his wants upon himself; "he gave provender to the asses, and washed his feet, and they did eat and drink."

But these Benjamites were as bad as the Sodomites, and they came round the house, and when they could not get the man, they took his wife and abused her, till she died. This was so dreadful a crime, that all Israel rose up and fought against Gibeah, and destroyed and burned all the cities of Benjamin, and killed all the people (see Shiloh, p. 127), except six hundred who escaped. So we learn what a hospitable man would do to strangers at night:

1. He would give them lodging.

2. He would give them water for their feet.
3. He would give food to them and their beasts.
4. He would protect them from all harm.

So, you see, people not only took strangers into their houses and fed them, but they were bound to defend them with their own lives; but then, these strangers must respect the rules of the family while they were in the house. So if a heathen staid all night with a Jew, and the next day happened to be the Sabbath, he must keep the Sabbath too, by resting; for the law of God said, "in it thou shalt do no manner of work, thou and thy son, and thy daughter, thy man-servant, and thy maid-servant, thy cattle, and the stranger that is within thy gates."

There is just one more place in the Bible that we will turn to before we finish this chapter. You will, some of you, remember that on Easter Day, when some women had brought word to Jerusalem that Christ was risen from the dead, and St. Peter and St. John had been out to see, and had found his grave empty, two disciples-one called Cleopas (supposed to be the brother of St. Joseph) and the other we believe St. Luke-were walking out to Emmaus, a village on the north, or, as some say, west of Jerusalem, about seven miles off, and they were talking, as they went, of all the things that had happened during the week, and were discussing, whether it could be true that Christ was risen from the dead, a strange man joined them, and walked with them, asking what

made them so sad.

And when they told him, he spoke in favour of its being true, and quoted the prophecies of the Old Testament.

So they went on talking till they got to Emmaus, when "he made as though he would have gone farther," but they pressed him and forced him to stay the night with them, and they all sat down to eat and drink. But before

they began, the stranger took the bread in His hand, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and "blessed it, and brake, and gave to them," just as Christ did at the last supper, and their eyes were opened and they knew Him, and He vanished out of their sight (Luke xxiv. 13, 18, 30, 31). They had been entertaining, not a traveller, nor an angel, but the RISEN LORD. Rev. Canon Ridgway.

QUESTIONS.

In what did people live in Abram's time? How was a traveller housed for the night? What strangers did Abram entertain? Where? What did he give them? What three things was a man

bound to find a traveller? Who ought to find them? What reward did Abram get? For what did our Lord blame Simon? When? Who gave Him what Simon neglected to give? What did our Lord give her? Where did strangers lodge in a city? Whom did Lot entertain? What did the people of Sodom do? Why did not Lot give them up? What happened to the mob? What was done to Sodom? Give another instance of hospitality. What must a man do for a stranger? What was the stranger bound to do? What does it say of him in Commandment iv.? Who once entertained our Lord after His resurrection? Where? How did they find out who He was?

INNS.

WHEN you read of an "inn" in the Bible, you must not think it is like what we call an "inn." We mean a sort of public-house, in which people get a comfortable bed for the night, plenty to eat and drink, a cheerful fire, and a hearty welcome, and can have almost anything they like. to pay for.

I have told you how travellers used to be lodged at night when they came to a town where there was no inn. Now let us see what these inns were like. They do not call them "inns" in those countries, but they call them "khans." This is a Persian word, and it means "a night's lodging;" and " khan," "hân" and "inn are all the same word, so that you see an inn does not mean a house, but a lodging; and in very hot countries it is cooler and nicer to sleep out of doors or in a tent.

At first, as we saw in Abraham's time, people got their night's lodging in the tent of the chief of the tribe, who was bound to protect them; then, as at Sodom, in the house of the great man of the place, such as Lot was; so the khan was the best place in the town, or the safest quarter in the encampment.

But in a wild, hilly country, like Palestine, where there were few people, it would very often happen that a traveller would chance at night to be where there was neither a town nor a chief's tent. So each tribe marked off some spot, perhaps only a field, hedged in with prickly pears or rough stones, as a shelter and safeguard, by the side of a

fountain or stream, and under a shady tree (like Abraham's oak, and Deborah's palm), which was the common camping ground for wayfarers; and everybody was bound to respect it, as if it were a sacred spot. Such a one may still be seen at Kirjath-jearim.

As people became richer, and companies of merchants travelled through the country with their goods for sale (like the Ishmaelites who bought Joseph and carried him down into Egypt), it was necessary to have khans that would be secure against the attack of robbers; so strong walls were made of blocks heaped one upon another, and after getting the camels and mules through a gap, it would all be made good again without any entrance to be seen. Here the travellers and their beasts would lie down together, feeding upon the food they carried with them, and sleeping upon their baggage, covered with the rough skins or camel's-hair cloths, which served to protect their wares from the sun and dust.

It would be at such an "inn" as this that the sons of Jacob rested for the night, when one of them "opened his sack to give his ass provender," and "espied his money in his sack's mouth" (Gen. xlii. 27). And at such another, some two hundred years later, that Moses and his wife rested, when the Lord met him, and Zipporah took a sharp stone and circumcised her son (Exod. iv. 24, 25).

These inns were at length placed at regular distances along the main roads, about seven miles apart, just as the stations are now in Norway. Many were built by rich men or chiefs, and in later times by kings and princes, and there are many ruins of old khans now in Palestine which were built by Saladin.

"They had only to strengthen the walls, raise them to a proper height, make a gateway, carry the water from the fountain, by means of a pipe or a wooden spout, to a trough in the centre of the yard, raise a platform round the inner wall, and divide it into rooms for the travellers, leaving the yard in the middle for tethering the beasts, and set a man to keep guard at the gate, each traveller giving him something for his watching; and we have just such an inn' as that to which the good Samaritan is said to have taken

the man who fell among thieves on his way to Jericho (Luke xi. 31-35).

"When built by a great chief, it would have a high wall, an inner court, a range of arches, an open gallery round the four sides, and, in many cases, a tower, from which the watchman might look out (2 Kings ix. 17), and give early warning of the advance of robbers."

Such an one may now be seen at Khan Minyeh, by the Sea of Tiberias, and one stronger still on the sea-coast two hours above Tyre, and at Lebonah, near to Shiloh.

"On one side of the square, but outside the walls, there is often a huddle of sheds, set apart from the main building," or more often still, leaning against it, used as stables for the asses and camels. In the centre of the khan springs a fountain of water, the first necessity of an Arab's life, and around the jets and troughs in which the cool streams flow, lies the gay litter of the East, camels wait to be unloaded, dogs quarrel for a bone; in the archways squat the merchants with their bales of goods,-amber from the Baltic Sea, gold-work from Cairo, shawls from Indian looms, spices from Arabia Felix, precious ointments from the gardens of Moab.

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"Half-naked men are washing their hands before they sit down to meat: here a barber is at work shaving a man's