Numbers 13:23

23. The brook of Eshcol A wady near Hebron. Says Tristram: “The walk up the valley revealed to us for the first time what Judah was everywhere else in the days of its prosperity. Bare and stony as are the hillsides, not an inch of space is lost. Terraces, where the ground is not too rocky, support the soil. Ancient vineyards cling to the lower slopes; olive, mulberry, almond, fig, and pomegranate trees fill every available cranny to the very crest, while the bottom of the valley is carefully tilled for corn, carrots, and cauliflowers, which will soon give place to melons and cucumbers. The culture is equal to that of Malta. Those who doubt the ancient records of the population, or the census of David, have only to look at this valley and by the light of its commentary to read the story of those cities.” Dr. Robinson says of the vineyards of Eshcol that “they are very fine, and produce the best grapes in all the country, and pomegranates and figs, as well as apricots, quinces, and the like, still grow there in great abundance.” Chap. Numbers 32:9, note.

Between two upon a staff On the return of the spies from the north they plucked a sample cluster and carried it upon a staff, not because of its great weight, but for the better protection of the grapes against being bruised. There are clusters of grapes produced in Palestine which weigh twelve pounds. By careful culture bunches weighing nearly twenty pounds have been produced. “The vine was the emblem of the nation on the coins of the Maccabees, and in the colossal cluster of golden grapes which overhung the porch of the second temple; and the grapes of Judah still mark the tombstones of the Hebrew races in the oldest of their European cemeteries at Prague.” Stanley.

Pomegranates A rich, delightful fruit of the apple kind, sometimes called “grained apples,” of somewhat the same medicinal virtues as the quince; its juice is like wine. It is ever-green, and forms rather a collection of stems, like coppice-wood, than a single tree, nor does it often exceed eight or ten feet in height. The general colour of the fruit is a dull russet-green. The outside rind is thin but tough, and its bitter juice is an indelible blue dye used by native dyers of cotton fabrics. The size is about that of the orange. Within, the grains are arranged in compartments as compactly as corn on the cob, and closely resemble those of the pale red corn, except that they are nearly transparent and very beautiful. This fruit is agreeable to the taste and pleasant to the eye. Figs are very wholesome and nutritious food when dried. The fig-tree belongs to the natural order of the breadfruit family, the trunk being often three feet in diameter. The ancient Greek wrestlers ate figs when training for the contest.