35 
L A C E R T A. 
with his mouth open ; but, noHvithftanding his being 
afleep, who will dare to harnefs him ? Who can open the 
doors of his face? his teeth are terrible round about. The head 
of this animal is oblong, and the mouth extremely large ; 
the teeth (hut one within another like the teeth of a faw. 
There have been home feen in India fo large that a tall man 
might Hand upright between their jaws. By his neefing a 
light doth lhine , and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. 
Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and [parks of fire leap out. 
Out of his nofirils goeth [moke, as out of a feething-pot or caul¬ 
dron. His breath kindlcih coals, and a fame goeth ontof hismouth. 
This poetical defeription admirably exprefles the viva¬ 
city of the crocodile’s eyes, “when he fprings out of the wa¬ 
ter, the rapidity wherewith he purfues his prey, and the ra¬ 
pacity with which he devours it. In his neck remaineth firength. 
His ftrength is principally in his neck and head. Going 
ftraight forward, he ravages every thing, and kills all be¬ 
fore him, when prefled by hunger. Flakes of hisjlejh are joined 
together ; they are firm in thevifelves ; they cannot be moved. His 
body is all nerve and mufcle; it is as it were impenetrable 
and invulnerable. His heart is as firm as a fione ; yea, as 
hard as a piece of the nether mill [lone. Thefe expreffions de- 
feribe, in a lively manner, the ftrength, courage, and intre¬ 
pidity, of the crocodile. The /word of him that (ayeth at him 
cannot hold ; thefpear, the dart, nor the habergeon. Travel¬ 
lers agree that the crocodile’s fkin is proof againft fwords, 
darts, arrows, and fire-arms; if any would pierce him, he 
mull ftrike him under the belly. He efieemeth iron as {Irazu, 
and brafs as rotten wood. The arrow cannot make him jlee ; 
Jling-fiones .are turned with him into fiubble. He maketk 'the deep 
to boil like a pot ; he maketk the fea like a pot of ointment. In the 
oriental Ityle, great rivers and lakes are called feas. There 
are crocodiles not only in the Nile, but in lakes. Thofeof the 
lake Mceris were adored in Egypt. They carefully prepared 
provifion for them; they put rich pendants in their ears, 
and bracelets on their legs. When the crocodile ftirs him- 
felf with impetuofify, or calls up water through his mouth, 
he makes the lake or river he is in to boil like a cauldron. 
The crocodile fmells likemulk; not only while he is alive, 
but his ftefit after his death retains this feent. He behold- 
etk all high things, he is a king over all the children of pride. 
Some explain this by faying, that the crocodile is the king 
of filhj but it may be better underftood of the Egyptians, 
■who are often called in feripture children of pride, or proud. 
The crocodile was their king, their god. In Hebrew the 
word king often means the god of any nation ; every one 
knows that the Egyptians worlhipped the crocodile, and 
that the crocodile was the emblem or figure of Egypt. 
The author of the book of Job has evidently taken 
great pains to draw highly-finifhed poetical pictures of 
two remarkable animals, behemoth and leviathan; whom 
lie referves to the laft in his defeription of nature, and 
with which he clofes the climax of that difeourfe which 
be puts into the mouth of the Almighty. He even inter¬ 
rupts that difeourfe, and feparates, as it were, thefe fur- 
prifing creatures from thofe which he had deferibed be¬ 
fore; and he defcants on them in fuch a manner as lhows 
the poetic animation with which he wrote. And thefe 
creatures evidently appear to be meant as companions ; to 
be referved as fellows and afi'oeiates. Under this idea, it 
is natural to inquire what were the creatures molt likely to 
be companionized and afibciated, in early ages, and in 
the countries bordering on Egypt? We hope it will now 
be admitted, that by the leviathan is meant the crocodile; 
accepting this as decided, the question is, What is behe¬ 
moth, his fellow? If any Egyptian poems, or other writ¬ 
ings, had come down to us, we might have a chance of 
meeting in them with fomething to aflift our refearches : 
but of thefe we are totally deftitute. The editor of the new 
edition of Calmet’s Dictionary has, however, by means of 
fome Egyptian reprefentations, pretty clearly decided this 
queftion ; and has confirmed our opinion, (fee vol. ix. p. 
193.) that the hippopotamus is the animal in queftion. 
Upon infpeding the great work publiflied under the au¬ 
thority of the king of Naples, containing prints from the 
antiquities found at Herculaneum, that gentleman difeo- 
vered, among other Egyptian fubjeds, fome reprefentations 
wherein thefe two animals are grouped together. Thofe 
which he feleded we have taken the liberty to copy into 
the annexed Plate II. Fig. j reprefents, at the bottom,.a 
large crocodile, with his mouth open as if yelling; on his 
back is a pygmy, bolding, in each hand, crofted reeds; a 
little higher is a duck floating on the water; and above, 
are two hippopotami, among reeds, (Job. xl. 21.) each with 
his mouth open, as if bellowing; the lower one, feems alfo 
to be moving its tail; (ver. 17.) The rell of the water is 
adorned with flowers, &c. Fig. 2 is an extrad from that 
famous piece of antiquity commonly called the Preneftine 
Pavement: it is mufaic, (or coloured Hones,) and was 
formerly part of the pavement of the Temple of Fortune 
at Preneftum. The portion here copied is that which 
fliovvs the aflbeiation of the crocodile and the hippopo¬ 
tamus; having at the bottom two crocodiles fprawling 
about in the mud of a kind of ifiand ; and above three 
hippopotami, of which one is juft lifting up his head 
above the water, to flare at thofe who are engaged in hunt¬ 
ing them ; a fecond has two (hafts (luck into his (boul¬ 
ders, of which he feems to complain ; the third has re¬ 
ceived a (haft in his hip, of which he feems to take no 
notice, but to feed on in full fecurity. The veffei, and 
the perfons in it, alfo deferve infpedion. 
We might quote, as another inllance of this aflbeiation 
of the hippopotamus and the crocodile, the famous ftatue 
of the Nile, with the fixteen children about him, (allud¬ 
ing to his waters rifing to fixteen cubits;) the bafe of 
which ftatue is ornamented with a number of thefe ani¬ 
mals all around it (fixteen or feventeen), in various atti¬ 
tudes, with reeds, &c. and pygmies in boats, &c. Thefe 
inilances are clear and decided ; there are others not fo 
clear; as in the famous Ifiac table ; the hippopotamus is 
among the reeds; but the crocodile is not fo clofely con¬ 
nected with him as in the foregoing inltances. After 
thefe authorities, we may venture to conclude, that it was 
not only not uncommon, but that it really was the cufto- 
mary manner of thinking, and confequently of (peaking, in 
ancient times, and efpecially in the countries where they 
were native, to couple the hippopotamus with the croco¬ 
dile, as the two moll wonderful of creatures. I may add, 
that, being well known in Egypt, and being, in fome de¬ 
gree, objects of Egyptian pride, they could not efcape the 
notice of any curious naturalift, or writer of natural hif- 
tory ; fo that, to fuppofe they were omitted in this part 
of the book of Job, would be to fuppofe a blemifti in it : 
and, if they are inferted, no other defeription can be that 
of the crocodile and hippopotamus. 
The pygmy on the back of the crocodile, at fig. 1, is 
a cuftomary mode of depiding the inhabitants of Ethio¬ 
pia, and thofe around the head of the Nile, i. e. Upper 
Egypt and farther l'outh. The pygmies are well known 
to the readers of claflic authors; but we recoiled no allu- 
fion to them in feripture, unlefs in Ifaiah xviii. 1, 2. 
Woe to the land which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia ; that 
fendeth ambaffadors to the fea , even in vrjfids of bulrufhes upon 
the waters. See the article Pygmy. 
It lhould be remembered that thefe fubjeds from Her¬ 
culaneum were the common ornaments of common 
houfes. Fig. 1 formed part of the wall of a (hop, fituated 
near the gate of the city of Pompeii. , The merit of the 
figures, therefore, as inltances of art, is by no means c*on- 
fiderable; but their commonnefs, as feems to he a fair in¬ 
ference from their being found in fuch fituations, deferves 
notice in fupport of the generally-underllood aflbeiation 
of thefe animals in Egypt. 
It remains to mention two other varieties of the common 
crocodile. / 3 . The African Crocodile, has the fnout much 
(horter than the head, and the neck fmootb, that is, free 
from the ridged or carinated feales which appear on the 
neck of the common crocodile. 
The 
