with iron is noticed in Acts xii. 10:-"When they were past the first and the second ward, they came unto the iron gate that leadeth unto the city." Such gates are still in use in the East :-" Vain," says Mr. Harmer, "would have been the precaution of building their walls high, unless the gates had been well secured also.

One of the means whereby they secure them now, is the plating them over with thick iron. Algiers has five gates; and some of these have two, some three, other gates within them, and some of them plated all over with thick iron. After this manner the place where St. Peter was imprisoned seems to have been secured. Some of their gates are plated over in like manner with brass." -Observations, i. 392, 393.

The gates were secured by means of locks and bars of

a massive character :--"The fish-gate did the sons of Hassenaah build, who also laid the beams thereof, and set up the doors thereof, the locks thereof, and the bars thereof" (Neh. iii. 3). A traveller describing his entrance into a monastery near Jerusalem, writes, "The passage is so low that it will scarcely admit a horse; and it is shut by a gate of iron strongly secured in the inside. As soon as we entered, it was again made fast with various bolts and bars of iron; a precaution extremely necessary, in a desert place, exposed to the incursions of the Arabs." They were always closed at night, as implied in Rev. xxi. 25:-"The gates of it shall not be shut at all by day (i. e. shall never be shut); for there shall be no night there." This is still the universal custom in oriental towns on account of the great insecurity that prevails;-"Many of the streets (of Damascus) are closed by gates, as at Cairo. These are shut every night an hour and a half after sunset." -ROBINSON'S Researches, iii. 455.

"Cairo is surrounded by a wall, the gates of which are shut at night.* . . . To the right and left of the great thoroughfares are by-streets and quarters: most of the by-streets are thoroughfares, and have a large wooden gate at each end, closed at night, and kept by a porter within, who opens to any person requiring to be admitted. The quarters mostly consist of several narrow lanes, having but one general entrance, which is also closed at night."-LANE'S Modern Egyptians, i. 25.

The gates were sometimes, if not generally double, i. e. an inner and an outer gate, with an intervening court-yard thus we read in 2 Sam. xviii. 24 :—“ And . David sat between the two gates, and the watchman went up to the roof over the gate unto (or rather at) the wall," i. e. the outer wall, whence he could get a good

* "I had procured the countersign from the Consul the evening before, in order that I might be permitted to pass the guard and gates without interruption, for Cairo is closely shut during the night. The password was 'Mamforlook.'"-Mrs. GRIFFITH,

view of the surrounding country. From the same passage we learn that the gate was surmounted by a watchtower or guard-room.

There is an account of an old castle at Tunbridge, in Kent, which may serve to explain the way in which the tower of entrance in which king David sat at Mahanaim was built.

In this castle there is a noble room over the gateway having two fine large windows. After the first gate (which is of enormous size) in the tower entrance, there is a pair of strong gates, and a few feet further another pair of strong gates, and between these two pairs of gates are two small doorways, one on each side, which lead to two rooms, one on each side of the gateway. Two more rooms are over these, and above them the grand state-room, to which they ascended by staircases leading out of the lower rooms; and from the state-room staircases lead to the leads, or open top of the building.

Now, in looking at the account given us in 2 Sam. xviii. and xix. we see the tower of entrance into Mahanaim furnished, like the castle at Tunbridge, with two pairs of gates, the one at a distance from the other, the king sitting between them, not, we may justly believe, in the passage itself, so as to block up the way, or at all incommode those who might be passing, but in a room by the side of the way. We find a watchman on the top of the tower, made, without doubt, commodious for that purpose by the staircases communicating with each other from the bottom to the top, as the English castle was flat, and covered with lead, for the purpose of descrying at a distance those who were coming, as well as wounding assailants. We find the observations made by the watchman were not communicated by him immediately to the king, but by the warder at the outer gate and that there was a communication between this lower room, in which David first sat, and the upper room over the gateway,

for by that means he retired to give vent to his sorrow. -See a paper written by Mr. KING, in the Archæologia. HARMER'S Observations, i. 416–420.

-

The gateway was of ample dimensions, and contained recesses where persons might sit, and in large towns the space between the two gates was applied to the transaction of business. Here it was that the market was held, as described in 2 Kings vii. 1:“Then Elisha said, Hear ye the word of the Lord; Thus saith the Lord, To-morrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gate of Samaria." The same custom still prevails:- 66 Frequently in the gates of cities, as at Mosul, these recesses are used as shops for the sale of wheat and barley, bread and grocery."-LAYARD's Nineveh and Babylon, p. 57, note.

Mr. Morier observes: "In our rides we usually went out of the town" (Teheran in Persia), "at the gate leading to the village of Shah Abdul Azum, where a market was held every morning, particularly of mules, asses, and camels. At about sunrise the owners of the animals assemble, and exhibit them for sale. But, besides, here were sellers of all sorts of goods in temporary shops and tents; and this, perhaps, will explain the custom alluded to in 2 Kings vii., of the sale of barley and flour in the gate of Samaria."MORIER'S Second Journey through Persia, &c., p. 189.

"We had a market in front of one of the principal gates of the town. Slaves, sheep, and bullocks, the latter in great numbers, were the principal live stock for sale. There were at least fifteen thousand persons gathered together, some of them coming from places two or three days distant. Wheat, rice, and gussub were abundant: tamarinds in the pod, ground nuts, ban beans, ochre, and indigo. Leather was in

great quantities; and the skins of the large snake, and pieces of the skin of the crocodile, used as an ornament for the scabbards of their daggers, were also

92

SITTING IN THE GATE.

brought to me for sale."-DENHAM and CLAPPERTON, Discoveries in Africa, i. 216, 217.

The gateway was also used as a court of justice. The following passages refer to this usage:" "Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there. And he took ten men of the elders of the city. And they sat down. . . . And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's " (Ruth iv. 1-3); "(The) children (of the foolish) are crushed in the gate" (Job v. 4); They shall not be ashamed, but (or rather when) they speak with the enemies in the gate" (Ps. cxxvii. 5); "Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land" (Prov. xxxi. 23); "The elders have ceased from the gate" (Lam. v. 14); "Daniel sat in the gate of the king" (Dan. ii. 49); see also Amos v. 12;

Zech. viii. 16.

66

This custom is illustrated by the following observations of a modern traveller, when visiting the fort of El-Arish. He says:-"At midday, we went to the gate, to enjoy the coolness. The arched roof affords a complete shade at all times, and often a pleasant breeze passes through. Under such a gateway, probably, Lot was seated, for coolness' sake, when the angels came to Sodom; and for the same reason, the people of old used to resort to it, and it became the market-place. We saw how the gate became the seat of judgment,* when a little after the governor appeared. His attendants having spread a mat and a carpet over it, and a cushion at each corner, he took his seat, inviting us to recline near him." -Narrative of a Mission of Inquiry to the Jews, p. 91. Lastly, the gate was the place where strangers were received, and all matters of public business were transacted: 66 Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in

It may be remarked that the gate of entrance to the now deserted Moorish palace of Alhambra in Spain is still called the gate of justice or judgment.