salvidoras (S. persica), a tree which attains the height of twenty-five feet. The seeds are very small, and are used as mustard. The Salvidora persica grows abundantly in the neighbourhood of the Sea of Galilee.

The Hebrew name for mustard is chardel. In the Syriac version of the New Testament, the word used by the Evangelist-sinapi-is rendered khardel, the name given in the north of India to the Salvidora persica. Dr. Royle, after arguing ably in favour of this identification,

says:

Salvidora persica.

"We have in it a small seed, which, sown in cultivated ground, abounds in foliage. This being pungent, may, like the seed, have been used as a condiment, as mustard and cress is with us. The nature of the plant, however, is to become arboreous; and thus it will form a large shrub, or a tree, twenty-five feet high, under which a horseman may stand, where the soil and climate are favourable. It produces numerous branches and leaves, among which birds may and do take shelter, as well as build their nests.'

"What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them,

Fig. 181

Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say unto you, That likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance" (xv. 4-7). The charge was brought against Jesus by the Pharisees, that he "received sinners." In their hearing he proceeds to set forth the value put by God on the soul of the sinner, under the parables of the lost sheep, the lost silver, and the lost son. They are all of great beauty. The scope of the second is, that because Christ regards the sinner as his, he has devised a plan for his salvation. In bring

ing out this he came

into the world-went into the wilderness after the lost ones, found them, and brought them back to the joy in the presence of God.

One aspect of the sinner's case, as brought out in this parable, is indicated in verse 16. Sunk to the deepest and most hopeless degradation, he is willing to seek solace and strength in that which is the plainest evidence of his misery. "He would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat; and no man gave unto him." The "husks," keratia, were the pods of the kharub tree or ceratonia (C. siliqua) one of the pod-bearing (Leguminifera) family of plants. The tree is a native of Palestine, and is abundant both there and on the northern shores and islands of the Mediterranean. It is evergreen and yields pods which, from their resemblance to a horn (keras), give their name to the tree.

The husks which are still used to feed swine, were formerly much more in request for that purpose than they are now, though in Malta, in Spain, and Italy, they continue to be given to swine and cattle. In times of scarcity they are eaten even by men. The full-grown pod sometimes reaches ten inches in length, and nearly two inches in breadth. In Turkey they are given to camels, under the name Camels' bread. They are also known as Locust-beans, and as St. John's bread.

The lesson of forgiveness here (xvii.) pressed on the disciples, awoke in them a deep feeling of helplessness even as to this homely duty. To

forgive a penitent brother as often as he came confessing that in injuring them he had done wrong, demanded attainments in spiritual life far ahead of anything they could lay claim to. Thus the cry-" Lord, increase our faith." "And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard-seed, ye might say unto this sycamine-tree, Be thou plucked

up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you" (xvii. 6).

Sycamine-tree," Gr. sycaminos, one of the mulberry-trees. Some plead for the sycamore (Ficus sycomorus) as the tree referred to in this passage. Had the sycamine been identical with the sycamore, it is not the least likely that Luke would have named the former sycaminos in this verse, and yet have given another distinctive name to the latter, sycomoria, in chap. xix. 4. That he did so, indicates very clearly that he regarded them as specifically distinct. Besides, the black mulberry (Morus nigra) is to this day known in the Levant as the sycamenia. The mulberry-tree is noticed under 2 Sam. v. 23-which see.

It was customary to plant rows of sycamore trees by the road-side. Zaccheus was eagerly anxious to see Jesus in his passage from Jericho to Jerusalem. "And he ran before, and climbed up into a sycamoretree to see him: for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zaccheus, make haste, and come down; for to-day I must abide at thy house. And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully" (xix. 4-6). The tree named here was not, as some have alleged, the eastern plane-tree, but the so-called Pharaoh's fig (Ficus sycomorus), thus named from its abundance in Egypt. Its botanical place and its uses have been pointed out under 1 Kings x. 27, and Amos vii. 14. "This tree was a tree of the plain-chiefly of the plain of the seacoast-also, as we know by one celebrated instance, in the plain of

Jericho. As Jericho derived its name from the palms, so did Sycaminopolis-the modern Caipha-from the groves of sycamores, some of which still remain in its neighbourhood."-(Stanley.) "That noble tree before us, with giant arms low down and wide open, must be the Syrian sycamore. Nothing is easier than to climb into these sycamores; and, in fact, here is a score of boys and girls in this one; and as its giant arms stretch quite across the road, those in them can look directly down on any crowd passing beneath. It is admirably adapted for the purpose for which Zaccheus selected it."-(Thomson.)

"And he said, I tell thee, Peter, the cock shall not crow this day, before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me" (xxii. 34). In Mark's gospel the words are:-"Verily I say unto thee, that this day, even in this night, before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice" (xiv. 30). The times of cock-crowing were, first, near midnight; and second, a few hours later. "This day" includes the whole twentyfour hours; and Mark's statement, "in this night," has reference to that portion of the twenty-four hours associated with darkness. "Domestic cock" (Gallus Bankivus)—see Plate XXVI., fig. 2.

ST. JOHN.

THE Baptist had pointed out Jesus to his disciples as the antitype to whom the paschal feast had been pointing ever since "the night to be remembered," on which Israel came up out of Egypt-"Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world" (i. 29). Inoculative power accompanied the words. Some of them followed Jesus. One of these was Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter. So soon as his own heart was touched, he brought Peter to the Lord. Jesus himself the next day met Philip, and spake to him the influential words of life, "Follow me." "Philip was of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter" (ver. 44). "Bethsaida," or House of fish, lay on the western shore of the sea of Galilee, not far from Capernaum. There was another town of the same name in Gaulonitis on the eastern shore, distinguished as "Bethsaida Julias;" compare Mark vi. 31-53 with Luke ix. 10-17).

"Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind (to pneûmá) bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit" (iii. 7, 8). Though modern meteorological science has explained many atmospheric phenomena hitherto mysterious, it has not interfered with the deep significance of the figure used here. On the contrary, it has set this verse before us in even more interesting lights. The laws which storms follow have been determined with considerable exactness; but the meteorologist still meets innumerable instances in which premonitory symptoms are not followed by the action of these laws. But even if this science, as yet only in infancy, were to reach a point at which symptoms of changes were unfailingly followed by changes, and distinct warnings could be given of every approaching storm, these words spoken nearly two thousand years ago, would still testify to the same truth. There will still be hidden, in depths into which man cannot penetrate, the power by which the causes are controlled which lead to the wind's "coming," and which determine its "going." The chief point, indeed, in the figure is just thisthe "new birth," the regeneration of the soul in the image of God,