BITUMEN. 
457 
den seel state ; solid, dry, and so friable as to be 
pulverised with the greatest ease. It is often per- 
fectly black and opaque, and smells very strong 
when it is either heated or rubbed ; in the last case 
it becomes electric. Small and very thin pieces are 
semitransparent, and when looked through appear 
of a red colour. 
The surface of the lake of Judea yields a great 
quantity of this bitumen, and from thence has ob- 
tained the name of the Lake of Asphaltes. The 
asphaltum brought by the springs of this lake is 
driven by the wind to the shore, where it hardens, 
and is collected by the neighbouring inhabitants 
for commercial purposes. From the disagreeable 
smell that this bitumen exhales, travellers have 
gone so far as to say that birds flying over the lake 
are suffocated, and that from this circumstance the 
lake with many has been called the Dead Sea. There 
is also a lake of asphaltum in the island of Trinidad 
in the West Indies, which was visited by Mr. To- 
bin in the year 1801 ; from whose account we 
learn, that the lake is situated about a mile from the 
gulf, on an eminence of from eighty to a hundred 
feet above the level of the sea. It is about a mile 
across, intersected every where by streams of pure 
clear water, which abound with small fish. In 
many places even in the centre of the lake, on the 
solid pitch, are said to be spots having the appear- 
ance of so many islands, on which grow plants and 
shrubs of various kinds. The water of the streams 
