on the site of the more ancient one, but where the set 

 tiers would be surrounded by green pastures or cultivated fields. 

 The fact is a warning to those who would place the ancient Me- 

 giddo at Mujedda on the evidence only of a similarity of name, or 

 who would transform the "Stone" of Zoheleth into the Cliff of 

 Zehwele, in defiance of philology and geogr.apliy. 



The second fact brought to light by Mr. Petrie is, that, if we are 

 ever to leam any thing about pre-exilic Israel on the soil of Pales- 

 tine itself, it must be by the help of the spade. His excavations 

 have shown that up to now we have known nothing, or next to 

 nothing, of the archaeology of the Holy Land before the classical 

 age. They have further shown what a rich harvest, on the other 

 hand, awaits the excavator. Already the basis has been laid for 

 a scientific study of Palestinian antiquities; the sites that cover the 

 ground can now be assigned to their respective ages by means of 

 the pottery they contain ; and we can tell from a simple inspection 

 of the stones of a building whether or not it belongs to the pre-exilic 

 epoch. The future excavator will no longer set to work in the 

 dark, trusting for success to chance and luck: be will know be- 

 forehand where and how to dig, and with what rewards he is 

 likely to meet. The explorer who will devcte himself to the 

 labor, as Sir A. H. Layard devoted himself to Nineveh and Dr. 

 Schliemaun to Troy, will obtain results as marvellous and far- 

 reaching as those obtained by Layard and Schliemann. The for- 

 mer story of Palestine has not been obliterated from its soil, as 

 bas often been imagined : on the contrary, it is indelibly impressed 

 on the stone and clay which that foil still holds in its bosom. 

 We have dug up Homer and Herodotus: we shall yet dig up the 

 Bible. 



Mr. Petrie's excavations could not be continued long enough to 

 allow him to penetrate to that central core of the tel where alone 

 lie could expect to meet with inscribed stones. Apart from stone- 

 masons' marks, in the shape of early forms of Phoenician letters, 

 the only inscription he has disinterred is scratched on the fi'ag- 

 ment of a terra cotta vase. The inscription he assigns to the age 

 of Hezekiah. One of the letters composing it, however, has a 

 ■very archaic form, and it may therefore belong to an earlier pe- 

 I'iod. But, like the famous Siloam inscription, it indicates in a 

 curious way what was the ordinary writing-material employed 

 by the Jews. The "tails" of certain letters are curved, the curve 

 being represented on the refractory terra cotta by two scratches, 

 which together form an angle. It is clear from this that the 

 Hebrews must have ordinarily written on papyrus or parchment, 

 where the longer lines of the characters would naturally run into 

 curves, and not, like the Moabites, for instance, on clay, stone, or 

 metal. They were a literary rather than a monumental people. 



A seal found in Jerusalem, and belonging to Mr. Clark, has at 

 last given us a clew to the relative age of the few Jewish inscrip- 

 tions of the pre exilic period which are at present known to us. 



The inscription upon it states that it was the property of "Elisha- 

 ma', the son of the King." Now, we hear about this EHshama' 

 from the prophet Jeremiah (xli. 1), who tells us that he was of 

 "the seed royal," and the grandfather of Ishmael, the contem- 

 porary of Zedekiah. Elishama', accordingly, will have flourished 

 about B.C. 650, and we can therefore now determine what were 

 the forms taken by the letters of the Jewish alphabet at that par- 

 ticular time. Comparing them with the forms of the letters in 

 the Siloam inscription, we find that the latter must be somewhat, 

 though not greatly, older, and that consequently the general opin- 

 ion is justified which considers that the construction of the tunnel 

 commemorated by the inscription was a work of Ahaz or Heze-^ 

 kiah. A fixed point of departure has thus been obtained in He- 

 brew epigraphy. 



The excavator, then, who continues Mr. Petrie's work next 

 season will be equipped with knowledge and resources which, 

 only six months ago, were not even dreamed of. Discoveries of 

 the highest interest await him, — monuments of David and Solo- 

 mon and their successors; it may be even the clay records of the 

 Amorite priests and chieftains whom the children of Israel dis- 

 possessed. The bearing such discoveries may have upon the in- 

 terpretation and criticism of the Old Testament Scriptures, the 

 light they may tlirow upon the conquest of Canaan or the estab- 

 lishment of the Davidic monarchy, cannot even be conceived; 

 but we may feel sure that such discoveries will be achieved, if 

 only the means of achieving them are provided: and provided 

 we cannot doubt they will be, as soon as the results of Mr. Petrie's 

 preliminary campaign are made known to scholars and lovers of 

 the Bible. In wealthy England the Palestine Exploration Fund 

 cannot fail to find that money for the work will flow to it in 

 abundance. 



SUGAR AND THE SUGAR-CANE IN CUBA. 



M. TRrY, French consul at Santiago de Cuba, says, according 

 to the Journal of the Society of Arts, London, that the cultivation 

 of the sugar-cane in the eastern portion of the Island of Cuba is 

 almost entirely confined to the districts of Santiago, Guantanamo, 

 and Manzanillo. This cultivation, although it has experienced 

 some extension of late years, is not in the flourishing condition it 

 was twenty years ago. This falling-off is due to the civil war, 

 which ruined many planters and discouraged others. The profits, 

 however, realized for some time past by those planters who had 

 sufficient credit, or confidence in the future, to continue to engage 

 in this industry, have given a stimulus to the cultivation of the 

 cane. Sugar- factories have been established in many parts, par- 

 ticularly in the district of Guantanamo and Manzanillo; old sugar- 

 factories have been supplied with fresh plant; and many planters, 

 encouraged by the high prices recently realized, have hastened to 

 get their ground ready for cultivation. Part of the products of 

 the province of Santiago is shippped to Spain, and some small 

 quantity is consigned each year to Canada; but the United States 

 absorbs almost the whole of the yield of the island. The Cuba 

 market was some years ago controlled by French merchants, who 

 owned the greater part of the sugar-factories of the province; but 

 since the civil war many planters sold their estates, and retired to 

 France. A few estate?, however, are still owned by Frenchmen, 

 at Guantanamo especially. Those known as Sainte Marie, Sainte 

 Cecile, and San Antonio are directed or owned by Frenchmen, 

 All the land in the island is, in general, fit for the cultivation of 

 the cane, an even surface being generally chosen with a view to 

 facilitate the working and the harvesting. The ground should also 

 be as near the sea as possible, so as to avoid the cost of carriage 

 and transport, which is particularly high in that part of the island, 

 where it may be said there is an absence of railroads, and the car- 

 riage roads are in a deplorable condition. If the ground chosen is 

 one that has hitherto been uncultivated, the planter, first of all, 

 clears it in cutting down the branches of the trees and small shrubs 

 with the machete, and burning the larger trees The expenses of 

 these preliminary operations may be estimated at from four hun- 

 dred to five hundred dollars per plantation of thirteen hectares 

 (the hectare is equivalent to 3.47 acres). Holes are then dug at 

 inter \als of from three to four feet, and in them are placed hori- 



