The roofs of the houses are well protected by walls and parapets. Towards the street and neigh bouring houses is a high wall, and towards the interior court-yard usually a parapet or wooden rail. Battlements' of this kind, for the prevention of accidents, are strictly enjoined in the Law (Dent. xxii. 8) ; and the form of thc battlements of the Egyptian houses, as shewn in the annexed en gravings, suggest some interesting analogies, when we consider how recently the Israelites had quitted Egypt when that law was delivered. These cuts, with the one before given (No. 269), are highly interesting, not only with reference to this particu lar point, but as elevations of different styles of houses existing in a neighbouring country in the early ages of the Ilebrew history. One of them (Nos. 277, 278) exhibits different forms of a pecu liarity which we have not observed in any, modern example. The top of the house is covered with a roof or awning, supported by columns, whereby the sun was excluded, and a refreshing stream of air passed through. Other Egyptian houses had merely a parapet wall, sometimes surmounted with a row of battlements, as in the cut here given (No. 279).
Of the inferior kinds of Oriental dwellings, such as are met with in villages and very small towns, the subjoined is not an unfavourable specimen. In these there is no central court, but there is generally a y,ard attached, either on one side or at the rear. The shaded platform in front is such as is usually seen attached to coffee-houses, which is, in fact, the tharacter of the house represented in No. 279, Here the customers sit and smoke their pipes, and sip their coffee. The village cabins and abodes ot the peasantry are, of course, of a still inferior de scription ; and, being the abodes of people who live much in the open air, will not bear comparison with the houses of the same class in Northern Europe, where the cottage is the home of the owner.
No ancient houses had chimneys. The word so translated in Hos. xiii. 3, means a hole through which the smoke escaped ; and this existed only the lower class of dwellings, where raw wood was employed for fuel or cooking, and where there was an opening immediately over the hearth to let out the smoke. In the better sort of houses the rooms were warmed in winter by charcoal in braziers, as is still the practice (Jer. xxxvi. 22 ; Mark xiv. 54 ; John xviii. 18).
The windows had no glass. They were only latticed, and thus gave free passage to the air and admitted light, while birds and bats were excluded. In winter the cold air was kept out by veils over the windows (see cut 274), or by shutters with holes in them sufficient to admit light (1 Kings vii. 17 ; Cant. ii. 9).
In the East, where the climate allows the people to spend so much of their time out of doors, the articles of furniture and the domestic utensils have always been few and simple. They are in this work noticcd under separate heads [BED ; LAMPS ; POTTERY ; SEATS ; TABLES]. The rooms, how ever, although comparatively vacant of movables, are far from having a naked or unfurnished appear ance. This is owing to the high ornament given to the walls and ceilings. The walls are broken up into various recesses, and the ceiling into compart ments. The ceiling, if of wood and flat, is of curious and complicated joinery ; or, if vaulted, is wi ought into numerous coves, and enriched with fret-work in stucco ; and the walls are adorned with arabesques, mosaics, mirrors, painting, and gold ; which, as set off by the marble-like white ness of the stucco, has a truly brilliant and rich effect. There is much in this to remind one of such descriptions of splendid interiors as that in Is. liv. 1, I2.-J. K.