their own, and were divided into three tribes. They were so odious to the Mohammedans for their predatory attacks upon the caravans, that in Syria the greatest affront that could be offered to a man was to call him Beni Kheibar. It did not appear that these Jews kept up any intercourse with their brethren dispersed over Asia. "When I asked the Jews in Syria concerning them," says Niebuhr, "they told me that those false brethren durst not claim their fellowship, for that they did not observe the law." This is certainly in favour of their claim to be Rechabites; and might go to suggest that they did not follow the law, according to its Talmudical interpretation. Niebuhr finds evidence that "this branch of the Jews must have subsisted for more than twelve (now thirteen) centuries." Beyond that the trace is lost. More recently Dr. Wolff, the Jewish Missionary, heard much of these people. "The Jews, not only of Jerusalem, but likewise those of Yemen, told me that the Rechabites, mentioned in Jeremiah xxxv., were still existing around Mecca. The Mussulmans who performed their pilgrimage to Mecca confirmed that account: the latter knew them by the name of Khaibaree.' This identifies them with those of whom Niebuhr speaks. At "Jalooha," in Mesopotamia, one was pointed out to him as belonging to this people. "I saw one before me standing, dressed and wild like an Arab, the bridle of his horse holding in his hand. I showed him the Bible in Hebrew and Arabic; he read both languages, and was rejoiced to see the Bible: he was not acquainted with the New Testament. After having proclaimed to him the tidings of salvation, and made him a present of the Hebrew and Arabic Bibles and Testaments, I asked him, "Whose descendant are you?" Mousa. (This was his name.) With a loud voice, "Come, I show to you;" and then he began to read Jeremiah xxxv., from verse 5 to 11. "At Hadoram, now Wolff. "Where do you reside?" Mousa. (Recurring to Genesis x. 27.) called Samar by the Arabs, at Usal, now called Sanaa by the Arabs, and” (Genesis x. 30) "at Mesha, now called Mecca, in the deserts around those places. We drink no wine, and plant no vineyard, and sow no seed, and live in tents, as Jonadab our father commanded us. Hobab was our father too. Come to us: you will still find sixty thousand in number; and you see thus the prophecy has been fulfilled. Therefore thus saith the Lord, 'Jonadab, the son of Rechab, shall not want a man to stand before Me for ever.'" And saying this, Mousa the Rechabite mounted his horse, and fled away, and left behind him a host of evidence of sacred writ. Previously, in the very quarter where Rabbi Benjamin got his information, Wolff writes in his journal: "All the Jews of this country believe that the Beni Khaibr, near Mecca and Medinah, are the descendants of the ancient Rechabites." Subsequently he met, at Ispahan, in Persia, with a Jew from Yemen; and when Wolff asked him, "Do you know the Jews Khaibr?" he replied, "You mean the children of Rechab? They are mighty men, and have not felt the yoke of captivity," (and then he joyfully lifted up his fingers, and moved them about,) and said, "They are the descendants of Jonadab the son of Rechab, who said," &c. "And thus they do: the children of Ishmael curse them, and we bless them." Lately some further information respecting this interesting people has been furnished by Rabbi Joseph Schwartz, in his "Descriptive Geography and Brief Historical Sketch of Palestine," published at Philadelphia in 1850. After showing that the Rechabites were descendants of Heber the Kenite, and more remotely from Jethro; and producing evidence from the Rabbinical writings, that they eventually settled in Yemen, a long statement ensues, of which the following is an abstract : “There are many traces of them at present: they live entirely isolated, will not be recognised, and shun, or rather hate, all intercourse, and every connection with the other Jews. They only sojourn in Arabia, and for the most part on the western shores of the Red Sea, and are engaged solely in the raising of cattle. In the vicinity of Junbua, a seaport on the eastern shores of the Red Sea, they are found at times labouring as smiths, and have commercial connections with other Arabic tribes; that is, they barter with them. They are called Arab Sebh, (that is, Arabs who keep the seventh day,) are generally esteemed and feared; so that they form, so to say, a gigantic people, whose power and greatness excite fear. They only speak Hebrew and Arabic, and will form no connection or acquaintance with the Jews; and should they be recognised as Jews, or if one should enter into conversation with them on the subject, they will quickly deny their origin, and assert that they are but of common Arabic descent. They will not touch another Arab, much less will they eat anything with him, even those things which are permitted to Jews; and they always stay at some distance from the other Arabs, should their barter-trade at times bring them together, so as not to come into any mediate or immediate contact. They always appear on horseback, and armed; and people assert that they have noticed the fringes, commanded in Scripture, on their covering and clothes. They are occasionally seen in Palestine, but very seldom, and then, as it were, in secresy and unrecognised. Some even say that several have been met with in Jerusalem, but never make themselves known, although the reason of this singular silence, and the anxious desire to escape detection, has remained hitherto a profound secret. At the same time it is clearly ascertained that they are Jews in every sense of the word, live according to the Jewish laws, and also possess some knowledge of the learned Rabbis who flourished in the early ages of the Christian era." An anecdote in proof of this last point, is given; and the fact shows that they must have been at some time subject to Rabbinical teaching. The result of the whole seems to be, that this people is known to the Arabs only as Jews,-whence also the report of travellers who derived their accounts from Arabian information. But those who derive their information from Jewish sources recognise them as Rechabites, which they claim to be themselves, and are unwilling to be taken for Jews in their own country, resting more upon the rights of their Arabian descent than upon the degree in which they have adopted the Jewish religion,-while proud of the testimony which the monuments of that religion bear to their history and their faithfulness. From these particulars, which we have been at some pains to bring together, it is not difficult to perceive the real position of this people; and we see that the greater exactness of modern inquiry has strengthened the probability contained in Rabbi Benjamin's first information concerning them,—that in this people we find the ancient Rechabites. Still, the evidence must be taken for what it is worth; and it must be borne in mind, that the fact that the Rechabites maintain at this day a descent recognisable by others, or even by themselves, is by no means necessary to the corroboration of Jeremiah's prophecy. Although the family should not be at this day known, our ignorance is no evidence that it does not exist. A genealogical series may perish from the knowledge of men, but not from the nature of things, and from the knowledge of God. Though the seeds of wheat, barley, and other things may be mixed together, so that men cannot distinguish them, yet their distinction has not perished; and God not only knows it, but also discovers it, when He makes every seed to rise in its own body.-Kitto. THE PEACE OF PERVERTS. I AM fully persuaded, that if they who speak strongly and with sincerity of the peace they have experienced in the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church, had but sought it with equal earnestness, and with freedom from all prejudice and of every undue bias of inclination, in the closer study of the Scriptures, in the more simple and hearty appropriation of the privileges of the Gospel to their own hearts, and in the more cheerful practice of its duties; they would have been much happier, and unspeakably more secure, than they are, or can be, in their present alliance with a Church doomed by the unerring verdict of Heaven to final and utter destruction. May all who have gone astray to the right hand and to the left, in search of happiness, now hear a voice behind them, recalling them into the path of life and peace, and saying, "This is the way, walk ye in it.”—Christian Observer. POETRY. TO A SKULL. STRANGE mimicry of life, sad silent preacher Of Death's existence. Speak, if I perchance Death's hand Hath froze thine eyeless casements; and his touch So, too, Must these eyes perish, that drink in the gold Sacred doorways, Why desolate thus? Hath the same hand unhinged Of those enshrined recesses where Thought enter'd, Shatter'd jaws, What mimicry is this? Is death thus frightful? O, I would love to watch the once-warm lips, And hear the precious music that distill'd Of holy feeling from a hidden shrine, Where every thought was prayer, and each expression A rapturous adoration. But the music |