Story of the Bible Animals. John George Wood

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СКАЧАТЬ is an exceedingly prolific animal, each pair producing on an average twenty-five young in the course of a year. The families are unsociable, and, as soon as they are strong enough to feed themselves, the young Hamsters leave their home, and make separate burrows for themselves. Thus we see that the Hamster, as well as the Field-mouse, fulfils the conditions which are needed in order to class it under the general title of Akbar.

      I have already stated that some translators of the Bible use the word Jerboa as a rendering of the Hebrew Akbar. As the Jerboa certainly is found in Palestine, there is some foundation for this idea, and we may safely conjecture that it also is one of the smaller rodents which are grouped together under the appellation of Mouse.

      The Common Jerboa (Dipus Ægyptiacus) is plentiful in Palestine, and several other species inhabit the same country, known at once by their long and slender legs, which give them so curious a resemblance to the kangaroos of Australia. The Jerboas pass over the ground with astonishing rapidity. Instead of creeping stealthily among the grass-blades, like the short-limbed field-mouse, the Jerboa flies along with a succession of wonderful leaps, darting here and there with such rapidity that the eye can scarcely follow its wayward movements. When quiet and undisturbed, it hops along gently enough, but as soon as it takes alarm, it darts off in its peculiar manner, which is to the ordinary walk of quadrupeds what the devious course of a frightened snipe is to the steady flight of birds in general.

      It prefers hot and dry situations, its feet being defended by a thick coating of stiff hairs, which serve the double purpose of protecting it from the heat, and giving it a firm hold on the ground. It is rather a destructive animal, its sharp and powerful teeth enabling it to bite its way through obstacles which would effectually stop an ordinary Mouse. That the Jerboa may be one of the Akbarim is rendered likely by the prohibition in Lev. xi. 29, forbidding the Mouse to be eaten. It would be scarcely probable that such a command need have been issued against eating the common Mouse, whereas the Jerboa, a much larger and palatable animal, is always eaten by the Arabs. The Hamster is at the present day eaten in Northern Syria.

      Beside these creatures there are the Dormice, several species of which animal inhabit Palestine at the present day. There are also the Sand-rats, one species of which is larger than our ordinary rats. The Sand-rats live more in the deserts than the cultivated lands, making their burrows at the foot of hills, and among the roots of bushes.

      THE HARE

      The prohibitions of the Mosaic law—The chewing of the cud, and division of the hoof—Identity of the Hare of Scripture—Rumination described—The Hare a rodent and not a ruminant—Cowper and his Hares—Structure of the rodent tooth—The Mosaic law accommodated to its recipients—The Hares of Palestine and their habits.

      Among the many provisions of the Mosaic law are several which refer to the diet of the Israelites, and which prohibit certain kinds of food. Special stress is laid upon the flesh of animals, and the list of those which may be lawfully eaten is a singularly restricted one, all being excluded except those which "divide the hoof and chew the cud." And, lest there should be any mistake about the matter, examples are given both of those animals which may and those which may not be eaten.

      The ox, sheep, goat, and antelopes generally are permitted as lawful food, because they fulfil both conditions; whereas there is a special prohibition of the swine, because it divides the hoof but does not chew the cud, and of the camel, coney, and hare because they chew the cud, but do not divide the hoof. Our business at present is with the last of these animals.

      Considerable discussion has been raised concerning this animal, because, as is well known to naturalists, the Hare is not one of the ruminant animals, but belongs to the same order as the rat, rabbit, beaver, and other rodents. Neither its teeth nor its stomach are constructed for the purpose of enabling it to ruminate, i.e. to return into the mouth the partially-digested food, and then to masticate it afresh; and therefore it has been thought that either there is some mistake in the sacred narrative or that the Hebrew word has been mistranslated.

      THE SYRIAN HARE.

      Taking the latter point first, as being the simplest of the two, we find that the Hebrew word which is rendered as Hare is Arnebeth, and that it is rendered in the Septuagint as Dasypus, or the Hare,—a rendering which the Jewish Bible adopts. That the Arnebeth is really the Hare may also be conjectured from the fact that the Arabic name for that animal is Arneb. In consequence of the rather wide sense to which the Greek word Dasypus (i.e. hairy-foot) is used, some commentators have suggested that the rabbit may have been included in the same title. This, however, is not at all likely, inasmuch as the Hare is very plentiful in Palestine, and the rabbit is believed not to be indigenous to that part of the world. And, even if the two animals had been classed under the same title, the physiological difficulty would not be removed.

      Before proceeding further, it will be as well to give a brief description of the curious act called rumination, or "chewing the cud."

      There are certain animals, such as the oxen, antelopes, deer, sheep, goats, camels, &c. which have teeth unfitted for the rapid mastication of food, and which therefore are supplied with a remarkable apparatus by which the food can be returned into the mouth when the animal has leisure, and be re-masticated before it passes into the true digestive organs.

      For this purpose they are furnished with four stomachs, which are arranged in the following order. First comes the paunch or "rumen" (whence the word "ruminating"), into which passes the food in a very rough state, just as it is torn, rather than bitten, from the herbage, and which is analogous to the crop in birds. It thence passes into the second stomach, or "honeycomb," the walls of which are covered with small angular cells. Into those cells the food is received from the first stomach, and compressed into little balls, which can be voluntarily returned into the mouth for mastication.

      After the second mastication has been completed, the food passes at once into the third stomach, and thence into the fourth, which is the true digesting cavity. By a peculiar structure of these organs, the animal is able to convey its food either into the first or third stomach, at will, i.e. into the first when the grass is eaten, and into the third after rumination. Thus it will be seen that an animal which chews the cud must have teeth of a certain character, and be possessed of the fourfold stomach which has just been described.

      Two points are conceded which seem to be utterly irreconcilable with each other. The first is that the Mosaic law distinctly states that the Hare chews the cud; the second is that in point of fact the Hare is not, and cannot be, a ruminating animal, possessing neither the teeth nor the digestive organs which are indispensable for that process. Yet, totally opposed as these statements appear to be, they are in fact, not so irreconcilable as they seem.

      A TIMID GROUP.

      Why the flesh of certain animals was prohibited, we do not at the present time know. That the flesh of swine should be forbidden food is likely enough, considering the effects which the habitual eating of swine's flesh is said to produce in hot countries. But it does seem very strange that the Israelites should have been forbidden to eat the flesh of the camel, the coney (or hyrax), and the Hare, and that these animals should have been specified is a proof that the eating or refraining from their flesh was not a mere sanitary regulation, but was a matter of importance. The flesh of all these three animals is quite as good and nutritious as that of the oxen, or goats, which are eaten in Palestine, and that of the Hare is far superior to them. Therefore, the people of Israel, who were always apt to take liberties with the restrictive laws, and were crafty enough to evade them on so many occasions, would have been likely to pronounce that the flesh of the Hare was lawful meat, because the animal chewed the cud, or appeared to do so, and they would discreetly have omitted the passage which alluded to the СКАЧАТЬ