Chap. 16.] ACCOUNT OF COTJNTRIES, ETC. 431 people that live apart from the world, and marvellous beyond all others tlirougliout the whole earth, for they have no women among them ; to sexual desire they are strangers ; money they have none ; the palm-trees are their only companions. Day after day, however, their numbers are fully recruited by multitudes of strangers that resort to them, driven thither to adopt their usages by the tempests of fortune, and wearied with the miseries of life. Thus it is, that through thousands of ages, incredible to relate, this people eternally prolongs its existence, without a single birth takmg place there ; so fruitful a source of population to it is that weariness of life which is felt by others. Below this people was for- merly the town of Engadda second only to Hierosolyma in the fertility of its soil and its groves of palm-trees ; now, like it, it is another heap of ashes. 'Next to it we come to Masada-, a fortress on a rock, not far from Lake Asphaltites. Thus much concerning Judaea. CHAP. 16. (18.) — DECAPOLIS. On the side of Syria, joining up to Judrea, is the region of Decapolis^, so called from the number of its cities ; as to which all writers are not agreed. Most of them, however, agree in speaking of Damascus'* as one, a place fertilized tained the same doctrines ; but the latter were distinguished bv a more rigid mode of hfe. It has been suggested by Taylor, the editor of ' Cabnet's Dictionary of the ]3ibk^,' that John the Baptist belonged to this sect. ^ Or Engedi. Its ancient name was ITazozon-Tamar, when it was inhabited by the Amorites. See Gen. xiv. 7 ; 2 Clu'on. xx. 2. Accord- ing to Josephus, it gave name to one of the fifteen toparchies of Judtea. It still retains its name, Ain-Jedey, or " Fountain of the Goats," and was so called from a spring which issued out of the limestone rock at tho base of a lofty clilT. ^ Its site is now known as Scbbch, on the south-west of the Dead Sea. 3 Af/cct TToXets, the "Ten Cities." lie alludes to the circumstance, that the number of cities varied from time to time in tliis district; one being destroyed in warfare, and others suddenly rising from its foundation. ^ The capital city of Syria, both in ancient and modem times. It is now called Ks-Sham. The only c]nthet given to it by the ancient )Octa is that of " ventosa," or " wuulv," found in the I'harsalia of Luean, 13. iii. 1. 215, which, it has been remarlied, is anything but appropriately chosen.
