WORD "CHEMIA^^ OR *^' CHEMISTRY." 117 



people that I suppose it is not to be neglected. If the 

 land was not black, I was inclined to say that the people 

 were black and had gradually been driven out. But it 

 may be too far to go back. The land must have differed 

 in early times. There cannot be metallurgy without heat; 

 and for that we must have fuel. Have Egypt and Midian 

 made a desert of themselves in part and of much of their 

 surroundings by burning up their forests ? Civilization of 

 a high character without fuel is impossible in any country 

 known to us. Want of wood has made much of the ancient 

 world desolate, and keeps it so now ; and the world has 

 much to thank the Germans for in teaching the cultivation 

 of forests. Without this care Germany would have had 

 no position as a great power. 



In Egypt wood, and therefore fires, must have been a 

 scarce thing for ages ; people have lived on uncooked 

 food ; civilization has been essentially stagnant for want 

 of fuel. There is no wonder that an idea arose that 

 heat could do any thing. Did it not warm the earth which 

 even the Nile could not make fertile alone ? and did it not 

 bring gold and silver, iron and brass out of stones ? It 

 turned rosin into strange oils ; and it brought strange 

 liquids, essences, and medicines with wonderful virtue out 

 of vegetation. Wonderful drinks were prepared ; and are 

 we to be astonished if one of them was also connected with 

 Kemi, that appeared to renew man's life and make him 

 stronger and Aviser ? We have seen that Hama became (in 

 an apparently wonderful philological manner, however 

 simple when explained) a relative to Soma and Summer and 

 the Sun which warms up all nature ; and it is fair to go to 

 Old Indian words to seek for new analogies. There is the 

 liquid Soma, which is '' pressed out of the Asclepias acida, 

 making an intoxicating drink, used by the gods to 

 strengthen them in their fight with demons " (see ' Indo- 



