All sorts of fuel are used.  Wood is the best, of course, but in that land wood has always been scarce.  In the times of the Hebrews, as to-day, dried manure, straw, and all sorts of refuse were used.  Jesus speaks of the grass of the field, “which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven.”

=Baking day.=—­To-day, while we are visiting, our Hebrew hostess is kneading some dough.  She “set it” last night, pouring in some liquid yeast.  By and by it is ready for baking.  A tray of small loaves about the size of biscuits is placed in the oven, and a great pile of dried grass placed around the sides and over the cover.  By and by the fire is lighted from some coals on the hearth; and in a few moments the house is filled with smoke.  We all go out on the street until the oven is heated and the smoke has escaped.

WEAVING WOOL AND FLAX

Another household utensil which Hebrew women learned to use in Canaan was the heavy loom.  This consisted of a low horizontal frame, with a device for separating the odd and even threads of the “warp” while a shuttle was drawn through them, carrying the yarn for the “web,” or the cross threads.  With this kind of a loom it was possible to weave much more rapidly than when one had to insert each thread, plaiting it over and under, by hand.  There is, no doubt, one of these looms in the house where we are visiting.

=Making linen out of flax.=—­In the desert almost all garments were made of wool, especially in the case of the poorer tribes, who could not afford to buy linen.  In those days the use of cotton was probably unknown.  Now everyone knows how it feels to wear a flannel shirt on a hot summer day.  And one of the things which drew the Hebrew shepherds to Canaan was the hope of raising a little flax on each farm, and spinning it into cool, soft linen garments for the hot summers.  So it may be that a part of the work in the house we are visiting to-day is to soak some of the stalks of flax in water, or to beat out from them the long fibers, or to spin and weave some of these fibers into cloth.

PREPARING DINNER

Of course the main business of each day in the household then, as now, is to get dinner ready.  There is a light lunch about noon for the women and children.  To-day perhaps we have some bread and milk.  But as the sun begins to sink in the west we know that before long the men folks will come home hungry.  We must have dinner ready for them when they come.  If it has been a good year, even poor families in Canaan can have a fairly good meal.  There is no meat, unless perhaps a lamb or a kid has been killed, especially for us as guests.  But there is the curdled milk, and bread with olive oil and other things which shepherd folk never have.  Here’s a steaming kettle of beans or lentils.  How good they smell!  And here are some bunches of raisins and figs, just as sweet and luscious as those which we buy in the fruit stores in America.  The figs in our stores may have come from that very country of which we are studying.