EASTERN WATER-CARRIERS WITH BOTTLES MADE OF GOAT-SKIN.
"Mine eyes fail for Thy word, saying, When wilt Thou comfort me?
"For I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget Thy statutes."
How forcible does not this image become, when we realize the early life of the shepherd poet, his dwelling in tents wherein are no windows nor chimneys, and in which the smoke rolls to and fro until it settles in the form of soot upon the leathern bottles and other rude articles of furniture that are hung from the poles!
In the New Testament there is a well-known allusion to the weakness of old bottles: "Neither do men put new wine into old bottles, or the bottles break and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish; but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved." It would be impossible to understand the meaning of this passage unless we knew that the "bottles" in question were not vessels of glass or earthenware, but merely the partly-tanned skins of goats.
Another allusion to the use of the goat-skin is made in that part of the Book of Joshua which has already been mentioned. If the reader will refer to Josh. ix. 4, he will see that the Gibeonites took with them not only old bottles, but old sacks. Now, these sacks bore no resemblance to the hempen bags with which we are so familiar, but were nothing more than the same goat-skins that were employed in the manufacture of bottles, but with the opening at the neck left open. They were, in fact, skin-bottles for holding solids instead of liquids. The sacks which Joseph's brethren took with them, and in the mouths of which they found their money, were simply goat-skin bags, made as described.
Yet another use for the goat-skin. It is almost certain that the "kneading-troughs" of the ancient Israelites were simply circular pieces of goat-skin, which could be laid on the ground when wanted, and rolled up and carried away when out of use. Thus, the fact that "the people took their dough before it was leavened, their kneading-troughs being bound up in their clothing upon their shoulders," need cause no surprise.
Nothing could be more in accordance with probability. The women were all hard at work, preparing the bread for the expected journey, when the terrified Pharaoh "called for Moses and Aaron by night, and said, Rise up, and get you forth from among my people, both ye and the children of Israel, and go, serve the Lord, as ye have said.... And the Egyptians were urgent upon the people that they might send them out of the land in haste; for they said, We be all dead men."