No. 11. — 1858-9.] SCRIPTURE BOTANY OP CEYLON. 339 



We are aware that the limestone soil of Palestine is no 

 longer a land teeming with corn and fruit, but a sad scene 

 of desolation. 



But this is because its people are " scattered." Let them 

 but return to their goodly land, and use the streams for 

 purposes of Irrigation, and all the ancient fertility of the 

 land will be restored, — the Desert blossoming as the 

 Rose. 



Jonah's Gourd. 



" The Lord God prepared a gourd, and made it to come 

 up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to 

 deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad 

 of the gourd. But God prepared a worm when the morning 

 rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered." 

 (Jonah iv. 6, 7.) 



The Fathers not only pronounced excommunications 

 against those who differed from them on the subject of the 

 plant representing Jonah's Gourd, but came to actual blows 

 amongst themselves on the subject. 



It is now admitted to have been the Castor Oil plant so 

 common in Ceylon, and of such rapid growth here and every- 

 where. At Paumban, and on the Coast of India, the castor 

 oil is used as lamp oil, while in China it is said to be used 

 in cooking. 



The Castor Oil, and the Egyptian Cotton plants, were the 

 most frequent shrubs I saw growing between Alexandria 

 and Cairo. The cotton is cultivated in small patches, and at 

 every Railway Station, the castor oil plant, with its bronze- 

 colored, palmated leaves, seemed the most common plant 

 of Egypt. 



Myrtle. 



" Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and 

 instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree, and it 



