though far distant from Idumea. This is true, but when we consider, as we shall do in the course of this history, that the masters of that sea were still the Edomites, who went from the one sea directly in the same voyage to the other, we shall not dispute the propriety of extending the name to part of the Indian Ocean also. As for what fanciful people *[1] have said of any redness in the sea itself, or colour in the bottom, the reader may assure himself all this is fiction, the Red Sea being in colour nothing different from the Indian, or any other Ocean.
There is greater difficulty in assigning a reason for the Hebrew name, Yam Suph; properly so called, say learned authors, from the quantity of weeds in it. But I must confess, in contradiction to this, that I never in my life, (and I have seen the whole extent of it) saw a weed of any sort in it; and, indeed, upon the slightest consideration, it will occur to any one, that a narrow gulf, under the immediate influence of monsoons, blowing from contrary points six months each year, would have too much agitation to produce such vegetables, seldom found, but in stagnant waters, and seldomer, if ever, found in salt ones. My opinion then is, that it is from the †[2] large trees, or plants of white coral, spread every where over the bottom of the Red Sea, perfectly in imitation of plants on land, that the sea has obtained this name. If not, I fairly confess I have not any other conjecture to make.
