Page:The lives of celebrated travellers (Volume 2).djvu/119

 eruptions; abounds in warm springs of a powerful odour, and in wells of bitumen, which ooze out of the rocks, and is carried into the sea by the river. It having been asserted by Pliny and others that animals and other heavy bodies floated involuntarily in the water of this sea, Pococke undressed, and made the experiment; and, strange to say, so powerful was the effect of prejudice upon his mind, that he fancied he could not sink in it, and says that when he attempted to dive his legs remained in the air, and having once got the upper hand of his head, gave him considerable trouble to reduce them to their natural subordinate position. However, though he was persuaded, he says, that the result would have been still more striking, his faith in Pliny was not sufficiently powerful to induce him to make the experiment in deep water; which was fortunate, for as, apparently, he could not swim, his travels, had he done so, would have terminated there. On coming out of the sea he found his face covered with a crust of salt, which, he observed, was likewise the case with the pebbles on the shore. The pillar of salt into which Lot's wife was changed was a little farther south, and therefore he did not see it; but he was assured by the Jews, who seem to have tasted it, that the salt of this pillar is very unwholesome. On this point, however, Pococke merely remarks that he will leave it to the reader to think as he pleases upon the subject.

Having visited all the most remarkable places in this part of Palestine, he returned to Jaffa, where he embarked on the 22d of May on board of a large boat bound for Acra. At this period the sea along the whole coast of Syria was infested by Maltese pirates. By an agreement entered into with the monks of Palestine, these corsairs engaged not to meddle with any of these boats within eighty leagues of the Holy Land; but, in spite of this arrangement, they frequently boarded them, seizing and carrying