ning machinery of modern days has banished from our cottage-doors the busy hum of the wheel. The cottager who once turned it gayly round has now to change her mode of industry, and has only to make up with her needle, into garments, the fabric which she would once have manufactured for herself. But, besides the actual spinning or weaving of the wool and flax, the preparation of these substances gave much employment to the Jewish household. The flax required drying and preparing for use. The wool, after being combed and picked and carded, was put up in round balls, ready for the spindle. It was sometimes left for use with the natural moisture which fresh cut wool always yields, and which reminds us of the wool of Gideon's fleeces, out of which, in the Syrian climate, he could wring dew, "even even a bowl full of water." Wool in this state was called plump-wool; but when the manufacturers were about to make some of those brilliant garments, whose tints no modern skill can furnish, the wool had to be subjected to the various processes of dyeing. In this case it was usual to anoint the wool with wine, or with some unctuous substance, preparatory to plunging it into the dye. SECTION XI. SHE STRETCHETH OUT HER HAND TO THE POOR; YEA, SHE REACHETH FORTH HER HANDS TO THE NEEDY. very reader of the Holy Scriptures must see how careful the great Jehovah has been, both under the old and new dispensation, to recommend to the care of the rich the wants of their poorer brethren. The law of Moses abounded in humane institutions respecting the poor, and these would be familiar to the Jewish woman. Though her Bible had not the Gospels, with their illustrations of the living and dying love of the Redeemer; though the sacred volume of the ancient Hebrew told not of the self-dying zeal of St. Paul, or other holy men of old, who lived and labored and suffered for others; though it had not the gentle and affectionate tenderness of the beloved disciple yet its law made provision for kindness and humanity; and the poor and the destitute, the fatherless and the widow, were ever described as the peculiar objects of God's love and compassion, and were recommended to the care of those to whom God had given wealth. "Blessed is he that considereth the poor the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble," had been sung by the Psalmist; and still the words resounded in the tabernacle of the righteous, and still were met by answering feelings in the hearts of those who loved and feared Israel's God. It was in the exact spirit of the divine law that this woman acted. Moses had said, "The poor shall never cease out of the land; therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land." There is something very expressive in the figure of the text: "She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy." It would seem to imply an attention to the wants of the poor, not forced upon her by immediate neighborhood. She waited not for the poor man to come to her door, but she went out to look for him. She did not deal out her bounty grudgingly, and by slow degrees, but gave with bounteous hands, and anticipated the duty taught |