1 88 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. [CHAP.

they apply lightly to it, until the gold dust is left completely pure.
Again, when this has been collected, other artificers place it in
earthenware jars according to a fixed weight and measure, adding
in proportion to the quantity lumps of lead and salt, with a small
amount of tin, and husks of barley ; and having covered all this
in with- a closely fitting lid, and smeared it over carefully with
clay, they bake it in a furnace for five consecutive days and
nights. At the expiration of that time, when it has been left to
cool, they find no trace of the other ingredients in the vessels,
but obtain the gold pure, and but slightly diminished by waste1."
The description of mining operations which is found in one
part of the above passage corresponds in so many
in*" of its Details to the following account of the same

the Book of thing in the Book of Job, that the question arises,
whether the same place may not be referred to
in both of them.
" Surely there is a mine for silver,
And a place for gold which they refine.
Iron is taken out of the earth,
And brass is molten out of the stone. ,
Man setteth an end to darkness,
And searcheth out to the furthest bound
The stones of thick darkness and of the shadow of death.
He breaketh open a shaft away from where men sojourn ;
They are forgotten of the foot that passeth by ;
They hang afar from men, they swing to and fro.
As for the earth, out of it cometh bread :
And underneath it is turned up as it were by fire.
The stones thereof are the place of sapphires,
And it hath dust of gold.
That path no bird of prey knoweth,
Neither hath the falcon's eye seen it:
The proud beasts have not trodden it,
Nor hath the fierce lion passed thereby.
He putteth forth his hand upon the flinty rock;
He overturneth the mountains by the roots.
He cutteth out channels among the rocks;
And his eye seeth every precious thing.
He bindeth the streams that they trickle not;
And the thing that is hid bringeth he forth to light3."
1 Diodor., 3. 12—14. « Job xxviii. i— 11.